Sometime later, I managed to track down my old shelter. It was almost completely dark, but the sight sent a wave of relief through me. Text appeared in my view as I looked at my cave.
BULLDAR
DESIGNATION: N/A
STATUS: Deceased
SOUL: Harvested
It took me a moment to realize what this was. I suddenly felt sick. My shelter wasn’t some strange cave. It was a corpse of one of these monsters. I re-envisioned it in my mind’s eye—the hollowed-out stomach, the jagged stones propped up were discarded limbs. My skin crawled. I’d been sleeping inside the remains of a giant monster, killed and gutted by… who? Or what? This planet wasn’t just dangerous. It was a graveyard. It was going to kill me, I thought. But not until after I get some sleep. I will process this in the morning. I crawled into the cave, and told King to wait outside and keep guard. I was asleep moments later.
When I woke up, King was curled up against my legs, breathing gently. I needed a new plan. The prinsaur knows me, my scent. If that means anything. But One Eye was for sure hunting me. He is probably recovering as well, so I doubted I’d see him soon. King ate the last of my rations, but I had some food in the pack. That would cover me for the next day or two. I sighed. Time to figure this out. I looked at King. He was still asleep. I focused in, trying to see his stats again. There was something there, at the edge of my mind. I could feel it. If only I could… there! I pushed at the sensation and Kings Stats popped up. His hatchling increased to 37%. Power up increased to 11%. Savagery increased to 26%.
I noted that his hatchling increased by 12, while the two skills increased by 6 each. I wasn’t sure if that was important or not. I made a mental note to keep better track and wondered how these skills worked. What measured them, and how was I being given the information. Did the stats reflect what it could do, or what it was allowed to do? Was I connected to some sort of wireless network? Subconsciously I touched the green light on my hand. The text changed.
PULSE HOUND. THE GUARDIAN. A CANINE-LIKE WEAPON DESIGNED TO BE THE PERFECT GUARD DOG, WITH THE ABILITY TO SENSE INVISIBLE ENEMIES AND TO REPORT DETAILS BACK TO COMMANDERS. ITS CRANIUM IS A POWERFUL RECONNAISSANCE AND RECORDING DEVICE THAT IS ALSO EQUIPPED WITH A STRENGTH ENHANCING FULL BODY EXOSKELETON. FULLY TRAINED PULSE HOUNDS ARE IMPOSSIBLE TO AMBUSH, TRICK, OR OUT MANEUVER.
Wow, that seems really useful to have in an ally. That proves my theory that these things were built or designed. King woke up from me shifting my weight, and made an annoyed ruff. He scurried away from me and growled, as if I was the one who curled him up next to me. “Good morning to you, too.” I went to pet him, but he snapped at me. Eh, I thought, he’d come around. “Let’s go get some breakfast.”
Starving was not one of my worries here. There was a bounty of food in the jungle, if you knew what to look for. Fruits, fish, small game, and plenty of insects if I became desperate. I didn’t know how much King would eat, but I would adapt. My biggest survival challenge was the monsters. One eye is out there somewhere and I was pretty sure this was still the prinsaurs territory. King stayed with me as I collected some fruit. I tossed him a rind after I managed to get a piece down, but he only growled at it. My fish trap worked great, and I managed to grab three decent sized fish from it. I tossed one to King who ate it eagerly. Kings bond went from 46% to 50%. Interesting. I never trained dogs, that was my cousins families lot, but I knew some basics. Some dogs were food motivated. Maybe King was too.
I also needed to train him. His skills had a percentage next to them, and I wasn't sure what that meant exactly. But it implied they could be better. His tackle, paired with his power up, Seemed to be his best move. When I made a small fire to roast the fish, I tried to work with him.
“King, come here.” He immediately did, though he growled lowly. That surprised me. He clearly hated my guts, so what was it that made him listen? I didn’t want to think about that right now. His head cocked to the side in a curious manor. I pointed at a nearby tree. “Ok, bud, attack that tree.” King looked at it, then back at me. His tail wagged once. Ok, maybe that wasn’t going to work. “King, tackle that tree.” King barked excitedly then ran to the tree. He lowered himself into a fighting position, growling at his opponent. Then, with all the strength of a perfectly normal puppy, he head butted the tree. It was… kind of adorable. But it wouldn’t help In any combat situation. It seemed that mentioning his actual skills helped.
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“King, power up and tackle that tree!” This time his cranium glowed yellow, and he barked excitedly. He took a few steps back, tensed, then tried to launch himself at the tree. What happened instead was one foot slipped in mud while the other had solid purchase, sending King corkscrewing through the air with a terrified yelp, missing the tree entirely. This was going to need a lot of work. We took a break to eat the fish, I gave him half of a fish, which didn’t increase his bond at all. Then for the next couple hours we practiced with his skills.
The next day we also practiced. It was slow progress. Turns out, each use of power up requires two energy. He also can’t use power up too often, only every five seconds or so. The previous day, I reset my traps. So King and I went to check them together. It was then that One Eye attacked. King noticed it before I did. His intense snarling nearly caused me to jump. The monkey wasn’t climbing, but was investigating one of my traps. Actually, something seemed off. It was smaller and was not missing its eye. This wasn’t One Eye, but another of its kind. It picked up a stone and threw it not at me, but King. The stone bounced off his head with a clang, and King bolted towards it. He was fast, for a puppy at least, and was on it in seconds. The monkey went wild, screeching and stumbling back. After the initial shock, I grew excited. This was our first real fight together. A prime moment to work on our teamwork.
“King,” I ordered, “bite him!” King did just that. Latching itself onto the monkeys lower left arm. The monkey screamed in surprise and slammed down with all three fists. Each hit slammed King into the ground. I winced as he whined with each blow. Kings health dropped from stable to winded. To his credit, King kept a hold of the monkey. But, despite his best efforts, he was doing nothing. The bone-like chitin was too tough to crack. I had an idea. Would power up work with his jaws?
“King, use power up!” The only acknowledgment was a yellow flash in the cranium. CRUNCH. King suddenly bit through the monkeys arm like a dry stick. The chitin splintered like bone and blood sprayed over King. The skelkys shriek was painful to hear. A raw scream of pain and loss. I felt woozy and felt my stomach drop. I’ve been in a few fights so far, but nothing this… visceral. Did king do that? Or… did I do that? I was the one giving the orders. That wasn’t survival. King unceremoniously dropped the skelkys arm. It tried to crawl away, I saw the plate on its back. I briefly considered bonding it. It probably would have saved its life. Shamefully, I decided not too. If not because this was a weaker skelky, but because it was severely wounded. Besides, I had already subconsciously decided One Eye would be the next monster I bond. I sighed, and picked up the heavy stone used for my trap. King had latched onto its leg, the panicked monkey trying to crawl away, half heartedly hitting King on the top of the dome. This is a kill or be killed planet. Its just like hunting, I told myself. But the words felt hollow. With a shaky breath, I dropped the rock.
Kings savagery, power up, and hatchling status went up to 35%, 19%, and 54% respectively. Seems a battle is much better at training than practice. Our bond also increased to 60%. I could hear the crashing of trees that signaled its time to move. I grabbed the skelky corpse, and began to move. King happily ran beside me, tail wagging. He had the skelkys arm in his mouth like a stick. I remembered when King had my hand in his jaws. I was lucky the cooldown for the power up was still in place, or I would have lost my hand. I made a mental note to be careful when I gave him treats.
Back at base camp, I tried to butcher the monkey. Meat was meat, and I wasn’t squeamish about butchering my own kill. But my lack of a decent tool and a its chitin made it impossible to harvest. Besides, I took a close look at the muscle of the thing, where king had tore off its arm. The fibers were more like cords than meat. Hard, like metal almost. I couldn’t eat it anyway. King made a whining sound. He was begging for food.
“Go ahead.” He did a happy little hop and set to work. Chewing on the corpse like a bone, licking and teasing at any morsel of meat. I shuddered. This was a kill or be killed world. I understood that. But, the pure brutality of it was still difficult to deal with. King was a puppy, and it was already vicious. I hoped this bond lasted. If it went away when King was larger, I wasn’t confident I would survive.