A group of men stand around the corpse of a beast, their expressions miserable. They had finally managed to slay the beast, but to do so, they had to back it into a corner and slowly kill it. While the beast was incredibly wounded and barely able to stand upright, the swipes of its paws still packed a punch. One swipe would be enough to kill a man, and the beast definitely did not give up without a fight. The men were tired for sure, panting loudly like dogs, the whole lot of them. Their clothes which earlier weren’t anything to brag about, were now fabulously drenched in sweat and dirt. They’d put up a good fight, and their reward is finally here.

“Put up one hell of a lot more fight than I thought it would, that one” A man from the back said in between breaths. The rest of the men were content with gruntling in reply, not wasting any more of their energy. One of the men with a pitchfork tried poking the beast in the ass.

“Is it dead?” He asked, unsure. Ambrose snorted at the man.

“Of course it's dead! Look at it!” He derisively spoke. Walking closer to the beast and stepping on it. The beast twitched in reply, frightening the man so much he almost jumped to the ceiling. “Holy shit! The beast is alive! Kill it!” He shouts. Everyone put their guards up, ready for the next round. The beast kept still and soon, they heard a hearty laugh from behind. They all turned to see Grace laughing at them all.

“Haha! That’s just some death cramps! You guys are like frightened chickens! Especially you Ambrose! Haha!” The men chuckled a bit, not taking it to heart, but Ambrose's face lit up like the lights on a christmas tree.

“What do you know! What if the beast had actually been alive? Huh!” This just caused her to laugh louder. Steve chuckled a bit himself before walking forwards.

“Alrite it’s dead, that means the threat to our village is taken care of” The men all nod in relief at that. “Now that we’ve killed this beast, we don’t really have anything to be afraid of. So, we have two options. We can stay here, grill this beast over a fire and enjoy ourselves till the others come back.” The men looked thoughtful at that. “Or, we can go in after them, see what they’re up to” Ambrose had a greedy look in his eyes at that. Suddenly a growling could be heard from the side. They all looked down to see Lukas holding his stomach and scratching his head.

“Oh! Sorry about that, but when I heard about food I just got so hungry! Hehe” The men all smiled in understanding, having been a young boy themselves. Steve looked around himself, inspecting them all, before smiling. “Okay, let's vote then. I, for one, believe we deserve a break after everything we have been through. So I think we should eat some, if the other group isn’t back by the time we’re done, let us go in after them, see what they’re up to.” The majority of the group voted to eat some food, leaving a stray few who didn’t.

“Let’s grill ourselves some meat, then!” Steve yelled in enthusiasm, making the group cheer up.

.

The group sat down to rip apart the beast without a care in the world. Seeing this, Grace stepped in. “You all! You all are about to ruin the meat! Do you have any idea of how to carve up a hunt?” They all looked at each other in confusion.

“Is it not enough to just.. You know, cut off a piece of meat?” Grace palmed her face in her hand so hard you could hear a smack. Looking at them through the gaps in her fingers, she said very lowly. “You all are grown ass adults and do not know how to prepare a hunt… Get out of my way, I’ll do it. If you all want to help. Cut off those legs and do those.” She said in an aggravated tone. She’s just about had it with these idiots by now, none of them being even remotely adept at hunting. Thought.. They were useful in the melee. The men all look at eachother and shrug their shoulders, who are they to argue if someone wants to do the hard work? Smiling, they use an ax to cut off the legs, then leave her alone. Seeing this, the sole woman nods and sits down in front of the beast, ready to carve it open. She’s surprised when a small silhouette with dark hair sits down beside her.

“What are you doing?” The child asks her. Looking at him through the corner of her eyes, she harrumphs.

“Fine, kid, I’ll teach you how to cut open a hunt. Listen closely, this will be the one and only time I’ll teach you.” The child looks speculatively at her for a moment, before a grin split his features.

“Mm! You can count on me! I’ll be more silent than a mouse!” The woman gives him a ‘look’, and he immediately puts his hands on top of his mouth in realization. A muffled ‘Sorry’ coming from his mouth. Grace nods in satisfaction at that, then puts all of her attention at the corpse in front of her. And what a corpse it is. Thick dark pelt covers the entirety of the corpse, though spotted with purple blood in places where the beast had been wounded by swords and arrows. Grace opens one of the beast's eyes and touches it gently, noting that it doesn’t move at all. Lukas takes all of this in as she explains.

“You’ve probably heard that the eyes are the windows to our souls” The woman asks rhetorically. “In hunting, it is even more true. If the eyes of the animal are closed, it is most likely still alive. And if touching the eye causes any movement, it is definitely alive” The woman told him. “Though, I, for one, would never move close to a beast as big as this one if I thought it even remotely had a spark of life in it” She chuckles.

“Now, we’re going to open it up. Watch closely as I explain what I do here…” The child looked on with fascination as she cut open the beast and all of its entrails fell out. It was at that moment that Lukas knew what he wanted to be in life. To be as cool and calm as Ragnar and Grace, they had both been absolute pillars of security through this whole mess, not once faltering from their roles. Lukas respected that.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

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While Grace was teaching Lukas how to dress down an animal, the men weren’t just standing around.

“So, what should we do about Owen? The beast really got to him, huh?” A man says in a somber tone. They’re currently standing around the carcass of their friend, who died valiantly fighting against the beast with them.

“Am not sure… He didn’t have any family left…” Another man gets angry at hearing that.

“Just because he didn’t have any family doesn’t mean that we’re just going to leave him here!” Another tries to calm the situation “Hey hey, now, he didn’t say that”

“He implied it!” Just as a fight was about to break out Steve, who had just been to check on Lukas, trots over and puts a hand each on the shoulders of the two people.

“Let’s take him with us when we leave, we’ll give him a proper burial. He was brave, he fought for a cause. It would be rude to do anything less” He solemnly told them. His tone didn’t accept any talk back. “For now, let’s leave him alone. Come help me with getting this fire started.”

Ambrose sat beside a few men, trying to get the skin of the legs from the beast, it proved to be more difficult than imagined. As they tried to cut the skin, the pelt got stuck under the knife and buried into the meat, trapping some fur in it. Though, it didn’t matter much, as they mostly tore the skin off the meat. These brutes didn’t care if they ate some pelt as well. Ambrose looked around at the men beside himself.

“What do you guys think is taking them so long? Why haven’t they come out of the cave yet?” He asked them. Frowning, another man replied. “Am not sure, they should have been back by now” Ambrose got closer and whispered “Know what I think? I think they found something magical, more magical than the cave we found. And they’re hogging it all to themselves” He conspiratorially whispered. A few of them looked curious at that. “But they’ll still have to come out at some point, what would be the point?” One of them was skeptical.

“That's the question, isn’t it? Maybe they’re trying to hide it before coming out” He told them nonchalantly. The men got a little triggered by that, what if they were in fact missing out on a goldmine right now? “Nah, Ragnar wouldn’t do that to us. He’s too upright”

Ambrose snorted at that “If you said Steve was upright I wouldn’t have an issue, but Ragnar? He might not be greedy, but he’s cynical as hell” He told them. Earning a few nods from the more observant people.

“But, why, Ambrose? There were enough crystals for everyone there, why would they try to hog them all to themselves? It doesn’t make any sense.” One of them was still dismissive of the claim.

“Why, indeed” Ambrose said in a low tone as he finished with the leg he’d been cleaning up. Now holding meat on a stick of bone. He looked towards where Steve and a couple others had been working on getting a fire started.

.

A stick of meat is slowly spinning above the fire, a nice crust of orange encasing it. Oil seemed to slide down the side of the meat, dripping into the fire and making a sizzling noise. The group looked on with hungry eyes, eyeing the piece of meat. Drool dripped from the cheek of Lukas, waking him up from the stupor.

“Is it done yet?” He asked the group. The men all looked at Grace, the one with the most know-how of how to cook in the wild. She shrugs her shoulders.

“Should be just about” She says in a non-caring voice. Swallowing tightly, Steve walks closer to the fire and pulls the meat out of it, causing a gorgeous smell to fill the air. Stabbing the stick into the ground, he rummages in his robes and pulls out a knife to cut the meat.

“Lukas, come here. You’ll have the first bite” Lukas smiles in happiness and leaps over to Steve’s side. Cutting a piece of meat off, Steve gives it to Lukas who almost burns his fingers from the heat. The group laughs as the child juggles the meat like a circus clown, slowly cooling it down. Grace rolled her eyes at the commotion from her position by the fire.

He looked on with eager eyes as the meat cooled down enough for him to have a taste.

“Finally” He murmured, his mouth had already closed in enough to take a bite by the time the last syllable hit. A chewy texture met his teeth in resistance, before utterly giving up to the force. Juices flowed from each and every bite, hitting his taste buds in a tingle of different flavors. Tingles climbed along his jaw in unmistakeable pleasure, it kept traveling along his jaw towards his eyes… Wait. His eyes opened wide as the world around him became clearer, colors just a little more vibrant, unnoticeable details coming to the forefront. He’d never noticed how Steve had a little stubble lacking in some places… but now it was so easy to see. He could see the twitches of his muscles as they moved into a frown.

“Are you alright there buddy?” Steve asked the boy. Nodding profusely, Lukas swallowed the meat and replied.

“Yeah! It’s just my first time eating meat, I didn’t know it was so good! Can I have some more? Please?” He begged Steve. Everyone laughed at that, it was good to see some innocent happiness after all the tragedy.

“Of course, here you go” This time Steve handed him a huge piece of the meat, on a stick. Lukas looked at it with wide eyes, wondering if he could eat it all. Determination filled his eyes. He would be damned before he let any go to waste.