The morning came too soon, and TJ wanted nothing more than to disregard any promises made the day before. Not because he was sleepy, though he thought he ought to have been. No, he just wanted to avoid all responsibility and do nothing. As soon as he remembered Junior, though, all thoughts of even taking it easy, much less escaping, quickly fled his mind. He sprang out of bed, and only then checked with the System to see what time it was.

6:30.

TJ’s heart panged. The same time Junior always woke him. His body was accustomed to his child’s presence, and his absence caused TJ physical pain. There was nothing for it but to move, to do anything. With a roll of his neck and a couple stretches, TJ began the day. He didn’t want to go to the firehouse and sit around for two hours, so instead he checked on the javelina pelts. Not quite done, so TJ moved them outside of the house, where they’d sit in the sun. Then, he moved to the wendigo remains.

In the light of day, its body was even more disgusting. Since it hadn’t bled or oozed any liquid whatsoever, every discoloration on its body came from TJ’s blood. The red staining its horrendous bovine maw colored it into a rusty picture of gluttony. While he looked down on it, TJ wondered if there was anything the supernaturally strong bone of the skull would be good for, but he couldn’t think of anything. Even so, he’d set it aside for possible eventual use. The claws and horns, though, he could use immediately. The first problem, though, was getting the horns from the stupid skull.

Now that he’d done so before, TJ thought that he wouldn’t mind cutting up a creature, especially if it didn’t have any blood or other stuff to make it even dirtier than the other creatures. However, because it was mostly human shaped and sized, TJ felt a certain unspeakable distaste at the idea of dismembering it. Then, there was also the problem of how he was going to cut through the ridiculously tough corpse with his shoddy stone knife.

A thought occurred to TJ, and the irony of it wasn’t lost on him. Then, he found the amputated hand, and sure enough, differently from the hand still attached to its body, the claws were undamaged and remained sharp and long. For now, he just needed to remove the claws to use them. There was the option of getting a knife out of the house, but using entirely “post-Integration” tools to create this tool seemed to be the obvious choice. The stones he had were far from sufficient, and TJ suspected he’d somehow manage to damage or break them before he made any meaningful progress on his dissection. He considered activating Divine Transformation to upgrade Wind Manipulation to the Copper tier, but decided against it. Instead, he concentrated on the wind, trying to focus it into a blade that could cut through the superhuman tendons and bones of the creature.

Though much less effectively than the Copper tiered Wind Manipulation, TJ sliced through the hand inch by inch. He sent little blades of air to separate the thumb from the rest of the hand, and about 10 minutes later, he had a thumb-sized and shaped and constructed blade. With a glance at his MP, TJ saw that he hadn’t spent nearly as much as he had suspected he would have. He’d been using the MP intensive Skill on and off for nearly that full 10 minutes, and he was only right around the halfway point of his total MP.

“Why didn’t I use much MP?” He idly asked the System.

The higher tier of Divinity a Skill, the greater the drain on whatever resource the Skill requires. Thus, when using the Copper (I) tiered Wind Manipulation, the MP drain is greatly heightened compared to the drain of using Dirt tiered Wind Manipulation.

That made sense, and TJ was almost embarrassed he’d never thought of it. Of course a more powerful Skill would demand a greater spending of resources. It was harder to lift a heavier weight, after all, so it made sense that elevating the tier of his Skill would be more intensive. The long term thought of what the drain on his MP would be at the higher levels of Divinity, when his Divine Transformation would evolve Wind Manipulation to two tiers above his current Divinity, staggered him.

“What’re you so focused on?” Stanton’s voice interrupted TJ from his musing.

“Just thinking about Skills and how hard it’ll be to keep up with them.”

Stanton grunted his agreement.

“Have you thought about what the higher tiers of divinity and Skills will do?”

“Yeah. I’ve got a Copper Skill now, so I get it.”

“Wait, you do?” TJ felt his jaw drop.

“Yeah. You think that upgrading my bow to a gun was something small? It costs me 10 MP per bullet. Does that seem like a reasonable cost for a Skill that I depend on?”

TJ shrugged.

“Course not. I’m betting your Wind whatever is Copper rank too? It’s too damn powerful not to be.”

“Only when I’m using Divine Transformation.”

Stanton nodded. “Far as I see, someone’s gotta pay something to get that kinda power. I can only store so many bullets and it’s hard for me to prepare them. You can only really use the Skill like you do when you’re using another. Makes sense to me. Other people can just always use theirs. We get powerful Skills that we can’t use all the time.”

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“I guess.” TJ answered as he looked down at the thumb he’d cut free from the wendigo’s body. He needed a knife, and this seemed like it would be his best bet, but he didn’t want to carry a literal thumb in his pocket as a grisly reminder of this monster he’d killed. Looking at the skull that’d been set aside in favor of extracting the “blade”, TJ remembered something else from his youth as a Boy Scout–a knife made from scrap rotary saw blades and an antler. With a pursing of his lips, TJ quickly made his decision.

“You see a big rock near here? Or do I need to go find one?”

Stanton cocked an eyebrow in confusion, but just a moment later, he looked down at the wendigo corpse and up at TJ.

“Round the back, there’s a couple boulders that might do what you’re looking for.”

Though disgusted with the thought, TJ had made his decision and hauled the body around the corner of the house, where he could continue his macabre work.

—-

Wind Manipulation, blunt force trauma, and more of both eventually left TJ with two curling horns and the shattered remains of the wendigo’s skull. As TJ breathed deeply to recover himself, he wiped a hand across his sweaty brow. Dirt, bone dust, and who knew what else coated his hand, a testament to days spent without any real option to clean himself. In his mind, the thuds of the bone repeatedly against rock echoed, and TJ fought to clear his mind of it. Though the act had been horrifying, to say the least, the Appraisal of his materials wiped any regret from his mind.

Wendigo Horn: The remains of one of the horns of a wendigo. Though most wendigos do not use their horns in battle and they remain primarily as a decorative accessory, the horn remains one of the most valuable parts of the wendigo. This horn can be used as a material in creating equipment, tinctures, and more. In addition, equipment created using this horn may gain additional attributes upon completion. All crafting attempted utilizing this ingredient will be heightened in difficulty due to its origin as part of an Elite monster. All crafting products completed utilizing this ingredient will be enhanced in quality due to its origin as part of an Elite monster.

The horns both hadn’t been damaged in his rough treatment of them, though they’d both hit against the stone multiple times. The shards of bone remaining of the skull came back merely as Bone Shards. Then, seeing that there was insufficient time left for him to complete the creation of this newly ideated knife, TJ evaluated the wendigo’s hand. It came back merely as Amputated Hand while the thumb was more specific.

Wendigo Claw: The remains of one of the claws of a wendigo. All wendigos are born with two innate weapons: their bodies and their frost. Their claws serve as the apex of both. The claws are supernaturally hard and sharp, resistant to damage, and are an effective conduit of divine manifestations, such as the wendigo’s frost. This claw can be used as a material in creating equipment, tinctures, and more. In addition, equipment created using this horn may gain additional attributes upon completion. All crafting attempted utilizing this ingredient will be heightened in difficulty due to its origin as part of an Elite monster. All crafting products completed utilizing this ingredient will be enhanced in quality due to its origin as part of an Elite monster.

TJ looked at the multiple materials laid out before him and could almost feel his Occupation growing in level already. The mere acts of cutting off the single finger and extracting the horns from the skull had given him not insignificant experience that nearly brought him to the cusp of the next level of Savage. Though he didn’t like how it’d look when others saw him making something with an almost human finger, the wendigo had already shown him just how vulnerable he still was. Every level was more HP, Toughness, and everything else that would keep him alive. Public perception wouldn’t change that. His decision made, TJ grabbed the entire hand, both horns, and after activating Divine Transformation and lopping off the second, more damaged hand, made his way back to the front of the house.

Stanton stood there, both hands in his pockets, his breath misting in the chill morning. After glancing at TJ and the contents of his hands, he sighed.

“You gonna put those in a bag? Fingers at the breakfast table are a bad look. Especially since a lot of people here already think you’re a crazy.”

TJ reached in the door, where just beside the entrance sat a mostly empty backpack. He carelessly dumped the contents to the side before tossing in the horns and hands and a prepared gut, just in case. When Stanton opened his mouth to complain, TJ raised his hands. “I’ll clean it up later, just getting moving for now.”

The grumbling old man muttered something about disrespectful little shits under his breath while TJ chuckled and jogged onward towards breakfast. His Primitive Craftsmanship reminded him that he’d need something to bind the blade of whatever knife he made into the hilt, so he pulled the thumb out of his pocket and cut a couple sections free from a pine tree he walked past where the sap had oozed free and crystallized. Even frozen and solidified, there was a certain amount of stickiness the sap carried, and TJ hoped it would be enough to hold this blade together.

Then, his materials gathered and in his backpack, TJ and Stanton made their way to the firehouse. The smell of fatty meat frying made TJ’s mouth water as they walked forward, though he couldn’t quite place the smell. It was almost like bacon, but not quite the same–the simple solution struck him. As they walked into the wide open garage, a table veritably filled with all cuts of javelina was sprawled before them. There wasn’t any processing possible into sausage or anything like that, but slabs of steak, bunches of bacon, and piles of pig awaited him. Some hash browns were there to give some semblance of a balance to the meal, but it was obvious that the fresh, unprocessed meat would go bad before too long and the kitchen knew it.

Though he wondered if his stomach would complain about the nutritional imbalance, TJ piled his plate high and quickly threw himself into devouring the meal. At least in that moment, he merely enjoyed the feeling of being full while missing a cup of coffee, regardless of its quality. Once he finished his meal and Penny swept up his plate with her usual insistence, there was still plenty of time left before Laura’s planned address. Thus, TJ was sat in a corner, idly whittling away at one of the horns with the thumb knife when Laura’s voice cut through the sounds of the crowd he hadn’t realized had grown around him.

“Thank you for staying, even if you’ve finished your meal. It’s now the fifth day of this, and we need to talk.”