I am scared of the dark. it is an embarrassing fear, but I am scared of the dark. I don't know what monster I expect to come out in the dark but there you have it. being alone in the dark scares the hell out of me.

for the last few days, I have not been getting proper sleep due to it. well, I shouldn't be sleeping anyway. who knows when something will jump at you and gobble you up.

I have been abandoned by the only two people who can presently help me. it's been a few days since they left, with a knife and, a map. they didn't even bother to leave the map intact. the map had eight big holes and as my luck would have it, the location that I need to reach, dragon Outpost is in one of those holes. this is naturally a test by them.

among these holes, two are in red zones, five are in the orange zone and one of them is in the green zone.

oh yeah, I have not told you about the zones. the map has four zones. the colourless zone is the safest. the green zone means a minor risk. the orange zone means moderate risk and the red zone represents a life-threatening risk. to be honest, the map kind of reminds me of a traffic light.

right now with my strength, the green zone itself is a life-threatening place. therefore I have to strengthen myself.

you want me to be honest I have no idea what to do. whether I should look for a way out or whether I should stay, get stronger, or whether I should begin exploring.

I have no idea what to do. by the way, I am thinking from tomorrow onwards I will be writing this in the form of a diary entry, unless there is something important and I have to report it directly

day 1 - I have finally decided what to do. the thing is I have finally figured out what the second page means.

the second page is called the totem page and I have finally figured it out. the totem page tells me the method to create a totem, kind of like a storage house for dead souls .from what I have heard about it, it is supposed to be very powerful. the only problem that I have is that my control over my blood energy is nowhere close enough for me to craft a totem. the only way that I can think of making my control over blood energy increase is in combat, difficult combat to be more precise.

day 2 - I have finally decided which tribe of beasts I am going to attack today. I need combat, that too tough combat. I am not ballsy enough to enter the green zone and to be honest In the colourless region, only the clans that somehow countered me in some way could give me the challenge I was hoping for. but before that, I needed to get used to hunting. to chase after something with the intent to kill it. well that is no problem, because the forest is full of lone beasts, looking to hunt each other.

even now I can feel many eyes staring at me, judging me. if something were to happen, the drop of a pin and everybody would be at each other's throat.

it is not the first time I faced this kind of a battle Royale. but, before I also had dragon slayer's support.

day 3 - I am going to live in the trees. it much easier than down here. there are only a few species that can fight effectively up there. with my blood whip, I can safely move with a speed that is not possible down there. leaving all that aside, I am planning to attack the phantom wolves. the phantoms wolves' special ability is the phantom void. they could phase their body, allowing them to ignore my defenses. they are a small clan of about ten wolves. just one is something I can handle. two would be tough for me and three would be something I could defeat, though I would be completely exhausted.

as for how I could tell it so accurately. I have fought a couple of phantom wolves.

you would be surprised at the number of single animals in the forest. it is often a result of the destruction of clans like the one I am attacking. every day hundreds of such clans are formed and destroyed. the lone wolves would fight each other to death or form new alliances setting up a new clan. this is the bottom of the world, where everything fought for survival. that's how I found out about the phantom wolf clan also. it seems they recently kicked out that wolf. he didn't particularly mind giving up on his brothers to live. I left him, though I have a feeling we will meet again. it is too smart for my tastes.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

I will spy on them first. most likely for a couple of days. figure out a couple of their habits. find moments where they let down their guard.

I would strike them in those moments. my blood vision is very useful in this as I could spy well away from them. nobody here expects an assassin from the trees, after all, which is quite weird if I have to say so.

I could safely stay up a tree, while safely spying on those below.

day 4 - the beast clan was way too cautious, I tell you. they were ten members, but they sent a team of at least three for fighting, eating, or shitting.

it is most likely that they are going to attack a nearby clan or are facing an attack themselves. from what I could tell, they would defeat me pretty quickly if I were to attack them. man, am I beginning to appreciate those patrolling sessions that the couple made me go through.

day 5 - I hunted for food today. it is a bird, one of the few species that hide in the trees. it must have felt that I am invading its territory for its attack so aggressively. while I am not exactly sure what kind of beast it is. I know that its flesh is edible and can be cooked, courtesy of some basics that miss mist taught me. it can be turned into something similar to rationed meat, though mine is much less edible. there was no change in the phantom wolf clan. I think I am going to leave pretty soon if they do not show any moment of vulnerability. I think I will stay another day.

day 6 - I have decided what species I am going to follow next. it is going to be a rock wolf tribe. they have an earth manipulation ability and are famous for their ability to create an earthen armour over their body. maybe their armour could give me an idea on how to develop mine.

unlike the phantom wolves, I had no idea where I would find rock wolves. I couldn't just keep moving randomly, hoping to run upon a clan. the map mentions a place called rock mountain. it would be a very good habitat for the rock wolves.

therefore the highest possibility of a rock wolf being found would be their highest. I will leave tomorrow and go to the stone mountain which is a day away.

day 7 - I set on my journey, traveling through the trees. as I had expected the trees are empty. there is no other bird-like creature up here, so that is one headache gone. while I entered their territory the beast clans could do nothing, expect to chase me, which is a waste of time for them. a few that were foolish enough to climb up, my knife struck them before they could get a footing making them fall on the earth.

the trees were my territory. going at this pace, I can reach my target by nightfall. though I would have to hunt again on the way. because I had to leave the bird corpse because it would have slowed me down.though I did pack my bag full of meat. it will last only a few days.

day 8 - I finally reached the rock mountain. it is as its name suggested. it is a large pile of boulders, piled one on top of another.

when I activated blood vision I could see their figures inside the mountain. they were tunnels inside the earth, I could tell. from what I could count, it was a large tribe of at least fifty members.

I should have left immediately. if I was discovered then I would be pretty dead. but I could feel something was about to happen here. they were no trees surrounding the rock mountain, It was a large barren ground surrounding it. therefore I couldn't even spy on them properly.

it looks like this clan hunting business was something I am not very good at. I think for now it's better if I just stick to the lone wolves. at least I Will not have to worry about food for the time being. maybe I can go after the tribes and the clans after I become a better Hunter or at least a bit stronger.

but for now, I won't relax, I am at the edge of the rock mountain tribes territory, so none of the lone beasts will attack. none of the patrolling wolves will find me unless I made some big moves. I can rest properly here. maybe nap for some time

the last three-four days have been very stressful. spying is not a very easy business you had to be alert twenty-four seven and to get a proper view into their land, I have stayed at the edges of their territory. if I am discovered, then all of them would attack at the same time. while I would be up the trees, so they couldn't harm me, they would become alert, which means I would have failed anyway if I was caught.

so after resting awhile and sleeping here I could function again properly. miss mist did teach me how to compress my sleep.

but the thing was these types of things take years to master. I have been doing it for just a few months.

well now is the time for me to relax. now that I think of it I have never really decided on a name for myself. the names I have heard nowadays which were very weird were something that a person decided for himself, kind of like how you choose a name for yourself in a game. you see this world had thousands of languages, which were too many to learn. as for what it had to do with my name. well, you see every person had to choose a name in the common tongue for themselves. this name is like a title. you could have an original name, but the title is what everybody uses.

it is partly because your original name held power over you. while I am not exactly sure how, but names could be used to attack you somehow. this world is so confusing, man.