After finally finishing the cabin, I was able to take it easy for a bit. I was able to spend more time with Nora, hunting with her and exploring the surrounding mountains. There were even times when we were able to just lay back and relax all day... of course, I couldn't relax all day, but I could for most of it. It was nice.

I also spent some time slowly building things. I wasn't rushed to get them done, so I was able to take my time and really focus on making them look nice. I built a table and chair, a bed frame---which was basically a short table to stack my furs on---and I also built a smoking teepee.

I placed the table and chair inside the cabin next to one of the windows and placed the bed frame in a corner next to the fireplace. The smoking teepee was obviously outside, but I also built some shelves with a lot of hooks on the underside of each shelf. I would be able to hang meats from the hooks and place fruits and veggies on the shelves. I placed it next to the table, closer to the door than the fireplace. To go into the fireplace, I also forged a metal frame so I could hang a pot and I also forged a little metal stand to place a pan on.

But what I was really proud of was my garden. I made a nice foot tall wall of stacked stones wrapping around the garden with an opening facing the cabin. There were several rows of carrots, onions, a leafy plant that was similar to spinach, some peppermint, a couple steelthorn bushes, and a couple apple trees that were still growing. It wasn't much, but being able to have a bit of veggies and fruit with every meal and have a cup of tea was amazing. After a few months of working the garden, Winter was on its way. I was a little worried that my plants wouldn't survive the winter so I saved some more seeds into leather envelopes and placed them in my cabin. I wouldn't be able to save anything for long, so I just placed my garden's harvest on the shelves I made and ate some with every meal.

With winter just around the corner I added wooden side walls to Nora's lean-to to help block wind. I also built up a small rock wall, only two feet high and three feet long, on the opposite side of the campfire in front of the lean-to to reflect some of the fire's heat back at us. It wasn't much but it definitely helped. The next thing we did to prepare for winter was to make furs.

Nora and I went hunting and we'd bring our fresh kill back to process it. I'd skin it and tan the furs using the smoker teepee I built. I also experimented on smoking a whole... haunch? Thigh?... of the large rabbits or deer. I don't know if it was good or not but I was able to hang up a couple of them that looked alright in my cabin. They should last about a week... or more. For the furs I made, I stacked them up in the cabin to bring out when winter finally hits.

The first snowfall of the year was quiet. The snow fell slowly as Nora and I were snuggled together by the campfire. I was wrapped in furs and was leaning against Nora when I had an idea.

"Hey Nora," I said, staring at the fire. "I should go hunt one of those big dinosaurs by myself."

Nora immediately growled.

"I know, I know. It's dangerous. But I didn't mean that I would be alone, just that I would do everything. You're going to be gone soon, so it would be better if I learn how to hunt the bigger dinosaurs while you're still with me. You can follow behind me and step in if I fail."

Nora paused with a tilt to her head, then barked.

"Not today though, we got plenty of food today. Let's just enjoy the warm fire and snuggle today. Let's do it tomorrow."

Nora barked and leaned into me.

We spent the rest of the day snuggled by the fire, only getting up to make lunch and dinner or to throw on some more firewood. The sturdy lean-to did a great job keeping us dry despite the snow, and was pretty warm. The fire put off a good amount of heat and the little stone wall reflected a lot of it back at us... point is that we were cozy. Especially with all the furs I had made.

The next day we set off early in the morning, with the sun only hinting at a sunrise. I ate a few slices of jerky and a handful of steelthorn berries for breakfast before setting off. We followed the stream in the middle of the valley upstream into the northern canyon. The canyon quickly opened up into a forest. Just to the left of the canyon entrance was where I had mined, smelted, and forged. There was cobanium ore in the rocks there and so I had built a large chimney there and an anvil right there so I wouldn't have to haul the ores all the way through the canyon.

I quietly stalked farther out into the forest until I came across a set of tracks. The tracks looked fresh so I followed them, Nora following close behind me. The snow wasn't too deep so I had no issues except that the crunching snow made it hard to be stealthy. It did help with tracking though. The tracks that I was following were very large, which also helped me track them. They were a bit larger than my hand, and looked like deer tracks... or at least they were a hooved animal.

My goal was a dinosaur, but I followed these tracks anyways. Nora still hadn't eaten yet today after all. We followed the tracks as quietly as we could until we came across a pond. No deer though.

But seeing as we were at a water source, we waited. No need to walk around and scare everything off, especially in the crunchy snow. Our prey would come to us... well, Nora's would at least. There were a lot of deer tracks but no dinosaur tracks around here.

Eventually a deer did come and I speared it through the chest. It fell over dead and Nora got her breakfast. Once she was done eating we set off northward, further into the mountains. We followed the side of the mountain until we had walked around to face the west, all the while looking for dinosaur tracks. We walked silently, in order to not scare off any potential prey.

By the time we were thinking of stopping for lunch, we came across a familiar sight. It was the ravine. We had walked in a large circle. Of course this wasn't a part of the ravine we had seen yet, but our new home should be back along this ravine. We followed the ravine further into the mountains before stopping for lunch. I had some jerky and Nora and something she hunted.

After lunch we kept moving along the ravine. It was here that we finally found some footprints that were over three feet wide. Obviously a dinosaur footprint.

"Finally," I whispered to myself, and followed the trail after the large beast. There wasn't just a line of footprints to follow, there were only some here or there. The trail was mostly snapped branches, scraped bark, flattened plants, and a pile of poo.

We followed the trail back to what looked like the dinosaur's den. It was an outcrop of rock over a large flattened area.

"Come on, let's hide by those trees and wait for it to come back," I said. Nora silently followed me as I hid in the bushes. If this really was it's home then it'll come back eventually. We just had to be patient and wait for it.

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Nora lay down as flat as she could in the bushes with me, and I just slowly scratched her head to pass the time. Unfortunately for us, it took hours for the beast to come back to its den.

I was leaning back against a tree, when I heard footsteps and the rustling of plants. Across the flattened area came lumbering in a dinosaur that looked like a triceratops. It walked on four legs and had a thick, short tail. Its head was wide and had three large horns, two at the top of its head and one on top of its snout. It didn't have any scales or fur, but had a thick looking hide. The beast was as tall as Nora and twice as wide.

Slowly, so I wouldn't scare it off, I got off my butt and into a crouch. I carefully nocked the atlatl thrower onto one of my spears and lifted it into a throwing position.

From where I was, I could totally hit it, but it wasn't as close as I would like it to be. So, I decided to wait a bit longer to see if it'll wander closer. It was sniffing around, but it looked like it didn't smell anything too weird for it and just walked right into the clearing.

I brought my arm back, aimed right behind it shoulder blade and into it side, and threw as hard as I could. My spear flew true. It thudded into the side of the beast piercing deep into its side. It roared in agony as it bucked and lashed out with its tail and horns. I slowly nocked a second spear onto my atlatl and just watched as it flailed about, trying to get its "attacker" off of it.

After a few minutes it realized there wasn't any attacker on it and stopped, breathing heavily as it looked around cautiously. That's when my second spear appeared right next to the first one, buried in its chest just as deep. It bucked wildly. The ground trembled with its stomps and kicks. Its tail whipped around and shattered the trunk of a tree, which crashed to the ground next to it. Suddenly, it took off running into the forest, vanishing from sight, but I could still hear it crashing through the foliage.

I stood up and sighed, “Welp, let’s go after it. It’s probably going to die from blood loss but we should hurry and put it out of its misery as fast as we can anyways.”

I wasn’t too worried about losing track of it in the forest. It did leave a large trail of blood, crushed plants, and broken branches after all and it was way more noticeable than the trail we followed to find its den. We ran after it, not caring about stealth or looking for anything specific besides the large trail in front of us. I did watch out for dangerous things of course, but I didn’t see any.

The triceratops was heading back in the direction of the ravine, which was directly west.

“If it just blindly charges forward, it might throw itself off the edge...” I muttered, now worried I might lose two of my spears.

It would be a pain to lose them, but I knew where I could get more metal from, so I could replace them if I needed to. I just preferred to not have to replace them if possible.

Luckily the beast didn’t go off the edge. It had turned more northward, heading deeper into the mountains. We found it laying on its side in a pool of its own blood, breathing heavily. Unfortunately, it was laying on the side my spears were stuck in, so the shafts were most likely broken.

I approached quietly. Stepping carefully around the side towards its head.

Crack!

I stepped on a stick. The beast bellowed and lashed out with its tail and horns, striking the nothing as it pawed at the ground trying to get up. I paused briefly but continued walking around it. Near its head, I had a straight shot towards its throat. With it lashing about, I didn’t want to get close, so I nocked my third spear onto my atlatl and threw. My spear punched directly under its chin and up into its head, killing it instantly. That was as merciful and humane death that I could give it considering the circumstances.

I didn't know what to do with all of the triceratops' parts, so I went to work trying to skin it while I thought. I knew that people used to use horns of animals to make things, but I had no idea on how to go about doing that. The hide was tough and thick, but it was a little too thick to work with. It was better to just use deer or rabbit furs. Smaller and easier to work with. So, I guess I'm not very efficient with my kills. I'm just taking the meat and nothing else.

We've never had triceratops meat before though, so that was good. We got a new meat to try out and see where it ranked with the others.

Nora growled loudly.

I paused, holding a large flap of meat that I was sawing away at. Hands covered in blood, holding a large bloodied knife. I looked over at Nora.

She was standing not too far away, sniffing at a tree. The tree had large claw marks slashed across its trunk. Whatever had made those marks must be massive.

Nora looked at me and barked, motioning with her head for me to come over.

I let the flap of meat fall back into place and walked over. The claw marks were above Nora's head in height and they were deep. But that's not what Nora wanted to show me. She was looking down.

At the base of the tree was a large footprint...

I just stared at it. There's no way that that was a real footprint. I could lay down in it! Three large toes with claws with a "smaller" thumb out the side.

"Nora... what is this?... What kind of creature is big enough to make this?!"

She just shrugged.

It was larger than any footprint we've seen yet, and with the claw marks, it surely must come from a predator of some sort. A large predator, larger than the T-Rex we fought a while ago... and it marked its territory close to my cabin.

What if it wandered to my little valley? Then we'd be in trouble for sure. We'd probably be able to kill it, but it won't be fun.

Wait a minute... What if it wanders into my valley after Nora leaves this world? Then I'd be dead.

"Nora," I said, “This thing is really close to our cabin, if it wanders close... it’ll be dangerous if it attacks us if we aren’t ready... and if it attacks me when you’re gone... Well, then I’m a goner. Point is, I think we should hunt this thing before it hunts us.”

Nora growled, shaking her head, then motioning her head towards the way we came.

“Yeah, I know it’s probably a bad idea. We should just go home and ignore this thing... but Nora, what if it really does find us when we aren’t ready for it? Wouldn’t it be better if we are the ones that ambush it? Think about it, throughout our travels we have constantly been attacked by dinosaurs. It’s like they just know where we are... I’m almost certain that this one will find us as well.”

Nora looked at me, then back towards home, at me, then at the footprint. She whimpered and then barked.

I breathed a sigh of relief. Hunting that thing by myself would have been tough, but together with Nora, it’s no problem.

“Alrighty then, let’s do this!... After we get all this meat back home.”

We couldn’t carry all the meat back with us, the triceratops was just too big, but we did get a large portion of it. I cut some big chunks off, tied them together with rope, and carried it like a meat backpack. Nora carried an entire leg in her mouth and had its tail tied to her back. We had to leave the rest of it behind unfortunately.

The way back home was quick. We just walked west for a bit until we reached the large ravine, then followed it down until we reached our little canyon valley. By the time we got back home, the sun was setting and the valley was dark. With barely any light to see, I got a fire going and started frying up some triceratops meat.

I diced some carrots and onions to cook with the meat, and brewed some peppermint tea. The tea doesn’t really go great with the food but it was better than nothing. Once the meat was done, and the veggies were soft, I dug into my meal and Nora dug into the leg she grabbed. The meat practically melted in my mouth.

“So,” I said around a mouthful of food, after a moment of silence, “What do you think?”

Nora ripped a chunk of meat off of the leg and swallowed it down before responding. She barked ten times.

“A whole ten out of ten, huh? Even better than the snake?”

Nora barked.

“I’m gonna agree with you, Nora. This meat is amazing, ten out of ten. Juicy, tender, not too gamey, and there’s this... almost spicy aftertaste. It’s awesome.”

After dinner, I leaned against Nora’s side, sipping at my tea. We watched the stars, listened to the rustle of the wind in the leaves and the popping of the campfire, and felt the cool Fall breeze. It was a peaceful night. The last peaceful night I would have in a very long time.