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A vagabond's ascent

Our protagonist is of the “vagabond” species. A pretty cool creature, but nothing compared to humans and their inventions. Humans can go eat my sawtooth branch. The world is constructed of floating island. Above and below is the “void” as all call it. Nobody has returned from the void yet, so they’re assumed dead. Are they really dead? Yeah, probably. Travel is hard - it requires flight, cause how else would you get between the floating islands? That means our protagonist’s species, the “vagabond” as I’ve established, can also fly.

Yahazek · Fantasy
Not enough ratings
14 Chs

Training arcs are getting stale.

The last week was quite a pain, to say the least. I've basically done nothing but come up with fruitless plans of escape. I'm the only "kid" in the pack, so nobody else will be staying here. I thought of clinging on to one of the adults at the very end, hoping they would spare my life and not throw me down into the abyss.. Or perhaps I could use the wind currents to push me through the air, as a way to compensate for my lack of arm strength.. I might try testing my luck and take a leap of faith into the air; maybe then I, just like a baby bird, will suddenly realize how to flap my wings and majestically take off.

Nah.

That's nothing more than self-deception, a way to trick my mind into believing there's hope of escape.

But, let's be honest here, there's really one and only one way of escape, and that is to fly away before the storms get too strong.

That's precisely why I've been training so much. Whenever II wasn't trying to come up with some sort of dumb survival plan - hell, even when I was doing that, I've never stopped trying to do it. The fact is, I have yet to master three more things before I could fly, which are the movements, the ability to transform my blades into the appropriate wing shapes, and the arm strength to sway said blades.

I've also been avoiding contact with all the other vagabonds because I've grown a sort of resentment towards their careless attitude. Like, fucking hell, one of your pack's members, - the youngest one at that - is being left alone to starve to death on an island. It's a conscious decision they're making, and they couldn't even be bothered to give their condolences.

I'm honestly more annoyed at the fact that they chose to abandon me than having to come to terms with death. Everyone dies at some point, after all. Sure, this is a pretty shitty way to die, but is there even a good one?

~~~

There are two days left before everyone finally leaves me. Since there's no hope of going with them, I figured it'd be best for them to leave early, because as soon as they leave the entire island's food supply will become mine.

As long as I don't receive any injuries my food supply will last for quite a long time. Maybe that time will be enough for some miracle to happen. A friendly human, for example.

Hah, of course not. These two words, human and friendly, don't fit in the same sentence.

*cling*

An ear-piercing sound echoed around me as I hacked at a stone, trying to get my angle just right. My blades are made of plasteel, as you know. A durable, ultra-light, and malleable metal. But there is a downside to that. You see, the flexibility is great for shapeshifting, but it also means the blade can deform when striking a hard object, like this rock I'm "dueling" against right now.

The low weight also drastically reduces my strike power, so something more blunt and thick won't do the job either. The only option available to me at the moment is mastery of the slice attack. If I hit the target at just the right angle and use my body weight to strengthen the swipe, the blade won't slide along the surface, preventing any deformation of the blade.

With just a few easy steps I can cut my foes in half. But that's a lie. The "easy steps" part, I mean.

Well, that much is expected. If it was as easy as it sounds, Vagabonds would have climbed to the top of the food chain a long time ago.

So, ya think our plasteel vagabond will manage to survive? Of course, he is the main character so there *SHOULD* be plot armor, buuuut..

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