5 Piecing things together

"You want all legs?" the chief heavily frowned while Koro gave me a disapproving look. "You not be greedy, think of tribe! How much meat you eat taking four legs of boar?!"

"What? Oh! No no no!" I quickly waved my stubby arms trying to clear up the confusion. "I only want PART of each leg. Like just the very front part of the legs."

Amon scratched his head with a claw, his expression puzzled. "Odd request instead of take single leg, but not see problem..."

"YES!" Oh uh. I lightly coughed, reverting back to caveman speech. "Much thanks. Also need new spear, lose old one in hunt." Amon grunted in response, waving to a nearby kobold before heading back to his hut. One of the kobold came forward, handing me a wooden spear with a small pointy stone at the top.

Kobold Spear: Attack: 3

Durability 5/6 Quality: Poor

As expected, this really isn't a reliable weapon. "Quality."

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Quality: Determines the rank of the weapon. A low rank tends to perform less sufficiently, and a higher rank, more effectively

Poor > Normal > Good > Rare > Epic > Legendary > Mythical

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While I was examining the weapon, Koro and several other kobold helped Rakuta to his feet and towards what I assumed would be his tent. The hunchbacked began to shuffle off as well. He might be a good place to start looking for answers. Catching up to him, I examined him with status.

Knar: Lv 2.

Hp: 7/7

"Hey, hold on."

"Hmm?" the medicine kobold turned around as I greeted him.

"Mind if I ask you some questions?"

The old kobold snorted, continuing on towards his tent. "I busy. If you want ask, do while I work." He pulled back the curtain to his tent. Sitting down on the ground, he began to take things out of a worn leather bag slung over his shoulder and organize them. Seeing as how he wasn't taking the opportunity to speak, I decided to start.

"So what was that clear sap you used on Rakuta? And where can I get it?"

Knar pulled a brown disk-shaped container out of his bag and opened it handing the thing to me. Inside was more of the clear sap I saw earlier. "That sky sap." he said gesturing with his finger. "Come from sky tree. When plant young, make sap trap hungry bugs. Bugs avoid plant. When grow to tree, tree make sap cover injury, like when break branch." Knar gave a satisfied nod. "Good sticky stuff. Harden to amber. Tough. Not tough like rock, but tough. Much uses. Slowly dissolves in water, wipe with cloth, or dip in."

"And that green paste?"

The old kobold stopped for a moment looking me over. "You want become healer too?"

"No, just curious. If it can help me, I want to know about it."

"Most say learn medicine when old, or too weak to hunt." he thoughtfully rubbed his chin. "I not mind tell."

Knar actually made for decent company. He was pretty smart, even by kobold standards. He and I chatted about various plants and their effects. Volunteering to gather a few of them if I ever found them while hunting. I also found out two kobold didn't come back from their hunts in the last few days. Sucks to be them, but at least that means I can claim my own tent.

"So, where exactly is this settlement we're in?"

"Forest."

"Okay, I get that, but where's the forest?"

The old kobold wrinkled his brow. "Forest in forest."

Mmmm. Maybe I'm phrasing this wrong... "What major countries and or factions live near or at the forest?"

This question got him to stop working once more. "Not know. Not know lot. Forest belong with elves, but not see elves." He shrugged, resuming his work. "Not know why. Elves keep to self, not like humans, not like demons. Both rarely seen in forest. Elves ignore kobold, kobold thankful."

Elves? Demons? That's unexpected. I'm starting to get a feel for the situation of this land, but I'm still in the dark about a lot. I need more answers, but this settlement isn't the place to get them. If I want to leave and get answers, I'm going to need to become more powerful. Because right now I can't even set foot out of this tribe without being in danger of dying.

"Thank you. I'll come back some other time. Got things to do right now."

Knar nodded, looking a little disappointed, before turning back to his work.

"Alright, so...status."

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STATUS

Name: Marek Antos

Species: Kobold

Level: 3/20 Progress to level 4: 76%

HP: 7/8 Strength: 4

Agility: 5 Resistance: 4

Endurance: 3 Dexterity: 3

Intelligence: 2 Wisdom: 2

Available points: 2

Element: N/A

Skills: Provoke Lv. 2

Abilities: God tongue, Hard scales Lv. 2

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I pulled up the status screen, looking at the various attributes. "While increasing my stats will help, it's not going to be of much use if I don't have a decent weapon. Two points aren't really going to increase my combat effectiveness very much no matter where I put them. So..." I tapped the attribute of my choice on the screen. "Dexterity."

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Dexterity: The ability and precision of performing tasks and actions with one's body.

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"I'm going to need to make a decent weapon, and this stat is going to help me do it." Tapping the screen twice, I put both of my points into Dexterity, increasing the number to five.

Right now I need a weapon to effectively hunt while putting myself in the least danger possible. And what better weapon for that than a bow? That uncle of mine that dragged me on his hunting trips insisted that no part of the animal was to be wasted if we could help it. And he went to rather...disturbing lengths in showing me and my terrified cousin how to do it.

I gripped my spear, carefully unwinding the ragged cloth tied around the stone spearhead. At the part where stone met wood, there was a hard clear substance, likely hardened sky sap. Following Knar's instructions, I wet the cloth, continuously wiping the hard sap. This took longer than expected, rewetting and wiping the sap for nearly 20 minutes as it wore down. I could have tried breaking it, but it might've damaged the spearhead. The tedious work however eventually paid off, and I carefully disassembled the weapon, now holding a knife-like stone in my hands.

"O-oh boy..." Now comes the hard part. I gingerly held one of the boar's severed legs, placing it on a log. Steeling myself, I gripped the knife in my hand and approached the leg, holding it down with the other one. "You can do this..." Giving the leg an experimental poke with the knife, a small bead of blood seeped out. "Come on! You pushed a spear into a boar's head! You got this! It's...it's fine. Just think of it like a steak." Firmly gripping the leg, I moved the knife to the top area behind the shins and closed my eyes.

"Ahhhhhhh!" With a cry, I cut down the shins with a quick slash as hard as I could. Warm blood splattered onto my hands, stringy pieces of sinew clinging to the knife. "Urrrp..." My stomach lurched, immediately covering my mouth with the non-bloody hand. Watching a family member dissect an animal is far easier than doing it yourself. I took slow breaths, in and out. Waiting to calm down, and for my hands to stop shaking. Pouring water over my hands to get the blood off.

This process was repeated three more times. After the third time, I had to fetch more water to wash my hands with. Finally finishing the grisly task, several pieces of washed and dried sinew lay before me. With the hard part over, I set out on weaving the individual sinews strands together. Even with the increased dexterity, my fingers were clearly not made for delicate work. More than once I ended up accidentally up tearing up a few strands or cutting them with my claws.

"Note to self, increase dexterity again."

Thankfully, the boar was pretty big, so despite my mistakes, I ended up making a decent string, and still having enough sinew to make two more if needed. Getting the right branch for a bow wasn't too difficult being in a forest and all. Using the stone knife, I cut two thin vertical slits down the middle of the stick ends. Tying a knot at each end of the sinew bowstrings and slipping them over the slits. I covered the end of the slits and knots with sky sap just in case it wasn't as secure as I thought. Creating a handle by tightly wrapping the spear cloth around the middle of the bow. As a last touch, creating small rings of sap around the upper and lower limbs of the bow to make it more durable. I don't know how long it took me, but by the time I had finished, the sun had set, my fingers were throbbing and my eyes were sore. Still, the result was worth it.

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Reinforced Kobold Shortbow: Attack: 0

Durability 6/6 Quality: Good

+1 Arrow damage

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"Oh, this one has an effect. Is it because the quality is higher?" Looks like my hard work paid off, I was able to skip past Poor and Normal to enter the Good quality range. But the bonuses didn't end there.

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You have acquired Crafting. Lv 1

The ability to create new products or items with materials, or disassemble items and other various things in order to obtain materials.

Crafting lv. 1 has increased to lv. 3

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Two new messages popped up on my status screen, like an angelic voice. Ah, whatever god or goddess is watching, they must be proud of me.

"Huuuuuuaaaaaaam..." I yawned, covering my mouth, tiredness hitting me all at once, now that I had finished. Since the bow has no attack, that likely meant the damage came from the arrows. Unfortunately, I was exhausted. So making arrows for the bow will have to come tomorrow. Laying my head down in the tent, I was out like a light.