1 A Rough Man

A thirty-year-old man had been lurking for a long time on one of the hilltops, near which was a harpoon-slinging device, similar to a crossbow but tens of times larger in size. A tool that people often use to take down large creatures.

He noticed the conditions around him, hidden by thick grass and shrubs. A tool like a small telescope he uses to look here and there.

"Goddamned!" he muttered. "He should have been seen around this narrow valley!"

The narrow valley dotted with towering hills is like the jaws of a dragon, lined with high cliffs like deadly fangs. At the bottom of the valley is a large river with blue and very clear water.

The hills are formed from stone pillars that stick up tens of meters from the bottom. Various types of plants cover some of these natural pillars. The scenery around looks quite amazing.

Something seemed to appear from a large pillar at the far right, and the 30-year-old man smirked.

"Finally," he tucked the telescope under his clothes. "There you are, damn rider!"

He immediately approached the harpoon-throwing weapon, prepared everything, and waited for the thing he saw earlier to appear right before him.

Appearing from the far right, between the towering hills was a man riding a wyvern.

The Wyvern the man was riding was dark gray with light gray wings. There were three large horns on its face, one right on its forehead, the other two on its head. The body size of the creature is the size of an adult horse.

The rider looks very calm on his mount without realizing that someone is stalking him with a giant harpoon ready to hit him.

"None of you I will let escape," muttered the man, who hiding on one of the tops of the rock hill. "None!"

And when the wyvern crossed in front of him, he immediately shot his giant sling.

Slap!

The huge harpoon shot and hit the wyvern right in the chest where it went straight through the heart.

Stab!

The winged creature gave a loud screech, then fell with its rider.

The man who shot the wyvern ran closer to the cliff, then he just jumped, catching up with the rider and the wyvern that had fallen.

Flap!

He developed his hands and feet. Like a flying squirrel that has webs on its hands and is connected to its legs, the man glides, chasing the rider.

The rider who had fallen in a tailspin could still see someone approaching him, and he was sure that someone had shot his wyvern.

In that fallen state, he drew the crossbow at his waist, trying to aim at the person hurtling toward him.

"Go to hell!" he shouted. "Bastard!"

Twice he shot, and both times that person was able to dodge his shots with agility.

The thirty-year-old man clasped his hands and feet together, causing his sliding speed to increase even more.

And then …

Stomp!

The rider let out a short groan as the man deliberately bumped into him hard and his crossbow slip off.

For a moment, they exchanged blows in the air before finally crashing hard into the river's surface.

Splash! Splash!

They plunged into the great and deep river, as did the dead wyverns.

In the water, the rider tries to resist the man who attacks him. However, his movements were quite slow, and apparently, he was not used to fighting in the water.

The man then drew a black dagger from his thigh, he swam toward the rider.

The rider tried to fight back, but the man easily dodged behind him, hugged him from behind, then slit his throat.

The rider convulsed, only for a moment, and then fell silent, sinking deeper and deeper.

Dozens of small eel-like creatures appeared from several corners of the river, they immediately surrounded the rider's body.

The man rose to the surface to breathe, he searched for the position where the wyvern had fallen. Then swim that way, and dive back down.

He looked like he wanted to get to the wyvern's body as soon as possible, before the eel-like creatures with their spiked bodies gnawed at the creature's body, as with the body of the rider who died with his throat slit.

He swam faster before the wyvern's body sank further. Once near the creature's body, he used his black dagger to rip open the creature's chest.

He pulled out the harpoon embedded in the wyvern's body, placed it into his back, and went back to tearing at the wyvern's chest.

As soon as he found the wyvern's heart, also because the spiny eel-like creatures were increasingly swarming the wyvern's corpse, the man immediately swam to the surface.

It wasn't good to be in the water for too long, that was what he had learned his whole life. What's more, near a corpse that was bleeding. The blood will provoke the emergence of a creature that is even bigger than just these spiny eel-like creatures.

He stored the heart in a cloth bag at his waist and swam quickly back to shore.

At the edge, there is a large rope hanging from the top of the cliff, and he uses the rope to climb the hillside which is quite high and vertical.

At a third of the height of the rope he had climbed, the man saw something large moving beneath the surface of the river. And apparently, it's more than one.

He grinned, those huge creatures must have been feasting on the corpses of the rider and the wyvern earlier. Thus, there would be no trace of their whereabouts after this.

He continued to climb the cliff until he finally arrived at the top of the hill. The same hill where he had hidden before waiting for the rider and the wyvern before he knocked them down.

On the same hill he then built a bonfire, not to dry his sodden clothes, but to burn the wyvern heart he had obtained.

While waiting for the heart to ripen, he cleaned up all the equipment. Splitting the harpoon launcher into several parts, then collecting them, and tying them with string.

Then pulled and rolled up the large rope that he had used to climb the vertical cliff.

He collected all his equipment into a cart disguised with firewood.

After that, he returned to sit by the bonfire. The aroma of the grilled meat had whetted his appetite.

Without feeling the slightest disgust or guilt, he enjoyed the heart of the creature from the dragon race with gusto.

While eating the roasted heart, the man's face contorted, he choked and then coughed. But that didn't stop him from eating the roasted heart out.

***