Chapter 37 A new friend

Hunting in the east beast forest was really a nerve wracking experience for those who have never even heard of 99.99% of any living creatures in the bloody forest which just so happens to be the exact amount of knowledge I lacked.

Gathering food from small beast and the flowing stream alleviated the basic survival needs while the cabin protected from bugs and whatever creepy crawlies came out at night. Even though I wasn't aware of the exact level of danger the animals and insects in the ecology posed, it wasn't all that bad especially since the panther that I had officially named "death machine" started hanging out during the evenings to get a free meal. Him staying around the premise led me to believe that this was his territory as I still hadn't seen any living thing in the surrounding 2km capable of matching its insane speed.

This continued for close to two weeks as I started getting more proficient at actual combat mainly against those ugly boars, a couple of rather large snakes and some weird mutated bird that totally reminded me of a chimera but on a smaller scale with just uglier features with a weird bird curved bird beak, the body of a lizard including its tail and the paws of a cat with some dark feathered wings.

That last one I just named ugly as ugly was really all I could think of when I saw it swooping down to try and eat my boar which led me to piercing the shit out of it with the superior quality horns from the boars I hunted.

The whole east beast forest seemed a little too "weak" in a sense to me after close to two weeks but I was never one to go running into danger so I hadn't really made plans to leave just yet. After spending quite a bit of time in the area and getting adjusted to the new world and my super powers I managed to gain another few points of energy and stamina leading me to a "passable" for a trainee stats according to Phoenix.

"Phoenix, can I see my stats again?"

"Do you really think that you're going to magically gain +50 in everything if you keep badgering me to show it to you?" She asked me a little annoyed at my recent love of looking at the stats.

"Possibly. The universe works in mysterious ways that even you have agreed about." I joked.

"Shut up, sigh." She has become increasingly cute as she still does what I ask even though we have our little moments.

Status

-Jupiter

-Human

Abilities:

- Keen senses ( Slime symbiosis effect )

- Adept Energy Manipulation ( improved)

- Enhanced Mental Cognition

- Increased energy regeneration (Crystal core)

- Supreme energy conductors (Crystal core)

- Core assimilation (unique trait)

Physical:

Strength – 4

Defense –10 (100%)

Stamina – 4 (+1)

Agility – 4

Vitality – 4.5

Energy – 18(+3)

Looking over my status page again I can't help but smile that the little hermit boy from Earth has come so far even though its nothing legendary, it still made me smile. I was hoping to get more out of the two weeks here but sadly things aren't that easy.

Phoenix has kept reminding me lately that we need to move towards the deeper parts to find creatures that are similar to "death machine" since they most likely have inner cores that I can absorb energy and maybe potential traits from. She wasn't sure of exactly how that new core feature worked and the only reason she found out was because of the unique information my core showed her from her scans that pointed out that I should be able to do something like the skill [absorb] or [devour] from games.

I was more than excited at getting more power and becoming some galactic level womanizer but I felt I still needed to one more thing before heading off to face greater dangers than I am keenly aware of.

I wanted to tame "death machine".

It sounded insane when the idea popped into my head but whenever I used to play rpgs or mmorpg games I always loved the ones where you could have a class that could tame a few of the cool wild creatures and it really seemed like a great idea considering the panther was totally big enough to let me ride it and if I could do this now maybe I could get an aerial mount one day and not have to walk like a fucking peasant.

I may sound like peasants aren't all that great but I do believe that no man should strive to be one especially when the life of "stable tranquility" is one I am recently trying to get away from since leaving Earth. I may be antisocial but who doesn't love a good adventure.

I've been wracking my brain over this for the past week since I had decided that I should try and tame the black/green panther of death but couldn't come up with any real method since my lack of taming knowledge in this world became really apparent when the only information I had in my head was that I should probably have some sort of complex magic circle structure that allows me to communicate, initiate and contract the damn thing. I always figured it would be easier done than said but when do I ever get this sort of thing right?

It seems the illusion that Earth fantasy knowledge gives on real life fantasy is totally useless unless you were reborn, dropped into some contract with a god or fell into a library upon entering the new world.

"Sigh, Phoenix what should I do?" I eventually gave in as I was pretty sure Phoenix wasn't interested in helping me tame a beast as she never mentioned it nor did she seem to like the "totally capable of killing both me and her death machine" mooching off of us.

"Oh, you actually want to tame the creature?" She asked a bit surprise at my question which wasn't the reaction I expected which kind of made me feel stupid at hiding my schemes from her for a week.

"Yeah, I've been wracking my brain on different methods like injecting mana or trying to talk to him and sign a contract of some sort to get a new squad member especially considering he is really fast and probably great to ride on but can't come up with anything remotely useful." I finally caved as I really wanted to tame the panther especially since half my meat has been going down its guzzler like some protection fee from the local thugs of 3rd street.

"Well, talking would be dangerous considering it might just get angry from a weaker creature than it to try and tame it so don't ever do that."

"Right…" I replied a little nervously as I was totally thinking communicating as equals could solve the friendship barrier.

"You totally thought you could get away with convincing it with your "eloquent" speech didn't you?" I could hear the silent mockery in her words. It stings. It stings a lot.

"Well do you have a better idea?" I didn't care at this point because compared to getting the terminator of panthers over there to become my feline beasty, I could withstand some mocking not like I'm not already used to it.

"I do but I don't know if you could pull it off. If we were a little stronger it might be very easily done by just getting it to submit but ha, that ain't happening anytime soon especially since we haven't found anything good in enough for a high impact evolution of your genes in the area."

"Well, get on with it then, if we get death machine to join the fray, we could totally explore and kill some stronger world beasts with inner cores and that should help us both in travelling to a library and me being strong enough to survive the beast forest."

"Well the panther is intelligent but from what I have seen it doesn't seem to be overly intelligent meaning at your level yet where speech and proper communication is lacking. It seems to simply be the equivalent of an alpha pack leader. Better at judging but still a wild beast at the end of the day."

Hearing her say this It made sense since death machine only came around for food and lazed about and would be gone in the morning. It didn't really seem to do much else but loiter in its territory but understands some simple things like wait, come, and eat. I still haven't been able to touch the bloody thing but we could be considered "acquaintances" or most probably "human food dispenser" from the other party's point of view.

"What you could do is if you can get it to let you touch its forehead is request a formal bond of equals where you provide let's say food as long as it follows you and helps out or depending on your choice, you forcefully use your pure inner energy to forcefully submit the thing, both could end pretty badly but they are the relatively safer options than trying to tame it by talking or whatever weird plots you thought up."

"So I can probably still get attacked?"

"Most likely unless you can precisely control your energy to forcefully create a connection or get one through bargaining with your inner energy as the meaning behind your intentions can be transmitted clearly through inner energy. There are simpler ways but we're just not there yet in strength or knowledge."

"Fair enough." I started to seriously consider the options as the desire for death machine was worth the risks.

"Decided what you are going to go with?" She asked.

"Yup. I've decided." I figured since I was going to get attacked either way if both methods fail, I might as well gamble on the one that gives me the best benefits.