First Trial - COMPLETE

He grabbed the slice of meat with his thumb and index finger and lifted it up.

Then he took the smallest bite he could from it...

"PTFU…! What the hell is this!? It tastes like mud!"

And he spat it out instantly.

Butaro felt as if he just took a mouthful of the grimy stuff from the bottom of some long-forgotten pond. The monster's meat didn't even taste as it could ever be ingested by a human being!

He wiped his mouth trying to get the awful taste off and only then did the door that he thought was the exit caught his attention.

The light coming from the cracks became much brighter than before.

"…So it's already day, huh… That's convenient"

Butaro bit his lip.

He put down the cut-off crocodile's tail and walked towards the door to hopefully push them open.

*SMASH*

He slammed his shoulder into the sturdy rock and pressed onto it with all of his might.

A cobweb of cracks spread from the point of impact but the door did not budge.

"No! Open up, you piece of…!"

*WHAM*

*click*

Desperate Butaro slammed both of his arms against the door, some of the monster's blood on his hands smudged against the stone and as if that was a magic spell the sound of metal slabs unlocking with a vigorous creek resounded through the chamber.

"Shit…?"

The door moved... And started falling right at Butaro!

"WAH!"

Butaro cried out in surprise and backed away as fast as he could, the door slammed to the floor raising a cloud of dust.

Butaro, taken by complete surprise, stared at the door in disbelief.

Then he looked at his arms as if he saw them for the first time in his life.

"What in the…? Huh…? Could it be that…?"

Butaro murmured and checked out smudges of the monster's blood on his arm, the remnants of the awfully tasting monster meat. If the pure strength didn't have a reaction, but the moment the monster's blood got onto the door they unlocked...

"The monster's blood was the key?"

The boy said in shock looking between his arms, the monster's corpse, and the door almost expecting a pop-up message congratulating him for completing a quest.

Of course, nothing like that happened and Butaro nodded to himself.

It seems that it was just how this place worked.

Well, it had a giant crocodile-like beast that could enlarge itself so honestly, a door opening only after getting sprayed with monster blood wasn't that surprising in comparison.

"…"

Butaro turned back and grabbed the tail, disgusting or not, it could come in handy in other ways! Then he proceeded to slowly peek through the door.

He tensed up as soon as he saw what awaited him.

When stepping outside, sword in one extended hand, the monster's tail held like a mace in the other, just in case another monster like the one already dead would just jump at him out of nowhere, he looked around cautiously.

The building, or rather a ruin of the building he just stepped out of looked just like the picture on the mural inside and made Butaro think of the Incas temple.

It looked mighty and mysterious even though it was covered in moss and other vegetation.

The temple was undoubtedly situated on top of some sort of mountain, also exactly as the mural portrayed.

It was surrounded by tiny bushes with blue leaves and tall green grass.

After a dozen steps, the terrain would gently slope down and after around twenty more feet or so tropical trees straight out of the rainforest were growing tall with vines and all!

And there was a path too, well, something like a rarely used path, maybe even only used by some animals – or monsters, possibly even the very monster that Butaro already killed - going from the temple's entrance down through the grass and bushes and disappearing between the trees further down.

But even when the greenery was so lush and captivating, everything was silent. Not even one shrill of a bird or a cry of a monkey would pierce the air.

Only the trees would sway in the wind but even that seemed off.

That eerie silence gave Butaro a bad feeling.

He tried to slowly back off into the temple gulping down his saliva nervously.

*RUMBLE*

Just then he felt a terrible tremor coming from inside and dust and small pebbles started coming down from the ceiling.

Only the biggest fool would stay there any longer!

And Butoaro wasn't that much of a scatterbrain.

The boy lunged outside just in time, but the whole temple collapsed on itself and everything inside got buried under the rabble.

"I... Wanted to try and skin that monster... or at least get its teeth...!"

Butaro groaned looking at the ruins.

He could stay and dig through the stones to get the corpse out for the materials but, truth be told, he never skinned anything in his life, so maybe this situation wasn't so bad, he didn't have water or food so wasting energy on suddenly trying to learn a hunters and butchers profession from scratch could prove to be fatal in the long run.

Butaro gulped down his saliva and gripped the sword and the tail a bit harder.

Anxious beyond belief he lowered his head to examine the path.

If this indeed was an animal path, the mountainous boy silently prayed that he would find some hoofprints and not pawprints of a beast such as a crocodile from back there...

It would be terrible if it turned out that there were plenty more crocodile beasts going around...!

"Oh...?!"

So can you imagine his surprise when in the spot of moist soil between the lush vegetation he spotted a human footprint!

Or a trail resembling one at least.

"Wait... why would someone walk here barefooted...?"

Butaro sucked in some air, he looked at the footprint more carefully.

It was rather big, it must have belonged to an adult, but... it seemed it was missing one toe, the little one, also the fourth toe was just as big as the, well, the big toe.

"...But it's not an animal... right...?"

Butaro straightened his back and looked around.

If he admitted that this was some different world like in the novels and anime, and it wasn't such a far-out idea since as he remembered, animals couldn't change their size at will in his world, then it wasn't impossible for sentient races other than humans to exist...

A sudden chill came down Butaro's spine, he suddenly remembered his dream and those purple humanoids butchering the golden ones and then being slaughtered by the golden tiger with white stripes...

"Were they like... the dark elves or something...? Could it be that they exist in this world...?"

Butaro muttered.

If it was indeed so and his weird visions were true, maybe it wasn't such a good idea to follow the trail...

But what other option he had? Go back and dig through the ruin?

Wander through the jungle completely not knowing where he is and where he could go?

At least this trail would lead him somewhere, since someone was using it, that meant someone was living here, and if so, there must be a water source...

"Let's just hope that those dark elves need to drink pure water and not a salt one or something worse..."

Butaro said out loud and his expression became bitter.

Voicing out his concerns certainly didn't help him calm down nearly as much as he hoped for, but he still took the first step into the unknown...