cold and alone

The effects of the newly absorbed essence was wonderful, his body by now was almost certainly at the standard of an average athlete in all sports due to the all around enhancement. Having such an open to improvement felt amazing to say the least.

The interesting thing though was something he hadn't noticed until now. The essence improved every physical aspect of his body and an unknown number of other things. But that also meant that while his strength might only be fairly impressive, it was mixed with agility, perception, and durability. Overall it created an effect that was rather astounding, if he had maybe 10 more essence he might even call it inhuman. 

"Obviously I miss not having to worry about killing things or getting to live in an actual safe environment. But having such a clear path of improvement really is satisfying, even if all the down time is starting to get really boring."

Living in the wilderness for almost a week straight with no human contact besides occasionally talking with Dwayne for fun really was starting to get to him. Maybe there weren't any worse effects because his situation kept him preoccupied or maybe he just enjoyed time alone a little too much. Either way he would need to finish things here soon due to one main reason.

He ran out of food today, trying his best to ration out snacks could only last so long after all. He even tried making a fire once he realized the issue but he had no clue what to do besides rubbing sticks together fast and obviously that had no result. And obviously eating raw meat was out of the question unless he was already starving.

So he made the decision to bring along enough water for a couple days and trek out deep into the forest searching for the last three animals he needed to kill. His body could withstand the cold indefinitely as long as he wore a couple layers of clothing so he wanted to try his best.

As soon as the sun came up he began his trek through the forest, his goal for this final excursion was to make it to the mountains in the distance. Provided he didn't clear his trial before that point of course, The high vantage point could probably help him survey the land and understand a little bit more of where he was. 

There was practically no wildlife within the forest to be seen, not even a squirrel. Not like they had any incentive to be out here either, the weather had been growing slowly colder, probably heading towards winter in whatever this place was. 

Only the animals who didn't get enough to sustain themselves were still out here in these woods. 

'Just like me I guess then.'

'Are my parents doing alright right now? I mean if they didn't get pulled into this obelisk as well they must be freaking out over how a section of the house just disappeared with me in it.' 

Reflection had always been something intrinsic to Connors mind. Know why he did something, or by proxy why he felt certain ways was important. But he didn't know how he felt about everything he was doing.

He felt like the forest around him was cold and scary.

He felt revulsion every time he killed an animal just to get what he wanted.

He felt wonderful every time his body was improved.

And he felt so disconnected from his current circumstances, as if everything going on wasn't about him or about how his life was on the line.

It was contradictory but it made sense to him in a weird sort of way. Nevertheless he just kept walking to the mountains, ready and waiting for the next 3 fights.

And not long afterwards his readiness would be rewarded. The forest had only continued to thicken as he went onwards towards the mountains branch's covered every path and all Connor could do was push his body through and try his best not to get scratched or stabbed.

Light found it hard to reach through the dense canopy of leaves above him but Connor could still faintly hear the rustle of something. And as soon as he did he stopped moving and breathing, and when he stopped so did the sound around him.

There, in the darkness was a wild boar it was much bigger than what Connor thought a boar could grow to be. In fact it seemed more like a horse in terms of size but the unkempt fur, snout, and tusks gave away what it really was. 

It's tusks were large, made of smooth ivory and ended in a point as sharp as a spear. Realistically if it were to ram a person into a wall not only would they be impaled their bones would probably be crushed.

Overall this beast would be a nightmare to face in a more open area. However the beast didn't immediately charge at Connor as he had expected. It seemed to want to stand its ground and kept its eyes trained on Connor.

After a few seconds Connor realized that the beast was also much more intelligent than it looked, making it all the more horrifying. It knew that its size would make it pointless to chase after the much smaller Connor in these dense trees. 

Connor knew that killing the boar would still be almost impossible though. Stabbing it with his best weapon the wolf claw would barely go past its rough hide if it penetrated at all. And if he tried to go for something actually lethal like a throat attack he would die to the tusks even quicker.

But for the same reasons that the boar was so dangerous it would also be the perfect target to kill. Not only would it definitely give at least 3 essence but much more importantly it would also allow him to use the tusks as weapons.

With those things he would be able to face off against a wolf or snow leopard head on, provided they were normally sized.

'Well its not really a question i need to kill this thing, but how?'

The boar was smart, dangerous, and really big. To hunt something like that would be like hunting an elephant, thankfully though the boar wasn't that big or that smart. 

Ancient people would hunt wooly mammoths using spears so that was what Connor planned to do. He found a branch that seemed hard and sturdy and tried cutting it off cleanly with his wolf claw and surprisingly it wasn't as rough as he thought.

That probably just spoke as a testament to the sharpness of the wolf claw though. Regardless he shaved off the extraneous branch's of the main piece of wood until it was straight and had a pointed tip. The work was crude but it still felt sharpish when he poked it against himself.

Along with that the wood was still fairly flimsy he felt like if he put in his full effort he could just snap it on his knee. It would be good for a one time use against the boar though, and speaking of it.

The boar had wandered off while he was making the weapon to kill it. Probably because it had never seen what a human could do before and because it got bored of maintaining the stand off.

'haha bored boar.' Happy in his own little way Connor started to follow the boars tracks that were still fresh in the snow until he finally caught up to it being as silent as he could possibly be.

He stalked it for minutes until it walked its way back into a small clearing in the forest where there was a lake of ice. 

Connor raised his arm and aimed, he would only have one shot at this and if he failed he would give up and just keep moving on to the mountains but as the boar walked across a small section of the lake he launched the spear using the best form he could muster.

It made a whistling sound as it soared through the air quite a bit faster than Connor expected.

It finally made contact with the side of the boar piercing inside of it 3 inch's deep. The boar squealed with rage and freaked out stomping into the ice under its feet which unfortunately cracked the ice dropping it into the shallow waters. 

 The shock from the spear and the instant embrace of the hypothermia inducing actually made the boar faint! and as it sunk to the bottom of that black cold lake the air lefts its mouth and it died.

Cold and alone.