Lament of the 21. Century slob

As he trudged through the underbrush something became abundantly clear. Nathan was an unathletic slob. After what felt like hours of walking in the dense forest, his legs felt like jelly, his back ached, his feet were sore, and he was chafing all over. 'You good damn failure ' Nathan reprimanded himself again and again. The sedentary lifestyle had finally caught up with him, and he was simultaneously angry at himself, Melissa and the world at large. 'Why not throw in a less useless body while you're so generously handing out gifts!?'.

Nathan caught himself before he went further down this train of thought though. Blaming someone else for his self-inflicted misfortunes was hardly productive. Instead he grit his teeth and continued walking.

Nathan found that the forest was teeming with life. He'd seen more animals, plants and insects in the past few hours, than an experienced outdoorsman would encounter for months on earth. This abundance of life drove home the alien nature of his new home. Many creatures bore resemblance to animals from Earth, but always with a twist. A horned rabbit hunting small critters in the underbrush. A giant bear-like creature with lean muscles and a more pointed, ferocious face. Then there were things that defied all earth logic. Squirrels that seemed to run on mist through the canopy, frogs which ballooned to quadrupole in size, and floated away when threatened. A moose sized moose with thunder antlers. Thankfully he'd so far been able to avoid the more threatening creatures, but his heartbeat was going at Mach 10, and his entire body was quivering with fear and anxiety.

He'd also been testing his abilities in the short interims between frantic running and hiding. His weak suggestion and slave contract didn't seem very useful in his current predicament, but his dark needle paired well with his shadow influence to all but guarantee a hit on his target. Upon his first encounter with a horned rabbit he'd struggled to find his footing. The little bugger was fast, nimble and surprisingly aggressive. Nathan had almost been skewered by that horn a couple of times, before he managed to predict the rabbits trajectory, and with a surge of mana grabbed hold of its shadow.

The little creature was stopped dead in its tracks, visibly distressed, as Nathan formed a dark needle from the palm of his hand. He could pour more mana into his projectile to increase velocity and piercing power. To secure the kill, he used about 20% of his maximum mana. Once released, the needle pierced the air like a bullet, flew straight through the skull of the rabbit, and embedded itself deep in a tree behind the poor critter. Nathan whistled to himself. 'Seems I'm stronger than I initially thought'. The question of survival remained however. Being able to one shot the weakest monster in the forest didn't mean much. Facing the moose or the bear would surely be suicide.

There was also the question of food and drink. He was in desperate search for water as the day waned and the unfamiliar physical strain of hiking left him parched. Food was a secondary problem for now, but going without for too long would leave him weak. Weakness currently meant death.

However, search as he might, there was no water to be found. Nathan wouldn't dare to ingest some of the berries and mushrooms he'd stumbled upon, and he felt queasy at the thought of eating raw meat from one of his many rabbit kills. For now he'd strapped a couple of rabbits to his belt, but they would soon go bad, and Nathan had no idea how to skin and dress an animal.

He'd crudely cut up the stomachs of the rabbits with a couple dark needles and removed most of their innards to the best of his ability. The animals hanging from his belt looked like they'd been gored and flung about by a vicious beast. He was not proud of himself.

Making a fire was out of the question. Firstly he didn't think he could manage it. He'd seen "Cast Away". Tom Hanks spent an entire arc on that fire of his. Secondly a fire would surely draw attention from creatures he desperately needed to avoid.

The only positive development thus far, was that he only needed 8 mana to secure a kill with dark needle. The projectile moved a bit slower, but it did the job when used in conjunction with a touch of shadow influence. He only needed to freeze a rabbit for a split second to land a shot, so Shadow influence only cost 6-8 mana on each kill.

After 5 kills Nathan still had 114 mana remaining. He was a little upset that he'd wasted 80 mana on his first dark needle, but he had been flustered at the time, so he excused himself. No good would come from dwelling on every little thing he did wrong.

Still, desperation mounted throughout the day, and Nathan was frantically searching his slowly deteriorating mind for solutions. Would he really be dead on arrival? Was this all his second chance would amount to? NO! He refused.

He spotted a rabbit in his delirioum and raised his hand to conjure a dark needle, before a thought struck him. The slave contract! There was nothing in the skill description about it being exclusive to humans. What better way to survive than enlist a helper with an intimate knowledge of the woods?

The rabbit spotted him, but it was too late. Nathan grabbed hold of its shadow and leapt towards it. He activated [brittle slave contract] which caused dark sparks to emit from his right hand as his palm took on a hazy glow, almost like an eclipse. The rabbit was frantically straining to get away from its captor, it's tensed muscles actually drained [shadow influence] at a faster pace. But it was to late and Nathan was upon it. He touched his palm to its head and instantly felt a dull pain in his mind.

It felt like part of his mind had been wrenched away from his brain and trickled from his arm into the rabbit. However, he felt resistance when trying to penetrate the animals' mental barriers. Nathan didn't know how to manually control his skills, but he tried to somehow get ahold of his mental energy and push.

First nothing happened, but then he felt as though his mind reconnected to the expelled energy, and he could exact some control over it. He tried breaking down the barrier, and although it started bulging inwards, he still needed that last bit of energy to get through. During this whole ordeal the rabbit had grown ever more frantic and Nathan's mana was dropping steadily.

His mana dropped precariously low, so Nathan focused and strained against the barrier. Suddenly it shattered, and the mental energy flooded into the little critter.

A flood of information hit Nathan's head. It felt like his mind had expanded to encompass multiple beings. Instincts to forage, breed and flee intruded upon his mind, and he had to focus and try to shut himself off from the foreign influence. He once again felt like he connected to his mental energy, and he managed to erect a new barrier.

There was still a link there though. Like a mental string he could use to access that other consciousness, control it. He tried to send a probing message through the string. "Sit". The rabbit that had previously looked like it would die from stress, sat down and looked up at him quizzically. It didn't seem like it knew exactly what had happened to it, but Nathan was no longer a threat.

Nathan smiled. The little bugger was cute like a normal rabbit. Its fur was a glistening white, and a spiraling horn adorned its head. Blue big eyes stared up at him, and he somehow knew it was a male.

"I'll call you Bob".