Compromise

"Humans can't just absorb mana crystals without having something happen to their body," Savannah stared at my unflinchingly blank face.

I closed my eyes, and sighed heavily.

"Fine," I looked her in the eye, "If I feel sick or pain or anything out of the ordinary at all I'll get checked out." I tilted my head slightly, "Deal?"

Savannah watched me carefully for a few seconds before nodding slowly. She clearly didn't agree, but she wasn't going to force me.

"Fine," Savannah's knuckles went white as she gripped her spear tightly, "Deal, but I'm holding onto the crystals we find."

I spotted movement out of the corner of my eye.

"Come on," I walked past Savannah, "We're going to fall behind."

The pairs system Goliath had worked out seemed to be working fairly well. Savannah, and I were now at the back of the group. Our short conflict had delayed us much longer than I would have liked. Losing our position at the front wasn't ideal. The next best place for us to be was the outer edge. I switched to infrared briefly as I scanned our side of the group for any enemies.

I spotted something moving off behind us. It looked like it was stalking us slowly. I raised my gun, and fired a single shot. Whatever it was flinched when it got hit, and ran away. I stared at its back end as it ran away for a few seconds as I fought the urge to take chase.

I shook my head slowly as the urge to chase let up. Stepping back in line as we continued trudging through the forest. I kept an eye out for any heat signatures that weren't human. All while switching back, and forth between my normal vision, and infrared. Infrared was awesome for seeing hot living things, but it made seeing things like the trees kind of hard.

The last thing I needed right now was to walk into a tree while looking for enemies. Someone off behind us screamed as the sounds of a scuffle rose up. I rushed towards the sound with my gun at the ready. I didn't know if Savannah was following me. I didn't care if she was at the moment.

My mind was completely focused on the path ahead of me. I started shooting as soon as I saw the little creatures attacking a pair of students. I didn't see who they were, but they were being attacked by about half a dozen of the little scaly bastards. Two shots each in rapid succession was all it took to knock them off of the pair. The two scrambled to their feet.

Rushing past me back to the main group as I kept shooting the little creatures. I lost track of how many shots I'd hit them with so the sound of click instead of my gun firing was ill timed. I whipped my gun around behind me, and started beating each of the little creatures to death. There were seven of them total.

First blood 5 xp. 7 Craggon lizards killed 140 xp. 145 xp awarded. 225/800 xp until level 8.

I heard my stomach growl angrily as I straightened after killing the little armored bastards. Savannah cut in front of me before I could start digging crystals out. I wiped the blood off my arms, and let her do what she wanted as I dug a snack bar out of my bag. I stuffed the whole gross thing in my mouth, and chewed briefly before swallowing. They were supposed to be a whole days worth of nutrition for the average adult human, but since I wasn't human anymore I didn't know how much it would do for me.

"Aren't you supposed to save those for when we stop?" Savannah had heard me open the wrapper.

"I'm hungry," I looked out into the forest as Savannah finished up.

"We only got two of those each," Savannah dropped the crystals into a side pouch on her bag.

"I was halfway tempted to cook up, and eat those lizard things," I forged ahead.

Savannah probably wouldn't take me seriously. Problem was I was being a hundred percent honest with that last statement. I honestly was halfway tempted to eat the lizard thing. That was why I had stuffed down the bar without hesitation. I got strange looks from the group when I came back covered in blood.

I swung my rifle around, and slammed a fresh clip into place. Stowing the empty clip in the side pouch of my backpack quickly. How many clips did I have left? Three clips came with my gun normally. Then I got three extra which were safely snuggled in my bag because I'd only chosen the one gun.

So five full clips one empty one. That wasn't enough, but one soldier could only carry so much weight. I was stronger than the average soldier so I could carry more than usual, but the others weren't supposed to know that. Had I been allowed to be alone out here than I wouldn't even bother using a gun. We spread out again slowly as the panic of getting attacked faded.

The fact that no one was badly injured made a couple of the kids in our group a little ballsy. Idiots, I thought to myself as they started letting the creatures get a little too close. I let them pull their stupid shit. A few injuries would wipe out any smug stupid thoughts circling their minds. I shot a two more Sneks out of the trees.

40 xp awarded. 265/800 xp until level 8.

Savannah killed one herself, and rushed to collect the crystals before I could. She was serious about not letting me absorb anymore crystals. What did I care anyways? The xp I got from the crystals was nothing when compared to what I got from killing the creatures. If it kept up like this I'd be able to level up before the end of the weekend.