Another?

"..right, that was my job," I shook my head as it all started coming back to me. My life as an orphan was considered okay considering the fact that the village basically took care of me. I wasn't the only orphan either. There were others. We were all the children of the village of Vesra. An orphan popping up in this village was abnormal as the village was quite a ways out of the nearest city.

Normally it would be abnormal, but about 19 years ago, a monster surge had occurred in the area. One that lasted for four years, leaving many of the villages that used to be around this area wiped off the face of the world. When it was over, in the scavenging efforts that Vesra had conducted, orphans such as myself were found. We were brought over to the village, and since then the village raised all of us.

Not out of only the pure goodness of their heart of course. Its hard for even the nicest of folks to just do something good because they could. The village of Vesra had lost people in the surge. It could be said that the orphans were an investment of sorts. Of course they were doing it also as an act of grace. Not many would willingly take the risk of feeding more mouths and raising them just to gain back the numbers lost.

There were seven of us that were orphaned and raised by the village. Differing ages, the oldest is six years older then the youngest. The youngest is just one year younger then myself. Three of us had awakened our systems. Kaden, the oldest had gained his when he was six years old. Jayce had his awakened when he was 10, and Lyra, the youngest, awakened hers when she was four years old.

Sounds like Lyra and Kaden would have the most advantage since they had their systems awaken earlier in their life, right? While yes it would be good to have it awakened early, not everyone can put to use the advantage of awakening the system early on. The reason? It's because of the weak bodies that one would have at that age. The system does give skills to, theoretically, everything, but the skills that one wants for magic, martial arts, or even a profession, can't be gained with a weak body. Usually of course. Kaden was born with a strong body. Since he was four years old it could be seen that he was born extraordinary, as he was found eating an adolescent lion, which after investigation, he killed by his own hands.

With the system, Kaden was able to gain skills that strengthened himself to the point where he is as strong as three of our strongest hunters in the village. Being so gifted, even without the system, he was adopted by the village chief along with Lyra. Who is also said to be talented, yet none can say what in. Jayce, after getting the system, advanced on the path of becoming a scholar of sorts. Which was praised by the village chief, since that would mean we could send someone to the capital for one to bring honor to Vesra. Along with other benefits of course.

There are seven other children that were system holders, originating from the village. They all became farmers, village guardsman, or hunters as they grew up. Many others in the village among the adults held systems also. All their skills and abilities, seemed to benefit the things they did individually within the village.

'And now I have one of my own,' I thought to myself. "Heh, who knew being apprenticed to the butcher would save my life one day," I said aloud. I thought back to the time where all I was basically doing, when I was able to do so on my own, was eat. So much so, that the village head had called me a glutton, which wasn't necessarily incorrect. It would've been fine if I was able to hunt, but I got so big that it was apparent I wouldn't even be able to hunt.

It was nice enough that they didn't kick me out of the village when I was ten and unable to do anything. I shake my head, as the thoughts of my own mind threatened to overwhelm me with the constant reminder of how I was a shitty orphan. "Clap!" The sound of my hands hitting my cheeks to motivate myself to get up. Things were going to be different now.

I had gotten up and headed over to the dead wolf.

[Wolf(Starving): Dead]

[Body condition: Salvageable]

[Job: Butcher(3) detected...]

[Storage Space... Unavailable]

[Interface updated]

[Job: Butcher(3) in effect]

After that long list of system messages, the body condition option updated and added something new to it.

[Salvageable parts highlighted]

Seeing that message, I saw the body of the wolf in new colors. Literally. Looking at the wolf there were colors, of red, green, yellow, even black. Peering closer, I could make out what the colors themselves meant in this case. Green meant that part was salvageable, in this case it would be the right foreleg. Highlighted yellow was the tongue and teeth of the wolf, I'm assuming would mean that the part is salvageable but would be tricky to handle. Unless the colors mean what part would be better to take? But that wouldn't make sense because teeth would be more valuable then the right foreleg and the tail of the wolf.

Continuing on that train of thought, that the colors indicated chances of successfully salvaging something, the red was pretty much everywhere else on the wolf that seemed to be unsalvageable at all to me due to the extensive damage it accumulated.

"Black though?" I wondered out loud. Looking at the right hind leg, I couldn't come up with why it was highlighted that way. Then I saw that although this leg looked almost as good condition as the right foreleg, it had a small cut that one would've missed if they weren't paying attention.

[Poisoned Wolf Leg]

A text appeared in my vision. "Poison?" I asked. Looking closer at the small cut, I realized that the cut must've been from one of the plants around here. Seeing that the poison was not spreading outwards, it must've just paralyzed the right hindleg. Seemed to be a pretty potent poison though, since such a small cut had done this.

Ignoring the right hind leg for now, I cracked my fingers as I got to work on the wolf. Reaching down to my side and pulling my satchel I carried with me, I pulled out my hunting tools. In them I took out what I needed to take what I needed from the wolf.

I started with the fur, although yes it was unsalvageable, I needed to remove it so I could harvest the rest without issue. After cutting through it and avoiding the right hind leg, I completed harvesting it.

[Grey Wolf Fur(Poor)]

'Interesting. I thought that because it highlighted red, it would mean that it was completely unsalvageable, but maybe the colors indicate the condition?' My thoughts were confirmed as I was working on the right foreleg and the green color was losing some of it's brightness. Yellow tinges immediately appeared after I messed up trying to carve the leg out and messed up by narrow. Missing a sizeable amount of meat underneath.

After a short period of time I managed to salvage the parts I needed to eat and what I could carry with me. Checking the list of notifications, I saw what I had.

[Wolf Meat{Right Leg}(Fine)]

[Wolf Meat(Good) x4]

[Wolf Tooth(Good) x39]

[Wolf Paw(Poor)]

Waving away the notifications from my view, I look down at the meat that I had in front of me and there it was again. Something I had ignored because of my excitement with the system. The hunger. The whole situation came back reeling. The rush I felt viewing my system was gone now.

I had come to the ruins that was three days worth of travel out from the village because I read something in one of the books that I had gotten from one of the trade caravans that had come through, about how the ruins here may have housed a relic of Randere. The great warrior of the bygone era. Said to have had lived without a system his whole life and still managed to become one of the strongest people of that age.

Surely, I had thought, he would have left a powerful weapon in his home. Randere was known to have come from these mountains. These ruins were the city that he belonged to once. The name of which was lost through time.

Yes, it was stupid to think that there would be something that would be here given that these ruins aren't hidden away. Surely there must've been countless numbers of people that had come here, and looted it, right? Right. Yet, in the book, there was a diary of a male attendant in Randere's employ. Discussing of how there was a secret stair case hidden beneath the well of Randere's garden.

The male attendant even described about how right before the master had walked down there, there was a specific stone on the well's entrance the master had pushed before walking down there with one of his equipment's and walked out without it. He wrote about how he swore to the master he would never reveal it, and how he reveled in how much the master trusted him to keep this secret.

I had thought about how this was going to be my chance at becoming something that could help the village. I was tired of just being butcher boy. So I packed supplies, and told the village lead guardsman I was going out foraging for valuables to bring back to help pay for the upcoming tax collection. After informing them, I was off.

I did not know what I was getting into. The ruins themselves weren't dangerous. The hounding beasts of the forest were. I knew about hunting and surviving in the wild enough as the next villager. Yet, those... monsters that I saw out there near the front of the city walls were unrelenting.

Not even the first night that I had gotten near here, I was attacked. I had ran with all that I could towards the nearest building in these ruins, and hid. Closing the door behind me as I stupidly left my pack with majority of my supplies.

From then on, I had decided that I would try to find the relic and then leave. Finding and hunting what I could to eat as I headed back towards the village. Yet plans are only good until you actually enact them. Even the goal of finding the relic was laid to waste, as I headed over to the well only to find it had collapsed in on itself.

I had tried for hours to dig through what I could, only to see that the collapse seemed to be all the way through. I did not have any type of food or water to last the dig. I had tried to head out of the ruins, but those monsters were out and about. I didn't even know what they were, but I knew I couldn't put myself up against them. They would never come into the ruins though. Only the wolves had.

So I had tried lure wolves in so I could hunt them. That only led to a pack of them running after me, only for me to end up hiding in a building once again. I had tried leaving the next day, but the wolves had stuck around for some reason. They had for... I don't know how long. Being exhausted, starving, and practically dying of thirst, I had fallen asleep a lot.

Day and night had blended together, until they had left one morning. I had taken the chance to walk out despite how weak I had felt. Luck did not seem to smile on me at all, as a wolf had appeared in the ruins as I was walking out the building. The one that I had cut down in its attack.

Eagerly, I had to will myself to not just eat the meat as it was, I ran back to the building I was holed up at for a while. What seemed like a ruin at least. Sweating and aching the whole way there, I got to the wooden door.

After a pain staking effort, I finally broke down the wooden door enough to make a wooden pile in front of the building. Pulling out my flint and stone from the satchel, I got to work on lighting the wood.

I take wooden dowels out of the the satchel, and stick them through the Fine wolf meat that I had. Lips dried, I lick them in anticipation I pulled out my seasonings that I packed. After seasoning the wolf meat, I held it out over the open fire that had been made.

It wasn't long before I felt my hunger compel me to eat the meat. Just as it had gotten ready. It was strange, but I ate willingly. My face must've looked funny from the outside perspective, as I was smiling while engorging myself.

"It tastes soo good! Bringing my seasonings was the best idea ever!" I mumbled through the meat out loud. I thought, 'the texture of this meat is amazing too! Is it the [Fine] condition? There isn't a lot of meat that even I prepared, that tasted this good. And I tasted a lot of meat. Or is that just hunger?' Just before my thoughts could spiral into a tangent, my vision was clouded in text.

[Two Title(s) pending...]

[Title found]

[He who is one with Food(+)]

[Title must be assigned to be used as primary for effects to be used fully... Title: "He who is one with food" activates at half capability... Error... Title: "One who walks with Death" activates... Title: "He who is one with food" not assigned as primary title... ERRO... Title: "The one who walks with Death" temporarily activates fully... System updated... Title: "He who is one with food" activates at full capability...]

[Title effect activated... Wolf Meat(Fine) consumed... +2 HP... +1 vitality... 5% of Max HP recovered for x hours for the next eight hours... Holder is one with Wolf{Starving}… Holder gains associated skills...]

[Title: "One who walks with Death" effect activated... Meat acquired from Holder's Kill... Title effect loading... Title: "One who walks with Death" activates... Title: "He who is one with Food" effect synergizes with Title: "One who walks with Death"]

[Synergy Effect activated... +1 Vitality... Hidden Stats Increase.. +2 to Soul... +1 Constitution...]

[Title: "One who walks with Death" effect activates {Spirit Acquisition}… Attempt Failed Previously... Soul is already in the.. Synergy Effect detected... Meat consumed from Holder's kill... Meat activated Title: "He who is one with food"... Condition of Meat... Wolf Meat meets condition...]

[Spirit Acquisition, attempts to capture spiritual essence within Wolf Meat... Title: "He who is one with Food" activates... Holder is "ONE" with Wolf... Success]

[Title: "One who walks with Death" activates... Spiritual Essence forms into ??… Spirit is unknown and unnamed... Achievement Earned... Title Generated... "He who gave life to a Spirit"... ER... Title: "One who walks with Death" absorbs new title and its effects through consuming with the Synergy Effect... ?? is curious of holder... ?? doesn't know what curious is... ?? is effected by two titles and their Synergy Effect... ?? absentmindedly takes space within the Holder's left shoulder]

[Spirit Tab created...]

[Spirit: ??… System knowledge updated]

[Title: "One who walks with Death" effects Spirit: ??… Spirit: ?? doesn't understand ... Title activates again... Spirit Assimilation Activates... Spirit: ?? has assimilated to Holder... Holder's Knowledge was used... Spirit: ?? is newly born... Spirit: ?? only learns how to express itself... Title: "One who walks with Death" effects Spirit: ??]

[Spirit: ?? expresses that Title: "One who walks with Death" is satisfied... Spirit: ?? also expresses Title: "He who is one with Food" is afraid of Title: "One who walks with Death"... Title: "One who walks with Death" is satisfied... Spirit: ?? is curious...]

Now that was a lot of messages... All from eating one piece of meat? I would have had more time to ponder but my eyes were going black now. 'Is this going to happen all the time whenever these title things show up?' I thought.

[Spirit: ?? expresses itself... Spirit: ?? is currently cheerful towards the Holder...]

[Title: "One who walks with Death" rears a cheerful smile, Spirit: ?? expresses... Cheerful like Wolf looking at food, Spirit: ?? expresses]

"Hey you!! Get moving, Goblin Platoon incoming!" Someone yelled in the distance, as my vision darkened.

"YOU DEAF!?! RUN YOU MORONIC FU-"

'Who's voice was that?' I had thought as I fell to the ground, face towards the noise. All sounds jumbled up and fell quieter and quieter as my vision was darkening. All that processed in my head slowly as I thought back to the last confusing system notification I got.

[Title: Pending…]

'There's another?"