Chapter 14 - Planning (2)

His mind made up, Alex decided to set off for the pond, where he'd previously encountered the other deer. On his way, he decided to practice something he'd previously written off as impractical - traveling across the treetops. With his new vertical jump and increased strength, climbing most trees was a breeze, and he was confident he'd be able to jump between most trees.

Picking a tree, he began his ascent, jumping up to one of the low hanging branches on the tree, and pulling himself up. There he tested his balance, using the branch as a balance beam. To his surprise, it was quite easy - the cognition stat was paying off in spades, improving the neural connection through his spine to his feet, and letting him make minor movements more easily, greatly enhancing his balance. Feeling quite confident in his abilities, he decided to jump to a branch on an adjacent tree 2 meters away.

Despite having to duck beneath another branch middair, he managed to land safely on the new tree branch, and he continued running along, reaching the trunk. Not stopping, he jumped to a different branch, and after pulling himself up, he continued his journey along the tree branch before continuing onto a new tree.

Alex practiced jumping from tree to tree, and he started incorporating his arms as well, using it to help him catch otherwise impossible branches to reach, and using it to transfer his momentum around. All in all, he felt he could move around half the speed he could on the ground, which was quite excellent, all things considered.

Returning to the ground, Alex continued his trek towards the pond. Even at his new speed, it would still take him another 5 minutes to get there, and he didn't need to be stealthy before he got there. The only risk was running into the demon bear, but Alex was taking a calculated risk, and he was reasonably confident in his ability to avoid being ambushed with his water senses. With his increase in soul force, and his upgraded cognition stat, he had a decent visual sense of everything with water in a 15m radius, and that included everything that bled.

If he sensed something moving, he'd immediately escape up the nearest tree. With how lazy the demon bear was, he was quite confident he'd be able to escape before he got labeled gourmet.

Fortunately, Alex was able to reach the pond before midday. This time however, he wasn't interested in waiting around, and he jumped up into the trees. It was time to scout out the surrounding areas.

Traveling atop the tree branches he continued heading east, deeper into the forest. He entered a dense area of the forest filled with greenery and underbrush. He then closed his eyes and began focusing on the sounds around him, pickout out various sounds and patterns.

Birds chirping, squirrels chattering, the wind causing trees to twist and groan, and finally, the sound of something digging in the earth. Tilting his head, Alex did his best to triangulate where the sound was coming from, he then started following his ears, and slowly creeping along the branches, started making his way from tree to tree. Eventually he found the source of the noise, it was a boar digging for roots, grubs or mushrooms under a fallen log. Unfortunately, the pig wasn't quite what he was looking for, it was still too heavy for him to carry back, and the volume of leather he'd get, while good, would likely be much easier to get hunting deer.

'I'll find you again, I could use some bacon.'

Alex continued along, putting some distance between himself and the boar, before he dropped down to the ground. He was better off finding another location, as this seemed to be boar territory. He continued traveling deeper into the forest, again on the lookout for dense vegetation.

Finally, after searching for another hour, he came across another potential candidate. It was a section of thick underbrush, but he noted a few small, barely noticeable trails through the thicket, where the foliage looked particularly trimmed. Taking note, he again ascended into the treeline, where he followed the trail. As he passed along, he noted the trail splitting and curving, branching out to cover much of the thicket. It took him a while to map it out, Alex estimated the trail stretched close to 600m in a few directions.

Alex then centered himself on what he estimated was the center of the trail, where he waited high in the branches. Bored, he drew some water from his deer stomach water flask, and began practicing his water control. He split the water into many little branches and streams hanging in the air, encircling himself in a small cocoon of watery veins.

About 3 hours before sundown, the deer finally appeared, coming from one of the many diverging paths, and crossing through the center of its territory, below Alex. This was another small deer by Earth's standards, again coming in at no more than 70 or 80 pounds. After reaching the center of the paths, it took another branching path, causing Alex to follow.

He followed the deer for another 15 minutes, before it entered a small clearing, where it stopped to graze on some soft looking leaves. Excited, Alex began slowly descending from the tree, instead of coating himself in mud, he'd simply left over 50m between himself and the deer, confident that he wouldn't be smelled until he got close.

After he got close, he took some of his water, shooting it off like a bullet where it collided with some leaves, creating a loud splash. Startled, the deer took off running away from where it had heard the noise, however Alex had planned for this, putting the deer between himself and where he'd shot the water, meaning the deer was coming straight for him.

Just as the deer was about to run underneath the branch where Alex was hiding, he dropped from the branch and landed in a neat roll, where he came up and quickly stabbed out at the deer, aiming to puncture a lung, or its heart in its chest.

The deer reacted shockingly quickly even despite its panic, managing to change its direction slightly, and instead only took the spear hit directly to its shoulder. The hit caused the deer to veer off course, and stumble, crashing into a nearby tree. Alex, having lost hold of his spear, as it was embedded in the deer's shoulder, drew his dager, and quickly approached the fallen creature.

Despite its wounds the deer was quick to recover, staggering upright, where it glared at Alex.

'Just like the prior deer, once wounded, they become quite aggressive.'

The deer proceeded to charge at Alex, its head lowered as it prepared to gore him with its horns. Alex, unperturbed, waited for the deer to enter his range before he proceeded to give the spear jutting from its shoulder a solid kick, causing the deer to once again stumble and fall at Alex's feet, stunned. As he leaned down to slit the deer's throat, it kicked out at him with its good leg, causing Alex to step back. Clearly the deer wasn't tired enough.

As the deer was trying to once again stand up, Alex managed to grab the spear and yank it out of its shoulder, causing its wound to further open and continue bleeding. The deer tried running, but due to its wounded gait, Alex was able to easily keep pace, continuing to stalk the deer from about 20m back. His plan was just to tire the deer out, even with its enhanced recovery due to mana, the wound he'd given the deer was too severe for it to survive..

After another 5 minutes, the deer collapsed, and Alex ended its life with his dagger. He frowned, somewhat disappointed his hunt had ended this way, he much preferred the defiant fight to the death with the prior deer, even despite the danger.

'Not the most ethical hunting practice, but I'm not exactly armed with a high powered rifle.'

Alex gutted the deer, and bled it out before carrying the carcass back to the clearing. There he cooked up the deer meat, while harvesting the hide and intestines. It was still an hour before dark, so Alex finished a full workout before everything was done cooking.

He'd eat half the deer meat tonight, and smoke the rest.

As night fell, Alex prepped himself to stalk some murder chickens. He headed north, along the river, he figured there was a nest of some form in that direction, having encountered several of the creatures over there. His rage demanded that he wipe out at least a nest.

After reaching the spot with the pitfall trap, he knelt down and examined the trap - something had picked the corpse of the trapped chicken clean.

Senses extended, he continued heading north for another kilometer, whereby he was greeted with his first sighting of one of the creatures.

Moving along the forest floor, stalking a squirrel was a murder chicken, lying low to the ground, it slowly approached the squirrel, doing its best to stay in the squirrels blind spot. The squirrel was hugging the tree, perhaps a meter off the ground - it seemed to be surveying its surroundings, looking for potential sources of food.

Alex, not wanting to be found out, put a tree between himself and the chicken. He'd rely on his water sight to keep him informed on what was going on.

The squirrel started scurrying up the tree, remaining blissfully aware of the lurking death on the ground floor, just meters away. The chicken, or perhaps more aptly named raptor, pounced, reaching a height roughly 2 meters off the ground, where it chomped the squirrel between its jaws.

'I guess I'm not the only one with a solid vertical around here.'

It then landed, and tore at the squirrel with its forelegs, shaking its head like a dog with a bone. It then held one end of the squirrel on the ground with its claws and pulled, neck muscles straining, until eventually, the squirrel tore in half. Not even stopping to remove the squirrels guts or carefully eat the animal, the murder chicken proceeded to swallow the squirrel halves whole.

'Damn savages.'

After consuming the squirrel, the creature wandered off in another direction, Alex quietly stalking his prey from the treetops.

Half an hour later, he noticed the creature giving a strange loud squawk, before hearing several replies in the distance. Minutes later, several other murder chickens appeared, who seemed to stop and give eachother some chirps, conversing a little, before setting off in a new direction.

Somewhat concerned, Alex increased his distance. The point here was to scout, not fight 5 until he knew exactly what he was getting himself into.

After following the creatures for roughly another kilometer, they slowed their pace, lowering their noses to the ground. It seemed something had piqued their interest. The creatures spread out, fanning out around a large swathe of underbrush. Alex watched from the treetops with interest as they proceeded to completely encircle a section of brush.

After another 2 minutes, it seemed the murder chickens were in position, and one rushed into the clearing, after which a squeal could be heard. Out of the thicket, a small boar ran, with a murder chicken stuck to its back, jaws clamped tightly on the hide of its back. The creature on its back started slicing into the boar's belly with its claws, which prompted the boar to try to give out a loud squeal, where it seemed to stop, and consider the creature clinging to it. From there, the boar did its best to body slam the creature, landing on its side and crushing the chicken beneath it, knocking it off.

Unfortunately for the boar, this action slowed it down substantially, allowing the other chickens to close on it, one leaping at its now exposed belly, with another attacking its flank. Overwhelmed the boar struggled, and in its thrashing about, it managed to gore one of the murder chickens, much to Alex's glee.

However, after the remaining two chickens arrived on the scene, the boar was finished, quickly succumbing to multiple injuries. There the remaining four chickens dug into the boar, ripping off chunks of flesh, which they swallowed.

After devouring around half the boar, they did something that surprised Alex, as they began working together to drag the remains of the carcass in a new direction. Surprised, he followed them for another 1.5 km over the course of the next hour. The boar was large, and they were rather small, significantly reducing their speed.

Their destination turned out to be a large cave, into which they proceeded to drag the carcass. Alex was rather unsure of what was in the cave, but caution demanded that he wait.

After another half hour, he was greeted by a surprising scene, not that of anything leaving the cave, but more creatures entering. This time, they were carrying what looked like a small deer carcass.

'How many of them are inside that cave?'

'Time to find out.'

Ensuring that the coast was clear, Alex began scouting the surrounding area, looking for an appropriately sized rock. After finding one roughly double the size of his fist, he slowly climbed down, and grabbed the rock.

'Time to make some noise.'

Alex positioned himself so he was a solid 120m away from the cave, he then aimed the stone at the entrance to the cave. While not having a particularly accurate throw, he was confident in his ability to hit the cave even at this distance, as it was quite a big target. He then hurled the rock into the air, and listened as it crashed down onto the stone at the entrance of the cave.

The crash was loud, shattering the silence of the night. Not wanting to be identified as the culprit, Alex quickly ascended one of the trees near him, trying to get to a decent height. After he reached around the 15m mark, he turned around to watch the ensuing chaos.

He watched as 12 of the murder chickens seemingly spawned from the cave, spilling out into the forest, where they began fanning out around the entrance of the cave, trying to identify the source of the noise.

Just as he thought it was over, he was greeted by a shocking sight, as a creature maybe triple the size of the other murder chickens exited the cave.

While the other murder chickens may have been characterized as just that, this was a full blown raptor. It stood almost a meter tall off the ground, and from head to tail, it was probably around a little over two meters. It was feathered just like its juniors, coloured in a dull green brown, and as it moved, it gave off a hypnotic grace, characteristic of that of a predator. Both its arms and legs ended in long claws, roughly two to three inches in length and shining a bright white in the moonlight.

'Looks like we have the leader of this gang.'

'Were the carcasses being dragged into the cave offerings?'

Alex watched as the creatures fanned out around the entrance to the cave, trying to identify what had happened. One of the creatures stopped before the rock he'd thrown, giving it a sniff, before it proceeded to release a loud clucking gurgle, alerting the other chickens. The other chickens turned their heads to look at what this chicken was going on about, before they wandered over, giving the rock a sniff.

The rest of the chickens started running around the forest, circling the area around the cave, their noses low to the ground. It seemed they were determined to track the source of the smell, which had disturbed them.

The alpha on the other hand appeared highly uninterested in the affair, and returned to its cave.

Watching the chickens scanning the forest in search of him, Alex decided it was time to go.

'I should probably go, I definitely don't want to fight 12 of these things, or alert the alpha.'

'Not a bad day of information gathering.'

He quickly headed towards the clearing, moving through the treetops until he'd put around 2 km between himself and the cave, where he returned to ground level. Upon returning to the clearing, Alex stored away his now smoked meat, and went to bed.