Primitive Ways

"How can you survive the jungle?"

Yao Guai recalled a question he found on the internet before his life went to hell. As a curious person and educated person, he had researched a little bit about survival strategies and pictured multiple scenarios of how to keep one's self alive if a plane where to crash whenever he was bored.

Throwing thoughts about his knowledge of soul land being out of sync to the current time period, Yao Guai went to work. Hungry and thirsty, he first had to solve the issue regarding the need to drink. A man can survive multiple days without food but leave them without water for 3 days and a dehydrated corpse would greet your eyes.

Leaving the cave again, his steps were slow and careful to not step on any twigs in fear of breaking them and producing more noise. The forest he was in was similar to a classroom, being quiet and lowkey leads to safety while being loud and obnoxious would draw the attention of the teacher, otherwise known as the apex predator. Same rules apply at the moment but if a sufficiently strong beast locks their eyes on the defenseless child, they might as well sit down and embrace death.

'As if I would wan't that.' Yao Guai had resolved himself to succeed. To do so, one must be careful and one must use their wits. Adapting to the environment no matter how bad things get. Yet to realize his status, Yao Guai failed to overlook his current mentality. The happy go lucky drunkard personality had long since vanished at the prospect of a new start. He had subconsciously slipped back to his old business minded self.

Careful, observant, resourceful and determined. He had drunk himself dead just to distract him, to forget the emotional scars paining him. Being tossed in what he could only speculate as the great star dou forest did more good than harm at the present, Yao Guai simply had no time to think too much of the past, all of his attention was drawn towards surviving.

Managing to make his way towards some thick vines hugging a tree, the reincarnated businessman grabbed a decently smooth fist sized rock. Stepping back a few feet, he threw the rock at the vines.

No reaction.

On edge, he kept on repeating it for five times and finally nodded. Yao Guai approached the tree blanketed by green thick vines and tore off the upper section of a vine. Countless sources of water exist in the wild, and thick vines were one of them, often times full of clear water or poisonous sap.

"This is no good." He shook his head and opted to just collect as much vines as possible. The vines he had found dripped with white sap, making the chance of the liquid being poisonous absurdly high. Wishing to take zero chances, he threw away the idea of drinking the liquid from the green vines and instead harvested them to be used later for other purposes.

A few moments later and Yao Guai was a few bundles of vines richer. Winding the vines across his chest and waist, Yao Guai continued to snoop around, making sure to be careful as possible. If he saw a strange looking plant he would stray far from it. Spirit beasts were not only mammals or reptiles. Spirit beasts can be in the form of plants too. And these plants were the most dangerous to him due to their possibly poisonous properties and stealth.

On his journey to find sustenance, catching sights of spirit beasts became the norm, out of fear of being detected, Yao Guai went as far as to roll on the ground and attache branches onto his clothes using vines to secure them. Succeeding in making a makeshift ghillie suit.

The makeshift ghillie suit did wonders for his security, leaves helped him blend into the forest and his scent that smelled like leaves or the earth prevented being sniffed out by strong nosed spirit beasts.

Yao Guai leaned back on a tree, a pack of gray wolves passed behind his tree, he watched nervously while crossing his fingers. The wolves stopped to sniff the air, his heart went cold and he prepared to climb if things headed south.

Yip! Yip! The leader barked and the wolf pack left. Yao Guai clutched his chest, one eye twitching.

'I nearly died...' Breathing a sigh of relief, he continued looking around and soon found more vines. Checking for danger, the vines were deemed as safe and upon snapping some, clear water trickled out of it and Yao Guai rejoiced. Drinking mouthfuls of clean water, Yao Guai made sure to re-hydrate himself and mark the position of the tree that had water vines hanging from it in his mind. Keeping track of the direction and how far it was from the cave.

Water crisis solved, Yao Guai started looking for edible fruits instead. He found some berries and opted to scratch them onto his skin. Moments later, the scratched part turned slightly red, sending danger signals all throughout his body as he threw the berries away.

"Fuck that shit." He cussed at the red berries, there was no way he was eating something that he wasn't sure if it was poisonous or not. He wanted to look for more fruits and try other herbs but the experience with the first berry sent his mind screaming at him. He was paranoid, and sometimes being paranoid was better than not. This nature saved him from setbacks and scams multiple times.

Completely giving up on eating food from plants, he collected sticks and stones from the ground instead. Choosing to return back to the cave.

The journey home lasted a few minutes and by the time he had returned to the cave, it was already a bit past lunchtime. Eating can wait, as far as Yao Guai could remember, before they were besieged by a lot of spirit beasts, the previous him had a pretty decent breakfast of meat and bread.

Yao Guai worked on the cave instead, gathering large sticks, leaves, branches, and fallen logs before setting them by the cave entrance. A few useful vines and angles did well in making the cave isolated from the outside world. It was hidden and any animal who would pass by won't think that a cave was hiding behind all the mess of sticks and leaves. The inside of the cave was bare stone, he set down a lot of leaves on the ground to form a temporary bed.

As for the idea of humans finding this place, Yao Guai surmised that he was decently far into the forest enough that meeting people would be a rare occurrence. And in the scenario of it happening, he would either be unlucky or lucky.

With a temporary source of water and a shelter that was made suitable for his stay, Yao Guai started thinking of his next course of action. He summoned the card, fiddled with it and unsummoned it quickly.

"I need to get out of this place. But I can't do that right now." The forest was dangerous and trying to leave it would be a perilous march. Afraid to admit it, Yao Guai was lost, regarding this matter he couldn't be blamed. Afterall, he had just recently woken up in this world, is it really expected for him to know the land so well right off the bat?

Having an idea, he shouted to the air a bunch of voice commands. Status, system, hello? He tried all he could think of and no Ding resounded in his head.

"Screw systems anyway." Yao Guai snorted. He didn't need something like that. But it wasn't bad to try and check if he really had one.

He could head out right now and look for something to kill, something like a rabbit but Yao Guai did not wish to try his luck right now. First of all, he was not prepared nor was he a former trained military member or something. At best, he was just a cautious and smart businessman who knew how to keep himself calm.

At a lost, it was better to do something productive instead of sitting on his ass daydreaming. Browsing through his items, after using vines to conceal his shelter, there were still a hefty amount of it left. And he had brought with him rough irregular rocks and long sticks the thickness of two human fingers.

In the forest, there was another reliable source of food instead of plants. They were animals.

Yao Guai was confident in his chances of killing weak ten year spirit beasts. They were only slightly stronger and more durable than normal animals afterall. And he was one to pick his battles.

The make shift ghillie suit would allow him to be able to go around the forest undetected as long as he moves slow and carefully while making sure not to wander too deep into the area. What he needed to do was to prepare. He needed a weapon and he needed a trap.

The interior of the cave was a bit dark. It extends a little bit deeper into the earth but it comes to a dead end quickly. As close as he was to the entrance, he could only rely on the light outside to see a little inside. Grabbing a rock and a stick, Yao Guai started sharpening it. Crafting five sets of wooden spear like sharp sticks, he yawned.

He had already done a decent bit of work today. And having not eaten, Yao Guai wishes to conserve his energy for the hunt tomorrow. Sleeping on a bed and blanket of leaves, he fell asleep while thinking of future plans.