It tasted more like beef than chicken, with rubbery, giblet filled flesh that refused to be chewed. Almost like cancerous lumps had infested every inch of its body. I swallowed each giblet whole, feeling the residual warmth of the cooling corpse as they slid down my throat. Its sticky, black blood stuck to my face. I ignored the fetid smell completely. I couldn’t stop. The mana inside of the meat made my teeth itch. Twice, I nearly choked, rushing to swallow before I felt the urge to vomit. I ate until the viscous blood running down my neck dried and peeled and flaked. I ate until I felt nauseous. And I kept eating.

Then I heard something. The shuffle of dirt. At first I ignored it, opting to continue eating until there was no experience left to be gained. Then I heard it again. I spun around, staring between the forest trees. Only some feet away, a hell chicken stared back at me. It clucked, looking between me, the corpse, and the roost. I pounced forward, [Scratching] and tearing into its throat before it had time to react.

It reeled back, freshly gored flesh dangling from its neck, emitting a pained cry. I gave it no lee way, pouncing upon my third kill, and my 7th use of [Scratch]. I felt it wear on me. Out of curiosity, I called out my status for my remaining AP.

AP: 5/12

Almost out. It wouldn’t be safe to hunt anymore. I glanced downwards.

As I looked down at the monster’s cooling corpse, I suddenly had a perturbing thought.

I was still hungry.

On my hands and knees, I wretched at the base of a great bamboo shoot, leaning an arm against it for support. Three chickens was way, way too much food. Well, if you could call the raw, slimy meat, disjointedly glued together by black blood food. Black dyed bile leaked from my mouth, covering the ground in a hideous slime.

I felt my nails dig into the tree. How long had it been since I fell onto that first prey? I had been hunting without stop since, carried by the exhilaration. But now, brought to my hands and knees and to the point of exhaustion, I felt my body pound its demand for sleep into my mind.

Delirious, weary, and sore, I laid against the bamboo, the fetid scent of my own vomit overwhelming me.

Did I overeat because I was starving? I heard that people tend to do that. Where did I hear that? Was it grade school? Or was it… no, it was on Drifters.

Weary and beaten, enraptured in my thoughts, I drifted to sleep.

I awoke to a pounding headache and a vicious hunger, a fire ignited inside of me.

I rubbed the grogginess from my eyes, and immediately felt part of my face erupt in pain. I screamed, falling onto my face, and looking at my hands. Blood dripped down my right index finger, hanging from a multi inch long, black nail. Its textured surface created valleys and rivers for blood to flow through. “This must be the [Talons] debuff...”

My right eye was obscured by a curtain of red.

“Fuck! Shit!” I exclaimed in pain. I had to heal, and fast. This world was dangerous. The corpses of my previous hunts were far behind in the forest. They were…

I looked up, examining my surroundings with one good eye and the other veiled in a curtain of blood. Where the fuck am I? Excited to hunt, I had dove deeper and deeper into the forest. My stomach rumbled. Careful to keep my inch long nails away from my face, I rubbed my eyes with my palms before standing up. I felt a voracious appetite rage inside me.

I needed to heal.

I needed to eat.

I lurked through the bamboo shoots, hunting for new prey. Stalking in the ending, eerie red light felt familiar. The red light had almost grown calming, even if I was in a constant struggle for survival now.

I nearly jumped when the bamboo shoot next to me erupted into splinters of wet wood, showering my face. The Hell Chicken’s [Scratch] easily ripped through it, sending it toppling towards me. These creatures were far more intelligent than I had given them credit for- but I had no time to think about that.

I felt much more agile as I stepped out of the way, the bamboo tree missing me by what felt like a hair’s width. My eyes flicked to the chicken, foot still raised. It leaned back, opening its mouth to roar. Not that I would let it. I [Scratched], a fountain of sickly black blood shouting out where I ripped apart the monster's neck. My scratch, now level 3, no longer just cut and tore the beasts skin, instead ripping apart sinuous muscle and fat. It coughed, a terrible, wet cough, that splattered out blackened globs. I [Scratched] again, fully separating its head from its neck.

“Hahaha…” I laughed from exhilaration. My skill had grown more powerful. It must have been doing... I inspected the monster again.

Hell Chicken

0/200

“Hahaha!” I laughed again. More than 100 a strike! An incredibly powerful skill. It couldn’t have been doing more than 60 at first! I was so enraptured by the thrill of my own power that I didn’t notice the second Hell Chicken approach. I should have known better, considering all of them lived in pairs.

I tasted its mana before I saw or heard it. I tensed. My back erupted in pain where its talons raked it before I could react. I screamed in pain. I turned in anger, already [Scratching]. My [Talons] carved through the monster’s, our scratches meeting, filling the air with a disturbing sound of metal shearing bone. The monster flinched. It only lasted a second, but it was enough. I sank my [Talons] into it, activated [Scratch], and ripped apart its flesh.

I fell on it before it even hit the ground, my hunger exacerbated by the wounds on my body and the rush of combat, tearing chunks of its flesh out. I felt the wounds on my body knit themselves back together bite by bite.

Tutorial initialized

Quest:

Hunt Hell Chickens: 5/10

Name: Damon

Level: 5

Skills:

Title: None

Class: Devourer

[Scratch] Lvl. 5 | [Talons] Lvl. 5

HP: 500/500

AP: 15/15

Strength: 10

Constitution: 10

Dexterity: 15

Perception: 10

I looked at my status. It was a fresh day. I think. There was still no sign of day or night in this red stained hell. I had noticed after eating the fifth chicken- I had stopped leveling up. I could feel it, even though there was no EXP- eating them wasn’t doing anything for my level, instead only helping my skills.

Also, my nails had grown comically large.

I smashed a rock into them again. So far, my attempts to find some way to trim them had failed.. Now they were at least four inches long, pitch black, and ended in an even finer point than before.

I found a simple solution while I was trying to think of a way to cut them shorter. I probably would’ve face palmed, if not for the risk of cutting my own face off, when I realized how simple a solution was available to me.

I [Scratched], cutting one set of the nails off, then I [Scratched] again, removing the other. My nails were surely ungainly, but trimmed. They grew back at an insane rate anyway, though I noticed it was slowing as I leveled [Scratch].

I made my way back into the red forest, looking for more prey. Today, I would finish leveling my scratch skill. Tomorrow, I could track down that wolf…. And leave this shithole.

At least, that was my plan.

I had been paying more attention to my environment. It was a harsh lesson learned through what I’m sure was a set of fresh scars on my back. I mean, even if I wasn’t paying attention with renewed vigour, I probably would have heard it. I passed by the collapsed bamboo pillar, and noticed one of the chicken corpses was missing.

I stopped, opening my ears wide. I heard it. A terrible chewing, cracking, and growling. I turned, wide eyed to the source, to find the dire wolf down at me, several feet away. Chewing on one of the Hell Chicken corpses. The smell of blood must have led it here.

Patches of its fur refused to grow, showing mutilated patches. Fire magic scars, I assessed.

Its right leg was just a stub, barely starting to regrow.

But it's left… oh god, the claws were larger than mine before I cut them.

A dagger was still buried in the rotting, necrotic flesh that used to be its left eye.

And the bastard roared at me.

Dire wolf

Necrosis

Maimed

1400/4000