*Ding – Notification pending*

*Ding – Notification pending*

He had woken a couple of times during the night, removing any chance of estimating how long he had slept at all. Surprisingly enough, the second time and one of the consecutive times he had woken it was due to receiving a system notification.

The remaining times had been to reposition himself so as to not shiver to death – Kent might have been exaggerating the cold – and refuel the fire.

New Notification Log Entries:

You have slain “Scrambler” Level 11!

You have slain “Drop-Pig” Level 6!

The notifications were welcome even though they didn’t do him any good. With the exception of potentially having secured his survival for just a bit longer, deterring any potential threat with free food had apparently worked.

In hindsight a rather risky plan. If the monster had been dungeon born there could have been a good chance that it would have just been ignored by others coming across it.

Kent was just about to start dinner when he realized that checking his baits might be a smart thing first. If the effects of tollkirsch on humans were similar to what it was on monsters some might still be alive, just in a lot of agony, or unconscious.

He checked on the torso first, just from the smell prevalent in the surrounding of where he had placed the body part he could tell that it hadn’t been taken yet. He did make sure to see it with his own eyes before leaving the stench behind.

Out of the other four poisoned appendages, he found one and a half. Which made him rather uncertain of what he could assume. Was it likely that more than two creatures had indulged in his offering? Guestimates helped him not at all. The scrambler could have been taken out by eating half of the arm due to its relatively weak defense. Alternatively, it might be level that is more relevant than race and it had needed one and a half. The drop pig while lower-level potentially had higher toughness – or the monster's equivalent stat – and vitality which might make it so that it could survive more poison.

Kent’s head rustled, and soon enough he gave up. He wasn’t an intellectual that could gauge how much harm something would do. He had been trained to be a farmer. His whole combat experience comprised of taking care of rodents in the grain stores and preventing birds from stealing the seeds during the sowing season.

So, what can I do?

The answers to his musings luckily were straightforward. Just keep going as he had. Find the corpses take them apart as well as possible and inject them with tollkirsch.

It should be a solid enough defense for a few days until literally every monster of the forest was drawn here by the smell. He shivered a bit then, thinking of the monstrosities that supposedly lived further away from the zones of civilization. Having seen the gross features of the scramblers torso by daylight made all those stories a lot more likely.

It was doubtful that a level one-hundred beast would care much about a paltry few tollkirschs.

What his specific steps after checking on his bait network were going to be he didn’t know, but he wanted to find people. Loneliness and being isolated didn’t suit him one bit. Yet it was doubtful that a village of traitless existed anywhere.

He armed himself with firestone and knife, ready to set out. Monsters would be less active during the day, a not well-understood phenomenon that was exploited heavily regardless.

Following the monster steps further into the forest would be dangerous regardless of the situation but being out alone made Kent reconsider his foolish actions several times. It came down to him not having other defenses, so if proactivity should get him killed, that was how it should be.

It was easier than expected to follow the tracks around the bait. The still mostly wet forest floor showed the hove marks well if you paid attention.

After a while, Kent gained an epiphany. The very tactic he used for tracking could be used to determine how many monsters had partaken in his offered meal. Something he would do after having followed the current trail to its end.

He grew increasingly worried as the always present feeling of the civilization beacon lost its strength. The indicator of moving into the more dangerous territory was unwelcome and didn’t help his mental state at all.

He did fill his knapsack with as many tollkirschs as he could find on the way, a lot, enough to occasionally lose some.

When he finally found the monster, his prediction of it being a drop pig as likely by the hove prints got confirmed.

Had his strength been higher he might have considered carrying it back and laying bait around the clearing, but as things were he might not even manage as much unless cutting the beast apart. Resulting in the best solution available being to prepare the carcass with as many berries as possible in the hopes of reducing the monster population by sheer tongue contact.

This wasn’t strictly necessary given the nature of his slowly forming plans, but only a dead monster was a good monster.

He tried getting berries to the monster’s digestive tract through the mouth but that ended up working less ideal, the lifeless neck not cooperating in the least. In the end, he went back to the tried-and-true method of creating a lot of stab wounds that could be filled with mashed berries.

He worked as fast as possible using up several dozen hands of poisonous berries and left promptly – following his footsteps back into perceived safety.

Finding and preparing the scrambler took about the same amount of time. Getting there had also been more confusing – and even a bit worrying. At one point scrambler tracks started to overlap dozens of times. Not knowing anything about herd behavior in monsters he tried to suppress his worries and insisted on following the track.

Fairly quickly he discovered that the overlaps of torn branches, muddled footsteps, and occasional excrements seemingly came from the same individual – relieving most of his related worries.

The berries must have influenced the monster more than just physically. Those implications he tried to ignore.

He proceeded much the same with the corpse this time around, again foregoing the re-filling of the previous bate spots around his clearing. The effort of carrying the monsters far enough not worth it. He figured.

That both of his tracks hadn’t brought him to the half-eaten piece of bait was telling of another monster roaming close to him. A monster that was not brought down by amassing large amounts of poison in his body.

Yeah, probs best to stay away from that. He scratched his neck roguishly before expanding on the situation.

Knowledge and understanding of monster anatomy and herbology would have been able to help out here… he just didn’t have any.

It was of no consequence in the end. With his main goal of the morning accomplished he re-ignited the fire to fill his empty stomach, throwing the occasional sad glance at the burned crisps that were the roaao the previous day. It was time to take care of his physical needs.

His plans slowly solidified during his cookout. He would circle around the zone of civilization, and approach the connecting road from Blueleaf to Reinsteel. The two-day journey across dirt roads would be no issue if he stayed on it during the day. With his plans of staying awake during the night, it would be interesting to see if he could manage.

Full of heart and spirits, and with a less gloomy outlook on the future than the day before he proceeded packing his meager belongings.

His Cloak was still on his back, the knife strapped to his hip, firestone on the opposite side, the remaining health potion stored in his knapsack that was filled with tollkirschs all the way up. He had no more food, no more drink, and no other reasonable options.

He made his way by constantly checking the pressure the zone of civilization exerted on him. The phenomenon had been explained to him at one point, but it hadn’t mattered back then, and it didn’t matter now. Its existence the only thing he needed as a guide.

When thirst overcame him, he drank from any of the few remaining bilgy puddles he found along the way. They were common enough to quench his thirst, but not enough to completely fulfill his want for water.

Given the vast diameter of the zone of civilization, his path would be a long one. Not even people classed as scouts and similars managed to traverse the whole primary zone in a day, at least none that lived in the village. There were occasional patrols sent out by Reinsteel, that no doubt had the ability to do so multiple times in a day but farmers and nature mages usually didn’t spec into agility and movement skills.

Kent wove through the various types of flora, keeping an eye out for the nasty stinging nettles, monsters, and traps that might have been laid by village trappers. There were two of those in Blueleaf after all.

With noon approaching and eventually passing he grew increasingly tired, having had only a pitiful amount of sleep the previous night. He chose to find a good spot further inside the relative safety of the zone which extended just a bit into the forest here.

Ideally, he would have replicated his poisoned monster-carcass trap from the night before. He was glad that he hadn’t encountered one, as fighting wasn’t what he liked to do, but it would also make his nap more dangerous.

Carefully and slowly, he approached closer to the village all the while staying in the forest. The warning function of the zone allowed for detection of fast-moving entities that were on course for the village, so he had to be careful not to set the system off. It would be ideal if his village were to deem him dead. Otherwise, Reinsteel, the place he had designated as his potential haven, might get wind of his existence and do more rigorous screening for people seeking entry.

However, Blueleaf was already skirting the rules by not removing him from existence directly, so maybe they wouldn’t end up reporting him even if they thought he was still alive. With the sway his parents had he might get lucky.

The spot he chose for taking rest on was a small depression just steps behind the forest line. The soothing pressure of the zone of civilization telling him that he was just outside of the main effect. The few monsters that roamed this close would have a harder time detecting him here, so he might be safer than in his previous spot.

He placed his stolen cloak on the ground and laid down on it to enjoy a few hours of rest.