Zhang Han immediately averted his gaze and coughed lightly. On the tips of his ears burned a slight tinge of red. How could Vaien just say things like that out of nowhere? Did it matter if he were smiling or not?
"That…," mumbled Zhang Han, "...just hand me the bow so I can make adjustments. It's too powerful and will eat up all the energy reserves."
Vaien was gripping the bow tightly in his hands and stared at the now hot metal wire.
"This weapon you made is pretty good..."
It needed more work until it became a finished project, but there was no question that it was quite an advantage for the area due to its ability to hunt from a far range. Needless to say that hunting would become even easier for the two from now on. However, Zhang Han still wanted to limit the use of it for more challenging prey, otherwise keeping up the power would be an issue.
Unless, perhaps, he found a way to cycle power or use solar energy…
Vaien seemed reluctant to hand over the bow.
Zhang Han waited while staring at him, but he was still not handing it over.
"..."
Vaien averted his gaze, it seemed like he didn't want to let it go. He really liked the bow as a weapon, it was interesting. No, not the bow part, the laser part.
"I think I just wasn't well anchored to the ground the first time. If I used it again, what happened the first time wouldn't repeat," he assured.
"..." As much as Zhang Han wanted to see Vaien punted into the ground ten, no one-hundred times over, what would that accomplish besides wasting the core's energy?
Zhang Han's expression was slowly turning darker with annoyance. In the first place, Vaien could fight with his bare hands, so he needed to stop giving him a look like Zhang Han was trying to take away his favorite toy! He needed the bow more than Vaien considering the fact that he had no superhuman body at his disposal to use.
Zhang Han grit his teeth and repeated, "Are you going to hand it back to me?"
Vaien sulked and then passed it over.
He stared at the figure of the bow and ran his fingers over it, then moved them to the tab at which he could adjust the energy settings. Carefully he tampered with it.
It should be good now.
Vaien made sure to stare closely at everything Zhang Han was doing, to the point that Zhang Han suffered from his nerves bunching up due to the scrutiny.
"All right, it should be good now." he said. "I'm going to use it."
Vaien paused. "Eh, really? You don't want me to use it again just to be safe? I mean, you mentioned that it could blow your arm apart, so..."
"No."
Zhang Han simply would not mind him any longer as he lifted his bow.
Since the deer were gone he needed something else that he could shoot at. There had been a really loud explosion the first time, so it scared the other ground-dwelling animals away as well.
Suddenly a few rapid images flashed through Zhang Han's mind as he thought of shooting. Things like explosions and death and people being blown to bits. He stood stock-still in an unnatural manner for a while, all of his muscles turning rigid and locked in place.
This lasted to the point that Vaien cocked his head at Zhang Han with bewilderment.
Seeing no reaction, and that Zhang Han's breaths had turned a little shallow, Vaien placed a hand against his cheek with a light slap. He always controlled his strength to the utmost when dealing with Zhang Han. He never wished to hurt him accidentally.
"Hey?" he prodded him. "Hello~"
No response. Then it dawned on Vaien.
"Haha, I get it. You're nervous about the bow and chickening out. Don't be so stubborn about that and just say something! It's not like I blame you, a fragile thing," his fingers reached out and plucked the bow from Zhang Han's grasp with relish. "I'll do it for you."
Zhang Han felt vividly snapped back to reality when the bow left his hands. Fuck, he hated when that happened. He quietly heaved in a few breaths as he glanced at Vaien.
The man hadn't been paying much attention, so it seemed the didn't find any issue behind Zhang Han's freeze up and exhaled a breath.
"..."
He watched Vaien as he aimed the bow up into the sky. Now that he took a look, there happened to be around 5 or 6 pterodactyl-like lizard birds circling above. Often they would come down from the sky to fish in the river or feed off animal carcasses, so it was likely that they were attracted to the deer that had just exploded in a splatter of blood.
This time Vaien didn't pull back as hard as before on the bowstring. Having learned his lesson once, he opted not to make himself a dumb fool again the second time.
A blue arrow, this time a more controlled and sleek size, and much rampant than the first, shot into the sky like a little shooting star as it pierced through the head of a pterodactyl.
The pterodactyls wings went limp as it began to fall, and the others near it began to make loud and grating screeching noises. But it was already too late for their kin, the pterodactyl thumped onto the ground about half a mile away.
Vaien and Zhang Han just glanced at each other before hiking over that direction, picking up the deer body along the way. The grass was tall, up to their wastes, and Zhang Han always thought it made his skin a little itchy after being in contact with it for too long.
Eventually they stood next to a giant purple and blue pterodactyl.
"I wonder how it'll taste," Vaien pondered.
"You've never eaten one?"
"Nope. They fly up too high, only your bow could reach it."
Zhang Han thought that this was probably the closest to a genuine compliment that Vaien had ever given. He stared at the sleep metallic bow he'd made with his own hands and also felt an odd glob of pride welling up within.
"Yeah, they're always flying up there and looking so smug," said Vaien, still stuck on the whole pterodactyl thing. "Sometimes they'll make these annoying clicking noises all day, too. Can't wait to see if they taste good."
"Yes." Zhang Han could fully agree with that. The tasting good part.
So Vaien hefted the headless deer and pterodactyl on each of his shoulders. It looked exaggerated and silly, him having two giant animals at once.
There would be a lot of wasted meat thrown over the cliff today, thought Zhang Han. But after seeing it several times, he'd grown used to that by now. Food or water shortages simply weren't an issue in this area.
The two headed back.
When the fire was started, Zhang Han gave a good look over the pterodactyl. Its skin was purplish and tight around a frame of bones. There was a large crest on its head with spots that looked like eyeballs. How strange.
But it still looked like it had the potential to be tasty in its own way?
So Vaien cooked it as usual, using all the same seasoning as with the fat and dumb bird Zhang Han had eaten previously, and surely he was cooking it over the fire in the same manner, too...
...but this lizard-like bird was different.
It started smelling. And not in a pleasant sort of way, but one that reeked of odors like sweat and bile. Its purplish skin sunk into its body, shriveling to the bones, and turned a charred and slimy black.
Zhang Han and Vaien once again shared a moment of silent understanding between each other, both feeling the same apprehension.
"Is it supposed to smell like that?"
Vaien roasted the last part of the bird's breast. "I don't know cause' I haven't eaten it before. But I've tried some nasty and bad smelling foods before that tasted good. Hm...but, we'll see."
Really, is that so…
Zhang Han was suspicious.
So far everything they'd tried was delicious, but it was simply hard to keep believing in that when he stared down at the slime-like goop that was put into his bowl. The pterodactyl 'meat' was more like an odd slime one would find if they let mushrooms rot in a humid and hot space for a few weeks and then added food-coloring to brighten up the rotten mush.
He wasn't an idealist! His doubts had now tripled. However...what if it really did taste good?
Zhang Han reached down his hand like a crazy fool, but just in time he heard the sound of Vaien making a gagging sound. His hand froze right before making contact with the purple goop.
Nevermind. He won't try it. RIP Vaien.
Vaien had tried a bite first and was also the first to suffer. He spit it out over the cliff, drank a third of the water basin's supply to try and clear his palette, and then in a fit of rage picked up the carcass of the pterodactyl and threw it over the cliff as well.
"Awful! Fucking disgusting!"
He picked up Zhang Han's bowl and threw that over the cliff, too. And that was not the end of it.