When Hunter woke up and looked towards the entrance of the cave, he could tell that the sun was just beginning to rise. [Damn I only got 4 hours of sleep, yet I feel better than I ever have before] he thought smugly as he lazily stretched before getting up.
"Morning." Orion entered the cave carrying a couple logs that looked as if they had been shattered by extreme force. "I had last watch after Spartacus so I thought once the sun came up I'd begin collecting some fire wood so I could help care for the others." Both he and Hunter glanced at the sleeping figures of all the children as Ian began stretching and getting up as well.
"You know, coffee would be pretty good right about now." Ian yawned before walking over to join the other two at the entrance.
"Let Spartacus know that I went out to hunt when he gets up. I'll bring back my catch before eight so we have food for when everyone begins waking up, but I'm also going to explore around and make sure there are no immediate threats." Hunter turned and walked out of the cave before scaling one of the dry cliff faces so he could have a better vantage point. [Okay we have nearly 40 people, damn that's a lot. So two deer would definitely produce enough meat, however a lot of the kids are malnourished so only eating meat isn't going to help them. We can't really cook anything good since we don't have any cooking utensils either. What to do, what to do.] He looked out to the mountains and hills covered with trees. Shaking his head Hunter took a quick glance at the sun, gaging that he had less than 2 hours to gather food.
He took in a deep breathe, catching multiple scents of the forest; his brain creating a mental image of the owner of each scent and mapping it all in his mind's eye. Quieting his heartbeat, Hunter could hear for miles, picking up the heartbeat of even ants as they crawled out of their nest. He quickly found a heard of deer that where a little over 3 kilometers away.
In a clap of thunder and a great burst of speed, Hunter took off running towards the deer as he pulled out his two knives, still tied to the yarn wrapped around his arms. Dashing through the trees he quickly neared the clearing, stopping suddenly when he caught the reek of goblin, the musk of dog, and the sharp tint of blood blowing through the breeze. Sniffing in the air he gauged the goblins no more than 4 kilometers away, and judging by the sent there was ten of them and they appeared to be riding some type of wolf.
Hunter began dashing towards them, staying quiet, down wind, and up in the trees so that nothing could notice him and alert his targets.
Arriving at where the goblins were, Hunter found a merchant cart destroyed with all the people slaughtered. He saw some of the goblins ransacking the cart, rifling through until they found weapons and food while the others gathered the human bodies, feeding some to their wolf mounts.
The goblins' maniacal laughter as they played with the bodies upset Hunter and as the rage boiled up inside him, his eyes begun to return to the void of hell. He launched himself from the branch into a group of 3 goblins, spinning so his knives could fly out and slice their unknowing throats. In a flash he was back in the trees hidden from the sight of the goblins. Sensing the goblins becoming agitated the wolves began pacing searching for his scent. One of the wolves stumbled across Hunter's scent and became excited, leading the other wolves and the rest of the goblins to be beneath Hunter.
As Hunter sat perfectly still in the trees he could hear a crack occur in his body. As he watched, the wolf became confused as it lost Hunter's scent. The goblins, angered, killed the wolf with their spears before they began searching again. With all the enemies clumped beneath him, Hunter knew it was time to let loose. As if a whirlwind had sprouted from nothing, he dropped down slicing goblins and wolves alike until they were all dead.
Breathing lightly as his eyes returned to blue, Hunter quickly flicked his wrists sending the blood on his knives flying off so that he could tuck them away under his belt. Going up to the cart, Hunter found crates of goods ranging from clothes, weapons, and even food. Grabbing a crate filled with apples, Hunter quickly dashed back to the waterfall.
Arriving back at the waterfall, Hunter found Ian standing on the top of the cliff watching over the valley. Upon seeing Hunter he jumped down, landing softly without cracking the ground.
"Where'd you get this?" He took a bright, juicy apple from the box and began eating as he walked with Hunter into the cave. Entering the cave, Hunter saw most of the children under 12 years of age still asleep while the thirteen older children where sitting and talking with Orion and Spartacus. Hunter walked up, setting the box of apples down in the center of the group before turning to Spartacus.
"Eldest brother, I found a party of goblins that had slaughtered a merchant group and so I killed them before bringing this back. There is still quite a bit of goods that we can gather from there. So if we can leave the care of the younger children to the ones who are awake now; I know us four can quickly get much of the stuff moved here before the goblins go looking for this missing party." Spartacus nodded before getting up and following Hunter to the cave entrance.
"Asani, Tarenia, I'm leaving you two in charge of distributing the food to the children while we are out. Make sure everyone stays in the cave for now. We should be back soon, in which case then everyone can go outside if they wish." Spartacus turned and looked at the two elven girls, who were also the oldest out of all the children. Seeing Spartacus look at them directly, the two sisters nodded their heads bashfully as they tried to cover up much of their exposed body due to being still stuck in the bikini outfits that they had been forced to wear the night before.
Orion smirked and winked at Spartacus before following after Hunter as they began heading towards the cart. Upon arriving at the cart, Hunter began gutting the goblins and the wolves pulling out the Feral Cores, while the others began sorting the cart and stacking everything on it before tying it all down. After storing the cores in an empty crate, and burning the bodies; the boys finished tying down all the crates in the damaged cart before picking it up together and carrying it through the forest with as little disturbance as possible to their surroundings.
Taking an hour and a half to get back to the waterfall, they finally set the cart down along side the cliff that wasn't along the river and lake, or the waterfall. Orion went up into the cave alerting the others that they could come out now.
A lot of the younger children came running out and begin playing with each other in the grass and the gentle river, laughing as they tried their new sense of freedom. Hunter pulled his hood down as he began helping Ian move the crates into the cave. A few of the older boys, who were in healthier conditions than the others, came over to help move the crates as well. Spartacus opened a crate containing clothes, pulling out two dresses, he walked up and handed them to Asani and Tarenia. The two quickly ran into the cave to put the dresses on, so the boys paused their transfer of crates until after the sisters came back out.
After fully unloading the cart Hunter sat down next to Spartacus as Orion and Ian came over to join them. The four sat in silence as they watched all the children relaxing and having fun together. None of them caring whether they were human or beastman, only seeing them all as friends and even family.
"Gotta say, we've done good in our first two days." Ian said with a smile as he noticed Sylvia and Quixi running over to join them. Quixi tackled Orion with a hug while Sylvia, looking at the ground, but the boys could still see how red her face got as she sat down next to Ian and began fidgeting. Hunter smirked and shook his head, then glanced at the two elf sisters as they to came over, sitting down beside Spartacus.
"So this some sort of council or whatever?" Hunter looked at everyone sitting in the group before looking back at Spartacus.
"Ya, this could be a council of sorts. Since the other children think of Asani and Tarenia as their leaders and since Sylvia and Quixi were the ones that lead to their rescue; it's only fitting that they should join us when we look towards the future." Spartacus smiled to the four girls before facing the entire group.
"Okay so yesterday, Ian and I were able to sell the 18 Feral Cores for 3 silvers a piece, so we earned 54 silvers in total. We then sold the rusted sword and knives to a blacksmith who paid us 1 silver and 25 copper for them. Hunter what did you gain for the two Feral Cores you had?"
"I used the two Feral Cores to buy the two spools of yarn you see wrapped around my arms. I also used it to pay for silence as I didn't want the people I interacted with to say anything. Also, whoever you sold the Feral Cores to juped you cause I was told Feral Cores sell for 5 silver minimum."
"Wait, wait, wait! Not only did we lose profit from the Feral Cores we sold, but you also only got yarn for TWO Feral Cores. Come on Hunter, why did you waist such a profit when we could've gotten more money?" Orion grumpily looked at Spartacus and then Hunter.
Hunter turned and looked at Orion, staring him dead in the eye. "I didn't waist anything. Had I not gotten the yarn, I wouldn't have been able to kill all those nobles as quickly as I did. Besides after I got done with my preparations, this yarn is now worth more than 20 silver easily. I soaked them both in my blood. This has caused them to become even stronger, to the point that they're able to withstand sword strikes, let alone handle our strength when in the middle of combat. You just need to see it in person before you comprehend how valuable they are now." Orion put his hands up in defeat as he nodded his head while Sylvia and Quixi looked confusedly towards Hunter. Hunter turned his attention back towards Spartacus, allowing him to notice the slightly fearful shifting that Asani and Tarenia did as uneasy being around Hunter spread through their entire bodies.
"Besides we've regained ten level 1 Feral Cores from the goblins I killed, plus these ten Feral Cores." Hunter pulled out one of the Feral Cores gained from the wolves and held it up so that the whole group could see it.
"That's a level 2 Feral Core." Sylvia's jaw dropped while her eyes widened as she looked at Hunter. "You said you killed ten of them? If I remember correctly my parents said that core leveling works in exponential strength of five. It takes five people to kill a level 2 Feral Beast, then twenty-five people for level 3. You are easily capable of taking down a level 3, maybe even a level 4 Feral Beast, on your own." Hunter nodded before turning back to Spartacus.
"Thanks to the merchants, may they rest in piece, we now have ample supplies of food. Enough to last us all two weeks, though I doubt the younger children will want to continue eating salted meat and roasted potatoes. So tomorrow, we'll have a couple people go to the town to buy seasonings while also collecting knowledge about the goblins and the Feniri. We also have quit a bit of clothing now, so everyone can change out of their rags and get into better clothing. We also have some really good conditioned weapons so if anyone wants to fight, we'll begin training tomorrow as well. Finally we found 20 gold, 76 silver, and 23 copper pieces in a chest so we shouldn't need to worry too much on money as well. Now then since you all know what we're sitting at, I'm going to go and start transmuting the cave so boys and girls both have their own sleeping chambers. Hunter I know we are planning to visit the town tomorrow, but can you go today and scout out where we can mass buy sleeping bags and such?" Hunter nodded as he watched Spartacus get up and head towards the cave.
"I'll be back by sunset after I gear up." Hunter turned to others before getting up and going to the cave to regear himself with better equipment. Opening the weapon crates, Hunter grabbed two double headed battle axes called labrys (good). He then untied the yarn from the bone knives handles before retying them to the labrys. He then slipped them into his belt after realizing he didn't have a proper sheath to put them on his back. Then he quickly grabbed a single longsword (good) and strapped the sheath to his back so he could pull the sword handle over his right shoulder. Finally he grabbed a bow (good) and a quiver with 50 iron tipped arrows (good). He then attached the quiver so the arrows could be pulled from his right shoulder. With the bow he slid it over his left shoulder so that it was sitting alongside the quiver. He smiled as he looked at all the weapons being in such good condition. He sets the two bone knives down with the three remaining so the guild members could use them.
He than quickly turned, glancing at one of the crates full of fabrics. Stopping suddenly, he walked over pulling out a black cloth that he looked at. Finally he put it over his eyes, tying it on the back of his head, before pulling his hood up. He then rifled through the clothes until he stumbled upon a black pair of leather gloves with he put on. After redesigning his outfit he stood there focusing all of his senses to create his surroundings in his mind's eye. Crack* All of a sudden his mind's eye lit up, creating multiple variations of his surroundings, allowing him to see in more ways than one.
Not only did Hunter have a strong sense of smell and hearing, but now he could use echolocation, could taste heat allowing him to "smell" like a snake, and his vision had heightened allowing him to see through the cloth so he could see color while also allowing him to see both people's souls and Divinity.
[Damn, why are my sense so heightened? Not even an apex predator has this great of senses, let alone all their senses being highly leveled. Can I even call it leveling? Well I guess it's the only way to make sense of my powers. Maybe this world has a leveling system, or do they just use ranks? Oh well, I need to focus, Spartacus wants me to keep an eye on the town. Gotta find out about those Feniri and that goblin army or whatever.] Hunter quickly sprinted out of the cave and took off towards the town.