The next morning, Anna was already up. This was a bit unusual as I am the one who usually wakes up first. After eating our breakfast, we made our way outside the village, to the place I used while training with the old man. After arriving there I said to her.
"Have you ever built a snowman?"
"What is a snowman?" she asked.
"Haha, great. Listen carefully: we need to roll three snowballs of different sizes and stack them on top each other, with the smallest one on top, serving as the head."
She nodded and we started making the snowballs. At start she just copied what I was doing but soon got into it and we both started fooling around, trying to create a bigger snowball than the other. Things got a bit out of control and we both made huge snowballs, about our size. With no way of lifting those up, we started again. When we were done and placed them on top of each other, she looked at me excitedly and asked.
"It's kind of cute. What do we do now?"
"We need to decorate it and make it seem more human. We will both go grab stuff that we think we can use to decorate it and do it together after. Okay?"
"Yeah, let's go."
We separated and went through the village to pick stuff to decorate. I evidently cheated, as I already knew how to make a snowman and picked about ten small pieces of charcoal, some small branches for arms and, finding no carrots, I just picked up some pieces of wood that could be used instead of carrots, wanting to try them one by one. I arrived early at the snowman and waited for Anna. Soon, I saw her coming towards the snowman a bit embarrassed. She showed me the clothes she brought and said
"Sorry, I didn't know what to get."
"No problem. I picked enough. How about you decorate it while I won't look."
"Sure."
I turned around and allowed her to surprise me, and surprised I was.
When I turned around. I really didn't know what to say. She used the clothes to dress it up, made a mouth and eyes out of the charcoal, but there was a slight problem. There was a huge bulge under the piece of leather that was covering the lower snowball and no nose. Lifting the leather up, I saw she used the nose wood and made it a morning wood.
"What made you use this piece of wood for that and not the nose?"
She blushed a little and said "Well, I tried to make it look like you and that wood looked more like than thing than the nose."
I started laughing at her innocent explanation.
Seeing me laughing, she asked embarrassed "Was I wrong?"
"No, that's not the usual way people build snowmen but it's good like this as well." Seeing the cute expressions on her face I could feel my heart melting little by little.
"Want to name it?" I asked her after I had my share of laughter.
"Can we name it Ethan?" asked Anna with big eyes full of hope.
"No problem", I replied as I moved the piece of wood and placed it instead of a nose. I didn't want my alter ego to sit here with a morning wood: "Did you have fun?"
She nodded happily, making a small smile appear on my face as well.
"So, is there anything you want to do now? I'm yours all day."
Anna blushed right away and looked down. Seeing her expression I immediately added "No mating."
She was startled and acted like a thief caught in the act, shaking her head to deny before saying: "No, no. I just wanted you to.. to kiss me again like last time.", stuttering halfway through the sentence.
Seeing her like this, I pulled her in my arms and went to kiss her forehead again, but as my lips were about to touch her forehead, she lifted her head and kissed me straight on the lips. I pulled back and flicked her forehead before saying:
"Did you do that on purpose?"
Seeing her looking to the ground, all red, and giving no answer I sighed before hugging her again, lifting her chin up and locking lips with her into a passionate kiss. After I let go of her, I noticed that she was beet red, with watery eyes and her breathing was a bit ragged. She brought a finger to her lips, looked at me with glazed eyes and mumbled "More" before bringing her face for another kiss.
I pulled my head back and flicked her forehead even harder than last time.
"Ouch.." She started massaging her forehead with a wronged look in her eyes.
"That's what you get for trying to take a mile after being given an inch." She immediately pouted and sat down.
"Anna, do you want to have a snowball fight? It will be fun."
"What is that?" she asked but was still not looking up at me.
"We make small snowballs and try to hit each other with them."
She nodded and we started a snowball fight. It looked like she really like snowball fights as she started throwing more and more snowballs towards my face. Or she was just happy trowing something at me, I really couldn't figure it out.
We kept fighting, rolling in the snow and I even taught her how to make snow angels. In the afternoon, after we had our fill of playing around and the cold was getting to us, we made out way back inside her igloo and got out of our wet clothes.
Getting in bed, we cuddled up next to each other to warm up. Stroking her hair I asked.
"Did you have fun today?"
She nodded and answered "Yes, I like it." She seems to muster up some courage and asked "Did you also play like this with the other girl?"
Images of Alison started flowing in my mind as I nodded and said "Yeah, we had a similar winter once.". A feeling of guilt appeared in my heart again and changed the topic, not wishing to ruin a good day for both of us.
"Hey Anna, do you want to someday leave this village?"
"I do, but the chief said there are some powerful monsters on the way and that they will eat us if we try to leave."
"I know. That's why I'm training. I want to get strong enough to beat them and leave this village eventually."
"Will you take me with you?"
"If you want to, of course I will."
"Mhmm" she nodded and snuggled closer to me.
'Ai, how long will it take for me to able to fight those ogres?'
[At this rate, it will probably take you a few years. If you manage to level up the time will probably decrease.]
'Take me inside my soul space after I tell Anna I'll go to sleep. I need to train harder.'
After telling Anna I'll sleep for a bit, I got pulled inside my soul space and started fighting the two wolves again. After losing the fight a couple of time, I fell asleep for real and when I woke up it was already the next day.
I slowly got caught in a routing. I will fight the old man every two days until I could barely stand up and practice inside my soul space the rest of the time. Anna tried to play her tricks once in a while but I managed to avoid giving up more than the occasional kiss. In this way, another month passed. Now I can exchange a couple of blows with the old man and inside my soul space I managed to kill up to five wolves at once.
Today, I started a new training inside my soul space. I was fighting two identical versions of the old man. Ai said that fighting five wolves was enough for now and that I should get used to fighting humans as well.
Two months later, inside the old man's house.
I actually managed to win our last spar, prompting him to say to me
"I already thought you everything I could. You will need real experience and fights to progress further."
"Thank you, old man." I bowed towards him and took my leave. Now that my training was over I could finally try to level up. On the way home I asked Ai to show me my status.
[
Name: Ethan Knott
Age: Avatar 18;
Race: Avatar Human;
Experience: 4/100;
Health Points: 30/30;
Mana Points 10/10;
Level: 1;
Vitality: 3;
Strength: 2;
Dexterity : 2;
Intelligence: 1;
Resistance: 2;
———
System Points: 0;
Spirit: 180;
]
'Tomorrow I'll go into the forest to try to hunt some wolves.' With new found determination I went home and told Anna about my plans.
"Can I go with you?" she asked with puppy eyes.
"Not yet. I will probably be able to take care of myself but I'm not sure I'll be able to protect you as well."
She looked a bit downcast but still nodded her head to show she understood. After eating dinner I went directly to sleep, not practicing inside my soul space. I wanted to be in top shape for tomorrow.
Next morning, after breakfast, I went straight to the chief's place. After getting permission I walked inside and said to him.
"Chief, I wanted to go to the forest and test the results of my training."
"Hmm.. It will be better for you to go hunting with the rest of the warriors later this week. Going alone is too dangerous."
"I won't go too far. Don't worry, I'll be fine."
He looked at me seriously for a moment before saying "Fine, you can go and pick a spear. Just tell them I sent you. Try not to die or that little girl will be heartbroken. Also you need to produce an offspring soon if you don't want you both to be thrown out of the village."
"All right. I'll be careful." I decided to ignore his talk about an offspring and thanked him before getting out of his igloo.
I went and grabbed a spear before making my way out of the village. I used my compass and went the same way as last time I went hunting with all the warriors in the village. While I was slowly making my way through the forest, I started feeling uneasy our of nowhere.
Not knowing where that feeling was coming from and thinking that I was better safe than sorry I climbed on a tree and waited patiently while scanning the surroundings. A few moments later, footsteps could be heard coming from the same direction I came from.
'Hmm.. People from the village? Why would they be here? The hunt is supposed to take place later this week.'
[There is a high probability that they are following you.]
'I guess, but why?'
[…]
The footsteps got closer and soon three men stopped right under the tree I was sitting on. I just realized that when I climbed up, my tracks stopped at the base of the tree and they should be able to point out my position right away. I was right because after noticing the tracks stop, they looked up and one of them said to me.
"Haha..Do you think that climbing in a tree will save you? Are you going to come down yourself or do you want us to bring you down?"
"What do you want from me?" I really couldn't figure out why were these people following me. I only saw them during the last hunt and never interacted with them, not even then.
"After stealing our woman you have the guts to ask that?"
'Huh? They want to kill be because they are jealous?'
"I didn't steal anything. She wanted to be with me."
"If you didn't appear out of nowhere she will have been ours. That doesn't matter tho, as after we kill you here we'll go back and get to enjoy her at last."
Seeing that there was no reasoning with these idiots I tightened my grip on my spear and started thinking about how to get out of this situation alive.
[Try to take one out first. You should be able to deal with the other two easily after that. Remember all your training.]
Taking a deep breath I said to them
"I will come down now. Don't attack me and we can make a deal. I'll just leave the village and you'll never have to see me again."
"Hehe, sure. Come down and we can talk about it." Said one of them while looking at me like I was an idiot.
I slowly got down from the tree, gripping my spear tightly. When I was at a comfortable height, I used my legs as support and dashed towards the one in the lead. They were still jeering and laughing at me so they were a bit late to react and I managed to plunge the tip of my spear straight through the neck of the one I attacked.
"Bastard" the other two were immediately enraged that I killed one of them and moved to attack me right away. I rolled on the ground straight under their thrust and used the spear to swipe at their legs. Compared to the old man, this was like fighting against children. After they were down I plunged my spear in their throats ending their life.
I thought I will feel something after killing a human for the first time, but surprisingly I felt nothing and this fact in of itself terrified me. I replayed the scene in my mind, waiting to feel some guilt or something, but there was not much of a difference.
'Ai, did you do something to me? Why don't I feel anything after killing them? They are humans, like me. I should feel something. This is wrong. Or am I just a psychopath?'
[Ethan, not feeling anything for killing another human is completely normal. The society you used to live in manipulated the people to think that killing is wrong, so that they could created a safe environment for the weak people and children who had no way of defending themselves. Humans are just like other animals. Killing for self defense, killing for interests and killing for food is normal. You have just been shaped to think it's wrong.]
'But, that can't be right. What about all the people with trauma I read about in my past? What about all the war veterans?'
[They are usually not traumatized because they killed someone. What causes the trauma is the fact that they don't feel anything after they did it. The same thoughts that pass through your mind right now are the ones they ask themselves until they start having mental issues. You are no longer on Earth, and in this world, like most other worlds, killing is a normal part of it.]
I took a deep breath to clear my muddled thoughts and just sit there pondering Ai's words. Deep inside, everything she said to me made sense, but I didn't make it any easier. While I was struggling with my thoughts Ai's voice sounded again in my mind.
[Ethan, did you ever think about this while eating meat from other animals?]
'No' I answered subconsciously.
[Exactly. You have not met them yet, but there are quite a few races who eat humans the same way you eat animals. Only a miss-judged sense of superiority, engraved in your mind by the society back on Earth, makes you feel this way. If you thought that humans are just animals, like any other being, you will realize that there is no difference between killing that wolf a couple of months ago and these people. Also, think what would have happened if you didn't kill them? Even if you just ran away, they will return to the village and sleep with, maybe even rape Anna. Did you really have any other choice? Maybe, just by killing them, you save a lot of future people that were going to be abused or even killed by them.]
'But isn't that just a thought to make me feel better?'
[It is. By the end of it all none of these things matter. All beings that exist kill. Be it an animal, an enemy, a loved one or even someone completely random, they kill. That is the way all beings were created and killing is in their nature. The only ones who don't kill anything their entire lives are the one that can't do it or have no reason to. The faster you understand that, the faster you will be able to put these useless thoughts behind you.]
Hearing Ai's words, a small feeling of understanding rooted itself deep in my soul. I sighed and looked at the men that I just killed while saying.
'It kind of makes sense.' Despite the fact that I was still a bit down, a chuckle escaped my lips as I continued ' You know, for a little brat you surely speak like an old man. When did those words came from?'
[I don't have a lot of experience existing, but the amount of information I have access to is beyond what you could ever imagine. I just repeated some of that information to you.]
'Hehe, thank you. I feel a bit better already.'
[Good. Your experience also reached 52 after killing them.]
I stood up and started pondering over my next move. Things were kinda tricky right now because killing other villagers is not allowed and I don't know how the village chief will react, even if it was self defense.
[You should try to level up before returning to the village. If they find out about it and decide to try to kill you, you will have a 96% probability of dying. If you manage to level up, that probability will go down to 20%.]
'That much? I didn't think that my chances of survival will increase that much.'
[All your stats will increase by 1 once you level up and you will also get one point that you can spend on any stat you desire to focus on.]
'That indeed sounds like a huge power up... I guess I'll continue with my hunt.'
Thinking up to here, I picked up one more spear form the men in case mine broke and made my way deeper inside the forest.