I had twenty-seven days now. The only thing I could get out of yesterday was massacring those wolves. I had already hit my first obstacle. Sure I was more capable of using my speed, but I was still unable to kill those herbivores. Even at my maximum speed, even after hours, I was barely able to touch them... And from the looks of it, that would continue to be the case.
A part of me wanted to just give up on them, but their power would make travelling a lot easier. From what I could tell, I was the only one in the group who couldn't fly in some sort of way. Not to mention, if I couldn't even kill a herbivore, I had no business trying to fight a God.
But being unable to beat them was an issue that would continue to persist. It wasn't just a matter of speed. They were masters of flight. In both senses. I needed to think of a way of trapping them.
"What are you doing right now? Shouldn't you be trying to kill that wingling? How have you already gotten so full of yourself?" A voice nudged me.
"I'm not full of myself. I just need a new plan. So I'm thinking."
"While building a treehouse?"
"We have around a month left here. Sleeping on a tree is getting uncomfortable. Add to that the fact that I need a place to gather resources, and this setup makes sense. This place is safe and we're quite a distance away from the edge too."
I put my hand on top of two planks and sealed them up with enamel. A new way of using hardening.
Honestly, I didn't quite know what to think. But I was sure trying to kill the wingling was a waste of time, for now, so instead, I adopted another waste of time. Keeping my hands moving, I would definitely come up with something, if not that, I would gather the courage to do something really stupid again.
There was always that one option, but taking it was honestly something I shouldn't have even considered. Not at my level.
I put the last planks as support directly pushing against the tree... And after 5 hours of work, the treehouse was ready.
"You can touch stuff in real life right?" I looked at the little woman next to me. She was sitting in her perfect posture against the wall.
The treehouse was barely big enough to fit me. But the supplementary area around it was capable of containing hydes and stuff I might pick up. I had some money left for myself that I, well, stole from back home and those mercenaries' pockets. But that wouldn't last forever. I set up a couple of wolves' hydes as a mattress.
"Yeah, I can touch the stuff. But stuff can't exactly touch me. I can feel you, but you can't. It makes sense, yes? I wouldn't be able to touch the grimoire otherwise."
"Uhn hnn, yeah, cool, then open the rucksack and put a meal together for me, please. I need to go and get some stuff ready for tomorrow's hunt."
"I'm not your maid, you know?"
"I know, but I really need all the hands I can get right now."
"Pch... Only this one time. She plopped down on the floor with a table in front of her."
Keeping my hands moving, I couldn't up with a plan. But I came up with the necessary courage.
I jumped down from the tree and headed outside. Yesterday, after failing miserably, I realised that my order of hunts had been wrong. If I wanted to kill the winglings, I needed tools that were capable of doing that.
Of course, tools don't come easily in the wild, but I could at least move in the right direction now. My first target wasn't the winglings anymore, I needed to kill a being far more feared than that herbivore. One that I was sure would be able to get hold of those oversized birds.
I needed to get my hands on an arachnid their ability to build webs.
If I were to tell Liu about my plan, she would do her best to stop me, saying that it's reckless. Or rather go even further and mock my insanity. And rightfully so.
But if I didn't do this much I would be stagnating here for days.
I raised my hand and the grimoire got summoned in my hand. It flipped open to the map and the location to the south started glowing yellow. I won't mess up finding the location now.
"Peak predator." It had such a distinct bloodlust. One that I could feel from the treehouse. That bug wasn't even trying to mask it.
It tried to imprint into your mind firmly that it wished to eat you and that nothing you would do would ensure your survival. That it was the one ruling over its territory and stepping in it was a mistake. Your mistake.
Letting you live was its choice, one that it seldom wished to make.
I remembered reading it back in a library when I was living out my fantasy of wanting to be an adventurer.
An arachnid was different from any other beast. Beasts are violent creatures, that lust after food, because they were made that way. Or so Liu said. But from what I read back then, arachnids were beasts that fed on malice. They were there for the thrill that came with stomping on lower beings.
There have been countless cases of arachnids destroying villages alone and only killing humans, not to eat them.
They were predators that you were advised to run away from an encounter. They weren't the strongest beast out there, but they had a strong distaste towards humans. And were unnaturally efficient at killing them.
There were vines hanging from above, the leaves were darker and so were the barks of the tree. The grass under my feet was a lot softer.
Before I knew it, I was already there.
And in front of my eyes, in a ginormous web, laid an organism that was capable of being both my predator and prey.
This was a competition.