Johnathan's goal wasn't to actually "hunt" monsters. All he needed were a few good-quality mana stones.
He reached an open area within the woods where a massive tree stood as king in the centre and prepared himself.
He reached into his backpack and touched the smooth blob of glass, slowly pulling it out as strings in his hands.
The superfine strings of glass looked almost invisible, sometimes shining brightly because of the moonlight refracting off of it.
"I think... People on earth called this kind of glass 'Fiber Optic Cables'...", he recalled from his past life as an electrical engineer.
With a good amount of glass cables in his hands, he started to lay down the traps he'd use to kill the monsters.
After careful precision and patience, it was done. Now, he only had to pick which beast to kill and lure it here.
He marked the spot with a thin but tall glass pillar and went deeper into the woods to search for monsters.
Soon enough, he spotted something.
"Death Rabbit...", he thought internally.
Weak creatures, but very fast. They contain low-grade mana stones. Good enough for Johnathan as of now.
He reached into his backpack, pulled out a blob of glass, morphed it into a small ball and shot it towards the rabid animal.
The animal instantly became aware of Johnathan and started jumping towards him madly. Johnathan swiftly started to run towards the direction of the tree with all his might.
As soon as they entered the area, Johnathan jumped up into the air, and the rabbit suddenly stopped out of nowhere.
Within a few seconds, its body sliced in half and the halves fell to the ground with a bloody splat.
The fibre optic cables Johnathan had laid down were no ordinary cables. They were unfathomably sharp. Fragile, but sharp nonetheless.
Johnathan walked over to the corpse and picked up the purple stone the rabbit had ejected from its body when it got sliced.
Johnathan wasn't unsatisfied with this, but he thought that this method of hunting was maybe safe, but not really on the efficient side. He only had a few more hours of time left before he had to return home.
He hatched an idea. he picked up the glass cables from the ground and moulded them back into a blob.
Then, he imagined turning the blob into a whip of glass. And sure enough, the blob moulded into a transparent weapon of the West.
He swung the whip around with little to no effort, as he could control every part of the whip as long as he was holding it in his hands.
He even modified the rope of the whip to be fatally sharp and with every swing, it sliced tall grass on the field effortlessly.
"Hmm... this'll do...", he judged as he ventured into the forest again.
This new weapon served its purpose extremely well. Johnathan was hunting small monsters with ease, collecting mana stones in the process.
But eventually, the worst-case scenario happened.
Johnathan saw smoke rising from a part of the forest. He instantly knew what it was.
"The orc tribe...", he guessed accurately.
He didn't dare get close to the tribe, but he at least had to check them out. His curiosity wouldn't leave him be if he didn't.
So, he carefully crafted a thin sheet of glass all around his body, to block his smell from escaping into the air and the orcs getting alarmed by it, and carefully walked towards the smoke.
Soon enough, he found where the orcs were residing.
The green beasts were sitting around a massive campfire, drinking some sort of liquid from their massive tusk-shaped flasks. Their monstrous faces instantly struck fear into Johnathan. He knew he stood no chance against them. Not even if he could get them into facing him one by one. He'd get obliterated before he could even do anything.
So he kept observing. But what caught his attention the most was the weapons of the orcs. Especially a mace.
"That's... Obsidian...", he thought as his eyes widened.
Obsidian was a natural glass that was difficult to find just lying around. But most importantly, obsidian made impossibly sharp blades. Johnathan absolutely needed that obsidian.
The lethal and intimidating mace was covered in dried blood. Its spikes were all made of obsidian. It was clear that the owner of said mace was not someone to mess with.
Johnathan waited patiently. He wasn't sure he could pull this off. So, he waited and waited till he came up with some plan or got an opportunity.
As he waited, one of the orcs suddenly spoke up, his voice hoarse and deep, reeking of violence and savegery.
"This town is full of pussies... No one came to challenge us in the past week...", he said with a disappointed tone.
Another orc spoke up, "Humans are squishy creatures, kehehe... They die so easily, no wonder they're scared."
"Hah! At least the women look fine..."
"Pfft! You're a weirdo for liking women with no meat on their bones! Human women are no more than skeletons! unlike the werewolves.... kehehe..."
"Hah! That's called liking furries, idiot!"
The orcs continued arguing and roaring for a while, until another orc arrived.
The orc, clearly being the leader of the group, silenced everyone else with just his presence. Johnathan felt like he'd piss his pants off if this orc were to even look at him.
"Brothers...", he spoke, his voice even more intimidating than the other orcs.
"We have discovered what we came here for.", he announced. All the orc's eyes suddenly widened.
"Chief... you mean you found the dungeon?", one of the orcs asked.
"That's right... And it seems that it's unraided.", the chief orc continued.
All of this information was hitting Johnathan like a river.
'So the dungeon rumour was real... and that's the reason for the orcs to be here...'
Suddenly, Johnathan recalled from his past life the information about dungeons he had read in the novel. The different grades, the strategies to conquer them, the different kinds of monsters that resided within them.
Johnathan came up with a plan. It was going to be risky, but he knew how to escape if things went poorly for him.
He slowly uncovered the glass hull he had on and the orcs instantaneously became aware of his presence.
"WHO GOES THERE?!", the chief orc roared, almost deafening Johnathan.
The orcs armed themselves and their combined bloodlust almost made Johnathan pass out of fear. But years of hardships and abuse had hardened him enough for him to not turn tail and run yet.
He slowly walked towards the orcs, with his hands up in the air, as if he was surrendering.
The orcs stared at him with suspicion.
"... Hello, orcs...", Johnathan managed to speak up.
"WHO ARE YOU?! HOW DID YOU COVER YOUR PRESENCE FROM US?!", one of the orcs yelled at him.
"I'm... a mage... I meant no harm... I didn't come here for you people..."
The orc chief slowly walked over to Johnathan, towering over him, casting an eerie shadow all over Johnathan.
"How did you cover your presence from us?", he asked calmly.
Johnathan showed himself manipulating glass, shocking the orcs.
"Interesting...", the chief orc mused.
"Why should we let you live?", he asked in a threatening way.
"Because... I can help you conquer the dungeon...", Johnathan said.
"... Pfft... KAHAHAHAHAHA!!!", all the orcs started laughing hysterically.
"A SKELETON HUMAN!!! SUGGESTING HELP TO US?!?!?! HAHAHAHA!", they all continued.
Even the orc chief joined in.
Johnathan stood there motionlessly, ready to run at the slightest hint of aggression from the orcs.
Eventually, they all quieted down and the chief asked Johnathan again.
"So you're suicidal, huh? You look like you've been through hell, haha! No worries. I'll decapitate you swiftly."
"w-wait. I know how to open gates and disarm traps in a dungeon.", Johnathan suggested, his body and heart still calm, although drenched in fear.
"Hmm. And what guarantee do we have that you won't betray us the instant you get whatever it is that you want."
"Look at me... I'm just a 15-year-old human... do you think you won't be able to kill me if I tried something weird?"
"Hmm. You're not wrong. Alright, sit down here.", the chief commanded to which Johnathan obliged.
"This one's an insane brat... I can see it in his eyes...", one of the orcs mused.
"I like this kid. We'll kill him painlessly later.", another orc joked.
"Hah! I say we kill him right now! Humans are all scum anyway!", another orc roared.
Johnathan, even though scared shitless, had no external telltale signs of it.
"Human, you are very brave to have come here, even though you are weak.", the chief said to him.
"... I'll take that as a compliment...", Johnathan said, his fear subsiding slowly but surely.
They continued conversing for another hour. Johnathan didn't move from his spot, even though his butt was in agony.
The orcs were savage, merciless and unhinged, yes. But they weren't stupid. Neither were they unreasonable. Orcs were a warrior species, and they lived and breathed violence and war. They revelled in life-threatening situations and had a very strong feeling of brotherhood with their fellow orcs.
This particular group of orcs were here because they heard rumours of a dungeon being in the forest, and they wanted to conquer it.
Why do they want to conquer the dungeon?
"It's most challenging to conquer unknown dungeons! It's a rare opportunity for orcs to come across such a challenge!", was the orc chief's answer.
Orcs and humans were not enemies, yet they rarely agreed. They would sometimes unite in battle when necessary, but crimes against one another's kind were frequent, and a deep-seated mutual animosity was ingrained within both civilizations.
Full-on war hadn't broken out yet because they both would suffer too much if they fought. That was the only thing stopping an all-out war.
Johnathan recalled from his past-life memories that in the future, the war against the orcs was inevitable, and the main character played a vital part in the victory of the humans.
One thing Johnathan couldn't quite understand was why in the world the orc's accent sounded similar to the crude British accent he knew from his previous life.