After shouldering his rifle, Yakup left his position and went after the Lightning Komodo Dragon, using the last of his strength to escape. Breakwater voice echoed through the jungle, a sound he was sure would attract the attention of powerful beings. The first thing he needed to do now was to leave his position.
After spraying himself with the deodorizing spray, he carefully followed the tracks. He hoped to finish the job before it got completely dark. He was afraid that other powerful beasts living in the jungle would realize that the Lightning Komodo Dragon was weakened and attack. This was no sport, there were too many monsters waiting for an opportunity.
Yakup followed the uncontrolled tracks on the ground through the forest. He paused when he realized the tracks led to the Lightning Komodo Dragon's cave. He turned off the safety on his rifle, went behind a tree and got down on his knees.
He waited in this position for about ten minutes. After making sure there was no sound coming from inside the cave, he lowered his rifle. It was already dark. Even if there was no sound coming from inside, he could not be sure.
He continued to hold his position. But his hands were not idle, he took out one of the stink bombs hidden in the pouch at his waist and opened the leaves. It took seconds for the smell of ammonia to permeate his whole body. Yakup sent one of the stink bombs into the cave.
He was sure that the Lightning Komodo Dragon was afraid of this smell. Because this smell had slowly lured him into the trap. At first, Yakup was going to use the ammonia to fool the Lightning Komodo Dragon's sense of smell. But when he realized that the beast was much stronger than he thought, he decided to use it as a trap.
He injected a mixture of Thunder Ant, Flameskin Climber, Black Claw Mushroom and Flame Beetle into the bodies of deer he captured in the forest. This mixture was a powerful drug. Beasts who consumed it would become disoriented. This was the main reason why the Lightning Komodo Dragon did not notice the trap. Of course, if he could have found Shadow Flower and Venomtick Spider, he wouldn't have had to try so hard. These two substances would have leveled the mixture, dissipating the Lightning Komodo Dragon's energy and causing him to hallucinate to the point of self-harm. When this happened, all Yakup had to do was watch the Lightning Komodo Dragon kill itself.
Half an hour had passed since he threw the stink bomb into the cave. There was still no movement. Yakup raised his rifle and moved towards the cave. He waited a little while for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Then he walked slowly into the cave.
He could not afford to hurry. The beasts were not stupid, they had developed many strategies to survive in the forest. Pretending to be dead and luring the hunter into a trap was very common among monsters.
It took him fifteen minutes to move twenty meters from the entrance of the cave. Another thirty meters took him an hour. Finally, he reached the end of the cave and the smell of blood made him stuff his nose.
The Lightning Komodo Dragon was lying in the far corner of the cave, its head crushed. Yakup carefully approached the corpse. When he threw a stone from the ground and checked its vitality, he realized that it was dead. It took him more time to approach the body than to kill it.
'The thing that crushed his head...'
When Yakup realized that half of the head of the corpse had caved in, he fixed his eyes on the wall. Looking carefully, he could see that the cave wall was caved in and covered with blood.
'He must have lost control of his speed and head-butted the wall.
When he saw the size of the Komodo Dragon up close, he shivered involuntarily. He took out the bayonet hanging on his leg and took a good look at one of the metallic scales of the Lightning Komodo Dragon. After measuring the space between the scales, he thrust with all his might.
After several attempts, one of the scales finally dislodged with a terrible ""crack"". The skin exposed beneath was gray and shiny, but as soon as he touched it, a slippery, sticky liquid smeared his hand. He gripped his bayonet tightly and began to carve into the tough skin.
Every time he dove into the meat, the bayonet would get stuck and he would struggle to get it out; it was very hard.
After about half an hour, the hole finally reached the desired width. Taking a deep breath, he pushed his arm into the flesh. It was hot and sticky inside. Drawing on what he had learned in anatomy class, he struggled for a while and finally found what he was looking for. He carefully pulled his hand out.
His hand tingled slightly when he picked up the Beast Core. The Core was half the size of a chicken egg. It looked like a translucent layer of gelatin. In the center of the core was a worm-like creature lying in a thin membrane. It had an electric blue color, with thin veins and spiral-like patterns.
Yakup carefully placed the Beast Core in the insulation box he had taken from the armory. Insulation boxes were important for the preservation of the cores. After securing the box, he did not wait here any longer. He quickly left the cave and washed off the blood in a nearby stream. Then he sprayed himself with deodorizing spray and rolled in the dirt for a while.
He made sure the smell of blood was gone.
He returned to his habitat to spend the night. Hungry and thirsty, he was still able to endure; he had trained for much longer without food and water and had practiced deadly training. There was very little in Paradise that an ordinary human could consume. Except for a few herbs like mint, there was nothing for ordinary people to consume. Of course, things would have been very different if it was an Overhuman, they could consume the flesh of monsters and animals without any problem.
After returning to his habitat, he picked up his rifle and went to sleep.
---
The sun was getting ready to rise. On the horizon, shades of red and pink blended with orange and spread across the sky. The clouds reflected the sunlight like brushstrokes, creating a peaceful picture. The pond was calm and serene, as if even the wind had stopped blowing so as not to disturb the sanctity of this moment. The silhouettes of the trees were framed in darkness, as if accompanying the sky's enchanting palette of colors, and the birds' feeble songs indicated that nature had not yet awakened, that this enchanting moment was shared only between the sky and the earth.
Boris opened his eyes in the midst of this stillness. He was in an old but clean sleeping bag he had spread on the ground. A gentle breeze blew across his face as he opened the door of his tent and gently woke him. His eyes were still sleepy, but his face was filled with the peace of the landscape. He sat up, straightening his camouflage pants and dark green T-shirt.
He had survived the night without any problems. He ruffled his hair and stretched a little, then stood up and stretched to warm up his body. After fifteen minutes of hard stretching, he grabbed his pistol and went to the wooded area behind him. After hunting a few small rodents, he returned to where he lived.
After cleaning his prey, he built a fire and made a fire to eat his breakfast. After some time, the meat was well cooked. Boris couldn't stop his mouth watering. It was too bad that there were not enough spices. Still, he was going to eat meat. That in itself was a reward.
The instructors on Prometheus Island were very strict. Boris couldn't remember ever being pushed so hard in his life. Two special training weeks in particular, called Hell Week or Hunt Week, pushed him to the brink of death. Despite his well-developed body, he found it hard to endure the training. If it wasn't for the friends he met here, he would have given up long ago.
After enjoying the meat, he buried his bones in the ground. He washed his face with a handful of water from a large pond nearby. It was hard to call it a lake because there were no living creatures in it. The water was unusually clean. No purification equipment was needed to consume it, which was a treasure in a wilderness like Eden.
He was lucky to have landed in such a place.
'How far am I from the Green Zone?
The areas on Paradise that had been cleansed of monsters and brought under control were called 'Green Zones'. The Green Zones were usually the lands of the blood nobles of Paradion. They were used for mining, agriculture and outposts, and were where gates like the Akdogan Gate opened. This was the main reason why the buffer zones never completely disappeared.
Each buffer zone was built around a gate. The United World Government was the main reason why the buffer zones were under control.
'Looking at the environment, this is supposed to be an Orange Zone. The Crystal Boa Snake is a Class B monster. I can't believe they asked me to hunt a Class B. Even a Master Hunter would fail to hunt the Crystal Boa Snake.'
He took a storage container out of his bag and looked at the egg-sized Beast Core inside. The outside was covered with a translucent gelatinous liquid, a substance that felt sticky and strange when touched with bare hands. Inside was a worm-shaped substance with a crystalline appearance.
'A 'Class B' Crystal Boa Snake Boa Snake Core...'
As he was thinking about the core, he suddenly took out the pistol from his belt and pointed it at the wooded area behind him.
"Who are you?"
When there was no sound from the other side, Boris put the core back in its container and gripped the pistol with both hands.
"You better get out before I shoot, brother."
A hand emerged from behind the tree he was pointing the pistol at.
"Your senses are as sharp as ever, brother."