'Please be safe tea-'
"AAAAHHH" Nathan's prayers were interrupted by the sound of a human scream that put a chill down Nathan's spine.
'Teacher has always said to keep calm no matter what, worst case scenario is that the fighters got overrun and now void monsters are tearing apart the village. I have to go outside to figure out what exactly is happening'
Taking a deep breath to calm himself, Nathan immediately got up from the ground and grabbed a dagger and a pouch made from animal hide.
He took another deep breath before opening the front door and stepping outside
'Oh... my god.' Nathan stood stunned, unable to react as he saw a giant Leopard 50 meters away tearing apart and eating a young boy he often played with.
After a few seconds of being unable to react, he turned around and ran away as fast as possible.
His heart felt like it was going to explode out of his chest, but he kept running without any other thought. He didn't even take a look at the other kids that were standing frozen in fear and confusion.
'Sorry everyone, but there's no way I can help, I can only run to save my own life.'
100 meters, 1000, 5000. Nathan never stopped running no matter what. Screams of his friends, his legs burning and in pain, his lungs feeling like they were on fire. It all didn't matter, he had to keep running.
After an hour of running and almost crossing 10 kilometers, Nathan tripped and collapsed on the ground, unable to even attempt to get up again.
'I-I t-think I'm s-safe.'
After lying collapsed on the ground and panting for 15 minutes, he felt enough strength come back to him to get up from the ground.
'My current situation is absolutely horrible.'
Nathan was now stuck in a forest, with no food, source of water, clothes, or any sense of direction he should be going in except away from his village, and everyone he knew most likely dead.
'I'll be sad about it later, teacher would kill me if he knew I would cry about his death instead of keeping a cool head and working towards my survival.'
Nathan decided to just keep walking in the direction away from his village. His current priorities are finding a source of water, all that water he sweated off himself during his run needed to be replenished.
'I'm not hungry at the moment so food will be a later thought. Thankfully, it's summer so I wont suffer too much at night, but I'll still need some sort of enclosure or wall so wind doesn't directly blow on me.'
Nathan kept walking in the same direction, paying attention to any sounds around him that could come from running water.
'I've always hated being dragged into hunts with teacher and him teaching me all about wilderness survival and hunting, but now these lessons are what will keep me alive.'
After walking for 3 hours, Nathan had found nothing, just an endless expansion of hills, trees, birds, and tiny animals that run up trees when they hear the incoming footsteps of Nathan.
'The sun is starting to set, not good. I'll just need to keep walking anyways, I can't sleep without finding water. As for predators, I can only thank my luck that I haven't met any yet, but nighttime would likely be my end without a hiding spot.'
Finally, Nathan had spotted a river in-front of him.
'Yes! I found a river. Wait, what's that?'
There was a fox drinking water from the river right in-front of Nathan.
'This is my chance, the water will somewhat mask the sound of footsteps. I can't let this chance go!'
Nathan held his dagger tightly and hurriedly sneaked towards the fox, wanting to get to it before it finished drinking water.
'Clear your emotions, don't let any positive or negative emotions cloud your judgement, don't get excited or scared'
Nathan repeated in his head the mantra that his teacher had constantly repeated to him during every hunt he brought him with.
'Now!'
Nathan leaped on top of the fox, stabbing his dagger into the back of it's neck, instantly severing it's spinal cord and killing it.
'What a sharp dagger, good stuff!'
Before dealing with his kill, Nathan crouched down and started drinking water for the river to replenish his thirst.
After drinking water to his heart's content, Nathan looked at the fox's corpse before having a damning realization... he didn't know how to make a fire.
'I will have to eat it raw, better to eat it straight away before the meat is infected.'
Nathan would also most likely get infected with parasites, but the current situation made him not care at all, all he could focus on was survival for the next day.
He skinned a part of the fox and tried to bite into it, but failed. The raw meat and connective tissue was too tough for his teeth, he couldn't even chew it so he had to cut the meat into thin strips with his dagger then directly swallow it.
After eating until he was full, most of the fox still remained but Nathan couldn't carry the corpse with him and taking any meat with him would only attract predators to the smell of blood on him. His hands and mouth were also covered in blood but he used dirt to rub most of it off, removing most of the smell.
It was now after sunset, with only a little bit of the sun's light left in the sky.
'I found my sleeping spot for the night' Nathan thought, as he looked towards a fox burrow in the ground, probably belonging to the fox he just killed.
Before going inside the burrow, Nathan decided to improve this spot by cutting up bushes with his dagger and placing them around the burrow to hide it even more.
'A perfect fit for my small body.'
After checking that everything was in order. Nathan, too tired from all the events that had happened to him, fell asleep instantly.