"Er…where is everyone?"I had dismissed Canis Major quite some time ago because the drain on my mana was starting to affect me physically but I couldn"t find anyone at all. It felt as if I had been walking in circles for ages. All the trees looked the same, there were no notable landmarks to distinguish one area from the next, and n.o.body to ask for directions when I got lost.
And lost I was.
"Actually…where the h.e.l.l am I?!"
There was no response other than the chirping of a bird from far away. I looked around blearily, feeling extremely tired. I needed to rest and soon, and I obviously couldn"t do it in the open. If only I could find a cave…
Ironically, at that moment my friends were all resting and recovering in a cave, and if I just found them I would be able to do just that. Unfortunately, I had completely forgotten about my poor sense of direction and my inclination to get lost, especially in a forest like this. I had trouble finding my way around a new city even with a map, though I managed (especially since there were people I could ask for directions if I ever got lost), but in a forest?
Basically, I was f.u.c.ked.
"d.a.m.n it. So much for being a hero."
And I wanted to surprise my friends with the blood tokens I had gotten, and share them with Harrison and the rest. The looks on their faces when I brought the blood tokens back…I was so looking forward to savoring their pleasantly shocked features.
Now that plan was all ruined because I couldn"t find my way around a d.a.m.ned forest. To be fair, most people couldn"t. I wished I had learned pathfinding and tracking like Troy and the rest. Then I wouldn"t be in so much trouble.
For now, however, the most important thing was to find shelter. I needed a place to rest or I would be a sitting duck for both the monsters and other predatory students seeking to add my blood token to my collection. If they found out that I had a ton of blood tokens on my person, I would become quite the ripe target for exploitation.
That wouldn"t be good.
If I couldn"t find a cave, I should just improvise.
Thinking that, I glanced at the trees and wondered if I could use any of them as shelter. It took another few minutes of trekking through unknown territory, but I finally found a tree suitable for my purpose.
There was a hollow at the base of the tree, where I could squeeze in and sleep without anyone knowing that I was in there. Well, to be sure, specialized trackers might be able to locate me, but if they weren"t looking for me specifically, they had no reason to watch for my presence and track me to my makes.h.i.+ft shelter.
"Ugh…"
Crawling through the dirt and soil, I dusted myself off wearily. Even creepier was the bugs, which I swatted away in disgust. I hated bugs and insects. Most of them, anyway. They crept me out, and I was a little ashamed to say I had a slight fear of them. Well, I dealt with that fear by squas.h.i.+ng them or swatting them away.
If they were gigantic, then I tended to take them out from long range with the hopes of not needing to get into close combat with them.
In any event, once I cleared out a comfortable spot for myself inside the hollow of the tree, I went to sleep and began the process of recovering my depleted mana.
*
When I woke up, it was the next morning. According to my cellphone, anyway. I had slept the entire night away, as well as evening. I was pretty exhausted after unleas.h.i.+ng Hercules, so I didn"t find it strange.
Just a little annoyed that I had slept for too long.
"d.a.m.n…well, I guess I should start looking for my friends now."
Crawling out of the hollow, I dusted myself off and looked around for any imminent danger.
Thankfully, there was none whatsoever, so I could immediately begin my journey to look for my friends.
"What a pathetic MC!"
"Spineless wimp."
I sighed heavily as I glanced at the comments to the right. Quite naturally, there were readers already condemning my plan to look for my friends. They were posting pretty edgy stuff such as me being pathetic for wanting to rely on others instead of surviving the forest on my own. Never mind that I wasn"t going to last long if I tried to survive on my own, particularly given my poor sense of direction and tendency to over-expend mana when fighting against monsters. These readers wanted me to solo the Spiritual Road and h.o.a.rd all the blood tokens to myself, and were enraged that I would even consider joining up with my friends again. They thought the act of wanting to reunite with my group was pathetic, cowardly and evidence that I was a spineless "p.u.s.s.y."
Seriously? I wasn"t some G.o.d Mode Mary Sue protagonist who could solo the entire Spiritual Road by myself. Fighting a single rank B Inferno Kong was enough to exhaust me to the point where I almost collapsed. If there was a second rank B monster, or another group of students chose to attack me then (to steal the ten blood tokens I had just picked up), there was no way I would have survived. Luck was essential in that scenario.
Unlike what all those edge lords would tell you, there was strength in numbers. And it wasn"t as if my friends had betrayed me. Harrison genuinely didn"t know that I had a terrible sense of direction while I completely forgot about it myself. If anything, it was more of my fault for wanting to play the hero than my friends for "abandoning" me. They didn"t actually abandon me, to be honest. I was sure they would be searching for me like I was.
Actually, I should be more practical. Neither my friends nor I were going to actively search for each other. I was sure Harrison and the rest would focus on surviving in their present predicaments and looking for a way out of whatever current crises they found themselves in. Looking for me was a secondary objective, and they were confident that they would run into me sooner or later as long as all of us survived. Similarly, I had to prioritize my own survival over everything else. Finding my friends was second on the list, not first. I was certain that I would encounter them sooner or later, but to meet up with them eventually, I had to first survive whatever the Spiritual Road had to throw at me.
Growl…
No, thankfully that was not from a monster. That was from my stomach. I realized just how hungry I was, after a whole day of fighting and not eating. All I did was sleep, but I didn"t feed my stomach at all yesterday.
I needed food. Thankfully I had a bunch of rations stored. I knew I had to be careful and proportion them out – I didn"t have enough to last me an entire month, never mind the few months we were supposed to be here. Even so, I was starving, so it was fine if I opened a single packet for today. The ration pack"s food was admittedly not at all appetizing, but it was better than the alternative – which was to starve.
The majority of the food supplies and rations were probably with Theodore and maybe Harrison. This was why teamwork was so important. It wasn"t just a matter of combat ability. By taking on the majority of the load for the team, which included equipment and rations, Theodore"s movements would be slightly slowed, but that allowed the rest of the team to operate at 100% combat ability, unimpeded. Not everything had to be about sheer strength or combat ability or power. Each team member had a role to play, and all roles whether it was a combat, support or reconnaissance role were equally important.
Unfortunately, many xianxia or cultivation writers and readers didn"t understand that, and they adopted the edgy "strength is everything" or "power decides all" arrogant mentality that just didn"t work in reality. There was no one in this world who could do everything by himself or live by himself. No man was an island, n.o.body was self-sufficient. If you specialized in a specific role, chances are you are not going to fulfil any other role just as well as other people specializing in that role could. Steve Jobs was a genius who could invent his Apple devices and an innovative entrepreneur able to start up his own company and become a billionaire, but even he needed to rely on doctors when he fell sick. He couldn"t just treat his own disease without a doctor"s help.
All these stupid myths about overpowered protagonists going solo and ruling the world with strength was just bulls.h.i.+t cooked up by not very sociable people who wanted to delude themselves into believing that they could solve everything with violence and not face the social consequences of their tyrannical actions. Yes, the world was unfair and bad things happened to good people. But good things happened to good people too, and bad things do happen to bad people, and it had nothing to do with obtaining strength.
Particularly in the military, we were trained as soldiers to fight in a squad, to forge strong brotherhood and bonds with our platoon, and to work as a company. Any idiot who thought he could solo the enemy like some crazed teenage Call of Duty gamer running in gung-ho and shooting everyone with his aimbot skills would die in the first few seconds. In a military unit, there were no individuals, only squads and brothers. Everyone watched out for each other, everyone helped each other. That was how you win a war. By banding together and cooperaring, becoming a cohesive, unified fighting unit. United we stand, divided we fall.
You would think that those martial artists and cultivators would understand this simple concept and follow a similar code that had been established by the military (since martial artists and soldiers were both warriors), but nope. All that bulls.h.i.+t "strength is everything" or "I can only do whatever I want if I have the strength" was just built upon false premises of grandeur. Power came with responsibility, and tyrants would be toppled. A single powerful tyrant would still fall to the united "weak" ma.s.ses. A single droplet of water might not be able to break through a wall of stone, but countless droplets of water constantly pounding against it would erode it and eventually destroy it.
So enough of this antisocial edge lord individual bulls.h.i.+t of "power is everything" and "get rid of everyone who is useless" or "the world can"t be trusted" or "abandon the world." That wasn"t how reality worked.
Anyway, for now, I needed to eat. I was about to reach into my backpack and grab a ration pack when I heard a grunt. Turning around, I saw a Blood Boar.
"…oh?"
It was huge, almost as tall as a man and several times as bulky. Its crimson fur stood out remarkably, with veins pulsing through its dense muscles. Wickedly curved tusks jabbed toward my direction and the creature glared at me with blood-red eyes.
A rank E monster, maybe rank D at most (but I doubted that. Completely incapable of casting any elemental spells. Easy prey, but I couldn"t let my guard down. A slight mistake on my part was perfectly capable of resulting in a fatal injury.
So I took my current opponent as seriously as I would any other monster. Moreover, an idea was slowly forming in my mind. If my ration packs were limited and wouldn"t last me for a month, why not seek an alternative for food?
Gradually, the Blood Boar was beginning to look more and more delicious in my eyes. My mouth watered when I pictured its eventual form, a thick, glistening thigh slowly roasting over a fire.
Yeah, I wanted it.
"Hi…?!"
The Blood Boar suddenly shuddered and backed away, instinctively sensing my hunger. It pawed at the ground nervously, then suddenly turned tail and ran.
"You"re not going anywhere!"
In a flash, I summoned Orion, and I slew it with a single arrow. The Blood Boar went down the moment my azure arrow pierced its neck, skidding across the ground and gouging out a slight tunnel before it writhed.
I finished it off with another arrow to its head before proceeding toward it. Trying not to drool, I began the process of cutting it apart so that I could hoist it over a fire.
Looked like my meals for the next few days have been taken care of in a most satisfactory manner.