Territory (1)
Putting aside the rumor that Allfather was actually Kadir, I got back to what needed to be done.
A newbie—if you could even call him that—with such an absurd gimmick had eaten up some of my schedule, but it had only been about ten minutes. It didn't affect my daily routine in the slightest; at most, it was just a brief detour into scrolling through the forum.
Today marks Day 13. Just two more days until the full moon.
Time seemed to crawl at an agonizing pace, yet somehow it slipped by in a flash. If my days had been an endless string of comfortable routines, time would have flown like an arrow, but out here I was enduring one trial after another. Suffering is all well and good in moderation, but this place really overdoes it.
Grumbling inwardly, I set out to train. First came the internal cultivation art, followed immediately by swordsmanship practice. In two days, on the night of the full moon, I planned to ingest the neidan. I had already mentioned this to the Heavenly Demon, and she had provided a much deeper theoretical explanation.
Now that is what a true mentor looks like.
Offering genuine praise without an ounce of jealousy toward a subordinate's achievements. This was precisely why, even when I cursed the heavens for my plight, I could never bring myself to resent other people. The world had its share of wicked souls, but it also held genuinely good-hearted people like the Heavenly Demon.
With a faint, pleased smile touching my lips, I tapped out another reply.
Hearing her weave such poetic metaphors only confirmed that she was an elder well along in years. Though she occasionally slipped into strange forum lingo, that was just what happened when someone spent too much time marinating on the Gallery.
Her explanation clicked instantly. I gave an appreciative nod as her words settled in my mind.
Back when I ate that giant electric eel, the violent side effects had nearly ended me. My body felt as if it were about to burst at the seams, yet somehow I had managed to guide and disperse the raging energy. Consuming the inner core would likely require a similar approach. In a way, that harrowing ordeal had served as an unintentional rehearsal.
All the better for me.
Having absorbed the foundational principles she passed along, I sat cross-legged and began circulating the mind cultivation method. As my understanding of the fundamentals deepened, the time I spent circulating the art grew progressively longer. One might think a seasoned practitioner would need less time, but as the Heavenly Demon had illustrated, the foundation was akin to tree roots. The deeper and wider the roots reached, the greater the volume of water they required.
If I want to purify my internal power, the only answer is to expand my lung capacity.
And the only way to achieve that was through steady, disciplined breathing. By circulating the internal cultivation art, my lung capacity naturally expanded in tandem. What I ultimately sought was a state where my everyday breath mirrored the flow of the cultivation method. According to the Heavenly Demon, that went beyond laying the foundation—it was the process of anchoring the roots into bedrock. For me, that milestone was still a distant horizon, but steady effort would carry me there.
Next up: swordsmanship.
With meditation finished, I moved on to martial drills. I had been methodically working through the guideposts written by Sword Master, yet I kept running into a persistent wall. Other forum users had raved that reading his posts alone was enough to churn out a mass-produced Swordmaster, but out here in the woods, I had no one by my side. In martial arts, having an instructor was paramount; fumbling around entirely on my own was a frustratingly lonely endeavor.
Unable to crack it myself, I reached out directly to Sword Master. In the past, asking a question required drafting a public forum post, but the interface now supported direct messages. Sword Master was every bit as exceptional an instructor as the Heavenly Demon, so I listened with rapt attention.
My brain short-circuited at a quip so completely out of character. Shaking my head to clear the daze, I realized he was right about one thing: I had completely neglected thrusting attacks. This brief exchange had yielded far more insight than I expected.
Taking Sword Master's advice to heart, I threw myself into swordsmanship and aura training. I focused on shoring up my balance while using aura to compensate for the inherent shortcomings of a one-handed grip. Don't forget to drill thrusts, either.
It wasn't just thrusting that needed work; my overall combat doctrine required fine-tuning. Up until now, my combat style had revolved around creating an opening to shatter the enemy's mobility, then steadily whittling down their stamina bit by bit. Since almost every threat I encountered had been an oversized monstrosity, that tactic had proven remarkably effective. Yet even that success had only been possible because I possessed an absurdly overpowered cheat item: the Heavenly Demon's Sword. I needed a clear tactical approach for dealing with smaller, agile beasts as well.
What happens if I get dragged into a prolonged war of attrition?
Such scenarios were rare, but in the Forest of the Four Seasons, taking anything for granted was a death wish. In all likelihood, long-winded endurance fights would be my greatest vulnerability. It wasn't as though surviving out here offered any structured regimen for building marathon-level stamina. While cultivating the mind method had steadily expanded my lung capacity, there was no telling what lurked in the wild—there were bound to be creatures in this forest with stamina that put mine to shame.
"..."
"...What are you doing?"
"Fhuuu..."
When I asked the Fast Tree Sloth what he was up to, he merely let out a long, languid breath. Rather than a sigh, it looked suspiciously like he was practicing rhythmic breathing. A dry laugh escaped me at the sheer absurdity. There's no way that's the breathing technique I showed him earlier, right? Don't be ridiculous.
Next thing you know, someone will tell me the forest gorillas have learned martial arts breathing.
A gorilla was a beast capable of ripping a grown human in half with raw muscle. If a creature like that mastered internal cultivation on top of its physical might, it would be an unmitigated catastrophe. Besides, internal breathing—the mind cultivation method—demanded a certain baseline of intellect. Unless the Forest of the Four Seasons had evolved primates to match human sapience, it was an impossibility. And who would have taught them in the first place?
Pushing the absurd thought from my mind, I rose to my feet. It was about time for lunch. Having built an oven, it was high time to put it to use, and the dwarf's delivery should be arriving any moment.
"Wonmo, let's go."
"Kyuu!"
Wonmo had just woken up, so I scooped him up. Naturally, Bbarmbo hitched a ride on my back as well. With buoyant steps, I headed toward the stream, eager to see what had drifted into the fish trap.
Splash! Splash!
"Aha, beautiful."
Two fish again. A wave of pure satisfaction washed over me. Hauling the heavy mesh trap ashore, I grinned in anticipation of the upcoming feast.
Rustle.
Just as I turned back with the trap in tow, the faint rustle of brush brushing against something caught my ear. Instantly, I snapped into a defensive stance, my nerves taut just as they had been that morning. But the brush fell silent. Nothing followed.
Am I just being paranoid?
Or perhaps the endless string of life-or-death ambushes had left me hearing auditory hallucinations. I wiped my face with a palm and glanced down at Wonmo. The little cub was staring intently toward the canopy, his gaze locked on a high branch.
"Wonmo? See something up there?"
"Kyuu?"
"Never mind. Let's head back."
Dwelling on every phantom rustle would only give me a headache. Besides, with the Fast Tree Sloth on my back, I had at least a layer of insurance against sudden ambushes. Dumping the two thrashing fish into an iron bucket, I began prepping for lunch.
Taking the barricade delivered by the dwarf, I hauled it to its designated spot. Thanks to my dramatically increased physical strength, shifting the heavy fortification was surprisingly effortless.
Next came the custom-forged steel tray. Sized to fit snugly inside the oven chamber, this was where the fish would rest. He even had the sense to raise the outer lip so oil won't leak over the edges.
I slid the tray into the oven mouth and pulled it back out a few times to check the tolerances. While its heft was a minor drawback, that was a fair trade-off for durability. Overall, the craftsmanship was stellar. Little by little, my standard of living in this wilderness was climbing.
Crackle! Snap!
I lit a small fire in the bottom combustion chamber to gradually preheat the stone walls. While the temperature rose, I gutted and cleaned the fish. Cooking with an oven didn't change the basic butchery, but to ensure even baking, I butterflied them wide across the tray and gave them a generous dusting of coarse salt.
Slide—clack.
Finally, I shoved the loaded tray into the preheated stone oven and secured the door. The tray's length and height fit like a glove; the dwarf had truly outdone himself.
He said it takes about fifteen to twenty minutes, right?
Until then, I could play with Wonmo. It doubled as hunting drills to sharpen the little guy's predatory instincts—though calling it training was a bit generous when all it involved was dangling a fish head from a rope tied to a stick. It looked almost identical to playing with a kitten, right down to the sheer adorableness of it. At the same time, dodging his clumsy pounces helped keep my own reflexes sharp.
"Kyuu! Kyuuuu!"
"That's it! Good boy!"
While the aroma of roasting fish steadily intensified from within the stone oven, nearby, the Fast Tree Sloth simply hung motionless, staring blankly up into the canopy.
Rustle.
Rustle. Snap.
A pair of agile beasts wove swiftly through the canopy. Rather than moving along the forest floor, they bounded across the branches with effortless grace, their light footsteps barely rattling the foliage.
At a glance, their silhouettes resembled humans, but their disproportionately long arms and thick coats of dark fur made their non-human nature unmistakably clear. Slipping through the dense boughs faster than wind, the creatures soon reached a secluded enclave deep within the woods.
Resting upon a broad bough high above the ground was a massive ape lounging in lazy tranquility. Though its build closely matched that of a common gorilla, the aura rolling off its broad frame carried an ominous, suffocating weight.
"Ooh! Ooh-ooh!"
"Ooh-ooh-ooh!"
The scout gorillas broke into urgent vocalizations, as if desperate to deliver critical intelligence. At their cries, the lounging beast slowly hauled itself upright. Gone was the leisurely indifference from moments before; its scarred visage was set in deadly, unwavering seriousness.
"Ooh?"
"Ooh-ooh-ooh!"
"Ooh...!"
Across the canopy, a subtle, chilling draft began to stir.