by Pegaz
Over the next few hours, John found different edible monsters and beasts like the Large Toothed Tiger, Silent Panther, Rhino Bull, and even the Komodo Dragon! He hadn’t seen these creatures since he was a mortal.
To this day, John could still remember the taste of the Komodo Dragon he had killed to reach SSS rank as a mortal. It was one of the best meats he had ever eaten, maybe only being beaten by the delicacy fish he had caught while on holiday.
Reminiscing about the great taste of the rare meat, he couldn’t help himself. He killed one, drained its blood, skinned it, and placed the huge carcass into his Storage Space to keep it fresh.
On the way back, he hunted five of the rodents like creatures for the village as promised. He knew providing them with a bit of sustenance would also put him in their good graces. It was essential that he got along with the villagers while Kelly was growing up. He didn’t drain or skin them which would affect the taste of the meat though. This was a ‘If you want better food, get stronger and hunt for it,’ motivation tactic.
When John got back, he noticed the scrawny man from the day before and another man were kneeling in front of his house with their heads down.
Sarah explained to him that they were there for his forgiveness and to ask for training since these men were the people who were responsible for protecting the village after the knight left, prior to John showing up.
John tossed the five rodent bodies on the floor beside them and instructed them to stand up. “I don’t know the taste of these creatures, but it’s still meat and there’s enough to share. You’ll need to bleed and skin them, but it’s also best if you learn to hunt on your own. I’ll teach basic martial arts and how to hunt these creatures to anyone who wants to learn.”
The people thanked him as they took the creatures away. In his Scan, John found them putting the creatures inside a cave after they finished skinning it.
Sarah explained that before refrigerators were invented, people used to put food inside caves like that to keep it cold. They could even collect ice from inside the cave, but not much. She didn’t know the full details because she had just heard about it somewhere back on Earth.
Over the next few weeks, the village had built a large building for Sarah’s medical practice only a few days prior, and since then, Sarah had been setting it up to receive her first patients. It could hold several dozen beds with room to spare and it was built next to their house, on the side away from the jungle.
John trained Kelly and fifty other people who wanted to learn how to hunt. John only knew the basics like how to set up simple traps, how to track an animal, and how to find water sources, but he hadn’t used any of that knowledge since becoming an immortal. Of those fifty, more than half came back to learn martial arts and they became increasingly stronger.
John also started teaching Kelly how to use a sword. It was a funny sight seeing a five-year-old child swing a wooden sword which was almost as tall as her. He wasn’t planning to teach her about weapons until her body had grown a bit more, but Kelly was getting bored of the same routine every day. It seemed to relieve her boredom, evidence being that Kelly never stopped practicing after getting it. They fell into another routine as four more months passed by quickly.
On this day, John opened the system to check and noticed something.
Toxin Pool (Brain): 9.99T
*UNIQUE* Conversion - Idlers 0/2160, Complete - 0/1
The brain’s capacity was full at ten trillion, but even though he hadn’t obtained the full amount, the skill unlocked anyway, confusing him greatly.
John looked at the skill for five seconds for the description to come up.
*UNIQUE* Conversion:
Complete: Forcefully changes the last 4 units of Life Power into Toxin Power.
John knitted his brows at the description.
Why wouldn’t I be able to change those units to Toxin Power without this skill?
It took a few seconds for him to come up with the answer.
Toxin Power needs five units of Life Power to change, but if every neuron or cell already has Toxin Power stored inside them to full capacity, then I can’t absorb anymore Life Power to get up to the five units needed for the conversion!
Which means it’s technically full at 9.99 trillion, unlocking the skill.
This system has a thing for whole numbers! When I was mortal, the system put my strength, defence, and stamina into numbers, but when I had completed everything it wasn’t a whole number, until the system gave me a boost to make it a perfect, whole number.
Ah, that’s another thing I’ve noticed. The only other UNIQUE skills the system has creates oxygen inside the lungs and gives me the ability to combine elements to create different elements.
Three different skills can’t be a coincidence, it seems all the UNIQUE skills are those that create things.
John looked at the numbers of the Toxin Pool’s Brain in the system, and like he thought, all the numbers besides the last ended in a nine. The last digit was six, so John had four Life Power that couldn’t be converted into Toxin Power.
Seeing as the system had a counter for the same Toxin Pool but for the body, he tried swapping the four Life Power in his brain for four Toxin Power in his body. No matter what he tried, it didn’t work.
He told Sarah about it since he’d share the skill with her once it was finished.
During the stay in the village, Sarah had finished strengthening her branches and also gained enough Toxin Power to officially enter Rank 7. Now that she had nourished her body with the new cultivation method, any Toxin Power that would’ve disappeared from the neurons because of the natural defence would now get stored inside her body. She was also strengthening the cells at a much faster rate thanks to the nourished body.
At this rate, Sarah reckoned she could get a level once every six months instead of the multitude of years it would’ve taken without the nourished body.
If that was true, Sarah would be able to get to Rank 8 in about five years.
All Sarah was doing these days, besides training and teaching Kelly, was waiting for the beds to be made for her medical practice. The villagers needed to make enough beds to fill her new building, which would take a while without machines to do it for them.
John kept training those who wanted to become knights. During one of his off days, he disappeared to the capital to find out how knights usually fought in battles. If he wanted to keep blending in, then he’d have to properly train the villagers the same way real knights were trained by the kingdom.
Without keeping up this facade, he would risk being discovered if a bunch of knights who trained under the same instructor had no idea how to perform their duties but could instead kill every single knight in the castle with ease.
Once he got back, he changed the trainees’ training to fit what he discovered.
Another six months passed.
John was in a pretty good mood since all his trainees, especially Kelly, had made huge improvements. To celebrate, he took a huge slab of meat from the Komodo Dragon and cooked it for his family.
After he had finished eating, he looked at Kelly before speaking. “Let’s extend this small celebration to the wannabe knights. Tomorrow, you’re all going to partake in a trial.”
Chapter 10: Trial
The next day, John woke up early to prepare for the upcoming session. He used his wood, earth, and metal elements to create training dummies for all of his trainees. The half-body dummies were made to be the same size, except for Kelly’s. It was trimmed down to match her height so that she could properly gauge how and where to attack a human’s vitals.
Not long after he finished crafting the dummies, John’s students started to gather and the group started their session. Excitement filled their faces as they anxiously examined the object in front of them. Some pretended to dance with their wooden counterparts and hugged them, as they were the first pieces of training equipment they had ever used.
John went around to
each person and shouted out basic commands for them to perform. The wooden figures were sturdy but still given enough flexibility to get knocked around a bit and also bounce back after being attacked. This was due to their weighted bases: the adult dummies were five hundred pounds, while the one for Kelly was around a hundred pounds.
After a few minutes with each person, John decided to move on to something else. “Everyone gather together!”
Kelly was the first to stop what she was doing and run towards John. The others were reluctant to leave the new dummies and grouped together.
“Today, I’m giving you all a group trial. Pass, and you can use the dummies from tomorrow onwards. Fail, and I’ll make you do the drills twice a day until you pass the group trial on your own!”
He stared into the small crowd and tossed them a satisfied smirk. He was proud to see that they had made quite a bit of progress since John and his family arrived. Everyone present had put on muscle, and their complexions were much better. This was all thanks to training, increased food intake, and the new medicine Sarah had passed out to those who were ill.
Upon noticing his smile, the group grew anxious about what was to come. They knew that John didn’t play around with his punishments, so any wrong move would cost them months of painful training.
“Follow me!” he instructed as he led the trainees through a tall field of grass that came up to most of their thighs.
He led them forty feet into the jungle and the height of the grass decreased drastically, but so did their ability to see. The sunlight was being devoured by leaves that clung to the tree branches above.
“Wait here!” John shouted before running further into the jungle and disappearing from sight.
Nobody in the group spoke or moved, which caused the entire place to become eerily quiet.
Moments later, a loud roar erupted from the direction John had gone. Everyone nearly jumped out of their skin, but Kelly knew better. She had heard this noise before and she burst into laughter when she heard her father yell at the creature to shut up. His voice echoed over the roar and everyone stared in confusion as they watched him emerge from the dark brush with a continuous boar in a strange headlock.
The bear, which stood over seven feet on all four legs, was hunched down and slowly walking alongside John as its head was under John’s arm. Its entire body was much bigger than John who was a dwarf in comparison, but that dwarf was dictating the direction and speed of the walk.
John’s arm couldn’t wrap around the bear’s neck completely due to its large size, but nobody could see the threads he used to complete the headlock.
When John was thirty feet away from the group, he looked at them and spoke nonchalantly. “All you need to do is survive. No equipment of any kind is allowed. You can only use the martial arts techniques you’ve learned.
“You’re not allowed to flee. The bear can’t be left alone for too long, nor can it be allowed to attack someone on their own. You must defend one another and if you don’t, you can forget about me training you to become a knight.”
Kelly raised her hand, catching John’s attention.
“Can we use an attack to defend?” Kelly asked, still remembering how John used an elbow attack to defend against the continuous bear the last time.
John nodded his head. “Any other questions?”
Everyone remained silent.
“This will last until the bear gives up. Don’t expect me to help you at all. I won’t move from this spot until it’s over!”
Without warning, he released the bear from the headlock and pushed it towards the group.
The creature let out a bellow, and the group covered their ears and shook in fear.
John rolled his eyes and called out starting instructions. “Surround the bear! Get in its blind spots. You’re forbidden to attack it, but it will make the bear panic a little. If the bear attacks someone, then the people on the left and right of the person being attacked should help defend.”
He saw the people instantly move to surround the bear.
The bear panicked and started to turn around in place, trying to make sure none of them attacked it.
Upon realising that it wasn’t going to be attacked, the beast lunged at one of the trainees, swiping at their neck with its claws.
Just like John hoped, the people on either side of the person being attacked used simple punches to hit the bear’s claws in hopes of saving their comrade.
Three men throwing a punch at the same target caused the bear’s claw to jolt backwards. It wasn’t strong enough to cause the bear to lose balance, but it did make the bear choose a different target.
Most of the trainees did a decent job at keeping their composure when they saw the bear switch focus.
When it attacked the person standing to the left of Kelly, she knew she couldn’t reach the claw the same way as the others. Quick on her feet, she performed a jump kick, but the recoil pushed her away. She landed in a bush a few feet away, but she soon got back up and rejoined the group.
Throughout the fight, there were a few mistakes like someone getting hit by one of the claws due to poor timing with defence. Luckily, the wound wasn’t too deep, allowing the man to continue fighting.
It took over two hours for the bear to run out of energy and collapse on the ground. Its eyes shut tight as its laboured breath grew heavy with each passing minute.
When it finally fell, the defenders followed suit, gasping for air as rivers of sweat ran down their backs.
John smiled at the group. “For your first group battle, I suppose you all did pretty well. Let me explain what this trial was about.
“Knights are not hunters! They don’t go off on their own to single-handedly kill an enemy. Instead, they work in groups like all of you just did. They surround their enemies and wear them down until an ally is able to deal a fatal blow.
“When fighting humans, the tactics change depending on the size of the group they’re fighting. If you’re against a small band of bandits, then you’d surround them just like a wild animal. If you’re fighting an organised army, the tactics are completely different as you would group together to defend each other’s sides while facing the enemy head on.
“This trial was to get you to see what it’s like to be a knight and help you become familiar with facing death head on to help you eventually overcome the natural fear of it. From now on, you need to keep practicing what you’ve learned but also start training as a group and your stamina, so you can easily outlast even the strongest monsters.
“You’ve all passed the trial and can use the new equipment starting tomorrow. Now, go home and get some rest.”
John watched as each member stood up and made their way home. Kelly, however, remained sitting on the ground, staring at the bear with a strange look in her eyes. After a few minutes, she finally gathered up the courage to look at John.
“Can I kill this bear?”
Chapter 11: First Kill
Kelly’s sudden question caused John’s mind to go blank for a while. After regaining the ability to think, John thought about the pros and cons to letting Kelly kill the bear. “Why do you want to kill it?”
John saw Kelly look down again to think about it after he asked the question.
A few seconds later, Kelly lifted her head to stare at John. “Food for the villagers.”
“Then I can kill it for the same results,” he replied with a chuckle.
“To protect the villagers,” Kelly squeaked, immediately changing her answer.
“Still the same results if I kill it. We can use this bear to train everybody, including you. If we kill it, we’ll have to find something else to train with, and that’s a real hassle.
“Unless you can convince me that you killing this bear is in the best interest of the village, I’m going to release it.”
“I want to kill it so that I’m not affected as much when I have to kill for other reasons in the future!”
Kelly’s words were sharp and
loud at first, but they trailed off as she finished her sentence, lowering her head once again.
John smiled. “At last, the truth.”
He approached her with a serious face and sat on the ground next to her. “There are two things that are almost guaranteed to happen to you when you kill something.”
Kelly lifted her head up to look at John.
“Before the actual deed, you might get a sense of superiority and this can be a serious problem if you let it.
“A creature’s life is in your hands and you can kill or save it on a whim, but that feeling is dangerous. It can easily become an addiction where you want to bring creatures on the brink of death in order to feel that superiority again and again.
“That feeling will fade with each kill, so you’ll move on to humans to satisfy the urge. This is especially dangerous for people who have felt powerless at one point in their lives.
“Then there is the second possible outcome. After the deed is done, something in your head will react to it. I can’t say what, exactly, as it’s different for everyone. Some people feel guilt, sadness, a sense of loss… Others will shut down emotionally, while a select few will feel pleasure or maybe something between everything I’ve just mentioned. The only people who don’t have a reaction are people who’ve killed at least a few hundred creatures, or psychopaths who don’t feel anything anyway.
“It might not hit you straight away, but it could come a day, a week, or six months later. That’s why I wanted you to wait until you’re older before you kill something.
“Even now, I think you’re too young to do the killing, but it’s best if I let you do it while I’m here to supervise; otherwise, you’ll sneak out to try to kill something alone.”
“You don’t trust me to do the right thing?” Kelly asked, tilting her head to the side.
“I trust you, but this is about life and death. Even if you get used to killing things for the right reasons, it’ll still affect you in different ways.