Deep in the night.
Kasumigaoka Utaha was jolted awake by an abrupt human voice.
The sound came from the direction of the stream—muffled yet distinct as it pierced into the shelter.
Her eyes snapped open.
In the darkness, the fire had died down to a few dimly glowing red coals in the ashes.
Aoyama was already awake.
He was crouched at the shelter’s entrance, ear strained toward the sounds outside.
Moonlight filtered through gaps in the clouds, tracing his silhouette with a cold, white rim.
He gripped his long blade, its edge glinting faintly in the shadows.
Aoyama glanced back at her, his voice a low whisper: “Someone’s here.” “…” Utaha’s sleepiness vanished in an instant.
Her hand instinctively found the flare gun in the side pocket of her backpack.
Her fingers locked around the cold metal grip, her palm slick with sweat.
She took a deep breath, forcing her voice to remain steady.
“…What are you going to do?” “Stay here.
Don’t move.” With that, Aoyama vanished into the darkness beyond the shelter’s entrance.
His footsteps were silent, like a cat melting into the night.
Even the rustle of dry leaves was kept to an absolute minimum.
“Aoyama…” Kasumigaoka Utaha sat alone in the dark, her heartbeat amplifying in her ears.
She stared in the direction he had gone, her fingers tightening and loosening, tightening and loosening, around the flare gun.
She knew Aoyama possessed strength far beyond that of an ordinary person, but she had no idea how much that strength would matter against an unknown enemy.
“…Come back safe, Aoyama,” she whispered, her voice so faint only she could hear it.
At this moment, the three men by the stream were completely oblivious.
They sat on a flat rock by the water, their makeshift torches thrust into the damp earth beside them.
The firelight illuminated their faces—weary, yet tinged with a smug satisfaction.
The leader was a burly man armed with a machete.
Old scars crisscrossed his muscular arms, the mark of someone who had survived in the jungle for a long time.
“The people at that settlement probably can’t even find a scrap of food now,” the burly man said in a coarse voice, unscrewing a water bottle and taking a long swig.
“When we were hauling the supplies away, that old man knelt on the ground and begged us to leave them a little…
Tsk.” “Just a bunch of fools,” the lean man with the backpack chimed in, patting the bulging bag beside him.
“In the end, the ones who survive on this island will be the ones with the fists and the brains.” The man with the compound bow stood silently to the side, his gaze warily scanning the surrounding shadows.
He was more cautious than the other two, never fully letting down his guard.
A compound bow?
Hidden behind a massive tree in the darkness, Aoyama stared fixedly at the three men.
His grip on the long sword was steady, his breathing measured and controlled.
He was waiting for them to lower their guard, ready to strike down the archer first.
But he never got the chance to move.
From the shadows deep within the forest, something darker than the night itself suddenly stirred.
Another expert?
Aoyama’s pupils shrank.
The shadow moved with a speed that defied his comprehension.
Whump—!
Almost instantly, he heard the muffled thud of an attack.
The archer spun around to draw his bow, but before his arm could even rise, a pair of talons covered in dark scales pierced through his side.
Blood sprayed under the moonlight.
He didn’t even have time to scream before he was dragged into the darkness.
“What the—!!” The burly man leaped to his feet, machete raised, his pupils constricting in shock.
The lean man drew a short sword from his backpack.
The two men stood back-to-back on a rock by the stream, their trembling shadows stretching and shrinking in the flickering firelight.
“What’s out there?!” “Come out and fight!” the burly man roared, his voice rough with suppressed terror.
At that exact moment, a massive shadow descended silently from the treetops.
Aoyama, his physical senses enhanced, caught a glimpse of its general outline in that split second.
What the hell is that?
The creature’s two-meter-long body was covered in dark brown scales.
Its hind legs were thick and powerful, while its shorter front limbs ended in three sickle-shaped talons.
Its head was streamlined, its mouth packed with interlocking fangs that glinted coldly in the moonlight.
Is that…
a dinosaur?
It looked like a dinosaur.
Specifically, one of those raptors from the movies.
But it was leaner, more elongated, and moved with far greater stealth.
The instant it landed, it clamped its jaws around the lean man’s neck.
The sharp teeth snapped shut with a crisp crack of breaking bone.
“There’s…
a monster…” The lean man’s body convulsed once.
The short sword slipped from his grasp as his body went limp, hanging lifelessly from the creature’s jaws.
“You fucking bastard!
Die!” Fury now overrode the burly man’s terror as he swung his machete at the creature.
The beast released the corpse in its mouth and recoiled backward, effortlessly evading the attack.
Thwack—!
Its tail whipped forward like a lash, striking the burly man’s side and sending him flying two or three meters before he crashed heavily onto the rocky bank of the stream.
“Aaaah—!” His agonized scream echoed through the night.
It all happened so fast—less than a minute.
Aoyama held his breath.
The creature stood in the moonlight, looking down at the gasping man on the rocks, a low rumble vibrating in its throat.
Then, it lowered its head and its talons sliced the man’s throat with surgical precision, ending his struggle.
Aoyama didn’t move.
His muscles were coiled to the breaking point, yet his breathing remained shallow and nearly silent.
I’m not fast enough to kill it.
The Herculean Strength ability had granted him a physique and power far beyond any ordinary person.
But in terms of speed, it had offered little improvement.
More importantly, he didn’t know if this dinosaur-like creature hunted in packs.
That was why he was observing from the shadows.
I wonder what ability I’d gain if I ate it?
The creature seemed to sense nothing unusual.
It lowered its head and dragged the corpse into the depths of the dense forest.
The sound of scales scraping against the underbrush created a faint rustle that grew fainter and fainter until it vanished completely into the darkness.
Gone?
Aoyama remained motionless.
He waited another full three minutes, confirming the creature had truly gone far away, before finally exhaling a slow breath.
This thing is much more troublesome than a crocodile.
No matter what creature appeared, he wouldn’t find it strange—at most, he’d be surprised.
After all…
How absurd could it be?
More absurd than a guy like me, who has been reincarnated twice?
Aoyama stepped out from behind the tree and quickly scanned the ground.
The cleaver had fallen among the shattered rocks.
Its blade was stained with a few drops of blood, but it remained intact.
The compound bow lay in the grass by the stream, its riser speckled with bloodstains.
He hurried over, retrieved the cleaver and the bow, and found the quiver in the grass containing seven or eight arrows.
“Good stuff!” The killing power of a compound bow was no joke.
A few well-placed arrows were enough to remove over 90% of carbon-based lifeforms from the biosphere.
“How selfish of that guy.
Why was he still carrying the backpack even after he died?” Aoyama felt a twinge of frustration.
It was obvious that the large pack contained valuable supplies.
Unfortunately, the dinosaur-like creature had dragged both the body and the bag away.
At least he had gained something.
Time to head back.
Under the cover of night, Aoyama deliberately took a longer route.
After trekking a few hundred extra meters through the dense forest and confirming nothing was following him, he finally turned toward the shelter.