A toast on a hunt should be short, like a command, like a gunshot.
Otherwise, there will be no time left to rest.
The Peculiarities of National Hunting.
Sephiroth.
Morning in a dark, frightening forest.
So here I am, walking along and thinking.
Why the hell did I give myself hair like this?
My loose mane catches on every branch and thorn in my path, which does absolutely nothing for my mood.
But I would hate to get rid of it.
I distinctly remember having long hair in my previous two lives, so by now it’s practically a tradition.
Argh…
Although…
some traditions can be reconsidered.
Or I could give myself two appearances.
One, so to speak, official, for dealing with the authorities and handling legal business in the city, and another for less-than-legal affairs or, like now, moving through terrain that isn’t exactly easy to traverse.
Fine, I’ll think about that later.
For now, I should focus on finding the Dark Ones.
Their camp should be somewhere around this part of the forest…
assuming they haven’t been scared off by all the noise I’m making.
You’d think an entire army was stomping through here.
Yeah, one thing my skills definitely didn’t include was walking through forests.
My previous lives had been spent mostly in cities, and I didn’t inherit anything useful from my host either.
Oh well.
I’ll manage somehow.
My noisy advance through the undergrowth really did attract attention, but not from the Dark Ones.
It attracted the attention of the local predators.
You know, it’s not particularly pleasant when a roughly fifty-kilogram beast leaps on you from a tree, sinks its fangs into the back of your neck, and starts raking your back with its claws.
A loud scream shook the forest, and for the first time, the world heard the Great and Mighty within its borders.
In the most literal sense, I had been selected as someone’s lunch!
The chef was a very large member of the cat family.
The animal was clearly surprised.
Why wasn’t its prey dying?
Why was it still standing on two feet and loudly cursing?
Fortunately, I recovered before the equally surprised cat could figure out what was happening.
I suppressed the host’s pain and turned my attention to the predator.
It had swallowed enough of my blood and Simba for me to work with.
I couldn’t take control of it.
I still wasn’t confident enough in my abilities, and in my previous life, my specialty had been humans, not animals.
But paralyzing the vicious cat was well within my abilities, so that’s exactly what I did.
All right, now to patch myself up and see what kind of nimble little bastard this is.
Healing took about twenty minutes.
Ah, where was my old regeneration, combined with my armor?
*What a tragedy.* As for the predator, at first I couldn’t believe my eyes.
But then I remembered what a strange world I’d been lucky enough to land in and accepted what I was seeing.
Lying unconscious in front of me was a lynx.
But what a lynx!
It was roughly one and a half to twice the size of its Earth counterparts, with khaki-colored fur.
Holy crap, a **camouflaged lynx**!
With fur like that, it could only hunt from ambush.
You’d have trouble spotting it in a tree even from a few meters away.
I seriously doubted that its fur was natural.
It looked much more like the result of some slightly unhinged mage’s experiment.
Hmm.
If the locals conducted experiments like this, then it explained why Life mages were so disliked around here.
Who else could mess with nature this badly?
But enough about the cat problem.
What should I do with it?
Take it with me?
I’m on my way to deal with bandits, so there’s certainly no place for it there.
Let it go?
The Hamster would never forgive me.
Leave it here?
There was probably a ninety-percent chance it would be eaten.
Besides, it was strange.
I’d asked about the local fauna, and creatures like this definitely hadn’t been mentioned.
Fine.
I’ll leave some of my cells inside it and let it run around for now.
If necessary, I’ll either lure it back to me, assuming my control is strong enough, or track it down myself.
Later, in the city, I’ll ask around about such an interesting kitty.
For now, let’s move farther away and switch the predator back on.
That’s one problem solved, but I still haven’t seen any Dark Ones.
Am I really going to have to go to the road and try to get ambushed?
In theory, they should take the bait.
A lone man in expensive clothes.
But wouldn’t that make the local knife-and-axe professionals suspicious?
Around here, anyone walking alone is either insane or a mage.
Although, considering the local mages, I’m not sure those two categories should be separated.
On the other hand, I could wander around this forest until Zeref’s second coming and accomplish absolutely nothing.
Looks like I’ll have to make my way to the road after all.
Yeah, I think I’m definitely a mage.
Otherwise, how else could I explain the sheer stupidity of my actions?
I came into the forest without knowing how to navigate through it.
Fine.
But damn, apparently I don’t even know how to find my way around.
It’s embarrassing to admit, but I’m lost.
Ahem.
Not exactly the most promising start to my career.
And what am I supposed to do now?
Meanwhile, evening was slowly approaching, and another suspicious problem had joined my list: buzzing.
“That buzz-buzz-buzz isn’t for nothing,” I quoted the famous bear.
Sure enough, a few minutes later, an entire squadron of mosquitoes launched an assault on me.
“Bastards, we’re practically relatives…
or at least we used to be,” *slap*, “and this is how you repay me?” *smack*, “attacking helpless monsters so dishonorably…” Ptooey!
The last mosquito flew into my mouth during my passionate speech, so I decided not to waste any more words on the buzzing bastards and quickly covered myself from head to toe with Simba.
Yeah…
who would have thought one of the most terrifying biological weapons imaginable would eventually be used as mosquito repellent?
The biting stopped.
Unfortunately, the constant buzzing was driving me toward a nervous tic.
I stumbled across the camp completely by accident.
I was so happy to see the Dark Ones that I nearly hugged some guy who was very obviously a bandit.
Unfortunately, they didn’t appreciate my feelings.
Instead, they went pale, and one of them actually ran away screaming something along the lines of, “Aaaaah…
monster, save me!” Monster?
What monster?
Oh.
I’d forgotten to remove my anti-mosquito covering.
Yeah…
that could have been handled better.
Still, I had come here intending to kill most of them anyway, so let’s begin.
An imaginary observer, had there been one, would have described the scene like this: a completely black figure, distinguishable in the darkness only by strange silver hair, was chasing the Dark Ones around their camp while making bizarre sounds that vaguely resembled a war cry.
A blade was clenched in the figure’s hands, and anyone unfortunate enough to cross its path immediately lost their life.
The mages of the Dark Guild tried to fight back, but they simply couldn’t hit the monster.
It easily dodged energy attacks and fireballs, while they had neither the time nor the strength to unleash anything capable of hitting an entire area.
Eventually, only the mages remained, huddled together while the monster stood directly in front of them.
Then the dark covering slipped away, revealing the face of a young man wearing the faint smile of someone completely satisfied with life.
“All right, gentlemen, I have a very advantageous proposal for you!
You surrender, allow me to tie you up, and tell me where you’ve got anything valuable stored.
In exchange, I won’t poke you with this lovely little thing.” He pointed toward the blood-covered blade.
“Believe me, this is an extremely generous offer on my part.”
“What the hell are you?” one of the prisoners finally snapped and tried once again to roast his opponent with a fireball.
The attempt failed.
The attacker collapsed to the ground with a blade buried in his chest.
The unknown assailant moved with truly inhuman speed and was clearly lacking in mercy or compassion.
“I’ve already been called a demon, probably deservedly so, so I wouldn’t recommend…
irritating me.” The smile disappeared from the man’s face, and fear washed over the remaining four mages.
The demonstration had been more than convincing.
The Dark Ones chose surrender.
It was certainly better than immediate death beneath that creature’s blade.
Sephiroth.
Deep in thought.