Depthless Hunger: A Progression LitRPG, page 32
This would be a good place to meditate and figure out what was wrong with his soul, since there was no sign of monsters. He was actually surprised that none of them had taken up residence in such a good location.
Wait, he'd learned this lesson before.
Kai leapt to his feet and dodged to the side as something slammed into the ground where he had been sitting. He was already pivoting toward it, smashing a fist into the rocky appendage. It broke apart and, as the creature staggered back, he finally got a good look at it.
What he had thought was a chunk of the boulder was in fact a monstrous beast that looked like the offspring of a spider and a crab. Two of its legs in front ended in massive pincers while the other two came down in spikes, like the one that had nearly stabbed him. His blow seemed to have shattered the joint, so he hoped that he was capable of hurting it, but the majority of its body seemed to be rock-like armor. Destroying its limb with one punch had to be a lucky hit.
For a moment they just stared at one another, Kai looking up into the beady eye knobs behind the pincers. The rock spider seemed to be confused that its ambush had failed. Kai wasn't sure exactly how he had reacted. Realizing the risk had been purely intellectual, and sensing the movement could be attributed to battle experience, but the immediate retaliation seemed to have come from nowhere.
When it reached forward to grab him with a pincer, Kai dodged past it and took a swing at its eyes. The monster reared up and his fist only cracked its central plate. An instant later, the other claw struck him in the chest and Kai was slammed into a boulder.
The rock spider immediately crawled toward him and Kai carefully examined it further.
<
Monster: Rock Spider
Threat: Gamma (III)
>
Not just a gamma-ranked monster, but a strong gamma. Even though he had become much stronger between fighting the Direboar and fighting the Isulfr, every gamma-ranked monster fight had put his life on the line. This beast seemed to be more fragile than those, but its blow to the chest had hurt and he knew his Physique couldn't stand up to its stabbing limbs. It was a miracle it hadn't torn through him.
When it next approached it did so at an angle, menacing him with a heavy claw. If he wanted to win, he'd need to find an advantage. As it sped up, Kai scanned the boulders and then turned to run.
It immediately gave chase, but Kai slid low between two boulders that were close together. Just as he'd hoped, the rock spider thrust its claw into the gap after him. Kai whirled on it and brought both fists down as hard as he could.
The carapace splintered as it was driven to the ground and the rock spider screeched from the other side. Kai grinned and tried to ignore the pain in his chest. If he was smart and used the environment against the monster, he could wear it down and then go in for the kill.
Behind him, he sensed another boulder uncurling.
This time it was the most Kai could do to dodge aside as a second rock spider attacked him. He was trapped between it and the small entrance... no, it was even worse. The first rock spider crawled up over the barrier, fixated on him.
Two monsters that would have been nearly fatal on their own. Already injured with nowhere to run. Kai let out a cry and charged.
Chapter 56: Fragments Coming Home to Roost
More out of a desire to go out fighting than any strategy, Kai met one of the monstrous rock spider's pincers with a punch. To his surprise, the carapace broke and the monster staggered back. He had no time to celebrate, because the other one was almost on top of him, all its front limbs stabbing down.
He managed to dodge one pincer, then one of the stabbing claws caught him in the side. Kai wrapped his arms around it on instinct, then pulled, hoping he could tug the monster off balance.
The entire limb tore off at the joint.
Though his conscious mind was stunned, Kai's muscle memory knew a weapon when he held one. He swept the limb to the side, knocking the rock spider above him over. The second monster was coming toward him again, holding its injured limb back and using its remaining pincer defensively.
Kai leapt into the air with the severed spider claw over his head and jammed it down into the center of the rock spider's body. It penetrated deep and all the monster's limbs began spasming, trying to batter him from his position atop it.
Several caught him, but Kai struck back at the others. Even with just his gauntlets, his blows shattered the rocky defenses of the monster. When he saw that first rock spider was still coming toward him, Kai grabbed the last limb, tore it off, and leapt into the air.
The second rock spider had clearly learned its lesson and scuttled back, avoiding a fatal impalement. But now that he was on the offensive, Kai didn't let up. He swung the limb at the rock spider repeatedly, scoring only glancing blows until finally the side connected with its upper carapace.
His weapon and the beast's torso both cracked, and Kai leapt directly into the fragments. One heavy blow between the eyes and the rock spider could only flail in death. This time he was able to leap away before taking too many blows.
For almost a minute Kai simply stood atop a boulder and stared at the dying monsters. He had expected to lose his life fighting them, since even one should have been a difficult match. Yet he felt surprisingly fine, his injuries not even slowing him much. His only explanation was that the rock spiders were a good match-up for him, particularly vulnerable to the kind of blunt damage he could inflict.
His stomach gurgling interrupted his thoughts and brought him low. Damn, he had never been this hungry in his life.
Kai found the firewood he had previously gathered, now scattered between the boulders. As he did so, he carefully kept watch for further monsters, but he found none. Perhaps these two had been a mating pair. Without a flint it was difficult, but he eventually managed to start a fire with friction. Since he didn't have a spit or pot, he took several of the meatiest legs of one of the rock spiders and propped them together over the flame.
While the monster cooked, Kai had more time to think. And he didn't much like his conclusions.
The idea of the rock spiders being particularly vulnerable to him didn't ultimately make sense. Even if their limbs had particularly weak joints, that didn't explain how he had wielded them so effortlessly. They had felt light in combat, but while setting up his cooking fire he realized they were as heavy as stone. It seemed as though he had grown stronger, yet his Physique was unchanged from F-7.
It couldn't have been drive, not that he had even been that driven. Unmotivated fighters might perform worse than their souls indicated, but no one could simply decide to become stronger because they were just too angry. The only explanation was that he was missing a variable.
As he rolled over one of the spider legs to cook the other side, Kai realized that his wounds barely hurt anymore either. When he glanced down at his torso, he began doubting his memory. There had been a growing bruise across his chest and a deep gash down his side, just minutes ago. Both were much less serious than he remembered and he felt as though he'd been resting for hours.
Since the problem must lie with his ruined soul, Kai sat down and tried to derive meaning from the hazy overlapping symbols. His hunger and the smell of the crabs cooking were so intense that he couldn't concentrate.
Most likely he had only cooked away some of the poison, but Kai told himself that he had always been resistant to monster toxicity and tore into one of the legs. With the rocky carapace off, its flesh tasted somewhat like the crabs he'd occasionally tried in the market. The lean body only offered enough meat because of the monster's enormous size.
He was so hungry, even foul monster flesh temporarily tasted good. Once Kai had eaten a significant amount and began roasting more of the monsters, he could finally sit down and think properly.
If the familiar symbols of his soul were only the half he chose to interpret, then logic dictated that the others might also represent something meaningful. Trying to look at both at once made him cross-eyed for a while, then his oddly doubled soul suddenly snapped into focus.
<
Name: Kai Clanless
Total Power: 60
Physique Level: F-7 (44)
Soul Level: 4 (16)
Monstrous Hunger - VI (zeta)
Direboar's Strength - II (beta)
Aquagorgon's Health - II (beta)
Isulfr's Bite - I (alpha)
Rockspider's Claw - I (alpha)
>
What he saw was horrifying, but Kai forced himself to stare at it until his mind could accept the truth. Though he had some normal elements of a human soul, the dominant impression was that of a monster. Not only were the second set of symbols rated like monsters, they corresponded to specific monsters he'd fought.
Even though he knew that it had just saved his life, Kai still felt a wave of revulsion. His entire life, he'd trained to fight on the side of humanity against the monster hordes. The thought that his soul was somehow contaminated left him sick to his stomach.
Still, he had to face facts. The symbols might be unfamiliar, but they were perfectly comprehensible. He'd displayed immense strength and his wounds recovered unnaturally quickly, then he saw "Direboar's Strength" and "Aquagorgon's Health" within his soul. It couldn't be exactly their traits, otherwise he would have regenerated almost as quickly as he was injured, but the sources were undeniable. That was enough to convince him that the more opaque symbols, such as "Isulfr's Bite," must have real meaning as well.
Now that he thought about it, he realized that these fragments of strength must have been the distorted symbols that he'd been carrying along with him. Gunjin had said that they were power he couldn't use, but that had clearly changed. It had to have been due to Anaelina draining his soul, though he had no strong theory about how it worked.
One piece didn't fit his theory at all: "Monstrous Hunger" corresponded to no beast he'd fought. It swam around in his vision, as if it wasn't as fixed as the others, but it felt most appropriate at the top of the list, as if it came before all the others.
That trait was rated higher than all of the others by a wide margin, yet he wasn't sure if it was doing him any good at all. Hunger didn't seem to have any benefit, unlike the others. He considered that maybe that was what was making him so hungry and chuckled.
Now that he had at least a guess at what was happening, Kai settled down to recover. Even if the idea of having monstrous elements in his soul repulsed him, it couldn't stop him from eating his fill. He also broke open the rock spiders' main bodies - remarkably easily - and retrieved their monster cores. They were just as large as the Direboar's, if not larger. His nature really had changed.
Exactly how strong was he? For half a year, he'd gotten used to everyone's strength being reduced to a single number, even if the variables were more complicated. Now he had only monster ratings that seemed to exist separately from everything else. Did anything like this exist, in Deadwaste or anywhere else in the world? It felt like he was stumbling directly into the unknown.
Once the smoke of the fire had died down, Kai tried to get some sleep, hoping that everything would seem clearer in the morning. Yet as he tried to sleep, he found himself distracted by a new sensation.
All the smells of the world around him were more alive than before... no, not all the smells. The bodies of the rock spiders smelled worse than before, but if his sense of smell had really been enhanced, he should have been able to smell the bone pits from the crossroads. When Kai explored the rocky area further, the few small flowers seemed no different to him, yet he found his head turning to follow the subtle presence of a pair of monstrous bats flapping overhead.
Again, he could only theorize the most basic concepts: his sense for monsters must have strengthened. An excellent trait for a monster hunter to have, he desperately tried to tell himself. The sensations were all still dizzying and unclear, just like when he'd first developed his mana or worked on his spiritual sight. Hopefully more understanding would come with practice.
Before Kai tried to go back to sleep, he caught something else: a stronger feeling, one nothing like the others. An entirely different beast, or a human? Somehow it felt familiar, which had never happened since he'd started developing these new abilities.
Whatever it was, it was coming from the caverns to the south. Instead of sleeping, Kai sat and stared out toward it hungrily.
Chapter 57: An Unexpected Reunion
In the morning Kai was hungry again, but not so overwhelmingly. Since he woke up too early, still ready for pre-dawn training, he cooked some more of the rock spiders. As he ate, he sat down to think about how he was going to approach the strange scent.
Fresh despite little sleep, he spent a while focusing on his new sense. He was now fairly certain he wasn't actually picking up new scents, it was more of a spiritual awareness. Going around sniffing things certainly didn't seem to help at all. Yet his impression that he could detect monsters was only strengthening. After further testing, he realized that he could also pick out humans, just less clearly. Everything else, from flowers to the foul bone fires, was no different from before.
Which meant he was still fixated on the strangely familiar presence in the caves.
As Kai walked toward them, he considered whether he actually had a good reason to pursue it. Technically he could just ignore everything else and go test his fate in Krysal. But the journey was still long and he would be making it with so few supplies that he was reluctant to start. Better to wrap up all loose ends here and prepare before going that far just to gamble on fate again.
Just as he'd suspected earlier, the caves were an obvious location for outcasts to use. He could sense a small group of hunters in one and left them be, instead focusing on the familiar presence hiding deeper within the hills. Whoever it was, they seemed to be actively hiding, because tracking them down led him into a maze of cracks that barely deserved to be called caves.
Since the meeting could just as easily be a negotiation as a fight, Kai decided to drink one of his few remaining Class potions. A tiny amount of power trickled down his throat into his soul, giving him a shadow of a Warrior's Class. Fortunately, his theory was correct: his soul stabilized in his own sight, orienting around the Class and obscuring everything that was broken. That would make a better first impression.
Kai rubbed his jaw and realized that he would make a terrible impression every other way. He already had a lot of beard, his hair was unkempt, his clothes were ragged, and...
And he ran into Zae Zin Nim before he could reconsider.
She jerked upright from her position in the cave, staring at him in shock, which gave him enough time to examine her. Since they'd last met, her weeping black scars looked no better and her robe looked much worse. It seemed that more of her hair had grown back, though it was still patchy and ragged. Her eyes, fixed on him, flickered through surprise, anger, and then irritation.
"I thought I said..." She stopped to cough into a fist. "I said I never wanted to see you again."
"Unfortunately, I have traveled for months just to annoy you in particular."
Immediately her already narrow eyes became slits. "No matter what you say, you tracked me to my hiding place." She reached into her robe, deceptively fast, already holding another of her pills.
"Wait!" Kai raised both hands palm up. "How much of that medicine do you have left? Are you going to waste more of it on someone who doesn't mean you any harm?"
Though Zae Zin Nim stared at him suspiciously, she didn't immediately swallow the pill. As the silence stretched, Kai decided that he was being given a chance to explain himself.
"I didn't intend to find you in particular, but my life hasn't gone the way I'd intended. I'm banished from my home and wandering. When I felt your unusual energy, I thought that we might be able to help one another. All I want from you is a fair exchange of knowledge, I swear. I don't know what you need, but I'm a native of Goralia. I don't think you would be hiding out here if you were fine on your own."
"Well... at least you're less suspicious than before." Zae Zin Nim slowly straightened and pulled her arm back into her robe. "You aren't going to try to convince me you want to help out of some sense of altruism?"
"No, I despise you and hate the idea of us working together. Which means you should trust me, right?"
To his surprise, she gave a low laugh that transformed her face. A moment later it dissolved into painful coughs that wracked her body. He wanted to step forward to assist her but restrained himself and just waited for the fit to subside.
"I know you might not want to talk about it," Kai said gently, "but would you tell me what's wrong with you?"
"No."
"Is there anything I can do to help?"
"Not likely, given the miserable state of this wasteland." Zae Zin Nim's scorn seemed to pass him, but Kai was still annoyed on behalf of his continent. Despite his best intentions, a trace of invective made it into his voice.
"How much progress are you making on your own?" Kai met her gaze directly and waited until she lowered her eyes. "If you don't think we could ever work together, I'll leave and stop wasting my time. But if you want to get anything of value from me, you need to reveal something I can work with."
After a long pause, the foreign woman shuffled away and sat down on a level rock. She didn't have much of a camp, but he could see a bedroll and the remains of a small fire behind her. After hacking up some more black bile, she spoke in a ragged voice.
"I am... not truly sick, not with anything that could be called a disease. Rather, I am trapped in a specific position and unable to advance. I believe even here you must be familiar with such things."
"Our Classes run into barriers pretty early." Kai found another rock, dusted it off, and sat down at a respectful distance. Maybe he'd finally gotten through.
"That is actually what I need from you. The trap I face cannot be overcome by any of the skills I know, which is part of the reason I fled to Deadwaste. Everyone in my homeland considers your powers inferior, but they seem intuitive and they develop quickly." Zae Zin Nim paused to drink from a narrow flask. "If you could help me awaken one of these Classes, you would have earned my gratitude."
