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35.6% Limits / Chapter 167: Avians

Chapitre 167: Avians

The Dead Forest that was part of the Dense Wilderness, stretched for a while before I cleared it. I met some Corpse Dogs and Black Sludge on my way but I had no issues with them. I already knew how to deal with those opponents. When I cleared the Dead Forest, my new map indicated that I was closing in on the Vulture Cliffs. The Black Sludge factory that was always on my right, disappeared after I cleared the Dead Forest.

I could proceed north but I decided against that. 'That guy Crow said, not to go there under any circumstances. I do agree with him, I can't take on a whole city of creatures and if some of them spot me, they may bring reinforcements. I will head to Vulture Cliffs first and find out what it is about. I can decided where to go next, after that' I thought and continued heading west.

After a few more "days" of walking, I finally noticed a change in the environment. There seemed to be a huge swarm of something in the sky, as well as the towering cliffs that protruded from the earth. 'So, this is my destination. What is that swarm of things in the sky anyway?' I thought. When I got close enough, I received my answer. 'So, those were birds. No wonder this place is called Vulture Cliffs. Those birds must be Vultures' I thought.

When I got even closer, I noticed some of the birds leaving the flock and coming my way. 'This can be bad' I thought and prepared myself. The few birds that left the flock, landed about 50 metres away from me and stood there. They were quite big, at least 2 metres tall when they stood there. Their feathers were grey and gloomy looking. They had long necks that were red and no feathers on them. Their heads were a bit elongated, with short beaks that were also grey. Their legs were quite long too, about ⅓ of the whole body size, the colour was also grey. To finish it off, the creatures had sharp looking talons, probably to catch their prey.

I didn't know the name of these creatures at the moment, so I decided to call them Grey Vultures. I stopped moving as I didn't know what those birds wanted. Although I didn't move, the birds started to walk towards me. I waited for them to arrive, the further away I was from the flock, the better. Their speed was not fast at all, they seemed to be much more adapt to flying than walking on the ground. Some birds could skip or walk quickly on the ground but these were quite slow. 'This must be their weakness. They are probably very good at flying and can stay in the skies for a long time but walking is something they don't do very often' I thought.

This was my guess but it was a solid one nevertheless. The vultures were getting closer, while I stood in place and waited. 'If they don't attack me, I have no problems with them' I though and waited. After a while, 8 Grey Vultures stood about 15 metres away from me. They started quite intensely for a bit and then, one of them spoke? "What is it that you want here, human?". I was surprised to be honest but I already had a fair share of shocking encounters. I asked anyway "You can speak?".

The leading vulture said "Of course, We are the owners of the Vulture Cliffs, do you think that stupid race could be its master?". I shook my head and said "That is not what I meant. I never saw a talking bird in the past, so I'm just surprised". The vulture got a bit angry and said "Of course you morron, we are not birds! We are Avians! Those primitive birds are to stupid to know how to speak!".

'So, this is another race that lives in the North. I wonder what the Crow guy's race is called. I should've asked him that before I left' I thought. As I was lost in my thoughts, the vulture or rather Avian, asked again "What is your purpose in coming here human?". I snapped out of my thought and replied "I'm going wherever the road is taking me, I don't have any other purpose to come here, than to explore this place. Your race is quite interesting, would you mind if I look around the cliffs? I'd like to see the home of Avians".

The Avian I spoke with turned around and started speaking to the others, in a language that sounded pretty much the same as bird's noises. After a while, the Avian turned towards me and asked "Why should we give you permission? What do we get in return?". 'I knew it wouldn't be that easy but fighting them is not an option. If that whole swarm goes after me, I'm dead. But I have nothing to offer them in exchange…' I thought.

After some more thinking, I replied "I don't have much I can offer you. Perhaps you need something done? I can do it for you and you let me visit the Vulture Cliffs. How about that?". The Avian turned towards his colleagues and started talking again. 'It seems that these birds don't follow the rules of "one leader says all". This guy is clearly a leader but he still asks for opinion of others. This structure in society is much more different, compared to humans' I thought.

The Avian turned around and said "We can accept that. There is something that needs to be done. If you do it, you will have the permission to walk around the cliffs and do whatever you like, as long as you don't slaughter everything and don't harm any of the Avians". I asked "What is it that you want me to do?".

The Avian said "We want you to clear out the underground den of those Corpse Dogs. They are annoying us. They know very well, we can't get them underground but you can. If you do it and come back with a proof, that their leader is dead. We will let you in and do whatever you like, as long as you follow the previous rules". I asked "Is the den very big?" to which the Avian responded "We don't know. We estimate it to have at least 1000 Corpse Dogs. Their leader should be much stronger as well".

'Hmmm, that is quite a lot of them. I could try and infiltrate it. First assess the risk then deal with it. I'm also curious what is inside the Vulture Cliffs' I thought and said "Alright, I will give it a try. Can you show me the location on this map?" and handed them my map. The avian took it and seemed surprised. He said "You don't have much on it".

I said "I doesn't matter, I just need the location of the den". He said "There are couple entrances that we located. Those damned dogs, they dig underground and make new entrances pop up, every once in a while. I will mark all the entrances that we know of, the rest is up to you". I nodded my head and waited for the avian to finish.

What happened next, surprised me as well. The Avian placed its wing on some feathers and what looked like ink appeared. Besides the ink, a quill for writing appeared as well. I decided to ask "Do you have some sort of storage item on you as well?". The Avian looked at me and said "Of course, how would I carry all that stuff around? Although it is different from yours, by a lot. We make them from the feathers of our King. The King would lose a feather or two once every other day, so we make those storage items from them". He then continued to draw on the map.

After a while, he finished and handed the map back to me, then said "Those are all the known locations of entrances to the den. Whichever you go through, I believe they are all connected. Either way, we will see you when you return and if you return human". Then, they spread their wings and flew into the air. 'Damn, I had more questions for them. I guess those will have to wait, until I'm done with the task' I thought.

I checked the map and saw 6 new marked location. The Avian was even nice enough to number them. 'Right, I should check out all the locations first and assess what I'm dealing with. I can then plan out my course of action' I thought and headed to the No. 1 entrance on my map.


L’AVIS DES CRÉATEURS
DarkRay DarkRay

4th chapter of the week. Sorry guys, I meant to release that yesterday but I just felt like shit and didn't write anything. I don't feel great today either. (Not depression or anything, no cause for concern. My nose is running and my throat is sore, that is all). I will release the 5th chapter of the week but I don't know if it's going to be today or tomorrow :D Thanks for reading and support.

Chapitre 168: Entrance No. 1

The Entrance No. 1, was located quite a distance away from the Vulture Cliffs. It was towards the north eastern direction. When I finally arrived in the vicinity of the Entrance No. 1, I could already see groups of Corpse Dogs running about. 'There are about 30 of them, next to the entrance. I don't know how many are inside but my guess is that, the amount will not be a small one' I thought.

I took out my bow and arrows. 'Long distance is the best way to figure out their forces. When I kill couple of them, more should show up. I can either grind them with arrows or I can take them on in close combat, depending on the numbers' I thought and started shooting.

I was about 300 metres away from the Entrance No. 1. With a few arrows shot, the Corpse Dogs started to die. I then heard some howls and more Corpse Dogs crawled out of the entrance. 'There are about 100 of them now. I can't deal with this number in close combat. I also don't know, if all those dogs are the same. Maybe there are some elites mixed in' I thought and shot more arrows.

The Corpse Dogs finally figured out where my position was and the whole group ran at me. I decided not to linger and simply run. 'There are still about 85 of them left, that is a large amount. I also have only 30 arrows left. This seems to be the best tactics but I will need more arrows' I thought, as I ran away at full speed. The Corpse Dogs had no way of catching up to me and I lost them after a while.

'I need more arrows. I wonder if those dead trees will be good enough to make shafts. I can use some rocks as arrowheads. I don't have enough ore, to waste it on arrowheads. The performance will be much worse but with my strength, I should be able to kill the Corpse Dogs anyway, even with makeshift arrows' I thought and took out a hatchet from my bag.

I didn't have to search for trees as those were everywhere. The only thing was that, they weren't densely packed. I also ran towards the direction of Dead Forest. This would allow me some cover in case the Corpse Dogs relentlessly chased after me. I swung the hatchet at the tree and got a bit surprised. 'This trees seem to be dying and rotting but it's actually quite hard. This will make very good arrow shafts!' I thought.

I cut down a few trees and started carving those arrow shafts. I needed a lot of them, if what that Avian said is correct, the Den would have around 1000 of those Corpse Dogs. I didn't want to create 1000 arrows at once but about 200 for the start, should be enough. I was also more experienced creating arrow shafts, due to the visit to my "home" village. Creating 200 shafts wouldn't take that long for me anymore. The problem was arrowheads.

'I will need sharp stones of a decent size. I will probably need to carve them as well and I don't know how long this will take. Although this land is rich in stones, not every stone will be suitable' I thought. This would take me a while but I had to finish the shafts first.

I spend the rest of the "day", carving the shafts. I made about 180 of them and decided it would be enough for now. I still needed arrowheads. I decided to rest first and then focus on that. Sleeping in the North was not that simple though. This place was potentially very dangerous and had very little protection. While I slept, I was vulnerable to all attacks. A Black Sludge could creep up on me and try to assimilate my body.

I came up with an idea of an early prevention mechanism. I set up ropes around the area I was camping at and tied that to myself. If a creature touches the rope, it would potentially wake me up. I didn't know if I could be woken up, when I was dreaming about the Dark Traveller but at least, it was something. This only work for creatures such as Corpse Dogs but for something like Black Sludge, it would have no effect.

The solution to that was medicine. I found out that besides fire, smell of medicine was also nemesis of the Black Sludge. I had loads of herbs and medical liquids, so spreading some around my camp was not a problem. What I found out, when experimenting with the bit that was left after the Black Sludge burned, as well as the one I retrieved from the sea of Black Sludges, was that the medicine worked on it like poison. On the other hand, poison was something of a medicine to it. I guessed that not all poisons would work that way but the weaker ones, would actually heal the Sludge, instead of harming it.

This was also apparent when I met the Crow guy. He ate the food without much of a worry. He knew that any poison I could potentially add into the food, would not affect him, or he was very naive. With that set up, I could now go to sleep at the top of a tree.

The next "day", I started collecting the stones. Not every stone was appropriate as an arrowhead but because there were so many of them around, I quickly gathered a pile of stones. 'Time to grind some stones, I guess' I thought and started carving.

This went on for another two "days", when I finally had enough arrowheads to create 180 arrows. Carving those stones, was not easy at all. I had to carve them to specific size that was one thing. The other thing was a ridge or a hole that would slip onto the arrow shaft. That was why, it took me so many hours just to create 180 arrows.

When all the arrowheads and shafts were attached, using some small strands of a rope that I sacrificed. I was ready to tackle the Entrance No. 1 again. I traveled back and arrived at the entrance to the Den.

There were again, around 30 or so Corpse Dogs running around it. I took out my bow and positioned myself. 'It's time to test my new arrows, I expect that their performance will be much worse compared to the arrows I already had but as long as I can kill Corpse Dogs, I don't care about anything else' I thought and aimed at the group.

"Swoosh!" "Swoosh!" "Swoosh!"

I shot 3 arrows, one after the other and fortunately, they managed to hit their targets. Although the arrowheads were made from stones, their speed covered for the substandard materials used to make them. The arrows pierced right through the Corpse Dogs, I targeted and all 3 died. 'Good, the arrows work. Now to grind them down' I thought and started to release arrows one after the other.

The Corpse Dogs were dying left and right when finally, reinforcements arrived. This time, the reinforcements numbered over 100, so the number altogether was around 150 of Corpse Dogs. I shot arrows like crazy at the pack or rather a herd of Corpse Dogs, that was getting closer. I stood up and ran. I didn't have the skills to run and shoot arrows at the same time but there was nothing stopping me from trying that out.

My aim was kind of all over the place but my accuracy was about 80%. It was all thanks to the size of the group that was chasing me. It was hard to miss it. I used up over 50 arrows and killed about the same amount of Corpse Dogs from that group.

With so many deaths, they chased me for quite some time. I decided to lose them first and then reorganise. I wanted to grind them down, not kill them all in one go. I lost them and hid my presence. I learned that these Corpse Dogs, although stupid, had very good sense of smell, probably even better than mine. There was an easy solution to this. Just smear some dirt onto myself. This would mask my smell quite well and adding in the distance, the Corpse Dogs would not be able to find me.

I managed to lose them but I didn't let go of that group so easily. I knew they would return to the Den but I wouldn't let that happen. I ate some food to restore my energy and went after them. The herd of Corpse Dogs running back to their Den, was the exact thing, I was searching for. I took out the bow and started shooting again. The Corpse Dogs turned towards me again and ran. I killed around 40 of them this time and only about 50 were left, from that whole herd.

I repeated the process one again and then, finished off whatever was left, by utilising the close combat. 'Around 150 Corpse Dogs died. There are potentially 6 times as many of them left. There could be more though. I need to collect back my arrows, I can't just make new ones every time' I thought and went around collecting arrows. Some arrows broke apart, while others managed to stay intact and would be still usable. I managed to retrieve around 80 arrows but that was not enough for another raid. I had to make more, so my grinding resumed.


L’AVIS DES CRÉATEURS
DarkRay DarkRay

5th chapter of the week. I might do a bonus chapter but that will be later (in the evening). I have some stuff to take care of. Thanks for reading and supporting. I appreciate all your votes and comments :D Keep it up!

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