5 Chapter 5: Law of the jungle (1/2)

The vultures circled overhead, squawking gleefully as they laid their sharp eyes upon the feast of corpses portrayed below. Circling on the slightly warm thermals, they gradually descended atop the dead bodies of unfortunate creatures that lay scattered across the floor of the abyss, their hooked beaks poking and snapping at flesh that had long gone cold.

One of the vultures eagerly hopped toward a single body, pecking away with its beak and feeling some pride at picking out a juicy target. As it lowered his head to tear out a strip of flesh, a hand suddenly shot out and grabbed its neck, abruptly ending its squawk in a choking gurgle. The vulture desperately flapped its wings and clawed at the arm, struggling to escape, but the fingers closed on its throat tightly, a suffocating deadlock that crushed the breath out of it.

”Perfect timing,” I said, admiring the strangled prey caught in my grip. ”I was just getting hungry anyway.”

*

The regenerative ability of an undead bordered on miraculous.

I couldn't remember the specific details of what happened after I fell from the cliff, but when I regained consciousness, I was fully healed.

Huh? I thought my Regeneration speed had slowed down.

Then I spotted the skeleton of a vulture next to me. Evidently I had cleaned the meat off the bones, devouring the poor creature without mercy.

I felt sick. But I also felt alive. Given what had happened earlier that day, I was thankful that I was alive at all.

But how did I survive that fall?

Glancing up, I stared at the sheer wall of a cliff, the steep slope almost perpendicular to the ground. The height had to be at least two hundred meters, taller than any skyscraper in Tokyo. I should have died from the impact, my skeleton shattered and my internal organs ruptured from the force of falling from that height.

But I was still alive. Beyond all odds, even after my classmates' multiple attempts to murder me in cold blood, I had somehow survived and fully regenerated. The turkey…I mean vulture probably helped too. It seemed I needed to eat if I wanted to restore my energy for Regeneration.

That was useful to know.

”What do I do now?”

That said, I didn't know where I could go from here. I had no place to go to. My classmates were up there, so I couldn't return up there, where a platoon of knights and two heroes were waiting to destroy me. I doubted it was wise to head toward the nearest city or human settlement. There would be more heroes waiting for me there, every single one of them bent on killing me. I didn't understand. Yeah, bullies were bullies, but they had gone too far.

”Fucking bullshit!”

Swearing, I punched the wall of the cliff. Well, if anything, this hardened my resolve to take revenge on them. It wasn't as if I had expected Matsumoto Kureha and Tsukishima Tomoyo to act all friendly with me. It wasn't as if I had forgiven them for either standing by and watching me get bullied or verbally abusing me. But with my current lack of skills and abilities, I couldn't get my revenge yet. Since it was Kobayashi Kenji, and his cronies Kijima Takeshi and Yamada Yuji, who tried to murder me, they were the only ones I planned on killing.

The rest, I was going to let off with…I dunno, a beating or something. Crushing them underneath my foot and forcing an apology out of them as they groveled before me. But the death sentence was reserved only for Kobayashi and his flunkies.

However, this changed everything. If the whole class was out to kill me, then I had no choice but to kill them all. Not just for revenge, but for survival.

”Bastards…”

Seething, I turned away from the cliff and assessed my surroundings.

It seemed like I was in a forest. What I had thought was an abyss – having imagined it to be a ravine or deep crevice driven deeply into the earth – was actually a thick, shadowy forest. No wonder the vultures were bold enough to descend this far. It was but another forest. It probably meant that the village was located atop a mountain or something.

I scratched my head. I didn't understand the geography of this place, and to be honest, it didn't matter. I was unceremoniously dumped into another world without any explanation or knowledge, thanks to Kobayashi's attempted murder, so it was natural that I didn't know anything about Restia.

That was something I had to rectify. Yet I had no idea how. I dreaded to approach a human settlement, for the possibility of walking right into my classmates would be pretty high. And I didn't want a repeat of what happened with Kureha and Tsukishima.

Then should I just live in the wild?

I grimaced as I glanced around the forest. Sure, living off the land sounded sound in theory, but it wasn't practical at all. Anyone who told you that they would love to be with one with nature or that humans could live in the forests like hermits all by themselves were bullshitting. At least not for a city kid like me, who had grown up in an urban space. There were way too many bugs, there was no comfortable or safe place for me to sleep and rest, toilets would be a problem, and I wouldn't be able to procure human necessities such as clothing and tools.

I had been spoiled too much by civilization to ever consider living in the forest by myself.

Sighing, I began walking into the forest. Whining wasn't going to help. Even if I understood the problems, I still needed to find a solution. Perhaps find a small village like the one I just came from and keep a low profile there until I polished my skills. I didn't know how my classmates did it, but it was clear that they had grown pretty strong in the six months that they were here.

They probably had access to resources Restia had to offer and cooperation and training from the natives. I felt envious but what was done was done. It was pointless wishing I started from the same playing field. I needed to do something drastic to catch up to them.

But how?

I conjured up my holographic screen and studied my personal information. There was no change from the last one. There were no stats, no values, and no levels…nothing except my name, species, job, class and special abilities. This wasn't like any role-playing game I had encountered.

Then again, perhaps the error lay in me treating this whole thing as a role-playing game. After all, this was cold, harsh reality. I should stop assuming that this world worked like a game. Experience couldn't be quantified, strength couldn't be measured in concrete numbers, and levels were meaningless in real life.

That said, that bastard Kobayashi and the others probably think this is a game, so they have no qualms PK-ing me…

My shoulders slumped and I let out a sigh. As much as I wanted to rage against the unfairness of it all, it wasn't productive. I should start moving and searching for a village or any remote human settlement to accept me. Hopefully my classmates remained in the cities and capitals, staying far away from such small villages.

Pushing the foliage aside, I began traversing the forest. I winced as thorns on vines and plants bit into my hands, cutting flesh, but my wounds healed quickly. Impatiently bashing my way through the forest, I proceeded deep in what I hoped was a straight line away from the cliff. I had best put as much distance between myself and the cliff as possible. I didn't know whether Kureha and Tsukishima would send the knights down to confirm my death. And I didn't want to stay long enough to find out.

Hmm…but what kind of forest is this?

So far, the forest appeared to be perfectly normal. Vultures, bugs, annoying plants…there was no sign of monsters or anything otherworldly that would differentiate this place from Earth. If I hadn't encountered a black tentacle monster, a necromancer who raised the dead, a platoon of armored knights who could use magic, and my classmates who were clearly heroes with superlative abilities, I would have thought I was still somewhere in Japan. Or at the very least, somewhere on Earth.

Crack.

I trampled nosily through the forest, stepping on twigs and breaking them, rustling leaves and swatting bugs that were buzzing curiously around me. I grimaced as I peeled off a leech from my skin and tossed it away, only to find a worm that I flicked away with my finger.

”Fuck! This is gross!”

This was downright disgusting. I hated bugs.

”This is why people who claim that they would love to live in Nature are just bullshitting,” I muttered. Clearly, those nature-lovers were deluded or had never experienced real nature. All those hiking trails in the mountains? Manmade. Nature reserves? Constructed to keep humans safe from animals (and sometimes vice versa, but I doubted that). Waterfalls? Paved over by concrete paths. Agricultural fields? Planted by hand by human farmers.

Swearing, I impatiently shoved a couple of particularly hard branches out of my way and stomped through, finally finding myself in a clearing.

”Hah…”

After bashing through the woods for what seemed like eternity, I was thankful for the little break. The thorns and bugs were getting downright annoying. Shoving a couple of shrubs aside, I staggered into the clearing, winded.

I can take a break here.

I had no idea how long I had trekked through the forest, but clearly it had been hours. The sun was slowly setting, the skies turning orange as the light faded away. Somehow I could still see the forest as clearly as day.

Probably a side effect of being a zombie. Come to think of it, I was still wearing my glasses even though I no longer needed them. Well, whatever. At least no one could accuse me of being glassy-eyed now.

That was when I heard a growl.

Oh, shit…

I couldn't hold back a curse when I heard the ominous sound. I tried to back away, returning the way I came from, but it was too late. Not that it would help, given how sharp animal senses were. They would have tracked me down with smell or sight even if I chose to conceal myself in the foliage. Wolves had a great sense of smell, after all.

…yes, I was assuming the growl came from a wolf. What else could it be?

Stupid question. This was Restia, not Earth. It wouldn't be surprising if it was an actual monster, like the black tentacle horror I encountered yesterday. As it was, the wolf didn't look like a normal wolf. It was white. Red lines seemed to bulge beneath its fur, emphasizing bunched-up muscles. Its eyes glowed crimson. I wondered briefly if it was an albino, but the angry red veins, spiky fur and two tails quickly disproved that.

”This isn't good…”

I dropped to a combat stance, even though I knew it would be useless. I might have learned basic martial arts (the only reason why I could fight back against Kobayashi and his lackeys), but they clearly wouldn't be sufficient to take out a monster from another world. And none of my special abilities were combat-orientated.

Well, I could turn this into a battle of attrition and rely on my Regeneration, then eat the guy to recover my strength…

It wasn't ideal, but it was the only practical plan I had. Taking a deep breath, I readied myself.

…only to be interrupted when something emerged from the woods.

The white wolf and I turned and stared at the newcomer, a gigantic, black anaconda that stretched over twenty meters in length. Its jaws open wide enough to swallow either me or the wolf, but the latter merely snarled at it. Dark muscles bulged as the anaconda uncoiled from the trees, slithering toward us. Its crimson eyes seemed to glow in the dark.

These things look like dangerous monsters…

Gulping, I backed away as the two creatures confronted each other. Clearly, they deemed me the lesser threat, focusing their attention on each other. Snarling, the white wolf pounced. However, with a speed that belied its immense size, the anaconda lashed out and snatched the wolf out of the air. Its jaws clamped down on the howling wolf, its fangs sinking into spiky fur and muscle as if they were nothing more than paper.

”Awoo!”

The wolf howled, but the anaconda quickly constricted it, wrapping its gigantic body around the poor thing. The white wolf disappeared under the coiling mass of muscle, and with a single twitch, the anaconda snapped the poor thing in half. I couldn't bear to watch as it swallowed the dead wolf whole, the carcass being consumed without any need for the anaconda to stretch its jaws.

Holy…!

I backed away, but it was too late. The anaconda had turned its attention toward me.