'I didn't expect that the hunt would be so short,' I thought the moment we returned to the camp. As this was the first place where the sky wouldn't be covered by the lush treetops, I was surprised to find the sky still a considerable distance away from the twilight.
'Well, let's make a dinner, then!' I thought, grabbing some herbs that I spotted by a nearby tree as I entered the clearing of our camp.
The furry sack that I attached to my belt continued to make noise as we returned, constantly reminding me of the idea that I had in my mind.
The best weapon for hunting was used both by the primitives at the dawn of civilization and by the professional and amateur hunters of the modern age.
Something simple yet so devastating that it was used as a tool to wage great wars for centuries and ages.
A bow.
There was a very specific reason why I decided to take the monster's tendons and bones. After some basic processing, Tendons could be used as the bow's string. In addition, the bones would serve as the reinforcement for the bow arms, given how I wasn't certain a compound bow made out of wood could handle the pressure.
That's right. Instead of going for a fully-sized and simple bow, I decided to make a compound bow.
Part of the reasoning was my desire to wield one, as I always considered them the coolest ancient weapon. But there was also the more practical point of how unwieldy a straight bow would be in a forest, especially during a high-pace hunt.
But all of it was only a song of the future for now.
With my head bustling with ideas on how to process the goods, I sat down and set up a small campfire right by the edge of the tent. While that thing was pretty magical, I wouldn't dare to fire up an open flame inside it.
And how could one enjoy a wild game more if by eating it straight out of the fire?
"Right, Senior," I asked, turning my head towards my Overseer. Looking through the gap of the tent's opening, I could see him washing his head in the common area. "Do you maybe have a pot of some sorts?"
As great as it would be to just eat the meat straight out of the fireplace, I wasn't such a brute to ignore the possibility of making a soup!
"I should be able to find one," my companion replied, only to shake his head a moment later. "Also, one more thing," he said, moving out of the tent only to drop a small, metal pot by my side. "It's not a senior, Overseer, or any other nickname. It's Lucius," he said, introducing his name for the first time since we met.
"Nice to meet you, Lucious," I said, quickly adopting the name to my naming sense.
"Likewise," Lucious smiled before returning to the tent. Even though he went along with my wishes to make some food outside, he clearly wasn't interested in the process whatsoever.
Using a few sticks, I constructed the simplest stand I could think of. With two sets of three sticks standing on the opposite sides of the fireplace, I hung the seventh piece of wood on them, angling the entire construction to keep the pot right in the middle of the fireplace.
'To think that a pot's handle would be such a genius invention,' I thought, chuckling a little as I continued to stuff the pot with most of the herbs I found before.
By the time I managed to get the fire going and the water boiling, I only managed to finish cleaning the meat up in the nearby stream. Yet, the second I stuffed it into the pot, I found myself just standing above the fire, doing nothing.
I looked around to find something to do while the soup was preparing, only for my eyes to land on the nearby array. Ever since I set it up to train the last night, it remained in the exact same place.
I looked down at my hand, with a few bits of herbs still remaining in it. The courtesy of how wet my hands were when I added the herbs to the pot.
'I wonder if that would work,' I thought, approaching the amplification formation and throwing all the remaining herbs inside.
'If it does, I could make quite a buck on it,' I thought with a sneer.
I wasn't naive enough to believe that such an obvious thing to do would be something that the locals have yet to discover. What's more, it was hard to believe that a dead herb could actually infuse itself with the energy of the formation.
"I'm going to stay in this place for a while, so how about planting some herbs within the array?" I muttered to myself; the idea stuck deeply in my mind.
People could cultivate. The monsters could not. From everything that I learned so far, they grew stronger by either eating other monsters or consuming precious herbs that grew rich in spiritual energy, or in other words, mana.
And since that was the case, I could hardly believe that I would be the first one to try planting a herb within the amplification array that humans used to cultivate!
"Don't bother yourself too much with means of making money," Lucious said, appearing right behind my back.
His face, hands, and attire were now cleaned, proving that he didn't go inside the tent just to slack.
"What do you mean?" I asked, shaking off the uneasiness caused by his unexpected appearance.
"Nothing at all," Lucious laughed out. "Just keep your ideas in check for now. You will understand what I mean once you see the headquarters," he added with a small chuckle.
For a moment, I wanted to say something, but I quickly figured out that I had nothing smart to say at all.
I never saw the headquarters, so I didn't really have any basis for arguing over that point with my Overseer.
"Right, are you going to join me in for a meal?" I asked, a cocky smile returning to my lips.
Even if the soup I was preparing would appear pretty poor to others, I had a secret weapon.
And it was the cooking job that I leveled up quite a lot while living with Mia back at the Skyladder sect!
In the end, though, either Lucious was used to eating all sorts of delicacies, or he managed to mask his astonishment so perfectly that I couldn't notice it. Nevertheless, the soup that he poured himself disappeared from his bowl pretty quickly, even with the several seconds he took afterward.
The greatest thing about living in a camp like that was the almost complete lack of cleaning. Once the soup was finished and we both snacked on the boiled game, I made sure to quickly wash the pot in the local stream before filling it with water and putting it back over the fire.
In a world without detergents and potent chemicals, boiling was the only way to ensure the sanitization of the food equipment we were using.
'Even if we can't really get sick with our level of cultivation, it will help get rid of the taste,' I thought, ignoring the weird look Lucius sent me when he saw me vigorously brushing the insides of the pot with a handful of sand.
Once I was satisfied with the pot's cleanliness, I boiled the water again. After a quick trip to the amplification array to pick the herbs I scattered there, I threw them all into the pot and stirred it, waiting for the simple brew to complete.
If there was anything that I was missing in this world a lot, it was tea. And ultimately, what was tea if not an aromatic herb?
After waiting for the drink to cool down a little, I scooped a bit of it back into my bowl and took a sip.
'I guess I was too excited about it,' I thought, realizing with sadness that the liquid had no spiritual energy in it.
It would be too easy, wouldn't it?
Still, be it the herb or the fact that I kept in the formation, the drink helped me to relax a little.
The sun finally started to set, bringing an end to the day. Yet, instead of going to sleep, I pulled out the one stone that Lucius allowed me to keep. Even though I obtained a total of six stones, the other five would go towards my biweekly quote.
'I guess I might just try it,' I thought, pushing the stone from the clothed part of my palm towards my naked skin.
'Let's see what Lucius meant by the stone being so valuable,' I thought, immersing myself in the cultivation.
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