Chapter 1: Life in the Mountains is Tough

From then on, to maximize the power of the minor status increase correction from the “Foul Eater” skill, I began putting a wider variety of things into my mouth than ever before.

Of course, even though I had “Near-Immunity to Status Ailments,” since it was only a resistance, it couldn’t prevent everything completely. I experienced slight numbness, mild dizziness, vomiting, and temporary poisoning—various things happened to my body. However, perhaps due to the Goddess’s divine protection, I would completely recover after a short while. Thinking, Alright, I’m cured, I would immediately go right back to eating whatever I could get my hands on, one after another.

It seemed the skills were synergizing well, and I started to be able to experience a sense of fullness, making my days of starvation feel like a lie.

Naturally, I didn’t forget to train my body either. Since I had no sword, I couldn’t level up “Swordsmanship,” but I thoroughly continued to train my physical body to make up for it.

I no longer had any sense of time and didn’t know how many days had passed. I think it had been about half a year since I arrived here, but even that wasn’t certain.

However, I had definitely gotten stronger… I think.

After all, the text of my status had definitely changed.

Name: Wazu | Race: Human (100% Purity) | Age: 15

Just like that, it was still hard to understand, but compared to when I first saw it, I had definitely grown. That growth had also affected my skills.

Skills

• Swordsmanship Lv: 2

• Hand-to-Hand Combat Lv: 1

• Man-Eater (Unique)

• Status Ailments Slightly Nullified / Mostly Resistance

• Goddess’s Encouragement (Unique)

It had changed to this. The one displaying this was, as always, the Goddess.

As for the “Hand-to-Hand Combat” skill, I acquired it before I knew it. It seems my movements improved while I was constantly running away from monsters, leading me to obtain it. Since the skill was only Lv: 1, its contents were just about what you’d expect.

And “Foul Eater” had changed to “Man-Eater.”

Of course, I checked it.

Man-Eater (Unique)

Can eat anything and find it delicious.

Eating high-ranking items provides an average status increase correction.

“Delicious.” This is important.

Indeed, recently, whatever I put in my mouth had started to taste delicious. Besides, the status increase correction had gone up from “minor” to “average.” This meant I could increase my stats even further.

And finally, although just a little bit, my status ailment resistance had upgraded to nullification.

I suppose this was the effect of frequently getting paralyzed or poisoned by the things I ate.

…And as for the Goddess’s text, which was the same as always:

Goddess’s Encouragement (Unique)

Nice, nice~!

Keep it up! You’re getting quite strong~!

At this rate, the day you can depart from here might not be so far off.

…That’s what it said.

How should I put it… it’s so light. She’s completely treating it as someone else’s problem. Well, it is someone else’s problem, but still. Even so, it does kill my motivation a little bit…

I quietly returned the Guild Card to my pocket. I decided to pretend I hadn’t seen it.

Besides, I have something important to do today. I don’t have time to deal with the Goddess.

That important thing—is my very first monster hunt.

It’s not like this is my first time facing a monster. The problem is that the monsters in this forest are incredibly strong. If I can’t do something about the monsters in the forest, I won’t be able to escape it.

My stats had certainly gone up, but I still decided to take every precaution. Getting overconfident because you’ve gotten stronger, letting your guard down, and getting killed in an instant is a common story.

So I will never let my guard down. On top of having no weapons, I don’t even think I can manage with just my body.

So how will I defeat a monster? The answer is simple.

I just have to wait… for the prey to fall into a trap…

I waited patiently. The trap I prepared was classic: a pitfall.

It’s simple, but its effectiveness is immense. Relying on my increased stats, I dug a hole. After all, my current strength was supposedly enough to handle a bear, so I dug it quite deep. For the cover, I used brittle dead branches, and scattered fallen leaves from the surroundings to camouflage it.

Then, I just hid near the pitfall and waited.

Naturally, I also prepared grass and nuts as portable rations for when I got hungry.

Also, I had to be careful of my surroundings. It would be meaningless if I was discovered by another monster while lying in wait for one.

Fortunately, perhaps because living in the cave was full of the constant danger of being attacked at any moment, I had a bit of confidence in my ability to sense presences. In the beginning, I spent sleepless nights reacting sensitively to just the sound of howling… Just hearing it, I couldn’t tell how far away they were.

However, now, a simple howl won’t even wake me up. I sleep soundly.

I’ve developed quite the thick skin. Unless they get somewhat close, I don’t wake up anymore. While I was nodding to myself, thinking about how much I had grown as a wild child, I felt the presence of something approaching.

I stared intently in the direction of the approach.

What emerged from there was… a slime.

It was a slime.

—That’s wrong~~~! That’s not it~~~!

Why is it a slime~! Why is it a slime~~! No~! I wasn’t looking for a slime~! I wanted something more… with bones… meaty… with a good build… meaty… I mean, meat! Yes, meat!

I don’t want a squishy, jelly-like thing; I want meat with a real bite to it!

…Ah, while I was agonizing over this, the slime fell into the pitfall…

Scratching my head, I approached the pitfall.

At the bottom of the hole, the slime was wriggling around. Looking down at it with a sigh, I picked up a rock about the size of my fist lying nearby and threw it with all my might at the slime at the bottom of the pit.

It’s said that to defeat a slime, one must either burn away its jelly-like exterior with magic or destroy the core located somewhere inside its body.

And the rock I threw brilliantly destroyed the slime’s core in a single hit.

“…How empty,” I muttered softly, looking up at the sky.

I enjoyed the slime as a meal. The jelly was slightly sweet and delicious.

After that, to increase my chances of getting meat as much as possible, I set up more traps.

To put it simply, if something snagged its foot, a sharpened log would swing in from the side; inside the pitfalls, I placed multiple wooden stakes sharpened like spears; and drawing on my culinary experiences, I created a pool blended with numbing and poisonous herbs.

Perhaps thanks to those efforts, small beasts began getting caught in my traps as prey.

The meat I ate for the first time in ages was truly delicious. Even if it was just roasted…

Since I hadn’t been living a satisfactory dietary life to begin with, my stats continued to rise even from just eating roasted meat.

And finally, I encountered a proper monster inhabiting this forest.

Getting beast meat was already enough for me, but since it got caught in the trap, it couldn’t be helped. It’s definitely not like I was satisfied with my recently improved diet and forgot about escaping this forest. Really, I didn’t, okay?

Caught in the poison trap was a boar-type monster, commonly known as a Boar.

When the giant Boar, easily exceeding the size of a human, spotted me, anger filled its face, and it charged at me frantically, intending to pierce me with the massive tusks on its snout. Surprised by a speed that didn’t match its massive frame, I reflexively dove to the side to dodge.

The Boar crashed straight into a large tree, but it was the tree that lost to the impact. Leaving only the base of the trunk, it snapped with a violent cracking sound. Witnessing the power of the Boar’s charge firsthand, I broke into a cold sweat.

A-As expected… if I took that head-on, I wouldn’t get off unscathed, right?

My VIT stat displayed “Body of Steel,” but since I didn’t fully trust the Goddess, I couldn’t trust that text either. So, I decided to focus entirely on evading.

Since the Boar had fallen into a poison trap, my best course of action was to stay safe until the poison circulated and it collapsed.

The Boar looking at me appeared to be in pain, but its eyes were even more filled with rage as it pawed the ground repeatedly with its front hooves before charging again. While dodging its charges, I never took my eyes off it.

If I don’t watch my opponent’s movements, read them, predict them, and act accordingly, I’ll be the one getting killed.

From the looks of it, the Boar was also suffering, attacking me over and over in a frenzy.

Because of its massive body, it seemed it would take some time for the poison to circulate throughout its entire system, so this offensive and defensive battle continued for a while.

Now, we were glaring at each other, both breathing heavily.

“Bwoaaarrrgh!”

Letting out a roar as if squeezing out the last of its strength, the Boar charged at its fastest speed yet. Distracted for a moment by the roar, my evasive action was slightly delayed.

Even so, I managed to dodge it by a hair’s breadth, but a part of my clothes caught on a tusk and tore. The Boar blew right past me, and as if the poison had finally fully circulated, it collapsed, all strength leaving its body.

I let out a deep breath.

Honestly, that was close. If my stats hadn’t gone up as much as they had, I probably wouldn’t have been able to dodge that last charge.

But I won. I actually won.

Hehehe… meat, meat… proper, solid meat for the first time in ages.

I can’t resist… I can’t stop drooling.

Yielding to an uncontrollable urge, I carelessly approached the Boar.

The moment I got close, the Boar suddenly thrashed wildly, its snout violently slamming into my stomach.

“…Guh!”

Impact and pain shot from my stomach throughout my body, but I gritted my teeth and endured it.

“…That freaking hurts, you know!”

As if to distract myself from the pain running through my body, I raised my voice and drove my fist into the center of the Boar’s forehead with all my might. Feeling a solid impact in my fist, the Boar heavily lost its balance, collapsed to the ground, and its life finally faded away.

After looking at the fallen Boar, I checked my stomach and the torn part of my clothes.

…My stomach area is completely exposed and bright red…

Rubbing my abdomen, which was still throbbing with pain, I had a thought.

The “Body of Steel” stat doesn’t seem to be entirely wrong, but… My current clothes have no spares, obviously. Thanks to living in a cave for so long, the sleeves are gone, and my pants below the thighs have vanished. And now, thanks to this incident, even my stomach is exposed…

I really just look like a wild child now.

Anyway, I need to prepare something to wear too…

I properly roasted the Boar and enjoyed a delicious meal.

Being able to eat juicy meat for the first time in forever left me extremely satisfied.

Filled with a pleasant sense of fullness, I thought about the future.

As for the dirt on my body, there’s a river near the cave so I can clean up as much as I want, but having no clothes is a problem. The season will soon turn to winter, and it’s only going to get colder… I hate the cold… I’ll make clothes out of monster hides or whatever else I can find.

More importantly, if I’m taking this much time on a single monster, I’m worried about what will happen even if I do manage to escape the forest.

Since I’m here anyway, even if it takes some time, wouldn’t it be better to train with all my might and get stronger? Here, I won’t lack opportunities for training.

The environment is the worst, there are plenty of monsters, and above all, with my current skill composition, couldn’t I become extraordinarily strong? …Do I want to get back at them, I wonder…

Maybe I do have those feelings… I might still be holding a grudge about being beaten to a pulp by the Hero two years ago.

Alright! I’ve decided! I’m going to get ridiculously strong right here!

I’ll raise my stats like crazy and become so strong that I won’t lose to anyone!

I don’t want to lose anything else through defeat.

For that, the forest alone isn’t enough. I have to challenge the monsters on the mountain as well.

From then on, my actions shifted solely toward becoming stronger.

While being extremely careful, I challenged the monsters of the forest, ate everything as spoils of war, and made my own clothes out of leftover materials like fur. Substituting fangs for needles, I stitched them together to make winter clothes, and I ventured into the mountain to acclimate my body to its harsh environment.

Once I got used to the constantly shifting, severe environment of the mountain, I used the same fighting style as in the forest: first dulling the monsters’ movements with poison or paralysis, and no matter how much time it took, prioritizing my life as I took them down. I never did anything reckless.

And then, I ate all the monsters I defeated, turning them into my own strength.