Chapter 63: Bear Hunt
Sam and Jack came back to the camp with fox meat and a shining dagger in their hands. By the time they came the sun is already set and it is becoming dark.
A while later the four members sat around the fire as the fox meat was left to roast over it. Sam took a bite off the roasted meat in his hands and said.
"Tonight, we will be staying here and from tomorrow onwards, we will be moving and everyday we will set a new camp by evening. We must explore as much area as possible in this forest in the remaining six days.
The main priority for us is to search for the animals and mostly the cruel ones.
Today we found a dagger when we took down a fox. As the Elder said, we have to search for the dangers for the opportunities.
But animals are not the only dangers that we are going to encounter. There are other places in the forest where we might get some benefits.
Get as much sleep as you can for tonight. We are going to take down that bear which chased us tomorrow.
Two people will sleep while the other two will keep watch, we will change in the middle."
After they finished the dinner, Jack and Eve slept on the makeshift beds made of some large leaves and grass while Sam and Shor took the watch.
Shor didn't say anything as he kept watch on his surroundings while Sam worked with the dagger in his hands. He is using the dagger on the slightly thinner bamboo poles as he sharpened the edge of the pole as if he was making a spear.
All the while, he is keeping as watch and sharpening the poles one after another. The poles are not long as they are only three-feet each. He skilfully sharpened ten poles by the time Jack woke up along with Eve and took the watch duty.
Sam gave the dagger to Jack and instructions to sharpen the poles just like he did and went to sleep.
While the four are in a goo shape with the food and fire along with some comfortable sleep. The rest of the teams are not faring well. These guys don't know the bow drill or any other techniques that will make fire. Because, as far their knowledge goes, a fire can be made by a fire mage and if he is not available, a scroll or an articraft will do the trick. That was it. they clearly didn't understand the ways to make a fire.
All they could do was search for fruits and some wild vegetable to make do with for the food. Some teams are lucky to find them and some people are taking rest on their empty stomachs. Even more pitiful thing is that, now that they are ordinary people, they have to endure the cold weather of night and the mosquitoes of the wild as they huddle under a tree.
One of those groups is the one that left Sam. The group of four right now are leaning against a tree as they huddled themselves to endure the chill of the air. Never would have they expected that they would have to live life like this. The forest is truly a test to ones will.
After they left the other four, they started walking, but the forest path is much harder to travel than they thought. They are at least lucky enough to not encounter another animal like the bear, but they failed to find any fruits. The only silver lining is that they were able to get some water from the stream they encountered in the morning.
"It is all because of you. Jerk." Jessie gritted her teeth as she scolded Dustin as he slapped a mosquito on her hand to death. Her face lost all the elegance and pride she has in the morning. Now she looked haggard and pale. Her clothes were dirty and she looked weak.
Dustin didn't know what to say to this pampered princess. He agreed that he was the one who proposed the idea to oppress Sam a bit to just satisfy their ego a bit in order to gain one over him due to their jealousy on the first- round scores.
But the remaining two absolutely agreed to it and they were even a bit happy at that time, but now this Jessie is blaming him completely. He just shook his head and diverted his thoughts to Sam. He was thinking how the remaining team was doing in the forest. He hoped that they would suffer a bit, so that he could feel better about himself.
Sun rose and the forest was full of chirping birds. Sam and Shor woke up. The fire has been exhausted by now and only some live charcoal was left.
Sam made himself lose the sleepiness and walked towards the fire and placed a fresh dry stick, but didn't let it burn, instead made it have a spark like a live coal. He then walked towards a bamboo pole and cut a section of bamboo and placed the stick in it as he covered the both open ends with some green grass and finally poked some holes on the outer surface of the bamboo pole.
He then walked towards some really tall bamboo trees and started checking them by tapping them on various sections, when he finally found the one, he wanted, he used the dagger a big stick to chop off the tree near its roots.
After that he cut some sections which he tapped earlier and in front of the surprised gazes of everyone, he poked a hole on the bamboo section and a transparent liquid immediately came out. He quickly put his mouth over the hole and drank the liquid with a pleasing expression on his face.
After emptying the section, he looked at the rest and said. "This is one of the purest forms of the water sources in a forest, have some it will be refreshing." Then he passed the remaining sections with water to them.
After everyone had the water, they looked at Sam to hear his instructions. He then looked at the group and asked.
"I am a warrior mage of fire element. What about you guys?" His question was intended to the two strangers but Jack also answered.
"I am a warrior. Swordsman."
"I am a mage of earth element." Shor said.
"I am a mage of wood element." Eve replied.
Sam was dumbfounded by the situation. He didn't know whether it was luck or bad luck to have these two guys in the team. Because, both of their abilities are most beneficial in the forest at the same time he can't use it. After all, even if he gave them the scrolls that can be used for unsealing their cultivation, there is chance that they would betray him. Now he is feeling conflicted and he could only find one solution.
He has to find enough scrolls to everyone, if he wanted go use their abilities to ensure they won't have any thoughts of back-stabbing him. And giving them the scrolls first is absolutely impossible.
He quickly shook off the thoughts and said. "Today our target is the bear. We have to make sure we can kill it properly and we cannot risk any mistakes in the plan as it may cost us our lives. But I can assure you that the reward would be high.
First of all, we have to reach the vicinity of its hideout without it noticing us.
For that we need to take some precautions and the first one is we need to conceal our scent. Bears are one of the beasts that have a keen sense of smell and if we give away the slightest scent, we would be done for. In fact, the scent is the main reason that we were discovered by it so soon yesterday.
Second thing is, we need to make sure that we make as little sound as possible. As it is a forest the bear wouldn't bother with every sound, but the big movements will alert it to make a move.
The third thing is that we need to prepare something to make a trap for the bear." Sam finished his words and led the team to the stream. After that he started picking the mud near the stream and started applying all over his body. He took off his shirt and applied the mud all over the upper body and then he took off his pants without a care about the lady behind.
Eve, immediately closed her eyes and turned around to avoid looking at the man, while the man himself doesn't seem to care at all.
Jack and Shor were dumbfounded as they saw Sam's actions without a hit of shyness. When Sam completed the task, wore his cloths after soaking them in mud, he turned around and looked at the three people, then only realized what happened and he couldn't help but shake his head with a wry smile. He felt that he was back in those days when he was a soldier taking a mission in forest. He completely didn't feel awkward being n.a.k.e.d in front of the team as that was how he was in his past life.
Sam just disregarded the whole matter off and instructed the whole team, to apply the mud as walked back to the camp. After sometime, the three people came back with their whole bodies covered in mud.
He then stood up and said. "we need to prepare something to trap the bear. Even though we can take it head on if we go all out, we will be exhausted by the end and if other teams spot us, we will be done completely.
Before that, let us go and find out where the bear's home is. After that we can think of the rest of the plan."
Sam, Jack and Shor are walking while carrying the sharpened bamboo poles and Eve is carrying the bamboo section in which he placed the dried stick with the fire spark.
Soon, they arrived at the spot they opened their eyes yesterday. Sam then started searching for trails of the bear and finally found them and from then on, they slowly and carefully followed the trail.
After walking for more than an hour, they finally found a cave in their line of sight. Sam stopped them and changed the path as they walked in a different direction, after they reached a good distance and found a safe place, he kept the poles down.
"We are going to make these preparations here. Jack, you stay near the cave and inform us as soon as the bear left the cave and also see in which direction it left." After giving the instructions to Jack he took out the rope he made of the bamboo outer layer and started tying the poles. He made three frames of the eighteen poles that he and Jack made.
"Both of you go search the nearby places and find a bee-hive. Also check it out if you can find some vines nearby. Don't go too far though." He instructed Eve and Shor and then walked towards a nearby tree with the dagger.
The trunk of the tree is not too thick. It is only about average. He placed the dagger's edge on the truck and used a stick as a hammer and started chopping the tree bit by bit.
After sometime, Shor and Eve returned. But Sam is still only one-third of the tree trunk. He still didn't stop after their arrival and after a horrendous effort, the tree was finally down.
But Sam was still not done as he started chopping the wood on the upper side of the trunk. After all, he is making a log off it. When he was almost done with it, Jack came and informed about the bear's departure.
Sam immediately got alerted and became faster in his actions. He turned towards Shor and Eve.
"We found both of them, but we don't know how to retrieve it." Shor said in an awkward tone. Then only Sam realized that he forgot the fact he is dealing with amateurs.
"Shor, you go and take watch near the bear cave. Eve lead me and Jack to the vines and bee-hive."
Shor nodded and left to take watch. Eve led Sam, who is holding the pole and the live dried wood (dried wood with fire spark) along with him and Jack to the bee-hive.
"Both of you go and get some vines." Sam gave the dagger to Jack and sent them off.
He started a small fire nearby and started burning some green grass and he placed the burning green grass with near the bee-hive with the help of the pole. Soon, due to the smoke, the bees started falling off the hive and Sam got the honey he needed.
Soon, Jack came with the vines along with Eve and all of them walked towards the place they camped temporarily.
Sam started setting a log trap with the vines and the log. He set the trap in such a way that if the bear stepped on the rope, the log will come and hit the person who stepped on the rope. Of course, the rest of them didn't understand.
Meanwhile, with his instructions the Eve and Jack worked on a tree which is aligned with the path of the log swing and tied the three frames made with the bamboo spikes he created
He made the things with the help of Jack as soon as possible, afraid that the bear will return. When he was finally done with the traps.
He halved the honey filled hive and placed on half near the rope and covered the rope with some dead leaves. Then he took the other half and squeezed it slightly. Honey started dripping from it. He then turned towards Eve.
"You, take the hive and make a trail of honey until you can see the cave and drop the hive there and then you and Shor climb tree as fast as you can and stay still without making a noise.
Eve nodded and started performing the task.
Then he turned towards Jack and said. "After we lure the bear here, we have to make sure that we kill it, otherwise a beast in its last struggle is an absolute nightmare." Sam said and passed a bamboo pike to Jack as both of them climbed two tree which are the positions, they need to take respectively to make the final move.
After waiting for an hour or so, they finally heard the foot steps and growls of the bear which made both of them alert. Soon, they saw a bear which is sniffing and licking the trail of honey and soon ran excitedly after it saw the hive.
Before the bear could reach the hive, the trap activated and a log swung in full force towards the bear. The bear sensed the danger and tried to avoid it by backing down, but the log still hit it at the upper ribs and threw it towards the tree with bamboo spikes.
The bear hit the tree and the spikes pierced into it albeit only few of them. But Sam was not happy as he saw the bear still moving.
"NOW" He shouted and he and Jack moved at the same time as a pike and a dagger both pierced into the eyes of the bear at the same time, seizing its movements.
Even though the plan was success, Sam was not happy. He felt that it was barely passable as he looked at the wounds of the bear.
The spikes placed on the tree almost did no damage. If he and Jack didn't take the opportunity of the dazed state of the bear, they might have been in a pickle as they can't confront the bear, even in its injury due to log trap as it will make it hard to fight a bear in its raged state.
He underestimated the animals in this world. Just like them as they are stronger than the humans from earth even in their normal human state after their cultivations are sealed, the animals also are a bit stronger. Sam marked these thoughts in his mind as he told Jack to call Eve and Shor to come back, while he picked up the bear's dead body.