Chapter 16: Chapter 16 – First Proper Kill
Kyle and Samson left the path and entered the forest.
On their way, Samson explained a couple more words in order to tell Kyle one sentence.
"We alone today. Team tomorrow," Samson said.
"Understood," Kyle answered in fantasy language.
A moment later, Samson extended his hand to indicate that Kyle should stop.
Kyle was a bit confused, but then he heard the very subtle sound of something moving through the underbrush.
Something inside of Kyle told him that this thing was not harmless.
"You strong how?" Samson asked.
Kyle smiled awkwardly.
"I fight no. Yesterday no. Yesterday yesterday no. Yesterday yesterday yesterday no. No. No. No. Strong no," Kyle explained.
Samson's eyebrows rose.
Was that supposed to mean that he had never fought something?
"Narvonian worm you kill," he asked.
"Yes. Narvonian worm strong. I no strong," Kyle said with embarrassment.
Samson looked at Kyle incredulously.
"How kill?" he asked.
"Narvonian worm attack. I..." Kyle said as he made the motion of a man running away. "Narvonian worm attack. Tree. I head. I attack." He pointed at his eye. "I..."
"Run," Samson said, giving him the word for running.
"I run. I throw... small blood body. I attack. No see. Narvonian Worm no see."
"Narvonian Worm attack I leg. I attack head. Narvonian Worm dead."
Kyle decided to skip the entire part with the wolves since that would make it unnecessarily complicated to explain.
Samson looked at Kyle with furrowed brows.
Meanwhile, Kyle felt quite embarrassed.
It was like he had lied on his CV, and when he actually had to do the job, the boss realized that his employee actually wasn't qualified.
Samson expected an experienced warrior but only got someone who had dumb luck.
Samson sighed.
"You learn," he said. "Earn money."
Kyle felt quite guilty and nodded repeatedly. "I learn."
"You learn now," Samson said.
Kyle became a bit nervous.
"Kill," Samson said as he pointed in the direction of the rustling. "Dangerous head. Back safe. Head dangerous. Understand?"
"Attack back. Run head," Kyle answered with a nod.
Samson nodded back.
Then, Samson handed Kyle a long knife.
'That doesn't look like a weapon,' Kyle thought as he looked at the knife. 'This looks more like a tool.'
Kyle smiled sheepishly before pointing at Samson's sword.
Samson raised an eyebrow before taking his sword off with its sheath.
Then, he handed it to Kyle.
Kyle took it and...
BANG!
The sword hit the ground.
'Fucking! Why is this thing so fucking heavy?!' Kyle thought as he slowly lifted the sword with both of his arms.
"Understand?" Samson asked as he took his sword back.
"Understand," Kyle answered as he took the knife.
'Holy shit. How is he swinging that thing around?! That thing is ludicrously heavy!'
Then, Kyle slowly moved forward as Samson silently followed him.
The rustling had moved away quite a bit, but Kyle never lost sight of his target.
As he walked forward, Kyle felt his heart rate shoot up, and his body began to shake.
Needless to say, he was scared.
'Shut up! I have to earn my keep! If I don't kill this thing, I will go back to prison! I don't wanna go back to prison!' Kyle thought as he remembered the suffering prisoners.
'Prison will kill me!'
Kyle walked after the rustling.
His target was quite small and low to the ground, but he still didn't know what it was.
'Fuck, I can't see this thing through these bushes!'
Then, Kyle remembered his fight against the Narvonian Worm.
The next moment, he jumped onto a branch of a tree and surveyed the area from there.
It wasn't easy, but thanks to his powerful body, Kyle managed to jump from branch to branch to follow the rustling.
The longer he did that, the more his eyes focused.
His body wanted him to strike.
The thing sped up quite a bit.
Most likely, it had heard the creaking branches above it.
Kyle sped up as he looked forward.
'There's an open space ahead. Most likely, it won't escape the underbrush since it knows I'm here.'
'I have to force it out.'
Kyle looked around and found what he was searching for.
He left the trees to grab the thing before going back onto the tree.
When his target reached the end of the underbrush, Kyle took out the stick he had grabbed and violently hit the brush behind the thing.
Sure enough, the target became panicked, and Kyle's eyes focused as it rapidly left the underbrush.
'A snake!' Kyle thought as he saw the slithering snake.
The snake was only around two meters long, but since Samson had said that the head was dangerous, it was most likely venomous.
Kyle's hands shook, and he jumped forward with all of his strength.
He shot at the snake and extended his knife.
CRACK!
The knife easily cut the snake in two, about twenty centimeters away from its head.
Kyle jumped back and watched the head writhing on the ground.
"Good job," Samson said from behind Kyle.
Kyle rapidly turned around with a jerk.
He was still in combat mode.
"Calm," Samson said.
Kyle took a deep breath and carefully handed the knife back.
This was very different from his battle with the Narvonian Worm.
During his battle with the Narvonian Worm, Kyle had just done random things to survive and somehow succeeded.
But here, he had actually planned an attack and finished the battle with his strength, smarts, and skill.
The snake probably was very venomous, but in the grand scheme of things, it wasn't very dangerous.
Humans were very quick, and as long as they weren't ambushed by such a snake, they could easily outrun it.
A human could also just use one of their hands to bait the snake into biting before grabbing the extended head with their other hand.
Compared to the Narvonian Worm or the fire wolves, this snake was harmless.
But it wasn't completely harmless.
When Kyle saw the snake dying, he felt a rush of excitement.
He had killed something!
'This feels amazing!'