‘Being the massive lake that it was, it took me well over thirty full minutes to reach the east side of the lake. From there, I ventured back into the forest hoping to find something I could hunt.
‘Then after slowly advancing deeper into the forest, I finally found something.
‘Is that… an ostrich?
‘It really does look like an ostrich, well, maybe, except for the fact it had long sabretooth-like fangs coming out of its mouth. Why the heck does a bird have fangs that long… it doesn’t make sense at all.
‘Hm… I’ll call it a Saber Ostrich. Yep, that works.
‘Alright, now how to kill it? I don’t know how fast or how strong it is, so running in rashly is probably a bad idea. Dying before I even kill one new beast would be kind of pitiful right? That’s why I waited and thought out a brilliant plan before acting.
‘It’s a very simple plan.
‘Rashly running into attack. I’m just a Goblin after all.
‘I say that, but it’s more than just me being a Goblin. It has everything to do with the fact that in my previous life I was nothing but an ordinary college student. How the hell was I supposed to know various battle strategies?
‘I wasn’t a genius in school either; just a simple kid, which explains why I only know basic things like trying to sneak up on a beast, or the whole sidestep thing that Jaba showed me.
‘After that? I have no idea what to do, which just leaves me with charging in. Or at least that’s all I can think of right now.
‘It definitely might be my best idea, but I can’t learn if I don’t try new things.
‘That’s how it works, you do something, it doesn’t work, then you try something else. As long as I don’t give up, I’ll have plenty of opportunities to grow and get better, which is all a part of the plan.
‘I’m not just out here to get Essence. I mean, that’s probably the main goal but there’s other things as well. While anyone can be taught how to fight, it’s completely different from actually doing it, and considering I’ve never even been taught, I have no choice but to learn on the fly.
‘So, with my plan of Essence gathering and constantly getting into more and more fights, my fighting instincts should improve as well, right? Hopefully to a point where I don’t get scared when something strong shows up in front of me like that wolf...
‘Well, that's probably a long way off. For now, I’m gonna take a step towards that goal by charging at this saber ostrich, as I’ve named it. A brilliant name if I might add. Plus, I need to test out this new body of mine.
‘Now I don’t plan on running towards it while screaming on top of my lungs to announce to the ostrich and probably the whole forest that I’m here. I never understood why people did that, anyway. Might as well cut your own leg off while you do it too.
‘Finally, as quietly as possible, I took off in a sprint towards the saber ostrich.
‘With the distance between us only being about thirty feet, I pushed my green legs to run as hard and as quietly as they possibly could.
‘It wasn’t until I passed the six feet mark, when the saber ostrich turned around, then immediately let out an ear-piercing screech. It wasn’t bad enough to make me want to cover my ears and cry or anything, but it was definitely bad enough to make me abruptly stop my little charge.
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‘I didn’t fall over or anything though, so I just readied my spear which now felt a little smaller in my hands after evolving. I probably need a new one.
‘Anyway, I waited to see what the ostrich would do from here. While being up so close, I realized this beast was a lot smaller than the ones back home on earth, at least in terms of height. With his body only around four feet in height, and its long neck probably adding another two feet, bringing up its total to roughly six feet.
‘Well, that’s if my estimations were correct, but I can’t let my guard down but despite it being smaller than a regular ostrich it was still bigger than my current size.
‘I think I’m roughly five in height, but it’s hard to tell.
‘I didn’t have time to think about that though, because it suddenly pointed its entire neck in a line towards me, began charging full speed towards me at the same time!
‘With only a short distance between us, all it took was one giant step for the ostrich to quickly cut that distance in half!
‘So, I did the only thing I thought I could do! I threw my freaking spear as hard as I could towards the face of the ostrich which had its mouth gaping wide as it charged at me showing off its two large fangs.
‘I don’t know why I thought to throw it. My body basically moved before my mind could fully process what happened.
‘It was much less about If I thought it would work, and more about that I thought that its wide-open mouth was a nice target, but to my absolute surprise, the damn spear throw worked!
‘Flying at a speed I didn’t think I could produce, the spear hit the saber ostrich firmly in its wide-open mouth!
‘With the spear coming out the other side of its head the saber ostrich immediately died. Falling down, it slid forward a little bit right at my feet because of the momentum of its charge.
‘Wow…I really just did that.
‘Now before I let my glee overcome me, I had to think about what just happened.
‘It might appear like I easily killed the saber ostrich, but I knew it was far from that. If that spear throw had missed, by not even more than an inch, I’d most likely currently be staring at some pearly green gates in Goblin heaven at this very moment.
‘Or at the very least be engaged in some weird first fight with the damn saber ostrich.
After taking a few moments to digest what just happened, I quickly but mostly painstakingly broke out the two fangs from the mouth of the ostrich. I then immediately began butchering the ostrich.
‘And in this situation the act of butchering was a stretch…the spear didn’t survive the impact and all I had to use were the recently acquired fangs.
‘So, I’m definitely not doing a good job of it, and really using my hands to pull a few strips of meat as best as I could before using the fangs to cut it free.
‘Now I knew the smell of the saber ostrich would instantly attract others, but it was still a little too heavy for me to haul back to the lake despite my recent evolution, so I had to just take what I could and leave the rest pretty much.
‘Quickly gutting the creature and cutting off all the meat I could store in my waist pouch I got from Jaba. I can’t take most of the carcass with me but that didn’t mean it would be entirely useless.
‘Though I definitely don’t know any crazy fighting strategies, anyone can figure out that other than when the target was sleeping, the second easiest time to kill your target is when they’re eating. I could be wrong, but it sounds pretty logical to me.
‘It sounds a little evil, but this isn’t Earth anymore so, I have to adapt.
‘I backed off around fifteen feet from the carcass and while holding both fangs in my mouth I climbed a nearby tree. I’m hoping that is far enough so that whatever comes for the dead saber ostrich won’t notice me but instead focus on the free meat on the ground.
‘I would be close enough to be able to get a good strike in from the air, before whatever the beast that shows up can see me coming.
‘I patiently waited in the tree, silently perched on a branch thick enough to hold my weight as if I was a veteran predator. With my eyes darting back and forth in the area around the bait, I looked on hoping to spot my soon to be victim.
‘While waiting, I took a peek at my status to see that the saber ostrich only gave me 0.5 Essence just like the Horned Rabbits did. A little disappointing, but whatever.
‘Before I died of boredom waiting in the tree, something finally showed up. It was big, it was massive, and it was undoubtedly fear-inducing. Truly a being that deserves to be called domineering.
‘The most alarming feature of the beast in front of me was that it was another saber ostrich.
‘Dammit.
‘I really hope I didn’t just risk my life to use what I’m now guessing is a baby saber ostrich to lure the adult version over…
