Touch of Fate

The giant chicken, there was no other way to describe it, lunged forward while barraging him with dozens of fast moving projectiles that seemed to emerge from its outspread wings. It was easy enough for him to slide to the right, avoiding not only the ranged attack but forcing the large creature to redirect its momentum awkwardly.

As it skidded by him, claws frantically working against the smooth stone floor in an effort to continue its assault, he took a moment to evaluate the creature.

It stood nearly three meters tall, and was covered in midnight black feathers that extended from its grey colored talons to it's dark grey beak. As he looked at it, he realized that, while it resembled a chicken in form, there were a couple differences that he hadn't noticed at first glance. Most notable were the feathers of its tail, which extended much farther than would be seen in it's domestic cousins, bringing to mind the exotic plumage of the male peacock when not on display.

The creature would have more closely resembled a pheasant or some such similar animal if it weren't for the pale gray waddle that framed it's furious face. This combined with its overall posture and jerky motions created the impression that Mike was looking at an old, black and white animation of a chicken.

Feeling slightly bemused by this realization, he nevertheless launched a trio of winds blades while dodging another, somewhat clumsy, charge. The first neatly separated the monster's feet from the rest of the body, while the second and third caught it on each shoulder respectively, cutting its wings from the rest of its body.

Mike was left with a disturbingly angry monster torso that continued to screech in an aggravated fashion as it flopped around on the floor like some kind of bloated fish. Needing to restrain it in order to properly harvest the meat, he channeled a bit of mana into the floor, causing the stone of the cavern to rise up and form an interlocking net of rocky bindings. Unfortunately, this only made the creature begin to thrash against its bonds with an almost maniacal energy.

[Ugh...this is going to be a bit more challenging than I thought. Maybe I can stun it somehow?]

Going through his options, he decided to try using Life Magic, figuring that, at the very least, he could practice other usages of the skill.

Moving around to a side where the monster's beak couldn't reach him, he laid a hand on its quivering side and sent his will into its body. Initially, he tried to follow the path of its nervous system, leading up to it's brain, but he quickly realized that there was something unusual about this creature.

The monster's body was strange in many ways, but the first thing that struck him was the lack of most major organs. While it obviously had a skeletal structure complete with the usual accompaniment of muscles and tendons, and seemed to still be equipped with a heart, lungs, brain, and the typical sensory organs, it was otherwise hollow. Or rather, all the rest of the space typically reserved for the other bodily systems was taken up by a large, bladder-like organ that didn't seem to have any inherent purpose.

He could vaguely tell that there was something inorganic inside of its membrane, but his senses couldn't determine anything else about it. After some thinking, the answer came to him.

[No way...these things have a literal treasure chest built into their bodies. I bet that's where they keep their mana cores and other drops.]

Shaking his head, he cleared the errant thoughts and concentrated on his mission. Knowing the bare bones nature of the monster, he figured that the simplest solution to his problem was to sever the nerves that controlled the creature's motions while leaving the one governing its heart and lungs intact.

Surprisingly, this proved to be pretty easy, and it wasn't long before he was looking down at the limp form of the chicken monster that would have appeared to be dead if it wasn't for the slow, shuddering gasps that issued forth from its beak.

Overcoming a momentary bout of nausea at the weird barbarity of the whole situation, Mike began planning the next step. He would need to cut portions off of the creature's meatier parts while making sure to keep it alive. After some deliberation, he settled on the solution of simply continually healing it with Life Magic while dissecting it with blades made from Dark Magic.

Although he wasn't sure if the creature was really capable of feeling pain, seeing how it was only vaguely mimicking the structure of a living being, he nevertheless tried to sever the actions of its spinal column that transmitted pain signals. Even though it was a monster that was trying to kill him earlier, he had no desire to torture it like this.

After roughly a half hour of harvesting, he'd used up close to two thirds of his mana reserves, and decided to call it quits, finally putting the creature out of its misery with a well placed spike of darkness.

Much as he anticipated, the main body of the monster dissolved into particles while leaving the severed chunks of meat unaffected. In their place appeared a large orange mana core, and a neat square of brownish-grey material that he used Appraise on with a sinking heart.

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Tenebrous Phasianidae Meat

Material (Tier 1, Rank 3)

Meat harvested from the Tenebrous Phasianidae. Well known for its savory flavor that compliments a large variety of dishes, this meat is often heralded as one of the most delicious in the Inland Sea Region. Can be refined through Alchemy or prepared using Cooking. In either case, this material holds an affinity for stealth and darkness related effects.

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Mike blinked and read over the description again.

[This implies that people could potentially create dishes that enhance a person's abilities or grant certain effects, like drinking a potion would...I really need to talk to Morris about this.]

After packing up and storing his spoils, he quickly blazed his way through the rest of the floor, made use of the dungeon exit located near the stairs leading up to the previous level, and walked back out into the real world.

He marched past the several delvers who were still hanging out in the little meeting area, ignoring their curious glances in his direction, and took off immediately once he left the cavern.

Hurrying back to the hotel, he swept past the receptionist, who was staring at him in a bug-eyed fashion, and hurried up to his shared room, waking his bard friend up as soon as he arrived.

"Is there a way to use Cooking to enhance someone?" Mike asked the groggy young man before he had a chance to really wake up.

"Cooking?...What do you...Dear gods, Mike! What in the hells happened to you?!"

"Huh?" He asked, looking down. Apparently in his excitement to explore this new option for crafting, he'd completely ignored the after effects of his rather gruesome harvesting method. He was coated nearly head to toe in a dark red, sticky fluid that could only be the monster's blood.

"Don't worry. It isn't mine." He replied while using Lifestyle Magic to begin cleaning himself. It was taking a surprisingly large amount of mana and time to remove the persistent goo.

"How is that better?!"

"And here I thought you were worried about me. It's monster blood. I just got back from the dungeon."

Morris shook his head, throwing back the covers he was still sitting under and standing up. "Let me guess, you just so happened to come all the way back here from the dungeon without even noticing that you looked like you'd just murdered a small army of people?"

"Well, yeah." Mike replied a bit sheepishly. "I'm guessing my Physiological Resistance skill negated the discomfort caused by the stickiness, and I was otherwise too distracted by the possibility of exploring a whole new method of crafting."

The bard screwed his face up in exasperation. "Physio...you know what, I'm not going to ask, and merely assume it's something ridiculous and unique to you." He sighed, shaking his head. "Well, on the bright side, it's already becoming a poorly kept secret that you're some kind of bigshot from the central continent, so it's unlikely that anyone would question you without some sort of reason. You just need to keep your head down from here on out and avoid doing anything too unusual."

"That won't be a pr…" Mike started, before having a realization. "Actually, I may or may not have gotten in a bit of a fight with one of the local Tier 4s. But before you get upset, it ended in a draw and we now have a standing invitation to visit their city."

Morris began massaging his temples like a headache was coming on. "Okay...did it at least happen somewhere discreet? Or were you by any chance wearing a disguise at the time?"

"Um, well, he kind of ambushed me, so I didn't really have any time to prepare for it, and we ended up duking it out in the middle of a produce market." Mike shot back with a somewhat nervous laugh. "Really did a number on a cart full of cabbages."

His friend was silent for a second, as if he was having a hard time processing the information. Finally, he nodded. "Alright, we can work with this. It's a safe assumption that your identity is at least partially compromised. After all, there are only so many people capable of fighting with a Tier 4, and of those, I doubt many would match your description."

"I see."

"Fortunately, it's basically an unspoken law that governments and large organizations will not openly recognize a Tier 4 travelling incognito, even if they do something ridiculous within their area of operations. So long as you don't announce yourself somewhere and don't do something to harm the interests of the city or region, we can depend on this to prevent undue interference with our business. That being said, you'll probably need to start moving around using stealth or a disguise, lest you be mobbed by people looking to take advantage of you."

Mike frowned. "You really think they'd risk making me angry that way."

"Considering the possible benefits and the fact that you are largely seen as someone who can be easily manipulated, I believe that to be the case."

"Easily manipulated? What the hell?"

"Apparently your actions during the war, coupled with your accepting of a semi-imperial title from the future king of Almir, has led to you being internationally considered as someone gullible that can be easily pulled into factional struggles if presented with a suitably altruistic goal. It only gets worse when one considers your association with the Dragonknights."

Mike opened his mouth to protest, but then took a moment to think about it. If he looked at it from an outsider's perspective, it would almost seem like he'd intentionally gotten involved in a territorial squabble for presumably little actual gain.

In modern-day Earth terms, it was a bit like someone who'd won the lottery and then gave away a good chunk of his earnings to the first stranger who told him a decent sob story. Something like that would only inspire others to follow suit.

"Hmm...I see what you mean. What do you have in mind as a solution?"

Morris turned and gazed out the window. "We'll have to start a rumor saying that you are currently on a journey of self discovery following the events on the central continent, and you will respond negatively to any attempts to distract you from it. Perhaps even violently, if necessary. We can spin both the fight with other Tier 4 and the dust up at the Guild as examples of this. It won't stop the most desperate, but it should dissuade the majority of favor seekers. Between that and you wearing a disguise when you go out, I think we can probably avoid getting too deeply involved in this city before we leave. That being said, I recommend keeping our stay as brief as possible."

"Right, well, that shouldn't be an issue." Mike replied with a nod. "But more importantly, what about my first question."

The bard blinked at him for a second before shaking his head. "Right, you wanted to know about Cooking?"