The Grand Weave

The night went by smoothly with no disturbances. The forest was strangely quiet. I kept expecting a bird, or even the racket of crickets, but nothing. Only the crackle of the dwindling fire kept me company.

Strangely enough, the new body had another hidden quirk unlisted on the status screen. With the minimal light from the moon above, and the fire, I found the dark wasn't nearly so bad. I could make out the shapes and see the world in what I suspected was some form of night vision. It wasn't exactly see in the dark-levels of awesomeness, but I wasn't blind by any means.

Despite the eerie silence, I found comfort in the absence of danger. I wasn't entirely alone either, as I called upon Áine after two hours of keeping watch.

We sat silently near the cave entrance, with my shoulder providing a comfortable spot for her to overlook the dark landscape in front of us. In the morning, when I went to wake up Sam, Áine retreated into my chest.

I tapped her lightly on the shoulders to not startle her.

"Hey, wakey, wakey. It's morning already, and we both agreed on an early start. Besides, we're going to be hungry soon, and frankly, we need to find food and water," I said as she opened her eyes.

She glared at me before yawning loudly.

"I'm up! Geez. Even in a new body, I don't think I'm made to be a morning person," she said while grumbling to herself.

Luckily for me, Sam didn't take very long to get ready. It helped that we didn't have anything to grab or put away.

Sam led the way through the forest with her giant stick in one hand. After some time walking in the still, silent forest, I deemed it safe to start a conversation.

"So, I never asked, but how did you have a fire going when I found you?" I asked her.

She carefully stepped over a large root before replying without bothering to look back. "Being bedridden means you have a lot of free time. With nothing else to do, I watched a lot of how-to videos. That being said, I'd never have the patience to rub some wood together if I didn't have this new body."

"Yeah, I suppose you wouldn't," I said. I hesitated, unsure if I should bring up Sam's family. I slowly started the conversation again and softened my voice. "I know your new body is a hell of a lot better than your old one. Hell, the change you went through probably feels like the difference between heaven and earth. But... Do you think your family will take our deaths well?"

Sam stopped and stood still for a short while. She visibly exhaled and squared her shoulders before resuming our journey. A few minutes of silence passed before she finally replied.

"Don't think I can be blamed for not thinking of my family yet. With everything that has happened in such an extremely short timeframe, I haven't put any thought toward our deaths," she said. She exhaled again and flexed her fingers. "Considering I pretty much had a life expectancy shorter than a year, I don't think it'll be too problematic. Don't get me wrong, I know they'll weep for me, but they have been expecting me to expire for a while now."

Sam...

We continued in mutual silence. Our journey through the forest ended up being completely uneventful. We found a small river that continued in the same direction as our destination. Without any containers to store water in, we just drank our fill before moving on.

The night followed the same pattern as the previous one. Sam kept watch while I slept for around six hours. Since there was no activity, we continued this routine for most of the next day. By lunch, we were both craving a good meal. Drinking water alone wasn't enough to satisfy our hunger.

There weren't even any random nuts or berries, just an endless expanse of blue-tinted leaves. In a few hours those leaves would start to looking tempting and chewy.

Everything changed when we started to hear the telltale signs of life sometime in the afternoon.

"Didn't think the world was so loud until we've spent so long walking in a land of silence," I commented while watching a small red bug crawling on the nearby tree. "Not going to lie. I already miss my phone and my playlists."

Sam grunted. "I'm not going to complain about the change. Sounds mean life; if there's life, there's food. If we don't find something to eat here shortly, I'm afraid I will end up desperate enough to eat bugs."

"Hey, bugs are good protein. I bet if we roast them over a fire, it'll taste pretty good." I laughed.

She scrunched her nose. "We'll cross that bridge when we get there."

It wasn't till another hour of walking that we finally heard something large up ahead. We shared a look of excitement before we slowly shuffled our way closer. A minute later, we finally found the source of the noise.

I spotted what appeared to be a wild pig with half of its face buried under some roots. It was roughly the size of a great dane and didn't have tusks. However, it had crimson fur and a faint red glow emanating from its nostrils.

Despite the omnious magic and massive size, my heart started to thrum. Excitement bled into my veins, and itched my muscles.

Taking a few steps back, we crouched down behind a thick tree.

"I don't know about you, but pork sounds amazing right now," Sam whispered.

"Any idea how you want to do this? All I have are my fists and Áine. And while I believe she can heal us somehow, we both aren't fit for fighting anything," I asked while waving my very empty hands.

To that, Sam gave me a wide grin and flexed her biceps. "Don't worry. I think I'm currently packing enough muscles for the both of us."

"Don't remember you being such a showboat. Now, get serious. The only hunting we've ever done was for a good iced coffee."

"Fine, sorry. I'm just feeling good. It's hard not to feel excited about seeing what we can do. And we have cool magic powers now. You can't seriously tell me you're not excited about using magic!"

She was right. The feeling was hard to describe, but it was like there was some itch. My body didn't seem to want to feel fear. I may not have been nearly as pumped as Sam was, but overwhelming need to use my magic pulled at my thoughts.

I sighed before looking Sam in the eye. "Let's just try to be careful. If we are lucky, maybe we can kill the pig quickly."

Some minutes later, I slowly creeped behind a tree. The plan we concocted was simple, possibly dangerously so.

Sam would throw a rock a few meters away to grab the pig's attention. We were betting on it charging at her in retaliation. While it fixated on her, Sam was to dodge behind a tree and then use her skill to strike the beast as it recovered from its charge.

Dozens upon dozens of warning signs shouted that we were being stupid, but a far more overwhelming voice in my head crushed the complaints. Things could go wrong, and our knowledge was half-baked at best. For all we knew, glowing red pigs could fly or teleport.

I could only hope that if anything went wrong, I could use Áine to heal us afterward. Our tale would be pretty crappy if we underestimated a magical pig and died.

I activated my Verdant Healer skill and summoned Áine. She seemed to understand what she needed to do because she gave me a nod while turning toward the beast.

Sam's eyes flicked to my position. I gave her the signal and she returned it with an excited grin before before she picked up a large rock and cocked her arm back.

The rock hit the back of its head with a loud thunk.

"Shreeeei!"

"Come on, Porkie! There's more where that came from," Sam shouted while bending down and picking up another rock.

Not giving her a chance to throw another stone, the pig charged. Despite its large size, it was fast.

Sam managed to dodge to her left, but the pig still clipped her ankle, sending her spinning.

"Sam!"

She moaned as she landed, and pushed herself up.

My adrenaline spiked. The beast slowly shuffled toward Sam, slamming its hooves into the dirt.

"Áine! Heal Sam!" I shouted to the fairy as I rushed forward.

Sam favored her right leg and leaned to one side.

I grabbed a fallen branch on the ground and ran towards the angry pig with my arms held high. As it finally noticed me and turned around, I brought the branch down hard on its back leg.

It emitted an angry squeal and thrashed its snout toward my face. Despite the force behind my swing, the beast stood on all fours, looking no worse for wear. When it snorted, a small plume of fire erupted forth, scorching my hands.

I backed up as flames crawled around each leg, burning the grass underneath.

With one last puff, it lowered its head and charged.

"No you don't!" Sam shouted.

She launched herself onto its back and wrapped her arms around its neck. The beast bucked once before a meaty, water-covered, blue fist smashed right between its eyes. Blood splashed, coating the ground.

Bone crunched underneath her fist, and the water tossed the blood aside as it fountained into the air.

Sam rolled off before the dead creature collapsed onto the burnt ground. She wiped some of the blood off her face and pumped the air.

"Ha-ah. Take that, porky... Aaah," she sighed.

With the battle over, I found myself lying down, staring up at the canopy of leaves. My arms screamed in pain, but it was dulled.

Probably the adrenaline. I should be screaming right now.

My vision was soon replaced by a small fairy hovering just above my nose.

"So, uh, can you handle this?" I asked her while holding up my roasted hands.

I received a firmer boop on the nose from the tiny fairy, followed by her gentle descent onto my leg. She placed her hands on mine, and an emerald green glow enveloped them, along with a scent that filled my senses. The aroma blended pine and newly cut grass mixed with berries, and even after the light faded, the fragrance lingered for a few moments.

I lowered my hands to my face and saw they were completely healed. There wasn't anything that would have shown that mere moments ago, they were covered in blistering burns and blackened skin.

"Damn. That's cool."

Turning my head towards the fairy, she seemed relieved I was ok.

"Thank you. It didn't even hurt at all," I complimented.

She reached down to give me another small boop before she disappeared back into my chest.

Sam walked up, and I noticed that her limp was also missing. "Seems like she healed you as well," I said.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure I fractured something in my leg. That damn pig hit hard," she said after crashing to the ground beside me. "Wasn't exactly how I wanted it to go, but damn, I'm loving myself more and more. I crushed its skull with one friggin punch! That felt amazing!"

When she mocked kissing her biceps, I rolled my eyes.

"Yeah, that was pretty cool. I could have done without the whole getting roasted, though," I grumbled. "Stupid meat thought it could cook me instead.

We both burst into laughter in the middle of the forest floor, feeling a bit strange and far too excited now that the fight was over. However, a small part sobered me. Our reaction to this wasn't onrmal. Old us would have looked at new us like we were psychopaths.

"Sam, have we gone insane?" I asked.

She frowned but shook her head. The blood adorning her skin looked almost cartoonish against her blue skin.

"I don't think so. But probably? I know I'm hungry but we just killed something."

"Yeah," I sighed. "We'll figure it out later. Now get up."

I stood and made our way towards the corpse. There were small pieces of bone poking through the shredded skin. Blood had started to ooze from all of its orifices--what remained of them.

Yeah, I don't think I'll be pissing her off anytime soon.

I wasn't about to find out what being on the other side of such devestation would feel like.

"Let's grab this and camp near the river tonight. Might as well have a source of water to wash up."

Before Sam could say anything, I activated my Dimensional Storage, and the little dragon whelp appeared. Opening its jaws again, it suctioned the whole pig towards its mouth. The sight was damn comical. As it got near my dragonling's mouth, the body slowly shrunk until nothing but blood remained.

My dragonling gave a loud burp before disappearing into my chest. I turned towards Sam with a smile on my face. Sam's jaw was hanging open as she stared at where the corpse used to be.

"I didn't expect the little guy to be able to swallow the whole thing."

Picking her jaw off the ground, she closed her mouth with an audible snap.

She shook her head and walked away. "Dude, that was weird. I get a portal, and you get some Kirby-esque little dragon."

"Better than some boring portal!"

She flipped me off and started walking away.

Thirty minutes later, we stood next to the river. Both of us stared at the pig's body lying before us. On a whim, and an errant complaint from Sam, I experimented with summoning items from the skill.

To a happy surprise, the pig's body flopped onto the ground without requiring the little dragonling to barf it up. All I had to do to pull items from my living storage was some will and a flex of mana.

I'm not sure if I'm dissapointed or not that the little guy doesn't spit them out.

I turned towards Sam, who had her arms crossed. "So, uh, did you ever watch videos on how to skin a corpse?"

A brief look of horror dawned on her face. "Shit! We don't even have any knives to cut into it!"

We were going to be hungry for a bit longer.