Ikfael shot from the bushes and into the water to swim after the buck. When she reached the waterfall, she dived over the side, absolutely fearless. I chose to take the safer path and shoved the greenery out of my way as I hurried down the hillside.

The buck thrashed in the pool, but the water wouldn’t let him escape. It surrounded him and pulled him down. Sections froze, but Ikfael moved the ice away. The water was her weapon after all, and the buck couldn’t freeze it fast enough to disarm her. All the while, the arrow was in his side. Suffocating and bleeding, it was a horrible way to die.

The thrashing stopped, and the pool stilled. Ikfael pulled herself from the water, huffing and puffing. She lay back on the ground exhausted. There was blood on her fur, but none of it was hers.

I dived into the pool to try and get the buck out of the water, but I wasn’t strong enough. Ikfael sat up and rubbed her face. She gestured, and the water lifted the buck onto the ground. There was still blood contaminating the pool, and she gestured again to remove it.

Not quite done, she gestured a third time, and the water soaking the buck’s fur gathered into a ball which she threw across the glen, at the place the buck marked as his territory. That wasn’t enough, so she pulled a wave from the pool and had it wash over the ground.

She fell back, her eyes closed.

I sat down next to her with a thump. “What in the heck.”

Ikfael nodded. What the heck indeed.

That wasn’t exactly how I planned my first hunt to go, but dang, he was the biggest buck I ever shot.

I was torn. I really wanted to check my System notifications, but the day would warm up quickly, and the longer I waited, the more time bacteria had to grow on the carcass. Ugh… I’d hate for all that meat to go to waste. My grandparents would totally disapprove. Grimacing, I stood back up.

“Ah, could I borrow the dagger back? I don’t have any more knives.”

Ikfael turned on her side to face away from me and pretended to sleep. I knew she was pretending, because I didn’t hear her woob woob woob.

“Please. I only need it for a day. Not even a day, a half day.” Actually, I could dress the deer in half an hour, but she didn’t need to know that.

“We could have a barbecue. Have you ever had barbecue? It’s the best food in the world. The way the meat chars and fat crackles. I could eat it every day.” She didn’t understand the words, but I smacked my lips and hammed it up as much as I could.

Ikfael looked over her shoulder at me, her eyes starry. A bit of saliva hung from her mouth.

I explained that I needed the dagger to dress the deer, and then I’d give it back at the end of the day. She’d get half the meat in exchange.

She pulled the dagger from her pocket and gazed at it forlornly. Then she covered her eyes and handed it to me.

I walked over to the dead buck and knelt beside him. “Thank you. Your sacrifice will feed our bodies and sustain our lives. Be easy and move onto your next life.”

I began by finding the joints and cutting away the lower legs. There wasn’t much meat on them, but they’d be useful for sinew. Plus they were in the way, and it was already hard enough dressing the deer on the ground rather than hanging it from a tree.

Next, I made a small incision between the hindquarters. I stuck a couple of fingers in there and pulled the hide and abdominal wall away from the deer’s guts. Now that I wouldn’t accidentally puncture any of the inner organs, I ran the knife up along the deer’s belly, opening him up.

The intestines and stomach spilled out. I reached inside and cut the areas where the inner organs attached to the cavity. Almost done. All that was left was to carve away where the rest of the gastrointestinal tract was connected. Once it was detached, I was able to pull the organs out in one go.

I saved the kidneys, liver, and heart and set them aside on a clean patch of stone. The rest wasn’t particularly appetizing or immediately useful, and I carried them away, outside the glen’s boundary. It wouldn’t do to attract scavengers to the glen.

When I got back, Ikfael was standing where I’d put the organs. She had a black marble in her paws.

“Is that what I think it is? A monster core?” They were a common feature in isekai and cultivation stories, the source of power inside magic beasts.

Ikfael sighed, clearly tired, but she waved me over to her side. She brought her dowel out and used it to sketch a picture of herself. She then pretended to destroy the monster core and immediately added muscles onto the drawing.

“Oh, that’s interesting. Destroy the core and you gain in power.”

Ikfael nodded. She then drew herself again, this time seated in meditation, the monster core between her paws. Even more muscles were added. An almost absurd amount.

“Ah, if you draw the power slowly, you gain more of it. That makes sense.”

The otter nodded, but then added fangs to the image and a horn growing from the head. She laid the lines down thick and heavy, and the eyes became angrier and angrier.

I swallowed. “Okay. Not what I expected. If you draw the power slowly, you turn into a monster? Is it the dose? I don’t understand.”

Ikfael drew a picture of me walking along a path, and I came to a fork in the road. Taking the left path, she has me breaking monster cores and growing slowly in strength by absorbing silverlight. To the right, I absorbed the whole monster core and became a monster myself over time.

Then, just to make things more complicated, she has the road fork time and time again.

“So you don’t become a monster immediately. It’s something that builds up over time. It’s a risk you take choosing the faster path. And you get to choose every time you collect a monster core.”

Ikfael put the dowel away and pulled a stone from her pocket. She smashed the monster core with it. The fragments were black, like coal, but dotted with glimmers of silver. The black parts began to foam, boiling in the air, until they disappeared completely. All that was left was four slivers of silver.

Ikfael took two for herself and put the other two in my hand. They dissolved, and I felt a warmth run through me, like when I killed the weird tree creature during my spirit journey.

12 silverlight gathered.

So, a person grew in power absorbing silverlight. They grew even more powerful absorbing both dark and silverlight, but then they risked turning into a monster.

Whew, it was the classic dilemma, wasn’t it? Either build up a good foundation slowly, or grow fast and loose and risk running out of control. (Or walk a hybrid path between the two.) I knew what I preferred--solid foundations make for strong houses--but I could see how a shortcut would be incredibly tempting when life was on the line.

Not that any of this was an issue right now. I still had a deer to skin and quarter.