Chapter 2 - Mama Bear

It did not take long for Hunter to return to where he started the fire. He did not hear the telltale signs that a large 4m tall bear was chasing him, but Hunter did not dare to look back. He picked up the 3d printer and threw the knife in so he could use his both of his hands to carry the printer, and he ran like hell towards the opposite direction of the gruesome sight he just witnessed.

After half an hour of running like crazy, which felt like an eternity, Hunter finally slowed down to catch his breath and look behind. He felt like vomiting from what he witnessed but he was in so much shock and strained from running, his body could not even bring itself to gag.

'WHAT THE FUCK is going on? Jesus h christ, that was messed up. Besides the fucking 4m tall grizzley bear, the lady tore a damn jaguar 3 times her size in half!'

"Hey AI or gladius what ever you are called, what the hell is going on?"

"That was another 'summoned' like you, attacked by what the local population of this planet call the shadow jaguar and the basilisk bear translated into your language. Hunter, You seem confused by my name. Would you like to set a name for me?"

The cold and unfeeling voice of the AI calmed Hunter down a bit, and after thinking for a bit, decided to call the AI with not even a sliver of warmth in its voice, Glados for the uncanny resemblence it had to the creepy AI in that video game both in name and character.

"I am gonna call you Glados. First question Glados, do I have a chance against those monsters, and do I have some kind of spells or magic like that woman used? How strong are they?

'Those monsters should be equivalent to 6 and 10 times your strength respectively, based on the records of the strength of the people needed to fight them. You have a lack of mana in you body, which the other summoned used to fight against the jaguar, so you currently cannot utilize any weapons that have rune or use any offensive spells'

"Holy Shit, that sounds really bad. Tell me what and how much more I can make with the 3D printer. We are going to need something more than this knife if I am going to have any chance of surviving against them."

'The Terra Corps Personal Standard Template Printer is capable of printing anything that I have the required scematics and license for, and fits within the dimensions of the printer. Currently the printer has 97% charge remaining and 90% of the material left. I also require nutrition for power to operate the printer, so you currently need to obtain more food'

"Well, I am now 100% sure those things are gonna maul me. Can I at least charge the damn thing? And where do I get the materials?"

'Existing preferred power sources are not avaliable, Alternate power sources are currently unknown. Any Matter can be used as materials, however power needed varies considerably.'

'I guess its back to walking to put as much distance between me and that basilik bear or whatever it was called, and find a shelter and something to eat'.

Hunter found a small wild path made from travelling wild animals and after passing a small stream, he walked for another half hour or so before coming across another opening surrounding a cave entrance cutting into the side of a small cliff. The cliff was next to a series of cliffs of various sizes and the incline around the cliffs were so steep, Hunter was not certain he could climb them in his current state.

'Crap, looks like somewhere some kind of animal might live; or even worse this might be the bear's den. I have to quickly find a way around and get the fuck out of here, before that bear or something living in that cave tries to kill me'

Suddenly, Hunter smelled the stink of a wild animal coming upwind from where he came from, and heard small animals frantically running away and plants being pushed aside in the distance. Having no choice against out-running the calamity coming towards him, Hunter headed into the cave praying to find somewhere he could hide in where the bear was too large to squeeze through, and who ever that lived in the cave was not home. He frantically ran into the cave to hide before the beast arrived.

The cave was much larger than Hunter had thought, wide and tall enough for two large tractor trailers to pass through side by side, and after a short while he had to rely on feeling the sides of the cave wall to continue. After what felt like eternity, where Hunter jumped histerically at any small sound expecting to find a monster that would brutally end his life, he finally came into a large cavern lit with daylight coming from an small opening at the top of the cavern. On the sunlit center of the cavern lay two bear cubs the size of a small car, taking a nap next to a mountain of bones and half rotting carcasses of unknown origins and sizes. Some of them were even larger than Hunter and it was clear the bear he saw at the clearing was the alpha predator of this area. Hunter was trespassing and he needed to find a place to hide quick, or he was going to end up in that pile of steaming bear shit in the corner.

'Look up Hunter'

Hunter looked up and saw a small opening located 3 meters above, large enough for him to crouch into, but he grimaced when he realized it was on the wall past the bone piles and the sleeping bear cubs. Hearing the thump of the bear's footsteps echoing behind him, Hunter stopped hesitating and rushed towards the small opening, ignoring the terrifying man eating bear cubs that stood between him and his only way out of this ordeal. The cubs thankfully did not wake up and when Hunter was near the opening, Hunter realized he could not jump into the small cave with both of his hands full. Hoping for the best, he took his knife out from the printer and lightly tossed the printer into the smaller cave, to free his hands to climb into the small cave.

The metallic case of the printer sliding across the rocks made a horrendous noise that echoed through in the cavern, Hunter felt his skin crawl, and when he turned around, he was horrified to see the bear cub wide awake, hungry and curiously looking at him. Giving out a cowardly yelp, Hunter darted towards the wall, and with an athletic feat he would never have been able to be accomplish before, ungracefully collapsed into the opening of the smaller cave with the two bear cubs close behind him. Before Hunter had a chance to believe he was safe, one of the bears managed to stick its paw in before Hunter had a chance to retreat further into the cave, and took out a large chunk of Hunter's back.

"Fuck!"

In an uncontrolled panic, Hunter lashed out with his knife and succeded in slicing the cub deeply between its eyes and snout causing it to yelp in pain. Hunter using that chance tried to quickly retreat further back into the crevice but he did not get very far before he tripped and fell backwards onto a rock, and he blacked out immediately.

Hunter was back in his lucid dream, and he was back on earth, dreaming about his childhood and recent times, both good and bad; flashbacks of unpleasant times eating alone during school, the faces of people trying to mask their awkardness and displeasure to be in the same group projects as him, his awkard confession as a teenager in class infront of his crush during middle school, his hectic college life of weed and alchohol, his sick mother, his recent 21 months of military service that ended a year ago and finally his recent unsuccessful job interview. Near the end, when the dream about his mediocre life was about to loop itself again, Hunter was suddenly woken up by Glados calling out to him.

'Wake up Hunter'

When Hunter woke up with his head throbbing and feeling like it was going to explode, while his body was sore all over, he realized the deep wounds on his back and feet that was bloody before had healed and the cuts were no longer visible and Hunter was not dying from an alien diesease from infections. Whatever the aliens did, they made sure he was not going to bleed out on them. Hunter was thankful, even though it might have nasty side effects like turning him insane like that red masked guy in the comic books, since the speed he had healed at was physically impossible for a normal human.

Hunter cautiously listened for the bears and after not hearing anything suspicious, decided to take a chance and look down. From the moonlight bouncing off the pile of yellowish white bones, Hunter could tell it was night outside assuming this planet followed the same idea of rotating around a star like earth did. He looked more closely around and found one of the cubs near the bottom of the his little cave, half eaten. His slice with the knife was apparently where the bear's important artery was, judging from the thick puddle of blood around it; the bear like creature from hell dying by bleeding out. After spending five more minutes agonizingly looking and listening to see if the bears were hiding somewhere, Hunter was relieved to conclude neither the bear cub nor its presumably furious parent was in the cavern anymore.

"Glados, did I level up?" After saying that Hunter immediately felt stupid and as his face flushed red, Hunter face palmed himself.

'There can't be levels in real life, am I losing my mind here after all this'

As expected Glados replied 'No Hunter, killing monsters directly does not make you stronger in anyway'

"How am I going to get stronger then and kill those bears?"

'From the database, Natives seems to get stronger by training or finding artifacts left from gods in this world and receiving their blessings. Some of them seems to have a way to get stronger from the materials gained from hunting those monsters'

"What? There are gods in this world? Wait, you must know where we are right now then? You seem to know a lot about this world."

'What I know is only preliminary research Terra has performed on this planet and has records of, right before the mission. I do not know where we are. I am a newly activated AI from mother. More data needs to be collected for me to estimate location on the planet'

"Some useful AI you are. Never mind then, we need weapons Glados, any ideas?"

'I have standarized plans saved for all Terran Infantry Weapons. Considering the resources on hand, would you like me to print a standard pattern 6.5mm ETC TMC-103 Assault rifle?'

"Weapons we don't even have a way to power? Forget it Glados, I don't even wanna know how much material that is going to cost us. Do you have any stronger melee weapons like that lady used?"

'Melee is strongly not recommended for Hunter right now against those monsters. From all possible calculations, including the fact Hunter lacks mana, Glados concludes Hunter is too weak physically. Glados is certain Hunter will perish, thus failing the mission'

"...... Traps maybe?"

'The Bassilisk Bear is considered to be smart enough to not fall into a man made trap'

"Hey, maybe I pissed the bear off enough for it to work"

'Glados still recommends a ranged weapon'

"Fine, what is a rifle and some magazines with ammunition going to cost us?"

'It will use up the remaining 80% of resources and power and Glados will have to enter sleep mode due to lack of critical nutrients in the body'

"Just go ahead, I don't think we can leave this area with this killer bear roaming around waiting to muder me in my sleep"

'User has Weapon Production Access authorized - Starting printing process now - Time remaining 60:00'

While Glados was doing its thing, Hunter decided to look around. Thinking back, it was starting to creep Hunter out how bold and calm he was being compared to his normal self back on earth. Hunter decided it was another thing that could be explained by alien modifications on his body.

'Maybe they modified the part of ny brain that dealt with emotion, who knows.'

Suddenly remembering all those novels he read back on earth when he was bored, Hunter decided to go through the carcass of the bear cub to see if it had something like a monster core which could help in this situation. Hunter chuckled to himself at the ridiculousless of all this and started to wonder if he was in a coma from an accident and he was imagining all of this. The last day or two felt very surreal, but the very real pain he felt from the bear cub and the fact he saw a woman getting brutally murdered right in front of him, made Hunter quietly acknowledge this was all real, and Hunter started to cut open the still warm carcass of the bear with his knife, occasionally stopping once in a while to look around and listen for the bears.