Chapter 4 We require more vespene gas

Hunter decided the cave was secure enough to be his base for now since the cave had only one entrance and he was sure nothing stronger than the bear was nearby and the lingering scent of the local alpha predator was enough to ward off potential predator. He alse decided to make crude traps all around the cave to try and trap small critters.

Living off the bear was absolutely horrible for the first couple of days but with Glado's help he was able to find some edible herbs and what looked to be wild onions, strange looking fruits and mushrooms to help make the meat more palatable. For the remaining bear hides after he was done butchering, he chemically treated with the extract of some unknown plant from the forest per Galdos's instructions and dried it for next time he goes into civilization since it might be valuable. He then crudely make some clothing again with Glado's instructions.

Solving the food and clothing situation for now, Hunter spent the next 2 weeks chopping down trees nearby, collecting iron near the cliff and producing hand tools to build the wood gas generator to power the printer. Although the printer seemingly could make anything, it only could make items or parts smaller than its mini fridge size so he had to manually assemble and build all the tools and equipment to make the gas generator. Glados gave precise instructions and to produce the steel, Hunter was able to make a crude crucible to smelt the iron and the other 3d printed ingredients together. With the powertools and a welder powered by what remained of the monster core he was able to finally assemble a wood gas powered generator the size of a small shed.

By then the wood he chopped up and prepared was sufficently dry enough to be used and with a lot of trial and error Hunter finally managed to power the generator up.

"My God, that took a lot effort."

'We need to make 3 more of those to power the printer Hunter'

"I am sorry what? You are telling me I need that much power just to make some more bullets?"

'Breaking down matter and reassembly them takes a lot of energy, especially with the materials we have. You should know that Hunter.'

"I am getting cabin fever here Glados, I mean I have you to talk to and all but its been 2 weeks and we have not found anybody else nearby. From what you told me about local habitants and all, I was at least hoping to find me some blue aliens, Glados."

'Since you never asked so I never told you this, but Hunter, this world is 10 times larger than earth'

"What? some support AI you are Glados. Am I right in the middle of the Amazon Forest or something? You would think for a mission given by some alien god, I would need to be closer to civilzation."

'......'

"Glados?"

'You were supposed to be summoned in a civilzation but I don't know what happened. This shouldn't have happened. I am sorry Hunter.'

"... Fine, lets just forget about it. Lets just get this over with so we can leave this god forsaken place. I don't know how long the smell is going to keep the predators away."

It took Hunter more than a month but he was finally done.

"Ready Glados?"

'Yes, Hunter'

It took a while but when the four sputtering generators were connected to the small box, Hunter finally heard the telltale sounds of a laser printer booting up and getting ready to print. The monster core from the bear was almost depleted and if something went wrong along the way, Hunter would have had to go out and hunt another monster like the Basilisk bear which would have definately ended up with Hunter getting killed. He knew just how lucky he was with how the recent battle went.

"Yes it works!!! It works! It was way too close but Glados we finally did it!"

'Congradulations Hunter'

"Now lets start printing some ammo. Lets get the hell out of here"

After celebrating by drinking himself to sleep with his homemade alchohol he brewed from the fruits, he was awaken by Glados.

'Hunter wake up'

"Shit, this is a comon theme ain't it. What happened?"

'There are three monsters scouting the area east of the entrance'

With the surplus of power they had now, Hunter installed a couple of sensors and cameras near the caves, and since Glados did not need to sleep he had the perfect warning system. Hunter was relieved he followed Glados's advice earlier.

"Scouting? Scouting!? Why the hell aren't they just attacking? You are telling me there are fucking monsters smart enough to bother checking us out first? Shit, are they like following orders from another alpha monster or something? How many more are out there? Or is that a beast tamer checking me out or something? What do we do Glados? We are fucked if those guys have some magical shields or even worse some fantasy skills. Wait is this a start to a territorial war?"

'Calm down Hunter, we don't know what we are dealing with yet. Take a look'

" Is that a fucking 3m tall chicken with horns? Holy shit they look pissed and mean Glados. Do they have a beef with the bear or something?"

'I don't know Hunter, but they are leaving. We better get ready, I think they are going to be back'

"How many magazines have you managed to make? I should have gone for the anti material rifle first."

'10, but the anti material rifle is going to need 4 hours'

" So 12 total and no way to deal with the shields for now even if we don't know if the anti material rifle will even be enough. I am not sure about this Glados.

Waiting for what hunter decided to call Raptors to attack, Hunter tried to stay awake but after 2 hours of silence started to doze off

'Hunter! They are back and they are rushing for the entrance!'

'Wha? Shit how many?"

'I count about thirty of them and one that looks to be an alpha at the rear!'

"Shit its going to try overwhelming us and tire us out!"

Hunter quickly grabbed his rifle, jumped out of his crevice, took a knee and started opening fire blindly towards the entrance of the cave. He then started hearing the dull thuds of bullets hitting flesh and breaking bones and saw a dark sillouette of one of em thumbling down and getting trampled over, followed by another tripping and breaking its neck.

Then the lead raptor jumping over its fallen brethrens triggered a trap wire and a couple unlucky raptors were impaled by logs lined with bone spikes. The advance was slowed down as the raptors had to jump and dodge its fallen brethen plus the logs and once the raptors reaching the end of the dark tunnel to the cavern was visible, hunter started to take careful aimed shots.

It was like a turkey shoot as the raptors fell one by one before reaching the cavern, Just as Hunter was starting to feel the entrance was going to be filled with the raptor's broken bodies, the alpaha raptor decided sending its underlings was not enough and started charging through the tunnel, trampling and blowing through the bodies and started to faintly glow red from all the blood and its activated skill.

With Glados's urgent warning Hunter managed dodge out of the way in time to the ground before the Alpha suddenly barreled its way into the cavern. It tried and failed to skid to a stop and barreled into the pile of bones. Hunter on the ground on his back, took the chance and started firing at it again.

When Hunter saw a faint aura stopping the bullets which was what he was dreading the most to see, he immediately started to run towards the crevice to use the same tactic he used on the bear. When he was about to pass the alpha still recovering from the skid, it whipped its tail and Hunter was flung towards the wall of the cavern.

Hunter had the air knocked out of him and blacked out for a couple of seconds from the pain. When he recovered and was back up again it felt like his chest was caved in and Hunter struggled to take a breath in. Then, he saw the alpha rear its head towards him and start to glow red again.

As soon as he saw the red glow, Hunter instintively dodged and heard a deafening crush above him as the alpha slammed its entire body into the cave wall crumbling large parts of the wall into powder. Hunter quickly reached for his rifle and started shooting at it again and was surprised to see his shots do damage.

The alpha screamed in surprise as it started bleeding profusely from its sides and slammed Hunter with its tail again. Hunter managed to block it partially with his rifle but was sent flying with a large crack along with his rifle. After sliding and rolling for a short distance on the cave floor, Hunter now angry and the adrenaline numbing his pain stood up and reached for his rifle again. Hunter picked up his rifle with his left hand since his right arm was dislocated, cradled the rifle against his bloody chest and started firing at the alpha that was roaring in terror and anguish.

The harsh recoil of the rifle against his broken ribs made Hunter want to scream as well, but with a broken wind pipe, all he could manage was a muffled cough filled with blood and mucus. With the magazine empty and rifle smoking, Hunter quietly watched as the alpha died and against his wishes Hunter blacked out from the shock.