Chapter 14: Chapter 7 – Frozen Stream

The fated day had finally arrived, and as I stood there, clad in nothing more than rags made from the amputated skin of poor innocent animals, knowing that we were going to go and kill even more of said innocent animals... I only felt excitement.

Sure, I felt a tad bit guilty at the thought of murdering animals, but at this point, the morals of my previous life were already starting to fade away, replaced by those of this new life.

"What are you thinking about, Kira?" I heard a voice say behind me, startling me out of the rabbit hole that my thoughts had been going down into.

"N-nothing, mother. Is it just going to be us two?" I deflected her question, having no intention whatsoever to explain to her that this wasn't my first life and that I spent half of my free time being depressed about it.

"Yes, just the two of us. Normally, it's more efficient to hunt in packs of two or three, but you'd be a burden to the others, so it's better if I supervise you alone." Mother mercilessly said. Still, I wasn't offended at her words, as they rang true.

I was only two years old, after all, and even though my body was more like that of a 6-year-old, it was still quite lacking. Furthermore, I had no experience whatsoever in hunting, so she wasn't wrong in that I'd be a massive burden.

"Enough dilly-dallying. Let's go." Mother said, falling down to all fours before taking off, clearly taking it easy for my sake. I just stared dumbly for a second before crying out.

"H-hey! Mom, wait!" I yelled. Thinking quickly, I dropped down to all fours as well so that I could run faster. Biologically speaking, humans aren't exactly quadripedal anymore, but then again, Northern-Tailed Foxes weren't exactly human, were we?

Even then, however, it proved a struggle to chase after my mother like this. The snow, while not as deep as it sometimes was, was still thick enough to make advancing through it difficult, especially when you had a body as small as mine.

Despite that, mom didn't to slow down at all. Hence, I could only keep chasing after her, leaping over the snow to avoid having to trudge through it.

It was only after an exhausting 30 minutes that she finally stopped, and when I reached her, my legs and arms were trembling from exhaustion, and even muscles that I hadn't even known I'd had were aching.

Mother gave me an approving nod despite my pain, perhaps pleased that I hadn't given up halfway through. After catching my breath for a couple of minutes, I finally took the time to examine my surroundings.

Mother had brought us over to a small, frozen stream surrounded by a decent amount of large trees. I wasn't really surprised she'd brought me here, as in the north, streams were where life gathered.

Hell, even our camp had its own little stream nearby, one from which we could gather all the water we needed to survive and more. Well, I say we, but I wasn't strong enough to gather it by myself, and mom had her leader duties to attend to, so it usually fell on some other tribe member to do the dirty work.

Mother gave a light cough, bringing back my scatterbrained attention to herself. "Usually, when we go for big hunts, we have to travel much further south, as it's easier to find prey there. However, this area has some small games to use as training for you. You're still too young to truly begin learning the art of the hunt, but this will be good for you nonetheless." She explained to me while casually walking around, staying close to the trees as she did.

Out of nowhere, her hand shot out and pierced into a tree, cutting through the rough-looking, semi-frozen bark as though it was naught but butter. A panicked squeal came from the tree, and when mom's hand came back out, it was holding a squirming squirrel by its neck.

"First lesson: The hunt consists of three main parts. Search, Chase, Kill. As I said before, you're not old enough to do the latter two, but you should be able to do the first. Find and bring me five of these squirrels, and only then will we go back home. Now go." She ordered, putting the very much alive squirrel in her mouth, swallowing down the still squirming creature alive, completely unbothered at the danger of it scratching or biting her neck or stomach.

I awkwardly stood there, not sure how to go about doing what she said. Wasn't this akin to searching for a needle in a haystack? How the hell was I supposed to do this?

Shaking my head to rid myself of those useless thoughts, I forced myself to draw from my rat-hunting experience, and through it, I knew what to do.

I focused on my hearing and smell. Surely, if mom could find a squirrel as easily as she did, then it couldn't be that hard, right?

Turns out, no, it was actually hard. Extremely hard, in fact. There were so many trees everywhere, and despite my extremely sharp senses, the squirrels were just as extremely good at hiding. Furthermore, because they stayed inside holes carved into the trees, their smell was concealed too.

It took me an entire hour to even find my first squirrel, having only found it thanks to sheer luck, in all honesty. However, when I tried to actually catch it, the damn thing managed to slip through me despite me standing right in front of the only exit. I did manage to scratch it quite deeply with my nails, which were slowly becoming more and more claw-like as I grew up, but that didn't stop it from escaping.

I tried to chase after it, but the damn thing was fast, and I was too clumsy. It eventually got away, much to my dismay.

Seeing my disheartened look, mother, who was carelessly leaning onto a tree while munching on a squirrel she'd casually caught earlier, giggled at my predicament.

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"You almost did it, Kira. Remember, the hunt isn't over until the prey is in your stomach." She commented uselessly, and I gave her a pouting glare in return.

For the rest of the day, I stalked the area, sniffing around for any hint of a squirrel while keeping my ears tall on my head, constantly twitching as they tried to find any useful noises.

I found four more squirrels, and they all managed to escape, two of them managing to do so without me even being able to box them in as I did with the first one.

It was disheartening, and honestly, it was also a rude awakening to just how blessed I was. If hunting simple squirrels were this hard to catch, then how hard must it be to hunt the beasts that I happily devour every week?

And more than that, just how good was my tribe at hunting, considering just how many dangerous animals found themselves ending up on our feasting table every week?

At last, by the time the sun was starting to go down, I finally, finally, caught my first prey. I got lucky, I'll admit, as the squirrel had been already hurt by something else, so when I chased after it through the snow, it stumbled because of a bad foot.

I was upon it like a hungry fox, which I was. My claws tore into it, immediately ripping off its head, and I almost bit into it. The keyword here was almost, as I quickly remembered my mother's orders.

Now, I considered myself to be a fairly brave man... Er, fox... girl... Anyways, I fear no man, but that thing... it scares me...

Ah, video games. How I miss those easy days where I didn't have to offer tribute to evil mothers, I thought gloomily as I walked back to said evil mother, handing her the gory mess that was the squirrel I'd mauled.

She happily took it from my hands and then ate it without any remorse. She even had the gall to lick her lips while staring at me with a smiling face that just screamed 'I'm a troll'.

"That was delicious, Kira. Now, you've got 4 more to go, and we're not returning home until you caught them. If you want to sleep through the night, do so if you want to, but I'd suggest against it." She commented, going on to explain how squirrels were more active at night and whatnot.

I just nodded numbly, feeling my stomach growl a little. In response, mother only grinned wider as she shooed me away.

Hunger, unsurprisingly, was a very good motivator for learning, as I quickly discovered. After going for an entire two days without any food, I found myself becoming much more ferocious in my hunting, spurred on by the pain in my stomach.

By the dawn of the third day, I'd finally done it. 5 squirrels had found themselves in my claws, and subsequently, into my mother's stomach.

As a reward, mom was kind enough to catch five more squirrels, all of which she gave to me. What had taken me almost three days to accomplish, mother did in something like 30 seconds.

It was inspiring, depressing, and also a bit ridiculous at the same time. She was obviously leagues upon leagues ahead of me in so many areas that it was just kind of sad.

As we traveled back home, with mom taking the opportunity to put me through what I can only call an impromptu obstacle course on the way, I made a resolution to myself.

I'd be better than her, one day. It might not be soon, it might not be in the next hundred years, but I swore to myself that, one day, I would make her look like a chump.

And so, like the good little masochist I was, after a day of resting at the camp, I asked mom to bring me out yet again for another hunt.

Unsurprisingly, she agreed, and while I knew that she loved me, even if her way of showing it was a bit unique, the smile she gave me at that moment sent chills down my spine.

Nonetheless, I didn't back out, and before long, we left behind the safety and comfort of our home, our destination being the frozen stream.

I wasn't human anymore, and as each day passed, that fact only became more obvious. Hence, either I adapted, or my fate would not be a good one.

... I still wish she would let me eat my own kills, though...

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