Adrenaline flooded his system. A sharp spike of cortisol made his fingers tremble around the flint shard, his only makeshift weapon. His muscles instantly tensed, fibers stretched to the breaking point beneath damp skin.
But the Etheric signature was weak. Grade 0.3–0.5 maximum.
A compact mass squeezed between the stones of his primitive alert system and charged almost directly toward him.
A kind of large hare with a horn. A really huge hare. With a damn horn!
The creature was visibly terrified, pupils dilated to the extreme, its brownish-red fur bristling. Something must have been chasing it outside. The animal apparently hadn't perceived his presence.
It slammed into Adrian on the side, hitting him squarely in the chest. The animal convulsed frantically, its powerful hind legs lashing the air and flesh, its spiraled ivory horn severely gouging Adrian's forearm. A searing pain, nerves set alight.
Adrian responded by primal instinct and brutally slammed the beast against the rocky ground.
He brought down the flint shard he still held firmly and, with a precise, almost surgical motion, struck the hare hard. It spasmed violently before lying completely still.
Adrian remained frozen, breathing raggedly, his hands slicked with thick fluid. Uncontrollable tremors coursed through his limbs. This was his blood baptism, the first life he had taken with his own hands. In total darkness. In visceral terror. Reduced to the state of a predator by necessity.
[ANIMAL PARTIALLY IDENTIFIED: HARE GENUS. UNUSUAL FEATURE: POSSESSES A HORN]
The cold intensified, biting his skin through his inadequate clothing. IRIS’s display flickered in his field of vision, relentless:
[ENERGY RESERVES: 10%. HYPOTHERMIA IMMINENT. INTERVENTION REQUIRED.]
The calculations were formal—without immediate caloric intake, his vital functions would begin to collapse.
Between his trembling hands lay the still-warm carcass of the Horned Hare. Its last breath had escaped only a few minutes ago, and its body heat dissipated some of the ambient cold. But no fire was possible. No suitable shelter. The situation reduced all options to one inescapable variable.
The flint sliced the skin with surprising precision. The blood that flowed was nothing like terrestrial hemoglobin—its texture resembled organic oil more than vital fluid. The odor emanating from it was not the metallic scent of iron, but an ozone emission that stung the nostrils like the air after a violent thunderstorm. His fingers, stiffened by the cold, tore a piece of dark red muscle from the lagomorph’s thigh.
Adrian contemplated the scrap of raw flesh resting in his palm. Twenty-four hours prior, he handled samples under sterile containment in a Level 4 lab, clad in a pressurized suit.
The first piece resisted between his teeth. The texture was strangely dense, fibrous, the muscle fibers seeming to offer abnormal resistance. The taste hit his tongue—a wild acridity, a pronounced bitterness, with a chemical note that belonged to no terrestrial taxonomy. His throat convulsed instinctively, but he forced himself to swallow this first bite with clinical determination.
The reaction was not physiological. It was not the slow caloric assimilation of an ordinary metabolism, with no noticeable effect other than satiety, but an almost instantaneous discharge, as if every cell in his body was directly absorbing energy. A wave of heat exploded in his stomach, radiating in concentric waves toward his extremities, pushing back the chill that enveloped him. His fingers sprang to life with an intense tingling, his cheeks suddenly burning as if touched by a sunbeam.
[CALORIC INTAKE DETECTED] [ETHERIC ASSIMILATION IN PROGRESS…]
[INTERNAL RESERVE: 0.00 → 0.001 EDI]
Adrian abruptly stopped chewing, molars locked between tough muscle fibers. His gaze focused on the cyan digits pulsing at the periphery of his vision. The variation was infinitesimal—three decimal places—but undeniable. His pupils retracted into thin slits under the influx of data.
"Active absorption... Not just metabolic. Etheric storage."
His raw voice resonated against the basalt walls. Tangible proof that this universe obeyed quantifiable principles, however obscure. An electric shiver ran down his spine as a constellation of bluish capillaries briefly illuminated his forearms, betraying the first controlled influx of Ether into his body.
[OBSERVATION: ABSORPTION PHENOMENON. EFFICIENCY 0.0007%.]
He methodically resumed his feast, tearing the meat with the hunger of a starving carnivore. The viscous fluid seeping from the flesh fouled his knuckles, coagulating into blackened crusts between his joints. The rough leather pouch—hastily fashioned from the hare’s carcass—hung across his chest, still warm with residual heat. His fingers automatically fumbled towards the bony protrusion in his pocket, measuring its pearly spirals with his thumb.
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[ANALYSIS: TWISTED HORN - LOCAL ETHERIC DENSITY: 0.08 EDI. CATALYTIC POTENTIAL.]
The cold still bit, but it was now held at bay. A thermal bubble of a few degrees—barely perceptible—enveloped him like a second skin. He continued to eat while IRIS was already calculating the implications: first steps toward quantifiable resilience in a world that rejected him.
Two hours passed. Adrian remained leaning against the damp wall, the piece of flint tightly gripped in his sweaty palm. IRIS was quiet, its calculations reduced to minimal standby to conserve residual energy. His eyelids grew heavy in waves, but every micro-sleep ended with a jolt, his body taut as a rusted spring, ready to snap.
Then the alert pierced the silence.
[DETECTION: GRADE 1.2 THERMAL SIGNATURE. NORTH SECTOR.]
[DISTANCE: 12.3 METERS. APPROACH VECTOR: 0° — MAIN ENTRY AXIS.]
The air locked in his lungs. Adrian straightened in one piece, his vertebrae cracking like dry wood. The occupant. The rightful owner of this makeshift den.
IRIS superimposed a reddish silhouette in his field of vision—estimated mass 98 kg, body temperature at 38.7°C, pulsatile Etheric signature. A predator. Not just a scavenger. Something that hunts.
First, the breathing. A deep, moist rattle that resonated against the walls like a poorly oiled bellows. Then the scraping of claws on limestone—a sound that reminded him of fingernails on a chalkboard, amplified tenfold.
The hairs on Adrian’s body stood on end, electrified by a pure adrenaline surge. His heart beat so hard he was sure the creature must hear it.
The creature pushed against the stone obstruction. A dry scraping sound, then the grinding drag of a rock shifting. Shit. The barricade was just a makeshift system to alert him, not a fortress. IRIS confirmed:
[TACTICAL ANALYSIS: BARRICADE STRUCTURE: UNSTABLE. COLLAPSE WITHIN 30 SECONDS IF PRESSURE IS MAINTAINED. PROBABILITY OF DIRECT CONFRONTATION: 88%.]
[PRIMARY RECOMMENDATION: EVASION. FORCE RATIO UNFAVORABLE (1:1.2K). OPTIONS:]
- SENSORY DISSUASION (SOUND/LIGHT)
- [RESOURCES AVAILABLE: NONE]
- DIETETIC DIVERSION
- [RESOURCES: HARE REMAINS (78% VIABILITY)]
- ESCAPE VIA NARROW PASSAGE (RISK: INJURY 65%)
With what?! The thought exploded in his skull, acidic. He had nothing. Just a piece of shaped stone and a rabbit horn in his pocket. Facing a mass of muscle, fangs, and primitive rage. IRIS relentlessly continued its analysis:
[BEHAVIORAL OBSERVATION: CAVITY PRESENTS A CHOKE POINT (DIAMETER: 0.8M). TARGET MUST SQUIRM TO ENTER. EXPOSURE TIME ESTIMATED: 1.2 SECONDS.]
One second. A damn second. Enough to strike? To flee? No. Enough to die, yes.
And then there was the smell. The blood. That of the Horned Hare, still fresh, impregnating the air of the cave.
The creature seemed to hesitate. It growled, but didn't force entry yet. It was calculating the risk. Like him. Adrian gritted his teeth, his jaw aching. He had an idea.
With a slow movement, he gathered what remained of the hare—the slimy guts, the pieces of broken spine, the scraps of still-warm skin—and pushed them toward the entrance with the tip of his boot. A sacrifice. A bloody offering laid on the altar of his survival. If the beast was stupid enough to prefer an easy meal to an uncertain confrontation, it would choose the lure.
The seconds stretched. The growling continued, deeper, but with an almost satisfied tone now. Then... the noises began: wet thumps, bone cracks, the gurgling of fluids being hastily swallowed. The creature was eating. Right there, on the other side of the stones, less than two meters away.
Adrian closed his eyes, every sound of mastication echoing in his ribcage like a hammer on an anvil.
Eat. Eat, dammit. As long as you prefer that to me.
The sounds of chewing stopped. A grunt of contentment. Then... the breathing receded. The heavy footsteps faded until they were a distant echo.
[CONFIRMATION: THERMAL SIGNATURE RECEDING. DISTANCE: 15M... 30M... OUT OF DETECTION RANGE (50M+).]
Adrian remained frozen. The muscles in his thighs burned, contracted for too long. His numb fingers around the flint, skin white.
He counted in his head. One minute. Two. IRIS signaled no return.
When he finally dared to move, it was to collapse onto his side, forehead against the cold wall. He breathed in gasps. In the returning silence, only one sound: the clicking of his teeth chattering uncontrollably.
He had survived. This time.
But tomorrow? Tomorrow, he would need more than a pile of entrails and a prayer. Tomorrow, he would need weapons.
The night dragged on like an open wound. Adrian did not sleep. He could not.
IRIS was still on alert. Luckily he had this thing... here.
He finally closed his eyes.
He was not desperate. Just angry. A cold anger, methodical, settling within him like frost on steel.
An electric shiver ran down his spine—not of fear, but of anticipation. Like before a crucial experiment, when the solution is within reach, but the slightest misstep can blow everything up.
Dawn finally broke, a dirty grey glimmer filtering through the entrance of the den.
Adrian emerged crawling, his joints stiff, his skin crusted with blood and dirt. The air was cold, damp, charged with the smell of the awakening forest.
He straightened up slowly, his vertebrae cracking one by one. His fingers searched his pockets: the hare’s skin, now hardened by the cold, girdled his waist like a makeshift belt. The horn, white and earth-streaked, was there, intact. The flint too, its sharp edge faintly gleaming under the nascent light.
In the distance, towards the east, plumes of smoke rose between the trees. Smoke meant combustion. Controlled combustion meant hearth. Hearth meant humans. Civilization. Market. Resources.
[ANALYSIS: OPTIMAL RESUPPLY DIRECTION: 087° EAST. ESTIMATED DISTANCE: 3.2 KM. RISK: LOW (CIVILIAN ZONE).]
Adrian nodded almost imperceptibly. IRIS was right.
He started walking toward the fire.