NOVEL WEB Chapter 72: Thoughts and Minds
Upon realizing what happened, Quagmire let out a chuckle, while Habagat looked at him curiously. Nevertheless, he made a mistake that almost cost him his life; even so, he survived, and so he laughed it off, just like all problems that could not be solved. Instead of sulking about it, just laugh about it; that way, his spirit and will would not diminish or degrade himself.
Even so, Habagat looked at him as if he just saw an insane species, yes a species, after all, this is the first time he saw someone that has such smooth skin, no horns, no lengthy ears, all his entire life, he thought he saw everything, alas there was more to the world. With that, Habagat thought about things in silence.
Looking back at the battle last time, it seemed he had a grave miscalculation; there were not five man-eaters, there were six, as he killed six man-eaters. It seemed that he was getting distracted, and that is a thing he needs to solve, and so with this experience, he wanted to clear his thoughts more and train himself more, to be multitasking. After all, there would come a time when he would need to do it so.
He cannot have miscounted his enemies; it might get on a repeat of the situation of what happened earlier. This time, his instincts or his intuition, just like always, are the ones that kept saving him. If he kept on relying on instincts, there would be no difference from a barbarian; he must train and rely on his wits, so that he may have survived in this world and eventually accomplish his goal.
Little did he know that would not be the only goal he would have, as time and discoveries aligned, things would only serve to get deeper and deeper.
With that out of the way, Quagmire heaved a sigh of relief as he stared at the cold night sky, all the while the moon illuminated the surroundings, he stared at the shade, at Habagat, who looked at him curiously, and eventually, as he lay down on the ground he felt a pang of hunger. Yes, he just ate, and he was hungry again, and seeing or noticing it, Habagat wagged his tail excitedly, during which Quagmire smiled.
"Let's eat later again, just not here. There might be more coming. We need to be somewhere much safer than here, alright?" Quagmire, said to Habagat.
"Woof!" Habagat replied with a smiley face in his mind.
It must have been all the fighting and thinking he made that made him go hungry again, even though he just ate a lot of beef, or what he thinks and likes to believe it was, the beef of this world. Next up, once he saw others who looked and tasted alike, perhaps pork and chicken might come. Maybe this time the chicken came first than the egg, perhaps. Just a little thought to entertain on the way.
Moreover, he has to think about the ghouls he fought just earlier before he fought the man-eaters. With that in mind, he raised his head, grabbed his ankles, and used them as a support to stand up. Once up, he glanced around the battlefield, looking over everything. It seemed that he had made quite a mess, and so he walked for a while or searched.
With soft and slow steps, he walked over the surroundings, his steps never making a sound nor a thud, it was not heavy, rather it was light but also precise. Eyes darting around, he looked everywhere, he could not see, so he instead of just aimlessly wandering, he retraced his steps from the final to the start.
As he was tracing his steps of battle earlier, he could see the dead flying ghouls or man-eaters, as the adjutant calls them. He carefully looked over the bodies, and saw that they really are vastly different from him, a human; they seemed bipedal like him, but they have notable differences.
Some of them looked like him, but had pointy ears, some looked like animals, and some had animal parts, yet some were completely animals. Such confusing things, yet he does not want to question it, as he came from a different world, and so it would take time to sort out the differences. Ultimately, both are sentient and so both are people, and people are people, simple as that. He cannot discriminate just based on looks, nor the color of one's skin, nor just because someone has slightly pointy ears.
That is just stupid, and he came from a civilized world, so it is he who must bring civilization to this world. With that in mind, he came to the conclusion that he really need to meet the people of this world, living of course, to make any judgement and not to cloud it further.
So he continued on with his retracing. All the while, Habagat curiously follows and stares at what he is doing.
It did not take long before he found the location of the fight earlier, and so he moved closer to the dead bodies and scanned them. There seemed to be clothes, or rather, it seemed like it was recently made; he made the deduction, and also on its side, there was a sword and a bow that had been dropped a few meters forward from the corpse.
It seemed like his earlier thought and deduction were right; this world's infected are learning, perhaps they are indeed evolving. After all, they have intelligence, and are capable of independence and self-thought, it's just that they have an insatiable urge to consume the living, despite them also living despite being dead at the same time. They go against the natural way of things and must be disposed of.
Nevertheless, Quagmire remains steadfast and strong willed, he might get into mistakes but he would get through it, he have faith in himself and his abilities. After all, he had already survived for a long time already since coming here, and is slowly learning more of this world.