Chapter 193: The meat hunter.
Sunshine spun around, a grenade sling half raised. Her eyes locked on the source of the sound, an enormous coyote, its eyes burning like hot charcoal, fur thick and matted, muscles shifting beneath its skin. The animal bared its teeth, a predator sizing her up.
Yet instead of fear, Sunshine’s smile grew wider.
Meat, she thought. And plenty of it.
It could all be sold to Bjorn for a handsome profit.
She didn’t waste time stalking closer. Her hand flew to the grenade sling strapped across her side. With fluid motion born of countless battles in the previous apocalypse, she hurled it.
The arc was clean, perfect, and a heartbeat later the grenade detonated with a demeaning crack. Smoke and dirt burst into the air. The coyote staggered, whining, stunned but alive.
Sunshine advanced without hesitation. Her boots crunched against the leaves as she drew her dagger, the sharp blade catching the sunlight. She dropped low, eyes steady, and with a single thrust, she drove it deep in the creature’s heart. Its body shuddered, then went still.
"It was either you or me."
No triumph showed on her face. Only efficiency. She wiped the blade clean on the grass and, with a flick of her wrist, stored the meat in her space.
"Who is next." She shouted, her tone filled with blood thirst, like a butcher moving down the lane in the dark, looking for her next unlucky victim.
Her gaze crept through the trees until it landed on a chipmunk darting nervously between the giant roots. Small but useful. She pulled out her pulse bow, drew back, and loosened the arrow. The bolt struck its foot, crippling but not killing it.
Sunshine’s lips curved into a cold smile.
"Sorry little one, it’s better you be the bait than I."
The chipmunk squealed, high pitched, desperate. The sound carried through the forest like a beacon. It wasn’t long before shadows moved. Predators, hungry and reckless, drawn by the crying of weakness.
One by one, they emerged; wolves, fox like beasts, even a scaled feline with eyes that gleamed like polished stone.
Sunshine’s pulse quickened, not from fear but excitement, her hands were steady. She fired bolt after bolt; arrows laced with faint frost that trailed mist as they cut through the air.
She waved her hands, sending out icicles that danced like swords of doom and penetrated the bodies of her prey.
The air around her fogged up, and the creatures that still held breath tensed up. They had not expected to meet something worse than a beast in the small territory that they dominated.
She took down a bird beast with the swing of one hammer. Its blood splashed on the leaves. A few drops landed in the fur of the chipmunk that was slowly getting away.
A wolf lunged at her flank. She snapped her hand up, icy shards blooming in her palm before exploding outward. The shards tore into its hide, freezing the creature mid leap, its body crashing into the dirt like brittle glass.
"Damn it what a waste!" She muttered. She had failed to control her abilities because she was too excited.
Another predator rushed her from behind. She ducked, spun, and drove her hammer upward into its chest, exhaling misty breath.
"Come on you suckers!" She yelled at the rest.
The forest became a killing ground. The cries of beasts mingled with the faint crackle of ice as she wove her abilities into strikes. Slowing, freezing, finishing off her prey swiftly.
She only stopped when the alarm on the watch that was on her wrist beeped. Twenty minutes had passed and that was all the time she had for hunting. The rest of the time was for gathering.
In five minutes, she packed away all the animals she had killed. For a moment, she sat on a big root, chest rising and falling, but her eyes cold and steady.
As she caught her breath, she cleaned her hammer with water that was melting from all the ice around.
"Good haul." She murmured, brushing frost off her clothes.
She ate a handful of coconut beans to boost her energy and then got up. She did not have much time to spend in this world.
"System, show me what else is worth taking around me."
[Scanning.]
While it scanned, she also scanned with her eyes. Sunshine thought it was important for her to learn and remember the things she saw. She could not always rely on the system to provide answers.
[Red fang flowers detected]
A flower appeared on the screen; it was the exact same as the flowers that dangled from a short tree she was looking at. The reason why they caught her attention was because they looked a little familiar.
"Red fang? Why does that sound familiar?" She mumbled.
A familiar name and familiar looking flower.... that could not be a coincidence.
[They can treat eighty percent of the viral and bacterial infections on your world and fifty percent on other worlds.]
Then it hit her suddenly. The answer did not come from the explanation given by the system; it came from a memory of a picture she had seen on a wall in Cross town.
The picture was of a red flower that looked like a crown. It was this exact flower. It was named the King Red fang flower which was a specially cultivated flower of Golden pharmaceuticals.
In the apocalypse, Golden pharmaceuticals, a new company which rose to domination quickly sold special herbal pills that cured the red disease and infections that came from mutant animal infections. Illnesses which came from bites, scratches, venom and such.
"Cassius you son of a bitch!" She screamed.
She had watched two of their teammates die because the pills were hard to buy and very expensive.
This happened in the third year of the apocalypse, and the pills appeared around the beginning of the second year.
There was no doubt in her mind that the pill was made from this flower. Cassius had the ability to save their friends but chose not to do so!
"What a selfish prick!" She groaned.
She did not think that she could hate him anymore, but she kept finding new reasons all the time. Sunshine let out a long sigh and her spirits lifted. The flower was now hers.
She would have the scientists research the flower and make the pill. Even though she did not know what other herbs had been used, she was sure they would come up with something.
She dug out fifteen red fang flower trees and moved them into the space.
[Sixteen minutes left.] The system reminded her.
Sunshine hissed. She had not got more coconut beans or croast plants.
She took an ATV out of her space and rushed to get to the spot where she landed the first time, following coordinates provided by the system.
It took her four minutes to get there, and she rushed to begin working. With a fork shovel she uprooted plants of coconut beans, the croast plants and green heart tomato plants.
In five minutes, she had moved five of each species. It was more than what she took on her last trip.
"This trip was surely worth it." She exhaled and wiped sweat from her forehead.
She still had six minutes left and she wanted to use them to find something new. But suddenly, a new sound pierced the quiet_raw broken, agonized. Not a cry of a predator hunting, but that of a prey in its final moments.
"Free meat." She whispered, lips curling into a smile.