Yami was awoken by a soft rumbling sound nearby. Faint light was beginning to shine through the treetops, signifying an approaching dawn. He looked around slowly, and found the source of the noise to be below them, on the ground. Another wolf, similar to yesterday's, was sleeping, curled into a ball and snoring softly. Switching over the reins to Kotushk, the shadow hiding them faded away, and the wolf awoke with a start when it smelled them. Before it could get its bearings, however, Kotushk dropped from above, and threw a speed driven punch down on its head, slamming its jaw into the forest floor. Then he ran a circle around the beast, building up speed before spin kicking it into the tree they were just sleeping in. With a sharp yelp of pain, the wolf slid down the trunk of the tree, its back legs twitching in agony. Stryker came out then, brandishing his kusarigama, wrapping the weighted chain around the wolf's chest and tree trunk to hold it in place before slicing through the tendons in the beast's legs, rendering it immobile. Then Yami came out, binding it in shadow before picking up a nearby medium sized rock and dropping it on the beasts head until it lost the will to fight.
"Phew, this one took a lot more to fight. It was good luck that tree last time was weaker and broke onto it, or we'd have been wasting a lot of energy on it. Anyways, let's see what skills a wolf has, Arthias."
Arthias nodded before assuming control. The wolf, beleaguered and exhausted, growled weakly at him as he approached, but no longer had any strength to back up its threat. Just like the first wolf, he used all of his fingers, and both feet, but also his head and venom skill to rapidly drain the wolf.
:NOTICE - The enemy, Shaggy Wolf, has (2) obtainable skills, as follows,
{E Rank} Sharp Senses - Increases all senses by a fair amount.
{D Rank} Speed Boost - Up to 4X Speed at 2X Exhaustion.
The chance to drain each ability, based on current rank and acquired skills, is E(25%), D(15%), and Fail(60%).:
After finally killing the wolf, Arthias was disappointed, as no new skills were obtained. The F Rank of his skill seemed to be very handicapped at gaining any useful high rank skills.
"Well, this is pretty rough. We need to see if any beasts have Absorption of a higher level. But for now, I'm going to make sure this wolf doesn't go to waste."
After saying this, Yami took control and activated his skill, intending to possess the dead wolf. But to his surprise, the system made a prompt when he targeted the wolf.
:NOTICE - Please choose consciousness to send to target, Shaggy Wolf (Dead).:
"Wait, I don't have to be the one in there?" Yami mused. "This means I can send one of you who is weaker in combat right now. And I know who needs to contribute the most right now. Go, Shane, be a good doggy for me."
"Really? You have to say it like that? It's humiliating," Shane scrunched up his face in embarrassment and annoyance.
"As I see it, you have no other use right now. Or would you rather I take some time out today to erase and replace you?"
Shane swallowed dryly. He knew Yami was serious. It wouldn't be the first time one of the fragments was removed for going against Yami.
"No. It's fine. I'll do it."
"Good. Everyone else is already fighting except you and Joshua, and I'm planning on getting more wolves to house Kotushk and Joshua, maybe even myself. Arthias can use the body to drain multiple targets easier if we spread out and bring him defeated prey, and I have the feeling he's going to be our secret weapon to bypass the system's handicaps. We will take over our own fate, even if we have to be beasts to do so."
After saying that, Yami targeted the wolf again, sending Shane into the lifeless corpse. After a couple seconds, dark shadows oozed from the wolf's wounds, binding the skin back together before it opened its eyes once more. But instead of the fierce blue they once were, only empty voids leaking shadowy tears remained.
:NOTICE - Establish link with chosen consciousness?:
"Yes," Yami said simply. With that, Yami could hear a slightly staticky voice coming from the wolf.
:'This is strange,': Shane's voice could be heard inside the control room. :'It feels like the wolf's knowledge and instincts are deep in my mind. I can use its powers as my own, but the system told me I would lose them if I went back to you guys.':
"Damn," Yami muttered. "I was hoping we'd be able to leech something from it. Wait... Arthias, try draining the wolf again."
:'What?! You want to kill me in this body?':
"Calm down, it's just science. He's only going to use one finger to see if the system prompts him with the same choices as before. I'm not planning on actually going through with it."
Arthias approached Shane in the wolf body, and touched him with his index finger. When he tried to activate the drain, however, the system gave another prompt.
:NOTICE - As you have already defeated this enemy and claimed it as your own, no further skills can be drained from it. Furthermore, draining a body with one of your own consciousness' inside will instead damage you at 10X magnitude. Continue anyways?:
"Hell no," Arthias grimaced, retracting his hand.
"Hmm, that part about our own consciousness is interesting. I guess we can drain HP from anyone else's shadow puppets we might fight, giving us a good way to keep our health topped up. But I guess we don't get any do-overs on resurrected creatures. Oh well. Let's go hunt some new wolves, Shane, hunt them down for us."
With that order, Shane began to sniff around searching for another wolf's scent. He also relayed information about his new form, including the stats it had. It was very physically adept, with a phenomenal 15 STR and DEX, 20 SPD, and 10 END. But it lacked any LCK or WLP, and only had a measly 3 INT. It was built for close quarters, but lost due to lacking any attack strategy against being rushed. It seemed to be an ambush predator, and Yami surmised they only beat the two they found due to ambushing the ambushers. And now that they could sniff them out using Shane, that was the tactic they would continue to use. After finally finding a scent trail, Shane was ready to chase it down. But before that...
"Hold on there. With that natural power and speed, I'm going to use you as a mount."
And with those words, Yami shrouded himself in the growing pools of shadow dripping from the wolf's void filled eyes, sitting atop and gripping the fur tightly before ordering Shane to move. With a huff, Shane's 20 SPD was put into quick use, dashing rapidly through the forest, around trees and over logs, zeroing in on his prey with frightening efficiency and eerie silence. The large wolf's frame belied the softness of its footfalls, making for a very effective battle mount for Yami. When they got close to the wild wolf by Shane's estimation, Yami extended his Shadow Hide skill to Shane, further accentuating his stealth and hunting skills. After a couple hundred yards moving in darkness, they came upon the prey, who was stalking a nearby blue deer like the one they saw brought down by the flowers the day before. Yami stopped Shane from attacking the other wolf, as he wanted it to kill the deer for them to use as food, and it didn't take long for the wild wolf to unknowingly oblige his request. After it ripped the deer's throat out in a short but brutal struggle, Shane pounced on its back, holding it down as Stryker came into control, bringing the weighted ball of the kusarigama to the base of the wolf's head, knocking it unconscious. Shane continued to make sure to hold it down for Arthias, however, ensuring his safety.
Arthias did as usual, giving as many points of contact as he could to speed up his ability. After beginning, he found this wolf had the same levels as the one Shane currently inhabited, but didn't know it this was the wolf's base stats. Regardless, he hoped to gain something from this one. And failed again. Frustrated, he kicked the wolf in the head, but the skull of the wolf far exceeded his weak kick, causing him to feel like he stubbed his toe on a dresser.
"Sonofabitch. Stupid fucking dogs, give me something I can use without touching something. Fuck, fuck fuck!"
"Jeez, calm down. We'll keep rolling the dice. I have faith in your skill, so chill the fuck out. We're just going to keep hunting wolves, use them as pseudo soldiers to hunt more beasts, and soon you'll be swimming in foes to drain skills from. Even low percents have to yield something if you grind out long enough, I believe. Now, Joshua, your turn to go into this wolf."
Joshua nodded as Yami activated his skill, sending him in and establishing a mental link before turning to the deer they had failed to 'save' from earlier. He pulled out the only blade they had, the kusarigama, and found that he wasn't very good at butchering, giving up control to Stryker to expertly carve some meat from the body, before Kotushk set up a campfire to cook some of the meat on a smooth rock they had found. While doing so, Yami had Shane search for their next target, and had Josh search for any nearby water source. When both had a lock on their own targets, the meat had finished cooking to a perfect rare, Yami ate it, relishing the taste of fresh meat. Too much hunting in their old world had made wild game nearly impossible to enjoy, and most meat was processed into hellish jelly, but he had come from a family that valued real meat for generations. He was glad his great grandfather had taught him how to cook at a young age using old recipe books.
With breakfast finished and some meat packed into a makeshift hide bag, Yami mounted Shane again as they ran to the water source Josh had located. There, they had their fill of water, cleaning some of the deer hide and using it as rudimentary water bags before setting off for the third wolf of the day. They found it resting near a carcass of another deer, which it had apparently been snacking on for a few days, judging by the state of decay and smell. This meat was no good for them, but the wolf was. Joshua activated his Low Presence skill, showing that they could use their own skills in the new bodies. After another fight that ended quickly due to being ambushed by a shadow hidden and stealth hidden wolf, Arthias had a third opportunity for the same skills that all wolves seemed to possess.
And he succeeded this time, obtaining the Sharp Senses skill. Upon killing the wolf, they also reached LVL8. Yami decided to keep these points as well, wanting to put two points into LCK next level. But now they finally had another skill for Arthias, and judging by the ants the day before, decided to forego gambling on the D Rank skill for now. 20% to get it at F Rank seemed too low for them right now, and Stryker was gaining decent proficiency with his weapon, so they began to focus on that instead. Besides, with Kotushk and Yami still in the main body, they needed two more wolves for their growing force before they returned to the ant lair to hunt the queen. Yami's plan was to keep Stryker in the main body to use his weapon to keep Arthias safe from any issues that might arise, while Kotushk could overwrite a wolf's natural speed with his own speed, and he could command the Dark Puppet wolves from inside one, allowing him to coordinate ambushes on their targets without putting the main body in needless risk.
And so, they set out to hunt, confidence growing in their ability to survive this new world, despite the harsh handicaps they started with. He was secretly glad that Kotushk had gained C Rank in his initial draw, seeing how it made his speed a weapon instead of a tool to retreat, but did wish Arthias' skill wasn't so hard to use. But it was fine, he told himself. They would overcome everything with the ingenuity he had flaunted before the system. It seemed the humans on this world relied on their skills instead of their brains, if the system didn't view human ingenuity as a threat. Well, he'd show the world what he could do, and no one was going to stop him.