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"And if they don’t take that?"

"They’ll attack us."

"And what then?"

I smiled enigmatically, making him shiver and turn away.

"Listen, Aiden. A few months ago, I was a botany major at CU. Okay? I studied plants. I paid my taxes and avoided group outings and liked Facebook posts of friends having children, so I didn’t have to go to their baby showers. But let me tell you something: I killed hundreds of animals in the first week I was here. Not because I wanted to—but because there was no choice. That hasn’t changed. So you have two options: you can play by this forest’s rules, or you can wait here for the next couple weeks while I do what needs to be done. Okay?"

Aiden nodded this pathetic nod.

I winced and turned away. "I wish we met under different circumstances." With those words, I disappeared into the forest to research what I could get to bribe the beasts around here.

2.

Aiden sat down by the river, trying to process Mira’s words. He heard it from Elle and Halten and Elionis and Brexton, but something about hearing it from someone like him… some geeky nobody from Earth… made it hit harder.

He understood (at least as well as anyone could understand a sudden shift and encouragement to mass murder) that it was a requirement. And after surviving the Bramble, he understood that he needed to fight to survive now that he was stuck here.

But still.

How could someone casually throw away the ideas and beliefs they developed as an adult? How could someone shed twenty-five years of socialization in a peaceful country and adapt to such a grisly lifestyle?

He didn’t know—

—but boy, would he love to. He envied Mira because she adapted—and he was sitting around thinking about it.

"Can you come out, Elle?" Aiden asked quietly.

A sudden explosion of fireworks lit up the sky, and a pixie flew out from behind his back, doing circles like the Blue Angels while strange and wondrous music played in the background.

"This’s a bit, even for you," Aiden said dryly.

The music ground to a halt, and Elle turned to him with puffed-out cheeks. "Can’t you see I have to? That girl’s Oracle is a depressed loner and he had a flashier entrance than I ever have. It was shameful, Aidee, shameful, I tell you! I refuse to be outdone again." Elle crossed her arms and pouted.

Aiden smiled thinly and looked at the ground. "She must be pretty amazing, huh?"

"Oh, Aid~ee," Elle said conciliatory, flying down and grabbing his cheeks with her tiny hands. "That girl’s a total psychopath. Don’t you never compare yourself to her."

Aiden’s eyes widened. "Wait. Really?"

Elle’s face cracked up, and she laughed. "Of course not, silly. You think a psychopath’s gonna risk their life to save some dragon she’s never met?"

"Oh…" he laughed, and his mood dimmed again.

"Hmmm… you look like you feel like you’re worthless. Ammirite?"

Aiden laughed a dry laugh and looked down and nodded.

Elle gave him five seconds of silence. Then her face lit up, and she grinned. "You know what I think you need?"

"What?"

"To speak to your patron."

"My… what?"

"Patron, silly. You completed the quest, didn’t you?"

Aiden’s mind went blank, and he opened up his Guide for the first time since finishing the quest and saw the notification.

—---

Neophyte Aiden Roe has completed the following Legacy Quest.

Legacy Quest: Curse Tamer

Summary: Well, look at you, you little demigod seducer, you! You just went from contracting a worker spirit beast to a cursed demigod in three days. You’re on a roll—so let’s turn it up a notch. There’s a spicy sitch brewin’ in the Fourth Ring, and we need a courier who can bring goods between here and there. Unfortunately, everyone about to take the request is about to die during the tryouts. :(

That’s where you come in! Tame a cursed avian in the third ring and drop off packages if / when they come in. If you do, you’ll get a request equal to the packages you deliver. And lemme tell you—they’re tasty.

Duration: N/A

Requirement(s):

Make a contract with a cursed bird to drop off supplies in the fourth ring.

Drop off supplies in the fourth ring.

Rewards:

Legacy offer.

A beast taming skill (epic).

Rewards equal the highest request used by the neophyte in the Fourth Ring for successful deliveries.

Warning: Couriers are punished for failed deliveries. The punishment for failed deliveries is designated at the beginning of each drop.

—---

Aiden reread it until his mind wandered, and the notification went away. Then he got another notification that left him even more stunned.

—---

Neophyte Aiden Roe has been offered a legacy from Killian Roskbaro, a beast-taming god.

Evolution: 9

Description: Omigod omigod omigod! You’ve caught yourself a keeper! Killian Roskbaro is, like, the biggest name in beast taming in this dimension! He’s nicknamed the Endless Horde because he was able to tame so many beasts that people thought he tamed entire planets! In other words, he’s reeeeeeally reeeeeeealy good at it. So whether you’re looking to become besties with a rabbit or a freakish demigod in the fifth domain, this bad boy’ll teach you the art of speaking to their souls.

Tribute requirements: Tame beasts for transport between domains to aid Killian Roskbaro’s operations. This year, you must deliver ten animals to the second domain.

Note: Tribute is growth adaptive, meaning that it grows with your skill sets.

Warning: If you try to bring animals out of the Fourth Domain at any time other than the Black Harvest, the Bramble will attempt to kill them.

—---

Aiden looked at the screen in frustration. "Uh… what? Is this requiring me to sell animals?"

Elle rubbed her tiny cheeks in thought and smiled and shrugged and said, "Kinda? I don’t know. It sounds like Mr. Roskbaro’s lookin’ to get his other pupils some roided out animals to dominate in the upper domains."

"But… he’s asking for second evolutions. We got those outside."

"Oh, no, no. These animals…" Elle pointed both of her hands to the massive corpse pile that Kline stacked up following the river massacre the day before, "are the uncut cocaine of powerful beasts. Pure, I tell ya, pure! Every one of those beast’s got more soul force than a legacy’s mount in the First Domain, and those guys roid their animals to the max."

Aiden smiled ruefully. "So I’m helping the war effort."

"Right-o!"

He frowned.

"That’s whatta Support Classer does," Elle reminded him. "And you’ll be great at it."

He reread the tribute requirements. "I don’t know… if I can."

"Oh, flip to the next screen you little glummy guts!"

Aiden set aside the offer and looked at the next screen. It was a reward. The description read:

—---

Reward: King of the Forest

Type: Skill

Description: If you wanna control violent beasts without killing them, the best way to do that is to make them submit to you! With this path, your very presence will make the baddies bend to you, and the goodies respect and love you for your magnanimity. Oh, and if you want them pesky legacies to leave you alone, why don’t you just build an army of beasts to tell ’em to shove it? Two trips to this domain, and you’ll leave with enough power to tell just ’bout anyone to do just that!

—---

Aiden’s heart drummed in rhythm, picking up speed as he got over a dozen spells and books and tutorials.

"See? See? This whole world’s messed up, but you got yourself a lot of means to take your life in your own hands. So…? You gonna sit there and let Halty die? Let Mira do everything while you just sit there? Or you gonna get out there and make a difference?"

Aiden felt his blood heat up and his passion flare, and he decisively said, "I’ll take it."

The notification went off, the screen changed, and he got a new legacy tab. Without his intervention, it opened up, and went into Patron Guidance and then opened up the Request a Lecture.

Aiden watched in a haze as the options filled themselves out. The date was set to now, and Elle wrote the following into the tab:

"Hello. My name is Aiden; it’s nice to meet you. I’m usually timid and soft and wishing I could cuddle with my pets, but I’m trapped in the Areswood Forest, and the Migration is two days away. So, if you ever want a spirit beast from this forest, I would greatly appreciate a meeting as soon as possible.

Aiden Roe."

"See? Just send it, and we’ll get you that meeting right quick."

"Woah… woah woah woah woah woah! Hold up! Isn’t this guy a god? I wouldn’t send this message to my math teacher, let alone a god!"

"Oh, shush. You notice how you didn’t have some introductory lecture? Why do you think that is? Hmmm?"

"I… don’t know."

"It’s ’cause he’s waiting for you to reach out. You don’t do that? You’re a spineless lily liver loser that’ll be dead by nightfall. That’s what he’ll think. So, I…" Elle pointed to her little chest dramatically, eyes closed and nose raised, "your wonderful little pixie bride has been a good partner and bridged that gap." She kept her eyes closed for a few seconds and then opened one to check Aiden’s reaction.

"Uh… thank you?" he said.

"Mmhm! Praise me more."

"You’re the best."

"Awww, you’re so sweet. Now check that box, sign your soul away, and we’ll get this party started!"

He hesitantly complied and was shocked when his patron responded immediately. He set a meeting for an hour from then.

"Oooooooooh, he was wat~ching you~," Elle sang strangely, fluttering up to a tree branch and sitting. "I can’t WAIT for you to meet him."

3.

The nice thing about finding the things that animals love is that they tend to enjoy the things that they are around. Not always. Sometimes, they like the good stuff that’s hidden behind a large pack of carnivores, like the bag of aleisma fruit we just picked up after piling up eighteen horse-sized carnivores outside a cave right next to the fruit, but for the most part, it’s just lying around.

In only an hour we found a full bag of things that beasts love, left behind after the Diktyo River massacre, as I called it, and the subsequent fire. We still found claw marks and fresh corpses killed by the soul-jacked animals that were still rampaging through the forest.

We could tell it was them because the wounds were savage and unpolished, and their soul core was left behind. We took the core and some meat and moved on.

I hope he can find one to ride, I thought about Aiden. If he steps on something, he’s toast.

To me, the world was a sea of subtle colors that became more pronounced when I concentrated. Purples for poisons and golds for food. I avoided one and stopped for the other, picking up spices and fruits to get me through the trip.

Aiden didn’t see any of that. In fact, he didn’t even have a plant identification skill! The guy would be walking around like it was a normal hike in the forest when half the things here were poisonous. It was a serious problem.

Getting him an animal would change that. He could ride and stay off the ground. And if we needed to run, the animal would run. Simple as that.

Don’t get your hopes up. I thought. He didn’t have to live through this shit…

I just went through hell beyond anyone’s wildest imagination. From day one, I almost died many times, and by week’s end, I was slaughtering beasts to survive.

It changed me.

Aiden? Not a chance. I was protecting him, so there was no need—no desperation—that would make him change. So, I doubted that an awkward animal lover like him would do what needed to be done to survive. So, I cut my losses mentally and moved on, praying that I could do 90% of the work and get serious results.

4.

Aiden was nervous as the clock struck the agreed-upon meeting time for Killian. Then that nervousness turned to fear when a humanoid walked out from behind him, covered in buzzed fur that was black as a void, making his body seem like a walking shadow, deleting the backdrop he stepped in front of as if someone simply cut the area away with a photograph.

His eyes were pure white, and he stood before Aiden.

I can speak, Killian said telepathically.

"I-I see."

"Well?"

"Well what?"

"You’ve asked for a lecture. About what?"

Aiden felt a sharp pang of hatred for Elle at that moment. She didn’t say—doubtlessly on purpose.

"I… want to know how I can tame animals without killing them."

Killian narrowed his eyes and snorted. "Let me ask you a question. If you were a beast. Would you respect you?"

Aiden smiled wryly.

"Didn’t think so."

"Then… what can I do?"

"Go out and kill some beasts. Until you do, not a single one of these creatures will let you walk away breathing. Without killing…" Killian scoffed. "It’s in a carnivore’s nature to kill. It’s the way they survive. It’s how they live and continue the cycle of life. Stop denigrating beasts with your ideals."

The god disappeared as fast as he came, leaving Aiden in a state of shock. Then Aiden looked up to address Elle but she was gone, leaving him alone to contemplate what he was just told.

It was the same thing, yet again.

Kill, kill, kill. Natural order this. Celebrated path that. At least here, it made sense. If he didn’t learn how to kill, he and Halten would die. He was certain of it.

Aiden gazed at his friend, wheezing hard as he fought off the fog that was corrupting his soul.

I need to… he thought. For Halten.

He opened his Guide and went through the skills and spells tabs, searching for something that would give him immediate power. And the more he read, the deeper his resolve became. By the time Mira returned with a huge foraging sack full of various plants and mushrooms, Aiden was ready. He looked her in the eyes and spoke from his heart:

"Will you teach me how to hunt?"