Kyran found a somewhat safe place after walking for almost two hours. He found a massive boulder with a crevice just big enough for him to squeeze in. When he tried to look in, he discovered the inside was actually hallow. He decided to use this place to clean the things he gathered and make survival items. Though he said survival items, most would be makeshift items he needed while traveling.
The first thing Kyran planned to make were short blades. He might be able to mold Void weapons, but he could not wantonly use his magic reserves, so he needed them.
The short blades might seem ineffective given the sizes and the thickness of the strange beasts' skin around here, but Kyran could aim for their eyes with them. As long as he could blind them for a moment, he could either run or aim for their heads for an instant kill. Kyran knew he could not outrun the beasts, given how puny his legs were compared to theirs. Some beasts could also fly, which seemed unfair to him. But if he could blind them for a moment, it would divert their attention from him to the pain, and once they recovered, he would have gained some distance or managed to hide from them. As for killing a beast in an instant, he decided to do that as a last resort. He was not planning to massacre his way to the blood-red tower anyway.
Making these weapons without proper equipment would be an arduous process.
Fortunately, after walking around and examining not just the beast carcasses but also the land, Kyran found some materials he could use to make an anvil, blacksmithing tools such as chisels, hammers, sets, tongs, and last heating.
In making an anvil, Kyran only planned to smoothen the surface of the block of iron he found inside the boulder. For the heating, he would use the coals and charcoals he found. He was not surprised to find some coals in this place, but he wondered where the charcoals came from. As he noticed, the earth in this place was incapable of sustaining plant life, especially trees. Anyway, he did not dwell on it because having charcoals were beneficial to him. He was not about to complain.
Kyran also realized that some beast's blood smelled like oil. He had not confirmed it yet cause he hadn't made some fire, but he was 99% sure they would work. The reason was that the blood's density and texture had similar qualities to oil. Of course, the 1% doubt he had was due to the question, what kind of creature possessed blood with had the characteristics of oil? As far as Kyran knew, the composition of both was different.
The materials Kyran would use to craft short blades would be a mixture of iron, metal, and beast bones. Unfortunately, he only gathered a few metals, and the irons he would use were the excess of the one he would use as an anvil. Still, the bones he collected were pretty sturdy. He could not weld it, but he could mold it and attach it as a handle or shaft. Maybe he could even mold a spear purely made of bones.
Looking at his makeshift workroom, Kyran took a deep breath and recalled everything Sigma had taught him about weapon crafting. What Sigma taught him was only the basics of weapon crafting. He did not teach him how to craft magic weapons. Obviously, crafting normal weapons was different from magic weapons. The materials needed were different, and most importantly, array calculations must be included during the forging process, not after.
Before he started creating the short blades, Kyran first made blacksmithing tools. This time, he used Void magic in shaping the irons, metals, and bones.
After getting all the tools ready, Kyran finally started making the fire. As he expected, the beast's blood did function similar to oil. As a matter of fact, it seemed the blood could last longer compared to oil. The coals and charcoal as well. They managed to heat up in under fifteen minutes, and they also maintained the temperature quite well.
Without wasting any time, Kyran started crafting the short blades.
Crafting took a lot of time. Fortunately, during the forging and hammering process, the noise he made did not attract any beasts. Too bad he did not know any noise-concealing spells to ensure further he would not attract beasts.
Once Kyran was satisfied with a short blade, he would quench it using beast blood. This blood was different from the ones with oil characteristics. It even had a black-blue color, which resulted in the short blades' color also having a blue hue.
Whenever Kyran ran out of blood, he would go out and collect more from the nearby beast carcasses. Of course, the bucket he used was a skull he took from a medium-sized beast.
Although Kyran appeared to have adjusted well with his current situation, the truth, he was not. It made him appreciate those people in ancient times who managed to survive in such a crude environment.
Time passed, and Kyran was immersed in what he was doing. Soon, he managed to craft enough short blades and even one spear. After that, he proceeded to make a bag and a tool belt.
Unfortunately, Kyran did not know how to make space storage, so he had to settle with a normal bag using the materials he had gathered. The materials he would use to make a bag were beast skin and fur. Due to the large size of the beast, he collected furs from, he thought of using them as threads. The strands of the furs were also durable, making them a good alternative.
Of course, Kyran was not an expert in making handicrafts like this. He only had a vague understanding after watching his mother and female cousins a few times while they make one. Besides, he only needed a bag to hold the rest of his items. The design did not matter.
As for the belt, he needed to add a few straps around it to hang the short blades. He also incorporated a sheath to these straps to avoid getting a cut by the edges when he moved around. That would be the most hilarious yet ironic thing to happen to him if he ended up wounding himself because the short blades lack a sheath.
When Kyran was done, he was practically drenched in sweat, and he stunk like hell. However, he could only endure for now, and hopefully, he could find a water source to clean up.
But one thing Kyran noticed as he left his makeshift workroom was that he did not feel hungry. He recalled Gustaff had experiences where he had to hunt for food during his training. So this incident made him confused.
'Is it a particular rule of this place? Or a granted skill by the tower?' As soon as Kyran thought of these, he immediately rejected the idea.
First of all, if hunger was not present in this place, how come all the beasts here attacked and ate each other? Although the parts they ate differed depending on the type of beast, Kyran was sure those beasts ate those missing parts. He had seen a few in the act, after all.
'If I ended up as a food, I wonder which part will they eat?' Kyran suddenly thought.
Kyran shivered at his idea, and he immediately shook his head to clear his mind. He sometimes scares even himself with how bloody the things he imagined.
The number of beast carcasses increased as Kyran got closer to the tower. He would still inspect the carcasses now and then to check how long it had been there, and then sometimes he would take parts of their bodies and put them inside his makeshift bag.
After a few hours, Kyran's expression turned sour as he stopped in his tracks and looked at the blood-red tower. He had been walking non-stop, and yet the tower still seemed far away.
While he was grateful that he managed to stay under the radar of the beasts, Kyran was beginning to think he was missing a piece of very crucial information in this place.
Once again, Kyran felt regretful that he could not use his Draconic magic. If he could, he would have tried using Sigil to one of the smaller beasts, like the beast he just saw, which had the body of a four-tailed fox and the head of a deer. Once he performed the Sigil, he would probe inside the beast's memory to understand what this place was.
'And there doesn't seem to be any human in here,' Kyran thought with furrowed brows.
'Just what kind of place did the tower transport me to? What am I supposed to train here? I mean, I understand that I have to train my Void magic, but so far, I haven't even sensed any energy in the surroundings. If I do not have any reserved magic energy within the Void core, I will also end up unable to use magic.'
With a sigh, Kyran looked at the carcasses around him. Most of them were still fresh, meaning they were killed recently. Unlike the ones further back, although the carcasses were few, most had been dead for quite some time.
'Maybe there's a clue in that…'
Slowly, an idea formed in Kyran's mind as he recalled the body parts of the beasts that were missing from the carcasses, both external and internal. Then he tried to make a mental list of the type of beasts they were. After that, he walked around the vicinity, inspecting the carcasses again.
'It seems there are similar parts that are missing every ten meters,' Kyran thought as he stood up and surveyed his surroundings.
'Starting from ten meters at the back, up to here, the most common part missing is the lungs. Previously, it is the stomach.'
Instead of walking in the tower's direction, Kyran walked around the ten-meter distance where the carcasses had missing lungs.
After walking for a while, he found an area with no carcasses. But that was not what got Kyran's attention. What got his attention was a glittering black obelisk right at the center.
At the foot of the obelisk, a mountain of different-sized organs was piled up.
Kyran might not know what the lungs of those strange-looking beasts looked like, but those were definitely beast lungs.. And all of them were there as an offering to the black obelisk.