When Aris woke up, the world had become calm again.
The pack around him had vanished, leaving behind bloodstains scattered everywhere—some small, some large, depending on how Aris had killed them or how the group had devoured them.
Aris himself slowly opened his eyes, careful not to worsen his vision due to the white sunlight reflecting through the clouds.
Still the same sky… It was still the same sky rising above him.
Aris did not move for a good quarter of an hour, staring at that sky filled with thoughts.
"They still haven't eaten me, huh? Looks like those beasts really think I'm their eternal food supply?"
Indeed, Aris Ronegard sincerely believed that what remained of the group would have thrown themselves on him the moment he collapsed. But to his great surprise, he was still alive.
"Surviving in these lands at this level probably wouldn't have been possible if I didn't have those idiots."
And for that, he sincerely thanked them. Without the intervention of that small fennec, the Mad Beast would have ended up as yet another meal for that hungry pack.
"Besides, I didn't expect such a transition. Up until now, I had taken advantage of the fact that these beasts never hunted in groups. Even foxes were against it."
Yet Aris had ended up facing a real pack from his very first encounter with a wolf, and unsurprisingly, their level being far superior, he had not been able to resist the entirety of the pack.
It was the first time Aris had felt death so close since arriving in these cursed lands.
Yet, he was still alive.
Aris slowly pushed himself up, his body completely numb. He could no longer feel any of his muscles. His head was slightly spinning as his vision adjusted from the white sky after staring at it for too long.
But even as all these misfortunes struck him at once, Aris noticed that his body no longer bore any wounds.
All the bite marks, all the deep cuts, all the bruises had vanished.
Since he had started eating that raw monster meat, his regenerative ability had become almost miraculous.
"Even I'm surprised."
On the other hand, his so-called clothes were in a terrible state. Of course, that was one thing that didn't regenerate.
The garments he had spent time crafting were reduced almost to rags, torn into shreds.
"Good thing I'm the only one here."
For sure, even though he knew he was well-built, Aris wasn't particularly fond of showing parts of his body to the world.
Beast hides were easy to turn into clothing now. Aris would have no trouble remaking them if he wanted to.
The problem was that his group had literally eaten everything that remained of the pack. There wasn't even a single piece of skin left. One had to wonder if Aris hadn't starved them over the past few days.
Aris stayed seated for a moment, first looking around after confirming his body truly had nothing wrong with it.
The group was further away, each beast staring intensely at him as if he were a desirable prey, yet staying so far that even his knife on the end of its wire could not reach them.
Their gaze reeked of greed, as if they were not satisfied at all. Their claws were mostly out, while for some, their jaws were wide open, letting a kind of liquid drip down that Aris quickly identified as saliva mixed with the remains of blood and flesh they had just consumed.
It was truly a horrifying sight, even for Aris, who had been in these lands for a long time.
But he did not react. Instead, he looked back at them with an indifferent gaze, confronting their hunger. Daring to oppose their numbers even after having been, in a sense, spared.
"Come, if you want to."
That was the look Aris gave them, signaling that anyone who came forward would not meet a pleasant end.
Some of the beasts backed off, others like the foxes remained on guard. But Aris no longer cared. Instead, he stood up calmly, stretched, chose a direction, and began walking again toward the hell of these cursed lands.
Soon after, the group also began to follow his steps, each of them waiting for other fools to provoke the Mad Beast.
Aris would, for sure, always remember those wolves—their fangs in his flesh, their overwhelming numbers, their eyes in the darkness, the fear they had inspired in him.
He still felt shivers so strong that he trembled.
It was just another bad chapter, like so many others would be. And Aris Ronegard would always remember it… as long as he was still conscious of being Aris.
And some time later, Aris realized that he was hungry too.
His long fight against the wolf pack had left him starving. He had drained all his strength, and now that he was looking for food, the pack was already gone.
The group of beasts had devoured everything without even leaving him a share.
In his state, it would have been obviously foolish to attack his own group in search of food again. But Aris was not in a normal state.
When Aris was hungry, it was no longer the noble king of the past walking through the vast western lands, but the terrible and insatiable Mad Beast.
Aris turned a few times, their devouring gaze. On several occasions, his head snapped quickly to observe the group of beasts. His only possible meal.
He had never dared to attack them before, but now he almost only dreamed of it. The fragments of reason he had left were fading away. Aris was slowly becoming that killing machine he once was before the pack.
He hadn't even noticed that he had been walking for several days. The sky reflecting the cycle of day and night above his head, the beasts walking behind him at a steady pace, the landscape repeating endlessly… Aris was beginning to see blurry.
His hunger altered his perception of time. For him, only a few hours had passed since he left the place where he had faced the pack. But in truth, he did not know that for several days, the western lands had been completely empty.
Not a single trace of beasts in sight, and not a single trace of the Elven land. In short, Aris was walking like a zombie, constantly looking behind him, because that was where the only thing he craved currently existed.
And yet, Aris should have been careful too. The size of the group had shrunk, the weak had almost completely disappeared. For a simple reason: they too had not eaten in a long time.
Aris might have been watching the group, but the group was also watching Aris with a gaze just as hungry as his.
In the end, both walked while staring at each other, not knowing who would retain enough reason not to attack first. But one thing was certain: Aris would not last much longer.
Madness was rising quickly in his mind, and on top of that, he was almost naked.
He really needed clothes..
And he knew how to find them...