Meeting The Natives

As I traveled back to the fireplace, I feared that other predators would be coming after me, but I hadn't felt an eerie feeling yet.

I was already halfway to my destination, meaning that it was safe to say that they probably lost track of my scent at the river. And as I got closer to the fireplace, I began to calm down slowly.

I knew that I had to cook the jaguar's meat to avoid contracting most of the diseases it had, but I also knew that doing so would probably attract predators nearby.

So after some thinking, I decided that it would be best to set up a trap, have the fire cook the jaguar, but also be waiting on a tree on top of the fire with two hammers; that way, if any predator came, I would be able to knock them out easily, therefore getting more food while making the area around the fireplace safer.

After making a new hammer, I also grabbed 2 Y-shaped branches. I used them to support the jaguar carcass over the fire by supporting the two ends of the spear after I removed it from the skull and forced it to go through the jaguar's throat, creating a very primitive form of a pig roasting stick.

As I waited on top of the trees, I began to hear sounds coming from far away, getting closer; initially, I thought that it was just some predator nearby that had fallen for the trap and was getting ready to fight for my life.

As the sounds got closer, they began to resemble grunts and nonsenses; it was then that it hit me.

'OTHER HUMANS?!'

I was shocked but ecstatic because although they were at their most primitive stage, just basic human interaction should be enough to help stabilize my sanity; plus, it also meant that I didn't have to survive in this hellhole alone anymore.

Even better, if I managed to get them to my side, I would finally be able to stop worrying so much about encountering predators.

Once I got down the tree again and looked at them, they seemed to be a group of 6, with some of them holding rocks while the others had sharp-looking sticks and all of them wearing the skin of what appeared to be pumas and jaguars as clothes.

They weren't too tall, but according to the system, I was currently physically 16, so although my estimations might be a little off, they shouldn't have been much older than 15-16 years old.

While I saw their arrival as a gift, they seemed to see me as an enemy, getting ready to attack to get to the cooked meat; before they could, though, I simply grabbed the two ends of the now hot spear and threw the jaguar carcass to them before the heat could do any real damage to my hands, followed by putting my hands in the river water just in case.

This caused the nomads to suddenly stop in their tracks before grunting and signaling things to each other in confusion.

I found it rather amusing but understood the reason for their reaction; after all, here in the jungle, food is the second most valuable thing one could possess, not to talk about the fact that it was the carcass of an entire predator.

Plus, this was probably also the first time in their entire lives that they had seen cooked meat and been able to enjoy the smell; still, after they were done communicating their confusion to each other, one of the nomads began to slowly approach the meat with his stone ready to attack me if I tried to take the meat away.

To my surprise, though, unlike what I thought, the nomad actually began carrying the Jaguar carcass over to the rest of the nomads instead of just eating the food himself, seemingly unaffected by how hot the end of the spear was.

It was actually quite nice to see that even initially, humans still felt a sense of comradery and were considerate enough to help each other.

Now that I began to think about it, I realized that they had probably been separated from their tribe recently, as nomadic tribes had around 20-30 people in them, plus, a group of just 6 wouldn't be able to survive out in the wild for long as shown by the fact that they were skinny and looked like they hadn't eaten much for a couple of days.

Once the carcass was finally on their side, they began eating it as though their lives depended on it, which is probably actually did.

They didn't seem to trust me yet, though, as they would constantly look back at me while eating to ensure that I wouldn't try to take the meat away from them, which made me sad as it showed just how hungry they were.

Although nomadic tribes were more civilized than most other animal tribes, they were still very similar to said animal tribes. There was still a power structure where the strong ruled the pack and basically decided how the food collected by the tribe was distributed.

This is why I believed that they hadn't eaten much even when they were a part of their tribes, as they couldn't have lost that much weight in so little time.

Something I did notice while they were eating the jaguar carcass, though, was that as time went on, they began to check on me less and less like they were slowly beginning to trust that I wouldn't take the meat away from them, which also allowed me to start moving around a little bit, as by this point I had been standing still for almost ten minutes.

Thankfully it didn't take them too long to finish the food, after which I signaled for them to come over by using my hand.

Although they did show hesitance, they decided to follow me, probably because they thought that I had tons of food to spare, and although they did look disappointed when we got to the fireplace and didn't see any other carcasses, they didn't choose to leave.