While Sera was waiting for the food to be done cooking, she was thinking of what to drink.
'There is no water source around here. Now that I think about it, where did the water in our own house came from? Well, it doesn't matter now... But then what should I drink?'
Then she remembered something they taught her in school that could replace drinking water if necessary. Looking at the corpse of the Hound she said: "And I naively believed that butchering it will be the most disgusting of todays events. I should at least look for a pot to boil it in. Because god forbid, I might catch something." Then she looked down at her wound and laughed. 'Yeah sure, that's what will make me sick.'
Sera looked around the ruins for a bit, and found a couple of useful items including a pot. Things were really looking up. Sera gathered some blood into the pot and started boiling it.
In a couple of minutes it was ready for consumption. Sera went and poured some into a metal mug, she found. Then turned towards the corpse and said: "Cheers", before downing the whole thing and nearly vomiting.
"Fuck that's disgusting, let's drink more."
Yes the blood tasted awful, but hydration is very important. After downing another mugful and rethinking all her life decisions, the smell of the roasting meat hit her. It was the best thing ever. In half a minute she was already pulling it out of the fire and waited for the meat to cool down a bit.
A couple minutes go by and she was already devouring it. The taste was so amazing, that she couldn't describe it with words. After finishing the first, she started eating the next with haste, like it would run away from her.
Sera ate as much as it was physically possible for her, she was never a big eater but probably the Evolution increased her appetite. It didn't bother her either way, she was just lying on the ground, enjoying the foods remnant taste.
"Ah, this is what life is supposed to be. Not hiding, running and fighting monsters, but eating them."
After half an hour, she finally had enough strength to actually sit up.
'I should probably check the new messages.'
She brought up her Watches holo-screen.
"Angel Monarch! You have unread messages!"
'This name, man. It will get annoying really quickly.'
She ignored the Watch and tried to open the message, but then the interface changed.
"Angel Monarch! Would you like to activate the Watches new Quick Communication feature?"
"Quick Communication? What's that?"
"The Quick Communication feature, sends pulses through your nerves to your brain, which it interpret as a voice that announces every message you get within your head, for only you to hear. The feature can be turned off and on anytime."
'It would be a lot better if the Watch didn't announce everything through speaker, so let's try it out. What could go wrong?'
"Okay, turn it on."
"Connecting...Connection established...Sending trial signal, please say 'I can hear you' if you hear my voice in your head."
'HELLO, CAN YOU HEAR ME?' The sound was so loud, that Sera fell down and started clutching her head.
"I can hear you, and please decrease the volume by a lot."
"Understood, connection working, volume decreased."
"Is this volume to your liking?" Asked a robotic, feminine voice in her head.
"Yes it's good, now open the message."
"Splendid! You have two unread messages! First message: You have killed a Feral Hellhound, a Rotten of the 2nd Tier! Your Soul is Nourished! Second message: You have received a Class 2 weapon of the 2nd Tier, Name: Insatiable Hunger! The item has been stashed!"
The first message she expected, but the second well there was no other word for it than "JACKPOT", she shouted happily and started laughing maniacally.
She didn't even wait a second and opened up her status window. There at the bottom of the page was something new.
Items:
Sera brought up the new page instantly.
Type: Weapon
Description: In a forest lived a hungry man who had nothing except for a hound. After an other failed hunt, the man couldn't take it anymore and went to kill and eat the hound. As the man was about to stab it, the hound pounced on him instead and started tearing him apart. In pain and dying, the man cursed the hound to all consuming hunger. The hound, no matter how much it ate, stayed hungry. Eventually the constant starvation drove it to Madness.
'Why are these stories always so sad?' She looked at the Hellhounds body and sighed.
'Let's read the rest.' She thought, her enthusiasm died down almost completely.
Attribute: This weapons strength increases with the users need. It also increases the users bloodlust.
'That will require some testing, but not too bad. Okay, let's see what kind of weapon are you.'
Sera began summoning the weapon which took a couple of tries, but eventually she was holding it in her hand.
Her first thought was: "Its...Its beautiful...and terrifying!"
In her hand was a glaive, its color could only be described as bloody. The whole weapon looked like it got drenched in an ocean of blood. At the places where it wasn't bloody the original color could be seen, the handle probably was brown and made of wood, while the blade and pommel of the weapon was an elegant dark blue color.
"How lucky! I even got a weapon that I can somewhat use. I don't know what I would've done if I had gotten a battle axe or even worse, a hammer."
Sera moved around with it, done some basic katas to get to know the weapon more and awaken her memory about its usage.
With that done, she dismissed and resummoned it a couple of times until she could do it with ease. Then she sat down next to the fire with a happy smile. Things were finally looking up. The sun was about to go down so she destroyed the fire, and while lying on the ground she was thinking about the tomorrow. Her long journey to Castleburg will start, and nothing would come in between her and her goal.