12 Chapter 12 - Collecting the spoils

Kyle went through things that the beasts dropped and collected everything useful. Anything that wasn't useful, Kyle tried crafting with, using the system.

Some of the crafts were really impressive. A new sword out of a leg bone and rib bones with purple crystal embedded. New pair of clothes for Kyle to wear to protect from cold nights. Also a pair of clothes that was extremely durable with leather and bones impeded to protect the vitals.

Other crafts like a whistle out of the bones and a funny-looking hat were not as useful, but still, Kyle stored them inside his storage.

The common pattern that Kyle noticed with these items is that when using the system to craft, they all had a purple crystal of varying sizes embedded into them. Some of the crystals brighter than other and some of them even having a hint of blue in them. Even a needle out, which was made out of the fang of the wolf had a small little crystal in it.

'Maybe it has something to do with the way items are crafted in this world?

The items, after everything was sorted, now occupied 90% of the 4 by 4 area inside his pearls inventory.

'I wish I can somehow increase this space in the future. I would love to store more things here.' After thinking this, Kyle smirked, 'I have always been a loot hoarder in all of my games… I hope that doesn't lead to my demise.'

Now that outside was clean, and the blood was the only thing left. Kyle had to consider his options. 'The blood will alarm all animals of the battle and make them come in caution, but at the same time, knowing how desperate beasts in this forest were for energy, I have to move far away from here if I want to sort my thoughts and new knowledge in peace.'

Kyle went back into the cave, now even more surprised by how beautiful the insides were, the crystals danced around in the sunset light that was slipping from the outside, and were giving off all 7 colours of the rainbow. 'This crystals and this cave are sure a wonder to behold…' Just as Kyle thought that he tried touching one of them. As the hand barely touched the surface, white lines appeared in the whole cave. Those were the same line that he pulled to slow down the time in the middle fo the battle.

'So this wasn't me being gifted; it was all due to this lucky encounter! Thank you, cave!' Kyle couldn't believe his luck. Time was always the most mysterious and secretive thing on earth that no one really understood. He didn't date to take his hand off the crystal as not to disturb this magical feeling. Even though Kyle knew that he had to move out of here as soon as possible, he couldn't afford to miss this opportunity.

Kyle closed his eyes, and the magical blanket of energy covered him and his consciousness. His head was empty like a clean lake which caused him to get insights. 'Time is the flow of my life; the way I got from birth until this cave. Everything leading up to it, all the actions were just made for me to end up here. That is what it means to be in the flow of time. Everything lost in the Past is just the build-up to the present, and everything in the Future is what will come out of the Now. This is what time is.'

With the last words spoken, Kyle opened his eyes. Still embedded in the magical insights of time his eyes had a purple hue and sparks flying through them. Those eyes showed great maturity and deep understanding—the purple lighting was showing the realm of knowledge in the unknown.

[ Congratulations ]

[ Insights into a Time Law solidified ]

The systems sound brought Kyle off this magical feeling, and he realised that all the crystals in the cave now were dim with no laster like before. It was as if something that swallowed all of the light. 'I was intending on bringing all of them with me, but it seems that only taking ones that were broken off outside should be enough. Maybe if this energy can regenerate, I can come back to use it later.' Kyle didn't know yet, what use was this time law and how to use it to slow down time like before, but any encounter should be cherished, especially the one that has helped him survive before.

Kyle's last task was to absorb the Lion. As he did so, the energy flowed into his dantian, but as no whirlpool wasn't present anymore, it started transforming into the pure Qi energy like it was always supposed to. The energy started rotating inside of his dantian and forming a pure energy whirlpool that instead of consuming, gave out energy to Kyle's body. In place of Lion's body, that now disappeared, countless items were lying in the blood. Fangs, marrows from the bones and even strong blood vessels that looked like silver chains were lying there.

But, as soon as Kyle was about to touch the first item, as to start sorting through them, without a prompt from the system, the items started disappearing and combining, just like in crafting. In the end, only 3 neatly stacked and soaking in blood items were left.

The first was a ring with a yellow lion head on top. The second was a belt that had a lion image embedded to the side. The third was an earring that had lions fang in miniature hanging down.

'What is with the jewellery dropping from the beast like that? Why didn't the system let me inspect each item individually? Maybe there was something that I could use to boost my other items or even combine with other beasts materials?' Kyle was very unhappy with the system.

[ The best possible combinations were found, the chance of those items coming together 0.00000000001 ]

Kyle got an answer to his question. 'Well okay, let's store the items separately so that I can sort them out later. I have always played female characters in my MMORPGs, so jewellery was never a problem. But how a guy supposed to wear an earring? Even a thought of having a pierced ear scares me.' Kyle's main problem was the type of items that he got.

As Kyle checked that he got everything that he could, he gave a last longing look to this battlefield. 'This was the place where everything changed. This was the life and death battle that made me who I am right now, and all of my future will be based on this.' Kyle made a deep bow to both the battlefield outside, to the cave and then to the heaven as if telling a Catter and a Game that he is thankful.

After that was done, Kyle ran forward to find a more secure place, as far away from this battlefield as possible.

Kyle has never dared to venture too far from the place where he got summoned into this world to. In reality, ha has started in the most outer region of the forest that was neighbouring a grass plane. At this point, together with the lake with talking lizard, Kyle has explored around 5 kilometres in diameter of the forest. The forest itself looked like it was thousands of metres wide. Instead of going deeper and staying there, for now, Kyle wanted to find a quieter place. Kyle has never explored the grassland, and this was a perfect opportunity for him to do so.

With that thought in mind, Kyle ran out of the forest and onto the grass plane to check what lies ahead.