Frostbitten Wayfarer

Zoe and Emma wandered around their camp pulling off leaves from bushes and trees, or plucking flowers from the ground and piling them into a metal pot they had. It wasn’t much, and Zoe wasn’t sure what the nutrition value of leaves and flowers were, but it tasted better than the plain boar meat at least.

Some of the flowers had a nice tart sweetness to them, and many of the leaves were firm without being too chewy. If they had a salad dressing, or even just some lemon juice to drizzle over it they would have had a nice salad. But even without it, the two found it much better than the tough meat that still sat on the rock.

They finished their meal, and cleaned up the mess they made while they decided what to do next.

“Still think it’s weird that it’s a 5 day camping trip, we’re basically done now. We’re not gonna run out of water or food at this point, so we just have to eat bad food for a few days and then be told we’re good enough?” Emma asked.

“It would’ve been harder if my eyes weren’t good enough to see the boar from so far away though.” Zoe said.

“I guess… I still think I would have found the boar anyway though.” Emma said.

“Probably. Maybe they just want us to experience what it’s like being on your own for a while?” Zoe suggested.

“Maybe. It is harder than I thought it would be, I guess. I thought we’d have been set on the first day for sure.” Emma said.

“Yeah, and maybe other people got less lucky than us too. Guess we’ll have to wait and see.” Zoe said.

The two spent the rest of the day lounging around their camp, chatting about Emma’s plans for her new house when she got it. She wanted a big backyard so she could try and get some of the seasonal master feats from the safety of her own house, and lots of space for her cats to run around.

Zoe took watch again, keeping an eye and ear out for anything that might be attracted to their camp. A more likely happening now that they had cooked at their camp, something could be attracted by the smell of food and wander over. They tried to clean up as best they could but it still paid to be extra careful anyway.

When Emma woke up, the two prepared some breakfast and went to find some tracks nearby that they could wait at so Emma could get her own kill for the exam. They found what looked like a feeding ground for some deer about forty minutes east of their camp, and climbed up a tree to wait and see if the deer would come back.

The day passed, and as the sun began to set Zoe heard the crunching of leaves and twigs as something approached. Minutes later, the two girls saw a deer poke its head out from around a tree not too far off. It walked a little closer and started pulling off chunks of the tree’s bark to eat.

Emma gestured at it, and Zoe nodded.

Emma drew her bow and nocked an arrow, then pulled the string back until her hand rested just at her cheek. She adjusted her aim and then let the arrow fly. The string snapped back with an immense force and the arrow flew towards the deer.

The deer crouched as soon as it heard the snap of the bow and tried to jump away. But Emma anticipated this and the arrow smashed straight through the deer just above its shoulder, embedding itself in the ground on the other side.

It stumbled through the forest for a few steps before it fell to the ground. Emma looked around and then hopped down out of the tree and ran to the deer’s body to pull it into the school’s storage ring.

Zoe hopped down and whistled. She knew that Emma was level twenty-one now, just waiting for a good class for her next choice. But seeing the power that a dedicated bow hunting class gave, even just at the first tier was impressive.

It made her look forward to whatever she would end up with even more. If this was what your standard bow hunting class could do, what would Zoe’s class do with all of her extra bonuses she had?

“Yes!” Emma screamed after she was confident there were no threats nearby. “I was getting worried. We sat up in that tree for like twelve hours. My butt hurts.” She rubbed her behind.

Zoe laughed, “Clean it here maybe? We know the area, should be fine.”

“Yeah, whatever. I got a kill too! Yay!” Emma hopped up and down, full of excitement.

“Yes, yes, I’m very proud of you. Good job. We should clean it and move though.” Zoe said.

“Fine, but we’re celebrating once we get back to town. On you. Since I’m trying to buy a house and you’re trying to…” Emma trailed off and started preparing an area for the deer. “What are you trying to save for anyway?"

Zoe joined her, “Nothing, really. I want a storage item like I’ve said. But no real big purchases planned.”

Emma summoned the blankets and the deer on top of it then started working on it. “Huh. You should get a house. Or maybe once you get a bunch of levels you could go make a cool cave to live in and be one of those cool immortals I’ve read about in books.

“Come back every few thousand years and make a big mess for everybody to clean up. Get really angry that nobody knows how to play your favourite sport anymore and force everybody to learn again.” Emma laughed.

Zoe laughed with her, “Thousands of years away from people sounds horrible to me.”

“Hmmm, maybe now, I guess.” Emma scrunched her face in thought. “But like, you’re twenty-five now, right?”

“Yes?” Zoe said with some confusion.

“Yeah, so two years is basically ten percent of your entire life, right?” Emma asked.

“Uhuh, and?”

“Well that’s a long time. But someday, you’ll be two hundred and fifty years old. And at that point, twenty-five years will be just as long as two and a half is to you now, y’know?" Emma asked.

Zoe shook her head, “I guess. But twenty five years is still a long time. I can’t imagine it ever just feeling like only two years.”

“No but think about it. When you were five years old, how long six months felt. Like that’s soooooo long to a five year old. And it’s still kinda long, but we’re rounding it down to two years for the comparison cause those six months don’t really matter much.” Emma said.

“I mean yeah, I’ve thought about that before. But at some point that’s gotta stop right? If I live to ten thousand years old,” Zoe shivered. “Then is a hundred years going to feel like just a moment?”

“You tell me when you get there,” Emma laughed.

Zoe tried to put on a happy smile but found it a little difficult to be as cheerful as she wanted to be with it.

“Oh. I guess you wouldn’t be able to, huh. Cause I won’t live that long. Right.” Emma said.

“Would you want to live forever?” Zoe asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe? I always thought I’d be happy with the few hundred years I’d get from just getting some extra levels. But I’ve kinda been thinking about it since I met you and I dunno. If I was given the option right now I think I’d take it, but I don’t think it’s something I want to really desperately search for. Not yet, anyway.” Emma said.

“I always wanted to live forever. When I was a kid. I really wanted it, but now that I have it, it’s a little scary.” Zoe said.

“How so?” Emma asked.

“I still have friends. But my friends aren’t immortal. And I know this, every time I meet somebody. Every time I end up liking somebody. I’m going to live forever, and the people I meet won’t always live forever. And that’s fine. People die even before getting to old age all the time. Work accidents, freak accidents, it happens.

“I know that. But just knowing it so definitely, so surely. I am going to outlive everybody I meet. It’s scary, sometimes.” Zoe said.

“Hmm. I tell you what then. If you find a way to make me immortal too then I’ll join you and we can be lonely together.” Emma said.

Zoe laughed, “Well I don’t think you’ll be able to get it the same way I did so we’re starting from ground zero.”

Emma smiled, “We’ve got a long time to figure it out.”

They finished cleaning the deer and put everything away, then made their way back to camp. The remaining days of the final exam were spent keeping their camp in order and spending their spare time trying to build something resembling a tree house.

When it was time to go back to the school, they had made something that tended to stay in the trees most of the time at least. Emma tried to sleep in it on the last night, but one of the sticks they were using for a floor snapped from under her. She woke up wedged between two branches and Zoe had to help her out while trying not to laugh too hard.

The two girls were full of scratches and covered in dirt, with big smiles plastered on their faces as they walked back in to the school’s front door. Other students filtered in along with them, none looking much better than they did. One pair looked like they somehow made it home to shower and put on some clean clothes before they went back to school.

Zoe and Emma guessed that most of the students here just decided against taking a cleaning skill yet. Emma was offered one as well but decided she could swap it in later on when she had more skills to shore up the weakness.

Everybody made their way to the classroom and sat in one of the chairs — the desks were all removed today. A few minutes later, Arthur — the owner of the school, walked in to the classroom and stood up at the front, flanked by Melania and Adam.

“Hello, students,” Arthur said.

The hushed whispering of students stopped as abruptly as a boar charging a concrete wall, and everybody’s head turned to look at him.

“You all did wonderfully out there. Not one rescue required this time. Give yourselves a pat on the back for being one of our more accomplished groups.” He paused as people took a moment to praise themselves and each other.

“One question that I am often asked by students after this exam is why did it need to be five days. I was done on the first day, done on the second day. Everything was handled and then I just had to wait.” He looked over the class, seeing a few nods. Emma being one of them.

“I do sincerely wish I were permitted to thrust you into wilderness you didn’t recognize, as antithetical to our teachings as that might be. But unfortunately, we can’t do that. I hope that this experience has given you all a better understanding of what fending for yourself in the wilderness is really like regardless.

“Which of your resources did you not end up needing? Can you think of a different situation where they might have been useful? Were there any things that you felt you wished you had brought? Was hunting and foraging for your food as easy as you expected it to be in the real world?” He paused for a moment.

“These are the questions I want you all asking yourselves. If you were left in a forest you didn’t recognize, if you made a mistake and wandered off somewhere you didn’t know, how well equipped do you think you would be for that situation?

“This is something I hope none of you have to experience, but something you have all proven yourselves to be capable of doing if necessary. Not only to me and the rest of the faculty, but to yourselves. Now, on to a review of your performance.” He said.

He went through each group individually, talking about what they did well and what they did poorly. Most of the groups seemed to have gotten their kill on the second or third day, but one group managed to get a deer on the first day. He gave pointers and advice on how to better avoid spooking people’s prey, and feedback for what people could have done better. Emma and Zoe were the last to be reviewed.

“The two of you picked a good location for camp. Good visibility so you wouldn’t be ambushed by a boar or wolf in the middle of the night without knowing and plenty of water available. Excellent choice.

“I would have investigated the first tracks you had found more, rather than continuing deeper into our controlled territory, however. You found evidence of a deer feeding and continued following the deer’s tracks, stopping when they left our school’s controlled zone. You made the right decision by staying within our area.

“However, in deciding your location, you should have recognized that many of the tracks that you would find would lead into uncharted territory and planned accordingly. You corrected this later on by finding a feed site and waiting for a deer to return. But had you done this on the first day rather than wandering aimlessly after tracks that were unlikely to lead you somewhere you would be comfortable with going to, you could have found a deer on the first night.

“Again on the second day, you should have remained at the feed site you found rather than travelling inwards. When you did find the tracks of the boar, I am told you performed excellently. You identified the tracks, decided on a direction and managed to find the boar. Taking it on with just a dagger was a risky move that I wouldn’t normally recommend.

“But you did so without any losses. Excellent hunt. However, you should have field dressed it. There was nothing stopping you from doing so, bringing it back to near your camp and doing it there was a bad idea. You made the right decision in taking it a ways from your camp, but it should never have been brought back so close in the first place. You risked luring in other predators to near your camp.

“Your second kill was textbook. Good job,” He nodded to Emma. “I’m unsure what the two of you were trying to do after that point at your camp. Remember to keep your wits about you in a survival situation, you never know what might end up happening at a moment’s notice.

“Overall, an excellent performance by you two. Good job.” He nodded to the students. “You are all accomplished hunters, and I wish you the best of luck with your future endeavours. Please remember to grab your certification from the front desk when you leave. Thank you very much.”