Chapter 62: Alpha White Dog 061 – Alpha White Dog #1
“Seems like it’s not the smell of flowers after all.”
I sniffed the round, white flowers blanketing the ground.
I picked one and brought it to my nose, but the sweet scent was coming from somewhere else.
“Maybe it’s from that tree.”
Like a moth to a flame, I walked over to the tree. The closer I got, the itchier my fur felt, as if my whole body wanted to twist and turn in delight.
“What’s going on here?”
Once I reached the trunk, my head started spinning.
The tree was constantly oozing that sweet smell, so I dug my claws into the base and started scratching around.
As I did, a glistening amber liquid flowed out, almost like it was bleeding.
I shoved my mouth against it and drank like my life depended on it.
The honey-like syrup was so sweet and sticky that it soaked my mouth and fur.
“This isn’t just honey; it’s honey plus ten extra points! What on earth is this?”
I kept clawing at the tree. The bark and leaves stuck to my gooey body like I was the world’s biggest cicada.
The tickle in my body made me want to burst into laughter.
—Haha. Hehe.
“I’m feeling better and better. What is this? Is there some kind of drug in it?!”
I rolled around in the meadow, trying to regain my senses.
The first thing that popped into my mind was my friend’s cat.
It was a bizarre scene, watching it roll around, unable to control itself after smelling the catnip my friend had brought over.
I’ve never seen a person on drugs, but I imagined a high cat could look a lot like that.
I probably looked just as ridiculous doing what I was doing now.
“Is this a dogwood tree?”
I gave my spinning head a shake to clear it.
I recalled that felines react like they’re on drugs because of the tree’s special properties.
“I get why Lao-Hoo is vulnerable to this. Even for a non-feline like me, the effect is pretty strong.”
Tigers are giant cats, so for Lao-Hoo or Mao, this must be a serious weakness.
“But calling it a treasure seems a bit much.”
I felt slightly disappointed.
To me, this tree was just a sweet-syrup-producing tree.
Sure, it had its worth, but I had high hopes for it as a “treasure,” which made my interest wane.
“It tastes good, though. But no experience points.”
I scooped the syrup from the tree’s wound in my palm. The thick and sticky liquid stretched like spider silk.
“Well, I can’t store it without a bottle. What a shame.”
Thinking it was better to indulge, I went all out, guzzling the syrup down.
Just as the sweetness faded and my belly started to feel full, I looked up to see fruit hanging from the branches.
The blue fruit resembled elongated unripe cherry tomatoes.
Honestly, it looked a bit more like green peppers than cherry tomatoes.
I climbed the tree and picked one. As I popped it into my mouth and chewed, an explosion of spicy flavor hit my tongue.
“Ugh, no way I can eat this.”
I’m usually good with spicy stuff, but this was on another level. There wasn’t even much flesh on it, so I spat the large seed into my front paw.
“Better hold onto the seed. It might come in handy someday.”
I imagined planting the dogwood tree in front of Leaf’s treehouse. It could be a drinks vending machine with its sweet syrup.
“Can’t believe I came back without a scratch. Guess there weren’t many frogs around? They did lead me to a cave that had likely been untouched for a while.”
As I emerged from the cave, Salome was waiting for me, perched on a cliff.
“You sure brought back a lot. How many did you get?”
I glanced at the white dandelions and evening primrose in my hand and counted silently.
“Looks like around twenty. Should be enough.”
“Probably is. Ahem.”
Salome wrinkled her brow and sniffed the air.
She leaned closer to investigate the scent emanating from me.
Her eyes landed on the dried, yellow syrup stuck to my fur.
“Smells really sweet. Did you stumble upon a beehive or something? What’s this gunk all over you? Doesn’t seem poisonous.”
“It’s not a beehive; it’s from a tree I found. It had this super sweet syrup flowing out of it. Must’ve gotten it on me back then.”
“A tree with sweet syrup? Hmm, that scent is familiar…”
Salome seemed to be searching her memory, her eyes darting from side to side.
Then, as if she remembered something, she exclaimed, “Oh! Didn’t that tree have some crazy spicy fruits on it? Did you eat any?”
“Yup.”
At my simple answer, Salome’s forehead twitched with a visible vein.
“Those little frogs were hiding the dogwood tree after all. No matter how much we crack down on them, they just won’t go away. I’ll have to bring in some other creatures to uproot that tree later.”
Salome clicked her tongue.
Given her almost illicit reaction, it felt like revealing the seeds I was holding in my front paw would lead to me losing them immediately.
“If I say anything, they’ll snatch them up in a heartbeat.”
I clutched the seed tightly in my paw.
“Anyway, we’re heading back quickly. The rainy clouds are starting to form, so we should avoid any turbulence. It’ll be night soon, and being out here is risky.”
Salome flapped her wings and soared into the sky.
She held onto me tightly, like I was a hunted prey, and suddenly flew away at breakneck speed.
It made the previous ride with her feel like child’s play.
The wind against my face was so intense I felt like my face could snap back.
Unlike the comedic encounter I had with the black lion on my way to gather flowers, the return trip was non-stop flying through the air.
The fast-paced flight meant we quickly returned to the cave of the elder Ilgast.
“Phew, thought I was going to d*e! Why fly so recklessly?”
I might be one to hop on dangerous rides without a second thought, but Salome’s wild flight almost made me pee my pants several times.
With no safety gear, looking down at the abyss beneath me was an experience that was hard to describe.
Salome smoothed her feathers as if to rest her tired wings and answered casually.
“It’s dangerous at night.”
“But flying through the sky means it doesn’t matter if it’s dangerous, right? You got night blindness or something?”
“Night blindness? I don’t know what that means, but flying at night is risky. Dangerous creatures roam the night sky.”
Salome scoffed, as if recalling something unpleasant.
It seemed being a danger at night was true both on the ground and in the sky.
“But at least with wings, we got here quickly. Though the ride was absolutely terrible.”
I grumbled a bit while finally letting my stiff shoulders and body relax.
Riding with Salome made me realize, “Wings would be awesome.”
The feeling was somewhat akin to the first time I rode in my friend’s car after landing a job and getting my own wheels.
Desiring what I didn’t have felt the same now as it did back in my previous life.
If I could sprout wings from my back and soar through the sky, how fantastic would that be?
“I wonder if my next evolution will give me wings?”
I thought about leveling up and evolving soon.
So far, I’d evolved once at level 5 and again at level 10, so if my calculations were correct, I should evolve again at level 15.
Right now, I was at level 13, and I had amassed quite a bit of experience from gobbling up frogs, so I figured I might level up when I received a deer’s antler.
“I wonder what I could evolve into this time.”
The very concept of evolution resonated with me, no matter how many times I thought about it.
Seeing my body grow stronger and change gave the thrill of hunting creatures and accumulating experience points.
If I had had level-ups and evolutions back when I lived as a human, I bet everyone would have worked harder for visible achievements.
Lost in those flowing thoughts, Salome abruptly flapped her wing against my back.
“Let’s go in. They’re probably waiting for us.”
“Oh, right.”
I finally got to obtain that magical deer antler.
As I thought of the exquisite taste of that chocolate-like antler, it made everything I’d just gone through seem like a walk in the park.
“I need to eat that antler quickly, then I’ll find a way to bolt south.”
I considered my next plan, whether to join Leaf and descend south together or make a solo escape.
I wasn’t sure if Leaf would still be waiting in that cave or if he’d already made his way south.
“But I have no clue where that cave is.”
I had been led there after being kidnapped by Mao, so figuring out the cave’s location was quite a challenge.
While I had a general sense of direction, it might take a while to find that cave.
As I mulled over these thoughts, I soon spotted Ilgast sitting on a chair with his back to me.
“It would be rude to make a loud entrance at night, so I just came in.”
Salome bowed her head for permission. Ilgast turned, shrugged, and replied casually.
“It’s fine. So, did you manage to bring back the evening primrose?”
His forehead had already regenerated about half of the horn that had been cut off.
“Do horns grow back that quickly?” I wondered.
I shifted my focus to my own horn and wondered if it would grow back if it were ever cut off.
“Let me see them.”
Ilgast took the bouquet of flowers I held like a bunch of tourists.
As I watched to see what he would do, he opened his mouth and started chewing the flowers.
“Tough dude.”
I had expected him to brew them into tea or make some kind of herbal remedy, but he just started munching them down.
Watching such a beautiful man eat flowers made me feel a little sorry for him.
“This is just a case of a deer doing deer things, right? After all, it’s not weird for a deer to munch on grass.”
Thinking of him as a deer in a human form made the absurdity fade, and the scene suddenly felt quite fitting.
But when I saw his blue eyes stretching horizontally across his face, I jumped back in shock.
It wasn’t just his eyes.
Ilgast’s whole body started twisting and expanding with the sound of popping joints and bones.
【Awesome, magical power is overflowing.】
His voice echoed as if the world had been hit by an echo effect.
It was a completely different tone than the light, cheerful sounds from before.
It was so ominous and dark that it resonated like it was coming from the depths of hell itself.
In an instant, Ilgast was covered in black fur.
The once twig-like horns spiraled and grew wildly as if they were undergoing a rapid transformation.
“What the heck is that?”
I cautiously asked Salome, who was watching this spectacle without flinching.
Seeing her remain calm made me think this was a sight she was quite used to.
She pondered for a moment and then spoke softly.
“That’s what he looked like when Ilgast was called the Deer Demon. He’s just regaining his powers and returning to his original form. They say no beast has survived after witnessing that form.”
“That’s his original form?”
The charming smile of the beautiful man in front of me had vanished, replaced by a deer’s head on a gaunt body, standing like a shaky telephone pole.
What emerged, covered in black fur, looked like something out of a forest monster or nightmare.
His horizontally slitted eyes resembled those of a goat, making it look like a being worshipped by dark cultists.
It was as if evil or blasphemous laughter had been morphed into an animal form and stretched out.
“I really wondered how a deer became the master of the woods. Guess he’s not an ordinary deer.”
I couldn’t help but be amazed.
Knowing he was Ilgast, who had taken a liking to me, kept me from bolting. But if I had come across this in the woods, I would have turned tail and run for dear life.
Ilgast’s unsteady form came to a sudden halt.
His horizontally-shaped eyes stared down at me. Then he opened his mouth wide, grinning almost tauntingly.
What I saw were sharp, spiky teeth that would hardly be associated with a deer.
【━!】
A guttural sound emerged from Ilgast’s wide-open mouth, a sound that made no sense.
In that instant, all the torches illuminating the cave extinguished.
