Chronicles of Forgotten Extra

Chapter 344: The Apex Predator Was Delicious!

I am fucked, aren’t I?

Life had thrown Alden quite a few surprises in the span of just a few hours. Jeremy had tried to take over his body then his mother had interrupted, then he had absorbed Jeremy’s soul, then he had been sucked into some portal, separated from Nyx, somehow powered up in the process and broken his body.

At one point, Alden had thought that would be enough insanity for a lifetime or at least for a few days. He thought maybe he had even used up all of his bad luck on that string of disasters.

But fate, even after being severed by his mother, seemed far too obsessed with him to let him go because there was no other explanation.

In a forest overflowing with wildlife, filled with countless easy prey and with two psychotic dragons fighting somewhere in the distance, this lizard-brained dinosaur had somehow found him, the one person quietly hiding on a single branch of a massive tree.

How the hell was that even a coincidence?

The thought barely had time to register before the dinosaur snapped its long neck toward the branch Alden was standing on, forcing him to leap aside immediately.

Alden landed on a branch of a neighboring tree just as the beast’s jaws closed around the spot where he had been moments earlier.

Wood splintered between its teeth as it chewed through the branch with ease.

Alden was currently at Ascendant Rank and yet the beast somehow seemed capable of matching his current physical strength.

Not to mention...

How the hell was a dinosaur even alive? And why the hell was it so strong for an ordinary beast without mana?

Alden had never heard of such creatures in any book so seeing one in person was shocking enough. Unfortunately, the dinosaur didn’t share his sentiments.

The beast turned toward him once more and attacked again. Alden immediately summoned the Sword of Chaos. The weapon answered his call at once, appearing in his hand, its pitch-black blade gleaming with an ominous sharpness.

"Sevenfold Ruins — First Step — Ruinous Severance!"

Alden forced his mana into his sword despite the sharp pain that coursed through his body. Gritting his teeth, he swung his sword.

Pitch-black energy coated the blade while unstable crimson lightning danced across its edge. For a moment, the dinosaur froze, its eyes blinking once and then again as if it couldn’t understand why its body refused to move.

A second later, its head slid from its neck.

It had been severed before it had even realized it.

Crimson blood erupted from the headless corpse, drenching Alden’s already exposed body. Several trees behind the dinosaur were cut apart as well, collapsing one after another, making a loud sound.

"Thankfully, there is a lake nearby."

He muttered as he looked past the fallen beast. Behind it, he could already sense dozens more similar creatures approaching, each of their steps making the ground tremble.

His gaze turned cold.

The Sword of Chaos lowered slightly and then Alden lunged forward, towards the herd of dinosaurs who had messed with wrong prey.

***

It barely took him ten minutes to deal with all fifteen dinosaurs. Their physical strength was intimidating but in the end, they were nothing more than mindless beasts without mana.

Alden danced around them, dodging their snapping jaws and whipping necks while severing them one by one. By the time he was finished, a large portion of the nearby forest had been leveled because his inability to properly control his mana and the sheer strength of his new rank made the collateral damage unavoidable.

His body was now covered in crimson blood from head to toe. The leaves that had been preserving his dignity had long since flown off somewhere during the battle.

So he was completely naked once again. Not that he cared anymore because he had other problems to deal with like the rumbling of his stomach which was even louder this time.

With no other options available, his gaze shifted toward the mountain of dinosaur corpses he had created.

After a moment of consideration, he selected one of them as the lucky winner and grabbed it by the tail before dragging it behind him towards the lake.

Today’s menu was Roasted Dinosaur.

Alden had never been particularly fond of eating meat of unknown origin. Let alone that of an oversized prehistoric lizard but he couldn’t exactly afford to starve to death.

And besides...

Everyone had to try new things once in a while, didn’t they?

With those thoughts, he arrived at the lake.

He could sense countless living beings beneath the water’s surface, but most of them were relatively weak. As for the truly powerful presence lurking in the depths, it didn’t seem even remotely interested in him.

Taking that as permission to exist, Alden washed the blood from his body before crafting a new set of leaf clothes for himself.

Only then did he take out his sword once more.

He cut firewood from several nearby trees and lit a fire using his mana, which now carried the properties of both light and shadow.

Afterward, he butchered the dinosaur into smaller chunks and used sharpened wooden stakes to suspend the meat above the flames.

He had no spices, salt or seasoning since his storage ring was gone, along with everything inside it but then again at this point, though, he would have eaten the meat raw if necessary.

So it hardly mattered.

As soon as the aroma of roasted meat reached his nose, Alden grabbed one of the wooden stakes and ate the meat hanging from it. It was still hot enough to burn his tongue but he barely cared.

It was delicious.

Hell, at that moment, it tasted better than many of the five-star meals he had eaten in the past.

He devoured the massive dinosaur within minutes and yet his hunger refused to subside. So he got up, dragged over another carcass and continued eating.

And then another.

Only after consuming three whole dinosaurs did he finally feel full as he laid down on the ground, surrounded by the enormous bones of what had once probably been one of the forest’s apex predators.

His gaze drifted toward the sky.

It looked peaceful and occasionally, he saw dragons flying across it, sometimes even battling one another in the distance and yet none of them paid him any attention.

For that, he was grateful.

Alden clenched his fist and raised it toward the sky.

"Now that I am full... it’s time to figure out where the fuck this place is and why there are so many dragons casually fighting each other!"