Sol looked at the pathetic scrap in his hand, then at Vurok's smug grin, and finally at the old man who was actively avoiding eye contact. He laughed…a low, cold sound that started in his chest and scraped its way up his throat. It wasn't a laugh of humor; it was the sound of a dam breaking.
But instead of shouting, he calmly extended his hand and took the piece of meat.
Seeing this, the old man breathed a audible sigh of relief. His shoulders slumped. As long as Sol took the piece, the transaction was complete. The Law was technically upheld. He got his share, So, No one could blame him now.
Vurok and his lackeys burst into laughter, slapping their thighs.
"Yeah, yeah! That's how it should be!"
"Good dog, take the bone!"
"Take it like the bastard you are and scram!"
Sol didn't move. He stood perfectly still, calmly weighing the piece of meat in his hand like a stone.
Then, without a flicker of warning, he suddenly lunged.
He moved with a speed that belied his lean frame, instantly closing the distance with Vurok and slammed that wet, heavy chunk of bone and gristle directly into the dead center of Vurok's face.
THWACK.
The sound was sickeningly wet… a mix of slap and crunch.
Vurok didn't just stumble; he was lifted off his feet. He flew backward as if kicked by a mule, his arms flailing uselessly in the air. He landed squarely on his back in the butchery pit—a patch of ground churned into a slurry of mud, blood, and discarded entrails. He hit the slime with a wet SPLAT that echoed through the sudden silence, sliding a few feet due to slipperiness before coming to a halt, his face coated in the filth.
Everyone froze. The laughter died instantly, choked off in the throats of the lackeys. They stared, eyes wide, at their leader sprawled in the filth.
Sol didn't even breathe hard. He just calmly dusted his hands, wiping the grease onto his trousers. Under the shocked gaze of the crowd, he spoke, his voice calm but carrying a weight that drilled into everyone's ears.
"Shove it up your ass. If this trash is so good. I'll hunt my own food."
Saying that, he turned and walked away coolly, his stride steady, as if the violence that just occurred had absolutely nothing to do with him.
Vurok's lackeys looked from Sol to Vurok and back again. Some shifted their weight, wanting to rush forward and stop him, but they hesitated. There was something terrifying about Sol's calmness… a dark, heavy aura that pinned their feet to the ground. They didn't dare take a step.
On the ground, Vurok lay dazed, staring up at the darkening sky.
His brain was swimming in a thick fog.
…What happened?
I was standing just now.
Why is the ground wet?
Why is the sky spinning?
Did the moon fall on me?
The world felt tilted. He blinked, trying to clear the red haze from his vision.
Seeing Sol walk away, the lackeys finally snapped out of their trance. They scrambled toward the mud pit, panic on their faces.
"Boss! Boss, are you okay?"
"Vurok! Can you hear me?"
"Damn it, help him up!"
The shouting pulled Vurok back to reality. The pain in his nose registered first, followed by the cold slime soaking his back. He remembered. Sol. The meat. The wet slap.
He struggled to sit up, his face twisting into a mask of pure, unadulterated rage. He opened his mouth to roar a curse, but just then, he felt something in his mouth. A small, gritty lump. Instinctively, like a reflex, he bit down and swallowed.
Crunch. Gulp.
A bitter, foul taste exploded on his tongue. A taste of rot and half-digested grass.
He froze. His eyes bulged.
He finally realized what he had just swallowed. The scrap Sol had hit him with wasn't just muscle…it was a piece of the beast's lower intestine. The part where the dung was stored. And… he had just eaten it.
The smell hit him a second later.
Vurok's face turned green.
Around him, the crowd gasped. Even his own lackeys recoiled, stepping back and covering their noses, looking at him with undisguised disgust. It was as if they were fighting the urge to retch just by looking at him.
"Urrgh—!"
Vurok doubled over, his hands clawing into the mud, and puked. He vomited violently, emptying his stomach onto the ground he was sitting on.
After finally retching everything he had eaten since yesterday, he wiped his mouth, tears of shame and rage stinging his eyes. He looked up at the retreating figure of Sol, now far in the distance.
"SOL!" he screamed, his voice cracking, trembling with humiliation. "YOU JUST WAIT! I'LL KILL YOU! I SWEAR I'LL KILL YOU!"
…
Even though Sol could hear the angry curses fading at his back, he didn't care. He continued walking forward, his steps lighter than they had been since he woke up in this body. He felt a profound, vibrating sense of satisfaction…as if years of stored farts had finally been released all at once.
Ahem.
'Okay, that example is a bit too disgusting. Let's try again.'
It felt as if years of accumulated anger and suppression were finally washing away, leaving his mind clear and sharp.
Once the initial rush of adrenaline and satisfaction faded, the cold air hit his face, bringing him back to reality. His pace slowed slightly as he began to calculate the fallout of this little saga.
One thing was absolute: Vurok was not the type to let this rest. The man was a petty, vindictive bully who thrived on fear. Sol had just shattered that fear in front of the entire village.
"He's going to want blood," Sol muttered to himself, kicking a loose stone. "Probably a lot of it."
However, he wasn't overly worried about the official channels. Even though his actions were excessive… remembering Vurok's shit-eating expression, perhaps a little too excessive… Sol knew the tribal politics. It was Vurok who had broken the Law of Distribution first.
More importantly, Vurok was proud. Would the son of a lead hunter run crying to the Chief or the Elders? Would he admit that a "cripple" had slapped him to the ground and force-fed him a piece of dung-filled intestine?
Not a chance," Sol smirked. "He'd rather die than publicize that he ate shit. If that story gets out, he'll never lead a hunting party in his life. He'll be the laughingstock of the Osari until the day he dies."
So, the Elders wouldn't be coming for him. The Chief wouldn't bother with a squabble between "children."
That left only one real threat: Vurok and his lackeys taking matters into their own hands. They would come for him in the dark, away from prying eyes, looking to break a few bones to restore their lost honor.
"It will be difficult," Sol admitted, looking down at his own lean, malnourished arms. In a fair fight, right now, he would lose.
But his eyes didn't hold fear. Instead, a dangerous glint appeared in them, sharp as obsidian.
"If I can manage to raise my strength... through that method," he whispered, his mind locking onto the soft sensual hand of aunt as she gave him a handjob, "then I won't need to be afraid of them. In fact... they should be the ones afraid of me."