Leo sat by the fire as meat sizzled over a stone slab.
He had been staring at the flame for a while now as if it would give him the answers he needed.
'How exactly do I use my abilities?'
He had been thinking of different ways to manipulate the flames, but nothing worked. He even swallowed his pride and embarrassment and asked Wannabe, but the wolf just told him to just control it, to feel it.
'That guy really is bad at teaching. Maybe it's because I haven't even asked for his name if he even has one.'
With a sigh, Leo turned the meat on the stone slab while trying to come up with a solution.
'I tried everything I can think of, but nothing is working, or maybe I'm just expecting too much.'
With his new power-up, he thought things were starting to get easy.
'Yeah, it is really kind of overreaching to be able to manipulate something I've never even come into contact with.'
He picked up the meat that was now a shade of brown.
"This meat is a bit undercooked, and it could also use a bit of salt."
As he took a bite, Leo couldn't help but comment.
"This meat is also rich in mana, but I don't feel any different."
As he was cooking the meat, he realized that the meat took unusually long to actually cook.
He was also able to observe as blue lights, which he assumed were like ice elements, and red lights, like fire elements, interacting as the meat heated up.
When he first saw mana, he wasn't able to distinguish them, but after a while, they started looking different to him.
He could see that mana wasn't just colorless balls of light but a mixture of different colors. He decided to call them elements since that was what he was most familiar with.
'I should probably find some salt and other metals or materials to make tools. This is honestly torture.'
As a man from a modern society, he, of course, craved modern luxuries.
'I should also learn how to sew.'
Leo thought as he turned towards a piece of pelt that had multiple holes in it and was cut unevenly.
'Yeah, it seems I have a lot to do.'
He thought as he chuckled slightly. Although he complained from time to time, he was actually pretty happy with his new life.
After finishing his meal, Leo picked up his daggers and walked to a relatively open area.
He had realized after the fight with the bear that he was extremely weak. The fight had honestly opened his eyes.
'I don't really care that much about getting strong or anything.I have no goals of taking over the world, no revenge I need to fulfill, and no ambition to become the best, but..' Leo clenched his daggers tightly as he got into a stance,'if living peacefully require strength I don't really have a choice now do l?'
He slashed down as an imaginary image of the bear appeared in front of him. Leo's eyes sharpened as he dashed towards it.
The bear didn't even move.
'Got it,'
Leo slashed down towards its belly, but then, when he tried to move, he couldn't feel his legs.
When he looked down, his whole lower body was gone.
Then Leo came out of his trance, breathing heavily.
'I didn't even see it move.'
A slight frustration bubbled up inside him, but he suppressed it.
'Of course I couldn't see it, it is more powerful than me by far.'
Leo got back in his stance as another bear appeared before him. This time it was smaller than the previous one.
'Let's see how long I can last with this.'
With that, he dashed forward once more. This time however, the bear moved as its paw came crashing down on him.
Leo side-stepped as the paw crashed down towards the ground, missing him by an inch.
The wide swing left the bear exposed, and Leo took full advantage of it as he got closer and slashed down towards the tendons of the extended limb.
However, a layer of ice appeared, blocking his strike.
Leo didn't linger and jumped back as ice erupted where he had been standing.
'That was close.'
Just as he was catching his breath, a shadow fell over him, and before he could react, a paw appeared right in front of his head, too close for him to avoid. His head popped.
Leo was once again out of his trance state.
'This should be good enough for now.'
Leo thought his breath was a bit ragged.
'If I keep at this l should be good enough maybe.'
Leo really wasn't sure about how creatures fought. What he was doing was trying to account for all possibilities by trying to mimic the bear's fighting style and the strength it showed.
Leo had always been good at memorizing things, which is why he was even able to get into cybersecurity in his past life. Coupled with imagination and his high intelligence, it suddenly didn't seem that impossible a thing.
Of course, all this was not accurate since he was literally fighting himself, and he couldn't account for how creatures would react after all, he wasn't an animal. But this was the best he could come up with.
'Let's continue.'
Leo then continued his training. The wolves who were watching from afar looked at him in pity, wondering if he'd gone mad.
Wannabe also watched, but he was able to make out what Leo was trying to do, but even he felt a bit embarrassed when Leo let out shouts while fighting air.
'Phew, I finally did it.'
Leo lay down on the ground as he caught his breath.
After hours of fighting, he was able to kill the mini bear. He had also discovered something. The rate at which his strength increased had almost doubled when he was practicing.
When he checked his stats, he was honestly surprised. After he'd gotten his skills, he saw that his stats improved at a rate of roughly one point per every four hours, with intelligence increasing by two.
But as he looked at his stats, he had gained double that amount in just four hours.
'It cut the time by half.'
Leo noted as he examined his body.
The strength increase wouldn't bother him if he continued training, so he wasn't worried about losing control of it.
'Anyways, I should probably start making some needles.'
With his new endurance, he didn't need to rest for long.
He got up and went back to the bear's carcass.
When he got there, he was surprised to find that the whole body was gone, leaving behind only bones.
'What the fuck! How did these guys finish all that?'
Leo was surprised by their appetite, even forgetting that his appetite bordered on theirs.
"Whatever, let's just get the bones and leave."
He picked up some of the bones and carried them back to his claimed spot.
"This should be enough."
He then picked one of the bones and placed it on a relatively flat surface, and then, using one of his daggers, he struck down at an angle to try to sharpen it. This, however, didn't work but actually backfired as his whole body got rattled.
'This thing is pretty hard.'
Leo thought while clutching his head. The bone had no scratches on it.
The daggers were pretty sturdy, so the problem was that Leo didn't have enough strength to damage them.
Leo stared at the bone and then threw it into the other piles of bones.
'What, you thought I would actually keep trying when it's clearly impossible, what a sadistic bunch.'
Leo thought, his delusions running rampant.
He then lay on the ground as he rested.
'I always wondered why reincarnators always tried to find civilization or went out to find trouble. This is pretty nice as it is.'
Leo closed his eyes as he relaxed.
'What's the point of face slapping even. Those guys are always so cheesy, and the villains are always lacking enough brain cells.'
At this point, Leo didn't really have anything to do, so he just rambled on, complaining about novels he'd read in his past life.
Leo didn't even realize when he drifted off to sleep.