Xiang Kun thought that the changes in the owl probably followed the natural habits and nature of ordinary animals, and it had not intentionally undergone targeted training.
However, near the cave where the owl lived, there was a rock that was filled with claw scratches beside a lake. Xiang Kun realized that the owl had undergone targeted training.
Xiang Kun did not see how the owl had sharpened its claws from its memory. However, he deduced that the claw marks were left behind by the gigantic owl from the distance between the marks.
Based on the claw marks, not only had the owl sharpened its claws on the rock, but it had also attacked the rock in different ways. Initially, the “marks” made by the claws were very light, but they gradually became deeper. The owl clearly had imagined the rock to be its prey and attacked it. Xiang Kun could also imagine how the owl’s claws had been injured and broken initially. However, since the owl was able to recover quickly from its injuries, the injuries did not affect the owl’s survival. After undergoing transformations after drinking blood, the sharpness and hardness of its claws definitely increased.
The gigantic and sharp claws of the gigantic owl became stronger and stronger like that.
After discovering the owl’s training method, Xiang Kun had a thought. Could he also sharpen his nails like the owl? If he had sharp nails, he would not need any weapons and could attack with his bare hands just like the owl and cause great impact…
However, he gave up on this idea almost immediately. After all, a bird’s claws and a human’s hand structure were different. Humans used their hands mainly as a tool. It would be alright if he was able to transform his hands into “iron claws”, which he would be able to use freely. However, if he transformed his nails into sharp claws like those of a wild beast, it would not only attract unnecessary attention, but also make his everyday life difficult. He would not even be able to type on his keyboard without his nails getting stuck.
Xiang Kun also found a stack of small rocks in the cave of the owl. Initially, he did not understand why the owl needed the stack of rocks. It did not seem to be making a nest. Unless the owl was “decorating” its own cave?
However, after searching through the owl’s memory, he found a scene where the owl hunted for its prey, drank blood, and consumed the rocks. This caused him to speculate.
Could it be a method that the owl had used to suppress its sleepiness after drinking blood?
One had to know that the wild was unlike the city—there were all sorts of danger in the mountains and forests.
Xiang Kun bought rabbits from the wet market and kept them at home. He would kill them when he needed their blood and slept immediately after he felt sleepy. His friends or family might look for him at his house if they could not contact him for an emergency. Other than them, nobody would look for him and he would not be in any danger.
However, the owl had to hunt for its own prey for their blood. That was because if the blood had left the prey’s body for too long or if the prey had been dead for too long, the effect would be nullified. Therefore, it would immediately drink blood or head to a nearby place to drink its prey’s blood. It would not intentionally bring its prey back to its cave. After all, the prey it caught were not small.
This meant that if the owl felt sleepy after drinking blood and would not be easily woken up as it slept for a relatively long period of time, it was dangerous for it to sleep at a random location in the wild.
Therefore, it had swallowed the rocks to suppress its sleepiness until it flew back to its cave, spat the rocks out, and slept in peace.
Other than that, there was no other reason to explain why the owl had swallowed the rocks and spat them out in its cave. After all, it was only able to drink blood and could not eat any other food. It did not need the rocks to aid in its digestion.
As for why the owl had chosen rocks over other meats or plants that were more suitable to be “eaten”, Xiang Kun guessed that rocks were probably more dense and easily suppressed if the owl felt like vomiting. The owl was also able to vomit them out completely when it wanted to.
Of course, those were merely speculations made by Xiang Kun. He wanted to experiment by himself when he went back.
If it was effective, the method could be used for emergencies.
It was like the day after fighting with the owl—if he had been able to stop himself from falling asleep, he could’ve probably seen the process of the disappearance of the owl’s body. That would help him greatly in understanding the changes in his body.
Of course, more importantly, he could avoid sleeping for long hours in dangerous areas.
Although he was unable to find the reason behind the transformation in the owl, he could make use of the traces in its rest area and compare them with its memory to figure out the process of its transformation. That could help him greatly in understanding his own condition.
After all, judging from how he would fall asleep and undergo some changes in his body after drinking blood, the gigantic owl must have been through many more changes than himself.
Be it the number of transformations or the duration, the owl was Xiang Kun’s “senior”.
Moreover, having lived in the mountain for four and a half days, Xiang Kun could better understand the improvements and changes in his body functions. He was also able to proceed with familiarising his body and training.
Apart from obtaining night vision from the owl’s blood, Xiang Kun’s vision, hearing, and sense of smell had significant improvements. Moreover, it was not merely the improvement in terms of sensitivity.
In the mountains, he could distinguish and identify the sounds and scents of various organisms. This was a skill that Xiang Kun, having lived in the city, never had. It was as though he had obtained the “database” from the owl.
This enabled him to survive easily in the forest, and he felt as though everything was under his control.
Sometimes, he wondered how amazing it would be if he could fly like the owl.
Of course, that was a mere thought. If he really had a pair of wings, he could only stay hidden in the forest.
…
Xiang Kun, who was sprinting on the paths of the mountain, suddenly stopped and looked back at the mountain.
Although he was not in the “mountains”, it was very far away from the area he was in the past few days. Although the place was not developed and there were very few people, roads were constructed. There was a village and temple on the mountain, and some villagers would occasionally drive in and out. There were also visitors to the temple.
The reason Xiang Kun had stopped was because he had heard the sound of a car. After ten seconds, a SUV appeared.
He raised his right hand and pointed his thumb, making a hand sign to flag the car down.
To be honest, he did not have much hope. Four cars had already passed by him earlier on and ignored his hand gesture.
Of course, he could not complain about that. If he was driving the car and saw a bald man standing barefoot by the roadside, trying to flag a car down, he would not stop for the man either.
Anyway, if he continued to run and take “shortcuts”, it would not be much slower than taking a car. The mountain road was too steep and there were many sharp turns. One would not dare to drive quickly here.
He had checked the map when he had signal on his cell phone. There was a relatively big village at the foot of the mountain. He should be able to rent a car to send him to the nearest village or town so that he could buy a ticket to go home.
However, he was in luck this time. The SUV stopped beside him.