Chapter Fourteen: A Giant Bird Falls from the Sky

On the fourth day of his journey in this otherworld, Jia Zhengjin was free from worries of food and shelter. He had mastered the safest and most efficient means of obtaining sustenance, as well as the method of leveling up by hunting kobolds with traps.

Kobolds truly were a brainless race. Despite losing many of their kin to his snares, they would foolishly return the very next day to drink from the same spot, only to blunder into the traps and meet their end once more. The survivors wouldn't dare come back that same day, but by the following morning, they seemed to have forgotten everything and delivered themselves up to him again!

They were indeed foolish creatures of this world, but Jia Zhengjin found them endearing. After all, they reliably provided him with a steady stream of experience points every day, and occasionally dropped weapons or accessories—albeit the lowest, most shoddy kind.

While mining for iron ore, he also worked diligently to improve his tool-making skills. With his progress bar just over level three, he could now craft ordinary-quality tools of all kinds!

Jia Zhengjin played it safe, mining and hunting close to home every day. In this perilous and unfamiliar jungle, the smallest carelessness could cost him his life.

There’s an old saying: “Calamity comes even to those who stay at home.” No matter how cautiously Jia Zhengjin developed his base, misfortune could still strike.

Just today, as he was focused on mining—bothering no one and minding his own business—he suddenly sensed the sky darken above him. Looking up, he saw the very same golden giant bird he’d once glimpsed using its “Lightning Flash” skill in the forest. It plummeted from the heavens and crashed down right on top of him.

If not for a stroke of luck—a massive boulder lay just beside him—he might have been crushed into a pulp beneath its bulk.

At first, fear gripped Jia Zhengjin, and he hastily swapped his pickaxe for his iron shield and stone spear, ready to fight. But he soon realized the golden bird was utterly motionless, already dead!

He prodded it a few times with his spear; still no reaction. Gaining confidence, he stepped closer for a careful inspection.

It appeared to have died from fire, for its left leg was thoroughly cooked, and half its body gave off the aroma of roast meat.

The flames reminded him of the giant python he’d seen battling the golden bird. Cautiously, he scanned his surroundings, but the python was nowhere to be found. Only then did he relax.

Perhaps, he reasoned, the golden bird had been fatally wounded by the python’s fire during their fight. Clinging to life, it had tried to escape, only to collapse here when it could no longer go on.

Jia Zhengjin could only speculate—he truly didn’t know what had happened. Regardless, having a giant golden bird fall from the sky and nearly crush him was bad luck, but finding such a windfall—a huge bird carcass full of meat and feathers—was a stroke of incredible fortune! The only drawback was his lack of a refrigerator; he couldn’t store too much meat at once. Even if he and his pet, Little Ash, ate their fill, much of it would spoil before it could be consumed.

Ah, a refrigerator… but that required too many prerequisites. Even if he unlocked it with skill points now, he couldn’t craft one yet.

Still, he wouldn’t waste these resources. Whatever they couldn’t eat would make excellent bait for his traps to catch more centipedes, whose venom sacs and strange silk were highly valuable.

With this in mind, Jia Zhengjin promptly drew his knife and began harvesting. The abundant meat, feathers, and even the innards sent a thrill through him! And then he discovered something odd: a [Lightning Core], a diamond-shaped golden crystal. It looked a bit like quartz, but was clearly much more, radiating a mysterious power.

[Lightning Core Lv1]: The lowest grade of energy crystal, can be fused into a weapon to grant the power of lightning.

He’d never seen this item in the game, but from the description, it seemed quite rare and useful.

After a moment's thought, Jia Zhengjin took out the iron ingots he’d been saving for a workbench. Using twelve iron ingots and a wooden stick, he crafted a [Shoddy Iron Spear], then tried embedding the [Lightning Core] into it.

“Whoosh—” Something incredible happened. The Lightning Core erupted in golden light, enveloping the entire spear. When the glow faded, the core had vanished, but the iron spear now bore a distinct lightning mark on its tip.

[Lightning Spear Lv1]: This spear is imbued with the power of lightning, capable of unleashing surges of electricity in battle!

Jia Zhengjin gave the spear a few experimental swings, and sure enough, wherever it swept, crackling sparks flickered and popped. The current wasn’t particularly strong, though—far weaker than the golden bird's “Lightning Flash.” When he touched the spearhead himself, he only felt a slight numbness for a few seconds, nothing truly harmful.

Still, it was far superior to his stone spear! With this electrified weapon, his close-combat skills would improve dramatically.

He played with the Lightning Spear for quite some time before finally stowing it away in his pack.

The giant bird’s skeleton was too large to bury, so he simply dismantled it, storing the bones in his virtual backpack for later use. To be honest, he hadn’t planned to collect bones, since they were useful only for making bone knives or boiling down for glue. Glue would be invaluable later on, but at this stage, making it would only take up space. For now, upgrading tools, weapons, and armor remained his top priority.

If the Lightning Spear required a [Lightning Core Lv1], what level would the python’s fire core be? If he could harvest one from that beast, would it be even more powerful? After all, the golden bird had fallen to the python!

But that was just wishful thinking—he had no illusions about defeating the fire-spitting python with his current skills. Even if he crafted guns and cannons later, soloing that monster would be a long shot. Unless he had a rocket launcher—then perhaps a long-range bombardment could finish it off!

For now, he needed to stay grounded. After all, making the iron spear had cost him twelve iron ingots, which meant he’d have to spend another full day mining just to gather enough to build his workbench.

The sooner he built a workbench, the sooner he could manufacture better tools, weapons, and equipment—an obvious boon to his survival here. If he ever managed to craft a full set of iron armor, he’d finally have the confidence to face a whole troop of kobolds head-on, without relying on traps! With their wooden clubs, the kobolds would have no chance of breaking through his iron defenses.

While timid when alone, kobolds were fierce and ruthless in groups. Only by utterly overwhelming them could he make them flee in terror. Such was the nature of a race that bullied the weak and feared the strong.