I wandered for a bit, trekking through what must've been miles and miles of forest and snow. The [Zith Robes] kept me warm and comfortable, and – most importantly – kept me from freezing my ass to death. Still, walking for what must've felt like hours, not knowing where the hell I actually was, was its special brand of hell. And, unfortunately, unlike in an RPG game, I did not encounter wolves or bandits. It made sense, to be fair, since I was in the middle of nowhere. Bandits and brigands would stick close to main roads, where a lot of merchants and nobles and peasants frequented. Wild animals, based entirely on what I knew from documentaries and videos on youtube, really didn't approach humans as much as people might think. Sure, bear and wolf attacks happened from time to time; but, a vast majority of the time, wild animals really didn't like getting anywhere close to humans, which was fair enough.

I was also grateful for that, because I had no idea what I'd do if a bear showed up and tried to maul me. The more romantic side of me would say, "Ha! I have magic! Wild beasts are no match for me!" But the more realistic side of me would say, instead, "Dude, a bullet can't kill a bear in one shot; what makes you think you even have a chance?"

See, the conundrum was that the first voice was probably right. I had magic. In theory, I should be able to smoke just about every living thing in Planetos, short of an actual dragon. In practice, I'd start running before I could even think to cast a single Cantrip, unfortunately. I knew myself well-enough. When faced with violence, aggression, or the mere possibility of death, I'd run away. If I didn't stack everything in my favor, guaranteeing absolute victory, I'd retreat. That was just... how I grew up, I guess. My parents never taught me to be brave. They taught me to be smart and self-serving, to think only about myself and my needs. They didn't want me to dream of being a hero. 'Heroes died first,' my father always said. And, honestly, I agreed.

That said, if there was a bear and I was forced to fight for my life, then I'd be an idiot if I didn't try to blast it with [Chill Touch] or some other shit, while running away. I was a pretty good multitasker, actually, and I could damn well make sure to make use of that ability of mine in a life or death situation. Actually, considering the fact that I was very much an Archmage, every single spell that I had in my arsenal would be at their highest possible levels, which means my [Sapping Sting] is going to one-shot most things, probably, especially since I couldn't think of a single thing, except for dragons, in Planetos, with even a single ounce of magical defense. So, a bear would likely just drop dead with a single use of that spell.

That said, I'd absolutely shit my [Zith Robes] if a damn grizzly ever pounced out of the woods and jumped me.

Luckily, as I stated earlier, that hadn't happened.

In fact, nothing was happening. As I walked, the only thing I encountered were miles and miles of forest and snow, with a ton of large rocks and steep hills. Above me, the skies maintained an almost perpetual gloom of gray. Every once in a while, I'd come across a rabbit or some other small creature, running through the undergrowth, darting from one hiding place to another. Really, it was almost too easy to underestimate just how sharp the senses of prey animals were; a deer, for instance, would smell and hear me coming from a mile away, before I even knew they were there. But that was the whole point of it, I figured, their senses had to be sharp, because they evolved to run away from danger. It was the same here on Planetos as it was on Earth.

Eventually, I must've walked far enough as my ears perked to the distant, but unmistakable crashing of waves against a rocky shore, the roaring of the seas. Oh, great. Every survival show and guide I've ever seen told me that finding the shoreline was the first step to finding civilization. Even if I wouldn't find any fishing villages or hamlets, the shore was a good place to find food, like shellfish – maybe – and, well, fish. I'd gone fishing a dozen times over the course of my entire life, mostly when I was hungry and couldn't afford to buy food, wherein I learned to do so out of complete necessity; still, I was an amateur angler at best, but it was a pretty good skill to have in this situation, because no amount of Necromancer Magic was going to save me from starving to death and dying like a freaking chump.

I turned eastward, where I figured the noise was most prominent. Tall trees and steep hills obscured most of what I would've otherwise seen, but I was confident. Before me was a natural path, likely beaten by the passage of animals over hundreds of years. The snow was thinner here as well, halted as they were by the ancient oak trees whose gnarled and extensive branches stretched out in every conceivable direction, shielding the soil from a good portion of the falling snow.

Honestly, this place I'd woken up in, the location of which I'm still not entirely certain about, was actually rather... beautiful. I could definitely and rather easily picture myself hiking in a place like this. It reminded me a bit of the old days, when I was much younger, and my dad would take me out to hike in Yukon. This land was very similar; though it had far less green and more white and black and gray, it was still quite beautiful – in a grim and rugged sort of way.

And then, something came trotting out of a nearby bush, about fifteen meters away from me. My eyes widened and my body stiffened when a goddamn bear cub showed up right on the natural trail, cute and fluffy, walking without a single care in the world. It was small, likely only two or three months old. Now, a bear cub, in itself, wasn't anything to be worried about. Not only was it cute, it was also tiny; so tiny, in fact, that I could probably punt it into the air as though it weighed nothing. I wasn't going to do that, of course, because I wasn't a psychopath, but bear cubs were dangerous for one thing and one thing only; wherever they were, their mother was always close by. And bear sows were dangerous, because every mother's first instinct was to protect their child.

Everyone who has ever went out to hike would tell you that coming across a bear cub made their hearts go still, because the mother was never far away. And, unfortunately for you, bears were really good at killing things that threatened them.

Ah shit.

Gritting my teeth, I reached into my [Bag of Holding] and pulled out the [Great Boner]. A quarterstaff wasn't going to do jackshit to an angry bear, but it was still technically a long stick that might just keep me alive if I held it right. But, despite the shaking of knees and the thunderous beating of my heart, I couldn't run, because running would only invite the mother to come chase after me and I wasn't exactly Usain Bolt. No, I stood deathly still, my skin turning ice-cold. My feet froze, refusing to move. I couldn't run even if I wanted to. I was stuck.

Cold winds blew hard against me, howling into my ears and carrying a soft haze of snow and ice. The trees and their branches danced and sang and rustled. I caught the sound of breaking twigs and branches, of pieces of wood snapping in two. A massive shadow lumbered behind a tall patch of grass and bushes and thornbushes, a great mass of reddish-brown fur and two round ears that were the size of dinner plates.

Oh boy.

The largest fucking bear I've ever seen in my entire life came lumbering out of the trees, its claws so long and thick they appeared more akin to freaking machetes. Its limbs were as thick as tree trunks and its head was probably larger than my entire torso. The whole of it was about the size of a damn car. It was about twenty meters away, staring at me with beady black eyes. My hands trembled. Still, twenty meters was a sizable distance. I could run- I could-

Ah, fuck it.

Still shaking, I held out my right hand towards the giant fucking bear and breathed in. Ya know, this might be the worst possible way to experience casting magic for the first time. But, here I was about to do it. My plan was to cast [Chill Touch] first, just to see if I can startle the big sow and force it to run away, instead of charging. After all, most predators wouldn't attack something if they knew it could fight back and hurt them; most of the time, it simply wasn't worth the risk. The same was true for bears. However, this was a mother, who was protecting her cub; the same rules weren't going to apply. That said, like any other creature, bears were easily startled by things they didn't understand, things they've never seen before.

First and foremost, based on what I did remember about the spell, which – in itself – was a miracle, since I was actually really forgetful, [Chill Touch] summoned some sort of spectral hand that dealt necrotic damage to any target within range. The higher the level of the spell, the higher the damage; being an Archmage, all my spells were at the highest possible levels, which meant a single Cantrip would hit like a truck. And, since I don't see a dice anywhere, it was probably safe to assume that damage was no longer calculated by dice rolls, but by something else entirely.

I'd find out soon enough. I breathed in and pictured a spectral hand right over the mother bear's face, which should be enough of a shock to get it to run away – hopefully. And then, I muttered the name of the spell, an act that I thought was entirely pointless as I got the distinct feeling that I was more than capable of casting spells without uttering any sort of incantation, unless specified otherwise; I did it, however, because it helped separate reality from imagination, essentially acting like a trigger mechanism. Nobody wanted a pistol that shot bullets entirely on mental commands, after all. "Chill Touch..."

A pale, ghastly apparition of a hand appeared right in front of the giant bear, immediately startling the large creature as it let out a grunt and recoiled, before the hand surged forward and grasped the beast's face. It roared in fear and surprise as ice-cold fingers wrapped around its snout. The little cub panicked and cried and ran off – poor thing, but I couldn't do anything about it. And then, my eyes widened as the great big mother bear just... fell down.

Huh?

"What?"

Slowly, very slowly, and very cautiously, I took a single step forward. When the bear did not get back up and charge me, I took another and then another and then another, until I was only about six meters away. If it decided to get up and charge me from that distance, I was toast. And then, I saw the answer; the front half of its face, including its eyes, nose, and mouth was just... gone, necrotized into a dark gray goop. It was still alive, I realized, with dawning horror, but it couldn't breathe. The poor creature couldn't breathe. Instead of steady breaths, long and winded wheezes came from its throat, accompanied by spurts of blood. It would die, but it would die a slow and agonizing death.

A fucking Cantrip could do THIS?!

My heart twisted in my chest. If my dad saw what I'd done to this animal, he'd be pissed. A hunter's job was to ensure that his or her kill was instant, to ensure that their prey felt no pain or suffered as little as possible. I'd failed in that regard – royally so, even if it really wasn't my fault, considering I did not possess a rifle, and I had no idea how the spell interacted with actual living things that weren't make-believe on a table top session.

And it wasn't like I had a healing spell. Though, I wouldn't use one even if I did have it. The only thing I could do now was end its suffering.

I turned my gaze to the [Great Boner] and figured I might as well have my first undead minion.

"I'm really sorry about this." I muttered, raising my weapon, the [Great Boner] over its head. The enchanted quarterstaff had no sharp edges, true, but it was still a long stick with a tip that could be used to focus a bunch of kinetic energy into a small area. And the bear's eye socket was exposed. If I jammed it in there a bunch of times, pulping its brain, then the beast was going to die, no matter how big it was. So, I did just that. I struck it with all the strength I could muster. The crunch of bone, the squelch of flesh, and the spray of blood that followed afterwards made my stomach churn. "But it's do or die and I don't want to die."

I didn't have to strike it a second time, fortunately. And I knew it was dead when I took a step back and it slowly stood up, despite the hole in its skull, the enchantment of the [Great Boner] proving itself effective.

I breathed in and forced down the bile that'd risen to my throat. As a Necromancer, I was gonna have to get used to this. "Hello, my minion."