Chapter 25: Towards the human territory

Sobek's journey was rather slow. Certainly not for the long road: since he could now reach 170 km/h, if he wanted to he could cover the distance that separated him from humans in less than five hours. The fact was that he wanted to thoroughly clean up every stretch of the river he passed through of all available fishes. That way he could level up and keep growing as he traveled. The preys in the river wasn't as abundant as in the swamp, but still they provided him a good amount. On the first day, he had covered 100 kilometers and gained 53,000 experience points. The second day he had covered another 130 kilometers and gained 66,000 experience points. He had therefore managed to cover abundantly the 100,000 experience points required to level up, reaching level 17. At 17 meters long and 5.7 meters high he was already the largest spinosaurus ever found in nature and probably also the biggest ever existed even in the zoos. However, as they used to say, the bigger, the better: he planned to reach at least 18 meters before he encountered humans. Sobek hadn't carnivores along the way; even if now he didn't need any more skill points, he knew that later he would have need them, so he started to storage them. He just hunted freshwater sharks and big fishes, and sometimes some crocodile, but not more. Even with this way, he already had 8 extra skill points. When he encountered bigger carnivores, instead, he just went away: he didn't want to take the risk of being hurt and the further he went, the more the river filled with creatures he would have rather avoided encountering. Initially he had only found small crocodiles and alligators, then things started to get complicated. Very soon the crocodiles that crossed his path had reached seven meters in length and many of them had very dangerous jaws. He had also noticed large snakes moving in the water. Most of them didn't exceed five meters, but some of them reached seven. They were extremely dangerous creatures, capable of crushing him effortlessly. At the end of the first day of travel he had even come across a purussaurus, a crocodile that had the pride of having the most powerful bite ever, even more than that of the t-rex and megalodon. It could exert 9 tons of pressure with its jaws, enough to break bones as if they were toothpicks. He wasn't an opponent Sobek intended to confront, so he quickly fled the area. During the second day he had found something even worse. [Prey identified: Deinosuchus riograndensis, crocodylidae. Experience: 55,000 points] Sobek hadn't thought twice as soon as he saw it: he'd activated [Swim speed] and fled as fast as he could. The deinosuchus was one of the largest crocodiles ever, a 12 meter long titan. Only its older cousin, the sarcosuchus, surpassed it. Sobek was five meters longer than the deinosuchus, but he was certainly not an opponent at its match. The crocodile was stronger, more agile, and more capable of killing than him. Furthermore, the deinosuchus possessed some of the most powerful bites ever recorded in nature, second only to the purussaurus. Unfortunately, the deinosuchus was not the only titan he had crossed that day. Towards evening he had noticed a serpentine shape moving in the water. [Prey identified: Gigantophis garstini, madtsoiidae. Experience: 60,000 points] The gigantophis was a giant snake over 10 meters long, the second largest ever found, surpassed in size only by the legendary titanoboa. Again Sobek had quickly left the area and not dared to bother the snake. While continuing was proving difficult, Sobek was still able to improve his knowledge about the dinosaurs. Many packs of that marvelous creatures went often to the river to drink, and so Sobek could observe them. Sobek discovered that Earth's humans knew very little about the dinosaurs: he found thousands of species that were completly unknown by Earth's scientists. After all, the fossilization process that allow Earth's humans to discovered the dinosaurs was very difficult to happen: fossils could testify less the 1% of all the incredible species that lived on the planet in the past. 99% of the creatures ever existed were disappeared from Earth without a trace, and so they were part of the so-called 'unknown unknown'. First, just the bones could fossilize. That means that almost all the boneless creatures of the past was disappear without a trace. Earth's humans knew only a few past invertebrates, and just for pure luck: they knew about some arthropods thanks to their exoskeleton and some molluscs and cephalopods because they had a shell. But sponges, jellyfishes, worms, octopuses, snails and other invertebrates were completly disappeared. That means that already the 70% of the ancient ecosystem was wiped out. Secondly, even for bones fossilization wasn't an easy process. The animals had to die in the right place, they couldn't be eaten by scavengers, they should had bury in a short time and they had to return to the surface just in time for the humans to find them. That means that many species couldn't fossilize. For example, in Jurassic period almost all the world was covered by forests, that weren't a good place to fossilization; so almost all the dinosaurs' skeleton from that time disappeared forever far before the humans could even just try to find them. Even if humans knew lots of dinosaurs, just some of them lived in the same ecosystem; most of the discovered species were some million years distant each other. And in the end, bones couldn't say very much. Earth's scientists still knew very little about prehistoric animals. They could only speculate about their behaviour. But now, Sobek could see real dinosaurs with his own eyes! If he could return on Earth, he could rewrite the entire paleontology. Like the birds, the dinosaurs showed the most amazing variety. Many of them was covered by soft plumage and had impressive decorations. Some dinosaurs had dark colors to camouflage in the forest, while others had bright colors to attract partners and appear dangerous. Some of them were straight or patterned. Some of them showed sexual dimorfism, while in other species males and females were very similar. Sobek could also finally really discovered something about dinosaurs' behaviour. Even for it, dinosaurs showed an extreme variety. They changed a lot in base of the family which they belonged. Megalosaurids formed small family groups, consisting of a monogamous couple and several broods. Abelisaurids, on the contrary, were pretty much solitary, but they formed monogamous couple for all their lives. There were just some little exceptions. Charcarodontosaurids, a giant family that compreended some of the biggest predators the world had ever seen, were in the middle. Most of their 'primitive' forms were solitary like the abelisaurids, but some of the most recent species, like giganotosaurus and mapusaurus, formed large packs and hunted togheter. Ceratosaurids were even more solitary than the abelisaurids and they were some of the few full poligamy dinosaurs that existed. Like the birds, in fact, many of the dinosaurs were monogamous. Piatnitzikysaurids, a very small and almost unknown family, lived in groups of two or three individuals. Tyrannosaurids had a high social capacity; they lived in packs of ten-twelve individuals. However, the cases were all the pack hunted togheter were rare: almost all the time just a couple went to hunt, while the others stayed behind. Just when there were famines and they were forced to hunt big animals like sauropods they went to hunt togheter. Dromaeosaurids were the most social carnivorous dinosaurs: they could leave in pack of 40 or even more individuals. Just some of them, like the utahraptor, were solitary. Ceratopsids lived in enormous packs with even 200 individuals. The males stood on the sides and protected the females and the young in the center. Males also competed for females' attention: their horns and shields were amazing colorful, and with Sobek surprise, male ceratopsids danced in front of the partner like some birds. Stegosaurids lived in more little packs, from 10 to 30 individuals, where there were an alpha female that decided were the pack should went. Males, instead, were solitary. Pachicefalosaurids were solitary, but they formed monogamous couples and familiar nucleos. Sauropods lived in great packs. The number of individuals was varied, but some packs could surpass the 1,000 individuals. Ornithomimids were like ostrichs: they lived in packs with an alpha couple. Heterodonthosaurids were more solitary and they barely form a couple that lasted for just the breeding season. Ankylosaurids were the most solitary dinosaurs: they lived alone for almost all their life and they reunited just for reproduce. Adrosaurids lived in packs of 40-60 individuals with a matriarch, like the elephants. Sobek was able to discover all that simple observing the dinosaurs that went to the river for some minutes. If he was able to observe them for a year, o maybe a decade, how much could he learned? "How wonderful and amazing this creatures are" he ended up thought. "What a loss for the Earth's humans not to be able to experience them firsthand!" He really wanted to stop and observed that ancient paradise for some more days, weeks, months... Sobek was tempted, but he was able to resist. He had a mission and he couldn't lost so much time. All that beauty was meaningless if he would have allowed to humans to destroy it. While he continue his travel, Sobek still managed to eat a fair amount of food each day. He needed 110,000 experience points to reach level 18, but after three days of traveling he had already recovered 72,000. He had also already covered about three-fifths of the way he had to go. It would have taken him still two days to get to human territory. At that point the plan was simple: let himself be seen, be photographed, and then disappear and wait. The advantage of cutting-edge technology was that anyone could use their cell phone to let the world know about the existence of certain creatures. After another day of travel, his experience reached 115,000 points. He could now reach level 18! After the ten seconds of agony had passed he ordered the System to open the main interface. [Spinosaurus aegyptiacus] Level: 18 Length: 18 m Height: 6 m Weight: 9 tons Diet: carnivore, fishivore Strength: 2,150 Agility: 1,960 Defense: 1,340 Maximum speed: 19 km/h Experience points: 5,000/120,000 Skill points: 13 Fame points: 0/1,000,000 Bonus Money: 33,580 Now he felt unique. He had reached a considerable size to say the least! Paleontologists estimated that the maximum length a spinosaurus could reach was 15 meters. On Eden's zoos there were even bigger specimen that could surpass 16 meters or even 17 meters. Now, Sobek had reached a sensational milestone! He was a giant among giants, the largest terrestrial carnivore ever existed! By now he weighed as much as a hundred and thirty people, or as a whole truck. He was longer than any other predatory dinosaur ever and as tall as a tyrannosaurus. On average, the floor of a house was four meters high, which meant it was now higher than a one-story house! Sure, he wasn't the most powerful, but he could still be proud of his results. Sooner or later, after all, he would have become invincible, so he might as well celebrate every little step. The first man on the Moon had uttered the famous words 'one small step for one man, one giant leap for mankind'. Sobek decided he could call his reaching level 18 'one small step for a spinosaurus, one giant leap for the dinosaur army'! "I didn't look the bonus money for a while..." he found himself thinking. "I didn't notice that they became so much. It's normal? I didn't understand. Well, who cares..." Now all he had to do was reach out to the humans. By now there were less than two hundred kilometers to go, so if he hadn't stopped he would have arrived in less than two hours. However, it was getting dark and he didn't want to swim with darkness, so he decided he would have continued on the following day. But at least he wanted to see where he was heading. So, after making sure there were no dangerous dinosaurs in the vicinity, he abandoned the protection of the water and went up a small hill. From up there he could get a general view of the landscape. Like a green sea, the forest covered everything. There were trees everywhere, north, south and west. Small strips of water that were rivers cut through the landscape and here and there you could see gray hills that were mountains. Everywhere, green dominated unchallenged. To the west, however, the landscape changed. After a short stretch of forest, the land turned yellow and sandy, typical of deserts. Even with the sun setting, Sobek could see holes in the desert and undoubtedly man-made structures. A small cluster of buildings stood on the edge of the forest, probably a city. Beyond the desert he could barely see some mountains hidden in the evening shadow. Sobek understood even more the need to hurry to evolve. He had no doubts that the desert was a forest until recently: if he wanted to prevent the entire continent from suffering the same fate, he had to act, grow and form his army as soon as possible. He went to sleep: when he met the humans he had to be at the maximum strength, because he could have been forced to flee. He had decided he would have gone to them at the crack of dawn, when he was still good rested. Unexpectedly, however, it was humans who came to him.