Heat and death spread with an orange glow. 

There was not a lot of shrubbery or weeds on the ground level, mostly roots and dirt. So, the fire did not spread very well on the ground level, however the tops of the giant trees were touching including their middle and lower branch levels. This caused the fire to spread by the trees which would eventually also travel to the ground.

The brightness kept getting brighter and while smoke did mostly go out of the top, a good portion was forced down by the bottom part of the fire. Fire and smoke spread throughout the forest. Tonight many would see the fire.

I ran towards the south and at the moment away from the stream, but I planned to go back to the stream after passing the fire.

Animals began to react to the fire. I heard some howls of wolves, some chickens, birds and some other noises I did not recognize. As I ran I even saw a rabbit.

The fire is spreading, but it seems to be on the slow side…. Does that mean it will take days to burn? I remember that firefighters would fight forest fires for days and planes would pour water from the sky. 

I finally passed the section of the fire and began to angle my flight towards the stream. After a while I made it to the stream and then I followed it to the south. I stopped running because I was panting and the fire did not look like it would be fast.

As I went I saw many animals flee, including a T rex. It even saw me, but it did not seem interested and just kept going away from the fire.

I spent almost all night moving away from the fire and finally found a spot to sleep a little before the sun began to rise. 

I woke up that morning and could see that the fire was still slowly spreading and the forest was a bit smoky. I was concerned that maybe I would cause the entire forest to burn down, but then I remembered that I almost died and  I do not regret living. 

If I had not caused that fire, the wolves would have kept hunting me. Maybe I could have killed enough of them around my campfire to make them retreat but I doubt it and I would have no ammo left. 

I checked my stuff and found that I only had 7 bullets left. I had about 6 packets of oatmeal and 2 packets of mashed potatoes. I had my water bottle full of water and would always refill it after drinking but now I was a bit hesitant. The stream began to have ashes floating in it. 

I have no idea if I am supposed to drink this or not.

I decided that I needed to find a new stream, keep going away from the fire and to hunt new food to keep my packaged food as my emergency food. 

I decided to go directly south. 

A few days have passed. I had continued to survive but had not made great successes. I made a fire and makeshift shelter each night. I hid in trees, between rocks and even dug and made burrows like a rabbit with wooden shovels I made out of sticks. 

I hunted rabbits and birds. I was mostly unsuccessful. I broke a few of my arrows and now I only have 3 left. My traps were not that great. I was able to catch one rabbit simply because I  created a fire on one side of its home and waited at a different hole. I caught it but not before it was able to scratch my arm with its horn. I did bleed but it was not that bad, the bad thing was that my clothes had holes all over it. In fact because my arms had been burnt, the clothes practically were falling off around my arms, luckily the fire had mostly burnt my clothes rather than my arms. My hands were not as lucky. The fires and cuts I had on my body made it hard to sleep at night. 

Good news is that my boots were still holding up. 

I was able to find a different stream and it was even bigger.

I had used a few of my packets, I now only had 1 potato packet and 3 oatmeal packets. I had mostly lived off of berries and shrubbery I knew was not poisonous. 

I was able to notice that there were deer-like creatures. I once caught a glimpse of a small group as they drank from the stream. They seemed a bit bigger than deer, about the size of elk and their coats were a really dark color, nearly black. The odd thing was that their antlers were dark too, a pitch black, but when I stepped closed and startled them. The main one looked at me and his antlers started to glow a dark purple. This made me stop and be more cautious. The other deer used this time to run and then the main deer ran after them. 

This shocked me and I began to think of animals that could have parts of their body glow. The only one I could think of was fireflies. 

Fireflies reminded me of insects, I had obviously seen some before but not in large numbers. However, I saw a huge mosquito once as it rested on a tree. Its belly was purple and bloated. Just so you know, this mosquito was about half the size of my hand. It scared the shit out of me and so I avoided it.

I had been better at hiding, practically bathing in mud and dirt every day but I still ran into predators from time to time. Luckily I was able to either get away or scare them away. The point is that I did not have to use my limited supply of bullets. I lost one arrow when I shot a wolf in the shoulder.

I was still struggling to survive but at least I had lowered the amount of near death experiences and I was learning. I was actually quite stressed and depressed but I was able to avoid negative effects by focusing on working to survive.  

The fire kept spreading and the smoke also kept spreading but I was able to travel faster than the spreading fire when walking, but I needed to rest. The fire began to catch up to me, but then it rained suddenly one day.

I was not prepared for the rain and ended up getting wet. It got kind of cold and the fire finally went out with lots of complaints as shown by the sizzling I could hear for nearly an hour.

I was finally able to slow down my march to the south and focus on exploring and learning the skills to continue to survive. I wanted to hunt one of those deer. 

I thought that after rain it might be a good time to go hunting, since tracks would be fresh. I also had discovered the area where I knew some deer hang out. The spot was an open meadow that had a spring. I passed it today, and I was sure the fire would reach it this evening, but now the fire is out so I think I can hunt there. I will try to go hunt a deer tomorrow morning.