Forever

The eyes loomed over him as he stared straight ahead, pointing his spear forward, not so much scared, as he braced himself for the pain to come. The dwindling light behind him only illuminated the rocky floor of the cave, gray stone wet with condensation, an orange glow still shining across. Neither moved, waiting for the other to make a move, as Salim tried to get control of his breath, as the creature stood stock still.

Slowly, he walked backwards, taking careful steps as he tiptoed his way out, only stopping when he reached the entrance. The creature hadn’t followed, causing him to lose track of it as evening ended, trapping him as the moon rose. Salim was thanking his luck that whatever the creature was hadn’t attacked him, and considered his options.

The outcropping he found himself on was not an easy to descend, with the only way forward being a difficult looking shelf of stone that he had to jump to. Not wanting to risk a fall in the middle of the night, Salim decided that staying in front of the entrance of the cave was the better option. Whether it was a monster wasn’t relevant, it hadn’t immediately attacked him, and while he wasn’t keen on staying around it was a new moon, and with any luck they wouldn’t be in a position to come all the way down the mountain if he was spotted.

So on the stone he rested, spear laying to his side, back resting against the moss covered wall as he shimmied from side to side, attempting to get comfortable. Murky darkness began to set in as night fell, clouds covering the stars, and making it impossible to see anything other than the outcropping he was sitting on. As Salim stared into the natural abyss, he imagined how it could move, his eyes catching the darkness trailing in strange shapes, speaking a language he couldn’t understand as wind buffeted the cliffside.

Trying to ignore the crushing solitude, Salim began to make plans for something that was a long time coming, how to cast a fireball. Images of flames filled his mind, how ignition worked, the ball he would need to shape, the size of the explosion it would make. As he got more and more convoluted with his plans, he decided to take a step back to consider realistic options.

Ignition first, he needed to first find a way to create fire, a skill that would be incredibly useful to master just on its own and would mean no more stick rubbing for him. The difficult part was trying to form the initial idea of a spark, he played with the idea of creating friction with his mana, but ultimately that was too complicated for any worthwhile results. Eventually, after a few minutes of testing, he settled on simply turning his mana into heated sparks, metaphorically burning energy for heat.

It took him around an hour to flesh out his program for the spell, since he wanted to produce the spark from his hand, he needed to transform the mana before it fully left his body and he lost control. Preparing for the first test, Salim pointed his fingers at the ground, and began to channel the spell. Mana began to take form in the shape of his pattern as he concentrated, pulling, forming, guiding, until all at once the small amount of mana left his fingertips.

Light! Sparks of light streamed out of his fingertips like firecrackers, his hand heating under the soft glow of the light. His eyes shined as the spell succeeded, an intoxicating euphoria that made him completely forget about the cold winds buffeting him against the stone of the cliff. He had succeeded after weeks of failure, and without Fallon providing comments that never seemed to really help.

Unfortunately, he seemed to be stuck producing sparks, for whatever reason, he struggled to shape how the sparks came out, using his fingers to produce a wave of light was the best he could do. Another issue was that he was producing the effect while the sparks were just leaving his fingers, causing them to start feeling hot and raw.

There has got to be a better way of doing this. Fallon doesn’t produce things from inside their body, they just send out the tentacles to do it for them.

How would I even do that? If I could just… Mana flowed pointlessly out of his hand, dispersing into the air as he sighed and shook his head.

You have invented a new spell!

Event has been Logged.

You have gained a Level!

At least I’m making some sort of progress. He decided to up his mental stats to hopefully get some sort of inspiration that might make his attempts more effective.

Lvl. 16

Stats

Confirm

Might: 26

-/+

Finesse: 28

-/+

Resilience: 49

-/+

Acuity: 27 (30)

-/+

Resolve: 26 (30)

-/+

Depth: 25 (28)

-/+

The headache from the level up was hard and fast, causing his eyes to swim in tears before his head cleared, and the pain was gone, his thoughts slightly faster than they had been before. The actual effect of each individual stat point was interesting to Salim, but had no way of testing, he didn’t think about it too much. With his stats being so far above what he started, he was visibly stronger than when he started, although the lack of gym equipment was making it hard to judge.

Flexing his pudgy arms, he quickly did ten pushups, reveling in ease as he was still full of energy. Before his abduction, he struggled to do five in a row, sweating and huffing with each movement of his arms. Feeling satisfied with his increased strength, he went back to his attempts at forming a ball of the sparks, his attention getting sucked back into his project.

As his core slowly emptied, he slowly came out of his creative stupor, deciding to stop, wanting to save mana just in case. He thought about the eyes he saw in the cave, a chill running down his spine. Scooting a few more feet away from the cave, he tried to get some shuteye, the lids of his eyes closing for what only felt like a few seconds before the sun was once again glaring down at him.

With the heat on his forehead, Salim shielded his eyes as he stretched, arms outstretched as he basked in the warm glow of the sun. The sound of birds chirping filled the air as stone and gravel was crunched beneath him as he shifted in place while smiling. Genuinely, he was smiling for the first time since coming to this place, the feeling of progress in his head and freedom in his heart while he ignored his aching body.

After a few minutes, he began to move in earnest, getting to his feet as he planned to continue his descent down the cliff. His options were limited, with sheer drops on one side, and a leap of faith on the other, he had to hype himself up, only wincing slightly when his lame foot touched the ground. Sufficiently fired up, he stepped back, over near the front of the cave, and counted down in his head.

As the count hit two, he felt the hair on his arms stand up on end, something shifted in the air as he glanced around, his attempt to clear the gap delayed as he tried to figure out what was wrong. It didn’t take long to notice what it was, the entrance to the cave, the two eyes, three, many eyes? Stared at him like a predator, the form of the creature somehow still camouflage even with the sun beaming from above, its eyes seeming to float in front of the cave.

Squinting as he backed away, being mindful of the edge of the cliff, Salim squinted at where the creature probably was, trying to see the form of the creature through its disguise. He stood completely still, just waiting for something to happen, as he watched the small rocks near the side of the cave slowly move, repelled by an invisible force. Reaching the edge of the cliff, he focused on the small stones, as the eyes seemed to be slowly adapting to the disguise, all eight of the beady large eyes staring at him.

As the next set of rocks were pushed out of the way, he thought he saw something, a flicker, some piece of the image not quite right as the rocks furthest away from him seemed to disappear. A solid stony texture moved in front of the stones as they disappeared from view. Salim felt an audible click in his head as he realized what was in front of him, finally recognizing what was taking place.

SPIDER.

With quick jerky movements, he took off with a sprint, tiny pebbles underfoot almost causing him to slip as a grating noise emanate from his foot against the ground. The gigantic spider seemed to act on queue, a deep hiss that mimicked the grinding of two giant boulders sounded as it pounced. Missing by a good couple feet as he moved, the bulk of the spider caused the outcropping they were standing on to shake, Salim losing his footing as he slipped off the edge.

His stomach dropped as the feeling of weightlessness overtook him, his mind spinning as he tried to find some way to survive. Hands reached out to grab the edge of the cliff, finding purchase but struggling to keep his grip with sweaty palms and shaking arms. He had completely lost track of the spider, his focus on the edge of the cliff, and that even with his increased stats he was struggling to pull himself up.

As he struggled to push himself past his shoulders, he had a burst of inspiration, possibly fueled by the daunting drop he was dangling over. As he channelled all the remaining mana in his core, his hand kept slipping, fingers attempting to dig into the rock wall with all the strength he could muster as the mana in his core was pushed to move faster. With a rippling roar from his channels, rippling power erupted as it was sent to his feet, trying to invert the push spell to trigger on his body.

While he was struggling to make it follow his directions, the mana began to clot in his legs from his failed attempts, as it went off inside his body with more force than expected. Grunting in pain, he held onto the edge with all the strength the adrenaline pumping through his body allowed for, his body feet hinging upwards as his fingers bled. Arms twisted and contorted in ways they never had before as his body came back around, back slamming straight onto solid ground as his head dangled from the edge.

You subverted danger with a clever use of a spell!

Event has been Logged.

You have gained a Level!

He quickly dismissed the notification, painfully moving his arm back around his head and untangling the rest of his limbs. Scrambling onto his feet, he looked around, not spotting the eyes of the monster as he smashed his back into the cliff, safely away from the edge.

Where are you… dear God, what did I do to deserve this?

Keeping his eyes peeled, he attempted to use [Arcane Eyes] to try and find the invisible giant death spider, only finding wisps of mana originating from the mouth of the cave. The wisps had an earthy brown color, slowly curling itself around the edges of the entrance, like claws ready to drag him into the darkness.

How the hell am I still alive? I went inside, it could have eaten me then!

Lvl. 17

Stats

Confirm

Might: 26 (32)

-/+

Finesse: 28 (31)

-/+

Resilience: 49 (50)

-/+

Acuity: 30

-/+

Resolve: 30

-/+

Depth: 28

-/+

Quickly throwing his points into his physical stats, he muffled his groan as he felt the fat from his limbs burn slightly and get replaced with a small amount of muscle. Shaking out the cramps that sometimes came with the level ups, he prepared himself once more, his runway this time being much shorter since he wasn’t going to stand in front of the cave again. Readying himself once again, he took a deep breath, feeling the cool mountain air fill his lungs.

He sprinted, pumping his legs as fast as he could, trying to ignore the pain from his ankle, reaching the edge in milliseconds as he buckled his legs, pushing off as hard as he could, and sending him flying across the gap. The jump wasn’t far, about as long as he was tall, but he wasn’t about to fall to his death by half-assing it. For a full second, he was flying over the gap, making sure not to look down as he closed in on the other side.

CRACK.

Coming to a screeching halt, he clipped his bad foot on the edge, sending him tumbling once more unto the ground, safely on the other side. After several minutes of lying in pain, he pulled himself together and stood up. Brushing the debris from his body, he started exploring the new path, carefully scaling the decline while minding his injured leg, only sliding to the bottom once he saw it was safe. Thankfully, the slide didn’t last long as it flattened out, leaving him on another outcropping, this one full of thin spindly trees.

Taking time to appreciate what little shade the trees could provide, he sat for a while before, reluctantly beginning to move, as he made a slow but consistent journey down the plateau.