Chapter 11

...

Floor 1 – Day 41

[Status]

Name: John

Attributes

Class: None – Skills: 2/6

Titles: None

Perks:

Strength:

15

-

[Domicile] – 1st floor

Dexterity:

12

Archery 5

Constitution:

14

Resist Poison 6

Intelligence:

10

-

Wisdom:

10

-

Charisma:

10

-

It was night.

Dark, moonless, and cold.

The sun was gone.

Winds whipped at me.

And I climbed.

Up the mountainside. Up and up, and up. The mountain wasn't normal, it didn't seem to change. It was a steady incline, with no path or clear course. There was no need to climb up rock faces, but there was no flat ground either. Just an endless uphill march, where there was never a good place to rest. Every place I thought I might settle, hardly seemed to welcome me. Often, I almost felt I might fall, should my foot only slip: the motion might cause me to stumble backwards, and roll endlessly down the slope.

Everything about it seemed unnatural. As if the very mountain was aware of me, and was acting the moment I thought to stop. As if it were making things clear, that I could only go forward, unless I wanted to give up entirely.

Still, I continued upward.

The mountain never seemed to get much steeper. It was not quite a cliff face that moved towards a vertical wall. It did not confront me with the impossible, only more. More and more, further and further to go. It remained a steady, almost staircase-like gradient. Loose stones piled along exposed bedrock, where layers of stone counted on in strange lines of color and shade. I had no knowledge to identify or understand them, but I could only imagine each represented great age. Each layer in the stone had to be countless lifetimes.

And yet: it never seemed to stop.

Up, and up, and up, as the wind began to truly howl and the air felt thinner. Not so bad that I could no longer breathe, but far less useful. Less than I was expecting with each inhale. The air was weakening me, and yet it wasn't nearly so bad as I expected. While the air was thinner, I could still continue. Perhaps, I thought, this was the [Trial] providing a small mercy.

Yet, this forced me to slow.

My body simply couldn't sustain my pace. My lungs burned. My vision grew dim, until I stopped to rest.

My pace dropped from slow, to crawl.

After an entire day of this, I was barely moving. One small step, followed by another small step.

But there was nowhere to stop.

There was no plateau. There was no respite. Only more mountain.

Cold...

Tired...

Pulled... No: dragged down by my pack. I felt as if any further exertion, and I’d barely be able to breathe. That my body might give out, all at once.

And still, I pressed on.

Digging my gloved hands into cracks among the mountain, I held on as another freezing gust pressed at me, snow whipping, tempting me to fall. My pack swayed, pulling at my center of balance, but I held fast until the wind lessened again.

Upward I went, as my boots crunched snow, and ice.

Upward I went until I was all but entirely on my hands and knees.

The wind was ever-stronger.

The cold was biting.

The air was barely enough.

I knew that the summit was close. Somehow, I could feel it. Like an invisible beacon in the dark, I could sense it. That cresting moment just up ahead. Where I would finally reach the peak, but every inch higher I climbed, the worse the wind got.

I began to question myself, my choices, and my life. Was this mountain really here, at all? Or was this just like the sun and the cloudless sky, fit to change on whatever whims had created this place. Was this all just intended to cause me to suffer, I wondered. Was this all just to torture me? To provide me just enough to keep going, but never enough to reach the end?

I was tempted more than once, to throw down my heavy pack. To give up everything, just to make it a little easier. To strive towards the promise of escape from this horrible wind and cold unburdened, but instead I continued.

If I wanted to live, I could not give up. I could not afford to rush. I could not afford to leave my possessions behind. Perhaps some others could take these risks, but I could not.

So, I needed to keep going.

Slowly.

Painfully.

Yet, consistently.

Until I was finally there.

On my knees, I found myself at the very top of the world. Above everything that ever was, and ever will be.

Where, beyond the darkness, I could see the rising sun on the horizon, cresting up over endless forests and meadows. Trees stretching much like an ocean, to the horizon. An entire world, unexplored.

Far, far, down below, I could faintly make out the shape of what might have been my house. Just a tiny dot in a tiny field far beneath the rising sun.

My life, now left far behind.

Then, came the messages:

[Floor 1 – Task Completed]

[Standard Bonus awarded] [+1 Free Attribute Point]

[Additional Bonuses awarded]

[Hidden Condition – Survive at least 10 days] - [+1 Free Attribute Point]

[Hidden Condition – Survive at least 20 days] - [+1 Free Attribute Point]

[Hidden Condition – Survive at least 30 days] - [+1 Free Attribute Point]

[Hidden Condition – Survive at least 40 days] - [Title Awarded – Wise Man of the Mountain]

[Maximum Additional Bonus – Reached]

[Title Awarded – Ambitious]

[Floor 1 – End]

[Floor 2 – Beginning]

Then, all went black.