The Cave Muskox moved on two periods of sleep later. He hesitated thinking of them as “nights,” as he had no way of keeping time in the cavern. The hairy beasts had eaten the mushroom forest down to nubs, save for the hip-high giant mushrooms and the phosphorescent shelf fungus. With no food left, they turned as a herd from the grove and ambled into one of the many tunnels that led from the immense cavern.

In that time Paul had retrieved his bundle of death-rat skin, meat, and bones from the den, setting to work on crafting himself a pair of pants, ruining half the pelt in the process.

Pants are fucking complicated.

Paul looked over his abortive attempts at his clothing with dismay. No matter what he did, he couldn’t come up with a way to create pants for himself that didn’t require extensive amounts of sewing. Paul didn’t consider the hours he spent cutting at the skin with his claw-knife entirely, fruitless, however, as, during that time, he received a new message.

*New Skill Gained: Leatherworking*

With the newfound knowledge brought by the skill, Paul realized that pants were entirely beyond his ability and materials at the moment. Not wanting to go naked, Paul set back to work.

I still want pants, but this will have to do for now.

Paul was pleased with the result, overlapping pieces of pelt forming a kilt of sorts, thin strips of animal hide laced through them to create an improvised belt that kept the top of the skirt above his hips.

Paul hadn’t realized just how vulnerable being naked had made him until he wore the kilt. He immediately felt safer and more confident, and while the raw hide scratched at his waist and the pelt’s short bristly fur itched, he felt more comfortable as well.

During his waking hours, Paul continued working on the remains of the pelt, earning another rank in leatherworking, though the skill mainly reinforced to Paul how crude his current techniques were. To take advantage of a hide, Paul now knew that he had to cure and tan it, processes that he knew could take weeks to do correctly.

That raised an uncomfortable question for Paul, one that he hadn’t been able to come to grips with yet. Was he prepared to stay in this cavern for the rest of his lives?

The question squirmed in his mind, eating away at his thoughts.

The answer, of course, is “no.” But that means I have to confront the fact that there’s been no evidence that anyone is going to rescue me. And I’m not going to get out of here by sitting on my ass in this cavern. That means…

Paul didn’t want to complete his thought, panic rushing back to its familiar home in his mind.

That means I’m going to need to explore the tunnels.

Memories of being disemboweled, and having his throat ripped out in the dark were still as fresh as wet blood. He tried to push past the memories, the fear, willing himself to reason.

The claws tore at his abdomen again in his mind, hot breath on his face and four red eyes glowing in the black.

Paul put his head in his hands, tearing at his thinning hair.

I’ll go later.

He had run out of rat meat days ago, despite rationing himself, stretching it for four more periods of sleep. The last of it had turned rancid and rotten. Paul was so hungry that he ate it anyway, cutting it into small pieces and swallowing them whole so he didn’t have to taste them.

After the rat was gone, he tried killing the lizards and voles, but most had left, along with the snakes. He assumed that with nearly all the mushrooms gone they moved to forage elsewhere. Paul had never been so hungry as now, and his gut seemed to coil and twist inside of him like a spring wound too tight. He felt weaker, having to stop for rest more often, becoming light headed after only walking halfway across the cavern.

Despite his newfound knowledge of wilderness survival, not a lot of it helped him. From the skill, he understood how to make a snare, to catch an errant vole or lizard, but without materials to do so, all that knowledge was useless to him. Occasionally, Paul would glance at one of the tunnels, trying to build up his courage to explore and find something to kill. Twice he got as far as standing in front of a tunnel entrance, war-club in one hand and bone-shiv in another, but both times his feet refused to move when he tried to push himself into the darkness of the tunnel.

Despite the warmth of the shelf-fungus that he had chosen as his bed, the nights were still cold, and every time Paul woke from his sleep he found his muscles tight and cramped.

On the third day without food, Paul tried to eat a beetle. Smashing it with his rock first, Paul gagged, then placed the thumbnail-sized insect in his mouth. His teeth broke through the insect's chitin, and an acrid liquid burst against his tongue. Paul screamed as the inside of his mouth sizzled noisily, the caustic liquid eating away at his soft palate. He rushed to the stream, placing his mouth under the water flow to clean his mouth of any remnants of the beetle.

Bleeding sores and blisters covered his tongue, the inside of his cheeks, and roof of his mouth. He didn’t try to eat again that day.

Sleep didn’t come easy, pain from his empty stomach warring with the searing pain from his mouth.

He didn't sleep well, but when he rose the next day he found that hundreds of mushrooms had sprung back up. Paul carefully harvested the mushrooms that the voles and herd seemed to prefer. They tasted musty and earthy but were filling, and Paul almost cried when they stayed down. He did cry when he had a second helping and bit the inside of his cheek, breaking open a blister and spilling coppery tasting blood into his mouth.

Still, if he could eat the mushrooms, Paul knew that he wouldn’t go hungry, and for the first time in days, he slept on his shelf-fungus with a full stomach.

Paul woke to stabbing agony. Sharp, jagged pain flared through his gut, and Paul gasped and almost fell from the shelf-fungus as he swiped with his jawbone club at assailants that weren’t there.

The agony in his stomach came alongside an urgent need to vacate his bowels, and Paul half-crawled half-ran to the divot in the cavern floor that he used as a latrine. He didn’t make it, and foul-smelling, runny shit ran down his legs only halfway to his destination.

He managed to clean himself off in the stream, only to have his stomach clench again, and Paul collapsed into the frigid water. Soaked and freezing, Paul struggled to his feet, just to bend double in wracking pain yet again. He didn’t know how long he lay there, convulsing and shitting, but eventually, he lost consciousness.

*Processing Death*

*Alpha Level Implant - Beginning Reconstitution Process*

Paul woke to darkness again. After his initial relief that his bowels weren’t betraying him and his rock was back in his hand, fear crept back in.

I'm back in the tunnel. Back in the darkness. Back in the cold. Back as a hunted animal.

“Shut the fuck up Paul!” He screamed at himself.

Yes, you’re back in the tunnel, yes, it’s fucking dark. Yes, there are things out there that want to kill you. Yeah, it’s a shitty situation. So. What the fuck are you going to DO about it?

Eventually, his breathing slowed again.Paul wiped his eyes and stood up. Now that he was back in the darkness, avoiding it for the last week seemed silly.

These tunnels are deadly. But so is sitting on your ass and waiting to die… again. Now get your shit together, and let’s start making some plans.

Paul’s trip back to the cavern was uneventful, and he navigated the tunnel with ease due to his enhanced vision. Along the way, he thought about his next steps to survive.

Work the problem backward, Paul. First, start with the end-goal, then work back. What actions have to take place for you to reach that goal?

Okay, end-goal: Get back home. To get back home, I have to first to get out of these caves. To get out of these caves, I have to first be able to explore them so I can try and find an exit. To investigate the caves, I have to be able to protect and feed myself. To defend and feed myself, I have to get better at killing those damn death-rats. To get better at killing death-rats, I have to practice. First step, finding and killing more death-rats. Oh fuck, this is going to hurt.

Paul’s jawbone war club, shiv, kilt and other items were left where he had last died. Paul was relieved they hadn’t disappeared along with his body. Tightening his kilt around his waist, he shoved the shiv in one of the loops of animal skin that held it together. He still had one long, thin piece of pelt left. He forced the rat claw almost all the way through its middle, securing the sharp blade, then tied the strip around his neck. Lastly, he picked up the jawbone war-club and took a long drink from the stream.

Frowning, Paul concentrated on the feeling he had when he had bound his rock to himself, how he had desperately wanted to keep the stone that had given him a fighting chance against the death-rat.

I really want to keep this club.

*Do you want to bind [Crude Jawbone War-Club] to you?

YES.

*Item bound*

I still don’t know how any of this works. That has got to change if I’m going to make it out of here.

After binding his shiv, knife, and kilt as well, Paul closed his eyes and gathered his courage, then turned decisively for the nearest tunnel entrance, the same one the Cave Muskox herd emerged from. Paul was nearly there, ready to step into the darkness when he stopped, eyes wide.

Paul, you’re a goddamned idiot.

Racing back to the pool, Paul used his knife to carefully pry one of the smallest phosphorescent fungi from the cave wall. He held his breath as it came loose.

It’s still glowing.