The inside of the sand shark’s mouth stank, so I had the incongruous idea of asking Ro about monster-mouthwash when I eventually made it back to Everwood City, but the problems of the moment soon caught up with me, and I flailed about looking for a hand- or foot-hold before the armoured beast could swallow me. My feet jammed against something with a little give, but at least it arrested my momentum.

I had been lucky, as hard as it was for me to reconcile that fact with being eaten; if I had been moving any slower when the shark snapped me up, I may have been caught in the rows of jagged teeth, and I was not sure I would be doing nearly as well at not being eaten if I had been bisected. Trisected? Bitten into pieces.

I will admit that I was panicking a little – this was not the first time something had eaten me alive and I was having some vivid flashbacks. It helped that I was not actively being gnawed on, but the pitch darkness certainly reminded me of my time in the Black. It was only by a supreme act of will that I was holding onto the edge of my rapidly fraying nerves, for which I was grateful. If I had blasted the big bastard with everything I had, I was sure that I would fry it, inside its head as I was, but it would also set my cultivation back by weeks, and while I was no longer regularly electrocuting myself, I was pretty sure that the inside of something’s mouth was conductive enough that my lightning would zap me as well.

The mouth lurched to the side violently and I was almost dislodged from my precarious perch. Instinctive Precognition flickered to life again and without conscious thought I reached into a ring with a filament of Experience and pulled free a sword before driving it down into the bottom of the fleshy cave. Realising I now had a place to grab, I wrapped both of my hand around the hilt of the blade and held on as if my life depended on it. I allowed my panic, which had spiked, to subside slightly.

I did not get long to center myself, however, I was quickly knocked into the air as the creature’s head jolted upwards, and for a moment I could see daylight again as the shark snapped at something I could not see. I wanted to take the opportunity to escape, but my hands were locked tight and I wasn’t touching anything for that split second. The opportunity passed and I dropped back into place, left in darkness, alone with the smell once more.

For several seconds I lay there trying to think my way out of the mouth as I was jostled about by what I assumed were my companions’ attacks. My best bet seemed to be allowing my companions to defeat the thing, as that posed the least threat of being eaten or electrocuted, but I soon came to realise that waiting was not in the cards. With a shift in orientation I was flipped over so that my feet were facing out, or rather down. I had sudden visions of the ridiculously over-sized land-fish diving beneath the sand; the relative size of a snack I may have been but I had no interest in playing the part of the cake in its cakehole for any longer than absolutely necessary.

Coming to the conclusion that being electrocuted again was probably better than being slowly digested for a thousand years, I once more Focused and pushed. I did not go all out; I was still conscious of my cultivation and on top of that, I did not know what trying to convert all of my Praxis in my channels would do to me – I had a lot more of it now than I had the last time I had lost control, or so I assumed.

With a flare of light, the rancid smell of the shark’s mouth was cut by the sharp chemical smell of ozone and the darkness fled before the blue-white tendrils of arcing light. The lightning was thick and the smell of burning meat joined the other scents; this was the strongest lightning I had ever used, aside from the last time I had been eaten. I braced for the shock of it escaping my grasp. Thankfully, I seemed my control had improved further than I had thought and I felt the power surging through and out of me, and as a pleasant surprise, it did not seem to be shocking me at all.

Normally, electricity would take any available path, but it seemed that I was not a viable path to the ground, so each incandescent line lashed itself downwards, as if held down by some great weight. The shark shuddered around me, and I could feel the hilt of my sword growing hot, but I did not stop, the image of being taken beneath the sand pushing me not to take any chances.

Several attenuated seconds passed as I allowed lightning to flow freely out of me, before I realised that the shark had stopped moving. There were no shudders or jostles, just stillness. I dropped my Focus and I was plunged once more into darkness.

I hung onto my hot sword until it cooled before I pulled myself up and braced my feet against the floor of the mouth. I pulled it free with the strange sound of tearing flesh accompanying it. My hand-hold gone, I dropped towards the beast’s teeth.

I knelt and tapped my sword against the huge teeth as I cleared my throat – it was irritated, though I did not know why. I hoped the sand-shark did not turn out to have poison breath, but I would worry about that if I was not buried.

The sound my sword against the teeth sounded hollow, which gave me hope, though in all honesty I did not really know what a sword was meant to sound like against teeth. With a shrug, I braced myself as best I could and began to hammer the pommel of the blade down into a tooth as hard as I could.

After a few minutes, there was a snap and I felt the tooth move. Placing the sword down, I reached out with my hands and felt along where I had been hammering. There seemed to be a break, so I grabbed my sword again and wedged the point into the tooth and levered it up and out of the new hole.

With a grin and a cough to clear my throat, I pulled out the phoenix egg and held it above my head. I was a little hesitant to use it as a torch, but I had already used more of my precious Praxis than I was comfortable with, and I was pretty sure eggs did not remember anything.

Gentle golden light filled the space around me. I looked down, at the space the tooth had occupied, only to be greeted with another tooth. Blinking, I recalled the shark having multiple layers of the jagged obstructions and wanted to slap myself. Not trusting the egg not to roll, I placed it back in storage and went back to work with my sword.

Another few minutes of work and I was once more working a tooth free and bringing the egg out. This time, I did not find more teeth but rather, as I had feared, sand. My heart dropped and I felt myself break out in a cold sweat as my mind raced considering options.

I could either wait for my friends to dig me out, or hope at least part of the monstrosity was above ground, and try to dig my way out of its asshole. Doing some quick maths in my head, I figured I probably had enough air not to have to worry too much for a little while, so I decided to trust in my friends, at least for a while.

Putting the egg away, I sat in the dark, and rather than trying not to think about the situation, as I would have certainly done in my last life, I cultivated. I sat and let the situation wash over me, along with all of the implications and milked it for all it was worth.

Waste not, want not, right?

*

***

*

After an hour of quiet meditation, I felt the sand shark shift again and I had another moment of panic, but it did not seem like it was waking up or digging deeper. The shift came again, and I could feel that the motion was come from behind, as I could feel the teeth press up into me. After that, there was a constant press beneath me, until all at once the orientation of the mouth shifted and I found myself tripping into my face. I caught myself, of course – even in the middle of meditation I was not oblivious to my surroundings. I could see sunlight through the gap I had created in the creature’s smile, and I popped my head out and looked around just in time to see Reff come around the shark’s bulk.

Seeing my head poking out seemed to give my friend pause for a moment, but when I grinned, he grinned back and with a low chuckle he walked over to me, shortly followed by his sister and Darina, who looked so irritated that I could not help my growing smile.

“Nice to see you, Reff. I was starting to think I was going to have to dig my way out.”

“With relieved jocularity, if the shark had dived much deeper, you may have had to, Hunter. It is difficult to find enough purchase on sand to pull this much weight out. Luckily, my sister was able to brace us.” Reff gestured to Riffa, who was looking smug. I could not say that I blamed her – Reff had been against her coming, but she had pretty much saved the day, by the sound of it.

“Thanks, Riffa. I was not looking forward to the attempt!”

“You would not have had to, and nor would we have had to rescue you, if you had not jumped into this... thing’s mouth. It was foolish, but I should not be surprised.”

Darina was not quite looking at me and had her arms crossed as she glared at the giant, six-legged fish. Her words were true, and I did not take any offense. The apprentice’s usual brand of unhelpful insults were one thing, but deserved criticism should never make you mad.

“Yeah, I totally did a dumb. Still, I managed to kill the thing, so I win, I guess?” Deserved the criticism might have been, but a victory was a victory, and I was only human. Or Ren. Humanoid?

“With impressed congratulations, you do seem to have defeated the shark, Hunter. Given its size, it is quite an old specimen and I had not expected to truly defeat it, only to drive it off.”

“What can I say, lightning can be pretty deadly when it originates inside your head. If I can find my way inside all of my enemies, I’ll be a real terror.”

Darina finally looked at me, or rather glared, and spoke quickly, her tone assured.

“You will not be able to defeat me in such a manner, I assure you. I suggest you focus on more productive methods of fighting.”

I blinked a few times, trying to hold back a chuckle of my own and glanced our giant friends, but neither one of them seemed to find what the apprentice had said to funny. Being the only person to get the double meaning, I quickly sobered up and dismissed the ridiculous comeback I had ready, judging it too easy.

“Right, well, should we go then? We still have a long way to go.”

“With hesitation, perhaps you should exit the shark first?” Riffa’s tone suggested I might not want to, and after a moment I had the realisation that I had defeated my first beast which, other than survival meant that there was a growth core up for grabs, and that meant money.

“Hey, there’s a core in here right? Where would it be? Is it easy to get to?”

Darina snorted and looked away, and Riffa wrinkled her nose in distaste. It was Reff who ended up answering as I looked back and forth between them, my head still poking out between the teeth.

“In hazy recollection, I believe the core is located in the heart of sand sharks. You would need to dig down to it, as the armour is too tough for the weapons we have with us.”

That knocked the smile off my face as I contemplated digging down through flesh to dig out part of its heart, but I really did not have much money left after buying supplies for the journey, and if this was an old specimen as Reff had said, its core should be worth a lot. Sighing, I looked at my friends in apology, and asked if they were okay with me going after it.

“We have already wasted too much time fighting this thing. But to abandon the core would be wasteful... fine.” Darina’s tone started heated but grew less assured as she went on, and I recalled that she had spent a number of years living wild. I imagined that she had not had the luxury of leaving cores behind at the time. The Risi siblings also agreed, so I ducked back inside as I heard the two move away, discussing the fight with the shark.

Making sure I was out of direct line with the gap, I stripped off my clothes – I would have to cleanse them either way, but the prospect of soaking them with already thickening blood was so unappealing that I stowed them in the ring without a second thought and grabbed my sword off the floor. There was bits of dried flesh all along its length from when I had super-heated it, and I grimaced. I had two more, but I would have to try and clean it later. There was nothing which differentiated it from the others, but it was the one I had been using regularly so I was kind of attached to it. Not as attached as the flesh, sure, but still.

Orienting myself within the shark, I hoped the heart was in a similar position as it would be back home. I walked as far back as I could before I started slashing at the flesh and cartilage of the shark’s mouth and body, my face twisted up as I felt bits of it lodging in my beard and hair.

I took me another hour to find the heart – I had had to detour around a couple of bones and pry apart a couple of layers of cartilage, and unfortunately it turned out the core was on the bottom of the heart, at least in this case.

The core itself was a dark blue, which if I recalled Walker’s description accurately, worked out at being worth about 2880 growth coins, a small fortune, especially given my almost total lack of funds.

Making my way out of the behemoth, I dressed once again and knocked some more teeth free before climbing out and slapping myself with a cleansing pill. The sudden lack of odour let me know I must have gone at least partially smell blind in there, and I was glad to no longer be afflicting my friends with the stench I was sure had been present.

“Guys, it’s a blue core. If we can make it to a city, we can exchange it for smaller denominations, right? Obviously, I can’t give you your shares yet, as it’s just... a ball.”

“Our shares?” Darina’s voice sounded curious, as if I was doing something strange.

“Sure. We split it four ways, right?”

“In correction, it is tradition that the killer keeps their kill, Hunter.”

Reff and Riffa both nodded deliberately as he spoke, and I looked back and forth between my companions.

“Bollocks to that! I’d still be down there if you guys hadn’t dug me out. We’ll split it, fair and square.”

The apprentice was looking at me with her eyes narrowed now, but she nodded once, a swift, sharp movement and uncrossed her arms.

“With reluctant gratitude, thank you.” Riffa did not seem sure, but adapting to my new world was only going to go so far; I was not about to abandon my sense of fairness, even if it earned me strange glances.

“Well then, shall we go?”