Death was cold. It was quiet, and it was dark. Unable to swim, Jake accepted his fate as he drowned. Unable to breathe, see, or save himself- the sand in his hourglass ran out. His lungs gasped for air, inviting in the thick goo of the Dragon Vein essence and he struggled until the final moment when his consciousness blanked out. It hurt- dying. Drowning. Even as he flailed and clawed at the space around him, he only sank lower and lower until he could no longer feel the pull of gravity, or the ever increasing pressure on his body.

“Chul…” The only thing he could think of in his last moment was his friend- the Guardian whom he had met in this dark underworld. Their time together was painfully short and was rather dull, but in that span of time- Chul was always nearby for Jake to ask questions to or for Jake to rely on for advice. While he had spent just as much time in the Library as in the Overworld after coming out of the Ravine, Chul was the steady presence that nudged him on. Jake wanted to be deserving of the Arachkin’s praise. He wanted to grow to become a respectable adventurer, someone Chul would be proud of.

And now, where was Chul? Jake’s hand bled from the injury caused by Chul’s leg, and the last thing Jake saw of his companion was Chul’s silhouette before the explosion blanked out his view. By the time the light went out above the surface, Jake was too far down to see beyond the green glow. There were no vibrations after that explosion, so the fighting had ended. Was the Maudrake dead? Probably not, since it was Magic Resistant…

So Chul was probably still fighting it, wasn’t he? If so, then Jake needed to help. He couldn’t just leave his friend alone.

“...Chul…” Jake closed his eyes, his vision fading as his head felt light.

But even as he was surrounded by the thick glob of the Dragon Vein’s essence- he felt the edges of his eyes grow hot.

* * *

Thump. Thump. Thump.

Thump. Thump.

Thump. ThumpThump. Thump! THUMP!

Jake’s eyes opened wide and he coughed- hard. The cough turned to a gag, followed by a painful wretching as his body purged the liquid in his airways. His body was pushed over onto his side and a heavy impact struck his back, coaxing him to vomit more of the liquid. His throat burned and his body ached. His muscles cramped, but he continued to wheeze and hack. His throat tightened and his eyes rolled as he emptied his guts onto the cold rock.

“Alive.” A voice whispered behind him.

“Alive.” Another voice answered. Jake’s eyes lazily rolled to his left as he tried to see who was speaking, but his stomach clenched and he threw up again. More green slob emptied from his insides, adding to the pool which was gathering next to him. He felt heinous.

“Safe.” A third, lighter voice spoke up. Jake felt the hands steadying him change from large and calloused, to small and frail. He was lowered onto his back and was surprised by the sight in front of him.

Three creatures, all pale skinned with one single eye in the middle of their faces. They had small mouths, small frames, and their skin was pulled taut over their meager muscles. They looked starved. Two were bald and lacked any hair, and those two also carried elongated rocks, sharpened at the tip- the objects looked like spears. The third was clearly a female from her anatomy, and she had long stringy white hair. Their irises were colored gray and their teeth slightly sharpened- likely to accommodate their meat focused diet.

They weren’t Maedra, at least that was for sure.

“Where…?” Jake wheezed and felt his throat clench as he tried to speak. He winced. A pounding headache cut through the center of his skull, and the pressure on his head made him feel as if he were about to pop.

“Quiet. Still.” The female creature urged him with her hands and broken words to stay still. She placed a hand on his forehead. The hand began to glow faintly green as she whispered to herself. Relief washed over him, and the pressure in his skull faded. Jake let out a sigh of relief as at least one of his ailments was helped. Now if only she could do that with everything else that hurt.

“Where am I…?” Jake muttered, trying again. Even as the woman tried to urge him to stay down, Jake slowly pushed his body upright and took a look around to try and get his bearings.

He was surrounded by black and stone. A river of flowing mana essence cut through the floor off to his right and it raced off into the distance. The space around him was lit up by small Sprites, but the Sprites seemed to only hover around the other creatures. A few had wandered off but they kept a short distance away.

“Safe,” the woman said bluntly. Jake blinked and stared at her. Safe? This was safe?

He was alive, but not safe. He didn’t feel safe. These creatures may have saved him, but they were foreign to him. And with teeth like they had- he might just be a meal to them. While they looked different than Maedra, Chul said only Maedra survived in places such as this. Maybe he had only seen a certain kind of Maedra, and these creatures were just a smarter variation.

Jake looked between the female creature and the other two for a few moments, both sizing them up and looking for any sign of them being threatening. They didn’t seem aggressive nor did it look as though they had come out to hunt for food. Rather, they looked more or less like Jake was the one who had stumbled into them- probably more the case.

“Thank you for helping.” Jake rolled to his knees and tried to stand. As he put pressure to the ground, a pain shot through his right leg and he let out a yelp as he dropped back down onto his hands. It didn’t look injured, but it certainly wasn’t good. Maybe it was an internal injury?

“Wait.” The woman moved over to his right side and placed her hand onto his leg. The green light returned to her fingers and he could feel some of the pain recede. Not all of it, but enough so that he could get to his feet. It hurt to put a lot of weight on the leg, telling him that her recovery magic wasn’t perfect, but it would do. He could stand. And if he could stand, he could walk.

The two other creatures stepped forward and helped him steady himself, but once he got his balance, Jake politely nudged them away. He would need to walk on his own. He wasn’t about to drag strangers into his problems. Especially strangers that lived alongside Maedra. Even though it hurt, he had to get back to Chul. The boy staggered over to the wall and placed a hand to its cold surface, steadying himself. Walking was easier when he had something to hold. If only he knew Earth-magic, then he could have created some kind of walking stick out of the stone. And of course, Earth-magic was something he had put off. How inconvenient.

Using the wall, Jake turned to the three creatures and looked them over again. He bowed his head and part of his upper body until his leg warned him to stop, and then closed his eyes. Truly, he was thankful. They could have let him float by, could have eaten him, or they could have even used their spears just to kill him outright. But instead they chose to help him. If only he could return the favor somehow.

But even if he could, all he was focused on was going back- Chul.

“Thank you for helping me.” Jake said softly. Then, without another word, he began to limp upstream, moving in the opposite direction of the river.

“No, stop! Unsafe!” The female creature suddenly realized where Jake was headed, and she hurriedly moved in front of him to block his path. Jake clenched his teeth. He was tempted to push her out of the way, but he couldn’t do that to someone who had saved him from drowning and helped him walk. Even so, his mind was made.

“I have to go. My friend is back there.” He muttered and placed a hand on her shoulder, trying to get her to move. Yet she was determined to stay in his way. She grabbed his arm and squeezed- her grip firm. Her head rocked side to side as she held him off.

Jake didn’t mean to, but the hand he used was the one cut open by Chul. The bleeding had stopped and the open wound had scabbed over already, but the reminder was there. Jake needed to go. The longer he waited, the more in danger his friend likely was.

“Please. I have to-”

Cutting him off, a howl echoed down the tunnel, coming from the direction Jake needed to go. The creature in front of him stiffened and then quivered as fear ran through her. Jake recognized the sound. The howl came from a Maedra, and it was close. Close enough that Jake could just barely smell the foul stench of its rotting flesh. The other two creatures were just as shaken up by the noise. They didn’t want anything to do with the Maedra it seemed.

“Unsafe. Must leave.” The more sensible of the three gripped his rock spear and started to march in the opposite direction of the distant threat. The other two seemed indecisive.

“Go then, I’ll fight it.” Before they could change their minds, Jake grabbed the woman and pushed her towards her two companions. He stepped away from the wall and tried to conjure up two fireballs into his hands. His mana stuttered for a moment, but it was there. While he had fully expended everything in that final spell in the cavern, floating in the essence had at least given him a refill of his mana and Dragon’s Blood. Focusing hard, finally the flame ignited within his fingertips and they burned brightly at his sides.

“No! Must run!” One of the creatures said, grabbing onto Jake’s shoulder in a panic. Jake shrugged off the hand and hissed at them.

“No. I have to go back that way. You run to safety. I’ll deal with these things,” he hissed.

Jake hadn’t fought the Maedra. Chul had, but none of the smaller types seemed resistant to Magic. While the Maudrake was capable of resisting the spells- none of the lower ranking creatures survived any of Chul’s attacks. Whether that was because Chul was overwhelmingly more powerful or they lacked magic resistance, Jake didn’t know. But he wasn’t about to let the pests get in his way.

“No, must run! Unsafe! Unsafe!” The hand returned to Jake’s shoulder, this time more tightly. Jake rotated his left arm and pointed the fireball at the creature. It stepped away, raising its hands and the rocky spear over its head as it backed off. Jake frowned, not wanting to spark a confrontation with those who had helped him, but this was for the best.

“Run,” he ordered. The creature nodded before running to catch up with the other who had left. The female remained, her eyes stubborn as she stood firmly in place. She looked less afraid of him than of the Maedra- which was fair. Jake didn’t want to hurt them, and she could probably sense that.

And he wouldn’t. If she wasn’t going to run off, then he wasn’t going to force her.

Ignoring her, he began to limp slowly along the wall, keeping a fireball ready in his left hand. Another howl echoed through the tunnel. Much closer this time, close enough that Jake could hear the heavy inhale after the howl was finished. He also heard footsteps- the slapping of feet on stone. Unlike the Maedra’s screams, the feet were really really close.

“You’re following me. Not running.” Jake said, not looking over his shoulder towards the sound of the small feet.

“Stupid. Unsafe.” Was she calling him stupid, or calling him wanting to fight stupid?

“My friend is back here. I can’t leave him,” he rumbled. Why he was explaining himself, he didn’t know. He just hoped it would get her to leave.

“Unsafe.” She repeated, as if ignoring his justification entirely. He couldn’t blame her for it, honestly. How could she know he had a friend back here and this wasn’t just some kind of suicide march? Seeing him was probably enough of a surprise as is. But he didn’t like how bluntly she spoke to him.

“I don’t care,” he spat. She sighed, which caused Jake to stop. He gripped onto the stone and glared over his shoulder at the thin creature. Jake was exactly old by any means, but they looked far older, even if they were the same height. While he wanted to shove her away and tell her to shut up, the concerned look in her eye was far too soft for him to do that.

“Unsafe or not, I’m not leaving my friend behind just because I’m scared.” Jake turned away. His leg limped forward and his hand dragged across the rough wall as he trudged forward. The light slapping of feet began to sync with the clicking of his sandals. And while he was so focused on staying upright and walking forward, he failed to notice two more pairs of feet also coming up behind him.

The third howl screeched out into the tunnel and the putrid stench was undeniable now. They were close, close enough for the Maedra likely to smell them, too. Jake pushed off the wall and balanced his weight on his good leg. He wasn’t skilled in combat in the least, nor did he know how to dodge or run around like Chul did- but if he could at least kill everything before it reached him, he should be fine. All he had to do was rely on his training in the Library and put the Dragon’s Blood to use. It bubbled and yearned for combat anyway, so he had faith it wouldn’t fail him here.

Jake raised his left hand and the fireball hovering by his fingers increased in size. He curled his fingertips, poured just enough mana into the fireball to trigger the spell, and then fired it into the black tunnel. He shot it parallel to the river, letting it sail over the thick essence. It lit up the tunnel as it flew, and Jake was quickly informed as to why the smell of flesh was so strong.

Several bodies were scattered around on the floor, and a dozen Maedra were spaced out in the middle of the carnage. Corpses with mangled faces, torned open torsos, and pillaged innards, all lay at the feet of the Maedra. The Maedra loomed over the bodies, engorging on the fresh buffet of meat.

“Oh, that’s bad…” Jake mumbled, a chill covering his body as the fireball soared by the last Maedra and off into the distance. The crunching of bones and the stripping of flesh filled the tunnel, mixing with the noise of the flowing water.

“U-Unsafe…” The female creature at his left whispered, her voice shaking just as much as her knees.

Jake swallowed a heavy lump in his throat and clenched his fists. He was scared, terrified. But Chul was waiting for him. Was he going to run here? Flee with these three other creatures and just leave his friend to die? After all those days Chul spent watching over Jake as Jake ran off to the Library, after risking his life all because Jake wanted to come here to fix a stupid mistake he’d made- was this it? Running would just be Jake trampling all over Chul’s resolve to protect him.

It was times like this that Jake’s father told him to be the strongest in, but all he felt was the shaking in his knees.

Jake lifted his left arm and before he could second-guess himself any further, he fired a fireball directly into the midst of the Maedra. Without a specific target, the ball soared over the massacre and impacted the side of a feasting Maedra. The ball exploded, tearing open the weak body of the creature and caused its insides to ooze out of the wound. Though, Jake couldn’t see the result. After the fire ball struck the Maedra, the light faded and darkness returned. All he heard was a terrible scream, followed by a chorus of dread.

“Run!” Jake shouted, both of his hands lifting as he began to fire off a rapid volley of spells into the pitch black. The screams of the Maedra thundered in his direction, and his magic tore into the dark as his answer to them. The first few fireballs missed their targets, but they illuminated the space and Jake’s follow-up spells were far more accurate. But while the Maedra were hit and stumbled, their numbers were large. Thus, Jake traded quality for quantity and boosted his output of projectiles.

Using Yir’s teachings in the Library as a foundation, Jake rapidly fired off enough spells to completely light up the tunnel in front of him. The fireballs scorched the flesh they hit, tearing through the large bodies of the hideous creatures. However, even as the Maedra in the front collapsed, their flesh melted and burned- there were more than just a couple.

Jake’s initial shot in the dark had only illuminated a small portion of Maedra. There were far more than that even beyond that group, and they were just as hungry. Jake glanced behind him to see if the three others had left him. To his dismay, they were still at his back, their eyes watching in a mix of awe and terror.

“Run…” Jake hissed and leaned into his hands. He needed to cast more, faster. He needed to not just fill the space, but he needed to completely overwhelm the Maedra.

He pushed mana into his feet and mixed it into the ground, stretching it outwards and in front of him like a needle. When it was several feet ahead, he triggered a fire wall spell. The floor cracked and a bright blaze sprayed out of the cut, stretching upwards to form a barrier of heat. The fireballs Jake shot off cut through the wall, launching into the dark to meet the stampede of rotting meat. However, the fire wall was thin and not quite the most powerful of barriers- nothing like Chul’s. It likely wouldn’t do much other than make the Maedra hesitate.

While the fire wall stabilized and Jake solidified the connection of mana to its base point, he formed a tail at his back and filled it with mana until it was large enough to stretch out to his side. Then, he split it down the middle, creating two long tails of mana.

The boy took in a deep breath and closed his eyes. His stomach felt uneasy and he could feel the mana inside of him quickly draining. But how much did that really matter? If he ran out of mana, he would die to the Maedra. If he failed to keep them at bay, then they would eat him anyway. Even if he risked causing another explosion, he had to put everything on the line. If he held back even just a little, the Maedra would break through.

“Ignarus…,” he whispered. The tips of his mana tails ignited and fired off the balls which formed over the tops of them. The Maedra on the other side collapsed as the wall of fire slammed into their faces. As one fell, the next climbed over, only to be obliterated as Jake fed off the mana around him. He pulled from the air, from the floor, and from within himself. His own reserves would run dry if he relied only on them, so he quickly began to lean into the outside sources.

With the ability to use Dragon’s Blood slowly coming more naturally, the conversion from raw essence to fuel felt instinctual. He could feel the essence in the air, could sense it, and he began to draw on it further to generate more mana. Igniting the fireballs in the air rather than using his own mana felt easier than creating the spark droplets. Once the balls were burning, spiraling the mana and directly adding it to the spell shortened the process and his fireballs maintained a higher temperature on creation.

The flashpoint for the spell seemed to drop, and the number of spells he could produce increased rapidly. The uptick in his output met the relentless Maedra with equal ferocity and the wave of flesh’s approach slowed to even less than a crawl.

He was winning.

The Maedra stopped drawing closer and instead began to stumble over one another. The body count on the floor increased, making it difficult for those still alive to maintain their footing. A few tried to climb over the wall of the dead, but they were quickly struck by accurate strikes to their lower bodies. Jake’s accuracy increased as his vision tunneled and his adrenaline poured into his veins.

Yet, it took more than just blowing off a limb or two for the Maedra to stop their struggle. Jake’s fireballs burned through arms and legs, fried off chunks of flesh, and even blew open a few heads. However, the creatures who lived off mana only truly died when their torsos were destroyed. After a few accurate strikes, Jake learned why.

Buried inside the chests of the Maedra, or at least near the torso region- each creature had a blue, crystal heart. It likely was what converted mana into life essence. Those with larger bodies had larger crystals, and some of those crystals had more of a purplish color than a blue one. A few crystals were green, but those were rare. However, even the smaller Maedra sometimes had larger crystals- a few so large the crystals stuck out of their bodies. Jake aimed for these targets, and blew them to bits whenever he was able to see them.

When their crystal shattered, the Maedra would drop in a heap on the floor. The decomposition of the body at that point was quick. The flesh would melt and dissolve back into the air, leaving nothing but the shattered crystal behind. An odd detail. Jake would have thought the crystal would return to its natural state as well. Still- he was thankful. Because of their hunger for mana and their recent meal, the bodies were lingering due to the residual mana trapped in the flesh. The sloppy, meaty floor didn’t provide as strong of a foundation to run on, further hindering the Maedra.

Jake capitalized. With the increase in his spell efficiency and the growing handicap against the Maedra, Jake switched tactics. Rather than fill the air with fire- he targeted the Maedra individually and with highly accurate shots. He increased the mana density in the fire spells, causing the balls to burn hotter. The typical orange hue shifted to a light blue color, reflecting the increase in temperature. The flesh at the other end was no match for the higher level of the spell and each impact caused the flesh to evaporate.

With the impacts of Jake’s spells becoming more efficient, the number of living Maedra plummeted until the noisy, echoing howling dulled. Jake removed the firewall in front of him to clear his view and instead created two pillars of fire at his sides, generating balls from them to add to his spell volume. Each Maedra was hit with two spells at a time- one in the upper left shoulder or a lower limb, and the second to blow open the chest. The third would hit the crystal or explode to further expose the innards. The tactic was effective and repeating the process was making the fight easier to handle.

The final Maedra emerged with an angry, high pitched squeal of desperation. Only for Jake to blow its head off and then decimate its chest. There was no crystal left to admire as Jake unloaded a fierce barrage of spells into the last target. The impacts pushed the remaining lower half of the Maedra’s corpse into the river, and it vanished beneath the surface of the green liquid.

Jake stood quietly with his hands raised, his tails at the ready, and the two small pillars of flame steady at his sides. He watched the bodies of the recently deceased dissolve slowly, leaving behind only the half-eaten corpses of their victims and a pile of mana crystals. Curious and cautious, Jake fired off two final spells into the dark, slinging them into the distance to see if any Maedra were hiding in the dark.

There weren’t.

Jake lowered his arms and canceled the pillars at his sides. His mana tails combined into a single tail, and then Jake wrapped around his waist. He let out a huff of air and felt several beads of sweat streak down his face, arms, and his back. When he looked at himself, he saw that he was soaked. His body was shaking from both the rush of the fight, and fatigue of his casting. He had been frozen in that position for quite a while. It made him feel stiff.

Jake looked over his shoulder to find the three creatures still standing there, staring at him. One stood with its jaw dangling. Jake smirked and then lit a fireball in his left hand.

“Safe.” He said with confidence, practically mocking the female creature as he began to walk forward. Using the wall to steady himself and the fire to light the way, Jake moved slowly into the mess ahead of him.

“Strong mage. Scary.” One of the males muttered and he elbowed his companion. The companion shushed him in return, as if what was said might irritate Jake.

No, in actuality, Jake was weak. Compared to Chul- that was a pitiful showing. Chul would have eliminated the entire lot in a single cast. Chul wouldn’t have struggled with those numbers. Chul wouldn’t be this tired. Chul wouldn’t have hesitated at the beginning.

Chul would have laughed.

“Help?” The female was at Jake’s side again, and she offered a hand. Jake frowned, but he wasn’t going to be difficult if she was going to be this persistent. He sighed and accepted her help. Carefully, he moved away from the wall and draped his arm over her shoulders. The female didn’t complain when he leaned into her a bit, but it was kind of… uncomfortable. She was a bit shorter and her frame was thin and boney. She wasn’t malnourished but it didn’t look like she was the healthiest individual either.

“Thank you, and I’m sorry.” Jake whispered. The female creature only smiled at him and the two began to walk forward . The other two followed close behind, careful of where they stepped as they moved through the Maedra’s feeding ground.

The smell in the air was a mixture of burned flesh, and rotting corpses. The bodies had been here for a while. While some were fresh, most were crawling with bugs. The innards were discolored, the blood dried, and the flesh leathery. The only constant was that they were all the same race. They were the same one eyed creatures that were helping Jake walk. At first, Jake wanted to spill his guts because of the stench. Standing in the face of it had made him used to it. Though, that didn’t make it any less gruesome. He doubted he’d ever forget the stench.

“They are like you,” Jake said aloud. A light pause, then the female bobbed her head faintly.

“Other village. Unlucky. Unsafe. Too close.” When she wouldn’t speak, one of the males spoke up. Jake stared down at a slightly smaller frame than the others, but tore his eyes away before it was imprinted on his mind. The Maedra truly were ruthless.

“You live down here?” Trying to distract himself, Jake tried to satisfy his curiosity.

“Yes. Village close.” The talkative male seemed to carry the talking-stick for the other two. Either because he understood Jake the most, or because the other two didn’t want to talk.

“What are you?” He didn’t want to ask the odd and painful question, but he had to know. Jake was new to being an adventurer, and if he was going to make it his life- then learning about other races would be key.

“What?” The female peered up at him, confused.

“Huh?” Jake stopped and looked at her with the same expression. He then looked at the other two. They both shrugged.

“I. Xul. He. Tul. She. Yae.” Xul pointed to himself, and then the other two, but while it was an answer to another question- it wasn’t the right answer to the current.

“No, what are you? Your race? The name of your people?” Jake tried to reword the question, but they all continued to look at him with confused expressions. It seemed they either didn’t know, or they didn’t have one. Maybe they didn’t know what the word Race meant?

Jake sighed and instead continued to walk. “Jake. I am Jake.”

“Jake.” Yae whispered.

“Jake?” Tul echoed.

“Jake.” Xul nodded.

Hearing his name being repeated made Jake a bit uncomfortable, but he put up with it. He continued his pitiful limp along and finally, they cleared the bodies. The tunnel opened up a bit wider and the number of sprites increased, revealing a long and smooth walk ahead. Jake slowly caught his breath and the sweating stopped. The fatigue didn’t fade, though. He felt tired. Exceptionally tired. Walking wasn’t easy and shifting the weight onto his good leg was beginning to take its toll the further they went.

But no matter how far away the end was, Jake would walk it. He had to.

Chul was waiting for him.