Chapter 7: Making Haste

The shimmering pattern appeared again, and after a moment Miguel found himself in a long, stone corridor that was lit by flaming torches in ring-sconces every twenty yards or so.

He was alone.

Miguel looked behind him; all he could see was a bare wall. There was, quite literally, only one way forward.

He began to walk. The guide had told them that speed was important... so should he run? But it had also mentioned agility – one of his weakest stats. This could mean that there would be obstacles to dodge, pits to jump over, and perhaps even traps. That would be bad news for him. If only he could have reallocated some of those strength points into agility.

But too late now.

He broke into a light run. He had already seen how much faster he was than Chloe – this was a genuine strength of his, and he might as well play to it.

The corridor continued in a straight line for some time, roughly ten feet wide and ten feet high, with smooth, featureless stone walls and floors.

There was still no sign of Chloe or of any of their rivals. Miguel felt himself tensing up. Had he been put in a worse spot than the others? Was it possible that the red-bearded Sid or blonde warrior Tarja might take Chloe out before he could intervene?

Come on man, he thought to himself. Keep running.

At least one of the baseball-sized drones was present here, humming near the ceiling about a yard from his head, and keeping pace as he moved along. Miguel found it strangely reassuring. At least he hadn't been somehow placed in the wrong room and forgotten about.

All the same, it reminded him of his relatively low ranking. The public didn't seem to hate him, exactly, but he wasn't popular either. Why not? He replayed the events of the arena and the giant centipedes in his mind. He had worried that his mistake had been stripping the bodies of the dead, but others – Chloe for sure – had done the same thing.

No.

So what had he done wrong?

As he replayed the events in his mind, one thing was happening again and again – uncertainty. He hadn't been at all sure of himself, and had repeatedly needed to be guided by Chloe. She had told him several times what to do, and he had changed course time and again.

Overall, he had been far too hesitant. That's not what heroes are made of.

If he was going to get through and succeed in Demon Hunters, he was going to have to have the courage of his convictions. To follow his hunches, stop hesitating, and be bold.

Miguel had been running in a straight line for about three or four minutes now, conserving his energy, until finally there was a change: the corridor curved to the left.

He followed its route, keeping to the middle. He was now panting slightly, and still gripping the dagger.

That was when he heard a click on the wall to one side, swiftly followed by two more. There was a scrabbling of claws just behind him, and he looked over his shoulder to see what horrors might have emerged.

Behind, three dog-sized animals with heads like those of stag beetles were rushing out from three openings that had appeared in the walls. Within moments they were scuttling after him, their enormously long blade-like mandibles gnashing at a level just below his waist, their chitinous feet rattling on the stony floor.

Miguel sped up, sprinting at full pace. He glanced around as he went – he was keeping ahead of the beasts, and even opening up a slight gap. But as he looked back at the corridor ahead, another opening clicked open, and a fourth of the giant beetles scuttled out into his path.

Unequip dagger

Unequip shield

Equip crossbow

He hadn’t done well before when he had tried to shoot without setting himself properly, but it appeared that he no longer had a choice. Stop, and the other three pursuers would be on him. Fail to take out the one ahead – same result.

He clutched the crossbow as hard as he could to his chest, trying his best to steady it and to work with the pace of his running. The insect-demon was only twenty yards ahead now, and had started to move towards him.

Bang.

The bolt thudded home, and while it hadn’t killed the thing, it had knocked it off to one side and out of play, and appeared to have stunned it, too.

Notification: You have gained 10 XP

As he reached it, Miguel leaped upwards, lifting his legs clear in case the gnashing mandibles or a flailing leg might trip him up. He sailed clear, landed... and then stumbled, crashing to the ground.

Damn shitty agility stat.

Unequip crossbow

Thinking quickly, he removed the weapon from his hands as he fell, then rolled, allowing him to keep up some of his momentum. Scrabbling at the ground with both hands he pushed himself up and began to run again.

Notification: You have gained 5XP

Perhaps that was for his acrobatics, or just for getting himself out of a jam, he thought to himself.

Just then, he felt a slicing pain on the back of his thigh.

You have lost 3 hit points. You have 5 hit points remaining.

That was the first serious bit of damage he had taken in the contest so far, and it showed him all too plainly that he couldn’t afford to take much more. Five hit points left? Man – he was a weakling. Pathetic.

And unsurprisingly, an armored chestplate was no use against a slash from behind.

Fortunately the wound hadn’t hobbled him in any way, and in moments he was back up to his full speed, sprinting along the corridor with his back to the pursuing beasts. He didn’t waste time looking back, now.

He just had to keep going.

After a further minute or so he saw an opening ahead – an open doorway with light coming from within. Before it there was a pit, perhaps four feet across, and he wondered whether the pursuing insect-beasts could leap over it not.

He very much hoped they couldn’t.

Miguel was closing in, and there was no time to think deeply about his technique. Trying his best to judge the distance involved, he planted his feet as close to the edge of the pit as he could, and jumped.

For a moment he seemed to hang in the air...

...and then he landed just inside the doorway of the room, stumbled, but managed to keep his feet. Spinning around, he saw that the beasts were still some twenty yards back – and the doorway had a large wooden door which was pushed back against the wall.

Reaching out, Miguel slammed it shut, and moments later heard the noise of all three beasts screeching outside. But they did not attempt to push open the door.

The pit, it seemed, was as far as they would go.

Notification: You have gained 20 XP

That could be for the running, he supposed, or for blocking off a potential threat.

Hmm.

Perhaps it was time to stop speculating on why the simulation did or did not award XP, and focus on winning.

Miguel spun around, proceeding cautiously into the room. It was dusty-looking, around five yards across, and roughly square, and was empty but for a pile of bones on the floor and a solitary wooden table. Another spherical drone hummed near the ceiling, and there was a further doorway opposite the one through which he had entered.

He stepped further into the room, gazing down at the pile of bones. A former player? A trap? An undead monster that was ready to spring up at any moment?

It didn't look like he had much choice but to keep moving, but he advanced much more cautiously now, scanning the floor for any sign of pit traps, and then glancing up and down the walls.

Finally he scrutinized the ceiling. There was a long wide crack above where the bones lay, but otherwise it was smooth, clean and featureless.

Equip shield

Equip dagger

He circled the table and began to approach the door on the far side.

Then, glancing back, he noticed something glinting among the bones. Jewelry? He took a step closer, crouching down.

It was a ring.

Notification: You have gained 50 XP (critical success)

Miguel wasn’t sure why, but he wanted the ring. It called to him. If nothing else, it might be useful to trade. But it was hard to imagine that it had been put here in the game if it didn’t have a purpose, even if he couldn’t say for sure what that might be just yet.

Perhaps it was more than just a piece of jewelry – a key of sorts, maybe, or something that would boost one of his stats. Get more of those damn hit points that he was so short of.

He glanced upwards. Was that a glistening, poisonous green color he saw in there? Acid of some kind? An ooze, or a trap.

Unequip dagger

Holding the shield up, he reached forward and tried to reach towards the ring with his free hands. He assumed that touching the bones must be a bad thing. A steady hand was all he needed. And then... he realized that something was falling from above.

Springing forward, Miguel contrived to keep the shield above him as he moved, grabbed at the ring and clutched it in his right fist, and then landed on the other side. But on his landing he stumbled, tripped and clattered into the far corner of the wall.

Notification: You have gained 10XP

Unimpressive – so that was what happened when high speed and low agility combined. All the same, he now had the ring held tight in his hand, and had managed to avoid getting covered by the green slime. That was a success of sorts.

Miguel lay there for a second, breathing hard, then began to pick himself up, observing as he did so that the green blob of poisonous-looking slime had fallen right down just after he moved and was now enveloping the bones, which had begun to glisten.

He wasn’t about to wait to see what the end result of this foul-looking combination would be. Instead he ran for the next door, bashing it open with the shield, and running through into the corridor beyond. To keep it safe, he slipped the little ring over his finger as he went.

Miguel had only run around ten yards down the next corridor when it opened out into another vast arena, as large as the one where the first task had taken place.

He was still underground, however, the area lit by flaming torches all around its edge, as well as long lantern–like globes that hung down from the rocky domed ceiling.

The new area was circular overall, with a raised outer platform where Miguel was currently standing, and below it, a huge underground lake. This had a set of islands towards its center, all separated by a murky black liquid.

In the very center of the lake was a gateway on the largest of the islands, which appeared to glow slightly and in a way that looked to be independent of the lanterns and torches.

A sense of foreboding filled Miguel as he began to take in his surroundings. He was not done with this task yet, that was clear. But there was no running past what lay ahead. Clearly, the game had something much more deadly in store.

He would need more than speed.