Chapter 15:

It’s been a month since I completed the training, and currently me, Robin, and Alex are on top of a mountain in the forest. Looking over a beautiful landscape, and all of the fresh mountain air you can breath. This has been one of the happiest last months of my life. It consisted of our group relaxing, visiting the familiar shops, and hiking mountains. We completed our quota for quests, but I can’t really remember what we did for them. Though they seemed to have been extremely easy. Nothing life threatening, no repeated loss of limbs, or constant healing. I would argue that this past month has been the happiest month in my whole life. Spending it with the people I want to, and not being in any dangerous situation.

Though, there is something nagging me, for some reason I can’t feel full. It’s weird, I eat til I am full, but it feels like I never actually eat. Well it doesn’t matter and I shouldn’t be thinking about other stuff, instead I should be enjoying what I am doing and where I am at. I look over at Robin and Alex, “It’s beautiful isn’t it?” “Yes it is.” “It’s beautiful Boss, did you get to see places like this back in your world?” Hmm, I think this would beat most places in America, but the Himalayans are better. “There were a couple places, but seeing new places like this is amazing.” “Do you like ‘Earth’ or Gaia better boss?” “Gaia wins, but ‘Earth’ is not too far behind.” I really haven’t thought about home in a long time. Though why does Alex know the name of my home world? Is it common knowledge?

“Hey Robin weird question, but do you know the name of my hometown?” I have been trying to, but I can’t ignore this nagging feeling much more. The empty stomach, shoddy memory, the healing woman’s name, and Alex knowing things he shouldn’t something is just not adding up. “Yes, it is Chicago.” Robin answered normally, but that wasn’t something she should know. I haven’t told anyone much about ‘Earth’, especially not about me growing up. Something is wrong, it’s almost like I am being shown a dream that makes me really happy. But how do I figure out if that is true or not?

My element! I haven’t sensed once with my element since the fight in the room with all the tiny spiders. I started only using control, and barely even used that. With the decision that sensing with my element would be the best path I laid down and focused on my surroundings. I could feel the earth around me, but it is weird. Kind of like jelly, and usually the earth element is more tough feeling. Maybe that is the dream part? I put more focus onto my sensing seeing it I could look past the jelly parts. After a bit of searching I find normal earth element, it seems to be a couple feet below me.

Am I in the air? Or is this top of the mountain just fake? Either way I control the earth to come towards me and surround me. Once surrounded I slow expand it outwards searching for interference, kind of like a sonar wave. Immediately I start falling, though the fall does not last long as I impact the ground, the pain causing me to wince. When I open my eyes again I am no long on top of a mountain, instead I find myself in a cave or a mine.

Fuck! I am still in the mine. All around me are cocoons, of what I am guessing are other victims. All of them are dead, seems like they had their blood sucked out as they are look like mummies. How long have I been here? I feel weak, and based off how empty my stomach is, it must have been at least a day. Why hasn’t Brock saved me? Can’t he tell what is going on inside this mine? Or is he just leaving me to die? That motherfucker, he thinks I am too weak, can’t even clear out some mines, and probably not even worth saving! That makes me so mad, I will show him who is weak, I will show him that I can clear out this place. And when I get back I can shove it down his goddamn throat.

I quickly create my weapons and armor, and head out the closest exit. The entire place is filled with web, but I don’t care these fucking spiders messed with me. You think I am some blood bag? Well I will show you that you fucked with the wrong man! I will burn down your bitch ass home! The first spider shows up, and it's one of the larger varieties. I instantly create an earth pillar crushing it into the wall. No mercy for these insects, I am going to get out of here, and I will fuck up anyone or thing that tries to get in my way.

One, two, three, four, ... ten, eleven, twelve, ... thirty, thirty-one, thirty-two, … fifty, fifty-one, fifty-two, … one hundred, one hundred and one, one hundred and two, … two hundred, … four hundred, … one thousand. They keep coming, but I will not stop, I will continue to destroy this mine until the last spider is dead. My body is getting weaker by the minute, the spiders have gotten a few good blows in and I am starting to bleed. They tried their dream stuff on me again, but this time I felt it, and I overcame it. My rage only increased though, and my rampage only became deadlier.

My body is covered in blood, my own and spider’s, but I have made it to their nest. I can finally kill them all, I can end their miserable existence. I would bury the goddamn world, if only to kill them. Limits? Those can fuck themselves. I will control the earth how I want to, and it will bend to my will. With a wave of my sword earth spikes form in masses slaughtering the spiders in front of me. More waves come from the nest, but I form countless earth bullets, and they kill all of them. I can see the spiders trying to protect a certain area, it must be the queen. I can’t wait to kill the bitch that created this hell hole.

I control a pillar to move me to the queen, on the way I crush the guard spiders against the mine’s ceiling. The crunching sound is delicious, I can’t wait for the queen to make the same noise. I will show that fucker Brock how weak I am. Making my way towards the queen, I see sacs along the way. Must be the babies, with a quick flick of my wrist, I crush all the egg sacs. I hear a scream from farther in the area. Good, I hope you enjoy me crushing all of your children, this is what you get for trying to eat me, for trying to suck my blood dry!

Inside I see a huge spider, as tall as a house, and all alone. Finally I can pay you back for what you did! Should I make it quick? No, that would be too kind. My rage is too great, and ending it too quickly will not work. The spider queen attacks me with her legs, but I block the first one and as it lands I quickly shape the earth around it. With the earth wrapped around it, I snap the leg off. One down eight to go. Just like the dream, I will kill you slowly, and just before you die I will kill all of your children. You will lay there and watch. I crush another leg, then another. The earth is mine and it sways to my thoughts. When before I could only create walls, and harden my armor, now I can freely bend it. I drop a large pillar of earth from the ceiling crushing the spider queen underneath. I sever another two legs while she is trying to recover. With three legs left she can barely stand. I start to just shoot earth bullets at her, and enjoy watching as she is trying to dodge them. How does it feel to be toyed with? How does it feel to know that soon you will be dead, and there is nothing you can do about it? I hope you are enjoying this Brock, because soon this will be you. You also toyed with me, and I will show you what happens when you fuck with me!

I slowly carve through the remainder of the spider queen's legs, and when she is just a body I proceed to crush all of her eggs. One by one the crunching of eggs can be heard. The saddened cries of the spider, is my melody. Unfortunately there are only so many, and my joy must come to an end. With using a large amount of control I curl the earth to slowly consume all of the crushed eggs, so that there is no chance that any of them will survive. I turn and stare at the spider queen, she is trying to reach me, but what a foolish spider she is. Even if she could reach me I would still continue to kill her children. With a smile I say my goodbye to this atrocity and stab my sword straight through the spider's head. The first part of my revenge is done, now onto Brock.

I make my way back to the entrance of the cave, and with each step my rage and madness only swells. Once I see Brock I start sprinting at him, my body is in tatters, but that doesn’t stop me. I am stronger than he is, I will show him who is the weak one. “Brock I am going to fucking kill you!” Brock looks at me, but then instantly disappears. So does the light and my consciousness.

My head feels as if someone is trying to split it open with a chisel. Unfortunately that is the least of my pain. My body feels like I am being constantly stabbed all over. I tried to open my eyes, but the light that invaded them only made the headache some much worse. “John, don’t try moving. You over exerted yourself by a large margin, you also were under the effects of multiple poisons. The poisons have been cleared out now, but you will still have a headache for a while. You are currently in the injury ward of the main family building.” I believe the voice is the family head’s.

“What happened?” I remember breaking out of the dream, and then everything kind of goes blurry. “One of the poisons inside of you was the meric poison, a drug of sorts that shows you a wonderfully happy dream, but the side effects are nasty. When the dream ends you enter into a rage induced madness. From what I heard from Brock you came out of the cave covered in blood, and said that you were going to kill him.” Wait really? “Does that mean I failed the quest?” Shit I really didn’t want to spend another month training. “Haha, no you passed the quest. Brock checked the mines and found that you went on a killing rampage and cleared out the whole mine. Seems like you tortured the spider queen also.” Yes! No more training. But, did I really torture a spider? Seems pretty cruel. “Well John we will have to talk later, but for now rest. You will probably be bedridden for another couple of days.” Scarson walks out of the room after saying that and I quickly fall back to sleep.

Waking up again, but this time the headache has subsided. The pain in my body has lessoned, but I don’t think I should more around too much. I open my eyes, but quickly shut them again because of the light. I slowly open and close my eyes to adjust to the light, and look around the room. I spot a dark skinned person in another bed next to mine, they look a bit familiar but I can’t put my finger on it. Just then the door to the ward opens up, and in walks the healing woman. “Hello how are you feeling?” She takes a seat next to my bed, and pulls out an apple from her pocket. “Much better thank you. I hope I didn’t offend you or Brock when I came out of the mine. From what I heard I said some pretty bad things.” Threatening Brock was the only thing I was told about that, but since she was also there I might have said something to her.

“It is ok you didn’t say anything to me. But you should apologize and thank Brock, he knocked you out quickly so that you didn’t cause anymore damage to yourself. You also same some rude words and threatened to kill him. Though I do believe he knows that you were under the influence of the meric poison.” That’s good seems like I only caused problems for Brock. “That’s good to hear. I heard that I did complete the quest, and if i remember correctly I believe that I would get to learn your name if I completed the quest and came back.” I give the healing woman a smile of confidence.

“You are correct I did promise you that, and after learning what you went through I believe it is only right you get what you deserve. My name is Jessica Verix, the only daughter of Scarson and Lala Verix. It has been a pleasure to aid you in your training John.” Jessica gets up from her chair and does a small bow. Jessica is the daughter of the family head! Wait? Scarson and Lala are husband and wife? I didn’t think that the daughter of the family head was helping me in my training. I almost completely ignored her till a bit ago and she turns out to be a big shot in the family. Ugh my headache is coming back a bit now.

Before I knew it I must have passed out again, because I awoke once more to the blinding lights of the healing ward. The pain in my body is almost completely gone, and my head is completely clear. I still remember the conversation with Jessica, but thinking about it kind of hurts my head. It's like figuring out the quiet person at work is actually a famous actor. Anyways when I look around the room again, I notice the dark skinned person is still here, but I then notice a white scaled person. I quickly jump out of bed and rush over to the bedside of the white scaled person.

My fears were confirmed and laying there was Robin. She doesn’t look injured though, and her breathing is normal. The door to the ward opens and in comes a woman I have not seen before. “What are you doing out of bed? You still need to be resting.” The woman immediately starts yelling at me, but I care more about Robin than that. “Is Robin ok? Will she be alright?” The woman looks at me weirdly, “She is fine just a bit of control exhaustion. A couple days of rest and she will be right back to normal. But you also need your rest, you may be feeling fine now, but your exhaustion was quite extreme. I am really surprised you are up so quickly.” Thank god Robin is ok. I go lay down on my bed hoping the nurse lady will stop nagging at me if I do.

Laying there for a bit I watch as the nurse changes the sheets and checks on both Robin and the dark skinned person. That reminds me, how is Alex doing? Is he still out doing his quest? I would think he would be here if he was back already. While I was lost in thought about Alex the dark skinned person seems to have woken up. They sat up in their bed causing their blanket to fall off, revealing two modest sized breasts. The dark skinned woman looks my way and blinks for a bit. She is quite cute, a tomboyish looking face, and nice black hair. Robin is beautiful, but this girl is equally cute. I notice the girl remove the blanket and get out of the bed. She walks towards me, and once she is only a couple steps away lunges at me. It freaked me out! “Hey what do you think you are doing. Who are you anyways?” I try to push the girl off me, but she is really strong. When I look at her face I can see she is quite shocked, “You don’t recognize me?” Should I?, “I think I would remember a girl as cute as you.” “Hehe, I was called cute! Well then let me unravel the truth to you! I am the one the only .. “ “Alex get back in your bed! You still need your rest.” When did the nurse get in here, and does she always have to shout at people. Wait!, “Alex! You are Alex? The male goblin that is in my group?” The dark skinned girl looks disappointed but her frown quickly changes back into a big smile, “My surprise got spoiled. I didn’t see you for two weeks just to do that! Whatever, yep I am the one and only Alex of the Witch and Mountain group. Also I have always been female, you just thought I was male. I have evolved and am now the lovely hobgoblin Alex!”