Bushes pricked his legs as low-hanging branches slapped his face. His vision pulsed as he honed in on the only thing that mattered, the next clump of packed dirt. His leg screamed for him to stop. It throbbed with each step, aching something fierce as he continued to force himself to move. A muscle in his lower back screamed for relief as it twisted itself into the tightest knot he had ever felt.

His breaths came short and quick as he shotgunned as much air into his lungs as he could handle. Every inch of his body trembled as he continued to shamble through the forest. His stick dug into the ground as he continued to hop from patch to patch. Stopping now was giving up. Stopping now was resigning himself to death. Or worse, capture.

A bush shook as he approached it. He skidded to a halt, feet digging into the loose dirt as he held his makeshift walking stick at the ready. A dark figure darted out of the bush, kicking up dirt as it scurried away.

“Shit,” he grunted, barely able to utter his favorite expletive. Everything ached, every joint and muscle screamed for him to find somewhere to curl up in. But he had to keep moving. His body creaked as he forced his legs to keep moving, especially his bad one.

Jaw agape, he continued his blind rush through the forest. One foot in front of the other, all he needed to do was concentrate on putting as much distance between himself and his possible pursuers.

The howl from the crystal still rattled around in his skull. It was so piercing and menacing. There was no way the other soldiers hadn’t heard it. One of them was bound to come looking for their comrade and, by proxy, him.

At least he’d been smart enough to strip the body of any useful items, the few that the woman had been carrying. She’d had a dagger stuffed into one of her boots, a trio of vials latched to her belt, the flask with the endless supply of water, and a ring that looked like it might have some value. Too bad he had yet to get an analysis skill, would have been nice to know what he was carrying around. He’d also taken the mask. It looked pretty cool.

He continued to replay the short but brutal fight in his head. He needed something to focus on, something to distract him from the pain and fatigue. His quickdraw had felt sluggish but he was content that he’d been able to pull it off. It had been a gamble, forcing his feeble host body to do something that it was nowhere near ready to do. His luck was holding up, for now.

A cramp bloomed in his gut, coming fast and twisting his potbelly painfully. He grunted as he doubled over, clutching his stomach as he coached himself through breathing techniques. He fell toward the nearest tree and used it to brace himself. Leaning against trees was getting really old. In fact, he was already pretty sick of being in this toxic swamp forest. He needed to get out quickly.

Sepeti closed his eyes and concentrated. The faint outline of a map laid itself against the darkness of his eyelids. Almost everything around him was engulfed in a deep, hazy fog. He wasn’t sure how far the radius was but there was an area of discovery just around the blinking dot that he assumed represented him.

“Fuckin’ Boba,” he muttered between labored breaths. He studied the line that showed his frenzied flight. He had traveled a lot further than he’d expected. Unfortunately, the map was so basic and nondescript that he couldn’t quite make out distances. He’d have to test things for himself at some point, maybe when he wasn’t busy running for his life.

Once he caught his breath, he pushed himself up onto his feet despite his body’s protests. He let out a measured breath before taking his first step, bracing for the pain that would soon follow.

He quickly fell into a rhythm; good leg, bad leg, walking stick, good leg, bad leg, walking stick. His mind shut down as he focused on the arduous task at hand, fighting through the pain. His broken body probably wouldn’t be able to handle another hard reset. He needed to move and keep moving, even if he wasn’t quite sure of where he was headed.

For what felt like long, distended hours, he walked. He trudged on, keeping an ear out for crashing through the underbrush or the sound of clopping hooves. Thankfully, he had yet to hear anything that would indicate a pursuit. As his mind settled, the tunnel vision that had taken over him finally eased up. He noticed that he was now in a much darker part of the forest. The foliage was dense, blotting out the sun almost completely. He couldn’t quite make out where it was in the sky but he was sure it had sunk past the afternoon point.

He came to a stop as he pulled up next to a large tree, sliding down it so he could sit and rest for a bit. He popped the top off the flask and splashed his face before taking a swig, greedily gulping the magically conjured water. It slid down his throat and rejuvenated every part of his body. Some of his aches dulled as he drank, even the constant throb that was ever-present in his right leg lessened. Maybe the water had some healing properties to it? If so, he may have just used up all his luck in ‘acquiring’ it.

A loud bird call broke his reverie. It emanated throughout the forest as it made the tree he was leaning against shake. A huge shadow passed overhead, blotting out what little sunlight was able to pass through the thick canopy.

“The humans are coming!” the shadow squawked over and over like a siren. It continued its flight, blaring its message.

“Dammit.” Sepeti ground his teeth and pushed himself up. He felt quite limber, his body giving little to no protest as he stood. He scooped up his stick and shambled after the flying monster.

He followed, spurred on by something. If he were smart, he would have run in the opposite direction the large monster was heading. Maybe he could slip by the humans it was screaming about. Maybe he could find somewhere to hide and recuperate, bide his time and avoid any and all contact.

But that something told him otherwise. It whispered to him, bidding that he follow. It called to him, pulling him further into the forest.

Or it could be Boba being really weird about how he was guiding Sepeti. There was, currently, no way for him to tell this yearning apart from a trick that the mercurial God could be playing.

As he trudged on he realized that the ground had grown less swampy. The need to skirt around bubbling mud holes had diminished as the dirt remained consistently rigid. He could hear the light footfalls of animals as they raced by. They all headed in the same direction but gave him a wide berth. He would catch a flitting shadow out of the corner of his eye every so often but he saw little else of the forest denizens. Some whispered to their companions as they passed, moving too fast for him to understand.

After pushing his way through a particularly thick wall of bushes, Sepeti found himself in a large clearing staring at the yawning mouth of a huge cave. Animals darted into it, sleek shadows moving with a singular purpose.

A group of, what Sepeti assumed to be, shadowy field rats popped out next to him.

“Human!” they screamed in unison before scurrying towards the cave, fumbling over one another in their panic. More panicked squeals followed as various animals of every size burst out of the forest around him.

Sepeti grit his teeth and began hobbling around the edge of the clearing, looking for a place to hide. He wasn’t delusional enough to think that the monsters would welcome him with open arms. They were running from humans and he just so happened to be one. There was a high probability that they’d attack him and succeed in killing him. Maybe he could wait around and see about blending in with the humans?

No, that sounded stupid. That had to be a stray thought pushed through by the host body.

He eyed a small alcove placed right at the outer edge of where the clearing and the cave met. It looked like the perfect place for him to hide. He dropped down and wriggled into the opening feet first. It was a tight fit but he managed. For once, his undernourished body seemed to be working in his favor.

He continued to shimmy backward as he kept an eye out. The stream of animals, monsters, whatever they were, continued unabated. They burst into the clearing in groups, appearing from all angles. A few slowed down to sniff the alcove as they passed.

Sepeti couldn’t make out any finer details to the animals other than their basic shadowy outlines. He’d have to figure out why this was at a later time. For now, getting settled in and observing was the top priority.

An elongated hiss and rattle rose from behind him as he felt something cold and scaly brush against his exposed leg. Sepeti froze as a rather large, lanky body snuck up next to him.

“Hue-man,” the thing drawled, elongating the word until it was almost unrecognizable. “We have a hue-man here.”

More rattling as he felt smaller forms press against his legs, sliding up and surrounding him.

“Warm,” the voice drawled as it drew even with his head. Something tickled his ear, a quick flick. Did it just lick him?

“Warm hue-man. Warm.” It began cooing as it slithered across his arms. He squinted at the large, shadowy head of what he was pretty sure was a snake. It slowly coiled itself between his arms. “Let us get warm, my children. Then we will deal with the hue-man.”

The other, much smaller snakes slithered up his sides and wedged themselves next to his stomach. They rattled, tickling his sides with their small tails.

“What the hell?” Sepeti murmured as he tried his best to stay absolutely still.

“Hue-man, can you speak?” the large one rasped as it lifted its head. The shadowy slits that appeared to be its eyes narrowed. “Hue-man, can you understand us?”

Sepeti didn’t want to answer. It was bad enough that his skill allowed him to speak with monsters. Now, it seemed that it considered anything sentient and non-humanoid to be a monster. He hoped this wasn’t the case. Having to communicate with more than one species was much more than he could handle.

“Hue-man?” The large snake’s shadowy head turned slightly as it eyed him with its nearest eye.

“Yes,” Sepeti sighed as he resigned himself to the fact that he was going to be forced to interact with the strange creatures. “I can.”

The snake let out an odd, undulating sound. The smaller snakes echoed the cry as they jumped up onto his back. Despite their relatively diminutive sizes, they weighed much more than he’d expected. He gasped as the mini weights continued to jump on.

Sepeti moved to shrug them off but the large snake slithered onto his shoulders. Just like the smaller ones, it was much heavier than it appeared. His chest bumped the ground as all the air was pushed out of his lungs.

“Hue-man, take a nap.”

Unconsciousness came quickly as his tired body gave in to the pressure the pit of snakes applied.

“We can’t trust a snake,” a voice boomed as Sepeti was slowly pulled out of the darkness of senselessness. He suddenly remembered how to breathe as his body kicked into manual breathing mode.

A hiss and an angry rattle answered the booming voice.

“The hue-man spoke to us. It understood us.”

Something huge smacked the ground. Everything shook.

“Lies!” a third voice challenged. This one was familiar. Was the blocky creature here too? “Human’s and Nifa can never communicate.”

The angry rattling grew as a chorus of smaller rattles joined in. Sepeti peeked through his eyelashes, trying to remain as still as he could. He needed more time to muster up the energy to interact with intelligent monsters.

Towering over him was the shadowy snake. It appeared much larger than it had been before it put him to sleep.

“Still-young, you dare accuse us of lying? We only speak the truth!” The snake’s neck flared as a hood opened, increasing its size.

A short screech forced the preening snake to slither backward.

“Stand down, both of you. We will find out the truth of the matter soon enough.” The creature’s gravelly voice shook him to the core. Something cold and metallic dragged itself across his forehead. “It is awake.”

Sepeti cursed his luck. How the hell was it able to tell that he was conscious?

“Human, if you can understand us,” the monster spoke slowly as if it were trying to communicate with a dunce. “Then you must say so. This is your one and only chance. Can you speak to us?”

Sepeti wanted to punch the condescending monster in the throat. He could endure a lot, but being spoken down to was a pet peeve. Hell, he’d never known anyone who responded well to condescension, and he knew a couple handfuls of people.

“Yes,” he growled, eyes still closed.

Gasps filled the room. He wasn’t sure where he was but it sounded as if there were more than a few monsters in attendance.

“It speaks!” a childish voice screamed. “The human can speak!”

Voices mixed with roars and squawks and various other noises as every monster in attendance added their voice to the cacophony.

“Lies!”

“Human’s can’t speak!”

“Tricks!”

“Kill it!”

A roar dominated the room, rattling every fiber of Sepeti’s being. He was glad to be lying down or else he would have fallen over from the force the roar exuded.

You have been {Stunned}

New Skill Acquired!

|Stun Resistance| - {Low}

Sepeti wanted to brace himself but he wasn’t too sure what he was supposed to be bracing for. He remembered getting stunned earlier but he couldn’t quite remember what it actually felt like. He concentrated, this time he would remember.

A fuzziness spread through him. It started in his head then it quickly swept through the rest of his body. He remembered, he’d compared it to the odd sensation of being able to feel but not feel at the same time after waking up from a long nap. This time it felt much less impactful, probably due to the new skill.

As the status ailment subsided, much quicker than before, Sepeti’s hearing came back. The room was deathly quiet.

“Human,” the gravelly voice said as its shiny metallic face hovered over his. “Can you truly communicate with us?”

Up close, the monster was mesmerizing. It shone brightly and its face appeared incredibly articulate. A foreign emotion bubbled in his gut as he fought the urge to jump and hug the monster's neck. Was he excited?

“Dragon?” he murmured as he stared into the beast's large eyes. He saw his reflection for the first time since arriving as his image bounced off the dragon’s shiny scales. He resisted the urge to recoil as he looked at his face. The excitement bubbled over and helped him keep focus.

“Come again?” the gravelly-voiced dragon said.

“You’re a dragon, aren’t you?” He had to steady his voice. It would be unbecoming to give away the fact that he was simply ecstatic at the moment.

The shiny dragon coughed, clearing its throat before whispering. “Yes, I am. But that is not important right now. Please, speak up and answer my questions. For both our sakes.”

“Last time, human,” the dragon said as it puffed its chest out and raised its voice. “Can you understand us?”

This time it didn’t speak slowly. The dragon was obviously much more intelligent than the rest of the rabble in the room. Not that he could say who or what they were, being that he was still on his back with tiny weights pressing down on his chest.

“Yes, I can,” Sepeti answered, raising his voice.

Murmuring began to build before a sharp shushing quieted the room.

“It speaks,” the dragon’s gravelly voice filled the quiet room. “And it appears to understand us. Praise be to God Boba!”

Sepeti’s stomach dropped at the mention of the inept God. The small snakes wriggled off of his chest as something powerful scooped him up and held him aloft.

“God Boba’s human speaker has arrived!” a voice boomed from beneath him. He hung limply, dangling from the end of what appeared to be a large, hairy trunk. The monster deposited him on its back before letting out a shrill trumpeting. The rest of the assembled monsters followed with an assortment of unique noises.

Sepeti hung his head as he tried to avoid making eye contact with any of the frenzied denizens. He covered his ears, pressing hard as he tried to drown out the noise.

“Live a little, you damned shut-in,” Boba wheezed, refusing to give him a moment’s reprieve.