Arnith woke to pain and for several minutes he could not make himself to move, he was covered in dust and pebbles and it took all of his strength to dig himself out. He was no longer holding onto his glowstone so he summoned a small wisp of light that hovered around him, the spell consumed considerably more mana than charging a glowstone would, but it would keep going for a while before he ran out.

There was no telling how long he had been unconscious, there was a wound on the back of his head and the blood from it had crusted solid some time ago.

Finally, he had time to take account of himself. There was little doubt that his pursuers thought he was dead and if they didn’t they were welcome to spend a century to dig for his corpse.

He felt better than he had any reason to, he had lost his shield and sword, as well as his provisions, and one of his boots was gone also, but after eight years of running for his life, for the first time, he was free.

Freedom came with its own problems, thought Arnith. This new world in which he was doomed to make his home, certainly did not welcome his kind, he had almost gotten himself eaten by a giant snake by accident. Venturing forth from here on would have to be practiced with some caution.

He took off his armguard so he could cut off the sleeve of his tunic, which he fashioned into a makeshift wrap for his barefoot. He thought about using his hood but he figured that the minimal protection it gave to his neck and head would be more necessary. At least his long knife had not been lost with the fall; it would certainly be the most useful tool to survive in the underground.

He dug around a little in the dust, to see if he could find his gear but soon gave up on it. It was a miracle that he had not been buried deep himself.

There was only one direction open in the collapsed tunnel so he proceeded along with it. The cave sloped down into the earth turning slightly here and there, Arnith had to climb over piles of rocks and dust where the earthquake had made minor collapses, but they appeared less often the further he went.

Going down Arnith had time to think about what he would need to survive down here, he had no sense of direction in the underground to navigate himself back to the surface and he was not sure if he should go back at all. Surely he would have to wait for a considerable amount of time for his enemies to stop being vigilant. Maybe one day he could infiltrate elven society as an unknown wanderer, but it would be decades or centuries before his name would be forgotten.

What he needed to do then was to find a stronghold here were to survive and from which to explore the underground, but first, he needed to secure a source of water and food.

Time had no meaning in the dark and the elf felt it’s passing only by his rising hunger and the short moments of rest that he took.

The cave finally came to a large cavern once more. Arnith was hesitant to enter the large chamber, he extinguished the wisp before entering, so as not to attract any undue attention, there was no telling what was creeping out there in the dark.

As his eyes adjusted he was glad to find that the chamber had a light of its own, there seemed to be glowing mushrooms here also as well as some kind of glowing moss. Some of the mushrooms seemed to be rather large, and there seemed to be a veritable forest of them in the bottom of the cavern. Arnith could see for several hundred meters into the cavern before he could not make out any more. He thought he saw a body of water behind the mushrooms but it was hard to tell, even though the entrance of the cave was high enough to give a fairly good advantage. For a moment he berated himself for not having learned any incantations that would have helped with his night vision, having had one of the foremost experts in the arcane arts on hand for years.

Arnith made his way down to the cavern floor. His goal was to see if there was water beyond the forest but he chose to skirt around the mushrooms instead of going through, he saw several of the large centipedes between the shrooms so he chose to avoid going near.

Once he made it to the other side, he found a lake. Though he was very thirsty he did not immediately approach it, instead, he spent some time observing it from afar. At one point a three-foot-long salamander went walking by the shore, so he reasoned that it was relatively safe and went to have a drink of water. The water seemed clean and so he drank deep, after which he washed his face and hair, the small hygienic activity greatly helped to lift his mood.

After a drink he thought of what to do next, having seen the salamander slowly walk by he had the thought that maybe it was time to hunt some lizard. After considering for a bit on how to proceed with his hunt he decided that the most optimal way was to lay in ambush.

He had considered some alternatives, but as he did not have any ranged weapons, he would need to get in close and he was reluctant to use any of his magicks, most of what he could do was eighter loud or flashy or both and he didn’t still feel safe enough to draw attention. Finally, he found a nice tall rock to climb onto from witch to drop onto his prey.

It took three tries to get a lizard, once he was hiding there seemed to appear one every once in a while but the reptiles were not without keen senses and it was the third one that did not spook before he landed on it with a skull piercing stab. He gutted the thing on the spot leaving behind its guts and the head. Having had a successful hunt he proceeded back to the cave from which he came from, hoping for its relative safety, so he could proceed to skin and then cook the lizard.

The salamander was barely edible. He had cooked it or more like flash-fried it with magic. Still, having had something to drink and eat he felt much more energized.

The salamander skin he left to dry by hanging it using a crack in the wall of the cave.

The cave was by no means an optimal location for him to stay for the long term, there was only one exit and the opening was too large to be defensible, he just hoped that it having little vegetation and the entrance being high in the cavern wall it would be left untouched until he was ready to move on.

The next time he went out, he went further afield to explore the cavern. There were a couple of tunnel entrances on the other side of the forest that he went to the first time and then the cavern ended with the lake, coming back he decided that he could gather some of the glowing moss to bring to the cave, though the luminescent parts of it were moist, there were often parts of it that were old and somewhat dry, which he thought he could make a fire with.

The second salamander that he caught tasted was far better as a true fire could cook it more fully, though the smoke from the moss made it a little bitter.

By the third time he went out to hunt, he was feeling mostly back to normal, having a fire to keep him dry and ample amounts of meat had restored him well, the wound on the back of his head had healed well as had most of his bumps.

Arnith decided that a reasonable way to measure time in the underground was to keep it by his sleep-cycles. How else could it be done? The environment was static, with no sun or moons to track, each moment was the same as the last one.

It was after his fifth cycle since his arrival, that he decided that he was ready to leave the area. He had made a couple of water skins, a crude leather boot to replace the one he had lost as well as a pouch to carry some smoked meat with him on his trip.

There were three caves to choose from. He had considered remaining in the cavern for a longer period, it seemed safe enough but he did not like that his abode was so open and there was little to do here except to eat lizards, he also thought that soon enough he might hunt out the tasty reptiles and eating the disgusting and aggressive centipedes just would not do.

He also wondered about how he had become accustomed to the reptiles, his natural wariness of the creatures had lessened the more he came into contact with them, maybe it was the number of legs that made them more acceptable; four legs being fine, two legs creepy, no legs no go.

He had observed that the salamanders frequented one of the caves more than the others and he reasoned that following his food source would be the most reasonable choice.

For a moment Arnith hesitated before the opening of the tunnel, Then a small ball of light appeared before him and he stepped forward.