As Quinten stood there in a shocked stupor. The sword penetrating his shoulder slid out and the jagged pain intensified several-fold, leaving a fresh, crimson bloodstain over his previous bandage. "AAAhhggh" The scream forced its way past his lips and he clutched his arm to his chest reflexively. The health bar in the corner of his vision dropped precipitously low, coming to hover at just under 20%, and a new debuff box appeared. This time, the contained symbol was of an arm in a sling. 'Won't be using that arm for a while' he thought through the biting pain. The danger of the situation kept him from losing himself entirely otherwise he may have passed out from the shock. With as much haste as he could muster, he grabbed the gun he'd dropped and scrambled on all fours, well, threes, to build up a good bit of distance then laid back, mindful of his wounded shoulder, and fired. Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Five shots rang out, deafening him once more, leaving behind a faint ringing. While two shots missed, the golem staggered slightly back with each successful hit when the final round penetrated its chest. A shower of sparks jettisoned from the hole and it toppled over backward with a clang. Breathing a sigh of relief, Quinten collapsed back and immediately regretted it as his shoulder hit the ground. He rolled onto his side then sat up to start babying the offending limb. After a moment wallowing in pain and self-pity, he grit his teeth and forced himself up. He only collapsed twice before finally getting back up to his feet. He looked over the two, hopefully dead, golems. The fear and pain from almost dying outweighed the pride in overcoming such a difficult situation. 'I would have died for sure without this thing,' he thought while looking at the still-warm gun he held in his hand. With a pained sigh, he holstered it and made his way back, finally noticing the room he'd missed earlier. "Hello?? Anyone here?" He called out softly into the dimly lit room. There seemed to be no other golems so he decided to hole up inside until he dealt with his arm. A little look around gave him the impression this place had been abandoned long ago. A corroded desk sat at the right side with a threadbare, moldy and rotten chair toppled over in front. Another of those crystal lights, set in a lantern, sat on top of the desk. There was a thin layer of dust covering everything except for a pair of footprints leading out of the room. "This must be where that first metal bastard came from." Pain shot through his arm as he was reminded of the previous fight. crossing the room, he eased his bag off his back with a grimace to place it on top of the table. In moments, the needed supplies were arranged on top of the bag. Now that the tools sat in front of him, he set to work cleaning and dressing the wound. With great difficulty, Quinten freed himself from his bloodied shirt and carefully peeled off the tattered remains of his previous bandage. The feeling of blood running down his back caused him to shudder. The open air caused a slight burning sensation around the edges as he stood there. Carefully, and painfully, he picked out the shredded threads left behind in the wound. When that was finally taken care of, the next step was to clean it with some water and antiseptic, The stinging of the hydrogen peroxide making him gasp. A bloody pool developed around his feet during the process so he stepped over to the side. After the cleaning, it was time to dress it. Quinten smothered two sets of gauze with the bacitracin, a difficult task with only one hand. Taking one of the smothered gauze, Quinten hunched over and carefully placed it on the backside of the wound and covered it with a folded paper towel. Quickly grabbing the pre-taped end of the bandage, he applied it to the top of the shoulder and wrapped it under the arm to hold it in place. A finger accidentally brushed the injury and his eye twitched and watered, but he held in the swear building on his tongue. Quinten applied the second gauze and paper towel combo then securely wrapped his entire shoulder tightly before taping the loose end. As he finished, a new box appeared in the corner of his eye. The flashing green symbol like a thick plus sign, apparently the multiversal symbol for healing, was proceeded by a gentle wave of relief. The small uptick in health every few seconds surprised him as well. Another small popup quickly flashed by and Quinten felt his knowledge of the wound deepened a little, tying together some of the odd biologic and anatomical information he'd accumulated over the years. It was an almost unsettling sensation as if he could physically feel neurons connecting together in his brain. With a one-sided shrug, Quinten looked over at the mess he'd created. Blood was splattered everywhere, the pool of bloody water was spreading across the floor, the torn and bloodied shirt laid across the chair and the old bandage already soaking up some of the water. He wasn't sure what to do about any of it so for the moment he decided to sit and rest while he healed up. Choosing a spot far away from the creeping pool, Quinten grabbed the beef jerky and what remained of the water and sat against the wall, grimacing as his useless arm was jostled during the decent. He carefully lifted his arm and laid it across his lap and tore into the jerky. A small, blissful smile crept over his face as one of the Mooger strips crossed his tongue. Even cooked and dried, it had that tender mouth feel and slight gamy spice. The experience was further enhanced by the bit of salt and chili flakes from the original jerky that sent the flavor into another dimension. The jerky had a lower quality of taste compared to the freshly cooked version, but compared to the machine processed jerky from home, it was like day and night. The small meal disappeared all too soon and after a moment, so too did half the remaining water. Quinten was surprised to see another green icon started flashing in sequence with the, assumed, health regen buff. This one depicted a small haunch of meat and sat right next to the health regen. It didn't last long, maybe 30 seconds, but within that time he felt a few subtle waves of relief 5 seconds apart. His breathing eased up and energy-filled back into his muscles, taking care of the soreness starting to set in. 'Alright! Food buff? This is going to make cooking way more profitable!' Even though he wasn't a greedy person, even Quinten knew he needed a way to sustain himself in this new world. Loot might not come very often and monsters only seemed to drop those crystal cores, the market might be overly saturated (if they sell at all). He couldn't be sure about the economical state of this world. He'd decided to keep hope there were people out there figuring he wouldn't be brought to an uninhabited world. Quinten closed his eyes to daydream about the restaurant he might own in the future. A bustling floor filled with patrons laughing and enjoying themselves over meals and beer. Adventurers clad in expensive magical armor would boast about their fierce battles with deadly monsters or the dungeons they've conquered. He could already smell the aromas of fantastic foods he'd cook in the kitchen. As the daydream filled his attention, dulling the burning pain, 20 minutes had already passed and the debuff faded from existence. His health ticked up a little faster and soon passed the 50% threshold. The pain died down to a greater degree and a small sigh of relief fell from his lips. After another 10 minutes, the health regen buff faded out as well and Quinten's health basically stagnated at around 65%, slowing down to the natural regen rate of around 1% a minute. The change in physical state cleared his mind and brought Quinten back to reality. With a bit of effort, Quinten picked himself up, using the wall as a brace, then headed back to the table to clean up the best he could. Using the old bandages, the excess bloody water was pushed into the corner. The scraps and waste he tossed onto the pile, unsure of what else to do with it. He hadn't thought to bring any of the plastic shopping bags to use for trash. It was a biological hazard to leave blood out like that but there was no way to clean it up so there it would stay. He started putting away the rest of the first aid supplies, but when he picked up the roll of bandages, he noticed it was almost empty, there wasn't enough for anything big but the remains gave him an idea. The ringing in his ears had subsided long ago, but the memory of the loud banging from his gun remained fresh in his mind. Quinten tore apart the cloth bandage into two strips, rolled them up and inserted them into his ears. It wasn't a perfect solution but the added layer of protection would definitely help keep him from going deaf or getting tinnitus. Satisfied with the results, and not willing to waste more time in the dungeon than he had to, Quinten left his quiet room and made his way back to the inanimate golems. ------ Demi breathed a sigh of relief and let out a happy whoop when Quinten survived and killed the second golem. "That was too close! Don't scare me like that you jerk!" She couldn't help but vent off the built-up anxiety. When she saw he was going to make it, a wave of relief spread throughout her chest and congratulated him in her heart. She'd already grown attached to the main character of her show. Quickly growing bored while Quinten rested and healed up, Demi threw the screen off to the left and opened a new window to start browsing through the options on Divinity+. Some new anime popped up on her recommended section but it was from a species that looked like anthropomorphic lobsters so she decided to pass for now. Nothing stuck out, so in the end, she decided to load up her old Final Fantasy VII save file. A nostalgic feeling hit her when little chibi Cloud popped up in the train graveyard. A little menu searching to find out what she'd been up to and continued on her adventures while she waited for Quinten to finish.