We can’t give up. There isn’t another option. There was no choice but to never give up.

“Bro, we need to get back there,” I said.

“Look hen, we... I don’t think we can make it...” I know he’s only trying to make sure that we survive. But then.. What would be the point if we let her die?

“We won’t give up on her,” I said.

“Ah... Alright, we’ll move then.”

This time we weren’t looting houses. We were hunting for ghouls. We were bound to get hurt or worse, even so we will do it.

“Let’s get going bro.”

“Aight. You lead.”

We then stood at a crossroad, this is where we would have to decide how we went.

Choosing one meant that we’d have to stay in that path, at least until we get enough Markis.

“We’ll go through the mine.”

“You sure Bluu?”

“Yeah.”

I took out my sword. For some reason it felt so nerve-wracking. But, seeing Bluu’s face, I calmed down. We’ll do it. We’ll make it. We’ll live. I slid my shield back onto my back.

“Hen, I’ve got the crystal lamp.”

The two of us walked closer to the desolate mine, it was a distance between here and the village, but we made it, and now we had to go inside.

I took a breath and walked inside.

“I’ll light the lamp, hold on,” said Bluu.

Suddenly came light.

Spiders roamed the stone roof that was barely held by the wooden supports that I saw. Pickaxes lie about, it had been years since anyone had been inside. There was no life here. All that remained was the broken remnants of the past that had now become the future.

There wasn’t room for mistakes anymore. If we screw up, we die. If we choke up, we die. If we don’t try, we die. It was like everything was out to kill us, I was scared.

“Hen!!”

“What?!”

“In front of you!”

I couldn’t see anything, but suddenly a ball of blackness jumped at me, it was a spider, a meter long, I immediately blocked it with my shield. It opened its mouth and hissed at us. It observed the both of us carefully.

Bluu charged at it with his knife, and stabbed into one of its legs, it screamed and bit his hand.

“Ahhhh!”

I raised my shield and crushed the spider with it. But it wasn’t enough. It started jumping up onto the walls, jumping from here to there, dodging every one of our attacks, it was fast. Annoyingly fast.

“Bluu! You good?!” On his left hand was a bite, swelling into a balloon. Not again, I won’t lose another person. I will never let that happen.

I put the shield on my back and took out my sword, I took a breath, and suddenly it was as though something took me over, I could charge at it with no fear, no hesitation. I took a stance, my left foot forward, and my right foot back, and then a slice to the left. One of the spider's legs was caught in it. The sword sliced through it like there was nothing there.

The leg fell to the floor and so did the spider, screeching in pain.

And suddenly Bluu came charging at it and stabbed it, in its abdomen, blood flowed out of it and it stopped screaming.

“Bluu, stop... Are you okay..?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Anyway... We should go, we just got 15 Markis, and it was gone immediately, I’m guessing it’s being used for Ana.”

“Alright. I wasn’t just high right? I saw this damn thing move so fast..”

“Yeah nah, it’s quick.”

Soon the two of us continued on, the mine branched off into a fork, and to make sure we didn’t get lost Bluu left a trail of rocks to follow back to get out.

We went into the first path, only to see that there were more spiders. Baiting one and running back to the fork we started attacking it. It was just like the other one, but we started noticing something. These spiders and ghouls, though they looked similar they weren’t the same. Rather they had completely different attack patterns even though they used the same moves.

I remember watching Miyamoto talk about this, he called it a DAS-AI. Dynamic Attack System - Artificial Intelligence. I completely forgot about it.

“In front of you!”

“Shit! Thanks for the save Bluu!”

“Watch your front! I’ll attack it!”

While I kept it distracted, Bluu came in from the back and stabbed it. I don’t know how many hours it had been, but eventually we had killed two more spiders and then Bluu said, “Hen! We did it! We friggin’ did it!!” He started hugging me, “We did?”

“We did!”

The reason for why we were so excited was well, the Markis had stopped being transferred, which means that she was saved!