I cursed as I read the message and then leaned back against a wall of the cave. Standing was easy enough, but everything else seemed to drain my energy at a radically fast rate. Under the weight of my own body, I felt dizzy, I felt weak in the knees, weak in the shoulders. Beneath my armor, my body was becoming a mass of bruises from the fight and from the fall, and here I was, trapped in some new hell.

I was not built for this. I was not a hero, not some all-conqueror warrior, I was a failure of an engineering student.

Yet, I couldn’t stop, I was on the rails of this destiny that had been foisted on me and there was no escape, no hope of absolution. So, I straightened my back and stepped forward towards the darkness. My erg sight at least let me see the contours of the space in front of me, the rock was rich with the energy, and as I moved forward, my map updated, showing more detail than I could see with my erg sight. With these combined, I was able to slowly creep forward in relative safety.

The space around me narrowed down and down, twisting into a tunnel that I could just barely squeeze my armored frame for. I pushed forward and briefly found myself stuck, trapped between the walls of the tunnel. The pinch of stone kept me from even pulling back and my breath quickened in pace, my heart raced, and sweat beaded all of my frame. Then, in a flash of insight, I brought my drill to the offending bit of stone and sheared it away with a powerful spin of the bit.

For a moment, the thrill of victory erased my fears and my doubts. Caves were terrifying, there was no doubt about that, but I was more prepared than most to handle the greatest difficulties here. I was prepared and I was powerful, at least against unmoving stone.

I pressed forward, carving holes where I needed to, keeping my pace slow. This environment should not have been conducive for healing, but I felt increasingly better as I moved forward. My leg was still broken, but the bruises seemed to bother me less and my breathing stabilized despite the tightness in my chest. The occasional bit of gravel and pebbles fell as I drilled my way ahead, but the progress was made, inch by inch.

Soon, I dropped from the tunnel into a large, spherical chamber. I immediately noticed ore deposits sealed beneath the stone, which had a slightly different color to them, somewhat greenish in comparison to the pure blue of everything else. Then, I noticed a long, curled form resting in the far half of the chamber. It wasn’t a snake, it had legs after all, but the creature definitely seemed snake-like, with a long snout and a scaly body.

I turned my attention on the creature and concentrated, performing a quick analysis.

MONSTER - Greater Cave Salamander

Level: 5

Strengths: Speed, Strength

Weaknesses: Lack of vision, weak underbelly

Trying to avoid a fight, I crept my way towards the exit, a tunnel off to the right. As much as that ore would be useful in providing access to new resources, I simply couldn’t risk a fight, not in my condition. I winced at every creak of my armor, every impact of my feet on the floor, but I continued, eager to make my escape. The tunnel looked to be just narrow enough that the salamander couldn’t squeeze in but I could.

Then the salamander’s head lifted and its nostrils flared and I realized that with my broken leg I couldn’t make it in time to the tunnel. So, I turned and focused, bracing myself with my good leg and my right hand against the wall, while I lifted my left upwards, aiming the spikethrower installed there at the salamander’s throat. Patiently, I waited for an opportunity to get a shot off, and soon the salamander lifted off of the ground, that huge body stretching towards the roof of the cavern.

I sent a spark of erg into the spikethrower and it launched the loaded projectile forward, whistling as it pierced the air. Just the moment before it was to lodge itself into the salamander’s throat, the massive beast suddenly jerked its head to the side. The spike still scoured the salamander’s neck, but it was far from a lethal injury. Glowing blood dropped from the wound onto the floor and the salamander bellowed out a hiss that made my bones vibrate.

I let the engine of the spikethrower begin to load up another spike, before pushing myself away from the wall, trying to find another position to fire from. The salamander’s tail lashed out, covering the entire space of the chamber and slammed into my side, pushing out my breath and sending me flying to the other side of the chamber, my body crashing against the stone. Immediately, the salamander lowered its body towards me, preparing to crush me or snatch me up in its jaws.

So I activated the enhanced pseudo muscle fiber installed in the harness. Erg surged out of my reserves and into the enhancement, it tightened around my body like saran wrap, but I could feel the raw power in my limbs now, the pulsing might that I had gained. It wouldn’t last long, but I was able to dodge out of the falling salamander and surged forward with my right hand.

The tip of the drill hit scales and refused to enter any further, those scales far too tough by any normal means. Fortunately, the war drill was far from normal in this regard, armor penetration was its unique strength. It whirred to life and I added the force of the muscle fiber to it, my right arm bulging visibly before suddenly the war drill plunged in, carving a hole of viscera as my arm sunk elbow deep into the body of the salamander.

The salamander writhed from side to side, and bellowed out a scream of raw pain. I pulled out my arm and allowed it to move away from me for a moment, watching as it continued to bleed from the wound. A sudden pulse of pain ran through my body, the fiber was starting to run out, and it would need several hours to fully recharge. The adrenaline of battle pulsed in my ears, I could do nothing but focus on the fight, on claiming victory, on pushing myself to my limits.

I almost let out a bloodthirsty yell but just barely held myself in check. The fiber had that as a negative side effect, it tied directly into the endocrine system in order to maximize the effectiveness of the user. It was kind of a wonder how much pushing down everything besides adrenaline, even the cortisol that should be forming in this situation, affected the way that I thought about battle. That I was able to think in such detail about the effects of the fiber, though, suggested that it was beginning to wear off. The throbbing pain in my broken leg further enhanced that notion.

I didn’t have long.

I jumped forward and landed onto the salamander’s back, then proceeded to climb hand over hand up to the top of the salamander’s head, my grip desperately remaining locked in place to keep me from being flung off. My left arm pulsed this time as I arrived at my destination, keeping me locked in place as I brought the drill directly down into the skull of the salamander. Its cry pierced my eardrums, but I couldn’t stop.

I only stopped when I felt the final dregs of my strength remaining. Slowly I began to fall from the top of the salamander and I just barely was able to bring the spikethrower in line with the makeshift trepanation and fired the spike into the injury. I heard it bounce inside.

The salamander’s legs grew unsteady, but it still turned towards me as I landed on my back, the pain and the exhaustion hitting me like a sledgehammer. I wanted to move, but I couldn’t, I had nothing left in me. Saliva filled jaws opened as the salamander lifted its head to bring down onto me and I could only stare in a numb terror, knowing that I had done all that I could.

Then, the salamander collapsed, sending a shockwave through the floor. I barely noticed as I stared at the eyeless head of the salamander. It let out a final, heavy breath before going still. In death, the creature was so quiet, so perfectly immobile, there was a raw sort of beauty in this new form. Erg continued to swirl around the corpse, before it suddenly drew out of the body and flooded into my body.

My veins pulsed and my muscles spasmed beyond my control, the erg worked its way through my every system, restructuring me, reshaping me, returning me to whatever it thought was my ideal. My once broken leg snapped and spasmed outward, sending raw pain through my joints, bringing tears to my eyes. To distract myself, I opened up the system notification.

Level up! +10 Path Points, Health and Erg restored!

War Drill 15->30

Spikethrower 1->15

Battle Harness Proficiency 20->25

Battle Harness Customization 7->14

the higher you climb, the harder the fall the fall the fall

I just laid there, unable to move, despite technically being brought back to full health. The level up didn’t erase the pain, didn’t erase the knowledge that I had destroyed something wondrous for the sake of my own life. Yes, it was a trade I would make again, but I cursed the world, the system itself, for having force to make that trade. I wanted to stop, but nothing ever stopped. It all just kept going.