Sometimes in my life I’d wished for something exciting to happen. Something that would allow me to leave my boring repetitive life. I would picture things as big as myself saving the world, and as small as me slapping a doctor in the face. 

I would dream of something, anything interesting to happen.

But I never thought of this.

The courageous Mardaug wasted no time. As soon as the Queen yelled “fight”, it was dashing towards me at an alarming speed.

I jumped aside in the nick of time. If I had been a split second later, I would’ve been toast. 

The monster kept redoing this move. I kept dodging. Soon I realised that the Mardaug didn’t know how to fight in any other way. So I used this to my advantage.

Although I was weak, my anger and frustration was strong. So I let it all bubble up in my stomach, and then unleashed it in one fiery punch.

The Mardaug seemed extremely surprised at my act. And again, an advantage. This was going better than I’d anticipated. Maybe I would win the fight? Maybe I would get out as a human, not one of these ugly creatures.

After summoning all my energy on this punch, I had nothing left. My knees began to buckle. You can do this! Just throw another punch! You can do this! I pumped myself. I pictured myself getting back up and throwing an even harder punch at the Mardaug.

And then I stood up.

With a lot of difficulty, of course. Every bone in my body ached. All of my muscles were sore. The bruises that gave my skin color sent jolts of pain through me.

But I stood up. It was like the teeniest bit of energy had returned. Just enough for this battle.

The Mardaug continued its tactic of running towards me, trying to knock me down. I dodged each time. And then finally, when the monster was in the perfect position, I balled my hand into a fist, and hit the Mardaug so hard that it stumbled backward.

My hand hurt so much that it felt like it were in extremely freezing water. How had I done that? It had happened exactly the way I pictured it. No, it wasn’t possible that. . .

I pushed aside the silly thought.

I had bigger things to worry about. The Mardaug was slowly recovering from my blow.

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I dared a look at the cheering crowd. The Mardaug Queen was not looking happy. She stared at my opponent disapprovingly. It was obvious that she regretted her choice of a competitor for me. I smiled. Maybe I really would win.

I then realised that when she had been announcing the battle, she said that the Mardaug shouldn’t kill me, just hold me down, and then that would be the end. But I couldn’t help but notice that she hadn’t mentioned anything about me winning.

The Mardaug now stood up, looking down at me hatefully. It kept going on its useless tactic, too dumb to realise that it wasn’t working.

It was too easy. I simply avoided the creature. But I couldn’t keep at this forever. Maybe if I held down the Mardaug, I would be set free? Or maybe I could just escape?

Both of my options had so many what ifs to go along with them. There was no point in listing all of them.

But which option had the better chance of succeeding? They both were extremely risky. If I were to beat the Mardaug, they might not set me free. And then I would have even less chance of escape. But if I tried to escape now, I could easily be caught. 

So which was better?

No, neither was better than the other. What could I do, then?

And then the idea came to me. I built on top of it until I was sure that it had the least many flaws possible. 

During all this time, I’d been dodging the Mardaug. I pictured myself holding it down, with strength that I knew I didn’t have. I kept this thought close to me as I put my plan into action. Would this work? I certainly hoped so. But I had no choice. It was all I could come up with.

The Mardaug got ready for another attempt that was bound to fail. And then it came at me again. But this time, instead of dodging, I took a deep breath, held my hands out, and tried my best to stay in place.

It felt like my arms would fall off when the Mardaug hit. Its leathery skin scratched my own, but ignoring all this horrible pain, I shoved forward.

I kept the image of me holding the monster down in my head. Please, oh dear please. I prayed that this would work.

My muscles strained as I pushed with all my might. The Mardaug didn’t budge, but just laughed quietly. You can do this! I pictured myself winning, succeeding in my risky plan.

And then the Mardaug moved. Just a little, but just enough to send it off balance, and soon after falling backward helplessly. It landed heavily on the ground with a thud. 

I wasted no time. This was my only chance. I ran to the wall, jumped on an empty platform, I kept on moving upwards, avoided surrounding Mardaugs. Thankfully, none of them even noticed that I had passed them with no trouble.

Like I’d planned, all the Mardaugs had their eyes fixed on the one I’d beat. Not even the Queen looked up from her defeated follower.

So I kept going. I was out of breath, and my whole body begged for me to stop. But I continued. At this point the only thing keeping me going was he thought that I was almost at the top, and that I would get there.

Up, up. Gradually it got lighter. The sun, oh how I missed it. Fresh air now flooded the hole. 

I smiled, and then laughed, but that hurt so I quickly stopped. 

And then I climbed out of the dark hole that had held me prisoner for who knows how long.