[Ghrush The Berserker]

Danger Level: Certain Death

What stood before me was a seven-foot-tall brown-skinned long-tusked bipedal sack of muscle, with fists about as big as its own head and a wiry mustache.

So a weirdly proportioned and muscular walrus man...

He and I stared at each other for a minute, before he made some 'horking' noises.

"What?" I asked.

This seemed to frustrate the creature, Ghrush I was guessing.

He then shook his head and started stretching his arms.

At this point, I was thoroughly confused.

The voice who brought me here mentioned that there was some sort of competition and that it was dangerous... but like, what does that mean? Maybe I should challenge him to something?

I pointed to him and loudly announced: "I challenge you to a game of checkers!"

Nothing happened besides making both he and I even more confused.

I scratched my head. "So it's not like that..."

Suddenly, the walrus man's muscles all surged in size, pushing him another foot and a half tall and causing his eyes to glow red.

He then charged toward me.

I guess hoping I didn't have to fight was just wishful thinking.

[Your champion has entered combat!]

"Thanks I didn't notice!" I yelled, running perpendicular to Ghrush.

I knew I didn't have any way to defeat Ghrush in a competition of strength, so I started listing off my advantages.

"Well, I'm probably smarter right now, his body size is massive, so his calorie intake is probably huge... humans are persistence predators... this is going to suck."

As I changed directions in order to avoid the walrus man yet again, I opened up the menu, dropped Radiation Intensity Reduction back to 0%, and then used the rest of my Adjustment Points to crank up Nutrient Need Reduction to 12%.

I broke out into full sprint, zig-zagging as much as possible to keep my aggressor guessing.

This is now a contest of power against endurance.

Will you be able to reach me before you exhaust yourself, or will I be able to play keep away until you collapse?

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Let's find out!

Obviously, it didn't take me very long to get tired, I'm a puzzle nerd who doesn't like to sweat.

Ghrush however, didn't seem to even notice the amount of running he'd been doing thus far, probably that berserker nonsense from his name.

As I started to wonder if this plan was a good idea in the first place, I tripped over a rock and faceplanted into sand.

As I tried my best to stand, Ghrush grabbed me by the leg and lifted me upside-down.

Luckily I was wearing my work uniform complete with tucked-in shirt, so I didn't have to worry about being exposed, which in retrospect was a really stupid thing to be thinking about given the circumstances.

I then turned my attention to something more productive, i.e. my enemy.

His breathing was quite clearly ragged and even a bit wheezy, but something was stopping him from feeling it.

Out of ideas, I tried recreating the 'horking' that I heard from him earlier in an attempt to confuse him.

He stared at me for a second, before punching me directly in the stomach with his offhand.

This was the first time I'd ever been hurt so badly, even accidentally.

I had never gotten anything worse than a twisted ankle before, so when three of my ribs broke, I couldn't help but scream.

The walrus man had reeled back for another blow, but stopped, instead just watching me as I became hoarse and switched to sobbing silently.

He suddenly returned to how he was when we first met.

Then all at once, he let go and fell to a knee in exhaustion.

Despite the pain, I managed to stand.

And then I ran as fast as I could... which was more of a hobbling jog now.

I was tired and hungry and in lots of pain, so I just hid inside of the nearest hole in the ground as soon as I was out of sight.

I just sat in the cramped barely-arm-width-wide cave and breathed.

I opened up the menu and put the Adjustment Points spent on Nutrient Need Reduction and Apparent Temperature Shift into Natural Healing Boost.

It certainly wasn't as much as I would have liked, but it would mean I wouldn't have to wait to heal for quite as long.

I started going over how I could have done better in that fight in my head.

I could have thrown sand in their eyes, I could have used a sharp shell as a weapon, I could have tried to climb a palm tree to try and wear the walrus man out more... but one question kept repeating in my head.

'And then what?'

Sand in the eyes would offer me an opportunity once, maybe twice, but how would I have used that opportunity? To run away?

If that's my plan, then getting close enough to throw sand is a mistake, and I should just keep running away like I already was.

Maybe to try and hurt him?

Ghrush shrugged off all of the exhaustion he had built up chasing me up until he changed back, so even if I used a shell as a weapon more likely than not the result would have been the same, especially against a creature with as much protective blubber as a walrus... or walrus-like being at least.

And what would climbing a tree actually accomplish? He can almost certainly climb it too, or even worse, just knock it over after he rested from all of the running.

For that particular plan, the best I could do is hope he's allergic to coconuts.

I closed my eyes.

This was the worst day of my life.

My glory days were over, and all that awaited me after that was a slow march toward death... I've just managed to expedite the process.

If there was any mystery to be found, it was why I even bothered in the first place.

I could have just lived how I had been, with a soul-sucking 9 to 5 and coworkers I didn't like.

Maybe then an opportunity to solve another great puzzle would have come... but no, I'm here on the edge of death for the second time today.

Maybe the world has no need for a self-proclaimed "Master Cryptologist".

'The most important thing for a puzzle-master to know, is how to look at things from different angles.'

That's something my dad used to say a lot when I got stuck on a puzzle.

Maybe the reason I thought of it was because the frustration I was feeling was similar to being stuck in a difficult puzzle for a long time? Whatever the cause, it made me think... maybe I've been thinking about all of this too shallowly.

I mean, this whole menu thing is pretty mysterious.

It doesn't seem like it was intended to be as I see it, with all the glitched text and references to 'your champion' and not just 'you'.

With renewed purpose, I opened up the menu again and started searching through it seriously.

That's when I found the option labeled 'Advanced Mode'.

Clarissa

Activating it was even more of a shock than I expected it to be.

There were even things like 'Manually Set Breathing Orifice Position'.

For the next day and a half, I would forget to eat because of how engrossed in my new task I was.

Though, as it turned out, it was all worth it in the end.

I clenched my fists.

The fight with Ghrush was going to be the last time I let myself be so pitifully defeated.