The fall was only a few feet into the loose dirt. I was falling at a weird angle, so as soon as my feet touched something solid, I rolled to avoid getting an injury. I came up covered in dirt from head to toe, but I paid it no mind. My first concern was getting out of the pit as fast as possible.

I turned to get back to the edge, and I could swear that I saw movement in the ground. My DTA program didn't highlight any information, yet I thought it was too slow to show me. I scrambled back over the loose dirt, having a much harder time than I anticipated.

Once I got to the edge, which I noticed was probably six or seven feet up, I leaped up and grabbed it. The ground immediately crumbled under my grasp. I fell back down and wasn't so lucky on my second landing. My back slammed into the ground with a rock digging into my side.

The rock hit me right next to my wound from the Rock Beetle attack, but I was thankful it wasn't in the same spot. I had to lay there for a moment, just gritting my teeth to deal with the pain. I got to my feet as fast as possible when the pain subsided.

My goggles display lit up like a wild brushfire. I didn't see any Rock Beetles entirely, but I could see numerous parts of them peeking up through the ground. I tried once again to climb out of the crater. If I had trouble with three of them, as many as I saw would be my death.

I didn't try to jump straight out of the pit as that method didn't work. I spotted some exposed roots from a tree at the edge of the depression but still standing. I began climbing up as my goggles started beeping warning signals at me. They didn't light up with any proximity warnings, so I kept climbing as I had time.

I was clear of the hole when my goggles lit up red, and since I was already climbing up a tree, I immediately jumped up to a branch and lifted my legs up to clamp them around the branch. I pulled my body close to the branch for extra space and shimmed around. It wasn't until I was secure on the top side of the branch that I looked back at the pit.

I hadn't been in any immediate danger, but it was close. The amount of Rock Beetles was staggering, and I wasn't sure how long my perch would be safe. The beetles were all on the edge of the pit, but they couldn't get out.

Although, they were quickly piling up over each other, and it wouldn't be long before they crested the edge. I was worried that they would forgo trying to get over the small cliff and just decide to dig into the side. If that happened, it would probably collapse the tree I was on, and I would be in an even worse spot.

For the moment, it seemed that the beetles were focused on me. Before I could gather my bearing and try to jump down and flee, the Rock Beetles were up the edge, and they started swarming around the tree. Just as they did at the edge of the depression, they began swarming around the tree's base. They all scrambled and climbed over each other, slowly gaining height as more piled on.

I stood on the branch with one arm supporting myself around the trunk and started thrusting down with my spear. I managed to hit one of the beetles in the head, and I sliced it open. It tumbled down the additional mutated bugs, but two more took its place. Most of my other attacks did nothing chink along the creatures' hardened carapace.

Nevertheless, I continued to stab and slash as much as I could. I quickly became desperate without any other ideas or the ability to do anything else. Just when I considered climbing higher or jumping as far away as I could, the worst came to pass.

The throng of Rock Beetles amassing on the tree was too much for it to take. The tree began to groan and sway. It tipped toward the pit, then away at least three times. I prepared to jump the next time it swayed away. The tree suddenly shucked convention, tipping in a different direction and in a circle like the hands of a clock.

The velocity of the sway nearly threw me off to tumble into the pit of beetles, but I managed to hold on. It then righted itself one last time before truly beginning to tip. To my relief, it started falling in the direction opposite the beetle pit.

While the tree was falling, I somehow got my footing along the tree trunk. Without much else to do, I rode the tree as it fell. I jumped the first chance I got as it fell next to another tree.

I could only chalk it up to my advancing in cultivation as to why I managed not only to ride the tree and jump to another but also to how I didn't die. I flew higher and quicker than I imagined as I sailed through the air.

I was whipped repeatedly by branches of the tree my trajectory took me into. But the whipping was child's play compared to when the collision between my stomach and a branch arrested my momentum. I folded around the offending branch, but somehow I didn't break my back or rupture an internal organ. I actually managed to hold on, but just barely.

I pulled myself up on the branch and caught my breath. The new tree I was in was significantly larger. It was also far enough away from the Rock Beetle crater that I didn't have to worry about it falling over anytime soon.

The swarm didn't seem to miss my abrupt position change. They began gathering around my new perch. I was fairly low on the branch hierarchy, so I climbed a little bit higher. I didn't know, nor did I want to know, how high the beetles would manage to get with their swarm.

I only managed to go one higher level up in the tree. The tree itself was larger than the other, but going any higher would have made the branches smaller than I wanted at the time. My entire body hurt, and I needed a moment to figure out what I would do next.

I was stuck in the tree and unable to get down since I was surrounded. If I could kill the Rock Beetles quickly, then I could perhaps fight back. I couldn't kill the beetles because not only were there too many but they were covered in a hard and rocky chitin that I couldn't pierce with my spear. Even though I didn't know if they could reach me, my only option seemed to wait.

I was safe for a little while. All the beetles that were going to show up did. They continued swarming in an undulating mass at the bottom of the tree.

That was all they were able to do. There weren't enough of them to get to me. I even decided to move back down one level to where the branches were a little thicker. Once there, I leaned my back against the tree trunk and took a few minutes to myself. I did my best to ignore the chittering and scratching of their legs all along the varied surfaces.

"Companion Mode," I said. I wanted to let my eyes rest for a few minutes and get some air. It was a good thing I did because as soon as it switched, a notification appeared in my vision.

-Please wait while ambient De is collected in the area.

Just as it did when I defeated the creatures at my campsite and when I left the dungeon, a bar appeared at the bottom of my vision and filled up until I knew it was complete.

-Congratulations! Your compatibility has reached 5.0%. New boons and functions unlocked. Would you like to view them now? Y/N

"Yes."

-Robotic Companion updates-

- 5.0% compatibility reached.

-New boon granted.

-Boon status: Automatic

-Boon: Augmented Armor

-Once the registered user reaches a compatibility of 5.0%, using the robot in Symbiotic Mode adds additional armor to the robot. This augmentation will increase with every additional percent of compatibility that is increased.

-Current Addition: Mask

-The mask addition forms a sealed cover over the nose and mouth and integrates with the user's robot to cover the eyes and other vulnerable soft tissue. In addition to providing minor facial protection, the mask works as a respirator and is used to protect the wearer from inhaling airborne pollutants and toxic gases. An additional ability of the respirator is to continuously filter the ambient De in the area to increase the user's cultivation. Note: The mask will not work as an underwater respirator.

I wish I had that function when I was fighting some of the other creatures. Especially when the Brownie-Spider gore splattered all over me. I suppose it was better late than never. It would also help me keep my identity even more secure than with just my goggles. Still, the update wouldn't help me get out of the tree.

However, while it wouldn't help me at that moment, the additional ability of the respirator to filter De for cultivation was phenomenal. That meant I would increase my cultivation as long as I wore the mask. I wondered if it would be enough to forgo my nightly cultivation so I could get some more sleep.

Although, ever since I started cultivating, I never felt tired upon waking. I even felt I didn't need as much sleep. It was a neat ability, though. One I would need to experiment with.

I continued to look at my status.

-New function granted

-Function Status: Automatic and Variable

-Function: ENT (Ears, Nose, and Throat) Proliferation

-ENT Proliferation function introduces and/or increases a bevy of abilities associated with the ENT bodily tasks. Increases in the user's compatibility percentage will increase the ENT Proliferation function.

-Ears: Advanced hearing – The robot attains the ability to heighten, filter, and subdue the noise that enters the user's ear canal.

-Nose: Advanced Smell – The robot attains the ability to heighten, filter, and subdue the smells that enter the user's nasal cavity.

-Throat: Voice Modulation – The robot attains the ability to heighten, filter, subdue, and change the volume of sounds expelled from the user.

These were all valuable functions. I couldn't wait to try some of them out. The first idea I came up with was to try increasing the voice modulation to the maximum and trying to scare the beetles away. I couldn't think of other ways to use the functions to help at the moment, but I was still looking through my information.

"Open Personal Status."

-Personal Status -

-Name: Matthew Gearwon

-Class: Regulator

-Robot Compatibility: 5.0%

-Compatibility to next boon: 10%

-Compatibility to next function: 10%

-Attack: Natural Realm – 7 (+5 in Symbiotic Mode)

-Mystic Realm – 2

-Defense: Natural Realm – 7 (+5 in Symbiotic Mode)

-Mystic Realm – 2

I was amazed at what I saw. My overall stats while in Symbiotic Mode were into the Mystic Realm. If I just reached five percent compatibility, that meant my modifier before was plus four. I had still been in the Mystic Realm with the old modifier and my attack and defense numbers.

That must have been why I could survive my recent beating and the insane feats I performed. I would be a little better the next time I went into Symbiotic Mode. Still, it wouldn't be enough to defeat all the beetles.

I closed my menu and looked down and around the area. I needed to think of a way out of the tree and away from the Rock Beetles. My tree was too far from all the others, even with my increased stats. Perhaps if the tree I was in fell again, I could leap clear, but that was a big assumption.

I was lucky I was close enough to a tree, hit a branch and managed to pull myself up. Had I missed and survived the fall, I would have been running for my life through the forest, and that would just have led all the insects to the town, which would have been bad, to say the least. I looked at the mass of beetles below me. I thought they might have lessened in their numbers, but there was still a lot of them.

The beetles slowly whittled away at the base of the tree and what appeared to be the ground around it. Eventually, I wouldn't have a choice but to attempt my previous tree-jumping move. None of the extra boons or functions I received could help me with that. I was at a loss as to what to do.

While watching the beetles in Companion Mode, my goggles used the elongated stare to analyze the creatures.

-Rock Beetle: Rock Beetles are a gigantic, cosmopolitan family of beetles, the Carbidae, which evolved from ancestors warped by De. It is a distinctive beetle owning a shiny grey abdomen that appears to resemble coke, a hard, porous coal-based rock with a high carbon content. Adult Rock Beetles usually grow between .5m - .75m and can weigh up to 30lbs.

-For additional information, search the local CoreLink cluster server.

-Class: Worker

-Attack: Natural Realm 4 – Racial Average

-Defense: Mystic Realm 3 – Racial Average

The information on their defense was interesting. I was still too weak to pierce their armor. I took a moment to think about everything that I knew and had researched. If nothing I had was good enough to keep me alive, I would have to get something new.