Waking up, Roberion tasted iron; the leg swipe the spider gave him made him pass out for a few minutes. He cleaned his mouth with the sleeve of the patient's gown. Trying to refocus his vision, a weird circular symbol is shown in his left eye, but it vanishes before he can examine it.
Roberion stares at the spider thoughtfully. I don’t remember anything before this place. Did my memory get erased? No, that’s not it, I..I’m just a newborn. It just feels that this information is right...why I feel so numb before, like I wasn’t myself?”, the spider seems to be immobile, back to its start position, “So that’s how it works, it’s just a simulation; as long as I don’t act, the spider won’t attack,” as Roberion circles, he learns that the room has no doors; it’s just a simulation; the projection does a good job of imitating a jungle.
It seems I don’t have another choice but to fight this thing. Before trying another action, Roberion opened his system screen, searching for the perk information. It showed that a change had been made in his perk:
Trashed and Scattered: Keep fighting until your breaking point, the times required for you are....8...times.
So it worked, at least for the first one. The second perk is still the same, but I don’t see a way of defeating this damned spider, The second perk is worth this fight anyway, the first seems only useful for fighting multiple enemies. The first perk seems like a weird choice for this simulation, it’s suspicious, Roberion analyzed the mechanical beast again; the spider blocky surface, although difficult to see, can still be traced; he felt that the spider was cheaply made; the entire training room looked to be made of inferior materials; the projection didn’t have quality in its imaging; it felt chopped and artificial. If you focused enough, you could trace the room walls.
I need more information about the spider. Trying to see how it acts and moves seems like the way to go. Let’s employ evasive tactics, finishing his plan of action, Roberion runs to the spider’s left, the machine moves to reach him, and Roberion, already preparing for the spider attack, evades successfully, but before he could act on it, he is hit again by another of the spider’s legs, but this time on his stomach. As he falls to the ground, the spider stops moving.
Dammit, I fainted again. At least the perk changed, so it seems just as the description says. That makes things more complicated. There is nothing I can do but wait for my wounds to improve. I can’t find any type of medical aid. A way to recover is to have the perk, but it’s a paradox. I need the perk to recover, but I will get hurt trying to get the perk.
Feeling lost, he tries again to fight the spider, but the result is more or less the same. He managed to almost evade the second hit, but the only thing he did was lessen the damage. The perk count didn’t change. He needs to defeat the spider or be put down to rise again.
Little by little, fall after fall, Roberion was learning how the spider moves. It’s undeniable that the robotic spider had a move set; her actions seemed to consist of a basic set of motions; changing some variations made the spider repeat some actions. Fighting like that with any other type of enemy would be a bad idea, but with the spider, it could work.
His medical gown was already soaked with blood. To think that all Nulls have to pass this is insane; the percentage of failed products should be incredibly high. A rising dissatisfaction is felt through Roberion, Products, right. That is what we are.
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The count needed to unlock the perk has fallen to only 5 faintings left; by doing that, he would have a better way to keep fighting the spider.
Trying to damage it like a normal spider seemed like a dead end. Its legs were too resilient. The more he fought the spider, the more he remembered the spider’s first form. Her upper body seemed to be made of building blocks. Maybe trying to make a go for its metallic body was a better idea.
Armed with the knowledge of the spider move set, he ran fast to the spider’s left side and made a try to move around it. The spider there showed its weakness, trying to rearrange itself, it needed to do a mini jump to face Roberion again. When two legs crashed against him, one at his upper and the other at his lower body, like a crumpled iron beam, he fell again.
The damage was accumulating; he felt some of his bones were broken, which would explain the strong pain in his ribs, but this time he knew what to make use of; he needed to fight smarter, The problem is that these fuckers made me a glorified punching bag; his creator could make him a better weapon; having an iron arm, or a stronger one, would make this fight easier.
Wait, there is something wrong here. How do I know how to curse? Every time I rise, there is that weird symbol, and the more I feel like someone, like an individual, the numb feeling that I felt in the beginning is vanishing, that doesn’t make being beaten down better, but..., his entire situation is weird; something was at play here, but the spider takes precedence.
Every try he made after was met with failure: jumping too low, jumping high, using the spider legs for some sort of improvised climbing. All had the same ending, but each trial was better than the last. Sadly, he had no more tries. His body was far too gone. This was his last one. Even thinking hurts.
Do or die, such a short life; even flies lived more than me. His dance with the spider started again, running to its right size. The same tactic was employed, jumping on its rear leg, his legs having just enough adhesion to make the second jump possible.
His body is screaming in pain, but the jump was enough. He fell just above her upper body; the exhilaration is immediate, but the iron taste in his mouth makes him remember his situation; if that wasn’t enough, the metallic legs coming for his head would. Panicked, he jumps to the spider’s upper body; sadly, his legs weren’t fast enough, both of them getting broken, his bones splintered.
Panic, pain, and distress, all mixed in a bittersweet potion, I don’t care anymore, I will make you fall, you cursed toy...shit..., he raises his arms foregoing any restraint he could have, his bloodied hands just get bloodier as he pummels its upper body with punches, all tries doing more damage to him than the spider, his fists looking more like gristle pieces of meat, A soft spot, feeling that a region in its left upper body was softer, he focuses on it, just as one of the spider's front legs tries to fall on his torso.
A breaking sound is heard in the room. Roberion’s hands reach deeper, and he pulls them, his broken hands trying to function one final time. The valve is displaced and pushed out, and he goes with it, losing balance on top of the spider and falling off. Before he could reach the floor, though, the mechanical beast did glancing damage to his back.
The damage was small compared to his situation, but the pain isn’t. The feeling is bittersweet, but it is welcomed as he falls to the ground. Opening his eyes, he gets scared as oil falls on him; the spider, losing the only thing keeping it in place, starts to crumple on itself. Roberion tries to move, but his body doesn’t answer. As the spider's metallic body starts to fall down on him, the screeching sound of metal on metal is heard. Roberion closes his eyes to the inevitable.
The impact of the spider's hitting the ground sends vibrations through his body, intensifying the pain in his back and abdomen. Roberion braces himself for the impending weight of the mechanical beast crashing down on him.