Chapter 20- From bad to worse.
Once I stepped into the portal, my vision immediately fades to black for a fleeting moment; Only to return a fraction of a second later along with a most unsettling dizziness and a feeling of sickness, that is quickly rising unsettlingly.
'Oh God, I'm going to puke my guts out…' Dropping to my knees, I try and fail to keep the contents of my breakfast inside my stomach as I projectile vomit what feels like everything I've eaten this week. And it just goes on and on…
After a good 5 minutes of emptying my stomach of any and all substance, I lie weakly on the grass next to the new puddle I spent the last 5 minutes making. As the urge to heave recedes, I start reflecting on my surrounding. "Grass? I guess I'm outside the city." I say weakly as I move my eyes around to take in the surroundings as I try to focus on recovering while I lie weakly on the ground. Patting my hip, I am relieved that I at least have my sword and water skin with me.
Once the initial peak of dizziness and sickness start to settle I gingerly start surveying my surroundings more carefully.
I seem to be out in the wilderness somewhere, and I can see a forest to what I assume is the west, going from where the sun is and how the shadows are being cast.
After a few minutes of resting, I have finally recovered enough to let me stand up without being sick again, so I gingerly stand up and look around and as my previous observation, I am currently in a valley, with a small river flowing quietly along from the far side of the valley; trickling down the line mountain that looms above the valley.
The forrest to the west is made up of ridiculously thick and tall trees, most likely easily a hundred meters tall and 20 meters thick.
"Shit." It seems I am out in the wilderness; with no city or structures in sight. "Fuuuuck!!" I scream at the top of my lungs as the frustration, the pain of losing a friend and stress of fighting for my life again and again is let loose.
"Oh, come the fuck ON!" I scream in pure rage while slamming my hands unto the ground again and again. "Why can't you just send me back?! Why am I out in the wilderness again!? Why!! Why did Janna have to die?! Why am I even here!?! I don't belong in this monster infested shit hole of a world! Aaaarrrgghh!!!"
Silence returns to the valley, no answer forthcoming except for the quiet trickling of water from the river and the wind blowing through the valley while rustling the grass and the leaves of the occasional tree.
Once the anger leaves me, I slump down unto my knees and just try to breathe to try and reclaim some semblance of calm.
'Ok, this is bad. It could be worse, but that doesn't mean that I'm real trouble. So think; what to do from here?' I think, trying to build a survival plan.
"Alright, list time! Shelter, water, food and lately rescue. In that order.
I need to find or build shelter. I have a river over there so water is a check, food though? I need to go hunting, or scavaging, I guess; Maybe there are fish in the river?" I mumble to myself as I look around for somewhere where I can take shelter in the short term.
A survey of the area unfortunately doesn't reveal any potential options for a shelter, and left choosing between open flatlands and woodlands, there is no doubt in my mind that the potential for shelters is higher in a woodland; although unfortunately the potential for danger is also proportionally higher in a woodland.
'I don't have much of a choice in the matter though… I don't want to be out in the open at night with a bunch of monsters swarming me…'
Stolen novel; please report.
With my mind made up, I walk over to the river and fill my water skin before reluctantly making my way towards the super woodland in the distance.
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A few hours later as I draw closer to the woodlands, I realise that my initial estimate of the woods were severely underestimated.
These so called "trees" are frikkin' organic skyscrapers that are easily 300-400 meters tall and could hold a decently sized house inside their trunks with ease as they are seemingly 30-40 meters or so across.
Walking up to the first of the trees, I place my right hand on the trunk and look up towards the crown of the tree which I am utterly unable to see behind all the foliage. So there I stand, in utter amazement as I am both utterly intimidated as well as in awe of the sheer size of this monstrosity of a tree.
"How does a tree even get this big? Pretty sure it's not supposed to be possible for it to sustain itself at this size… Ah, right; Magic. Doesn't explain nothing but what do I know about magic? About jack shit, that's what." I mumble to myself. "So… Magical tree, huh? … they won't come alive and attack me, right? 'Cause that would not be cool…"
Carefully surveying the closest trees reveals no obvious danger but that doesn't exactly put me at ease. 'Just because I can't see any hypothetical hiding, most likely magical, murder beasts doesn't mean they aren't there waiting for me to go inside their hunting ground.' I muse darkly to myself. 'Yeah, ok these thoughts aren't helpful. Let's just go in; Just standing here and fretting won't change anything…'
Working up the courage, I take a hesitant step towards the woods. Seeing no change forthcoming, another step follows and another. Before long, I find myself inside the magical woods; The light coming through the foliage has taken on a green hue as it filters the greenery of the woodland.
I continue walking all the while carefully checking my surroundings for any movement or threats while I walk along through the woods in search of shelter.
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A few hours later the light starts fading and my stomach is protesting its lack of food to work with; I lost what I had for breakfast after that whole portal incident so I must say that I am real hungry.
"I swear, I could totally eat a whole cow…" I mumble quietly to myself as to not alert anything in the surroundings to my presence.
In these last few hours of walking in the woodlands I have only glanced small critters hurriedly rushing through the branches at least 10 or so meters above me; From what details I could make out, they looked close to squirrels, if squirrels had two tails and and over sized, super ripped hindlegs that could easily propel them to jump 10 meters or so. 'Whoo, Crazy magic squirrels...At least they won't try to eat me.' I ponder to myself as I walk along vigilantly. But then a thought hits me; This is a frikkin' magical world.
'...Uhh, surely they're not carnivore's, right? I mean, even for a magical parallel world or whatever, they wouldn't have that, right?... Right?' I muse worriedly as I continue walking while glancing up towards the branches above at the slightest sound.
By now the sun must have begun setting, as it is quickly getting darker and darker as I keep going deeper into the woodlands.
'It must have been a few hours or so since I first stepped inside the woods by now… I need to hurry up and find somewhere to spend the night now; or I'll be spending the night watching for any beats or monsters that want to eat me instead of getting the rest and sleep I sorely need.
A few minutes of walking later with no change in the shelter situation; I am forced to give up my search for shelter on the ground level, and instead reluctantly turn my sights above; Towards the lowest branches of the trees. Searching for a relatively easy climb combined with a relatively low height and a decent spot where I can sleep, I am forced to keep walking for quite a while more to find a suitable spot to rest.
By the time I finally find a relatively good spot to rest, the sun has almost completely set. The spot I choose is where two nearby tree's branches cross one another to make something of a natural, if uneven terrass.
With my temporary shelter decided, I hurriedly start looking for a way to get up to the branches in question.
A survey of the area reveals a hanging vine that's hanging from a nearby branch, which I quickly start climbing. Or well, try to climb; Turns out climbing vines isn't as easy as they make it out to be in the movies.
It takes me close to half an hour to finally manage to reach the branch about 10 meters up and pull myself up onto the branch.
'Alright, now I just need to walk along this branch then jump across to the spot I found…Should be easy enough' I think to myself as I stand up on the branch and look down at my feet to check my footing; And consequently I also see the ground far below me.
"Oh shit this is high!" I exclaim as I realize that if I place my feet wrong or lose my balance, it's a long long way down.
"Ok, don't look down; Don't look down! It's fine; I'm fine. Just focus on the branch and… and walk. Whoo boy; Breathe Ray, breathe. I'll be fine..."
Slowly and carefully, I make my way along the branch while trying to avoid looking down as much as I can.
It is slow going, but luckily it isn't far to the other branches; only a few meters or so really and before long I reach the point where I need to jump over unto the layered branches that I decided would be good as my shelter for the night.
"Alright, time to do this… Shit this is high up after all… No, no! Focus; you can do this Ray. Let's go! Breathe, and go!" So I do just that. After a very slow and deep inhale and exhale of breath, I take a leap of faith, so to speak, and throw myself across the 1 meter gap between the branches.
End of chapter 20