Nick wished that he had found a healing item in one of his reward chests, or at least a basic first aid kit. Unfortunately, all that he had to work with was the roll of gauze that had come with his toolbelt.
At least you still have the leg. You almost lost the whole thing. To reduce the risk of infection, he opened his canteen and rinsed the wound clean, using as little water as he could. He cursed all the while at the necessary but unanticipated hit to his supplies, skeptical that his stockpile would last until the end of the tutorial. When the puncture was free of dirt, he used the last strip of gauze in his pouch to bind it tight.
After Bandit stopped by to see how Nick was doing, a gesture of friendship that he found deeply moving, he tried to figure out how to keep his ruined jeans from falling apart. The only thing he could come up with was to sew the slit back up using the hook from his toolbelt and the fishing line that he had found in the dungeon. He wasn’t going to win any fashion awards, but he thought the crude patch would keep everything together for the next few days. While he worked, he reflected on how events had proceeded thus far.
In the end, the first battle for the highlands had been a mixed bag for Nick. He had survived a fight that should have been unwinnable, thanks to the spiders’ timely intervention, but had suffered a serious injury in the process. He was still alive, but his mobility was impaired, and he had a steep climb ahead of him when the water rose again.
He was lucky that the melee was over for now. While he was able to stagger about if he had to, Nick wouldn’t be back in fighting shape until his wound had scabbed over enough not to start bleeding from the exertion. The good news was that he had improved his understanding of real-world tactics, and he had been given some time to recover from his ordeal. The shadows were growing long with the end of the day, and sometime over the next hour, dusk would descend upon the weary combatants.
He should have until morning before the battle resumed—if the water didn’t start rising sooner than he expected. The spiders were more than capable of launching a night raid if they were so inclined, but circumstances had led him to believe that, at least for now, the spiders were on his side. While Nick was unable to deduce their intentions, it seemed that the formidable beasts were not actively trying to kill him. With any luck, their goodwill would endure when he arrived on the summit, and the spiders would be willing to work together to tackle the tutorial’s final challenge.
Injured or not, he couldn’t afford to just rest and wait for nightfall. Every second was a precious resource—time that he needed to spend surveying his situation and refining his plans. Hissing through his teeth, he forced himself back onto his feet. Using a spear to help support his weight, he limped his way up the hillside, intending to inspect the battlefield and evaluate the condition of the lemur forces.
Before he went to work, Nick stopped to grab a bite from the communal stores, preserving the resources in his pack to stretch out his reserves for as long as possible. He felt a little guilty for hoarding some supplies for himself, but he had been the one that had carried most of these resources up here to begin with. Besides, his small stash wouldn’t meet the tribes’ needs for more than a few hours at most. At least, that’s what he told himself. After eating a pair of ripe berries the size of tangerines, he turned his attention to the lemur warriors, who were battered but not yet broken.
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The tribe had held on, fighting bravely in the face of overwhelming odds, but a full one in five had fallen, and many more were injured, at least as badly as Nick. While he was busy tending to his leg, the primates had arranged their dead in a long row along the hilltop.
He was surprised to discover that what looked like a funeral procession was taking place. Mournful lemurs stopped in front of the fallen to say goodbye, touching their faces and placing wildflowers in their hands. He could hear both sorrow and resolve in their voices as they cried out to one another. He bowed his head in a moment of silence, acknowledging the tribe’s courage and the debt he owed them.
Nick looked out over the grim procession, their gazes harder than steel. The lemurs knew that more of their kin would fall when the sun rose tomorrow. Despite the somber mood, the beasts were comforting one another, holding hands, clasping shoulders, and dropping off a handful of fruit to a friend.
In that moment, he understood that the tribe was truly a family. It made him miss his own with an intensity that took his breath away. He wiped away the tears that were running down his face because the tribe’s sadness resonated with his own. He too had lost loved ones not long ago, and he hadn’t truly let himself process his grief. But Nick was ready. It was time to face the truth head-on.
Unable to hold back the acrid tide of memory, he let his repressed emotions wash over him at last, bawling his eyes out as he watched the tribe pay their respects. Scattered bits and pieces of his memories had begun rising to the surface weeks ago, but Nick hadn’t been willing to face them until this moment. I’m ready. He gritted his teeth, bracing himself against the pain as it all came flooding back.
Nick remembered the arrival of the System. The shroud of annihilation that had slaughtered most of humanity and scoured their works from the face of the Earth. He remembered Angie’s last moments. The look of fear in her eyes before the pillar of light devoured her. He remembered the mind-warping pain of integration and the System awakening his geneline; what Pax had told him during his brief orientation; the arrival of Taltos, the Mad God, hacking the System to claim the Earth for his own; twisting the rules so that humanity began their tutorial with only a basic class and the clothes on their backs.
Despite the emergence of his sorrow and his loss, Nick didn’t give into his misery and didn’t let the pain break him, because as bad as things were, there was still reason to hope. “Angie is dead.” It broke his heart to say those words, but he was finally ready to face the truth.
There was a chance, however slim, that his brother, perhaps even his parents, were still alive. Maybe some of his friends as well. The survivors of Earth were out there somewhere, however few of them there were left. Nick imagined what his friends and family must be facing if they had survived the purge of integration. Perhaps they were wrapping up their tutorials as well. Hopefully, he would find out in just a little over a day and a half.
As night fell, the air grew bitingly cold, although thanks to Nick’s thermal cloak, he was able to bear the chill. He built a small fire from dried brush and shattered spears, then sat down near the periphery of the huddled mass of lemurs. He moved close enough to the press to keep the wind off one side, listening to the distant chatter of lizards and the croaking of frogs and the wind whistling across the face of the mountain. He slept in scattered snatches, interrupted by the pain in his leg and the understanding that he was still in the middle of a prolonged battle for his life.
Whenever he woke up, Nick would plot and plan, preparing himself as best he could for the trial ahead. He expected the water to rise sometime after dawn, forcing the lizards in the valley up the hillside and kicking off another melee. Then it would be time to scale the mountain and face whatever trial awaited them on the summit.
Before Nick knew it, the sky had begun to lighten with the coming of dawn, heralding the start of the tutorial’s final full day.