I once had a dream...

~

My nose was leaking blood like no tomorrow. I stared at my hands in horror, seeing them now already covered in blood.

Just like before when that strange man suffocated me, I had no time to question things - a tight, gripping pain locked my hands up as I stared at them, and my fingers pulled back as a result. I groaned as the tightness didn't go away. I couldn't move my fingers and panic quickly set in.

"Hah! HnnNNNGGKK," I tried to hold in my urge to shout as I felt adrenaline begin to pump through me and heard the thump of my heart in my ears.

But this was only the beginning.

There was a sharp jolt in my hands like someone had yanked a finger back, and right before my eyes, my fingers started to snap and contort, the very bones themselves breaking.

I tried to keep it in, but it was too much. I started to scream again. It wasn't just my hands. My arms followed suit, then basically everything.

Bones and muscles everywhere were snapping and tearing. My whole body felt like a contorted mess and I was both petrified and in immeasurable pain. "Excruciating agony" is a mere pinprick in the eyes of what I was feeling.

My heart rate increased, now almost no delay between one beat and the next. I was screaming endlessly at this point.

"HEEEELPP!"

The snapping of bones slowed somewhat, and I felt at first an uncomfortability, but later yet more pain, in my legs as they grew and changed shape. My chest seemed to cave in on itself and my hips cracked and popped and shifted as they grew narrower, my torso itself growing longer.

I found it hard to keep screaming after a while. Not because I'd ripped my vocal cords to shreds, because that never stopped me before, but because the voice just simply wouldn't come out anymore.

All the muscles in my body, especially my back, locked up completely, causing me to arch my back and throw my head back, locked in that position.

The muscles just kept trying to tighten and it felt like my spine would be ripped out of my body.

That was a soul-ending lashing of pain that will definitely wake you up in the morning. That let me find my voice.

I screamed out again in sheer agony, but this time my voice was more coarse and rough. Not that that was of any concern right now. I wanted whatever this hell was to end and go away.

The whole time I was there screaming, the phoenix did the same, making the same wretched, loud screeching noise it made when I was running through the cave.

My back was still locked up, and as I was fighting to regain control of my muscles, I felt my spine twist and turn and pop and crackle, and my shoulders felt like they were going to rip themselves off of me as they too threw themselves outward.

"GAAAAHHHHHH!" I shouted as loud as I could.

My muscles contracted in various areas, making me feel like I was being punched and causing my torso to convulse.

I could audibly hear my bones cracking, which was terrifying to say the least.

"What is- HYAAAHK," I was cut off by another nasty jolt of a breaking bone. "-HAPPENING TO ME??"

Please let this end. I don't want this anymore.

Perhaps this is punishment for making a deal with people you shouldn't make deals with.

Not that it matters. The pain is a reminder of my failure.

Or perhaps a motivator for my revenge...

Pain was everywhere. My eyes hurt. My head hurt, inside and out. The worst of it seemed to have passed, though everything was beyond sore.

There was pressure in a few places - my head, my mouth, my crotch, the bottom of my back right above my trunk, followed immediately by sharp, stinging pain in all of those places.

I coughed up blood again, and then all the pain subsided.

I was left lying on the stone floor breathing heavily, panting like I'd just run the mile... twice... and I wasn't allowed to stop and take a walking break.

I was exhausted, but finally I could rest. I didn't want to get up or move.

Everything felt so heavy and so unbelievably still. Even if I wanted to try to move something, I simply couldn't. Every once in a while, I would still feel a muscle twitch or tense up, and my whole body would immediately tense and I would hold my breath, expecting another outburst of breaking bones and misery like before.

I eventually fell asleep after laying still and motionless for... who even knows how long.

I woke up a few times with cramps in various places because I was certainly not laying comfortably, but promptly fell back asleep because my tiredness outweighed everything else.

After so long of that cycle, I'd decided I had enough in my groggy state. I felt like a bear waking up out of hibernative sleep as I tried to shift a little to get more comfortable.

Pushing my arms against the ground, I tried to bring myself to flip my body over to lay on my back, but I got some of my torso up, and that was it. My body just wasn't feeling it, so I ended up flopping back on the ground with a grunt and a thud, being in even more of an uncomfortable position than I was before.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

Finally, I was in legitimate pain, and woke up like a drunk on a hangover. With every ounce of strength in my body, I stood up, noticing immediately that I felt taller.

I couldn't see myself, but it was just something I could feel.

My footing didn't keep for long, and I fell to the side, luckily having a wall to catch me and keep me standing.

That act alone had me out of breath. But I'm finally off the floor. So that's improvement I guess.

I was still super weak, apparently. The cave's still, cold air touched the skin on my knees and ankles and feet and arms, and I realized my clothes were now ripped, which was beyond disappointing.

But I reached into my pocket and retrieved the knife I'd stolen from what I now knew to be the Demon King's grave.

The feeling of a knife in my hand now was powerful. Empowering, in the sense that I had a weapon.

Despite my overwhelming lack of strength, I clenched the blade with the grip I didn't have, noticing my nails almost digging into my skin.

I was starting to notice a lot of things, actually. The almost indiscernable breathing of a creature in the same room.

Probably the phoenix. But it's not on fire. Maybe it's asleep?

That definitely makes it easier to kill. Wouldn't have to deal with its damn screeching anymore.

That thought brought a very genuine smile to my face, but I shook it off. I'm sure once I beat it into its head that screeching is a no-go, it'll be a useful creature in the long run.

I noticed my own heartbeat. Not in my ears, but the faintest echo of it from the walls.

Most of all, I noticed the cold, which I haven't like this in a long time. In fact I was starting to shiver. My midriff was exposed to the icy air - likely because there was a hole in my coat where there used to be a hole in my torso.

But with nowhere to go and all the time in the world to get there, I took a step forward.

The first step in a long, long road to revenge.

I made up my mind in that moment; I'm going to kill the piece of garbage that put me in this hole and ruined my coat. That's a definite. I don't know how long the road ahead of me will be or what other miseries I'll have to put up with, but I do know where that road ends: getting back at a lot of people.

My heartbeat picked up a little and a bit of a knot formed in my throat as I imagined all the things I could do to them. My fist was in practically a white-knuckle grip on the knife by now.

So then came another step. Off-balance and weak. I nearly stumbled and fell, but held onto the wall with the knife-hand.

Another few jagged steps followed, and then I stumbled across the room and caught myself on the tomb, almost falling again because my arms could barely keep me up.

I scooped up the sleeping bird and set it in my jacket pocket since I didn't have anywhere else to put it, then continued shambling along out of the tomb and into the cave.

I have no idea where I am, what's happened, or how to get out of here. So, my goal of revenge will have to be sidelined somewhat. At least until I'm out of here. My goal for now has to be to figure my way to the surface. Not that I mind spending a while in the dark and away from people, but I don't care too much for the cramped spaces of caves.

With one foot in front of the other, I made my way out the door, after flipping a very affectionate middle finger at the resting place of Caiasiara for making me go though what he made me go through.

I still had to hold myself up with my hands, and I was going along at more of a slow shuffle than a walk, but it was movement. At this point there was no destination in mind. If there's a tomb down here in the middle of nowhere, I imagine this is a place of importance. There's bound to be something else important somewhere, and it ought to be what I can use to help me figure out how to get out of here.

My slow, shuffling shamble and feet scuffing along the floor bounced off the walls down the cavern. My eyes began to adjust to the dark a little bit. What was before completely pitch black was now a small, almost incoherent haze, like when you wake up in the middle of the night and shamble to the bathroom. But after hours of trudging through this void, I could see almost an outline of the things around me.

I started to see tiny blips of the color red, and I gradually made these out to be what almost looked like veins. Sort of like when I hallucinated before I met the Demon King. They were incredibly faint, but it seemed like the longer I looked at them, the clearer they were.

They had this sort of slow pulsing effect about them, like the red glow was moving along the veins that gripped the cave walls like tree roots.

It was fascinating, to say the least.

So, if there's veins, there's a heart. And where there's a heart, there's more blood vessels leading to the important organs. Which is probably idealistic mentality, but it's the best shot I have at finding anything.

As I followed the veins, I could see more of the cave. I still had to hug the walls to stop myself from tumbling over, but things were getting clearer.

I guess it just takes time?

The tunnel widened and narrowed as I went on. There were lots of forks and places where I had to just pick which route to go and stick with it.

It made me nervous at first but I can't un-lose myself by backtracking if I was already lost in the first place. So at the end of the day I've lost how lost I am and as such I'm as lost now as I was when I first woke up.

Are you lost now? :D [ignore me, 4am writing hit different]

There were a few points where I had to squeeze through narrow places and crawl on my hands and knees. I'm glad claustrophobia is not an issue for me [though it is for SireSwag and writing this hurts a little bit]. Though at one point my foot got stuck in a notch and I had to abandon one of my boots (which at this point barely resembled a boot because somehow they were now too small for me)

But I just kept following the veins. That was until I stopped to rest against the wall because both my arms and legs were unbelievably tired, then heard a group of people coming down the tunnel from behind me after I'd been resting a few minutes in the dark silence.

I was lucky that there was a small inlet behind me I could crawl into, though I could barely fit my head into it, and doing so quickly and quietly was a bit of a challenge.

Something on my head smacked the rock as I tried to hide, which confused the hell out of me because it was past the top of my skull.

The group of people passed by. I still couldn't see much, but they were talking in a language I didn't understand and I could tell they were larger, namely from the gear and clothes they were wearing. I could hear metal clinking which suggested they had swords and/or armor for me to be worried about.

One of them audibly stopped, his shoes scuffing against the floor. Another, a woman, asked him something in a concerned tone, presumably asking why he stopped, and at this point I kind of thought I was found out.

He responded in a cool, calm, steady voice, and they all said something that sounded like an affirmation and left. If I didn't know any better I'd say he was giving orders.

As soon as they left, he turned to face me, and with a deadpan look, motioned directly at me to come to him as he drew a sword.

Well, fight or die, right?

Despite being notably nervous - I mean it's not like my life was going to be on the line or anything - I was almost excited. I was ready to test myself and test my mettle.

I got out from the little hidey hole, and readied my stance with my knife, which looked like a little toy in comparison to his sword, but I just tightened my grip and shrugged internally as I felt myself harden like a rock inside, ready for whatever could possibly come my way next.

No turning back now.