The humans built a wooden platform on the rough stone floor. Unlike the floor, which at random intervals sunk and at others jumped, the wooden floor was largely flat, five foot wide, and continued into the cave at a steady rate.

It creaked as I walked over it. It was nice to know that I didn’t weigh that little. I’d lost so much power, it was almost unbelievable. With my past power’s I’d be able to blow up the whole village. With my past powers, I could have done anything I wanted to. Damn it! If I keep using that phrase I’ll go on for hours on hours. I won’t get anywhere by doing that.

Swallowing whatever pride I still had left, I wandered deeper into the cave. Almost all of the ore this close to the entrance would already have been mined. I’d have to travel deeper and take certain corners that I hadn’t taken. Thankfully the miner class came with the skill [Mapping] giving me a small map up in the corner of my sight. I didn’t have to worry about losing myself.

The map continued to draw my surroundings and everything I saw, highlighting important parts. That drawing wouldn’t stay forever though. At its current rank the whole map would wipe after eight hours. For now, that would be enough time for me to travel into and out of the cave. The deeper I got though the longer it would take, but by then the skill should have evolved.

The sound of mining came from many different spots and angles. The sharp, rhythmic, sounds bounced around the walls. I could make out about twelve different rhythms, and I tried to avoid wherever they came from.

Miners were tough sorts. They spent their entire days laboring away in the darkness. That was a great way to go slightly insane and grow a solid body. I also assumed that they picked a combat oriented subclass to deal with the monsters.

If they spotted me, and correctly assumed that I was a monster, I had no chance. That fact pissed me off. Going from the peak of strength and power to a little shit imp wasn’t a particularly fun position, but it was my current spot.

I wouldn’t have to worry too much about monsters if I stayed near the surface. The tunnels branched off in many different directions, some downwards, and I made sure not to take those.

Even though I hate to admit it, my short length aided me. There were certain spots were the cave bent inwards, like a fat man clenching his belly, and if it wasn’t for my size I wouldn’t have been able to squeeze through them.

There had been torches and the light from the outside guiding me before, now they were gone and the darkness cloaked around me. I couldn’t see anything. Anything could creep up on me without my knowing of it, but fortunately I’d planned for that.

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I cast [Fireball], except instead of shooting it, I held it in my hand. A wisp of red flames as large as a man’s toe spun in circles above my palm, lighting up the surroundings about three meters away from me. It gave a ticklish sensation, but I knew that in fifteen minutes that it would start to burn me.

Or it might have been even less time than that. A part of me still made calculations as if I retained my previous strength. My own mana couldn’t hurt me, and when the fireball was created, it was solely powered by my mana. The longer it remained outside of my body, the more of my mana mixed with the world’s and it turned into untainted mana. Then, the fire would start to hurt me.

Due to the potency of my mana, I could have left a fireball for a very long time without it starting to lose its taint. At the current moment, I wasn’t too sure how long I could leave it, but that unsurity quickly disappeared.

The ball heated up at a much faster rate than I thought it would. How weak have I gotten? And before a minute had passed it had started hurting my hand, and that was despite my resistance to heat.

I couldn’t simply throw it away. If I kept creating new fireballs I’d run out of mana and then I’d be alone in the darkness without a light source. Just the thought made my spine start to rattle. Fortunately nobody had been around to see that.

I needed to keep the fireball on my hands for at least another minute. Two minutes was enough time for me to regenerate enough mana to cast a little ball like this. I tried to take the heating sensation away from my mind.

The light of the fire only extended three meters out, where the darkness seemed to push against it. Anything could be sitting out there in the darkness, watching me. Eyes fidgeting around, I tried to remind myself that I could best any creature this far up, but that didn’t seem to ease my fright.

What did take my mind away from the darkness was the fire burning in my hands. It was now searing, and the pain flared up, making me bite my tongue, and resist the strong urge to shriek.

A window suddenly popped up,

The skill [Fire Resistance] has been gained.

Yes, skills. I’d lived for a very long time and I still couldn’t quite figure them out. Whilst perks seemed to be more permanent shifts to your body, the skills were improvements.

I had the perk [Resistance to fire and heat], which was very similar to the new skill I’d gained. Whilst the skill could grow in strength as I trained it, this was by burning my hand, the perk couldn’t. That made the skill more fluid, but it would have to be trained to nearly lvl 30 before it was on the same level as the perk.

Suddenly, I halted to a freeze. There was a pair of eyes in the darkness reflecting the light of fire. They stood about four meters away from me, and my mind raced to try to figure out what creature they belonged to. In the end, I could only hope for the best as I tossed the fireball towards it.