Not much could be done or said about the given scenario. Even after the snake, left my body refused to move due to fear, so I took the only choice I had and accepted his proposal.
“Fine, I’ll take all the help I can find,” my thoughts trembled, “So, do you have the necessary knowledge for me to survive, as you clearly won’t be eaten.”
“Sure, I’ll help you but you need to swear on it.” Ben replied snarkily, “But don’t count on it. There’re things here which would even eat metal.”
After calming myself down, I swore and asked if he was able to move or do anything. I needed all the help I could get in order to get out.
“As you can see I’m unable to move but you should be able to drag me out somehow,” he said. “All I can do is provide you with information and strategies in this form.”
“I don’t know if I can drag you out. My status says I don’t have much energy left, I feel that if it reaches 0, It’s game over for me.” I replied. My body felt weak and heavy and dragging a sword in my current state would be impossible for me.
Ben started laughing.
He was really weird, he laughed as he said, ”well, isn’t that just great. How much time do we have?”
I also wanted to know about it so I asked Ai about it.
<48 hours if not moving>
<4 hours of movement>
<30 minutes of combat>
<
Even though I got some skill points the results shocked me quite a bit. On knowing the impending horrors which awaited me if I didn’t reach the sunlight in time, made my entire self tremble.
“The-, “Ben cut me short as he replied, “Yeah, I saw.”
With less than 4 hours of movement, and venturing out alone into the ever expanding darkness. It didn’t seem like the best of option I had. But that was all I could think of.
“Well, aren’t we in quite a pickle, eh,” Ben said sarcastically. “Well don’t worry bub. We can get ourselves out of here.”
“I don’t quite follow and why did you change your tone?” I asked confused by his sudden insight.
“Okay, first let me explain some things to you,” he said as I listened to another of his long explanations, “This place is a very desolate region with only a few things which can live here naturally. All the animals here are omnivores, meaning both meat and plants are on the plate for them. The snake you saw before is called the dwarf black serpent. It has bad eyesight but makes up for it with a good sense of hearing and tasting. The 3rd leader also said it also has heat sense. It must have been attracted by the large sound and the high magiscule count which got released during the battle. The snake eats everything, not eat exactly but swallow. The 3rd leader taught me that it has very strong acidic digestive juices. I don’t know exactly what acidic and heat sense means but you may know. We use that acid in flasks to burn and blind people in combat. So being eaten by the snake is definitely a “game over”. Even if you are trapped inside, I’d doubt your spikes could pierce through its tough inner flesh. After all, you’re one of its favorite food.”
Shocked by his response, I asked, “Wait for a second! I can’t understand? If I’m his favorite food, why did it not eat me?”
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
To which Ben replied, ”It must have been due to the number of dead insects releasing foul scent around the area which masked your scent, the snake couldn’t find your scent among the dead insects' corpses.”
“So, couldn’t we carry a dead insect to mask my scent to repel the snake?” I asked.
“Not possible, it would attract some other predators along with the snake, thinking that a creature is dragging an insect with it. Well, it’s not surprising that you are the favorite food of almost every species here. And even I can say you had a mellow sweet taste, like nectar. But I decided to stop cause it has a very bad reaction with some species.”
I was losing hope, Ben was giving me almost all the bad news there was, “Is there really no way out?” I asked.
“Well, I do have a very risky plan” the word risky was an understatement, he continued, “We need 3 things for this plan to work.
-1st the snake.
-2nd the items we have here.
-3rd you as the bait.”
“What do you mean me as the bait?!” I exclaimed.
“Hey, if you’ve got any better ideas? I’m all ears.” He replied. I had no answers to it so I kept shut, he continued, “I thought so, now let me finish. As I was saying you’ll need to be the bait. The plan is high-risk high-reward, either we are out of this place or you’re dead and I’m buried somewhere forever. Now listen here, this is the important bit. First of all, you’ll need to place me, the book, the vial and the crystal inside the bag, then proceed to cut yourself with the edge of my blade. This will attract the snake. Keeping the crystal inside the bag is important, as it uses up the magiscule around the area by attracting it, so the snake won’t be able to sense your presence properly if you have it. Now after everything is placed inside and you’re out in the open with an exposed wound, make sure to not fail. The amplified scent from you will attract the snake immediately. After you spot it and it’s about to eat you, make sure dodge it. It won’t expect it’s favorite food to suddenly start moving. Dodge it and force it to rush you. Dodging it once or twice will do. Once it has locked itself on you rush inside the bag, it should force him to swallow the entire bag. Once we are inside, we have to play the waiting game. Once we see some plants inside we can be sure that it has reached a place with vegetation. And even if it goes inside a hole we would be much nearer to the exit.”
“Do you have any plans to get out once we get inside the snake?”
“The vial here is a type of poison. It’s not strong but gives a very powerful stomach ache if ingested. And, considering the snake’s habit, it should seek out some medicinal plants, which mostly grow on the surface. If the snake manages to poop or vomit us out, we’re golden. If not I have another backup plan.”
“You’re crazy!” I exclaimed. It was a ridiculous plan, one that I would have refused outright if the situation wasn’t so time-based. But I had to be thankful for even the tiniest shred of hope I could find, I continued to relay my thoughts to him, ”But, if this is the best plan you could come up with and considering my current situation, I can hardly refuse.”
Ben seemed a bit happy. “Do you think you can dodge the snake’s attacks? It’s incredibly fast compared to you.” He teased. “And considering how you fared against an army of insects, I don’t know if you are ready for dodging it.”
“It isn’t whether I can or can’t. I’ll have to. There is no other choice” I said as I steeled myself for the plan. It wasn’t a half baked emotion. I was desperate for survival and I was preparing my mind for it.
Ben understood my conviction. “Hmmm, I half expected you to get angry but seems like I misjudged you,” he said, “Let’s set the plan in motion.”
Using my spikes to drag myself, I proceeded to pick up the vial and drag the book into the bag they were light objects compared to the Dagger. I gathered some snow from the surroundings, as I reached Ben, he said, “Good work, But with that speed, it’s impossible to dodge the snake. If I were you I’d extend and twist together some of those spikes. Using them as limbs to drag your body would be much easier than extending and retracting. Try to see if it’s possible.” Using the snow I managed to clean the dagger quite a bit. It was still a bit bloody but the edge was usable now.
And after listening to Ben for some time I did seem like retracting and extending the spikes took a lot of time for simple movements. So I extended some spikes and twisted them together at the end of my two extensions. Using them as limbs to drag my body was a bit difficult, but it was faster than extending and retracting the spikes again and again.
I practiced moving about a bit until I got used to it. Then suddenly a good idea struck upon me. Using the two extended spike forearms, I launch myself in a straight direction like a slingshot. I flew fast. But I forgot to think about the landing. As I was about to crash into the rocks I extended all of my spikes. Maybe it was an instinct, but I was left unharmed by the crash.
<2 hours of energy left>
I was only moving about for an hour or so but it seemed like moving like that wasn’t the best use of the energy I had.
I reached for the dagger and dragged it into the bag. Ben saw the whole thing as he remarked, “I saw how you jumped. With that much speed, you should be fine somehow. But it must have cost a lot of energy. Don’t jump like that straight away. Also-”
We discussed strategies for a while on how to get the snake to eat the bag. As I finally dragged myself into the bag with the sword,
I walked out after injuring myself on the blade. It was a bit vexing but it had to be done.
With no light, I was unable to see what was happening around me, even with my night vision skill. All I could see was dark shadows on top of shadows. I felt the earth tremble once again as darkness approached me, and I couldn’t back out anymore. Maybe it was a good thing that I couldn’t see, being paralyzed by fear wouldn’t have been the best of situations right now.
The operation was a go.