I was lucky. I don’t know how long I was out for, but the fact that I’m still alive and kicking is fortunate by itself.

One thing that I noticed after waking up is that the space that I’m currently trapped in is actually a cavern as big as or more than the Capital’s Olympiad Stadium. I tried to fly around the border once to search for a gap to escape to, and it took a considerable long time just to get around. The only things that I discovered were occasional air holes in the walls, which are not very big. I could probably try to force my body in one of them, but my butt will probably get stuck on the way.

Holes aside, at the center of this place is that humongous magic heart in the ceiling. In terms of size, it may even rival the magic heart used for the Royal Holy Shield protecting the Imperial Capital.

Considering the size of the heart, my guesstimate is that it was probably from a dragon that was dead and abandoned a long time ago or some other magical creature along that line. I can’t exactly tell since when I tried to get close to it to analyze it a force field of magical nature deactivated my flying spell. My back still aches after that fall this afternoon.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Another thing that I noticed about the heart is that Its glow is so bright, it illuminates the whole cavern like a sun. Its glow gradually changes color, resembling the time of the day. It was yellowish when I woke up, then turned into a bluish glow, and yellowish again before it turned off for the night. I’m not sure how the change interval differs from real daytime, but since it’s pretty much in time with my biological needs, I hope this won’t be a problem long term.

Moving on, on the topic of biological needs, I decided to start rationing myself. After the futile attempt of analyzing the mana heart, I figured I won’t be able to escape from this place anytime soon, and it’d be a good idea to ration as early as possible. Because, while magic spells can help me create water by condensing humid vapor in the air, it can’t help me create more food.

The supplies on my bag were packed to last for at least a week of dungeon delving. It consists of mostly dry food, such as hard breads, meat jerkies, salted fish, and assorted nuts. In normal situations, I’m supposed to eat all of these three times a day with a full portion each, but considering the current situations, I may need to manage with only twice a day with half a portion each. That will last me about a month of food, which in turn buys me ample time to figure out a way out of this place.