I had turned off my sense to smell at this point. The combination of smelling cooking meat and knowing that it was from an at-least developing intelligence was giving me queasy feelings. Those feelings were mostly hunger, which is the other reason I had decided to focus on other things.

I walked up to the closest brazier and took a hold of it, carefully this time, so as to not touch the liquid fire. This brought my hand in direct contact with the rim. As soon as my fingers touched it I felt a low intensity static. Immediately I pulled back.

I flexed my hand a few times, trying to peer through the haze of partial blindness to see whatever was printed on the inside edge. No amount of squinting would bring any focus. Carefully I placed my hand back on it, the expected static was there again.

Static was the best description that I had for the feeling, although if I was pressed I would be hard to describe the exact feeling in its own terms. Almost tangible static charge, like sticking your hand inside a computer enclosure you have just turned off.

I dragged it using only the tips of my fingers and only using the single already burned hand. Just in case something happened. Like this, I went around the room and gathered all three, in a line facing the door.

It didn’t escape my mind that the feeling from the edges of the bowls was very similar to the one that I had felt in that, death-dream-game-hallucination thing. Could this mean that runic enchantments were on the bowls as well? But why had I not felt them before, surely I couldn’t have overlooked it.

The feeling was subtle, yes, and even as I thought about the stress I was under in both circumstances I wasn’t sure that I wouldn’t have noticed something like this. Another thought that percolated was that how did the dream have that sensation in it if I hadn’t felt it before. And even now I couldn’t see whatever was causing the feeling, above what looked like some discolored smudges that circled the rim.

Was my brain just leaping to conclusions amid a not-dying fever state? Were they dreams or some other way of getting information? Or were these the missed information being processed out by the stress?

I tentatively accepted that last one for now. It was the most plausible and right now it didn’t matter much. I sat and looked at the three fires that burned before me. Bright yellow and orange light danced around everything in sight. The dreams as a way of getting information. But that only happened when I almost died right? It didn’t feel like something that would happen when I went to sleep normally.

Oh god sleep. I hadn’t had a proper sleep since I got here. Too much had happened. Admittedly I don’t think that I could get to sleep without some sort of aid at this point. My growing hunger alone would stop me from sleeping.

The three braziers, they were my proven weapons against the enemy. Since there appeared to be different ones from the few that had killed me the first time, I had to assume there were at least another eight. But likely much more.

Hopefully since in recent fight they hadn’t gotten reinforcements it was unlikely that the camp or whatever they had was close. Even then with all the screaming, it would be a nice surprise if nobody had heard. That wasn’t normally how things went through so I had to prepare.

I looked around again. These three weapons were almost too effective, I had gone from being able to do nothing against them to be able to take on a whole gang just by having them. Some minor skill was involved and a larger portion of luck, but that didn’t matter in the end. I had won. Barely.

Well... I had died. So maybe I didn’t win after all?

I was alive now though so maybe I did? I wasn’t sure of the rules on who counted what victory. I walked up to the slaughter at the door.

“Well, fellas? Who won do you think?”

I started to search through what was left of them. As before they wore only that insufficient clothing. The weapons they had carried, with no scabbards of sheaths or anything. The blades themselves varied in condition, from melted useless slag iron to only half-melted. Not being any time of chemist or blacksmith I was not sure which was more impressive. Burning through flesh and bone like it wasn’t there, or the incredible melted metal art that the liquid fire had created.

I counted myself lucky that I still had a hand and moved on. While some things would make me stop and think, there was a sense of pressing urgency that had been growing in me since I woke up the first time after being stabbed to death.

What was important and becoming increasingly apparent was survival. Information was good and I would take what I could get, but after so much happening to me and the fatal nature of my first few ‘adventures’ it was becoming increasingly apparent that I would have to move forward.

My search wasn’t a complete waste, they all had carried weapons, the best condition award went to a sword that seemed to be melted in half across the blade. I was able to snap that section of the still cooling metal and now had a sharp edge to cut things with, if horrendously under-serviced.

Eventually, I had a small pile of similarly affected weapons that were tagged as ‘usable’. The half-a-sword, remained the best out of the lot, followed by another sword that had taken the flamberge thing a bit too far, and now had no edge but otherwise was intact. A heavier greatsword that seemed to have suffered the least, but only due to its relative size. This one was almost useless to me as I had had trouble holding its massive weight up for more than a minute without dropping it. Finally, the rest were mostly just blades that had had their handles melted off.

That had even me something to look at, the design was almost entirely a solid piece of metal. No doubt whatever blacksmith who made this was a bit overzealous with their craft. This made the greatsword in a similar category to the liquid fire, in that it was a more of one shot, drop it on someone blade edge first and hope for the best.

But...something was missing...the stands. Yes, I had forgotten the tri legged stands that the braziers were originally on. I glanced around and found that the one I had defended myself with was gone, a small wooden block charred black was all the remained. Even that surviving was more than I had expected. The other two were intact.

All in all a rather sad assortment of tools to deliver death with. I was surprisingly ambivalent about that, the dealing death aspect of this. They had spilled first blood, the easy truth, when that happened an irreconcilable wall had formed between us. A declaration of war between me and another species. That was that I kept telling myself.

Somethings I hadn’t thought about when I came up with my on the spot plan, the door was now gone. When it caught, I am not sure but with the entrance brightly as brightly lit as it was, I couldn’t miss something like that. That pretty much sealed the deal with moving on. Moving Forward. But it opened new challenges as well, whereas before I had nothing now I would have to carry around my motley assortment of weapons if I was to stand much a chance.

I studied the problem, my bare feet starting to ache from the lugging and hauling I did. I took a seat on the low dais with my arsenal arranged before me. This was pretty much all I had, along with my clothes. The t-shirt being ruined beyond being a blood-soaked rag at this point.

An unfortunate reality was settling into my mind as I looked around. I couldn’t take anything with me right now. My main tactic now was to dumb the liquid fire onto unsuspecting targets. Unfortunately, the tunnels outside the now non-existent door looked just as dark as the cave. Which meant taking along even one brazier would ruin my element of surprise.

‘Well, maybe...?” I stroked my chin, ponderously. “The monogreels carried touches, so it stands to reason that those cocky bastards would assume that I am one of them. Until they see me of course...”

After some thought, I concluded that I would have to take one of them anyway. And risk whatever consequences that may bring. My main argument was that if I ran into another patrol they were gonna be difficult for me to kill with just a couple broken swords. And if I was carrying this thing then there wasn’t much that they could do against it. I hadn’t seen any ranged weapons among the dead, which meant that they would have to get in close to me to kill me and that was were this fire liquid shone. Figuratively, of course, it was brighter than some light blubs from back home.

“Ahhh reason tho art’ my fickle mistress...”

I wish I had more time to experiment with this liquid fire. There was something that I wanted to test now, however. I set aside the blade for a second and picked up the middle brazier. I took it to the dais on the other side of all the equipment that I had in the world and got ready to test my hypothesis.

I set the bowl on the edge facing away from me and carefully began to tilt up. The liquid fire did as it always did and began to flow out the rate increasing as the angle increased. I took this opportunity to look at what it was I dealing with.

For the millionth time, I wished I had my glasses. ‘To get them back would be reason enough for me to kill the whole tribe of them.’

I blinked. Where had that come from, such hyper aggression for glasses? Yes, I was frustrated, but that seemed like an overreaction, at least to the glasses.

I watched the liquid fire pour out and pool below the lip of the dais. The heat was intense but tolerable. It seemed that I was getting used to it. Good thing I figured that I was probably gonna be around it lot.

the liquid that had yet to go up in flames was the same yellow-orange as the fire. Slowly the bowl emptied and is was left looking at a sea of flames.

Quickly I set down the bowl and had a look inside. More miscolored blurry segments. More runes? At the very bottom was a flat red stone. It seemed to be worked into the metal seamlessly and if the texture wasn’t so obviously different I might have said they were uniform.

It was also interesting but not exactly what I was after. Then... there. I started counting.

One-one thousand

two- one thousand

...

A clear crystalline substance seemed to be seeping out of the metal, refilling the bowl at a visible rate. Most importantly, it wasn’t on fire or even the same colors for that matter. Then a drop reached the stone in the center.

A puff of flame.

“Oh. Wow.” my breath was a whisper. It was more than I imagined. I darted my hand in and taught one of the clear drops on my finger.

Carefully I extracted in from the bowl. It sparkled slightly in the light of the small beads of flame that were now becoming more and more frequent as the build-up of this mysterious substance grew with every passing second.

I lifted the drop closer to my eyes. It seemed to have facets even in this phase and remained perfectly still on my finger. I am sure it looked quite nice. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to do anything else.

A thought occurred to me then. When that second bowl was upside down the floor underneath it was undamaged. My mind buzzed at that, there was something there. Ideally, I watched the drop while my mind worked.

Two other similar incidents the first was that I could stick my hand in there and I was fine. The other was much shorter and I was surprised I remembered it in such detail. When I had first unleashed my new weapon against the monogreels, there had been a moment when the liquid fire emitted no heat. Then I had dropped my bowl to my side.

Then I dropped the bowl...

That was the key, the bowl. But how? Obviously, some magic was involved, had to be. I kneaded my burned hand, then in surprise looked at it. Only after taking my hand out of the bowl did it start to burn.

So inside the bowl fire burned without heat...but that wasn’t quite right to. I had stuck my hand above the bowl. So maybe in an area above the rim as well? A cylinder is drawn by the rim itself.

I was proud of that reasoning. I was finally coming to grips with this new world is not just theory, but in practical terms as well.

The bowl filled slowly and because I was distracted I had to dump out and start my timing again. In the end, I found that the bowl refilled in, very approximately, twenty minutes. From being empty to burning at what seemed to be the default fill level, the time was pretty amazing considering I understood nothing of what was happening.

It looked like magician style magic, rabbit out of the hat illusions. But I had felt the heat from those flames and even the light that was produced would make me question if this was a true ‘illusion’ or ‘deceptions’ at work.

I thought about that for a minute. Then poured out the contents of the bowl. Again I watched as the clear liquid became yellow-orange. And again. Each run through the time was similar, the bowl of the thing filling up in twenty or so minutes.

Then I had an idea. I picked up my ruined shirt after a run had finished and the flames leaped and danced in the air before me. I poured it out again, and before the clear liquid could form I stuck my shirt onto and around the center stone. Happy for once that I was an XXL.

Slowly the bowl refilled again. This time through the clear liquid had no way to reach the stone and rested against the shirt. I was not sure that it wasn’t water, but I wouldn’t risk drinking it. The small drop that I had seen was clear, but held to a ball shape almost too well and appeared to even my impaired sight as... almost sparkling. And not with carbonation.

When the level rose to a certain point I had been willing to sacrifice the busted shirt to the flames, just to see if this could work. But that didn’t happen. The liquid didn’t seep through the material and simply rested against it.

And after twenty minutes that was it. A full bowl of strange clear liquid with a blood-stained shirt at the bottom. I was not surprised, a little curious, but I had almost no expectations going in and was prepared for anything at this point.

The bowl was dark so without any light forthcoming, carefully I carried the bowl back over to my collection. I set it down on the dais, the reflected light made the strange liquid even more apparent, strange light patterns bounced off from the inside the liquid, giving more detail to its crystalline structure.

After five minutes of nothing changing, I found that the liquid only filled to that line on the inside rim, where the row of unidentifiable characters cut off the lip of the bowl. Shrugging I set it to the side on with the other bowl and now had only two lights.

I stopped my experimentation there for now, although the loss of light didn’t bother me I still wanted to use them as a weapon and not a school science project.

Next, I went over and picked up the half-sword. Experimentally I swung it around a bit. It felt odd to be swinging around what amounted to a knife with a long handle and shoddy point, knowing that I might have to use it to defend my life. Hopefully with more success than the last couple times.

I was beaten. Setting down the blade after nearing twenty minutes of ‘practice’ with my blade it was apparent that while coming back from the dead had obvious benefits, I was quickly running out of steam for the day. Or maybe night. I wasn’t sure, but like a lot of things I was finding out that it mattered very little.

I lay down on the stone, unsure of how or even if to get comfortable. The blade was still gripped tightly in my hand by the time I drifted of to sleep, still wearing my only slightly bloody sweats and no t-shirt.

My dreams were muddled and confusing, I drifted in a world of sound light color and words. Everything sort of melded and reformed creating the strangest experience of my life. Sounds became colors and vise versa. Light the shone from no sources and seemed to paint things in strange colors would change into words that crawled off the surface float lazily through the air. There had been no beginning, as there was no end. One moment I existed in that world the next my eyes snapped open.

I froze listening for anything that could have woken me. Nothing. I stood and looked around. Nothing had changed. A sigh of relief escaped my lips as I took in the dark gloomy cave. The fires brought a much-needed cheer and more uplifting feeling to me.

I sat up and blinked away the last vestiges of sleep shaking out my limps to try and get some feeling. I jumped up and froze realizing that I was about to start doing. I had never felt the need to stretch as soon as I woke up before, besides the obligatory one of course.

I found myself falling into an old routine that Marc had established for me a while ago when I had tried, to ‘get in shape’ with him. That had ended quite soon after I started, my heart was never really in it.

I found myself wishing that I had stuck with it back then if nothing else than to be able to lift these things better. The bitter thoughts about Marc and Lyla, simmering below the surface which I forcibly tamped down on hard, I couldn’t let my emotions bog my down here.

The routine was a simple-seeming set of stretches although the difficulty ratcheted up when Marc had demonstrated his form compared to mine. The two were not even comparable, where he could put a whole hand on the floor I could barely get to my shins. Push-ups were worse.

Slowly I went through all that I remembered of the routine, not having practiced it in what felt like ever. That progress had slipped backward over the years. But I pressed on, determined to at least go through the motions of all that I remembered.

I stopped after something that must have been close to an hour. The timing was getting to be a little bit of a problem, my phone along with everything else was in the bag, which was taken from me. I maintained a small hope that my glasses and my bag were fine and only being pored over by those idiot savages. It was not a realistic hope I admitted to myself, but I clung to it nonetheless.

The first stirrings of hunger were coming back to me, but I pushed those down as well. I had nothing to eat and thinking about it would only make me hungrier. I picked up my half-sword, flicked it around again, once again feeling strange about carrying the very brutal looking weapon. The coat of blood on the side was not helping my hopes at all. What were they used to cutting down...

‘Hopefully, they are tasty... whatever they were... such a variety of colors I didn’t even notice.’

I stuck the blade in the back of my pants and pulled the strings tight knotting them well. Then I scooped up a brazier by the bottom, it was impractical and pretty heavy, but it was when I woke this morning that the decision stuck in my mind. I needed it to even the odds.

With purpose, I strode to the doorway and hesitated. I teetered on the edge of the pass into the unknown, there was very little reason for me to wait around and do nothing. I needed to eat, and drink, and most importantly get out of this cave. I peered into the darkness, finding only more stone walls that extended into the darkness. It was unfortunate that all that was left of those touches brought in by the last group had been in even worse shape than the weapons they had.

I stepped into passed the door, after all, that had happened to my body that I didn’t understand it was time to bring what would and could give me pause up a level.

I felt something within me shift at that moment when my foot landed on the other side of the door. Some mental key was turned. As the change washed over me I kept walking into the dissipating darkness ahead of me. Moving forward.

I didn’t bother trying to hide my presence, at this point, it would probably be more of a hindrance than anything else. I was not going to be able to hide with this literal spotlight that I was caring around and anyone that could hear me could see me coming from around the corners.

The walls were much the same on this side of the door. The only visible thing that didn’t appear entirely natural was the door frame itself, and that was only a thin sliver of space. The pile of fine ash where the door had been, was proof enough that whatever tiny amount of security it provided was now gone.

I moved slowly at first. Not out of a need to be quiet, more the opposite I wanted to hear anything coming. Slowly I began picking up the pace while maintaining my vigilance. This tunnel that was slighter larger width than the room I was just in. It didn’t appear to have any support system and seemed almost natural. Almost of course because there was a door at the end.

Occasionally I would look back at the door, where I could still see light spilling from the one remaining brazier. But slowly, even that vanished into the darkness. And still, the tunnel continued on, and on. It’s direction perfectly straight.

This told me to things, the sole purpose of it was to get to my room. And also that it was easy to defend if that became necessary but I would have nowhere to go if whoever overcame my defenses.

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

It was after a long walk that I finally saw something different. It was a tall figure outlined at the very edge of the light of my flames. I could barely make it out through the fire and the dark. It was his torch that made him stand out against the blackness. I stopped, frozen, waiting for a reaction. When none came I was almost relieved. However, this was no time for that.

I moved almost painfully slowly setting down the brazier. I didn’t want to risk overwhelming the light provided by his flame and be discovered. I withdrew the half-sword from my pants and gripped it tightly. Sinking into a crouch I stared at his back. Was this a guard for this tunnel? But facing out, they expected me to be dead maybe? But they must know that the other party was missing at least if not dead ...right?

I crept forward padding lightly across the smooth stone on bare feet. Even as I was moving I was surprised at the ease at which I had so little sound. I hadn’t noticed it earlier when it didn’t matter to me however now I could barely hear my steps. Now if only I could see it would be easy. However my night vision seemed okay, but I didn’t have glasses and being in the dark still slowed my progress considerably.

His torch guided me in the right direction. As I got closer, I noticed he was at least two heads taller than me and had a sword rested on his shoulder. He held the torch in his other hand and seemed to be staring fixedly in one direction. I was sure he wasn’t expecting anyone from this way.

I crept up on my prey. I was tense but felt my body start relaxing as I skulked through the dark tunnel. I was trying to come up with a plan when the monogreel grunted and hefted the blade of his shoulder.

I scrambled back already chastising myself and getting ready to run, but it was for nothing as he moved further into the lightroom and turned out of sight. Curious I crept forward, his torch was leaning against the wall just on the inside of the tunnel, the other room seemed to be well lit now that I could see it.

The guard, if that’s what he was, was taking a piss against the wall as I peeked around the corner. He still carried his sword in one hand, and I wasn’t sure that I could take him even now. I leaned back and breathed deeply thinking. I didn’t know enough. I didn’t know if the guards would switch or even if they did. I silently contemplated, I couldn’t risk him seeing the light. If he even glanced into the tunnel before resuming his watch I was busted.

I peaked back around the corner and waited for an opening. Watching him, I would almost mistake him for human. Besides four limbs and generally similar in other anatomical areas his face was quite different than humans. Something different about this one was his eye was a much lighter green than the others I had seen, who had varied a bit in body structure but had had the same shade of green in their eyes.

Soon he finished and dropped his cloth back into place before I pulled back and waited. I picked up the torch as well, as an afterthought. In my mind, I saw his tall stature. I was not sure if I could kill him in one shot like I had the others. While the blade was still a foot long at least, he was taller than me and would be able to move much faster.

The more I thought about it the more the fear gripped me. I couldn’t do this. I would be overwhelmed in a second, whatever I was I was no swordsman. Or much of fighter. I regretted putting the brazier down and losing a way to kill them instantly.

Shit shit shit. The fear I had thought I was ready for. How could I be ready! I shouldn’t be here trapped between a magic lamp and a terrifying murderous one-eyed thing. Something inside my mind fought the panic attack that ripped through me. My mind retreated against the onslaught of terror.

I had killed eight of these things already, their bodies barely recognizable. This was only one more, no reason to panic so for one measly brute.

My breath was coming quick and shallow. Then I heard a grunt come from behind the wall. He was right there.

Anger flashed in my heart. This one insignificant shit would not break me. And like that my mind exploded back out burning away the fear and terror that had so quickly come over me.

I let out an incoherent scream as I felt the creature take another step moving into striking range. There was no skill behind my wild one-handed swing. I carved a massive arch in the air, looking to use surprise for the moment necessary to find a target.

I had started a low swipe looking to lop off his sword arm. I had less than a second, but I changed my mind at the moment I saw him, I turned further into the swipe and looked to carve up his chest through whatever important bits that my blade could find.

My guttural horse voice must have been truly surprising because he had frozen and simply stared in my direction a strange expression on his face. That only lasted until my blade touched him though, his skin parting easily. He screamed as I carved upward. The strike lost momentum much faster than I was expecting it to.

In any case, I had to let go the handle and jump back as I saw his arm twitch right before his much longer sword came sweeping around to cut me in half. I threw myself back as hard as I could. It wasn’t fast enough I felt my skin part just before I left the arc and felt hot blood well up and drip down my stomach. I light wound thankfully and only seemed to have broken the skin.

I stumbled backward attempting not to fall on my back and thereby losing my life.

The creature howled as it looked down at the handle that jutted out of it torso before grabbing the blade and yanking it out with another heavy grunt. Even I knew that was bad for any injury, already his leg was being covered in a layer of blood.

That left me weaponless except for the torch, and that wasn’t much of a weapon. It was a heavy wood and could be used as a club, and was longer than the sword so maybe I was underestimating it.

I snarled at the creature, actually snarled. My feral instinct from before not fading as I waited for its move. But this wasn’t chess. I swung the torch down and stepped in as the creature watched. His blade came around and slammed into my torch, which knocked me back several steps. I was surprised the torch was in one piece still but didn’t have time to question it.

The creature staggered forward and swung again at me. The devastating power behind the massive swing was evident. I wanted no part of blocking one of those blows and hastily stepped back. Then I saw it as soon as I got that distance. The opening that I needed. The world slowed down, as it had before. I moved at the same speed but acted so much faster. Red light bathed the alien out of nowhere as I stepped into the space created just behind his swing. I brought the club/torch down as hard as I could on the side of his knee.

There was an audible crunch that echoed strangely in this slow perception as the heavy torch slammed into the knee and pushed it into a position that didn’t at all look like what a regular knee could do.

The distorted and drawn-out scream of pain that followed was considerably higher pitch than before and seemed much more intense than the last had been. I pulled back and reset again. The sloppy but brutal sword swing that came to cut my head off was almost predictable.

The sword scored sparks of the wall. And slammed into the stone, and stuck.

I didn’t stop and slammed my club down on that arm that was stuck holding the sword. Another crunch and scream of pain. The creature's arm flopped uselessly at its side and it pointy teeth gleamed savagely in the light from my weapon.

Then the accelerated time faded, as a wave of fatigue hit me. I wasn’t too bad, but it was noticeable. The increase in the monogreel’s apparent speed, threw me off as the creature’s foot came up much faster than I was expecting and landed a heavy kick, almost identical to the one I had suffered before.

I tried to step back, but the dulled reaction times left me flat-footed and I only got a step away before the long leg punted me away.

That was all he got of course as the broken leg gave under his own weight and he crumpled to the floor, another scream of pain being pulled from him.

I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t even breath. All the wind had been knocked out of me and I took a heavy crack to the head when I fell. Stars and splotches of color danced in my vision as I gasped and tried to take in any air.

The edges of my vision were going dark as the lack of oxygen slowly overcame my brain.

A bright red light danced over my vision. That was the third time I had seen that light, and it had slipped my mind every time. I tried to focus on it, just for something to do. It wasn’t like the light that came to snatch me away from my glade, whenever that was. A day, three, who knows how long it had been.

This light was lighter and didn’t have that appalling sense of disgust that had overwhelmed me before. Then the mote drifted out of my view. But I still thought about it, even as the world was washing away.

I gulped air. And another. The fading reversed itself as my mind cleared up as well. As soon as I felt able I rolled to the side and pushed up. Looking over to my enemy I found his one eye still open and staring at me.

He was a mess. The pool of blood that surrounded him was not growing any longer. how he was still alive was beyond me, how much blood was that on the floor? When he saw he get up, he let out a barking curse and started moving. He was dragging himself over to the wall.

I picked up the pace and stumbled to my feet. Scooping up my club along the way. Even now he was going for his sword, pulling himself up using the wall, which he did surprisingly well, even with a broken arm.

I wasn’t one for torture and was drained from the fight as it was. I swung directly at the back of his head. The snap, this time, was more final.

A red light flashed again. Brighter this time. I found my vision wasn’t impeded at all and even my night sight was unaffected. I sighed and pushed the corpse over with the still flaming torch. The body flopped bonelessly to the ground.

I was glad these creatures looked and were built very much like humans. If its knee had worked another way, I would be dead. Again. And this time I would have left enemies alive as I slipped into that strange place again.

The exhaustion caught up with me at the same time a strange exhilaration filled me. I leaned against that same wall, and slowly sunk down next to the brutalized body. The bloodied torch I lay carefully within reach but set it aside as my hands began to shake. The conflicting emotions pulled a crazed giggle from me that sounded defending in the recent silence.

White smoke began to drift of the body then. I sat up straighter and looked. I remembered this from the first time, although that had been interrupted. Same as before the smoke drifted upward before streaming in my direction. It was like a wave and when it hit me that odd cool oil sensation flowed up my arms, and any other place the stuff torched. I could feel it inside me.

That wasn’t just in my head I realized, actually had a sense of exactly where the smoke was inside me. It was bunched together and compacting into some white blob shapes that I remember from the room.

‘I guess that was more real than a dream.’ That thought gave me pause and I thought about what exactly I had done. I had eaten this stuff somehow, the damn cat did as well. I focused on the feeling I had of it had simply trying to get a better understanding.

As I did, as if almost sensing my attention the flow slowed then stopped altogether. I blinked, unsure if I had done something to make it stop. I tentatively explored the feeling that came through so clearly in my mind even though I had never experienced anything like it before.

No... wait that was wrong. Something similar, not identical not even close really, but the same state. However, the dream again rose in my mind, the feelings of torrents of mana flowing through my body. This lacked that intensity, the drive burn of fire that built and built as the spells worked to compound my damage. What Illoya had felt was like a being in the center of a raging river.

Again with the dream. The suspicion I held that the dream was more than it seemed, even given that I experienced it right before returning from the dead. There was still more, three times now I knew something in the dream that translated into reality. I frowned, and what’s more both times that dream had revolved around the game.

I like to think that I wasn’t an idiot, but something within me resisted the involvement of the game, as it had resisted the very notion that magic was real. I still wasn’t sure, the runes feeling the same could be a coincidence or something more. Something using my understanding of the game to pass information to me. That explanation worked for me if only as words that might be true and not something I even could vaguely say to be true and still keep a straight face.

If this worked it would a step closer to ...something that I wasn’t sure. But something. I refocused on just the memory of mana, drowning out everything else.

As I felt again the mana flowing inside Illoya and me. I sunk into the memory even deeper than I thought possible my mind connected, at once to the memory body of Illoya and my real body. I was pulling more detail than I thought I would ever get from a dream.

For a second I thought nothing would happen, then I felt the cool energy in my shift. Beginning to follow the complex interweaving of energy that built the structure that was pictured in my mind.

But something was different. The pattern was there I could feel the cooling sensation alongside the burning one now, two different bodies having a completely separate met uniquely similar process happening inside them.

The flow sped up within me now. The energy moving much slower than in the vision. It crawled along with the structure’s pattern like some slime leaving behind a thick trail of the stuff.

I was too focused to on the memory at this point and the duality that is produced in my mind to pay much attention to the small things, which was when the small glob of energy that came from my most recent opponent ran out.

Inside me, a desolate feeling welled up, and my mind was pulled into itself. I viewed a pinprick of light surrounded by raging darkness, its shape was those toxic emotions given form and substance. I could still feel and sense from my body and interconnected mind. However, the overlapping images flattered slightly as I felt the strange feeling of regret and pain come over me. I struggled to keep my hope alive, even as I watched this new scene with rapt attention. This faltering caused my fears and emotions to well up once again, stronger and more intense than before threatening to topple on sanity into a pit of despair that I feared from which I would never wake.

The fear and suppressed doubt and anxiety that lurked within the back of my mind over the last, the day returned even now after I had thought I had gotten over or at least dealt with them. But for naught, it seemed.

My mind held on in the storm of emotion that rolled through me, like a small candle in a storm at sea. The small light buffeted by the darkness on all sides each time the emotional turmoil grew.

I knew on some small level that this was important to hold onto. This small spark. I fumbled about with unfamiliar senses as the dark world attempted to snuff out that little light. Yet it struggles on, and so do I.

Slowly I rain in my wild heart. Pulling the tenuous threads of my emotions back into my heart, where they are normally tied so tight. A pressure resists me, growing stronger even as I try to pull myself back together. The light steadily grows brighter and the darkness recedes bit by bit.

I needed something to fix the problem. The closer my mind becomes to stability the easier it is to feel the source of that pressure. The unfinished pattern emits gloomy dispirited feeling that is almost unnaturally powerful. I have to finish the pattern. But how...how ... as

My mind scrambles in desperation making my physical body twitch and buck as and my breathing already raspy breath grew short and quick. Then the answer came to me, in my panic I had forgotten. I had more, of whatever energy this was, stored within me. I had no idea where but I knew that it was there.

So I searched desperately, turning my attention away from the small light, even as my mind juggled the different things that kept trying to tear me apart from within. I kept the memory in my mind that few second of perfect clarity from another life looped in my mind, and I still focused on the energy structure, as well as keeping my mind from unraveling.

I didn’t let anything go for more than I second without making sure that it was the same while I searched for that extra energy. The complexity in my mind was growing ever greater, I was already surprised that I could take the strain as it was. But it wasn’t that bad considering, yes there was a slight headache building but considering half the tasks I barely understood that was already amazing.

I was coming up empty only darkness surrounded me not that cooling flow that I so fervently searched for.

‘meow’

... my mind flickered at that sound. It was so unexpected that I almost fainted from surprise. Where did that come from, that damn spooky kitten got me every time.

‘meee~~oow’ I followed the sound of her cute voice until my eyes landed on the light. Of course. I berated myself internally for not checking that important thingy first. I followed the kitten's voice again, but differently this time. Unsure of exactly how or what I was doing, but wanting... no needing to go to her.

As I got closer her fluffy face appeared in my mind mind’s eye and she looked up into it as if knowing I could see her. Hell, she probably could. Relief flooded me as I saw her walk over to the glob of energy that still floated meaninglessly in the white room. That was surreal and would be a huge revelation in any other circumstance, however now was not the time for anything new.

Not that the universe seemed to be giving me much quarter in that respect.

I moved closer to the light and found it to be an orb sitting in this dark space, I pressed my hand to it. The surface was not warm like I had expected but cold and biting to the touch. Then another feeling rose to meet it, from somewhere...else... inside of me, the energy appeared inside my real-world body.

As soon as that connection was made and the flow of cool energy was again moving through my body I felt the emotional and mental pressure from the structure vanish like dust in a breeze. Along with it, the darkness retreated like a quick tide. It was replaced by a dull gray void.

Just before my awareness was pushed out of that place I saw the outer edge of the space for the first time, the darkness having dispersed out into only a thin layer. In this place my sight was perfect, and I couldn’t miss the sight of the horrifically complex pattern and eldritch scrawling all over the outer edge that leaked a crystalline vaporous light into the space. Perfect sight meant I could make out every little detail of every little symbol that covered the immense larger sphere that contained this small light ball.

Then I was whisked out. Whatever that was it made my pattern look like a lego model with discolored pieces compared to a model airplane setting sail around the seas of Neptune, that was then put inside you or me in this case. The mind space that was now free from the clutter of emotional turmoil took a minute to try and analyze the specific and superbly odd feeling that I had before pushing it aside, yet again refocusing on the life and death struggle that was underway within me.

The original and denser cooling-energy took over the duty of following the path. I wasn’t sure even after all that it would be enough, even after all I had been through, but I could only keep going. I blinked as my sight returning the to the outside world. But immediately shutting my eyes again to focus internally. I could still feel the path that the cool-energy had followed.

The complex structure was barely half-finished, and I could still feel the slow movement of cool-energy along with it. I wasn’t sure quite what I was doing. That should have stopped me, it didn’t though. I was tired of things happening outside of my control and without my knowledge, and now that I had something that I was seemingly gaining some modicum of control over I stuck to it. Foolhardy as that had already proven to be.

I hoped nothing would come to disturb me, even with the fight no one had come to check on the guard, so I was a little confident that at least there were no other permanent stations nearby, like other guards.

I felt the energy become thinner and thinner, eventually forming fine wire-like strands of the substance that followed the pattern, I could feel its slow movement as it spread out, evenly forming perfect gossamer threads out of what originally felt like energy slime. I could feel them responding to my will with greater and greater precision.

Until they didn’t.

The rotation stopped and suddenly I felt stiff and drained. It took me a moment of complete panic and existential terror at the thought of that nightmarish turmoil again before I realized that nothing more was happening. The structure was completed. The, now thin flowing web changed again, solidifying into the complex shape in my ...body. The feeling of it dulled, but was still there squirming into ...me. Then it settled, my proprioception added a notch to its highly metaphorical belt.

The mental machinery I built...somehow...was slowly turned into a lower and lower gear. The memory from the dream of Illoya that had caused the trouble in the first place continued to play over and over again my mind seemed unable to disentangle so quickly after such a powerfully disturbing event.

That small light. It was the most prominent thing in my mind now. That small something that was me in a way that was far outside of my comprehension that I didn’t even have words to describe what it is. Metaphysics was never what I was interested in.

‘heh..was is right...’ that was the last thought I had for a bit.

Eventually, I found myself simply laying against the wall strength returning at last. The blankness of that mental oblivion melting away. I ‘woke’ feeling pretty good. I could still feel that new structure inside me. It wasn’t doing anything but it was there. To be honest I had my fill of that particular thing for now. The idea of what it could be was tantalizing sure, but the almost wiping of my existence felt like a stretch past what I could get excited about.

My first order of business I got up and pushed the cooling corpse out of the way. I am not sure how long I was in that trance-like state, so couldn’t say for sure if the body was cold but couldn’t work up enough shits to give about him now. The blade that still was stuck in the wall was complete and only had that characteristic bloodstain down the center to mare its appearance.

Now that was worth my time.

This particular sword was a double-edged bar of steel, or what appeared to be steel, with the same all-metal design and a slightly curved segment at the top. I could easily fit both my hands around the over the long handle, and in fact, it was required as the blade was pretty heavy.

In total length, the blade was three and a half feet and the handle another hair over a foot. I found myself resting it on my shoulder much as its previous wielder had done. After wiping the blood from the half-sword I stuck in the back of my pants again. I picked up the torch and held it out in front of me taking a look around the room for the first time.

It was almost as empty as the tunnel had been except I could see another tunnel branching off, except this one had torches placed in sconces at the entrance, that provided light to the room but not the tunnel.

I made my way back up the tunnel to my lamp and stopped. Unsure of how to carry everything at the same time already I was overencumbered and with no points to dump into strength, never really sure why strength related to the creation of more space in a bag. I sighed and bemoaned the loss of my own backpack for the third time, in this case, its basic ability to hold things.

I sat again near the brazier letting the sword fall next to me, but not too far out of reach. My feet were starting to hurt after stepping on the uneven stone floor, but I ignored it unable to do anything about it and needing to press on. I was glad the ground seemed relatively flat so far.

I examined the torch, as much as I could. Not surprised to find that it was different than what I had originally thought it was. The ‘standard’ torch that I was familiar with from D&D was a stick with some cloth wrapped around the top, that seemed to burn forever. This was another thing entirely. In hindsight, the metal cap that was flush with the wood, and seemed to be constantly on fire was probably the reason that my attacks were as effective as they had been.

That and the mysterious red light.

“Just when I thought I caught a break,” I muttered quietly to myself my harsh rasp slightly off-putting, even to me.

The torch was of course, completely out of focus and lacked any distinguishing detail. In disgust, at my poor vision, I threw it into the lamp. The heat from its fire vanishing as it entered the bowl.

Well, at least I could say that I got that right. Too bad I couldn’t eat it.

My hunger had grown while I was otherwise occupied with more mystical bodily problems and was one of the reasons that I knew that time had passed.

I looked in the direction of the body and realized I had actual heat now, that wasn’t going to melt through the flesh before I could bite into it. I would just have to figure out how to butcher up a monogreel and hope they were biologically compatible. And that I wouldn’t explode after eating them. I was pretty sure that whatever was bringing me back to life couldn’t heal that.

I rubbed my hand through my hair thinking of possibilities. Nothing seemed viable, not if I was counting on fighting again. Which I did. Anything that I used to carry around all of my newly acquired stuff would hinder any running away I had to do later. That was something I also counted on doing. Not that I stood much chance at running away. These super athletes compared to me. I poked at my belly and watched flop a little. I sat up suddenly a thought growing in my mind.

Was that the answer then. I couldn’t run away anyway. And even then I was at a dead end. I had already said I would move forward. But maybe...maybe I hadn’t taken it far enough. Maybe I needed to commit to an all in. Take everything I had, and more than that take myself and the tiny flimsy security I had in that cave and move forward. Move Forward.

An all-in gamble. I was a fan of the massive play that paid off in the end. But even if I liked doing it in my heart, that was different from actually doing it. The game was where I had done it most. And this was no game. Everything was so very real. And to go all-in here meant that death was pretty final. Resurrection or not, once I was caught that would be it. In the worst case that meant endless, perpetual agony.

This was no game. Or at least, I speculated morbidly, not a game to me. Unfortunately everything else aside, this place was very dungeon-like. That thought died quickly in my mind and faded. What I did think about was game experience with the large choices that I had ever gone all-in on. They were very few. The streaming, the game, ...and the twins.

So the bad, the excellent and the gut-wrenching blissfully-painful anger-pain-sorrow.

I would call that a mixed bag.

I sat in silent thought for a long time.

I really couldn’t make this decision on an empty stomach, or without water for that matter. Neither of which seemed readily available at the moment. But that was part of the problem. I groaned.

I had played it safe in my life for a long time.

‘hehe,’ I chuckled at my turn of phrase. “Played.” How I ironic. I resolve that this isn’t a game to turn around and say that. Was it just a turn of phrase. Sure, it could be taken that way but I liked to look deeper. If I had ‘played’ the earlier parts of my life safe, and the result was the shut-in that I had become. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to play it safe.

No, I didn’t feel bad about being the introvert, or even a shut-in. That wasn’t it. Now shut in a cave by myself, save for the killer monsters that lurked around that would probably have been a problem. Progression. Moving Forward. These things were missing from my personality.

Had they ever been there? I wasn’t sure, Lyla and Marc always pushed me and I was happy to go along with them.

Friendship? IS that missing as well. Could it be? No. I had friends and that had hurt. I didn’t need anymore. I snorted. Then did a quick check for that pressure again afraid it had come back. But no, just my mind being caught up in its thoughts.

I stood resolve building in me as I headed for the room where I had first arrived. I had to get my things together. There was still the issue of how I was to carry everything. I had some ideas earlier, but I was sure that new issues would pop up. But what else was new.

Oh yes. I had a cat.