“it’s… night! Damn it! Cough cough”
When I crawled out of the well (which was very hard), I was greeted with the dark silhouettes of trees.
It was very dark in the dungeon and, truthfully, I was slightly missing the Sun. I was looking forward to seeing the bright light of the day again.
But then again, it’s not too bad that it was the middle of the night. My eyes are used to darkness and a sudden flash of light would just be a nuisance.
After catching my breath for a while (crawling out took a toll on me), I then slowly crawled towards my cave.
There were at least wolf pelts and leaves there. I could have a somewhat satisfying sleep at last.
…
I woke up in the morning. In my cave the morning wasn’t too bright, so I dully stared at the light that leaked through the entrance and then slowly moved towards it, letting my eyes get used to to the light.
God, I was hungry! I wasn’t afraid of anything in the forest, except for passing level 500 mages and their granddaughters, so I cheerfully went and hunted a few rabbits, got some mushrooms, berries and some eatable vegetation and then cooked me a good meal after a long time.
My cooking skills were awful as always, but I just so happened to be the kind of person who cared little about the taste of my food. Eating well and sleeping well was good enough for me.
“This is bliss”, as I lay on the grass and the pelts of wolves and slowly digested the food I just ate, I couldn’t help but marvel at how little one needs to be truly happy.
What wealth, what comfort – all of it was superficial. Humans just needed to rest well and eat well to be content before all. Though I would not at all refuse a comfortable bed, good food and access to the Internet, I was content to just lie on the barely hygienic crude pelts and eat the barely eatable food.
Besides, I had a lot of things to think over. This time I crawled into the dungeon half-heatedly, I didn’t quite understand just how hard and how dangerous it was. Thoughts like, “If I did this, make that, took those things it would be much easier”, plagued my mind.
Thinking over your failures is a good way to get problems with your stomach and your psychological state but it also a good way to make yourself better.
I have lived for about two decades already and I had only small problems with my stomach and not severe problems with my mental state, so I think I am good at balancing that thin line between self-reflection and self-loathing.
Unfortunately, my attention span is similar to that of a goldfish, so I quickly went from relecting on what I could do better to magic.
“Ralph, can you show me how much is a cubic meter?”
“How should I do it?”
“Can you conjure up a bucket? It’s not too much to ask for, right?”
“I could conjure it up, sure, but the problem is different. This Universe and your home Universe are different. Their fundamental laws of physics are different. They don’t even exist in the same material space, they are located on different layers of reality itself. I could, of course, conjure up a bucket, just like I conjured up your body or your clothes, but it wouldn’t have the volume of one cubic meter. Because meters don’t exist in your current Universe”
This would be a problem, wouldn’t be… Wait
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“Why are you shit*ing me, Ralph? It doesn’t matter if it’s not one cubic meter! I could still use it as a unit of measurement! It wouldn’t be a meter, sure, but it could be a different unit of measurement, why would it be important whether it’s a meter or not? In the first place, I use barely passable knowledge I have of physics of a different Universe, hoping that it roughly works, which it has been doing so far, so I don’t need to be precise!”
He’s often like this. Sometimes I ask him something and he begins to mislead me with a strange argument, making me run in circles until I realize that I’ve been tricked. Is he a demon or a lawyer?
“If you could use a random bucket as a unit of measurement, why would I need to conjure it up in the first place? Just find one yourself”
…that’s fair. I didn’t think of that.
“Why are you just lying there? Go search, weren’t you thinking of experimenting with water?”
I would stand up, but I found a very comfortable lying position….
“You were just too lazy, weren’t you? You asked me to warp reality across dimensions because you couldn’t stand up and search for a bit yourself?”
“Oh, Ralph, I know you aren’t really mad about it. Me acting like this towards you is a way of showing my trust in you. It’s like a small way of expressing affection if you think about it. If I didn’t trust you, would I dare to ask you anything? Would I dare showing you this side of me? We simply have a wonderful relationship where we can pull these kinds of small pranks on each other, aren’t I right?”
The more I spoke the less confident I felt. I felt as if I was being led into a trap somehow, no, as if I was willingly walking towards a trap myself.
“Oh yeah? Yes, you are absolutely right, my friendpet! You are absolutely right! Also, while we were talking, a scary monster came to your surrounding area of this forest and it’s going towards your cave right now. You should probably run, it’s two minutes away from you and it’s hungry”
Quest detected!
“A game of tag with death”
A hungry monster is about to arrive. It’s much stronger than you, it’s much faster than you and it’s very keen on eating human flesh! It is yet to become aware of your presence so you have a chance of survival if you run and hide from it.
Will you become food or will you survive another day? The choice is all yours.
Time until the monster arrives: 01:54
Task: Survive
Reward: Experience
A bunch of words entered my head and read themselves within a split second.
“Why haven’t you warned me about it, Ralph!”
“Haven’t you said that we have the kind of relationship where we can play these kinds of small pranks on each other?”
“It’s not a small prank!”
“Relax, you have a 47% chance to survive~! Nope, go the other way, you’re running towards the monster! 32% now!”
$%@@*! I couldn’t quite curse him to his imaginary telepathic face, so I simply unleashed a string of profanities in my head.
Also, I sprang up and ran out of the cave the moment Ralph said the “a scary monster”.
I might’ve defeated the first floor of a dungeon but I was more or less prepared. I was loaded with spells which I didn’t have right now and without spells I was nothing but a delicious (I daresay I would be a desirable treat to a monster) chunk of meat.
I was exhausted from the whole dungeon adventure and I was able to relax just a moment ago and now I had to run and get into a state suitable for a struggle for life. It added a whole new level of psychological level of difficulty.
I knew I ran in the direction away from the monster now but I didn’t hear no see any signs of it, I just knew it was close. It was like I ran from an intangible ghost, it was a matter completely different from fighting a being I understood and was prepared for. I just knew it was powerful and that I would die if I got caught.
“Oof”, I stumbled! There was a root under my foot and I fell dow-
*chomp*
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ned?
YOU’RE DEAD!
Quest failed!