POV Jacob
After catching up with what happened while I was on my little adventure and subsequent power nap we decided to discuss what to do next. I thought we should try to complete the challenges, explore, and try to find the resources alluded to in the announcement sent by Wheel Head. But some of the others kept bringing up irrelevant subjects such as “not surviving” or “ getting lost in an endless tunnel network filled with unknown risks”.
Ok, their objections may not be completely unfounded but we still need to get stronger so we don't die in a future event where we can't just sit in a relatively safe area for the whole week. ‘Plus it would be soooooo boring. Even if I’m not a massive fan of tight enclosed spaces it would be so much better to go exploring than just sitting here.’
But I don't currently voice my opinion. I am instead eating rocks, like any normal person would, instead of helping a group of people decide whether to potentially risk their lives or go exploring magic tunnels made by a hallucination-inducing wheel God.
I let out a snort of amusement. ‘At least now my random thought processes are vaguely relevant.’ I take another bite of rock, not really minding the texture and satisfying crunch now that my body has developed a superpower to eat far worse substances.
“I still think we should at least try and complete the first two challenges, if it's too much then we can slow down and just focus on the resources that were mentioned. What do you think Jacob, you haven't said much…Are you eating a rock like an apple?” Noah asks while looking at me with confusion.
I take another bite of my apple-sized rock, lock eyes with Noah and chew before answering. “No,” I say with a mouth full of ground up pebbles before swallowing. Mai laughs slightly while Noah just sighs.
“I need fuel for the flesh mech so I was just listening for now. Although I do agree with Noah we still need to get stronger so we don't die in a future event where we can't just sit in a relatively safe area.” I take another bite of my rock, finishing it off before continuing. “I can always melt the walls to give us a safe space, plus points means prizes and with a God handing them out I don't want to miss out.”
“I know, I know, Noah's right I’m just stressing out about what could be down there,” Mai says in a defeated voice as she pets Twitch.
‘Hmm, she's petting herself in another body.’ I melt another apple sized rock from the wall and continue eating. After another few minutes, the others reluctantly agree to head down the tunnels and try our luck at the Cave Crawlers that we know about so we can complete the first challenge.
As we didn't know how dangerous the unknown creatures were or what the challenge counted as killing the Cave Crawlers, we decided to deal with the first creature we encountered as a group and then try to kill the creatures one on one to secure the challenge completion.
With a basic plan of action finally laid out we headed deeper into the inky blackness of the tunnels. The constant twisting, turning and uniform grey illuminated by the single flashlight made the whole journey disorientating. It didn't help that the only sounds were our footsteps echoing off the rough stone wall that only helped to remind me of the literal tones of earth surrounding us in every direction that funnelled us in a single direction. ‘Hmmm, yeah, I was definitely made for open air and freedom, not tight spaces and sadness.’
To try and stop my claustrophobic thoughts of being buried alive I started to develop my echolocation inspired sub-skill, careful to not use up too much power or upset my stomach. My training involved sending out small pulses of my matter affecting abilities into the air through my hands and trying to sense the air particles in the small 10cm squared area of energy saturated air. It took a lot of concentration and a fair bit of stumbling as I walked but I was starting to get the hang of my small pluses when Sam announced that the Cave Crawler was close.
Not wanting to be a complete liability I stopped playing with myself and checked the knives on my hip before doing a few stretches led by Noah to limber up. Basic preparations completed, we head off again but this time with more light as Mai and Ella have both turned on their headlamps, the battery drain deemed acceptable for the upcoming conflict.
After another bend in the tunnel, I start to hear a harsh guttural hissing and rapid metallic sounding clicking getting progressively louder. 'It's getting closer.’ I grin and bounce on the balls of my feet. A brief alert from Mai and Sam confirms the incoming threat causing everyone to get in positions. Noah takes point with a large sledgehammer appearing from his inventory, Ava brings forth a large bucket filled with water on Noah's left While I hug the right wall to have a ready supply of ammunition. Meanwhile, Sam and Mai stand slightly behind Ava With a sharpened javelin in hand ready to help back her up in case the incoming creature gets too close. Ella stood in the middle with a liberated bow and arrow in hand ready to heal if needed.
We waited a few more seconds before the mother of all centipedes came barrelling towards us like a bat out of hell. “Fucking hell that's a face only a mother could love!” Mai yells in disgust. She wasn't wrong the Cave crawler took the natural unease of potentially venomous creepy crawlies and magnified it tenfold. It had a flattened, many-segmented body with a bulbous head that sprouted long erect antennae and vicious looking mandibles. It was at least 4 metres in length and coloured a dark purple with bright yellow rapidly moving legs that dragged its armoured body toward us.
Ava, quick on the mark, leads our attack by sending fist sized balls of water at high speeds towards the Cave Crawler causing it to nimbly doge to the right making the liquid projectiles crash into the rocky floor, producing small dust clouds upon impact. Without missing a beat I hurl a large chunk of liquefied stone at the approaching monster’s spear-like legs effectively trapping the appendage once the stone solidified.
Or at least it did for a second. The sudden transfer of the charging beast's momentum caused the stone to crack, allowing its smooth blade-like legs to slip free of their rocky confinement. But it did slow it down enough for Ava to launch another barrage of watery constructs onto the now panicking beast. It flinched at each strike that landed on its elongated antennae and tried to crawl up on the wall but I continued to throw globs of liquid stone at its joints and feet doing my best to reduce its movement.
It didn't take long for the monstrous centipede to be completely restrained with only Ava and I actually doing anything. ‘Kind of a letdown after dealing with the Sky lurker.’ I think in disappointment, but now that the crawler was restrained we moved on to the next part of the plan which involved Sam going over to the struggling Cave crawler. He sat down next to the struggling beastie while Noah stood guard, sledgehammer at the ready and head on a swivel. Sam's job was to map out the senses of the creature that was made to live in these dark tunnels so that he could better guide us into the twisting depths. Mai on the other hand was trying to see if she could dominate its mind and add it to her hive mind.
After a few minutes, Mai informed us that she currently wasn't strong enough to invade a cave crawler's mind at the moment so she joined us in waiting for Sam. After half an hour of more echolocation training and eating rocks, Sam was done mimicking the senses of the creature, apparently gaining the ability to taste heat in the air and sense vibrations through the stone. Both of which would be useful in traversing the twisting passages of earth.
“Mai, you said it was too strong to take control over?” I ask as I walk over to the captured monster.
“Yeah, its will or physical body is strong enough to resist me taking it over,” Mia responds as she too moves towards the stone-covered Cave crawler.
I crouched down to look at its bulbous head and into its beady black eyes “Hmmm, what if we made sure its will wouldn't get in your way?” I wrap my knuckles in between its eyes listening to it hiss in undulated hatred.
“What do you mean? Torture? You plan to break its will so I can take over its body?” Mai asks in mild disgust.
‘Unnecessary, pretty sure she already breaks and removes the will and personality of whatever she takes over.’
“I was more thinking along the lines of knocking it out by drowning it then causing sensory deprivation to remove its sense of self temporarily.” I look at Ava and Sam as I talk. ‘Plus torture would take too long to heal it back up.’
“Should be possible,” Sam says noncommittally while Ava just shrugs before taking water from her bucket and sending it into the monster's maw. Its hissing quickly turns to spluttering, its body twisting in its restraints with renewed vigour as it tries to escape.
Ava looks slightly guilty but keeps up the stream of water as both Sam and Mia lay their hands on the struggling Cave crawler. I stood there for a few minutes looking on apathetically before quickly getting bored and continuing my training. I was now able to notice my finger as a void within the pulses and wanted to be able to visualise my hand with nothing but my abilities by the day's end.
Several more minutes pass before Mai suddenly lets out a triumphant cry, letting us know that it has worked. She then sagged onto the floor and groaned about her pounding headache. Ella was still out of magic healing touch juice so we just gave her some painkillers and a small break while I freed the new addition to Mai’s hive mind.
When we were finally ready to fight again we headed off to the other known Cave Crawlers locations at a slow jog to not push the still-suffering Mia too much. Now that we knew what we were up against it was time to score our solo kills to secure the challenge compilation and subsequent points.
Noah volunteered to go first for the second beastie we found, with the rest of us close by in case he needed any support. Which it turned out he did not. Like at all. A single well-timed sledgehammer strike slammed into the Cave Crawler's head produced a resounding crack with enough force to shatter the chitinous armour’s upper layers making it stager and unable to provide any real defence to the second blow to its head, or third until the hammer crashed into its head for the final time making it explode in a shower of gore.
The poor beast was only able to get one nip in with its large mandibles but it didn't even piece the skin with Noah's armour and crystalline skin. Once it was dead Noah simply spread out the splattered brain matter with the hammer head with a grimace until he found the small pale white gem.
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‘Impressive’ I smile widely as I think of the implications of Noah's enhanced stretch and durability.
Not knowing if the meat was edible I only melted off a few legs for my friends to try and eat later and picked up the blade-like mandibles to try and make something with in the future.
Once I was done playing with the corpse we quickly backtracked and went on to the next located Cave Crawler, updating the map and symbols as we went. This time it was my turn to take out the glorified armoured worm. It wasn't difficult but it did take longer than Noah's fight.
I started by crawling along the ceiling of the cave by melting holes in the stone for my fingers to slip into. It was murder on my core but feeling like a possefinal spider made up for it. Once I was above my target I melted the outline of a rough sphere with a pointed base into the stone allowing me to pull a torso-sized boulder from the ceiling. My stomach churned but I ignored it as I watched the large stone start to fall. Grabbing the boulder with my hands I pushed off the ceiling and guided the improvised prehistoric weapon into the Caves Crawler head. Brittle stone shattered upon impact, and my body tumbled to the floor as the beast screeched and spasmed, twisting and curling in upon itself, writhing in pain.
I roll to reduce the impact and launch myself into a standing position with a wide grin on my face. I watch it thrash around for a few seconds, noticing its slowing movements and pooling blood before rushing in, chisel and hammer in hand. I jump over its flailing body and avoid its sharp legs before I manage to mount its back. It's dark purple chitinous armour was cool to the touch and felt solid but it had weak points in the form of joints where the large purple plates interlocked allowing it to move from side to side. Which it was currently doing as it tried to knock me off its back.
I just snorted in amusement before driving my chisel into one of the joints and hitting it with a hammer making the steel blade sink deeper past the armoured plate and into the soft flesh within. My thighs started to burn slightly from the strain of staying on my unwilling mount but I managed to stab it thrice more in rapid succession. On the last stab, I left the chisel inside the soft gooey flesh and used it to lever the armoured plate off its back.
It peeled off with a sickening squelch to reveal dark pink flesh that I stabbed viciously, covering my hands and formans in blood until it stopped moving and I could now interact with its atoms. ‘Dead then.’ I straighten up, stretching my arms and back, and walk over to the head to liquefy it, finding the same pale white gem Noah did.
“Why didn't you trap it?” Asks Ava as she summons some water to help wash off all the blood.
“I won't always be in a situation where I can trap things so it's good to practice when I’m in a relatively safe situation,” I respond and give thanks for the cleaning. ‘Plus that was more exciting.’
“Are you sure you just weren't copying Noah?” Asks Mai in a teasing tone.
“I want to be inside him, not be him, there is a difference,” I say with a smirk as Noah sighs while Ella just face palms in the back.
“Well ignoring that, does anyone want to go next?” asks Ella
“Um, I can go?” Ava raises her hand timidly.
With that, we once again traversed the labyrinth of compacted earth and stone. Continuing to mark our way both on the tunnel walls and the map. We made our way to another Cave Crawler’s layer where Ava stood out ahead of the rest of us, ready to bombard whatever came out of the tunnel with water.
It didn't take long for the scuttling bug to rush towards her at high speeds only to run into a rope of water that wrapped around its antenna, pulling it to the side like a horse's reins. The beast, feeling the strain on its most sensitive body part tried to lessen the pull by leaning into the water, effectively giving Ava control of its movement. Which most experts would agree is a bad idea. Especially after witnessing a small stream of water enter into the Cave crawler's mouth.
‘It's going well.’ I pause for a moment half expecting something bad to happen after thinking the dreaded sentence but nothing changed. I give a small smile and spare a glance away from the slowly drowning monster to see Ava waving her arms around in steady deliberate movement to help visualise her control over the water. ‘...That's definitely not the most glamorous of movements but it's not like I'm one to talk.’
I continued to watch Ava wave her arms around like she was cooking an invisible meal for a few more minutes before the giant centipede finally succumbed to the lack of oxygen and collapsed into an armoured heap with its bright yellow legs sticking out haphazardly.
‘...Bright yellow…Centipede. Are these things poisonous? Venomous? Can I get some?’
“If it bites you and you die it's venomous right?” I ask aloud.
“What?" Noah looks over at me in confusion. "Yes, venom animals inject toxins, whereas poisonous animals unload toxins when you eat them. Why?” Answers Noah.
“Centipedes are toxic and our new friends have bright yellow legs soooo maybe we can milk them?” I make vague milking motions with my hands.
“Um, can someone check if it's dead? I am getting super tired over here.” Ava wines out.
“I can have Pinchy bite you to find out if you like?” Says Mai as her new Cave crawler chitters by her side.
“Hmmm, later when we are more secure?” I ask.
“Guys,” Ava says in a slightly louder voice, hoping to get our attention, causing Sam to head over to the potential corpse.
“Jacob, no,” and “I was joking” came from Ella and Mai simultaneously.
“Why not? It could be fun.” I answer with a small grin on my face.
Sam reaches over and taps the motionless Cave Crawler on its side. “It's still alive,”
“For fuck sake.” Ava moans as she sags slightly before straightening up and making even more violent hand gestures with a look of annoyance on her face. I watch as more bullet-shaped water projectiles hurtle towards the incapacitated beast.
We stand and watch Ave for a few moments before Ella speaks up again. “Why are you trying to poison yourself?” She asks.
“I’m not sure it counts as poisoning, but I'm not sure about the correct terminology.” I look over to see Noah shaking his head and Ella with an annoyed expression on her face. I blink slowly before carrying on. “Anyway, I want to adapt to toxins and infections now that my body isn't as pathetic.”
Ella exhales sharply through her nose, a slight scowl still marring her face. “I can't stop you from causing yourself harm but I won't heal you unless I have to. I won't encourage this nor will I waste my healing on every stupid idea you have.”
‘Stupid? I thought it was quite logical.’ I open my mouth but think better of it when I see Ella still looking annoyed. “Ok, that makes sense, if anyone thinks of a better idea I will give it a go.”
“It’s dead” Calls out Sam “Fucking finally” Respods an exhausted Ava as she slowly sits down and leans against the wall.
Despite Ella's reluctance to heal me from self-introduced toxins, she didn't stop me from locating venom glands from the corpse and putting it in my inventory after I extracted the gem from the corpse's head.
Once Ava was rested and the rest of us had a quick lunch we headed off to find our next adversary for Mia to face. Her fight was by far the loudest with animals snarling and squealing as Pinchy tangled up her would-be sister as Twitch ripped off its antenna and Sunny scratched out its beady black eyes. All that was left was for Mia to slowly decapitate it with her hatchet before it stopped struggling and another core was added to our collection.
Sadly that was the end of our solo streak as Both Sam and Ella weren't able to harm the Cave Crawlers through their thick shells while avoiding their venomous pincers or spear-like legs. Sam was able to numb his Cave Crawler’s senses but it didn't stop him from being flung into a wall and nearly torn in half before Noah and I managed to step in and finish it off. It took Sam another four encounters before he was able to numb their senses enough that he could take advantage of their confusion and finally manage to finish off his fifth monster.
Ella on the other hand struggled due to her lack of offensive powers and inability to crack the shells or dodge the beast's attacks. After a few attempts and a few close calls, we decided that I would restrict the next bug's movements with as little stone as possible so that Ella could kill it with as little help as possible and hoped that it would count.
With the first challenge finally done we tried to make more progress on the second wheel task, travelling 100 miles. Deciding that cars, motorbikes and push bikes wouldn't work in the tight dark spaces and uneven floor we had to continue jogging deeper into the depths of the earth, mapping the route back up and marking any side passages as we went.
It was a long and tedious couple of hours but luckily the deeper we got the more Cave Crawlers we found, sometimes even in mating pairs with their small, regular-sized centipede children. This helped break up my boredom and allowed us to gather more parts from the corpses. The encounters also allowed us to work on our teamwork as we would work in random pairs to remove the threat from our underground marathon and become used to each other's abilities.
‘There must be something more interesting down there, the higher powers wanted something fun to watch and I'm getting bored just doing the same shit.’
After another couple of hours, we decided it would be a good idea to find somewhere to cook dinner and get some sleep after our long day of running, fighting and almost dying. In an attempt to find somewhere safer, we headed up another tunnel with a slight incline to distance ourselves from the depths and the monsters that crawl within.
It didn't take us long to climb up the path and pass more off-shooting tunnels that led to more unknown darkness and danger. But those adventures would have to wait for a few hours, the group was fatigued both mentally and physically. They used the last of their strength to set up camp while I created basic walls by shifting liquid stone into stalactites and stalagmites.
A few minutes of setting up camp later, found us settled in a rough circle of camping chairs to eat our cold meal. Or at least the others did, I was dismantling Cave Crawler parts for their venom and amour while putting their meat into melted stone to avoid attracting predators through the rancid smell of their meat.
“It’s almost worth the risk of suffocation to have a decent warm meal instead of this.” Noah gestures vaguely at his pile of cold beans, meat and bread.
“Could be worse,” Ava states as she sprinkles salt and pepper onto her own cold meat. “We could be eating rocks all day.” She glances at me as I liquefy the meat out of a leg and store the solid chitin in my inventory. “Does their meat taste ok at least?” she asks in a hopeful voice.
“The meat tastes rancid, rocks on the other hand aren't too bad surprisingly.” I clear out another leg and sink the discarded meat into the previously brittle floor.
“Speaking of which, today wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, and I even got a new pet.” Says Mia as she rests a hand on Pinchy's ugly ass head and scratches her between the eyes.
“Just more ways for you to play with yourself Mia, it's we won't judge,” I added while taking out a venom sack from my inventory.
“You better not judge, otherwise you aren't invited to join,” Mia replies, watching me as I dip a thick pin with a hollow tip I made from chitin into the venom. “Are you dosing up?”
“Well, alcohol doesn't do the job anymore so maybe stabbing myself with venom-infused crap will give me a nice buzz,” I say in a joking tone as I brace myself mentally and relax my left arm.
“Please don't say it like that,” Sam mutters before continuing. “ I know I’m going to regret this but If you don't die I would like to join you.”
“It's bad enough that the idiot is doing it, but do you have to follow his bad example?” Ella remarks with a glare directed at Sam and me.
“I was almost bitten a lot more times than I am comfortable with and I don't want to put people at risk by not being able to handle it,” Sam states in a defiant tone.
“Why am I THE idiot? I thought I was doing alright?” I mutter before stabbing myself with the toxic needle.
“Damn it, I will give it a go as well…If you don't die,” says Noah as he stands up and approaches me. After a few moments he asks “How is it?”
I grimace slightly as I rotate my arm and jiggle it around slightly. “Mild, throbbing, burning pain around the wound with low levels of muscle weakness. 2.5 out of 10? Not too bad honesty” I explain my symptoms before making more Pins.
“This is ridiculous.” Sighs Ella as Sam, Noah and surprisingly Ava are all pricked by their own needle. Noah needed to break through his hardened skin first before administering the toxin to get it into his system but he took it like a champ.
As we cleaned up after our respective meals and or crafting stations the effects of the toxins started to diminish greatly, with mine seemingly disappearing altogether within 25 minutes while the others took 40 minutes in total. I attributed this to my slight healing factor due to my enhanced digestive and respiratory system which allowed my body to convert matter into exactly what it needs at a high pace.
Not wanting to be missing out on our group bonding activity I dosed myself again before the others managed to recover and began to set up my bed. My sleeping area consisted of a camping sleeping mat, several towels and sheets for padding, two sleeping bags and a memory foam pillow I managed to steal from one of my neighbour's houses. Not the most glamorous sleeping arrangement but better than the power nap I had to take earlier in the day by a mile.
Speaking of my power nap, I was first on watch as I was the last person who actually got some rest, even if it was after fighting for my life and filled with nightmares of my friends and family tearing me apart and blaming me for their deaths.
But I had no qualms about it, I just kept dismantling corpses, practising my echolocation knockoff and micro-dosing myself with the Cave Crawler venom while the others got their rest.
The mild pain and irritation from the venom kept me alert and the slow continuous dosing managed to bring the recovery time down to 19 minutes, while I was finally able to detect my own hand using my developing sub-skill. I sit back against the hard cold stone, ignoring the sharp jagged edges that dug into my back and grin widely.
‘Today has been fun, almost died to a sky leviathan, killed said Sky leviathan, had a nice stroll in the woods, dosed myself full of toxins, developed my magical abilities given to me by a God with a game show wheel fetish and did glorious battle against big ass centipedes. The apocalypse isn't so bad so far.’