Day 5

I dreamt then, a very vivid dream, I was floating there in an inky blackness when I heard it a low voice, like the rumble of bass, “CONSUME!” it said, shaking me literally to my core, and I woke up. A burning sensation coming from my left wrist. Wresting against it was the crystal, which had shrunk to the size of a clenched fist. I quickly tried to pull away, but it had become attached to me, like it was welded on. When I grabbed it with my other hand is when I realized it, I could feel through this thing.

I admit, I freaked out, but only for a good minute before I realized something, I was starving. I reached for my destroyed pack, grabbed my oat bars and devoured them, sipping water as I went. It was only until after I did that did I realize I had ate my entire supply of food. “Am I gonna actually have to eat that thing?” I ask myself aloud, knowing that I probably would. I bundle up my stuff, my ball stump not helping much, except as a brace.

I start walking for a while, thinking about what happened with my hand, where that creature is, now I was getting angry. I took a sip of water, when I realized I was shaking with anger. I had to stop for a minute and calm down. So I decided to meditate, to clear my mind, to realize, to think about what I needed to do. I sat down, looking around, making sure nothing was around, and laid some wrappers on the ground five feet around me, and placed my ax in my lap, hopefully ill be ready this time. I lean against the wall and start the exercise.

To start you picture a wall, picture it as a solid color, any color will do. Then you walk towards that wall, and see a door, as you walk up to it it opens outwards, into a forest. Walking through, you enter this beautiful forest, and hear birds chirping, wind blowing, leaves rustling, and start walking down a mossy path. You keep walking till you get to a waterfall, a gorgeous waterfall, 10 feet high. Its crystal clear waters pouring down onto a large stone, a very smooth, very flat stone, say 5 feet around. You sit upon the stone and relax, the water falling on your head and shoulders. you eventually come out of the meditation relaxed. As I was going through the steps and got to the waterfall, the meditation became different, atop the waterfall sat the crystal, before it was attached at my wrist. It sat there unmoving, parting the water around it. I still got up on the rock and sat down, the water hitting my shoulders, but not my head.

After a while, I open my eyes, blinded for a second. I look down at my stump and see the crystal glowing, brighter than it ever has. I touch it with my right hand, and it burns a hole in my welding glove. “shit!” I shout, having to throw my glove off by swinging it, it may not have touched me directly, but the glove got really hot from that simple touch. Then I smelled it, the burnt leather smell made me gag for a second, “God I hate this place” I whispered to myself, “I lost a hand, I got a crystal stump, I killed monsters, I'm trapped in a cave, and I want to go home.” I punched a wall with the crystal stump, shattering stone and creating a cloud of dust in the cave. I stopped for a second, staring at what happened, the massive crack in the wall, 'holy shit' I thought, I did it again, shattering more stone, but I noticed, the light dimmed in my stump, considerably, curious I did it a third time, and the light went out.

I reached down, and turned on my flashlight, coughing a bit from all the dust, 'finally, somethings going right. Through the hole in the wall I saw a grotto, a smaller cave, a little room, I was overjoyed, and the best thing ever, a small stream, 'I might actually live through this' I thought to myself. I squeezed in and turned around, noticing that the hole in the wall wasn't too big, say, about 2 by 1 foot. I quickly pulled the rest of my stuff through, and pulled some of the rubble in with me. Effectively blocking the hole. I sighed and turned around. 'finally' I thought, 'I can rest in peace' and then I took a big gulp of the stream water and laid down, taking my first stress free nap in a long time.