Day 21

I had a vivid dream that night, I was back on earth, driving along a midnight highway, and was listening to the radio, and I heard it, that 6 note tune, discordant and hypnotizing. I switched the channel, and I heard it again, I kept switching stations, and every song had it, it was like an earworm, burying itself in my head. I wasn't paying attention to my driving when I looked up, as I crashed into a barrier, bolting upright in bed. “fucking hell!” I shouted startled awake, adrenaline pulsing through my body, I was wide awake now, and looking around. In the distance, I heard a crash and felt a vibration through the ground. I could barely hear the sound of some sort of deep cry, like something in pain.

I grabbed all the things I could and ran up the mountainside, the fear pushing rationality out of my head. I made it up in record time, winded and out of breath, and looked back at the forest, seeing a wave, its the only way to describe it, rush through the forest, and saw the outline of a great beast surge up through the treetops. It was a giant worm-like figure, and it dove back down, more and more crashing noise could be heard, and it headed deeper into the forest, before long it was beyond the horizon.

I sat there, terrified, what the fuck had that been, where was it going, what had hurt it? I waited until it was dawn, the sunlight showing me the terrible destruction the creature had wrought. A large swath of trees had been uprooted and knocked over, creating a path of devastation. I slowly crawled back down the mountain, careful of my footing, the rock slippery under my feet. I was tired and sore when I got all the way down, and I was starving. I walked over to my fire pit, the embers undisturbed, and started to roast some meat as I prepared some meat for under the pit.

I ate my breakfast and calmed down, it was gone, and it had gone far deeper into the forest, I didn't have to worry about it, yet. I still had to:

• check my trap
• check the hole
• look for fruits or vegetables
• build a proper shelter
• figure out magic
• find out why my phone was weird
• figure out my HUD, which hadn't popped up in a while
• check my leather tanning
• make stone tools and bowls and cups
• investigate the hole in the ground
• investigate the massive tear in the land
• etc. etc. etc

I had a lot to do it seemed, and nothing but time on my hands. I got done eating, and 'drinking' and started on my through the forest, one of my spears acting as a walking stick. It took me a bit, but I got to the clearing, the stone and hole in the ground, undisturbed. The spear I had left in the hole, however, was broken again, violently broken inwards, whatever it was that had left, had come back. I propped up against one final spear, spiky bit pointing inwards, hoping to catch whatever came out, I had my suspicions that it was the cow bear, but I wasn't sure yet.

Proceeding onward, I eventually reached my trap, surprisingly it had been sprung, and the culprit wasn't too far away, a trail of purple blood leading to a yard long snake, as thick around as a basketball. It was groaning quietly, slowly dying. I rushed over, wanting to put the creature out of its misery, when it turned and looked at me, immediately, the groaning stopped, and I looked in its eyes and saw a cruel intelligence, then it sprung at me, its body stretching out, and it spits something at my face.

“Mother fucker!” I shouted, it had barely been injured, and it seemed to have been waiting for me. Whatever it spat at me was acidic, and started melting through the left side of my face mask. It bit at me, trying to sink its fangs into my chest when I smacked it away with the Manaphage, “fuck you!” I shouted at it and grabbed at my ax and while trying to pull the safety mask off my head with the Manaphage. I had it half off when the snake lunged again, and through sheer dumb luck, it shoved the whole Manaphage into its mouth and started working its way up, sinking its fangs into my wrist, and I could feel it pushing something thick into my body, like an injection of glue into my veins, it flowed slowly, but it burned like hell.

I dropped the ax, and grabbed the bastard with my right hand, and started to will the Manaphage to absorb the monster from the inside out. I grabbed it by the top of its head, and tried peeling it back, and felt its struggles weaken, I was absorbing its life force, and it was strange, it had a lemon and mint taste to it, refreshing really, and for a second I got lost in the taste. Looking down, I saw my veins slowly bulging up, the growth moving back towards my elbow. It felt like someone was slowly shoving my arm into a fire pit. I stopped trying to peel off the snake, and quickly pulled off my belt, and synched it around my left arm, right below the elbow, an inch away from the bulging. I then grabbed my knife and started slicing at the snake from the outside, only managing to leave light marks on its body. I then pried its mouth open with the knife and was able to wedge it in there, stabbing through the roof of its mouth into its brain. Its weak struggle stopped, and slowly the flavor faded, the snake quickly withering away. My arm still burned though, and as the adrenaline died down, the pain hit me like a truck and knocked me on my ass. Before I passed out I dragged myself to the side of the tree, and leaned against, willing the Manaphage to absorb the poison or acid or whatever, hoping I wouldn't die just yet.