Chương 13: To Run, Or Not to Run

A distant sea breeze brushed her face, washing away the last remnants of the plant monster's sweet, yet irritating secretions.

"Finally." Alexandra sighed and blinked to dislodge the last tears from her eyes. She opened her journal. Thirty six kilometers out of fifty, meaning she had to walk four to leave the infected area. Anyway, this wasn't what she was looking for. Her eyes wandered down the page, to the skill update section. Inflict Weakness 3 -> 4 Sickle Mastery 1 -> 4 It was nice to progress, but Alexandra expected more.

With the size of the monster, and the destruction it brought around it, she hoped for maybe one or two extra levels. Yet, as she walked and thought about it more, there was a key difference between this fight and her goblin hunt. Sure, the plant monster seemed stronger. But so was she. Not to say she'd come out of it unscathed. No, she felt like shit. Yet, ultimately, she wasn't injured past a few bruises and superficial cuts. Furthermore, it made sense to her that higher levels would need more work.

That's how things went, usually. Then again, nothing about her situation was usual. The landscape slowly shifted as she got closer to the sea. It wasn't that different, as she already observed on the day of her summoning. The flower patches grew sparser, mixed with succulents and low growing mats. The air had a different weight to it. Saltier. Cooler. At forty one kilometers, a low, constant sound beneath the wind, like the world breathing gradually filled her ears. A few hills later, she stopped.

Cliffs, dropping maybe twenty to fifty meters to the water below. The sea stretched out flat and grey-green to the horizon, catching the late afternoon light. She checked her journal. Nine kilometers left. That was a lot, especially as her legs were starting to shake from exhaustion. Now that she'd reached the sea, she'd have to pick another direction, too, which may make her total distance longer depending on how the quest counted. She looked left, then right.

Right, which is to say east, seemed the more natural direction, the cliff line curving gently that way, the ground beside it flatter. She turned east and kept walking. The wind was stronger here, cold enough that she pulled her cape tighter. Below, the waves broke against the base of the cliffs in long, patient intervals. Forty three kilometers. She uncorked her gourd, got nothing, and remembered she'd finished it an hour ago. She corked it anyway and put it back. Forty four.

She ate the last of her bread without stopping. It wasn't enough to register. She spotted a beach down below, though there was no way to access it. Her feet had stopped hurting and settled into a dull, total heaviness that started at her ankles and went up. She took another step — ah, it still hurt. At forty six, the sun was sitting low on the horizon, the light going flat and orange across the clifftop. She kept walking. The sun went down. The sky held its light for a while after, pale enough to see by.

She kept her distance from the cliff edge and watched her footing. The sound of the waves below was the same as it had been for the last hour. She was thinking about soup. Specifically Lara's blue soup, which she hadn't wanted to drink that morning and would have given a great deal for right now. After that she thought about water. Then about the soup again. She was comforted by the thought that it definitely worked, and that she wouldn't have made it without. Her left knee buckled.

She caught herself and kept moving. Forty nine. One kilometer. She stopped checking her journal. Her resolution broke ten steps in. Journal open in her hands, she barely looked at the moonlit ground and instead stared at the quest counter. Forty nine. Forty nine. Forty nine.

"Will you get to fifty already!" She shouted, her voice drowned by the wind and waves. The counter didn't listen. Of course it didn't. It only knew one language: that of her feet hitting the ground, and pushing her body forward. So she did. She did just that. Again. And Again. And again, and again, and again. One more time. Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. Fifty. She stopped.

Travel 50 kilometers away from Lanterne (50/50) -> Quest Completed: +10 exp, +1 CON, Skill Quest Unlocked: Running. Daily Quest Streak: 2 -> 3 Alexandra wanted nothing more than to collapse on the ground and take a break. She knew she couldn't afford it. Now, she wasn't going to walk back to Lanterne tonight. Setting aside the distance, even tracing her way back in full sunlight tomorrow will be a challenge. A night? She'd never find it.

At best, she'd find the road, if she didn't completely miss it by walking north after leaving the coast. The clifftop stretched out silver and dark in either direction, the sea a flat black beyond the edge. Snuggling in her cape, she walked inland, trying to get away from the wind. If she was going to spend the night outside, she needed to keep warm. Her stomach protested, reminding her that it was empty, and that her throat was parched.

She found a shallow depression in the ground a hundred meters from the cliff edge, out of the worst of the wind. Not much, but the grass was longer there, and the ground was flat. She pulled her cape tight and sat down. The moon was up, nearly full, casting enough light to see by. Her stomach made sure she remembered it. She'd been ignoring it for a while now. That was getting harder. She looked around.

In the moonlight, the ground cover was mostly low mats and rock, the same succulents she'd been walking through for the last few kilometers. Nothing she recognized. Nothing that looked obviously edible. She stood up, then she spotted it. A small patch, twenty meters off, growing in a cluster near a flat rock. The blue was muted in the moonlight, almost grey, but the shape was right. The smell confirmed it when she got close. Faint, earthy, the same medicinal undertone as Lara's soup. Aetherveil.

She crouched down and looked at it. Smaller than the cultivated version in Lanterne, the same as the wild one she'd spotted on her way out. The stems were thin, the petals slightly more ragged at the edges. A by-product of it went into Lara's endurance powder. A sought after alchemical ingredient, Therion and Lara made their living from this plant. None of that told her whether she could eat it raw. She picked a stem and turned it over in her fingers. It didn't look dangerous. Wait, what was she saying?

It was a blue flower, it definitely looked dangerous. That meant nothing. She brought it close and smelled it. Earthy. Medicinal. The same as always. Her stomach made another point. She thought about it practically. Lara and Therion grew the plant. They processed it, extracted powder from it, used the petals and stems separately. That implied it had known properties, known effects. It wasn't some random flora she'd plucked from an unknown bush. People worked with this plant every day.

Then again, worked with was different from ate raw. She set the stem down and went back to her depression in the ground. She pulled her cape over her shoulders and looked up at the moon. Too dangerous. Five minutes passed. She got up, went back to the patch, and picked a small petal. The smallest one she could find. She held it between her fingers. The worst case scenario was that it made her sick. She was already exhausted, bruised, dehydrated and hungry, a day's walk from the nearest person she knew.

Sick would be bad. Sick would be very bad. The best case was that it did nothing. Or that it helped. Lara's powder had boosted her endurance. Raw aetherveil might do something similar, or something different, or nothing at all. She was leaning toward nothing at all, as she hadn't seen Lara and Therion eat any, and from what they'd told her. She was reasoning in circles and she knew it. She put the petal in her mouth. It tasted the way it smelled.

Earthy, faintly bitter, with the medicinal edge she'd come to associate with the plant. She chewed slowly. It wasn't good. It wasn't terrible either. She swallowed. She waited. Nothing happened. No burning, no nausea, no sudden clarity. Just the wind, and the waves below the cliff, and her own heartbeat. Well, not like she expected anything to happen right away. If it did make her sick, it would take some time. Returning to the depression, she hid in her cape to ward off the cold. She waited.

Despite her stomach asking for more, she decided to be patient and see if her body showed a negative reaction. The difference between eating some poison and a lot of poison wasn't lost on her. So far, so good. Well, her throat was feeling a little tight, but that must be because she hadn't drank in hours. Right? Right? That's it. She was done for. She'd only lasted three days in this world. Goodbye Laika. She waited for her impending doom. Nothing happened. Except, her heartbeat was a little faster than normal.

She froze. There it was. To think she wouldn't be able to repay Lara and Therion's kindness. Her heart settled. She coughed. From embarrassment, this time. She was… fine? After a good ten minutes, she felt no different. Actually, she felt even hungrier.

"Argh, to hell with it." She went back to the patch and picked entire flowers this time. She ate slowly, chewing each piece thoroughly, watching her own reactions between bites. Her hands were steady. Her vision was clear. Her stomach accepted each addition without complaint, although a few flowers weren't going to cut all her hunger. Even if they were edible, which was still a toss up. It wasn't enough. Not nearly. But it was something. She blinked.

It was faint, but the sensation was there, somewhere deep in her chest, warmth. Her chewing paused.

"Mana," she whispered, mouth half-full. Not really what she needed. She went back to her shelter and lay down. The ground was hard and cold through the cape, and the wind found her despite the depression. It was the best she had. She opened her journal one more time. Her extra constitution point brought her total to eight. She flipped to the quest page. Running: Run 100 kilometers without stopping. (0/100) She closed it. Opened it again. Yep, didn't misread. A hundred kilometers. Running for a hundred kilometers.

If she wasn't so tired, she would throw her journal down the cliff. Was it making fun of her? She barely managed to walk half of this, how was she supposed to complete this quest? She sighed. Whatever. This was a problem for future Alexandra. Presently, she was going to sleep. Her arm was aching. Her back was aching. Her feet were beyond comment. She pulled the cape up to her chin and closed her eyes. The waves were steady below. In. Out. She matched her breathing to them without meaning to.

Alexandra drifted to sleep, hoping that she would wake up to a better tomorrow.