Midnight Wings

[1] XXXVII : Is It Just Me? (Maze)

...with the night's wrath...

~

I had to be getting somewhere important, considering there were actually monsters in these depths now. Not just a here and there boar, either, there were some non-sentient demons (not that I know what they're actually called), strange and fearsome beasts, and even a whole goblin hideout.

It was with them that I took my sweet time carefully planning out an attack - it went up in flames, thanks for asking - and I was quite thoroughly disappointed to gain only a few coins and some old and dried jerky.

At this point, they were all just experience. That makes me sound like I'm in a game in a way, which is at least a little ironic, since this is absolutely anything but that, but I couldn't stop myself from having fun and treating it like it was. I liked to pretend I was using skills, even naming some of my "attacks" and putting together "combos," which helped me figure out how to fight at least a little better.

My spade-ended tail was easily my favorite weapon, reserved only for finishing formidable foes as its end was incredibly sharp, and with practice, could move faster than the eye can see. Using it wasn't easy, though, since I had to adjust to using muscles I've never used before, and it was like learning to catch again - only instead of growing my hand-eye coordination, I'm growing tail-eye coordination.

Especially given that I had nothing else to do other than throw around Vaxen the Phoenix, who has grown quite grumbly and sleeps a lot lately, fighting and killing are easily my favorite pastimes. Which isn't to say I'm some genocidal maniac (okay maybe a little bit), but it was nothing more than kill or be killed down here, so why not make it fun?

The one thing that was an empty dead end was magic. There were a few times during long, boring stretches of my wandering where I'd pass through the old, dead, barren caves, and I'd manage to concentrate hard enough to get maybe a few sparks from my hands or the tiniest draft, but I had no control over it.

No control. That was a frustrating phrase, especially when it comes to something I want so desperately. I had absolutely zero say in how my utter lack of casting went. I tried hard to think back to what it felt like when Lasory showed me magic, but I think I can just chalk it up to the fact that he was a good teacher who was putting on some major training wheels for me.

Without him, though, I was nothing more than a complete loser in the sorcery department - really in the fighting area, too, but in that I was at least improving a little bit.

Each time I tried, it didn't last very long because I'd just get pissed off, yell out, punch a wall and split my knuckles open, and then run ahead in a fit of anger.

Things in this cave didn't stay cave forever, though, and I started coming along some much more man-made tunnels.

I could tell they were walked upon at least somewhat often, and some of them even had old, faded signs or carvings, or were a bit whittled down as to look more uniform, like a real hall, with supports and beams and the like.

Once I started finding these, I came on edge. There weren't any more monsters, but what I did find... was people.

It didn't take long for me to stumble on a trio of demons making their way along a completely man-dug tunnel wearing casual clothes and talking in a language I couldn't understand, and my immediate reaction was to hold my breath and duck around the corner until they were long gone.

I pulled my fur coat close for comfort, covering my hand which tightly gripped my knife, and felt my tail tense as I inevitably went the same way as them, until I left a small, insignificant tunnel and walked out to a simply massive cavern, one big bubble that was full of shoddy buildings and people all over the place.