"I saw the moon again. It felt nice." A small boy spoke with a hoarse voice. His cheeks were sunken and his face looked gaunt and malnourished. He lightly nibbled on some bread as he sat beside the fountain, his eyes piercing through the darkness where a shadowy phantom was lurking.
"Is anyone looking for me out there?" The boy asked the lingering figure. Something squealed from the dark and the boy's expression seemed to have become more sullen.
He nibbling slowed and after a few seconds, he was simply staring at the bread in hand. It didn't taste very good. A few heartbeats passed, and a drop of water fell onto the half eaten bread. The boy felt warmth trickle down his face and fall onto the bread.
He tried his best to stop, but it wouldn't.
"Sniff..." His breath hitched, and he broke down crying.
"Sorry... sniff! I'm sorry... I'm so sorry... I won't do it again, I won't run away... hic! Please..." He breathed heavily and buried his head into his knees. The shadows shimmered with a light, but died down in the end. A sad squeak came from the dark and silence again descended, broken only by the crying of the boy and his constant apologies.
...
...
...
A golden light cut through the darkness, deflecting a stinger and piercing the head of a hulking scorpion in a single attack! As the scorpion disappeared into an explosion of dust, the ever pleasant sound of the notification rang into Nathan's ears.
[You have gained 3 Customization Points!]
His eyes lit up instantly and newfound motivation surged through him. With his brows furrowed and eyes drilling through the darkness and into his enemies, he moved back, narrowly dodging one of the scorpion's pincers and deflecting it's tail with his sword. The two scorpions at the back jumped onto the walls, scuttling along like giant mountains of terror. Nathan instantly found the situation getting worse.
He could take on one scorpion. They were large and almost covered up the entire tunnel, and while they were abnormally fast, his instincts were sharp enough to be able to dodge or deflect the attacks. But three scorpions? At the same time?
Nathan suddenly leaped back, a stinger missing him by a hair's breath and began running in the opposite direction!
The scorpion followed on their eight legs, bumping into each other. Two of them stopped, ramming at each other as they began to fight out of frustration.
Seeing the opportunity, Nathan spun himself around and blocked the first scorpion. The tail came at him at blinding speeds, but right when it would've hit, he tilted his body to the side and sliced the tail into two!
The scorpion didn't seem to register the pain and used its pincers as a last attack. Nathan nimbly jumped over them. With the tail gone, the scorpion couldn't attack in the y-axis very well.
Spurt!
The sword pierced the arachnid, dissolving into a shower of dust and Nathan finally turned to face the other two. They were still fighting.
Everything is a lot easier. Nathan thought. It feels like my body is flying through the air. The actions that seemed to take up a lot of energy before are effortless now. My body instinctually avoids attacks and makes counters...
Feeling more confident, Nathan hurried forward. He pulled out his bow and quiver, stashing the sword back into the inventory and took the first shot.
Whistle!
The tell tale sound of the arrow screeched through the labyrinth, but it bounced harmlessly off of one of the scorpion's natural armor. Nathan narrowed his eyes at this. His arrows were enchanted with piercing enhancement; and any normal arrow from a war bow was the medieval equivalent of a 50 cal. Anti-armor sniper. It was quite a shock that the arrows could not pierce it. Now, Nathan was especially glad he had upgraded his sword's sharpness.
The scorpions stopped fighting and once again focused on him. Their pincers opened and closed in a staccato manner as they both hopped onto opposite walls, running right at him!
Nathan found the world slowing down around him.
He ran at the scorpion, and just when they struck, one with its pincers and other with its stinger, he slid onto the ground, passing them by and drawing his sword in a line through the one on the left wall!
Another scorpion disappeared in a flash of dust, the familiar ping of notification sounded into his ears but Nathan was too focused to care.
Right as he passed, he swung upright and slashed at the undefended tail of the scorpion!
Slash!
The tail flew into the air, the stump at the scorpion's back spurting with dust and a transparent fluid.
Without waiting, Nathan dispatched the last scorpion as well!
As it fell, a trophy appeared on the ground.
It was a thorn... no, it was the scorpion's stinger. Only now did Nathan notice that almost all of the scorpions had dropped spoils.
Another two had dropped their stingers and the last one had dropped a piece of its chitin armor.
Nathan picked everything up and put them into his inventory, planning to sacrifice them to the cube later. But just as he picked up the chitinous exoskeleton, it transformed.
The small tile morphed into a chestplate, glinting under the golden hue of the sword. It seemed as if it were tailor made for him, exactly his size.
Nathan scratched his chin for a moment before his lips tugged into a smile. He put on the chestplate with some difficulty - he had never actually put on any medieval armor after all. Under the hard exterior rested a gentle padding that seemed to be made out of a cartilaginous covering. It seemed capable enough to reduce impact so Nathan was happy.
The straps were also an extension of the cartilage itself and after tightening it up, the armor laid snugly on his body, not enough to he restrictive but enough to offer protection.
He checked his status again - with the pounts he got from the mare, his points had climbed to 9.8, and with the trophies, he would break past 10 again.
This time, he wanted to wait and upgrade his spirit for 5 points and edit some of his equipment.
Only one way to get points. He smiled, and walked further into the darkness.
...
Nathan ducked under a battle axe as it swung over his head. He had found out quickly that this place held many many many traps. Spikes in the ground, the floor collapsing into a bottomless abyss, arrows shooting out from the walls, the ceiling closing in towards the floor, random battle axes embedded in the wall and of course, random boulders that closed off entire sections.
When you were wandering around aimlessly, Nathan could see why the Labyrinth could be so nightmarish. If he didn't have this strange ability to see paths that even he didn't get entirely why, he would have been very concerned about his next course of action.
Heck, he might have had to gather enough points to upgrade his compass, uselessly wasting points.
Because of the traps, he needed to backtrack sometimes and take paths he could not take otherwise. He came across a section made entirely out of roots and dirt, then another section with many skeletons bleached white from the passage of time. There was even a section with many ice cream billboards and coffee machines embedded into the walls. To Nathan's disappointment, they didn't seem to work.
He came across 3 more scorpions while wandering around. One of them was even cannibalising another scorpion in a very... horrid and grotesque manner.
Anyways, he made quick work of them and got another 6 points to his name, bringing his points to a total of 15.8 and earning 2 more stingers and another chestplate.
With so many stingers with him, Nathan decided to test something.
He pulled out his Transmutation Cube and a single stinger. Sacrificing it yielded him a single point.
Then, he pulled out his remaining stingers, 4 in number, and sacrificed them all at the same time.
And lo and behold, a very pleasant surprise rang into his ears.
[You have gained 6 Customization Points!]
Nathan's eyes gleamed as one of his hypotheses was confirmed. Sacrificing in bulk yielded more points than not. Next, he sacrificed the chestplate, yielding himself a whole 2 points!
"The chestplate is almost worth the same amount as a scorpion? Thats something to think about." He scratched his chin in thought, musing for some time.
[Customization Points: 24.8]
Shaking his head, he continued on through the maze.
...
He ducked through another narrow passage, the ceiling was a series of metal pipes and were hot to the touch. Above the pipes however, was the sound of people.
Is this some sort of boiler taken by the Labyrinth? Right under some building? He wondered as he kept on his way.
He had been in here for an hour now, and aside from the scorpions, had yet to run into any other monsters.
As the passage expanded again, he felt some movement at the end of the hallway. A shadow was moving somewhere in the darkness. Nathan narrowed his eyes and approached very cautiously. He jumped over a 5 meter gap filled with burning hot water and approached.
The shadow suddenly darted to the left, and it was gone before Nathan could even react.
"Whoa..." He muttered to himself, but his voice rang heavy in the Labyrinth. He could barely see a silhouette, but before he could make out any other details, the thing was gone.
The way whatever it was had disappeared reminded Nathan of the Ceryneian Hind, who was so fast that Nathan couldn't catch up no matter how fast he ran.
He followed the shadow for some time. Everytime Nathan got close enough to see it, it disappeared around a corner.
Nathan felt like he was being led, presumably into a trap, but his instincts weren't warning him. He stopped, contemplating whether he should still continue. He weighed the pros and cons for some time.
Strangely, despite what his deductive reasoning would have him do, he moved ahead, following the shadow.
Slowly, he turned round the corner and stepped through a narrow gap between a giant boulder and the wall.
And there he saw it.
A large door, shut tight and on it was emblazoned the symbol of a Lightning bolt.
A room dedicated to Zeus? Or Jupiter? He thought. Is that shadow something related to the gods? I haven't caught their attention already have I? I'm just a sorry little mortal...
He contemplated his choices before stepping foreward and pushing the door open. It was surprisingly difficult for even his current strength level. It seemed to be made entirely out of metal and creaked so loudly Nathan felt like his eardrums may well explode.
The first thing he noticed was the size of the room. It was large, large enough to throw a kick ass party and there was a large fountain in the center; thought it seemed to have stopped for a long long time. Moss grew on it's marble but strangely enough, there was still some water in it.
There was a crack in the ceiling that let out a single streak of moonlight through. The silver light fell onto the water, making it glimmer like thousands of stars.
The fountain was also embellished with various patterns and images that depicted the Greek Gods... in their naked and usually sexual fashion.
The rest of the room was empty, but Nathan felt two presences in there. One was hiding behind the fountain, and another hid in the shadows.
His eyes narrowed.
None of the two presences felt dangerous. In fact, his body hadn't really gone into battle mode at all. It was like there was no danger.
He stepped fully into the room and the door slammed shut behind him.
Slowly, as he moved closer to the fountain.
He saw a pair of eyes peek out from behind it.
Seeing them, Nathan froze.
Why? Because he realized at this moment, that he wasn't looking at a monster.
It was... a child.
"Um..." His awkward voice echoed in the hall. "Hello there."
Suddenly, the child peeked out fully. It was a boy with black hair. He looked like he hadn't eaten in forever and there was dirt and grime all over his body. A dried blotch of blood rested on one side of his head but his eyes held a glimmer as they locked onto Nathan.
"Stop right there!"
"Huh?"
...
...
A/N: Oh my lord I haven't even properly prepared the normal chapter and you're already close to getting 250 PS💀.
I might have to edit either the goals or my normal uploads schedule or I might just burn myself out. I'll go through with this bonus Chapter but there will presumably be an updated PS goal next time.