Chapter 11

'I'm such a dumb ass! What the hell was I thinking messing around with magic in this situation!?' Remy was struggling to get off his side and failing to do so.

His head hurt from the impact. His right hand was numb and two of his fingers were bending in strange ways. An ugly burn was covering the entirety of his palm. The shock also stimulated his other wounds making the pain amplify even more.

He desperately struggled to get off the ground, his ears ringing non stop. At some point he made the mistake of placing too much of his weight on his right hand, making him tumble all the way down once again. Finally he managed to get himself upright again.

"Status." He said between heaping breaths.

[Status.]

Name: Remy Riverson

Age: 15

Level: 2 (170/300)

HP: 21/110 ( +0.1/min)

MP: 90/120 (+0.3/min)

STR: 8

VIT: 7

DEX: 10

AGI: 20

INT: 12

Points: 0

Perks: [None]

Skills: [ Mana Manipulation I]

Remy spit out a curse when he saw his HP. He lost more than 30 points because of his stupidity. That was more than he managed to recover these past few hours! He basically went one step forward and two steps back.

As more and more negative feelings arose in him he glanced at the [Skills] section. Different from before there was something new written there.

[Mana Manipulation]

Rank: I (Amateur)

Experience: 100/1

The user can move, shape and sense mana.

Normally, Remy would have been overjoyed at obtaining his first skill. Unfortunately, the circumstances in which he did so were enough to suck out whatever happiness he had.

He closed the [Status] window and grimaced. His head was pounding and his body was in a lot of pain, but Remy still managed to form some thoughts on what happened.

Most likely, he overcharged the monster core. It was, after all, just a tiny little crystal. There was a limit to how much mana it could contain before bursting. Remy would have expected it to simply crack like glass, but its unique nature acted entirely different. It held on just enough for the pressure to shatter the thing all at once.

Mages following a normal education understood implicitly that this quality of monster cores was crucial in many things. Something that could resist magic pressure, even for a short time, was invaluable, especially in artifact creation. Naturally, they took many precautions not to overload the crystal.

Remy, even with his scholarly knowledge, had no way of knowing this. The things he understood about magic were general outlines taken from books available to the public. No one expected a common man to suddenly use magic and randomly pump it inside a core. That was the reason it was not explicitly stated anywhere that it could blow up in their face.

Unfortunately, Remy experienced first hand just how bad that could be. He thanked his luck once again that he didn't mess around with a bigger core. He might not have survived to regret it…

Now, Remy found himself in quite a bad situation. The monster core exploding was not a quiet thing. It rang out like a gunshot in an empty parking lot. He'd have to be stupidly optimistic to think nothing heard it.

He was already one foot in the grave, it wouldn't take much effort to push the rest of him in. He glanced around and was thankful nothing showed up, but who knows how long that would last?

If Remy's wasn't momentarily half deaf he would have noticed the surge of activity in the distance. He had no way of knowing that his stunt alerted pretty much every monster in the dungeon.

Still, while he wasn't smart enough not to experiment with dangerous things, he still understood how screwed he is if he doesn't get moving.

Pain or no pain, he couldn't stay here anymore or he'd lose whatever initiative he could gain by being active. A minute later and his dizziness disappeared, proving that his HP was beginning to go up again.

He struggled a bit to get up but he managed to do it. Unfortunately, it could be easily seen that Remy's body was close to its limits. He was fortunate there was no wind in the dungeon or a strong gust might have toppled him over.

He grit his teeth and drew his dagger. It felt unnatural to hold it with his left hand, but Remy had no other choice. It would take hours before his dominant hand was usable again with how messed up his fingers were.

With unstable steps he began dragging himself away. His weapon was out but he still held a silly hope he wouldn't have to make use of it too soon.

Not even a few minutes passed before whatever shadow of optimism he had died a gruesome death. Up ahead Remy saw a couple of small silhouettes moving towards his direction.

Judging by their small frames, Remy could guess they were also rat men. He now had the opportunity to find out if he could really take two of them at once. Still, that was something he was not too keen on doing at the moment.

He went to the side and began moving along the wall until he reached another one of the many wooden support arcs.

'If it's not broken, why bother fixing it?' He thought as he waited in ambush once again.

The two entities were indeed rat men. If there was any difference between them and the last one Remy couldn't see it. The only thing differentiating them was their behavior. While the previous one was simply curious these ones were on edge and fidgeting as they walked.

A few moments later they arrived at Remy's position. He spared no second thoughts and executed the same move he did last time, except using his other hand.

"Guh!" The dagger went through the rat man's neck without any issues. This time Remy quickly took it out before any struggling could begin. That one was as good as dead, but it was not alone.

To Remy's surprise the second monster, instead of attacking him, released a horrified screech and ran away. This rang all sorts of alarm bells in his mind.

Remy ignored the first rat. It will bleed out and die in a few seconds. Instead he clenched his teeth and sprung after the one that tried to flee. He couldn't predict the monster to be so cowardly, but once he remembered the animal it was modeled after it made sense.

In the condition he was in, Remy would have been glad if the enemy chose to retreat instead of fighting. But, in this case, he couldn't afford to let it live long enough to call backup.

With his injuries screaming at him to stop moving and lie down, he ran after the rat man. At this point Remy relied more on the force of his momentum to stand upright rather than his muscles. Even so, he didn't have to endure much longer since there was no way a creature half as tall as a normal human could outrun him.

The rat felt Remy was right behind him and was even more terrified. His base species was not the most courageous to begin with and the fierceness displayed by Remy was enough to assure it had no chance.

Remy brought the dagger up even as his legs kept moving. With a silent swing, the blade flew downwards, his body following shortly after.

The monster had no time to register the pain coming from his new wound before Remy fell on it. The crash left Remy's right hand burning with pain as he instinctively brought it forward to cushion his fall.

The creature began struggling underneath him, its wretched scream was muffled by the human on top of him.

Remy stabbed repeatedly underneath him, not knowing what he was hitting, but after a few seconds the monster stopped struggling. When small sparks of mana began floating around him, Remy finally relaxed.

He was thankful blood disappeared as well, otherwise he'd be soaked in it. The need to lie down and rest was ignored and Remy stood up. He was afraid that if he took a break he'd instantly pass out.

He gave a long look at the newly dropped core. The impact from the explosion was still very fresh on his mind. He shook his head and simply threw it inside his [Inventory]. He turned back and picked the other one just as the corpse finished disintegrating.

A short glance at his status and he saw that he gained 40 experience points from this fight. Another 90 and he'd level up again.

Remy took another look around and was thankful nothing had found him in the meantime. Slowly, he began moving once again, cringing with each step.

The current zone was not ideal for his recovery. Long tunnels meant he could get attacked from both sides. Ideally he'd like some closed off space with an entrance that he could block.

That was just hopeful thinking though.

He hardened his determination. Even if he had to fight continuously, at least as long as he wasn't hit, his regeneration would fix him right up. Then he could figure his way out of here.