Learning

April 3rd, 2034

A-Rank Wormhole, Unknown Subspace

How would one remedy a broken leg? A cast, of course.

Hence, I attempted something that I wasn't proficient with. I expelled a moderate amount of my fire mana into the cavern wall a few feet away. It quickly started to melt, much like my prior experience. The tricky bit was utilizing the magma.

I used the rudimentary mana skill Mana Manipulation to 'grasp' the fire mana contained within the molten rock. Normally, I would have only used such a technique to either siphon mana into myself or attempt to control an opponent's flame magic. After all, due to my class restriction, this skill might as well have been called Fire Mana Manipulation.

When applying the skill to the magma, however, I felt the injected mana swirling chaotically. I tried to grasp some of it, but the mana disobeyed. I could have brute forced it, but all that would do was destroy the rock the mana was contained within.

It seemed that somewhere along the way, the mana had become wild, so to speak. Feral mana was really of no use as anything other than raw energy, so I absorbed the heat back into myself. Some of it was lost during the process, naturally, but all in all it hardly made a dent in my mana reserves.

Next, I tried to maintain my will over the mana throughout the entire process. I used Mana Manipulation to grasp my own mana pool and gingerly sent it into the rock formation. Graciously, the stone did start to heat up, much slower than before. I could feel the mana I was sending into it stay under my control, gracefully merging with the molecules in the form of heat energy.

As I sent in sufficient amounts of mana, the rock wall started to brighten with heat. It was difficult maintaining a balance of control and sending in enough mana to actually melt it, but I was managing.

After about 10 minutes of the process, I could see some of the rock starting to droop downward. I had been feeling the dampness of perspiration coat me for the last few minutes, but I felt surprisingly refreshed seeing my progress.

Finally breaking the prerequisite amount of intermolecular bonds, I had liquid rock. I then used the mana I had saturated it with to grasp the atoms I needed, pulling a chunk of the rock wall away and bringing it toward me.

I felt my migraine strain against my thoughts as I forced the mana to pick up hundreds of kilograms of rock. I gnashed my teeth and took a deep breath as I tried to maintain focus. It was incredibly strenuous to micromanage the output of my mana to keep the magma from cooling while simultaneously controlling the mana already contained within.

I brought the glob over to my right leg and submerged it in the molten rock. I spent a few moments shifting it all around to completely enfold my leg before I looked to the water. Hoping that I wouldn't mess anything up, I used my good leg to jump backward into the underground lake.

My leg, put bluntly, didn't like what I had done to it. As the rock hardened around me, I felt it fuse to my flesh painfully. Stifling a shout, I reached out and grabbed the ledge of the outcropping before I was dragged into the depths by the mass of the rock. I wasn't the strongest, but I was able to pull myself out of the lake.

I inspected the result of my labor. All the way from my hip to my feet, my leg was coated in rock. Naturally, I couldn't move the thing but it allowed me to use it as a pivot. Hence, it was an acceptable outcome. I made sure to confirm with the status that it wasn't somehow killing me before moving on to the next step.

It took roughly an hour of walking back and forth on my little piece of land but I eventually felt sufficiently proficient with using the thing. The issue was that now I couldn't swim, but that was something a little heat would help with.

Using my large mana reserves, I carved out a pathway around the edge of the lake for me to traverse. It took hours to make much progress, but I eventually stumbled across a natural-looking opening in the cavern. I didn't feel incredibly rushed so I sat down at the entrance and made myself a little meal and had some water.

My head was still killing me and I felt like passing out, but I couldn't risk falling asleep here with no one to keep watch.

After my picnic, my mana pool was looking relatively full and I wasn't hemorrhaging HP. I felt comfortable enough to start exploring the cave soon.

Awkwardly standing, I looked at the ground near the entrance to see if there was anything amiss. I couldn't detect tracks or anything on the solid stone without a detection skill, but I did take in just how large the opening was. It was easily 10 meters high and just as wide. Compared to the initial tunnel, it was incomparable.

If the boss monster was around, it was probably either in this cave or at the bottom of the lake. I really didn't wish to confront it without any help, with this being an A-rank wormhole and all. The boss would likely have a divinity comparable to my own and have a level somewhere in the hundreds. By design, a boss wasn't meant to be taken down by a lone hunter.

Before venturing in, I wanted to confirm that this cavern was otherwise vacant. I hadn't risked waking whatever else could have been down here with me previously, but if my suspicions were correct, this would be all there was.

Spending over 200 mana, I cast a greater version of the wisp I had previously used for light. The conjured fireball ended up being over 2 meters across. I sent it out over the lake to illuminate the rest of the cavern.

Thankfully, the cavern seemed to be empty. My vision couldn't pierce the depths of the lake, but if there was a monster down there I imagined that it would have stirred from the light.

Once I let myself relax, I took in the sight I had created. The walls all curved upward, forming a massive hemisphere. At the top, I could see the deformed opening of the chute that I had been spit out of. It seemed to have warped and drooped, but it didn't entirely get closed by my magic. A rough estimate put it to be about 120 meters over the water, which I had no means of climbing to.

The only path forward was into the large cave. Sighing, I hobbled my way into the entrance. Just in case someone managed to find their way down here, I left the floating orb of flames over the lake as an indication of my survival.

"I am a pioneer." I tried to cheer myself up. "The frontrunner in a race to the center of the Earth."

The cave had multiple chasms jutting through it. They were easily stepped over, but I couldn't see the bottom of any of them.

I continued journeying through the deep dark for a few hours. I was on guard, but it was eerily quiet. The loneliness and sleep deprivation started to lead to paranoia.

I stopped in the passage and looked back. Had I somehow gotten turned around along the way?

"No—surely not." I shook my head and continued forward.

Finally, another handful of hours later, I had contact. I heard some form of shuffling around a bend in the cave, just louder than my own footsteps.

I approached as quietly as I could manage with my rock boot. Which, as it turned out, wasn't very quiet at all. As I reached the bend, I placed the broken leg down to pivot with. The rock-on-rock collision echoed just barely enough to stir whatever was around the corner.

The shuffling got louder and I started to prepare a Flame Lance to greet whatever was approaching. I was expecting another form of earth elemental after the last encounter I had.

To my surprise, though, what popped its head around the wall was a skeleton. Seeing me, it rushed forward and brought the sword it had equipped over its head in a downward slash.

I had hardly any means of dodging currently so I simply fired the stored spell. The lance flew faster than the skeleton's sword could drop, killing it instantly.

+743 XP

Now fully expecting more undead, I drew out some of my mana and summoned a tempest of flame in front of me. Since there almost certainly couldn't be any accidental casualties, I unleashed the inferno and sent it around the corner.

+3987 XP

Satisfied with the amount of XP that popped up, I stuck my head around the corner, looking for survivors. All I saw were 5 crispy skeletons.

It felt good to finally kill something again, to not be on the receiving end of mortality.

As I walked over them, their gear seemed to be completely commonplace. Having no need to loot them, I continued onward.

However, just moments later I reached the end of the cave. Confused, I walked forward and tried to inspect the sudden dead end. I would be incredibly screwed if this really was all there was down here, so I tried to knock on the cave wall. I was hoping to see if there was something on the other side.

To my surprise, though, what I felt was actually wood. Before I had a moment to comprehend what was going on, I heard a muffled voice on the other side.

"Come in."

Now entirely bewildered, I tried to push the cave wall. It gave way, allowing me to step inside the room. Not thinking rationally, I stepped through the opening. The moment I crossed over the line, a rare system notification popped up.

—Hidden boss discovered—