Zeke hid behind the stalk of one of the tree-sized mushrooms, his heart beating out of his chest while his breaths came in ragged, uneven gasps. He could barely hold Voromir in his blood-soaked hands, and it was all he could do to remain upright. But quitting wasn’t an option. If he stopped to rest, even for a scant few minutes, he would doubtless fall prey to the dozens of hunting parties scouring the mushroom forest.

Not for the first time, he glanced down at his forearm. Amidst the various gashes and lacerations, there was a softly glowing rune. But unlike the runes that activated his skills, this one pulsed with malevolent power, sapping his strength and igniting his nerve endings with every beat. Alone, it would’ve been a mere inconvenience, easily ignored. But with its fifteen brothers attached to various parts of his body, it had become a life-or-death struggle. And one he was steadily losing.

Zeke had long since become accustomed to pain, but weakness was something entirely new to him. And the cursed runes were more than physically draining as well; they made everything feel more sluggish – even his mana and skills. With their effect steadily sapping both his mental and physical strength, the effects of [Leech Strike] were negligible, and even [Heart of the Berserker] had become mostly ineffective. It was like something was weighing down on his very soul. The worst part was that he knew that if he just had some time to study the runes, he could break them down.

He glanced around at the fungal forest. If he hadn’t been running for his life, he would’ve been amazed at the size of the mushrooms in the giant cavern. They were at least as tall as most trees, with caps that spanned hundreds of feet. Like was the case with their smaller cousins that had been instrumental in evolving his body, the caps emitted a blue bioluminescence that was reflected by some sort of crystalline structures hundreds of feet above. The result was that the entire forest was bathed in a soft, blue light that felt almost blinding after spending over a year in darkness.

It would have been so easy to just give in. To give up and succumb to the weakness. He knew that the trolls wouldn’t prolong his death; they were far too enraged to take the time to do anything but rip him apart. His life since being reborn had been characterized by agonizing pain, so it wasn’t like it would be that big of a loss. And he remembered that nothingness that had preceded his rebirth. It hadn’t been comforting, precisely, but there hadn’t been any pain, either. Given his horrible state, such a fate didn’t seem so terrible.

Zeke knew that he’d never just give up, though. Not only was he incredibly stubborn, but he’d already given up once in his old life. He hadn’t acknowledged it as such, but when his future as a ball player had been snatched away from him, he hadn’t just been depressed or rudderless – he was both of those things, but more than anything else, he’d simply given up on life. Perhaps he might’ve regained himself after a time, but it was entirely possible that he wouldn’t have. In a way, he was glad that he had died when he had, managing to go out doing something worthwhile when he’d donated his kidney to his little brother. Because if he hadn’t, he would’ve only gotten worse.

He refused to let himself fall into that pit again. Not even for a second.

So, summoning what strength he could muster, Zeke turned to face the stalk of the mushroom. Resting his hand against it, he was somewhat surprised at its toughness. The almost rubbery texture wasn’t quite as hard as tree bark, but it wasn’t far off, either. Even if it was, though, it wouldn’t have made much difference. Weakened as he was, Zeke’s strength was still much higher than that of an old-world human. So, he dug his fingers into the rubbery trunk and began to climb.

It was much more difficult than he expected, especially given that he had to somehow hold his mace at the same time, but eventually, he made it to the cap without alerting his pursuers. That was when things got really difficult, but he quickly found that he could treat the gill-like structures on the bottom of the cap like monkey bars. Soon, he was swinging along, his feet dangling almost a hundred feet in the air while he balanced Voromir across his chest, holding it in place with his chin.

Thankfully, despite a couple of hunting parties crossing below him, Zeke remained undetected as he finally heaved himself onto the top of the enormous, blue-spotted mushroom. He barely had the strength to crawl a handful of feet toward the middle of the fungus before he collapsed in exhaustion. As he lay there, breathing like a bellows, Zeke thought about the past couple of months and how he’d gotten himself into such a pickle.

After finding the larder filled with human remains, Zeke had gone on a rampage, killing every troll he could find. He even went so far as to backtrack to troll towns he’d skipped over for being too populated. In his mind, the only good troll was a dead troll, and he’d lived by that mantra for more than a month, slaughtering everything in his path. And he’d reaped the benefits, too, even gaining a level. He didn’t even slow down until he ran into the first troll shaman.

They didn’t look that different from the warriors he’d killed, save that they were usually a bit shorter and lacking the muscle that characterized their physically intimidating brethren. In addition, while the troll warriors were typically clad in nothing but a loincloth, most of the shaman wore robes of crudely stitched-together human skin. They also, one and all, carried staves capped with human skulls that had been painted black. The sight only furthered Zeke’s anger and disgust.

He'd charged in, just like he always did, but when he was only halfway there, the shaman barked something in a harsh, guttural language, then pointed its staff at Zeke. A glowing green rune shot out at him, and he instinctively tried to dodge. However, it followed him with unerring accuracy, hitting him square in the chest. As soon as it touched his skin, it disappeared from sight. But it was still there. Zeke had felt it, burrowing into his pathways and obstructing everything from the flow of his mana to his lifeforce. A single rune was little more than an annoyance, and he’d continued his charge, effortlessly taking out the shaman and the accompaniment of warriors – leaving him to study the curious rune the shaman had cast upon him.

In a way, Zeke was thankful for that encounter because it snapped him out of his trance-like, vengeful state. He soon found a secluded cave, where he spent the better part of a week studying the rune. It wasn’t nearly as complicated as the ones that controlled his two skills, but it was still multilayered and complex enough that it took him days before he could even see what it did. All the while, he suffered from the stabbing pains and weakness that came with the rune. The effects were more frustrating than truly harmful, but they served their purpose of ruining his concentration, which was enough to slow him down considerably.

And that was probably a good thing, because there was absolutely no way that he could’ve kept going without getting himself killed. It wasn’t like his anger over what he had seen had simply faded away; he fully intended to follow through with his plan of killing every single troll in the caves. But he had been going about it all wrong. He hadn’t had a plan; he’d simply been running wild through the cave system, murdering everything he saw. It wasn’t sustainable, and it certainly wasn’t a healthy frame of mind, even if it was justified.

However, having the rune to focus on changed everything, and as he began to understand the layered symbols that empowered the thing, he started to compare them with the construction of his skill runes. And the first thing he noticed was that the troll’s curse was far more simplistic than the ones associated with his skills. It was like comparing rudimentary cave art to a renaissance sculpture. Some of the concepts were the same, but there was ultimately such a wide gulf between them that they became different things entirely.

But studying the two in tandem did give Zeke some ideas about the basic construction of runes. Not enough to truly understand it, of course. But he discovered enough that he could at least break them, which was always far easier. More, it was probably something he was better suited for.

So, he’d slowly gone about unraveling that first curse. It took him nearly a week, and it was a lot more complicated than he thought it would be, but in the end, he finally managed to disperse it. Afterwards, he’d sat in his little alcove, marveling at the feeling of finally not being in pain or feeling any weakness. By that point, his other wounds had long since healed, and though he added a few more scars to his growing collection, he was far stronger than he’d ever been in his life. On top of that, he felt like he’d made real strides in his understanding of the runes that seemed to drive everything about his new world. He left his self-imposed solitary confinement, for once feeling a little optimistic about his future.

If only it could’ve lasted.

For three more weeks, Zeke continued to climb the cave system, killing trolls wherever he found them. He ran into a few more shaman, and each of them unerringly cursed him, which had forced him to repeat the cleansing routine. The repetition had continued to give him at least some limited insight, but the real value was that he’d managed to cut the process down to a couple of days for each rune. He couldn’t help but feel pleased at the progress.

Disaster eventually struck when he found the mushroom forest.

Zeke had to hand it to the trolls, though. Until that moment, he’d considered them possessed of little more than primate-level intelligence. Like hulking, scaly, murderous cavemen. So, he was more than a little surprised when he saw the trap they had laid for him.

He hadn’t had time to count, but there had been more than fifty warriors there, each at least twice his level. And accompanying them were around twenty shaman. Even if he’d managed to find them unseen, Zeke would’ve fled before such odds. He was strong, durable, and incredibly deadly, but numbers still counted for something – especially when he knew precisely how debilitating those curses could be.

But he didn’t have that option, because they were waiting on him. And on top of that, he could hear the heavy footfalls of even more trolls approaching from behind, cutting off the easiest method of retreat.

So, he’d had little choice but to grit his teeth and push through, hoping he could lose them in the huge mushroom forest stretching out in front of him. It went on for miles, so, with his superior strength and agility, he had a good chance of shaking off the lumbering trolls’ pursuit. He only had to survive long enough to make that happen.

Even as Zeke sprinted towards the line of trolls, he heard the familiar grunts coming from the shaman. Then, each of them pointed their grisly staves at him, casting their curses. The fluttering runes shot toward him with unerring accuracy, each hitting a different part of his body. The effect wasn’t merely cumulative, but rather, it was exponential. Each empowered the other, sapping his strength to the point that, after only a few steps, he began to stumble. It took every ounce of his remaining strength, even empowered by [Heart of the Berserker] to crash through the troll lines, shouldering the brutes to the side as he made his way to what he hoped was safety.

The pursuit went on for hours, the trolls howling in rage all the while, until, at last, Zeke managed to shake them. Even then, he didn’t dare stop. Instead, he stumbled along, running on fumes the whole way until, in a last ditch effort, he’d climbed atop the mushroom where he now lay, panting with the exertion of the last day-and-a-half.

He lay there for hours as he tried to regain his strength, but the curses made that all but impossible. From experience, he knew that they wouldn’t simply go away. He needed to unravel them, one by one, before he would get any semblance of rest. Still, even knowing that, he found it difficult to take that first step.

Finally, summoning the last drops of his willpower, Zeke focused his mind on the cursed rune that had latched itself to his forearm and began the arduous process of unraveling it. It took him almost six hours, which given the circumstances, was faster than he could’ve anticipated, but eventually, he managed to force it to dissipate.

One down, fourteen to go. Even as the troll search parties scoured the fungal forest, Zeke got to work.