Solomon remembered seeing a lot of shops selling climbing equipment when he looked at the map and now he knew why.

As he dangled 100s of meters off the ground on the side of the rock wall, every little gust of wind or piece of falling debris felt like a hurricane or a meteor.

At this point, he was pretty sure he would gain a fear of heights from all the high places he had been to recently and he wasn't happy about it.

When he had finally reached the tunnel and had dragged his sorry-looking body over the edge he couldn't help but glance at his tail in thanks.

The only reason he had ended up making it to the tunnel instead of falling was with the help of his tail. It was surprisingly tough and he had driven it into the rock wall to hold himself up when his arms got tired.

Watching Solomon look gratefully at his own tail, the surrounding group of demons looked at the bedraggled demon with strange looks. They had to carry up pickaxes and baskets as well as themselves, but you didn't see them congratulating themselves.

The demon that had the lower half of a snake even brought up the Boss, who was blind and couldn't climb the wall himself, wrapped in his tail.

The Rat demon, who was called Kith coughed loudly after seeing the weird looks Solomon was getting.

Solomon noticed the strange looks and started to get embarrassed. "Hey, Look how incredible the view is from here. I think I can see our camp." He said awkwardly trying to draw attention away from himself.

"Yeah, the view is great." echoed Kith empathising with Solomon. Then with quick thinking, he turned to the Lamia Demon and said "Why don't we get going, Laud."

Bursting with enthusiasm Laud turned and led the march deeper into the tunnel.

Realising something, Solomon turned to Kith and whispered "Is he named after loud because he shouts a lot?"

"Shhh, we haven't told him yet. He just thinks it sounds cool." Said Kith checking worriedly to see if Laud had heard him.

Solomon wasn't sure, but he thought he saw the Boss chuckle when Kith said this. The boss did seem to have very good hearing after all.

Making their way through the winding tunnel, the height of the tunnel got lower and the walls, which were originally a dark grey gained a reddish hue. Some of the larger demons had been forced to crouch down uncomfortably.

Solomon and Kith who were at the back talked to each other in hushed tones. "So, when I was reading the leaflets, I saw that you only have a year to complete each 'Penance' before you run out of time and are reincarnated."

"Yeah, that's true. We all came here together from the same barge and joined the Miners at the same time. I think we only have another 3 months before our 'Penance' has to be completed." Kith replied.

"But why do you wait until the last possible moment to take the 'Penance'?" Solomon asked confused.

"Well... It may not say so in your little leaflets but, as you know, when you complete a 'Penance' you get stronger, and your abilities improve." Kith started to Explain to Solomon who nodded in response.

"However, that doesn't mean you can't get stronger before the 'Penance' to make it easier. We have found that when we go mining it works like exercise and we get stronger. Then we spend our Pay on monster meat, which also makes us stronger." Kith continued to explain.

Enlightened, Solomon understood their reason for waiting, better safe than sorry after all. Before he could ask another question, however, he received some terrible news from Kith. "Honestly I feel for you guys with Karmic flames. If you fail your trials your Soul get incinerated."

"Huh?" Solomon stopped walking and stared at Kith. "What are you talking about?"

Kith started to sweat and his whiskers twitched a bit. "Don't tell me you didn't know that. Wasn't it in the leaflet?"

Solomon looked shellshocked, "I guess I haven't read that part yet." He replied half-heartedly.

Seeing Solomon looking distraught, Kith patted him on the shoulder to comfort him and gave some advice. "Don't think too much about it. It doesn't change much about how you are going to live your daily life right."

"It does add a lot of pressure though," Solomon muttered sadly.

"Ahh... Relax. You won't have to take your 'Penance' for a year right?" Kith said awkwardly trying to bring up Solomon's mood.

"Yeah... I guess." Said Solomon dispiritedly. Honestly, he was rather worried. Just while climbing up the rockface he could tell he was much weaker than the other demons in his mining group and they weren't even confident to take their 'Penance'.

Kith, who was struggling with the hot potato that was Solomon's volatile emotions sighed in relief when Laud who was leading the group came to a stop. They had reached the end of the tunnel and a welcome distraction was given to Solomon.

As all the mafioso demons got to work with their pickaxes or claws on the walls, Solomon marvelled at their efficiency. It was clear from their practice swings this wasn't their first time working together.

Solomon picked up a pickaxe, that was almost as big as he was tall and, with some difficulty hefted it up to his shoulder. He swung at the wall with as much strength as he could muster and was quite depressed when only a couple of small splinters of red rock fell from the tunnel wall.

Glancing around he saw that even the weak-looking Boss was mining and Solomon blushed in embarrassment. How could he be even weaker than a blind demon?

Gritting his teeth, he remembered what Kith had said about how they got stronger from mining and he kept relentlessly hammering at the wall with his pickaxe.

After an hour of work, Laud called a halt to the mining for a lunch break. Usually, they wouldn't be allowed to take a break until after about three hours of work so the other demons were confused. "Why had they stopped?" Still, they wouldn't complain about a free break so they stayed quiet.

On any other day, they would have taken their break after three hours just like usual. The difference was that today they had Solomon. Who, after hearing they were taking a break, slumped to the ground in exhaustion turning into a pile of mush.

Laud had noticed Solomon's exhaustion and was considerate of his struggles. He remembered that it had been hard for him too at first.

Solomon felt like maybe he should just die. Then, he wouldn't feel so tired and shitty. Just as he was lamenting how he hadn't brought any food for himself the already faint light In the tunnel was blocked out by a hulking Lamia demon.

At this point, he couldn't be bothered with Laud's shouty enthusiasm so he wasn't looking forward to whatever this guy had to say.

Laud, sensing Solomon's standoffishness, lent down and handed him a plate full of weird green meat and gave him some words of advice.

"I use my claws when I mine you know."

"Yeah and..." Solomon said moodily

"You have a tail idiot. Just use that." Laud snapped at Solomon, annoyed at his moodiness. He didn't exactly have a good temper, to begin with.

After Laud slithered away, Solomon slapped himself in the face. He felt like an idiot. He had already realised that they had stopped for a break because of. When he looked at the other demons he could tell they weren't nearly as tired as he was.

So, when Laud shouted at him for not using his tail he felt stupid, but also grateful. He didn't like being a burden and holding others back. He couldn't be blamed for forgetting to use his tail, after all, he'd only had a tail for a couple of days. Sometimes he would forget it was even there and end up sitting on it by accident.

'I can't believe I didn't think about that. I guess I need to re-evaluate my strengths and remember what that tablet said. My body may be weaker than your average demon but I have my strong points.'

After Solomon had finished eating the uncomfortably sour green meat Laud had given him, Solomon focused his attention on his tail.

It was about 150cm long and was a dark grey metallic colour divided into wickedly sharp serrated segments. Controlling his tail didn't feel the same as the rest of his limbs. He could just give it general instructions or it would sense his intent and take action.

He decided to test if he could break the rock with it and started by hitting the wall with his tail. To his joy, chunks of rock were sent flying when he hit it.

'Success! I can't believe it actually worked.' Solomon cheered internally. The last few days had been pretty tough on him and he would take any little victory he could get.

Now, that he could see a path for him to take to get stronger he was over the moon. He definitely didn't want to end up getting his soul incinerated after failing a 'Penance'.

Laud, who was watching Solomon pat himself on the back in congratulation gave a little smirk before getting back to mining.

Understanding the uniqueness and utility of their racial abilities was one of the most important parts of growing as a demon and successfully progressing deeper into hell.

Laud was happy to help a fellow demon out and perhaps more importantly, he would definitely receive some good karma for this.

Solomon, oblivious to Laud's somewhat self-centred thoughts, lost himself in mining. Every time he struck the tunnel wall with his tail, a chunk of metallic red metal would fall to the ground. He was nearly keeping up with some of the far more experienced miners.

His tail would shear through rock with a metallic clang and before he knew it he was addicted to the satisfying feeling of cutting the rock and hearing it hit the floor.

Perhaps because he was so preoccupied with just the mining, he didn't notice how deep into the tunnel wall he had mined unit his tail met with something it couldn't cut for the first time.

Lining the rock in front of him was a dark golden metal that was much harder than the surrounding rock. Just by being near this metal, his tail began vibrating and Solomon could feel hunger coming from it.

Since he didn't recognize the metal, he decided to shout out to the rest of the demons. "I think I found what we were looking for!"

Laud stuck his head around the entrance of Solomon's tunnel and when he noticed the metal beside Solomon, his face lit up with a rare smile.

"We've struck it big this time boys. the Boss was right once again. this is the good stuff." He cheered.

Everyone tried to pile into the tunnel before they were shouted at by Laud and they backed up so that Solomon could get out.

Because the Metal was so hard, it would take more effort to mine and they ended up organising shifts to collect it. While one person would mine the metal, the rest would expand the tunnel.

After a few gruelling hours of mining, they were left with 4 baskets of black metal with a hint of gold.

Everyone let out a sigh of relief when they were finished and wiped the sweat from their brows, horns etc.

Laud laughed while imagining all the money they would make and told everyone their cut of the earnings. "The Boss and Solomon get 15% of the earnings each, we have to give 10% to the mining camp for our food and lodgings and the rest will be split evenly amongst the eight of us."

Solomon was shocked when he heard he would be getting more than anyone else, but, frankly, he was in desperate need of money because he had none at all so he wasn't about to complain.

When he remembered the weird reaction his tail had to the metal, Solomon asked if he could take his cut as part of the metal itself instead of money. He wanted to see why his tail reacted like that and he could always sell it later by himself.

None of his fellow miners felt this was weird, But they did remind Solomon that he would have to carry it back himself. Apparently, even though they were stronger than him that didn't mean they were going to carry someone else's pay for them.

Thinking this was only fair, Solomon picked up a sack that was handed to him by a demon with sharp tusks and slung it across his back with some difficulty.

Turning around to glare at Kith who had failed to stop his laugh when he saw Solomon nearly fall over trying to pick up the heavy sack, Solomon masked his embarrassment by grunting and quickly following the rest of the group down the tunnel.

By the time he arrived back at the mouth of the tunnel, he was a sorry sight to behold. His shirt was slick with sweat and rock dust and stuck tightly to his body, while his face was covered in soot.

He wasn't looking forward to carrying the bag while climbing down the rope but he gritted his teeth and jumped out of the tunnel mouth, grabbing onto the rope.

'I'm definitely going to get a fear of heights,' he thought as he hurtled down the rope at startling speeds. Red marks of blood were left behind on the rope as his hands were rubbed raw by the friction.

At this moment he felt grateful for his stronger than normal grip strength. While simultaneously cursing gravity for existing.