Chapter 6 – Down the Hole

In the morning mist covering the town, me, the knight, and Cathelyn were chasing after the ghoul. Although we had managed to injure it gravely and had wounded its legs multiple times, it still ran with incredible speed.

The mist covering my vision wasn’t helping in keeping track of it, but the blood it kept dripping allowed us to keep up. As we ran eastbound, I felt the difference in my physical capability between me and the knight and Cathelyn; while they were keeping up with the ghoul’s speed, I was losing breath and gradually losing momentum.

Fortunately, I managed to keep up as it led us out of town and into a tall grass field. I could see where the ghoul had entered the field from the flattened grass, standing beside it, Cathelyn and the knight.

I slowly decelerated and stopped beside them. “Why are you stopping,” I asked.

The knight faced Cathelyn and asked, “A newbie?”

She answered, “Yes, first time in fact.”

Turning towards me, the knight said, “We don’t think there’s only one ghoul. You can seldom encounter a lone ghoul. If we rush after this one into such an obscure field, we could possibly fall into an ambush.”

Ignoring the fact that there could possibly be more abominations like this one, I asked, “So, what do we do?”

“We are thinking,” Cathelyn answered. Facing the knight, she said, “We also can’t just let it go like that. It showed signs of intelligence when we fought; it could be misleading us to avoid us finding its nest. If we lose it now, it would be more troublesome to find it later.”

The knight said, “We could split and surround the field. It doesn’t look that big.”

“And how can one of us alert the others if they do find traces of the ghoul?” Cathelyn asked. “Not to mention we can’t all stay here; someone needs to look after the other newbies back at the inn.”

The knight contemplated for a bit before talking. “You’re the guide, right. You go back for the other newbies. Me and this one will track the ghoul,” he said as he pointed towards me with his head.

Cathelyn remained silent for a moment as she tapped her finger on her arms. She seemed to have decided on something as she quickly jolted her head so her eyes would match with the knight. She said, “Fine, but if anything happens to him, I will hold you accountable.”

“You have my word,” the knight responded.

Snorting, Cathelyn walked away. As she passed by me, she said, “Take care, and if anything happens, just run and use him as bait.”

With that sentence, she began to dash off towards the town.

“That was not very nice of her,” said the knight. It seemed as if he had heard Cathelyn last sentence, or maybe he was meant to hear. “Shall we track the ghoul.” He motioned his hand towards the gap created by the flattened grass.

I nodded. “After you.”

We traced the beast as we stepped on the flattened tough reedy grass that had formed a path between the still-standing immaculate emerald grass.

“Can I ask you a few questions, uhh? Sorry I didn’t get your name.” I asked.

I hadn’t spoken when they were discussing their next steps because I had no idea what to do in such a situation, but now that we have got some time, I wanted some explanations.

“My name is Rich. Go ahead with your questions,” he said.

“One, are you also an Otherworlder? You seemed pretty knowledgeable when you talked back then. Two, what will we do if we find the ghoul?”

“I don’t know why you asked two completely unrelated questions.” He said, “But to answer your first question, yes, I am an Otherworlder, although from a different origin planet. For your second question, it depends. If we find the same ghoul unhealed, I think we should finish it off. If we find there is more than one, we retreat and regroup with rest, then figure out what to do. Any more questions?”

“Ah, yes,” I confirmed. “Can you explain to me how cores and traits work in summary?”

“There is no summary, you either get the whole explanation in one go, or you don’t. If you have anything specific you want to inquire about, you’re better off asking it about than getting a superficial understanding on cores and traits that would be needed to be fixed later.”

“Alright, it’s that I have this trait that I have no idea what it does, which I think could be useful in combat.”

“What is the explanation that the template gives you when you focus on that trait?”

Although I didn’t understand why he called it a template, I assumed he referred to the screens and the system. I checked to provide him the complete explanations.

Trait

[Echoes of Belief (Iron)] – With your belief and sentiment as your center, reverberate and resound your spirit.

“With your belief and sentiment as your center, reverberate and resound your spirit. Is all it says,” I said. “Where do I even begin to understand what it means?”

“The trait is still in its fundamental form, so the template doesn’t give a complete detail.” He explained, “It seems that you have a faith core; faith originates for many reasons but mostly out of emotion. If I understood correctly, you should imagine the emotion generating your faith spreading around and affecting your enemies. When you do that, you will know how to use that trait.”

“Then how — “ As I was about to ask more about traits, Rich raised his hand as a gesture to stay silent. He readied his sword and shield, and following his action, I conjured a staff. We were edging forward cautiously when Rich abruptly stopped and kept staring at a spot a bit far away.

Following Rich’s line of sight, I gazed towards where he was looking. It was a giant gaping hole in the ground. He pointed with his finger to the ground multiple times, gesturing for me to stay put. He then treaded forward until he was right upon the hole.

Tilting his body forward, he took a look inside the hole. After standing back straight, he seemed to take a sigh of relief as he gestured for me to come over.

“What is it?” I whispered.

“You don’t need to whisper,” he said. “It’s a tunnel, and there’s nothing down there currently.”

I took a look into the hole and saw nothing but darkness. “Are you sure? Can you even see anything in this pitch-black hole?”

“Don’t worry,” he answered. “I am sure. The question you should be asking is, what to do now?”

He was right; we seemingly hit a dead end. We had no equipment to climb down, and even the option of going down wasn’t something I wanted to think about; it would be too dangerous down there. “Do we go back and regroup?” I asked.

“I don’t know.” Rich said, “We still don’t know if this is its nest or a distraction.”

“You’re suggesting we go down?” I inquired. “How do we even get down there.”

Rich kept his silence for a while before finally answering. “Yes, I think we should go down. Stopping here would be wasteful since we don’t have concrete information. As for how to get down, can’t you conjure a rope or stairs?”

Knowing what he was saying was true, I sighed. “I could try, but I can’t guarantee it. My trait clearly stated it needs to be a weapon.”

He nodded. “Just try.”

I first tried to make a rope ladder but failed even to conjure an image. Fortunately, when I imagined a rope, it materialized without problems.

“Great,” Rich said. “You hold on that rope and lower me down. We can then decide what to do from what I will see,”

Before we went proceeded, Rich threw me a marble out of his pocket. “This is a shimmering bead; it will help you light up the hole when you descend.”

After dropping a rock into the hole and making sure its depth wasn’t significant and that the rope I conjured was capable of reaching the whole way down, we went forth with our plan.

Rich strapped the sword and shield on his back and tied the end of the rope around his waist, and then he began to scale down the hole. I held into the other end of the rope as I felt Rich tugging the rope as he went down.

After a dozen minutes, the rope completely relaxed down, and I heard a shout coming from down the hole. “Come down; it’s safe.”

I conjured a small blade and tested it out as I punctured the rope with it and left it alone. The knife didn’t dissipate after a few minutes, which gave me a sense of relief. I tied the rope around the staff I had conjured earlier and then planted the staff into the ground.

When I was sure the rope was firmly tied to the staff, I began my descent into the hole.