Chapter 5 (Bard)

The branch manager didn’t warn me of what would happen once I passed through the doorway. I half expected to walk into a new world surrounded by, hopefully, friendly goblins. But, instead, the hole in the wall led me into empty space. At first, I stood upright on absolutely nothing, looking at the emptiness of space. The distant shapes were more than just sparkling dots. Instead, I saw spirals, helixes, clouds, and a variety of other forms. The site had terrified me at first, but now soothing tranquillity took over as I admired my surroundings.

Far below me floated a titanic circle. Mountains, sapphire seas, and expanses of lush emerald peeked at me through swirling clouds. The circle didn’t curve like a sphere should but lay flat.

“When they say disk, they really mean it,” I whispered, surprised that I could still hear myself in the void of space.

An invisible force sucked me towards the disk, and I started accelerating towards it. I got the chance to glance at my surroundings as I fell. Similar circles floated all around my destination, but unlike it, narrow expanses of land connected them. None of them sat on the backs of tortoises or elephants. Instead, they floated on nothing. I hadn’t studied much physics after high school, but I was sure this new universe followed a different set of rules.

Light refracted around the distant disks, suggesting they all had individual atmospheres. Gravity clearly didn’t function in the same way as it did back home. The branch manager did say the Cosmics’ magic had shaped this dimension. It went without saying that this new Universe was far beyond my understanding.

Before long, Arena Disk’s edges cut off my view of the other disks. As the mountains and seas below grew, I realised I had underestimated the world’s size when I heard the word disk. The scale became apparent as I flew through the clouds. It made sense too. The Cosmics wouldn’t conduct their games in just any arena. Arena Disk was so much more than a continent. It was a planet probably as vast as Earth laid out flat. Perhaps it was bigger.

Then the acceleration got too much for me. My temples throbbed, and my heart pounded inside my chest. I felt the wind against my face again and moisture collected on my cheeks. It was the first thing I had felt since Tracy branded me.

Just as concerns of splattering against stone reared its head, my vision blurred. The fall ended prematurely, and I felt solid ground under my feet. The sound of crickets and leaves rustling filled my ears.

“Testing. One. Two. Testing.” My voice hadn’t changed. “Well, that’s a relief.”

When my vision focused, I found the ruins of a fallen town surrounding me. Moss and vines covered crumbling stone, and trees extended out of the decaying wooden structures. The cold wind stung my face, and all the hair on my arm stood on its end.

My clothing had changed when I transformed into the halfling. I now wore a bright green vest and matching knee-length pants. The accompanying white shirt didn’t do much to fight off the frigid temperatures, but it did feel comfortable against my skin. Unfortunately, my leather jacket and shoes hadn’t followed. Thanks to my comically large leathery feet, I didn’t need the latter. Now that I thought about it, I didn’t feel the cold under my knees at all.

My feet felt strong, leathery, and my soles sensed everything under them. I started my adventure on Arena Disk by scaling the crumbling building next to me. My hands gripped the roots and branches clinging to the cracked wall, and finding footholds proved easy too.

The branch manager had dropped me off in the middle of an abandoned town along the foothills of a snow-tipped mountain range. A dusting of white powder covered the mountain slope just outside the ruins. The mountains reached towards the sky to my left, casting shadows on the town and the woods below. Swampland lay ahead, and I saw vast grasslands to my right. Much to my disappointment, a screen appeared, getting in the way of the beautiful sight.

Trial of Brawn
You are in a maze full of terrifying beasts.
Well, they aren’t precisely terrifying by Arena Disk’s standards. However, they’ll have no trouble ending you.
Survive. Dominate. Conquer.
Pass the trial to enjoy an influx of Strength and Vitality.

Arena Disk didn’t give me the time to get my thoughts together or prepare myself for what came next. The building I had scaled shook, almost knocking me off, and a deep bellow followed. Fortunately, my giant feet had little trouble finding traction on the rough surface, and my low centre of gravity helped me regain balance too. I fell into a crouch, scanning my surroundings for the attack’s source.

At first, all I saw was rustling foliage. Then my eyes found a pair of horns and realised that the tangle of brown below was fur. A couple of orange eyes with rectangular pupils glared at me through a curtain of matted hair.

“Holy shit!” I gasped, scrambling back as the bear-sized creature retreated. On second thought, it was closer to donkey proportions. My perspective had shrunk with my body.

The leaves tangled in the fur helped the goat blend into the ruins. Anticipating the creature’s intention, I crawled further away from the edge and scaled the tree growing out of the crumbling structure. The beast bleated before charging the decrepit building. This time, chunks of it broke off the structure, raining on the beast. The tree shook so hard I struggled to hold on. Even though the sound of my pounding heart made me want to freeze up, I continued climbing higher.

When the goat threw itself against the building again, the tree trunk creaked. I heard cracks spreading through the wood too. My refuge wouldn’t last long. I needed a way out. A neighbouring branch caught my attention. It appeared thick enough to support my weight and stuck out far enough to reach a more intact building.

After a painfully long climb, I reached the top, and the sight from the branch made my heart dropped. There wasn’t just one goat. The specimen ramming the building was the largest of the lot, but there were at least half a dozen others. Two of them were two-thirds of its size, while the remaining three only stood less than half as tall. Kids, I assumed. The branch manager had dropped me off in the midst of giant territorial mountain goats. “What an arsehole.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I mumbled, clinging onto the tree for dear life. Once the shaking stopped, I took off at a run. My ears blocked out everything but the sound of my pounding heart. I’d never been the daring kind, but now was a good a time as any to test my limits.

Unfortunately, a second goat joined the fray before I made the jump. It rammed the building just as the first dug itself out, making the tree tremble again. My foot slipped as I kicked off for my jump, and I found myself hurtling through the air. Unlike last time, my fall was neither gentle nor controlled. Terror accompanied it, and I expected to break half my bones with the landing, then the goats would trample me and snap the rest.

If luck existed in this Universe of Cosmics, it must’ve taken a liking to me. My elbow caught a moss-covered root sticking out of the neighbouring building. It felt like the sudden stop was going to rip the limb out of its socket. Everything hurt, but I endured and pulled myself up onto the roof. Bleats echoed all around me, but I ignored them and distanced myself from the edge.

Thanks to the Coward’s Brand, beating the trial following traditional methods wouldn’t be possible. I needed to find an alternate way and do it quickly. The elevation helped get a lay of the land. The ruins were much larger than I initially assumed. Due to my short legs, jumping from roof to roof wasn’t a possibility. Looking at how swiftly the goats weaved through the alleys, I was sure that I didn’t have it in me to outrun them.

“It’s a maze,” I whispered.

The stone structures had collapsed at several points, or the overgrown flora had blocked an alley. A smile spread across my lips as hope blossomed somewhere deep inside. I didn’t have to fight or endure the assault. I could escape! The remaining goats were trying to find their way to me, but the labyrinth slowed their progress. Unlike me, they couldn’t scale the barricades.

Skirting around the building’s edge highlighted a section completely cut off from the goats. Instead of wasting more time, I scrambled into the alley and made a run for it. Loud bleating sounded from all around me as I took off. The goats knew I was on the move. A head burst through the tangle of roots to my left, spraying me with twigs and splinters. My face and arms stung, but adrenaline helped me ignore the increasing sources of pain.

An opportunity to poke a stuck goat in the eye showed itself, but I didn’t want to risk my trait’s penalty. The branch manager had said that I’d start with one in each attribute. But, given how much everything ached before the adrenaline kicked in, my suffering would likely double after Coward’s Brand cut everything in half. So, I avoided the temptation and pushed myself up a barrier made of rubble.

The sound of vines and roots giving way filled the alley behind me. Instead of wasting time glancing at the goat now on my tail, I carried onwards. The ear-wrenching bellow confirmed my suspicion. The big guy was once again coming after me.

My breathing had gotten heavy by the time I reached the top. I guessed halflings weren’t built for running from goats and scaling almost vertical surfaces. My human body wasn’t one for exertion either. Thanks to the fifty-five-to-sixty-hour workweeks as a cook, my legs were solid, and I had the willpower to put up with a lot. However, the job didn’t leave a lot of time and energy for cardio.

Just as it looked like freedom was within reach, divine intervention—or the supernatural entity watching over the trials—got in the way. The rubble under my hairy feet gave way, and I was sure it wasn’t my weight or movement that caused the collapse. I slid down to the barricade’s base, scratching my knees and forearms during the descent. The rubble scraped my shins and feet, but the sharp edges failed to break the skin. I came to a stop near the bottom, lying on my stomach and winded.

Hooves galloping on stone filled the air, and I knew the goat was coming for me. So, the last of my strength into rolling out of the way. My guitar hummed as the rubble pulled on the lings, but I managed to get out of the goat’s way. He rammed into the stone at full speed, causing a cascade. The stones entombed him while a new pathway opened up to my right.

My body protested when I tried to move. The stinging of several tiny cuts compounded into a full-body burn, and my joints ached from all the abuse. The thought of bringing Tracy down spurred me on, though. So I got up at ran.

I skidded under one of the mid-sized goats and then hopped over a kid. The trial probably wanted me to show my strength and beat them, but there wasn’t much I could do about it. Before long, I realised I didn’t know where I was going. Every bit of the ancient town looked the same to me, and I didn’t have the strength to climb anymore. Soon I found myself backed into a dead end with several bellows and stomping hooves around the corner. I was out of options.

Was this what it felt like to face imminent death? My brain raced through countless scenarios where I imagined possible ways out. I couldn’t attack. My body didn’t have the strength to climb. However, I refused to accept the trial as my end. Then, a random thought popped into my head. It felt like pulling at straws, but in my desperation, I couldn’t think of much else.

I swung my guitar around and strummed. “Good.” The strings were all in tune. The body had suffered several scratches, but the instrument appeared just fine. I’d heard of cows and deer responding to music. Apparently, it worked on certain predatory creatures too. As I started playing, I hoped ‘You’ve Got A Friend In Me’ would tell the goats that I didn’t want any trouble.