Luke Everhart

Chapter 36 - Sudden Quest

Nar came too slowly, air still roaring past him.

He had fallen to the floor, and had lost the others.

“Jul?” he croaked, tasting blood.

“H-Here…”

“Tuk?”

“Also… Here.”

-[ Quest participant’s HP/Stamina points restored.

Quest participant’s pending gains have been applied.

Quest, Follow the arrows, will proceed. ]-

“Crystal,” Tuk muttered. “My ...

Chapter 35 - ITS NOT MAGIC

When they made it back to the others, it quickly became apparent that all was not well.

Kur, Gad and Viy stood to one side. Opposite, Cen had her back turned to them.

Mul had a blank expression on his face, and he was sitting a few feet away from his sister.

In the middle of the party, wringing her hands and shifting her eyes from one side to the other, stood Jul, looking scared.

“What’s going on?” Nar asked.

Jul looked up at them, and dashed to hide behind...

Chapter 34 - Lost Attribute Modifier

Poisoned or crushed.

The shock of his impending death made him blank.

Would the poison kill them quickly? Or just weaken them so that the guardians could finish the job? Would the boss wait for it, or would it just crush them to paste by itself.

And above it all, would it hurt?

Nar wanted to close his eyes, so as to not see that green monstrosity. Somewhere deep inside his mind, something screamed that this had to be a nightmare, and that he had to wake up.

Howev...

Chapter 33 - Power

Blurs moved around her.

Distant sounds echoed, muted.

She heard words.

She heard pain and fighting.

But it was all so far. Her Nexus was but a blur of dark and green that held no meaning.

Cen knelt on the floor, her staff forgotten in her hands.

Her mind replayed the same thoughts in an unbreakable spiral that pulled her deeper and deeper, and farther from the outside.

The secret she had carried had been weightless at first.

It had been easy to ...

Chapter 32 - Powerless

“Kur!” Gad shouted. “What do we do?”

Nar stared up, frozen in place.

From the green lights that shone from the Sentry, a nightmare of moving limbs and blades descended upon them.

This is not real… He thought. There was no way it could be.

Around them, on all four sides, the Pressure walls had them trapped. There was nowhere to run.

Fighting was impossible and there was nowhere to run to…

“Kur!” Gad shouted.

“I…I…” the ...

Chapter 31 - Survive If You Can

The silence was crushing.

Nar dragged his feet into yet another square. Another, identical, few feet of dark floor, with a single dim yellow arrow at its center. Around them, nothing. Not even the Pressure was visible, or made a single sound.

How many squares was this now? No idea.

How much time had passed? No idea.

It was impossible to tell without access to his UI’s clock.

The party stood in silence, only grunting at each other whenever blistering hot skin ca...

Chapter 30 - Mistake

Sweat pooled under him, on the sweltering hot floor.

On all sides, walls of Pressure rose to the endless darkness above them, confining the party to a tight space.

There wasn’t enough room for all of them to lay down in, and they had to take turns so that half of them could try to sleep while the other half sat.

At his side, Viy stuck to him, her body a furnace that he had no way of escaping, and on his other side, Tuk had his back glued to him.

Nar took a deep breat...

Chapter 29 - Invisible Trial

Their labored breaths echoed through the tight, stuffy corridor. Nar saw green out of the corner of his eyes, and that fueled him to run even faster.

Unfortunately, up ahead, Cen was slowing the back half of the party down, and unless he kicked and shoved the others out of the way, he was stuck behind them.

The green mist reached out to him like tendrils, enveloping him from behind. He covered his mouth and stuck to Jul as much as possible.

“There’s something ahead!” J...

Chapter 28 - Poison

The walk in the dark proved uneventful in the end.

After a few more short breaks, Jul called out something in the dark.

“I-I see something,” she said, alerting the others. “I think it’s a wall.”

“A wall?” Kur asked. “What do you mean?”

“Like-Like a wall? The arrows stop at a wall.”

“Like a dead end?” Gad asked.

“Oh… Yes. It looks like that…”

“Let’s just get there first,” Kur said, before anyone could speak. “A...

Chapter 27 - Secret Guilt

Nar had never experienced a darkness like that. The light of the arrows seemed to stretch a few feet away from them, and suddenly disappear, as if swallowed.

Even sounds, which he had so clearly heard before, now seemed muted somehow, as though he walked with his hands covering his ears.

He had the impression that they were walking in a room of massive proportions, however, where the light ended, it felt as though existence itself ended there with it.

It was a perfect, absol...

Chapter 26 - Sense Attributes

They waited, anxious, for something to happen, but after 10 minutes of nearly absolute silence, Kur spoke up again.

“It looks like that was it,” Kur said.

Tuk sighed, and leaned back on his hands. “That was some welcome.”

“What do we do now?” Cen asked.

“We need to rest,” Kur said. “I’m slowly getting better, but Nar is still injured. At the very least, we should all heal a bit. But just in case, it's better to keep our weapons out.”

At his ...

Chapter 25 - From Now On, Its The Real Deal

Despite the late night, Nar woke up ahead of Kur and Tuk’s wake up call. For their last night, Kur had reinstated the watch to make sure they didn’t sleep through the deadline.

Now, Nar sat alone, drumming his fingers against the grip of his sword, waiting for the door to open. Around the room, the others were in different stages of preparedness and nervousness. It was time to finally see what the real Climb had in stock for them.

As the timer hit the 15-minute mark, they were...

Chapter 24 - The Path is Changing

Nar stepped into the blaster, and the door closed behind him, gently and on its own.

“Woah…” Nar whispered, staring at the closed door.

He passed a finger over the smooth, slightly reflective gray metal. Not even a speck of rust on it. The thing looked brand new.

With his head spinning at so much display of abundance and quality, he dropped his clothes in a bundle on the floor, and looked for the buttons to turn on the blaster.

Suddenly, it activated on its own, ...

Chapter 23 - Tutorial Gains & Rewards

When next he opened his eyes, the lights were still dimmed.

Nar blinked, staring up at the featureless square of ceiling above him. It was low enough that if he stretched, he could touch it.

“You alright?”

Nar turned his neck, slowly.

The movement felt off. Like there had been a split-second of a disconnect between him wanting to move and his body actually responding to his orders. It was as though he was inside someone else’s body.

“Slowly,” Kur whispe...

Chapter 22 - Interlude

What does light look like to those who have lived their whole life in the darkness?

What does real, true color mean, to those who cannot even imagine it?

Real color. Real light.

How can a worker know that all that surrounds them is but a faded memory, a mockery of what they have lost?

It is but an idea, preserved through the Long Dark, as all else faded.

Food. Drink. Fun. Levels. Life…

A multitude of a billion choices available at one's fingertips.

...

Chapter 21 - The Bridge

Nar and Jul sprinted down the corridor, chasing after the others.

With each step forward, the lighter his steps flew off the corridor’s floor. His very brain seemed to relax inside his skull.

“Jul? Are you feeling this?”

“Yes!” she panted. “The Pressure is lifting!”

“Thank the Crystal!” Nar muttered.

In the distance, he could just about make Gad, Kur and Tuk. Beyond them, there was a tall, slender opening.

“I see the end!” she shouted....

Chapter 20 - Predict

Nar considered the half-eaten square of cracker between his fingers.

It was the last half of his fourth cracker.

He wasn’t supposed to have finished two of them, let alone be finishing his fourth.

He wanted to blame the others. They ate every two or three days, lacking his discipline and need. And there was only so much pretending he could do before someone noticed it.

However, the blame didn’t rest solely with the party.

Truth was, when they were hungry, so ...

Chapter 19 - The Light We Follow

Mercifully, nothing else happened that night, and everyone was able to get their share of Pressure sleep.

However, sleeping meant nothing.

His muscles grew heavier.

His eyes were always sore and gritty.

His bones felt as though they belonged in someone else’s body.

Nothing in him was right anymore.

HP or no HP, the Pressure was slowly sapping the life from him.

He croaked, wordlessly, as he got back up on his feet, and leaned against the wall, waiti...

Chapter 18 - Blocked

“Nar? Wake up, Nar.”

He returned from afar, to the sensation of light fingers gently shaking him.

“Whaaaaat?”

“It’s time to go,” Jul said.

Nar opened his eyes and frowned at her.

“Already?” he asked.

She grimaced. “Yes. It’s been six hours. Kur says we need to get going.”

Nar stared at her, blinking slowly.

“I slept for six hours?”

Jul nodded.

Nar groaned and sat up straighter.

He had forgotten his p...

Chapter 17 - Clouded Minds, Clouded Hearts

“Is he okay?” Gad shouted, panting from the floor.

Cen didn’t answer, unable to in the midst of her grief.

Kur crawled over to the caster, and checked on Mul.

“He looks fine, just knocked out. Cen! Do you hear me? He’s going to be fine!” he said, trying to calm her.

Thank the Crystal! Nar thought. He had feared the worst.

Opposite him, Viy nursed her bruised throat, coughing feebly. The guardian’s striped limbs had been imprinted onto ...

Chapter 16 - Endless Corridor

When Nar and Tuk woke up the others, their rest hadn’t been as restful as it had looked.

They woke up sluggish and groggy. Almost more tired now than they had been before they had slept.

“Ah!”

Nar whipped his head around, towards the source of the scream.

Tuk stood over Viy, with his hands raised in a placating gesture. “It-It's just me, Tuk! We-We have to go.”

Viy had a demented look to her. Like she had been pulled straight out of her worst nightmare,...

Chapter 15 - Heavy

Nar and Kur woke the others with 15 minutes to spare.

As if on cue, the lights turned back on to full intensity.

“Up, people. I want everyone ready to go in 5 minutes!” Kur said.

While the others stirred awake, Nar collected his pack. He wrapped it securely around his shoulders, and once he was done, he waited, with sword in hand.

That’s when it hit him.

Uh… Something’s off.

He frowned and looked around.

Nothing looked out of place....

Chapter 14 - Resolve

-[ You have encountered a safe room.

Each safe room provides different amenities. You will know what they are when you enter them.

You have been granted use of a toilet.

You may rest here. You are safe.

Time remaining in safe room:

07:57:45 

Warning: If you remain in the room when the countdown is over you will be punished. The ...

Chapter 13 - Safe Room

The Pressure returned to the same pattern the next day, and once again, days passed.

Would it be another two weeks before they faced their next enemy? Another two weeks of soul crushing Pressure and of that endless, straight corridor that never seemed to end?

All they could do was plod on. They were at the full mercy of the Crystal.

On the 18th day since they had left, four days after their second fight, they found themselves, once more, enduring the first Pressure wave of t...

Chapter 12 - The Wrong Gains

The pattern held.

The first wave hit them again the next day, at twelve thirty, and the last one at ten thirty at night.

So it was for the third day, and the fourth… And five entire days passed, forming a week of seven days.

Then, another week slowly dragged by.

The corridor, the pattern, the arrows. It was all an endless same.

One thing that did change was that the Pressure grew increasingly worse. Heavier, hotter and more painful. However, they too changed in...

Chapter 11 - Humble Beginnings

He was gently brought back from his sleep, and found Kur squatting in front of him.

“Hey man, sorry to wake you up so soon, but we need to start walking,” he said.

“Walking?” Nar asked, confused.

Kur smiled and pointed at the yellow arrows at their feet.

“Oh…”

Nar sat up straighter. Corridor, yellow arrows, Pressure. Yes.

“Yeah, we are Climbing after all,” Kur said. “I wish I could let you sleep for longer, but I think we should...

Chapter 10 - First Night

“I can’t keep going!”

Everyone stopped and turned to Cen.

The lengos sat on her knees and gasped hard, holding her throat. “My stamina… I only have 7 points left!”

Oof… I guess she has the lowest stamina out of all of us, Nar thought.

Tuk leaned his shoulder against the wall. On his back, Viy had never even stirred since the last wave of Pressure. Not even the guardian had woken her up.

The trugger looked just about ready to collapse. His c...

Chapter 9 - Gains

“Thank you. And sorry about that,” Gad said. “I’m being a burden.”

Nar kneeled next to her, gulping air like a desperate man.

“You’re fine,” he panted. “Don’t worry about it.”

She licked her dried lips, and looked like she was going to say more. Instead, she nodded and closed her eyes, and leaned her head against the wall.

The second and now the third trip through the pressure had been just as long. Always between 40 and 45 minutes, according to J...

Chapter 8 - Not a Great Start

… one more.

Nar breathed hard.

He huffed, blowing the tickly sweat drops from his nose.

He was dying to wipe his face, but the last time he had tried to, he had almost dropped Gad.

About an hour later since they had started walking, his arms were numb and tired.

His throat was scratched dry from the heat and his legs shook.

He swore it smelled burning somewhere, but that could just have been his brain catching fire inside his skull.

The pai...

Chapter 7 - Under the Pressure

The minutes dragged and turned into hours.

Nar had forced himself to stand, to ensure he didn’t drift off.

He had gone over all of his skills, his sword, his attributes, the HP and stamina information multiple times.

He had found he knew a dozen new words like “pierce” and “parry”.

Off of his sword alone, he had learned to name every single part of it. Or at least, all the parts the System deemed important enough to tell him about.

Pommel, hilt, grip, g...