But he had to rest. Kek decided to climb a tree so that he could at least feel a little safe while he caught his breath for a few minutes. He could hear the party of mercenaries, and they were hunting kobold tonight. He sat as still as he could in the pitch-dark night. The thick jungle canopy hardly let any moonlight through. Kek prayed to whatever gods were listening that the party would go in a different direction. But, of course, they headed directly toward where he was sitting in the tree.
The dogs were way ahead of the rest of the party, and they would surely signal the humans the second they spotted Kek in the tree. They’d smell him before they even saw him up there. He got ready to jump down and run, knowing how pointless it would be given the superior speed of the dogs, but as the large group of four-legged animals slowed beneath the tree, they didn't start to bark right away. In fact, they bark at all. They certainly noticed he was there, but they just sniffed around and whimpered a little. Even the older dogs didn't seem interested in alerting the humans. All those years of kindness to them worked in Kek's favor.
"Good dogs," he said quietly, even though he knew it was a mistake to speak at all. They weren't going to turn him in to the human masters. "Go on now, go home," said Kek. They didn't seem as though they were going to listen to him, especially since the dogs didn't understand many words. But after sniffing around and waiting so long that it seemed the humans would finally catch up with them, the dogs did run off in a different direction. They were leading them away from Kek. He waited about twenty minutes before climbing down, just to be sure that nobody was waiting for him.
He half expected one of the humans to have been waiting for him to climb down as part of some cruel game. When he finally accepted that the humans were gone, Kek continued on his way.
The only problem was that he didn't know where they were going. There was a good reason the humans stuck to preplanned paths that they had made in the jungle. They took them to the prime hunting areas. It was incredibly difficult to maintain one's bearings in the area when off the trail. There were supposedly tribes out in the depths of the jungle that had had little-to-no contact with the humans and other races. Surely, they would know how to navigate the jungle. But short of being born and raised in that sea of green death, not to mention all it was impossible to know how to find one's way.
That left Kek in quite the predicament. If he came out of the jungle on the side that lead back toward the north, it was likely he would be picked up by other mercenaries or humans who wouldn't think twice about killing a wandering kobold. His species were dungeon-dwelling denizen after all, and humans typically associated his species with nefarious deeds because of that. It didn’t seem fair at all.
What seemed like an eternity of aimless wandering soon culminated a complete mental breakdown for Kek. He finally threw his arms in the air and located a tiny patch of clear grass to sit on. He knew there was a chance something would crawl up his leg or drop down from the tree canopy above, and equal chances it would be poisonous. But he had enough, and he was completely exhausted after hours of travel through the dark.
His infravision would allow him to see any warm-blooded creatures that were approaching, which gave him a little bit of confidence. Thankfully, many of the larger and more dangerous creatures were warm-blooded.
He didn't know what to do, but he knew that he did not have the wherewithal to think of a plan. Only one person in his life had been anything like a role model to Kek, and that was Hendrik. Despite how his actions had actually caused all of this, Kek knew that Hendrik was a man to be emulated and trusted. So, the cold and scared kobold sat alone in the dark with endless dangers crowding around him, trying d to think what his master would have done in this situation.
What was Hendrik trying to do to get himself out of an equally horrible situation? That was the purpose of the potion. It was supposed to give the person who consumed it some kind of superpower. Kek wasn't quite sure how it could be used against murderous mercenaries. But it certainly seemed like it couldn't hurt. And he trusted that Hendrik knew what he was talking about. Remembering how this had all gone down in the first place back in the tent, Kek remembered that he knew exactly what went into making this special potion. A plan started to formulate in his mind, and he decided that he would wait until the morning and then collect the ingredients again, this time for himself.
For now, he needed to survive the night. His people were dungeon denizens, so they weren't traditionally the type who knew how to survive out in the jungle, or anywhere but underground for that matter. Still, Kek was smart enough to find a spot in the upper branches of one of the sturdier trees and tried to get some sleep. He wasn't sure if he did manage to keep his eyes closed for more than a minute or two at a time, because the little kobold felt utterly exhausted by the time the sun began to rise.
Collecting the ingredients was not hard at all. The only plant that had given them any trouble was the Liathon plant. But, of course Kek now knew exactly where to look for this in the jungle. That was something even his exceedingly wise master hadn't even been able to figure out. So, after gathering the ingredients it was nearly daybreak. That meant the hunting party of mercenaries would soon be back on foot and on the hunt for a little blue target to shoot with arrows.
When he had gathered all of the ingredients for the potion, he searched for a tree he knew would be useful. The large bolide tree had pods that were useful for containing water and other liquids, like cups. He located this and used it while making the potion. He ground the ingredients up on a large flat stone and use this as a kind of workbench on the jungle floor.
He wasn't quite sure how he had managed to actually stay in the jungle overnight, but it was nothing short of a miracle he hadn't been killed already. Kek didn't want to get a big head about it, but maybe he was not as useless as he had always thought.
He finally finished mixing the potion just how Hendrik had and then held the pod full of it in front of him. He didn't have fire, but he knew how to make it without a flint or proper tools. Hendrik had insisted on teaching Kek many things he had thought was unnecessary, like primitive methods for creating fire.
Had the old man foreseen that this day would come? Kek didn't believe in anything like future visions, but it was difficult to deny that this was all coming together perfectly. He used some carefully selected pieces of wood and rubbed them together in just the right way over some kindling, until he had created a small burning ember. Then he used some tiny slivers of bark that he'd taken from the Peppertree to start a fire.
Once he had finished doing this, it was time to heat up the brew in its little pod. Kek knew that the tree pod would not withstand a flame as well as the glass vials they used back in camp. However, it was possible to heat the pod without burning it. But it was a much slower process. It felt like nearly an hour had passed, with Kek moving the pod into the flames and then carefully moving it away, trying to hold it at just the right distance where the flames would not destroy the pod and without letting the liquid inside stop heating.
It worked well though, and it finally reached a temperature he felt was nearly boiling. He removed it from the flames completely and allowed it to cool. Thinking about the way Hendrik had acted, it was hard to motivate himself to drink the liquid. But there was really nothing left to do, and he felt like he was doomed either way.
It calmed him a little to know that this was what Hendrik had wanted for him, in a way. Well, the druid had probably meant to mix the potion himself with proper tools and equipment. But this was as close as Kek could get.
He drank the liquid in one gulp. It tasted strange enough that he couldn’t compare it to anything else. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't good. It was almost like it didn't actually exist. Almost like nothing really existed now that he thought about it. He decided he would just sit down and wait until it hit him. The last thing he wanted was to be stumbling around the jungle when he started to act strangely.
The day seemed to drift quickly, and Kek felt hi
mself feeling much less afraid of the jungle than he usually did, like there was nothing coming to get him. Like he knew that he was in a safe spot and there was nothing but bugs and insects around him. And he wasn't worried about the mercenaries coming to get him because they were clearly far away. Maybe this was the all-knowing ability, or maybe he had just managed to poison himself or himself drunk or high. Maybe he was losing his sense of self-preservation and care for the world. Either way, he drifted off to sleep on a nice patch of grass.
8
When he woke up, it was dark. Or perhaps he was still asleep—or maybe unconscious. If he was dead, he supposed this wasn't the worst possible outcome. If the afterlife was just a whole lot of nothingness, that was better than the endless torment like some of the crazy religions breached, Kek supposed. And it was certainly better than the dungeon his people lived in, where he had been taken from as a pup during a human raid.
Thinking about that was starting to make him feel like he’d lived a fuller and more adventurous life than it seemed. He didn't feel afraid of the jungle anymore, and that was almost worrying. But he just couldn't bring himself to worry about anything.
He was starting to understand why Hendrik had been acting so recklessly the previous night. The druid probably felt safely connected, believing everything in the world was in just the right place and nothing could possibly hurt him. While Kek had never had much of an education beyond what Hendrik had taught him about alchemy and the natural world around them, Kek was starting to think about numbers quite a lot.
He felt as though numbers were all around him. He could almost see them. He rubbed his eyes and stood up, looking at the faint shards of light that fell through the jungle’s canopy. It felt warm, but he knew they were relatively mild in temperature. How did he know that? How did he know that it would take him months or perhaps years too cut down most of the trees that were around him, apart from the ones that could be broken because they were so thin? And why would he try to punch down a tree? He had never known how long it would take him to punch down a tree in the jungle because he had never wasted his time thinking about such a stupid thing. And that was just one of the many things that he was starting to think about in great detail.
Kek began to walk, and eventually he felt like he wasn’t so safe anymore. There was something moving just beyond a copse of trees. It was rooting around, probably looking for food or water, judging from the way it paced to and fro without much sense. The notion of dealing with anything right now made his brain hurt. He put his hands to the sides of his temple and shook his head thoroughly. No, there was nothing there. The jungle was empty all around him.
He had poisoned himself, and he was slowly going crazy while his body shut down and edged along toward death. This must've been what happened to Hendrik. The potion up must've been some sort of stupid trick by whoever the druid had learned it from. Perhaps one of the guards had written it down and left it lying around for the druid to find. All of these things seemed so much more likely than the alternative, which was that Kek and his master had been granted the power to see the true meaning behind the universe.
As much as he hated to admit it to himself, that was starting to seem more likely as time went on. Every time he looked at something around him, it seemed to have its own special attributes, which he just magically knew. He decided to move away from whatever was moving around on the other side of the thick wall of trees before him. He had no intention of finding out whether there was an aggressive animal over there.
As he moved, his head swiveled from side to side, taking in everything around him, as if for the first time. Vines hung down, and he knew that some of them were okay to touch or pass by while avoiding others that had little suction devices that would try to grab and strangle him. Others still were camouflaged snakes hanging down, waiting to bite him. He had not been taught any of these things, and he had no reason to know this information. In fact, Kek was so caught up that his feet became tabled in the roots of a wide and tall tree.
He tripped and fell into a prickly thorn bush on the other side of the tree root, letting out a loud yelp. Several of the large spikes stuck into his hands and forearms. He sat down beside the stupid plant and began picking the thorns out. He screamed after he pulled out the first of them. The thorns had barbs in the end, that took purchase in his flesh, making them painful to remove. But at least it looked like there wasn't any permanent damage, and after smelling the thorn he’d pulled out, he was almost certain there was no toxic or poisonous liquid on them. So, he decided it was good luck, even though his good luck seemed to be short-lived.
He pulled out a few more of the spikes when he realized something was moving around in the jungle much closer to him now. There was that rustling sound again, and now it was closer. Kek could see numbers with writing next to them floating in the air over where the sound was coming from. He knew he was going crazy then.
A huge mantis appeared from behind some wide leaves, and the numbers surrounded it. This was no ordinary mantis either, even for the giant variety. It had large snaking tentacles coming out of its flanks and back, which writhed around and seemed to have a life of their own. And for all the petrified kobold knew, these squirming things did have a life of their own. There certainly didn't seem to be much life in those blank staring eyes on the head of the mantis. It looked like something that belonged under the sea, if it weren't for its primarily insect like qualities.
Sure that he was about to be killed, Kek stood up, determined to face his fate like a kobold. He had never heard humans say a positive word said about his own species, and he didn't know how to stand up like a man, and wasn't sure he wanted to. Maybe if he knew what those numbers and esoteric abbreviations meant, he would be able to figure out a way to best this thing using his new power. “Gaming" the situation, as he had heard Hendrik say on several occasions. He didn't understand how this was anything like a game, although he was familiar gaming things to cheat a system.
Cheat the system …
There might be a way out of this, he thought. So, he jumped up and did one of the things he knew he could do well: Kek ran into the jungle behind him and searched for a good hiding place. That didn't take long, and once he had found a suitably thick pocket of foliage and undergrowth to hide in, he tried to breathe as shallowly as possible and waited to see if the mantis was following him. Maybe it wasn't trying to kill him after all. Maybe it was just as startled as he had been, but he wasn't willing to move and find out.
As he focused on his own heartbeat and breathing, it became difficult to keep his attention on listening for the creature coming toward him. The jungle seemed to be louder than it ever had been, even though he was out in a particularly dense and, he thought ironically, isolated part of it. This was the first animal Kek had seen all day, apart from small insects and lizards. Then something came crunching toward him, moving through the foliage slowly and with short, quick motions. He tried to prevent his mind from conjuring up imagery of the giant insect darting around like some sort of machine with no emotions, those tentacles weaving their way through the air and reaching out to rest upon the leaves that it passed, possibly tasting or sensing things of their own volition. He broke out into a sweat just thinking about it.
Okay, Kek, he told himself, you're not just going to go down hiding like a coward. Hendrik didn't risk his life so he could die like a coward. The thing was clearly moving toward him, possibly picking up his scent. Hiding was not going to be useful anymore anyway, so it was time to find a weapon for himself. The only thing at his disposal was a large rock. It was longer than it was thick, but it had a good heft to it and a sharp point at one end. It resembled the tooth of a rock giant—another beast he had only heard about in legends, but now it seemed like just about anything could be real.
He had an inkling of what some of those abbreviations that surrounded the creature meant. STR was so very similar to the word “strong.” That might mean how well this thing could stand up to a beating
or exert its own force upon him. There were other words for this that might fit better, but this was the only one he knew. And that thing’s STR was low. He only wished that he could see his own numbers and meanings like he could with the other things in the jungle. Perhaps he would need a mirror to do so, or maybe that just wasn't part of the deal.
9
As the unseen mantis crunched closer with its limbs stabbing into the ground like long green blades, Kek stood up and slowly raised the rock above his head. He hoped to ambush the creature. As it came near, the head appeared out of the foliage, but he could not see the rest of the body. It seemed to startle the mantis, but Kek had set the trap and was anticipating just such a surprise. That translated to an immediate knee-jerk reaction, and he swung the rock down onto that giant green head. The rock didn't stop moving until it was lodged between those two unfeeling eyes. Strange blood, black mixed with browns and oranges, came from the wound and splattered as the mantis went down to the ground.
Kek jumped back in case the thing was still alive, and that's when he noticed the number next to HP had changed to zero! That must've represented the things life. That was it! The H must have stood for health, but he couldn't think of what the P meant. Kek wished he wasn’t just a stupid kobold, because a more educated creature or man would probably be able to take full advantage of this power instead of flailing about trying to figure out the right words for things. At least he wasn't illiterate, which was rare for his species, or he would probably be dead by now. That might be in the first time he realized that knowledge could truly be powerful, even in the hands of someone so small and misunderstood.
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