Running through the rainy woods with just his spear, shield, and a half-filled bag on his back, Diven cursed his previous self for feeling bored. Boredom was better than nearly being stomped on by a deer so large he could only see its legs disappearing into the clouds.
He still wasn’t sure what it was exactly, all he had seen were the two sky-piercing legs that ruined his camp, but it was enough to know he didn’t want to stay around.
He didn’t make it very far before he encountered a problem. A small bipedal creature with thick orange fur and a long tail was eying him from a tree branch.
When the little thing noticed Diven, it started screaming at the top of its lungs.
Diven was about to ignore it and continue when a second one appeared on another branch. Then a third, and before he knew it, he was surrounded by dozens of little cackling orange monkeys.
A memory popped in the teenager’s mind.
Swarmlings.
These creatures were known to originate from some rifts and cause absolute havoc on their passage. Before their rampage snuffed itself out. The little disasters were dangerously reckless and tended not to last long out of their natural habitat.
Before he could think more, the horde of swarmlings threw itself at him.
Diven had no choice but to fight. With a swipe of his spear, he slew the first row of beasts but their numbers kept growing.
Thinking quickly, he started moving, he needed to break out of the encirclement. Step by step, he moved toward the river, the only place where he wouldn't be surrounded.
But the fighting was rough, for every swarmling he blocked with his shield another would manage to scratch him. For each he impaled on his spear, two more would appear.
Uncaring for survival, the horde hurled itself at him with reckless abandon.
His vision was drowning in orange, his ears assaulted by the constant cries of the swarm.
Still, he held on.
For all their destructive tendencies, an individual swarmling was relatively weak. Its bites and claws were unable to penetrate his skin. Every scratch added up, but it would take a while for him to fall.
His progress was unbelievably slow. The thick undergrowth was hard enough to navigate in normal conditions, it was nearly impossible with a swarmling horde harassing him.
But he wasn’t about to give up.
He had survived the behemoth stepping so close to him, a few swarmlings weren’t going to scare him. Not even when hundreds of them were constantly poking at him, trying to wear him down.
For once, he was glad he had his shield. With how light the swarmlings were, blocking them was not very taxing and it was freeing up his attention to concentrate on his exposed sides.
Swipes and strikes of his spear took out the orange goblins by the dozens; he could almost swear his striking accuracy was improved by Spearfishing. The motion was very similar and each swarmling was about as large as a big fish.
Skills could synergize like that so it wasn’t too much of a reach. That said, he couldn’t be sure, it was also possible his Spear skill did more work than expected.
Everything was going too fast for Diven to really process. Soon, one of the swarmling managed to draw blood by scratching his right arm with its claws. Then, soon after, he received a bite on his leg.
Slowly, they were whittling him down.
He needed to do something. But what? He was already fighting with all he had. There wasn’t much more he could do.
Desperation started to set in, and with it, his movements became frantic, sloppy, less controlled. His strikes were fueled more by panic than strategy. He was committing too much, and taking too many hits. Struggling to maintain his composure, his defenses faltered.
He was on his own. Help wouldn’t come. Part of him was ready to give up. Yet, another part was exhorting him to continue. If only out of spite for the clan that had abandoned him.
That’s what they wanted.
They sent him here to die.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
He wasn’t going to give them that. There had to be a solution.
But the soft claws of the swarmlings were ripping into his back. Their small fangs that bit his neck tickled more than they hurt but blood was starting to flow and soon, he would lose.
He wasn’t close enough to the river, a few dozen meters maybe. His best bet was to jump in and maybe cross to the other bank or let the current take him downstream. Swarmlings hated water. At least he hoped they did.
But he needed to get to the water first.
Each step was tantalizingly slow, everywhere around him was filled with swarmling, from the canopy to the ground where he had to take care not to step on one of the little orange menaces lest it destabilized him.
Falling to the floor here would be a death sentence.
Realizing that, with how things were going, he was not going to make it, he gritted his teeth and attempted to charge through the pack. He would take the hits, but he would make it to safety.
The swarm offered little physical resistance to his charge, but every swarmling he passed by landed some damage on him.
Still, he pushed through. It hurt.
He was bloodied and battered when he reached the bank. Not taking the time to think, he jumped in but as he entered the water he noticed he was headed straight to an underwater portal.
It was a swirl of purplish magic spinning. A tear in the fabric of reality. Out of place. Unmistakable.
Unable to stop, he was sucked in and landed butt-first on a pile of snow. All around him, there was nothing but snow.
He took a deep breath. Now was not the time to panic. He knew he had entered a rift.
How did a rift end up here? He didn’t know. He had seen no sign of a rift in the area until the swarmlings appeared.
Of course, the horde itself was coming from a rift. It was a well-documented phenomenon. During the formation process of the rift, for a short moment, monsters that dwelled inside were able to take the portal and get out into the real world.
Swarmling rifts were one of the worst in that regard. There were so many of them that they were sure to wreak havoc on the rift’s surroundings.
That said, Diven was sure he wasn’t in a swarmling rift. If he was, he would already be dead after being mauled by an uncountable number of the little beasts.
At least, he was safe from them. But even if he wasn’t in immediate danger, rifts were never without danger. Even the tamest one was a deathtrap, especially for a weak teenager like him.
Racking his brain, he tried his best to remember what little he had learned about rifts.
Rifts were holes in the world, portals to another reality promising treasures and secrets. Brave adventures ventured into them and cleared them for riches. Another thing he remembered was that rifts often appeared in clusters which would explain the chaotic scene in the forest. If a bunch of rifts spawned next to each other, the monsters streaming out would surely be a problem.
Not his problem though.
At least not yet. Now he had to figure out what to do in that snowy rift. He couldn’t just walk back into the portal he came from. The way wasn’t only blocked for rift-dwellers but for everyone. He had to find the exit portal.
Taking stock of his situation, he sighed. He had lost his bag in the scramble to escape from the horde. Now all he had were his weapons and the ragged clothes he had on him. No food, nothing to drink, nothing to wear.
Despite the wintery landscape, it wasn’t that cold. Even with his skin touching the snow, he barely felt a chill.
It was strange. But Diven wasn’t in a position to question what he was experiencing so he quietly took the win.
Needing a moment to recover from the exhaustion, Diven stayed lying on the ground for several minutes. After such a fight, there had to be some progress to his skills so he looked into his inner garden.
He almost forgot the predicament he was in when he noticed the state of the rotten tree.
The branch representing the Facet of the Hoplite was fully grown. The sapling was bigger, its trunk larger. If not for the rotten black streak extending from its base, one would think the tree was perfectly healthy. It too had grown, the pulsing gash now released a dark, ominous fume.
This couldn’t be good.
Still, the rest of the garden seemed unchanged, the bamboo grove was larger, and the brambles surrounding it were thicker and denser.
He was growing.
Skill leveled up: Spear lv4 -> lv5
Skill leveled up: Shield lv2 -> lv4
Facet of the Hoplite completed. You can select a new facet.
He could feel it.
For the first time since his awakening, he felt the effect completing a facet had on him. He felt stronger, more energetic, more… Complete?
It was hard to translate this sensation into a proper thought. It was as if he discovered a piece of himself he didn’t know was missing.
All things considered, it was a good thing.
He would be allowed a new facet, and with it, at least a skill would come.
He needed all the help he could get.
The dangerous thing with rifts was that it was a lot easier to enter than it was to leave. There was no portal he could simply walk through to return to the Wildlands.
Instead, he needed to leave the rift.
In essence, it was simple. To leave a rift one simply had to find the exit. But in reality, execution was always complicated.
Rifts were not safe. No signs were pointing the way to go. There was only danger. Be it in the form of monsters roaming the rift or, like here, the harsh environment.
Stranded in the middle of nowhere, with only snow and thick fog as far as he could see, Diven knew he had a tall order in front of him.
First, he decided he would explore his surroundings. He needed to see if there was more to this rift than snow and fog.
Surely, the impenetrable haze hid things in its midst.
Anyway, he couldn’t just stay here. Standing up, he stretched his weary body. Since he couldn’t see anything past the length of his extended arm, he picked a random direction and started walking.