After I had finished with my feast,-for the first time in days- not something of human origin, I burped in satisfaction.
It was chewy, but had a distinct and rather fatty flavor, it was not only filling, but warmed me up too, so I can't complain. Bear is quickly becoming a new favorite of mine.
The issue is of course, still the spike in my spleen.
Luckily, it's still in there, but I really don't know what to do about it besides just, keep it in there until I can see a doctor. Fuck, I don't even know if I should be eating right now…
I mean, I do have a rune in the Runic Board that I devised a while ago, that's supposed to heal a wound, but it's only a prototype, I haven't even memorized it's make up, let alone actually try to make it in reality. And before I could be confident in using it on myself, I would need to run a bunch of tests on animals, and even then, I don't even know the real limitations of it. since the runic board can't simulate the complexities of human life, or any kind of life above single celled organisms. And the board was really vauge about the specifics of what that rune actually does.
All it said was 'allows for the healing of small wounds, as long as the caster keeps firm concentration on the task of regulating mana intake and output.' Which might sound like it makes sense, but what the hell constitutes a 'small wound' to something like the system? And what matters about the concentration? Is it more important to focus on how much magic gets in? Or I would need to keep attention on keeping mana from escaping?
There are simply too many variables that I have no confidence in for now, maybe in the future, after I have enough time to learn how the thing interacts with living creatures, and hopefully not blow up a squirrel or something in the process…
But of course, this whole tangent was to avoid the extreme threat that had taken up my attention as I sat and digested.
Boredom.
These past few days have been so stimulating and stressful, that I haven't had even more than a few hours to unwind, and even then, it's been mostly when I'm unconscious. But all that being said?
A part of me has started to expect some bullshit to happen, so being relatively safe to eat, while not having some threat looming over me, it's started to feel alien, that's lead of course, to boredom.
I could try to meditate some more, but I don't really want a bigger migraine, I could try working out, but I don't really want my body yelling at me right now…
Bored bored bored, bored bored, bored?
You know that feeling, when you're looking at something for so long, that you start to see things, inside it?
I might just be hallucinating again, but there's something in the darkness.
Not really like, a real, physical thing, but more a kin to, shapes?
Like I see helix pinwheels, and eight lined circles. Not octagons, but like, eight lines coming from the center of a circle and connecting with the circular edge.
But there was also a wiggly line that moved like a worm.
There were also things that I couldn't really describe, like a trapezoid that had a seemingly endless amount of trapezoids that slowly rotated intra-clockwise.
What is intra-clockwise? I have no gods damned clue. But it was the best word for what I was looking at.
There were also lines that looked like the wiggly squiggles, but they had three humps on both sides, but one of the ends of the line interlaced with the midsection of another part of itself, and therefore started to make my brain hurt by looking at it for too long.
There was also, some kind of an ouroboros, but it was like, a circle, with no ending and no beginning, and for somehow was shrinking without actually getting smaller???
Over all, it was bunch of mumbo jumbo, completely incomprehensible, and probably illusions produced by my mind in order to cope with the lack of stimulation.
There were also a bunch of squiggles, some that reminded me of numbers others of letters, but mostly it was just a bunch of lines and dots doing weird things.
Fuck, it could also be a last ditch effort of escapism, I heard that brains do that before they die as a way to try and run away from the inevitable. That was a morbid thought, but really, if I'm going to go crazy, I could at least give myself the decency of making the delusion Intresting.
Who's gonna look after my house? It certainly isn't going to be Allen, he'd have to pry the deed from my cold dead hands before I ever let him even lay a finger on my property!
He'd probably have turned it into a fuckin training field… he'd say some shit like 'ahh ya fackin brat! When I was yer age I slept standing up in a hollowed tree trunk to avoid getting eaten by vicious predators! Learn ta respect yer elders and aye might let ya sleep when yer dead! Now get back ta dodgin, ya hear me ya lazy git!?' Or something like that, crazy ass codger…
Now that I think about it, I haven't actually trained with him in a bit… I've been too focused on learning about soul seeing, and rune crafting in hopes it'll give me an edge against whatever test that blighted stick wants to throw at me.
So I haven't really been doing my job as his scout….
Uh oh. Uhh, you know what? I think I'm fine with dying here, actually, he might just drag me back from the after life anyway just to give me an ear lashing…
If I ever get asked about what's the most OP magic in clover, I would have to answer be Allen Vale's Mythos Magic.
It's entirely unfair, but the old man has something like beast magic, but instead of embodying beasts or monsters, he embodies the qualities of anything considered mythological.
Which, you'd think would mean that he would be able to take on the qualities of a dragon or something right? But no, they have to specifically only exist in myth.
Things like sapient balls of electricity, or three headed octopuses, or even a really, really, reaaaally fast cloud, it doesn't matter, as long as it doesn't exist in this world as anything but legend.
Which is just, so utterly broken, it isn't even funny. And he uses them to beat my ass in 'spars' if I miss something while scouting.
I like to think I've gotten better at dodging, but I doubt it'll make much of difference against that speed freak.
Wait… with this stupid amulet on.. oh shit. I'll be slower in the day, which is when he likes to 'give the fools their licks' which is what he calls beating me and the other apprentices up for doing something wrong…
Sometimes when there has been a particular fuck up, he won't even use magic, which is somehow hurts worse.
I snap out of my nostalgia, as I notice something I hadn't in the darkness.
One of the longest, but slowest moving lines, opened up, to show a very human eye.
And after that one opened, one after another began opening from the same line, until there was a fucking golden ratio of eyes. All staring at me.
It was just about the most horrible thing I had ever seen.
This is not what I meant when I wanted my mind to make my near death delusions more interesting.
It turns out, divine madness is not nearly as interesting as people make it out to be, it's just shapes that make you crazy apparently, cool, but ultimately lazy.
Sure, there was a part of me that was screaming in terror, but like, what was the point of being afraid? Like really, what the fuck is someone supposed to do in this situation?
'Oh no, there's a spiral of eyes staring at me, OMINOUSLY!!!' come on, bunch of bodies fused together, then it was the bunch of hands fused together coming from that book, now it's eyes? I mean, what are eyes gonna do. Seriously?
Seemingly responding to my thoughts, in between the eyes, sharp, gleaming and razor sharp rows of teeth seem to stretch into another golden ratio, but out of teeth this time.
Of fucking course. Eyes and teeth on a background of pitch black darkness? What is this fullmetal alchemist? What's next, am I gonna see a little well dressed boy who wants to kill me? This attempt at escapism sucks!
Nah! Fuck this shit.
Irregardless of the pain of standing, I manifest my strings, use them to help leverage the bear again, and start moving again.
It's slow at first. My body immediately started protesting. But I had eaten. I have digested, about half of my mana reserves had come back.
Meaning that I don't have to be complicit in the illusions of my own broken psyche.
As I pass the stagnant pile of eyes and teeth, I stop for a moment, and poke my middle finger into one of the eyes and say "you suck!" And continue on my way.
My hand came back slimy…
For no reason in particular, I sped up by coiling my Ki around, and through my muscles.
I pointedly did not look in the direction of the feeling of being watched.
Really needed to get that cardio in…