Chapter 13 - Jungle Rumble

  Welcome to the jungle, it gets worse here every day

  You learn to live like an animal in the jungle where we play

  If you got hunger for what you see, you'll take it eventually

  You can have everything you want but you better not take it from me

  - Guns N' Roses

  Ira was the first through, and she barely had the wherewithal to step aside for her husband, Dimitri, who repeated the cycle with Solis and finally Samir, each falling for the same trap of staring jaws agape at the brightly lit jungle in front of them.

  The air stuck to the group's skin, and just breathing in deeply felt thick with moisture.

  Solis chuckled to himself as he swished his hand back and forth, realizing there was a low mist hanging on the ground, which slowly dissipated upon approaching the tree tops. Strangely enough, it wasn’t grass underneath their feet. The floor was all still stone, just covered with the underbrush of a dense forest. Additionally, while there wasn’t a sun, the entire forest was illuminated by bulb-like fruits that emitted light.

  “I’m pretty sure we’re getting the water we need just by standing here. Pretty sure we could wring out our clothes for a little extra too.”

  “I would not advise that.” Samir shot back.

  “Hey, sometimes that’s how it be.” Solis said. He took a moment to pull out his notebook, but when he attempted to write in it the paper felt flimsy, almost damp. With a huff, he turned and made the hand sign for [Translate], “Dimitri. You got a bead on that water you heard?”

  The bald man held up a hand and closed his eyes. When he opened them, he had an uncomfortable smile. He pointed to the trees and signed [Translate], “I think what I heard was water dripping from the leaves.”

  “Ah, well that blows.” Solis said as he stared out into the rest of the jungle. There wasn’t a path to be seen, and walking directly through without clearing any of it would just result in torn clothing and falling into a tangled heap.

  Considering their situation the grin on Solis’s face shifted into a smile as he spread his arms wide to the group, “This is actually really good. It’s damp enough here we can collect water. There are a lot of plants, some of them have to be edible. A new light source, and most importantly,” he let that one hang in the air for a second, “we don’t have to eat crickets if there are other animals or monsters!”

  Ira picked up a twig and threw it at him. Despite the damp air, Ira still wrote in her notebook in broken English, “Talk much. Save mana. We no listen.”

  Grimacing, Solis nodded and turned to Dimitri, “Explore. We search.”

  Dimitri gave a thumbs up, handing his wife the large military knife he borrowed from Solis, and she began slowly clearing a path through the brush.

  Without much else to do, Solis started to help widen the path Ira was clearing. Somehow, that shifted into bringing leaves and plants to a bowl by the entrance and squeezing every last drop of water he could out of them. With the leaves, small droplets collected on many of their surfaces, and it was simple enough to let those fall into the bowl.

  The plants were a different story. It seemed like some of the vines stored water inside of them, while many of the other plants didn’t. He put the water from the vines in one bowl, and the mashed-up remains of plants into the other. Maybe it was poisonous, maybe not, but they had nutrients and moisture, and worst case, Samir could hit them with a [Purify], as painful as that may be.

  After three hours of cutting through the underbrush, everyone in the group needed a break. They drank greedily from the water bowl and sat, sweating and hot, as they stared hatefully at the jungle in front of them.

  Ira said something in Russian, and Dimitri laughed. Solis didn’t know what the woman said, but it sounded like a curse, and a particularly long one.

  Nudging Samir, Solis spoke.

  “What else do you think is here?”

  Solis’s words broke Samir from his thoughts, and he half flinched.

  “Er. What? Oh. I don’t know. I’m still amazed that all of this is here. I don’t recognize these trees or those plant, not even vaguely.”

  That brought a frown to Solis.

  “Really?” he picked up one of the vines he had squeezed dry and inspected it closer for anything off about them. It looked like a vine to Solis. The only thing he could pinpoint as a possibility was the vine being mostly hollow.

  “Yeah,” Samir offered lamely, “I don’t even know how these things survive without sunlight.”

  “Hell, maybe they don’t. They could’ve been teleported here too, might die soon. There’s no dirt. Or there could be a giant hole in the ceiling a ways in leading straight up to the sky. Wouldn’t that be neat?”

  “I continue to be impressed by your seemingly bottomless positivity.” Samir let a small smile touch the corner of his lips as he said that, which surprised Solis more than anything.

  “Well yeah. I mean, this shit can be scary, don’t get me wrong, but things were scary before too. For some even, I think the system was a good thing. How many people in horrible situations a few days ago just got teleported out of them?” Solis thought of his siblings, not Fami, but the fifty or so others.

  Samir didn’t say anything at first. He had opened his mouth to retort, no doubt, but soon closed it with a contemplative look on his face. “You said something the other day. You thought the System was trying to help. That it wouldn’t have teleported children to a truly impossible place. Do you believe that? Truly?”

  With a smile, Solis nodded, “I do. It may be the hope talking, but I believe it itself, or at least whoever made it wanted us to succeed. I think about them a lot, the potential architects. I like to think they were kind.”

  “That is,” Samir hesitated a moment, “a nice thought to have.”

  “What about you?” Solis asked.

  “About what?”

  “The System, where it came from, or whatever else?”

  Another pause, another thought-out answer, “I do not know. I haven’t thought much about it. Life’s just been … chaotic ever since. Didn’t really have the time for anything besides sleep and what was right in front of me.”

  “That’s—“

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  A gunshot rang out.

  Solis hissed in pain and slammed the ear muffs on.

  He was already on his feet, gun leveled at the forest.

  Samir had hit the deck instead of standing. Hands over his ears, lying prone.

  A stray thought flashed through Solis' mind, ‘He thinks he’s getting shot at.’

  As quickly as the thought came, it was gone. Dimitri was shouting. He held the gun out towards the forest. He had taken steps back. Ira was in front of him.

  They were in the mini clearing by the crack that led back to their camp. The path of retreat remained open. Nothing immediately flew out of the forest. No more shots were being fired, return or otherwise.

  “TRANSLATE” Solis boomed, projecting his voice as loud as he could. “Dimitri I need info.”

  “Crickets! There’s a dozen. They’re deeper in. They’ve been watching us this whole time! I heard rustling before, but I saw them!”

  ‘Shit. Why haven’t they attacked. Why couldn’t Dimitri seen them? That was his entire build!’

  Solis began to panic, but as soon as he felt the dread welling up in his chest, he activated his Resonance at full power. His processing time and thought process almost doubled, and he could take in all of his surroundings with a clearer mind.

  They weren’t being attacked. They were in danger, sure as day, but that danger wasn’t on top of them. A question filled the young man, ‘can we beat 12 level nine monsters with four people, three of which lack combat abilities?’

  The question answered itself. Solis took a step towards the crack and kneeled. With one hand on the stone, he began pushing the mana into his palm. It recognized the stone and began mimicking it inside Solis’ mind as he began constructing fortifications.

  Everyone making a break for the crack wasn’t an option. The squeeze was too tight, movement too slow to ensure, without a shadow of a doubt, everyone would make it back inside if the crickets decided to attack, and Solis didn’t like that uncertainty.

  “Translate,” Solis spoke with an eerily calm tone, “I need to focus. If they attack, run to me. I have a plan. Otherwise come when I shout, and Samir bring me a twig or something. Anything with wood!”

  With that, he began building. Even with what amounted to basically two streams of thought moving twice as fast as usual, it wasn’t enough for the size of what he wanted to make. His mana didn’t want to stay in the form he commanded, which went double for the portions of the structure further away or out of his direct line of sight. Then a twig landed in Solis' outstretched hand, and the real work began.

  He had to force maintaining all of the stone structure to one of his streams of thought, while the other one was constructed with wood. Once, he had tried to make something out of two different materials with the same thought stream, and his construct had shattered instantly. He couldn’t afford that to happen here.

  Still, after a minute of real time, he let out naught more than a groan to his allies; too focused to spare any part of his mind to forming actual words. Luckily, Dimitri seemed to pick up on his cue, and soon everyone stood around him. That’s when the crickets started leaping out of the forest.

  They came in flashes of movement, leaping from the ground to the trees, or from the trees towards the group. Solis couldn’t count how many there were, but he knew there were too many. He solidified his mana construct.

  From nothing sprouted a dome of stone around the crack. Small slits littered the dome at eye level, cricket level, and sporadically through the roof, just enough for a bullet or spear could slide through, but not large enough for a cricket. The edges of these slits were reinforced with additional stone, and the entire dome was supported by wooden struts, crossbeams, and numerous pillars throughout.

  Just from looking at the construct, it was clear that Solis had never taken a structural engineering class, as the supports were seemingly randomly placed, like someone panicked and threw them at the dome, which is exactly what happened.

  Crickets began peppering the top of the dome as they landed, but with their light bodies and the density of the stone, the structure held, but it was not without cost.

  The vertigo hit and was much worse this time. Completely cut off from the light of the forest Solis began twitching on the floor. He bit his cheek, hard, if only to stop himself from biting his tongue. It took all his effort to roll his tongue back, let his cheek go, and then clench so he wouldn’t accidentally kill himself.

  He didn’t even bother trying to get to his feet, but he did roll onto his stomach. Failing to keep breakfast down, he heaved. His brain felt like mush. He couldn’t think, could hardly breathe. He needed to activate Resonance. The blowback caused him to dry heave as his ability screamed at him.

  ‘The System said something about expelling corruption. Attacking it? How? How am I supposed to do that. Where is it?’

  Activating [Mana Manipulation] he scoured his internal mana, searching for what was causing him such intense agony.

  The others were shouting, but he couldn’t hear them. He felt a hand on his shoulder, and he aggressively batted the touch away. More hands. More hands pinned him to the ground. The back of his shirt was lifted, and he started thrashing wildly.

  He couldn’t find it. He couldn’t— There. A void of darkness tore at his mana membrane, and more of the same substance started congealing on the outside, waiting for a hole to open.

  Then the pain of [Purify] hit him as did the cold clarity of his surroundings. He screamed out, long and drawn out.

  He was panting on the ground a minute later, face down—thankfully not in his own vomit. It seemed Samir had the wherewithal to scoot him over to the side a bit.

  “Solis. Good?” Dimitri asked, his voice steady, but concerned.

  Solis gave a thumbs up, still face down. Then let out a chuckle.

  “Translate,” he paused and then lifted his head with a grin, “For the record, don’t overspend mana. Shit sucks.”

  Solis threw up again.