5 Cavern

I immediately grab my kodachi as I spring to my feet. I may have been clueless in the last timeline, but now I know just how dangerous this place is. Out of all the people that portaled to Agartha I couldn't be considered the unluckiest, but I certainly am not lucky either. Unfortunately, my current body's fitness couldn't match that of my past life and I instantly got a cramp for my effort and fell back to the ground. I wanted to shout in pain, but I knew that would be a terrible idea. After, giving my body a chance to recover I was ready to go again and slowly got to my feet.

The place I was teleported to was the middle of an underground cavern. That in itself wouldn't have been so bad. The real problem is that this cavern was the den of a Grootslang. The Grootslang is a snake like creature that has immense strength. It is 50 meters long, has pitch black scales, white oval eyes, and two long fangs that stick out of its mouth. However, its fangs are not poisonous, instead it uses the fangs to impale its prey then detaches its lower jaw, which has razor sharp teeth and minces its prey to pieces before swallowing it. Of course it can also just coil around you and crush you with its massive strength. Just a flick of its tail is enough to shatter bones. In the last timeline it took a hundred man team of level 20 humans two hours to take down the Grootslang.

Luckily, in my past life I didn't run into it, but I did run into a few of its offspring. By forcibly mating with other snakes the Grootslang produce offspring that are about five meters long and as thick as a human arm. They, like their parent, have two long fangs, incredible strength, and can wrap around a human limb snap it in half if you let it. I almost lost my life multiple times before. The only weakness they have is that their senses are limited since they mostly locate prey through sound. Also two inches behind their head is a reverse scale that was softer than all the other scales. It's a small target, but if you hit it you will pierce right through the scale and the snakes spinal cord.

Humans don't know if it is caused by some unseen rule of this universe or if it is just coincidence, but many creatures on Agartha have what we refer to as critical points. These are locations on a monsters body that can result in an instant kill. For some monsters it's a soft spot in their defense like the Grootslang and it's offspring. For others it requires a certain element or situation to work. Critical points are hard to find and most of the knowledge about them are close kept secrets. If it wasn't for a book I happened to find in my last life that described the critical points of many creatures I wouldn't know about critical points at all.

If the 100 man team had know about the Grootslangs critical point only one person would have been needed to kill it. If I were level 20 I would hunt down the Grootslang myself, but for now I'm too weak.

Currently, I don't have the strength I had before I died, so most of the techniques and abilities I had learned cannot be used. However, after concentrating some of the easier movement and blade techniques surfaced in my mind.

The first one that came to mind was a technique I picked up from a corpse I found in the Saarthal Desert during my last life, clearly it didn't work so well for him but it's all I have right now. It was called the shifting sands movement technique. It was very basic and essentially focused on using the strength of your toes to make sudden angular movements to quickly evade enemy strikes.

The blade technique I remembered was a mediocre one that was commonplace among humans called the body force technique. The technique focused on leveraging your weight behind the blade to make parry's and deliver heavy blows and strikes.

After a moment of contemplating them and preparing myself mentally I began to prepare myself to get out of this damnable place. Last time I wondered aimlessly fleeing from offspring before finding the exit. So I couldn't remember exactly how to get out. I would just have to try different paths and hope they lead me to the exit. Even my ten years of knowledge couldn't help me navigate this place. That's just one of the reasons I was hoping I ended up somewhere else.

Many tunnels branched from this room, so I arbitrarily chose a tunnel on my right. The ground was soft beneath my feet, which helps since it dampens the sounds I'll make. The whole cavern was covered in a misty, humid atmosphere. It was very dark but I could vaguely see about 10 meters in front of me due to a small fungus that gave off a weak glow. The fungus is harmless to humans as long as you don't eat it. If you eat it you'd be vomiting for hours as I learned on my last visit.

This tunnel goes on for quite a while, it had been about ten minutes since I left the last cavern. Slowly I began to hear a soft scraping noise coming from in front of me. I steeled myself, I knew what that sound meant. It couldn't be the Grootslang, the sound would be louder, it must be one of the offspring. I softly stepped over placing my back against the wall of the tunnel. I could hear the offspring getting closer each second. In a bend in the tunnel ahead I saw a greyish snake about three meters long with two short fangs protruding from its mouth slowly slithering down the tunnel. I almost let out a sigh. It was a fairly newborn. Once the offspring reach the adult stage they will be five meters long and have black scales. Being three meters long and having greyish scales meant this one was only about a year old. Knowing that I needed essence to get stronger I couldn't let such easy prey slip by.

As it began to get close I tightened my muscles getting ready to pounce. Just as it was about to pass me I raised my kodachi and using the body force technique putting the power of my entire body behind my strike as I brought the kodachi down on the critical point of the Grootslang offspring.

Essence gained +3

The notification flashed in the corner of my vision. ALIC would notify you every time you gained essence. Satisfied, I let out a sigh and as the tension left my body pain quickly took it's place.

Ughhh! I hate this! I screamed inside. I hated myself for ignoring my body for all those years on Earth. Obviously, I had over taxed my frail body with just that strike. I had to relax my muscles and rest for over an hour before my body felt well enough to move again. The body force technique while simple did use the entire body's force and my frail frame could barely handle that transfer of power.

After feeling normal again I began to skin the corpse. Even though I had the grain for food who knew how long it would take to get out of here and the scales can be used to make some light armor if I can bring it to a blacksmith in one of the towns. I put the scales and about five kilograms worth of meat in my knapsack. Too much would only slow me down. I could only carry about 20 kilograms total before my movement would be affected.

Again I set out to try to find an exit. After about two hours of careful traveling I came upon another large cavern like the one I appeared in. I was starting to feel hungry so I decided to munch on a little of the grain and drink a some of my water. I would have eaten the meat from my kill but I didn't have any way of starting a fire in this damp cave. I could eat it raw, but even in my past humans had not fully understood bacteria and diseases in Agartha, so it wasn't a good idea to eat raw meat.

After my short break, I looked at the surrounding cavern. Stalagmites were coming up from the floor and at the edge of my vision I could see the start of a pool of water. I began to move toward the other side of the cavern to look for another tunnel. I also kept an eye out for any Grootslang offspring nearby. I had to circle around the pool since I didn't know how deep it was and although I hadn't heard of offspring that could swim I didn't want to take the chance since I would be at a disadvantage underwater.

I made my way around the side of the pool and was looking into distance when I saw what appeared to be a tunnel. In my excitement I focused on the tunnel as I moved closer. Just as I passed a stalagmite on my left I felt a sudden change in the air. Quickly I brought my kodachi up on my left side preparing for danger. Just as I braced myself a huge force rammed my kodachi launching me backward. I slammed into a stalagmite knocking the breath right out of me and sending my senses into confusion. Forcefully overcoming the pain and bracing myself I looked up and saw a five-meter black snake with two long fangs wrapped around the stalagmite I was just walking past.

Crap! I was too careless. After seeing the tunnel I dropped my guard just a little. With my experience I should have never let something like that happen. It seems being on Earth for a day and seeing Mike had effected my mindset. Realizing the problem, I used a trick I had learned in the past and a cool sensation enveloped my mind. I calmly analyzed the situation.

It's an adult offspring and it has the advantage. I noticed a tension in the tail wrapped around the stalagmite. In the next moment the offspring used the stalagmite as a springboard and quickly shot towards me. Anticipating that move, I easily used the shifting sands technique exerted force on my toes and shifted my body to the right. Missing me, the the offspring slammed into the stalagmite. It became dazed not expecting me to be able to react. Before it could recover I brought the kodachi straight down on the offspring's critical point. After piercing through I could see the offspring struggle for one last second before giving in.

Essence gained +5

The ability to clear your mind and think rationally may not seem very useful, but it was this exact ability that kept me alive for ten years. Without my previous life's experience there is no way I would have survived this ambush. Even wielding a kodachi with enough accuracy to hit two critical points in a row without missing would have been a near impossible feat.

Just as I felt my adrenaline begin to wear off I heard the sounds of scraping coming from the tunnel I noticed earlier. It kept getting louder and louder. Then to my absolute dismay a dozen adult Grootslang offspring came charging out of the tunnel.

This is bad! They must have been drawn by the noise of our fight. Before I could start to panic I calmed my mind.

If I run back the way I came I risk my adrenaline wearing off and all the pain from the earlier fight will flood in preventing me from out running them. To go to the tunnel they came from is pure suicide. Then I looked over at the pool and thought I really, really, hope they can't swim. I only have about a half a second before the pain from my last fight overwhelms me. I don't really have a choice. I grabbed my kodachi and sprinted towards the pool.

Luckily, I was close to the pool and was able to quickly dive in.