Chapter 39: Bottom of the Hole

Thanks to my training in tree-mimicry, I’d gotten good at erasing my presence and sneaking up on things. To test the results, I ended up skewering a whole lot of Horn Rabbits, Hedgehogs, and even some small Elks with my short spear.

There are probably a dozen or more Horn Rabbits and Hedgehogs sleeping inside my magic bag right now.
I ended up stealing prey from low-earning adventurers… I should reflect on that.

Training really pays off. When I walk through the forest with my presence erased, getting close to prey becomes much easier.

I walked alone through the quiet forest, and when I found a Horn Boar using detection, I crept closer and stabbed it with my short spear.

It was a mid-sized Horn Boar, and it was careless—
Behold the power of my custom-made magic steel short spear!
—or so I thought, until the Horn Boar convulsed and suddenly thrashed around, sending me flying.

For a moment I must have blacked out, because I came to from the pain.
I had déjà vu—this time I was alive, but the light shining from above made it clear I was at the bottom of a hole.

And I was wrapped in a dense cluster of presences; I didn’t even need presence detection.

When I sat up through the pain, the presences clinging to me scattered all at once—except for a few that stayed close.
The mass of presences that withdrew clustered together up near the light shining down, fluttering around almost like they were dancing.

Presences—spirits—do they normally gather this densely?

My body hurt and I had a bump on my head, so I decided to drink a healing potion… probably a basic-grade one was enough.

It wasn’t as disgustingly bitter as the Adventurer Guild’s infamous brews, but it still felt like chugging transparent green juice.
Still, the pain faded.

When I tried to stand up, I saw that several thorny vines were wrapped tightly around me.
It looks like they slowed my fall, and the twigs and dead leaves beneath me had cushioned the impact.

Two coincidences—and I got away with light injuries.
But good luck never stays long.

Mixed among the dead branches and leaves, I spotted scattered animal bones.
I hadn’t noticed because of the light from above, but the darkness around me wasn’t shade—it was walls.

Stone and earth all around; I was at the bottom of a pit.
The top opening was easily five or six times my height—basically the bottom of a well.

Worse, although the top seemed 6–7 meters wide, the lower interior spread outward like a funnel.

I searched my magic pouch for equipment; I had a thin rope, but climbing up with that was impossible—and it wasn’t long enough anyway.
The vines tangled around me were partly torn from the impact, so they weren’t usable either.

My light spell didn’t reach far enough to show any hope of climbing out.
Even if someone told me to climb those overhanging walls, I had nowhere near the skill.

As the sun gradually tilted and the bottom of the pit grew darker, I thought through every possible way to escape.

Fortunately I had 4–5 days of rations, so I wouldn’t starve. If I butchered my prey, I could stretch it longer.

I considered where to sleep. I doubted any wild beasts could get in or out, but sleeping without a dome spell felt scary.
Still, I didn’t want to dig into the dead leaves—after what happened before, something might go wrong.

Then I realized:
A thin tornado could suck up the dead leaves and branches like a giant vacuum cleaner.

So I wrapped myself with the balloon I used for catching birds to prevent debris from falling on me, then cast:

「Tornado! Suck it up!」

After clearing a five-meter area for a sleeping space, I made a Dome!, pulled out my portable bed, and sat down.

I finished my meal and, out of habit from camping, lay down and began my usual pre-sleep magic drain.

…Huh?
What the—!?

Presences swarmed before me, whirling around like they’d gone mad—
And then I passed out from magical exhaustion.

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When I woke up, I sensed a few presences nearby, and a huge mass of them farther away—though not as densely lumped together as yesterday.

The elf from the Apothecary Guild said these were spirits, but do spirits normally gather in such huge numbers?
And why here of all places?

I started overthinking it first thing in the morning, but escaping was more important.

My tools for escape consisted of two knives, a store-bought short spear, and a bow and arrows.
My magic-steel short spear was still stuck in the Horn Boar’s chest.

The rope was only thin enough for tying things or pitching a tarp—too thin to climb even if it supported my weight.

Even if I cut up my clothes or tarp, I had nothing to hook onto the edge above, and I wasn’t even sure there was anything to hook onto.

I spent half a day digging through the dead leaves and branches looking for something useful, but all I earned was a layer of dust.

I checked again if I could climb the wall, but there were almost no handholds.
At an angle leaning back 110°–130°, it was impossible.

I thought about using magic, maybe riding a tornado upward.
But could I go up 17–18 meters without getting dizzy?
And even if I made it, could I dispel the tornado and land safely on the ground outside the hole?
I didn’t even know what the terrain up there was like.

That night, I again performed my usual magic drain before sleeping.

Just like yesterday, the presences swarmed around me, as if confirming it wasn’t a dream.
But this time I only released about 70% of my magic.

The presences—spirits—seemed to gather around the area where they sensed released magic, writhing around it.

Even using Appraisal told me nothing.
I just tilted my head in confusion, released the rest of my magic, and fell asleep.

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Ignoring the spirits, I focused on escape.
Magic was the only realistic option, but how was the problem.

A tornado with slow rotation would have weaker lift, yet that didn’t guarantee it wouldn’t make me dizzy.
A dust devil was no better.

Was every wind spell I had destined to make me dizzy? I felt despair.

Looking for ideas, I made miniature versions of tornadoes and dust devils and lined them up.

Rings… vertical rings… balloons… nothing came to mind, so I dispelled them all—

—and ping!

A small tornado sucked up dead leaves and sent them flying upward.

If I entered the tornado, I’d spin just like those leaves…
But I had a secret plan.

After canceling the dome, I created a balloon, jumped inside, poked several holes in it, and practiced changing its size.

I expanded it until it filled the entire wall, but I felt no physical discomfort. It was risky, but I figured it would probably be fine.

Next, I needed to confirm whether it affected the spirits. I approached a cluster of spirits with a small dust whirlwind.

When the whirlwind got close, their presences scattered, but a small number of spirits didn’t flee. It didn’t seem to affect them much, if at all.

Even though I believed my chances were good, I steeled myself, took a deep breath inside a balloon about four meters in diameter, and began.

Imagining the balloon being caught inside the vortex, I chanted lightly, “Tornado! Spin slowly!”, while expanding the balloon to slightly smaller than the inner diameter of the vortex.

The balloon began rotating and rising, but its ascent wasn’t strong enough, so I raised the tornado a bit and increased the wind intake from below.

It reached the usual height of about ten meters, but with the thick tornado boosted by the updraft, the balloon suddenly accelerated upward.

With a pop! I shot out above the forest canopy. Panicking, I quickly expanded the balloon, and wind rushed in through the holes.

I felt a little dizzy, but the large balloon drifted in the wind as it fell. It got caught on a branch, so I shrank it and safely returned to the ground.

Success achieved.

Man, I was drenched in cold sweat.

After a short rest, I walked upwind to confirm the location of the spirits’ hole—I had been blown away quite a bit.

I made it back within five minutes. The area was messy with piled-up dead branches and fallen leaves from when I cleared space for camping, but when I looked down, I sensed that presence.

It might come in handy someday, so I memorized the area by circling around and checking the surroundings carefully.

Along the way, I found the Horn Boar’s remains and my bloodied short spear, so I cleaned it and tossed it into my magic pouch.

My clothes were already dirty enough, and since I’d encountered the spirits’ hole by heading south, I turned north toward the grasslands.

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Near the border between the forest and the grassland, I chose a tree to use as a landmark and made a Dome! there to rest.

I waited for sunset, then wrapped the landmark tree in a thick tornado. As I increased the tornado’s height and wind strength, thin branches snapped and leaves scattered everywhere.

Even from inside the dome, I shivered at the roaring vortex, the cracking branches, and the leaves exploding outward.

I didn’t intend to kill the tree, just damage it, so after extracting my magic and dispersing the tornado, I moved a bit while sensing for beast presences and created another Dome! Then:

“Tornado! Spin!”

By leaving random massive tornado tracks everywhere, only one damaged tree wouldn’t stand out. Well… the whole situation was unnatural anyway.

If I really poured my magic into a tornado and spun it at full force, I could probably destroy an entire house without much effort.

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I went to sleep early and woke when the sky began to brighten, sensing the same multitude of presences. It seemed I had become “spirit-attached.”

But none of the spirit-attached people I’d met had ever gained any blessings from the spirits, so having a large number didn’t make me expect much.

As the surroundings brightened, I headed north, reached the Blange Highway, and walked east. After about an hour I arrived at Zandra’s west gate.

From the west gate, I walked another hour, and heading south from there would bring me to the landmark tree anytime, meaning I could always find the spirits’ hole.

I had breakfast at the market, restocked my preserved food, and then headed for the Adventurers’ Guild.

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Since I didn’t have much prey on hand, I went straight to the guild’s dining hall, ordered some ale, and looked for an empty table—an empty seat, really—before sitting down.

As always, unfamiliar me attracted a barrage of stares, but this time I also noticed someone showing a different kind of interest.

I realized what it was when I lifted my ale mug to my mouth—there was a presence inside the mug, and I hesitated to drink.

Because of that thing, I’d grown used to being constantly surrounded by huge swarms of presences and several individual ones, so I wasn’t bothered lately.

Normally, even those with sharp presence-detection senses wouldn’t feel anything in the guild dining hall, yet since I’m always swarmed by countless presences, they must be able to sense something off about me.