WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Alyo

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◈ Surviving as a Warrior in a TRPG World ◈

Chapter 55: Adrift (2)

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"Haah... Haah... Cough...!!"

Gerik drifted through the underground cave, his injuries worsening on top of everything else.

The internal injuries that the potion had barely managed to seal were beginning to worsen, perhaps from moving for so long. Every so often, after walking a certain distance, he coughed up clots of blood.

'So this is how I go again...'

Gerik spat a clot of blood onto the ground, wiped his mouth with a hand, and looked at the red blood staining his palm.

It was a situation in which any ordinary person might fall into despair and give up. Yet Gerik did not.

'I'm not afraid of dying. The problem is how I die.'

He had already experienced a life ending in vain once before. Through that experience, he had come to understand all too keenly just how precious every second of being alive was.

So even if death was likely now, he had not the slightest intention of letting go of life.

'Every moment. Do my best. Even if it's only a futile struggle.'

With that thought, Gerik moved his legs again.

Silently.

Grrr...!!

"Ha... Even while I'm dying, I'm still hungry."

He had no idea how much time had passed when he heard his stomach growl and gave a faint laugh.

He stared briefly at his empty food pouch, then raised his waterskin to his lips to endure the hunger for now.

"Hm...?"

As he lifted his head to drink, something strange entered his sight.

It looked like the remains of something that had shattered.

It was higher up than where he stood, so he could not inspect it properly. After quickly gulping down some water, he forced himself toward it.

"...Ruins?"

Beneath the vast cavern ceiling lay scattered fragments of broken statues.

Dimly lit by his torch, the debris suggested that this had once been a place of worship.

The ruins formed a massive circle.

As Gerik passed between the broken statues and moved farther inside, the torchlight revealed an enormous structure at the very center of the cavern.

Circular steps carved upward, and at their peak, a space that looked like an altar.

It was badly damaged, but the structure still possessed an imposing grandeur. Overwhelmed by it, Gerik raised his head and slowly examined the top.

'A door...?'

Curiously, a lone arched doorway, resembling a triumphal arch and just as badly damaged, stood atop the great altar.

It was a structure that led nowhere.

Gerik could not make sense of it.

'Phew... It looks like there's nothing else around here.'

After slowly looking around the ruins, Gerik realized there was no way forward. The only path leading elsewhere was the one he had come through.

'Is this as far as I go...?'

He had no food or water left. Going back now to search for another exit made no sense.

Gerik felt certain that the end had truly come.

'If I'm going to die anyway, should I at least take a look at that altar first?'

Gerik coughed up blood again and smiled bitterly. Using his sword as a cane, he slowly began walking toward the altar.

Hummm...!!

"!!"

When he had climbed about halfway up the steps, an unknown sensation swept through Gerik's chest.

It felt as though something atop the altar was calling to one of his belongings.

"...This is..."

To find the source of that strange feeling, Gerik reached into his clothes and took out a pouch. As if possessed, he opened it with trembling fingers and pulled out a familiar object.

An old key engraved with a goddess of unknown name.

'Come to think of it... There was a statue associated with this goddess on the highest floor of those ruins.'

As he ran his fingers over the key, Gerik recalled the statue he had seen in the ruins where he fought the Grizzly Owl.

'Then this altar is probably connected to that goddess too.'

Gerik felt both excitement and unease. The goddess he had encountered in a past nightmare had clearly been an evil, ominous being.

She loved living creatures, but her affection was twisted somehow. His instincts strongly warned him not to approach carelessly.

'But...'

Gerik bit his lip.

'Isn't it better than dying without trying anything?'

You never knew. Perhaps the goddess might show him some bizarre favor and save him from death.

If there had been another way, he would have chosen it. But right now, Gerik's only chance of survival lay in the favor of the ominous and evil being before him, one that loved him nonetheless.

Having made up his mind, Gerik moved again. Leaving himself to the sensation guiding him from the key, he climbed upward one step at a time.

Before long, he reached the top and faced the arched doorway standing before him.

The moment he saw it, he felt an even stronger yearning flow from the key and began walking toward it as if entranced.

Hummm...!!

As he reached the space beneath the arch, an intense wave began flowing from the key in his hand.

"...!!"

Startled, Gerik looked down at the key and saw the wave taking shape, turning into a single light.

'Dark... light...?'

It was a contradiction in itself, but there was no other way to describe it.

It was clearly darkness, yet it illuminated the surroundings.

It looked as though it defied the very order of the world. And as its power grew stronger, Gerik instinctively realized that his very being violently rejected it.

Soon, the light began pouring into the empty space within the arched doorway.

The moment it touched the space...

Fwoosh!

The empty doorway warped, and something began to ripple within it.

Then, before long, the space itself tore open, revealing a new world beyond.

'A portal...?'

Seeing the miracle before him, Gerik instinctively recalled a piece of Tabletop Role-Playing Game lore he had read in his previous life.

He stared blankly at the thick brush and dense trees visible beyond the portal.

'Could this lead to the Demonwild Forest...?'

As that possibility dawned on him, Gerik's previously calm emotions began to stir.

Perhaps it was not yet time for him to die.

Of course, the Demonwild Forest was far from safe. It was a green hell crawling with monsters in every direction.

'Still, it's a hundred times better than here.'

There was no way to survive in this place.

But in the Demonwild Forest... perhaps he could survive. At the very least, he could gather food.

'If I'm lucky, I might even stay alive on herbs.'

He had Skyler's Quintet, which gave him the powerful healing method known as Cure Serious Wounds once a week.

If he desperately hunkered down and focused on surviving, perhaps he could make it.

Having finished thinking, Gerik did not hesitate any longer.

He stepped boldly toward the portal.

And so, leaving the dark cave behind, Gerik passed through it.

'...Thankfully, nothing happened.'

Crossing the portal came with surprisingly no restrictions at all. It was like walking through a door into another room at home.

Feeling foolish for having been so afraid, Gerik looked around.

"Phew... Fresh air really is nice."

Though his injuries had left half his senses dulled, the firm earth beneath his feet and the cool breeze brushing his cheeks soothed his mind.

It was an entirely different, comforting sensation from the cave's damp, heavy air.

"...A hill?"

Gerik realized that he was standing atop a gentle hill.

Instinctively, he turned his head to look at where he had emerged.

Centered around the portal, another huge arched doorway stood there as well, like a twin to the one underground.

Unlike the underground ruins' arch, which had remained relatively intact, this one was far more severely damaged.

About half the arch had collapsed, and the moss covering its surface, along with the marks of weathering, showed how much time had passed.

"Is this the entrance to the Demonwild Forest...?"

Looking at the valleys scattered through the forest, Gerik was certain that this place was no farther in than the Boundary Forest.

At the outer edge of the developed area, the worst monsters were only Goblins, so even ordinary people could manage there.

'...I might survive!'

Seeing that his surroundings were far better than expected, Gerik clenched his fist in excitement.

Then he felt the key clenched tightly in his hand and looked down at it.

"Phew... In any case, you saved my life..."

He had no intention of becoming a follower of an evil being. Still, the goddess had saved him, so Gerik respectfully bowed his head to her and offered a brief thanks out of courtesy.

For some reason, he then felt as if the expressionless face of the goddess engraved on the key had smiled.

A chill ran through him, and he quickly tucked it inside his clothes.

Fwoosh.

To his surprise, the portal rippling behind him vanished without a trace the instant he put away the key.

"...I'm sure of it."

Seeing what had happened, Gerik became certain.

The old key engraved with the unknown goddess was an artifact capable of opening portals and instantly transporting its user to other places.

'That's why that unknown group was trying to get their hands on this key.'

The key's power seemed to have limitless tactical and strategic uses if employed properly.

Having experienced that power himself, Gerik understood why a certain group or person in power might covet it.

"...Huh?"

As he continued thinking about the key, the sight beyond where the portal had disappeared caught his eye.

"...!"

Something enormous stood in the space that had been hidden behind the portal.

Gerik's vision was blurry from his injuries, so at first, he thought it was simply a mountain of strangely colored rock.

But when he focused and looked closely, he recoiled in shock.

It was something shaped like a gigantic monster.

Something resembling an ammonite.

Its head resembled a many-limbed creature, like a squid or octopus.

But farther down, it had a hard, round body like an ammonite's shell, making its appearance all the more bizarre.

What shocked Gerik most was its size.

That enormous being was, at the very least, as large as a great ship. Its sheer presence was overwhelming.

'What the hell is that...?!'

As Gerik stared at it in awe, he realized that the unidentified being was too badly damaged to move and had been abandoned for a very long time.

'Ruins...!!'

Gerik instinctively understood.

That was no ordinary ruin.

A ruin of such immense size and strange shape was likely to hold some special history.

And that realization gave Gerik hope.

'If it's ruins like that...'

If the ruins were that bizarre and magnificent, there was a strong chance that researchers might be stationed there.

Archaeologists like Minos came all the way here because of one buried ruin in the Demonwild Forest.

What about ruins as grand as those?

Gerik began to grow excited at the possibility of survival.

If he was lucky, perhaps they could treat his injuries.

Of course, that might be a scenario calculated entirely in his favor. Rather than treating him, people who coveted his equipment might harm him instead.

But Gerik had no choice now.

He could only cling to even the slightest possibility.

'Let's go. That's my only way to survive right now.'

Having made up his mind, Gerik used his sword as a cane and began walking toward the ruins.

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