Cold air burst through my nose with all the subtly of a bull in a China shop. I shivered, barely able to suppress the desire to curl up into a ball of my own clothes.
When I opened my eyes - closed because of the breeze, I found myself in a winter wonderland. Within the center of a small clearing in the middle of an even colder forest.
Frost covered the barren trees whose leaves had fallen with the winter. The frost bit at my skin so much that even my clothes couldn't stop a sliver of it.
I had closed the pod moments ago and counted to three in my head. Three seconds. That was all it took for my body to shiver with enough force to power a damned city.
The two participants before me. I thought that they were just wimps. But eh, I guess that it was too realistic for them and they weren't able to handle death.
Thinking on it. Would I be able to?
They had come out of their pods with ghost white faces and shaking hands. Barely able to even sit up without assistance.
Had they chosen the hardest difficulty and as a reward, suffered for their hubris?
[Welcome to Sanctuary Demo version 1, please select a difficulty.]
[A friendly reminder that because this is a demo, and demo version 1, this will contain only combat. So please choose wisely.]
[Easy] [Normal ] [Hard] [Extreme] [Suicide]
Even as that thought flashed through my mind, as I read through the text in front of me.
I knew that there was only one answer to the question it posed.
"Heh~" I laughed to myself.
Yeah, despite their warning. In gestures rather than words.
I still chose the hardest difficulty. Suicide.
Without even a thought of my own safety.
/./
The world flashed once. But the difference between then and now was worlds apart. It was in the air. The plants seemed to move with a finer touch, the wind touched my skin with a more... alive breeze for a lack of a better word.
"Combat… in this weather…"
My words were spat out between the coldest winds touching my body.
It was not possible.
There was no way that I was fighting in this weather. I had no weapon. Nothing but a coat that did nothing to stop the winter frost.
My hands and wits. My only weapons.
I splayed my fingers over the snow covered ground. A hint of something strange wafted into my nose. But I didn't have the experience nor the knowledge to know what it was.
"An enemy. It's a combat trial after all."
Muttering to myself, I didn't even bother to keep my voice down.
Just as this was a combat trial, so too was this an examination.
The test was of two parts, the difficulty and the results.
That's why I had so impulsively decided on Suicide difficulty. If this was a trial of results and difficulty would it not stand to reason that the greatest difficulty with the greatest results would win.
The results meant more to me than the potential danger and anguish. It was not a matter of if's and's or but's. This pod would be mine.
Of course there was reason for this passion. I was driven not by want but by an ultimate desire. To be the best. Or something like that. It wasn't fully developed.
I waded through the snow, careful to keep my steps easy. I ignored the cold and the shivers. Wading until my mind eventually drifted towards the cold gaze over my back.
I didn't care to find whether it was instinct or warning. Only that by my sixth sense was I able to leap out of the way and onto the ground.
Before my body could register the cold another warning forced me to roll onto my other side and away from the enemy.
A cry left my mouth as I impacted against a tree.
The creature was giant. Maybe the size of a horse. But unlike a lithe horse this one had the physique of a tank. Rough edges climbed over its back like a snowy mountain. Eyes so glacial that they mimicked the very sea.
When it blinked the snow accumulated above its brow fell to the floor with a tiny thud.
"Heh~" I laughed.
"Hahaha~"
My hands bunched into the ground and found snow. Naught but piles and piles of snow.
I curled my fists and threw the snow. Balled into fist sized snowballs.
It didn't do anything.
Well besides flinching. That was probably because it had expected some danger and found snow.
But it had slowed in its approach. Enough for me to leave the immediate area and attempt my escape.
I can't beat that thing. I can't beat that thing.
The same phrase kept echoing in my mind.
I couldn't do this without a weapon or an advantage.
So I ran to escape the prowl of that creature.
Others might have given up and tried to find some place to hide and plan another day. I didn't.
I looked around almost religiously for anything. A cliff, a waterfall, even just a lake. Anything that could be used.
There was nothing but more trees, bushes and dead berries that littered the ground. There was not a single other creature either.
I looked back over my shoulder, there was nothing. Not a single sign of that creature. Like it had given up on me.
I held no belief that it had. It was more likely that it was stalking me. Like… like… a human… I laughed. And laughed and laughed. Until my breath could no longer hold up to my laughs.
"If that is so… then…"
I trailed off.
Looking around my surroundings. I took a mild pace towards some random direction. Making sure that I stayed on path, using each and every tree as a marker.
At some point I turned. My path was no longer was straight, it was not linear. There was a purpose to my stride.
I looped around. Finding my old footsteps I had placed but minutes ago. But there was something different. A set of large footprints that could be from nothing but that giant creature.
The beast was not light. Its hooves left deep craters in the ground.
Despite all the adaptations I had seen. There wasn't any way to hide its weight.
Once again intelligence had trumped strength. And it would do the same again. Soon.
There was hope yet for this impossible task. It would only take thought beyond the normal and mundane to trap this beast like the animal it was.