“There you are!” Arthur laughed as he finally spotted his spear. He limped over to it quickly, pausing as he was halfway there as he realized exactly where it was located. It took him a moment too long, for the creeping vines had managed to get behind him and grab his legs.
It pulled him forward, forcing him to slam into the ground. Head tucked in tight against his chest, he felt the air in his chest explode out of his lungs, only one arm managing to smack the ground just ahead of his fall to break it.
His head swam, the concussion that had been slowly healing growing worse at the jostling. Blinding pain shot through him, his vision swimming as it dragged him closer to the large plant, red petals unfurling and the central stamen opening.
Arthur groaned, pushing himself upwards, focusing. He had rebuilt his Refined Exploding Energy Dart, stored it away and it was a simple matter to release it. It exploded forwards to strike the flower, burrowing within before exploding and spreading warm sap all across him.
The whole creature thrashed him around, bouncing him side-to-side in anger. On and on, it dragged him closer. Hands flipped around, Arthur managed to snag the spear from its resting place near the damn flower. After that, it was just a matter of stabbing around, again and again and a few frantic moments to lever the spear into the body to stop it from eating him directly.
Then, finally, the damn thing died, dropping him onto the ground to lie there, in pain once more.
“I hate this,” Arthur said as he slowly pushed himself up. “But I got what I need. My backpack, my spear and most of my gear. Now, I just need to put it in gear.” A hesitation, then he sighed, realising he'd used the same word twice.
He was far down, certain that he was off the trail. A cliff face from here meant he couldn't actually make his way back up, unless he wanted to climb it. And considering the flying monsters out there, he knew it was going to be a pain and a half. Nevermind the potential hanging vines that could grab him or otherwise attack him.
Still, that was the most direct way out. He could see the cliff face, hanging towards his left. A long way to climb, such that he couldn't see it.
The other option was to ignore the cliff face, the trail or at least getting back to where he left. He could backtrack, head to where it had started to make it easier. He hoped that he could reconnect that way, but he wasn't certain. On the other hand, he could go with option two. Not take the safe choice, and take a risk.
It was a risk, for sure, but he could head towards the end goal. He saw it, even now, the top of the mountain that he needed to go. He'd have to figure out a way to get pass the current cliff face, head sideways a little, make it through the mountain ranges and bushwhack in the direction he needed.
There was one other consideration. The packs.
Either way, he was losing a day. Maybe more. Probably more. There was no way he could risk climbing today, which meant he needed to hunker up and wait. That started pushing the timeline with the packs getting too close for comfort, either way. If he bushwhacked, if he did it right and headed straight for the mountain and the peak and the end, he was sure he could make up time. Even if he was further down, even if he'd lost a day, two days by being down here.
But there was danger involved.
"Tiu." Arthur closed his eyes, trying to decide, trying to work out what he wanted to do.
In the end, he turned away from the cliff and started limping way. He needed to keep moving rather than stay still and risk getting attacked. More to the point, he was worried about how much time he would lose if he waited. He'd tried the safe and smart methodology, so now he was going to go back to what he used to do - run a risk and hope it worked out.
Limping away, Arthur used his spear to aid his walk, eyes shifting from side to side as he kept looking for traps. He knew off the trail, traps would be fewer around along with monsters, but that didn't meant they weren't any. Keeping an eye on the peak and where he needed to go, he kept track of each step. Every time he had to walk around a tree, he moved back to his original line almost immediately after. He knew he needed to keep an overall straight line, what with the lack of a compass to use or any other form of guidance.
Eyeballing his way forward, Arthur kept moving, pulling at his various energy types to store another Refined Exploding Energy Dart. After all, it wasn't going to be this easy.
***
The first fifteen minutes was quiet, not a single damn creature to kill. He limped onwards, but soon enough the creatures that had been converging began arriving. Drying blood all across him, still limping and probably smelling like a snack with all the various pheromones he was giving off of being in pain, he would likely have been a tasty snack even for normal animals. As it stood, the monsters on the floor were more than happy to come for him.
The first, he took with a fist to the face and then a stab with the spear. After that, he kept his spear leveled, not even stopping to grab the core this time around. As much as he'd miss the core, if the roamers were arriving already, then more and more of them would just come.
Better to put distance between himself and the fall, to force them to fight over corpses and decide how long they'd want to track him. Some would eventually give up, others would continue but he would deal with them when it came to that. He couldn't stop them, but he could space out the attacks a little. So long as he kept moving.
The next was a giant green snake that dropped from above. Arthur hopped back, stabbed it once and then a couple more times till he managed to pin it to the tree. Since he needed to retrieve his spear from the still dying creature, he managed to retrieve its stone whilst slaying the creature by opening it half-up.
Levering his spear out, he kept moving. Weathering the occassional attacks from those monsters that chose to find him, or in some cases, to tear into the corpses kept him moving as fast as he could for the next hour. A semi-persistent use of Bark Skin kept him safe, or at least mostly protected even when he missed a swooping bird with extended claws or the slashing attack of some molelike creature.
It drained his cultivation stores, and even with the significant stores he had, it wasn't enought to keep it running constantly. By the time three hours had ended, he was out of the danger zone though, or at least so he believed. Attacks had grown less frequent, not even a monster that he couldn't avoid in the last half hour.
Arthur figured that was a success. At least for now. A few more hours, as the sun set and maybe a place to rest up and he would be significantly more healed, if not all the way back to normal.
Question was, what tomorrow would bring.