3 Cave

Don't tell me I'll have to go all the way there... I started the walk with a since dread, knowing I'll have to walk back afterwards.

"I know what you were thinking and we both know I'll never shut up. I'm not the damsel in distress,"

"You're not my girlfriend or the frightened princess, I know. Just stop being in my head... it's uncomfortable,"

"Not like I like reading you or anything!" Amber did a tsundere impression and instantly broke her act with laughter, "Really though, you make it too obvious,"

S-She almost sounded like a villain.

We jogged to Damon together, but in the end, it was more like Amber carrying me.

"W-Why... my stamina... I hate everything about it," I whispered.

"You are SO heavy. You owe me one for this, I feel like my arms are ripping off of my body" Amber dragged my practically dead body.

"One of the heaviest swords that were in the blacksmith is on your back, it's like 80 kilograms. My weight is NOTHING compared to you running casually with that sword! YOU DON'T EVEN USE IT,"

"It looks cool okay? Why did I learn random Latin? Just because it's cool. You are moving and produce drag. Also talking with you steals energy from me!"

Feeling's mutual.

"You know you like me," Amber teased with a smirk.

I really don't think so...

After half an hour we finally caught up to the others and their relentless complaining. One good thing though, Shin was later than me, making me escape being the butt of the joke.

"Please tell me I had to drag 59.4 kilograms all the way here for something important,"

Why does she know my weight on the decimal point?!

"Rounded, 59 kg is what Kirito's weight is. You're basically Kirito with blue eyes and the decimal is a lucky guess," Amber whispered making sure that I was the only one that heard.

Why? How are you so lucky? I don't understand why fate loves you so much. Is it just making up for the bad stuff that's gonna happen because you'll be the bad guy?

"I found a pretty big cave. Thought it'd be fun to explore, but to be safe I wanted to see what you guys think," Damon said, leading us deeper into the forest.

We strolled for a bit to find a clearing in the middle of the forest and the big cave-like Damon said. The cave towered over me and looking in, you can only see darkness.

"S-Scary..." Fay's hand flinched for a second.

As the soft and fading light of the sun starts to cross the west horizon. It was dusk. We should head bac-

"Let's go back, it's getting dark. Who knows what kind of monsters can appear at night here," Misa started to walk back to the grass field but was stopped by Amber's arm.

"We came all this way... why don't we go a little bit further?" Amber stared into the shadows, lingering.

"It's not safe for you, we should listen to what Misa sai-"

"Said? Come on... don't be cowards. Think about it. Think about how many monsters we can slay in there. How much we can level up. We won't be weak anymore..." Her tone, sinister. Her voice felt like a serin casting her spell, persuading anyone who listened. She was focused... even to a scary degree. She looked afraid, but also excited.

"What's wrong with being weak... let's just go," Damon backed away from both the cave and Amber.

Amber shifted her glare to Damon, there was no malicious intent behind it, but even though she wasn't looking at me... I felt a chill go down my spine, "Being weak is the worst thing you can be-"

"Alright! Time out!" I gently slapped her head for her to snap out of it.

"Hey! What was that for?! I was about to have my character moment!" Amber whined.

I guess she's not taking this whole thing seriously huh? Didn't expect her to, but she looked like she got really into character then.

That overwhelming sense of fear though... it kinda reminds me of my childhoo-

"Your character's backstory is way too long for you to have a flashback in the middle of a scene," Amber pouted, disappointed she couldn't get her cool character moment

It isn't long... you just didn't want me to have a moment cause you couldn't get one... didn't you?

"What. Ever. Do. You. Mean, ha... ha..." Amber looked away, once terrible at lying, always terrible at lying.

"Anyways let's go, guys!" Amber tried walking casually into the cave, but immediately got stopped by Misa.

"Where do you think you're going after that little stunt you pulled?"

Misa's mad... oh no...

"Ah... ha... ha... ha... lord have mercy on my soul!!!" Amber ran inside the cave as fast as she could, instantly followed by angry Misa and concerned Damon.

"I hope you won't get Arifuretaed Hajime," I teased Shin and walked inside. We can just pretend like we lost track of time... besides... I feel like we really did. I could've sworn it was about 3 pm when we first saw the cave.

Either we're time bending or our concept of time is way out of wack...

"Come on Fay, we'll lose track of them if we don't follow," Shin's normally annoying stubborn voice became soft and almost gentle.

What's there?

"Could it be... chemistry?" Amber snuck up behind me, surprising me in the process.

How did you get here?!

"I ran and I ran and I ran and I didn't stop. Dude you guys are so slow, I've been running for like 20 minutes already and you're still at the entrance?" Amber raised her eyebrow while leaning on me, trying to catch her breath.

Wow, I thought she could run for hours. Guess I was wrong...

"It's full speed running, what do you want from me man?" She whispered, slightly tired, slightly irritated.

"I'm just... scared of the dark..." Fay's trembling body slowly made her way inside, holding onto Shin's shoulder.

"No rush! I wasn't blaming you! It's totally normal that people are scared of the dark," Amber smiled

The fricking double standards!

Walking away, I wanted some peace and quiet. It was dark. We should've brought some torches... how stupid.

Why did we expect a cave wouldn't be dark?

I feel like they turned up the brightness too much in anime that they made us thought it'd be the same here... there's not even a brightness setting in the menu... thank you very much, system creator!

Stepping blindly I felt the floor breaking underneath me! I'm I gonna fall?!

The fragile stone beneath me collapsed and I fell!

About 5 foot down.

Well... that was anti-climatic. Unnecessarily. Wait... wait for a second...

I opened the menu to go to my skills list and pressed activate on 'soul flame'.

A blue transmutation circle appeared from my right hand with a screen saying [Caution! Activatable by speech of the spell's name. If made eye contact with, the flames could blind the human eye]

Cool...

"Soul flame" I lit up the cave with the cold bright blue flame. Surrounded by stalagmites and stalactites I realized how lucky I was to not have dropped down on one of them... it would've gone right through me...

I grabbed my stomach, feeling sick just imagining it.

"H-Hiro! Hiroto where are you!? Where did you go?!" A scared voice cried out. That sort of tone was one I haven't heard in years from that voice... Amber's voice.

"I'm right here!" I waved my flames back and forth, trying to climb out of the small hole.

A torch illuminated Amber's position as she finds me. I stood up properly, out of the hole, brushing the dirt off of my pants.

"The hell were you thinking?! Don't make me worried! There can be dangerous monsters in here! You could've died and we wouldn't even know for sure!" Amber grabbed the collar of my shirt, throwing me around the room.

Was she... actually worried?

"Hey, it's cool. I only fell a few feet. That's all. You don't have to be so worried,"

"No, coming in here is MY idea. If you die here, YOU'RE ghost will haunt me for life!"

That's... strange. I haven't actually seen her worried or scared like this ever sinc-

Her eyes widened, "My backstory's not important. No one needs to know it. I'm just not willing to have a whole character arc and back for you, it'd be a pain. Anyways, Shin fell down and we have no idea how far or even where he'd end up. I thought the same thing happened to you, stop giving me heart attacks!"

I walked towards her, relief that at least I wasn't lost, "Yes ma'am. I'll be carefu-"

I felt the brittle ground collapse. This time, my eyes couldn't see the floor beneath me, only the black of the abyss. The world seems to slow down to a crawl as I tried to reach out my hand.

Amber's hands reached out as fast as she could, running towards me without a care in the world if she'd fall with me. Forging an iron staff for me to hold onto... but it was too late.

I'm falling...

There's nothing I can do about it until I reach the ground or get stabbed by stalagmites. I can't die here... can I?

Does it matter if a side character like me die?

I wonder...

What a lame death.