Chapter 5 Will to Survive

James had never been too afraid of dying. In the world he grew up in, death was an everyday occurrence. He knew deep down that one day he would die, and he had accepted it.

However, he had always believed it would happen in an accident or attack from those more powerful than him. Something quick and without too much pain.

Now, as he burrowed deep beneath the surface away from the behemoth set on killing him, James understood the fear of death.

Each labored breath felt harder, the darkness of his surroundings so absolute that he wouldn't have been able to see his fingers in front of his face. Through his senses, he could feel the pressure of the surrounding soil trying to fill the pocket of air his ability had created.

He felt totally alone, injured beyond anything he had ever experienced, and, more than anything, afraid.

His life had not been easy before, but he had survived everything thrown at him and made a life for himself. He had understood his world's dangers and learned how to avoid them or mitigate them.

Even when he did get injured, he could at least depend on the aid of others in similar situations. Living was not impossible.

However, the situation he found himself in was beyond anything he had ever experienced. He hadn't even been in the world for more than an hour and already felt like he was dying, buried at an unknown depth underground.

The fear ate at him like nothing had before, and something within him snapped. A shift occurred that turned all his fear into a rage at the situation, his weakness, and his fear.

James's mentality changed as he promised to live through this if only to spite the world and what it had done to him. He vowed to grow stronger to the point that he would never feel as weak as he did right then. To the point that no one would dare harm his dream of living a peaceful life.

The promise made and will set, James decided his next step was to ensure he survived his current circumstances.

Knowing that his injuries only worsened as time passed, he decided to try and focus his ability inward. To check his situation, something he believed should be possible considering his brief glimpse within the tree and golem.

Unfortunately, as soon as he began to focus his thoughts on his body, the soil, supported by his ability, fell towards him.

Quickly switching his focus back to the earth above him, James caught the ground and pushed it back into place.

"Fuck." James cursed, realizing he could not safely attempt to treat his wounds underground. As the solution wasn't complicated, he immediately began to rocket through the ground again to at least increase the distance from the golem before surfacing.

He pulled the surrounding soil around him so that it flowed around him like a torpedo passing through water.

After traveling forward for a few minutes, James felt the pain in his chest grow stronger and knew he didn't have the luxury of traveling further.

Deciding to bite the bullet, he adjusted his body and rocketed upward… and upward... And upward.

Confused, James began to grow desperate and tried increasing his speed. As soon as he attempted to speed up, his body started to wrack in pain, pressure squeezing him from every angle. Stopping immediately, he gasped for breath, coughing up blood as he did.

"Fuck," he cursed again. He knew from the blood he was now bleeding internally. "This day gets better and better."

Pushing through the pain and slow loss of oxygen, James continued upward now at an angle, carefully maintaining a consistent speed.

Finally, as he felt he may simply die beneath the surface, he reached it. The light graced his face again, and the air was full of oxygen.

As soon as he realized he had broken the surface, he reinforced the sides of his hole and began focusing inwards.

The pain wracked his body and unfocused him from his task, but the desperation pushed him to continue focusing inwards. Never having tried his ability on himself outside of reinforcing his skin against damage, James had very little idea of what he was doing.

However, after coughing up what felt like a pint of blood, he could finally see the inside of his body. It was like observing a 3D model he could control with a thought.

James quickly honed in on the area around his lungs and found the issue. One of his ribs had broken and punctured his lung in the span of his escape from the golem. In morbid curiosity, he watched as the lung slowly filled with blood from where it was damaged.

As desperate as the situation was, or maybe because of oxygen deprivation, he couldn't help but think about how useful this ability could have been in his old world. He wouldn't have been at the bottom, that's for sure.

Breaking himself out of the observation and hallucinations, he tried to think of how to fix the situation. He wasn't a doctor and did not know the best treatment methods. However, even without a medical degree, it was clear to him that if the situation continued, he would die, probably quickly too.

Taking as deep a breath as he dared, James began to work on saving his life.

First, he used his ability to slowly pull his rib out of his lung. The pain of that first step nearly made him pass out, but he knew he would die if he didn't, so he gritted his teeth and pushed through.

Observing the bone being pulled out of his lung wasn't doing anything great for his sanity.

With the bone removed, James ignored it and moved on to patching up his lungs. He didn't know how to do that, so he could only use his experience stitching up wounds from his past. Pulling the hole closed, he willed the flesh to meld together.

The pain from that was far worse than the removal of the rib. His eyes shot open as he screamed and thrashed within the confines of his tiny hole.

Eventually, his nerves seemed numb to the pain of being melded together. After gasping for breath from the experience, he focused once more on the inside of his body.

Looking towards his damaged lung, he saw that the hole was gone, with only a bit of scarring left to show that it ever existed.

With his worst injury taken care of, James let out a small sigh before firming his will. He then spent the next few hours putting his body back together in the same way. Each time James connected a bone or even moved it within his body, the pain would push him nearly to the breaking point, and he would remember his vow every time. He would survive, and he would thrive. Finally, he mended the last of his fingers before abruptly passing out in exhaustion.