Crimson Stone

He could see several bones, some looked human. Even so, he composed himself and walked again. Upon arriving at the place of origin of the light, could not suppress his disappointment, the light came from the ceiling of a higher area of the cave and was at least 6 meters high. There was an opening of one meter in diameter.

'It's just impossible to go up there.'

So, Jonas was beginning to understand why there were so many bones scattered there. They fell into that hole, and either they died of the fall or they couldn't get out anymore. The same thing must have happened to the wolf.

'The wolf...', Recalled Jonas, 'I won't survive long without food, I can't walk in these caves. The only plausible way to survive is to go down that abyss of stalagmites, take the wolf's flesh and pray for a way out.'

Having solved his plan, he didn't take long. The human bones still had clothes, so Jonas went through searching the bodies. Over time he found what he wanted, two daggers, they were well rusty, but still serve his purpose and a leather canteen.

Upon reaching the edge of the abyss again, he saw the body of the huge animal torn down there. A sense of vertigo rose in his spine.

'That's completely insane, but it's also the only way.'

Jonas nervously began his descent, tried to jam one of the daggers in the rock of the wall and found difficulty, but with a few more attempts he managed to fix it, soon was able to put the other.

The hardest part is finding footrest in the damp stones of the cave, and it worsened because his legs trembled.

'I can't believe I almost tried to kill myself. Now I'm so afraid of dying.'

He went down slowly, even though his arms were already showing signs of tiredness, but there was no way for it, slow down it´s safer. The weakness in his body was evident, like someone who was suffering from cachexia.

However, the further he went down, the more Jonas believed he would survive. When he reached half the height, he calculated that he could resist the fall, but not with so many stalagmites underneath.

After another meter, he heard a metallic tinkling and the dagger that was in his left hand broke. Jonas grabbed his right dagger with both hands, desperately trying to find a firm footrest, but it was too late. The second gun came loose from the wall and he came down.

The impact on his back came soon after. He lost consciousness for a few minutes, when he woke up, he was confused, touched his chest hoping to find the tip of a stalagmite, but there was no injury. His arms and head were also fine.

'Thank God!'

However, when he tried to get up, he felt a violent snare in his left thigh. When groped in place felt the tip of a stone. It´s had crossed over. A cold sweat descended on his spine.

'I'll probably die of bleeding, or from an infection if I can't find help, but there isn't other way I needed to get my leg out of there, I needed to keep walking.'

With both hands he pulled the thigh. A snare-blowing pain ran through the entire limb, ripped out cries of agony.

After much effort and tears, his leg came out of the stone, bleeding openly, as Jonas feared. He quickly tore his sleeves with the dagger, that was still whole, and improvised a tourniquet. He applies it forcefully above the injury.

'This will serve per hour.'

He stood up, leaning on the stones, and walked staggering where the wolf had fallen. Carcass of the impaled animal was huge, so Jonas thought of taking only one of the legs, because it was how much he could eat before it spoiled.

He used the dagger to tear the joint, but soon noticed how poor this type of weapon was for this service and, moreover, the animal's skin was extremely resistant, so Jonas could not pierce it.

'That's ridiculous!'

With the pain in his thigh attacking him and hunger, he had no choice but to use the already open wound on the animal's belly to remove some organs and eat.

He inserted his arm where he thought the liver might be, when he felt a consistent mass, he pulled the organ out, had some difficulty, but in the end he succeeded. Then he looked for his heart, this one was being harder to find, so he put his arm deeper.

Thus, Jonas touched a hard object, like a stone, but the peculiar one that appeared to have a spherical shape. He removed the object and in the darkness of the cave he shone, a crimson glow.

"But what is this?" he marveled.

In addition to the glow, the stone also eased a warm warmth, a feeling of comfort spread through Jonas's arm. After a few minutes admiring he decided then saves it. You thought you'd take a closer look at him when he wasn't so fucked up.

After removing the animal's heart, he hurried to look for a way out or at least something to burn and make a fire.

He soon realized to his relief that down there the cave had no forks or several passages as at the top. Thus, the fact that he could survive or not, nothing depended on his choices now.

After walking for half an hour Jonas had to stop. His thigh had bled again, and if he squeezed the tourniquet more, he feared he might lose his leg, but if he took much longer to find the exit there would simply be no choice.

He sat down and took the liver with fear.

'Hunger is relentless, or I'll either eat enough energy to get out of here.'

So he summed up his food. Even the animal's liver was still very hard, hard to cut with its teeth. After only three bites, Jonas had a fatigued jaw, so he used his dagger to cut small slices and swallow them whole. Soon he finished, leaving no leftover. The taste was terrible, but Jonas didn't care, now he wasn't hungry anymore.

After his meal he felt sleepy. In this way, he decided to rest a little before continuing the walk.

While lying down he removed the small stone from his pocket and i look it closer. The strong glow that once existed in it diminished. That scared Jonas a little.

The stone itself had no deformations or inscriptions. It was as smooth as a sphere could be. The boy sighed and again kept it.

'I look like a child admiring shiny objects.'

So, he decided to let it go and fell asleep.

...

After a while, Jonas woke up. He was hungry again, but a little less than when he first woke up in this cave. Soon after, he smelled a strong putrefaction, he feared it was his leg, but soon noticed that stench came from the heart he had removed from the dead animal.

'The state of this heart seems to be at least 3 days of decomposition. Have I slept all this time?'

In the end, he decided to simply continue the walk and adhered to this prolonged sleep to tiredness. However, when he tried to get up something unbelievable happened.

'My leg! I don't feel pain anymore.'

He analyzed the wound there was still plenty of blood on top, but when he groped and ripped out that crust, underneath there was only a newly formed skin, no other sign of injury had left.

'That's just impossible!'

After thinking for a while, he remembered a small stone that had relieved his pain by touching it. Then he stuck his hand in his pocket and to his surprise he found only reddish stone bran.

'That's the only explanation, but what the fuck was that?'