Chapter 1: The Sky Only Yields To Those Who Climb

Caleb hung in the open air.

It was one of the only times he truly felt alive.

A cool breeze blew across his sweat-slick skin. His arms strained with exertion, fingers digging into the bare rock, pressing hard enough to split. A trickle of blood slivered its way down his calf from a gash on his shin. Muscles and tendons screamed for release, but he forbade them.

He could not fall here. He would not fall here. Falling would spell the end.

Come on, he thought to himself, jaw clenched, eyes narrowed on the stone above. Just climb.

It was the most dangerous point of the route – completely new territory. And the worst part was he could only afford one crash pad, and he’d since climbed past the point he would land on it. Beneath Caleb was about twelve feet of air, and then a swarm of gnarled tree roots and small rocks. He’d only been able to mime his movements from down below, guess at the best way to the top of the rock. Now that he was dangling like a spider on the ceiling, it was a lot harder to remember what his plan had been.

But despite the looming threat of crashing into the earth and breaking his bones, Caleb couldn’t wipe the smile off his face. Most people took pleasure in hanging out with friends and family, playing video games, or going out to parties, Caleb only took pleasure in one thing – Climbing.

It was only then, hanging on that razor-thin edge, that he felt life was worth living. That risk, the chance of falling, having everything distilled to a perfect point of success and failure. Everything else was bland in comparison, devoid of color.

Every single day after slaving away at his office job, sitting at a desk, he did the same thing. Hopped in his clunker of a car, changed into his climbing clothes that he had sitting in a beat-up duffel bag, and drove an hour out of the city to climb.

It would have been nice to have a friend with him out here. That way, they could move the crash pad when he was no longer above it, but then he’d have to talk to them. When he climbed, he didn’t want any distractions. It was like he entered a meditative state where it was just him and the rock.

There were a few other people nearby. Fellow climbers that he’d seen around this area on a few separate occasions. He could hear them talking and laughing occasionally, and he didn’t want anything to do with them. Once, when Caleb had gotten to a particular crag before them, they’d demanded he move and go somewhere else, claiming that that rock was theirs. Caleb didn’t want to talk to anyone while climbing, and he certainly didn’t want to fight anyone, so he’d just left and let them have the stupid rock. Those dicks weren’t worth the trouble.

Almost there, he thought, preparing to maneuver his body to the next hold. He’d been trying to complete this route for two weeks now. Trying and failing.

He’d almost made it to this spot on the route once before. That had been two days ago now. When he’d fallen then, he’d barely avoided breaking his arm and had been wearing a wrist brace ever since. That wrist brace was currently lying next to his backpack on the ground. If he fell, he fell. If he broke his wrist, he broke his wrist. If he broke his leg and couldn’t get back to his car… eh, hopefully that wouldn’t happen. He couldn’t afford the handicap of wearing the brace while climbing, and he didn’t want to wait until it fully healed to start climbing again.

Was it the wisest decision? Not really. Did he care? Not at all.

His chalk bag dangled from a clip at his waist, swinging beneath his body. Caleb carefully released his right hand from the small grip it had on the jutting rock – just barely enough for the pads of two of his fingers to find purchase – and stuck it into the bag. The chalky white powder coated his fingers.

The seconds ticked by. Caleb breathed in, preparing himself to leap headfirst into the unknown. Birds tweeted, flitting from the tree branches, and annoying laughter carried on the wind from the asshole climbers nearby as he heard a car start up, but he paid them no heed. It might as well have been as though they didn’t exist. Just him and the rock.

And then he swung, pushing off with his legs, tightening his grip with his left hand, stretching and reaching with his right. It was a split second of floating through the air. Then his right hand grabbed onto the rock, clenching around a tiny outcropping like a vise.

He’d done it! One move closer to the top. Now to repeat the process all over agai–

Initiating System…

Caleb blinked. He nearly let go of the rock. “What the…?”

Please refrain from moving to avoid any complications during Initiation…

Was he dehydrated? Hallucinating? The screen appeared to be floating directly on the rock face, just a few inches from his nose. He had the urge to touch it, but the warning and the fact that if he let go of the rock, he would fall kept him locked in place.

Then the world began to shake.

Initiating Terraforming…

It started light at first, just small rattles, like an eighteen-wheeler was driving nearby. But there shouldn’t be any cars near him – let alone any eighteen-wheelers. He was out in the middle of nowhere. His car was parked about an hour to the east and he’d had to carry all of his stuff, crash pad included, on his back to get to this rock.

The shakes started growing more violent. He held on for dear life, desperately hoping that it would soon pass. Small bits of dust and rock fell from the rock around him, raining down to the ground. Trees shook, shedding their leaves. A clamorous crack split the air as a fissure raced its way up the rock face toward Caleb.

“Shit!” he yelled, whipping his head back and forth, trying to find the source of whatever was going on or a safe way down. An earthquake? But it couldn’t be. He was in the middle of Texas – there were rarely ever any earthquakes here, especially not ones this powerful.

A nearby tree groaned and creaked, wood splintering as it fell over. But it never hit the earth. A massive fissure opened up on the ground right beneath him, swallowing everything whole. The tree fell and disappeared down into its shadowy depths, plummeting until it vanished from sight.

Caleb’s crash pad tumbled into the fissure, along with his backpack and wrist brace. Just minutes ago, falling meant a bit of pain and maybe a broken bone. Now… What could it mean besides certain death?

Spawning Dungeons…

The rock Caleb was hanging precariously on, clutching to like it were a buoy in the middle of a storming ocean, sheared away from the rest. It pitched back, and began to fall. He held on as the massive chunk of stone the size of his car plunged through the air, spinning like a bucking bull. It took every bit of strength he had to keep from being flung off.

Populating Dungeons with Soulless Monsters…

Everything was a whirlwind. All Caleb knew was that he was falling. Falling into the titanic fissure that had split the earth. Stone, dirt, and wood flashed past him in a nauseating smear of greys and browns. His head swam. Saliva gushed in his mouth as he forced himself to swallow the bile that had surged up his throat.

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Populating Dungeons Complete.

Spawning Dungeons Complete.

Initialization Complete.

Planet Solar-AE109, otherwise known as “Earth” has been successfully Initialized into the Aethereum. Planetary Grade: E

The screens rippled into existence, locked in front of his view despite the turbulence. Like their location was based on where he was and where he was looking. He could see them clearly. They looked like the notification boxes that he’d seen when he played video games as a kid – though it had been nearly a decade since he’d last played. As soon as he finished reading them, the screens vanished, leaving him once again hurtling through the darkness.

A powerful purple glow appeared beneath him. Or was it above him? It was difficult to tell what with all the spinning. It shone like a violet sun, and it was growing closer.

The entire world became washed in purple light as Caleb fell toward the glow, still gripping to the boulder like his life depended on it. It very likely did.

A tickling sensation covered his body as he fell fully into that purple glow. It felt as though a thousand tiny bugs were swarming over every inch of his skin. The glow became overwhelming. Even when Caleb closed his eyes, his sight was filled with it, shining through the thin skin of his eyelids. He wanted to scream but the wind stole the air from his mouth as soon as he opened it.

There was nothing he could do but hold on. So that’s what he did.

Warning! The Dungeon you are about to enter is of a significantly higher grade than someone of your Aether Level can complete. It is highly recommended that you turn back.

Great advice. He’d just put the falling rock into reverse and back up.

Caleb’s world was swallowed. The purple light dimmed, shifting to a cool white, and Caleb opened his eyes.

Welcome, Caleb Ward
You are entering a Dungeon: Mistveil Peaks
Grade: E
Completion Objectives: