System Programmer Chapter 20: Mistake

The scene in front of him defied all logic. For Joshua, who was very analytical by nature, such an absurd scene was… painful. Not physical pain of course, but it gave him the same impression as a defective program. If this were a video game, he would qualify it as 'nonsensical world design'.

"Did you find something?" Catherine asked him mentally.

"Now that's an understatement. Don't come over yet. I'm checking if this place is safe." he replied.

'Think rationally, Lockman, it is impossible for the sun to shine 15 kilometers below the surface. This has to be an illusion of some kind.' he thought as he launched a scan of the area.

He didn't find anything about the strange sky, but the ground did provide some results. Luna detected a large shape engraved below the ground.

'This is… a gigantic rune. Never seen one so big before... Let's see if I can decipher it.'

The rune was ridiculously complex, but he recognized some parts related to an Earth symbol. He figured this rune was responsible for allowing the grass and the trees to grow.

'Interesting, I think we're getting closer to our goal. This rune might have been created back when Easa was flourishing to boost the fertility of the land. It's impressive such a massive thing is still operational.'

He turned his gaze upward. The sun's position seemed to indicate it was midday. Joshua checked with Luna's clock, it was accurate. While he couldn't find anything regarding the fake sky, he assumed another rune was responsible for creating it, along with the sun. This one, however, bothered him.

'I can accept Easa building a rune to help the land develop… but as far as I know, Easa was on the surface. In other words, this fake sky was added much later by some unknown person. Whoever they are, they must be really powerful…'

He looked around to see if any animal was nearby, he detected various lifeforms. He saw some small lizard, a couple of rabbits, a lot of different insects and even heard a few birds singing. The place was actually pretty lively! Intrigued by the ground, he materialized his body and dug a small hole with his hand. The soil felt very natural. He took a deep breath, the air was clean and fresh. If he didn't know any better, he would consider this place a great camping spot.

Seeing no immediate danger, he told Catherine to bring the party over. They arrived after a few minutes. As expected, their eyes went wide upon seeing the location. Joshua shared with them the results of his scan. No one had any objections toward his conclusion, what he told them was quite logical.

"The question is, what do we do now? We can either explore this area or go back down the cavern and try to go further below," he concluded.

"I believe we should explore this field, as you said the presence of this rune probably indicates we are getting close to our destination. This area may give us some clues about how to proceed," Eric remarked.

Everyone agreed and they all started to head into the field. They stayed close to the mountain range as the number of trees was gradually increasing. The way things were going, the field would soon be replaced by a forest. Joshua remained in physical form, he was used to taking a walk through the forest near his house so he was feeling a bit nostalgic. He listened carefree to the sounds of the cicadas that could be heard all over the place. They soon reached the river they had spotted in the distance. Per Catherine's suggestion, they decided to follow the river to see where it was going. As the forest was growing denser, it was a good way to avoid getting lost.

A few hours passed as they followed the river. Nothing bothered them apart from a couple of foolish musquitos. As one might expect, they were quickly dispatched by Lydia. Most animals seemed to realize it was best not to bother the group.

As they walked something crossed Joshua's mind, this area was an open space, kilometers below the ground. Yet it seemed stable. One would expect to see some pillars to support the ceiling, but after a few hours, he had noticed none of them. This whole fake ceiling was intriguing him more and more.

The peaceful atmosphere was broken when Catherine & Joshua noticed thanks to Luna that all animals started to run in the opposite direction they were going.

"Danger ahead…" Joshua warned the party.

Indeed, a large figure was suddenly picked up by Luna. It was nowhere as big as the monstrous Hydra but still appeared to be at least five meters tall. The figure was moving fast and would reach them in less than a minute. Without hesitation, everyone climbed into a tree and hid. They were powerful but better safe than sorry. The ground trembled as the figure got closer.

Finally, the figure appeared. Most members of the group had never seen a creature like this before and were wary. It was clearly a savage beast and they should be able to defeat it, but the size of the creature and its gigantic teeth encouraged everyone to be careful. Well, there was one person who reacted very differently. Joshua looked at the monster with shiny eyes. He had never hoped to actually see one of those beings.

It was a dinosaur. To be more precise, it was a Tyrannosaurus Rex. As you probably know, children on Earth love dinosaurs. And most of them actually never grow past that phase and keep them dearly in their hearts. Joshua couldn't help it, he left out a chuckle and the beast turned its attention toward him.

"Joshua! It found you! Dismiss your body!" Catherine ordered him.

"No, Catherine, it's fine, its vision is based on movement," he answered with an idiotic smile.

The T-Rex saw Joshua hiding in the tree and swallowed him whole. His body got torn in two by the large teeth of the beast and got destroyed.

"JOSHUA!" Catherine couldn't help but say out loud.

Joshua's spirit appeared right next to the beast, his gaze looked confused and his mouth was twitching.

"Oh… I forgot.. That got disproven… Damn you, Dr. Grant…" he said, a bit disappointed.

The dinosaur was confused, the body it had put in its mouth suddenly vanished. The beast let out a large roar in anger.

"Seriously, did your brain go on a strike suddenly?" Catherine yelled at him.

There was no point in hiding anymore, Catherine had made some noise when Joshua got eaten, so everyone brandished their weapons. As a token of apology, Joshua materialized the new rune weapons he had designed, it was the perfect target to test them on.

The T-Rex was a powerful beast in his own right but compared to the Hydra they had faced, it was just a small lizard. Lydia shot several arrows that exploded on impact, piercing the beast's thick leather skin. Her sister danced around it as she kept hitting it with her staff, each hit sending an electric current through the creature's body, making it growl in pain. Finally, Boris smashed it down with a single blow. The combination of his herculean strength and the electric discharge proved to be fatal.

The easiness with which the creature had been slain was a testament to their resent prowesses. Of course, the new weapons had rendered the task even more trivial. Still, as soon as the beast let out its last breath, Catherine ran up to Joshua and smacked him in the face.

"How can someone as smart as you be so stupid?" she yelled.

As usual, Joshua kowtowed in apology.

"I'm sorry Catherine, please don't imprison me in a giant's beast stomach, where I'll be doomed to have my body dissolve over and over again...."

"Stop with your nonsense. What the hell happened to you?"

Joshua stood up and looked at Catherine. He saw her furious expression and was shocked. He really didn't expect her to react like that and tried to formulate an answer.

"Let's call it… a momentary lapse of judgment… "

Catherine sighed and continued the conversation mentally.

"Joshua, the next time you pull a stunt like this, I'm turning Luna off, understood?"

"Right… I'm really sorry. It was a childhood dream of mine to meet a dinosaur. Seeing one here suddenly… I didn't act rationally."

He vanished and locked himself up in his soul world. He sat behind a desk and started to bite his finger as he reviewed what had just happened. He thought Catherine was used to his nonsense so it wouldn't be that bad, but the way she had reacted led him to believe he had misread the atmosphere. Right, they were on a dangerous mission. When a predator appears, you stay focused, you don't start making noise and let him eat you for the heck of it. How could he have been so careless?

Joshua was suddenly filled with shame and anger toward himself. The way he had behaved was unacceptable. No matter how small he had put the party at risk. Realizing this, he bit his finger so hard, blood started to stream out of it. But what hit him the most, was a simple phrase that crossed his mind: 'I have disappointed Catherine…' Realizing that, he started to cry.

Chapter end