Chapter 11: It'll Be Fine

Half an hour later, we stumble to a stop. Not to take a break, although my pain filled body sure needs one, but to survey the latest obstacle that lies in our path.

We’ve been climbing for over an hour, but while we’ve been able to see the top of Benton’s hill for a while, it doesn’t appear to be any closer.

I take another look over the scene in front of me and sigh. Standing between us and the next section of trail, is a rope bridge placed over a thousand meter deep ravine.

What? A rope bridge? Sounds like fun, right?

Actually, no. It’s not fun at all. Because this bridge looks like it’s going to collapse at any moment.

Back in my previous life, Bridges were built with careful attention to detail. The plans were checked and double checked. The materials were chosen with extreme care.

Everything was done in a way that would prevent the bridge from collapsing fifty or even one hundred years in the future.

This bridge looks like it’s a thousand years old.

Sure, maybe at one point it was as sturdy and well engineered as the bridges from my previous life. But now, it’s falling apart.

The ropes holding up the bridge are frayed. The boards making up the floor of the bridge are rotten. Every time a gust of wind blows against the bridge, the entire thing flaps around like a flag in a hurricane.

That’s right, flaps. This bridge doesn’t sway in the wind, it flaps.

Oh, and let me remind you, Flappy Bridge is placed over a ravine that’s so deep you can barely see the bottom when you stand at the edge and look down. Why does everything in this world want to kill me?

To make matters worse, the kind of river that you’d find in a white water kayaking documentary, makes its home at the bottom of the ravine. Which means, even if I did somehow manage to survive a thousand meter fall, I’d still have to avoid drowning when I hit the bottom.

Yeah, I know. If I fall I can use my super swimming skills to save myself from a watery grave, right?

Well sure, if I was the protagonist of a light novel I’d be able to do that no problem. Unfortunately, reality isn’t so forgiving.

You see. The truth is…

I don’t know how to swim.

There. I said it. I’m not perfect. Are you happy now?

Why don’t I know how to swim?

Well, I was never given the chance to learn.

In my previous life, swimming wasn’t something my family did. Whether it was a pool, lake, or ocean, my family avoided any body of water that was deeper than our bathtub like the plague.

In this life, I didn’t learn how to swim because there weren’t any places to go swimming.

In the Empire, most of the water is heavily polluted. The lack of any sewage filtration plants really takes its toll.

Any bodies of water within the Empire’s borders that aren’t polluted are carefully guarded by the Empire’s army, so the only bodies of water that are available for swimming are the polluted ones.

Now, I know children can be stupid. But, even a kid like me knew that swimming in raw sewage wouldn’t be beneficial for my complexion. So, even though I’ve been blessed with the opportunity to live two separate lives, I never learned how to swim.

Cross a rotting bridge over a thousand meter deep ravine? Easy, am I right?

Heck, I’m an Adventurer. I can jump across the ravine blindfolded, with my wrists tied to my ankles, while wearing a 150 kilogram Weight on my back, no problem.

Not.

Maybe I could do it if I was Samantha or Denise, but in my current pain wracked state there’s no way I could jump even a quarter of that distance, even without any of the added handicaps.

“Do you think it’s safe?” Bridget asks, gesturing towards the bridge.

“Of course,” I say, attempting to infuse my voice with confidence. “I’m sure Samantha doesn’t want us to die before we finish the assessment.”

Probably.

“I’ll go first,” I say, the perennial gentleman. “I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

I walk up to the edge of the bridge and take a deep breath.

Spray from the rapids caresses my face. The roar of the water pounds against my eardrums.

Thankfully, this water is sourced from a spring deep within the mountains, otherwise an entirely different substance would be caressing my face.

I grab hold of the rope handrails and pause. The rope is sodden and porous under my fingers. It feels more like a sponge than a rope.

Taking a closer look, I see that more than a few strands of the rope have separated from the core, making the entire thing appear more like a poorly done braid than the rope it’s supposed to be.

Don’t worry. It’s not rotten and frayed, that’s the way it’s supposed to look.

I’m sure it’s made out of some sort of super material. Kind of like the Guild’s Indestructite.

Right?

After taking a moment to psyche myself up, I tighten my grip on the handrail and step onto the first plank.

As I place my full weight on it, the plank lets out an anguished splintering sound, but to my relief it doesn’t give way.

Ok. So far, so good. On to the next one.

Slowly, making sure I don’t make any sudden movements, I shift my hands forwards on the handrails and step onto the next plank.

Two down.

I continue forward, stepping carefully from one plank to the next. The third plank, the four, the fifth, so far everything seems to be holding up just fine.

With growing confidence, I let go of the handrails and wave at Bridget. “If you skip the first plank you should be fine,” I shout. “The rest of the bridge isn’t as rotten as it looks.”

As soon as the words leave my mouth, a gust of wind hits the bridge causing it to sway violently.

Ah, right. How could I forget. Rotten planks and frayed rope are the least of my worries, after all I’m currently standing on Flappy Bridge.

I flail my arms wildly, trying to regain my balance, but just as I manage to stabilize myself the bridge snaps back in the opposite direction.

I stumble forward, grabbing at the handrails, trying to keep myself from being thrown off.

Suddenly, one of the boards that I’m standing on lets out a sharp crack, and I find myself in free fall. I scrabble at the bridge with my hands, desperately searching for something to stop my fall.

Through some sort of miracle, my hands find one of the ropes that supports the floor of the Bridge. I attempt to pull myself up, but the rope is slippery and I almost lose my grip.

Heart pounding, I dangle there, buffeted by the wind, a single thought filling my mind.

I’m. Going. To. Die.

When I was younger, I was a quiet kid. Most of the time I kept to myself, only interacting with the other children when it was strictly necessary.

The orphanage where I grew up was small by the Empire’s standards. In this world, where death is an ever present companion, a large number of children become orphans everyday.

During the time that I lived at the orphanage, it was home to around one hundred kids, and like any situation involving a large number of individuals, the children at the orphanage were split into three cliques.

The number one clique was the “troublemakers”. This group was primarily made up of the boys who went out of their way to make trouble.

Fighting, bullying, drugs, stealing, you name it, if it was dangerous and against the law, the “troublemakers” were most likely involved with it in some capacity.

Despite the orphanage director’s best efforts to keep them in check, the “troublemakers” were the top dogs at the orphanage. They wouldn’t hesitate to use violence against anyone who defied them, so most of the other children at the orphanage tried their best to steer clear of them.

The number two clique was the “popular girls”.

As a rule of thumb, the “popular girls” were made up of the prettiest girls at the orphanage, but that didn’t mean they only had looks. Many of the popular girls were highly skilled martial artists in their own right, who were able to hold their own against the “troublemakers” strongest fighters.

Some of the “popular girls” had even been recruited by the “troublemakers”, but most of them stuck with their clique out of a sense of loyalty.

The final clique, and by far the largest, was the “leftovers”.

This was composed of the children who weren’t powerful enough to join the “troublemakers”, and who didn’t have the looks to join the “popular girls”.

Which clique was I in?

Surprise, surprise. I was a member of the “leftovers”.

Not by choice, mind you. I was a member of the “leftovers” because I didn’t fit in to either of the other groups.

Most of the children in the “leftovers” clique, weren’t there by choice, however there were a few exceptions.

Generally, these exceptions were children who possessed overwhelming power. They could take care of themselves, and didn’t need a clique to protect them. Not that the members of the “leftovers” looked out for each other. Most of the time we kept to ourselves and didn’t interact.

My childhood friend, Genevieve, was one of those exceptions.

I don’t remember when it started, but from a very young age the two of us were inseparable. We played together, we did chores together, basically we spent as much time together as we could.

Genevieve wasn’t a “leftover”. In fact, she was strong enough and pretty enough, that both the “troublemakers” and “popular girls” had tried to recruit her multiple times. But, no matter how many times they asked, Genevieve always refused.

Since the two of us were always together, I was shielded from most of the harassment that the other “leftovers” were forced to endure. From bullying to physical violence, the “troublemakers” and “popular girls” used their power to make the lives of the “leftovers” miserable.

Of course, there were exceptions. Two days a week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the orphanage’s director held special “etiquette” classes for the orphanage’s girls.

The subject of these classes varied from dancing, to table manners, depending on the week. However, the purpose of the classes was always the same, to prepare the girls for a life in high society.

Depending on the title they received, girls who grew up in the orphanage would often find themselves thrust into high society. Most of the time they would be hired as servants of a noble household, but if they received a truly exceptional title such as Mage or Saint, there was a high chance of them getting to marry into the noble family themselves.

According to Genevieve, these classes were extremely dull. Every week on Tuesday and Thursday, she would come up with a different scheme to escape. However, no matter what she tried the orphanage director always saw through it and ended up dragging her off, kicking and screaming, to attend class, leaving me alone.

While it was nice to have some time apart every now and then, whenever Genevieve was at class, I was left vulnerable. Without Genevieve to protect me, I was at the mercy of the cliques. And, it was during one such time, right after the orphanage’s director dragged Genevieve off to class, that I was approached by the leader of the “troublemakers”.

“Hey, Sage,” the leader said. “Can I ask you for a favor?”

I was relaxing under a tree on the bank of a river near the orphanage, when he swaggered up to me surrounded by his inner circle.

“Um. S-Sure. W-What do can I do for you?”

“I want you to force Genevieve join our gang. You can do that, right?”

“N-No, I don’t think I can.”

“What do you mean, you can’t,” the leader snarled. “The two of you are always together, isn’t she your girl?”

“No, she’s really isn’t.”

“Ah, I see. I guess I was mistaken.

“Oh, well. I guess we don’t have any further use for you.

“Throw him in the river,” the leader said, grinning at his cronies. “Let’s see how long he can keep his head above water.”

Two members of his crew stalked over to me and grabbed me by the arms. They jerked me to my feet and started dragging me towards the river.

I kicked and struggled, trying as hard as I could to escape, but my captors were older and stronger than me, so my struggles were in vain.

Cold water washed over me, sucking the breath from my lungs. Panic filled my mind, as my clothes grew heavy and I started to sink.

I kicked and splashed, struggling to keep my head above the water, but I quickly ran out of energy, and was pulled underneath the surface.

As soon as the water closed over my head, something changed inside of me. The panic disappeared, replaced with a sense of peace and calm.

I resigned myself to my fate, as I watched as the last of the air in my lungs rise up towards the shimmering sun.

Before everything went dark, the waters parted above me, and Genevieve, hair streaming behind her, grabbed hold of my outstretched hand.

“Sage.”

At the sound of my name, I open my eyes and come face to face with a hand. Carefully letting go of the rope with one hand, I grab onto the person’s wrist.

“Genevieve?” I murmur, as the person hauls me up onto the bridge.

“It’s Bridget, silly. Are you okay? You didn’t hit your head, did you?”

Bridget, not Genevieve?

Oh, right. We were climbing Benton’s Hill together.

I run the back of my hand across my face, clearing the tears from my eyes.

“No. I’m fine.”

“That’s good. You had me worried there for a second.

“Here,” Bridget says, helping me to my feet and draping my arm across her shoulder. “You seem to be in shock. Let’s get to the other side of the bridge so you can rest.”

Am I in shock?

Of course I am. But, not because I almost fell a thousand meters to my death.

No, I’m in shock because Ms. Trips A Lot, suddenly transformed into a member of the Dependables.

Wasn’t Bridget supposed to be super clumsy? Wasn’t she always running into walls and tripping on air.

This isn’t the Bridget I know. This is an impostor.

Who are you, and what did you do with Bridget?

The two of us step off of the bridge, and promptly collapse.

“Phew,” Bridget says. “That was super scary.”

“Yeah. That was rough.”

“I’m glad I was able to be useful for once.”

“Give yourself more credit. You weren’t just useful, you saved my life.”

“Think of it as repaying you for earlier.”

“Earlier?”

“Yeah, didn’t you cushion my fall when I lost my footing on the trail?”

“I mean, I guess. But, that wasn’t on purpose. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“You’re so modest. Well, no matter what happened, you saved me, so now we’re even. Okay?”

“Ok.”

The two of us lie on the ground side by side staring up at the sky.

“Do you think we should tell Samantha about how rotten the bridge is?” Bridget asks. “Actually, that’s a stupid question. She must have crossed it on her way up the trail.”

“Maybe not. If I had Samantha’s strength I would have just jumped over the ravine instead of using the bridge.”

“Right, makes sense. Let’s tell her about it when we get to the top.”

Bridget scrambles to her feet and leans over me.

“Shall we continue?” she asks, offering me her hand.

“Yeah,” I say, taking her hand and pulling myself to my feet.

“Great. Onward to lunch.”

“I think it’s already too late to get lunch. I mean, look at the sun.”

“Ugh. I guess so… Then, we’d better hurry so we don’t get on Chloe’s bad side.”

“Agreed,” I say, willing my aching body into a run. “Let’s do our best not to get on her bad side on the first day of class.”