Azad's pickaxe clinked against the stone as he continued to dig, the repetitive sound almost comforting in the otherwise eerie silence of the cave. He wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand, the damp air clinging to his skin as he worked. The torch beside him flickered, casting long, shifting shadows on the walls around him, and he realized the light was growing dimmer. His supply of torches was nearly gone.
"Great," he muttered to himself, the sarcasm dripping from his voice. "As if this place wasn't creepy enough already."
Just as he was about to curse his luck, his pickaxe struck something that felt different. He paused, holding the torch closer to the rock face. A glint of black caught his eye. "Coal!" A grin spread across his face. "Well, that's some good news for once."
He quickly went to work, chipping away at the coal veins embedded in the stone. It wasn't much, but it was enough to keep his path lit for a while longer. Azad set to crafting more torches, the warm glow chasing away the shadows that had been lurking just beyond his reach.
"Ellie would probably smirk at me for being this happy over coal," he muttered with a laugh, shaking his head. "But hey, when you're stuck in a cave, you take what you can get."
With the new torches in hand, he continued digging, making steady progress downwards. But after a few more minutes of work, his pickaxe broke through the stone with a crack that sounded different, hollow. Azad paused, peering into the opening he had just made. As he held the torch over the edge, his eyes widened.
Below him was a vast, open cavern, the likes of which he had never seen. The torchlight barely penetrated the darkness, but what little he could see was enough to make his heart race. Massive stalactites hung from the ceiling like ancient fangs, and the floor of the cavern was shrouded in shadow far below.
"Whoa…" Azad whispered, his voice barely audible. "This is… huge."
He sat back for a moment, considering his next move. There was no clear way down from where he stood; the walls around the cavern were sheer, and jumping down was obviously a death sentence. "Alright, Azad. Think."
He looked at the walls around him, the stone unyielding and steep. "Okay, I could try and dig a staircase down… but that'll take forever," he muttered. He thought for a moment, then grinned, an idea forming in his head. "Or… I could just dig straight down."
Azad couldn't help but chuckle as he imagined Ellie's voice in his head. "'Never dig straight down, Azad, you'll end up dead,'" he mimicked, rolling his eyes. "Yeah, well, watch me. I'll prove you wrong, Ellie. I'll get down there safely, and you'll have no choice but to admit I pulled it off."
The thought of her shocked face filled him with a strange sort of pride. "She'd probably choke on her own smugness," he grinned. "This is gonna be perfect."
Feeling confident, he began digging directly down, carefully carving the stone beneath his feet with his pickaxe. The air grew colder the deeper he went, the oppressive weight of the cavern pressing in around him. Every few feet, he planted a torch into the wall to mark his progress and keep the darkness at bay.
"Piece of cake," he said to himself as he chipped away at the stone. "Ellie, you're going to eat your words. I can already see your face now—"
Before he could finish his thought, the ground beneath his feet gave way with a sudden, stomach-churning lurch. "Wait… what the—?"
For a split second, he hung in the air, staring down into the void below him. His heart leapt into his throat, and panic surged through him. "No, no, no!" Azad screamed, flailing as he tried to stop himself from falling. Instinctively, he jammed his pickaxe into the wall, the metal scraping against the rock as sparks flew. He clung to the handle, his body hanging precariously above the drop.
"Oh no, oh no—" he muttered, heart hammering in his chest as he desperately tried to pull himself up. His fingers gripped the handle of the pickaxe tightly, sweat dripping down his face as he struggled to keep his weight steady.
"This is bad, this is so bad," he groaned, his voice trembling. "Why didn't I just listen to her for once?!"
But before he could berate himself any further, a loud crack echoed through the cave. His eyes widened in horror. "Oh no…"
The pickaxe, unable to bear the weight of his body, began to splinter. "No, no, no—don't you dare break on me now!" Azad shouted, his voice rising in panic. He clawed at the wall, trying to find another handhold, but the stone was smooth, offering no grip.
With a final, sickening crack, the pickaxe snapped in half. Azad's stomach plummeted as he lost his grip and fell into the darkness below.
"AAAAHHHH!!" His scream echoed wildly off the cave walls as he tumbled through the air, arms flailing as the world blurred around him. His mind raced, panic taking over every thought. "This is it, this is how I die!
Damn it, Ellie's going to be so smug when she finds out I didn't make it!"
The wind roared in his ears as he fell, the walls of the cave rushing past him in a dizzying whirl of rock and shadow. For a brief moment, everything seemed to slow down. His heart pounded in his chest, fear tightening in his throat.
"I'm not ready for this…"
But before he could finish the thought, the ground below rushed up to meet him.
And then—