I was acquainted with true despair after being welcomed to my new home. The slave house was nothing more than a hut dug into the ground covered with wooden planks. We were crammed in 13 people per hut, probably 10 more than should have been in the small space. After I was shackled with a slave collar that limited access to the system and was introduced to the slave houses, I was handed a pickaxe and led to the mines on the first floor of the dungeon—my new career. The dungeon was a dark cavern that continued for miles. We were to grab the purple glowing rocks buried in the hard iron deposits, a precious resource for the war effort. We were told that we were luckier than most. Some mining slaves had to travel into the more dangerous parts of the dungeon, but fortunately, we still had plenty of purple rocks to gather on the first floor.

  I had asked my benevolent guards multiple times why I was not given the magic test, pleading with them that this was a mistake, but each time, I was met with silence by the indifferent guards. We were whipped anytime I tried to ask other slaves for details about their capture. This, of course, made me very popular with other slaves. However, before the others shunned me, I was able to piece together the common theme that no one knew why they were mining slaves. Some had done well in the combat portions of their test, while others hadn't. But every one of us had unlocked the system before the magic test.

  That had to be it; we were anomalies and, for some reason, were being thrown away in these mines.

  ...

  During my second back-breaking week, I saw recruits coming down the tunnels. These men and women weren't wearing collars and had tactical gear on. If I had to guess, they were training in the dungeon.

  "Get back to work, earthbound", the unit commander shouted at me before making a beeline for me and grabbing my pickaxe out of my hands. I must have stared too long at their entrance. He began to hit me with the flat side of the tool brutally again and again. He must have beaten me for 12 minutes before he was satisfied. I lay there in a pool of my blood, my left eye sealed shut. I was half dead and could barely move. The silent guards picked me up and handed me back my tool. Gesturing to my pile of crystals, urging me back to work. Something broke inside of me as I went back to work. I could only think, what did I ever do to deserve this? Being born on a planet that was a part of the expansion of some godlike system. Why did my mom leave? Why did my dad leave when I needed him in the wilds? The only conclusion that I could draw was that everything was pointless. Nothing had a more significant meaning; the strong would take from the weak. If I were ever to get out of here, I would need to get stronger.

  I couldn't be sure, but I put all my eggs in the basket that my pickaxe would give me levels of axe proficiency. Every strike, I put my soul into it, picturing my captors in the stone and that piece of shit commander. I began to find the best way to flow from one move to the next, creating my efficient style. I practiced the same three-hit combination 14 hours a day for 600 days. Lateral slash in an 11 to 4 o'clock position with my left foot as lead, switched my feet with a 4 to 11 strike, and finished with a 12 to 6 overhead chop. Our rations were nowhere near enough to sustain our daily efforts. I wasn't the most muscular person at the start of confinement, but I was stringy now. I probably looked more like my opponent from the combatant match than I would have liked. With the atrophy of my muscles, I had to use gravity and the weight of my pickaxe to keep up the long days.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  ...

  On the second anniversary of my enslavement, it was a typical day. We ate our ration in the chow hall and were escorted to the section of the mine that we went to day after day. I began practicing my strikes, swinging at the rocks in the three-hit combo I had perfected. Every swing felt good; I could have sworn that the ground shook under each blow. That can't be right. I slowed down, but the rumbling persisted. I raised my head to see that everyone in the area had fled. I heard a crashing sound, then the floor beneath me opened up.

  When I landed, I was in the fetal position. I looked up to see falling stones from above coming straight for me. I tried to get up, but my legs wouldn't move. A boulder that was about six feet by six feet lay directly on my legs, crushing them almost into a paste. The loud crashes from the collapse were finished. I was safe now, but still had to figure out what to do about my legs. I tried to move the stone, but it wouldn't budge. I scanned the immediate area around me, the only thing beside me was the rubble which fell with me, and my now broken pickaxe, the only thing remaining was the head.

  I lay at the bottom of that hole for hours, waiting for someone to come back to the area where I had taken my fall. I was once again reminded that I was weak and worthless. It felt like another day. However, my sense of time was skewed. I saw movement at the top. My lips were dry and cracking. I tried to call out, but the only response to my horse cries was the boards being laid down on the slivers of light that could make it to me.

  "Jesus fuck why am I always stuck in the dark." I began laughing hysterically, but didn't even recognize it when it became sobs.

  I grabbed the pickaxe head and knew what I had to do. Like a coyote caught in a trap, I struck my legs with my new handheld pickaxe, my version of gnawing off my leg to free myself. Most of the area was numb, but on my third strike, I learned that if I hit too close to my knee, I still had plenty of nerves alive and well in my legs. Over the last couple of years, I grew more indifferent to pain than I would like, so even though the scene was gruesome and I should have been hesitant, I wasn't. I was free after about an hour of hacking away at my legs. I had lost a lot of blood.

  "Shit I forgot to tie a torniquet," I said while starting to feel woozy.

  I started to rip at the rags that I passed off for clothing. I had to braid three pieces together, as when I used one piece, the cloth was too dry and rotted, not to shred when tied hard enough to stop the bleeding.

  I began to slide my body across the floor, refusing to accept my fate. As I army crawled across the jagged floor, I began to hear what sounded like a heartbeat, badump it grew louder BADUMP. As I was crawling, the noise became more rapid until all of a sudden it stopped. The floor beneath me began to glow blue, a familiar stone platform I hadn't seen since the combatant match. The blue light transitioned from the familiar blue to a deep royal purple.

  "Happy Birthday." The system rang out in my head.