The sun rose lazily over the trees, stretching golden fingers across the field and into my half-functional disaster of a camp. The fire had long since died into glowing embers. I stood at the edge of it, arms crossed, staring at my shelter like it had personally insulted me.
"Okay. No offense, but you look like you were built by a blind raccoon with anxiety."
It was basically a half-leaning frame of crooked branches covered with moss, bark, and regrets. The wind could topple it if it sneezed hard enough. I could either live in fear of that sneeze… or fix it.
So I got to work.
Dragging logs was my first bright idea. Big ones. Ones I had no plan for.
"Why am I even? I don't know. They just feel useful."
I stacked a few at the edge of the camp like I knew what I was doing. Then unstacked them. Then stacked them again in a new shape. By the third time, I had what resembled a partial wall thick enough to block wind and strong enough to not fall apart at a mean glance.
Over the next few hours, I built up the shelter's frame with better support, thicker limbs tied together with strips of bark and woven vines. A-frame roof. Slanted just enough for rain to roll off. I lined the inside with dry grass and bark shavings for insulation.
"Still looks like I live in a woodland crime scene." I muttered, wiping sweat from my forehead, "but now it's functional."
When the shelter was done enough to stop looking like a threat to public safety, I turned to the forest. I needed herbs. Plants. Food, maybe.
And strangely enough… I found things I recognized.
Yarrow. Plantain. Even something that looked suspiciously like thyme.
"You're telling me this world also has thyme? Is that the real magic?"
I collected what I could. Some I bagged in a cloth pouch I'd fashioned from boar hide, others I wrapped and stored near the fire for drying.
Between trips, I found myself thinking more clearly. There was something therapeutic about labor. About purpose. For the first time in days, I wasn't reacting, I was planning.
Then came the training.
I'd never held a real sword before arriving here. The closest I'd gotten was foam ones at a summer LARP event and a few too many late night movie marathons.
Now? I had a rusty hunk of metal and a lot of free time.
I set up a few targets, sticks driven into the ground, tied together with hanging bark. Then practiced the basics. Grips. Swings. Footwork. Blocking. Slashing. I fell. I stumbled. I cursed out a tree for dodging my sword. But by the end of the day, the sword felt... more natural. Less foreign.
Still awkward. Still heavy. But mine.
Between training sets, I took breaks to stare at the marks on my arm again, the spiraling letters that had etched themselves from the book. They shimmered faintly when I focused.
So I practiced that too.
The shockwave.
I remembered the first time, frustration, thrown hand, boom.
This time I tried it on purpose.
Hand out.
Focus.
Push.
FWUMP.
A breeze. Maybe.
Again.
Whump.
A puff of dust kicked up to the left.
"Okay, okay, now we're talking."
It was weak. Not enough to knock someone over. But if timed right, maybe enough to stagger an attacker. Interrupt a spell. Knock a weapon aside.
I kept practicing, channeling that energy, refining the feeling. It was like flexing a muscle I didn't know I had. The more I focused, the more control I felt.
By dusk, I was tired. Sore. Hungry.
But I had a roof over my head, a stash of herbs, better sword work, and a tiny bit of magic that didn't explode in my face.
I sat by the fire, chewing on another slightly-burnt slice of boar meat, watching the smoke curl upward into the sky.
"This world still scares me" I whispered, "but maybe… I'm starting to fit into it."