I Bet On Myself

A blue screen materialized in the air directly in front of Willa. Lines of white text scrolled across the digital interface.

[Sponsor Chat Room Activated]

[User SilverFox: She got lucky. That monster was blind.]

[User IceKing: She is barefoot and arrogant. I bet fifty points she freezes before sunset.]

[User VoidWalker: A writer? What a useless class. She will die soon.]

Willa read the scrolling text as she trudged through the snow. Her new boots kept her toes warm but the wind still bit at her face. The invisible audience treated her struggle like a cheap television show. They bet on her death from the comfort of their safe rooms.

[User Bloodhound has entered the chat.]

[User Bloodhound: I like her spite. One thousand points on Willa surviving the night.]

The chat feed paused for a fraction of a second before exploding with laughing emojis. The other sponsors mocked Bloodhound for wasting points on a dead girl walking. Willa stopped walking and looked up at the grey clouds. A cold smile stretched across her lips.

"Keep your bets coming," Willa said to the empty sky. "I am going to rob all of you blind."

She dismissed the screen with a wave of her hand and scanned the horizon. The blizzard worsened with every passing minute. Visibility dropped to a few yards as thick snow blinded her vision. She spotted a dark opening at the base of a massive rock formation. She rushed toward it and ducked inside just as a violent gust of wind swept across the tundra.

The cave offered a brief reprieve from the biting wind. Willa walked to the back of the cavern and sat on a flat stone. She pulled her knees to her chest to preserve her remaining heat.

Footsteps crunched in the snow outside the cave entrance. Carl stepped into the cavern a moment later. He shook the snow from his broad shoulders and scanned the dark interior. The two women followed closely behind him. They shivered and hugged their arms against their chests.

"Back of the cave is taken," Willa said.

Carl spotted her sitting on the rock. He did not say a word. He guided the two women to the middle of the cave and ordered them to sit down. He gathered a small pile of dry moss and dead twigs he had stored in his jacket pockets. He struck a metal survival knife against a flint rod. Sparks flew and caught the moss on fire.

A weak flame flickered to life. The wet wood hissed and produced a thick cloud of grey smoke. The two women huddled around the meager fire and coughed as the smoke filled their lungs.

"It is better than nothing," Carl said. He rubbed his hands over the small flames.

The woman in the torn business suit looked over her shoulder at Willa. She noticed Willa sitting alone in the shadows without a fire.

"Are you cold over there?" the woman asked with a mocking grin. "You must be freezing in that wet shirt."

"I am fine," Willa said.

"You are shaking," the woman in the cocktail dress added. She leaned closer to Carl and smiled. "Carl is so smart. He knows how to make a fire from scratch. You should have been nicer to him."

"Just get on your knees and beg him for forgiveness," the woman in the suit said. "Maybe he will let you share our heat if you cry loud enough."

Willa ignored their taunts. She reached into her pocket and pulled out the Author Quill. She knew she needed a real fire to survive the night. The damp wood Carl burned would not last another hour. She needed something permanent.

She uncapped the black pen. She held her breath and braced herself for the physical toll. She pressed the nib against the cold stone floor and wrote two words in the dirt.

Geothermal Campfire.

A sharp pain pierced Willa right in the center of her chest. The system interface flashed blue before her eyes.

[Creation: Geothermal Campfire]

[Creation Cost: 2.5°C]

[Core Temperature: 35.6°C → 33.1°C]

[Warning: User entering hypothermia threshold.]

Her vision blurred and black spots danced across her eyes. The sudden drop in body temperature hit her like a sledgehammer. Her lips turned blue and her hands shook with violent tremors. The system drained her life force to pay the toll.

The stone floor beneath her pen glowed a bright amber color. The rock melted and reshaped itself into a perfect ring of smooth black stones. A roaring fire erupted from the center of the ring.

The flames did not produce any smoke. They burned with a golden light that pushed the shadows out of the cavern. A wave of intense magical heat washed over Willa. The fire warmed her freezing skin in a heartbeat and chased the hypothermia away. She let out a long breath and soaked in the radiant warmth.

Carl snapped his head up at the sudden burst of light. He stared at the roaring campfire sitting at the back of the cave. He looked down at his own smoky twigs. A gust of wind howled through the cave entrance at that exact moment. The draft hit Carl and snuffed his weak fire out.

Darkness swallowed the middle of the cave. The two women shrieked as the cold air bit into their skin.

"My fire died," Carl said. He struck his flint rod again but the wet moss refused to catch a spark.

The two women stood up and looked at Willa. Her side of the cave looked like a luxury resort. Willa stripped off her wet work blouse and draped it over a warm stone near the flames. She sat comfortably in her bra and jeans while the geothermal heat dried her clothes. She looked relaxed and content.

"Can we come over there?" the woman in the dress asked. Her teeth chattered loudly.

"It is freezing over here," the woman in the suit pleaded. She took a step toward the golden light.

"Step back," Willa ordered. Her voice echoed off the cave walls with unyielding authority.

The two women froze in their tracks. They looked at Carl for help but the veteran simply stared at Willa in silence. He could not comprehend how she manifested a smokeless fire out of thin air.

"We just want to share the heat," the woman in the dress cried.

"Get on your knees and beg your veteran," Willa said. She repeated their exact words back to them with a cold smile. "Tell him you need him. Maybe he will spark another wet twig for you."

"You are evil," the woman in the suit sobbed.

"I am surviving," Willa said. "Stay on your side of the cave."

The blue screen materialized next to the fire. The sponsor chat feed rolled by at a blinding speed.

[User SilverFox: What just happened? How did she do that?]

[User IceKing: She cheated. There is no magic in the Tundra zone.]

[User Bloodhound: I told you idiots. She is the real deal.]

A golden notification box popped up over the chat feed. It chimed with the sound of dropping coins.

[User Bloodhound has won the wager.]

[User Bloodhound has gifted Participant Willa 500 Survival Points.]

[First Tier Shop Unlocked.]

Willa smiled at the digital screen. She rested her hands near the warm stones and closed her eyes. The Frostbite Tundra was supposed to be a graveyard. Instead it was turning out to be a very profitable game.