Lucian pre-emptively grimaced just before he tugged at the crimson-stained, dust sheet strips wrapping up his lacerated hand, sharp lances of pain racing up his arm as he made sure it wouldn’t shift unless he intended for it to.

Gritting his teeth and ignoring the pain, he made doubly sure his bandaging was satisfactory before stopping; sharp painful lances subsiding back to a consistent, dull throb moments after.

Taking a moment, he calmed back down and picked up a knife-sized shard of glass from the end table next to him before starting to use it as an improvised dagger; slicing away at the bits of canvas haphazardly sticking out from his hand and making it as neat and tidy as possible.

Small bits of fabric fluttered to the ground as he slowly worked at it. Only once the raven-haired man was satisfied did he lay the shard back down where he had gotten it from. Eyeing the other items lying alongside the glinting piece, he decided to get another short blurb on each significant one before making a move and leaving the room for good.

First up was an irregularly shaped piece of sharp, fragile obsidian.

The fragment would have been unremarkable if not for two facts; one, the cut off crystal blue line, identical in colouration to the jagged ice bolt’s, on one side, and, two, the fact that he had found it—alongside two other similarly coloured, yet dissimilarly shaped—fragments after rooting through the Eye around the Corner’s chunky remains.

Name: Rune of Corrupting Hoarfrost [Fragment].

Descriptor: A sculpted chunk of obsidian imbued with magic by the Arcane, twisted after its creation to suit the Deep’s purpose.

Remarks: Collect 10 fragments to reforge a single Rune.

While this was the second time hearing it, he couldn't help but think over the information revealed by the mellifluous voice. Lots of what it said seemed deliberately mystifying, but one thing was crystal clear; he would have to collect ten more of such fragments to find out more.

Judging from its appearance and name, he had no doubts that it was related to the supernatural projectiles the Eye around the Corner freely fired off. The issues were its Name, in and of itself, and the Descriptor, however.

The raven-haired man needn't be a genius to understand that the word, ‘Corrupting’, was a gigantic red flag all on its own. What's more were the two names casually disclosed in the Descriptor. Even though he was only hearing it, it was clear both had a certain gravitas and would be capitalised if they were put to paper. He really didn't need to have all his memories to know they were important in some way, shape, or form.

While Arcane felt neutral enough,, the Deep gave off an ominous undertone.

Lucian preferred to think he wasn’t a gullible person by nature –missing memories notwithstanding—and so he made sure to keep the narrated Descriptor in mind. If nothing else, he was confident the names, ‘Arcane’ and ‘Deep’, were going to become important, somehow, somewhere down the line.

Picking up the second item of interest, he dropped the three Runes of Corrupting Hoarfrost [Fragment] into one of the open compartments before zipping it back up; the nondescript brown backpack having multiple compartments, both small and large, as well as straps that were easily adjustable.

Name: Backpack.

Descriptor: A simple brown backpack.

Remarks: It’s a simple backpack. Need I say more?

Even though this was the second time hearing it, he was still forced to bite back a laugh at the mellifluous voice's out of the blue snarky Remarks.

In all honesty, finding the backpack had been a pure stroke of luck. In his initial fervour to unveil all the hidden pieces of furniture prior to fighting the Eye around the Corner, searching through the wardrobe hiding the Closet Horror had completely slipped his mind.

It was only after he had started fashioning out bandages from the canvas dust sheets when he remembered to do so; a fortuitous turn of events owing to the simple convenience the backpack, by its nature as a carrier, offered.

Shaking his head free of thoughts on the recent past, Lucian carefully set the backpack back down on the end table before transferring all the test tubes he had collected thus far—there being three in all—into said backpack's most secure compartment; the raven-haired man triggering the Knowledge implant just as the newest glass cylinder pressed against his hand.

Name: Abyssal Vitreous.

Descriptor: 3% of an Eye around the Corner’s mass.

Remarks: It’s actually a health tonic. Cross my heart and hope to survive~! Stick a needle into an Eye around the Corner's eye~!

His most recent find—retrieved from amidst the Eye around the Corner's chunky remains like the rune fragments—was filled with a hypnotising scarlet liquid, one that slowly sloshed around as if it were a gel of some sort.

While the mellifluous voice hadn't given him any reason to doubt it thus far, the Name, Descriptor, and Remarks of this particular item finally made a sliver of doubt rise in his chest; considering how unsettling the blurb, as a whole, sounded.

Unfortunately, there was no way to confirm if the Knowledge implant was telling the truth – unless he tested it for himself to see if it really healed his wounds, something he was extremely reluctant to do since things didn't feel that dire at the present.

Lucian eyed the Abyssal Vitreous one last time before zipping the compartment close and concealing it from his sights. With all the more interesting items out of the way, he pulled open the backpack's largest compartment before carelessly sweeping all the remaining odds and ends resting on the end table into it; comprising Several differently sized shards of glass, a few rolls of bandages made from white canvas, and a fluffy cushion purloined off the king-sized bed.

As the glittering mirror shards fell into the compartment's depths, he couldn't help but feel slightly embarrassed once again. While the broken shards had proven to be extremely useful, he was glad he would be the only one to ever know how he had actually obtained said items.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

After all, which guy would ever want to admit that they had acquired such items purely because he had thrown a temper tantrum and engaged in a bout of mindless destruction.

Lucian forcibly squashed any traces of embarrassment lingering in his system once all the items had tumbled in to the compartment. Putting on the backpack, he made sure the straps securing it to his shoulders and back were tight but comfortable, knowing it was imperative he wasn't tripped up by discomfort at some crucial moment – especially if it happened to be mid-fight.

Sweeping another assessing glance over the entire room, he double checked and made sure he hadn’t overlooked anything potentially useful.

…

…

…

It seemed like he had not.

“I guess… it's finally time to make a move.”

If anyone else had been in the room right at that moment, they would have been able to hear the clear, identifiable note of apprehension underpinning the raven-haired man's voice. Fortunately for Lucian's pride, no one was.

Before setting off for true, he picked up the end table resting on his right and comfortably nestled it against his shoulder; Knowledge implant triggered at the same time.

Name: End Table.

Descriptor: A simple wooden end table.

Remarks: It’s… an end table. What more do you want?

Lucian treated the mellifluous voice as background noise as he headed over to where the king-sized bed used to be; the piece of furniture having been displaced after his earlier temper tantrum.

His eyes immediately zeroed in on the trapdoor that had been concealed under the bed as well as the warm glow of firelight streaming through the numerous, large cracks tracing across the weathered wooden planks.

His embarrassment nearly reared its ugly head at the sight of the trapdoor. The raven-haired man hated to admit it, but it turned out his temper tantrum did have its uses in the end.

…

Some time earlier.

Although Lucian had understood the urgency of stemming the blood flow from his left hand's lacerations, there had been two issues with that.

For one, he didn’t actually have any proper bandages and, for two, he didn’t actually know how to properly bandage himself up even if he did…

Luckily for the raven-haired man, the first issue had been handily solved by his self-created stack of dust sheets, placed out of the way and ready to be used for any purposes he might have had – like bandages, for example.

In contrast, the second issue hadn’t been a problem he could so easily solve.

At least it had been… up until his little destructive outburst, anyway

In a fit of pique and childishness, he had decided to push over the wardrobe; something that caused the mirror on the door to shatter into tiny little pieces and multiple larger shards.

Like a bolt of lightning in clear blue skies, seeing the carpet of glittering glass shards made him realise that he could use them to slice apart the white canvas dust sheets and fashion out bandages from them.

In a further stroke of absolutely insane luck, he had spotted the muted glow of firelight underneath the king-sized bed when he was midway through selecting the best mirror shard for the job he had envisioned, letting him find the exit out of the room.

And the rest, as they say, had been history.

…

Lucian shook his head free of thoughts on the recent past as his leading foot unknowingly trod on the trapdoor.

The distinct sound of creaking wood immediately sounded off from underneath his boot. Looking down, he saw even more cracks racing out from where his foot was pressing against the timeworn wood; causing a shot of adrenalin to be injected into his system as he instantly jumped back and off the buckling wood.

Eyeing the trapdoor for a moment, he breathed out a sigh of relief when he saw it wasn't going to break apart. Although the raven-haired man had fiddled with the trapdoor when he had first found it, he hadn't realised how flimsy it actually was. Until now, that is.

Eventually, he chortled under his breath when a thought occurred to him. He supposed one way of leaving the room would have been to forcefully break through the trapdoor and jump down if it had been locked.

Luckily for him, it seemed the difficulty of escaping the room was in actually finding a route out, and not in getting the route open.

Lucian swept his eyes over the room’s entire length and breadth for a final time, making sure he hadn’t missed anything useful before he took his leave of the space – having an odd feeling he wouldn’t be back here after leaving.

A complicated cocktail of emotions coiled around his heart as he did – anger, for being trapped, apprehension, for leaving somewhere more or less familiar, and anticipation, knowing the path ahead would inevitably lead to more answers.

Rising above all that was hope, however, as even with the likely dangers ahead, he wanted—needed—to get his memories back; the void in his mind a constant reminder of his lost identity while concealing his reason for being here.

Even if the emotionless mechanical voice had claimed his presence in the Dormitories was purely voluntary, he needed to understand what in the hell possessed him to do such a thing.

…

…

…

Letting the emotions run rampant for several long moments, he eventually quashed them ruthlessly and deep down into the recesses of his mind.

Tensely rolling his shoulders and clenching his hand around the end table's thin stand, he shuffled forward slightly before dropping to a knee; left hand's fingers instantly hooking through the rusted iron ring meant to open the trapdoor.

“One… two… three!” Lucian counted under his breath before abruptly yanking upward and hopping back; the trapdoor loudly groaning open with a burst of stale air and intense firelight.

The room, previously dominated by a dim fluorescence, was washed in the soothing, orangey-yellow glow. Adding to the altered ambience was the soft crackling of multiple open fires; something different, yet very much appreciated, compared to the heavy silence previously blanketing the room.

Though Lucian hadn’t been consciously aware of it, his shoulders, previously as tense as a taut bowstring, immediately relaxed substantially.

Perhaps the sight and sound of firelight was a soothing one for the raven-haired man, or perhaps something about it called to the missing memories of his past.

There was no way to know for sure, unfortunately.

Lucian waited for some time, but it looked as if nothing was going to jump out of the open trapdoor.

Padding back over to the hole in the floor, he stopped right at the edge and curiously peered down.

Multiple burning sconces lined the walls to the left and right, each one placed a distance apart as they travelled down the vertical drop. Though the presence of naked flames were concerning, his attention was almost immediately stolen by the partially rusted ladder riveted to the wall closest to where he stood presently.

The abundance of rust on the ladder made him glad that his injured hand was bandaged. He was pretty sure its unhygienic state would have caused an infection of some sort in his open wounds. Furthermore, though the drop wasn’t that deep—maybe thrice his height, at a guess—he didn’t think his hand would have been able to handle the climb down without some padding.

From his current angle, he was unable to see deeper into the passage below; the only thing easily visible being the drab grey tiles, whether it be due to dust or its natural colour, making up the passage's floor.

“There’s nothing for it, I guess.”

With his observations proving less than satisfactory, Lucian supposed there was nothing else he could do except go down there and explore, come what may.

“But before that,” he mumbled to himself while twisting his end table-wielding hand and pressing the back of it against his neck, “let’s see if there have been any changes to what the voice says when I appraise myself.”

…

Though a tad obvious in hindsight, finding out that he could get a short blurb about himself had come as quite a shock.

Especially since it had been purely—embarrassingly so—on accident.

Right after he had finished fashioning out the bandages, he had been curious about what the Knowledge implant had to say about it.

Acting on his thoughts at the time, he had pressed his right hand's fingers to his left wrist before triggering said Knowledge implant. Somehow, and really, don’t ask him how, his aim had been off the mark and landed on his pulse point instead of the canvas strips wrapping up his injured extremity.

As a result, he had been gifted with information that, while illuminating, simultaneously caused several questions to spring to mind.

…

Handle – El Knight.

Health: Slightly injured.

G. A. M. E.—#1.

Players Remaining/(161/201).

Though Lucian keenly listened to the mellifluous voice after he triggered it on himself, he didn't waste any time and started climbing down the ladder; causing his increasingly furrowed brows to be cast in shadows from the flickering firelight.

He couldn't help but feel concerned by the narrated blurb. Much like when he had first heard it, several questions sprung to mind as he mulled over the oddly structured information.

1. Even with most of his memories scattered to the winds, he still knew exactly what a game was. So what in the hell was he doing in one?

2. Only several minutes had gone by, but the number of Players had fallen from 164 to 161. If things kept apace, what were his chances of surviving up to the end?

And 3. He was absolutely, 100% sure that his name was Lucian Noxlear. So why in the hell was his chosen Handle… El Knight, of all things?

< End of Nightmare One: The Locked Room. >