CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

KENNEL

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Rio

I awoke in almost utter darkness. There was an eerie red glow coming from the cracks in a door at the end of a hallway, outlining the silhouettes of bars.

Was I… in a dungeon?

“What… where am I?” I asked.

A small shape beside me suddenly twitched.

“Speak quietly. If it gets too loud in here, then they’ll come in and start cutting,” said a young voice.

I could barely make out an acne-covered teenage face. He was sitting against the wall, in the same cell as me, but I could hear the minute shuffling of a lot of people, all trying to stay quiet.

“What the fuck…?” I whispered, feeling horrified. Where was I? Who was this kid? What the hell was happening to me?

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Rio.”

“Well, Rio, I’m Todd. If you don’t want to be taken next, learn to be as quiet as possible,” he said.

“Okay,” I murmured. “But… where are we?”

“Best I can tell, we were all kidnapped. Little red demons. Stabbed me, gagged me, tied me up, and brought me down here. Same story for you?” He asked.

“P-pretty much. They attacked me in my… house…” I said, suddenly distracted by something strange. There were two… buttons. A green one and a red one. I remembered they’d showed up shortly after I stabbed that imp.

“Shhh!” someone whispered. “They’re coming!”

We shut up as the door suddenly slammed open, bathing the dungeon in the dim red glow. An absolutely monstrous creature walked in. It looked like some sort of strange gorilla, but it was even thicker. It walked on two hind legs and its knuckles, but its entire front half was a maw the size of a washing machine, and its fangs had to be a foot long. As soon as I spotted it, my tongue locked in my throat, which was fortunate. I couldn’t have made a sound if I’d wanted to.

It took a few steps before I realized it had some sort of collar around its neck.

Holding the creature’s leash was a tall humanoid that at least had two arms and two legs. Its similarities to a man ended there. Massive horns erupted from its head, and its eyes glowed like a flame. A tail swished behind it. The living personification of a devil. It was naked from the waist up, only wearing a pair of pants. Its torso and arms were a wall of muscle that would’ve been attractive at first glance person but looked unsettling on the red-skinned creature. Something about the muscles seemed off, like they were growing in the wrong places, triggering an uncanny valley sensation that only made me more afraid.

I could hear the sharp intakes of breath all around, but the demon seemed to be in a rush. He turned to the second cage and unlocked it with a key.

“No… no, please,” came a pitiful whimper. I couldn’t tell from my spot near the back of the room if it was a man or a woman.

The demon ignored the plea and nodded to the beast. The monster howled in glee before pouncing into the cage. A sharp scream was abruptly silenced as the beast opened its massive maw. A sudden squelch. A gasp.

I was shaking, suddenly glad for the dim gloom that hid the whole picture from me. I watched mutely as the creature shuffled back out of the room before following the demon out of the door. A pair of legs dragged quietly beside the monster, the person's upper half held tightly in the beast's jaws.

“Oh fuck… oh fuck… what the fuck!?” I heard the words echo around the room after the door closed. I wasn’t sure if I said it or someone else.

“We…” Todd said before gulping down bile. “We probably… can talk for a bit. Oh god,” he said before dry hurling a few times. The gruesome slaughter had affected him just as much as me.

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“Is it always like that?” I asked fearfully.

Todd shook his head. “Usually the demons grab two or three of us and push us out. We can hear screams out there though. I’ve never seen… whatever that thing was.”

Someone was crying. Maybe more than one person. I wasn’t but I didn’t think reality had set in yet. There must be ten more people in here. Five cages on each side of a long hallway. It perversely reminded me of the pound scene from “The Lady and the Tramp.”

“N-not a Disney movie,” I murmured stupidly.

Todd blinked at the non-sequitur. He gave a small, pained smile. “If you’ve got a magic lamp handy, I certainly wouldn’t turn it down.”

The joke startled a hysteric sob from me.

“I’d… rather have my gun. Or my phone,” I breathed.

Todd, surprisingly, pulled out an iPhone. It looked newer than mine. “Didn’t work down here at all. It only died a few hours ago.”

“Right… caves. I knew the Ozarks had caves, but I didn’t know any were within walking distance from my house. How long was I out?”

“No idea Ma’am,” Todd replied. "I got the ropes off you as soon as they put you in here though... maybe an hour ago?"

‘Ma’am? Seriously? I’m only thirty!’ I thought viciously.

Okay. I needed to take stock. I was in some creepy murder hole, kidnapped with a bunch of other people. I had buttons in the corners of my vision for some reason, but I didn’t know what they were or what they did. Still, with this many people missing, someone must’ve noticed.

Todd seemed to have noticed that he’d struck a nerve and nervously said, “Uhm. Sorry. Miss?”

“Mrs. Tande,” I corrected.

Hell. Theo! Was he okay? Would they attack him, too? God, I loved him, but I didn’t think he’d fair any better against those little imp bastards than I had. How had it put me to sleep? Magic? Like, real magic? I’d always thought hypnotism was bullshit, but maybe it wasn’t so farfetched?

I sighed. The buttons weren’t going away, and I didn’t see any better options in front of me, so I clicked the one to the left.

“Blagh!” I blanched, jumping back as a full screen covered my vision. I turned my head left and right but the screen stayed rooted to the center of my vision as if it were laid directly on my eyes.

“The seals are broken. The hells awaken. Take up arms, humanity. The ancient enemy comes once more.”

I… oh. Well. That explained a bit. These were the hells. Like… the biblical hells? Oh, what the shit have I stumbled into?

I refused to believe that the biblical Satan had risen up from below to come kidnap and torture humans with an imp army. It just seemed too ludicrous to be real. That person dying in front of me had been anything but fake, and somehow, that didn’t jive with the stories of demons and people speaking in tongues.

A list of options was spread out before me, which almost immediately had me rolling my eyes.

‘You’ve got to be kidding me. Classes? Like Theo’s games?’ I thought. My disbelief was so strong that it almost overshadowed the horror I’d just witnessed. Druids and Paladins and Monks? Nerd stuff?

I’d never had a problem with Theo’s hobbies. They’d never been for me, just like my true crime shows had only ever been a passing interest for him. I swore to god if this whole thing was just some incredibly elaborate ruse to get me more into Dungeons and fucking Dragons, I was going to flip my shit.

Still, I clicked through the different classes, surprised and impressed by the detail. If this was all some super immersive video game then it had certainly done an amazing job.

I didn’t think so, though. It was like I’d been transported into a horror movie, but it was far too real to discount. Even with the gamer terms and the class descriptions, I refused to believe this was all some prank.

Each class had a miniaturized version of me in different clothes. Every last one of the idealized versions of myself made me jealous in one way or another. All of them were soap opera sexy. Even the super buff Barbarian Rio looked like she’d fit right in on those lady weight lifter shows.

I didn’t understand the stats. Each of them had primary attributes and… did shit during peacetime? Whatever. There was only one choice that made any sense in this context. I had to get out of here, and the only class that looked like it would remotely help me with that was Rogue.

I chose that class and was then greeted with a selection of symbols. Every last one of them represented a skill. There were… god, ten of them? And there were five different tabs, each with even more skills to choose from.

Overwhelmed, I slumped down against the side of my cell, wishing I could ask Theo what I was supposed to do.

Then again… I wasn’t exactly alone here.

“Todd, this will sound weird, but do you know anything about classes? Like, Paladins, and Wizards. Rogues? That sort of thing?” I asked.

“I… don’t play Dungeons and Dragons. Or anything like that. I’m more of a Call of Duty guy,” the guy said, sounding mildly offended.

I sighed. “Shit. Okay. So it’s like this. I killed one of those goblins on my way down here. When I did, I got this weird set of buttons in front of me, letting me pick a class. I picked Rogue because that class seemed like my best way out. Now, I have about a frigging thousand different skills to choose from and only one point to use to get one of these skills. At this point, I’m ready to believe just about anything to get out of here, so I’m going to go through these skills and you tell me which one you think has the best chance of getting us out, okay?”

Todd blinked.

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