Chapter Five Hundred and Five - Sympathy for the Monster

"You can unhand me, now," Amaryllis said.

"I'm not quite done yet," I said as I gave her a cheek rub for good measure.

"Is this normal?" Laine asked.

"Awa, I think so?" Awen tried.

I decided that two minutes was long enough for a hug, at least this kind of 'I'm happy you're alive' hug. Obviously, I could have gone on for longer, but I didn't want to annoy Amaryllis too much.

"Sorry," I said. "I was just really worried."

Amaryllis huffed a weird huff that was hard to translate, then she reluctantly wrapped her wings around me. "Fine," she said. "I was worried about you too. For nothing, obviously."

I grinned. "I think everyone's made it here, then?" I glanced around and counted heads. Obviously Awen and Calamity and Desiree were fine. Orange was snoozing. Miss Laine was here, as was Sir Aberrforth, and they seemed to be standing closer to each other than I would have expected from the witch's previous behaviour towards him. The explorer we'd found earlier was patting the shoulders of two others who'd been with Amaryllis.

It looked like the one we'd found in the mines was here too, he looked happiest of all to see his friends.

"Is everyone safe, then?" I asked.

"Safe?" Miss Laine asked. "Hardly. After being scattered through these blighted tunnels by that blackness, I no longer have any conception of where we are. We're easy prey for the monster that stalks these halls."

I glanced at Laine. "Would this ... monster ... happen to be a shadowy figure hidden in an aura of near-impenetrable darkness?"

Laine whirled to face me. "So you've seen it!" she breathed out.

"Yeah, I've talked to him. We shouldn't have any problems getting out."

"You what," she said so flatly that I wasn't even sure it was a question.

"I spoke to him for a while. He's... not that bad?"

She stared at me for a long moment, her mouth working soundlessly. "... The monster living here is evil," Laine said. "My predecessors have been guarding this area for generations, fearful of the day he'd emerge from this accursed maze to destroy what's left of the Darkwoods and the world beyond that."

"Well, he's had a long time to reflect, you know? Centuries, it sounds like. He really ... the way he talked, he really hates his past self. He said that it was good for the World that he'd been sealed away." I wrung my fingers together. "I think he's a better person, now."

Laine shook her head. "You are mistaken. A monster cannot simply cease to be evil. Those kinds of stains don't wash out."

"I mean, maybe not instantly, but I'd like to think that evil doesn't really exist as like... a tangible thing. It's meanness done for the joy of being mean with no regard for how it hurts people, but that's not something solid. It's more like... a sliding scale of nice to mean, and sure, he was pretty deep into the mean at one point, but the fun thing with sliding scales is that you can slide back sometimes, with some effort. Am I making sense?"

Miss Laine didn't seem to believe that was likely. "You're claiming that the creature in this space is what... kind and friendly now?"

"Uh, well, maybe he hasn't slid back that far yet," I said. "But he didn't hurt me, did he? He was maybe a little rude, and socially awkward, but those are a far cry from being evil right? He's been buried underground for hundreds of years, so ... that makes sense! Not a lot of opportunities to socialise! And anyway, being rude and awkward isn't evil, right?"

"The legends say that he destroyed multiple towns and stole a precious artefact," Miss Laine said. Her hands found themselves on her hips and she looked less than amused.

My friends were watching the confrontation, which made it a smidge awkward.

"Well... okay, that is a rather mean thing to do, but it was a long, long time ago, right?" I winced even as I said it. Time was only so much of an excuse for bad things. "A-anyway. I reasoned with him, tried to make friends, and one thing led to another and he left. I don't know if it's to sulk or meditate or if he just turned shy, but he at least let the lights come back on. Sorta." I gestured to the magical lights we were all using to push away the dark.

"We can discuss morality and the like once we're back under the open sky," Amaryllis said. "I'm not fond of enclosed spaces at the best of times, and this one I like less than most."

That seemed reasonable. We asked around to see if anyone had a good idea on how to leave the cave, and it turned out that one of the Exploration Guild grenoil had a skill that helped them navigate dungeons and the like.

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

That reminded me that I had to tell my friends the full story of what happened below, but... I wasn't sure if I should say it in hearing range of the others. I liked to think of myself as the trusting sort, but there was a difference between being trusting and being willing to spill dangerous secrets in front of people I'd known for less than a day.

The faded memory of being executed for dungeon murder still lingered in my mind. Even if I had a good reason to ... break ... the vision-core, I wasn't sure that Laine and Aberrforth and his companions would be understanding.

The grenoil led us up, then around a bend, and finally back down a rather heavily sloped room. I was worried that maybe his skill was on the fritz, but the passage soon levelled off and brought us into an area where the walls turned more natural and where a large steel door barred the way out.

It was made of metal thicker than a finger joint and even with the rust covering it, the door seemed strong. Which is why it was so worrisome that it was bent and dented as if it was made of cardboard and someone really angry let off some steam against it.

The door was technically still closed, but the bottom was bent up enough to squeak through without any trouble.

So we did, filing out into what looked like a more natural cave without any of the signs that someone had worked on the walls or built anything other than that doorway. One of the grenoil recognized the area, though. "There's a part of the mines that leads here," he said. "We walked right past this place, I think. But we didn't see the... oh."

Turning, I looked at the door and... it wasn't there. There was just solid stone. Calamity was closer, and he reached out to touch the stone only to pull his hand back covered in red rust. "The door's there," he said. "Just illusioned away."

"And in a darkened tunnel, without strong mana-sensing, you'd never think to look," Amaryllis said. "Clever."

"My ancestors built this trap, this prison, very carefully," Miss Laine said.

"Not carefully enough to keep whatever was in there in, clearly," Amaryllis said. "That door's not keeping anything determined away, and I can't sense any magical traps in the air here. If there were any, they're worn out."

Miss Laine didn't seem happy to have her ancestor's work poked at by Amaryllis' rather critical opinions. I patted Amaryllis on the wing to tell her to calm down a little.

"Let's just get out of here?" I asked.

"Before that, we should return to where we were before we got pulled down," Calamity said. "I dropped some gear when I got yoinked."

There were a few more nods all around, so he wasn't the only one who'd lost some equipment. I hadn't even thought about it, but it was true that I'd had Weedbane with me earlier and now it was gone. Oops?

The grenoil led us up and through the mines, taking their time as we came to areas where the supports had fallen apart or where parts of the mine had started to collapse. It looked like time was wearing out the mines in a bad way. There was even a small stream of water running down the side of one tunnel we walked through. I figured there were good odds that parts of the mine were flooded.

Eventually, we were back in the sections we'd come down earlier, and then it wasn't hard to retrace our steps to where a lot of our gear was just... laying on the ground in random heaps.

Once we all had our stuff gathered, we felt a bit more secure, even if the mines still held an ominous air and were definitely still spooky. I hefted Weedbane onto my shoulder with a grunt of relief.

As we continued down the mines, always heading up and towards the surface, I couldn't help but feel like something was watching me from behind. Whenever I looked back, though, there was nothing.

"We should, ah, hurry," Awen said.

"Yeah, daylight's burning and all that," Calamity said with a nod.

Miss Laine sniffed, then sighed. "You may stay at my place for the night. No, not you Aberrforth. You're sleeping outside. But the rest of you deserve at least that much hospitality."

"Thank you!" I said.

Miss Laine nodded stiffly, her eyes scanning the rocky path ahead. "Let's make sure we all make it out of here first," she added, a hint of urgency creeping into her voice.

We made it to the room where the explorers had camped and they were quick to gather up their own things.

Then it was time to squeeze our way out of the mines. I insisted on going last, since I could make myself smaller and leave in a hurry if it came to it.

I glanced back before leaving, expecting ... something.

But there was only darkness behind me as I left.

***