Darkness enveloped everything. It hid the creatures that scampered about on the surface, and even the walls and floors that adventurers walked on. It even blinded the young woman, who sat in a deep hole, where she would never be found or rescued again.

Her hands in front of her face were nowhere to be seen. Everywhere around her was pitch black, she could only feel the coldness of the stone walls that were narrowed and made her feel cramped.

She couldn’t even see the wet liquid draining from her ankle. But she didn’t need to, it was all too obvious to her.

She was bleeding out.

And well aware that she was well below the surface.

Still, she did nothing. No one would come for her, and there was no way she’d get out of the hole she was trapped in. It was finally her time.

She didn’t cry, nor yell for help. It was futile. She accepted her fate, closing her eyes to let death come for her. At least she’d be free from her suffering.

Before she breathed her last breath, she thought of one more thing from her life.

It was her husband. She died with a smile on her face.

X X X

Lio

I had made a terrible mistake.

With the Autumn Festival finally here, merchants began selling exclusive items just for the festival. I wanted to buy something for Charliette as a “get well soon” gift. What I hadn’t realized was that she was already up on her feet. Last time I visited her, she was still bedridden from all her sore muscles, complaining about the aches. She sure had recovered quickly.

When I went out to buy her something, I realized that I didn’t know what Charliette liked. I mean, c’mon! I’ve known her for well over a month now, we’d seen each other nearly every other day, and I still didn’t know a single thing about her! So the obvious question was what gift to give her?

Let’s see… They sold special made swords, daggers, clothing, pretty much anything if you look hard enough. Charliette did break her dagger in the Treasure Dungeon, but I couldn’t find any daggers that would fit her well. All of them looked elaborate and autumn themed. Some had engravings of wheat bushels on their blades, while others had hilts that mimicked the color and patterns of cow hide. They didn’t seem like things Charliette would like.

I was thinking long and hard on what to do, until I ran into Christia and Kueler at the local tavern. They saw me downing mead and sat down next me, ordering a cup for themselves. But Christia ordered grape juice, close enough to wine.

Christia was sharp. She knew something was off just by the way I downed my cup of mead. She crossed one leg over the other on her lap, and had a mischievous grin for some reason.

“So, what’s going on, Lio?” She leaned in closer to me.

“It’s not a big deal,” I told her while sliding my cup over to the tavern worker for a refill.

She took a swig of her grape juice and exhaled as if it were the strongest stuff she’d ever tasted. It was grape juice, stuff they have for children. “I don’t know about that. Your lips do jitter a lot on the cup’s rim. So it must be important enough to make you shake like that.” She scooted her stool closer. “Do tell.”

She was like a human analyzer, detecting any irregularities in someone. It amazed me. I was so amazed that I just spilled the beans. Wasn’t like it was anything that important. I told her how I wanted to give Charliette a gift from the Autumn Festival but didn’t know what to get, and her eyes lit up with a burning passion.

“Leave it to me!” She pumped her fists.

That was the mistake I made. I left it to her. I let her go out and scout out Charliette’s gift preferences. So she went right to her door in an elaborate attempt to pry info from her. I really didn’t want her to do that, since it felt very cowardly of me, but she went ahead and did it without my approval.

Then she came back with a report. A very urgent one, at that. It turns out that she unexpectedly steered the conversation to birthdays, and found out Charliette’s birthday was tomorrow. This made me even more uneasy. I had to get the best gift for her now, especially on her birthday.

“Did you at least get any idea as to what she’d want?” We sat at a table in the tavern again and drank together as I probed her brain on the matter.

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“She wasn’t too talkative when I spoke with her since I was leading most of the conversations. Because of that I couldn’t get much information.”

“Really? She didn’t even mention one thing she was interested in?”

Christia perched her chin on the palm of her hand that was anchored to the table, deep in thought. She hummed a melody while skipping through her memories, I assumed. I wasn’t a mind reader.

It was when her humming started hitting high notes that she opened her lips to share vital intel. “I did remember catching her staring at my dress a few times. Maybe she wants new clothes? She was wearing pretty ragged clothes when I met up with her.”

Clothes? That sure narrowed things down, but then it brought up more questions. What were her clothing sizes? What type of clothes did she like? I was assuming she would like a dress like Christia’s, since she was staring at it.

And thus I started an adventure to find a dress for Charliette. But even that proved harder than before. There I was, running all around town, looking for suitable dresses sold by merchants.

Of course, I wasn’t dumb. I had thought at one point to just cut the nonsense and just tell Charliette what she wanted or to pick out the clothes of her choosing. But Christia stopped me, saying, “It would be much better if it was a surprise! A woman always loves a good surprise.”

Knowing Charliette, she’d probably deny being given a gift if I gave her a heads up, so I ended up agreeing with Christia. It had to be a surprise, so no interaction with Charliette until I get that done.

I couldn’t do it myself with my limited knowledge of women in general, though. So I had to call in reinforcements. That would be Fiar. He’s married, so he should know more than me about what gifts are good for a girl or not. What dresses are in fashion and what places sell them in good quality. He was my trump card.

I showed up to Fiar’s doorstep and knocked. Hanging from both sides of the doorway were baskets with plants inside of them. The exterior of his house oozed a natural atmosphere. Green plants surrounded the house, and the smell of wood from the house made me think of a woodland forest.

Fiar opened the door, hopping on one foot. He stabilized himself with a wooden crutch, his hurt leg still wrapped in thick layers of white bandages.

“Huh? Lio? What can I do for you?”

“I wanted to have a chat with you about something.”

All he did was nod his head and lead me inside his house. It was cozy, and smelled of cinnamon. Paintings covered basically every inch of the walls, and Fiar plopped down on a soft looking brown couch, resting his hurt foot on a small table in front of him. I sat down with him.

“Is your wife home?” I asked. Maybe I should ask his wife first. She would relate to Charliette way more than Fiar would.

“She is, but she’s sleeping right now.”

“Ah, okay, that’s not a problem.”

“So…” Fiar grabbed a pillow on the ground and placed it under his hurt foot. He set down his crutch at his side. “What did you want to talk about?”

“It’s about Charliette.”

“As everything else is.” He chuckled a bit. “She is quite all over the place, if I may say so myself.”

“This is different, though. Her birthday is tomorrow.”

Fiar raised an eyebrow in surprise. It seemed Christia hasn’t gotten to him yet.

“I wanted to buy Charliette a gift, but don’t know what to get her. She might want a dress, but I was stumped on what exactly to get her. I figured you’d know more on what types of gifts are good for a woman.”

He leaned his head against the couch cushion and stared up at his wooden ceiling. “You said a dress, right? She wanted a dress?”

“That’s a guess, but I think so.”

“Have you tried asking the merchants selling them? What was popular with their female customer?”

“No, I haven’t thought of that.” That was actually a good idea. That way I’d be sure to buy her the trendiest clothing possible based on what everyone else was getting. The more I thought of it, the more it sounded like the best solution to my predicament.

I thanked Fiar and rose from the couch, but he grabbed me by the shoulder and pulled me back down. “I have something that would be a good gift for Charliette, so you can save my advice for later.”

“What is it?” I gave him a skeptical look as he grabbed his crutch and slowly got to his feet. He slid his hurt foot slowly off the table.

“Let me show you. Stay here.” And there he went, trudging forward like a limp deer in search of berries. He slowly made his way down the hall and I heard the creaking of a door swinging open.

Well, I guess I had nothing to lose by staying here with Fiar a bit longer. What piqued my curiosity the most was the gift Fiar had in mind. I was especially surprised by his confidence that Charliette would like the gift. Not even I knew what Charliette would like, and I presumably spent the most time with her out of all the people we know. I was her master after all.

Master Lio… yeah. That had a good ring to it. “Master Eliott” doesn’t roll off the tongue as much. Even though I hated Charliette addressing me as Master all the time, if I was going to be called that the rest of my life, might as well make it a catchy name. Master Lio, [Lio the Cauterizer], those names’ll do. But that was enough ranting, because Fiar had finally come back with something in his hands.

He returned with what looked like folded white cloth. “Here it is.” He handed me the cloth, but it was so much more than that. I unfolded it and held it in front of me. It was a gorgeous white mini dress with intricate embroidered silver decorative designs. I patted off the dust that stuck to it and glared at it once more.

Fiar came to my side and laid his free hand on my shoulder. He seemed more solemn than usual.

“Where did you find this? It’s stunning!” I glared at it in awe

“It’s my wife’s, she wore it a few years ago when she was twenty, so I thought it would be good for her too.”

“Are you sure it’s fine with her? I mean, this is her dress that you’re giving away.”

“It was her idea that I give it to you. She woke up when I entered the room, and gave it to me to hand over to you.”

“Thank you so much, then! Tell your wife I gave my most sincere gratitude.”

I refolded the dress and held it gently in my arms, then stood up to head for the door.

“Yeah, yeah!” he told me with his thumb up in the air. “Get going! She’ll definitely love it.”

“Oh, right!” I saluted my reinforcement for providing support when I needed it most. Then my feet finally tasted dirt again once I walked right out of Fiar quaint little house.

The hard part was done, now was the harder part. That would be giving it to Charliette.

My heart pounded and I felt my face turn red. This was not as easy as I thought it would be.