I sat down and contemplated my existence for a moment. Nobody had ever done this to me before. I had been called several things through my existence, from horrific things to great things, by both mortals and other Gods, but to be lowered to such a ridiculous name; to be—mocked—in this way by a mortal… one as pitiful as Eleanor… I wasn’t sure if I should be mad, sad, laugh it off, or ignore it.

“What’s wrong, Kyun?” she asked, and I felt my eyebrows tremble after hearing that name.

She crouched down and tilted her head in confusion, seemingly unaware of what she had done for calling me that way. I just looked back at her, somewhat stunned about being named that.

While I looked at her, she took the opportunity to stretch her hand in another attempt to pet my cat form, but as I was about to slap her hand away, a piece of metal falling and hitting the ground caused both her and me to turn and look in the direction of the sound.

She quickly stood up and took a defensive stance with the short dagger she picked up earlier. It wasn’t the best of stances, and I could see her hands shaking. I did as she did and focused my attention on the place from where the sound came, and quickly noticed that the top half of an old, rusted sword had broken down and hit the floor.

Eleanor had yet to notice it, but it was a good reminder that we weren’t in a particularly safe place and that it would be better to keep moving. I stood back up and turned my way to keep going deeper and away from the black veil that was supposed to be this place’s entrance.

“Eh?! W-where are you going, Kyun?” Eleanor asked, surprised at me leaving, and causing me to hesitate on the next step for using that name again, but I decided to ignore it and keep going.

She shakingly looked at the place of the broken sword, and her eyes went from both that place and me as I kept getting away. Eventually, she realized she didn’t want to stay alone, and finally moved to go after me. Once she caught up with me, I stopped to look at her—glare, actually—and waited for her to keep going. I wasn’t going to be leading her, as she was the one that had to find a way out, and unless she died, I was planning on simply watching what she was going to do in this place.

She stopped a step behind me. “What is it…?”

It seemed like she couldn’t really understand what I was hoping for her to do. I could use magic, or the blood that covered this place to write down exactly what I wanted her to do, but I wasn’t sure if it was a good idea for a God to directly tell mortals what they should and shouldn’t do—especially since I didn’t want to be like a certain Goddess—so I just waited for her to continue and simply pointed with my paw into the darkness.

“Ah…” she replied, her eyes set in the depths. “I guess… I’ll take the lead…”

She took a hesitant step forward and I followed her.

* * *

Nothing strange happened the deeper we went. No monsters popped out, and no dangers appeared. The only thing that changed was that there weren’t as many corpses as before, and the quality of the dead people’s gear appeared to be better. It still wasn’t stronger than what Eleanor was wearing with the dress that I fixed and the armor pieces she picked up from the skeleton demon, but it was still something that she could consider now.

Another detail from the fallen corpses was that there was a greater amount of diversity in their appearances. The armors were shiny, even if destroyed, and the clothes and robes had intricate details on them. There were large beings with huge horns, as well as smaller ones that could be confused with children—if not for the strange proportions.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Eh!?” suddenly exclaimed Eleanor, stopping in her tracks.

I did as she did and tried to find what she saw. It didn’t take long to notice a knight kneeling on one knee up ahead a short distance away from us with his hands on a half-buried sword in front of him. He was tall, had a pair of horns that popped out from the back of the silvery helmet and ended at the front like a laurel crown, and the armor was still clean and shiny as if someone had just crafted it.

There weren’t any details that could be seen on the knight under the armor since it covered every part of the body, so it was difficult to know what kind of being this was.

“H-hello?” Eleanor called out to the knight. However, there was no response, no movement, and no change around him. “Can you hear me… I need help, please. If you could show me a way out of here, fair knight, I would do anything in my power to repay it.”

And despite that, there was no response. Eleanor glanced down at me, seemingly hoping for answers, but I just looked up ahead and waited for her to decide. She quickly understood and looked ahead as well to the knight. After gripping the dagger in her hands, and heavily swallowing, she finally took a step forward.

“I’m getting closer, okay…?” she said as she slowly made her way to the knight. There was still no response, and the closer that she got, the tighter her grip on the weapon was, until eventually, she was just a couple of steps away from the knight. “Sir Knight…?”

Once more, she turned to look back at me, seemingly expecting guidance, but once more, I remained silent and unmoving. She tightened her lips slightly and turned to look at the knight. After thinking for a moment, she reached out to the knight, her hands shaking the closer she got, until finally, she touched one of the arms that was still holding on to the half-buried sword.

As soon as she touched the metal on the arm, it completely fell to the ground. Eleanor yelped in surprise and took a step back right after the loud noise of metal hitting the ground passed. There was nothing inside the armor. No flesh, no bone, no man or monster. It was completely empty.

The rest of the armor followed soon after, as the other arm, the helmet, the torso and the legs all crumbled down, leaving nothing more than a pile of metal and the half-buried sword.

It was then that I got closer to stand behind Eleanor, who was looking with widened eyes at the mess that she created. It seemed like whoever was the owner of that armor was long gone. However, whether it was arranged like that or if the person inside simply died like that, it was impossible to know right now.

Once the surprise passed, Eleanor glanced at me once more, but by now she knew that I wasn’t going to guide her, so she quickly looked back down at the armor. She knew that the pieces dropped were good, so she started moving them aside to try to find out what she could make use of or why they were left like this.

The chest piece was revealed to have a large hole in the middle, just like every other corpse out there, so it wasn’t usable. The other pieces were far too big for Eleanor to wear, so even trying them on would cause her to become a clunky, easy target. After looking at it, she finally set it down and stood back up.

The only thing left was the half-buried sword. I could tell that it was of great quality, since despite how long it had been stuck in there, it showed no signs of rust or damage. Eleanor looked at it as well, then turned to look at me again. This time, I decided to nod, since it would be foolish of her to leave this good sword here.

“Okay…” she said in a whisper and placed her right hand on the sword’s handle.

She tried to pull it, but it refused to come out. She put more strength into it, but it didn’t even shake in place. Finally, she placed both hands on it and pulled. There was no movement from the sword, until from her left hand—the one that I remade—a small dark mist appeared, and the sword finally popped out of the ground, lifting rocks and dirt everywhere. Eleanor stumbled backwards with a yelp and the sword in her hand, nearly falling on her butt.

The sword was in perfect condition, with a perfectly clear silvery hue on the blade and a golden crossguard glinting under the dim light of the fires surrounding us. The handle had a royal blue grip, and at the end, a red jewel was used as a decoration. This sword apparently belonged to someone important…

“Woah…” Eleanor awed as she inspected the blade.

It was about half as long as her height, so it wouldn’t be an issue for her to use, and as I glanced at her left arm… it seemed like she had more than enough strength to wield it and do with it whatever it took to survive… That was, if all she needed to do was to fight, as right after, a rumbling noise came from her stomach and she placed a hand over it with a furrow as she looked at me.

There was more for survival than strength and magic for a mortal…