Black, darkness, null. Nothing.

“W-what the?”

In the dark, one must steel themselves and prepare for everything and anything to happen, all at once. This is because at every movement, every step, every little breath, lies the potential for danger. Darkness harbors a mental torture unparalleled by anything else.

Luckily this guy won’t have to suffer it for long.

With a flicker, the moment as if torn from the bible, light- torchlight to be more precise.

“Where the fu…?”

Freshly unveiled by light, stone bricks- gray, laid all around covering the floor, walls, and ceiling being solely supported by rotting wooden pillars.

Startling the poor 16-year-old, a window blinked itself into existence, ‘Stephan. Survive.’

Limiting unnecessary questions Stephan closed his eyes. Most may panic, going into hysteria. Not Stephan. He began calculating, taking into account all actions just before this.

His sister was cooking, angry, fuming, spontaneous. An argument had bud about their lost father. She was saying things she might regret later, not exactly thinking. Stephan hadn’t muttered a word for quite a while- not wanting to further escalate the situation.

He was doing his homework at the kitchen table since it was the only table in that small, cramped house. She whipped around with a large knife in hand. Big mistake. Stephan swallowed by his anxiety, forgot that she was preparing dinner. He thought she was going to attack him, and so: Silence. One Mississippi, two Mississi- thud.

A dead body laid on the floor. Knife in his hand. Fuck.

And with a blink. Here we are. The present.

Despite not having any time to even process what he’d done, Stephan had no time to enter shock. Think. All he could do was think. His mind was currently one of only 2 weapons in his arsenal, since the knife came with him.

Falling to his roots, Stephan remembered wise words spoken by one of his heroes, “When you have eliminated all which is impossible, then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” But an instant location change occurred, home to.. this place and there’s a floating, glowing message window. What constitutes impossible now?

Despite him not being in literal darkness, metaphorical darkness drowns him. This kind of darkness is one he’ll have to push back himself.

And so it begins… Rule one of the unknown: ‘Brace. For. Everything.’ Opening his eyes, he began scanning the immediate environment again. Traps? None visible, though there may still be some, I’ll keep that in mind. Anything alive? This place wasn’t silent, distant clanging could be heard. At least it wasn’t close by. Conclusion, no immediate danger.

He took an audible breath at last. Though it was far from being a relieved one.

Rule two of the unknown: ‘Explore and learn, dangerous as it may be. Expand your territory, or risk being ruled over’ Must explore and map this tunnel, whatever lives here knows this place infinitely better than me. Taking his house slippers and stuffing them in his pocket to reduce footsteps he began: One shaky, unsure foot in front of the other, he reluctantly built up a pace. Though our character here may have seemingly noteworthy mental fortitude, his unconscious cowers in absolute fear of his current situation.

Churning stomach, shaky feet, increased heart-rate, only a fraction of the symptoms of the fear of the unknown. Fears like these, have been chiseled into the very core of all human beings over the span of millions of years, they’re not something simply to be thought or reasoned away.

Regardless, even in the brittle state he subconsciously forced upon himself, Stephan pushed through. At first, each footstep felt like moving a mountain, then the mountains became hills, until the hills became boulders, and finally he’d regained control over his body, now being able to nimbly walk through the tunnel.

Passing one set of torches after another, he kept a mental note of how many sets had gone by and noticed that they were placed far enough from each other that there was a patch of near full darkness in the space between them, but close enough that he’d never be in true full darkness. After about 22 sets of torches he noticed the clanging was now much closer, he’d estimated no more than 15 more set’s and he’d reach the source. What exactly was he closing in on? well, whatever it was, he’d have to steel himself. Freezing up or becoming a shaky mess could prove to be certain death.

As he was letting his imagination race, trying to figure out what exactly he was approaching in on, he’d also caught a hint of footsteps coming from behind him. They were making a slap-like sound on the brick, definitely barefoot.

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The entity speed: light jog, estimated 6 torch sets away. Entity approaching but no stagger in footsteps, I’m unnoticed.

Positioning himself in the darkest part between two torch sets, he got in the position runners do before a sprint, ready to blast out. But just as he was getting ready to pounce-

Second set of footsteps, much faster: sprinting. It’s a chase. Estimated 4 sets away.

As the two entities closed in, he could hear and decipher them further.

Entity ‘A’: Girl being chased, jogging speed, panting heavily, exhausted. Entity ‘B’: possibly male, sprinting speed, strange groans and grunts whilst running, much lively sounding.

Since one is running using more footsteps than the other, Stephan deduced a height difference, but this was highly unusual. The difference would have to be something like an average sized human and a 10 year old child.

As they turned into view, the painting was fully composed at last:

A skinny girl, running as if she could collapse at any moment, and a- fuck, is that a..

Short, around 3-4 foot tall. Patchy green tinted skin. Teeming with skin defects such as warts and scars. A goblin. Stephan felt the temperature around him drop and his heart skip a beat or two, he was yet again left petrified. Omitting the obvious confusion as to why there would even be a goblin there in the first place, there was something else about it.

In games and stories alike, goblins are always portrayed to be a weak creature, big-bellied, mostly-annoying, pest-like beings. This goblin didn’t exactly reflect that; sure, he had the stereotypical hooked nose, and big belly, but weak was definitely not part of his description. This goblin had lean, well-built looking arms and legs, enough so that any human even in a game would think twice before bothering it. There was a small issue in Stephan’s specific situation though; Stephan wasn’t heading towards it, it was heading towards him. and they were getting rather close too.

Now 2 torch sets away, Stephan’s adrenaline managed to overcome his fear, depetrifying him. This allowed him to readjust his pose and better grip his knife. This sadly didn’t go unseen. The girl noticed him, though in her current state, this little distraction cost her. She failed to see an out-standing brick, big mistake. As she was falling, she looked at Stephan with hope in her eyes. Little did our boy here know, she hadn’t seen another human in months, or at least another whole one.

The girl landed less than 4 meters away, the goblin saw his chance to finally catch the runaway. Fixating on her, he’d failed to see Stephan hiding in the shadows.

Now!

Stephan burst out of the shadows, wielding the knife with both hands, though our untrained rookie would soon find out just how out-leagued he was going up against this goblin. The goblin didn’t just dodge, he countered thrusting with his shoulder into Stephan, sending him off balance and into the wall, falling to the floor.

Though a bit confused as to where this strange human came from, the goblin saw Stephan as an easy target, seeing how easy he was to topple. This permeated him with cockiness, having him commit to a proud jumping move, where he jumps over his opponent and thrusts his knife into them upon landing.

Rule 3 of the unknown: ‘Survive’. No move is underhanded. Play all your cards, because if you don’t, you die. As the goblin jumped, Stephan immediately locked in on his weak spot: the most painful place on any man’s body.

His groin!

Stephan thrust his hand upwards putting all the power his untrained body could muster into this one attack.

“Skreee!” The Goblin’s cry shrieked and echoed throughout the tunnels, sounding similar to a pig’s squeal, but it did not last. Taking initiative, the girl muffled the goblin’s screams. Pulling out the knife, Stephan was a hair away from entering shock- but fuck! Can’t be noticed now! With a grunt and another mighty thrust, his blade pierced through the goblin’s stomach, having it’s intestines and blood burst out from itself, making a puke-provoking scene all over Stephan. Blood spilling, dripping, pouring. Guts and organs gushing. Desperate, sad wriggling from such a small, now remorseful-looking creature. And oh the stench, an iron-like smell from the blood, and the stink of enzymes from the guts.

Facing this sight, the jug finally tipped. Stephan’s breaths shortened, leaving him struggling to breathe. Heart rate rose, trying to cover for the shortness of breath. Hysteria kicked in, walls spinning, closing in? Where? what? who? and finally: Click, like flipping off a light switch.

There is only so much a city-grown teenage boy could take. Having to instantaneously switch from a relatively cushy life style to this law-of-the-jungle driven, danger-at-every-turn having place had Stephan running his mind at overclocked speeds from the beginning. Stephan simply couldn’t keep up with the information intake and.. Short circuited?

Luckily, the brain is a highly plastic organ, extremely effective in adapting to new environments. Sleep is where most learning happens, memories and actions get decrypted into patterns, and patterns are easily learnt. Ever try do learn a new skill and you just can’t seem to get it right, so you sleep on it, only to return the next day and for it to have suddenly become easier? That’s the power of sleep -and also where Stephan got forced to. With such a sudden, large intake of new information Stephan’s mind had to take some time off to ‘digest’ it all.

Waking, vision still foggy. Stephan’s head laid on a Puffy pillow, at least that’s what it felt like. Sadly, it did not last. As he returned to his senses, dissolving the momentary bliss, a rush of adrenaline spikes him into gear. How long was I out? The rush was slightly mellowed out by his realization that he was laying on a lap pillow. His accomplice sure seemed considerate.

Looking up, he got a better look at the girl’s face. Red eyes, and… bunny ears? Either those are authentic, or that goblin was into cosplay, neither of which would surprise me right now.

“Hey, what is this place?”, having not noticed that he’d woken up, the girl was startled by him suddenly speaking, eliciting a small “Eep!”.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you, I’d still like to know where I am though.” Stephan continued whilst sitting up. An awkward pause filled the air as the girl stared confused, slightly tilting her head. Aah, language barrier, of course… Stephan facepalmed.

Due to their all too obviously aligned goals, it was unspoken that they were now a team, at least until they find a way out of here. Well, two is better than one, but apart from her severe malnourishment leading to decreased stamina and general weakness, what other weaknesses does she have. It’ll put both me and her in danger if I don’t know any and all existing injuries.

Pointing to the girl, then making a ‘T’ pose, therefore signing to her to copy him, she obliged. Stephan stared her up and down, analyzing. Cracked fingernails: Cleaning tasks..? Scratches and cuts on her hands and forearms: Labor tasks, maybe working in some sort of mine judging by the fact we’re underground and the still audible distant clanging. Getting absorbed into his little investigation, Stephan lifted up the patchy, worn out, torn tunic she was wearing, soon finding out that it was the only piece of clothing on her at all. Realizing what he’d done, he immediately dropped the tunic, but looking back at her, she was completely unfazed. The things they must’ve done for you to be this jaded… poor thing.

Seeing as she was unfazed and he needed to properly asses her, he continued. Stephan circled behind her: Whip marks, thighs and calves: She was certainly a slave. Lifting up her tunic once more, the whip marks proceeded through to her back. Some marks were especially deep and obviously infected.

It’s a surprise that she’s alive at all in her condition. She’s not exactly in a dependable state, I’ll have to take the lead. Though she’s shown to be particularly intuitive, instantly catching on and silencing that goblin. I’ll be the main, and she’ll be support i guess.

Having successfully analyzed his accomplice, Stephan put a finger to his mouth, signaling her to be silent as they began moving. His steps filled with more urgency now, he sets off, moving closer to the noise. Passing torch after torch, eventually a stronger light began peeking through at the end of the tunnel… Freedom at last? But something was off: for the light at the end of this tunnel wasn’t the right shade, not sunlight. The air only became denser, not cleaner.

Each step now only gathered up more adrenaline, preparing his body for another fight. Finally, reaching the end of this tunnel, as Stephan pushed into the light, an impossible sight faced him. Was this.. Hell?