Pov Eclipse

The sun had gone, and the moon had come long before we reached the human territory. Causing a feeling of empowerment to flow through me.

Jack had left me alone with my thoughts in its room. I looked through the opening, which I had jumped through before, and at the moon pondering, my thoughts have been in turmoil ever since Jack told me about death. I looked down at the floating blue rectangle sitting behind me, something that I had to ‘ask’ Jack to show again. The contents of the blue rectangle interested me, well two of my [Titles] have interested me. [The Last of Your Species], and [Curiosity Killed The Cat, But Why?].

I stared intently at both of them, why did they interest me? The first one well simple, while I walked through the forest, I never noticed a trace of my species, not any bees going from flower to flower, not any ants busy making their nests, not any grasshoppers, and not any moths.

Am I alone...? No, I’m sure there is some of my kind somewhere, they’re just not here.

I’m sure of it, there are too many to count, I’m sure this blue rectangle is wrong.

But what if it isn’t...? No don’t think about that, I’ll go visit that worm in the dry wasteland and all will be good.

With one [Title] delt with, I pondered about the second. It felt like some sort of warning, but for what?

Why would curiosity kill a creature called a ‘cat’?

But I didn’t have time to ponder any more as the entrance of the room was opened and in stepped Jack wearing wavy armor, or how Jack called them, ‘clothes’, a mystery why would humans called a shell, armor and clothes? Very strange but oh well. The clothes it was wearing were the same ones it had on when it came to bring me... home.

It's strange calling this place home. It really was, maybe if Silven were here, it’d feel more like home. Yet Silven is somewhere else.

Jack never said anything about Silven, causing my mind to wander.

Was it-

“Alright Eclipse! We’re going to go down into the bar and introduce you to a friend of mine.”

Jack suddenly said, once again interrupting my thoughts, maybe for the greater good.

What’s a bar?

Today I learned what a bar was, it was the large room on the first floor of the building and for some reason, it was filled with loud humans all making weird noises. I was currently on an elevated surface with Jack beside me, talking with another human.

Not knowing what to do I merely looked at the other human beside me, it was a short human with a large amount of brown fur on its face and on top of its head. It wore something that looked like armor and clothes and had a thick line with a block of what looked like stone at the end on the ground beside it, leaning against the elevated surface base. It was currently looking at me with piercing green eyes,

“What? Ya never seen a dwarf before?”

A dwarf? Is that human?

I just stared, knowing the language Silven taught me was useless in these situations. The ‘dwarf’ made a noise and continued.

“To be fair I don’t know what the bloody Depths yer are, but quit yah staring, weren’t yah taught that was rude?”

The dwarf placed a wooden object up to its mouth hidden behind the fur.

What does rude mean? Is that bad?

Just in case it was bad, I switched my gaze to the object the dwarf was holding, which it placed down of the elevated surface.

“Eh yah interested in some beer?”

Beer? If you would explain it first.

“Rod, don’t give children beer.”

Jack suddenly stopped talking with the other human while it shifted its attention over to the dwarf named Rod, I looked over confused.

“Ay why yah bringing a kid inta here?”

Rod put its large hand in between me and the beer and watched me carefully.

“To send a message, don’t want any of the mercenaries to try hunting Eclipse over here.”

Hunting? Is... Is that bad?

Jack said not bothering to look at Rod as it scanned the crowd, a crescent always present on its face.

“Ay that’s smart of yah, no one wan’ to mess with the Reaper”

Rod made a strange loud noise as it brought the ‘beer’ up to its face. A moment of silence passed before Rod put down its beer.

“So, it a mute?”

Rod asked slightly raising its beer up which prompted another human to walk on over and pour a brownish liquid into the beer. The human gave me a few pats before walking off. Rod just raised the beer up to its mouth.

“Bingo, not even a week old, too smart for its age, though.”

Jack said, which caused Rod to spit out the brown liquid.

“Not even a week!? It’s as big as a tryno! Bloody Depths.”

I don’t know what caused Rod to suddenly speak so loudly, but with all the other humans making loud noises, it didn’t sound so loud. Jack just made a strange series of noises.

“Ah Rod, you always have the best reactions.”

“Ay shut it, yah may be the Reaper, but I ain’t ‘fraid of punching that grin off yah face!”

For some reason Rod was very angry at the moment and I had no idea why.

Oh, it’s Jack’s fault! It also makes me angry.

I found another human who shares my dislike of Jack! That made three of us!

“As much as I want to joke around Rod, I need to cash in a favor.”

Suddenly Jack lowered its voice, Rod stopped midway with its beer and looked over at Jack.

“I’m going to the Forest of Dreams, and I need someone to watch over Eclipse.”

Rod put down its beer slowly and looked around.

“Why yah going to that horrid place?”

Rod asked quietly, its voice losing its joy from a while ago.

“Silven got cursed by a demon.”

Jack said, its voice sounded angry, yet its face never changed. Meanwhile I felt confused and worried. I was wondering where Silven went.

Why did Mother not tell me so much? Why did Mother give me so much, yet so little? What is a ‘cursed’?

Rod’s eyes went wide, but then they returned to normal as the dwarf looked down on me.

“This one Silven’s, aint it? I remember now, yah were leaving together. It evolved?”

“Yes, Eclipse is Silven’s, and it did evolve.”

Rod talked quietly about ‘not even a week old’ and ‘levels’.

“Aight, I’ll take it under my wing till yah return. Anything I need to know?”

“Three things, from what I’ve seen it doesn’t need to eat, this is the last creature of its kind, and if you can, teach it some things.”

With those words, Jack patted me a bit before walking towards the entrance, every human in its path went off to the side. Losing interest in Jack, I looked over at Rod confused and it looked at me sadly. It exhaled, and then continued talking.

“Eclipse, that yer name?”

I stared silently, not bothering to attempt conversation. I tried to do the human ways of communication that didn’t include talking before, but that didn’t work for an odd reason.

Stolen story; please report.

“Oh yah, yer one of ‘em mutes, flap your wings once if yes, don’t flap if no. Understand?”

Oh, hey, a new way of communicating! Maybe this one will work better than Silven’s!

I flapped my wings twice to answer both questions, happy that I get to talk, well answer, again.

“Oh, the Reaper aint lying when he said yah were smart.”

Rod looked at his beer for a second before closing its eyes and hopping off the other elevated surface just below the one I was on. Rod was shorter than I imagined. It was slightly taller than me.

Yet it was strong, I watched in amazement as it picked up the large stone on a thick line with no effort whatsoever. That thing was slightly taller than it!

“Aight let’s go to yer new home for the time being.”

New home? Does it mean the one in this building or...?

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Rod meant a completely different home. This one was a bit further from the building we were just in, the new home was a small building which was made from grey stone, there was an area where the roof went far over the house and covered some weird objects sitting around.

The inside was rather nice to look at, the entrance led to an area with an elevated surface at the far back which had some strange colors just floating inside the surface. I was confused but I was distracted by something else.

Due to the short distance between the large building and this building, I didn’t have much time under the moon which made me a little sad.

Wait why am I feeling sad...? No not sad, tired? No not that either, I feel weird, I feel like.... I want more of the moon.

Something strange was happening suddenly, just being inside the building, my body started to feel heavy again, but it was worse this time, my vision started to flicker from darkness and back.

Rod said something, but I didn’t quite hear it, I looked behind me and saw that the entrance was still open. With haste I subconsciously flapped my wings and quickly exited the building, off the overhanging roof and onto the street, where the moonlight hit. Though I was in a strange position, my body started feeling better already.

I laid there for a minute until I heard footsteps.

“Eclipse what the bloody Depths has gotten into yah!?”

Oh right, Rod is here.

I stood up and looked over at Rod, I didn’t know how to explain the sudden urge to be under the moon.

I just stared and it stared.

“Are yah okay Eclipse?”

I flapped my wings, which caused Rod to exhale.

“Don’t give this dwarf a scare, come let's go back inside.”

I didn’t flap my wings and stayed still.

“Hm? Can yah come inside?”

I didn’t flap my wings. I heard Rod quietly say something again, this time it was about ‘damn the Reaper’ and ‘three things its boot’.

“So, yah can’t come inside.”

I flapped my wings.

“Bloody Depths, Percia have mercy on this dwarf... Can yah show why yah can't come inside?”

Hmm... now how do I go about doing that?

I stared at the moon, wondering how I would ever convey the fact that the moon is urging me to stay.

“The moon? Do yah need the moon?”

I was shocked, I looked at Rod and flapped my wings quickly. I don’t know how but someone understood me! With no misunderstanding and no guessing!

“I see Eclipse, yah don’t have to flap yah wings so much!”

Oh, I was so excited to finally be understood that I completely forgot I need to flap my wings once. Whoops.

“Alright, the Reaper said yah don’t eat, but yah need energy from someth’ I’m guessing whatever the moon is giving yah, is yer food.”

Let's hope Rod understands this.

I had no idea if my food source was the moon or not, I don’t really have a mouth, but maybe I’m eating in an unusual way. Since Rod didn’t tell me what my answer should be if I don’t know something, I’m going to do the same thing I did with Silven and adapt.

So, I flapped my wings only halfway.

“Ah so it is, to think my wife thinks I’m dumber than a rock golem.”

What Rod said was followed by a loud weird noise as I stared at it with disappointment.

Oh well, just because it worked the first time, doesn’t mean it’ll work again.

“What are you doing out here talking to nothing Rod...”

I heard a new human call out, which caused me and Rod to look over to the speaker, I had to angle my head a bit to look over Rod’s broad upper body.

What I saw was a human standing in the doorway, it had white clothes that reached just above the halfway point of its legs. The human has beautiful long golden fur, it had long tipped objects on the side of its head, not as long as a goblin, but longer than the average human. The human looked delicate like a flower in a field. I couldn’t see its eyes as it currently had them closed as it weakly rubbed one of its eyes with its hand.

“Ah I was just talkn’ with Eclipse over here.”

Rod said while raising its hand and pointing its big finger behind it and at me.

“hm...? Have you gone mad, why would you be talking with a children’s story.... PERCIA ABOVE THERES A MONSTER!”

Once the human opened its eyes, it widened them immediately. And an alternating red and orange object appeared in the human's hands, with fast movements, it pulled on a small line behind the large, curved line, and another red and orange object appeared, this one had a sharp tip. The objects were beautiful, and I couldn’t help but fall into a trance, which broke immediately as Rod seemed to talk as loud as the new human.

“ALEA IT’S A FRIEND, CALM DOWN FOR A SECOND.”

Silence filled the human territory, as Rod and the human, ‘Alea’, stared at each other. I looked back at the pretty object, but didn’t fall into a trance this time, I didn’t notice until now, but the object emitted light, which allowed me to see more details on Alea.

Alea had golden eyes which sparkled in the light, matching its fur well. Its clothes looked different from any other clothing I’ve seen, these ones let me see slightly of what's underneath the clothes, which was surprisingly, more clothes, but these ones were focused on a part of the upper body and a part where the lower body and the upper body met, both were white.

Suddenly the object dissipated into nothingness, and Alea crossed its arms.

“Well, are you going to explain?”

Its voice sounded tense for an odd reason.

“Why don’t yah head inside first, cause y’know...”

This caused Alea to suddenly move back inside the building, Rod followed this by making the strange noise again. It looked at me and I looked back.

“Now, how to bring yah inside without yah leaving the moon...”

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It didn’t take too long for me to be brought back inside the building, but this time I was dragged through the large room and up the human building. This place was just a long room with multiple closed entrances to the sides. The entire time I felt strange, not as bad as strange as before, but still uncomfortable.

Thankfully I was brought into another room which had an opening similar to the one in Jack’s room, just being bigger. I walked into the light and the uncomfortable feeling vanished, allowing me to view the room. This room was not too big and looked similar to Silven’s, but there were just more objects in this one, there was an elevated surface with large square holes filled with objects just off to the side, beside me was a better-looking big square object that Silven and I went through torpor together.

To my other side was a wooden elevated surface with another smaller elevated surface, something that I’ve seen in the bar, tucked under it.

“This is our son’s room, he’s out learnin’, so yah can use it for now.”

Use it? How would I use a room?

Confused as I was, I saw the human named Alea standing in the entrance, this time it’s clothes were separated with the top being white while not covering the arms, and the bottom being blue and reaching down to Alea’s feat. Neither were see-through.

It had crossed it’s arms and was watching me with intensity.

No please don’t be another Zolton...

Alea made a rough sound and Rod looked over.

“Are we going to talk now, dear?”

Alea said roughly, watching me the entire time. While I took a step back due to my experience with strange humans, Rod walked towards Alea.

“Let’s talk somewhere else.”

Rod said, Alea was about to say something, but Rod shook its head.

“It’s a difficult topic, Eclipse wait here.”

With that Rod and Alea left, with Rod closing the entrance behind them. I looked at the entrance, slightly confused.

Human and dwarfs are weird.

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Pov Alea

This felt like a dream, maybe it was. One moment I was asleep and the next I was awoken by what sounded like a bang. I thought it was some troublemakers at first, I was shocked when the troublemakers were my husband and some strange monster.

I was even more shocked to learn that this monster was going to be living with us, which made me quite angry knowing that my husband decided to allow a monster to live with us without even asking me.

“Rod, dear, I love you but-”

“Alea please let this dwarf explain first.”

I looked down at him, he was sweating more than he did when working in the forge. I merely crossed my arms and waited for him to explain himself.

“The Reaper cashed in a favor for me to watch over it.”

My eyes widened.

“Why would the Reaper cash in a favor for that?”

“The Reaper needs to go to the damned Forest of Dreams, Silven got cursed by a demon.”

Forest of Dreams was a place I did not expect to suddenly come up in this conversation. Neither did I expect demons. I heard my heart start pounding in my ears.

I can still hear the screams.

I snapped out of whatever episode I was about to go on and noticed that Rod had grabbed my hand at some point.

“It’s ok, it wasn’t yah fault.”

“I know...”

I let out a sigh, the Forest of Dreams, or more commonly known as the land of the elves, was a serene place until about 30 years ago when a cult decided to open a hole to the Depths, and all went ablaze.

Now the elves were scattered all over the continent.

I took a deep breath again.

“So, the Reaper decided to visit that place, but why leave ‘Eclipse’ with us?”

I asked, the monster was surely stronger than it looked, I couldn’t even read its [Status].

“Well, I don’t know the details, but I do know that we can’t leave Eclipse alone.”

I was confused again.

“Is it cause Eclipse is too strong to be left alone?”

Rod let out a nervous laugh.

“No, its cause it's only a baby, and it got no mother.”

A baby? That thing? When were babies strong enough to resist [Appraisal] from a former Gold one?

“A baby? Are you sure? I can’t read it’s [Status]”

“Ay when has this dwarf never been sure, it's not even a week old.”

There are many times when you weren’t sure. Wait-

“Not even a week old!? Why are you telling me this now!?”

I couldn’t help but pity the creature now, not even a week old and it had no mother.

I once again looked down at the dwarf who was awkwardly laughing as he looked away. I sighed.

“Alright we’ll keep it until the Reaper returns, but I want to see its [Status] to be sure.”

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Pov Eclipse

I never thought of this problem before I re-entered the building...

The moon moves!

I was currently squishing myself against the wall getting the most amount of moon light as I can, I was able to deal with squishing myself against the wall for a bit, but this was starting to get uncomfortable.

What’s taking the human and dwarf so long?

I couldn’t help but grumble as I waited, but as if the human and dwarf heard me, they entered the room with Rod leading. I noticed it was carrying a Reader, which it placed down in front of me. Rod was about to say something, but stopped once I placed my leg over the Reader.

Rod and Alea looked at each other for a second before the dwarf pulled out a small sword out, which prompted me to freeze.

Jack’s words and actions were still clear in my mind.

Nope I do not want to be in the endless darkness again.

My body once again moved on its own as my wings flapped without any prompts and nothing happened due to the fact I was already against the wall. Rod and Alea looked at each other once again. This time Rod said something.

“Ay it’s alright Eclipse, I’m just gonna make a small cut for a drop of blood.”

Oh, right the Reader.

Blood was needed for the Reader, so was the sword going to collect it? I did not know, but I was willing to put trust in Rod. Slowly I brought my leg above the Reader again, which Rod had to replace due to the wind I just created and focused entirely on the small sword.

Rod did just as it said, and a drop of blood splattered against the Reader pulling up my [Status]. Not worrying about experiencing death, I watched in amusement as the dwarf’s and human’s faces changed at every moment.

That was until Alea suddenly moved quickly and wrapped its arms around me. Which I immediately tried to struggle out of. The delicateness I thought of Alea was wrong, Alea was quite strong.

“Oh, you poor thing.”

Alea suddenly said as it patted me, I was in between being confused and feeling comfort for some strange reason.

Are all humans this weird?