I panic and cannot think of what I can do next. Maybe I’m so exhausted, so stressed out, that my engine is stalling. So, all I can think of doing is pumping his heart.

Do I shoot him with another adrenalin injection?

“Wake up, kid, wake up,” I say, but he hears me not.

And I start to feel his soul is ready to leave his body again.

“No!” I scream. “I will not lose you again!”

I jolt his heart with another bolt of energy, hoping I’m not frying him up.

“You need to WAKE UP! You! Cannot leave!!” The words come out as if it’s not Oollie, as if it’s me, and I’m Gandalf. The voice is deep, so deep it makes the whole dungeon creak.

“Oh, no,” I hear Old Gerwin behind me already lamenting, not sure if it is because of the kid or because all dungeon suddenly shakes.

I’m not ready to let Vania go.

I look at him and I don’t see a kid of some sword master. I see my kid. And my kids don't die. Not today. Not ever. Or else… Damn with this job, and all the universe!

“You wake up! Now!!” I yell, feeling the energy flow through me, transferring to air all around me.

In desperation, I raise my fist high up, then hit him on the chest with another jolt of energy one more time.

Then I realize how stupid I am for hitting him. He's a part of my dungeon now. I can just...

If he lives, I promise I'll never tell him what I am doing right now as my ghost hand slowly goes inside his chest. Slowly, I feel it all. No bleeding or anything. I just find his heart and give it a massage, firming my grip and making sure my fingers don't go inside his heart muscle. Then I imagine it's just a sponge that needs to be squeezed a bit, and I do it, once, twice. Not working.

Damn. I shock his heart muscles directly with some energy, squeeze it again, and...

I almost fall on my ass as his heart moves. All on its own. Twitches once. Then again.

Hell, yeah!

The kid gasps for air, and I pull my hand out. I see his chest. It’s moving up. His heart is beating again. I watch him. We breathe together. And I see a bit of color return to his pale face. Then I open his card again and see his health slowly rising to 5, 6, then 7.

Not good. But better than 0. Anything is better than zero.

“SAMS, get me another healing potion. That helped a bit before. Maybe it can stabilize him again.”

I don’t leave Vania again. I let Old Gerwin carry the load and tell him just to spread it around the floor of the tunnels and I go sit next to Vania and monitor his state.

His health is now 14 since I gave him a healing potion. Hopefully, it will improve some more. He is not burning so hot anymore.

SAMS informs me that my energy has grown already by 10 units but now is projected to grow a hundred within one hour. I bet all that wine and spirit has started to kick in. Still, I was hoping for more.

Really debating with myself if I should just torture those sleeping dwarfs just a bit. I can just poke a few teeth out, work on their nerves in there, and let them scream their pants off. Why not? Why should I not do it?

I get lost in those thoughts, imagining exactly how to devise it all. Burn their feet over a small fire. Pluck out their nails. Na - I’m not so sure I want to get close to those.

I could also just tie one of them up, and set the wolves on him. Tell them to go for his balls. It would be messy, wouldn’t it? Too much blood.

But then, how about if I force them to smell each other? No, really. That’s painful right there. But, I bet they are accustomed to that pain.

I drift off until I feel a soft hand touching my shoulder. It makes me jump up. Tarra is there behind me, looking all concerned.

Strange but I did not feel her come, and I realize I actually passed out inside Oollie’s body. Sorry, little man.

“So?” she asks.

“The dwarfs have not been behaving lately,” I say, looking at them all sleeping there. “Doing some time out, you know.”

She looks at Vania and nods her head up.

“Yeah, he had a nasty and not-too-bright idea of trying to kill me. I had to freeze him. Now, I’m trying to save him, but… it’s not going so well.”

She nods her head, and only then do I see her hand drop away from her sword handle, relaxing in front of her.

“Strange, but I did not feel you come.”

“It seems you had yourself a busy time.”

“I brought it all up.” I hear Old Gerwin come and report he is finished.

“Did you spread it over the floor as I told you?”

“Yes.”

“You did not spill all the good food in there did you?” I ask him, fully knowing I told him to do just that.

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“But… But... You did say. And…”

He looks confused.

“Relax. I was just messing with you. Yeah, well, come and sit here with us. Have some of the bacon and cabbage here. There is still some stew left. You too, Tarra. Help yourself. Don’t anybody ever say I’m a bad host.”

They accept my offer, slice some bacon off, and each pours themselves some stew.

They are still eating when I feel the presence entering the dungeon, hear it running, and a moment later see Nemyr's red face.

He nods his head to greet Tarra and runs to see his boy.

“He was not doing so good,” I tell him the truth. “Had a fever, had almost left us. But… he is doing better now. Still… I do not know if he is stable. I want him cured as fast as I can. Did you bring something? The stuff dwarf carried might not be enough.”

“Yes. I brought everything I could. There are some of my neighbors and people who wanted to help. They do not dare come inside. But… we brought stuff.”

“Great.”

“One question… You said stuff… that was even rotten?”

“Yes.”

“How about cows' manure? A neighbor had just loaded a full wagon of it, and thought about taking it to his field to fertilize his land, but… I begged him to help me out. I thought if it is good for the land, it might be even better for a dungeon.”

That idea sounded about right. “I like it. Let’s try that first. I think that may work really well.”

“But the cart is a bit off… by the road. Can I use the dwarf’s wheelbarrow?”

“Yeah, but wait a minute. I know exactly who will be giving you a hand.”

I go to the first cell and bang on the rail. “Hey, you four young delinquents! You’re on a shit duty! You’ll go and help Master Swordsman bring some pile of shit up. I don’t even want to hear a word from you. I’ve already decided if you don’t help to… burn your feet over a slow fire and plug your nails out and have the wolves bite your balls off! So, don’t freaking even dare to give me a lip!”

They look confused and look to their older who is two cells down, probably seeing council and direction.

So I go to him.

“I do not have that much time to waste,” I tell him “That sick boy there is dying… and your boys are going to help me save him.

“What have you done to him?” he asks as if he owns this place and as if I’ve done something wrong.

That pisses me off. “See what I have done to him? Look at him!"

I smirk, letting that sink in. "And I even like him! Imagine what I’ll do to you who… I can’t say I like it at all! And brush your teeth next time you get up in the morning!” I scold him before I turn around to leave.

“You better do what he says,” Tarra adds behind me. “I’ve seen dungeons do worse things than those.”

But it actually took the old man nodding his head for young dwarfs to do the same and replay, “We’ll help. Tell us what to do.”

I open the cage and tell them, “Go and help Master Swordsman. You bring the stuff into the dungeon. Seems people do not trust coming in here.”

Of all the things, they bring the manure first in.

I’m smelling it, deciding to tell the dwarves to drop it in the corner of the Great Entrance Hall since the floor of the whole dungeon is almost covered with stuff.

“Hustle, hustle, hustle. Faster!!! What are you, like five? Little Oollie can do this faster than you! Put some pride in it, would you? Spread it over the ground. Use your feet. It’s only shit! Won’t kill you.” Well, it may, but… what the hell? I’m a slave driver, but I don’t care. I want the whole dungeon’s floor covered in whatever we can get our hands on.

And, just as I thought it might happen, it seems my dungeon loves manure. It processes it so fast that I can actually see it happen. By the time they bring another load, the first one is already gone, so I tell them just to drop it on the side next to the entrance where there is no stone or granite.

“What is my energy now, SAMS?”

[LIC Energy Balance: 500 Units]

Holy shit! Really holy shit! It was like, less than 300 just half an hour ago. That’s it. I’m getting myself a cow. Or two, so one never has to be lonely.

I’m guessing each pile of cow’s crap is giving me at least 30 to 40 energy units.

Nemyr brought with him a bunch of other stuff. I see broken chairs and old rags, plates, and pots. I think I made the man clean his house inside out. And not just his.

I tell him to spread the stuff over the Grand Hall, but I already see we have more than enough.

“I think that should do it. We just have to sit down and wait.”

“It should be like an hour, maybe two.”

Tarra is beside me with a question. “And why do you need all that energy?”

“Need to level up,” I say as if she can understand that. But she looks at me and I’m waiting for a question, except she just flashes that little smirk on her face and says nothing.

It takes only two hours for the dungeon to produce 1000 LIC units. I’m amazed. I tell SAMS to sell it as I’m supposed to, and before I’m even notified that I have leveled up, I tell Tarra and Sword Master to pick the kid up and carry him to the Core.

Four of us are inside when I get a notice that the Dungeon is now Level 3. I pull the option for Denizens support, select the Self-Healing option, and put Vania next to the Constructor.

It spins the web-like membrane into a cocoon-type covering over the kid's entire body in a matter of a minute and starts working on him.

Ten minutes later, the process is over. The cocoon disappears, but… the kid is there. Looking better with more color on his face and more glow in his eyes. But he's still not responding.

“What… what is happening?” his father wants to know.

“Give it a minute,” Tarra says.

I sigh and come over to the kid, pulling his card out. His health says 50. Well, it did not go all the way to a hundred percent but fifty is a mile better than 0.

“It might take some time,” I say, thinking the kid will be better as I see his health raise already to 51. Then 52. That’s a good trend.

“Hey, buddy, care to wake up?” I ask.

He opens his eyes as I shake him. “Wakey, wakey, sleeping beauty. Your father wants to talk to you.”

“Where am I?” he asks, looking around, all confused and disoriented.

“Don’t remember me?”

He shakes his head in denial and looks at me all confused.

“How about this beauty here? Do you know who she is?”

He nods his head. “You’re a Ranger. Tarra, right?”

“Good… How about that ugly guy that would serve great as a Halloween movie bad guy?”

“Father…?” he says and Nemyr runs to hug him.

How they hug each other and cry. And hug each other even harder.

I feel a teardrop running down my cheek.

I thought I was going to like to see that. But seeing it… it kind of makes me… I don’t know what. It’s actually painful. I actually feel pain as I breathe, as if the air carries needles with it. My chest, suddenly shrinks. My mind, goes numb. And the only thing I can think of is where is my own family, where are my children?