Have you ever woken up after a night of hitting the grog hard and felt like death but just a smidge warmed up? It’s alright, you’ll get no judgment from me, I’m Aussie after all. It would concern me more if you’d never felt that way. Shout out to my brothers and sisters across the pond in Scotland. They know what I’m talking about.

Well, that's all good and well when you’re at home and can crawl your blasted ass to the fridge to cook literally everything inside it in the most unhealthy way possible. That's a right pick-me-up after a night on the booze. Can’t really do that when you wake up in a freezing, damp, smelly, stone prison though.

I slowly lifted my aching head off the ground as I groaned in agony from the small movement. It was enough to make me heavy up a splattering of bitter bile. I sat back on my heels, dragging a leather-clad forearm across my dry lips. There was one saving grace to my predicament. At least there was no blazing sunshine to burn a hole through my eyeballs and stab viciously at my poor brain, like some creepy red-headed doll on a knife-wielding rampage.

I dug my hand in my pocket, grateful the bastards hadn’t decided to rob me blind the moment Theo had killed me. That’s what he’d done the bastard. If it wasn’t for the rare All-Mother’s Grace potion that he’d given me I’d still be… somewhere. I couldn’t quite remember where I’d gone in the moments before I’d been viciously yanked back to this bizarre reality. I’m not sure whether that’s a good thing or not. I pulled out my canteen and drained it dry, my parched throat still begging for more.

I stood on shaking legs, feeling my way across the tight circular room I was trapped in. The plan had worked. Well, kind of. It would have gone a lot smoother if it wasn’t Theo I’d been facing up above but some ungodly monster. Still, I was in the underbelly of the main hall now, and that’s the place I needed to be; the place where the Elders had stashed Nigel the Sentinel. Now I just had to find the man.

I floundered in the dark for way too long. If we’d been smart, we would have stashed a torch or a lantern in my inventory before this mess but I guess that small detail hadn’t crossed our mind. I finally found the iron doorway into my little slice of hell and focused on the lockpicking icon.

It only took me a matter of seconds to best the simple lock, I mean seriously, only three bouncing balls? Can’t get much easier than that. The door swung open. I took one step outside my prison when I realized something was wrong. I could see detail at the end of the long hallway I was standing in. Worse still, the area of light was growing brighter.

I hissed and ran back into my cell, carefully shutting the heavy iron door before laying flat on my face again. I tried not to swear when my cheek landed in something disgustingly slimy.

“Hurry up Aaron, Elder Leon said we had to dispose of him quickly,” a squeaky voice said from not too far away.

“I don’t know why we have to do this. Why couldn’t Barrett or Jamison do it?”

“This is our punishment I guess. They were really pissed off when they found us sneaking into the girl's baths.”

“It’s not our fault. I mean come on, the place is right there. What did they expect us to do? I’m sure every single one of them has done the exact same thing.”

“I know. Any red-blooded man would have done it,” said squeaky voice. “We just have to learn to be a bit sneakier, that’s all. No one cares unless you get caught.”

My hands curled into fists as I listened to the shit spewing from the mouths of what had to be a pair of dumbass teenagers. They should count their lucky stars the only punishment they were getting was dead guy disposal duty. If Nora had caught them sneaking into a bathhouse she would have chopped off their heads and placed them on spikes for all to see.

“Come on, let's get this murdering sack of shit over to the pit. Gregory will be having a good dinner tonight.”

I tried to remain as limp as possible as the pair yanked me up by the shoulders and dragged me out into the cramped hallway. It's actually a strangely hard thing to do. I know that sounds silly, I mean, how hard is it to stay still? But seriously, try to be a dead weight. It's harder than you think.

“Weird that the door was unlocked. Why bother giving us a key then?”

“Doesn’t matter. The only folks that get dropped down the pit from the arena are dead anyway. What are they going to do, get up and walk right out the door?” The boy talking hooted with laughter.

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I kept the smile from my face as best I could but I’m sure my lip still twitched. If it wasn’t for the Elders' vendetta against me, making a corpse walk was probably exactly what we would have done. Miranda could get down here without the need for a staged death. The Elders had us trapped in a corner though. They needed me gone, and I needed to be down here. Win-win aside from the brutal headache that throbbed every few seconds like some asshole was using my skull as a drum.

“Fuck this guy is heavy,” one of the boys whinged.

“Why’s it always the fat ones that die?” the other grumbled.

Highly offensive given I barely had a gut at all. That’s what happens when you’ve spent months on rations and years before that working a labor-intensive job. Fucking pansies wouldn’t have lasted a day on the farm.

“Hey Gerry, don’t you think we should strip him of his valuables before we feed him to Gregory?”

The other snorted. “What valuables? The dude is wearing a battered old pink bum bag for Pete’s sake.”

“I don’t know, these swords look pretty good.”

“Can’t be that good, Elder Theo crushed him without losing any health.”

“Oh yeah, good point.”

I itched to teach the assholes a lesson but I’d convinced myself they might give me some useful information or at least lead me to a place a bit closer to where the Elders had stashed Nigel. Theo hadn’t been sure where just that it was down here. The others had never invited him to join in the interrogations and before he’d met us, he’d never felt the need. Freaking numbat that he was.

The sound of a heavy key turning in a stiff lock made me open my eyes just enough to see through my lashes. They’d dragged me a fair way from where I’d started to a cage that looked similar to the one I’d woken up in. The only difference was this one had a huge hole in the floor of it. They dragged me inside and dropped me by the edge of the hole. My fingers tensed, ready to throw myself back the moment they tried to kick me into it.

One of the boys leaned over the hole, holding out his torch. “Wakey, wakey down there. We’ve got a nice little treat for you.”

A thunderous roar shot out of the hole. The boy holding the torch yelped and dropped it. I watched as the fiery stick fell into the abyss, lighting up the enormous croc trapped at the bottom of it. This monster with rage burning in his slitted eyes must be Gregory.

“What’d you go and drop the torch for, you donkey? That’s our last one.”

“Shut up, it ain't like I did it on purpose.”

“Let’s kick this rat in and get the hell out of here, I don’t like being too close to the monster.”

“I think it's kind of cool. How long do you think they were living in the sewers before they came up?”

“I don’t think they actually lived down there before the system came. At least, I don’t think so. Maybe they weren’t kidding when they said we shouldn’t flush live things down the loo.”

“What, you flushed a crocodile?”

“Hell no, maybe a goldfish or two.”

“What’s that got to do with anything? We aren’t being slaughtered by killer fish named Goldy or some shit.”

“I’m just saying, I don’t think they were there before, that’s all.”

Alright, I’d had enough. They were driving me insane with their endless prattle. I turned my head and focused on the pickpocketing icon beside the boy closest to me. I raided his stash including the key and some sort of stone orb with markings that looked important. I didn't bother reading the descriptions as I heaved to my feet and Shadow Rushed the short distance to the other side of the metal gate.

The boys screamed in horror as I locked the heavy door and pocketed the key.

“Have fun with Gregory, lads,” I said leaving them behind with a wave. “He’ll keep you company until someone finds you.”

“No, please, you can’t leave us here!” one of them bellowed.

“He’ll kill us,” the other practically screamed.

I’m not going to lie, I felt a little bad about leaving them back there as I marched through the darkness with a confidence I did not feel. I held one hand out in front of me and dragged the other along the wall to my side. I passed through two doors before I found a lantern hanging from a wall. I took it down and turned the small knob to release more wick. The lantern burned brighter, showing me more of the horrid dungeon.

To my chagrin, it was nothing but a maze of tunnels and cages. Some were housed by criminals that cried out to me, others were empty or worse yet had corpses as their only tenants. It scared the shit out of me to see so many people down here. Once I’d found Nigel I’d come let them all loose, I just couldn’t risk them giving me away before I’d found what I was after.

I tramped up and down the corridors, throwing open doors and peeking into every cage until finally, I found something that looked a little different.

At the end of a long empty stone corridor was a heavy iron-strapped wooden door. I tried the key I’d stolen on it but it didn’t work. I focused on the lockpicking icon and blanched when I saw the seven bouncing balls. The hardest lock I’ve come across so far. I swallowed hard and eyed my lockpick count in the corner. Only nine tries to get this right. Fuck.

Well, only one thing for it I suppose. Seven bouncing balls on the wall, seven bouncing balls…

With a loud click, the door swung open on my eighth try. A rush of foul-smelling air swamped me as I held my lantern high.

“Come any closer and I slice your balls off and shove them down your throat you blaggard!”