As I march up the staircase, my hollow armor clanking all around myself in the small passage, I come to a sudden realization. I forgot my pole-axe up on top of the bridge. Turning my helmet back around, I look down the long stretch of staircase I’ve already gone up. Well, I suppose it’s too late for that now. That’s okay. I’ll just try to keep things peaceful this time around. Productivity is the name of the game today, apparently. The dungeon-master wants me to find the stairs, so I guess I can do that for them. I feel kind of bad, I don’t think they like me that much. But… for some reason, I want them to like me?

  I’m not really sure why. But it just feels like something I want. I don’t want someone to not like me. Then again, I guess a lot of people don’t like me. The rat-queen doesn’t like me, which, up until now at least, I feel wasn’t justified. The hero is a nice guy, but he didn’t like me once he saw my menu, same for the rest of the party I guess. Ah, why does it make me feel bad? That they don’t like me? Do I care? I guess something inside of me cares.

My metal rattles as I ascend further.

I wonder where the thief was in my last life. Guess she took the day off. Fair enough, I’d do that too if I could.

  Shaking my helmet, I clear my mind and look up to the looming light shining in from above. The subtle glow streaming down into the darkness from atop, as a gentle heaven-sent sign that this is where something brighter is.

I step out over the last step of the secret-staircase and look out ahead of me.

It is dark. The stream of light that seemingly has no source now gone, dissipated the moment I stepped over. Did it lure me in?

  Huh? Where am I? I step forward out of the secret passage and listen as a moment later something sloshes behind myself, something wet. The wall is sealed off, but I can’t see anything. I run my fingers along the wall behind myself, it’s closed now. Stones having come into place the moment I looked away, in order to seal me in on this side.

What is this feeling? This… dread?

  I turn towards the darkness and step out into it, not sure what awaits me. Nothing happens, save for the clanking of my metal armor as I breach forward. There are no lights, there is no ray of light from any fire or torches, no fake glowing sound, no ethereally glowing dead-light. There is nothing. It’s just… dark.

Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

  Something skitters off to my side and I turn to face the direction, at least the direction I think the sound originated from. But I see nothing and I stand there in silence for a moment, listening to the sparse noise around myself come from the perpetual darkness. The air is filled with a low drone, not like that of being underwater, but like that of wind gently pushing through a cave. Somewhere off in the distance, there is a trickling sound of water hitting a stone from some great span and here, up close, there is…

Skittering.

I listen as the sharp, pointy legs skitter around the darkness all around myself.

“Hello?” I ask the darkness, but it doesn’t respond. Rude. All I hear are more excited steps and clicks.

  Shrugging to myself, I step into the void. It’s not like I have a meat-body or can feel pain, so what’s the worst that can happen? In truth, there are a lot of bad things that could happen. We all know how this goes, guy. But…

  Nothing happens. So I take another step, then another, then another and soon I am walking with long strides through the seemingly entirely empty ether. At first I expect to fall down at any moment, to trip or to spiral downward into some hole that I walked straight into. But there is simply nothing. It’s like a perfectly flat, entirely lightless room with just me walking through it. Just me and whatever skitters after me in the darkness.

  I call out to it again, but it doesn’t respond. Is it an it? Or is it a they? I can’t tell if the thing following me is one, singular thing or many smaller things. I just know that there are a lot of legs. A lot of sharp, little legs that make clear clicking noises as they follow me. Okay, uh… creepy, but that’s okay. The dungeon is full of creepy things, tell you what. The dungeon-master worked hard to make all of us, it would be rude of me not to acknowledge their efforts. So… good job dungeon-master, very creepy.

  It skitters and I keep walking ahead, wishing I had a torch or a fireball or anything that could light up the world around myself. I’d even take the dead-light at this point, hell, I’d take the hero’s strike. As long as he swung it the other way.

How am I supposed to find the secret stairs here? It’s literally pitch black. I saw more underwater when I was a serpent than I do here. I saw more as a slime than I can here, and I didn’t even have eyes the- IAAH!

  I swing around at full speed, swiping at the darkness just behind myself, striking nothing to my surprise. Suspiciously I try to stare at the empty, but my ‘eyes’ find nothing to focus on. If I had hairs on my neck, assuming I had a neck, I’d swear they’d be standing on end. I felt something come close to me, I felt something almost touch me. I felt it skitter.

The darkness is quiet.

  Lowering my arms, I turn around and keep walking down the way. As soon as I start walking however, the skittering continues behind myself. The gentle tickle of the little feet over the surface of the floor beneath us. It’s following me, whatever it is. Whatever thing is out there in the shadows, i-

DAMN IT!

I swipe around behind myself again, as something brushes my back, my heavy metal fist swings around into the shadows but meets nothing but air. Nothing but darkness.

I stand there and I listen to the little legs skittering all around myself. The tapping of the thousand sharp feet surrounding me, like the sound of falling rain.

I hear a gentle voice call out from the darkness.

“There you are!”