Panting, heaving, I stand on my knees and look down at the mutilated mushroom body down on the ground before me. The bright chunks are spread over the forest floor, painting it as if there had been a violent, bloody carnage here. I hate mushrooms. They’re gross. All of my problems always seem to come from mushrooms and their disgusting, creepy little invisible roots. Fungus isn’t fun, guy. Fun guy. Fungi. Haha!

I rub my face into my shoulder, wiping some of the mushroom gunk off of it.

Get it? Because mushrooms are fungi.

I sigh. Will I ever die?

Fundie. Haha.

Looking around the forest, I get up, feeling the vibration run through my body as something hums, as it buzzes with a familiar pulsing that I remember feeling all too recently, as it goes -

*PFFFTPTTPPTPTPTPTBBBBH!* blurts the slime, blowing her tongue into my face as she plops out of my body. I narrow my eyes as wet goo splatters into my face.

That isn’t the noise that it’s making at all!

She puffs out her cheeks, making a funny face. Her hands press themselves against my skull as she tries to press my face into a smile. My teeth rattle inside of my head as they press against each other, as the energy that hums through the dungeon, filling it with a constant vibration that shakes me. The sound of the electricity fills the air, fills the forest that smells so green and so familiar and it overpowers the gentle birdsong with its monotone droning that goes -

*TPFFTPHPTPHTH!* She blows her tongue into my face again, interrupting my super cool monologue. Slime dribbles down my chin, dropping onto the outside of my armor.

Okay. First of all. How dare yo-

*TPPTHTHTBTHTHT!*

I stare at her and she stares at me as we stand there in the forest, locked in what appears to be a showdown. I’m going to spout as many idiosyncratic platitudes as I want and you can’t stop me.

“Can too!” she says smugly.

I cross my arms. “Can not!”

“Can too!”

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

“NU UH!” I shout.

“UH HUH!” she shouts back, poking a slimy finger into my forehead. Lifting my free hand, I poke into her forehead simply out of the principle of the matter. She grunts and presses harder and so do I, both of us poking each other in the forehead in an attempt to make the other one give in. I narrow my eyes and so does she.

“I’m just trying to say that the dungeon is going b-“

*TPTPBTBGHTHTHT!* she does it again.

I stick my tongue out back at her. *TPFTBH!* Our fingers press harder into each other’s foreheads. “I need to explain what’s happening, so that guy and eyeyoume can keep u-“

*TPFBTTHHTHTHTH!* They’re stupid! You’re stupid!” she says smugly. She’s not wrong, but I can’t let her know that. Nothing personal guy, but you haven’t had the best ideas up to this point, you know? I’m sure you have a great personality though. I grit my teeth in agitation and press harder and she does the same, more or less.

Suddenly, her gooey finger squishes flat as she pokes harder, slime presses itself into my eye socket as the force is too much for her to sustain as a solid object. At the same time, my finger breaks the outer layer of her ‘skin’ and penetrates deep into her slimy forehead. I squeal, so does she. Shocked we stare at each other for a second and then both of us quickly pull back out from each other and look away in opposite directions.

It’s so embarrassing! I clutch my cheeks, smearing some goo on my face in the process as I feel my legs shaking beneath myself. Dungeon-master, I swear, it was an accident! It just slipped in!

“A- are we married now?” asks a timid, gloopy voice.

“I’m not ready to be married! I still have my whole life to live!” I yell, realizing the terror that dawns on me at the prospect. It’s a terror that not even the hero or the thing that reaches can instill in me. Fear. Primal fear.

“But what if we got… you know…” she places a hand on my belly. “You have to take responsibility!”

“We didn’t!” I yell. “Besides, I’m just going to die soon anyways! It’s fine! It’ll be like nothing ever happened!”

Both of us howl in a shared embarrassment and confusion. Why is dungeon life like this? I just want to have cool and dramatic fights and then hang out with Piotr sometimes, is that so much to ask for?

Wait…

I narrow my eyes, staring at the slime. None of this makes any sense. None of this makes any biological or even just plain logical sense. Sensing my growing doubt, she blinks a few times, playing dumb as she shrugs a naive shrug. I’m on to you. What are you trying to distract me from?

I look around the forest, what was I talking about? There was something…

something…

Something…

- In the forest?

No.

No that wasn’t it. That doesn’t sound right.

I rub my chin, stroking the bones of my face as I try to remember what I was going on about before I was interrupted. I feel like I was about to go on a tangent, but I don’t know what it was about anymore. Hmm…

Well, if it’s important, I guess I’ll remember.

I sigh, shaking my head as I look around at the forest. There is a ravaged, gnawed mushroom at my feet. What’s that about? Did I do that? I guess I got really upset about something. Huh. Well, you know how it is. Sometimes, I kind of lose it, haha. I just kind of lose control now and then. I’m not a bad person, I swear! I just get…

I just get caught up sometimes.

I’m very emotional, you know? I have a long day at the dungeon, maybe a drink too much and then, BAM! Dead mushro-

I look down at the dead thing at my feet.

This isn’t a mushroom.

Bending down, I poke the thing with my finger, flipping it over.

The mutilated red-cap flops onto its back. Its mangled, child-like face, ruined by the many savage marks left on its destroyed body. Chunks of it are missing, their absence proven only by bite-marks and the leaking red. What?

It was a mushroom, I swear.

I didn’t see! I didn’t SEE! Bloodstained hands run up to my face, as I feel my armor rattle, as I feel my bones shake in fear as the energy swallows me. As the lifeblood of the dungeon makes itself felt in my bones once again. I can feel it. I can feel it. I can feel it. The buzz, the hum, the noise that goes BM-

*TPFTBTHBTHTHTH!*

Snapping out of it, I look up at the slime who is hanging out from my front, her hands next to her head as she blows her tongue in my direction. You jerk!

“Hoooneeeey!” she calls, holding out a slimy hand. Something shiny floats in it. “I picked a ring for us!”

I blink, staring at her and the little purple-stone ring in her hands, before looking down to the mushroom at my feet. My head lifts back up and I stick out my tongue as I look for a way out of this conversation.

*TPFTBTH!*