Blinking the brightness out of my eyes, I look around and see I am sitting in front of the Shrine, like I never left. Looking down at my freshly bandaged hands, I curl them up into fists, the reality of my situation hitting me. I was still trapped, I don’t know where the exit is, but I have hope. Teacher Lee’s final words gave me that hope, all I needed to move forward. Jumping up and putting my skirt, I make sure my bag is secure and move towards the room with the throne in the middle. Sniffing, I still smell the strong scent of alcohol. Resisting the smell, it gets weaker the further I move away. Reaching the room with the giant throne in the middle, I look around. Excluding the room to the pond I fell into and the one behind me, there are another six paths, four behind the throne and two at the opposite end. Pondering about the best way forward, I go exploring each one and use my sense of smell to find a way through.
Heading to the closest path behind the throne, I enter and start walking down. Not smelling anything out of place, I notice the gems on the sides are becoming less frequent the more I explore. Not minding thanks to being able to see well enough in the dark, I keep moving, with my body relaxed and ready to kick up my wind magic at any moment. After walking for an hour, I arrived in another room. Looking around, I see more paths, four more in total. Feeling my heart sink, I knew that unless I got lucky, I was not escaping here easily. Hesitating, I walk down the path to my right, while keeping a mental map.
***
Four days. Back and forth down numerous paths, I’ve lost count at this point, I haven’t seen anything, not even a monster, empty rooms everywhere. I’ve long since explored deep enough that there are no more gems lighting the way. Maybe the exit was the hole in the ground. But it’s too high up, I can’t reach it to climb back up. I’ve hit a lot of dead ends, but I’ve also ran into rooms with even more pathways leading somewhere else. Looking around in the new room I’ve arrived in, there is nothing but total darkness. Scratching one of my ears on the top of my head, I consider what to do. Should I continue just going down paths, or go back to the pond and see if I can reach the hole? Extending my claw marks out, I etch an X on the path I came out of and move to the next one. Carving an E at the entrance, I move down the new passagewag. Mustering up my hope of seeing Sally and Gray again, I move down the next path.
***
Another two days have passed, I’m exhausted, I’ve been walking the entire time, sometimes running. Being alone in this darkness is unsettling, with not even a soul down here it’s hard to imagine escaping. I’m sitting down in a corner of a room I’ve reached, it’s a dead end with only one entrance. I can get some rest here, and caressing the egg in my lap, the only company I have, I take a light nap. I only had enough food for a few more days. Waking up, I continue treading down the numerous pathways.
***
I can’t take this darkness anymore. It reminds me too much of Crater, of the cells I was kept in during my childhood. The loneliness is overwhelming, clutching the egg to my chest, I keep moving. I’m hearing things, voices, sword clashes, monster growls. Every time I hear them, I run, run towards the source of the sound. But nothing is there, every time. Arriving at yet again another dead end, it’s been another week of nothing. Letting the tears fall, I start falling into the temptation to just sit down and stop. Shaking the thought out from my head, I take this time to sit down. I haven’t eaten in a few days to conserve the last of the meat and smoked meat, I fall to my hunger and get some smoked meat out and slowly eat it. Afterwards, as always, I keep my egg on my lap and fall asleep to the silence of this place.
***
Jerking awake to the sound of cracking, I look around. I've been hearing sounds while awake, but never has it awoken me before. Keeping my guard up, I look at the single entrance that led me here, and don’t see anything. Marking it down as a sound I heard, I closed my eyes, about to drift off when the cracking sound happened again. This time I felt something move on my lap. Looking down, I can see the egg that I’m holding moving slightly. Another crack rings out, and now I can tell what the source is, it’s the egg! Sitting up, I don’t know what to do, is it hatching, is it in danger? Holding it carefully, I watch as cracks appear on the outside until finally I see something break through. Unable to make out completely what it is, I wait as more of the egg falls apart.
“Kraa!” A cry rings out as the egg crumbles away, revealing a black bird, with beady black eyes and a sharp, long black beak. It looks around, jumping slightly off its claws, and then looks at me and tilts its head. I tilt my head and stare at it. We continue looking at each other in silence, heads tilted. Suddenly, it lets off another “Kraa!”, flaps its wings once and starts walking up my lap, looking at me closely. Taking off a gauntlet and raising a finer, I poke its head. Closing its eyes, it looks like the strange bird is enjoying it. I slowly stroke its feathery head and I hear a low “kraa” from it, sounding happy. As I do this, I check the System prompt.
[Egg of ??? has hatched. Displaying newborn’s information.]
[??? (Unnamed)
Dark Raven
Female
Level 1
A mysterious species of Raven, it shares a blood oath with Alisha. Fiercely loyal to those it considers family, it will never forget a face. Dark Ravens have the unique ability of using Dark Magic, giving it its name.
Shares a special bond with Alisha that holds a mysterious connection.]
“A name huh…” Looking at the newly hatched Dark Raven that was enjoying my small pats, a face flashes past my mind, and so does a name. Smiling, I gently pick up the raven, small enough to fit in one hand and raise it to eye level. “Your name will be Alice, the name of an old friend who taught me what she could…before she…” Trembling slightly, I still have fond memories of the times Alice taught me, the first person to be friendly to me, and I’m not sure why. Letting the tears fall, I see my own reflection in the raven’s eyes. My black hair with my fox ears poking through, blue eyes that are stained with tears and my fangs. Looking at this reflection, I found myself more motivated to continue to find a way out.
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“Kraa!” The Dark Raven, or rather Alice, cried out again and jumped over onto my wrist, reached out and rubbed my face with her head.
[Dark Raven name updated to Alice. Alice considers you her mother.]
Smiling at both Alice and the System notification, I take a strip of smoked meat and offer it to Alice. As she starts picking at it, I consider our next move…well, not like I have many choices but to keep moving through the seemingly never ending passageways. Reaching down and putting Alice and the smoked meat on my lap again, I stroke her head while talking to her.
“So Alice, we’re kinda stuck down here so we’ll be walking a lot. I don’t have much food, so let's hope we find some monsters. Don’t worry, I’m sure we’ll get out of here very soon, then you can meet Sally and Gray.” Alice looks at me and cries out with a kraa, then continues eating. Seeing how fast the smoked meat was being eaten, I smiled and put another piece next to her. Slowly patting her head while she eats, I continue talking to her about small things, like how we escaped the humans, about Cerberus, Sally, Gray and Teacher Lee. I also talk to her about Alice, the times in Crater she taught me how to act as a hybrid, the rules to follow when exploring the dungeons and so many more things. By the time I finished, Alice had eaten 4 pieces of smoked meat, and wondering where she put it all, I stood up and put my sack over my shoulder. Holding Alice with one hand, I move that hand to my head, which Alice jumps onto and snuggles in. Making sure to keep her undisturbed, I make my way down the passage once again.
***
A few hours have passed and so far there has been no progress, only more dead ends and connecting rooms. Marking another passageway with an E, I walk down it. After a thirty minute walk, I can see a light coming from the next room. This has happened a few times, it’s the light from the gems that rarely comes up. However this time, I notice something that sets me on alert. Feeling Alice stand up on my head, she lets out a low kraa, I knew it was a warning growl. Slowly moving forward and keeping my body to the wall, I watched the shadows I had spotted as they moved around. Approaching the exit and crouching low, I peek an eye out.
In the room, stumbling around, are humans…or once were humans. There are about a dozen of them, and in the middle is a giant looking one, about the same size as Teacher Lee. Checking the System, I feel a smile creep onto my face.
[Level 13 Zombified Human]
[Level 14 Zombified Giant]
Looking at the closest Zombified Human, I can see its skin rotting, the smell was pungent and they were mindlessly walking around. I felt confident I could kill one quickly, but I knew if I ran into that room now, I would be overwhelmed in seconds. Noise likely attracted them, so I would need to somehow get the attention of them one by one and take them out. If I can get some experience here and level up, I’ll get stronger, making it easier on me to traverse for longer times. This wasn’t the only upside, the fact there were monsters here meant more progress! Just need to figure out how to lure them in one at a time.
Creeping back down the passageway, I talk to Alice and explain the situation with her in my hand. She tilts her head, looks at the passageway, back at me and tilts her head again. Smiling, I don’t know if she understands me or not, but talking aloud these past few hours have helped a lot, it was no longer lonely. As I watch Alice, she opens her beck with a soft kraa, looks back at the room and then back at me and repeats it. Starting to understand, I softly ask “Do you want to attract them over with your noise?” Flapping her wings, I take it as her saying yes. Nodding at her, I walk softly back to the exit of the passageway and Alice lets out a slightly loud “Kraa!”, and I see two Zombified Humans turn and start walking towards the passageway. Moving back and watching as they reach the entrance way, Alice lets out another kraa before I move back again. The Zombified Humans keep following, and after doing it once more I move Alice to the top of my head.
“Alice, hold tight, it’ll get a bit windy now.”
Feeling claws dig into my hair, I get into my relaxed state of mind and body, kick up the wind magic around my limbs and body and face the two zombies who have started running towards me. This should be far enough, the noise of fighting shouldn’t reach the next room…I hope.
Quickly moving towards the first zombie approaching me, I throw a fist attack I’d practised hundreds, thousands of times into its fist. Feeling resistance upon hitting, I move back and look closely. It was wearing chest armour and a helmet, so was the other zombie. It was hard to distinguish the armour from skin thanks to the rust and darkness. The attack still threw the zombie off, but there wasn’t any damage. Adjusting myself, I extend the claws on both my fists, and move in again. Dodging a strike from both, I weave between them and slice at their shoulders, an area not protected and slice an arm off both. Roaring, in anger or pain, they both turn towards me and bite with a speed that shocks me. Without moving my feet, I swing backwards, feeling Alice holding on for dear life. With the bottom of their chins exposed to me, I swiftly stab my claws through their heads, pull them out, retract my claws and backflip away. Looking at them, I notice they are still moving, my attack should’ve gone through their brain!
Quickly thinking of a plan to just decapitate their heads, I check their necks and see it’s unprotected, but it's small. Too high or low and I’ll hit the helmet or chest armour, I don’t know if my claws will pierce that armour. Reconsidering, I look at their legs and see no armour on them. If I can stop them moving, removing their heads will be a cinch. Breathing in, I pick up the wind around my legs and move again. Moving faster than their rotting bodies should allow, they strike out attempting to grab me with their remaining hand. Sliding under the legs, I stand up, pivot and with one fluid strike, I slice through both legs of the first zombie, dodging back from another attempt of a bite from the zombie with no legs, I focus on the second one as it charges at me. Moving in close to it, I spin to avoid the hand, and aim at its neck, with only one attacking me I felt confident. Connecting, I slice through and decapitate its head. Without looking back, I move and swing down at the last one's head. Decapitating it, I quickly backflip away once more to see both no longer moving.
[You have killed Zombified Human, gained 2,000xp]
[You have killed Zombified Human, gained 2,000xp]
[You leveled to 11!]
Panting, the System confirms they have been defeated. It only lasted thirty seconds at most, but it felt like minutes. If they grabbed me or bit me once, I would’ve been done for. They were much faster than I thought, if it wasn’t for Teacher Lee teaching me this style, or if I never found his Shrine, I would have been done if I encountered them without Trainer Lee’s style.
“Alice, are you still there?” Hearing a “Kraa!”, I ask her “Want to do it again?” she replies with two kraas that sound happy. Nodding, we move down the passageway once more, aiming to kill all the zombies, not only to practise my new style of fighting, but to progress and get out of this labyrinth.