As the night is drawing near and everyone is forced to have to make use of torches to navigate the twilight cast by the forest canopy, they finally make their way into the interior of one of the many titanic trees that fills this place. Being warry of traps and thankfully only having had to deal with a couple more little skirmishes on the way here, everyone lets out a sigh of relief as they find the door to the Safe Room.

Bug immediately makes a b-line for the room, heading inside before anyone else can. Blocking the entrance, she declares, “We have an hour until the restock happens, I’m taking a bath. If any of you try to spy on me, I swear that I will turn your feet into hands and your hands into feet. Do not test me.” Her eyes on Hannah for a moment as she says, any.

Everyone immediately takes a step back and returns to the hallway, not wanting to argue with the little crazy person that is currently caked in layers of gore and smelling like the back end of a butchery. If she wants to take a bath, they aren’t going to stop her.

Sitting in the hallway just outside, they can hear as Bug jumps into the large fountain that adorns one wall of the Safe Room, a big splash of water sounding out as water spills out over the rim and wets the floor.

“Ahhhhh~ So good!”

…

“So… How long does it take for the water to clean itself again?” Jakub asks.

“… About an hour or two, I think.”

He just tips over his water skin and watches as the last couple drops drip out through the tap…

“Can I have a drink from your canteen?”

“Sure.”

…

Closest to the door, Hannah sits with her knees to her chest, blushing as she listens to Bug splashing in the water, her satisfied voice reaching her ears as Bug happily cleans her body.

No peeking! No Peeking! No peeking! I don’t want my hands turned into feet!

----------------------------------------

Sometime later, Bug calls out to everyone and says they can finally enter. Sitting next to the hearth, she is waiting as her clothes dry nearby from the heat of the fire. Sitting on a seat that is a grown-out part of the floor, she is wrapped in a towel with her scaled cloak hanging down her back from her shoulders, warming herself by the fire with a satisfied look on her face.

Running a second towel through her shoulder length grey and black hair, she dries out the last few drops of water as they bead off of her.

Hannah is stopped and stunned at the sight of her and has to force herself to stop staring like an idiot at Bug’s exposed legs, marveling at how her scales flow over the curves of her thighs until they disappear somewhere under her towel, which can only do so much to hide her figure.

Hannah carefully takes a seat nearby, and tries to fight down the urge to look, but her eyes keep going back to Bug, settling on her exposed shoulders and examining how her four arms connect to her body, how the scales cover her body and transition into soft, tan colored skin at her torso, leading down to a pair of amazingly sized breasts that are practically trying to spill out of her towel. If it weren’t for the fact that one of her hands was holding the towel together, if she were to let go of it-

Holy shit stop staring at her chest! Don’t look at her like that, Hannah! You know she doesn’t like it!

Hannah quickly turns her head away, resisting with all her might to keep her eyes from returning their lustful gaze to Bug’s barely covered body.

Thankfully, the other girl isn’t paying her any attention and has now started on brushing her hair with a brush that she had somehow just pulled out of her cloak from behind her back. Bug happily hums to herself as she takes care of her hair and then works on brushing out the fur that covers her forearms.

Looking towards the rest of the group, Hannah finds that the guys are looking away as well, and when Jakub tries to sneak a peek at Bug, he gets a slap from Sam. He quickly decides that the wall is suddenly very interesting.

“Hmm? Why is everyone acting weird? Are we not going to cook some food?” Bug asks curiously after she finishes brushing herself, her hair and fur all looking very soft and fluffy now.

Hannah looks back towards her, fighting to keep her eyes on Bug’s face, and absolutely nothing else but her face. “Uhm, do you mind covering yourself up some more, please?”

“More?” Bug looks at Hannah’s face and seems to realize something. Very quickly, her other arms go up to her scaled cloak and pulls it around herself. “Oh… I thought I was covered up enough…”

“Uhm… We can’t see anything important, but… Well, wearing nothing but a towel is sort of… “

Bug interrupts in a hurry. “Yes, I think I understand now, thank you! Uhm, my clothes should be mostly done drying now, I’ll go and get dressed!”

With one hand darting out of her cloak, Bug snatches up her clothes and pulls them in. As she does, Hannah can’t help but notice the silk and lace white panties before they disappear with her hand under the cloak.

Isn’t that the sort of stuff Noble women wear? How does she have such fancy underwear?

Her thoughts are blown away as Bug stands up and runs past her. The scent of fruit and soap is carried by the air in her wake as Bug runs out of the room.

…

A short while after Bug leaves, Jakub lets out a curse. “Shit, I’m starting to see why some guys have a thing for Dwarf and Halfling women…”

Max just gives him a smack on the back of the head. “Shut up, she might be able to hear you.”

Hannah ignores them, her mind questioning how it is that Bug could have these things. What her life must be like. What sort of a mystery this strange, but beautiful, little person is.

----------------------------------------

In the middle of the night, a few hours after the mana wave had passed outside, Hannah stirs from her sleep and sits up in her bedroll, her eyes heavy with sleep.

Looking around, she has to blink her eyes a few times as she draws her vision back under control, her enhanced eyes wanting to focus on a distant crack in the wall for some reason. Looking around, she notices that Bug’s bedroll is empty, the girl is instead sitting near the hearth opposite to Sam. The two of them are both chewing on some jerky, but they aren’t talking about anything.

Hannah moves to crawl out of bed, and catches as Bug’s ears twitch. Turning her head, Bug looks Hannah’s way.

“What are you doing up already? We still have three hours till morning.”

“I was going to ask the same…” Hannah ask as she fights down a yawn.

“I don’t sleep much. I only need a couple of hours per night.”

“Mhm…”

Sam nods her head toward the freshly woken Hannah and asks, “Do you want to switch with me for the watch? I wouldn’t mind getting a couple hours more sleep if you don’t mind.”

Hannha thinks for a second and decides that she has had enough sleep for now. She might as well let one of their fighters get some more sleep before the big boss battle tomorrow.

“Sure, get some more sleep. I’ll stay up with Bug.”

Getting up from her chair with a grunt, Sam says, “Try not to get too distracted, sweetie. If anything happens, make sure to wake us.” Being loud enough for anyone listening to hear.

As Sam is walking past Hannah to head to her sleeping roll, she leans down and whispers in her ear, “If you two need to have some privacy, feel free to grab one of the nearby rooms. You don’t need to worry about us.”

“Wha!?”

Sam just pats her on the shoulder and doesn’t say anything else as she crawls into her sleeping roll, a cheeky smile on her face as she rolls over to face away from the hearth.

Does she know!?

Watching Sam for a bit, her spine locked up in fright and confusion, Hannah waits for something to inevitably explode or for someone to yell at her or hit her, but nothing happens. Sam just goes to sleep, nobody stirs in their sleep, and Bug just keeps munching on some jerky without a care in the world.

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Feeling a little shaken, Hannah slowly works her way over to the hearth and sits down a short distance away from Bug. The flames of the hearth are pleasantly warm, and help greatly to warm up the cold blood in her face that has become chilled from the fright.

Maybe she just meant if we want to talk in private? It’s not like I have to assume that she meant… that… right?

Sitting quietly together for a while, Hannah stewing in her embarrassment, Bug finishes off her jerky and washes it down with some water.

Surprisingly, it is Bug that breaks the silence as she asks a question. “So… Earlier, I asked if you could tell me about your life…”

“Ahh, right…”

“Could you… if you don’t mind… You don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

Hannah looks down at her hands, watching as the flames from the hearth make light and shadow play over her fingers. Slowly, she asks, “Why do you want to know?”

Bug doesn’t answer for a long while, simply staring into the fire. For a while, Hannah worries that she might have scared Bug away from the subject. As she is about to apologies, the spiky horned girl speaks up.

“I… I don’t have a family. I don’t really have much of a past of my own…”

She doesn’t say anything more than that, going quiet as she just keeps watching the fire.

Should I tell her? I did say that I would…

Wetting her lips, Hannah takes a moment to think before opening her mouth to talk, the words weighing heavily on her tongue. “My, my life before coming here was, normal I guess, for the most part… I grew up the daughter of a merchant. My mother was a seamstress before she married my dad and then worked to help him with his business. As a kid, I helped with keeping the store clean, did chores around the house, and studied a lot. My parents made sure that I could read at a young age. They wanted to be sure that I would have a better future than them, and I am very grateful for that and everything they did for me…”

She has to take some time as the memories start coming back to her. Memories of playing with the neighborhood kids in the streets. Memories of the time when Clemet, the neighbor boy, three houses down, had gotten sick and died. Memories of going to church with her parents and praying to the Goddess. Memories of her first time earning an allowance from helping her parents and then promptly spending it all on sweets.

She tells Bug about her childhood, about her family, and about how she lived her life. Bug sits quietly and politely listens to her story. Eventually, Hannah’s story brings her to the University of Sarataga.

“My family had worked hard to pay for my admission, and I studied for weeks to be able to pass the entrance exams… My parents were so proud of me when I got in. I was even able to move out so I could live in the University’s dorms. I got a job working for the library so that I could afford my stay, but I only had so much money, so I sometimes had to skimp on meals.” She says with a nostalgic smile on her face, memories of a happier time playing before her eyes in the light of the fire.

She hesitates as she works up the courage to say what comes next. “…It was in my second year when I met her…” Hannah says, her voice almost a whisper.

“She was a freshman in her first year, and I don’t know why, I still don’t to this day, but for some reason she took a liking to me. We quickly became friends and would do everything together. Eating lunch, going out to the city to shop, studying in the library… She took my first kiss, right there in the History Section, aisle 16C…” Hannah says as her fingers go up to her lips, lightly tracing the curves of her lower lip, as if she can still feel something soft and wonderful pressed against them.

“I had never even thought of us as being anything more than friends. The idea of being with… another woman… I had never considered it, and why would I? The Goddess teaches us that love can only be between a man and a woman, but… I don’t know… At first, it frightened me, I pushed her away and we fought. This went against everything I knew, everything I was taught and raised to believe. But… I just couldn’t get that kiss out of my mind. One night, I couldn’t sleep, my thoughts full of her. We hadn’t talked in days after our fight, but I found myself walking to her dorm room, the moon was full, and its light filled the halls with such a wonderful glow… When she answered the door, wearing nothing but her nightgown, I couldn’t stop myself…”

Hannah is holding herself now in a sad hug, her eyes staring into the depths of the fire as if she could see something there, leaving the next part unspoken, kept only as a wonderful memory in her heart. She has to fight to keep the tears from coming.

“We, we started dating after that. We became more than just friends… We didn’t tell anyone about us, we couldn’t. We never could… In front of everyone else, we pretended to just be really good friends. We didn’t want to ruin what we had… But good things can’t last forever. We got caught by a teacher and he sent letters to our parents… We were separated and sent back to our families, the both of us getting expelled…”

The tears start flowing now, no longer able to hold themselves back as she is forced to remember how they were separated, kicking and screaming as the guards pulled them away and locked Hannah in her dorm room.

“I never got to see her again… I got put in a carriage first thing in the morning with all my things and sent home. I never even got to say goodbye to her…”

Shaking, Hannah says, “My parents were furious. They told me that I betrayed them! They beat me and then sent me away to the church where the nuns tried to cleanse me of my sins. They would have me prey on my knees for hours every day, to beg the Goddess for forgiveness as they poured freezing water on me, but all I could think of was her. I just wanted to see her again, to hold her and kiss her one more time… I couldn’t take it anymore, so I ran away. Leaving a note for my parents, I told them how sorry I was and that I still loved them. I ran away from the church, from the Goddess. I ran away to try and find her…”

Hannah remains quiet for a long while as she shakes and tears continue to stream down her face. Bug carefully asks, her voice small and gentle like she is afraid Hannah might shatter like glass. “Did you find her?”

Hannah slowly nods her head, sniffing back a cry in her throat, still having enough composure as to not want to wake the others.

“Mhm… I found her. It took me months of travel, but I finally reached her home… Where she comes from, people are far less forgiving of those who slight the Goddess’s teachings…”

She runs a trembling hand through her hair as old tears are dredged up from the well of her heart, a hic in her voice as her breaths become halted. “She was executed. Burned at the stake for being a heretic… Her family had called for the punishment when she was submitted to the church! Her own parents demanded that she be burned! Never had I wanted to kill another person so much in my life! Never had I wanted to make someone suffer! I wanted to see that whole place burned to ground for what they did…”

“What did you do?”

“… Nothing. I couldn’t do anything. I was just a weak girl then. I still am… I’m not a mage or a warrior, I can hardly even use a knife to prep food for cooking. The only thing I am good at is reading maps and books… I couldn’t do anything… I didn’t even get to see her body, buried in an unmarked grave near the woods... I was so scared that if they found out, that I would have been killed as well. So, I left, and I never went back. I just wanted to get away from that place, to put as much distance between myself and home. But no matter how far away I get, I can never forget about her. And I can never forgive myself for what happened…”

Bug asks softly, “… What was her name?”

Bug has no idea why she should care, but a part of her needs to know.

“Her name was Jesica, and she was beautiful. Fire red hair and wonderfully green eyes… she had these adorable freckles and her lips where just so soft that I could never possibly forget them. Her voice, her laugh… I’m sorry, Bug… Your eyes just reminded me so much of hers. I’m sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable with my always staring at you.”

Bug feels awkward as she watches the shaking girl, tears falling from her eyes and looking so incredibly vulnerable. So fragile that she could probably be shattered with a couple words. Already, Bug knows exactly what she could say to make her break, what horrible things she could do to shatter and destroy this fragile creature before her. She could even bend her will and manipulate her, it would be easy. A little bit of comfort, a physical touch in her time of need, a little bit of faked affection to make her fall under her will and do anything she wants.

The little part of Bug that makes her a monster whispers these things to her. The very same part of her that pushed her to trick and delay those two teenagers, costing them their lives when they failed to leave the Dungeon in time, the skeletons of which are now mixed together in death, forming an insectile abomination of bone and poison.

But another part of Bug asks herself something. 'Is this what a human is? Is this a person?'

And Bug latches onto this question. Is Bug a person simply because she is capable of higher thought and reasoning? Is she a person because she is better than those mindless creatures that spawn on the first floor? Because she is capable of resisting her baser, more animalistic urges? Is she a person because she is capable of planning for the future, of having dreams?

If that is all it takes for her be a person, then what is this thing that is sitting next to her?

Sadness, regret, nostalgia, love, hatred, happiness, and so much more, all tied together and woven into the history of just one person’s life. So many things that Bug can’t even begin to say are parts of hers.

Has she ever loved? Has she ever regretted something with all her heart? Has she ever formed a memory so powerful that it will never be able to leave her, no matter how long she lives?

No, she hasn’t. But, at the same time, she has only lived but a short number of days. She has not truly been given the chance to live as a person yet. In all honesty, despite being better than and smarter than the others… she is still a little monster, born from a plant by the Dungeon. Her purpose has always been to kill the humans, and that is exactly what she has been doing…

Even now, on the higher layer, a plague of her own creation is brewing. One capable ending the lives of hundreds of thousands of people if it were to be let loose. And even now, she has no intention of stopping. Even if she has to slaughter an uncountable number of people to see it done, Bug will have her revenge, her freedom.

She is a monster that wants to be a person… Despite all the power she has gained, and all she plans to further gain, no matter the price… She envies this fragile, weak, little human. She wishes that she could be like her…

…

Without thinking, Bug reaches under her wings and pulls out her box of cookies. Taking out two of the chocolate chips, Bug hesitates for but a moment before slowly reaching out and offering one to the crying girl.

“Ah, what is this… a cookie?”

“Mhm… you can have it…”

“Where did you?” Hannah tries to ask, but she sees the uncertain look on Bug’s face, as if she is questioning her decisions, just one mistake away from running away from this place.

She carefully takes the cookie from Bug and tastes it. Instantly, her tongue that only tasted of the saltiness of tears, is filled with the warm sugary goodness of soft cookie and slightly bitter, melty black chocolate. The cookie practically melts in her mouth with warmth and softness, still hot as if it had just been pulled from the oven and set aside to cool down but a short while ago.

Hannah sniffs back more tears after she swallows, the warmth of the cookie filling her stomach like a warm hug.

“This is delicious. Thank you, Bug… Thank you…”

Bug nods as she eats her own cookie in silence, savoring the taste with every bite. Between bites, she works up the courage to ask, “Could we… be friends?”

Hannah looks up at her, blinking, startled by the sudden request.

Bug quickly corrects herself, “But no kissing or anything like that! Just friends, ok…?”

Hannah smiles, wiping away her tears with her sleeve, holding the half-eaten cookie close to her heart, she says, “I would like that. I would like that a lot. Thank you, Bug… Can I give you a hug?”

Bug thinks for a little bit, but decides that being touched is still too much for her right now.

“No hugs…”

Hannah just smiles and gives a giggle as she watches Bug. “Ok, no hugs. Thank you for the cookie, Bug.”

Beneath her cloak, Bug hugs herself with her lower set of arms, a weirdly warm feeling filling her as she eats her cookie beside her very first friend. But also regret, so much regret…

What am I going to do? After what I have planned for tomorrow, would she still want to be my friend?