บท 15: Quiet
"Achoo! There's gotta be something around this godsforsaken place."
Marcus figured it had to be night outside due to the darkness within the building. There were no windows to confirm this, but the slight breeze he felt and the cold wooden floors helped him form his hypothesis.
Eventually he made it to the stairway and headed down. The stairs creaked under Marcus's weight.
'Welp, there goes stealth. If there's anything else inside this place I'm gonna be screwed'
Marcus may have been cold and hungry due to his situation but the survival skills his father instilled in him still shone through as he tried to move around as quietly as possible, as to not alert anyone or anything to his presence. Luckily though, nothing greeted him as he made it to the bottom of the staircase.
Marcus continued trudging forward since there was only one direction left for him to go in. He caught a glimpse of the night sky through the doorway window further down the hall, and so he decided to approach the door to open it, but just before he was about to, his master's voice rang out in his head.
"Fool."
Marcus stopped as his hand were on the doorknob. His master hadn't spoken the entire time sense he had left and entered the hallway. He deemed that his master spoke those condescending words for a reason so he stopped to check his surroundings.
He prayed to the gods nothing had crept up behind him. He'd tried to keep mindful of his surroundings but with the state his body was in, it was hard to be as scrutinizing as he normally was.
He ended up slowly turning around and as he did so his heart started beating frantically out of his chest as he felt a cold chill run down his spine.
'Please, Please just be my imagination. My luck can't be that bad can it? Gods I hope not.'
Marcus finally finished turning around and was relieved at the fact that there was nothing waiting to rip his head off behind him.
He exhaled a sigh of relief. His master on the other hand only scoffed at his 'student's' false sense of security.
"You know 'master', maybe you should-"
Suddenly Marcus stopped speaking. The surroundings grew eerily quiet and he noticed that when he spoke earlier everything grew quiet with him, too quiet.
Deciding there was nothing in the building with him, Marcus turned his back to the empty hallway, and leaned up to the door to take a peek outside.
What he saw nearly made him lose all strength in his legs as he slowly and silently backed away from the door.
Outside the door's window was some sort of creature that Marcus had never laid eyes on before.
The creature stood at about eighteen feet tall with multiple tentacles all over its body. It even possessed slightly longer and more sturdy ones for its arms and legs. The tentacles on its feet were similar to that of an eagles foot and the the ones it used as arm were almost as wide as a tree trunk. They also seemed to possess a life of their own as they constantly wriggled around the creatures body.
The abomination was also entirely green aside from its eyes and mouth. Its eyes were blood red and it had vertically-slanted pupils that occasionally caused its eyes to open and close sideways like that of a snakes.
Its mouth had to be the most frightening characteristic of all though as it was entirely blood red like its eyes. If you looked close enough past its wriggling gums you'd catch a glimpse of a plethora of tiny razor sharp teeth hidden beneath. They seemed to be retractable so that the creature could hide or show them whenever it wished. It was a truly disturbing sight to behold.
Marcus decided to get closer to the door to get a better look at the creature and where exactly it was headed.
'What kind of monster is that thing?'
Marcus didn't dare speak again as to not draw the creature's attention towards himself, so he only thought the words in his head. His master seemed to notice the confusion on his face and decided to enlighten him.
"I believe the people of Terra refer to it as a Swamp Creeper. It is only an F-rank monster."
Marcus nearly pissed himself when he heard his master's voice in his head. He didn't know if others could hear it as well so he put a finger to his lips to signal to his master to keep quiet.
"No one can hear me besides yourself you fool. Not to mention, the creature doesn't possess ears to even hear us right now."
Marcus again looked back at the creature and confirmed it indeed did not have any ears to speak of.
The abomination seemed to be searching for something in the abandoned town as it scanned the numerous buildings and houses in its surroundings.
Marcus studied the creature as it continued its search. The way it moved was slow and clunky but Marcus didn't underestimate it. Clearly, it traded swiftness and mobility for strength and overwhelming power judging from its size and shape. Plus, even if it was as slow as Marcus judged, he doubted he could outrun it right now with it being only fifty feet away and because of his own body's sub optimal condition.
Marcus backed away a few feet from the door and began to think.
"Great. Any ideas as to how I can escape this thing," Marcus questioned the voice.
There was no reply which caused Marcus to wonder why it was the voice suddenly went quiet in a situation that involved whether or not he'd live or die. He knew the voice wasn't entirely invested in his well-being but he figured it would at least try to keep him alive.
"Hello? Master? Can you still here me in there?"
The voice finally responded to Marcus's dismay.
"I meant what I said boy. Do not test my patience."
It took Marcus a moment to understand what his master was referring to. When he realized what it was and what delayed his master's response, Marcus nearly imploded, but before he got the chance to respond, he heard a shrill and horrifying scream from outside the door.
"AHHHHH!!"
Marcus was instantly startled. He looked around but he couldn't seem to find the source of the scream or where the monster disappeared to. All he could see were the same old-abandoned and broken down buildings that surrounded the building he was in.
Marcus unconsciously gulped.
"Um, master you did say that thing can't hear right?"
This time his master didn't force Marcus to wait before replying. It seemed his master was more invested in his life than he was willing to let on.
"Yes, the creeper doesn't have ears to be able to listen in to our conversation."
"Phew," Marcus let out a sigh of relief.
"However, it does possess a very unique set of eyes. Its eyes are incredibly sharp due to their sensitivity to mana."
Marcus's calm expression fell apart and was instead replaced by caution and anxiety.
If the creature could detect mana then that meant it could find him if it kept looking.
He had already experienced unimaginable amounts of pain before, both when he was tortured and after being revived; so he didn't fear pain or much of anything for that matter. However, that didn't mean he wasn't unnerved by the idea of being eaten alive by some monster in the middle of nowhere at night. Sure, he'd experienced death once already but that made him all the more cautious in ensuring he didn't experience it for a second time.
Deciding it would do him no good to sit still and wait, Marcus opened the door and stepped outside to survey his surroundings more closely. It seemed when the slavers brought him here they'd stopped in some abandoned village. The building he was in was some sort of storage building judging by the sign above his head that read 'S-T-O-R-A-G-E'. It didn't take him long before he spotted a clothing store with shattered glass and a few dozen wooden mannequins both in the store and strewn about the front porch of the shop.
'Okay, first we get some clothes and then we get the hell outta here.'
He made sure not to step on any of the shattered glass outside the building. He knew the creature wouldn't hear him but he still didn't like the thought of getting glass stuck in his foot while trying to run away.
As he stepped in the shop, he didn't take too long to grab what he needed. He found some underwear, socks and shoes that fit him well enough. He also found a pair of rugged brown pants and a white shirt to slip on. It may have not made him look the most fashionable but right now this was all he could find and he couldn't care less about how he looked. That monstrosity could be anywhere right now and he didn't want to stick around and run into it.
'urrrrgggrrr'
Marcus's stomach started growling.
"Uggghhh... I forgot I haven't eaten anything in a while. Speaking of, how was I able to go so long without eating anything anyway?"
The question was directed towards Marcus's master so that he could see if he could fish any useful information behind him being revived. He was also just curious too.
"When I revived you, I also provided your body with a small amount of my mana to help sustain your body's biological process. Although, just resurrecting you took an absurd amount of mana in the first place so I was only able to spend a little bit more to stave off your hunger for about ten minutes or so. You're welcome"
This time Marcus obliged and didn't antagonize the voice because it was true he'd saved him, which gave him another shot at life.
He still was confused on the whole 'revive' thing but he didn't bother asking his master anymore questions because he doubted he'd get an answer.
*Sigh*
'I hope I can get lucky enough to find some food along with the clothes I found without running into that thing.'
With that, Marcus exited the clothing store and slowly trudged down the street in search of food.
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