Not even half an hour from when we first entered and the group that was believed to be great had lost two of its original five members. We were now more careful and moved around in a more controlled way. The funny thing is we knew that we could have a controlled entrance through the Hub, but instead we believed that we were so great that we didn't need it. Now we could only suffer for our mistakes.
After two hours more of wandering, we met almost all the entities that resided on this level except crawlers, but we heard them. The crawlers were in every vent that appeared every so often. The sound of a dragging body near all the vents reminded us of how helpless we were in this situation. An endless horror was all we had found on that level.
Even Hannah which Bard had given his life to save her died. She couldn't take much more pain and be far too distracted leading her to a room that she hadn't checked well. The room was infested with Clumps. She was torn apart. We were a group that claimed we would not only come back successful but would also come back unharmed.
The only thing that saved us was that this level was smaller than level 1, so every now and then we found an exit to the level, but our luck wasn't good.
Ten exits. Every single one led to level 3. It was only then after all that did we meet another Wanderer that didn't try to kill us. That man was called Samuel Jackson. He was a high-level officer of MEG. Both I and Chen couldn't take it any longer, so after finding out he wouldn't try to kill us we asked to follow him. We thought we were so great before, but we could no longer take it.
We decided together that even if MEG told us to kill ourselves in a death mission then we would do so gladly. That was the time I joined MEG. It was immediately after we proclaimed to others that we were about to officially start our journey to do great things in the Backrooms. I guess we were also lucky since Samuel was also the second nicest guy we had ever met directly after Carl."
Pops got up and stopped his somber tone, "Well I hope that will give you enough information about what place the Backrooms truly are!"
Vain couldn't help but respect the man even more. He had just described how his first friends got killed and he could still talk loudly as if it wasn't a big deal.
"Pops? I... Thank you for sharing such a personal story."
"What do you mean? I know it might be scary and sad for you, but I have lived long enough in this hell hole that I have experienced much worse things when I worked with MEG. It is also because I have experienced so much that I agree with your decision to take your precious child with you to learn more about this place."
Vain looked to Athena and knew that Pops believed that if she doesn't learn well enough to protect herself without Vain she will end up in a similar situation to Hannah. He also learned something very important thing that Pops glossed over. Slavers. People kidnap girls to sell them.
Pops and Vain stretched and got ready for the journey. Vain picked up Athena and carried her until she finally got out of her thoughts half an hour later. The group was more silent with a few loud words from Pops and some casual words from Vain.
Six hours later, Vain and Pops got ready to take a nap before heading back to the entrance to the Hub. After a new 'day' started Athena now felt more comfortable asking Pops questions again, but this time she was much calmer.
"Hey, Pops? Are there the slave traffickers on this level?"
"Yes, but they work as single-person groups since larger groups than that get hunted by MEG."
"Then why do they capture girls? Do they also capture boys?"
Pops appeared to be prepared to strike back, "Well they capture girls to have them be breeders! As boys aren't that well-liked, it is almost impossible to find a trafficker go for one!"
"Whats a breeder?"
"Ask your father!" Pops had a smug look on his face. He looked to Vain as if he had won, after all, who would want to tell their child, adopted or not, what it is to be a breeder.
"Dad? What is a breeder?"
Vain glared at Pops, but he also understood that Athena was mature so she could deal with such information. "To breed is the act of making a child in an animalistic way, so a breeder would have the job of making children."
Pops looked at Vain in shock, not expecting him to actually tell Athena about what is a breeder. He had thought that he would see a distressed man trying to explain something to a child that he shouldn't explain to a child.
"Don't you have to love someone to have a child? What do you mean animalistic? How can one have a job of having children?"
"Well, it isn't really a job since the people in such positions are usually forced to have children, which means that it is possible to have a child without loving the other person but make sure you know that such an act is disgusting in everyone's eyes. As for everything else you should wait until you are older to know more about such a subject."
"Aww- Why can't I know now?"
"Such things shouldn't be known to someone who can't even have children."
Although he saw how mad Athena was, Vain was super happy he was able to placate her. The pair moved on with only a couple of random questions that Athena really wanted to know, granted a few questions were downright denied similar to anything more to do with breeding.
A few other questions being...
*
"When can you have children dad?"
"When I think I don't have to worry for the child that is right in front of me."
"Could I have your children?"
"NO!"
*
"How do you kill a Smiler if you couldn't hurt it in the first place?"
"Energy weapon!"
"What is an energy weapon?"
"The most simple of energy weapons being a sword that is made to conduct electricity around the main sword, or maybe an incendiary bomb which counts as a fire weapon. Granted such low-class weapons can't kill such an entity easily."
"Ohhh- what else?"
"You don't have access to such things anyway so don't worry about it."
"Awww-"
*
By the time the group was ending their journey both Pops and Vain were feeling like they wouldn't make it past the next twenty rooms to make it to the Hub.
Vain before would have considered another group a horrible time since the only group he had seen around here was annoying, but now that only another group would let him escape this suffering no one came to save him. The hellish rooms were the last few rooms where both Vain and Pops didn't dare stop should Athena take this chance to ask as many questions as she could.
They hadn't met anything all the way till the last room next to the room to the Hub. It was a guard checking that an entity hadn't appeared in the room next to the entrance.
Pops nearly cried when he saw the guard, "Finally! My suffering shall finally end! Vain if you ever invite me again with such a child I would rather go through the other hellish levels than go again with that little curious devil! She is cute sure, but just the number of questions that she has are ridiculous! I told her things that even I didn't know I know!"
Finally! Pops was able to escape the grasp of Athena. He swore that if he were to ever take anyone on another celebration journey, it would have to wait until at least a year has passed to get rid of his trauma of the little girl that had questions that he never knew could be asked.