Chereads / Volition / Chapter 23 - Cowards

Chapter 23 - Cowards

Arriving before a heavy looking door, the young boy looked at it for a few moments then grabbed the handle without hesitation, shaking a few times but the door wouldn't open, it budged but it was locked for sure.

He waited a few moments before knocking on the mettalic door with a bit of agressiveness.

On the other side of the door, the two people assigned to watching it where crapping themselves, they had never expected something to actually get to the door, they were looking at each other in a panic, afraid to even speak.

"Bonjour! I am Ithelisemou a young roaming doctor, would you mind opening the door?" asked a voice on the other side of the door, it indeed sounded young but that was about it, the voice still didn't seem to come from a trustworthy person.

"What do we do?" whispered a pale man to the other guard, a pale girl, they both had white hair.

Before she could respond, the voice on the other side sounded again.

"I can hear you, you know? I can smell you too... Someone smell really good in there!" said the voice, seemingly getting even closer to the door as it spoke.

"In all seriousness, open the door before I open it myself, let's not cause property damage!" warned the voice.

The two guards didn't quite believe that the owner of the voice could get in though force, they both believed that it was some sort of abomination, had it been possible for it to enter immediately, it would have.

"No response still? Are you not aware of your own defenses outside?" muttered the voice as the sound of something entering the keyhole was heard, the sound persisted for a long while and the two guards, instead of calling for help or running away, backed off in a corner out of sheer fear.

"AH! Wait no, I really need to step up my lockpicking skills" the voice spoke out loud as it seemed to struggle with the door.

The clicking sound of a door opening was soon heard and the so called Ithelisemou slithering inside, closing the door behind him, the two guards were quite surprised to be met with something that was so human looking but still didn't let go of their dread.

Theli looked around the place, ignoring the two people shivering in a corner, the room was about has wide as the width of the tower would suggest, a few decrepit furnitures were around the place, glasses and bottles of water made out of a glass that didn't appear to have been made from regular sand.

He casually took every item that seemed out of the ordinary, as well as anything else, in the end he made everything down to the furnitures vanish from their spot, the two guards had grown even paler than usual as they watched him perform some sort of withcraft as he shoved everything underneath his ragged cloak.

Now that the room had been licked clean of everything inside of it, the peculiar intruder turned to the two guards who seemed to lack natural survival instinct.

"Now, you two, it's nice that you chose to hang around" he said as he pointed his finger at them before pointing it up.

"What do you think this building is?" he asked them.

Seeing them struggle to muster up the courage to speak, he wished he was more competent in areas that could allow him to make them speak, it was a shame that he couldn't do everything at once, yet.

He looked down upon them with his emotionless eyes and his mouth curled downward before slightly shifting his expression when he realised that he needed to stimulate their senses a bit.

He reached for something strapped to his waist and pulled out a hunting knife that was much larger than the norm, the handle of it was made with wood and the guard made with a slightly golden metal, the blade was in keen condition and reflected the lights in the room, its edge threatening to cut anything that got in its path.

"Listen here you guys, it either you answer my questions or I decide to upgrade our relationship to that of colleague in torture methods" he said, his words not making much sense but the message got through as the man managed to squeeze out some words after severely stuttering.

"This is the last remnant of our civilisation on the surface, it is just a ruin of the past" said the male guard, Theli turned his head as if he was a cat to that answer, creeping the two guards out even further.

"Oh really? How interesting, très intéressant, thanks for the answer, what about you guy's hairs? Does everyone have white hair here?" he asked as looked up at the ceiling, unlike what could have been expected, this place didn't extend any further up, from the inside that is, this meant that there was either some other way of going up or the top had remained unreachable for quite a while now.

"Yeah, everyone has white hair" this time it was the woman that responded, the answer was interesting, there was the possibility that Theli had ran into a group of humans from a separate species, that was an exciting prospect.

He lingered around for a few moments has his mind went into many directions, the two guards were easing up little by little, surely they were realising that they weren't faced with a horror beyond comprehension, it was just a crazy person.

He was still very much terrifying to them, especially when he did sudden movements while waving this huge knife around.

He turned his gaze to the man and asked a third question.

"Do all men look like you?" he asked, a scary glint in his eyes.

"Huh? They all have white hair, we already told y-"

"No, not that, I mean the rest, do you all look so feminine?" he precised his question.

"I am not sure what that mean but yes, I guess" he answered.

"This place is great, show me the way" he ordered them, they hesitated but when he pointed at his knife they did as told like soldiers marching to war.

The three of them walked down a long circular flight of stairs as the two guards were split between being relieved that they weren't dead meat already and the fact that they were leading that strange man to their people.

He looked a lot like them in a way but he wasn't nearly as pale as them and had completely dark hair, his eye color seemed a bit peculiar too.

"Why don't you two explain me how it is down there while we are walking?" he suggested to them even if there wasn't much suggestion when they could practically feel the cold blade against their napes.