"... What?"
Des stared blankly at the woman, wondering if he was the ignorant one, or if she had misspoken. Maybe he even misheard what she said, but he really doubted that he missed any of the words she uttered to him.
Even if he wasn't confident in much, Des was well aware of his higher-than-average cognitive abilities—one that allowed him to pick up information rather quickly and process them at fast speeds.
He also hardly forgot information that he received—especially visual or auditory.
Since he was well aware of that fact, he was surprised by the expression of the strange woman, and the way she looked at him with shock. Was he supposed to know the meaning of "Architect"?
'If it's related to Dungeons, or it's a popular term… I think I would have learned about it already.' But Des knew nothing of the sort.
"An Architect is… ahh, you know what? Forget about it! Hmm… yeah, it's probably best you don't know… or is it? Hahahaha!!!" The cackle she made was a little terrifying—almost reminiscent of an evil creature's—but Des endured it with a rather uncomfortable smile.
He even chuckled a little to get into the mood.
"In any case, you're quite something. I saw how you held on to life even after being devoured by those creatures. It's a miracle you even made it out of the first hurdle and survived that giant thing."
Des didn't need to be congratulated. He didn't feel like anything he did warranted any kind of praise. The deaths of his comrades were what made him able to figure out the patterns of the colossal Horror, and he was utterly powerless and unprepared against the little things that nearly killed him.
In fact, much to his shame, he wanted them to kill him.
"Don't feel too bad, man. Most people who experience that kind of pain and despair either go insane or beg for death. You did well by surviving… though I'd say it's partly due to the toxins of those worms."
"Toxins…?"
"Yeah. They secrete toxins from their saliva, which sort of messes with your neural network."
"N-neural… what?"
"Basically, you can feel all the pain, but you can't fall unconscious or die—at least, not easily. That's what happened to you, right?" The moment the lady mentioned this, Des remembered the horrific experience and nearly threw up.
There was nothing in his stomach to vomit, though, so it was merely a gag reflex.
"Those things prefer their meat fresh, so they'll keep you alive for as long as possible before you die. Merciless beasts, aren't they?"
Des also noticed that they often licked his open wounds, preventing his blood from spilling out too much so he wouldn't die quickly. Now that he thought of it, by normal circumstances, he should have been more than dead already.
'So it wasn't just luck or my willpower… but poison?'
"The toxins aren't fatal, though, and they wear off in seconds—minutes tops. I brought you here and fed you even more of their toxins while patching you up so you wouldn't die due to shock. You're welcome, by the way."
"Thank you… erm… sorry, I never even asked for your name." Des muttered, feeling slightly embarrassed by his manners—or rather, its absence.
'I was more willing to know if she was a cannibal than to know her name…'
That was no way to treat his savior, though in his defense… he was pretty creeped out by the way she interacted with him.
Even now, it didn't seem like she was completely sane.
"My name is Des. I just recently turned eighteen, and this was my very first Dungeon Exploration. I came here with five other people, but… I was the only one who survived." He began his introduction.
There were a few things he figured she'd be curious about, but much to his surprise, she addressed the least significant element of his introduction.
"Eighteen? You look sixteen, though. Seventeen tops."
"Haha… well, I get that a lot." Des chuckled rather uncomfortably once again.
It was probably due to malnutrition, or some sick joke played on him by genetics, but his body seemed immature despite being a full-fledged adult. He had tried several times to work out and get a lot more buff, but he couldn't get rid of his slender stature.
It didn't help that he had a 'cute' face—something unbefitting for a Dungeon Explorer.
"Well, eighteen, huh? That's… interesting to know."
The way the woman said those words caused Des to shiver slightly, but he maintained his composure through it all.
"E-erm… your name?" He managed to ask.
"Ahh! Call me Eve. Sorry about what happened to your friends, though. You must have seen them all go up in flames, right? Like pshuuuu! And boooom, with some krraakakakakaaaa!!!" As she spoke those words, she made large and exaggerated gestures while making strange sounds with her lips.
It was a little weird, but funny.
"They weren't friends… but thanks." He smiled warmly for the first time, pushing past his trauma to remember the faces of the five.
'All of them… I'm sure they must have been decent people, but…'
Not only did Beck and Dredd abandon the main group out of fear and self-preservation, but Philip and Levi also abandoned him despite their joint plight—running to the very cave that he pointed out to them.
'If any of them had gotten there before me, I'm sure they would be perfectly fine with letting me die while they saved their own lives.'
He wasn't sure about Lisa, but considering how the rest of her comrades acted, and how she often behaved in the group, he couldn't help but lump her with the rest.
'I thought about them long and hard in that cave…'
Perhaps it was a way to get rid of his survivor's guilt, or some kind of epiphany that he had, but Des didn't have lasting good impressions of his dead comrades.
'Now that I think about it, they didn't hire me because they were nice or anything. It was probably because I was cheap.' That wasn't necessarily a bad thing, since they didn't do anything illegal or even treat him badly.
It was simply business, and Des had to treat it that way rather than looking at them with rose-colored lenses. Of course, this made the admiration he had towards them vanish, but it gave him a sense of realism and closure that he desperately needed at the time.
"The fact that you survived it means you figured out the patterns of that Horror. You're a quick thinker… I like that!"
"It was nothing, really…" Des didn't feel good about the incident, but he could confidently say he learned a lot from it. Jumping to conclusions rather early was fatal—no matter if it was dealing with Natives or Horrors.
"Hm. I see." She mumbled, almost as if she was no longer interested in the topic. "Anyway, what were you doing out there in the dark? I already guessed that you didn't know about the Worms, but what were you trying to do by sneaking out so late?"
Des sighed as he spoke, once again reminded of his foolishness "I was the Porter of my Party, and the backpack I carried and left behind in that place had supplies. I figured I could get to them and return to the cave, so I wouldn't starve to death."
In hindsight, the smarter move would have been to go in the 'Daytime' since he already knew what to expect, but… the trauma of the Horror back then was still ingrained in his body.
Even now, he could feel himself trembling just thinking about it.
"And what would you have done after getting the supplies? Wouldn't you eventually exhaust them?"
"I-I hadn't thought that far ahead. I was hoping someone would eventually come to rescue me, and… well, I now know that nothing of the sort is happening anytime soon."
Truly, all his efforts at survival were pointless with a little bit of hindsight.
He was trapped in the worst possible place.
'But…' Des looked carefully at Eve, noticing how fresh her skin was despite its paleness. '... This woman has survived here for at least two decades. If she was able to survive in this place, does that mean I can too?'
However, he already knew the answer to that.
'No!'
Compared to her, who had all her limbs intact, and seemed to be rather skilled and more intelligent than him—though also a bit insane as well—he was already a disabled waste of space who could hardly walk.
He already knew the answer from the start.
'I can't survive here… I'm going to die.'
*
*
*
[A/N]
Thanks for reading!
The moment of despair creeps in, and Des is now at a crossroad. What path will he take forward?
Hopefully, the next chapter decisively answers that.