Grievous' body bobbed in the air as he continued to push his small black spherical body forward. The ball hummed a happy tune as he strode through the night.
He wasn't worried about the darkness, though. Although he had no eyes, he was capable of sight like any egg. And like any egg, he was able to pinpoint where the gate was—and he had a long way to go before reaching it, probably a couple of hours.
That was, however, true for all the monsters on this floor. But after spending a year here, he was able to know a thing or two. When he was near a certain distance from the open gate, it would undoubtedly suck him in.
That was why, on the off chance that those orcs were waiting over there, he would be fine as soon as the gate opened. But he doubted those stupid monsters would be able to think of that.
Under normal circumstances, Bruiser-type monsters are usually on the dumber side of the spectrum.
After leaving the filthy alleyway, he turned right and began his journey through the street of the slum. If he had a nose, he was sure he would vomit ten times over from this repugnant place.
Bodies of monsters littered the street—poor and miserable with their life. The lucky ones own houses, but those are usually the ones that are slightly a cut above the rest here.
The orcs belong to a whole clan of them. If Grievous didn't know any better, with so many orcs around, he would think they were the monsters of the same type here.
The reason why they were chasing him earlier was to capture him and sell him off to the market.
The market was set up by those on the upper floors, which allowed the monsters on this floor to exchange with those on the higher floors. This allowed the monsters here to earn a little bit of money to use somewhere else in the market—most likely for food.
That said, the upper floors did not do this out of the kindness of their own heart. The market was used by those living on this floor to sell eggs to them.
Why, you may ask? That was because of clans. Important families that have a degree of control in the tower depend on the reputation of their members.
The usual way to acquire these members is through either recruiting them into the clan or having children.
Grievous isn't entirely sure what the eggs have to do with any of this. He is only aware that genitals are a lot more rarer to come across.
"Finally!" He yelled in his mind. At the end of this road was a large open square area with the gate in the very centre.
Unlike the filthy dirt street, the platform under the gate was clean and appealing to stare at. It was made out of a smooth and white marble that seemed to have little to no imperfections.
The gate itself didn't look like your typical gate, for it had no doors. The gate, the size of an empire building, didn't look like any gate he knew from Earth.
Instead, it was just two massive stone pillars parallel to each other attached to an arch—it looked more like an archway for giants to him than anything else. But it's connected to the tower nonetheless.
Grievous wasn't sure what it looked like when it opened, but he was damn sure it was going to be worth it for how long he was trapped here. He wasn't sure how why he was the only one of his generation with a semblance of sentience, but he was going to pay back the one who did it to him, for it felt like hell for him.
In front of the gate, he saw a horde of monsters conversing with each other. Grievous had lived here for long enough to be no longer frightened by the sight of monsters.
And, to be honest, they were a lot easier on the eyes compared to the uglies on this floor, in his opinion.
Despite their different appearances, they all had one thing in common. And that was an egg. They all had an egg with them, be it in their arms, tentacles, mouths, or on their back.
Grievous couldn't help but raise an imaginary brow at this before slowing inching past them. He glances at the eggs and finds something unusual about them compared to the ones he's seen before.
They all had some sort of branding on them.
'What's that about?' He thought before looking away. A sense of realisation passed through his being as he looked back at the eggs again, 'Are these clan eggs!?'
Deciding not to think much about it, he made his way towards the rest of the normal eggs. The current generation was made this year. And yes, eggs are made every year.
So why didn't he enter the gate last year? Well...
***
"Huh...? Where am I?" Grievous groggily said before opening his "eyes". He then tried to move his limbs but discovered that he couldn't feel them.
He looked around and saw hundreds of white eggs and some ones that were a different colour.
"Weird..." He muttered before looking up and finding a massive archway. "What the—? Where the hell am I!?" He began to frantically look around again before his eyes landed on a grotesque-looking monster.
"AHHH!"
Grievous ran away.
***
He couldn't help but sigh deeply at that memory, 'I should've just kept my cool. Just a few more minutes, and I'm sure it would've opened.'
"THERE IT IS!"
Grievous turned towards the loud outburst and found the three pigs staring at him. They panted deeply, and their faces looked more awful than before—the boss' finger pointed directly at him.
They must've been searching for him the entire night.
Everyone on the platform stared at what they were pointing and widened whatever eyes they had. Somehow, they had missed a conspicuous black egg right in the midst of the regular unbranded eggs.
"Black egg?"
"Yeah... Something about a black egg is ringing inside my head."
"Same here..."
Before all of them could ponder on this matter more in-depth, the sound of wings fluttering in the sky drew their attention away from Grievous. He released a sigh of relief before staring at the individual flying in the sky.
The artificial sun behind the humanoid figure with wings caused everyone to focus harder on trying to discover the newcomer's appearance.
After they had landed on the ground, everyone was then able to recognise their identity.
"*Gasp* It's Mihal!"
"They look so dashing..."
"I've never seen someone from Benevolence here before..."
Mihal was a man with long, dashing blonde hair that reached his waist. His exposed face was completely androgynous to the point he actually looked more like a girl.
He wore some heavy metal armour with his clan's emblem on it. The emblem was two wings crossed over a sword.
He stood at about 6ft and looked more or less like a human with his face. Under his armpit was a gold-coloured egg with the exact same kind of emblem branded onto it.
Mihal smiled and waved towards everyone, "Greetings, greetings! Just here to drop off my kid." He gently placed the egg onto the ground before watching it float towards the gate.
Grievous struggled to tear his eyes away from the handsome man. He was more good-looking than any model he had seen in his past life.
'I'm straight, I'm straight!' He chanted in his mind like a mantra.
While he was chanting, he was then snuck up and caught in the foul hands of the orcs. The dirty hands crawled over his body. He tried to wiggle free, "Unhand me, you filthy orcs!"
"It talks!?" x 3
The three orcs simultaneously yell in surprise before noticing the calm steps from Mihal approaching them. His nose wrinkled for a split second before returning back to his smiling face.
"What's all this then? Must you three cause such a ruckus?"
Mihal's eyes drew to what they were holding on to before stiffening. "Let go of that this instant!" He roared before pushing his hand to the side and creating a sword made of light.
The orcs trembled and quickly unhanded the egg—in fear that they may lose their lives if they hadn't. Grievous hanged in the air—his nonexistent eyes staring at the sword in terror.
A tremble in his being made itself known. If Grievous was still human, he may have pissed himself by now under the intense glare of Mihal.
"I pray for your next life," Mihal said deeply before tightly gripping the hilt and swinging down. Mihal hadn't put a lot of strength into this swing due to eggs usually being quite fragile.
The world seemed to slow down in Grievous' eyes as he was the blade that was about to bisect him in half. He clenched his jaws—was this how he was going to go out? He thought with unwillingness.
He refused to die such a simple and pathetic death once again, especially one he unknowingly waited for an entire year.
As the sword cut through the air like butter and passed through the egg, Mihal expected it to fall apart and fade away. Instead, the egg still stayed in its complete state—no sign of any damage or falling apart.
Mihal raised a brow before a light of realisation flashed through his eyes. He twisted his head towards the gate to see that the empty archway was now glowing.
A tall wall of light appeared inside the archway. Its light showered over them as it began the process of drawing in the eggs.
'It opened already!? It's still too early!' Mihal glared at the gate—almost as if he was scolding it for being early.
In the past, the gate would always open at exactly 2 am. Currently, it was thirty minutes before it should have opened. Such an event had never happened before.
Mihal twisted his head and scanned over the countless eggs.
All of them began to blur before being sucked away towards it. This was also the case of Grievous. Once a gate opens, the surrounding eggs would be put into a state of invulnerability.
Grievous hesitantly opened his eyes and saw himself being pulled towards the door without his own volition. "Hahahaha! It's finally here!" He laughed as his body entered the wall of light.
***
Grievous' body, along with the rest of the eggs, travelled through a pillar of light. The light twisted and turned in on its journey to what seemed to be a planet.
Inside the pillar, the various eggs were undergoing sudden development. One of the eggs cracked open, and whatever was inside began to expand rapidly to form what seemed to be a small tiger cub with white fur.
Others formed various grotesque appearances, unlike the elegant form of this one.
Grievous' spherical body cracked open like the rest of them before being moulded like clay.
While all of this is happening, Grievous is face-to-face with a strange situation inside his mind.
===
[The Administrator senses potential entertainment from you. He has gifted you the trait: "Stubbornness Deserves a Reward"]
[Stubbornness Deserves a Reward: "Each act of stubbornness, recognised by the system, towards an individual will reward you the choice of picking one out of three skills from the individual to copy. The cool-down period after activation is an hour."]
===