*Dunnnng*

 

I tap the tip of the spear against a pipe, the metal reverberates loudly out into the silent world around us.

 

*Kaduuuung*

 

“What are you doing?” asks Madison with a muffled voice, her covers barely opening, as I hold her there beneath my arm.

 

*Kaduuuung*

 

  “I’m looking for it,” I tell her and keep walking down the main street that is littered with corpses. I recognize these faces, I was here. I was a part of it. I was here when we killed them all. Well, I wasn’t. But this body was. You get the idea, guy. We’ve been on this ride together for a while now, so you know how this works.

 

*Kaduuung*

 

“Looking for wh- no, look. You really, really need to go back!”

 

“If the dungeon-master didn’t want me to abuse this body, they shouldn’t have given it to me,” I tell my favorite book and keep walking, stepping over a particularly small skull that is charred with black ash.

 

“They didn’t! You were supposed to be a hydra’s head this time!”

 

I stop, thinking. “Oh. That’s cool… Is that allowed? Isn’t the hydra a sub-boss?”

 

“It’s like with the red drake. The rules are squirrelly, but we made it work.”

 

“I’d rather be a human honestly," I tell her and shrug.

 

“You can’t be a human! You’re breaking the rules!” protests the book, squirming beneath my arm.

 

*Kaduuuuuung*

 

I tap another pipe, kicking a fractured femur out of my way. It’s just laying there, in the middle of the road, you know? This neighborhood has really gone down-hill lately. “Hey, it wasn’t me who made the choice. I just play the cards I’m given, Madison.”

 

I turn to look at a cute house on the side, a small family place. Hey, I know this place. I knock on the door to see if anyone is home. A strained groaning rings out and the charred door breaks free from the hinges, falling over and down into the rubble beyond.

 

“Piotr? Piotr are you home?”

 

No response. I guess he must be out with the family. Shrugging, I keep on walking through the village, stepping over a dislocated jaw beneath me. Maybe tomorrow.

 

  “Listen to me, PLEASE,” begs Madison. I stop and sigh. I just can’t say no to those moonlight eyes of hers, you know? They always get me. They’re so big and round, I’m a sucker for them. I grab the book’s argent cover and she squeaks again, stopping as I pull her out and let her float freely on her own again. Her cover is a little flushed, but I think she’s just mad at me. Which I don’t think is fair, but this is the world we live in, guy.

 

“Walk with me, talk with me,” I tell her and keep walking on ahead. Scraping along the stones with the old, dinky spear.

 

“It was the dungeon again, it messed up the respawn. Look!” Madison opens herself up and I quickly look away, blushing as she shows me the insides of her pages.

 

“Not in public, Madison! Everyone’s watching us!” I say, turning away and holding my hands against my blushing cheeks.

 

“What- No!” The book yells at me, frustrated. “Look!”

 

Warily, if only to keep up the facade of modesty, I peak out of the corner of my eye and see the sheet of paper clenched inside of her pages. A crude drawing of a hydra, that is scribbled over. A figure of a human, leaking black ink sits next to them.

 

  “Huh. Neat,” I lean in closer, pressing my face towards the drawing. Madison let’s out an uneasy cough, as I come close enough to smell her pages. “I like the little eyes they drew,” I say, pulling back. I take a second to press against my own eyes to make sure they still fit right. They look a little loose in the sketch, but I didn’t want to say that. It would be rude, you know?

 

“It’s the dungeon again! It’s getting… worse,” says Madison, floating alongside me, but not making eye-contact anymore. “We… we had to cut off the goblin outpost.”

 

“Huh?” I stop, looking at her.

 

  “The mold spread up through the well. The whole place is… It was bad. Really bad,” she says, sounding rather upset. I feel kind of bad at the tone in her voice. “So you have to go back, right now! Before anyone sees that you’re breaking the rules! We can’t risk getting punished again! We’re already running out of time!” she pleads. I rub the back of my head. I wish that… I wish… I scratch my head. What do I wish? Hmm…

 

  “If the dungeon changed my respawn, I feel like it isn’t my place to argue. Maybe it wants me to get out quicker?” I say, telling her, making up something on the spot. Though actually, that sounds pretty logical to me. If the dungeon has identified me as the source of its suffering, then it only makes sense that it wants to expel me as fast as it can. Like scar tissue pushing a puss-crusted splinter higher and higher until it bursts out of the skin.

 

“But you can’t! Even if the dungeon is…” Madison looks around uncertainly, as if it were listening. She's right to do so. It is. “- Even if the dungeon is… ‘coming to life’, we’re still bound by the rules of the game. Of the punishment. If the dark-lord sees that yo-“

 

“- The dark-lord isn’t going to see,” I tell her, waving her off. Dark-lord forgive my arrogance, but I know. I know. I know.

 

“How can you be so sure?!”

 

“Look into my eyes, Madison. What do you see?”

 

“Huh?”

 

I widen my gaze and press my face against her cover, grabbing her roughly again. “WHAT DO YOU SEE?!”

 

“Let go of me!” she yells in fearful protest. I narrow my eyes and push her away. She doesn’t get it. She doesn’t see like I do, like you do, guy. She doesn’t know. She doesn’t actually have eyes. “Where’s SUSSURANT? Why isn’t she keeping you in check like she was supposed to?”

 

I stop.

 

SUSSURANT. SUSSURANT. SUSSURANT. Hahah. Hahaha! Was that her name? I never knew her name, guy. I never knew! I need to remember. I need to remember. Before I forget. I’m forgetful you know? You know? Yeah, you know. Haha! I open my menu, going to my notes and I wipe all of the old gunk away. I need space. I need space for her eyes. I begin scribbling, I can’t draw. But I want to remember what her name is. Imagine how happy she’ll be if I know her name, haha. Haha! Sussurant. Sussssssurant.

 

“What are you doing?! Come on!” protests Madison, trying to budge me to the side. But she hardly weighs a pound and a half and is basically just a minor annoyance. It’s kind of cute. Though her sharp corners are going to leave a bruise in my soft skin tomorrow.

 

“I’m taking notes, Madison, can’t you see that?”

 

I spend a few minutes drawing in my menu with my fingers, like a child finger-painting. I’m not a very good artist, but I think this is what she looked like, right? Right? You saw her guy, you know what she looks like, right? It was like this, right? RIGHT?! RI-

 

Something crunches off behind us. I turn around to look.

 

  “GUY!” calls out the monk, who has for the first time that I have ever witnessed, separated herself from the hero-party. She came all this way for me, alone? She looks so worried. I have such good friends. I have such good friends! I could cry… But our relationship is a special one, it's making me feel kind of bad now, actually. It's complicated, guy, okay? Keep your nose out of it. Catching her breath, she looks up towards me. Towards us. Her eyes go wide and they shake as she sees. I like that look. I like that look! I can see so much of her eyes! They’re so BIG!

 

“What. What is… what is that?” she asks, pointing towards me and pulling back a step.

 

“Huh? Oh, that’s Madison. Madison, this is BMMMM-“

 

Madison looks at me somewhat lost. “’Huh? That’s just a sound, how is that a na-“

 

The monk slams a fist against the burnt doorway next to her, it falls apart in an instant, falling into a heap of burnt ash and rubble. “WHAT IS THAT?!” yells my only friend at me, pointing a beaded hand my way. It’s shaking, the heavy wooden beads rattling loudly.

 

I look around, somewhat lost. But… Ooooooooh, she means that -

 

  “You mean this old thing?” I say pointing to the floating purple menu behind me. “It was a present, from a friend. He’s dead now, but he gave me his eyes. He gave me his eyes!” I say, clutching my face tightly. Thanks demon-miasma, you were a good friend. My very first! Her face looks funny. What’s with that expression? She squishes it in a weird way as she looks down to the ground next to herself for a second, a strange squelch escaping her throat as she averts her eyes. I hear something creaking, I realize it's the straining of her own fingers as she clenches her fists tightly shut.

 

Oh. Now I feel like a jerk. I think she’s cr-

 

“-IAAAH!” she screams as she dashes towards us in an instant. Her fist meets the side of my spear as I raise it in the last second to block her punch that was aiming straight for my face. A shockwave rings out and I only just manage to grab Madison in time as we’re sent flying back into the soot and the bones.