“Please release me!” A girl bound by a chain and rope pleaded to Alta as she knelt on a pedestal. The prisoner wore a grey coat with red embossments, and she had black hair that reached down to her back—and her scarlet red eyes were striking. But why was she even locked up? And in a dungeon? Something was very suspicious about her.
Alta was taken aback completely since she expected an abandoned fortress to be devoid of human life. Dungeons were huge labyrinthic complexes that formed from abandoned structures like mines or fortresses, and they would often be filled with loot and monsters looking for a new home.
And that’s why people like Alta, who were adventurers, braved these dungeons. Alta wasn’t a newbie to the occupation of an adventurer, but it was the first time she went into one solo. She was ill-equipped for this situation; her equipment consisted of an iron chest plate with a shirt underneath, shorts, and a sword. She had a bag hidden by the entrance too.
Alta prayed for forgiveness to whatever god she had upset for this to happen and took a deep breath. First, her light source went missing and now finding this girl. It was really not her day. “First of all, who are you? Why are you locked up here?”
“Erm…” The prisoner looked baffled, like she was expecting something else. “So I’m Kaida, and I’m here because I did a very bad thing in the past, but now I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on it,” As the prisoner, who went by the name of Kaida answered, she turned away from Alta. The action raised a question or two about the authenticity of her statement. As she gazed at Kaida one thought came to her mind… She’s super shady! Yep, something was just too odd about the girl. Alta couldn’t bring herself to release her, not yet.
“Why should I help you?” Alta asked while looking around, ensuring the room was clear of any monsters. “Is it just you here?”
“It’s just me here… Just me.” Kaida’s voice wavered slightly, her head drooped a bit. Alta wasn’t sure how long she had been here, but her imprisonment seemed to weigh heavy on her shoulders.
Her face brightened though, and trying to shake her sadness away, she continued, “If you release me I’ll grant you anything you want! I’ll be indebted to you.”
Alta squinted at Kaida, giving things a long hard think. If she did release the poor girl she could potentially get a party member, something she had been struggling for a while with. But on the other hand, the girl could be lying and she could get scammed just like the last time…
“How can I be sure that everything you say is true?” Alta asked with one eyebrow raised as she eyed the bound girl. The room she was imprisoned in was weird, white tiles covered all the surfaces and everything looked new—unlike the rest of the dungeon which had been reconquered by mother nature herself. Alta inched closer, not knowing what was to come.
Kaida’s solemn expression was washed away with a grin. It unnerved Alta, there was something off about it. And out of nowhere, a sharp metallic object flew towards Alta, making her yelp in surprise and jump back with her sword held defensively. “No wonder they locked you up,” Alta muttered.
“Got you! Ahaha, don’t worry, I can’t do anything without a registered handler,” Kaida said with laughter. And now that Alta was still she could inspect what was sent so close to her face. It was a metallic tail! It had a scaly pattern imprinted on it and was segmented with a sharp needle-like end, Kaida smirked as the tail wagged around behind her—waving around a dead crystal spider. The crystal spider was, as it name indicated, really hard to pierce and it had a venom that could kill one hundred grown men from a single bite.
Alta just gave her a blank stare, a bit dumbfounded by the event. Kaida had probably just saved her life, and on closer inspection, she could see two horns sprouting from the top of her head.
“Sorry, I’ll leave,” Alta turned around immediately and started to speed walk away from the strange girl. Alta didn’t think that she would meet a monsterling in such a random dungeon. Kaida’s demeanour changed. Her joy evaporated as quickly as Alta was making for the exit.
“Noo! Please wait!” Kaida cried out... “I won’t do it again! I just don’t want to stay here anymore…” Hearing her plea, Alta stopped a moment, still facing the exit to the strange area but not leaving yet. Kaida grinned at Alta’s reaction to her words, going as far as to stop her exit. Kaida continued speaking, “Come on, I mean I just saved you! Plus I haven’t seen the sun in forever! Do I not deserve a bit of freedom? To feel the wind ruffle through my hair, for the light to touch my skin! Please! Don’t leave me here!”
Alta pondered. And pondered. And continued to ponder some more. Was she really going to leave a girl like her unattended? Was she not going to let her see the sun, feel the grass stroking her feet, smell the fresh air lightly scented by summer flowers? Yeah, she was.
Except, a sense of guilt washed over her. It was the feeling one would get from leaving a puppy out in the rain, or walking past a beggar on the streets. Yep, she would’ve been terrible just to leave her, she thought... Alta turned around with a cautious look on her face.
“Promise me you won't do any more pranks?”
“Mhm. I promise.” Kaida gave a cheeky grin. It was a reaction that almost made Alta second guess her decision to help her. Despite that, she still caved in. After letting out a troubled sigh, she walked back over to her.
“Alright, how do I do this?” Alta stared at the weird contraption in front of her.
“You just need to touch the pedestal in front of me and follow the pictures~”
Alta reluctantly touched the pedestal in front of Kaida. It lit up and a picture of Kaida appeared on it. A pictogram of a hand pointed towards the picture, and Alta instinctively tapped on it. An outline of a hand appeared on the screen, and after a second or two of staring at it in confusion, she placed her hand in the outline.
At this point, lights and other strange symbols were flashing from the pedestal. As she did so her eyes widened. She’d forgotten to ask the most important thing. “Oh yeah, I didn’t ask before but what did you even do to get imprisoned like this?”
Kaida moved her shoulders in a shrugging gesture, “ I just killed hundreds of people. It was a long time ago though.”
Alta smiled, “Ah that’s all?”
Due to the strange experience before her and her casual tone, Alta didn’t fully register what she said. However, a second later, and right after all the flashing and symbols had disappeared a wave of panic rose. Sweat started pouring down her forehead as she slowly glanced up. “Wait, YOU DID WHAT?!”
A sharp sting quickly took away Alta’s attention, as a small needle drew blood and injected fluid into her hand. “Ouch! What the heck?” Alta quickly withdrew her hand from the screen. The screen, which had gone blank momentarily now displayed a green checkmark before becoming blank once more. In an instant, the chains around Kaida’s hands unlocked and fell to the ground with a clatter, so she got up and stretched her body.
“Feels good to move again!” She exclaimed with glee, stretching her body and removing a thick cable from her neck. Alta, who had recovered from being stung, kept her distance from the monsterling.
“You’ve killed people?” Alta asked, her voice faltering a tiny bit.
“Of course~ The smell of blood in the middle of a war is where I love to be~” Kaida giggled, reminiscing in her memories. She got up close to Alta, staring at her. She was standing way too close for Alta’s comfort, as Alta could make out the tiniest details in Kaida’s iris.
“You’re not going to kill me now, are you?” She managed to nervously cough up, while quickly backing away from the monsterling.
“Hmm. No. I can’t hurt you, but now that you’ve freed me I can go and have lots and lots of fun!” Kaida happily exclaimed, frolicking towards the exit. Alta watched in horror, trying to think of anything she could do to stop her. She remembered that Kaida mentioned something about needing a handler.
“Kaida, stop,” Alta commanded with a stern voice, while also gambling everything on this one single moment. Either Kaida was going to listen to her, or she would escape and go on a massacre. To the relief of Alta, Kaida froze up immediately. She didn’t think that it would work, but she praised her intellect for stopping a bloody massacre from happening.
“Hey uh, would you mind letting me go?” Kaida looked back at Alta, who was now rapidly approaching her. Alta put her hands on Kaida’s shoulders and stared at her.
“Just who and what are you?”
“M-me?” A few sweat drops ran down Kaida’s face.
“Yes, you, Kaida,” Alta doubled down, she wasn’t planning on letting the monsterling go until she was sure that she wouldn’t hurt anyone.
“As I said before, I’m Kaida. And uh, I’m a killer robot?” Kaida replied, a glint of nervousness and confusion in her voice. She was still smirking but it was more forced now. The response she’d given was like the question was self-explanatory. Alta, seeing her cooperativeness, took this chance to push further.
She got even closer to Kaida’s face, “Tell me, what is a handler?”
“Erm- Are you sure you want to know that?” Kaida’s demeanour changed, her giddy excitement from before all but vanished. Alta knew that she had struck gold.
“Yes.”
“Ugh fine. A handler is someone who can issue orders to robots, or in this case—me. But please don’t do that!” Kaida cried out the last part, pouncing onto Alta. They both fell onto the hard ground with a loud thud, with Kaida landing on top of Alta. Tears were forming in her eyes, she shook Alta with frustration written over her face. “Every day was a living pain! All I did was kill, kill, kill! Constantly, twenty-four-seven, seven days a week, three hundred and fifty days a year. And on the six days I didn’t go out to kill I was in maintenance or locked up. I was treated like a tool, just another trinket to be used up and discarded. It was miserable! I ended up killing them…” Kaida finally broke down into a puddle of tears and sadness, tears ran down her face as she kept rubbing her eyes.
Alta was taken aback by the sudden burst of emotions coming from Kaida. A few questions popped into her mind though, was she a robot? Why did she grow tired of killing? What was it with her metal-like appendages? But even with all of those questions lingering in her mind, it was clear that something needed to be done.
Alta instinctively wrapped her arms around Kaida, leaning into a hug. Kaida wept on her shoulder, occasionally sniffling. Kaida gripped tightly against Alta, as she was slowly recovering from the parade of sadness. There was something about Kaida that reminded Alta of herself. The fact that Kaida was locked up for a long time reminded Alta of her own miserable time in the orphanage, always trapped one way or another within the walls of pure agony.
Alta sighed. She tried soothing her, patting the back of her head gently. She didn’t know what would happen next, but the one thing she did know was things would certainly become more interesting from that point on.
End of chapter 1?
Aha! It got made a series!
Thank you for the chapter.