Chapter Text
DARK, DARKER, YET DARKER.
THE DARKNESS KEEPS GROWING, THE SHADOWS CUTTING DEEPER
PHOTON READINGS... NEGATIVE
THIS NEXT EXPERIMENT, SEEMS VERY, VERY INTERESTING...
…
WHAT DO YOU TWO THINK?
Avery looked up at the giant assortment of letters carved into stone, a sinking feeling growing in his chest. I hate codes.
Codes were created just to spite him, he swore. If people ever started talking about some “ciphers” or “keys” to him, they might as well have just started speaking enchanting table. If you were going to mention a “key,” it better just be the full answer written down.
But Avery, a thought emerged. Where's the fun in that?
A counterthought filled the gap: Shut up.
…
Silence, in his head. A smile on his face.
Now, where were we? He stared at the wall of letters above him. Ugh.
“Hey, D3r? You got any answers in that head of your–”
CRACK! Startled, Avery recoiled from the impeding structure, trying to find where the noise had come from. He traced the noise to the closed doorway beneath the code, where… D3rlord was.
Is… he doing what I think he's doing? CRACK! A two by one hole was now visible behind D3rlord, who was tightly gripping onto his diamond pickaxe and was clearly about to swing again.
Avery started walking towards the door, his attention now fully absent from the useless code above him. A feeling of amusement filled him.
CRACK! Guess the guy that knows everything would know the fastest way through, huh?
Paranoia was seeping in – no, it was flooding into D3rlord3’s head.
Ever since he realized they were being followed, all D3rlord3 could think about was getting to somewhere safe and reevaluating what they should do. The problem was, D3rlord3 couldn’t let Avery know that was what he was trying to do.
He’d spent so long tiptoeing around the idea of being fully transparent, that as they only went deeper into the cave – he’d have even more things he’d need to explain.
And whatever was following them didn’t help that weighing guilt, either.
Get past this stupid door, and you tell Avery everything. The hum had gotten far worse as D3rlord3’s stress kept rising, and he was certain that if Avery looked at his face now that he’d see someone on the brink of psychosis.
I might already be there. The thought only made him angrier, and he channeled that into one final, cathartic swing of his pickaxe.
The air felt damper than before. Mustier than before.
It reminded Avery of his cold, decaying, and filterless basement he’d built under his house for the express purpose of literally just having a basement.
Except, this was certainly no basement.
This was an entire village.
A seemingly abandoned, cobweb-ridden village, but a village at that.
Suddenly– a strong gust of freezing cold air from behind. Avery shuddered in reaction, but before he could do anything else, something grabbed his hand.
“Wha?” D3rlord kept looking ahead at the village, firmly holding onto Avery’s hand. “We need to go.”
A now-flustered Avery didn’t even get to say another word before D3rlord started to run, and Avery now ran with him.
There was no time to waste.
D3rlord3 had to get both of them inside one of these houses as soon as possible, and all he could hope for was that this thing wouldn’t follow them inside.
By instinct, he had grabbed Avery’s hand the second he felt the cold air rushing behind him. He obviously thought nothing of it at the time, but even he couldn’t shake off the feeling of something… else. Infinite knowledge couldn’t even answer this for him, so he just assumed it was part of what was already messing with him, and tried to push the feeling down.
He had a much more prominent concern anyway.
They ran all the way until they were right before a giant fountain, the centerpiece of the village. Surprisingly too, there was still water flowing out of it. Maybe it was a bit murky, but expecting anything otherwise would be unrealistic.
D3rlord3’s attention darted from his left to his right, trying to find the best place they could hide for the time being.
Avery, meanwhile, was experiencing a cross between severe confusion and being livid. No one just takes your hand and starts running for no reason, especially if that person had a mind as strange as D3rlord’s.
What was making him mad was how quiet D3rlord was about it all.
No explanation, no reassurance, nothing. A part of him was feeling a little worried about how little D3rlord was talking, but he knew that if Mr. Infinite Knowledge wanted to clarify something, he would.
“D3r.” Avery said softly. D3rlord was now looking intently at the fountain.
“D3r.” Avery said, voice raising. D3rlord tried to move forward, toward the fountain, but realized something was stopping him.
Avery wasn’t budging.
“D3R!” Avery screamed. D3rlord finally looked at Avery. His face was now more red than green, and the desperation on it was clear as day.
Oh… The thought echoed in D3rlord3’s mind. “Avery… we need to go to the fountain.”
He noticed tears bubbling in Avery’s eyes, and his face grew more uneasy. D3rlord3 continued. “We need to get inside the fountain and hide, Avery. I’ll explain everything when we’re in there–”
“STOP!” Avery screamed again, this time catching D3rlord3 firmly off-guard. “What- what are you talking about? Why are you acting like this? Why are we running? W- Why are we hiding??” The tears were flowing freely now.
“What… what are you not telling me?”
D3rlord3 looked at the slime, who now looked exactly like the documented image for “emotional wreck” in his mind. Pushing that quip away, he tried to figure out how he was going to convince Avery to get moving.
“I…”
But nothing came out.
D3rlord3, for maybe the first time in his life, had nothing to solve the problem.
Avery could only watch as the knight he had come to see as a friend stood motionless, unresponsive to his pleas.
Why… why did it have to be him?
The freezing air rushed past the two of them… and at that exact moment, Avery felt something he had never felt before.
Like a kick in his head.
And from the kick, came a gravelly, booming voice that should never have been there.
Because he was chosen.
And to his horror, when he looked around him, the fountain, the village, and… D3rlord… all gone. He was alone with his thoughts in a dark, endless void, with only one thing left in front of him.
A towering, yellow gate.