Here we go.
"Words" Speaking
'words' Thoughts
"Words" Demon Speech
"A... top-secret human hunting ground?" Emma parroted.
The pink-haired girl just stared at her emotionlessly.
"Tell me! Is this another plantation?! Are there "Poachers" here?! What about Will-" before Emma could finish her line of questioning, the girl interrupted her.
"I knew it. You're not a newbie like the rest of the newcomers. You know the truth, about what we are, and about them." The girl said, looking down at Emma, who looked at her in shock at her interruption.
After a moment to recover, the pink-haired girl continued.
"You, me, all the kids here, are prey for the monsters who run this place. The farms don't know about it. It's a secret only their super-elite know of." The pinkette said.
"... "All the kids here." you said?" Emma asked, her shock completely replaced with grave concern.
"Most of them are newbies. Once a month, they send in replacements for the ones who are eaten." the older girl answered.
"Replaced by whom?" Emma asked.
"Farm kids, mostly from a specific plantation. the leaders of the hunt have a lot of power there." the teal-eyed girl answered, remaining monotone.
"You make it sound like the kids don't know the truth…" Emma said.
"The new ones don't. They still think they were born into a happy orphanage with a loving caretaker and family not related by blood, who was lucky enough to be adopted by a loving family. Only to get kidnapped by some monster who tries to kill them. They get shipped out without an inkling of doubt." the girl answered, lifting her bat up onto her shoulder. "We need to go. They will be here soon. Follow me. I know a place we can hide until the music plays again. There is someone who's gonna want to meet you." The girl said, starting to turn around.
Just then, a loud yell of a terrified child pierced the two girls' ears. Without wasting a moment, Emma bolted in the direction of the scream.
"Hey!" the pink-haired girl exclaimed, reaching out in an attempt to stop Emma from pursuing the scream, but it was too late. Emma was already down the alleyway towards the trees where the cry came from.
Emma's thoughts raised as she approached the trees, trying to figure out a game plan for encountering the demons. Her bow was gone, all she had was her pistol, but she only had the shots in the chamber. She'd have to save those for emergencies. But this was an emergency, wasn't it? She started to hear a gravelly high-pitched voice counting down. Right now, it was at 4. When she came into the clearing, she saw three kids, two boys, and one girl. The younger boy seemed injured. The other boy was running towards her, seeming to leave the two others behind.
"3." a demon with a column of eyes said in the same gravelly voice she heard before. Surrounding the two kids were it along with four other demons, five in total, that she could see.
Looking at the kids, she noticed a fire axe was dropped by the girl. Without wasting a moment, she sprinted for it, scooping it up.
"2." the demon spoke again, seemingly caught up in his own game to notice Emma raising the axe and threw it towards the demon's face.
"RUN!" Emma yelled as the axe spun towards the speaking demon's center eye.
The five demons stood in shock, frozen in place as a bloodlust washed over them and the axe's blade spun towards the leader. But right before the axe could pierce the demon's weak point, another demon leaped from a tree and caught the axe, the blade centimeters away from the gravelly demon's center eye.
A moment of silence passes between the monsters, trying to process the events that just occurred. By the time they had regained their composure, the prey had fled out of sight.
'This, this is Goldy Pond? To think demons took it over to turn it into an amusement park! Those demons must be the "poachers" Mister talked about. They look so different from the ones in the forest, they look much more like the one Norman, and I saw that night… and like Sonju and Mujika, except bloodthirsty. I could feel it. That one demon I threw the axe at was going to kill all of them. They must have been the ones that took Mister's family from him.' Emma thought as she led the three other farm children through the forest.
The five of them didn't stop, continuing to run from the demons that would surely follow.
'If Mr. Minerva made this place for us, he must have left some piece of evidence that we can use to survive. I must find it and get out of Goldy Pond alive, preferably with all the others here in tow.'
After about five minutes of running, Emma stopped holding her hand up to indicate to the others. The younger girl and injured boy collapsed in exhaustion as the older boy leaned on a tree. The Pink haired girl from before was leaning on her bat but not breathing as heavily as the others. She must be in shape, just like Emma.
Emma kneeled down and placed her good ear to the ground, trying to listen for their pursuers.
'... nothing, we must have lost them… for now.' Emma thought as she stood back up. 'I have to find Ray soon, but right now, these guys' safety is more important. We're going to have to keep running until the hunt is over. We just have to survive until the music plays again, right?'
Emma didn't notice the Pinkette walking over to her, as Emma was too deep in thought to see. Emma was jolted back to reality with a hard slap to the back of her head.
"Dumbass!" the bat girl yelled in her ear. "Are you out of your mind?! I thought you were tryin to get away from me, but instead of running and hiding, you went directly to save these kids you don't even know?!" the girl yelled in Emma's face.
"Well, yea…" Emma replied, rubbing the back of her head where she was hit.
"Are you stupid or something?!" the taller girl yelled. "You got some shitty luck coming face-to-face with the monster in the black hat. He's one of the worst ones!"
Emma looks at the girl with a confused look, wanting to know more about this black hat monster the pinkette was so scared of.
"Say.. the demons, I mean monsters, are the ones that come to "hunt" always the same ones?" Emma asked.
The older girls' anger swapped to confusion. "Uhhh yes, but why?" she replied.
"How many of them are there?" Emma asked.
"five, not including their "attendance" which is about ten." She answered.
"And how many of us are there?" Emma questioned.
"At the beginning, when new children are added before a hunt, I say about fifty. But my guess is a little lower than that." The pinkette told the inquisitive girl.
"And how often is a hunt? Is it every day?" Emma asked.
The pink-haired girl started to look frustrated with all these questions but replied nonetheless. "No it's about every three days. What's with all the questions? we don't have time!" The pink-haired girl dropped her bat and placed both hands on Emma's shoulders. "Look, we really need to run and find a place to hide right now! Even if they lost our trails, they'd be here eventually. And the other monsters could find us just as-" the girl said before being cut off by Emma.
"But the others!" Emma retorted.
"Go! Go on without us." The younger boy told them, still holding his bleeding arm. "We can get out of this ourselves. Thanks to both of you risking your lives, we got out of there!"
Emma looked at the boy, still concerned given his current condition.
"Don't worry about this." He gestured to his injury. "I can run just fine. I only gotta rest for a bit." He said.
After a moment of Emma looking at him inquisitively, she smiled. "Okay! We can split up and meet back at the town once the hunt is over!" She said to the boy.
The young boy gave a weak smile at her reply, seemingly from the assurance the orange-haired girl had at all of them surviving this.
"Okay, but where we gonna hide? You're still bleeding all over the place!" The blonde girl with the boy said, looking at his injured arm.
Still smiling, Emma replied to the girl while also taking off the cloth sweater belt and walking to the boy.
"Don't worry, we bought some time, just head downhill." She told them. Emma started to wrap the boy's arm in the cloth so he could let go of his arm.
"If you stay downwind, they will have more trouble tracking your scent or sound. But try not to leave physical tracks they can follow, stick to the beaten path. And keep an eye out for their own tracks." Emma told them as she finished tying the cloth around the boy's arm.
"If you see them, run. If they see you, run. But if you're surrounded, and you can't escape. Make sure to tell them to come after me." She said, looking into the children's eyes.
The three children that were just saved look to Emma, confused by her order.
"Tell them, "she's a premium from Grace Field. First come, first served." Okay? Saying something like that gives you a chance of survival." She told them, hoping they would understand.
Emma looks at them with a smile and says. "My name's Emma. What's your names?" She asked.
The boy smiled back. "I'm Theo."
The blonde girl also smiled from behind Theo. "And I'm Monica."
The eldest boy walked up behind him, cliff-faced. "Jake." He replied in a monotone.
"Then we will meet again later," Emma said. Emma then turned to the pink-haired girl and nodded.
And with that, the two groups went their separate ways, Emma following the pinkette.
'Okay, so there are five hunters with ten attendees. Fifty humans get replenished every month and get hunted every three days. Therefore the number of kids killed during a hunt must be limited to less than five a hunt. From the looks of Theo and Monica, not all the kids that come here are premium like me. So they will want to get a piece of me. Well, they can try!' Emma thought.
"Just so you know, I'm not suicidal. I can't afford to die here. But I can't ignore them. Just leave them to die? Hell no!" Emma said to the pink-haired girl in front of her.
"If that's the case. why were you so eager to leave them behind?" The bat wielding girl said.
"Well, if all five of us ran together, the chances of the monsters tracking us would increase. But I do have mixed feelings about it…" Emma said. "However, after what I did, I'm sure those two demons will be targeting me."
"Hmm." The older girl grunted. "Guess that makes sense." She replied.
"By the same token, you should get away from me as well," Emma told the other girl.
"Shut the hell up. As if I'd die by the likes of you." The older girl retorts. "All we need is time. If you can run and hide until the music plays again, you're safe from the hunt."
"Right, but there's something else I want to do while we run…" Emma starts.
The pink-haired girl stares at her inquisitively as Emma stops suddenly and then turns to the right, going behind a tree.
Following her, the pinkette notices tracks of both kids and demons on the ground, with the kids' tracks overlapping the demons.
"It seems the demons don't take care in hiding their tracks, even though they are intelligent… that means we can track them just as they can track us," Emma tells her.
"Yeah, so what?" the older girl asks, a little confused.
"I'm gonna stay one step ahead of them and get to the children before they do. That way, I can help the ones that are scared to run." Emma replied. "Maybe there's nothing I can do, but I want to save as many kids as possible." She continued clenching her fist.
"Cuz you "Can't ignore them," right?" the taller girl asked.
"Yes!" Emma replied confidently.
The older girl stared at her for a moment before closing her teal eyes with a sigh. "... you know, dealing with you is kind of a pain in the ass."
"You're not the first to say that about me," Emma replied quickly.
"...Okay, I get it. But if shit hits the fan, then I'm getting you to safety. Even if I have to hit you with this. Got it?" the pink girl says, gesturing to her bat.
"Y-yes, got it," Emma says nervously.
With that said, the pink-haired girl nodded and started running towards the tracks left by the other kids.
Over the next half an hour, the two girls looked for children who needed help escaping from demons. The girls saw a pair of demons in all black; however, the two demons did not notice them.
After Emma and the older girl helped a few kids, the same distorted music came flooding throughout the area, signaling the end of the hunt.
Emma, the pink-haired girl, and the children they saved made their way back to the town. Noticing all the other children join them. All the kids were dirty and tired-looking, some were holding arms that were injured or supporting limping kids, and many of the younger children were crying.
"It's over…" Emma said in relief.
"If you're injured, come over here!." a boy with dark skin and a white headband yelled.
"W-we have medicine and supplies if you're hurt…" a shorter blonde boy with a flower hair clip said.
The two boys started to treat the injured, fixing wounds and handing out medicine. It seemed like there weren't any significant injuries. The child who looked most injured had a deep cut on his shoulder that was getting stitches by the blonde boy.
'Theo had a cut like that. He'll need help…' Emma thought.
"Theo!" Emma yelled, "Monica! Jake!"
'I hope Theo's injury didn't get any worse. Monica and Jake should be okay as long as they did what I told them.' she thought as she ran around the town.
After turning a couple corners, Emma saw the back of Theo's head as he walked down the street slowly.
Emma smiled with joy at seeing the young boy. "Theo-" Emma began only to see Theo collapse onto his hands and knees.
Theo turned to see who was talking to him, seeing that it was Emma. His face looked soul-crushing.
"Emma…" Theo said in a despaired tone.
'he's… alone…' Emma thought.
"Where… Are Monica and Jake?" Emma asked, a worried look on her face.
"Th-they're… de-dead. They're dead! The monster in the hat, he, killed the. We tried to run, but he got in front of us somehow. I wanted to yell it as we ran, but then he would have gone for you. He was going to hit me with the axe, but big brother shielded me. Me and Monica ran as Jake's head was chopped off." Theo said, looking at the ground.
Tears started to fall down his face onto the ground looking at the axe in his hands.
"Then the monster threw the axe at Monica, and- and I just stopped. Everyone was gone, and I couldn't move. The monster approached me. Only then, when my life was in danger, and everyone else was gone, did I manage to say, "she's from grace field, she's a premium." and the monster stopped. He said he wouldn't kill me or you this time, that he wanted our fury to drive us to take revenge on him. He told me to tell you his name is Leuvis and hunt him just as he hunts you… I'm so useless. I let my family die before I could tell him. It's all my fault. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, bro, sis." Theo continued as his composure slowly crumbled to dust.
At that moment, after he told Emma what happened, Theo fell apart. "JAKE! MONICA! WHAAAA! I'M SORRYYYY." Theo cried out.
Emma just stood there in stunned silence, trying to comprehend what happened.
'They're… dead? What? How did that demon know? Did he predict they would go downhill? Yes, he must have. More importantly, he wants me. He wasn't going after them. He was going after me!' Emma thought. Emma slowly walked to some steps and sat down, burying her face into her knees.
'Monica… Jake… it's not Theo's fault. It's mine. If I went downwind rather than them. Leuvis would have confronted me. They wouldn't have died.' Emma continued as tears started to fall down her face.
'This pain in my chest… It's like when Spencer and Norman left… but different. Is it because I didn't know them? No, the pain isn't less. It's different. It's because it's my fault, isn't it…' Emma thought as she grasped her chest.
For hours Emma sat there, wallowing in the pain, filled with thoughts of 'what ifs and 'if only's.' too wrapped up to notice the darkened sky and the figure approaching her.
"... I heard what happened to Jake and Monica." The voice said, Emma, recognizing it as the pink-haired bat girl. "Are you sad? You know, I've been here for almost a year now. I've seen friends and family die in front of me. One of the guys that been here longer tells me death is inevitable, and we don't always have control over how or when it happens." She continues sitting next to Emma, leaning her bat on the stairs.
"There's nothin' you coulda done to save Jake or Monica. But you did save Theo, and our leader tells us that even saving one life is a job well done." Emma remained motionless, not acknowledging the girl's presence or words.
Placing a hand on her shoulder, the pinkette continues. "Look, Emma, we get put into situations that are lose-lose situations. Where death is inevitable, it's how you deal with the loss that can determine whether the future is a lose-lose."
Still remaining motionless, the older girl's frustration at Emma starts to boil. "Hey, are you even listening? I know you're not asleep," she says in an angered tone.
Having enough with this, the pink-haired girl slapped the back of Emma's head to gain her attention. "Listen to me!" the pink-haired girl exclaims.
Emma was brought back to reality by the pain, looking at the girl next to her, who started to stand up.
"Look, I've been following you all day. It's time you follow me. You need to meet the rest of us." She said, picking up her bat and starting to walk to the center of town.
The plaza's center was a windmill made of stone bricks, and the fans had a checked pattern.
Walking up to the door, the pink-haired girl knocked on the door three times in quick succession.
"Adam, it's me. Open up," she said. After a moment, the sound of a lock and a bord moving was heard before the door opened inward.
Walking in silence, the two girls entered the windmill, wooden gears and cogs moving around the room. Emma noticed the person who opened the door to be a gigantic boy, very bulky, with a wide frame, elongated and extremely muscular arms, with a small amount of wispy, short blonde hair. The boy, who Emma could guess is Adam looked at the girls, not talking at all before closing the door behind them.
The pink-haired girl led Emma to a room with eight other children. Emma recognized a few of them as the ones helping the children who were injured,
"I brought her." the pink-haired girl said, as the group of kids looked in excitement. "Let me introduce you to my comrades."
"On the right, there is Kelsey, but he gets all whiny if you call him that. Just call him Kel, the scout." the pinkette said, pointing to a tall boy with tanned skin and short brown hair, who was grinning ear to ear.
"Next to him is Basil. He works for both provisions and first aid," she said, showing the pale, blonde boy with the hair clip, who was not looking directly at them, and a blush on his face seemed out of nervousness.
"Then there's Zack. He's the lead medic." the dark-skinned boy with the headband who was also aiding injured kids nodding in acknowledgment.
"There's Nigel, the mechanic." pointing to a boy in a brown hat that had a pair of cracked goggles on the forehead, smiled and waved at Emma.
"Sonia, the second in command." a girl with blue hair tied in twin tails nodded at her with a smile.
"And then there's Pepe, part of Provisions with Basil." Who was a tall boy with back skin and black hair smiling at her.
"And Gillian, also part of Provisions." a girl with blonde hair and a beanie with bunny and clown pins in it gave a wide smile.
"Then there's me, Aubrey, head of defense." the pink-haired girl, now known as Aubrey. Said, pointing to herself.
"At the head of the table is Oliver, our leader," Aubrey said, indicating to the tall boy at the head of the table. Oliver had white hair with a red streak to the left side of his head. He smiled as he walked up to Emma, extending his hand to be shaken, to which Emma obliged.
"Hello, Welcome. The nine of us know the truth about the world, about the farms and monsters. We have survived in the hunting grounds for longer than most others, months or even years." Oliver told her to gesture to the rest of the group.
"So, what's your name? and where do you come from?" Gillian asked in an upbeat tone.
"Ohh umm, my name's Emma. I escaped from Grace Field plantation a little over a week ago. My comrades and I came here looking for someone." Emma replied. "ar-Are you all escapees too?" she asked.
"Nope," Aubrey answered,
"We were shipped here, with no knowledge of the truth," Oliver said, undoing the top of his shirt to reveal a tattoo on his upper chest, being AII 866-890.
"Ju-just like the new kids you saw earlier," Basil said, pulling down his green shirt and overalls, revealing AXI 640-651.
"Yea, we may not come from the same house, but we do come from the same plantation!" Gillian said, pulling back her jacket to reveal her ID as QI 231-493.
"We come from Grand Valley, the plantation run by Lord Bayon, the guy who runs this hunting ground," Aubrey says, pulling her bra down a bit, showing DIV 332-198.
Kel, Pepe, and Zack pulled their shirts down a showing, PVI 468-992, PX 363-076, QII 863-552.
With that, everyone stopped showing their ID tags and looked back to Emma.
"Pretty much everyone who gets sent here is from Grand Valley. We believe it's cuz Bayon doesn't have much influence over the other plantations. Including you, only three kids are from other farms." Oliver said, looking into Emma's eyes.
"We-we've never seen someone from Grace Field…" Basil said, still finding it hard to look at Emma directly.
"And an escapee even!" Gillian said, throwing her hands up in the air in excitement.
"This place, Goldy Pond, is a playground for them, where every few days they come to hunt us like it's a game. They start in the morning, have their fun, then replenish the ones they kill. And the cycle repeats. They only kill about three to five kids every hunt. This time they took four." Oliver explained. Oliver looks to Nigel and nods, causing Nigel to walk over to a stack of boxes and pull one from the top. Nigel brings the box off and places it on the table.
Looking into the box, Emma sees many weapons, guns, knives, bats, the list goes on.
"The monsters gave us these 'toys to play with," Nigel says, pulling out a rifle and grinning.
"They are seemingly unkillable, so they gave us these to make it 'fair,'" Sonia says.
"Countless of our comrades went to fight them with these in hand. Very little have ever survived a frontal assault on them. Many more have fallen without any idea of what's going on, before they know the situation, much less take hold of a weapon. Some, some have pointed these weapons towards themselves..." Oliver explains, holding a Glock pistol.
"Those monsters have killed, and killed and killed and killed." Oliver's face clenched in anger. "Eve-even though we have constantly endured being surrounded by death. We have found a reason to continue, a reason to live. And that reason is to destroy this playground, utterly and completely!" Oliver declares. "We will kill every last one of them!" He says in rage.
"This hunting ground is secret, so their numbers are limited," Zack explains.
"They don't want other monsters to know about this place. The poachers won't call for reinforcements, and even if they do, it will take a while for them to arrive." Sonia tells Emma.
"We plan to kill them all and escape to a human village," Oliver tells her, confusing Emma.
'What? Human village?' Emma thinks.
"I'm done with cowering in fear and allowing sacrifices to be made, now is the time for vengeance!" Oliver says, clenching his fist. "Emma, we will need your help to accomplish this goal. You know the truth. You have come face to face with them. Hell, you escaped a plantation! And you still have the courage to move on." Oliver says, relaxing his hand and extending it to Emma once again.
Everyone was looking at her with a hopeful smile, silently asking her to join them in achieving their goal.
"Of course! I want to destroy this place too." Emma said, smiling, shaking Oliver's hand once again. "I do have some questions, however… like how did you learn about everything? If you didn't escape, then how do you know about the plantations, the demons, and the outside world?" Emma asked.
"Well, someone told us," Oliver answered with a smile.
"Someone?" Emma parrots.
"While Oliver is the leader, He is the head. We are like his agents, his arms, and legs," Zack says.
The sound of clicking reverberates through the windmill, like a cane hitting the stone floor.
"He's the only adult here," Pepe tells Emma.
"We keep his existence a secret. So shush about it, okay?" Gillian says, putting a figure to her lips.
The clicking gets louder and louder as the children cryptically explain this person's existence.
"No- not even the demons know of him, we think…" Basil says.
"I said, "There is someone who's gonna want to meet you," didn't I?" Aubrey says, walking next to Emma.
Suddenly a figure stands at the doorway, obviously an adult in a cloak. His right sleeve did not have an arm through it, and no evidence of a right arm was visible under the cloak. In his left hand was a cane that he was leaning on.
"Hello, nice to finally meet you. I'm Lucas." the man introduces, smiling with a large scar on the right side of his face.
'Lu-Lucas?! Is he the same one as Mister?...' Emma thinks.
"You have a pen, right? Can we talk about William Minerva?" The man asks.
"..." silently nodding, still trying to figure out if he is who she thinks he is, Emma walks up to Lucas.
"Good, follow me, please," Lucas says, turning around and walking back from where he came.
Emma quickly falls out of her stupor and jogs to catch up to Lucas.
"Uhh, Excuse me!" Emma exclaims, causing Lucas to stop and turn his head to see her. "Are...you from Glory Bell?! Did-did you come from the Shelter? And the friend of-" Emma asked in rapid succession, hoping she was right. Hoping that someone could help her save Mister.
"I knew you were from the Shelter. Your clothes and gun are from there." The man states his hand starting to shake. "Yes, to all of them. But, what I want to know… God I
I'm terrified to even ask, so much could've happened in 13 years, but… is He still there?" The man asks, looking into Emma's eyes with both fear and hope.
Emma looks at the man and gives a soft smile, nodding in affirmation. Lucas's face shifts from fear to joy and relief as his body relaxes. Tears well up in the man's eyes as he bows his head.
"I, I see. Thats, wonderful to hear. I'm thrilled." He said to the girl. Wiping the tears with his shoulder, he composes himself. "Come now, we have more to discuss." He says as he walks to a doorway leading to stairs going down.
Once they get to the bottom, Emma notices the table in the center, just like I'm the room before, only this room was filled with jars and boxes of what can only be food. The room was cold and dry, the perfect place to keep food for as long as possible.
Lucas sits down on one side of the table, leaning his cane on it. Gesturing to the other side of the table, where another chair is, Emma sits down.
"I'm sorry if my appearance is off-putting. I have let myself go a bit." He says with a small smile.
"No, no, not at all. I'm actually delighted to see you despite your condition. I can't wait to tell Mister that your alive!" Emma tells Lucas with a bright face. However it her smile didn't last as it turned to sadness. "He thought you and the rest of his family were dead!"
"... I'm the only one in our group to survive, not counting him, of course. Although, back then, I thought I was done for." The man tells her. "Let me explain, cuz I'm sure he didn't." Emma nods in response.
"We had been living in the Shelter for about a month before we found the letter. Once we did, we thought that it meant a way to the human world or Minerva himself. So after a week of preparation, we left the Shelter, pen In hand, and headed here. We somehow managed to get through the forest with no casualties, but once we got close to here, all these ropes wrapped us all up, and a white smoke knocked us out." The man says, taking a deep breath.
"Then the hunt began, and our numbers started to dwindle quickly. It was a massacre, the most children killed in a single hunt, eight in total, and it was all done by Leuvis. It was just me, and that guy left, so I threw the pen to him and yelled for him to run, and he did. I had reserved myself do death as I faced the demon in the black hat. He did this." Lucas says, gesturing to his missing arm and scarred face. "And then left. I was bleeding out, leaning against a tree, just waiting to die. Then a girl I had never seen before walked up to me. That girl told me she'd been in the hunting ground for a few years and had the perfect hiding spot. She took me here, to this Shelter, and saved my life. I believe the demons think I escaped with him or died of blood loss. So I've been here for 13 years. I became "the man who isn't there," not revealing myself to many, only those who had the skill and drive to survive. Those who did became the nine you saw before."
"... and what about the girl who saved you?" Emma asks.
"Dead. She died 8 years ago from a disease that ravaged us for a month or so. During that time, the demons didn't hunt and delivered medical supplies so we could fight the virus, but once it was all over, they resupplied the ones that died and began to hunt again." The adult answered.
Waiting for a moment to allow Emma to absorb the information, he lets out a sigh and continues.
"Over the years, I have thought about escaping this place alone. However, I have quickly been reminded of my disability and the fact I don't have a pen. Even if I got out of here and survived all the way to the Shelter by some miracle, I don't have a pen to open it. And knocking on the hatch would be pointless. But more than just those reasons, I am reminded of something. My comrades. What would they say if I just left all these children, our brothers, and sisters, to die? There screams of terror fill my head, the faces they make as they run from beings they never knew existed. I won't leave until I stop it from continuing." The man clenches his fist and his face looking directly at Emma. "I will put an end to this nightmare park and never let the children go. I will protect them to my dying breath!" He exclaims.
After taking a deep breath to relax, Lucas continued his monolog. "So I gathered new comrades, ones with the same drive and determination as me. I told them what I knew, taught them the skills needed to survive. Over the years, we have lost a few, but new bright children always come to fill their place. Besides, there's another reason I can't leave."
Emma, who was entranced by Lucas's story, comes back to reality when he starts to get up from his chair.
"When that girl took me here, she showed me the hiding spot that was the reason she lived so long. She didn't know what it was, but I did. It is the way to Minerva." Lucas told the girl as he walked to a brick wall on the far end of the room.
Emma was shocked to hear what Lucas said. 'The way to Minerva? What he said was "more than this shelter?" Could it be a way to the human world?' She thought as she quickly followed the older man to the wall.
The man smiles at the girl as he reaches up to a brick at his eye level and presses it in. The brick moves back, and an audible 'Click' is heard as gears and cogs move the stone, opening a doorway with a spiral staircase leading down.
"This hidden passageway leads underground and out into the forest. In the end, there's a door with an owl on it, yes, that owl. But there's no doorknob, and it won't open no matter what. It needs a special key." The man explains.
"You don't think!" Emma exclaims.
"Yeah, but I don't think, I know. It's the only answer." Lucas responds. "With that pen, we can go beyond Minerva's door. After 13 years of hoping for a chance like this. It's finally happening!" Lucas says in excitement. "Let's go." He tells her as he starts to walk down the narrow steps.
Once they get to the bottom of the stairs, Lucas picks up a lantern on the wall and lights it, the light illuminating the dark cavern.
As the two walk into the darkness, Lucas begins to talk to Emma once again.
"Ever since I was thrown into this hellscape, I've kept wondering, why did Minerva send us here? I bet you've had a similar thought, right?" Lucas says. "That maybe this has been a lie. And Minerva works for them luring children to be hunted?" He suggests.
Emma makes a face of shock and disbelief. The thought that Minerva worked for them never occurred to her. 'Could it? No, why did he make the Shelter? Why give us the tools needed to survive in this unfamiliar land.' She thought.
The man lets off a soft laugh at the girls' expressions. "Hahaha, it never occurred to you, did it?" He says with a chuckle. Then his face returned to looking somber. "That door still worries me. Is Minerva's intentions for us truly what he says?" Lucas says.
"I think, no, I know Mr. Minerva is with us. All the things he's done for us, giving us the knowledge in his books, the Shelter, he truly wants us to live. I know it." Emma says with a smile.
"Hmm, you remind me of an old friend, the one who helped us escape from Glory Bell all those years ago." The man said with a soft smile.
"Speaking of, how did you escape? Mister never told us." Emma asks.
Lucas looks at Emma for a moment, as If trying to determine if it was right for him to tell the story. He looks forward into the darkness as we walk and begins to say to the orange-haired girl.
"... His name was Makoto, he was a couple years older than me. Makoto was the bravest, kindest, and wisest person I have ever known. He could light up a room with just his presence and had advice for any situation he was put into." Lucas said, a large smile on his face at remembering the good times. "Our caretaker said he was born a hundred years old. It was also that wisdom that caused him to learn the truth. Makoto could see a lie a mile away. Even if it was a half-truth, he knew it wasn't everything. He'd often play detective, trying to find out who ate the last cookie or broke something. Eventually, that ability caused him to learn the true intentions of Glory Bell's Mama." The adult said.
Emma listened intently to the man's story, reminding her of the good times she had at Grace Field. 'Makoto sounds a lot like Spencer…' Emma thinks.
"He was eight at the time, and almost immediately, he started on making an escape plan. However, most of his time was spent tutoring the kids. He didn't want anyone to get shipped, so he started helping the children learn and become premium goods. And it worked. Over the next three years, only two were shipped, them being twelve years old." The man tells a shocked Emma.
'No one getting shipped in three years? He must have been an amazing tutor.' Emma thinks.
"Makoto made the plan and got some supplies, so now it was time to tell us. He was eleven at the time, almost twelve, so he had to move fast. He told that guy and me first, showing us his evidence and sharing what he knew. We believed him, of course. Makoto could tell if someone was lying, but he couldn't lie for shit. So we started gathering more supplies and telling the others. Within four months, we were ready to go. All the kids 6 and above knew the truth and were fit enough to escape." He said, his face slowly darkening. "Then, then Makoto was scheduled to be shipped. We had to move fast, but when we went to look for our supplies, we found it all gone. We went to Makoto telling him what happened. He said he knew…" Lucas looks down at the ground and stops, his face pained and saddened.
Emma reaches out to put a hand on his arm reassuringly and looks up to him as to say, 'it's okay if you don't want to continue.' But Lucas shakes his head and starts walking again.
"He said our caretaker came to him with an ultimatum. Either give up all the supplies and get shipped the next day, or everyone but him would be shipped the next day…" the older man has tears running down his face as he continues the story. "And he took it, we begged him not to go, to run away before he was shipped, but he refused, saying this was the only way. He said that everything was going to be okay, and he loved us all very much before leaving that night."
Emma had tears of her own at this point. Makoto's sacrifices mirrored Spencer and Norman's to a T.
"Later that night, we found a note from him, telling us to go to a certain spot in the woods and to continue the plan. He said Mama didn't know we knew the truth, so it was still possible. When we got there, we found all the supplies he'd hoarded over the past years. Ready to be used. That next night we left, cutting out the trackers leaving through the air ducts without anyone noticing. There were eighteen of us when we left. Only ten of us made it to the Shelter…" the man finishes. Wiping the tears from his face.
Emma does the same whipped her face with her sleeve as she notices the tunnel coming to an end. A small hole in the ground part of a ladder sticks out of the ground.
"Before we go on, I want to say I know how it feels. Two of our friends, once who learned the truth as soon as I did, were shipped out and refused to escape without us. Their names were Spencer and Norman. They said it was the only way that the rest of us could leave. It hurt so much, like a part of my heart was taken with them. But they left us with hope, with a new and better plan, with this pen, and with their memories." Emma says, taking out the two items.
Lucas looks at the girl with sympathy, 'she knows that kind of loss, doesn't she…' the 31-year-old thinks.
"I'm sorry to hear that, Emma, but now that we're here, let's finish this and make all of the comrades we've lost proud." He says, putting a reassuring hand on her shoulder.
"Right!" Emma responds with a nod.
Lucas starts going down the ladder first, with Emma close behind, holding the lantern.
Once they reach the bottom, a door is seen just a few meters away, the same owl as Minerva's books on the front, the circle segmented in morse code. The door was solid stone and had no keyhole near the wooden handle.
'P. E. N… okay, let's try this.' Emma thinks, taking out the pen. She opens it as if to check her location. Instantly a click is heard, Emma and Lucas look at each other.
Lucas reaches a hand to the doorknob and tentatively twists it. The doorknob twists, and the door slowly opens.
The room inside was dark. Slowly the pair walk into the darkness, shining the lantern in the hopes of seeing what is inside. Only when they got fully inside, and the door shuts behind them, bright fluorescent light shone from the ceiling. Shielding their eyes from the sudden flash of the two of them slowly adjust to the new level of light to see a room of metal. The walls are covered in computer monitors that are booting up.
"Whaa-" Emma says in confusion at the room in front of her. 'What is this place?' She questions herself.
'Temperature, ventilation, power, plumbing? Even the time and sky projection… is this the control room for the entire park? Or is it just a monitoring room?' Lucas thinks as he walks around and surveys the room.
"This way!" Emma ran towards another door.
Through the door was some sort of cave, with a lake in it. A golden lake at the center was a floating island with a building of some kind on it.
Emma gasped. "This must be it! Goldy Pond!" She opened the pen again, and the screen showed the message, "Welcome to Goldy Pond."
'All this time, the goal Minerva gave us, was under the park? If this is what he meant, then it wasn't a trap at all! Then, how did it become a hunting ground? And where is Minerva?' Lucus monologed in his head.
"What could that floating cabin be for?" Emma asked, pointing to the center of the golden pond.
"It, it must be an optical illusion. There's no way it can be actually floating," Lucas said. "My guess is the depth and translucency of the water is bedding the light it's emanating to make it look like the island is floating." He says, bending down to the edge of the water.
He dips his hand into the golden liquid, an air pocket around his hand forms, preventing him from getting wet.
"This water… it's weird." Lucas says as he puts his hand through it tentatively. "You can't touch it."
"Let's go to the cabin," Emma suggested. "There must be something in there!"
"it doesn't harm us, so I think we can wade through it," the man says, getting up.
As he and Emma walk, taking the first steps into the golden waters, the same air pocket around their hands surrounds their legs, their feet and legs completely dry as they walk.
Once they reached the cabin, Emma helped Lucas climb the steep stairs leading to the front of the building. There was no key needed, so they could just go right in.
Inside was an elevator and a terminal of some kind.
"This elevator… it's an older model, but why is it here?" Lucas questioned.
"Maybe… this elevator takes us to the human world?" Emma guessed.
"No way," Lucas shook his head, laughing. "That's way too easy!"
"Ha!" Emma laughed as well. "You're right. That's too easy."
"...Honestly, it doesn't sound that far-fetched," Lucas muttered. "Why would this elevator be here? And secured in all of this? Plus, the letter said to come here for going beyond mere safety…"
They were silent as they took that in.
'Could this really be it?' Emma thought hopefully.
"Look," Lucas pointed to some buttons. Next to it was another owl. "It says pen again. I'm assuming you put it in that hole right there."
Emma slowly put the pen in. It clicked, and there was a message that said 'on.'
They heard cranking noises coming from the elevator.
'If this really is a way into the human world, we can escape right now! All we need to do is rescue Phil's group, and we can go!' Emma thought.
But then the message changed to 'failure.'
"Eh?" Emma exclaimed. "What happened? We need to get this thing work-"
A telephone suddenly rang. It was also old-fashioned. They hadn't really cared about it since it seemed so insignificant. But now… who's on the other side?
Emma shakily picked up the phone. Lucas leaned down to the other side of Emma's face so he could listen to her. "...Hello? Who is-" Emma started.
"This is William Minerva." The voice of a North American accent said through the phone, cutting through Emma's greeting.
Chapter 10 ends.
Man, that was fast, even for me. I just kind of sat down for a couple hours a day and did it. As you noticed, I switched Violet, Sandy, and Paula with Aubrey, Kel, and Basil respectfully. Like I said, they come from the game OMORI. It wasn't much of a stretch as their personalities aren't too different. If you wish to know, Sunny and Hero will make appearances later. The story of OMROI will come into play in the next chapter, so if you haven't played I or watched someone play it, fix that. It's a good ass game. Alright, that's all.
Get vaccinated, and have a good day.