Chapter 23

Michael opened his eyes to a world of pain. His head hurt where he had been struck, his [[Distortion Field] useless against surprise attacks at its current level. He couldn’t see them, therefore he couldn’t react to them.

His hands were bound, his clothes bloody, and his head was swimming. There were lights all around, the nighttime forest filled with eerie dancing points of painful brightness. And the noise! There was a roaring bonfire in front of him, and all around shapes and shadows were moving about. They talked loudly, argued, danced, sang and argued some more.

Blinking, he realized that he had been brought to a sort of village deep in the forest, walls, roads and houses made of bioluminescent plant matter and fungi. The impossibly high canopy was bustling with activity, shadows and shapes climbing the many dangling vines that fluttered in the breeze, leading to houses and platforms up above. Close to the fireplace, where the light was warmer and brighter, he could see many strange creatures.

The forest folk were many and diverse. He could see goblins, different from those of the first floor, like the one who killed the flying fox. Then there were wolves, people that were more akin to trees than anything else—their skin bark and their hair moss—living mushrooms, snakes and slithering creatures, orcs and giants with maces. One such giant, perhaps an oversized orc, had noticed that Michael had woken up.

“Oh, our little prisoner is awake. About time.”

Voices rose almost all at once, in reply. “What shall we do with him?” “We make him fight!” “Boring! How about we make him dance naked in the fire, and then cut him apart with your axe?” “I like it. Bring out the booze, and we can start!”

“Silence!” said a deep, rumbling voice, and suddenly a Presence bigger than anything Michael had ever felt swept through the unruly camp, stunning everyone to motionlessness.

Out of a truly gigantic tree emerged the biggest creature of the camp, a towering tree-kin of dried bark and dripping moss, flowers and mushrooms growing on its wooden skin like ornaments. He was covered in leaves, some fresh, some brown and red, and they were woven together like a regal mantle. Michael knew, by looking at him, that this was the Forest King, the first boss he needed to defeat.

“I shall know what this strange trespasser was doing in our lands, before any of you are allowed to have your fun. Speak, prisoner, what brought you here?”

Michael tried not to panic, but the situation was not good. He was bound, surrounded by many powerful enemies, and all he had to his name was his pitiful magic. Except… the coins! I still have them!

He had to think something up on the spot. There was no way he could fight through this mob and escape, and he needed to buy himself time. Having the coins was good, but not good enough unless he found an opening.

“I was lost! I don’t know how I got here!” he said, putting on his best clueless Karen impression.

“Lost, he says.” The king laughed, addressing the other denizens of the forest. “And shall we believe him?”

“Nay,” said a particularly eloquent goblin, “haven’t seen such a creature around here before. He’s an intruder, and invader.”

An orc perked up, “I say we make him dance in the fire.”

“Whoop! Whoop!” came the chant of many others, overjoyed at the prospect.

“Uhm.” Rumbled the towering king. “The prisoner, he smells of no Fae magic. He is puny and weak, of no threat to us.”

Fae magic? Is that why they didn’t take my coins? Can they even see them? I can see their mana… wait, this gives me an idea.

“All the more reason to let us have some fun, my liege.” Said a slimy voice, one of the goblins. “It’s boring out here, parading in the forest, the prey dwindling. Let us have some fun.”

Michael’s heart was thumping in his chest. It was definitely not going well, and now most of the mob’s attention, as well as that of the king, was no longer on him. It didn’t mean he was free to act though, close as he was to the center of the bustling village of monsters, just that his fate was slipping away from his hands.

“You say you want fun?” he shouted, surprising even himself. Balls of steel, I need them. “How about a duel? I will speak to you, king of the forest, but I want to fight for it. I know you will all enjoy a good fight. If I lose, then I will reveal my secrets.”

“Not to the death, then? How boring.”

“Not boring, because… Then you can do as you please with me.” He said, thoughts spinning rapidly. “You say I am puny and weak, don’t you? Well, let the weakest of your warriors fight me. It will hardly be a challenge.”

One of the orcs laughed, a deep yet phlegmy rasp. Disgusting.

“Crafty,” he said when he was done. “I can’t wait to skin you and make you dance in the fire. Perhaps tear your limbs one by one while you dance.”

Michael wanted to shiver, but suppressed his reaction as well he could.

“You will have your fun,” rumbled the king again, “but no maiming until I am done… talking with him. Well, strange creature. What if you win?”

The mob went crazy at that. “Win? You think the puny thing can win? I will challenge him myself!” said the slimy voice, and Michael saw that it was the goblin who had swatted the flying fox out of the sky like it was just a nuisance. Doesn’t seem to be the weakest, but better than the orc, I guess. Not like it changes much, after all.

His plan was crazy. He felt nauseous, sick, scared and shivering, but at the same time a faraway song was luring him into danger, the song of adrenaline like an orchestra. The gains he could make if his plan worked… yes, the risks were tremendous, but he could practically taste the sweet glyph glowing inside the barky king, radiating an alien power. He wanted it for himself, a reward for overcoming an impossible challenge with wits and luck, as well as all the hard work he had put into his training so far.

“Very well. Speak prisoner, what if you win.”

“I want your word that I will not be harmed, and that I will be allowed to leave this place. By my means, without being followed, hunted or hurt.”

“Pah,” the king scoffed. “I would not agree to these terms but, you will not win. Very well. Should you win,” he rumbled, “for one night and one day, we will not hunt you.” he laughed, like bark splitting and water rushing.

Good enough. Not the main goal anyway.

He was picked up like a sack of potatoes by one of the orcs, still bound by thick ropes of green vines. They took him to a small arena, mud and dirt and the occasional tall weed surrounded by a shoddy wooden fence, rotten and infested by a glowing fungus. He was dumped into the dirt, and opposite to him the goblin gracefully vaulted over the fence, squaring him up as he struggled to get up, arms and legs still bound.

Shit. They played me, hard. Now, I need to decide what I want to do.

The goblin snickered. He was wearing a pointy helmet, barely a sheet of metal crudely hammered into shape, with a spearhead glued to the top. That was his only vestment, other than a loincloth, leaving his body visible. Rippling muscles covered every inch of his green-skinned body, and to Michael’s magic vision, he glowed with strange swirling magic. He had no aura, and all his internal magic was visible to Michael’s eye, like a looping network of rivers or branches of a tree, all leading to a central confluence point where the heart was supposed to be. No, there is another, in the brain. But it’s mostly dim.

Filing the information away for later, he got up to face his threat. His feet were still bound, but he propped himself against the fence, ignoring the hollering and hooting from the many rambunctious spectators outside. Spittle was flying at him, as well as rocks and plants thrown to distract him. Not that the goblin needs any help.

It was then that Michael made up his mind. It was a hard decision, one that barely occupied the split second of time while the goblin crouched to begin his charge against him. Then he shot at him, faster than a bullet.

He’s going to slap me like he did that cursed fox. But all his magic is internal. It will hurt but I can—

Then the world was dark once more. Michael had barely even seen a blur of green, the impact rocking his face.

Then he was inside a tree, the forest king sitting on a huge stump—the only thing that could accommodate his immense bulk. But both he and the stump were tiny, compared to the large room they were in, which Michael knew was carved into a much larger tree because he could see the rings in the bark, and the single window showed the tree’s many branches. They were up above, in the canopy.

“Foolish creature. You thought you could defeat my soldiers, uhm?” the king rumbled. “Or did you know you’d lose, hoping to prolong your life before my orcs had their fun with you?”

Michael said nothing. He was no longer bound, so he slid one hand into his pocket, feeling for his coins. Not all of them were there, some had fallen when they had carried him and even now he could feel their magic calling at him from far below, out of reach.

“You gambled, and lost. But you can call yourself lucky, if this even is luck, that I am a Fae of my word. There are others, darker Fae who don’t value their given word at all, the wretched beings. I had to have a healer fix your head, so that you could speak to me, per our agreement. Perhaps you are not lucky, though, because now you will be lucid while my orcs torture you.”

Michael studied the room. It was a mundane enough room, filled with oversized furniture, and a door led to another room where something like a stove could be seen.

“Speak,” the king said, a powerful voice forcing words out of Michael’s mouth.

Despite the compulsion, he could still choose what to say and how to say it. If Fae were crafty, at least according to the stories, then he needed to be craftier still. Perhaps then, a very simple human trick, cowardly and shameless, could work.

After all, it’s not like they have movies here. He won’t know it’s cliché.

“I… am here to…” Michael said, voice feeble and low enough that the king could not make out his words.

Meanwhile, he was burning coins to try and recreate a crude mockery of the strange weaving of mana he had seen inside the goblin’s body.

“Speak. Up!” the king commanded.

Well, one of my gambles failed.

“My name is Michael Lexington. I come from a tiny town in Kentucky, barely large enough to have its own karate dojo, and—”

“What nonsense are you speaking? Tell me, how did you get here?”

Michael fought against the compulsion, trying to buy himself time. Creating the swirling pathways of magic was a grueling task, as was creating the two vortexes in his heart and brain without killing himself, even though all he needed was a working crude imitation of the Fae magic.

“I was walking on the Trail with my friend Josh. There we see this strange cave, you know, dark and damp? Not a place I’d normally go but… Josh tells me to explore it, and like the fool I am I go inside. Little do I know, this place is a dungeon…” Michael spoke, explaining to great detail all the workings of the dungeon, and of its magic.

Never did he mention having magic himself, instead he lingered on the details that seemed to interest the king the most, avoiding all topics that bored him, talking for as long as possible. The king was interested, making strange faces, worry and disgust and hatred sometimes flaring as he asked for more information about the voice of this dungeon, and why monsters and creatures were forced to fight in there.

“You see, this is the second floor of this dungeon. You are one of its mobs.”

“Nonsense!” the king declared, “I am free as the wind. Not a tool of this wretched creature, this dungeon.”

“Still. It wants you dead, you know? It asked me to kill you.”

The king laughed at that. “You? Kill me, and how would you do it? You couldn’t even kill one of my goblins.” He taunted. “No, tell me more about this strange person you met, the one who looks like you, and this Unity he talked about. I have no knowledge of it. The glyph I do have, I was born with it.”

Interesting. Either the dungeon lies, or the king was created with just enough false memories so it could function as a boss for me to defeat.

Michael started talking again, explaining the theories in the most complicated and confusing way possible, buying himself time. Until, at last, the last of the squiggly lines finally connected in a crude, barely functional network inside his body, leaking mana like a sieve and damaging his internal organs. He could only sustain it thanks to his healing skill working overtime, and already a gnawing hunger was biting at his stomach.

This new skill will allow me one more gamble. The king can’t see my mana, and in the grand tale I spun for him I never mentioned using magic myself. I must strike while he has his guard down.