The Night Bell

"Run along now," Uncle Bob shooed me with his hands.

Without further ado, I show myself out. All of those staring and colourless emotions in their eyes suck. The faster I escape these piercing gazes the better.

As the norm, the central estate of any city cost a fortune. Here though, each dwelling didn't have its own value. However, the previous fact still stands.

The one living nearer to the monolith obviously had higher standing. All of the high people live around the monolith. That was why they always wasted their time in front of it.

Where would I live then? Of course, the most outer hole of the Hole. Away from everyone else. Away from society. Around ten holes around me were empty. And I should be able to occupy them since they were vacant.

But with my standing as an outlander, my only right was the most outer one. Uncle Rob said and I quote, "You should be grateful that you didn't have to dig your own hole."

And to that, I was really thankful. In the beginning that is. Until they started to harass me for everything that I do.

It took quite a while to walk from the monolith to my hole. I know it sounds very wrong but this is what they called them. I could't openly refute their bad naming sense lest they charged me of insulting their ancestors.

It was nothing special. Just a normal hole like any other. The inside was dimly lit with a small night lamp I had managed to get from exchanging two sacks of ores in one sitting.

My routines were as follows: cleaning up, scratching, dinner (or lunch or whatever it was, I only had one meal per day to begin with), lying down and contemplating my cursed situation and lulling myself to sleep in that state.

I jumped into it. It was two meter deep. If there was any second hand dust and dirt that I got from my ten-hole-away-neighbors, I would clean them up first.

Next the daily wall scratching. Precisely, a total of thirty scratch marks could be seen.

'It had been a month huh? What a month…'

I lie on that scratched wall and gwaffed on my slice of bread.

"Urrk…"

That was what happened when you ate dry food with such speed.

I scrambled my hands around in search of a plastic bottle.

Half empty. Half full. Nobody cares whether they are optimist or pessimist if you're in my situation. Survival first. Everyday was a challenge.

The question is can you stand again and unfold the tale of tomorrow?

It sure had been a compilation of thirty tales for me. Each with their own plot twist. What I had been telling you was what happened only on this day.

But as they said, let bygones be bygones. If I cannot move on, I would have already given up on my life in this kind of environment. Fortunately, I had quite a willpower.

I took a few slow gulp from that bottle. Water was more expensive than bread. While you could starve for quite a few days, thirst will surely get you first if you are not careful.

This water bottle was my water ration. Now only quarterly full.

I sighed. I need to mine a little extra tomorrow if I want to exchange for another bottle.

As I lay myself down on a tattered blanket - folded in half, one half covered the ground while the other half covered me - I think back to my thoughts earlier.

I had been sensitized to this world. I had already begun to think like them. A slave mentality. A slave to this world. All their needs catered by this world in exchange of their free will. No matter what I want, in the end the only thing I can do is mine.

Don't you think it's weird? This world offers their citizens no will of their own. They cannot create anything in this world. Be it housing above ground or crop for the purpose of self-sustaining. They were solely dependent on their world system.

A slave system.

Even their holes arrangement mimicked those of bees. The big black monolith stand as the sole unopposed queen while the rest were her slave bees, answering to her every beck and call.

Well, the monolith only had one order though.

Mine.

If you want to live, mine. If you want to survive, mine. If you want to swim in fortune no others could have, mine more than the others could.

From under the blanket, I grab a hold of something.

"What's so special about you, huh?" I asked aloud as I appreciated its mesmerising shine.

This ore in my hand really shined like a star. Especially in this dimly lit tunnel(or hole if you will). It seemed like I was holding a live star in my hand. It rested there in my palm, giving off a slight warm sensation.

Its shine wasn't blinding in the slightest instead the opposite was true. The longer you stare at it, the more bewitched you got.

This special guy was the only one I managed to smuggle into my hole. As you know, my neighbors always come to lend me some dust or two. While they were at it, everything that piqued their interest would become theirs.

One ore would be small enough to hide under the blanket. More than that and I wouldn't dare to take chances.

This guy was my lucky charm. I always used it to lull myself to sleep. Amidst the storming thought in my mind, I found a little spot of tranquility from this little guy's light.

A faint bell sound reverberated. It was deep and profound. Yet the beginning of another tale. Since there was no sun here, the concept of day and night didn't exist here. That sound separated the night and day cycle here. A chirpy high peach bell for morning and deep melancholic bell for night.

The soothing sound of the night bell lulled me to sleep. One of my guilty pleasures. Though I loathed the black monolith, this sound was one of my favourites. You have to give credit where it's due.

As I was about to fall asleep, a shrieking voice greeted my ears. No, let me correct it. They were a collective of voices. Screaming and shouting.

My dozy self was immediately roused out of sleep. I peeked my head out of my hole. From a single glance, everything looked normal like every other day.

Usually they wouldn't have any commotion past the night bell. Everybody would tuck earlier, especially those with morning shifts.

Though the situation looked normal, the sound of screaming and shrieking didn't stop in the least. No they didn't. With each passing moment, the chorus only increased in sound.

There was also another peculiarity that I had overlooked. The night bell. It usually sounded only for a few 'ting' before going mute. But now, under the masking of screaming, the bell sound could be heard very faintly. Almost like a whisper.

A whisper of omen.

'Something must have happened over there. Most likely around the central area where the monolith is.'

I quickly dove back inside to grab my loyal pickaxe and ran my way to the centre of the Hole.

Only when my distance with the monolith shortened to that of a hundred meters, could I see the chaotic situations there. While I was running towards it, others were running away.

Some feelings kicked in me. Warriness. Caution. But above all, a bad bad feeling. A premonition of sorts. I felt like everything would change after this incident.

Such a chaotic situation could only arise from something sinister happening at the centre. When I was so near to it, I could see some of the people struggling to run away from the monolith, none of them unscrathed. There would always be a wound of some sort on them.

And they were bleeding. The air also smelled salty like blood. It only meant that what I had seen was only the tip of the iceberg. A large amount of blood must have been spelt somewhere.

No longer running, I walked with caution towards the monolith. What greeted me there was a scene of gore.

Limbs were splattered everywhere. The black hard ground was dyed red. The sound of screaming left me behind as they ran away from the monolith they once worshipped while the sound of the night bell seemed more eerie than soothing this time.

The bell sound suddenly changed. This was only my feeling but I swear I could hear it said 'Welcome outlander!'

Suddenly…

Sound of something being munched could be heard. I tilted my head towards the monolith. It came from atop the monolith.

I was tongue-tied.

The black majestic monolith similarly didn't escape the fate of its surroundings. Splashes of blood could be seen on it, covering its usual sheen.

Blood dripped along the monolith's body adding an abstract red flowering pattern to it. I slowly raised my gaze, following the blood trail.

What I saw was a tale I would forever remember as long as my body carried breath.