The Unexpected Guest

I was awoken by a loud banging against the door, observing the moon from a window I deduce the it's sometime around the middle of the night, after doing so I close the blinds, I didn't want the the Trickster Moon God peeping on me. I left Twig by the bed since I didn't want to wake him and walked over to the door, opening it I see the gaint form of the Mayor darkened by night. Noticing he was holding something in his arms that seemed to be moving around a lot I greet him.

"Hello Mayor, what brings you to me at such an hour"

The Mayor steps into the room, brushing me aside as him and the thing he's holding become visible in the candlelight. It was Marina, she was being held in an underhand grip as was struggling quite a lot, the Mayor just puts her down and knocks her on the head, knocking her clean out he lays her on the bed I was sleeping on and walks back infront of me.

"I saw this whelp while I was taking a walk, she looks like she'll make a good casserole don't you think, maybe paired with a good wine too, I'll leave her here with you, you can get some fun out of her before I cook her for dinner tomorrow. I'll be leaving now, be careful with the body, nothing to rough."

I nod in shock as he walks through the door, closing it and making sure it's locked again I walk up to the bed and look down at Marina. A sigh escapes my lips as I tuck her in a bit and mutter.

"What the hell am I gonna do with you"

Twig wakes up at my voice and jumps back in shock, taking a second to observe his surroundings he looks at me with a suggestive look, his non-existent eyebrows waggling up and down.

"I see what's happening now, Sam you dirty dog you, I fall asleep for a few minutes and already you got a someone in your bed, hey atleast she's cute"

"He"

I corrected him, his double take did get a chuckle out of me as you looked closer at Marina. Although his next words did cause a bit of a twitch in my eye.

"Didn't know you swung that way dude, so what are you gonna do with him"

I just shake my head at his antics before sitting down and lean on the wall across from the bed, giving me ample view of both doors into the room, grabbing my bag I rummage in for a bit before pulling out a stack of books. Placing it down I grab the first book of the pile titled Recipes of the 15th Centruy Vol. 1 put it on my lap.

"I've gotten enough sleep for now, I'll just read until the morning, by then he'll probably wake up, if he wakes up earlier though I'll talk with him and get him up to speed on the situation."

Twig jumps onto my shoulder and gets comfortable before laying down, he looks up at me curiously.

"I wasn't asking about that, I meant if you were gonna let the Mayor eat him? I may have woken up when he walked in and was pretending to be asleep"

I reach up and give his head a noogie with my finger.

"So you said all that stuff about me being a dirty dog knowing what really happened eh? Don't worry Twig, I don't plan an letting him die, atleast not here, we'll think of a plan when he wakes up"

Twig nods, satisfied with my answer, going to sleep on my shoulder. Turning my attention back to the book I open it and begin reading. The book makes itself out to be about the various recipes made by the famous chef Andérs of the royal kitchen of Rondon, but in truth it's more focused on the notorious chef himself, it's more of a biography book, greatly overexaggerating the escapades and challenges as the royal chef, there even seems to be a love story too with the princess of the court, luckily I managed to catch the recipes for Meatpie and Vegetable pie between all the romance and betrayal.

Although it hurt me internally I tear the paper with the recipes and put it in my pocket, the rest of the book, even though it had a decent story, would way me down. A sliver of sunlight spears through the crack in the drapes and hits the floor near my feet. I close the book and place it down beside me as I lean back and look up toward the ceiling. These past few hours were relaxing, even though I'm still on alert for anything dangerous it's much less than when I am outside. It also helped that I was reading, I love reading and I hadn't gotten the chance to actually sit down and enjoy a good book what with the whole 'transported in another world' situation.

The shuffling of the covers drew my attention to the bed as Marina began to slowly wake up, actually scratch that, he wasn't slow, his eyes snapped open and he shot straight up. His voice seemed panicked as he stared mumbling some things I couldn't hear. Standing up I make her aware of my presence by clearing my throat and speaking.

"I get this might be a confusing and frightening situation for you right now but you should calm down first so that we can make a plan in order to save you, take a deep breath in, then let it out. I'm Sam, from the train remember?"

By now Twig had woken up too and was look curiously at Marina as he began to follow my instructions and control his breathing, slowly calming down from his previous state. I nod, impressed at his ability to calm down so quickly in a situation such as this, I had expected him to continue like that for a few more minutes. I make to get closer to his bed but stop when I notice him tense up, I hold my hands up in a show of non-aggression and begin to explain the situation to him.

"Basically the Mayor, that big guy who kidnapped you, is planning on turning you into a nice tv dinner, I'm not really interested in that so I'll help you get out of here but first I need to get a few things in this place, it should only take me an hour or two and judging by the position of the sun it's around 4:00, I imagine the Mayor will only come and get you when it's almost dinner time, by then I'll have got everything I need and we'll be out of here, I just need you to follow my directions"

Marina relaxes a bit and nods slowly at my words, he gets out of bed and pulls out his knife, showing it to me.

"I'm still a bit suspicious of you but I'll trust you to get me out of here, I can help you too, I know how to carve the gods sigils that give certain benefits to the person."

I pretend to act surprised as I walk closer and ask him a question.

"What kind of benefits are given?"

"Gro-goroth makes you stronger physically, Sylvian provides a boost in defense against otherworldly powers, Alll-mer gives a boost in physical defense, Rher increases your mind, letting you cast more spells, Vinushka increases the magic damage done by you, and the God of Fear and Hunger makes the you faster and more agile. These are all permanent increases so you won't have to worry about losing them, and before you ask no I cannot draw more than one sigil on you, the gods can be very jealous beings and if they sense another god beside themselves in your body they'll just make you go pop"

I think long and hard about which engraving to use.

'Vinushkas crossed out, I don't plan on using any magic besides the stuff I already know, and the only buff he'll give me is to Rot and Mischief of Rats, the strength of my puppet arms is dependent on my physical strength, Sylvian and Alll-mer are enticing for the defense buffs they give but I can always use armor and accessories to mimic those affects, Rher is also good because it allows me to have more mind but that's only really need for consecutive casting, so that just leaves me with the God of Funger, and Gro-goroth. And to me Gro-goroth seems like the best option, my puppet arms will be stronger and so will I so I'll be able to use heavier weapons, especially the one I have in mind, I can always just get a Small Things amulet to give me the increase in agility, it's really simple to get it too, I just need to head into the sewers of Prehevil for a bit'

I nod at my thoughts, raising my head I look at her and walk closer, sitting down.

"I've made my choice, engrave Gro-goroths sigil on me, right now I need strength more than anything"

She shrugs, knife in hand as she steadies her hand, moving it closer she begins to engrave. To be honest the pain wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, what was truly painful was receiving the strength, my body almost felt like it was overheating from all of the energy flowing into it. Luckily for me the pain only lasted for a moment, my body quickly cooled down to normal temps after a minute. Getting up from the bed I immediately felt the changes in my physical capabilities. My body felt like it was packed with power, my arms felt like they could dent steel. The greatest improvement though is my puppet arms, the thread connecting me to them has become much thicker and now looks similar to a vein, I had greater control over them and I could exert more force through, I had also learned something new. I felt as if I could increase the amount of power my puppet arms exert by simply pushing Mind into them through the thread connecting us. Although I couldn't use it much now because I was very low on Mind it was good to have as an ace in the hole.

I walk over to the door and open it slightly to avoid making any noise.

*CREEEEEK*

Well shit I guess not, turning to Marina I pretend to not notice his look of disappointment as I say to him.

"I'm gonna head out to get a few things done, it should only take a couple of hours, when I'm back we'll leave this place, I'm sorry to ask this of you but please just stay put, there's some books on the shelf if your interested"

Seeing her nod I exit through the ajar door. Once I'm outside the room I see the door straight infront of me and walk through it. The room I'm in is a simple one, a table in the middle with some books on it, a wardrobe sits in the corner of the room, and a shelf sits in the corner beside it. The shelf is cluttered with a bunch of miscellaneous bottles and jars, most empty but some had weird discolored goopy stuff in them. The I gave a Quick Look at the books on the table but there turned out to be nothing of value.

The only reason I came into this room was because it led to another room that was blocked by a bunch of cluttered barrels and shelves, and moving those would have surely made enough noise to wake the whole town, let alone the Mayor. A Perfection circle lay engraved in the middle of the room, candles dotted along the top wall at the floor and on the wall hung an effigy of Alll-mer pinned on a cross. On the Perfection circle lay the dead corpse of the priest, his body was mangled and looked like it had been hit with a truck, bits and pieces of his body scattered around his body.

Moving aside the priests body I gather some of his blood and begin drawing Rhers sigil into the circle, pretty soon I was pulled into the twisted dimension. Once I was there though Twig started hopping around my shoulder, it seems he was trying his best to remain quite so we wouldn't get caught. I pat his head in acknowledgement of his effort and begin my speedrun of this place.

Turning left I exit this one and run through the room next to it, a Ronteal lays buried next to the door and I run past it quickly, it I submerged and begins chasing after me. Taking another left and then a right I get to a rickety wooden ladder, climbing down I ignore the machinary next to me and continue running, I turn left and alert another ronteal. Continuing forward I run past some odd machines before reaching a chest, sadly there was nothing in it so I turn back.

By now all the Ronteals had emerged and I could see two shambling towards me through the machines. I just walk along the opposite side of the room and get to the ladder, and just as I walk into the room the Ronteal at the top floor falls down from the second floor and crashes through the wood, hurtling into the shadowy abyss. Twig jumps off my shoulder and looks down from the newly created whole.

"She's gonna be falling for a long, long, long time"

I nod at his words and hold out my hand for him to climb up, as I'm climbing up the ladder I tell him what I know about the abyss.

"Rhers dimension reveals truths, or atleast that's what most think, others believe that it's actually hiding the truth behind a lie, but that's beside the point. Think of these dimensions as… the image people think of when they think of the Mayors Manor, this place uses that image and creates a world based off of that, this ends up creating very twisted and unnatural places, that Ronteal could be falling till the world ends, and even then it might not die, it could only really die if Rher died, and that won't be happening anytime soon"

Once I'm at the top of the ladder i dust off my pants of some nonexistent dust and my puppet arms come back with three Rust-coloured pearls in their midst, pocketing them I walk back to Rhers circle and snap back to reality.

Instead of going back to my room though I continue forward entering the hall and soon after the room that was connecting to my room. Going down the ladder that was in the room I get to the place that was blocked off my a bunch of chairs on the first floor. Down the hall and to my right was a room with a hole in the middle, luckily there was railing to stop people from falling in. In the far side of the room was some leather armor on a stand and a chest, as well as the manor key on the table, I didn't really need the key but I took my hoarder instincts kicked in and I grabbed it. This chest was also empty, cursing my luck I backtrack back to my room and open the door.

I had already given up on being quite with this door so I yank it open and motion for Marina to follow me. As I did he jerked upward and revealed a horrified face, taking a look out the window I realize that I might have spent a bit too much time as the sun had already began peaking across the horizon, Marina must have thought I was the Mayor. Fortunately though it was me and her face soon turned back to normal and he got up and walked to me, punching me lightly on the shoulder he mumbled something about not being scared and walked into the hallway.

"Looked scared to me"

Twig snickered as I closed the door to the room that had been my safe space for but a while, forever leaving it behind.