From that point on, I was on my own.

No matter how much I called out, the woman's voice who had led me here was completely gone.

A rumble could both be heard and felt as the cavern began to shake and that was it.

Silence.

"Hello...? Uh...ma'am?" I asked out, with no reply.

I was now in a completely new place all alone.

I thought she promised that she would grant me my wish!!

Oi!

You dumb drunk and high woman!

Where the heck did you go?!?!

All of a sudden, I could feel something crash into my head and I fell to the ground in pain.

I looked to see what had landed on me and realized that it was a...sheathed sword.

It was as if the lady from before had slammed this on my head on purpose because I was thinking bad things about her.

I sighed and picked up the blade.

It was heavy and sturdy and was much better than whatever I could get on the surface.

I wonder who the heck was able to craft such a beast.

"Why the heck would I need a sword of all things...?" I mumbled to myself as I stood up from my spot.

It had been a while since I had last eaten a proper meal and from what I could see, there wasn't any good source of water around either.

The bottomless pit in my stomach will be the end of me...

I decided that staying here any longer would only bring out my inevitable death, so I grabbed the sword that had fallen out of the sky and gripped the hilt with my dominant hand and walked forward into the unknown.

I guess...I'm just going to have to find my own way back to the surface then...

The cave I was in had many tunnels all stretching outward in unknown directions.

But there was one specific tunnel that had a long staircase leading upward, the exact location I needed to go.

I sighed and began to ascend up the stairs with my sword gripped in hand.

After that, the pathway leveled out, revealing many other pathways and tunnels.

It was almost like a maze.

...No.

It was a maze.

Without a doubt, the entire design of this place was quite game-like.

The interior seemed confusing at first glance, but in reality, there was a pattern to the corridors and it was quite simple.

I wandered around for a few minutes until I came across a particular pathway that led upward again.

But I was starting to become less worried about my growling stomach and more about the time it would take me to get out of here.

The pit I had fallen down was very deep and, although these mazes were simple, they were time-consuming.

...When am I going to get to see the surface again?

I climbed the set of stairs and reached another floor.

This time, there was no light in the cavern and I could hardly see anything in front of me.

I knelt down on the ground for a bit so my eyes could readjust to the darkness.

This place was weird...and for some reason, I had a feeling that something was watching me.

From somewhere, I think I could a small deep groan.

It was at that moment, where I completely stopped thinking and succumbed to instinct.

I ducked my head in time before my head could be chopped off by an axe.

"WHAT THE HECK?!" I screamed internally as I did my best to keep my mouth quiet, carefully cupping over my lips with my hands.

The area around me was much too dark for me to see anything and the only thing I could do was to use my hearing and natural sense of instinct to defend myself.

I guess this is why that woman gave me a sword.

Wait...was this...how this place was planning on making me strong...?

No...

This isn't what I wanted.

Instead of making me stronger, this will kill me.

What kills you can't make you stronger.

I could feel the wind shift slightly and I ducked again.

This time, the axe barely missed my head grazed past one of my pigtails.

...Am I going to die here...?

...No.

I unsheathed the sword in my hand and held it tight between my hands.

Left...?

Right...?

Where was it...Where was the monster that wanted to kill me?

I heard a small thud on the ground near my right and I immediately swung my sword in that direction.

I could hear my sword clang against something hard and metal, which was likely the axe.

Quickly, I pushed aside the axe with my sword and slammed down my blade, causing a large splurting sound in front of me.

Was it...dead?

I slashed the squishy thing in front of me once...twice...three times for good measure.

Yep.

It was definitely dead.

What the heck was it in the first place?

Based on the fact that it was wandering around in such a dark place, it was probably adapted to the darkness.

It had an axe too.

I wasn't quite sure what it was, but I knew for a fact that it wasn't the only thing living here.

Since it was a living thing, that meant that there had to be something else to eat, likely another monster.

It also meant that there had to be water somewhere nearby at the least.

Good.

At least I knew it was possible to survive here.

It was dangerous to stay in one place for too long, so I decided to continue on through the maze, using the walls of the pathways to guide myself.

I made sure to memorize my path.

There might be many things I'm not good at...but if it was a test of memory, I'd be undefeated.

Haha...This was the worst.

I couldn't even use magic.

What was I without magic?

I was nothing.

Even now, I was gripping onto the blade of my sword with no confidence whatsoever in my sword fighting skills.

I was only confident in my strength since I knew I had my magic to back it up.

But now...I was in a place where magic didn't work.

I bit my tongue harshly.

This wasn't the time for me to think about such things.

Survival is the only thing I should be worried about.

.

.

A Few Days Later

.

.

At this point, I had killed so many unknown monsters that I couldn't even see and rose so many floors that I had lost count.

Eating monster meat and drinking blood was still something that I was having a hard time getting used to...but I'd actually die of starvation if I didn't eat anything.

I still remember the first time I decided to take a bit of monster meat though...

I nearly passed out from how horribly bitter and salty it was.

It tasted terrible.

I shuddered as I ducked to the ground again.

An arrow flew by my ear and made a thud on the wall next to my head.

These days, instead of blades, monsters with bow and arrows have been attacking me.

"Stupid...monsters...Can't you just let me relax in peace?!?!?!" I yelled as I charged in the direction where I felt the arrow come from and slashed downward until I could feel the blade pierce through flesh.

The moment the monster died, I collapsed to the ground with a groan.

For days I had been walking around this maze...memorizing the paths and killing monsters.

There was no light...no people...no one I could rely on other than myself.

Traveling in complete darkness without being able to see anything wore down my spirit and I began to feel tired of it all.

I felt blind...

No...I was blind.

In this place, I was both weak and blind.

I was only trained enough to trust my instinct in battle and to evade deadly attacks, but other than that, there was nothing in my battling sense to be proud of.

...A way to fight in complete darkness...

I need to figure it out quickly...before I lose all of my stamina and actually die from a monster.

.

.

A Few Weeks Later

.

.

I slammed my sword down on a monster and crushed its skull until I was sure it was dead.

Monsters on this floor were powerful and wouldn't stay dead unless you completely obliterated their head.

"Thank you for the meal..." I murmured to the monster as I began to cut up the monster into neat portions.

I knew there was no point in talking to a corpse.

But...

...I felt that I would go insane if I didn't speak to anyone or anything.

Who knew that a loss of sight would affect me so much...?

For the past few weeks, I had been living in almost constant darkness.

It used to be scary, but now it just felt empty.

Ah...I want to see the sky...

The bright blue sky...I could only imagine what it looked like at this point.

I lit a fire using some flint I had picked up from a monster and some wood that I salvaged from a monster's broken bow.

The fire illuminated a part of the cavern I was in, but the only thing the light revealed to me were stone walls and stone walls and more stone walls and empty silence.

From what I could see, my clothes were dirty and torn.

Wearing a rag would be better than the ripped and sweaty school uniform I was wearing now.

As a noble, I have never gone through a single day without a new set of clean clothes.

It felt strange.

"Are my clothes the only thing that are changing...? Or am I changing too..." I murmured as I cooked the monster meat with the fire.

I craved the taste of the food back on the surface...

Steak...

I was craving a large rib-eye steak...

I imagined the tenderness of the meat, the flavor of the steak, and how good it would taste now that I had cooked monster meat to compare it to.

In the beginning, I ate the monster meat raw...which in normal circumstances, might have led to disease and such.

But for some reason, I was still quite well and healthy.

Maybe the gods had something to do with it...they gave me their blessings after all.

Actually...I've never been sick ever since coming into this world...

Speaking of the gods, I actually tried talking to them at some point along my journey.

I thought that since they lived in my head, they would at least accompany me on my journey.

But when I tried to speak with them, they weren't there and didn't respond.

Was this place blocking them out of my head?

Or...were they just busy...?

They were gods after all.

I wouldn't be surprised if they had endless amounts of work to do.

Wait...Now that I think about it...Shai was the god of Earth, right?

Was it really alright for him to be living in my brain and staying in this world so much?

He had a whole world to govern...so why was he always chilling in my head before?

I sighed.

The gods probably had their reasons...just like how the gods had a reason for leaving me alone now.

I'm sure...

...That the gods didn't abandon me.

Because if they did...I would have no one left.

.

.

A Month Later

.

.

"...You're...in the way..." I murmured mechanically as my arm unconsciously moved to kill all of the monsters around me.

With each movement I made, I could feel my blade slash through the flesh of a monster.

A monster.

They were monsters.

Or was I the monster?

The one doing all of the killing was me.

I was killing.

The monsters were only defending their home from me.

So...who was the monster...?

Me?

Or them...?

I swiped the blood off of my sword using a monster's corpse.

...I had no use for sight anymore.

The empty darkness felt just like a home for me.

The sky...I wanted to see the sky...

No...

There's something else I want to see more than the sky.

No...someone else...

I was beginning to forget small details of their face, but I'd never forget his name.

"...I got to go back...back...home...he's waiting for...me...he's waiting...right?" I murmured as I continued moving through the darkness.

I slammed another monster to the ground and pierced my sword through its skull.

I no longer needed to guide myself using the walls of the pathways.

I could just simply tell when or where it was possible to walk through a different tunnel...or if it were possible to ascend up another flight of stairs...

Another flight of stairs...

Another flight...

Another...

That's right...I wasn't even close to finishing yet...

More...

I still had so much more to go through.

Hahaha...How long...was I going to be here...in this darkness...this eternal darkness...for?

How much...how much longer...?

I could feel it...

I was becoming emptier the longer I stayed here.

Quickly.

...I must leave this place as quickly as I can.

Was this...the price for wishing for something I didn't deserve...?

Was it just...divine punishment...for wishing for strength?

I kept moving forward...

...Forward...

...Upward...

...Using all of my memories of the surface to keep me from going insane in the darkness...

.

.

Another Month Later

.

.

I ran, carefully scanning the area around me for any traps that I might set off...for any monster that would try to attack me...for anything that would keep my mind off of the fact that I was alone.

I was alone...

Danger...

I quickly positioned my sword in front of me and blocked the powerful sword slash that was aimed toward me.

The air around the area whooshed outward from the force of the attack I blocked, and I could feel the rock ground crack below my feet as the monster persistently pushed his sword down onto mine.

I kept my sword in the defensive position as the monster continued slamming his own sword on mine over and over again.

Haha...If I get hit by that...I'd die.

...Die?

Die...I'd die...

It's okay...if I die...I'll just respawn...

Because this is all just a game...

At some point along the way, my mind became unable to accept reality, and in order to stop myself from going truly insane...I began to act like this was all one big dungeon game.

A game...

A long game...

The sky...

My goal is the sky...

And then I'll see him again...

So it'll all be worth it.

It'll be worth it...

So I can't die...

...Die.

I swung my sword and knocked the sword of the monster away from it and slashed my own sword through its body.

Using my hand, I grabbed its throat, smashed its head onto the ground, and killed it with my blade.

I cut up its flesh and ate it raw.

The fresher the meat was, the less likely I'd be poisoned from rotten meat...

I had nothing to create fire with and had no use for light anymore either...

"Die...for me...home...so...I can...go...I...want...home..." I gasped out as I collapsed to the ground.

Somewhere a few dozen or so meters away, I could hear and feel it.

The trickling...fluttery...sound of water...

Water...

All traces of my fatigue disappeared.

I ran towards the small pool of water that I could hear and immediately crouched down, drinking straight from the pool.

Thirst...

Pure thirst...

I drank the water quickly and didn't let a single drop go to waste.

It had been over a week since this dungeon game gave me water and the burning painful feeling in my throat and chest was almost enough to kill me.

Water...

Who knew...how much I had taken water for granted...

It tasted so sweet.

It tasted so much better than any other five-star meal I had ever eaten.

Plain old water...

Dirty water found underground...

It tasted so good that I started to cry.

.

.

A Few Weeks Later

.

.

There it was...

Without even hearing or sensing it...I could see it.

I could see light.

I reached my hand out toward it.

The light reflected off of my hand.

It wasn't light from a fire...

It was light from somewhere...

Light...

It was so beautiful.

The light fluttered through and made patterns on my hand.

I placed my foot into the light and I created a shadow.

A shadow...

It was something that anyone would have thought normal...but to me...it was the most fascinating thing in the world...

How wonderful...

"You have finally reached me, young one. How long has it been...? Three months or so?" the voice of a woman said as I moved my hand through the light.

"...You...woman...who...bring...I...here?" I said in completely broken English.

I cupped my mouth with my hand in embarrassment.

What was wrong with me...

It had been so long since I spoke to any other person that I forgot proper grammar...

"Yes...I was the one who brought you here..." the woman responded.

"Why..." I tried to say as my voice broke.

Did I do something to her...?

What she put me through...was something that...not even I would do to my worst enemy.

The growing insanity from loneliness.

The endless darkness that you'd never know when would go away.

The constant fear of death...

Why...

Why...

Why...

"You must resent me by now...I'm sorry that I forced you to go through this all because of me," the woman said as her voice reverberated in my ear.

I collapsed on the ground and onto my knees with a thud and I couldn't stop the tears flowing from my face.

"Why...Why...Why..." I repeated over and over again out loud.

Even though it was her fault...

I felt neither hatred nor resentment for this woman...

What was wrong with me...?

Instead...I was overflowing with peace...after everything I've been through...I was nearly done...

Peace...

"My body...Is at the end of this last maze...If you'd like to see me...Please come," the woman said to me slowly.

I stayed on the ground, unable to move after her words.

This really was the last maze...

One more...and I could see the sky...

And him as well...

One last one...

Unlike the floors below this one, there was actually light and I could make out the walls of the cave with my own vision.

But I didn't need to.

I closed my eyes and in my mind, I could make out everything from within the labyrinth.

I could sense and feel everything and I knew the exact path for me to leave.

Quickly, I ran toward the exit impatiently.

Just a few more steps...

Just a few more...

I was so close...

My eyes were kept closed shut and I killed whatever monster it was to my left.

I killed it so fast and ran away so quickly that I didn't even know whether it was actually dead or playing dead.

"...You've made it...Please...Open your eyes. I promise...that I won't hurt you..." the woman said from a few steps in front of me.

No...

Even without my eyes open, I knew exactly what the woman was.

There were no other living species on the planet that could exude as much strength as this woman.

...A dragon.

I opened my eyes and I saw her.

Her scales were a magnificent shade of gray and she had two large wings that reached so far out that it almost felt like a shame for her to be somewhere underground instead of being up high in the sky where she belonged.

She had two large horns and a soft look on her face that showed her wisdom.

Straight into my eyes, she stared at me and I stared at her.

For she was the one who brought me here.

"I finally get to see your face for myself...young one...or should I say...'strong' one..." she said in a voice full of mystery.

"You...are...a...dragon..." I murmured as I saw her fold her wings close to her back.

"Yes...I am one of the three true elder dragons of this world...It's a pleasure to meet you, Cordelia de Boren Cyllia," she said as she dipped her head low in front of me.

"How...Why..." I stuttered.

"I have watched over you as you traveled through all 500 labyrinths. I witnessed your pain...your desperation...and your fear. Without a doubt...you must resent me...and for that...I am sorry," the dragon continued as she kept her head low.

"...No...I...wished...for...strength...myself instead of...a way...back up...so...don't...blame yourself..." I murmured as I tried to formulate a proper sentence.

"...I am surprised. I had thought you were the type to grow resentment for anyone who burdened you..." the dragon said.

I shook my head no.

"I...thought...I was...like that too...but...I think...I've...grown," I said to her.

"Your eyes no longer reflect your age. It is a pity and something to be proud of at the same time...Once you reach the surface...please, use your strength to overcome the growing disaster in this world..."

"What...growing...disaster...?"

"He is a cruel man...but he cannot be blamed...He will bring about this world's end...and Gadia shall die by his hands."

Gadia...?

The god of this world...?

He was going to die...?!

"I...don't...understand..." I said quickly.

"The royal bloodline lives on...but that is the choice you made...If you wish to save this world, you must make a choice...a hard choice that no one should have to make..." she said.

"That's too...confusing...I don't...understand..."

All of a sudden, the cavern began to shake and break down.

"...No...It's too late...he has found me...You must go...this is the last time we will meet," she said.

"What...? No...I need...answers...I...need..."

"Leave...Use your newfound strength to create a miracle...Go..." the dragon ordered.

"...I..."

But the pained look in the dragon showed me that it really was too late.

That I really had no choice but to go.

I bit my lip.

I didn't really like this dragon since she brought me all the way here...but she didn't seem like a bad person and I didn't want her dead...

And for some reason, I felt a small dull pain in my ankle around my dragon's mark.

I nodded my head to the dragon and immediately began to evacuate from the area.

"Wait...Before you go..." the dragon said before I completely left.

"...Huh?" I asked as I turned around to face her.

The dragon smiled and looked at me fondly as if I were her daughter.

"Please, say hello to my son for me...when you see him again," the dragon said.

"Your...son...? Who..." I said with wide eyes as I asked her quickly.

The dragon said nothing as the roof of the cavern collapsed on her head and the room began to shake harder than it ever had.

The entrance of the cavern began to close up and I realized that this was my last chance to leave.

I bit my lip in frustration and ran outside.

And that's the moment I finally saw the sky.

----------------------------------------------------

A/N: Well this was certainly a fun chapter to write! Cordelia seems to have gone through a lot, hasn't she?

Anyway, I'm sure some of you have connected the dots and realized who the dragon is...and if you haven't...someone will probably comment it.

School started again for me, and I must say, that this year seems to be very relaxing(?) The workload is much less and is much easier than before, for sure. I guess that means I won't have to worry about how much time I need for chapters!

Thanks, again, to my readers/voters/commenters! You guys are all supportive~

Stay safe, everyone~

Okie byeee!

Word Count: 4104