Chapter 2: Could I be a HERO?

When he awoke in the dark, Morrison had no idea where he was, but his instincts warned him that it was a bad place. It felt like only hours had passed since he’d gone to work in the forest. But the passage of time was hard to follow. Now he was sitting on the rocky floor of some unknown place, barely able to see.

What’s going on here? He wondered to himself. Then he remembered. He remembered the terrified faces of his friends as the axe tore into them and spattered his body with their blood. He remembered the pain of it forcing its tendrils into his flesh.

He was now in a nightmare…

What was this place anyway? The air was cold and stank of decaying meat. When he stood up, compelled to move by that accursed axe, filthy strands of sticky, ropelike material clung to him, impeding his every movement and pulled painfully at his skin as he pushed through it. The disgusting stuff was everywhere!

“I hate this, I hate this, I hate this,” Morrison whimpered as he tore his way through the awful substance. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he realized he was in a cavern of some sort. A big one, too. Morrison had never been interested in cave exploration, but his new surroundings did remind him of something he’d heard in a tale once. Which had it been? Something his father told him years ago. Something about being wary of silken caves.

Morrison’s father had loved telling all manner of stories. He had a natural gift for it, but at some point in his life, Morrison had grown tired of hearing them and began drowning his father out. Now, he wished he’d done a better job of listening. This was a situation that his father had spoken of more than once. But what had it been? Oh, it was hovering on the edge of his memory, he was so close to recalling it!

What had it been, what had it been, what had it been…

“Oh, right,” Morrison said, as recollection suddenly came to him. “That was the one with the big spider.”

Yes, that was it exactly. The silken cave of the rhyming spider.

The big, man-eating rhyming spider.

Above him, Morrison saw something massive and hairy unfold itself from a sleepy curl and begin spinning about in a lazy manner as it hung from the ceiling. A voice called out to him, in a hissing whisper:

“Oh, precious lamb with sweetened blood,

Who stumbles through my happy home,

What brings thee here, so filled with fear,

to stand before me, all alone?”

Morrison couldn’t talk. Stark terror had frozen his tongue. Not only was he now facing a giant spider, but it was intelligent! He was so dead.

“You can talk?” he asked, although the voice that came from his lips sounded nothing like his own. How had that happened? It was the axe. That evil axe was speaking through him!

“Indeed, I can, my newfound friend,

As easily as you. I find it great, to conversate,

but others seldom do. It seems they’d rather run-in fear,

and race like light for day; than stop to have a chat with me,

as if they’d get away.”

“I don’t mind talking with you,” the axe said cheerfully.

It didn’t mind? Was that right? Well, how wonderful for it! Morrison minded! Morrison wanted to run the hell away! Was this idiotic scrap of steel insane?

“Did I hear right?Could that be true?Hurray for me!Bully for you!”

“Having said that, I’m on a quest to improve myself and part of it entails defeating monsters and chopping them into bits! You seem nice, but I'm honor bound to be forthright with my intentions.”

“On a quest to be your best,

is that the way you’ll go?

Do I now address this night,

a burgeoning hero?”

Morrison wanted to laugh as well as scream. A hero? This thing? Oh, it was a hero all right! In the same sense that a slit throat was a second smile!

“Gosh, a hero? Well, I've never really thought of myself that way,” the axe said wonderingly. “Do you really think I could be one? Oh, that would be neat!”

“Don’t belittle yourself so much, dear friend,

for as far as I can see:

You must be brave to enter this cave,

so, a hero is what you must be!”

“Oh, wow! Thanks!” replied the axe earnestly.

“You’re very welcome, little man.

I like to spread joy, when I can.”

“Well, I think you’re swell too!”

Now Morrison was beginning to feel irritated. The rhyming was bad enough, but the mutual flattery was sickening.

“Sadly though, Mr. Spider,” said the axe. “Although I truly think you’re wonderful, I can’t help but notice that you’ve been methodically moving closer and closer to me with graceful but predatory intent."

"Who, me? That can't be!"

"Ha! I like you. But although I appreciate your compliments and am going to give this hero thing some real thought, I think this is now the end of our brief but enjoyable acquaintance. Unless you’d like to try to escape first?”

The spider hissed out an amused laugh, and then said:

“My newfound prey chose not to pray,

instead, he tried to scare me away!

How brave, how strong, how very bold.

Sadly, spiders don’t do as they’re told.

Although I’ve found our meeting mete,

my stomach says it’s time to eat!”

With explosive speed, the huge arachnid began climbing down to the cavern floor, faster than Morrison would have believed possible for a creature of its size.

“Wait,” he desperately tried to say, wanting only to make it stop as it raced to him, glistening fangs now exposed to sink into his flesh. “Wait, just wait please—

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Before he could continue trying to beg, the vile thing bit into his shoulder as hard as it could. Then it reared its head back and shook him violently, throwing him to ground and preparing to feast…

__

…And then, with a sudden, powerful stroke, I hewed the massive spider’s head free of its body and sent it flying away. The obscenely bloated looking thing fell on its back and twitched its legs madly before finally succumbing to death. Awesome!

For my win, I gained a sweet three thousand experience points and was now level nine! I even had a couple new skills: [Envenomation] and [Razor Web]. I could now shoot webbing and generate poison! Wasn’t that a hoot?

Still, it was the decapitation I was most pleased with. It had been a pretty darn clean looking cut, if I did say so myself. Something for an axe to feel proud of! Sadly, my wielder wasn’t as impressed as he should have been. He was probably upset about being chewed up and tossed around by that bug.

Made sense, I guess. Gosh, I’ll tell you what: I did not regret no longer being meat. It now seemed so dangerous in all kinds of ways. Being an axe really was where it was at!

“Oh, gods! Oh, gods, why!” he choked out as vomit dribbled from his lips while he hunched over on his hands and knees. He shivered as the spider’s poison was slowly absorbed and purged from his system by the roots I had running all throughout his body.

“Relax, chum!” I told him. “I won’t let you die! I won’t ever let you die…”

Why didn’t that seem to bring him comfort?

__

Earlier

Being a lumberjack had quickly gotten boring.

Yeah, these old trees had lots of experience points for the taking. So what? It had been way more fun playing with those woodcutters. They hadn’t been strong, but they’d been dynamic! And they sure made lots of funny noises too.

As it turns out, I’m the sort of axe that needs to be stimulated. Easy kills didn’t suit me at all. Besides, those trees had existed in this forest since forever. It was probably bad karma to take more from them than was needed. In a world like this, karma probably mattered a bunch.

So, rather than continuing with my acts of deforestation, I decided to go look for some monsters to kill. I knew there had to be some around here, somewhere. This was a fantasy world of gods and miracles, and things of that nature. How could there not be some monsters to chop up?

“Come on, Morrison! Sing it with me! Dreeeeams last so long!Even after you’re gone! I know you love me and soooon, I know you will see!You were meant for me!And I was meant for you!”

I love being an axe! An axe reborn into a new life of adventure and magic! Wandering the land aside my new buddy, Morrison the woodcutter sure was fun. We’d only met recently but we got along like bees and honey. Morrison has been a little reluctant to open up to me, but I’ll win him over! After all, we’re both in this thing together!

“I go about my business and I’m doing fine!Besides, what would I say if I had you on the line?Same old story, much the same.Heeeearts are broken every daaaaaay!”

Monster hunting can get a little dull when nothing shows up to be chopped in half, so I’ve been passing the time by teaching Morrison my favorite Jewel songs. Isn’t she great?

Did you know her dad was the star of Alaska the last frontier, and that she had a bunch of money growing up but pretended to be homeless and was basically a music industry plant? She’s had like five number one hit singles!

Rich people can do anything!

“Stop it, stop it, please stop it!” Morrison moaned.

“She really gets to you, huh? Oh, wow, wait until you hear Foolish games. It has a lyric that I really like now that I’m a sentient axe. You’re tearing me! Tearing me! Tearing me apart! Can you see why I’d enjoy that? It’s because I’m an axe and I like tearing things apart! Jewel has something for everyone—"

“STOP SINGING!” Morrison screamed.

It was a quiet forest to begin with, but you know what? I think after he lashed out like that, it got even quieter.

“Hey, Morrison? I think your thoughtless words are breeeeeaking my heeeeeart!”

“What was my sin? Tell me, gods! I’m faithful to my girl! I was an obedient son! What did I do?”

“Hey, now! Don’t be like that. You didn’t do anything wrong; you’re helping me out! If anything, you’re earning yourself a blessing by your good deeds.”

“I don’t want to help you! I want my freedom! Why won’t you release me?!”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah!”

“I said RELEASE ME!”

“Yeah!Yeah!Yeah! Oh, wait, sorry, I thought we were doing a Duffy thing. Yeah, sure, I can release you, buddy. But it’s going to take a little time. Just a little precious time.”

“…”

“What?”

“…Nothing. I thought you were singing something else.”

“Oh. No, I wasn’t. You didn’t seem like you were into it. Listen, Morrison; I can let you go eventually. But I’m going to need you for just a few more days, okay? I’m not a bad guy, honest! As soon as I don’t need you anymore, I’ll cut you loose. I will literally cut you loose.”

“…By your honor?”

“Definitely! There will absolutely be a detachment!”

Tee-hee! I’m a pretty subtle axe, aren’t I?

Well, as subtle as an axe can be, anyway.

__

It was now seven days into our journey together, and I really have to say: I was an amazing axe!

By using Solar Absorption, I pulled energy directly from sunlight and fed it to Morrison. Thanks to that, we didn’t have to eat or sleep. It was so neat! I always felt refreshed and ready to go. Not so much, Morrison, though. The poor guy had a psychological attachment to R.E.M. sleep. From the way he’d started speaking to himself when he wasn’t staring unblinkingly at the sun, I think he might have been starting to lose it.

No worries. I didn’t need him sane. I just needed him alive.

I was getting pretty good at piloting his body around. His movements had grown so smooth and natural looking, that you’d find it impossible to think he was being controlled by someone else.

Sadly, though, I couldn’t see out of his eyes. That was why a lot of flying beasts kept getting the drop on us. This time, it was a hornet the size of a large pony. It came swooping out of the sky and impaled Morrison right through his belly, pinning him to a tree. I bisected it before its mandibles could pull the skin off his face, but he sure did grouse about the new hole in his belly while I patched him up.

Say, now, this was interesting! The hornet was only worth a middling two hundred-fifty experience points, but I had now gained the skill: Compound vision. I could now see forwards and backwards and side-to-side! And the detail was sharp. Who knew bugs had such sharp vision?

Heh, now I’m an axe with sharp vision too! Get it? Sharp? (It’s an axe pun!)

I tried sharing my new joke with Morrison, but he ignored me again. Gosh, he was always so dour and glum. Here we were, two best friends on the best road trip ever, but his heart just wasn’t into it!

I had to find a way to cheer him up.

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