Chapter 16: Chapter 15-Gift

Chapter 15- Gift

So there's a lot of plagiarism on Amazon. I'm putting this here just in case someone rips this whole thing and puts it in a book. If you're reading this and it's not Scribblehub, please report this publication.

"The Wrong Person Was Transported to the Horrific Lost Village" is the intellectual property of Sebastian Guzman.

Readers, thanks for bearing with me. Here's the chapter.

Also, thanks to strangewaraxe for the advice.

 

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Calling it a 'gift box' was generous, admittedly. This tiny 'gift box' was more like a disturbing mockery of the real thing. It was a rough, cuboid shape, wrapped in wilting leaves and clingy fuzzy green moss. The red string used to hold it together seemed to be a little thicker and a little wetter than a string had any right to be. 

"Should we get closer?" Haunting whimpered, her trembling hand on my shoulder.

"I... guess?"

I approached the box, getting more creeped out with every step. I glanced over at Susy. It was nice that she could sleep through this too.

Haunting poked her head over my shoulder. "Do you think it's a bomb?"

"Hmm." I stared at the box. "Honestly... I don't know... Maybe get some distance--"

"Yup!" she said, already standing over by Susy.

I sighed and kneeled in front of the box. "It looks safe enough..." I slowly neared my finger.

"Be careful, Mari!" Haunting yelped, more freaked out than I was.

"Yeah, I know."

I poked the box, and nothing happened. I breathed an internal sigh of relief and picked up the gift. The box was big enough to hold a tennis ball in it. I shook it to try and get a sense of what was inside. 

"I hate not being able to just scan this..."

Then, I inspected the box. I got a strange feeling of dread when I could make out the slightest signs of fingerprints--many tiny fingerprints. They were just slightly red... Just a little bit darker than the green leaves. 

I rubbed the 'string' between my fingers, then sniffed it.

"Smells like iron..."

Settling the queasy feeling I was getting in my stomach, I pulled at the string and "unwrapped" the leaves and moss to find a wooden box made of twigs held together by what I would assume was sap.

"It's really just a box?" Haunting whispered as she came closer. 

She must have been feeling braver... Heck, I was too. I lifted the crude top off the box, and we both peered inside.

Haunting's feline ears got in the way as she peered. "It's... Is this an accessory? May I, Mari?"

"Yeah... Go for it," I said, weighing the risks.

Haunting reached into the box. When she did so, she gasped quietly but didn't let go of the item. She stared at whatever was on her hand, turning it over and over again before her eyes fell on me.

"Okay," she said, making the strangest smile. Excitement but also unsure excitement, maybe? "It's super creepy, Mari, but as a paranormal investigator, it's pretty tantalizing."

I rolled my eyes as she handed it to me. "Please keep in mind how strange this all is--"

I stopped. My heart was beating faster than ever. Damn it. This damn place got a scare out of me. Damn it.

"Lemme look at it again!" she said, lifting the item out of my hand. "Yup. Still creepy... It's a pretty cool eye design, though. The iris looks very detailed. I wonder what it's encased in... Do you think there's significance in the centerpiece being inside a triangle? Triangles are sacred shapes, you know?"

The thing in her hand was a necklace with the most peculiar ornament--an iris within some kind of glass or resin. It was framed by a metal triangle.

"The mystery accelerates! What could this be? And why were we given it?" Haunting asked.

Meanwhile, I was shaken and really just bothered by the thing that only "I" could see. The necklace had traces of Vengeance around it, and when I peered into those dregs, I saw flashes of Kaz Kitanari's memories--the same ones I saw the night before.

My mind was racing.

Immediate conclusion--that iris was Kaz's. I couldn't recall what color his eyes were, but I didn't need to. The Vengeance was latched onto it--it definitely came from him. But there were problems with that conclusion.

Point of clarification--Vengeance disappears when the person dies, so what did it mean that the Vengeance lingered?

Option A--The simplest solution. Kaz was alive still. Shit, Kaz was alive. No, if that were the case... damn it...

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Option B--Kaz is "dead," but maybe we're dealing with some fuckery like a piece of his soul--if not his whole soul--is locked within the accessory.

Further line of inquiry--how did it get here, and why were we given it? Does the thing have some purpose other than to freak us out?

My thoughts went into hyper-drive as I quickly brought all my clues together. I would have thought this entire thing through the night before, but they took my time away.

 

Eldritch deer--I tested it the whole night, talking to it every now and again. It responded to my snark all throughout. Spreading its legs in response to the attention, drooping when I called it ugly, and so on, all climaxing in it pointing at me when I pinned Kaz's death on it.

It was more responsive than a beast would be, but it still didn't generate Vengeance. There are two simple ways around this--

One, it's like a golem. A golem can be programmed to be human-like, such that any sufficiently advanced golem can appear human at first glance.

Two, it is more eldritch than I can imagine, not only in form but in mind. Eldritch beings are usually incomprehensible. The fiction says that trying to understand them will drive a person mad... That could be the same case here. What all this means is that they could very well have something equivalent to human sentience but have it be something that fundamentally isn't human sentience, among other things. Can I comprehend that not-human sentience? Can I fathom that? I'm not sure. Is that why the goddess dropped me in this world? She knew my powers required me to "understand," so she put me in a world where I couldn't do it quickly enough?

No, I'm getting distracted--there's a critical clue here. The present. That sadistic, sick present. The bastards overplayed their hands. Vengeance was able to give me just a little more insight, and now I know they like giving out body parts as gifts. 

First, there's a present--a reward. For there to be a reward, it means there must be reward criteria. If there are criteria, that means there is order or rules that describe the legal actions that can be used in pursuit of the reward. Where there are rules, there is an agent of order enforcing the rules. It means this isn't just chaos--some level of order governs the interactions. That reality explains last night! There was a rule applied... One that the eldritch deer had to adhere to. The question would be, is the Ruling Force some kind of natural, unconscious enforcer that enforces by virtue of existing, like how the natural gravity forces a thrown ball to fall, or is there a structured conscious enforcer who ensures the creatures follow arbitrary rules like don't enter caves... 

The present. It's so sadistic, or it could be natural, depending on your perspective. I have to be careful not to let human bias give the wrong meaning to events... Regardless, what I can definitely say is that to be given a present, we had to do something that satisfied the Ruling Force's criteria. There was something that could be satisfied. Considering a possible sadistic nature and the deer potentially trying to out me, there is a very real fear of them exposing me now too... Shit... If there's a Ruling Force... If it's whimsical I'll be in trouble in the short-term. But... if it was something that would try to sow discord, would there still be the small society here? I won't know more without interviewing the people of the village. They all seemed so effective and united though. That doesn't seem like a society afflicted by discord.

I can't dwell in fear...

Speaking of bias, I can't afford to forget a giant elephant in the room- my ability to see Vengeance. That power was born from the desire of wanting to always know that my victims deserved what was coming to them. That initial desire may have really biased the power and given it a gigantic blindspot on things that weren't "persons." With that in mind, I have to remember that I cannot solely rely on Vengeance to discern the correct nature of an eldritch being.

 

I glanced at the accessory. 

It must have some purpose. Is it a real reward? Does it have magic? Is it a trap? The paranoia is increasing the more I wonder about it... Wait, it has Vengeance. If I break it, could I get an emergency dose of it? So many questions--

"How did it get here, though?!" said the girl studying the thing with the widest smile on her face. She looked at me, unable to decide what expression she wanted to wear between balls-to-the-wall animated and nervous. "That's creepy, right? Something was able to get in here, but it didn't do anything... That means it could have come at any time, couldn't it? Were we really safe?" Her face turned serious. "Or have we been dead all-along?! Dun-dun-duuuuun!" She smiled mischievously. "That has been some scary pondering with Haunting Tone. Good night... or good morning, I guess."

I looked at her free hand, the trembling one she had kept near her pocket. Then I looked at her and smiled. "You have a very entertaining delivery."

Her cheeks went a little pink, and she smiled. "T-Thank you..." 

"Do you do podcasts or something?"

She cocked her head at me. "What's a podcast?"

"Uhh, it's like a radio show..." I replied, minding my words.

"Oh! Is that a new word? Well, I have my own radio show--The Midnight Haunting Tone."

"Wow. So much makes sense."

"Aww, shucks," she said, pink. She looked at the accessory again. "I try my best... Still, I wonder what it means that we received this... Was it that monster from last night? But I don't get it... If it could get in here to leave this..." She visibly shuddered.

Haunting was terrified of the possibility that something had come into the cave, but honestly, that wasn't what had me the most concerned. Video game-style worlds were full of items just popping up out of nowhere. Money in the grass, in the pots, in the body of a monster. Then there were the chests that just appeared. Chests in towns, chests in dungeons, chests in hot springs--everywhere. So, for someone like me who kind of expects to see an item appear as a "reward," this was nothing. No, what bothered me most was the fact that something "forced" me asleep. I was upset about it as I was concerned.

I knew my body. I knew my history. If I didn't want to sleep, I wouldn't, to say nothing of the fact an enemy was mere feet away. 

"Resistance" was the term we could use. 

I used to have high resistance to all sorts of status effects. Not even the goddess of an entire world could affect me directly. But here? Just like that? Someone forced me to "sleep" so that I couldn't see the moment they dropped their creepy gift.

Someone that could do that to me at any time--that was what was truly terrifying. Compounded with everything else--this controlled and caged environment, the eldritch deer's fear effect, the possible Ruling Force overseeing it all... I had one immediate conclusion--

"My advantage is on even shakier ground than I thought..."

"Hmm? It's morning?"

Haunting and I looked over at the corner of the cave at the sleepy-eyed Susy lifting her body off the ground. Her eyes landed on Haunting, and she twisted her lips.

"Haunting?" she innocently asked. "Where are we?"

I sighed. "And, of course, she doesn't remember her little gallivant through the forest."

Haunting nervously chuckled. "Oh, come on; she might just be a little confused."

"Haunting? Where's the bus? And where's everyone else?"

I looked at Haunting, and she grimaced while holding down her ears.