The Gentle Hero

Yuril extended his right leg, stepped down and brought his left to join him a second later. Despite knowing that nothing had really changed, he felt different, the air he breathed was the same as before, but now it felt heavy like he needed to chew it. It was a natural ground that had existed for centuries unchanged. An incalculable amount of blood had been split in the dungeon by both monsters, humans and other races of all kinds. So many lives were lost in the tunnels and caves of the dungeon by both the natural inhabitants of the dungeon that appeared to be seemingly endless and the daring adventurers that braved the dark depths to try and make a name for themselves.

Now, Yuril Artwaltz was going to join them.

He would seek out glory and adventure like the thousands that came before him. Yuril would be risking his life to dive into the dungeon all for the promise of becoming a Hero that one day would be recalled as a legend. He would not stop his journey until he had achieved his goal, bards would write and sing songs, legends would be written and stories would be told about the young white-haired boy.

But that was far into the future. Yuril knew that he would have to crawl his way to the top. He would need to complete numerous journeys before he reached that grand height. So he took another step, then another, then another and another until he started to put a decent distance between him and the spiral staircase that was the only way in and out of the dungeon.

Yuril was thankful to learn that his grandfather's journal had been right about one thing since he arrived in the city. It had an accurate map of the dungeon which put Yuril slightly at ease. Though he expected as much considering that the dungeon had changed very little if at all in the past several centuries.

He picked a tunnel at random and started to walk down the passageway. The walk was more boring than he had thought it would be in the dungeon; it was surprisingly quiet.

He kept an eye out for any possible threats. The journal had a picture of a goblin crawling out of the dungeon's walls itself. It explained that that was the way that the dungeon swamped new monsters. It made reasonable sense to Yuril. He was unsure why the dungeon would spawn monsters; no one that was natural to the earth had that information. The only "people" that did were the numerous Gods and Goddesses, though they never shared the information with anyone in all the centuries since they had descended upon the earth. Several scientists and scholars had made assumptions as to how and why the dungeon would do something. Most coming to the conclusion that the dungeon was spawning monsters to try and protect whatever it was that the dungeon held. However, no one could hope to know for sure, most people agreed that the only way to really learn the truth was to reach the bottom and see the real truth.

Although the dungeon was a massive collection of intertwining tunnels and caves with dozens of floors, it could not go on infinitely. It had to have an end, a bottom where all the questions about the dungeon could be reasonably answered with logical causes. But Yuril was still leagues away from reaching the bottom, he was only on floor one and by all means, he did not even have any right to be on the first floor in the first place without a blessing.

Yuril stopped suddenly as he heard a soft noise coming from behind him where he had come from,he quickly turned around to face whatever was coming his way. F-footsteps… ma-maybe it's just an adventurer and he will pass right by me… o-or…. Yuril did not have time to finish his thought as the source of the noise stepped around the rocky corner and into view. ... it's a monster…

The short green creature that stood just above waist height to the albino boy growled slightly in a gurgly tone. Drool leaked from its slightly agape mouth. Several yellowish stained teeth gleamed in the light of the crystals that illuminated the tunnel. It was hunched over and had its two skinny arms extended slightly in front of it. Its dirty nails had several small chips and cracks yet they still appeared sharp enough to injure someone if it was given the opportunity. The only thing that the creature had in its possession was a small brown tattered cloth around its waist to cover itself, the rag had several stains and tears. Its gem-like beet-red eyes glared into the crimson eyes of the young boy as it snarled and took another step closer towards him.

The creature seemed to be starved as Yuril could see the monster's ribs and its flesh was wrinkling around its gut. It was a truly disgusting sight!

The creature took another step closer towards Yuril, its arms raised slightly as its body seemed to tense up at the sight of the boy. It took another step that was quicker than the last, it took several more steps until it had broken into a small sprint towards Yuril. With its arms thrust out in front of him, it let out a screech.

As the creature was nearing its target it bent its legs slightly and leapt towards Yuril with his arms ready to scratch and rip at his chest. Despite being slightly caught off guard as the green creature jumped through the air. Yuril was able to step to the side, the creature was quicker than Yuril had anticipated and as it flew through the air past him he turned on its side and slashed its nails in his direction. The slash caught him in the right elbow but it was only a slight scrape akin to tripping and skidding across the ground for a few seconds.

It landed behind him with a soft thud, having turned its body it lost its chance to land on its hands and feet but that seemed to not bother the creature even slightly as it quickly scrambled on the ground to get back to its feet. Yuril spun around to face the monster. He pulled the knife out of its leather sheath that Syr had given him and that he had strapped to his right thigh with his extra belt.

There was a brief moment of silence between the two as they both waited for the other to strike first, sizing up their opponents; they planned out their next moments and the Goblin started its approach. The creature was the first to succumb to its natural instincts and rush the boy for the second time, it had learned from its previous mistake and kept its bare feet planted on the ground as he dashed in the boy's direction.

Yuril did not let the creature fully reach him before he took a step forward and kicked the monster in the chest with his right leg, it let out a small screech and fell to the ground on its back. Before it could get up and recover to make another attack. Yuril stepped on the creature's chest with his right leg, it let out another scream from being pinned under his foot and started to claw at his leg.

Yuril tried to ignore the stinging pain in his leg as the creature clawed away at him, the numb pain slowly started to seep its way into his leg and coiled around his leg like a viper before constricting tightly giving his leg several cramps and small spasms. Finding no real success from clawing at the boy's leg the creature switched its strategy and opened its jaws to bite down on the boy's foot. Yuril went to pull his leg away from the Goblin. He planned to put his right foot behind him and kick the creature away from him with his left. However, his plan never came to pass as the Goblin ensnared his leg with its claws. The Goblin opened its mouth wide enough to fit the young boy's foot in his mouth and Yuril closed his eyes as he prepared to feel the creature's sharp dentures bite down.

But no pain came.

Yuril opened his eyes a moment later and saw the creature with several cracked and broken teeth, blood leaked from its mouth and he was struggling under his foot to try and escape from the boy. It had taken a moment for Yuril to realize that the Goblin had bitten down on the metal plating over the toe of his boot while trying to hurt him, it had shattered its teeth in the process. While the creature was still recovering from its self given injury, Yuril crouched down slightly and plunged the knife downwards through the creature's skull between its glowing eyes.

Once the monster's eyes slowly closed Yuril fell backwards and sighed heavily as his shoulders sagged, he had done something that many people in their entire lives had never done or would ever do.

But he knew what came next, he had to retrieve his prize from the monster's dead body. Yuril pushed himself back up onto his knees and held the knife with both hands and brought it straight down into the green creature's chest. He kept the blade as deep as he could and slowly started to pull the blade towards himself, he had to add a fair amount of pressure and add a slight up and down movement as if the knife was a saw to cut through the monster's flesh. Once he had sliced the monster's chest open enough he set the blade down as his side and dove his hands into the monster's chest and fished around for a moment. The wet squishing sounds coming from the monster's corpse as Yuril rustled around outside of its guts was enough to make him close his eyes and hope that it would end soon. Once he had found what he believed he was searching for with his right hand he grasped it tightly and pulled it free from the corpse. In a moment the Goblin's corpse disappeared in a small puff of black dust and fizzled away.

He reached over and picked up his knife with his right hand and turned his left hand over so that his palm was facing the roof of the opened his closed fist and in his palm he saw a tiny purple crystal that had a slight luminescent glow in the dungeons' dim light. Holding his knife with his right hand he pushed around the crystal with his index finger in his left hand's palm as he smiled to himself slightly.

"I-I did it… I actually did it!" Yuril shot to his feet and cheered, as he threw his left fist into the air in a clenched fist with the monster crystal held tightly in his hand. "Did you see me, grandfather? I actually did it! I slayed my very first monster!" Yuril said loudly in an enthusiastic tone, he looked up at the ceiling and could almost hear his grandad's praise for completing his first of many trials. It took a moment for it to dawn on Yuril, since arriving in Orario this was his first major victory, while others would not call it much of an achievement he considered it a massive success that he needed badly. He had killed a Goblin on his very own, with no assistance or blessing. To him, it was a sign from the heavens that he could make his dreams a reality if he simply put his heart and soul into it.

Yuril had only a moment to celebrate as a few seconds later he heard another snarl coming from behind him. He quickly pocketed the crystal into his pants and turned around to prepare himself for another fight. The sound of soft footsteps and growls could be heard from just around the corner of the tunnel, steeling his nerves and with the slight boost of confidence, Yuril decided to strike first instead of waiting for his opponents to come to him and catch them off guard.

He sprinted around the corner and did not stop. Once he saw his enemies he continued to rush towards them to get the maximum gain from his sudden appearance to the beasts. He only had a single moment to assess the situation and study his surroundings, his opponents were two Kobolds.

The two small creatures were standing next to each other, the one on the right had a light brown fur coat while the one on the left had a dark grey colour to its fur. Both of their furs were matted and tangled, in several places, they were both missing patches of fur showing the pale skin of the beast beneath. They had sharper claws than that of a Goblin. Their teeth appeared to be in better condition. While with the Goblins jaws their teeth were mostly crooked and various sizes with a dirty yellow coating of them, the Kobolds had a cleaner set of fangs that lined up properly and stayed consistently the same size.

The two creatures appeared to be only slightly surprised by his sudden appearance and they both quickly went into crouched stances and prepared for a fight to the death. While Yuril felt confident in his abilities after his first encounter with the Goblin, he knew that fighting against two of the monsters at the same time would not be advantageous.

He used the speed that he had built from sprinting around the corner and transferred the force into a kick towards the brown-haired Kobolds head, the bottom of his boot connected with the creature's face and sent him flying a few feet backwards with a bone-chilling crack. After Yuril had temporarily dealt with one Kobold, he switched his attention towards the second, it was only a few feet away and rushed towards him with its claws raised.

Yuril crouched slightly and charged forward, he held his knife tightly in both hands and extended his arms forward to stab the blade into the centre mass of the creature. His knife pierced the monster's chest and it let out a bloody scream. After it took a few seconds to shake off the pain from being stabbed the creature started to claw and scrape at Yuril's arms to get him to release the knife that was still lodged in its chest.

The creature's claws cut through the sleeves of his jacket and pierced the skin of his arms, fighting to hold off the pain Yuril gritted his teeth and let out a small scream as he tried to push the blade deeper into the monster.

Yuril wiggled the knife around inside of the creature. After finding it to have little effect on the beast, he devised a second offensive move, he raised his left leg and kicked the monster in its right stubby leg making it drop down and take a knee. Before the monster could recover from the hit Yuril took a step backwards and pulled the kitchen knife from the Kobolds chest, he spun the blade around in his right hand and raised it above his head. The Kobold looked up at him with his flaming red eyes as Yuril brought the knife down with both hands and stabbed the creature through its right eye, it twitched for a few moments before its body went silent and the monster ceased living.

Yuril let out a small sigh and as he was about to turn his attention back towards the remaining Kobold that he had kicked away he heard a familiar gurgling voice to his left, he turned his head to see the source of the sound and saw another Goblin coming around the corner. "You have to be kidding m—?!" Yuril did not get a chance to finish his sentence. In the corner of his eye he saw that the other Kobold had recovered from the blow that it received and was charging to attack him. Yuril turned to face the monster and just like the Goblin had done before had leapt through the air to tackle him to the ground, Yuril attempted to perform the same dodge as he had done before, but as he stepped back slightly and since his balance was still shifting his heel hit a rock, he fell backwards.

While he was falling backwards he let out a small gasp as Kobold passed just over him, the two missing each other by mere inches. The creature had little time to react to Yuril's "intentional" dodge and flew right past him and landed on the ground several feet away on all fours and quickly spun around to face off against him again. He was joined by the Goblin that had momentarily distracted Yuril and the two creatures started to approach him, he rolled over his stomach and quickly pushed himself up off of the dungeon's jagged floor and onto his knees.

The Goblin rushed past the Kobold and broke out of the small formation to attack first and flipped his knife around so that the blade was facing towards the roof, as the Goblin was nearing him Yuril pushed off of the ground and stabbed into the creature's gut. Before the monster could attack him any farther Yuril pulled the blade upwards, increasing the length of the wound from the monster's waist all the way up to his neck before it finally died. He pulled the knife back out of the fresh corpse and it fell to the ground with a squishy thud as a puddle of blood started to form under the dead Goblin.

The Kobold was the next to follow up after the Goblin, making sure to give Yuril no time to recover; it rapidly approached him as the boy backed up and started to slash in his direction. Yuril was able to block the first two slashes but the creature landed its third swipe in the centre of his chest, he had not been overly concerned about the attack as his armour would protect him from any attacks that the monsters on the first floor could deal with him, at least that was what he had thought.

The monster's three claws ripped through his cloak and tore through his armour like it was nothing more than paper, Yuril stumbled backwards for a moment as he gasped as his eyes went wide. He grabbed his chest with his left hand and gritted his teeth against each other to help cope with the pain, repeating the only attack that had seemed to work well for him since he had entered the dungeon. He kicked the beast back to give himself some breathing room. While the Kobold recovered from the blunt attack Yuril brought his left hand away from his chest and his heart dropped deeply upon the sight.

Blood.

W-why is this happening...m-my armour should have protected me better… t-the leather I can understand… i-its claws are sharp... b-but the metal plates in between should have at least b-blocked it….s-so why…

The Goblin took its turn and charged forward, pushing past the still recovering Kobold and Yuril used his right leg to kick it in the side of the head, it fell to the side and its head came into contact with a rough rock and it let out a small screech of pain. "Why… why is this happening to me… i-it wasn't supposed to be like this…" Yuril stuttered out as he noticed the decent sized stain of blood that was slowly seeping into his cloak. Yuril had just decided that he needed to escape the creature and retreat to a decent distance, treat his wounds and have some time to recover his strength before he could hope to kill the creatures.

Then he heard it, the sound he did not want to hear at that moment.

A soft groan behind him, he barely had enough time to turn his head before the green creature that had emerged from the wall leaped onto his back and started to claw and scratch at his upper back and neck. Yuril stumbled around and tried to shake the creature off his back to no avail, unable to rip the creature from his back by spinning around; he quickly came up with a second solution to free himself from the clutches of the Goblin. He turned his back towards the closest wall and ran backwards towards the surface, the Goblin had no time to hop off his back once it realized what he was doing and Yuril slammed its green body against the hard jagged surface. Several sharp rocks stabbed the creature in the back and it let out a scream from the pain and began to struggle more and claw at Yuril, ripping up the shoulders of his overcoat and jacket. Yuril pulled away from the wall for only a moment before slamming back into the wall for the second time, the Goblin let out another scream and squirmed behind him to try and get away from the wall and Yuril.

Yuril stepped away from the wall and the Goblin fell to the ground, he was only able to take a few steps before he was tripped and the view of the tunnel faded and was replaced by the rocky surface of the dungeons floor before his face slammed into the rock. Yuril grabbed his face with both hands as he rolled over onto his back, he had dropped his knife and had no idea of where it had landed. The world around him was spinning as he tried to regain his surroundings, the one remaining Kobold was standing on his wounded chest with its claws raised ready to strike Yuril's face.

The injured Goblin that Yuril had bashed up against the wall that had also tripped him had crawled over and was getting close to his feet.

As the Kobold was about to bring its claws down to attack Yuril he had just enough time to raise his arms up and defend himself, the monster carried on with its assault clawing at his arms relentlessly.

Why…

He felt another swipe rip through his left arm and he buckled slightly under the pressure, blood dripped down from his arms and painted his face with its crimson colour. It stained his white hair with its dominant shade.

"W-w-w-wh-why-y…"

He felt another swipe as he stuttered and tried to speak softly, as he had opened his mouth to talk several drops of blood dripped down from his shredded arms and he tasted his own blood. It tasted salty and dominated his taste buds as he felt another slash which cut through his sleeves and scarred his arms.

"WHYYyyy?!" Yuril roared as several tears leaked from his eyes as he came to realize that he could very well die to the creatures around him, he would die a nobody. He would never get to become a hailed Hero for the citizens of Orario, he would never get to see the deeper floors of the dungeon and the monsters that they held. He would never get to go on a real adventure, instead he would die on the first floor to the weakest monster the dungeon had to offer.

M-maybe this is for the best… I won't be a burden on anyone anymore… Yuril thought to himself as he felt another swipe from the Kobold and he felt something happen to his left leg, he closed his eyes as he could not bring himself to look at whatever was happening to his limb.

B-but Syr… s-she is still in bed probably… what… What if she wakes up in the morning and I am not there with her..? Will… will she freak out and come looking for me…? Or will she just carry on with her life… like nothing ever happened… like… I never existed… Yuril thought to himself as more tears leaked down his cheeks.

N-no… she isn't like that… she would not have done everything that she did for me… if she didn't care… I-I can't die yet… I… I don't want to die! Yuril clenched his hands into fists, he waited until he felt the next slash as his arms that had been torn to pieces and once the attack had passed he pulled his arms down and punched the Kobold in the face once he saw the creature. The punch was enough to make the monster fall to his side for a moment but that only presented him with a second problem.

The Goblin with its jaws in his left leg.

He had not noticed the pain in the heat of the moment but once he saw the sight the pain hit him all at once like a runaway carriage. He let out a small yell of anger as he pulled his right leg up and proceeded to kick the green creature in the face several times in quick succession. Once he had managed to kick the monster several times in the face he was finally able to get free from its grasp and he rolled several feet to the right. He quickly scrambled to his feet and gasped as he felt a sharp pain in his left leg that almost made him collapse as he clutched his left thigh with both hands. Stealing a quick glance downwards he could see several broken shards from the Goblins teeth in his lower leg, while the pain was killing him he had no time to worry about the wound too much in the heat of the moment. If he managed to survive then he could worry about the injury afterwards.

But the wound did limit his options heavily, initially he had only attacked the monsters with the plan of escaping once he had an opportunity to do so without being killed. The wound on his leg however would prevent him from moving at anything more than a quick walk, so he only had one real option left in front of him.

Kill the monsters and pray to the Gods and Goddesses above that he did not run into any other monsters in the dungeon while he escaped and retreated back out of the dungeon. With his mind made up he went about searching for his knife so that he would stand a slight chance against the creatures. He scanned the ground until he caught the glint of the blade several feet away, the only thing in his way was the Goblin that he had slammed up against the wall repeatedly and was barely standing on its own legs.

"You're in my way!" Yuril screamed as he charged forward as fast as he possibly could while trying to nurse his left leg, once he was close enough he kneed the Goblin in the face with his right leg and as it fell backwards he carried on forward passing the creature and grabbing his knife off of the ground with his outstretched right hand.

Yuril took a quick moment to study his knife, the blade was dented in several places from where he had initially blocked the Kobolds attacks and the tip of the knife was bent to the right slightly. But it would work and that was all that mattered to Yuril in the situation that was his own doing.

He turned around to face down the monsters that were now separating him from the exit to the dungeon. If he remembered the map in his grandfather's journal correctly, if he went straight ahead and took the next two right tunnels and then one left he would be back at the spiral staircase.

"I-I refuse to die here! I promised Syr I would make it back and I have no intentions on breaking that promise and dying to some stupid monsters!" Yuril said as he held his knife out in front of him in the direction of the monsters, the pain was starting to get worse in his leg and chest as with each breath he was breathing heavier. Every time he breathed in it was similar to getting punched in the chest repeatedly. With each step of movement of his leg it was as if someone was stabbing it over and over again with a dagger.

The closest monster to him was the Goblin that was still trying to get back up after being kneed in the face by Yuril, against one monster Yuril would stand a far better chance and with the Goblin already heavily injured and on the last legs of its life he settled on attacking the still nearly perfect condition Kobold.

Yuril pushed forwards towards the Kobold and the one remaining Goblin, once he reached the two monsters he punched the Kobold again with his bare fist and despite the fact that it likely hurt himself more than he hurt the creature it did give him enough time to take care of the beast. Yuril kicked the creature in the face and before it could get back up, stomped down on its chest with his right foot, noticing his bloody boot Yuril remembered that the kitchen knife he was clutching in his right hand was not his only weapon.

Yuril quickly tapped his toe on the monster's chest twice and the knife sheathed inside of the black boot shot out and went straight through Kobold's lower jaw and up into the creature's brain. The Kobold had been slain and its arms that were stretched up to try and rip and tear at Yuril's flesh went limp and fell to the ground at its sides. He pulled his foot back and as his foot pressed against the ground for a third time the blade returned to the inside of the boot and Yuril turned on his heels to face his final threat. The only thing left between him and his escape, the remaining green Goblin that was limping towards him.

Both were injured heavily as they limped slowly towards each other for what could very well be each of their final confrontations, the coin was up in the air on who would win and Yuril grit his teeth tightly as they began to draw near each other.

Yuril could see that the monster had several teeth missing from his kick and if it was not pissed off at him before it surely was after the destruction of its perfect smile. Yuril spun the knife around in his hands so that it was backwards, with a single horizontal slash he made the creature blind. The green Goblin had held its arms up to try and block the attack but all that happened was the loss of several of its fingers as they were severed from its palms and fell to the ground at its bare feet. He slashed at the monster's face several more times after the initial cut that ruined the Goblin's eyesight and it started to scratch and swing frantically with its vision gone. Yuril took a few steps to the side as the monster waved its arms around widely, he twisted the knife back around and placed his second hand on the pommel, using all of his force he pushed forward and stabbed the blade into the side of the monster's skull.

After a brief pause that made Yuril slightly panic, thinking that he did not manage to go deep enough and kill the thing, but as he pulled his knife back out of the beast and prepared to stab it again it fell over dead. Its corpse fell forward and landed face first into the stone floor with a rough thud. He had survived, not thrived but he had survived and that was all that truly mattered.