Point-of-View: Izzozon

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"Hey, do you think he’ll get morning wood right as he’s about to wake up?"

"Huh? What? Why do you keep talking about his penis?" I responded in bemusement.

"Oh, I’ve always liked dirty jokes and innuendos...though, I haven’t spoken like this in years, so it’s like a dam had broken and it’s all flooding out now. I mean, it’s not like you can have a casual conversation with a man who enslaved you and raped you on a near-constant basis, as well as renting you out to other men for further rape and abuse," She replied with a laugh, but I didn’t miss the dark, bitter look of pain in her eyes.

A few hours have passed now, we were seated by a wall in the corner of the cavern, with Larrk still unconscious. His breathing and heartbeat sound pretty stable, so I don’t think there’s anything to worry about.

The amount of blood he lost was more than enough to be fatal for most humans, so it’s not unexpected that he’d been out cold for a while as he recovers.

I’ve been speaking with Lumena while we’ve been waiting for Larrk to wake up, and just like she did now, she’s been making jokes about her time as a slave repeatedly. She’s a bit like Larrk, hiding her true feelings behind an act. Though the context is different, it’s the same thing...

"Hey, are you trying to minimize your suffering? Or rather, trying to convince yourself it wasn’t as bad as it actually was? Every time you joke about it, I can hear your heartbeat quickening and your voice trembles a bit. It’s similar to what happens when humans feel anxious or scared. I can’t claim to understand what you’ve been through, so maybe I don’t have any right to say this, but...it doesn’t seem like trying to downplay what you went through is helping you. It seems more like you’re hurting yourself when you do that," I remarked bluntly.

"I-I...I know that, okay? But what the fuck else am I supposed to do about it, huh? For about half my life, I was a slave...I was beaten for amusement, raped over and over, used as a tool in battles, and thanks to the slave collar, I couldn’t even end my own suffering, no matter how fucking badly I wanted to. And now...I’m free again. I’d given up on that possibility, I’d resigned myself to being a slave for the rest of my life, at the mercy of someone else until I outlived my usefulness and ended up discarded.

I don’t-...I just don’t know what I’m supposed to do now, or how I’m supposed to act. And worst of all...I’m afraid. I’m scared that I can’t survive on my own, as a free woman...I’ve been a slave for so long, with no will of my own, everything I did was at the command of someone else. I wasn’t allowed to have an opinion of my own, I never had a say in anything, I couldn’t even think for myself.

Or rather, I just stopped bothering with it. There was no point in having my own opinions or putting my own thoughts into anything. At most, I’d wallow in my own misery, feeling sorry for myself. And now, I’m free again, I don’t belong to anyone anymore.

And as a result, my mind is a complete mess...I’m struggling to make any decisions on what I should do now, and no matter how hard I try to distract myself and think, I keep getting flashes of my time as a slave, which brings my thoughts to a halt. All I can think to say are vulgar obscenities, words of no real consequence. Fuck...talk about pathetic, huh?" She turned her gaze to the ground with a broken, bitter smile.

"No, I wouldn’t call that pathetic. I know much someone’s mind can get warped by the circumstances, though in my case, it was a pretty different scenario to yours. For about two centuries, I lived in isolation, doing absolutely nothing and just feeling sorry for myself the whole time."

"Wait, two whole centuries? Uh, exactly how old are you? Well, never mind that...you seem like you’re a pretty good headspace despite going through that, though," She responded as she glanced at me.

"Well, yeah, but that’s only because of my friends. Hey, I just got a great idea! You should join our group...if you go back to the Light Continent, they’ll probably try to enslave you again. And this Dead Zone place looks like a real dump, and the people in the Dark Continent are fighting amongst themselves, so I doubt they’d be too welcoming to any outsiders. So, join us...I’m sure the others would be fine with that too," I offered with a grin.

"That...doesn’t sound too bad, actually. Hm, it might be my only option, in fact." 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

"Well, it’ll probably take us at least a few days to get out of this Labyrinth, so you can decide after we’re back outside. You’re free now, so it’s your decision to make," I remarked with a smile.

"Yeah...yeah, you’re right. Okay, then, I’ll-...," She began, before trailing off as dazed groan echoed out.

"Where am I...? What happened?"

"Larrk! You’re finally awake! I’m so glad!" I grinned as I hopped onto my feet and bounded over towards him.

"Izzy, that you...?" He muttered with a weary look in his eyes, before his gaze widened slightly, "Wait, I remember now...if you’re back to normal, then that means it worked. Huh...I’m kinda surprised that I’m still alive..."

"I’m so sorry...I almost killed you. I don’t remember any of it, but Lumena told me what happened. She’s also the one who healed you," I informed him.

"So, that’s what happened. You don’t need to apologize, Izzy...if it wasn’t for you, we’d all be dead regardless, so thanks. And thanks to you too, Lumena, I owe you one," He said to her gratefully.

"Er, no, don’t mention it...aren’t you gonna complain that I didn’t help out much? You saw me down in the shadows, hiding, didn’t you?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah, I did...nah, I’m not gonna complain about that. I mean, you don’t really know is, so you had no reason to put your life at risk to help us. I’d have probably done the same in your shoes, so it’s all good. I must’ve been out for a while, I bet...we should get moving, there’s no telling how many days it’ll take to get out of here," He sighed as he got back on his feet.

"Hm...no morning wood, huh? Maybe it’s because you’re low on blood," She responded as she glanced down at his body.

"What? Oh, shit, my clothes...!" He blurted out in alarm, before swiftly opening a portal and dropping into it in an instant, the portal closing up as he disappeared into it with an embarrassed look on his face...

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