A large Fruit of a Plant of the Gourd Family with smooth green Skin, red Pulp, and watery Juice

Everyone that spots this man immediately averts their gaze, so as not to incur his ire.

No one wants to see if he is as capable with that large sword hanging from his belt as he seems. For seem capable, he most definitely does. He carries himself with a certain confidence, most likely because he sees everyone down here as inferior to himself, both in terms of skill and station.

Every single stud on his leather armour reflects a bit of the dim torchlight, weaving together a constellation of wandering lights that practically demands the eye’s attention. Yet alas, just like if one were to look too long at the sun, to look at him too long would certainly invite disaster.

I've certainly learnt my lesson, so I keep my gaze low, watching him only from the edge of my vision. His head turns slow and deliberate, surveying our alcove. As he looks vaguely in our direction, he stops. And to my dismay, it starts heading straight for us.

He towers over us, looking down where we sit on the ground, Eleanor bent carefully over my left hand. Everyone's eyes are now on us.

"It's way too dark down here to be sure, but I think it's one of those two. But which one is which?"

He is more musing to himself rather than talking to us. Best to stay silent.

The sound of him slowly unsheathing that sword of his sends a shiver down my spine. With the tip of the blade, he forces my chin upwards until I’m practically forced to meet his gaze. I still try my best to look away.

"Young mountain elf, brown hair going down to the shoulders. Eyes... Look at me!"

The steel grazes the skin of my neck as he yanks it further upwards still. Eleanor must be furious, judging by the way she's squeezing my hand.

"Golden eyes. Must be the one."

He's after me? Why?

"You're coming with me."

With his free hand he grabs me by my left shoulder, pulling me roughly to my feet.

"Why are you taking him?!?"

Eleanor cries out at him, all sense of restraint clearly already having left her body. Though just shouting at this man is already very dangerous, I too would like to know what's going on here.

He stops leading me away and looks around for a moment, likely spotting all those intently watching him. He starts loudly proclaiming:

"Listen closely, all of you wretches! We know some among you conspire to rebel. This—"

He appears somewhat unsure how to continue for but a moment, his eyes narrowing as they linger on me in confusion.

"This 'elven child' knows where these dissidents have hidden themselves, and we will torture that information out of him. Count your days in terror, for none of you guilty will escape the sword."

What? They know? How?

Did someone rat me out after the raid? The humans shouldn't know what I look like; the cloak obscured everything but my eyes. A rat, then? Someone on the inside? The elves should be too proud to even consider working with any human, much less the overseers.

A mystery for another day; I need to solve the problem at hand. I don't want to get tortured. If I don't dispose of this man right now, I am doomed.

I've got no weapon; he's got an imposing longsword. I've got no armour; he has a set of formidable studded leather. And to top it all off, he's holding me tightly with his left. How do I turn this awful situation around?

Almost like he can sense I'm starting to plot against him, he presses his sword to my neck. Shit.

Eleanor, in a motion as quick as lightning itself, draws a dagger from somewhere below her shirt and starts advancing on the man currently threatening my life. She deftly strikes for a gap between his armour, yet stops shortly before she hits her mark.

For I am used as a living shield, the man placing me between her blade and himself.

"Coward!"

Eleanor pulls back, barely out of his range. He replies, his voice calm and certain:

"I am many things, but a coward I am not. I could behead you with my eyes closed."

He tosses me to the side with surprising force, my face hitting the ground. Ouch...

"Witness true skill."

I hear the clash of steel upon steel.

Whether by sheer luck or fate, he's thrown me rather close to where I left my hammer, the one I used with a chisel to work. Better than nothing. I snatch the tool and force myself up, ready to help Eleanor.

As I turn to face them, their battle had already concluded. It can't have been more than a few seconds. But that's all it takes for a life to be snuffed out.

I see Eleanor, her lower body impaled by our opponent's blade. She too stares at the harsh steel piercing her, eyes wide in utter disbelief; it happened too quickly. A single skilful thrust was all it took.

I hear the blood from her open wound dripping onto the floor. Her breaths grow laboured. She attempts to suppress her grunts of pain, but a few escape despite her effort. Her grip on her dagger loosens; it falls to the ground with a jarring sound in this otherwise hellishly silent moment.

She smiles weakly at me, blood spilling from the corner of her mouth. She tries to say something, but nothing loud enough for me to hear comes out.

"You were no match for me."

The guard kicks her off his weapon; her maimed body slams into the floor. Blood starts pooling around her.

My rage overflows. I sprint blindly at him. He turns to face me, assuming his stance.

"ᕓᑊᕋᘯᕮᔕ ᗞᕮ ᘕᖇᑊᔕᘕᕮᔕᔕᕮ, ᑭᖇᕮᘯᕮᓯ ᑕᕮᘕ ᖺᕞᘻᗩᑊᘯ"

Our rage overflows. Thorny vines, not completely unfamiliar to me, shoot up from the hardened salty ground, ensnaring and fixating him on the floor.

He struggles against his restraints, hurting himself in the process but getting no closer to breaking free. As I get on top of him, he stares at me in a strange mixture of awe, shock and fear. Like he had seen a ghost or something similar.

And thus, I got to work.

Did you know that a human head has roughly the same consistency as a watermelon? At least I remember reading that factoid some time ago, somewhere on the internet. Yet I always wondered how true that really is.

There are some similarities certainly: the red interior and somewhat harder shell surrounding it. The amount of water inside might be somewhat similar as well. I think, however, that a human skull would be much more resilient than a melon's green outside shell.

But is using a hammer to split a watermelon as hard as splitting a human head? I don't know; I've never used a hammer to split a watermelon. That is something they do in some eastern country, right? Well, maybe not with a hammer. They must use some other kind of blunt instrument there.

But all blunt instrument work largely the same, don't they? The principle of 'smash thing with rock' has been around as long as humans themselves. Even down here, we use pickaxes to break away at the walls. Then we use a hammer and chisel to break these down even further. Force, if applied patiently, reduces the world to something manageable, after all.

As long as you keep at it with a good pace and steady rhythm, almost anything can be broken down to its smallest parts by hitting it over and over. An axiom that holds true for everything in life, really. The hard, salt-filled rock down here is no exception, and neither are watermelons.

Once one gets into a smooth rhythm, tasks that seemed unachievable before suddenly appear to be within one's reach. Better yet, one might even encourage your fellow man to work hard themselves. We are group animals after all and don't want to be outdone by our peers.

Being admired by others is the core principle of motivation, after all. For why do anything at all, besides live for one's basest of instincts, if there is no one around to envy you for your achievements? Everyone dreams of being cheered on while they fulfil their work.

I am no exception. With every swing at this watermelon, the accompanying cheers coming from those gathered around give me the strength for the next. So I cannot stop, even if I wanted to.

Working isn't about results; it's about giving the impression you've done enough. A performative art, portraying that you've given your daily part of your soul. Whatever gets done during that is secondary at best and meaningless at worst. The performance becomes the thing, and the thing is performed as proof of existence.

So until someone comes up to you, on the verge of collapse, and tells you that you've done enough, you have to keep going. Even if you cannot. Even if no one is watching or cheering anymore. Even if the wounds on your hand open up again. Even if you'd rather kill yourself. You cannot stop!

Your hair grows; you must get it cut. Your teeth grow dirty; you must clean them. You do your work; someone undoes your progress. You must persist in everything, no matter how tedious and meaningless it is. Your true worth as a person only consists of how much meaning you can give the meaningless.

If you can't manage that, you are broken and defective. Better to lock you away and throw away the key, lest you hurt somebody. Or even better yet for everyone involved, you should just kill yourse-

"ISAYAH!"

Isha pulls me back into reality. Into the hellish mines. Into Isayah. How long did I do this?

I look down upon my work; the man apparently no longer possesses a head, with a fine red paste strewn about outward from where it once was. Around me, deathly silence. No one is still down here except me.

I crawl over to Eleanor. Her once oh-so-beautiful blue eyes, which used to sparkle so brightly it almost blinded me, have now lost their lustre. The blood around her is already beginning to dry, the hot environment speeding up that process.

"She's gone, Isayah..."

Holding her in my arms like that, I think I should be crying right about now, but I am not. Why?

I close her eyes.

What do I do now? Why should I even go on anymore? My entire reason for wanting to live in this hellhole was taken from me. Eleanor's dead, and Mother's-

"She's not dead yet. We can save her."

As always, Isha is right. I've got a pretty good idea as to where everyone's gone off to. Once the genie's out of the bottle, it will not go back in, after all...

I scavenge what I can from the scene: my hammer, Eleanor's dagger and a bit of the man's armour. While most of it is clearly too large for me, I manage to fit the bracers and a few other spare parts to my body. I take anything that doesn't impede my mobility, really.

As I turn to leave, I hesitate. I will not leave her down here, in this hellish place. I can place her somewhere until I can bury her, right?

Thus I begin my ascent from this hellish place, with the one I love on my back. This time, however, her usual warmth is gone. And I will never feel it again...