Onestop Shop: Daily Short Stories

Day 1: Free to Fail

After walking past a blood-stained treasure chest and turning the corner, Arlen traced his finger along the streams of blue light which pulsed between the cracks of the decrepit dungeon walls, Ike, and the other party members, followed closely behind. Arlen looked down at his gauntlet, a screen projected from it was at 10 minutes and counting down, Arlen then looked back at the group, counting their heads, "3 ... 4 ... where's Sylva?" Ike frantically spun around.

"She was here just a second ago!" he said. Arlen gave Ike an unamused look.

"Here!" Sylva squeaked, the group turned around and saw her head peering out from around the corner. Her arms were full of gold pouches. Arlen moved back to where they came from to see the treasure chest he had just walked past was now open and empty, however, a pair of obsidian black arms reached out from within the chest. The creature, a mimic, grabbed Sylva's ankle, and one of its fingers morphed into a dark strand, crawling up her body, rendering her whole body unable to move.

Arlen unsheathed his sword and shield, severing the spectral hand which grabbed Sylva, but threads of shadow sprouted from the mimic's forearm, reattaching its wrist to its main body. Ike made his way over to assist.

"Maybe I can-" Ike said, but was cut off as Arlen began the slow and arduous task of hacking away at the Mimic's shell. Eventually, the monster was vanquished, though now only 7 minutes remained.

"Well, I wasn't wrong," Ike shrugged. Arlen sighed and raised his eyebrow at Sylva, the bags in her hands thumped to the floor. Arlen pulled Ike over and the group continued walking.

"Seriously? We only have 7minutes left, do you even want to clear this dungeon?" Arlen said. His voice was a sharp, quiet hiss. He pinched the bridge of his nose and exhaled, moving his hand back to the wall.

"It might only be a B-rank dungeon, but it's a new dungeon, and I'm sure we're all just a little nervous. If we wipe I'll treat you to some dragon-turtle pudding again," Ike said, elbowing Arlen. Arlen kept walking, for a moment, the prospect of pudding sweetened the idea of their inevitable failure. Whether it was because Ike wasn't leading properly, Sylva triggered a trap, or for some other reason, they hadn't beaten the dungeon nor even encountered the boss yet. Arlen shook his head.

"Hallow Vale's one and only run still holds the record, and we aren't even on the leaderboards yet." Just once, Arlen didn't want his team holding him back, just once, Arlen wanted to beat Hallowed Vale at something, anything. A-ranks rarely had any need to revisit an already complete dungeon, securing a record above theirs could finally mean dethroning them, to prove that Arlen was a worthy Dungeoneer. Ike's smile vanished and he muttered something, but before Arlen could question him about it, they entered a corridor and the hallway behind them became closed off by a collapsed wall.

In the room were two lagoon-beasts sucking on the wall's blue glow, making their veins pop the same color. They turned around, and their lifeless, large, white eyes protruded in the direction of the party. Ike, Sylva, and the others drew their weapons, but Arlen looked down at the timer again, it read 6 minutes. The lagoon-beasts hissed and lunged, while the other party members all ganged up on one of them, Arlen dealt with the other on his own.

Arlen drew his shield, bashing the creature with it as soon as it attempted to tackle him. Arlen then brandished his blade, his strikes hit their mark but did little more than cause minor flesh wounds, blue goo dripping instead of blood. With each swing of his blade, Arlen watched the timer on his gauntlet tick down, all the way to 5 minutes, only occasionally glancing away from it to look at Ike's squad.

Ike, meanwhile, hid behind his own shield, letting his enemy gnaw at it as he ordered Sylva, holding her twin daggers, to sneak around. Sylva sank her knives into the foe's throat, it flopped around and made odd squelching noises before disintegrating into a pile of scales and gold coins.

4 minutes now remained, however, Arlen didn't hasten his pace. He continued to wrestle with the lagoon-beast until he finally made enough cuts for it to melt into monster materials. Now, only 1 minute remained, not nearly enough time.

"Failed yet again. Well, at least I'm not paying for pudding," Arlen said. He threw his weapons to the ground and crossed his arms. Ike stomped up to him.

"If you're so dissatisfied, then leave."

"Ike, drop it. You aren't thinking straight, I'm the best you've got."

"We aren't good, I get it. Before you joined, we were C-rank. But if what you really want is to make history then why not join Hallowed Vale? They gave you an offer before we even did."

"You knew about that?"

"I'd like to believe that you chose to stay with us because I'm your friend, or because you liked pudding a lot, or any other dumb reason. You'll never get to where you want to be, not if you keep blaming us and not if you stick with this group."

Before the two could finish their conversation, their visions became pure white as they were teleported out of the dungeon.

***

Let me know your thoughts in the comments!

Thank you for reading Day 01 of my Onestop Shop series. This story sucks a lot more than I thought it would, but the good news is this will most likely be the worst one. It took me way longer than it should have I don't even want to admit it, but you gotta start somewhere. I promised myself I would post before bed, and though later than expected, I will sleep with that goal. 

Not all stories will be like this one. Unless I feel like returning to it, all stories will have different characters, genre, theme, tone, setting, plot, etc. All stories will aim to have less than 800 words, though I may go up to 1000-1500 words if I feel like 800 is too restrictive.

The goal of Onestop Shop is to be consistent. I do as little revisions as possible. That being said, I still put my very best into each piece and hope you enjoy the stories. Let me know if there is anything in particular that you enjoyed. Thanks again, and I hope you stick around for this experiment.