Mythical Artifacts

Chapter 10: Inner Conflict

I entered the spacious room of my house, having just returned from the Bedwars game. I looked around, but nobody was there: sunlight shone through the window, and the room had its homely scent, but it still felt empty with only the plain shelves, unoccupied kitchen area, and the quiet atmosphere.

I figured that my team had probably come back to my house after dying and was now on the top floor. I walked up the stairs and found that, indeed, they were all there, sitting around the table which was littered with papers. "Hi guys," I said reticently. At the sound of my voice, they all eagerly stood up.

"Did you get it?!" asked Melon, posing the question that all of them were probably thinking.

"What happened after I died?" asked Ferbooper. "Was it a hard battle? Did you win?"

"It was actually . . . an interesting thing that happened," I said thoughtfully. "I'm still surprised how it went."

"How did it go, then?" asked Mine casually, laying back on the couch.

I said nothing; instead, I looked at each of them. I still haven't been honest with them, I thought to myself. They don't truly know why I want The Sword. I knew I had to tell them, though. I couldn't just keep The Sword for myself and refuse to tell them anything — not after they helped me get it in the first place.

They continued talking to me — telling me to explain — but I ignored them as I tried to piece together what I was going to do next. Surely I couldn't just demand the staff to give me information in return for The Sword, because they would just be able to take it from me. Wait . . . I'm such an idiot! I thought. How in the world did I think this was going to turn out?! I put my hand to my forehead, frustrated at my stupidity.

"FLAWED!" one of them screamed, which snapped me out of my thoughts.

"Alright, alright!" I said, raising my hands. I inhaled, wondering if this would be the conversation to unveil my real intentions for getting the mythical weapon I currently had in my possession. "Well . . . we didn't fight," I said.

"Y-you didn't?" said Melon. "Then what did you do?"

"Right after you died, Ferbooper," I said uneasily, "I snatched The Sword before she could get it herself . . . but we didn't have a battle or anything."

"Then what happened?!" asked Ferbooper. "Flawed, just tell us."

"Well . . . she asked me why I wanted The Sword," I said. I walked around subconsciously, thinking back to what had happened. "I didn't want to answer so rashly, so I asked her why she wanted it. She answered, and I said that I had the same reason."

"There's really only one reason to want it, though," said Typo. "Kinda redundant if you ask me."

I stopped pacing and looked at him. Only one reason to want it, I thought. No matter how obvious it seemed to me, they didn't understand. I wasn't even sure if they needed to know, as I had no idea how I would get information from staff anyway. I just have to wait, I concluded, but I still felt anxious about it.

"We talked about it some more," I said, continuing the story, "and she eventually told me to keep The Sword for myself. I didn't want to keep it, but in the end, I—"

"You didn't want it!?" said Melon. The rest of them seemed surprised as well.

"—conceded and told her I would hold onto it," I said, ignoring his interruption. "She then jumped off the void and I was soon teleported back to the lobby."

"So you have it?" asked Typo.

I slowly took out the Mythical Artifact from my inventory and held it out to my right. "Yes, I have The Sword," I said. They all seemed relieved that I had not come back empty-handed. Not one of them tried to take it from me, either, which I felt grateful for.