A shock bolted from within his chest and traveled to any of the corners of his body it could get used to. It wasn't until it reached his brain that he sprang up and gathered what was going on.
At first, his vision was blurry. The already dark world around him didn't make it any better for his eyes to get used to it, slowly zooming in and out of focus until he was able to see his shaking hands.
"Fuck, what happened?" He scrambled around the room until he saw a dim light above what he assumed was the door he'd come from. "How did it…" Throwing the question out of the way, he stood up, falling back down immediately, and held his side.
"Damn it, just a little more". He scrambled for anything around to help him, like shored fish looking for its precious ocean. It wasn't until his hand landed on what felt long and rough that he managed to get on his knees.
"What happened to me?" Something was missing, something gray and blotchy, something he could absolutely not forget. Yet, his years went nowhere; he couldn't remember a thing, and panic swept into his stomach.
"Monster!" He yelled, adrenaline pumping through his body, giving him enough strength to stand.
"Monster! What the hell is happening to me!" He tugged and tugged against the hair on his skull until they were on the brink of tearing.
"Why can't I remember?" The monster's last words rang through his head, find the double doors and knock thrice.
"Double doors," He hurried out of the room, grabbing the torch with him. "Find the double doors and knock three times".
Eve… Eve that name, the face, the same face as someone else. There was something he needed to do, something he needed to do in this moment; only he could do it. What was that something? He'd repeat the question, gnawing at whatever the root of the problem connected to, and yet nothing,
"Double doors".
It all seemed so endless, that light so sparse, unforgiving dancing only where it wanted to, not where he needed. Double doors, where were these double doors? Three knocks. Three knocks. Not more than three. Find the monster. Find i—.
A searing heat torched the back of his neck.
He turned around, throwing his arm forward. The heat followed him anyway. There was nothing there.
Creak. Crack. Snarl. The noise went away. He turned back, the torch's flame following with him.
Creak. Crack. Snarl. The noise went away. He stayed still, his eyes following nothing but the darkness filling in gaps, attempting to understand anything.
Creak. Crack. Snarl. It was large.
Creak. Crack. Snarl. It was everywhere.
"Another one". It could talk.
Gryce shot back, freezing in place as the smell of tree sap intruded on his nose. In and out. With shaky nerves, he watched as the flame danced in such a way that it provided a glimpse of what was ahead of him. That was unnecessary. This time, his eyes didn't need to fill in the gaps as its bright white teeth shone like moonlight. For the first time, he could see what was around him, and he wanted nothing more than to never see it again.
"Another one." With clenched teeth, the beast spoke again, its bulbous body shaking with excitement.
"Another one." A confusing mess of humanoid characteristics was littered across its body. Its color was so recognizable, like any other person from the mainland, maybe even the same anatomy, but it was wrong, malformed.
"Did you just get here?" Its hands large and strong, rubbing its knuckles together in symphony with its swaying hips and dangling member.
Gryce stepped back, his body shaking uncontrollably. What the hell is this thing? I don't know. I don't know. He took another step back, frantically looking for any escape. With the brief look he got behind him, the hallway bent left. Maybe I coul—
The monster took a step with him, the floorboards creaking under its weight.
"I'm not like the rest of them. I'm like you".
"What?" Gryce said in a panic, taking another step back.
"I'm just like you, you're from the mainland, aren't you?"
"That doesn't make sense".
"Sure it does. We look similar, don't we? Even in the slightest way, you can tell, can't you?"
"No, no, that doesn't make sense. Stop talking and get away from me!" Gyrce drew the torch closer to the monster's face, and in an instant, its gums shifted over its teeth, and the hallway grew dark once again as the sounds of its whining and stomping grew further until it abruptly stopped.
Its teeth burst from the darkness once again.
"Your little whore of a daughter is rotting in her casket".
Gryce's body stiffened.
"The casket broke, and the black and red worms got to her first. You know what those are, don't you, Gryce?"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"I heard her last breath twice. Do you want to hear it? Do you want to hear what she pleaded for while dirt swallowed her up?"
"Stop talking." He dropped to his knees.
A foreign noise erupted from the monster's body, like the sound of crunching leaves but in a constant, only stopping once its mouth opened and a woman's voice leaked from within. Slowly, her voice built up, starting only as grunts and murmurs, and then burst into a manic scream that shook the foundation of the building.
"Eve?!" Gryce shot up. "Baby?"
Cracking wood pierced through her shrieking wails as the sound of fists striking against something hard pierced through. She was trying to get out, dirt had already begun to seep inside, and there wasn't enough time.
"Dad, help!"
"God, not again!" Gryce threw the torch away and covered his ears. "God, please don't tell me!"
A large boom stopped her screams, and for a moment, he recognized she had a burst of panic as she put all her effort into making that hole bigger.
"Please, please, just a little bit more. Dad, help!" Waves of heavy dirt would have continued to flow into her wooden prison, pressing against her chest, and it would start to close in on her. A dark, coarse enemy that would fill her lungs until she would suffocate with her last words being,
"I'm sorry." At the end, she didn't scream, as the only thing she could do was silently weep, as for a second time her life would come to an end. Her last thought of a hero that'd never know of her end and never know that even as she suffocated, she still held hope that her father would come and rescue her.
"That's not true," Gryce murmured. "That's not true!"
The monster laughed through clenched teeth. "Cheap wood. Dark sky. Bad rain. You remember that day, don't you?" His heart stopped. "He warned that buying cheap wood could potentially lead to unfortunate circumstances, but, no, you wanted your precious daughter to be buried next to her mother, a fitting end to your strain of ilk".
He was sure of it; he wasn't sure how, but he could see it from afar. That contempt, that somehow the mere sight of him was worthy of scorn, him in particular, no one else. As there is no bigger stain on this world besides the grieving father who wanted nothing more than to start over. The curse wasn't over.
"What are you? Why are you doing this?"
For the first time, the monster took a moment to respond, its small,l unwavering eyes glued on him. It felt nostalgic.
"Your blood—"
A flash of light made every corner of the hallway a pulsating source of blindness, causing the monster to shriek. Gryce closed his eyes; even a second of staring into the light blinded him briefly.
"Begone!" It was the voice of the first monster. "Even in these harsh lands, your kind still stands as the pinnacle of depravity. As curious as I am as to how you've arrived, this realm does not need your interference". Its shrieking grew louder by the second, an amalgamation of hundreds, if not thousands, of voices combined into a horrid melody.
As the last remnants of the monster's voice echoed through the vacant halls, cutting through the hodgepodge of voices, there was not one but two that, in the end, Gryce recognized. Evette was there too.