Maruruk's Treasure

Maruruk swung his pickaxe at the crumbling wall, revealing an empty chamber on the other side. He sighed. One of these days, he would find an amazing relic, and finally win Ozen's love and attention. But over the years, he had become more and more discouraged. It seemed to him that he would never be able to do it. Maruruk thought to himself: surely if I uncover something great, Ozen will finally be proud of me.

He was exploring the outer regions of the second layer, searching for shiny relics. His stomach grumbled. Maruruk hadn't eaten the day before as punishment. He put his hand over his stomach and forged onwards, determined not to return empty-handed. The area before had low-grade relics everywhere, but the place he was in right now seemed not to have any relics at all. This didn't make sense; even though this place was popular for raiding, there wasn't any reason for someone to scoop up all the relics around here.

Maruruk heard a low growl behind him. He turned around and was thrown backwards by a flash of red. He was stunned for a moment but was able to see his attacker: A crimson split-jaw! They don't normally go up to the second layer unless they're too weak to go back to their home. Sure enough, this one had a large hole on the side of its head. It would surely die if it went to the third layer in this state, but it still had enough strength to kill him.

He scrambled up, moving to behind a large stone. The split-jaw lunged forward, going around the rock the opposite way to Maruruk. It stood facing Maruruk behind the stone, slowly moving forward. The serpent's presence explained the lack of relics; it was feeding here. Maruruk fumbled, trying to pull out his emergency flare. Finally, he pulled it out, pointing it at the air and pulling the trigger. The serpent immediately jumped to extinguish it; it seemed to understand the flare was a cry for help. In reality, the flare was a distraction, to buy him time to blow on his whistle.

Once it had gulped down the flare (somehow unaffected by its fire) it turned back, this time wasting no time to attack. It flew downwards, mouth open, directly at Maruruk. Maruruk closed his eyes, and formed a ball, waiting to get eaten. After a few seconds of a surprising lack of excruciating pain, Maruruk opened his eyes and looked up. He saw Ozen standing, watching the serpent fly away. She looked at Maruruk. He fainted from the excitement.

A few hours later...

Maruruk slowly woke up and noticed that he was in bed. He looked up and almost shrieked when he saw Ozen by the bed. She said, "Lie back down, Maruruk, you're still weak". He did as he was told. It was usually difficult to tell what Ozen was thinking, but right now, it seemed as if she was almost worried.

Before Ozen got angry, Maruruk confessed; "I'm sorry, Ozen, I didn't bring anything back".

Ozen looked thoughtful for a moment. "No, I'm sorry, Maruruk. I'm sorry I wasn't clear". Maruruk looked confused.

"What I mean is, the point of you going out to hunt for relics wasn't so that you could bring them back to me. I never cared about those relics" she started to explain.

"What do you mean?" Maruruk asked.

She paused. "What I mean is that my real treasure was here all along, Maruruk" she said.

"W-what?" stammered out Maruruk, tearing up.

"Ever since Lyza left, I've been lonely. None of the other raiders ever made me feel as though I once have felt. Except for you, Maruruk. You've been like a son I've never had" Ozen said. Maruruk would later swear that he saw a tear forming on the side of her eye.

She immediately got up. "Now... Get well soon, we have things to do" she said, her voice quivering, and then left.

Maruruk sat, without a word.

The End.