The world fascinated Grae and fed his endless curiosity.

The leaves swayed, casting strange shadows down on his face. The roots were full of strange mosses that felt like wet fur, and mushrooms that sprouted in the shape of ears, bugs that crawled, birds that hooted, acorns that tasted bitter as his teeth cracked them open.

Everywhere around him there was life.

If water tasted sweet to a man dying of thirst, the world tasted sweet to Grae. The light was almost too much for his old eyes, adapted to the deep gloom of the dungeon. He walked half-blind, breaking branches, stumbling across uneven spots in the ground.

His tall head peered into treetops and disturbed birds as they sat over their eggs. His snuffling nose found rotten apples laying beneath trees, and he happily devoured the pulpy mess of half-fermented fruit.

For Grae, in that moment…

Gratitude. Boundless gratitude for the world.

And as he found a corpse lying under a tree, gratitude that he’d lived long enough to experience it. The bones were old. Moss grew into the eyes sockets and small weeds pushed through the ribcage.

The skull had been crushed in. Grae inserted his finger and wiggled it about, feeling a piece of metal rattle in the hollow space inside. Pulling it out…

Grae found an arrowhead.

This human had been killed by another human.

How strange. Creatures in the dungeon had warred for territory, fought over scraps of meat, but they’d never gone as far as killing one another.

“Humans…”

“Humans aren’t like me. And I’ll never be a human.” He held the rusted, rough-edged metal arrowhead up to the sky; the light glinted on its worn edges. “It would be a mistake to think I’m one of them, even if I have an intellect.”

But…

His route led him towards humanity. He was seeking magic, the lessons of creation. In all Grae’s long memory only humans had ever cast magic; his maker had been magical, yes, but that was not the same thing. It was not something that was learned and passed down in books.

He wasn’t human but he’d need to seek them out.

So Grae sought humanity in the forest.

There were ancient, long-abandoned cabins in the woods. Grae avoided those. They were too clean. The ground around them had been cleared of trees taller than a sapling, as if something massive had been moving in the area.

As if the cabins would pick themselves up and hunt him the moment they sensed prey.

As he walked, ancient machines became clear under the moss. There were ones like insects painted in flaking red paint. They had many legs and long, scythe-like arms, with a strange opening in the middle where Grae found a chair and many rusting levers.

Pushing at the levers of one made the metal insect shudder and shake, and then it fell still again, foul-smelling smoke oozing from the gaps in its armor.

There were machines that looked human. They sat in the fields, not caring at all as moss grew across their bodies. No more alive than the skeletons.

In the distance, above the forest, Grae could see massive machines. Pillars of tall smooth metal rounded at the top, with long wings that extended out into the air. The wings turned slowly in infinite circles, rust flaking from their edges into the wind.

It was clear this land had once belonged to humanity. Heart and soul, this place had been shaped by their clever hands.

What Grae didn’t know is why their own world had turned on them; why houses and cities had come to life to attack their creators.

What a strange way for their world to collapse.

Carrying on, Grae walked through groves where the star’s light sparkled against pools of water contained within the roots of trees…

Glades where the crunch of leaves underfoot mirrored the shushing dance of the branches above, moving in the wind…

He walked for a long time in this unfamiliar world.

And then the sun began to rise.

All this time, Grae had believed the great blue light in the sky was the sun. Now, as it slid away into the distance, the real sun rose. Fiery and yellow and full of hatred for his gray, dungeon-born eyes. The piercing light came over the horizon like an enemy army. It marched through the trees, dispersing the shadows.

Grae groaned. He couldn’t see more than a few feet ahead, the world drowning in gold-colored light. Clutching his hands to his face he stumbled, the hateful star burning at his skin. Small flecks of stone appeared on the backs of his hands and in his coat of fur. They clung to his skin like scabs and began to grow.

This.

This was why no dungeonborn ever ventured past their home.

The hateful sun.

Lifting his nose to the sky with his eyes pinned shut, Grae sniffed at the air. He was searching for the scent of deep places…

For still, stagnant water…

For stones lying in cool shadow…

For mosses and mushrooms and mildew…

His eyes were weak, but his nose was sensitive. Through the riot of smells lingering in the forest, he found what he needed, and dropped to all fours to chase that scent across the earth. The sun beat down upon his back and covered it in stony growths, spreading rapidly now, beginning to encrust his skin.

Grae hurried for cover.

He burst into a chasm of the earth where the rise of a low hill lifted up the roots of an ancient, massive oak tree. Between those roots was a doorway into the earth, a tunnel mouth sloping down into the subterranean spaces beneath the forest.

Squeezing his way inside, Grae breathed a sigh of relief as the cool darkness of the underground welcomed him home.