Dungeon Prowler : One Man Army - Chapter 447: Tea and Biscuits

Although the atmosphere did not seem right, Tasha saw the silent determination on Yunan and chose to stay silent, the entity that kidnapped them seemed deranged to a point, rambling all the time about how much fun to be had, about delicious foods and drinks, it seemed that whoever this being was, it was lonely.

It became apparent when they arrived inside the universe, there was no trace of life inside, everything in this place was made of dream energy, no matter how Yunan scanned the universe, there was no trace to be found about any life.

No wonder the light ball was deranged, being alone in the universe of dreams would break any psyche, if one was in a normal universe, he would have the respite of dreams and waking and would still lose some sanity as the years progress, they would forget social skills, language, and many behaviours, resorting to talking out loud to keep themselves company.

Now if we apply the same but everything around is a dream, the deterioration would be much faster and the sanity loss would be near irrecoverable, death by insanity was rare among gods but not as uncommon as death from boredom.

As they traversed the universe Yunan found some answers along the way. From the things he saw and the things introduced by the light ball, this universe had some very unfortunate history.

The ball of light led them to a villa where they were left to their own devices, but as they tried to look around they heard the same voice coming from upstairs.

“Sorry to make you wait, I have not had a guest for so long that I almost did not know which clothes to put on” a cute looking cat 3 feet tall walked upright with a top hat and a monocle, a double-breasted suit and no pants, he looked comical but his demeanour was nothing but, he half pranced half walked to Yunan and Tasha shaking their hands joyously.

“You can call me prince Cattolu, or Catto for short, even Tolu works, just call me anything you like, nice to meet you, welcome welcome, oh where are my manners, shall we have some tea while we talk?” the upright walking cat did not seem to be bothering himself with the idea that Yunan and Tasha would rather leave this place as soon as possible, let alone chat and have tea.

With a wave of his hand, or paw rather, the three of them were sitting in a garden filled with catnip and around a table that had a tea set already set up, the teapot was already streaming, there were no biscuits though, only crumbs left in the plate. Yunan could already guess what kind of tea was in the pot.

“I love this garden, it helps refresh my mind and restore my thinking when I get distracted, help yourselves to the tea, there is no need to feel awkward, act as if you were home, you are my honoured guests after all”. The upright walking cat kept talking endlessly, it had no “nya” in its speech patterns, it was very verbose and had no end to things to talk about, Yunan and Tasha were still debating if they should call the cat him or it.

“Oh right, you already passed the test of another dream god so this should be easy, as per the will if you can pass the test you shall inherit the place, if not, then you can keep trying as long as you keep me company, are you ready to take the test, I must say I will not help you, for I do not know the solution myself” this ended Cattolu’s rants, he looked at the two very keenly.

“You did come here for the test right?” the question was a threat, they had to answer very carefully or be in peril, the upright cat looked like it was waiting for the wrong answer.

“Tourists, we are tourists” Yunan almost stammered before remembering that this thing could read him like an open book, “well, sort of tourists, we are on a mission, and we had come here to replenish the dream energy reserves of our realm, we had no idea that this place existed before, therefore we are not interested in this universe, we have no benefits from causing it harm, as such we hope to leave once our divine realm has recuperated”.

Yunan tried to keep things a bit unclear, he had no choice, telling the truth was redundant and clued the god before them that they knew it can read minds, or whatever its ability is, and lying was just asking for death, being ambiguous was the best choice.

“Yes, yes, how unfortunate, you must take the test once before you can leave this place, those are the rules, the good news is only one of you must take the test, the other is free to leave once the test starts. How terribly sorry I am, I thought you came as challengers, to repent let me serve you some precious and rare biscuits, usually these are for big events but, take it as my apology” the walking cat then walked to some brick in the wall and removed it, behind it was a metal cookie box.

“Alas only three are left, woe is me for failing so miserably and having to apologize, please accept my most precious of belongings”, the cat served one cookie beside each teacup, his shaking arms showed his unwillingness to give away its treasure.

Yunan took the cookie and ate it, although it was old, it was not stale, and had some traces of life on it, this was something made by a living mortal. As to when it was made, he could not tell at all.

Feeling a tinge of guilt as he chewed on the cookie, Yunan felt worse when there were tears threatening to spill from the feline eyes, Cattolu watched Yunan move his jaw as if he was loath to the idea itself.

Seeing this, Yunan cleared his throat and took out a box of cookies and biscuits from the portable home slowly saying, “to forgive mister Cattolu, I have to insist that you share the contents of this box with us, how about that?”.