My Black Arse in a Beast World

More than life

Having been given the opportunity, Denise immediately started.

"What the hell are you?" the question came slow, each word well articulated, "what do you want from me? Are you trying to eat me or something? Am I the only one that can hear you? And most of all, why do you keep creeping all up on me, asking me to speak? That's just freaky, man." By the time she got to the last question, she was literally rapping out the words.

Excited laughter and animal noises erupted behind her, seeming beyond euphoric.

"There's always a price to pay for knowledge of anything," surprisingly, the creature actively replied, "some give crystals, some cores, others power and most, their own lives. It doesn't matter what the means or the object is, in the end, a debt must be paid."

Denise replied, "listen, I didn't come here with any money so..."

"Money?" it quizzed then mumbled to itself, "where have I heard that before. I'm not forgetful, you know. I never forget."

"It's like, what people use to pay for stuff," Denise shuffled, pulling her knees to her chest and occupying as little space as she possibly could, "you're not going to ask me to pay with my life or an arm or a pound of flesh or anything like that, are you?"

Clearly, Denise was trying to avoid the issue of using her life in exchange for any kind of information.

"My darling, if your life was what I wanted, I would have already taken it."

That statement should have put her at ease, but somehow, it was failing completely.

"Life is only a small part of what creation is, a small part of what you can be. I want. all. of. you."

"Why do you want me?" Denise was failing to understand the bounds of whatever the creature was saying.

Whatever it wanted from her, it must be hard to attain. So until the creature was able to easily attain it, Denise could consider herself safe.

"Who else could there be," it asked, "there is none like you and therefore, it can only be you."

"And if there's someone else like me?"

"Then one of you is useless to me, one of you will die," it said simply.

Denise only sighed. What could she do about the matter of death? It seemed everywhere she turned, there was something that wanted to kill her.

"Then why is the wolf still alive?"she asked, "do you want all of him too?"

"So, it's true. There's a wolf in my forest. What a nuisance!" There was a significant tag of irritation in the voice.

Denise immediately concluded that the creature was not able to detect the wolf. Whatever it was the wolf was doing, he was completely safe.

"What are you?" Denise went back to her original question.

She hadn't let her guard down while dealing with the creature. It was just that she didn't have many options for survival and so had to act as natural as possible instead of running like she usually did.

"I refuse to believe that we are any different. After all, you, as well, are here to collect a debt."

Denise immediately wanted to ask the creature to open its eyes. In what way were they the same? It only came out at night and devoured all kinds of living things. It seemed to have some form of power while Denise had none of those.

"Collect what? There's nothing I want from here."

"If there's nothing you want, then why not leave."