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Chapter 01: Why am I in a cell and who is that girl?

  I woke up in the dark. Absolute darkness. My hands were tied behind my back. I tried to stand, but my legs were too weak. My ankles were also bound.

  "Well, that’s a weird hospital," I muttered to myself.

  "Hello? Help? Is someone there?"

  Had I been kidnapped? The last thing I remembered was bleeding out… Maybe they took me after the hospital had patched me up? But that wound couldn't have healed so fast...

  "Nurse? Doc? Kidnapper evil guy? Someone? Anyone? OH, am I dead?"

  Could I really be dead? But why was I naked? DUDE, was I in HELL? WHY? I was so good! Come onnn. What if death is just this? A dark room by myself, for eternity. Oh no, no, no, that's actually pretty scary. It's kinda cold, though. And humid. Shouldn't hell be... I don't know... hot?

  Then again, why would the afterlife match up with what I thought it was, right?

  Okay, I’m getting sidetracked. Occam's razor: the simplest explanation is preferable. So... naked, alone in a dark room, and shackled. Oh, wait. Am I... did someone drug me and...? My grandma always said I was a handsome young man... but what about the whole stabbing episode from before? No way a drug would make me hallucinate on THAT level, would it? Or maybe they want my body, like, in a literal sense? Organ trafficking? That makes more sense. Am I missing a kidney? That could maybe explain the whole stabbing content of the hallucination — dreams could have some correlation to the physical state of the body. Did they drug me and open me up? I do feel some pain, but not enough. Am I still under the effects of anesthesia?

  ...

  Yeah, now that I was thinking this through, this was terrifying, and I felt like pissing my pants. I didn't know where I was, but this wasn't normal. I should take this seriously.

  Feeling the rope binding my hands, I realized that the knot was well made, too well made to be a prank or a misunderstanding. The problem was with my ankles, though. From the sound of it, they were chained to the walls with metal chains. I'd probably need a key for them.

  My senses felt torpid. I couldn’t see or hear much... I had been drugged; there was no mistaking it. Still, the silence and darkness were excessive. I was probably underground or in an extremely isolated place — no crickets chirping, no wildlife noises, no howling wind... nothing. No windows either. This was some type of underground jail, most definitely. The floor under my feet felt like rough, unpolished stone, and there was no distinct smell other than stale, dusty air.

  Should I shout? Yes, I decided. No point in staying silent.

  "HELP, HELP. SOMEONE HELP. I AM DOWN HERE. SOMEONE!!"

  ...

  After a good session of crying for help, I perked my ears to see if I could detect something. Silence. Absolute, unnerving silence. Why? Soundproof room? Unlikely. I needed to escape; the sooner, the better. Either no one could hear me down here, buried under meters of solid ground, or they weren’t coming on purpose. Besides, something told me that staying here was not a smart plan at all.

  Coming to a decision, I directed my attention to the only prop in the room: the chair. There had to be something I could do.

  I started examining it, mostly by touch, however limited it was. Since each of my feet was bound by a different chain that connected to opposite walls, I had little space to maneuver. There was nothing particularly interesting about it, but I really hoped it had what I was looking for. If it was 100% wood, I would have to come up with another plan.

  Moving my weight around and making a weird pendular movement, I managed to fall to the ground without hurting myself. Perfect.

  Now on the floor and with my hands behind my back, I moved the chair around and turned to face it. There! Under the chair, four nails held parts of the chair together. Thank goodness. Memorizing their location, I again turned and reached with my hands. Urgh, this would be much easier if my arms weren't tied behind my back, I thought.

  Feeling one of the rusty nails, I tried to pull it, move it, maybe wiggle it. Nothing; it was too tight.

  I had to break this chair; it was my only option. I shifted my body weight, pressing down hard on the legs, practically laying across it. Finally— 'crack'. One of the legs snapped. I paused to let out a relieved sigh and continued working. Now with a pointy nail sticking out of the chair frame, I started rubbing the rope against it. I hope this doesn't take all day.

  After quite a while, I managed to free my hands.

  Now for my feet.

  With my fingers, I examined the cuffs by touch: two keyholes, one on each cuff. I glanced around the dark room.

  "I don’t suppose the key’s just lying around here somewhere, is it?"

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  Yeah, tough luck. Refocusing, I put my now-free hands to work, breaking the rest of the chair apart and freeing two bent nails. They weren’t perfect, but they’d have to do — wasn't exactly full of options here.

  Now for the hard part of the plan: I had to lockpick these cuffs using these two rusty nails. Was it possible?

  No idea. Frankly, this was the only plan that had come to mind so far.

  I was pretty sure that to open a normal lock, you just needed to lift some pins inside, apply pressure, and then twist, right? Sounded easy enough.

  "You can do this, Rio," I said out loud, trying to cheer myself up.

  *********

  I couldn’t. I didn’t know how long it had been—didn’t exactly have a clock here—but I had been trying for what felt like the better part of an hour. Honestly, I wished I had paid more attention to those lockpicking tutorials on the internet back then...

  This might be impossible with only two nails, I thought. Taking out the remaining ones from the chair and spending some precious energy bending them, I started working again. No success. I couldn't even fit all of them in there at the same time. Did this work more like a police handcuff and less like a padlock? How was I supposed to... Ugh, not good. I could feel myself slightly panicking, the blood rising to my face. Stopping and focusing on my breathing for a few moments, I calmed myself down. I needed to focus, not panic.

  Should I try yelling again? No, too risky now. If someone came and saw that I got my hands free, I might get in trouble. Should I cut myself somewhere? Use blood to ease my way out of these cuffs? Was that even possible? If the sweat wasn't helping, then I wasn't sure blood would be effective. Forget it; it didn't seem like a viable solution anyway.

  Looking around the dark room, my eyes paused on the broken chair's leg. This was it. I'd been too tunnel-visioned; too focused on that dumb lockpicking idea. I shouldn't have restricted myself to finesse when brute strength was also an option.

  A plan formed in my mind. Checking the chains connecting to the cuffs, I realized, unfortunately, that there was no way I'd have enough strength to break a normal chain link. They were too sturdy. I would need a tiny bit of luck to escape.

  After picking up the wooden chair leg, I gathered all the straight nails and started examining the chain links more closely. I was betting on at least one of them being too old. From the feel of the ground and the smell of the air, this place was ancient — abandoned. There had to be a way to exploit that somehow: a rusted component, a damaged part, anything.

  A while later, I'd found a promising target. One link had a tiny chink on it, a faint crack along its surface. Putting one of the nails against the weak spot, I got the wooden leg and started hammering away with all my strength.

  'Bang, bang, bang...'

  "Man, this is going to take a while."

  *****

  One hour of constant hitting later... 'Clack'. YES. Finally! Just when I was about to give up and start thinking of another method, one of the links got deformed enough that it snapped. My right leg was free, and I could move around the room. I suppressed a shout of joy that threatened to burst from my throat and let out a sigh of relief instead.

  "Okay, first one down, another one to go."

  Moving to the other chain, I examined it closely. It connected directly to the wall and didn’t seem very sturdy. After spotting a promising weak link, I went back to grab the nails and one of the chair legs. Using the wood as a makeshift hammer, I hammered away until I heard that blissful "clack" again. Yeah, that’s my new favorite sound.

  With both legs free — though the ankle cuffs were still there — I paced around the room. It was empty, with nothing noteworthy on the walls. The ground, however, was littered with dried bloodstains, especially near the corners. "Not creepy at all," I murmured. Leaving was certainly the right decision; all evidence pointed to this place being a torture chamber of some sort.

  I turned my attention to the steel door behind me. It looked heavy and old, just as I imagined a solitary confinement door would. Testing my luck, I pushed it open and realized it was... open?

  Weird. After taking a deep breath, I peeked through the narrow opening. A gray wall loomed right in front of me. Glancing around, I saw that I was in a dimly lit corridor. I stayed still, straining to hear any sounds. Nothing. It seemed I was alone.

  Looking around once more to be sure, I opened the door wider and stepped into the hallway. It was time to make a decision: right or left?

  I took a right and started walking, being careful to make as little noise as possible. The hallway was cold, but considerably more humid than the chamber I was in. As I moved through the darkness, chains dragging on the ground, I spotted a heavy steel door to my right.

  Another cell, I thought to myself. Should I open it?

  There could be someone trapped in there. The safest option was probably to ignore it and continue, but... I had to check, just in case.

  Besides, I could be wrong — this could be the way out.

  My ear pressed against the cold, dirty door. Silence. I couldn't hear a thing.

  Slowly, I opened and peered inside the cell.

  There was someone in there, chained, bloody back facing the entrance. Oh God, what is happening?

  "Hey," I whispered from the entrance. No response. The girl hung limply in the center of the room, her limbs bound by chains and her head drooping low. Manacles suspended her by the wrists, while her knees rested against the ground.

  "Hey, can you hear me?" I repeated. Not good. She was too unresponsive — no twitching, no signs of life.

  I stepped into the room and walked towards her. Had she been whipped? Tortured? The ground was painted red, and the smell inside was absolutely vile. I walked towards her and called out.

  "Hey, hello? Are you okay? Can you hear me?"

  Again, no response. I examined her bindings. Same style as the ones on my feet. I could probably break hers using the same method.

  Should I go back and grab the nails?

  I quickly doubled back, deciding it was worth the hassle and took everything: rope, nails, and a chair leg.

  While walking back through the dark hallway, however, I started pondering: Should I really waste my time on this random girl? I am not going to be able to carry her, and if she doesn't wake up...wait... damn it, I forgot to check her pulse. Is she even alive?

  Quickly, I retraced my steps and entered her cell again. Putting two fingers on the side of her neck, I clumsily searched for a pulse.

  "Oh, thank God." She was alive.

  Actually, I should've checked if she was breathing first, probably faster.

  I took some distance and looked at her. Her hair was in an irregular buzz-cut and she was visibly hurt, covered in slashes and purple bruises. What had they done to this poor girl?

  A chill crept up my spine. Urgh, everything was still so confusing. I was stressed and scared and... and a thousand other things, all mixed and jumbled together.

  But I had to decide.

  What do I do? Do I help her?

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