Monster Mansion 2 by Dante King (most interesting books to read TXT) 📕

She nodded.

“Feels good, right?”

She nodded again.

“You’re doing great. Now, I want you to stick your hand out. Just lift your hand and put it out the door. Let’s see what happens.”

“Just my hand?”

“Just your hand,” I said reassuringly.

She lifted her hand, extended one finger, and carefully pushed it past the doorway, out into the outside world.

Nothing happened.

Kyrine’s face brightened, and the fear seemed replaced by excitement for a moment. “It works!” she said. “Look, Jeremy, it works!”

With rising confidence, she pushed her whole hand out, then her arm. She turned it around in the open air outside.

“See?” I said. “Nothing goes wrong! The grounds are yours, Kyrine, the grounds and the outside of the mansion are all yours. I understand not being able to set foot outside the grounds, but within them you should have free access.”

“It’s just… it’s not done. A dungeon avatar does not set foot outside the confines of her walls.”

“Well, things are changing. Maybe the old rules don’t apply anymore?”

“Maybe…” she admitted.

I stepped outside and turned to face her, extending my arms. “Come on,” I said. “Give it a try.”

She took a deep breath, screwed her eyes shut for a moment, and then did the thing she had thought was impossible. She stepped through the doorway, out into the open air.

As her foot touched the ground outside the mansion, something did happen. We both felt it. There was a noise, a vibration like a giant string being plucked. The whole world seemed to waver just for a moment, then it was still again.

“I did it! Jeremy, I did it! I’m outside!” She hugged me tightly, and I spun her around in my arms. We heard a sudden cheering and applause from the entrance hall and looked back to find the agents all standing in the hall clapping and cheering.

“Amazing, Kyrine!” said Astrid. “I didn’t know you could do that!”

“Neither did I!” said Kyrine. “I didn’t believe I could, and so I wasn’t able to, but look! Here I am!”

“It makes sense that a dungeon avatar can’t get too far from her core,” I said thoughtfully. “At least, it makes sense that she wouldn’t want to. But we’re in a new age of dungeons now, and I guess the old rules just don’t apply as they used to. It’s our job to test the new rules, don’t you think?”

“I do,” said Kyrine. “It’s because I have such a good keeper that I’m able to do this, Jeremy, I’m sure of it.”

“Come on, let’s have a walk around the grounds,” I suggested. “Do you want to try?”

“Yes,” she said with a determined look on her face. “Let’s try.”

I led the way, with Kyrine keeping her arm linked through mine. Amanda, Belinda, Selena, and Astrid followed us at a respectful distance, talking quietly amongst themselves.

At first, Kyrine was a bit wary, but as we moved through the grounds, she became bolder. We did a full circuit of the mansion, wading through tall grasses and looking up at wild, overgrown trees. Everywhere we went, we found what looked like old garden areas that had become overgrown. There were broken statues, benches all covered with creeping vines, silent water features with mud in their basins, and flowerbeds that had been overtaken by weeds.

Everywhere we walked, the mansion loomed over us. From the outside, it looked as abandoned as the garden. Broken windows like dead eyes stared out into the distance, and long streaks of moldy damp ran down the dirty white stone of the outside. The gutters were full, with moss and plants overflowing from them at all points.

“It looks so uncared-for!” Kyrine exclaimed, looking up at the walls of the mansion.

“It’s pretty cool, in a way,” put in Amanda. “Like a haunted house. If I was a dungeon adventurer coming through these grounds at night, I’d think it was a creepy place!”

“I understand that,” said Kyrine. “In the old days, it was considered good for dungeons to be intimidating to the adventurers. I’m sure that’s true still. And yet, I’d like there to be some way I could make it a bit nicer for us, while keeping the creepy aspect for the adventurers.”

“Is there some way you could do that, do you think?” I prompted her.

She looked pained for a moment, as if she was trying to remember something.

“I think…” she said, then stopped, shaking her head. “No. There was something… but it’s gone. I can’t remember just now. I will think on it.”

We carried on round the garden, eventually finding the area that my Flora Whelp had worked on. Here, the grass was mowed neatly, and many colorful flowers and interesting-smelling plants were laid out neatly in the flowerbeds. There was a trellis with a flowering vine growing up it, and neatly trimmed hedges enclosing the little garden. In the center, a stone fountain with a statue of a beautiful woman on top was in full working order, with water flowing merrily down through it.

We sat talking for a while, and Kyrine lay back on the grass and looked up at the sky.

“These are some interesting plants,” said Amanda, looking at one of the beds.

I walked over and looked where she was pointing.

“This one,” she said, plucking a couple of leaves, “is well-known as an intoxicant used by some of the Drow priests.”

She indicated another one, this time with a bright orange flower. “This one is good for giving a bit of an energy boost…”

A thought struck me, and I opened my Personal Cultivation System. The menu hovered blank for a moment, then began to flash up the names and the properties of the plants. To my surprise, they all had some kind of application. There were healing plants, poison plants, plants that were