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[h1]Ruined Inn[/h1]

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---!

My grandfather passed away in my first year of high school. He'd been ill for a while. It wasn't really unexpected.

He'd been a kind, but increasingly distant person in his last few years. Maybe it was depression, over realizing that his life was going to end soon.

I'd been in the room when it happened.

I thought he was just sleeping at first, but as I got closer I realized I couldn't hear him breathing anymore.

---I didn't cry. Not immediately. It took a little while for me to truly grasp what had just happened, and even after that the experience didn't even feel real.

He looked like he was alive, still. Just still. Just asleep.

I think what hurt the most was that I didn't say goodbye to him, properly, even though I knew it was coming. The fact he had died was expected at that point, but the fact I didn't give him that final farewell wasn't anticipated.

It was the one and only time I'd truly been present in the same place as a dead body. A surreal, unexpected yet expected experience that I only truly comprehended after the fact, that only stung in the aftermath when I truly grasped what had happened.

It was nothing like it is now.

I guess I'm thankful that the body is dried out. It's probably due to being locked inside and mostly encased in armor that whoever it was didn't rot and make things a lot worse in here.

---It wasn't quiet, though. There's dark streaks all over the wall. They're old, but---

That's blood, isn't it?

I can feel this tightness inside of me. I can't look at it for very long, I have to turn away and avert my eyes, my hands gripping tightly onto my new staff as I take in a deep breath and try to clear my head.

It's a corpse, alright. I guess I can be thankful there isn't more of them, given that it looks like there's a warzone outside.

Just one gives me a little time to adjust and stop my heart from beating quite this quickly.

It's probably for the best that I try to think of something, anything else.

Supplies. We're looking for supplies. Where could more supplies be? This place is old but not old enough to be completely destroyed, so maybe---

"I-If there's any food still useable, it'd probably be the dried or salted stuff th-they'd keep in the basement," I comment, still facing away from the corpse and holding my staff tightly. I just need a little more time before I can properly look at it and try and take in what it means for our current situation.

[@Rune_Alchemist][@Crimson Paladin][@FujiwaraPhoenix]