Day 18,324

It’s the waiting that makes some souls trapped with me break. We haven’t seen anyone in days now and the silence of our cage is wearing people down.

No one comes to jeer at us. It’s like everyone’s interest is gone, and we’re forced to sit in the emptiness of our own minds. The odour takes a toll on me after the fifth day. There’s a stagnant reek that wafts past my nose, but no one is able to find the smell.

On the seventh day, a soul tries to make an escape, pressing his body to the bars in a pathetic attempt to squeeze through. He dislocates his shoulder and rips the skin from his hands, but the moment he seems to make progress, a blade falls, seemingly from nowhere, taking his limb off and leaving behind a cauterized stump.

One soul laughs as the other watches his removed arm flail and twitch. The manic cackle only seems to calm me more, though. I silently congratulate myself on not becoming a mindless sack of mumbled words and rocking motions like the others. If the intention is to break us, I refuse to be broken.

By the tenth day, the cage is completely silent. Souls stare up at the vibrate sky of the Nether like animals waiting for rain. I keep my eyes ahead, watching the inhabitants walk by without a care. It’s a game I’ve made up. Each being who walks by gets a name and a backstory. Some are more scandalous than others. After a while I’ve found myself enjoying the game and even standing at the bars, trying to find my previous characters.

On day twenty, I peek my eyes open after a nap and pause. The gaze of a being shrouded in a dark aura stares back. I don’t flinch. His aura leaks from his body like a continuous stream and pools at his feet, being sucked back in like a perpetual mechanism.

With a single raised finger in my direction, I’m pulled from the cage and greeted with applause. Something fun is about to begin.