X-Factor

*Mild suggestive suicide theme at the end. Read at your own risk.* "That was a short quest," Riddle spoke to himself. "And rather harmless. I should be in more danger and excitement than the possibility of being trampled...

The old man sat at his porch and watched the fields. He hummed a simple tune and slowly rocked on his chair. All was calm. All was silent. "Hmm," the old man furrowed his eyebrows. In the distance, a tiny, childish scream....

Riddle spent far too much time simply trying to get Pipper out to the fields with him. The egg-butt creature wobbled relentlessly and found every moving thing to be a distraction. Pipper stopped to wreak havoc on every single ant pile by...

"Here ya go, kid!" The elderly man had thrust the door to his old barn wide open. Dust flew into their noses for a moment or two, and Riddle was left with an unexpectedly long stretch of silence. He looked at the old man, who...

When little Riddle opened his first book, he was greeted with the giant grins of mighty men and women draped with ragged clothes and bent armor. He saw sacks of gold and jewels, frightening monsters beheaded or caged. Weapons and maps,...