Those words hung over my head as I finished wiping down the walls of the blue room. They remained while I started decluttering the green room. Despite those haunting words, I felt like two more seasons was plenty of time. There was a sense of finality that brought a chill, but I had already done so much in one season. I was confident that I would reach level five in all the areas well before winter. Which meant the house would be completely transformed by winter. That would be my goal. Get the house done before the next season.

At least… every room except the locked room.

I glanced in the direction of that final room. I had control of every other room in this house, but that room was completely Theo’s responsibility. He showed no interest in coming in the house at all.

But now with what we learned… if it was a matter of life or death, would Theo enter the house? Part of me said yes. However, it would still take time.

And time is what we had. After all, we still had two full seasons, and we’d only started the second week of the second season. All the more reason to make sure this house was sparkling clean. I knew deep in my soul that Theo would have a far better time if the house was clean. It had already been transformed now, and I was glad I’d gotten as far as I did with it.

I placed all the junk on the front porch in the shade, then went for another load. I figured two more loads would overcrowd the front porch, then I’d drink some of the chilled basic tomato soup and drop the junk in the dumpster.

There was far more urgency in what I was doing. Before I was doing this because I thought I had stumbled on some sort of simulation of my favorite game. Now it was revealed that I was playing this game for Theo’s soul.

That felt weird to admit in my mind. There still had to be something else. Some other clue we were missing. But with everything else we discovered, I wasn’t about to neglect this house. I’d probably have to clean the lawn, too. I wasn’t getting any more to-do lists, which meant everything I was expected to do was already before me. I just had to do it.

Theo was right. What was the end of a farming game? It wasn’t like Theo’s game, where you defeated the monsters and then were done. Done, with the occasional post-game quests. But with farming games, it never really ended. I could play forever if I wanted to.

Except… not in this one. I had until the end of spring. Then I’d be forced back home, whether or not I had Theo’s soul with me.

Home. I hadn’t thought about it, mostly because I forgot it. I’d been here an entire season. Did that mean I lost three months back home? Were Theo and I both in some sort of strange coma? Or was time itself frozen while we were in this place?

I waited patiently for the alien overlords to help me out, but I got nothing. I gave them plenty of time to answer as I gathered more junk from the green room into my inventory. Once I decluttered the second level, I wasn’t sure what to expect. There was the locked room I couldn’t enter. That might keep me from completely finishing the second floor. Not until Theo felt comfortable enough.

Though I wondered what I’d do with my repairing furniture abilities. Currently the pink room only had the sewing machine, and it didn’t need repairing. The blue room was completely empty, though it was nice and clean now. Except for the floor. My four levels of cleaning clothes let me repair furniture, but if there was no furniture to replace, what would that do? Would I get to build furniture?

The thought alone excited me. Knowing the blue room was where little Theo spent most of his time, I wanted to give little ghost Theo a proper children’s room. Maybe even a race car bed. Those seemed popular among boys.

Already my mind was racing with ideas, and I wasn’t even certain I could build furniture.

“Again,” I said to the ceiling. “Not wanting to bother you and tell you how I should be able to play this game, but… I would love to be able to build furniture for the second floor.”

I kept grabbing junk from the green room and placing it in my inventory, not expecting to hear an answer. As I was walking down the stairs, words popped into my vision.

Reach level five in cleaning, and you can build furniture.

“YES!”

No one could hear me, but I didn’t care. I didn’t want to leave those three rooms empty, and learning I could build furniture made me excited to reach level five.

I drank some basic chilled tomato soup and began dropping the junk into the dumpster. Once this junk was in the dumpster, I considered the greenroom partially finished. I wondered what I could do with the green room, now that I knew I could build furniture. Maybe create a guestroom or something. Or a gorgeous, in-home library. I could always decorate the sewing room as a craft room.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

I was almost done dropping the junk in the dumpster when Theo came back, holding scrap metal in his arms. I glanced at the hazy sky, sensing it was mid-afternoon. I finished dumping the stuff before walking over to him.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hey. The mine isn’t far, but it always takes a bit of time.” Theo lifted his arms to show the metal. “But I’ve got some.”

“Good. I’ll need it to finish my cow box trap, then I’d love to go foraging. You can join if you want,” I said.

“Oh, yeah. That’d be nice. Is it as hot in the wolf territory as it is out here?” Theo asked.

“It shouldn’t, since it’s mostly in the shade. I could always use an extra inventory to get more food.”

Theo nodded, moving over to the trees near the wolf. “Finish what you’re doing. I’ll wait here, then I’d love to help you forage for more food.”

“Sometime I’ll have to help you with what you’re doing,” I said, heading toward the front porch to gather the last of the junk and dropping it in the dumpster.

Theo chuckled. “Can you upgrade your axe anymore?”

“Probably not,” I said, gathering the last of the junk into my inventory before walking over to the dumpster. “But you say you’re in this mine, or something? Is that how you gather scrap metal?”

“Yeah, in a way. It’s a cave, really, with a bunch of different corrupt monsters who love metal, so they’ve hoarded a bunch of it. I usually go in, kill as many as I can while filling up my inventory, then book it out of there,” Theo said.

I glanced over at him, frowning. That seemed wildly dangerous, though I’m assuming those words could describe anything that had to do with Theo’s side of the river. I started dropping junk into the dumpster, keeping an eye on my total dopamine points.

-18.06

-18.05

-18.03

-18.02

I kept dropping junk in there, smiling as it finally broke -17.99.

-17.98

-17.96

I straightened when I dropped the last of the junk, the smile still on my face. “I’ll bring over the cow trap so I can finish building it, then we can go foraging.”

Theo nodded. “I’ll just wait here.”

I entered the storage unit and brought out the cow trap. I placed it in my inventory since it was awkward to hold. I walked over to Theo, trying not to think about how unfazed I was with everything. I had a pocket dimension in the small of my back capable of holding a trap big enough to catch a cow. It wasn’t the first time I thought about how odd game logic was.

I walked over to the shade. My chilled tomato soup ran out while I was walking toward Theo. I lost a bit of stamina, but considering we were leaving to forage, and I knew apples gave me some stamina, I wasn’t too worried about it. I pulled out the cow trap as Theo handed me some scrap metal. I placed them in the trap until I had a nice, lovely, finished cow trap.

I placed it back in my inventory because I was not interested in carrying it around a very dark forest.

“I don’t get it,” Theo said.

I glanced over at him, confused. “Huh?”

“You’re just… content,” Theo said. “The whole time you were dropping things in the dumpster, fixing the trap, everything.”

I shrugged. “I like farming games. You know this about me.”

Theo shook his head as we headed into the woods. I was prepared with a trap, and I had Theo’s inventory to help out with more foraging.

“I know I’ve constantly talked about how I doubt I’ll survive on your side of the river, but I do want to see your base camp sometime. It’d be fun to see,” I said.

Theo shrugged. “The invitation is always there. I’m getting closer to level twenty-five, though, so it’d be good to experiment with whether you’re capable of teleporting to my side using the transportation disks. Once I get it set up.”

“Yeah, that’d be good.”

We both paused to mentally accept entering wolf territory. Even though the silence pressed all around us, I still felt a need to talk to Theo. My voice dropped to a hushed whisper. At least Theo was right next to me.

“There’s something I have to tell you. On the calendar at home, there were the words ‘game over’ at the end. I’m certain it means the alien overlords are giving us until the end of spring.”

Theo didn’t say anything, and in the darkness, it was hard to decipher the emotions on his face.

“That honestly still gives us plenty of time,” I said as we approached my traps with all the meat.

“Yeah.” He sounded more worried than anything, and his arm raised to brush against the key under his clothes.

“We take it slow. And careful,” I said. “We don’t start by immediately heading for the second floor.”

Theo still didn’t say anything. I knelt down at one of my traps, filling my inventory with raw ground beef.

“Do you wash your hands before cooking?” Theo asked.

I gave him a wry smile. “No. For the same reason I didn’t wash my hands after cleaning the garage, either. Because for whatever reason, the grime doesn’t stick on my hands.”

Theo blinked, then shone his light on my hands as they moved from touching the raw beef to the raw chicken.

“I mean, do you wash your hands after killing monsters before you eat?” I asked.

Theo let out a sigh. “No. No, I don’t. I guess since we’re still healthy and thriving, we’ll be fine.”

“Unless the alien overlords get ideas and want to switch things up.” I stood and brushed myself off before pulling out the cow trap.

“Wait, they can do that?” Theo asked.

I shrugged. “I don’t know, honestly. Sometimes I think this is their first time ever running a game, and they’re making things up on the spot. I’ve been course corrected a couple times.” My mind flitted briefly to the time I could buy three clothes at the same time before it was taken away. I quickly made myself move on from that topic. Even though I’d learned a lot since that time, there was still the very real fear they could wipe my memory of that event.

I started setting traps again, glancing at Theo. “Have you been coarse corrected yet?”

Theo paused, then shrugged. “I mean… there’s nothing too complicated about killing a bunch of monsters and leveling up.” His eyes seemed to glaze over as he looked at whatever interface was in his vision.

“I suppose you’re right.”

I finished up with the traps, deciding to set another box trap to get another chicken. The coop looked as though it was able to hold five of them, and getting too many eggs was not a problem for me. I was still dreaming of being a resource dragon.

“There’s still a lot of this place I haven’t discovered yet. We could stop by the orchard, load up on some fruit, then see what else this place has,” I said.

Theo nodded, then gestured toward the dark parts of the forest. “Lead the way.”