He only had a few seconds before the box was filled with water. He breathed in and out very fast, several times, then took one final big breath and stayed still. He had a second of peace as water flowed through the open seam, then it rushed in all at once, pushing open the lid and engulfing him.

Doing the closest underwater equivalent of sitting up, he glanced at his surroundings. There was little light and a green tint to the water. His box seemed to be partially embedded in sand, surrounded by loose stones and small aquatic plants. There were tiny fish moving around him, curious about their new neighbor and the cloud of air bubbles freed from the box. Looking up could see light dancing across the waters surface. That surface seemed quite a distance away.

But it didn’t really matter how deep the water was, he thought. Either he would reach the surface or drown. All he had to do was hold his breath and swim. It seemed simple enough.

He found his body and limbs moving in trained instincts. There were swimming lessons rattling around somewhere in his head. He found himself with feet flat against the bottom of the box, knees bent, arms pointed straight up, hands pressed together with palms facing out.

And then he was off, kicking away and launching himself, arms and hands pulling himself through the water. He felt like an arrow shot into the sky.

He felt confident at first. His legs and feet were paddling, his arms repeating their motion in a manner that reminded himself of a slow, angry goose flapping its wings.

But the surface still seemed so far away.

He kept up his swimming. His lips were pressed together. Now he could feel a kind of pressure in his mind, getting stronger every second. This was the lack of air. This was him reaching the limits of his endurance.

Now his instincts were telling him to just open his mouth and breath in. His swimming became more desperate. The pressure in his mind was overwhelming. His heart was beating faster and faster, the pulse pounding in his ears.

Darkness and shadow crept in at the edge of his vision. The instinct to breath in was all-powerful. There was no more room in his mind for thought, just a continual battle to survive, to keep moving, to not give in.

And then he was through.

He head breached the surface, arms pulling him up, legs kicking. He was heaving in breaths. His heart was beating faster than it ever should. The sunlight felt blinding and flashing spots danced across his eyes. There were ducks flapping wings and quacking, moving quickly away from him, it seemed he emerged in the middle of their flock.

He felt like an overwhelming weight had been removed from him, he wasn’t aware of just how tense he had become in the race to survive. He was terrified of how close he came to dying, and yet still he felt overjoyed in his victory.

He realized he was laughing. He wasn’t sure if he was laughing in triumph or the sudden release of tension. It was probably both. It felt good to laugh.

His limbs were doing some kind of swimming motion to keep himself afloat and steady. His legs seemed to be moving in circles. The action came naturally to him. He gave a thanks to his past self for whatever training made this feel instinctual.

Now he could finally look around, floating in the water, and figure out where he was. Hopefully.

He was in the middle of a lake, large enough for the water to stretch far in every direction, not large enough to go over the horizon. Forests ringed the lake, with some sandy shores between mossy rocks. The forests were mostly coniferous pine, but enough of them were orange, yellow and red deciduous trees to give the woods a very beautiful feeling of the Autumn season. There were only a few clouds in the sky, allowing the midday sun to shine bright in a vibrant blue sky. It was a wondrous scene that would have had his heart beating faster if it wasn’t fast and tired enough already.

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Hold on. Coniferous? Deciduous? He couldn’t remember his own name but his addled brain decided that yes, right now, remembering the proper scholarly terms for botanical classifications of trees is something he needed.

Hmm. While the desperate race to the surface was necessary for his survival, that lack of air to his brain had certainly not helped things.

He slowly realized he really didn’t know where he was. This forest looked like any other forest. The sun was in the middle of the sky, not raising or lowering, so it was no help pointing to East or West. The ducks were familiar at least. He was mostly sure he was still in the continent of Oros, which he was mostly sure was a near useless statement. The continent was so large that for most of its inhabitants it was the only world they knew.

Treading water was slowly tiring him. He began swimming to the largest lakeside beach he could see, his limbs now moving in a way that strongly resembled a frog. It seemed to work though.

As he got closer to the shore, he realized the beach was not empty. There were a pair of small wooden boats laying in the sun. The wood looked to be quite old with what seemed to be moss growing in parts.

By the end of his swim, he was exhausted. Wading to shore, he was given another fragment of a memory, this one of a large hairy dog paddling in from the sea to a rocky, pebbly beach. The absurd amount of wet fur hanging down on the hound weighed it down and made it looked even more comical in how it plodded along. He was much like that dog now, his clothes, his robe and hat all felt like weights upon him. They were weights upon him.

It was no surprise that he immediately collapsed onto the beach, then rolled himself belly up, sand stuck to his robe. His breathes were heavy, his heart was pounding, the fatigue was overwhelming, but he made it. He had survived. Now he was safe, he could relax a bit, recuperate, get his bearings. The hardest part was over.

He lay there on the lakeshore for about five minutes, eyes closed and smiling, before he heard footsteps on the sand beside him, and a shadow passing over.

There were two men standing over him, mouths open, looking a combination of confused and fearful. It was difficult to tell with the sun casting them into shadow, but their clothes seemed very damaged and dirty for even the most humble of farmers.

“Err, you a Wizard then, eh?”, asked one of the men. His voice was very thick with what a polite person might refer to as a country accent. He seemed to be missing a lot of teeth.

The Wizard cleared his throat, coughing up quite a bit of lake water he managed to swallow. He tried to make the action seem somewhat dignified.

“Yes. I am. I am a Wizard. That’s me,” he declared.

It seemed sensible at the time for him to say this. He was wearing what tailors and the general public were referring to as The Wizard Classic. Big cone hat with a wide rim, long robe. It might have been in vogue when he started wearing it.

And besides, who would hurt a Wizard? We’re respected pillars of society, is what he thought. Even the most basic of rewards for helping a lost Wizard would be worth quite a bit, especially to country bumpki- humble peasants like these two fellows. They would have a walk to the local pub, have a drink, have a talk, have a laugh, and the Wizard would return home through the village Gateway. He thought this was quite a dire situation and he was feeling generous, so he felt that a reward of one hundred gold coins split between the two of his rescuers would be quite nice indeed.

Yes, he had it all planned out. He was smiling at the two men, feeling very relieved.

He noted that there were dark grey clouds in the sky now, slowly spreading out and threatening to turn a beautiful warm Autumn day into something much more wet and miserable.

Two two men shared a look with each other, something that looked a bit solemn, a bit angry, but still fearful. They seemed to decide something, making a slight nod to each other.

“Well, I follow the rules,” one of the men said, looking down.

“Of course,” said the Wizard, looking up.

The man who spoke seemed a bit surprised at this. The other man walked out of the Wizards vision.

“Well, uh, no hard feelings then. Nuthin’ personal or nuthin’, you know how it is,” said the first man.

“Actually, I really don’t,” said the Wizard, now frowning a bit. “I seem to be missing quite a lot of my memory. It’s rather frustrating.”

“Hmm. Yeah. Well it’s the first thing outta’ the mouth of all them preachers comin’ through the village.”

“What’s that?” asked the Wizard.

The second man returned to the Wizards sight. He seemed to be holding a shovel. A big shovel.

“It’s simple,” he declared, raising the shovel above his head with both arms.

“All Wizards must die.”

And then he slammed it into the Wizards face.