Ade looked at Phillip’s corpse, it was a broken thing, body mangled, pieces twisted off and cast aside like a little girls’ doll. He was the first person she’d seen in this world, he had trusted her, however little, and now he was dead.

The guilt burrowed in her mind, planting itself deep within the soil of her psyche and promising to germinate. Not now though, for now she had to survive, it must wait patiently until she’d managed that before making itself a problem.

Ade crouched down by Phillip’s corpse and got to work,

“What are you doing?” She heard Dima’s voice ring out from the side, and turned just in time to see him poke his head out above the rock he’d apparently been hiding behind. A hero, that one, she was beginning to learn.

“Gathering resources.” She said as she finished unlacing, then pulled off one of Phillip’s boots.

He looked quite disturbed, and Ade wasn’t stupid. She could tell why. Looting a corpse, especially the corpse of a man you once knew, while it was still warm did not endear one to most people. But she needed Phillip’s boots more than her allies’ approval.

Dima to his credit did not mention it, instead moving to matters that were more urgent. “Ah, I see, so the Bull-man is dead?”

“Yes,” Ade grunted, wearing the boot and feeling how her foot practically drowned in it. Shit, it was too big for her. “Thanks for the help, by the way, Dima, you’ve proven yourself quite invaluable to the team.”

If he was bothered by her words, Dima could apparently think of no better way to convey it than shrugging. “Ha!” He laughed. “I knew the Chinese would save you, can always count on them to be handy in a fight, yes?” He grinned at Chaghatai who looked at Dima as if he’d just shit himself for the world to see.

“Firstly, he’s Mongolian.” She said, guessing of course but her guesses were often right. Chaghatai was a Mongolian name if she was remembering correctly. “Secondly, go fuck yourself.”

Dima scoffed as if she were being completely unreasonable. Ade pulled off Phillps’s other boot, cringing as his knee twisted in a way knees didn’t. She turned to Chaghatai. “Want a pair of boots?” She asked. “It can fit either you or Dima and only one of you didn’t abandon me to die.”

“It was self preservation, what do you expect from me?” Dima snapped.

Chaghatai didn’t turn away the ‘gift’, taking off his shoes, which seemed more fit for a ballroom, and replacing them with the construction boots.

Ade grabbed Phillip’s knife to replace her own, then walked over to pick up his helmet which had been cast aside. It was a shame she wouldn’t get proper boots in a land bleeding with lava, but at least she was wearing something mobile. She’d just have to hope sneakers and a tracksuit were up to the challenge of Hell.

Dirt scraped behind her, compressed and ground by a foot, Ade gripped her bat with both hands and turned around to strike whatever Hell had decided to throw at her once again.

It was an awful swing, weak and clumsy. Like everything Ade’s stupid body tried to do. That was what saved Basma’s life, as the bat arced harmlessly by her head in as total a miss as Ade had ever seen a person manage.

The momentum dragged her off balance, her foot snagged on something, and she fell onto her face painfully. Ade cursed.

“Fuck!” She groaned, thanking Phillips’s helmet for taking the brunt of the fall.

Basma stretched out her hand and Ade took it. “You’re alive,” the woman breathed with relief.

“In some ways yes.” Ade looked at the back of the other woman’s palm and saw a bright red tattoo along it. That wasn’t there before. On closer inspection she saw that it was a vague outline of a shield. “Where’d you get that?”

“It happened when the notification of my exemption popped up, must be an indicator that I’m safe

… You saved me.” She said, smiling.

This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author's work.

I couldn’t save Phillip though. Ade noted, feeling the guilt begin to grow, she didn’t give it the time nor the nutrients to flourish in her mind. In a situation as dire as hers, that would only be poison. “It appears I did.” She noted, turning away.

“I’m sorry for abandoning you.” Basma said quickly.

Ade stopped and met her gaze. “It’s fine.” She smiled. “It was self preservation or whatever.” She reassured the woman and watched the tension bleed from her. It was the right thing to do, after all people were far easier to manipulate when they felt indebted over something the other person was too good of a sport to hold them accountable for.

She turned her eyes back to the boys and saw them in a conversation. Well… most people wouldn’t call that a conversation, they were more repeating the same things back to one another.

“I want the pole.” Dima demand.

“No, leave me alone.” Chaghatai replied, not even looking at the Russian. He was busy removing the laces from his shoe, well his old shoe, he was wearing Phillip’s now.

“I want it.” Dima pressed, with the expression of a man certain he’d just made the best argument the world would see in ten generations.

“And I want you to leave me alone, do you notice how neither of us are satisfied with the current state of things.” Chaghatai explained as he pulled his blade out. For a moment Ade thought the mongolian was going to open up the bigger man’s jugular. Then she realised what he needed the laces for, and felt stupid.

Chaghatai placed the dagger at the side of his pole, with the blade sticking past the end of it. He wrapped the shoelaces around the handle of the blade, tying it to the pole in some knot she’d never seen and didn’t know how to replicate. Once he was done, Chaghatai had crafted himself a makeshift spear.

Dima looked at it with weighing eyes. “Not bad.” He decided with a look of approval.

“Are we ready to move?” Chaghatai asked, eyes on Ade. It was not just him, Basma and even Dima looked at her with expectant eyes. It seemed she had been deemed the leader of this group.

It had been her plan, and she’d succeeded. The more control she had the better chance she had of getting out of this alive, and yet… Why did it feel like an anvil had been placed atop her shoulders?

Alright, I just need to remember what the events were. She thought and the menu popped up in front of her with a bright red flash. Ade did jump this time, finding it too sudden to be a coincidence. She thought about it disappearing and it vanished in an instant.

“How did you do that?” Basma asked.

“With skill,” she lied. Thinking the menu back into existence.

[Welcome to Limbo!

This Game is sponsored by Dresel, Dresel, good for your teeth!

Goal: Survive 23 hours, 53 minutes, and 41 seconds.

Event A: All players are scheduled for smiting in the next 5 hours,53 minutes, 41 seconds. For each Actgonian or Player killed, a random member on your team will be marked exempt from smiting.

(New) Event B: Safe Zones have been activated across the map. Monsters cannot reach you in safe Zones. All players can access and use Safe Zones.]

“Alright, so we need to find these Safe Zones.” Ade said instantly.

“And how do we do that?” Dima asked. His scepticism was practically incandescent.

“I have an idea.” She answered, walking over to one of the tall outcroppings. “Dima, can you lift me up there?”

“Can a titan carry a leaf?” He laughed.

Ade grinned. “Awesome, prove it.”

A normal man, a sane man in fact, would have asked why she was asking to be lifted onto a random tall rock. Dima, it seemed, was not a normal man. He moved over with a wide grin and lifted Ade up to the highest outcropping he could manage to get her onto.

With the upper body strength of a toddler at her disposal she relied on patience and physics to help her climb to higher and higher outcroppings, picking ones that were within a foot of whichever one she was currently standing on. Soon there were none she could reach, but she reckoned she was high enough to do what she wanted to.

Ade gazed around the landscape, from this height there were less obstructions and she could see more of it. It was much more of the same, leaking volcanoes and glowing rivers, but there were a few new details she could pick out.

For one, there were several dozen glowing shields etched into the earth like the one on Basma’s hand. What set these ones apart however, was that each was about as wide across as a small house.

Those must be the Safe Zones.

Numerous figures dotted the landscape like ants on a hill. Hundreds of them, all congealing towards one of the numerous shields in the distance. They travelled in groups of three, fours and occasionally fives.

“Ade,” Basma called out. “What do you see?” She asked.

“People…” She breathed, not knowing whether she should be relieved or terrified. “A lot of them.”

Terrified, her heart decided, fucking terrified.

Just when she thought Hell couldn’t get any more dangerous.