After being carried for hour Fred finally arrived where ‘the one who pops up’ would pop up next. Before him was a stone plane extending for miles in every direction. Rodrigo dropped Fred from his shoulder and onto the rock hard ground. Fred raised his head while still lying down, around him was a rocky plane. Completely flat stone that reminded Fred of a frozen over lake extending for miles upon miles.

“We’ll be living here for the next month while waiting for the one who pops up to appear.” Said Rodrigo.

Fred pulled himself to his feet and turned to look at Rodrigo.

“How will we be getting food and where will we be sleeping?” Asked Fred.

“I’ll be going down the forest each day and hunting and we’ll be sleeping on the ground.” Said Rodrigo.

Fred slumped. I kind of expected that. He sighed. Well it’s not like i can do anything about it now..

“What will I even do for the next-”

“Well I need to go hunt now. Goodbyeeeeeee!” Rodrigo leaped of the edge of the mountain, his voice fading into the distance. Fred stood there for about a minute. Staring off the cliff in stunned silence. ~In what kind of world do people casually jump off three kilometre high cliffs? This place is crazy.~ Fred fell down from his standing position onto his butt. Letting out yet another sigh.

“So what am I going to do?” He said to himself while looking off the cliff. “If this place were more scenic. I might have walked along the edge of the cliff and admired the sights. But.” He gestured to the ashen wasteland in front of him. “There is nothing here.”

Fred fell onto his back, his eyes moving to the clouds in the sky above him, Analysing their fluffy white shapes.

~That one looks like zeus. That one looks like a bird. That one looks like a gas station attendant.~ HIs mind began to grow numb as his eyes roamed from one cloud to another finding shapes in each of them. He was pretty sure he had found two different shapes in one cloud once or twice. ~How long has it been since I've been to a gas station? Now that I think about it, gas stations were the sort of thing that I took for granted. It was a place you could get cheap food and fuel to transport yourself faster than a person could ever run.~ Fred began to take deep breaths. ~I miss my girlfriend too. I wonder what she’s doing right now. Probably crying in the arms of another man.~ Tears began to fall down Fred's face.

He rubbed his head. Where the katana cut him. I fucking died man. Not once but twice. Fred pulled his knees to his chest while shifting onto his side. ~I was almost buried by ash! Who the fuck gets buried in ash.~ Fred felt his heart beating in his head. ~That man killed a whole town with a snap of his fingers. I saw them scream! I saw them scream!~ Fred’s breath grew so rapid that it began to fold in on itself. I died. I died. I’m going to die again.

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His lips began to quiver with fear. ~I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I’m going to die.~ He stayed lying there for the next ten minutes, his face ghostly pale. Until suddenly he hoped to his feet. A grin on his face. “I’m going to die eventually no matter what I do! But i’ll just fucking come back come nightfall! So why care about what’s going to end me!”

Fred walked back slightly from the cliff, then with a grin he ran towards it. With his arms thrown into the air he jumped off it. He threw his arms behind his back and spun in the air while doing so. Just barely managing to grab onto the edge, it was a miracle that his hands had stopped his momentum at all. He slammed his back full force into the cliff wall. The air being blown out of his chest, He sucked in breaths as the wind was knocked out of him.

But strangely. There was no fear on his face. In fact. He was grinning. After a few minutes he had caught his breath.

“FUCK YEAH!” He screamed as he began to climb down the ledge. His hand grabbing onto any random hand hold. he could find while his feet blindly scraped against the wall. He climbed down maybe another ten metres or so before he ran out of hand holds that he could grab onto. Silently and with the same manic grin on his face he climbed up the slope. “WOOOOOO!” He cheered as he stood back at the top of the mountain. “Next Pushups.” Fred dropped to the ground right next the ledge not bothering to move a centimetre.

He began to push himself up and down sweat quickly appearing on his face as his unfit body squirmed from the constant push ups. He continued to do push ups for thirty more minutes until finally he physically could not get his body to move anymore. “Situps!” He dropped onto his back his knees bent, For the next thirty minutes after that he did sit ups until he again could not muster the force to move anymore. “Now squats.” He moved up into the squat position and did squats for the next hour. Until finally he could not move anymore…….

Rodrigo bounded back up the mountain a large grey insectoid creature that he had decided was the highest in protein on his back. What he saw the second he got to the top of the mountain was a sweat soaked Fred. Who laid there breathing heavily with a look as if he were paralysed.

“Never expected you to be someone who would like working out.” Said Rodrigo.

“I had some extra energy.” Said Fred.

Fred looked up at Rodrigo who seemed to be holding some kind of cockroach in his arms.

“I wonder if you’ll make any gains over the next month because of that.” Said Rodrigo.

“Unlikely.” Said Fred while looking off to the side.

“Anyways.” Said Rodrigo, while cracking off two legs of the torso sized cockroach and handing them off to Fred. “You must be hungry, have some roach.” Rodrigo walked off thirty feet and sat down. Taking off his helmet in order to devour the majority of the roach he had left for himself. ~He can’t expect me to eat this.~ Said Fred looking at the roaches.

“Don’t worry, I cooked it in a lava stream I found on the way back.” Said Rodrigo. Fred sighed. At least it cooked. ~Well, It's either this or I starve.~ With great struggle Fred pulled himself onto his butt. He bit into the roach while looking off into the horizon. It tasted like chicken.

Fred spent the rest of the evening having a conversation with Rodrigo about how the metal birds of his world were not alive. But in fact dead flying birds that drank magic water.

Fred looked at the moon, as night time came. ~This is the first full day that I've spent here where I've seen the moon.~ Fred felt a gnawing sensation in his stomach. ~Funny, I've just eaten. Why do I feel hungry?~ Fred looked down into his lap. “Wait. Have my arms gotten bigger?”