‘Jack, wake up.’

Jack’s eyes flickered open at the lingering voice from an unknown dream. Despite the simple nature of the bedroll, the night’s sleep behind him was surprisingly restful.

‘Jack!’

He glanced over at the stairs to see Aeshara, the pretty half-elf bard with the platinum blonde hair. She stood on the stairs to the attic peering through the banister, a huge smile stamped across her face as she glanced back and forth between him and the floor below.

‘What is it?’

‘You’ve got to come see this.’

Jack moved to get out of bed but glanced down at his lower half beneath the cover of his bedroll.

‘I’m, uhh… Not wearing any pants.’

‘Oh,’ she said swiftly, hurrying away. ‘I’ll just wait downstairs…’

Once she was out of sight he pulled on his jeans, tied his belt and pried on his sneakers.

I’m really going to need some harder wearing clothes if I’m going to survive in this world.

He made for the stairs but paused and glanced over his shoulder at the the dagger, the longbow and the quiver of arrows.

Even if this town seems quiet, I’m not going anywhere from now on without a weapon.

Jack snatched up the dagger, clipped the sheath to his waist and headed to the second floor. He couldn’t find Aeshara or Fiora, but when he looked down to the first floor he saw them both hanging by the last few steps trying not to laugh.

Jack headed downstairs quietly to join them. Fiora straightened her thick-framed glasses on her perfectly-curved nose and ushered him down with a lilac hand.

Eldrin, the high-elf guard, was on his back in front of the burned-out hearth in nothing but his long-johns, arms and legs spread wide like the vesuvian man.

Though the vesuvian man had a little more grace about him; Eldrin on the other hand laid on his back, mouth agape, snoring loudly with a run of spittle dripping over his cheek.

Not exactly graceful for an elf – but then neither was Torick the gnome mage, laid out over the back of an old armchair in the corner on his front like a sleeping dog, limbs hanging limply over the sides of the chair.

‘What the hell happened here?’

‘You didn’t hear them singing last night?’ Fiora asked. ‘Maker, you must be a deep sleeper, Jack.’

‘There is no way that that guy was singing last night,’ Jack smiled, nodding to Eldrin. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if he slept standing up with that freaking polearm in his grasp.’

‘It happened,’ Aeshara smiled. ‘Swear it to the gods. There’s one thing that can make all men sing together, no matter their natures.’

Jack frowned at her in confusion. Aeshara jabbed her finger at the air like a bird bobbing its beak at an empty whisky bottle tucked under Eldrin's arm. Jack carefully crossed to it, pried it out and sniffed the top.

He winced at the smell. The scent alone was stronger than any whisky he had ever tasted.

‘Woah,’ he whispered. ‘Where did they get even get this?'

‘No idea,’ Fiora said, tying her silver hair away from her pretty face and into a loose ponytail. ‘Do you think we should wake them up?’

‘We can’t afford to waste daylight, and if you’re right about all of us being a part of this puzzle, Jack, then we need everybody up and raring to go.’

‘Then I guess we’d better get on with it,’ Aeshara smiled.

She stooped over, snatched up an old metal pot and a plank of wood that had been leaning up against the stairs and clanged them together.

Jack hadn’t even drank anything, yet even he winced at the sound.

‘Wakey-wakey, gentlemen!’ She yelled.

Eldrin sat up like his mid-section was on a hinge. Being close to seven-feet-tall, he whacked his forehead straight on the stone ceiling of the hearth.

‘Agh!’ He groaned, clamping his hand to his head.

‘I was a barmaid a lifetime ago,’ she shrugged at Jack and Fiora. ‘Not my first time waking up leftover drunks from a tavern floor.’

‘Drunks?’ Eldrin repeated in a daze. ‘I am no such thing! The blasted gnome tempted me with that demonic water!’

‘Uh huh,’ Aeshara said dryly, crossing her arms and raising an eyebrow.

Torick groaned from the armchair and stood up, wrapping his bedroll around himself messily like a cloak and glancing about.

‘He drank more than I did!’ Torick suddenly shouted, wincing at the volume of his own voice. ‘Do you know how much perfectly-fine whisky it takes to get an elf drunk? A lot is the answer. You can put another job on today’s to-do list: find more liquor.’

‘Where did you even get it?’ Aeshara asked.

‘I found a stash in the tavern last night. Like I would tell you fun sponges…’

‘And to think I was worrying about people not being who they said they were,’ Fiora said sarcastically.

‘Oh, come on. It was just a little drink.’

‘Little is one word for it,’ Jack frowned. ‘If we find some grain, yeast, water and a time machine that I can hop into for two years so that we can fast-track the brewing process, I’ll get straight on with prioritizing that. In the meantime we’ve got work to do.’

‘All right, all right,’ Torick said, batting a hand at the air and grabbing the rest of his clothes.

Jack unlocked the door and swung it wide. Instead of the view of the Builder’s Fire, the plaza and the main buildings surrounding it, Zania’s looming seven-foot figure stood before him.

‘Shit!’ Jack yelled, jolting back and reaching for his dagger before recognizing her. ‘God, Zania… What are you doing?’

‘Cold last night,’ she spoke, pushing past him with a heap of logs in her arms. ‘Zania bring firewood. Skinny beings need warm.’

Eldrin scrambled out of the way, giving room for Zania to toss the firewood heavily into the hearth.

‘No kidding,’ Jack remarked, admiring the huge heap of finely-chopped wood. ‘I’m thinking the rest of us really need to start pulling our weight.’

‘Right, but what we need to do first is get a lay of the land now that it’s sun-up,’ Torick said, squinting against the sunlight. ‘We need to know if that map you found is still accurate.’

They headed through the dusty, derelict innards of the tavern, surmising it to be the tallest building in the area, and clambered to the roof, the unlikely team of six heroes keeping a steady footing on the as they surveyed the world around them.

The central plaza was surrounded by six primary buildings: the mayor’s house, the stables, the storage building, a residential home, the blacksmiths and the tavern they now stood upon.

In the streets surrounding the plaza, two-dozen derelict buildings of stone and wood, both merchant buildings and private residences, weaved around in a rough circle. Just beyond, yards and small patches of farm land gave onto patchy areas of greenery and forest both thick and thin.

Dusty cobbled roads led to the north, south, east and west, tapering off into parts unknown.

‘Zania wonder what happen in this world,’ the troll berserker grunted curiously. 'Why no people in town?'

‘War,’ Eldrin spoke simply. ‘The only answer to such a question.

‘We might be the ones who are supposed to rebuild this kingdom,’ Jack added, ‘but it’s already got a population of people. They’re out there – in villages, towns, communities, maybe even cities. There’s a whole world out there that’s in turmoil.’

‘And an amoral realm keeper wants us to somehow restore it from scratch,’ Torick spoke. ‘We haven’t even got a stable source of food and water yet.’

‘Then we had best get started,’ Aeshara nodded.

***

Quest: Suitable Sustenance

Objective: Find a source of food and water in the forest

Reward: You will not die.

Hilarious.

Jack brushed aside the window as he touched down in the plaza.

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

‘I’m going to head out with Aeshara and Zania to find food and water,’ Jack began once everybody had joined him. ‘Once we resolve that, it’ll make everything else a whole lot easier. Eldrin, you’re going to need to hold down the fort while we’re away.’

‘Understood,’ Eldrin nodded formally, still eager to take orders.

‘Wait, why is he the fort-holder?’ Torick protested. ‘And more importantly, who put you in charge?’

‘Number one, I mean fort-holding in the sense that he protects the place,’ Jack replied. ‘Zania and Eldrin are the best fighters we have right now, at least until we find you a staff. Unless, that is, you want to take the role of fighter away from Eldrin. I’m sure he’d be more than happy to hand it over. Eldrin?’

Jack glanced over at Eldrin. The high-elf guard moved to spout about his sense of nobility, then caught the look on Jack’s face.

‘I would be glad to hand the role of protector over to you, gnome,’ Eldrin said knowingly. ‘Feel free.’

‘As a fae with certifiably zero fighting skills,’ Fiora said, ‘I am all for Eldrin holding down the fort, as you say. Is there anything we can do while the three of you are away?’

‘Make an inventory, Fiora. Every single weapon, resource, flask and useful item that we found last night, plus anything else we might have missed.

Jack retrieved his longbow and his quiver of arrows, then set off eastwards in the forest with Zania and Aeshara. The troll-berserker was adept with a club, and Aeshara’s bard healing skills would be invaluable if they ran into anything nefarious.

A quarter of a mile into the forest, the sound of running water greeted them like an old friend.

The three exchanged a glance and smiled at the most universal of shared interests before hurrying onwards. Just beyond the next line of trees, they found it.

The stream was three-yards-wide and flowed generously through the forest, cutting north to south from a nearby patch of hills.

Zania dropped to her knee and scooped up some water, testing it at her lips. After a moment of thought her eyes went wide, and dunked her head into the stream like a thirsty horse, gulping it down.

Jack wasn’t convinced until Aeshara tasted it too.

‘This is fresh water,’ the half-elf bard smiled. ‘It must come from those hills up there. And only a quarter-mile from our base… This is perfect.’

Jack filled up his canteen and took a drink. It tasted as good and clean as any he’d ever drank.

‘That’s job one,’ he nodded. ‘Now we just need to find something to eat.’

‘Zania hope find food,’ Zania spoke. ‘Zania grow angry when hungry.’

‘What do you think we’ll find out here?’

‘Zania see elk print in brush. Elk travel across river. Elk print fresh. Elk not far. Voices quiet.’

Jack thought back to the Level 1 Tracker skill from the day before. After acquiring it, the trail had appeared before his eyes.

The others must have had tracking skills considering the worlds they came from, but the trail would likely appear different to them.

Once they had crossed the river, Jack moved to Zania’s side and activated the Tracker skill. A thin wisp of light raced into the forest ahead of him, weaving and winding among the brush before vanishing a second later.

‘How are you with a bow?’ Aeshara whispered, sweeping her blonde hair over her ear and flashing Jack a smile as Zania moved ahead of them both.

‘Not great,’ he replied honestly. ‘But I’m hoping that I’m not too rusty when we come across this thing.’

‘I don’t mind taking the responsibility if you’re not up to it.’

‘I thought you were more adept with a sword,’ Jack replied.

Aeshara looked at him strangely. Suddenly he realized his mistake – he had seen the one-handed sword skill level sitting at 11 in her companion page.

But she didn’t know that information even existed.

‘How do you know that?’ She asked, taking on a serious tone as she looked him up and down.

‘Umm…’ He muttered. ‘Just from the way you handled your lute yesterday. It looked like you were about to swing it at Zania like a blade.’

Real smooth, moron

‘Oh…’ She nodded uneasily. ‘I don’t recall showing you all my lute until later… Maybe I did… Hm…’

All Jack could do in the meantime was scan the wilds around him and glance at every shuddering bush. Occasionally he activated his Tracker skill to ensure they were moving in the right direction, resisting the desire to spam it. When he moved to fast, a 60-second cooldown alert activated in front of him.

So no spamming at this level.

After half a mile of traversing the forest, Zania turned around suddenly and pressed a finger to her lips. She pointed through the trees just ahead, then ushered Jack and Aeshara forward.

Aeshara weaved her hands through the leaves and pushed them aside carefully, creating a tiny window into a clearing just ahead.

‘There.’

A lone, fully-grown elk stood in the middle of the clearing, chewing on a patch of wheatgrass.

‘Think you can hit it?’ Aeshara whispered. ‘You need to make a shot between the neck and the body. Take out its lungs from the side and it’ll go down easily enough. Strike its heart and it’s as good as ours.’

‘I don’t know if I can take the shot from this distance,’ Jack whispered. ‘I need to get closer, but I don’t want to spook it. That’s a lot of meat to lose if I miss.’

‘I’ll keep it steady for you, just as long as you can keep a steady hand of your own.’

‘How are you going to do that?’

Aeshara winked and pulled her lute from over her shoulder. She strummed a chord, cutting immediately through the quiet of the forest, bringing her own brand of ambience to the scene.

Jack winced – not at the sound itself, which was perfectly played, but at the effect it might have on the elk.

He looked back into the clearing. The elk was still there, though it had stopped grazing and now held its head high, more out of interest than concern.

Aeshara stood smoothly and played a calming tune via a pleasant run of major chords. There were no words, but before Jack’s eyes a plume of purple arcane magic emerged from the head of her lute. It swam through the air towards the elk as she played and surrounded the animal’s head.

The elk suddenly calmed. Zania and Jack watched in awe as Aeshara’s careful playing continued.

‘Does that work on all beings?’ Jack asked.

‘Only on common animals and those that are weak-willed.’

‘Well whatever you’re doing, keep doing it. I’m going to flank around so I can get a shot at its side.’

'Zania will go around other side and catch beast.’

Aeshara continued the melodic spell while Jack and Zania took off in different directions.

Even if the elk was successfully hypnotized by the bard spell, the louder crunches from Jack’s footsteps made it stir.

Still, they were nothing to Zania’s heavy footsteps on the other side of the clearing just beyond the tree line. The troll woman was a great fighter and an invaluable ally, but stealth definitely wasn’t her strongpoint.

Jack would have to work fast before she moved too loudly and the elk broke free from Aeshara’s spell.

He moved as quickly and as quietly as he could until he was in line with his prey. He slid the bow down his arm, drew an arrow from the quiver and readied it upon the bow’s string.

It pulled tightly against Jack’s fingers as he drew it back. He stared down the arrow’s stem to the head, held his breath and aimed at the thick point just right of the elk’s neck.

Jack kept the bow steady, surely aimed the arrow at the animal, and-

The arrow burst free from my bow and surged towards the elk.

The shot was the best that he could have hoped for, hitting the elk’s lungs. There was a chance that a fatal shot was even more secure if he had got a hit on its heart, but it was unlikely considering the distance and his current skill level.

The elk reared and kicked its legs at the air. It bucked wildly, breaking free from the spell which whipped straight back towards Aeshara’s lute, then surged away in the opposite direction, disappearing into the forest with a marked limp.

‘Zania capture beast!’

Zania rushed after the elk as Aeshara and Jack emerged into the clearing.

‘Good work,’ Aeshara nodded to him. ‘Come on, we’d better catch up with Zania.’

They headed into the forest, jogging in the general direction that she and the elk had gone.

‘There’s blood here,’ Aeshara said, running her fingers across the nearby leaves, ‘This way. I’ve got the trail.’

He might have fired the shot, but it was Aeshara who knew how to track it without spamming the skill. She didn't even have it and she still knew the way.

Jack wondered whether or not all beings from the kingdoms that his allies had come from knew how to track wild game. Back on Earth it was a skill reserved only for the most hardcore of wild hunters.

But here was Aeshara easily tracking down the path that the elk had walked.

They emerged into a small clearing among the trees to find Zania wrestling the elk to the ground with her bare hands. It eventually gave up, and she set it down upon the ground as it gave its final breaths.

‘Elk deserve merciful end,’ Zania said. ‘Heart must be stopped.’

Heart must be stopped. That was a hell of a way to put it.

‘Heart is there,’ Zania said, pressing one of her huge fingers against the elk’s side in a specific spot. ‘Must make small bleed. Big bleed spoil meat.’

Jack took a knee and pressed the tip of his dagger to where she had indicated.

Killing an animal. This was a first, but considering the circumstances it was necessary to survive. There was no question about it. He ate meat all the time back at home, and with the limited resources out here, this was necessary. He had to own what he was eating.

Jack raised his hand over the base of the blade’s handle and delivered a sharp, sturdy strike. The blade jolted into the elk’s side several inches, but required a further push to get past the lungs. He leaned over the animal and grabbed the blade hard, pushing it into the elk until he struck the heart. The elk’s body tensed briefly, then went still. Jack wrenched his knife free and stood.

Quest Completed: Suitable Sustenance

Objective: Find a source of food and water in the forest

Reward: You have not died.

The reward might have been on the nose, but the experience from taking down the elk suddenly provided a whole host of inadvertent rewards.

Jack has reached Level 2

Jack has received 1 skill point.

Jack has received Tracker – Level 2 (Cooldown reduced to 30 seconds, Sentient beings now trackable)

Jack has achieved Dagger Proficiency – Level 2

Jack has achieved Longbow Proficiency – Level 3

He scanned the achievements quickly before subtly sweeping them away and returning his attention to the fallen elk.

‘Good kill,’ Aeshara said, patting him on the shoulder. ‘Not bad for your first time.’

‘Have you done this before?’

‘A long time ago,’ she replied, swerving subtly away from revealing much else. ‘Come on, let’s get this back to the town so we can put it to good use.'

‘This thing must weigh a ton,’ Jack said. ‘Any idea how we can get this back to base, Zania?... Zania?’

He glanced over at the troll-woman. She stared straight ahead to the edge of the forest, slowly reaching over her shoulder for her club.

Having firmly adjusted to this new world and the magical inhabitants that had the capacity to occupy it, Jack immediately took the scaly, red-skinned reptilian-headed humanoid for a kobold.

It wandered casually into the clearing, grunting with each footstep in the undergrowth. It wore tattered rags covering its scaly body, several rusty weapons attached at its belt, and an old satchel hanging over its shoulders.

In its clawed hand, a dead rabbit swung back and forth lightly with each of the kobold’s footsteps.

Zania suddenly rushed forwards, waving her huge, muscular arms in the air and yelling at the top of her lungs.

‘RAAARRR!!!’

The kobold hadn't even noticed their presence, but it sure did now.

But it didn't even have a chance to attack.

Zania raised her club over her head with both hands and slammed the tough weapon down upon the kobold's skull without a second of hesitation. The kobold's head practically exploded with an almighty crunch, ripping away its life-force before it even hit the ground.

Then, like it was nothing, she turned back and joined Jack and Aeshara.

‘Zania carry.’

The troll-woman spoke the words simply as she took a knee and worked her huge arms beneath the elk’s side. With a grunt she heaved the elk up and laid it over her shoulders in a fireman’s carry, swiftly starting back through the forest towards Silverward.

Jack and Aeshara shared a glance and followed, not knowing whether to be impressed, intimidated or both.