I sat up suddenly, my head spinning from the teleportation. The ritual had felt like being torn apart and reassembled, every atom screaming. But I was alive. I had remembered myself through it all.
There was something strange. Something wrong. Something that annoyed in a familiar way.
I felt down to my legs and came across hard yet soft, cutting yet smooth,
The grass in the game was ever present and ever yielding, pillowy stuff of an ideal suburban dad's would gush for. It was fake. This was not. This was not particularly anything. It was yellow and dead and alive and vibrant and some stems had little shoots squashed by animals and some had domes of seeds hanging of them high in the air. It was all so… random.
I plucked at it. Amazed. Held it squashed and torn to my nose to indulge in the wet herbal nothing smell of it.
Still not in game. I stood taking a deep, satisfying breath. My mind hadn't been quite right after whatever Hella did to me, everything was a haze, a world seen through a broken mirror formed of glazed pottery and hateful faces. Fragmented memories flashed through my mind—the grand hall, Queen Hella's scornful gaze, Lilac's kind eyes filled with worry, a thousand mocking jeering looming silhouettes, the overwhelming sensation of being pulled apart by the portal. Lyn.
I touched my wrist where the wristband used to be. I guess it hadn't made it.
That place, the towers of brick, the lane-ways, the people with cat ears and fox tails and sharp canines. It was real too. But in its overwhelming newness there was nothing to compare to the game with. Here I indulged. In the kinetic force of the earth, with its random rocks and sticks and debris. I shook around like a cat on that green carpet. Finding wondrous imperfection in everything. The wood, the individual tears on a blade of grass. How one rock had pitted holes and another was cracked down the middle but not split. Even the rustling of the branches, you could feel the wind push the branches and the sound of it all rise and ebb with that flow.
I felt a slight, irritating tickle on my forearm. A tiny black body was making its way up my arm. Prodigiously manoeuvring it dodged hairs and powered round my wrist aimlessly. It was fascinating until it stopped suddenly stooping its head and a slight pain twinged from it.
-Flick! The ant was gone.
( Black Ant ) Killed!
+1 EXP
No, please no.
My heart dropped. I had hoped that was a horrible waking terror, I had tried to forget what Lyn said. What the world was like.
If this isn’t the game, then what is it? What have I woken up to?
I leaped back as unbidden blue boxes filled my vision, tripping and tumbling back to the grass.
Achievement!
[ Slayer of Magnamartis, Saviour of the World ]
[ Dawnbringer, King of the Gods ]
[ Saviour of Humanity and all ]
Ability Gained!
[ INDOMITABLE HUMAN WILL ]
( PASSIVE )
Will = ∞
My breathing hitched. Slayer of Magnamartis. I wet my dry lips and repeated those words.
The sound of my own voice reminded me of something.
Zach
Human. 16 years.
Level - 1
Endurance
0
Dexterity
0
Strength
1
Wisdom
1
Intelligence
0
Spirit
0
Perception
Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
0
Will
∞
I wrung my head and sat back. This was reality, undeniably so. The game had just followed me into it. I sat ruminating, the despair a weight around my neck, it felt as if I had traded one mantle for another.
In the city, I'd been too overwhelmed by the betrayal to really process what Lyn had said - that everyone saw them, that this wasn't a game to them. To anyone. I thought of Lyn's face as she accused me, of the corrupt guard's purple-stained eyes, of Lilac's tears as she cast me out. What kind of world was this, where power levels and stats existed alongside real pain, real betrayal? Where notifications congratulated you for killing actual living creatures? The game had been a prison, but at least I'd understood its rules. This... this was something else entirely.
Yet, the despair that weighed on me could not smother my spirit. Minute yet pernicious, the idea of a fresh start, a new beginning, unlimited potential, it set a flicker in my heart that would not be quelled. It was hard to think about the game, I had never failed to keep moving in it, always pushing, always grinding, always the best. But now, in some strange way, I had done what needed to be done, this was reality, I had escaped the VRMMO and awoken in a new world.
Except for one thing. The title I had received, "saviour of the world," this world knew something of the game. But it wasn't the game? How could that be? How could I have infinite WILL? What does that even mean? At least it explains my survival of the portal and resisting the potion's effects.
But where was I? What just happened in the city?
The sun pressed down on me as I lay asking questions, the only answers I received was the high whistling through the branches. The heat was relentless, as if trying to pull me out of my thoughts and back to reality. I couldn't stay here. I needed water and food, instinctively my hand reached for my sword, only to find its absence, and that absence seemed to reduce me, the world growing larger, the dark underbrush around gloomy and impenetrable. It was a thick wood filled with vitality, the underbrush filled with logs and bushes drinking in the dappled light.
The ground felt different beneath my feet - not the predictable, even surface I'd grown used to in the game, but a chaotic jumble of sensations. Every step brought new textures: springy moss, rough bark, slick mud that squelched between my toes.
I was level 1 again, a measly 10 HP.
I found a stick and forged into the underbrush, eyes peeled. Strangled alien cries and caws seemed to gain depth. I did not appreciate how alien they truly were but standing there eyes wide stock still I could decipher nothing in the chaotic chorus of the forest all shadowy silhouettes and no substance. Figures formed in the darkness, turning to look at them they would disappear. It wasn't right. I was used to a map, a UI, at least some understanding of what I faced. Now all I had was a primal fear that made my hands shake and my breath come in short gasps. I kept reaching for abilities I no longer had, scouting, searching, my inventory, but nothing familiar was there to comfort me. All I had was that reminder of my weakness,
LEVEL 1 INDICATOR
I forged on.
‘Zinggggg’
I flung myself to the ground. A splash of dazzling white light slammed into the earth in front of me. The grass sizzled and blackened into ash.
Before I could even think, long buried reflexes forced me into motion. Rolling to the side, I managed to avoid another blast.
A familiar hum filled the air, high-pitched and angry—the unmistakable sound of mana bolts. My instincts kicked in before my brain could catch up, and I threw myself to the side just as a bolt of white light slammed into the earth, sending a shower of dirt and grass into the air. My heart pounded in my chest, my breath coming in ragged gasps. How long had it been since I’d felt real pain? The VRMMO had dulled so much of it, but now... now, every scrape, every bruise burned like fire.
I could barely think, my body moving on reflex alone. This wasn’t supposed to happen. I wasn’t supposed to fight for my life in the real world. Yet here I was, dodging mana bolts like a level 1 scrub all over again. The thought sent a wave of bitter frustration through me. Was this really my life now? Fighting creatures that shouldn’t exist in a world that was never supposed to be real?
I lurched to my feet, the thunderous beating of my heart slamming in my chest drowned out everything. I stood still for a moment. Adrenaline was pumping, sweat and my breath and everything forced into painful overdrive like I was dying, the game did not do that. Everything had slowed down so much, and yet I felt so powerful, my entire body numb yet on fire.
'Zinnnng'
Pain exploded across my back as the mana bolt slammed into me, searing heat radiating through my body. I howled, stumbling behind a tree, heart pounding in my throat. It had been so long since I felt something this intense—so sharp and real. This wasn’t like the game. There was no safety net here, no respawns. If I made a mistake, that was it.
My mind was reeling from the over-stimulation. The corrupt queen had attacked my very spirit and the pain had been the pain of not knowing myself, of witnessing memories without their meaning, knowing you had loved, but not knowing who, a soul in tumult, cast adrift. This was pain of pain, true agony, nerve endings telling me parts of my body was dead or dying, and it was like ice water on my systems, paralysing while forcing me to act.
I forced myself together and risked a glance around the tree, my breath catching in my throat as I spotted the creature—a horned rabbit, its eyes glowing with mana, red and unblinking. It was smaller than I expected, but the raw fear twisting in my gut didn’t care. I was level 1, with barely enough HP to survive. If I didn’t act fast, it wouldn’t be a glitch, a cat eared witch, or an unfair boss that killed me—it’d be a rabbit with a glowing horn.
Jagged, gleaming, buck teeth. A wicked horn imbued with white luminescence, alien blood red eyes peered out from a white shaggy squat form.
{ Horned Rabbit }
Level - 1
HP - 2/2
I felt a touch of cold fear grip my heart. My stomach clenching slightly as I stood behind the tree. I did not know if I could outrun it.
I filled my lungs with air and launched from behind the tree. Pelting down towards the animal I saw the horn pulse with light and swung to the side as a ball of light was lobbed in my direction. Its attacks, guided by the glow of the horn, were easy to predict. However, each evasion grew closer than the last as the distance between us closed. Each step more precarious as the tangle of roots and fallen branches threatened to trip me.
The rabbit seemed to have overestimated itself as I bounded forward, closing the distance to it rapidly. As it turned tail, powerful hind muscles started to bunch up in preparation to leap away back into the brush where it could strike at its discretion.
I had lost my stick at some point, and no obvious weapon appeared in the underbrush.
Instead, I launched forward just in time to catch its large fluffy feet mid leap. Long claws scraped along my grasping hand, splicing the skin, my arm was wrenched hard by the rabbits powerful momentum.
We slammed into the mucky underbrush. Wind driven out of my lungs, stomach driven back too far inside me, I held on.
The rabbit didn't hesitate as I was still regaining my bearings. I bellowed as it wrenched around and gouged into my hand with its oversized and yellowed buck teeth.
It met something hard and scraped along it, it felt like a horrid chorus of nails on blackboard yet emanating entirely from within my body.
Crying out in pain I slammed the damned animal into the dirt, trying to loosen its grip on my arm without letting go of its feet.
A cacophony of angry squeals unleashed from the rabbit. Yet even as I repeatedly slammed the rabbit into the earth, hollering in rage and agony, it only seemed to squeal louder.
A low hum of mana emanated from the horn as it began to glow, I had but a second. I whipped around and slammed the rabbit horn first into the tree, the waves of agony narrowing my vision into a dark tunnel.
'Zing'
Heat washed over my hand and the rabbit let loose a low grating keen. Woodsmoke wafted over me, piercing the veil of pain. Yet, it still wouldn't let my arm out of its agonising grasp. Instead of resisting I shoved it forward, ensuring it would stay in the tree and took hold of its scrabbling hind paws with my other hand.
'Shhk'
A wave of warmth engulfed my hand as the rabbit let out a harsh, grinding groan. The scent of charred wood infiltrated the pain-haze surrounding me. Still, it refused to release my arm. Instead of pulling away, I pushed it further into the tree, gripping its struggling hind legs with my free hand.
I shoved its legs up, contorting its body up while its head stayed facing the tree. Shoving with all my might I let loose a primal roar. Visceral, wet pops reverberated across the rabbit.
'Crack!'
A high snap rung out. Then silence, only my laboured breathing filled the air.
Enemy slain!
{ Horned Rabbit }
----------------------------------------
+ 1 [ Damaged rabbit pelt ]
+ 4 [ Copper ]
Level Up!
{ 2 }
You have gained + 1 assignable status point(s)