Ooh! As I slide along the thin glass of the menu that is suspended in mid-air, the fingers of my other outstretched hand graze the smooth skin of the fruit. My calloused fingertips sliding along the soft, supple body of the thing, as I am just barely able to reach it. I climb out further, hovering dead over the water now. If the menu vanishes or breaks then this is it. I’m a goner. Ooh. But so far it seems to be holding well under my weight, I’m not that large or heavy. About the size of a goblin. But my muscles are strong and dense and my teeth are sharp. Very sharp. Very good. Meat cutter teeth. But no meat here. Only fruit. Ooh!

  My palm wraps around the plump morsel and with a snap I tear it free from the branch, the leaves above shake as the branch swings back upwards, several of them falling down gently as they break off and waft back and forth, drifting towards the goo below us. Towards the swamp water. With my prize secured well within my grasp, I straddle my way back to the safety of the core of the tree. Back where the branches are thick and knotted. It was a risk, but it paid off for me today. Ooh!

  Once I reach the base of the tree a moment later, I swipe the menu away with my free hand and watch as the first leaf lazily sways towards the wet. Dumb leaf. Stupid leaf. Ooh! Not know. Leaf not know that water bad. Bad water, bad. Thing in water. Thing that reaches. There is a gentle ripple, barely even visible as the dead leaf makes contact and the water churns an instant later. The single spot below myself splashes, the thing that reaches, moves to run after the leaf. The water sloshing as if a single, large man was standing up to his knees in the swamp, as if he were rushing towards the disturbance the leaf had made and a second later it is swallowed and vanishes beneath the surface. Dumb leaf. Dumb thing! Not smart like me! Haha! Ooh!

  I take a bite of my golden fruit and watch as the disturbances in the water become quiet again. Save for the single ripple that makes its way back towards my tree. There is no physical body to see, no meat, no eyes. Just an invisible presence only brought to sight through the disturbances in the bad water. Bad. Ooh.

My eyes light up as the taste of the sweet nectar reaches my senses. The flesh of the honey fruit is bitter and earthy, but the juices inside are sweet. Not good. Not bad. Is food.

Food?

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  I look down at the strange, dewy fruit in my hand as I realize what this means, the first me coming back to my senses for a moment. I’m actually eating something. Something that isn’t a rat. Food. Real food! A real fruit. I greedily chomp down again, my fanged maw messily ripping apart half of the fruit in a single bite. There is a tingle in my brain. This earthy, swamp-tree fruit is the best thing I’ve ever eaten. I think so at least. I take another bite. Sticky juices run down between my grubby, stubby fingers, sticking to the hair on the back of my hands. Finishing the last bite of the delicacy with a little remorse, I then begin to lick my hands filthy clean, making sure to get every last sticky drop. Even if there is a little swamp dirt and bits of bark too, it’s a price I’m willing to pay.

  But soon enough even that is gone, leaving just me now. Just me and the thing in the water. Dire apes. Dire apes. I repeat the words in my head a few times, trying to remember what I can about these guys. Seems like a fun life. But this floor…

  I look around at the swamp. A strange, misty purple haze seems to fill the air. Not like a fog, but rather like a dim glow that seems to always be just in the distance, no matter in which direction you look. Always just behind the trees. But I know that I can never reach it, no matter how far I go it will always be just out of reach. The swamp itself is a strange, dead-green color that edges on a midnight black. As if the fetid water below had stained everything here. As if the trees had taken it in through their roots and let it tinge their brown bark into the same, grayish shade of feculence.

  From some of the trees a strange, sticky, yellow liquid drips down into the water. It is good. But it is too low to the water for me to get. Very dangerous. Very risky. Ooh! Fruits. Fruits are safe. Fruits are high up. As long as I stay above a certain height, it won’t reach me. As long as I don’t fall, it won’t reach me. The thing in the bad water. Even now, I can feel it watching me from just below. I can feel the shifting of the air as those long, invisible clawed hands reach towards me. Pinching and swiping to try and get me. Get me-get me. Ooh!

  I shake my head. The ape brain is strong stuff. That was a risky move, climbing out on my menu like that. But I suppose at least I know that works, maybe I can use that mechanic to my advantage sometime. Creating a floating platform could come on handy. I should focus, I should try to keep it together though.

  I look around the misty swamp and try to think about where the secret stairs could be here. If the water is dangerous, then I’d be willing to bet a piece of fruit the dungeon-master put them below the water. Having said the word though, fruit, my mind switches gears. I feel a rumble in my stomach. A hunger. I’m hungry. Ooh. Want more. Want more fruit. Climbing higher I look over to the next tree and jump across the gap, my heart stopping for a second as I fly through the air. But I make it and grab on tightly as my race begins to find more fruit. More ooh! Ooh!

Many fruit here. Many us. Many water-things. But that’s fine. Fine-fine. Ooh! Soon hero be here. Soon they must cross the swamp. Then water-things distracted. Make for easy fruit! Maybe even gold-water. Sticky gold-water, ooh! Seeing a branch high above myself, that most others couldn’t get to, I leap.