In movies people often talk about their lives flashing before their eyes in their final moments, and in a sense I guess that’s true.

As the grinning gnome blew up in front of me, the whole world seemed to slow down – and I hadn’t even activated my Perception of The Apex Predator skill.

Before my very eyes, snippets of my life played out, but not in quick, romanticised scenes resembling clips from a flashback episode. No, it was more akin to snapshots from a polaroid camera. Single moments in time, images of important events plucked from my mind seemingly at random.

A highlight reel of my life.

I saw my mother the first time she told me we’d be fine on our own after one of her failed relationships ended. I saw my friends in high school celebrating after I’d scored the winning goal for our school football club. I saw the day I threw my desktop computer through my boss’ window after he’d told me I wasn’t getting paid for all the overtime I’d been forced to put in over the Christmas period.

If I wasn’t about to die I’d have laughed at that memory, quitting that job was when my life on Earth had really begun.

Shortly afterwards I met my wife.

Layla, the love of my life. A woman who could keep up with the drinking and the banter. She was so amazing. When the snapshot of her entered my mind it was a frozen moment in time, the perfect moment: the day I proposed.

I was so nervous I nearly chickened out, but before I had time to properly reminisce the next photo entered my brain: the day she told me she was pregnant. Then regret, anger, frustration.

Was everything I’d been through in Celestia all for nothing? I’d had plenty of near-death experiences since arriving in this world but this was the first one where I’d felt so completely and utterly out of control.

No potion or quick thinking was going to save me. A fucking gnome was exploding with the force of a… I don’t know, science isn’t my strong suit, but… the force of a giant fucking bomb, right in my face.

I felt helpless, and if there was one thing I hated more than overcooked steak, it was feeling like I wasn’t in control of my own life. That was the reason I’d left my corporate job to become a self-employed wagon driver. It was the driving force behind all the time I’d spent trying to level up so that I could reunite with my family.

So, as I looked around at the other helpless, screaming, shocked faces. I felt nothing but disgust and anger.

Anger at myself for being in this situation in the first place. Anger at that stupid gnome for blowing us all sky high. Anger at Freja for allowing it to happen despite being one of the strongest people in the city of Cali Port.

But mostly, I was angry at Fredrick Millicent.

If he hadn’t hired those mercenaries to steamroll the negotiations then the gnome wouldn’t have gone all suicide bomber on us. His relatives were arseholes too, but that was beside the point.

So, as I flew backwards through the air from the force of the explosion, gnome guts and limbs rocketing out in all directions. I decided to make my last moment count. I gave into selfish desire and pulled out my bow as I activated Perception of The Apex Predator, stopping time for a mere second, and shot that self-adsorbed bellend right in his inbred, oddly angular face.

The arrow exploded from my bow with the full might of a Soul Shot powered attack and entered through his bulbous nose, exiting out of the back of his skull and bringing chunks of brain and bone with it.

I knew that it was futile. We were all going to die regardless of my final actions. However, if you’re going to die anyway, you may as well do what makes you happy in your final moments and nothing could have made me happier than the feeling I got from ending his life.

My time skill ended and suddenly everything sped up.

I felt the force of the explosion, the heat of the flames as I resigned myself to my fate. Then I heard a voice.

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“Hold on human, it’s going to be a bumpy ride!” Asmodeus shouted as he activated some kind of skill.

A bubble erupted around us, encasing Bell, Freja, Panda, Sally and me. It looked like a huge foam bubble, the kind that could be found in little plastic bottles at any child’s birthday party. It glimmered and sheened in its sudsy goodness as the fire from the blast parted and filled in the area around us.

“What the-” I began, but then remembered the bubble shield skill he had picked up when he went all vampire dragon on the captain of the guard.

I knew that new power was OP! I thought, and I couldn’t help but laugh as we were blasted out of the penthouse suite window, a sea of orange and red flames licking at our unlikely transport as we soared above the cityscape.

After I’d helped the communists by setting up this failed negotiation, I’d unlocked a power for Asmodeus as a quest reward.

Leech Life – Adsorb another creature’s power and use it as your own by draining their life force. Only one skill can be stored at a time. Excess power will be used as nourishment to enhance the overall stats of the wielder.

Immediately afterwards he’d attacked a powerful guard captain, who’d been duelling with Sally, and managed to steal a copy of one of his skills. The dragon had told me it was a bubble shield, but I’d had no idea it would be like this.

“Azzy I fucking love you!” I screamed, joy overcoming me as overdose levels of dopamine coursed through my veins.

“Don’t call me Azzy, human!” The dragon protested, “I’ve told you before, that’s our thing.” He looked meaningfully at Bell who was grinning and flapping her arms in the air as we soared through the sky.

“I’m glad we’re all getting along,” Panda shouted to be heard over the rushing wind that surrounded our bubble, “but I think you’re forgetting the fundamentals of gravity.”

“And the fundamentals of bubbles,” Sally said, casting a wide-eyed stare back towards the Ivory Tower.

I followed her gaze and saw huge chunks of glass and metal shrapnel cascading from the penthouse suite. It was about to rain death on everything below us, and those sharp edges looked like the natural enemy of our little bubble shield.

Oh, shit.

“Azzy, can you fly this thing?” Bell shouted.

“Of course not,” he responded, “it’s a shield not a mode of transportation. Stupid humans and their idiotic questions.”

We began losing height, but it was gradual and not my chief concern. The bigger issue was the flaming, jagged pieces of shrapnel that were chasing us like heat seeking missiles through the sky over the inner-city circle.

“So, out of interest,” I began, “what level would you need to be to survive a fall from this height?”

“Over the level cap at least,” Panda replied, grimacing as he stared at me with wide, concerned eyes.

“Well, at least Freja will survive,” I muttered and caught her glancing scarlet eyes and the slight frown on her midnight purple lips.

POP.

I barely had time to crane my neck towards the sound of glass penetrating our bubble before gravity took hold of me with its bear hug-like grip.

Wind rushed around me and I felt my ears pop like on an aeroplane flight. I could no longer hear anyone, though I could see Bell falling with an open mouth. Knowing her she was screaming like one would on a roller coaster.

Panda’s arms and legs were flailing, almost as if he was trying to control the freefall like a skydiver, his cheeks wobbled violently in the wind and his lips were pulled all the way back revealing pearly white teeth and pink gums.

Sally sprang into action the moment the bubble popped, unsheathing her oversized, black sword and holding it in a pose that looked like an attack move. The tip of the blade pointed downwards as she held onto it from above and it began glowing red.

Was she attempting to channel a skill to mitigate the damage?

Copying her idea, because I had literally no clue what else to do to try and fight my fate, I summoned my bow and began channelling a soul shot.

I nocked an arrow tightly onto the draw string and it glowed bright green, with a tinge of black as I focused on channelling all of my stamina into the shot.

It could work.

Every time I used the skill I was hit with a backdraft from the force of the arrow leaving the drawstring. It had taken me ages to finally be able to hold myself still after firing.

Perhaps, if I was really lucky, that backdraft would counteract the force of gravity and allow me to hit the ground softer and survive. It was a long shot of course, but I didn’t have a lot of options.

To my side, Sally was picking up speed. She looked like a meteor as she rocketed towards me, shrouded in red flames and aura that almost blinded my dragon’s eye.

I couldn’t see Asmodeus but he could fly, so I wasn’t really worried about him.

On my other side I saw Panda flapping his arms desperately towards me. He must have known that the sky wasn’t a swimming pool, even if his front crawl was immaculate. I didn’t even know that pandas could swim.

I waited as long as I could, though the ground was approaching fast. Then, as soon as I felt Panda’s fur touch my neck I released my shot.

The arrow exploded form my bow, slowing me down momentarily, as Sally streamed passed me at an impressive speed.

Though the soul shot had slowed me down momentarily, the ground still seemed to be heading towards us way too fast. It was a long shot, but a part of me had genuinely thought it might work.

At the speed Sally was going, she was likely to crack the ground and cause an earthquake. Not that it would affect us when we were mushy skin pancakes on the concrete.

Without warning, a huge, purple circle erupted from the ground, its surface was shimmering like a crystal-clear lake.

My arrow shot through it, followed by Sally and then Panda and I barrelled in behind them.