We ran, and even in my frail form, my adrenaline made me forget about my body’s instant exhaustion. An undead bear with shark arms will do that to you. As we started running towards the onion men, their tops opened up, and an aroma started to fill the air. It smelled like an onion but magnitudes more intense. I was too late in pulling up my robe mask. We both started to tear up uncontrollably, and I was barely able to see with the well of water on my eyes.

“I love you, man!” Jace said with a sob next to me.

I was suddenly overcome with emotion. I couldn’t keep it in anymore.

“I love you too, man. I couldn’t imagine doing this without you. I’m so glad to have you here with me,” I said with a sniffle as we ran down the hall. “We are going to make it, man. We are going to save our family.”

I glanced back through watery eyes, seeing the onion men as small blobs no longer trying to pursue us and turning to face the bear. The Onion Men charged, letting out a high-pitched war cry. They were no match. The first was quickly shredded by a shark arm. Onion skin floated around, slowly falling to the ground like dropped feathers. The same fate quickly followed the next few Onion Men as they charged. Not one of them landed any sort of attack, and by the look of the creature I don’t know if any attack would do damage. Onion skin was thick in the air. In a matter of seconds, there were only two Onion Men left, and they were fleeing, running towards us, a look of pure dread on their cute onion faces.

I felt bad in that moment and involuntarily slowed down my own fleeing as my brain processed how I could help them, but the creature was merciless. In a few large strides, the creature caught up to the two fleeing Onion Men, and each shark arm had its dessert.

“It’s a fucking dead end!” Jace yelled, taking my attention back to getting the fuck out of here. “And shit, I could have used those onion guys. Some great recipes with them. Maybe we could go back real quick and-” Jace said, trailing off rational thought answering his own question.

The hallway ended with a more circular shape. I assumed this would be another fork in the hallway. I was wrong. The hallway ended with a single door. The door was black with silver-studded metal reinforcement. Engraved on the door in a font that I would best describe as horror movie demon scribble read ‘knock, knock’. There was a single human-sized skull doorknocker.

We were finally out of the aroma. I had luckily stopped crying, able to finally see clearly after a wipe of my hand. I took a look back down the hall and I knew what was next for dinner after the onion guys. The sharks and bear were still munching on the onion men behind us, but there didn't look like there was too much left. Jace went up to the door.

“Alright. It says knock twice. So, knock twice?” Jace said quickly, panic in his voice.

“Sounds good,” I replied. “Do it.”

Jace used the doorknocker and banged it twice.

Green lasers shot out of the skull door-knockers eyes blasting Jace right in the chest, sending him to the ground, yelping in pain.

“Shit!” Jace said, taking out a health potion from his inventory and chugging it. “That took out half my health. What do we do? That was my last potion.”

I looked back down the hall. The bear and sharks had finished their main meal, now gobbling up tiny scraps.

One of the sharks lifted its head and we made eye contact.

I gulped. “Hi. Can’t we talk about this? Might I persuade you to leave us alone?”

The shark went into a frenzy chopping at the air.

“I don’t think that worked,” Jace said turning back to the door knocker. “What the fuck is ‘knock, knock’? There has to be something.”

The way Jace said ‘knock, knock’ gave me an idea.

“Knock, knock,” I said to the door.

A long moment came where I thought my idea was a bust until the skull spoke.

“Who’s there?” The skull said, its jaw moving, in a gravely haunted voice.

I was momentarily at a loss for a good ‘knock, knock’ joke. Luckily, having a kid in elementary school, one came to mind.

“Nobel,” I replied.

“Nobel who?” The skull said with a smile.

“Nobel,” I said, “that’s why I knocked.”

The skull’s smile deepened as the door popped open. I rushed in, Jace right behind me, both of us using our shoulders to slam the door shut behind us. We heard thrashing on the other side, followed by the sound of lasers shooting. Then came the sound of a bear yelping in pain with the pattering of feet going off into the distance.

Jace and I slumped to the ground back to the door breathing heavily, taking in our surroundings.

“Fuck this game,” Jace said panting next to me.

“Agreed,” I replied.

We were in a large room. On each of the four walls, there was a painted mural. The first one directly across from us on the other side of the room was a cold scene. Rolling hills of snow were depicted. On our left were rows and rows of almost barren trees, the wind blowing. Piles of leaves making the ground almost completely covered. On the right was rain pouring on a field of crops. There was a deer licking the fawn next to her. Behind us, there was a bright sun and clear skies showing a scene of hills and a beach. In the center of the room was a pile of dirt.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

“So, it’s the four seasons, right?” Jace said.

“Yeah, pretty obvious,” I answered. “But what are we supposed to do?”

“Huh. The four seasons and a pile of dirt,” Jace said hand under his chin.

I walked over and started sifting through the dirt. Just a few inches under the dirt right in the center was a gold seed, about the size of the tip of my finger. I placed it back in the dirt.

“Looks like there is a seed in the dirt. Do we need to grow it? Water makes things grow, right? That and sunlight?” I said.

We thought for a few moments in silence, walking around the room.

“Should we start with water? I finished my bottle a few hours ago,” I asked.

“Same, last water I saw was at the frog place,” Jace said. “Is there water in healing potions? Not that it helps I don’t have anymore. Your pills have liquid in them?”

I only had one other idea I could think of, not wanting to use a pill unless I had to.

“Alright, look away,” I said to Jace as I lifted up my robes and loincloth.

While I peed into the pile of dirt, I thought about how I hadn’t seen Jace use the restroom since his cleaver incident. I didn’t want to bring it up, as he probably wouldn’t see it as a silver lining to no longer have to go pee. I know I wouldn’t take the trade.

Just as my stream trailed off into its last few drops the mural depicting spring flashed with white light. When our vision returned, the mural was gone replaced by a plain stone wall. I was suddenly pushed back as a small tree sprouted a few feet its branches hitting me as it grew.

“Awesome!” Jace said. “Now what? Light?”

“I know just the thing,” I said with a smirk as I let loose a Light Orb.

The same thing happened with the summer mural, disappearing in a flash of light. The tree grew into a large tree, its leaves and branches pushing against the ceiling.

“Did we, do it?” Jace asked.

“Maybe we have to do all the seasons?” I replied.

“Well, how the hell are we going to do autumn and winter? I assume that means wind and cold?” Jace said.

“Yeah, this is reminding me of a movie. What’s that movie where they have to do this? It’s got that red-headed chick?” I asked.

“Yeah, I know what you’re talking about. Can’t think of the name,” Jace said.

Jace went over to the pile of dirt squatting down face close.

“We’re not going to make it,” Jace said.

Jace stood back up taking a step away from the tree. There was a flash as the bottom twenty-five percent of the autumn mural glowed bright and then disappeared replaced by a stone wall.

“What did you do? Show me what you did?” I asked.

“I was just standing here like this,” Jace said squatting back down, “and I said we’re not going to make it.”

“That’s it?”

“Yeah,” Jace said in reply. “Must just be wind.”

Jace blew a long breath on the dirt at the base of the tree, which surprisingly didn’t budge. Jace quickly took steps back as the rest of the autumn mural glowed white and disappeared. Large apples started to grow from the tree. There were at least fifty or so. The apples were large, almost the size of pumpkins, and were a deep red.

“Wow. Those look nice. So many recipes.” Jace said ringing his hands.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, I think we should hold off plucking any until we finish this. Isn’t there a book that starts off with plucking apples and things going downhill? Now, how the hell are we going to do cold?” I asked.

“Yeah, alright. We have a few loot boxes we can go through. Maybe we’ll find something,” Jace said clearly looking in his inventory.

I only had one loot box myself. A Not-Bad Level Loot Box of the Coward that I had received from the frog encounter. I opened it.

Not that we needed any more proof, but you are a total coward. Skipped the Gym Rats, the frog guys, those onion guys, and the Beararmshark. That’s like most of the encounters you’ve had down here.

You have gained Underwear of the Coward!

I looked in my inventory, seeing a pair of boxer briefs. All it said was Underwear of the Coward. No properties were listed nor any description. I selected it, and they materialized in my hand. At first, I thought they were a normal pair of black boxer briefs until I turned them over to see the word Coward on the back in rhinestones. It looked to be the same font and style of the Juicy pants that were popular years and years ago.

“I guess I can’t be picky,” I said rolling my eyes and putting on the underwear under my robes, replacing the loincloth. “Wish I would have had these hours ago.”

Being used to wearing underwear for the past who knows how many years, it was a strange creature comfort now having boxers on. Damn, did it feel good. Everything was now where it should be. Nice and snug. An experience I purposefully did not say out loud to Jace.

“Do I even want to ask?” Jace said as I finished putting on my boxers.

“No, you probably don’t,” I replied.

“I didn’t get anything useful from the loot boxes that I had. A few more healing potions and some more chocolate chip energy bars,” Jace said.

I went through my inventory. I didn’t have much. I had the Depends, some mana potions, the pill bottle with mini-heals, oh and those weird furry handcuffs that I was trying to forget about, and…

“I can only think of one thing,” I said, “but I’ll let you come up with something better before I try it.”

We talked for a few minutes on different ways to make cold to no avail. We sat around for a bit, continuing to try to think of a better idea. I ate one of the energy protein bars while we contemplated. It tasted horrible, and that was coming from a guy who had been eating some weird stuff lately. It tasted like chocolate chalk.

After a while, we didn’t have any better idea than the one I had. We tried the door first, seeing if we could just get out, knowing that if the Christmas room was any indication the room might just try to kill us. There was no door handle on the door, and no matter how much Jace pried with his knife, it didn’t budge.

I then whipped it out, I held the tube of IcyHot and opened it, lathering it into my hands. I walked over to the tree, hands chalk white, and started rubbing it on the tree trunk up and down.

Wow! This can’t work right? This is definitely going against the labels intended use. But keep going. I kinda like it.

It felt like more time had passed than the times previously, but it happened. The winter scene glowed white and was replaced by a stone wall. The apples on the tree shone with a golden light and were replaced by gold apples. Words were now etched on the ground in front of us in gold ink.

Those who take a golden apple only have but an apple, but for those who wish upon the tree, may just see something come to thee.

“So, we make a wish?” Jace asked.

“I guess,” I replied.

“What should I wish for?” Jace said.

“I don’t know,” I said. “What do you need?”

“I wish for my family back,” Jace said.

One of the golden apples withered and died, dropping to the ground black and rotten.

“Alright, fine. I wish for more experience,” Jace said.

Another golden apple withered and died, dropping.

“I wish for a powerful loot box,” Jace said.

One of the golden apples morphed into a gold loot box.

I wasted no time quickly stating my wish. “I wish upon the tree for a powerful spell loot box.”

One of the golden apples morphed, turning into a gold loot box. I went up and plucked it, adding it to my inventory.

As Jace plucked his loot box, the door swung open. We both turned.

“God dammit,” Jace said.