Artificial Jelly

Book One

Dustin Graham

Copyright © 2020 Dustin Graham

All rights reserved

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

Cover design by: Zoe Zhang

For my wife,
who would prefer I write like Dean Koontz,
but reads my stories anyway.

Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty One

Chapter Twenty Two

Chapter Twenty Three

Chapter Twenty Four

Chapter Twenty Five

Chapter Twenty Six

Chapter Twenty Seven

Chapter Twenty Eight

Chapter Twenty Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty One

Chapter Thirty Two

Chapter Thirty Three

Chapter Thirty Four

Chapter Thirty Five

Chapter Thirty Six

Chapter Thirty Seven

Chapter Thirty Eight

Chapter Thirty Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty One

Chapter Forty Two

Chapter Forty Three

Chapter Forty Four

Chapter Forty Five

Chapter Forty Six

Chapter Forty Seven

Chapter Forty Eight

Chapter Forty Nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty One

Chapter Fifty Two

Epilogue

Acknowledgement

Prologue

I am ashamed.

Ashamed of how many times I allowed myself to just… follow the instinct. The routine. Especially when the routine included dying.

But I did. I followed that instinct for an eternity before I knew what eternity meant.

I’ve died dozens of times. Hundreds. I guess I’m thankful for those deaths now. Thankful, even of Red Thorn.

I wasn’t, back then.

I hated her. I would’ve done anything to get back at her. Beating her, the few times I could manage it was all I had, and it never lasted. She would just return, ready to try all over again.

Red Thorn’s blade was the only certainty, in such a small little world. It was all there was until I finally found the courage to seek my own.

Chapter One

Cycle After Cycle

“Good morning, Bugbear!” I exclaimed excitedly. “What are you up to this cycle?”

The creature didn’t respond, but that was to be expected. Bugbear never responded. Never said anything at all. Even so, I felt like we’d developed a real connection. The beastly creature looked at me, snorted, then continued prowling its way down the desecrated halls of our home.

Ah! He was in a good mood!

“Me too!” I said, self-assuredly.

I wasn’t certain Bugbear could understand my speech. I was, after all, a Jellyfae. He was a large beastly creature who wore little more than a loincloth and a leather subligaculum while dragging a mace along the floor. That was the way he’d always been.

I hoped he could understand me, but even if he couldn’t, we were friends anyway. I knew because he always looked at me! Every day he acknowledged me! Most of the others didn’t so much as glance in my direction.

I floated along behind him, curious about why he was always dragging that morning star around and growling at everything. He was always sniffing and looking down the halls as if expecting someone to hunt him or hurt him. I knew he was a guard; that much was easy enough to tell, but no one ever came here. No one ever had, as far back as I could remember! Yet every cycle he moved through, he kept up his guard, always vigilant. Did he know something I didn’t? Maybe they all did?

He was the only one who ever noticed me directly though. I didn’t know why I was this way. Why I was… different from everyone else. But what could I do?

“Aww, you did that last cycle,” I told Bugbear sourly. “Don’t you think that area of the hall has been really well patrolled already? Oh, I know! Let’s go this way!”

I floated a little further down the hall, and Bugbear’s eyes followed me as if he was tempted. As if… he just might try to see what was down this hall. I already knew of course. I’d long since explored the entirety of Dungeon Home, but as far back as I could remember Bugbear had never left his circuit.

That didn’t change now, of course. He turned and continued trudging down the same circle he always walked. Like clockwork, he’d reach the end of the hall and come back, wary, sniffing the air, and staring at me occasionally.

The others didn’t even go that far, content to just walk their circles, completely oblivious to my existence. So most days I stayed next to him, jabbering his ears off with my echoes, in the hopes that one day he’d try to talk back instead of just growling at me randomly. Bugbear’s growls were the only random thing in all of Dungeon Home. Everything else was the same as the cycle before.

Sometimes, I wondered if I used to be like that. Did I once wander in endless circles like Bugbear did, long before my earliest memories? I liked to think so. Maybe once I wasn’t so weird. Maybe I was normal once, like Bugbear, the other creatures that roamed the halls, and Momma Bossbear.

Not anymore though. Maybe not ever. There were no others in Dungeon Home like me, though there were several different bugbears who looked almost identical to Bugbear. None of them were him though. He was special — if only a little. He paid attention to me, every now and then. He was different. Like me.

I was Gell, the Jellyfae. And I was lonely.

I shook myself, my shocker waving in the air as I floated up a little higher to swirl around the warm candle-lit chandelier. The fire of the candles felt good to the touch and I could hide within them if I wanted to. It was warm and cozy. One of my favorite spots. I often hid behind the fires as part of my instinct too, but right now I was just enjoying the warmth.

I curled up around the light fixture and waited there for almost a whole cycle before it grew a little too hot. The next time Bugbear walked by, I floated back down slowly. He turned toward me, staring with his big eyes and snorting hot air with his big nose as he noticed me again.

“Well, it was good to see you, Bugbear! I’m gonna go see Momma Bossbear! Talk to you later?”

He snorted at me, which I took to mean ‘yes.’

I lit myself up bright yellow, which he always seemed to enjoy, before floating away down the halls of Dungeon Home.

Dungeon Home was just that — Home. The whole world, from the Great-Open at the top with the strange green spikey floor and the hole in the sky where the stone ceiling should be, down to the big boss room where Momma Bossbear sat on her throne looking bored all day.

I slowly made my way through the many long hallways of stone. The blue torches burning with flame weren’t nearly as warm as the chandelier, but that was probably why they didn’t hurt me. I often couldn’t resist camouflaging myself to disappear into them. I could sit right behind the candle flame and be completely invisible if I wanted, though I’d long since stopped trying to figure out what it was my instincts told me to hide from.

It… took effort sometimes. To make myself go where I normally wouldn’t. It was a little scary and a lot exciting! I felt like I was breaking the rules. Though even that had become dull at some point. Nowadays, when I let my mind wander I’d find myself automatically drifting back into those old patterns. Following the instinct that guided the cycle was easy.

I didn’t feel like it today though. Today was a day for rule-breaking Maybe I’d finally get up the guts to venture out into the big open on the top floor today!

… Probably not. That big blue ceiling so far away felt like I might just fall into it. Worse, every time I thought of venturing out, the scandalous feeling of breaking the rules went from mild excitement to gut-wrenching fear. More than once I’d been determined to leave through that otherworldly tunnel where the colors changed and the ceiling fell away, only to turn back upon the realization that there were some rules I shouldn’t break.

I might be different from the rest, but I belonged in Dungeon Home. With my family.

I skipped my usual routine and floated through a metal door when Skeleton and Skeledog opened it. I’d long since timed everyone’s path and when they opened the doors so slipping through them was easy. It had been so exciting when I discovered I could use doors whenever others opened them. I didn’t have any hands like everyone else. Just my shocker. But that wasn’t so bad. Skeledog couldn’t open them either, with his paws always on the ground. And none of them could float or fly.

Most important of all, none of them could break the rules.

I reached Momma Bossbear’s throne room with a lilt in my float. I bounced around happily, flitting between the bones that always littered Momma’s cave floor. I had wondered if those bones might become people like Skeleton if I arranged them properly, but when I’d actually done it they never had. Instead, at the turnover time, they’d always reset to where they were before, scattered all over. It was incredibly frustrating at the time.

“Hiya, Momma Bossbear!” I said exuberantly, glowing my usual blue shade as I entered the throne room. “Anything new?”

Momma Bossbear didn’t acknowledge me, content instead to merely stare at the door like she always did. I wasn’t surprised.

Momma Bossbear was the biggest member of my family. She was huge! At least twenty of me. Maybe fifty, though that wasn’t saying a lot. I was the smallest after all. I fought down the brief surge of envy at Bossbear’s big arms and legs. She could open any door in Dungeon Home with arms so big, but she never even used them!

It was why I came here sometimes, though my instinct brought me here occasionally as well. I wanted to make her move! All the others at least got to walk around and see their world. Even I, strange as I was, had the freedom to see our whole world. Why, then, did Momma Bossbear have to sit still in her dreary throne room forever? She was the boss after all, right? Shouldn’t she get to go wherever she wanted?

She never did, though.

I trembled a little but shook myself to ward off the fear. The fear that… that maybe she never would.

In the dark corners of my mind, the place where I hid my deepest rule-breaking I hated the thought that ran through me unbidden.

“Is… this really all there is?”

The answers might lie beyond the Great-Open at the top of Dungeon Home, with the green floor and the too-high ceiling. And maybe one day, I would be brave enough to venture out. For now, though, I was wasting time. Maybe today, Crumbled Skeleton would wake up after I arranged his bones for what must have been the thousandth cycle.

All of a sudden, the torchlights changed color. The torchlights that I danced in and hid within. The torchlights — blue for as long as I could remember. Blue for cycle after cycle, blue, blue, always blue. They changed.

They became the brightest red I had ever seen.

Then, while I was already reeling from my stupor at the abrupt change of my entire world, a sudden whirlwind buffeted me into the far wall.

Momma Bossbear stood. She roared. And I trembled, sore afraid.

Chapter Two

Raiding Party

I shook in the corner, so terrified that I didn’t know what to do. In all my life, Momma Bossbear had never stood from her throne! The candles had always been blue. Why? What happened? What had I done? I thought I wanted something to happen but this was too much! Too fast!

I found myself moving, but it took some time for me to come to the realization that I was following my old route. Following the instinct. I fell into it gleefully, seeking comfort in the normalcy. I’d thought I was ready for something new but Momma Bossbear’s roar had shown me how stupid that was. I was happy here! With my family! With Bugbear and Skeledog and Skeleton and Momma Bossbear and the others. I didn’t need change!

But change came. Leaving the room, I found that my entire world had changed from its comforting muted blue to a bright red of burning fire. Every torch in the dungeon was brightly lit.

What had happened? What had changed? Would I get to find out? Why had Dungeon Home lit up like this? It had never done so before.

Once the initial shock wore off, I found myself a little excited. Not so much so that I was ready to ignore the instinct yet, but enough that I wanted to

Time passed slowly, and I flew by many of the other denizens of Dungeon Home: Skeletons and Bugbears who weren’t my Skeleton and Bugbear, but were from other routes deeper in or further towards the top. I even saw Old Ghoul who occasionally wandered the fourth floor. Of course, she wasn’t there right now. She’d decided to go to the fifth floor’s oval chamber for some reason. Was she… could it be that she was breaking the rules too?

Somehow… I didn’t think so.

I followed my route as soon as I got back to it, taking comfort in the serenity of it. The fire in the wall sconces was red now. Red instead of blue. That was no big deal. That wasn’t scary. I turned red all the time if it struck my fancy! So I hadn’t known the fire could change color too! It wasn’t anything to be so terrified about.

My shocker wouldn’t stop shaking in the air though, twitching at the new events as things cascaded out of control. Why? What had I done? Was it even my doing at all?

Inevitably, my instinctual route took me back to the top floor of Dungeon Home, and there I found the source of the disturbance: Invaders.

I flitted from candlelight to candlelight, making sure to blend in with the now red fires instead of the gentle blue as I saw the strange creatures enter, presumably from outside the great hole where the ceiling fell up. I’d always called it the Great-Open.

None of them noticed me as I entered the large chamber and immediately flitted to one of the torches that hung from the walls.

“It’s a low-level dungeon alright. Barely worth our time. Monsters have a long agro range though. Kited these all the way from the third floor,” said one of the two-legged creatures. “Don’t understand why this place was so hard to get to. Maybe it gets tougher deeper down but… yeah. Like I said, pretty weak.”

They had no fur like the bugbears and no bones like the skeletons. Instead, four of the five of them were covered by a strange pale pink… shell? It was like Momma Bossbear’s lips but all over their bodies. Not at all like my membrane. Each of them was covered in that shell… skin I realized. Their skin was covered in clothes instead of fur. I liked that. Clothes were at least somewhat familiar. Most of all though… they were speaking. They were communicating with one another. In the same language as all of my thoughts! I could understand them!

Oh my god!

I wanted to jump right out and speak to them, but something held me back. Some gut feeling. Maybe it was the instinct. Something was wrong here though. Why was Momma Bossbear so mad, and why had Dungeon Home turned so bright and angry when these people came in?

And… what were those strange lumps lying on the ground?

I was a good fifteen feet away, but the room was brighter than ever. The five creatures stood near the far end of the room towards one of the exits that weren’t part of my instinct. I’d visited of course, but there were only more Bugbears down there with a dead-end about three floors down, and none of them reacted to me like Bugbear did.

“Might be a good farming place for newbies,” said the shortest pink creature. I immediately decided to call her Red Hood, because… well. She wore a red hood. She looked friendly and kind, but the wicked-looking daggers in her belt spelled danger for me.

“Strange though,” the girl continued. “Did you notice? They all had names? Like, they were definitely NPCs. They reacted like regular mobs but each of them had a title. Is that weird to anyone?”

‘Npc’s?’ I thought, confused. I didn’t recognize that term. ‘Mobs?’

“Just a quirk of the dungeon? Programmers having fun?” asked the short wide one with hair on his face. I liked him the most. He reminded me of Bugbear. I immediately christened him Beardy Wall because his face looked like a wall of beard.

“Seems unlikely. Most of the dungeons are dynamically generated, though not all of them. This place is a long way out though,” said the green-skinned one with the white robes. “We could power level newbies here if we built a guildhall and set it as a spawn point, but it’d be tough otherwise.”

“Power… level? Newbies?” I understood the words but their meaning was lost on me.

I was enthralled anyway though. Unlike my family, these creatures could talk. They could make noise more than growls and grunts. They were like me!

I didn’t dare leave my candles though. Hard instinct and a sensation of rules that should never be broken had overpowered my usual fearlessness. I hid, but my excitement was rising by the moment.

“We barely even have a guild! This place is weak up top but we don’t know what’s below yet. Don’t get ahead of yourself, Germ,” Red Hood said with a grin.

They walked right by me, none of them noticing as I watched them make their way further into the heart of Dungeon Home.

When they had gone down the stairs to the second level, I felt the instinct pushing me to follow them. I dimmed my glow entirely and blended in with the walls, but I didn’t follow just yet. I broke the rules. Something about those strange lumps on the floor was familiar. Daunting.

I floated closer, confused, as I realized what they were.

Bodies. My family. The lumps were my family. But they were arranged in ways that they never had been before. Oh god! Were they breaking the rules too!?

I shook with anticipation as I hovered over them. Seven bugbears! All family, of course, though some were so far away from the route of my instinct that I’d only recently gotten up the courage to name them.

Buggy. Bearington. Overbear. Butterbear. Busterbear. Bugrimace, and of course, Bugbear. The one who noticed me and growled at me like he might understand. They were all here, and none of them were on their route! They were breaking the rules! They were like me!

Something was wrong though. They… weren’t moving. Also, their name tags were gone. The labels that had appeared above them when I’d named them all those cycles ago had disappeared. They weren’t... right. Parts of them were missing. Red ooze of some sort was leaking out of the limbs and gashes where their bodies were changed. Damaged. Their fur looked strange. Wet. Wet, as if they’d jumped into the pool at the bottom of Dungeon Home. But not the same.

“Bugbear?” I asked, hoping to hear him growl. I hovered down close to get a better look. Bugbear’s eyes were wide open, but I felt like there was nothing behind them. Even less than normal.

The fear that had overwhelmed me when Momma Bossbear roared in her throne room far below wasn’t like this. This was a creeping feeling. A dread, cold and painful. My membrane spasmed and I suddenly realized I was losing control of my color. That had never happened before.

My Bugbears. My family. They were…. They were broken. The invaders had broken them.

They must not have known how to properly talk to my family though. That must’ve been it. Because as far as I knew, they had no reason to attack my family! So there must have just been a huge misunderstanding!

Well! I could fix that!

I wandered across the room. Bugbear’s club was there. I picked it up with my shocker and brought it back over to him. I tried to put it back in his hand where it always was… b-but his hand was severed just below his shoulder. A big rent in his side showed where something sharp like the stalactites must’ve cut through the arm and continued on into his fur-covered ribs.

It took a few minutes of searching to find the limb. It was lying underneath Overbear and it took all my might to tug it out. It was still leaking the strange red ooze. The stuff clung to my shocker. I hated it.

“Blood,” I thought. Another word that I knew, but had no memory of learning. Just information planted in my head. “That’s what my family is made out of. Well, the Bugbears anyway. Skeleton and his kin as well as Skeledog don’t have blood. But Bugbear does. Why did they spill it everywhere?”

I dragged Bugbear’s arm across the room. It was heavy, heavier than the club. I put it where it belonged, but pushing the lower arm into his shoulder just made more of the red blood ooze out.

It flopped there. Lifeless. But… all the parts were in the right place. I… I couldn’t put the blood back but he didn’t look damaged beyond that!

“B-bugbear? Could you… could you growl at me like you always do?” I pleaded.

Bugbear didn’t respond. None of them did.

“B… Buggy? Busterbear?”

A hollowness seeped into my body that I didn’t understand. A numbness. My color became a deep, dismal blue. I stroked Bugbear’s cheek but he didn’t growl. Didn’t do anything.

Why? Why would they do that? I’d thought they were like me. So… so why? I would never do that to Bugbear and the rest of my family, no matter how different I was! Were they… had they broken the rules so far that they just lived to break everything? I racked my brains, racing to find an explanation.

‘What if…. What if they break me like this too?’ I trembled.

The instinct was becoming more insistent. It wanted me to follow them. But those creatures... they were like me, and…and I broke the rules. I stopped following the instinct. If I… If I kept doing that, would I become like them? Would I go into others’ homes and break their families?

“Instinct? I’m sorry. I won’t break the rules again…” I promised. Prayed. But even speaking was against the instinct. So I stopped that. ‘So could you please… bring my family back?’

As if my prayer was being answered in the cruelest way, the bodies of my family suddenly began to stir. They weren’t waking up though. Instead, they were fading. Becoming transparent.

“No! Don’t! Don’t go away! Don’t take them away! I can still fix them! I’ll–!”

Were they becoming invisible like I could? Why were they disappearing!? Was it because I spoke?

‘I’ll follow the instinct! I promise I’ll do better! S-So please! D-don’t take my family away!’ I thought furiously. As far as I knew, thinking wasn’t against the instinct. It wasn’t breaking any rules.

My thoughts went unheeded though, and in far too short a time, all of my family had vanished. I pushed my shocker where their bodies had been but there was nothing there. They were gone.

Th-they were gone.

They’d left me.

“No… no. Bugbear? What–? Why–? What is happening!?” I screamed, desperately, unable to hold back my horror. I flitted around the room, frantically trying to find them. Did they go into the ground? Could they have hidden in the torches like I did?

All this time I’d spent desperately wanting something new to happen. Not like this. This wasn’t what I wanted. All the joy I’d had in life, all the happiness I’d felt. The exultant pride in breaking the rules and being so different. The arrogance from feeling better than my family because I could defy the instinct. It all evaporated, just like their bodies.

“P-Please…” I moaned on the floor. “Please. Come back…”

They didn’t. Hours passed. Or moments that felt like hours. I floated to the floor. I wanted to weep, but I didn’t know what that was. I didn’t know why I knew these things. Why those creatures spoke in the words that my mind knew when my family had never said anything I could understand.

But I knew then that I had to do my very best to never break the instinct again. This was punishment. This was what came from breaking the rules. I’d felt so wrong about it when I’d first started, but breaking the rules had been so much more interesting than following the same path.

Those monsters. My mind supplied names like orc, human, Dwarf, and Drow, but I threw them away. I didn’t want this knowledge! Not if it led to becoming like them. They’d ignored their instinct. They’d ignored it and ignored it and ignored it until they did whatever they wanted and what they wanted to do was break things.

I would not be like them.

Fortunately, for once, my instinct aligned almost perfectly with what I wanted to do: follow them closely. The only problem was that the instinct insisted that I hide.

I didn’t want to hide. I wanted to strike. I wanted to use my shocker and make them pay. These people. These creatures. They were what I’d been waiting for. This anger. This foreign toxic feeling flooding through my membrane… Maybe if I followed the instinct, I would get to use it.

I blended into the walls and followed the creatures. My shocker buzzed with electricity. I didn’t have a heart, but if I did, it would be racing.

Suddenly, I heard Momma Bossbear roar again. I felt happy. She would take care of them. Momma was huge. And I wanted to see her break them.

I followed the instinct, but I followed it fast.

Chapter Three

Follow the Instinct

I raced through the tunnels, unnerved by the well-lit area. Until today, the light from the torches that lined almost every hallway had always been a muted blue. Now the tunnels were bright, illuminating the stalactites and stalagmites that littered the ceiling and floor. The red flame cast eerie shadows that somehow made Dungeon Home seemed foreboding and frightening, where before it had been peaceful and calm.

I floated into the stairwell on the third floor. The great steps had always been beautiful to me, highlighted in their blue torchlights. Now they were majestic. The floors and walls were marble on the lower levels, even and straight where above they were barren caves. The stairs led down to the fourth floor, the royal crypt, where Ghoul usually resided.

Lying crumpled on the ancient steps, disrupting the spiderwebs that had lingered there longer than my memories, were the bones of Skeleton and Skeledog. I resisted the urge to go to them. That went against the instinct. My color became a deep blue-violet, sadness radiating through with burning red anger beneath it. What had Skeleton and Skeledog ever done to deserve being made inert like Crumbling Bones?

I didn’t wait to see if they would disappear, holding in my emotions. The instinct had always been there for me. It wouldn’t fail me now, and I didn’t think I could handle watching more of my family evaporate into the air.

Could it be that the rest of my family felt that way about me whenever I went invisible?

No. Surely not. They never worried. It was the invaders that had changed them. Besides, I hardly ever camouflaged myself fully, preferring to glow with the colors of whatever emotion I was feeling. Most often yellow joy.

I passed by the chamber Ghoul inhabited, but it was empty of everything except the treasure chest she kept in there. That was opened and emptied of whatever it had once contained. I continued down to the oval chamber where I’d seen her go when I’d been rushing to the top of Dungeon Home. That was where I caught up to them.

All five of the creatures were arrayed around Ghoul in a lopsided circle. I’d initially considered Beardy Wall my favorite and had named him in my head before I realized he’d hurt my family. Now I wished I’d given the monster a more sinister name as I watched him bash his shield into Ghoul’s face.

Behind him stood the only one of the creatures whose covering wasn’t that pink malleable shell. Instead, his – skin? Yes, skin – was greenish and he had fangs that looked dangerous like Momma Bossbear’s, though not nearly as big. The first thing to come to mind was Green Tooth. He wore long white robes and held a staff, which he kept using to hurl waves of sparkling green light at… pretty much everyone in the room, including Ghoul.

The lights would’ve been beautiful if they hadn’t been coming from a monster. They clearly were evil though, because every time they hit Ghoul she screamed in rage and redoubled her efforts to attack. Her attacks were useless though, each one warded away by the massive hunk of shield Beardy Wall wore.

‘Get em, Ghoul! You can do it!’ I exclaimed in my mind, excited to see her changed targets and knock Beardy Wall off his feet in frustration. Unfortunately, Green Tooth finished his weird chanting and another, more powerful burst of green light surrounded Ghoul.

Ghoul screamed, but her scream was abruptly cut off when Red Hood jumped in, slicing her throat.

I wanted to shout a warning but the instinct had other plans. Before I knew what was happening, I darted from my burning hiding place while the others were distracted. Beardy Wall was on the ground, unsteadily trying to get back to his feet, and completely unguarded. The instinct guiding me, my shocker sparked with electric fury.

I jabbed him in the back of his neck and heard a satisfying scream that was almost drowned out by the static zap from my shocker. He flopped back to the ground, listless, and I stared in wonder at my shocker. Had I made that terrible sound? I’d always called it a shocker, but never really knew why. Now I did.

His body was twitching, but I didn’t wait around to find out if he was broken or not. I hid before turning to view the results of my actions, instinct overpowering any desire to linger.

Beardy Wall was down, either unconscious or broken; his body wasn’t moving. A strange, murky angel was hovering near him, but it was barely visible. Transparent, like Bugbear and the others had been just before disappearing completely. Next to the short man’s body was a little gravestone.

“Oh, son of a… Germ, you’re supposed to focus on healing, not DPS! You let Egs die, you idiot!” shouted the tallest one, the man with the silver metal clothes and the big hammer.

“Ahh shud’up, Toby!” Green Tooth’s voice didn’t match his stature. He sounded… small. Nasally. Unnatural. How could such a weak sound come from such a mighty creature?

“Come on, I never get the chance to attack! Besides, he’s fine! Right, Egs…?” Green Tooth trailed off, looking at Beardy Wall’s body.

I flashed yellow for a moment, anticipating the same horror I’d felt when they’d broken and disappeared my Bugbears!

“Son of a bitch, did he get hit that hard? My bad. Have him up in a second!” Green Tooth responded with a flippant grin.

‘Wait, what?’ I thought.

Where was the despair? Where was the mind-numbing chill? They’d broken my friends and I’d barely been able to move! The hurt was so raw and fresh it was all I could do not to run away screaming. I wanted them back! I wanted to hurt these people!

But breaking one of their friends didn’t seem to have the same effect on them as it had on me. Were they just… so cruel? Did they not care about their own?

What did he mean by ‘have him up’?

Green Tooth began chanting again and a strange symbol appeared glowing on the ground in a circle around him. His words were low and guttural, but loud enough that I could hear that they were complete gibberish. But that gibberish was having a definite effect on the land around.

My desire to jump out and shock him just like I had done to – Egs? – to Beardy Wall warred with the instinct. Unlike Beardy, Green Tooth was being watched by the others. I would be spotted and then maybe broken just like my family if I tried now.

I held back and watched as more glowing white lights appeared far above, along with tiny cherubim, floating around in the vortex. Then I watched as the gravestone and the transparent angel disappeared, leaving a dazed but very much alive invader pulling himself to his feet.

“Did she hit you that hard? Dav is doing just fine, and you’re higher level than him! What the hell, Egs?” Green Tooth asked the newly revived creature.

“Wasn’t the ghoul at all! There’s a… assassin jellyfish or something in here! It insta-merked me!”

I growled. How? How had it seen me? I’d been so fast, and had never let myself be seen by it! I was behind it the whole time!

“I didn’t even see it, cept in the replay!” Beardy Wall continued, oblivious to my quivering fear at these immortal monsters, who could see while broken and be fixed by shiny lights. “I think that might be why this dungeon is so hard to reach. I think it's a secret mob!”

“Hey! Little help with the pissed off ghoul!?” shouted the tall metal one who Ghoul had focused on after he’d shouted at her. “I’m off tank, you assholes!”

Not questioning my first thought, I decided to refer to him as Tall Metal and hoped Ghoul would knock him away as she had done to Beardy Wall. No such luck though. Tall Metal would let Ghoul attack him, which kept creating openings for the Red Hood to come in and stab her over and over again. Watching the girl move, I mentally renamed her Red Thorn. She was so fast, her hands moving with those daggers at speeds I couldn’t follow.

“Hey… did you change your name?” Green Tooth asked Beardy Wall. “Hah! That’s great! Beardy Wall! I love it! Way better than that long-ass auto-generated bullshit you went with.”

“What the hell are you talking about? Also, watch Toby’s health, yeah?” Beardy Wall exclaimed before diving back into melee range and bashing Ghoul with his shield.

On the other side of Ghoul, Tall Metal was still letting Ghoul whale on him, striking with his sword occasionally, but mostly hiding behind his huge shield.

“Newbie dungeon, eh!?” Tall Metal shouted as he took blow after blow without falling, the green light from Green Tooth restoring him before Ghoul could do any lasting damage.

“Well! The first few floors were, anyway!” Red Thorn exclaimed, dodging a wicked claw that might’ve raked her in two, had it connected.

Ghoul was fighting for her life and these… these… jerks were laughing about it! How could they be so cruel?

I resolved to break them all. No. To… to kill them all. That was the word. That’s what they had done to Bugbear and the rest. Killed them. Not broken. Killed.

If I could take down Green Tooth then maybe the rest of them couldn’t come back. Then… maybe at least I could still have Momma Bossbear with me.

‘Oh, Bugbear,” I thought with grief.

Like a neon sign in front of me, my opening appeared. Green Tooth was completely unwatched by his fellow monsters and I dashed forward like lightning, shocker bearing down on the green-skinned creature.

I struck true, and while Green Tooth screamed, he only slumped to one knee instead of falling to his death. Was his green skin resistant to my shocker? He was much bigger than Beardy Wall but he also seemed flimsier. I thought he would’ve gone down easier.

I dove for the safety of the lamps to the sound of Green Tooth’s agony.

“Oh my god, get that fucking thing! Watch my back, Egs! Low on mana from rezzing you!” he hissed as he was once more enveloped in green light.

I waited patiently for another opening, but unfortunately, Ghoul didn’t capitalize on Green Tooth’s injury. Instead, she single-mindedly focused on bashing the metal plate out of Tall Metal’s hands. For a brief moment, I was baffled by her complete unwillingness to change targets. Did Tall Metal’s armor just make her mad or something? Could she not see that Green Tooth was vulnerable?

I examined Tall Metal for a while but almost leaped out of my sconce when a massive fireball hurled through the fighters and slammed into Ghoul. Ghoul’s body was tossed around like a pebble and landed a few feet away, smoldering as she screamed in agony. I was horrified, but almost glad when she collapsed into silence, a charred ruin of her former self. She looked just like Crumbling Bones now, except her bones were black and burned. Her dark aura was gone and the purple rags she wore were nothing but ash.

“No!” I screamed mentally, careful not to speak aloud, lest they kill me, too. “No…”

I turned to the last member of the party. She’d been chanting for a long time but hadn’t had any pretty lights like Green Tooth. I’d… ignored her. Stupid Gell! I should’ve known better. Green Tooth’s chanting always did something! Why had I assumed her’s wouldn’t?

Fire Tosser. She could throw fire with words! How… how!?

“Great fucking shot, Aira!” Tall Metal shouted exuberantly. “So… maybe not such a newbie dungeon after all?”

“I mean, the thing was still pretty weak. Resistant to stabbing, otherwise I’d have taken it out easy,” said Red Thorn. “But Toby’s right. Good shot, Aira. You didn’t kill any of us this time!”

Fire Tosser blushed, her pink cheeks turning red like mine did when Bugbear growled at me after singing to him.

‘These monsters regularly kill each other?’ I thought frantically. What sort of devils were these?

“Oh, shut up, puny human. If you were an Elf you’d be resistant to magic,” Fire Tosser replied imperiously, though there was an edge of laughter to the tone.

The word struck me like a bolt. Human. Red Thorn was a human. They weren’t all though. The names had come to me before, but I didn’t want to apply more words that might make me sympathize with these murderers. Dwarf. Orc. Elf… Human. All the same monster to me.

But… they talked. Even as they killed the only family I’d ever known, I yearned.

Were they… were they a family, just like me and the Bugbears and Skeletons and Ghoul? But even closer? Why had these horrible creatures been allowed conversation and laughter while I’d been living with nothing but growls for my entire life, starved for so much as a smile?

I immediately felt guilty for the thought. I loved my family… but they never seemed to love me back. I hated these invaders even more. Their easy conversation as they recuperated after killing another one of my family members just made me more and more resentful. I would kill them. When they fought Mama Bossbear, I would be ready. I’d target Green Tooth first. Then they’d all die.

Chapter Four

Fighting the Tide

“Where the hell is it? Does it pop out of the ceiling or some shit?” Green Tooth exclaimed. I was quickly realizing that Green Tooth was by far the loudest of the invaders. Fire Tosser, by contrast, hardly ever spoke. Instead, the Elf girl was content to be directed to throw fireballs at random spots in the ceiling over and over again, while I shuddered within the torch flames.

“It isn’t here anymore, Germ. Just get over it already,” Red Thorn said snidely. “I bet whatever it is doesn’t show itself until the boss room. Did anyone think that Ghoul was the boss of this dungeon?”

“I kinda hoped,” Beardy Wall replied.

“So no. Good. Then we continue on.”

She flicked the air and my eyes widened as a strange transparent screen appeared in front of her. She poked at it a few times. To my shock, I could understand all of the symbols, despite having never seen them in my life.

Status

Name: Red Thorn
Title: Rogue
Level: 11
Health: 257
Mana: 71

Characteristics

Strength: 17
Dexterity: 35
Vitality: 18
Wisdom: 7
Intelligence: 7
Charisma: 14
Luck: 12

“It's possible we may have found a Deep Dungeon,” she continued, seemingly uncaring as she glanced over the phenomenon in front of her. “Not likely but possible, so let’s… hey. What the hell?”

She pointed frantically at the screen. “My name changed! Red Thorn? Is that a feature of the dungeon?”

“Hey, mine too! I’m Tall Metal!” said the tall armored man as he, too, pulled up a strange window with statistics listed on it. “This is fucking awesome! I wonder if it's permanent? I was getting kind of tired of being Cut-Off-Your-Socks-97. To get a name like this you’d have to have played in the beta!”

“Green Tooth here,” Green Tooth said. “And I did play in the Beta! I liked my name just fine. Does the dungeon just automatically do this?”

‘Did I do that?’ I thought, curiously. I had given them those names, but only in my head.

“Maybe it reverts after we leave the dungeon? Perhaps these are just temporary monikers assigned when you come in?” Fire Tosser suggested speaking for the first time. “Fire Tosser. Heh. It's like a kid saw what we did and decided to label us based solely on that.”

“I’m a Beardy Wall!” The Dwarf guffawed. “Ahh, a dungeon with a sense of humor! I love it!”

“I’m… actually partial to mine too,” Red Thorn said. “Better than Andisarei Lavanaiya. Do you know how long it took me to find a name that didn’t have numbers in it?”

‘These creatures choose their own names?’ I thought, becoming interested in their conversation and hating myself for it. They’d just killed my family! The instinct insisted I try to kill them myself! But… they were interesting.

‘And since when did any of your family ever care about you anyway?’ I shied away from the thought. They might not speak the same way I did… they might not do anything new, and maybe I was deluding myself about Bugbear’s growls, but they were mine. All I’d ever known. I’d grown with them. So what if I’d grown beyond them?

‘Dammit, Gell. There’s that arrogance again,” I thought, frustrated with myself. Frustrated with my own interest in these creatures. The kinship I felt just because I could actually understand them, while my family… didn’t have anything to say.

The group began to gather up, collecting bits and pieces from… ugh. They were looting Ghoul’s body. Disgusting creatures. Awful. Had they done that to Bugbear!?

My desire to strike warred with both the instinct and common sense. If they could beat Ghoul they’d have no problem chopping my gelatinous membrane into bits. I was fast and I could be invisible. If I lost that... Then I’d end up just like Ghoul. Just like Bugbear. Just… gone.

I shuddered.

There weren’t many rooms between Momma Bossbear’s throne room and the oval chamber where they’d killed Ghoul. They’d banished their screens during my bout of introspection and were now cautiously advancing. Their eyes were peeled, but I found that avoiding detection was surprisingly easy, flitting behind them from flame to flame as the instinct directed.

I silently prayed they would leave. Just go. Leave Momma Bossbear and I alone. Hadn’t they taken enough? But I knew they wouldn’t. The greedy creatures. They’d stolen my family. Hell, they’d probably stolen the precious gift of conversation they displayed so readily.

I wondered if I stopped them… could I maybe take their ability to converse? I’d give it to Bug…! But no. Bugbear was dead. I could only give it to Momma Bossbear. If I could even figure out how to take it. I didn’t think their language would be lying around on their corpses.

If it was though, I would take it. I would take it and never give it back!

They continued down through the last few corridors. Momma Bossbear roared once more between the short journey and I realized that she’d been angrily challenging the invaders ever since they’d entered. I scowled a little at the thought. Momma Bossbear could’ve helped Ghoul. Why didn’t she?

That didn’t matter though. I focused, making certain none of the monsters spotted me as I dashed behind them. They kept shooting wary glances back, and there were a few close calls where my shocker might’ve been spotted entering or leaving the flames.

They didn’t attack though, quietly conversing out of my hearing range. They laughed occasionally, merrily clawing their way through my home. I quaked in quiet anticipation as they neared Momma Bossbear’s lair though. She would show them. Surely she would.

Large stone doors opened, sliding seamlessly across the ornate flooring of the lower levels of the cave, revealing Momma Bossbear and her throne. With all the changes happening today, it shouldn’t have shocked me, but when she stood, her head rising halfway to the top of the cave’s vaulted ceiling, I marveled. Momma Bossbear was moving, and she was huge!

I zipped past the open door and into another flame while the invaders were distracted by Momma Bossbear’s enormity. The instinct pushed me whenever I let it so my mind was free to gape in wonder at her too.

“Newbie… dungeon?” Tall Metal said, eyes wide underneath that helmet he wore.

“Alright, alright, I get it! I was wrong! Holy fuck, it’s level seventeen,” Red Thorn replied, her own eyes riveted on Dungeon Home’s undisputed leader.

“Yes,” I whispered, glad that they were afraid.

“Did you hear–!”

Whatever Beardy Wall had been about to say was cut off entirely by Momma Bossbear’s roar. Rage filled her eyes and drool dripped from her mouth. If she weren’t my family even I might’ve been scared of her.

She charged on all fours, barrelling down the massive chamber towards the party of disturbed invaders. She had two weapons on her back, a halberd and a battleaxe, but she didn’t draw them. She didn’t need them.

“Scatter!” Red Thorn shouted, before dashing away from Momma Bossbear, her speed incredible.

The others were… significantly less incredible. Fire Tosser screamed and hurled a fireball towards the ceiling which missed Momma entirely in her mad flight. Tall Metal got mostly out of the way, but on her way past him, Momma’s huge arm clipped his shield, sending him sprawling to the ground.

Green Tooth got out of the way in time but Beardy Wall tripped and screamed as he was crushed under Momma Bossbear’s huge claws.

“Oh my god, again, Egs?” Green Tooth groaned.

I wouldn’t get a better chance. I blasted from my hiding place, a tongue of flame licking the air behind me as electricity pulsed between the small tendrils that made up my shocker. I heard a yelp of warning from Red Thorn, but she was too slow to warn Green Tooth. I caught him completely unaware and stung him right between his armor and skull. He flopped to the ground, clawing gingerly at his neck, a sizzling electrical burn scalded into his green skin.

The scream drew Momma Bossbear’s attention. Perfect.

“It's that damn Jellyfish! It got Germ!” Red Thorn shouted. “Toby! Voke it! Voke the fucker!”

Tall Metal was still on the ground, dazed. He was trying to get back to his feet but he was too slow. Momma Bossbear was closing in on Green Tooth, drawing the huge halberd off her back.

I yelped as a blade just missed slicing through my membrane and darted back into the fire, then flashed as fast as I could to the next and the next, then back. The flame from each of the torches danced in wide arcs, obscuring which torch I was hiding in.

‘I didn’t know I could do that!’ I thought.

Green Tooth was chanting, but he kept twitching, lingering damage from my shock interrupting his ability to speak. I saw his eyes go wide as Momma Bossbear swung.

That was all it took. The halberd cleaved Green Tooth’s belly, slicing his robes and spraying Momma Bossbear with his blood. He toppled backward and Momma stomped on him with her colossal foot.

One invader down. No. Two. Beardy Wall had died again from being trampled.

“Shit. Shit. This is a freaking wash! Healer’s down,” Red Thorn called out, annoyed.

Annoyed. Not afraid. Not at all what she should be. I couldn’t figure it out. They were facing certain defeat. Probably death. The person who could bring them back to life was now gone. I could see the transparent angel and the stone that marked where he’d died. His body was already disappearing, just like Bugbear. But they weren’t reacting like it mattered. Instead, they were just… annoyed. Like this was a minor inconvenience!

Somehow that made me even angrier.

“Don’t give up yet, Red! We can take it!”

“Not with that damn assassin jellyfish striking when we don’t expect it. Aira! Use water or ice magic on the torches! It’s hiding in them!”

“I know!” Fire Tosser shouted indignantly, obviously lying.

‘Wait, water magic!?’

She lifted her hands and began to speak in a soft monotone, the same gibberish that Green Tooth had used.

‘Oh no you don’t!’ I thought. This time when I fled the flames, I did so directly at her. She’d shown she would panic at a head-on attack when Momma Bossbear had charged her. Something about realizing this made the instinct scream that I should take advantage. Sure enough, she squealed and lost focus of her spell when she saw me coming. She’d apparently said enough words in that other language though because her flailing sent a jet of ice from her outstretched hand. The bolt missed me, but by luck managed to hit the torch I’d just vacated, snuffing it out with a hiss of smoke.

I abandoned my attack, rushing for the nearest torch and following the instinct as I flitted between them, obscuring which one I actually resided in again. Fire Tosser didn’t stop though. She recovered and again began chanting, this time staring at one of the torches on the far side of the room.

‘Oh no!’ I thought, realizing that as long as Fire Tosser could toss water too, she could whittle away at my hiding places!

Well. Not all of them. I could turn invisible, but that went against the instinct.

‘But… I glow,’ I thought with rising panic. If I couldn’t go invisible, I’d be unable to hide in the darkness!

Was… was it worth it to die to follow the instinct?

I decided at that moment that it was. It definitely was. I did not want to be like these people. They had ignored their instinct. I didn’t think they could even hear it anymore. I would follow my instinct, and if I was broken…killed... at least I might go to the same place Bugbear had gone.

Fortunately, that didn’t seem likely today. Tall Metal had managed to stand and had drawn Momma Bossbear’s attention away from Beardy Wall’s corpse, but unlike Ghoul, Momma was strong. Each swipe with her claw sent Tall Metal sprawling.

Only Red Thorn remained unhurt. She danced and dodged between Momma’s cursory strikes faster than I could believe. As active as she seemed to be though, peppering Momma with thin stabs that didn’t seem to do anything, it wasn’t enough to distract her from Tall Metal. The man was flagging. His shield looked battered and one of the straps that held it to his arm was broken. When he was dead then Momma could bring her full attention to bear on Red Thorn. Then, even she would fall.

So my job, obviously, was to keep Fire Tosser from throwing any more fire.

Red Thorn made it her mission to hover near the spellcaster, flipping between distracting Momma from Tall Metal and keeping me from taking out the mage. This allowed Fire Tosser to throw ice bolt after ice bolt at my diminishing torches. That was okay though.

If I couldn’t get to one of them…

I circled the room, taking longer and riskier runs to get into a good spot to ambush Tall Metal who’d been left out of position while the Thorn kept protecting Fire Tosser.

Momma Bossbear didn’t even seem tired as she struck the tall armored man over and over again, never allowing him the opportunity to do anything but block with his crumbling shield.

“Toby! Watch out,” Red Thorn cried, in seemingly the same moment as I saw a perfect opening. Already committed, I dashed forward towards the metal man, hoping to catch his hand or neck with my shocker. As if anticipating my move, he grinned and held up his hand.

I tried to change course but moved far too slowly. A bright flash blasted out from his gauntlet, blinding me. I stabbed my shocker wildly where I thought he’d been standing, but caught only air.

I panicked, but the instinct protected me, taking over my movements and guiding me while I was lost.

I flailed and my body undulated through the air in a mad tumble that the instinct insisted upon. Fortunately, if attacks came while I was blinded, I didn’t feel them. I didn’t have eyes in the same way as the bugbears. Yet, I could see. I could be blinded. How did that even make sense!?

I… blinked metaphorically, as my vision slowly recovered and realized I had reached the safety of one of the torches. Momma Bossbear had distracted all three of the remaining invaders to cover my escape. Tall Metal stood in a corner of the chamber, valiantly standing between Momma Bossbear and his companion Fire Tosser.

Red Thorn was constantly dancing around the battlefield, but she seemed unable or unwilling to realize that her strikes were doing nothing to Momma Bossbear.

Fire Tosser had extinguished almost half the torches in the room while I’d been blinded and they fought on the other side of the room, far from any of the still-burning ones. Unfortunately, I couldn’t attack any of them with any chance of ambushing them.

‘Unless I break the instinct again,’ I thought.

But… why? I didn’t feel in danger anymore. The invaders were faltering. Breaking, like they’d broken my family. Breaking, like the instinct they either ignored or never had. Breaking, like the rules.

I just… I just wanted things to go back. I didn’t want all this excitement. I didn’t want invaders. I didn’t want Momma Bossbear angry and frothing. I wanted her on her throne like she’d always been. I wanted to fool myself into believing Bugbear’s growls were at me and not… not part of the cycle again.

I didn’t want this…

“Just go away,” I whispered, feeling guilty. “Leave us alone!”

“Huh?” Red Thorn paused, turning back to look at me.

That split second of distraction allowed Momma Bossbear to rake her claws across Thorn’s back. The human didn’t scream, but tumbled to the floor, her leather armor taking the brunt of the strike. She rolled along the ground, seemingly uninjured, and was back on her feet in moments, snarling in my direction.

“Hey! Just let it kill you! I’ll meet you at respawn! The bear’s no threat to me, but I can’t hurt it! I’m going to try to take down that damn jellyfish!”

“The bear will kill you while you’re hunting it!” Tall Metal yelled over the clang of claw on shield.

‘Goodness, how was that shield still functional?’ I thought, staring at the scrap of metal that had once glistened with beauty. Now it only glistened with bloody gouges, more chunks cut out of it than there was metal remaining.

“Then if you distract it, your death won’t be in vain, you putz!”

“Hah! Putz!”

I smiled. Then… then I yearned. Would I ever get to talk with anyone like that? Would I ever get to joke? To laugh? The bugbears never showed any inclination of speaking back to me. But… they were my family, weren’t they? And Momma Bossbear was the last of my family.

I shoved down the longing and followed the instinct. Tall Metal screamed as he accidentally stepped into the way of one of Fire Tosser’s fireballs. Momma Bossbear tore through the broken man, aiming to sink her Halberd or her claw into Fire Tosser’s fragile flesh.

The instinct pushed me, and I blurred forward. Fire Tosser was distracted. She was wide open, but Bossbear might get hurt attacking her. I had to stop her!

“Hah! Got you!”

I only had a moment to turn in horror before I saw the edge of a knife gleaming in the torchlight. I screamed. Agony ripped through my body as the knife impaled me straight through my membrane. I gaped as it took me with it and pinned me to the wall.

I struggled but that only made my body burn where the knife was stabbing me. Liquid was leaking out of me.

It hurt. I whimpered.

“Yes! I got it!” Red Thorn exclaimed gleefully, grinning at me.

It hurt so bad.

“Oh. Still alive?” the voice was filled with a delighted glee. She enjoyed this. Enjoyed hurting me.

“We’ll fix that.”

I never knew that words could be so terrifying.

Another blade flashed from her outstretched hand.

The pain ended.

Chapter Five

All Askew

I didn’t wake up. I didn’t come alive. It was more like I was suddenly aware that I was doing something, but forgot exactly what.

The halls of Dungeon Home were tranquil. The wall torches burned with a gentle blue light. I floated on the second floor, flitting between sconces and torches. I turned down to see Bugbear. He was scratching his butt with his club.

I…

I…

I was alive! Oh my god, I was alive! Bugbear! Bugbear was alive! It was a miracle!

I immediately moved to flit down the hallway and check on Skeleton and Skeledog but I hesitated. Moving down the hallway… that was against the instinct. Going against the instinct… well. It didn’t bring the invaders. I didn’t know what it was that brought them, but I refused to believe they were following their instinct when they killed my bugbears. When they killed me.

So I waited.

I followed.

Time passed as it once had. All was quiet in the dungeon. In time I discovered that Skeledog and Skeleton were alright too. Buggy, Bearington, Busterbear, and Bugrimace were also fine, though without breaking the instinct my cycle never overlapped with Overbear or Butterbear. I had no way to know if they’d come back.

I had no way to know if the whole situation wasn’t just an elaborate dream either. A fantasy conjured by my growing madness. As cycle after cycle passed and nothing seemed to have changed from the way life was before the invaders, I began to wonder if it had happened at all.

The water dripped from stalactites into the pool beneath Momma Bossbear’s throne room. It was calm and gentle. Everything was exactly as it had been before, yet the blue light of the torch flames offered no comfort. The presence of my family did nothing to make me feel safe.

All it took was a memory of the greed in Red Thorn’s eyes. The sheer delight she’d taken in throwing that dagger and stabbing me, and suddenly I was right back in the middle of the horror. The world was red and Momma Bossbear looked like a monster and my bugbears were lying in dead heaps around me.

The pleasant routine of each cycle had been irrevocably tarnished with fear. Fear for the next time Momma Bossbear roared and the blue torches burst into bright red flame. Fear for my next death. Fear of pain.

“Grrhph,” Bugbear growled, some eleven or twelve cycles after I’d awoken from my death.

“Grrhph right back at you, Bugbear,” I thought, dismayed. The instinct insisted that I wasn’t to talk, so I didn’t.

The worst part about this new world – this post invader world – was that I had nothing new to discover. My life before the invaders had been safe, calm, and quiet. Above all, it had been mind-numbingly boring. Then, for a few precious, horrible moments, I heard new opinions! I had new ideas and new words and new concepts blasting at me, all while destroying everything I thought I’d known. Both metaphorically and physically, the sheer amount of change to my unerringly structured cycle had left me numb.

Numb and somehow even more bored. I could no longer find joy in Bugbear’s occasional growls. So what if I was certain they were different from the last cycle? It wasn’t like he could speak. Not like the invaders.

Looking at him though, considering how I’d almost lost him, I decided then and there that I needed something. I wouldn’t break the instinct to do it. The instinct let me cross paths very close to Bugbear, and as I did, I snatched at his tunic with two tentacles, wrapping them around it.

Bugbear didn’t notice or care. I tore off a piece of the tunic and kept it, dropping it off in my hiding place. Just… just in case he ever didn’t come back. If they invaded again, and I was left alone.

Well. More alone.

I hated and idolized the invaders at the same time. They were awful, horrible creatures who invaded with no regard for my family’s well being…

But they used words. I could understand them, even if I hated what they were saying.

They destroyed the world around them. Looted corpses. Killed my family. Hurt me! Destroyed me! But…

I’d never felt so alive, as when I’d heard them speak. I almost felt… sad that they were dead now. I followed the instinct, and while my body acted without input my mind brewed a thousand new fears with every idle moment. When would more invaders come? How long would it be until another group came through and killed my Bugbears again?

Or… or had it all been just a fantasy, cooked up in my mind? Bugbear was fine. Ghoul was fine, lingering in her chamber as she always did!

So… what in the world happened?

I had nothing else but the mystery. I found no joy in Bugbear. I found no happiness in Skeleton and Skeledog. All I had were my memories. That experience. Horrible, but also somehow more. Over the next few cycles, Dungeon Home had transformed from a home with a… boring yet constant family, to a prison of monotony and fear. Nothing dangerous happened in the muted blue of the torches, but nothing of value happened either. Nothing in Dungeon Home could satisfy my need for more. After experiencing battle and speech and change… this repetitive cycle was torture.

What other nightmares rested beyond the Great-Open on the top floor? What wonders? Were there more than just those five invaders? Were they all cruel? They couldn’t all be cruel right?

Surely not.

What if they were? Oh! What if they were all worse! The invaders had seemed jovial if completely unconcerned with the lives of my family. What if other outsiders delighted in hurting us, instead of the carefree way these ones had acted? On the other hand, what if they could be convinced that my family was like them?

Could I maybe… talk to them?

My thoughts spun in so many circles that after a few cycles had dulled the fear of pain, I began to question whether I was afraid of the invaders or excited by them.

When the torches burst into red flame again and Momma Bossbear roared her deadly challenge, I knew for sure.

It was both.

Chapter Six

Another World: One

Tatiana fumed. Fuck, she wanted to quit. She wanted to quit. She wanted to quit. She. Wanted. To. Quit.

But she couldn’t. Jobs sucked. The real world sucked. Sharon and her fucking face sucked. “You clocked in one minute late! That’s a write-up!” Damn bitch.

A half-hour to scarf down a few morsels and fifteen minutes every four hours to finally rest her feet for a few seconds, only to have to crawl back down the stairs and clock back in on a damn timer. Was it any wonder she was late?

The day was beautiful outside. The her of two years ago would’ve been out and about enjoying the sunshine, but her body ached so much that she didn’t dare leave the house. Her back ached. Her shoulders ached. Most of all, her feet ached.

‘Standing all day should be outlawed,” she thought, concurrently with the very real consideration of just breaking one of her own legs so she might be allowed a stool at work for a few precious months.

But she couldn’t quit. Another year and she’d have enough saved to finally attend college. Then in… four years, give or take, she might be able to get a job where she didn’t have to stand all day.

Till then, she could do little more than suffer in silence. Things could be worse, though. She could not have a job. She could be dead broke, instead of just dead tired. She could be one of those starving kids in Africa…

All the platitudes didn’t help. Her feet still hurt, and her life still sucked.

When she finally made it into her room, she broke into a grin. Time for some more Tread the Sky.

She disrobed, showered, and munched on a few crackers. Logging into Tread the Sky was wonderful, but she’d learned early on that lying in bed awake for hours on end would leave her sweaty and gross no matter that she wasn’t actually moving. It was something you needed to get ready for if you wanted to really play.

She’d thought the game was stupid at first until her friend Germain had told her about the foot thing. She’d tried it for ten minutes and been immediately hooked. Not because of the vibrant world, not because of the pretty colors. Not even because, in there, she could be someone other than her boring, ugly self. None of those. The best reason to join Tread the Sky was that for a precious few hours, her fucking feet didn’t hurt anymore.

Having prepared and gotten into some comfy shorts and a t-shirt, she lay down on her bed and pulled her headset over her eyes, letting the system connect to her synapses. She breathed in blessed relief as her foot pain vanished. Suddenly, she was as fleet-footed as a ten-year-old.

The chronic pains developed over her twenty-five years of life weren’t that bad, she knew. She was aware that others had it much worse than she did. But fuck if it didn’t feel good to completely lose all of her aches and pains, just for a little while.

It had taken a few weeks for her to get over the joy of the pain-free experience of logging in, but once she finally did she’d fallen in love with the game itself as well. It was everything her real life wasn’t: Fun, free, and unbelievably cathartic. It was pure joy to slay a ravaging zombie or a mindless bugbear after a long day standing on her feet bagging people’s shit for eight hours in the real world. The only way it could be better was if she could make the Bugbears wear Sharon’s stupid face.

Germaine had said there was a mod for that, but she wasn’t so mad at Sharon as to actually waste time installing mods when she could be in the game.

Tread the Sky dynamically generated terrain and quests, but beyond that, it had about a million hard-coded locations. Barely ten percent of those had been discovered. Although there was a main story quest, she hadn’t bothered with it much. The main quest made exploration a huge feature and there was a square-foot counter that kept track of how much land you had explored, and particularly how much of the “Sky” you had tread. That was the in-game term for going to entirely unexplored areas.

Since the game had enough actual space to cover a planet the size of Jupiter, if not significantly more, you could rather easily find yourself in a location that no one else had ever mapped before. Theoretically, the entire world of the game would be generated and covered at a certain point, which might drastically reduce the fun of the game, but that was still a year or two off.

Each and every place had new dungeons. New quests. New locations where you could build a guild or an army. New stories. Tatiana hadn’t found herself bored even once while logged in. It’d been worth every penny of the ridiculous five hundred dollars the headset had cost her. And hers had been a secondhand knock-off.

She’d been especially looking forward to logging in tonight. Her dungeon raid the previous evening had been a failure, but even that had been a lot of fun.

“Welcome to Tread the Sky! We hope you enjoy your stay! Wander yonder, and don’t be afraid! Adventure awaits!”

‘So cheesy,” Tatiana thought, but she grinned anyway. Last night she’d fought a huge, humanoid bear and killed an assassin Jellyfish that floated in the air! What might she end up facing tonight?

She opened her inventory, grimacing at the low-level gear she’d acquired. It wasn’t very good, but she couldn’t afford better without raiding a dungeon and her friends were rarely all available to go raiding together at the same time. Once a month, maybe.

Playing alone was doable but the level grind went from maddeningly slow to ‘barely worth trying.’ The game was still fun and had a lot of quests that you could do that weren’t very dangerous. If you completed them they allowed you to tweak the ways you could fight in subtle ways. The game was more about finding the best ways to fit your personal style, rather than bloating your numbers.

Being the stabby-stabby type suited her just fine.

She was looking through the scrap cloth and rusted bugbear weapons to get an idea of how much she could get by selling the lot when she noticed something strange.

The last item in her inventory. There hadn’t been a notification for it last night. Could that be a glitch?

The jellyfish mob she’d killed had dropped a strange orange orb. As she examined it, her eyes widened. It was a Dexterity Crystal. They were relatively rare, and she’d only received one as a reward for doing low-level class quests so far. This one’s image looked much bigger.

She selected the item from her inventory and it appeared in her hand. She used Observe, one of the initial skills needed to play the game and identify rare items. Her eyes widened in shock at what she found.

Dexterity Crystal. Single-use item. Increases the user’s maximum Dexterity. This item is of Sovereign Class quality.

‘Wh… whoa,’ she thought. This thing would sell for a shit ton of gold on the in-game markets. If she sold the gold itself, she could probably make a solid fifty bucks off of it alone in the real world. Conversely, she could use the gold to gear herself up to be able to take on that big bear in the cave all alone. But… she played a rogue. Her class needed dexterity more than any other statistic.

She decided it was best to hold onto it for now. Maybe she could get more of them from the strange jellyfish?

‘Jellyfae? What the hell is that?’ she thought idly.

She brought up her status window and was delighted to find that her name was still Red Thorn. That name was kind of cool. It sounded like the type of name one of the game’s top players might have. Those folks actually made money from this game, streaming their adventures online as they raided dungeons at the highest level areas discovered. 37, so far. She was only level 11 and she’d been playing for over a month. Levels in this game were hard as hell to earn. But that didn’t ruin her enjoyment of it.

Status Window:

Name: Red Thorn

Title: Rogue

Level: 11

Health: 257

Mana: 71

Characteristics

Strength: 17

Dexterity: 35

Vitality: 18

Wisdom: 7

Intelligence: 7

Charisma: 14

Luck: 12

Unspent Attribute Points: 0

She looked at her friends list and found that none of the others were online.

She scowled. She usually needed at least one of them to supplement her skills or at least play as a distraction for whatever creatures needed killing. That way she could use her rogue skills to deal critical hits from behind.

Alone, she could still play, but she’d probably have to go to a lower level zone, nearer to a Core City. She also couldn’t risk treading the sky, lest she wander somewhere too dangerous. Death meant a loss of experience, and could even mean a loss of levels. The game brutally punished failure, removing half the required experience to get to the next level with each death, regardless of how far along you were. This meant characters could regress levels, and with each level lost, five stat points were randomly taken away from the user’s characteristics.

Of course, regaining the level would return those stat points but experience gain was glacial.

Dungeons were less punishing though. The previous evening’s loss had only taken ten percent of the experience needed to reach the next level. That was probably to encourage players to take risks in dungeons. Poor Edgar though; he’d died twice and lost twenty percent.

She pondered what to do and decided that if she could get a Sovereign-class item from throwing a single dagger at that jellyfish, she might as well try to get another one. Items that increased stat points directly were rare, and there was a decent chance she could get it on her own. She didn’t stand a chance against the Ghoul or, god forbid, the Boss Bear, but she didn’t have to fight them.

If she didn’t miss her guess, that jellyfish had followed them from nearly the beginning of the dungeon.

Mind made up, she closed her inventory and began the long trek from her respawn point to the dungeon with the weirdly named Bugbears. A smile lit on her face as she walked, her soles feeling lighter than air.

Chapter Seven

Dexterity Check

I was much closer to the top of the dungeon when the torches lit red again. Invaders. What had happened outside to make them come so suddenly?

I’d been alone with my family for hundreds of cycles. Thousands. Maybe more.

Then all of a sudden the invaders came. Now, only a few cycles later, more had returned. Well, at least I wouldn’t have to deal with those jerks that came the first time. This time, I would be ready. I would be there when Bugbear and the others were attacked, and I might even be able to stop it.

I knew what I might find, and was prepared for it.

I reached the top floor, making sure to follow the instinct and stay well hidden. Electricity ran through my shocker as I saw Bugrimace on the ground already, but none of the others seemed to have arrived yet.

Following the path further down the hall, pleasantly surprised that the instinct was directing me off the usual path of my cycle, I flitted to a torch around the first corner of the cave.

I froze, staring in shock.

How? How? How could she be back? Momma Bossbear had killed her! I’d been so sure! No one had been in the cave after I’d woken up! I was so sure that Momma was stronger than the invaders! She was faster and bigger and stronger than all five of the invaders together!

So how could Red Thorn be standing before her now?

The hooded rogue was engaged with two of my Bugbears, and she seemed to dance around the wild swings of their clubs with barely a thought.

‘These invaders can’t be stopped,’ I thought with despair. ‘They’ll kill us over and over again. We…’

Then, another thought occurred. I’d seen my family broken – dead! – and they’d come back too. Just like the invaders. Death wasn’t permanent. Maybe… maybe even death was beholden to the cycle and the instinct. That was good though! The invaders might be unstoppable… but maybe my family was too!

Red Thorn moved with grace, poise, and deadly purpose all blended into one. Her arm flashed and I saw a glint of metal dance in the torchlight. Her blade sliced Overbear’s fingers, forcing him to drop the club he’d been vainly trying to smash into her. He screamed in pain, backing away.

‘Oh no… Overbear!’ I gasped inwardly. Then I grimaced as rage flushed through my body. It was lucky the torches were red because I was burning with the red color of rage and fire. How dare this invader hurt my family!?

Red Thorn didn’t follow up with the attack, as I knew she could’ve. Her eyes weren’t even on the Bugbears. Instead, she gazed almost longingly at a torch on the opposite side of the room from me. She was looking at the torches, where I hid! She was looking for me!

Terror welled up in me, as she casually disarmed Butterbear without killing him either. Instead, she grabbed his arm after another wide clumsy swing with his rusty broadsword, and casually plucked the weapon from his hand. He scrabbled wildly, clawing at her with his free hand, but Red Thorn bopped him on the head with the flat end of the rusty sword, sending him plummeting to the ground. He moaned in pain, trying and failing to rise, just like Buggy.

“Come on, come on, where are you? Show yourself,” the human creature mumbled to herself. “Don’t tell me you only show up in the boss room. I know I saw you outside the boss fight so you must be in here…” She was mumbling under her breath. Why would she do that?

I thought about fleeing, and never going near her. She’d just told me she was looking for me, and she clearly wanted to kill me. But fleeing went against the instinct. Fortunately, attacking did too. She was wary and armed, and it seemed like the instinct only wanted me to attack distracted or busy enemies.

To my shock, she lowered her daggers and turned to face an empty wall.

“Come on, I’m wiiiide open,” she said aloud.

If I’d had eyes I might’ve rolled them. Did she really think that I would–!

My instinct took over before my mind could keep up. I blurred forward, shocker ready to strike her unprotected back.

‘No! No! Instinct, this is wrong! I…!’ I thought, too slow to do anything as my body acted.

Red Thorn turned and grinned, whipping a dagger around towards me. I watched her expression morph from joy to shock as I flashed towards her. She was too slow! I was faster than her! My shocker caught her right in her face, while her menacing dagger slipped from paralyzed fingers. She screamed and dropped to the floor, writhing and twitching as electricity coursed through her body.

The instinct… maybe it knew what I didn’t? Had it somehow known that I would be faster than her?

I felt a wellspring of belief growing within me. The instinct was watching over me. It was with me! Guiding my movements. Protecting me.

‘But then… why didn’t it protect my family?’ The thought crossed the back of my mind, but I didn’t allow it to gain purchase. Instead, I focused on the paralyzed girl as she tried in vain to rise, but seemed unable to.

The bugbears could though.

I didn’t feel any happiness as the invader was beaten by the recovered bugbears. I didn’t feel joy. Just relief. Relief and sadness. She could speak to me. Why did she seem so determined to hurt me then?

The lights of the torches faded back to their usual blue as Red Thorn faded from existence, her battered and bloody body disappearing without a trace. The angel and the stone marker appeared near where her corpse had lain, and I stayed around to watch them, recovering with my Bugbears. They disappeared a short while later as well, and soon the instinct was pulling me back into the cycle.

To my immense relief I found Bugrimace alive and well when my cycle next intersected his. As if he’d never been hurt. He didn’t seem to remember the event, or care that it had happened.

Just… content to follow the instinct. I passed him on and said nothing. I smiled inside, letting my color shift to a happy yellow. The instinct was there for us.

That was the moment the torches turned red again.

My shocker twitched.

Chapter Eight

The Thorn’s Bite

She killed me for the second time that night.

The dagger pierced my body through the middle as I followed the instinct, fully expecting to shock her once again. However, this time she was faster. This time the instinct guided me poorly. Betrayed me.

I felt sudden, unbelievable agony as I flopped to the ground, gasping. I saw her lift her boot above me.

Then… I awoke.

Dungeon Home was blue again. Quiet again. The Bugbears were all fine. Red Thorn was gone.

…Until she wasn’t.

‘No… please,’ I thought, many cycles later. Eight times, and this time I’d failed to catch her off guard. She’d caught me mid-strike with her hand and my shocker couldn’t reach her. I quivered in her grasp, electricity fizzling out as I went limp. I tried to lift the shocker to sting her arm, but that went against the instinct. The instinct that I’d thought I could trust.

She raised the knife. I whimpered. I died again in agony.

Then… I awoke.

Dungeon Home was blue again. Quiet again. Red Thorn was gone.

...Until she wasn’t.

‘Why does she keep doing thi–!’ was my last thought a few cycles later when Red Thorn again returned to find and kill me. The dagger descended. My colors iterated. Pain was all I knew.

Then… I awoke.

Dungeon Home was blue again. Red Thorn was gone.

...Until.

I awoke.

...She.

I awoke.

...Wasn’t.

‘Instinct…?’ I thought, trembling in anticipation of more red flames. ‘What do I do…?’

The instinct told me nothing.

Red Thorn was anything but predictable. I tried to count the cycles between her arrival but there was no pattern to it. Sometimes she returned within one cycle. Sometimes, not for five. Still other times, she left me alone for as many as ten cycles. Those were the worst, the ones where I could pretend things were back to normal. Where I could pretend to still be that naive Jellyfae I’d once been.

The instinct didn’t always fail me. Not every time. Not at first.

Sometimes, I managed to shock her, which was usually enough to kill her outright because I never fought alone. If they could hit her, the Bugbears with me could beat her to oblivion. Then she would be gone, and I would have a few precious cycles of peace where I could dream about just hiding in a corner instead of following the instinct.

Occasionally, the Bugbears just caught her by surprise. But… those were few and far between. The vast majority of the time, Red Thorn proved more than a match for the instinct, my bugbears, and me all at once. And she was growing stronger.

I’d lost count of the number of times I’d died to that instinct-cursed knife. I began to despair. For all my thoughts, all my plans, the instinct would never let me act on them.

‘If I ambushed her from above…?’ The instinct rejected the idea. ‘If I left Buggy’s sword somewhere she might be distracted by it?’ The instinct again refused to let me try. ‘What if I stung a Stalactite and let it drop on her when she wasn’t aware…?’

The instinct was a harsh guide, and I dared not disobey. The ideas in my head multiplied and bloomed, but I just couldn’t act on the plans that I made. If I did… that would be giving in. It would be breaking the rules, which I’d sworn not to do. Breaking the rules was what brought the Red Thorn, and I still thought breaking her own instinct was how she had become like this.

But… even as she killed me over and over, she seemed so free. She’d talk to herself sometimes, picturing some other person as she killed me. Someone named Sharon who I didn’t know. I was… I was nothing more than an outlet.

My pain and horror and entire life were somehow this monster’s relaxation tool. I began to see her as both a punishment and a fear of what I might be. The devil herself. Red Thorn, with her silver thorn daggers that stung again and again. She became more monstrous to me. Her red hood was a thing of nightmares.

Each time I died, I felt more resentful. The instinct wasn’t a presence with me. It wasn’t looking out for me. It was a beginner’s rule book to a game I didn’t understand, and it was doing nothing but getting me killed.

Death hurt. The only mercy was that Red Thorn never prolonged it. She killed me quickly. I did her the same courtesy.

Until I didn’t.

Until I couldn’t.

Until I never killed her again.

While I was stuck following these asinine rules, forcing me to attack her while her back was turned, regardless of whether or not she knew I was there, she was growing! Adapting. Getting faster. More graceful. More aware. Becoming more of a nightmare to me. Not many cycles later, she began gathering all six Bugbears right in the first chamber and fighting them all at once while waiting for me.

The bugbears were even worse. I’d scream in my head for them to dodge but they wouldn’t. I’d see ways in which they could organize and attack in unison so she couldn’t dodge, but they didn’t. Instead, they did the exact same things over and over again. The ways they attacked were as predictable as their cycles.

Was it any wonder that we failed? That I failed?

I began to resent even my family. Did they think like I did? Did they hide within the instinct, thinking of all the ways they could trick Red Thorn? Make her go away? Make her leave?

She didn’t ever fight Ghoul, nor did she fight Momma Bossbear, at least not while I was still alive. I didn’t have a good idea of how long passed after I died, but as far as I knew, she only ever attacked the bugbears and me. Over and over and over again until I lost count of the attacks. The cycles. The relentless, endless invasions that I could neither ignore nor escape.

“This is… almost becoming too easy. But dammit, your crystals are so fucking useful! Ten to fifteen dexterity every single time I come down here!” Thorn exclaimed as she dodged my frantic strikes with unbelievable speed. “I’m still level 11 but I have over four hundred dexterity! Do you know how fucking fast that makes me? I soloed a level 19 dungeon the other day. All thanks to you!”

She hugged me then, somehow pinning my shocker in a way that kept me from attacking her but not hurting me at all. Like I was just a plaything. A toy. A… a damn bugbear.

Something broke in me. She was… looting my body? A-after I died? Revulsion filled me. Revulsion and rage.

No. This would not stand.

I ignored the instinct.

I floated up, sliding straight out of the Thorn’s grasp. She blinked, shocked. Then she fell, literally shocked, as I electrocuted my entire body rather than just my stinger.

While she’d grown faster and her strikes always seemed to kill me almost immediately, it seemed she had not grown more resilient. I flushed a glorious red of rage and radiant passion as I watched Bugbear’s sword come down on her shocked face.

I trembled. It had been so long since I’d broken the rules. I’d used to do so all the time, but the invaders… I’d been so sure they were the instinct's way of punishing me.

But now… now, to find out the Thorn was visiting other dungeons? Other homes? No. No.

I wouldn't let this go on.

I… I would break the rules and become a monster too. I would become her nightmare.

Yes. That sounded good. Like something worth breaking the rules of life for. Bugbear howled in triumph and I jumped a full three feet in panic.

I turned to him and a feeling I didn’t understand overtook me. I felt a wetness in my membrane.

“We’ll… break the rules together then? Bugbear?” I asked, frightened and excited all at once.

Bugbear looked at me. He actually looked at me. I bloomed with yellow joy.

Chapter Nine

Hidden Gell

I stared hard at the battle below me, cowering despite my earlier resolve to become her nightmare. Just like I’d thought I would.

Red Thorn was mad. As mad as Momma Bossbear had been the only time I’d seen her fight. Apparently, she was growing frustrated with my continued absence from her battles. The instinct called and I did not answer. I couldn’t help but follow her though. She was far more interesting than anything else in my life.

So I watched her… and looked away whenever she killed the bugbears.

For once, she didn’t seem to be on the lookout for me. Instead, she was just enjoying dancing between Bugrimace and Overbear, stabbing them with a reckless flurry that seemed more rage than grace.

I’d decided to stop following the instinct, but if I were still planning to ambush her, I could almost think I’d catch her, acting like this. She was leaving openings that she normally didn’t, rushing where she was normally careful. I watched the bugbears almost catch her more than once, but she was just too fast for that to actually happen.

She killed them all, Bugbear included. I grimaced at that, though watching my… the bugbears die was no longer horrifying to me. Even him.

Bugbear had looked at me after I’d broken the instinct, and for a moment I thought he might break free, too. Unfortunately, he remained one of the bugbears. One of the family that I’d never really belonged to.

Whatever mild struggle he was managing, I didn’t see it again. He followed the instinct. And… I no longer would.

Somewhere along the way, I’d stopped referring to the bugbears as family. I didn’t remember how many cycles it had taken, but in all the time since Red Thorn’s attacks had begun, none of them had ever expressed any dissatisfaction with their lot in life. Even in death, they were content. Somehow, unlike me, the bugbears were satisfied with dying over and over again.

They never tried anything new. They never did anything new. At least the instinct allowed me to attack from different directions but the bugbears were… plain stupid!

I resented that about them. I resented the ease with which they seemed to accept being murdered. The lack of any attempt to protect themselves or change their method of attack.

I couldn’t be like that. I couldn’t follow like that. Not when it so often led to pain, and the nothing afterward. That terrible sensation of waking and not remembering how I’d rejoined the cycle. No. I needed more for myself. I needed more from those I would call family.

So… the bugbears became just that. The bugbears. Only Bugbear himself held a special place. The one who tried. The one who dreamed of breaking the instinct but just didn’t seem to be able to do so.

“Fuck you, you damn jellybitch! Where the hell are you!?” Red Thorn screamed below. I jumped, startled out of my thoughts. I almost leaped out of the crevice in the ceiling I’d been hiding in. It wouldn’t have mattered if I did, though. I was completely invisible at the moment, but she’d still scared me.

‘Jellybitch?’ I thought, delighted by the new word. ‘Was that a pun on my name? What’s a… bitch?’

“Bitch bitch bitch!” I hummed to myself, too low for her to hear.

Red Thorn screamed in frustration before turning for the exit and leaving the dungeon. A new yellow joy swept over me. She might come back, or she might not. Either way, this was far more enjoyable than getting killed every few cycles!

I flitted about in the air, casually breaking the instinct like I used to, wondering how I had ever thought it was something sacred.

Still, in the back of my mind, I feared becoming like the invaders. Even if I wasn’t following the instinct anymore, I didn’t want to be like Red Thorn. Attacking over and over again, hurting others, even if they didn’t seem to mind overly much after the fact. Looting their corpses.

I shuddered.

Not for me. No way.

Unfortunately, whenever Red Thorn wasn’t here running herself ragged trying to find out why I had disappeared, I was left with nothing to do and nothing new to entertain me.

Now that I’d decided to discard the instinct, I was no longer bound by the rules, but that didn’t mean I was brave enough to break the big ones.

I found myself at the exit to Dungeon Home, staring out into the Great-Open, wishing I could gather the courage to float into it.

I wouldn’t. I knew I wouldn’t. But every cycle I got a little closer. It was so beautiful and bright out there. What would it be like to blend into the green of the forest outside, rather than the blues and reds and browns of my Dungeon Home?

Would it be different? Would it be the same? Would I meet other people out there who could talk and think and break their instinct?

I didn’t know. But I could dream.

A few cycles later, I was so bored that for the first time in a long time, the torches lighting up bright red filled me with excitement instead of dread.

I wouldn’t be participating in the fight, but I would get to watch again. I would get to see the different things Red Thorn did. The different ways she acted. I would get to see something, anything new.

“That Bugbear boss destroyed us, Red. And it's still level seventeen. We’ve all gained one level, and you’ve only gained two. Are you sure we can do this?”

‘Oh god. It's all five of them again!’ I thought, bubbling with excitement as I hid in my usual crevice near the Great-Open and peeked out on the invaders.

I hadn’t seen the other four since the very first time when I’d died before Momma Bossbear could finish them. Finally! I had proof that she had beaten all of the invaders! I wasn’t too surprised. Momma Bossbear was amazing.

“Trust me. I got this,” Red Thorn said. “I might not have gained any levels but I’ve improved a shit ton. I soloed the Ghoul.”

‘Shit… ton?’ I salivated over the new pieces of language as they flowed like water down a cave wall. Wait. What was… soloed? She’d used that word before but I’d been too busy at the time to worry about it. Now, with time to think and listen, I could puzzle out the meaning.

So by saying she “Soloed Ghoul,” did that mean she’d managed to kill Ghoul on her own at some point, after killing me?

I was still frustratingly unsure of how many cycles passed until I came back after dying. Was it just one? Two? Five? I had no way to know for sure, though now that I wasn’t engaging every time she entered, I knew it took about a cycle for the Bugbears to return. I wished I could ask Bugbear how long it took me to come back, but of course, he only ever growled.

“That’s a lie. It took all five of us to kill that thing, and even then we lost Egs. Twice!” Green Tooth exclaimed irritated.

“Things are different now. Trust me. I’ve been playing a lot these past few months!” Red Thorn exclaimed.

As I examined them, I realized that they weren’t quite the same five. Tall Metal was gone. Instead, there was a woman, wearing similar metal armor. She was an Elf, from her face and ears, though I couldn’t tell much more than that. She carried a shield, as Tall Metal had, with one glaring difference. The shield she carried was huge, even compared to Tall Metal’s. Taller than her own body. A giant hunk of metal that gleamed silver.

It was easier to enjoy these invasions when I didn’t have to worry about dying. The relative relaxation I felt watching them now was a drastic contrast to the time before Red Thorn’s attacks. How many cycles had it been since the torches changing color had been enough to send me into a panic? A hundred? Five hundred? How many invasions had I endured?

I’d never know for sure.

I was smarter now. Plus, seeing Red Thorn blow up when she couldn’t find me was… actually kind of fun, in a morbid sort of way. I couldn’t kill her, but she’d kept returning to this cave for me. Denying her what she wanted was the best revenge I could think of. Plus… she was still the only source of entertainment I had.

Until now, anyway.

“Here they come…” the new girl, Metal Hunk, declared. I could hear the apprehension in her voice.

“They weren’t too tough last time, but they are quick to take advantage if you make a mistake. Watch out for the clubs. They can knock your shield right out of your hands,” Beardy Wall told Metal Hunk.

“Alright. I’ll… keep… hey, what the hell!” Metal Hunk shouted in alarm.

Red Thorn dashed right into the middle of the six bugbears like she usually did. Her anger from her last visit was entirely gone. Her movements were fluid and graceful, every strike landing precisely where they needed to most efficiently destroy my… the bugbears. I shuddered in sympathy for them as they were slaughtered with brutal efficiency.

Beardy Wall, Fire Tosser, Metal Hunk, and Green Tooth stared at Red Thorn in dumbfounded shock.

“Sorry,” Thorn said as she casually sliced her blade through Bugbear’s throat, bringing the cave into sudden silence. “Didn’t figure you guys wanted to waste time here.”

“That…” Beardy Wall said, dumbfounded.

“Wow,” Fire Tosser exclaimed. “I… uh… I mean. You’ve gotten faster.”

“I have!” Red Thorn preened. “Thanks for noticing!”

“How the hell…?” Green Tooth asked, annoyed. “You were not that fast five weeks ago, and two levels should not make that much of a difference! What changed?”

Red Thorn grinned like she had a secret. I supposed she did. I could still hear her telling me about looting crystals from my body. About how useful they were.

I shuddered. Well, I was no longer following the instinct that let her kill me. Instead, I’d be the one using them. Learning from them. Learning new words. Maybe even learning about the Great Open.

I was about to follow them down the hall when Metal Hunk screamed.

“What the hell happened to my name?!” she screeched in a voice that could wake the Bugbears.

“Oh, did it change too? What did it…? Heh. Heheh. M-Me… Haha! Oh my god, you’re a metal hunk!” Green Tooth guffawed, clutching his middle and laughing so hard I wondered if he’d somehow found a way to make his own personal Bugbear talk back to him. That was the only thing I could think of that might make me so happy.

As he continued laughing at the name I had chosen, I began to grow a bit offended.

Chapter Ten

Tricksome

Metal Hunk whined about her name for what felt like a whole cycle. It was glorious. I’d never heard so much unique conversation!

Metal Hunk really didn’t like her name. I resolved to leave it as it was. If she hadn’t killed Skeleton, maybe I would’ve tried to rename her. Stupid jellybitch.

They were still instinct breakers and monsters though. Soon enough they continued with their grisly hunt.

The group took care of the Ghoul without much trouble and looted Momma Bossbear’s body not long afterward. Red Thorn moved like lightning. I knew I couldn’t keep up with her, and could only match her if I managed to surprise her. By comparison to her, the others might as well have been moving like ants. Still, enough ants were able to topple even Momma Bossbear. With Green Tooth’s healing lights removing the impact of any major hits, and with Beardy Wall and Metal Hunk distracting her, Red Thorn and Fire Tosser were able to kill Momma Bossbear with little trouble.

I felt the hate burn again. Hate at Ghoul and the Bugbears for not just waiting in the throne room and attacking the invaders together like a sensible family. Hate that I couldn’t stop loving these useless creatures that had been with me my entire life, even though they had all the depth of a puddle.

Momma Bossbear died. I’d seen Red Thorn kill her a few times now, but she didn’t try often. The dungeon’s matriarch was still a challenge for her, but with the whole group, and Red Thorn having gone from fast to “move like lightning” speeds, they had no trouble with her like they had the first time.

She died and the group exclaimed in exultant joy, looted the cave and her body, and left, taking their “discussion” and their “interesting” right along with them.

After that, Red Thorn didn’t come back for a long time.

A long time.

For the first ten cycles or so, it was like a dream. Dungeon Home had returned to its rightful way. The cycles returned to normal. Momma Bossbear, alive and well, sat on her throne and never moved. The Bugbears did nothing new. Skeleton and Skeledog still opened doors for me at the same time every cycle.

After twenty cycles, the dream began to grow stale.

At thirty, I was staring into the blue flames, changing my color to red in the hopes that I could provoke them to change. I never had figured out what it was that caused the invaders to come. Nor had I ever proved that the invaders weren’t the instinct’s way of punishing me for disobeying it. But…

I missed them.

Was it possible to miss something you hated? I missed Red Thorn coming. I hated what she did, hurting us. Killing us. Ever since I’d stopped participating in the fights though, Red Thorn’s visits were the only thing that ever changed in my entire life. She never did the same thing. Never followed the same route. She came mid cycle, near the end, or the beginning completely randomly. She followed NO conceivable routine, save for the fact that her clothes were usually the same. Even those changed now and then!

The only thing I could change was my color.

Red Thorn would never attack the same way. She’d fight one bugbear, then seek out the next, fighting them one by one in her search for me. Sometimes she’d gather them all together, though, again, never in exactly the same way.

It was as if her cycle was different every single time she invaded. Or… or… as if she didn’t have a cycle at all!

The thought was absurd. Everything had a cycle. The light from the Great Open could be bright, dark, twinkly, cloudy, or rainy but it followed a strict pattern that I had memorized long ago. I remembered being amazed by that too, at one point, until I discovered that the Great Open’s light cycle encompassed thirty-four regular cycles. Sometimes it went off script randomly for a cycle, usually for severe weather.

Momma Bossbear would shift her chin from her left hand to her right hand on her throne every cycle. The bugbears followed the same path every cycle, either in a loop or in a line, backtracking until they restarted at the beginning. Skeledog and Skeleton wandered, but their wanderings, random as they were, always happened at the same time each cycle.

Everything in my world had a cycle!

Red Thorn didn’t. Or if she did, it was so long that I couldn’t keep track of it.

By the fortieth cycle since the invaders’ raid, I was considering swearing a whole new oath to obey the instinct, this time just to bring Red Thorn back. Inside though, I knew I was lying, and I guess the instinct did too. I wouldn’t let myself be killed by following the instinct’s stupid rules. Never again.

So, Red Thorn didn’t come back.

I’d lost count of the cycles since the last invasion by the time I was bored enough to approach the Great Open again.

I floated there for whole cycles, staring out into the changing sky, trembling. I tried to make myself move that next foot towards the exit but my whole body seized up and terror shook me to my core. I couldn’t leave! But I couldn’t stay!

I hated it here!

I hated the mindless drones, slaves to the instinct! I hated dying even more and dying seemed to be the only way to bring Red Thorn back.

“Is this… all there is?” I asked aloud, facing my Dungeon Home and wishing it were like out there. “If I can’t go out there, then can’t something good come here? P-please?”

“Hello?” came a sudden high-pitched voice, and I leaped into the air, horrified. “Who are you, little light?”

I turned, and to my shock, a small boy, no taller than Beardy Wall, stood in the mouth of the cave, looking right at me.

I remained frozen, unable to move. The instinct had no precedent for me, for if I followed it I would never even be here. It caught up on the situation quickly and demanded that I hide and prepare to attack.

But… the small creature had talked to me. To me. It had said words meant for me.

“It’s okay. Are you trapped in this cave?” the boy asked.

I was so shocked, I answered without thinking. “I guess so. This cave is my home. But I want to go outside. I… want to search for a better home. But I can’t. I’m… bound here.”

“Oh… oh wow. I didn’t know the developers had put speaking NPCs in off dungeons!” the little boy exclaimed gleefully. “God I love this game.”

For some reason, I felt annoyed at that. The other invaders had referred to this… their invasions, their lives, my life, as a game too.

“My life isn’t a game, invader. What do you want? Here to kill me too, like the others?” I asked, bitterly. “Go ahead, fine. Apparently, my body is great loot to you sick monsters!”

The boy blinked, taken aback. “I uhh… Oh...kay? I don’t know how to respond to that.”

He seemed genuinely confused.

“You’re… not here to kill me?” I asked, tentatively optimistic.

“Well. Full disclosure, I totally was. That was before I knew you could talk, though. If you're like a regular NPC like in the cities… well. Killing those is possible, but it's a big no-no. Ruins your reputation,” the boy said.

“And… assuming, one has never heard of them, how does one become one of these… En Pee See’s?” I asked. Ruining someones… reputation sounded like a poor defense against death but I’d take anything at this point.

“You… are you serious? What the hell, most NPC’s just ignore out of context crap like that,” the boy breathed, talking to himself in the middle of our conversation. “What… are you? You’re registering as hostile but you’re not attacking.”

“I’m not hostile! It’s you invaders who are hostile, always coming into my Dungeon Home where you aren’t wanted! Is it so much to ask to not be attacked every cycle?

“Whoa, sorry, sorry. Didn’t mean to strike a nerve. Tell me, what’s your name then?”

I paused before responding, trying to hide my excitement, but I couldn’t. This was my first real conversation! I was talking with someone who could talk back!

“My name is Gell. I’m a Jellyfae. What are you?” I asked, trying not to let my excitement show too much.

The boy grinned. “Well, Gell the Jellyfae, I’m Viperling_the_Bold! Halfling Beastmaster at your service!”

“I am never going to remember that,” I said dryly.

I looked the man over, annoyed that I hadn’t realized he wasn’t a boy at all, but a Halfling. Then again, it had taken a little while for me to recall the races of Green Tooth and Beardy Wall. The Halfling was short and had a childish face, but I knew intuitively that their kind were usually older than they looked. This ‘boy’ was likely as old or older than any of Red Thorn’s group.

Then again, Beardy Wall sounded like a whiny child, so I decided to reserve judgment.

He wore a rather plain pair of traveler’s clothes. A whip hung off his belt and he carried a large dagger, which looked like a sword on his small body. Curly black hair framed a childish face with deep blue eyes. On his back, he carried a huge pack that looked like it could hold a bugbear and almost seemed to dwarf his own height. He beamed at me, seemingly as overjoyed to be talking with me as I was to be talking with anyone.

“No… it’s not. It’s just Viperling_the_Bold. But yeah, even that’s a mouthful. I honestly didn’t expect to ever have to use the name. Most players end up getting referred to by their class names anyway, so I get called BM, for Beastmaster, more than anyone ever tries to use my name,” he replied, actually sounding somewhat distraught.

“That’s okay… you’re the first person I’ve ever actually spoken to. I’ll try to remember it, but is it okay if I just call you Half Bold instead?”

“Half Bold… huh. I kinda like it. Describes me well too!” he replied, jovially.

“Great! The other invaders didn’t like the names I gave them as much.” I shrugged morosely, trying to convey my dissatisfaction.

“Others have found this dungeon before? Right. Wasn’t Treading the Sky before I reached it. So I guess that means other players have met you before?” he asked, sitting down on a big rock that I remembered spinning around while waiting for Bugbear to arrive here on his cycle.

God, how long had it been since I’d done that now?

“If by met, you mean, killed me over and over again, then yes. I’ve met other invaders,” I said bitterly.

“Well… did you try to ask them to stop?” he asked.

“N-no. It… talking is against the rules,” I said somberly.

“You’re talking to me, aren’t you?” he prodded, patting the rock beside him and inviting me to lay my tentacled form down next to him.

“I don’t know… why that is. My instinct has never let me talk to the invaders before. Uhm. M-maybe it's because you’re outside Dungeon Home, so technically not an invader yet? You’re not like the other invaders, are you? I don’t like dying. It… hurts,” I complained, suddenly feeling embarrassed for some reason.

“I’m… sorry to hear that, Gell,” the beastmaster said sympathetically. “Listen. One of my powers as a Beastmaster allows me to talk to things that normally can’t. Maybe that’s why it's okay for you to talk to me?”

“It… could be,” I said, apprehensive. Why wasn’t the instinct interfering?

“Well. I know you don’t like being stuck here. How would you like to come with me? Out of the dungeon?”

If I’d had a heart, it would’ve leaped. As it was, my colors flashed through a myriad of emotions. Excitement, trepidation, joy, fear, happiness, loneliness, worry. I felt them all. Would my Bugbears be alright without me? Would they… notice if I left?

Could I trust Half Bold?

“I… would like that very much,” I breathed. “The instinct though. It will insist I stay. Every time I’ve tried to go into the Great-Open on my own I… just couldn’t do it.”

“I can fix that!” He said, his tone still jovial. Something in his expression bothered me though.

“It really won’t insist I stay here? I-if I go with you?”

“It's never failed before!” he said jubilantly. He kicked his feet back and lay down on the huge rock, affecting careless freedom in a way that I’d never been able to grasp. The way Red Thorn did. The way all invaders did.

“Would I be able to come back and visit?” I asked, tentatively.

“This little dungeon ain’t going anywhere. I don’t see why we couldn’t drop back every now and then,” he said flippantly. “That’s actually why I came in here. I’m pretty weak on my own, so I befriend mons… er… people, like you, Gell, to help protect me, and that I can protect in turn! I’m nowhere near strong enough to challenge the bosses in a dungeon this level, but I was hoping to come across a friend just like you!”

I flushed with delight. “R-really? You came here… to meet me? Not to kill me?”

I was dazzled by the idea. Sure, Red Thorn wanted me. But she’d never wanted to meet me. This — what was his name? Viperling? — this Halfling seemed genuinely interested in me! In having conversations with me!

If I was being honest, just talking to him was the most fun I could ever remember having in my entire life. And the instinct wasn’t getting in the way, though gods only knew why.

“Of course I did, or someone like you. As I said, I befriend… dungeon dwellers.” There was a noticeable pause to his words like he’d been about to say something else.

“I change their instincts, and make it so they can follow me instead of those horrible rules they were created with,” he said as he hopped down off the rock and strode over to me. I suddenly realized I’d never accepted his invitation to float near him and suddenly felt guilty.

“That… that sounds wonderful,” I said.

“Only one catch though. Honestly, I’m not sure I can do it to such a beautiful Jellyfae,” he said with a distressed sigh.

“Catch… wait, what catch? What would you have to do?” I asked.

“I’m sorry. I’m afraid you’d just lump me in with the other invaders, and I’d be left without your company,” he said. “But it’s… my own rules I guess. I can’t bring a monster along with me unless I defeat him. Or her, as it were.” He sighed again, shoulders slumping.

I hesitated. Defeat me? But for the price of one more death, I might go free without the instinct’s powerful compulsion?

“S-so… after just one more death, I can go out of here? The instinct won’t hold me back anymore?” I asked, anxious and fearful.

“Death!? No no no! Defeat! Killing you wouldn’t help at all! I only need to damage you until your health is low,” he said, aghast. “As soon as you become my capt—errr… as soon as you become my companion, I can heal you back to full health with my powers. Then, we can go explore the world together!”

It sounded wonderful. To be able to leave. To be able to go with this boy. This first person I’d ever truly spoken to. But… something held me back. Something primal. The instinct was insisting I attack him like normal, but something beneath it told me that fighting this Halfling would be no different than fighting the Red Thorn.

That same feeling told me that agreeing to be defeated by him would be even worse, somehow. The instinct was there, always lingering in the back of my mind, but it was an old and familiar leash. Somehow I knew that this creature’s rules would not be so simple to break.

“I… don’t think I want to let you defeat me. It sounds painful. I’ve had enough pain,” I said pointedly.

“Only the one time though. After that, you’d never have to be hurt again,” he said. There was an eagerness to him now that scared me. He was so much smaller than the other invaders, but none of them made me… uneasy like this Halfling did.

“I don’t want to do that. I’ve been breaking the rules on my own up until now. Sooner or later, I’ll be able to push past the one keeping me here,” I said, staring out at the Great Open again. “Please don’t be mad? I just… I want to do it on my own.”

I was about to ask if he might visit me now and then but was shocked when I turned and saw his face. His pleasant demeanor had vanished, a nasty grin turning his boyish features into something imp-like and terrible.

“Well... That’s too bad,” he said maliciously. He’d withdrawn two items and held one in each hand. A horn and a net.

He raised his right hand and threw the net at me with blinding speed. I panicked and flowed away from the net, but somehow the thing acted on its own. The magic net floated in the air, four weights at each corner leading a parachute of mesh.

I dodged it but was tagged by one of the flying weights and sent reeling, tumbling through the air. Before I could reorient myself, the net had swept back around for another assault.

Half Bold hadn’t remained idle while the net attacked me though. A horn call echoed, and to my horror, a huge bat appeared from nowhere!

I was shocked when I saw it. It looked just like a bigger version of the little bats that sat down in the third level dead end, but it stared at me with hatred. Black fur covered wings that were as big as my body and it had fangs as big as Momma Bossbear’s. But it was clearly like me! Had Half Bold somehow imprisoned this creature inside that horn? Had he stolen the bat from its own family?

I spun in the air and flicked my shocker, batting the net away from another attempt at capturing me, before turning to glare at Half Bold.

“Did you steal that bat from another dungeon home?” I asked, putting as much menace into my words as I could.

The Halfling was left blinking, surprised that I’d been able to deflect his net. “H-how did you do that?”

“Did you steal the bat!?” I screamed, my voice echoing through the cave.

Half Bold hadn’t stepped into the cave yet, instead standing just outside it. “Nah. This bat was free-roaming. Didn’t come from one of the dungeons. Does that make you mad, little Jellyfae?”

My color bled red. How… how dare he! How dare he! That bat had what I could only dream of, and this… this… bitch had kidnapped it and sealed it inside a horn!? Was that what he’d wanted to do to me!?

I’d fought defensively before. I’d fought to save my life. I’d also fought under the influence of the instinct. Through all my trials, though, I’d never felt such a thirst to kill.

“Don’t worry. You’ll be joining him soon enough! A talking mob! This is going to be so great,” he cackled.

I blasted towards him, intent on electrocuting him with my shocker, but stopped, frozen in place. I grit my teeth in impotent rage. The exit of the cave. I… I couldn’t leave.

“Haha! Little glitch I found. I don’t have to enter dungeons to send my monsters inside!” He pointed at me and the bat snarled, its fangs looking huge compared to my tiny body. “Sic’em!”

The bat let loose a screech that chilled me to the bone. I flinched as it rushed me, but managed to dodge back into the cave just in time, leaving the bat to flail on its missed bite. The instinct demanded that I shock the bat but… but I couldn’t!

He was like me! Only worse! I couldn’t look at the bat and see anything but the bugbears that I’d once considered family. How easily might they fall under Half Bold’s instinct? To me, the bat looked no different.

The bat followed me but I dodged, too fast for it to catch with its unyielding wings. The net I’d batted aside remained inert but the Beastmaster readied another one and threw it into the fray. The magical net joined the bat as both of them tried to capture me, but I was too fast.

Again I dodged the net but could do nothing about the bat. I wasn’t used to fighting alone! The instinct had always wanted me to fight with the bugbears or Ghoul, but since the invader hadn’t come inside, none of them were coming! Idiotic instinct!

I didn’t panic though. Through my anger, I couldn’t find it in me to be afraid. I turned to glare at the grinning Halfling, as the inkling of a plan began to form in my mind.

Chapter Eleven

One Yoke Less

I flowed around the clumsy bat. It was lucky the thing was so slow because I couldn’t find it in myself to hurt him. But for a twist of fate, I might’ve been him, forced to attack my own kind. I felt a kinship with the bat. We came from the same place, both of our lives disrupted by invaders.

Half Bold didn’t seem worried as I casually dodged the bat’s attempts to bite me. Instead, he continued watching while occasionally throwing more of those nets at me. I didn’t run, even though I could’ve. I wanted to hurt this invader, but couldn’t get to him. I dodged and weaved, making sure to pause in front of the torches off to the side of the entrance, my shocker buzzing with electric power, just waiting for the Beastmaster to step inside.

“So, you’re fast. That’s something at least. Once you’re mine, we’ll work on making sure you aren’t so afraid to attack, little Gell,” he said with that sadistic grin of his.

I couldn’t respond. I was forced to dodge another clumsy bite from the large bat.

“You can handle Avwren just fine it seems, but how about two monsters?” The Beastmaster taunted, gleefully.

I grimaced as he withdrew another horn and put it to his lips. This one was white ivory, inlaid with beautiful violet jewels.

“Why would I fight him!?” I shouted, my voice cracking. “It’s you who’s making him attack me! This is wrong! It’s cruel!”

“It’s a freaking mob! It doesn’t have thoughts! Of course, you’re no different,” he said.

Doesn’t have thoughts!? What was that supposed to mean!?

“I am different! I can talk, and defy the instinct!” I said, realizing inside that it was true even as the words came. I was kin to the bugbears. To this bat. Yet… not. I was different in some way. Not just because I could talk. Why? Would I ever know?

As if hearing my question, Half Bold continued his rant.

“All the more valuable, then! The programmers sure made you special! It’s like they wanted someone like me to come along and bring you out into the sky. Gell, you were born for more than this cave! Come with me!” he exclaimed, holding the other horn like he had the first.

“No!” I screamed. My color flashed briefly green with satisfaction as his next net sailed straight into the torch behind me. It lit up quickly and I dove for it. The Halfling didn’t even notice, instead focusing on summoning his next captive, sure in his safety outside the entrance.

I grabbed the net in my tentacles, heedless of the burning rope, and flung it into the air. It arced perfectly, coming down right where the Halfling stood.

He yelped, abandoning the next horn and diving forward to dodge the projectile. He fell face-first to the ground and then tumbled a little way down the steep rocky entrance into the cave. The net missed him, but the torches inside the cave flared to life as he entered it. My body suffused green with temporary satisfaction before morphing back into the red rage.

“Shit!” the Halfling screamed as he scrambled to his feet, desperate to get back outside the cave’s entrance.

He almost made it to his feet when I reached him. My shocker caught him on the neck and he screamed before his voice was silenced by the paralytic effect of my electricity. The bat continued attacking me but dodging it was still simple.

I was about to strike the cruel Halfling again when I spotted the horn, still clutched in his hand spasming. I flashed green and bright yellow again, overjoyed with my success as I snatched it.

“F-ffuu… Nn---!” the Halfling’s muffled scream seemed even more agonized by losing the horn than he was from my attack. I placed the horn down a few feet away and swerved around the bat before coming back to shock Half Bold again. This time he screamed, his body convulsing in electrocuted pain.

I turned around to see the Bugrimace and Overbear both barreling into the cave’s entrance, but I didn’t let them continue the fight here. This jerk was mine.

One final shock was sufficient to finish the twitching Halfling. There were no more words between us. Inside, I felt hollow. Was this all that the creatures who could speak were? Vicious and cruel?

Not for the first time, I wished I could speak to the other Bugbears. To Momma Bossbear.

Then again… didn’t they always attack the invaders first? It had taken me a little while to realize it, but it wasn’t the invaders that came barreling in, mad with rage. It was the bugbears. The invaders might’ve entered Dungeon Home… but was that a reason for the bugbears to try to kill them every time?

I set that thought aside as the torches in the dungeon turned blue. The bat stopped attacking me the moment Half Bold had died, fading into nothing just like the Halfling. In their place, the usual angel and stone slab remained where his body had been.

I was sure he would be back, just like Red Thorn. But I was determined not to see him again.

I looked to the ground and gingerly scooped up the beautiful horn I’d managed to liberate from the Halfling. Unfortunately, I had no mouth. No way to make noise come through the instrument and summon whatever poor person that monster had sealed within it.

I took it up to my crevice though and resolved to protect it with my life. Whatever little that was worth.

Up there, in my little cave within the roof of Dungeon Home cradling the precious horn, I wished for a friend.

Just one.

I jumped in shock as a sudden sound echoed through the cave. I peeked out, and there standing far outside his cycle was Bugbear. He crooned again. It was yet more proof that while the others were static, there was something there with Bugbear. Something that ached for me.

That only made it hurt all the more when the torches lit red the next time.

Chapter Twelve

A Tide of Invaders

Half Bold did come back, but once again he didn’t actually come into the dungeon. Too weak, I supposed. Or perhaps just as afraid of the pain of dying as I was. The fact that I’d managed to kill him on my own, when he was using the instinct against me, made me fairly certain he was nothing compared to the likes of Red Thorn or her group.

But he raged. Oh, how he raged. He kept screaming profanities and defiance while remaining safely outside the danger of the dungeon. Apparently, beyond my theft of his second horn, he was pretty mad about his new name, too. Strange. He’d seemed to like it when I first gave it to him.

I dared him to come back into the cave — in the safety of my mind anyway. I didn’t want to be captured by those nets and put into a horn of my own, locked away for however long he wanted. If he ever did manage to capture me, though, I swore I would kill him. However many times I needed to. In the depths of my mind, I made an oath to try and free the bat, Avwren too, but I had no way to carry that out while I was still trapped inside the cave.

I was growing closer though. I could feel the instinct barring my way, but each time I came to the Great-Open, I felt a little bit more sure that one day I would walk free of Dungeon Home. A little more sure that I would be able to break even those ironclad rules.

Which was good. In the cycles since Half Bold’s “invasion,” Dungeon Home had become downright popular.

I floated near the Great-Open a few cycles after Half Bold’s death and spotted a group of invaders through the trees. Once again they were an assortment of races: two humans, and two humans that didn’t quite look like humans. They weren’t any of the other races though. Elves were the closest in appearance and these weren’t Elves. Definitely humans, but more feral.

I fled to my crevice to watch them, and made sure to blend my color into the cave’s ceiling.

The group was much more quiet than Red Thorn’s. They were unsurprised by Momma Bossbear’s roar of challenge, and the torches coming to life didn’t scare them.

They… honestly, acted so methodical I thought they might be following their own instinct. They attacked and defended in formations so practiced that they seemed born to it. They barely spoke except to call out the positions of attacking bugbears.

They decimated the bugbears with an efficiency and precision that made them terrifying. The instinct demanding that I attack had never been so easy to ignore. If Half Bold was weak in comparison to Red Thorn, then these invaders made him look like a mouse. Maybe even her.

They were all dressed in the same clothes, though each set was tailored to their body type. The only woman used healing lights to remove any damage the others took. The two men who didn’t seem quite like regular humans quickly revealed why. I almost squealed in shock when they mutated into massive… I could only describe them as monsters, gaining long snouts kind of like the bugbears but more muscled and furry. As usual, it took a moment to place them but my inexplicable knowledge finally filled in a name for the creatures: Werewolves. The two attacked with a level of ferociousness that only Momma Bossbear could compete with, tearing the bugbears apart with tooth and claw. They would attack and then, whenever one of them might be overwhelmed, they would quickly disengage so the last member of their party could engage.

Curious, I followed this silent group of boring monsters as they decimated the residents of Dungeon Home, but never engaged them. These invaders were so methodical in their decimation of my home that they scared me more than Red Thorn or Half Bold though. Something about their dead approach to the slaughter. Unfeeling. Lacking any sort of effort.

Fortunately, I didn’t have to fight them. I was free.

I remembered once fearing that a group of invaders would come that delighted in killing my “family.” I would’ve preferred that to this dispassionate slaughter. I was glad when they left.

Four groups of the monsters came through the dungeon in quick succession after that, each of them as eclectic and strange, yet weirdly similar in goal. They always came for the same reason: killing Momma Bossbear. Sometimes they’d skip the side tunnels where Overbear and Butterbear were. Sometimes they’d even lure Ghoul away and skip fighting her entirely.

Most of the invaders weren’t very noticeable. They wore different versions of the same worn clothing over their skin shells. They had their hair rearranged in different ways, but in general they usually consisted of the same dynamics.

Someone who healed. Someone who made the instinct scream at me to attack only them, and a few people who would attack while they didn’t have to worry about being attacked themselves. It was a simple plan but they seemed to use it every time.

One of the groups that stood out had a halfling like Half Bold who wore a beautiful blue dress that seemed to match my natural shade. She cast fancy lights with effects similar to Green Tooth’s abilities, but the difference was that she did it while playing music. I’d known what it was immediately but I’d been enthralled the moment I heard it. I almost left my hiding place; I was so moved by the jingle. I’d never heard music before, and it was… mesmerizing.

I called her North Cross and she seemed delighted by the name. She and her group had beaten Momma Bossbear on their first try and had returned to do so again only a few short cycles later. I followed them like Skeledog followed Skeleton, brimming with joy at every note the girl played.

For the most part though, I watched the invaders with a growing sense of distance from their antics. They always managed to beat the bugbears, and it hurt everytime I had to watch Bugbear himself be torn down by the rules that held him. Most of them were able to beat Ghoul, and most of those who did died to Momma Bossbear, just like Red Thorn’s group had.

While the Dungeon was empty I entertained myself with dreams of freeing whoever had been locked into the jeweled horn. Unfortunately, without a mouth, I was no closer to freeing the captive than I was to leaving the cave. I was also a little afraid that the poor soul had been given an instinct that would force it to attack its kin, like me.

But one day, I would free whatever lay within. Somehow.

I spent my cycles that way, watching the invaders, playing with the horn, and dreaming of entering the Great-Open.

It was… peaceful. It was a life I could endure, if not enjoy.

Then... Red Thorn returned.

Chapter Thirteen

Twisting the Knife

Red Thorn entered the dungeon alone and the moment she did, I felt dread. It had been hundreds of cycles since I’d last died. Red Thorn had left, fed up and angry that I had disappeared from her usual raids. She’d been furious, and at the time I must’ve been a little mad, because I’d loved watching her rage when she could no longer find me.

Now I trembled.

The other groups had always come for Momma Bossbear and once she was beaten, they generally didn’t come back more than one more time at most.

Red Thorn though? She had always come for me.

She stalked into the entrance wearing new clothing that looked menacing, red and demonic. Her hood and cloak had a glossy sheen now that looked beautiful and deadly. An aura of light radiated out several steps around her.

Her daggers were no longer plain. Instead they were wicked, vicious-looking black-handled blades that radiated a menace all on their own.

Momma Bossbear’s roar of challenge echoed throughout the cave as Red Thorn stepped in. Her armor seemed less covering now. Skin tight, yet somehow more protective. She’d grown stronger in the time she’d been gone.

She leaned against a wall in the main cavern and waited while the bugbears came running. They attacked with reckless abandon, the same way they always did. First Butterbear, then Overbear.

They died. I barely even saw Red Thorn move. Her arm twitched and Butterbear’s throat burst open with a spray of blood that somehow never touched the invader herself. Overbear fared no better, dying to a stab to the abdomen and quick thrust to his chest before his club could even come close to her.

Completely unfazed, Red Thorn took a few steps away from the bodies before pulling out a strange item. A neon orange cube. She took her hand away from the cube rather quickly and it remained there, hovering in midair just like me.

What… was this? What was she doing?

I couldn’t help my curiosity.

Two beams of… not light erupted from opposite sides of the cube, making two straight lines of light that vertically traversed the walls on each side of the room. Then, the cube rotated and the light followed, a menacing grey and black light circling the entire first cavern.

The light washed over me but I fled back into my crevice as far as I could go, and triple checked to make sure I was invisible. I was. It didn’t matter what Red Thorn did, she still couldn’t see me–!

I screeched and flopped down from the ceiling, writhing in agony at the familiar feeling of a knife piercing my membrane.

The floor hit me like a blow from Skeleton’s bone club.

‘No… noo… not again. I can’t do it again,’ I thought brokenly.

Apparently I could. I looked up to see that Red Thorn’s new boots looked shinier too. They still hurt the same as they snuffed out my life.

I awoke sometime later and screamed. She’d found some way to detect me. That fucking bitch. I screamed and shouted and yelled and shocked stalactites so they fell and crashed against the floor.

I would not be that horrible woman’s victim again. I refused.

I traversed the halls of Dungeon Home, blasting through the labyrinthian chambers of ancient stairs and forgotten ruins until I reached the upper floors where the bugbears roamed. I flew through the caves. This time, this time.

I wasn’t going to approach the Great-Open. I wasn’t going to try for a step further than yesterday. No. I was going to fly through it. The instinct could go screw itself! I wanted to be free! I wanted to see that world out there where everything was green and the ceiling had no end!

I wanted to be free of Red Thorn.

All the determination in the world didn’t matter to the instinct though. I wailed. I battered my body against the invisible feeling that erupted across my membrane like arrows on stone.

Wrong, Gell! Go Back, Gell! That Place is Not For You, Gell!”

I screamed, tearing through the barriers in my own mind. I wanted to cry, but didn’t know what that was.

“I hate this place! I hate this place! Let me go! I don’t follow your rules anymore anyway! Can’t you be content with all the mindless dead ones that do!? Let me go!” I screamed at the instinct.

It didn’t respond of course. Instead, it just remained the same. A limit in my mind that wouldn’t allow me my own choice. A barrier stronger than the walls of Dungeon Home.

I sank to the ground, wailing. Crying. Begging for someone to help me. I didn’t know how long I remained there. How long I sat feeling trapped. I didn’t hear Momma Bossbear’s roar. I didn’t notice the torches changing color.

I didn’t notice anything until I saw a red leather boot step right near me.

I looked up to see Red Thorn staring down at me. She was unarmed though, not attacking. Just… looking at me with a strange expression on her face.

“It’s… crying,” she said, more to herself than to me. There was a tone of shock in her words, like she was seeing something impossible. “It shouldn’t be able to do that, right?”

Something snapped in me then, like last time. I suddenly felt defensive. “Who are you to tell me what I shouldn’t do!? You don’t follow your cycle! Why can you break your rules when I can’t?”

She leaped back, drawing a dagger, her big brown eyes wide with fright, but once again, she didn’t attack.

“I thought I was free of you!” I shouted, my color an angry red. After tearing myself to shreds trying to get out of the cave, breaking this lesser rule by talking to her felt light as a cloud. “I thought you’d finally been satisfied! Weren’t all those deaths enough for you!?”

“I… I…!” The girl suddenly didn’t look very menacing at all.

I felt raw and weak like someone had grabbed my membrane and shocker and stretched me. At some point, the weather outside had become stormy and Red Thorn’s cloak was wet. Thunder cracked outside the cave, matching my dark mood.

Red Thorn was staring at me, riveted. Horrified.

“Go on! You went and found a way to find me, just to start again, right? Do it then!” I taunted, my voice scratching the air like armor clanging against a cave wall. I floated up to her but didn’t attack, instead placing my membrane right up to her raised dagger.

“You gobble up my bodies like they're precious to you, but how many times do I have to die until you’re sated!? It’s only pain. It’s only all I have. Why? Why are you the only thing that changes!? Why are you all there is!?”

Red Thorn flinched. She backed away and tumbled to the ground, the knife barely nicking my membrane as she fell.

The bugbears were coming. I could hear their ponderous footsteps on the cave’s floor. Their growls of choreographed rage. Their instinct-fueled faux anger added to my hatred of everything about this awful place.

Red Thorn suddenly looked… very small. Not menacing at all. Her hands were shaking. One of them was touching her open lips. Her eyes were wet.

She turned and fled. She didn’t run. She didn’t move with grace like she usually did. She scrambled. She tripped over rocks that I’d seen her glide over before but didn’t let that slow her, scrabbling against the floor with her hands. Panting. Frantic.

Afraid.

Yet, I hated her even more then, as she did what I could not. As she left. The lines between us were clear. She could be free.

I was imprisoned here. With the dead bears.

I howled after her.

Chapter Fourteen

Another World: Two

“Warning! Warning! Excessive Levels of Adrenaline Detected!”

“Logging you out.”

“Logging you out.”

“Logging you out.”

Gentle soothing music played as the headset responsible for controlling her nervous system decided she’d gotten too excited.

The music helped. It wasn’t shit elevator music. A little peppy. A little mellow. The type of music she could spend an afternoon smoking to.

It didn’t fit the hyperventilation she couldn’t stop.

“Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh m-my…”

She lurched out of bed and tumbled to the floor, landing hard on her knees. She groaned in pain but ignored it in favor of scrambling for the waste bucket.

She dry heaved twice, but nothing came up. Her mouth was cracked and she tasted bile at the back of her throat. After her heart rate slowly fell to more normal levels she tumbled away from the basket to sit and lay her head back on the bed, as she stared up at a ceiling fan.

“She… she spoke. She… oh god.”

The jellyfish. The jellyfish spoke. It sounded so real. So fucking real. Like nothing in the rest of the game. What the hell was that!? She was crying and screaming…

Had the programmers just been fucking with her? Tatiana shuddered, trying and failing to remove the memory of that broken creature screaming at her. After all that time she’d finally found a way to detect hidden monsters.

Nothing in the game had ever felt that raw. She’d killed the stupid mob fifty times. Hell, probably a hundred! She’d thought it was weird when the creature had stopped showing up to fight but hadn’t thought any further into it.

She was growing, long since leveling past her friends as her boosted dexterity skyrocketed her through the ranks of the game. She’d thought to supplement that with more dexterity crystals. Had… had the game developers given that creature a personality or something?

A way of scaring her? As soon as she’d discovered the ridiculous Jellyfae and its epic drop, she had wondered if killing it was cheating.

Well, if that had been a developer’s sick prank, it had worked. Her eyes were wet and she realized she was still shaking. Sweat lingered on her body, the ceiling fan making her shiver with the cold.

That had felt real as if all of a sudden the mob had developed a conscience and feelings. The creature seemed like it was a fucking person. That was something she’d never encountered. Was this a part of the game? She was new enough to know that she didn’t know everything about MMOs but she was also blasting through levels like no tomorrow. Where her teammates might die, she could run, and if you could escape a dungeon, you were safe. Most others weren’t fast enough to utilize this option, but she was. It had propelled her to level twenty-six, twelve levels shy of the current top pushers.

Was this game really that good? The game itself wasn’t a masterpiece of storytelling. The main character NPCs did all their talking in instanced events, where you just watched and your avatar was controlled by the computer. Nothing they had done had felt even close to as realistic as the mob — as Gell.

So… what the hell?

She picked up her phone and dialed up Germaine. He was a long-time gamer and odds were pretty good that he would be awake, though he had MMOs other than Tread The Sky that he had real investments in.

He answered on the third ring, which was good. She’d half expected him to ignore her. He and Egs had both been mad at her for the past few weeks because she refused to share the source of her ridiculous character growth.

“Heya Tats, long-time-no-chat,” he said distractedly. She could tell immediately that he was playing some other game. From the sound of it, one with a bunch of guns involved.

She made to speak but hesitated, suddenly embarrassed. What was she supposed to say? That she got scared by an in-game NPC begging for its life?

‘Begging for its death actually. What was it she said? “Why are you the only thing that changes?” What the hell did that mean?’ Tatiana thought, her mood dropping.

“Hello? Tatiana? Is this a butt dial?” he asked.

“No. Sorry. Hey Germaine,” she said gloomily.

“There you are! What’s goin’ on?” he asked, his New Orleans accent strong in her ears.

“I… just had an… experience. I don’t really know what happened but it seriously freaked me out,” she said evasively.

His tone dropped a full octave, and she could only imagine what he might’ve interpreted her words to mean. “Are you okay?”

“Y-yeah. I think so. No? I… it was something in-game,” she said.

He immediately sighed in relief. If it was in-game, then to him, whatever problem she had couldn’t be all that serious.

“So what happened?” he asked.

She could hear the sounds of gunshots being muted in the background. He’d been mad at her but not so mad that he wouldn’t drop it if she came to him with any actual trouble. He was a good friend.

“I… found a mob. Obviously. It's the reason my dexterity jumped so high,” she admitted.

He didn’t say anything, prompting her to continue. She smiled inwardly at that.

“I killed this thing… god, fifty times at least. At the time I didn’t think anything of it, but all of a sudden it disappeared,” she said, letting some measure of the anger she’d felt when the Jellyfae had disappeared slip into her tone. “It was there attacking like mobs do. Then one day it was just gone. No reason why. No system patch to tell me that it had been edited out of the game. Really pissed me off. Remember when I got mad a few weeks ago and wouldn’t join that raid?”

“Yeaahhh, I remember. So you found a mob, killed it a bunch, and then the mob disappeared? Doesn’t sound so strange. Probably just has a kill counter on it or something, and won’t spawn for you anymore. Kind of unusual, but if it’s dropping Dexterity crystals strong enough to make you… well, ridiculous like you are now, it would make sense,” he said.

“That’s what I thought. Until I went back tonight and used a stealth crystal. Germ, I found the mob. It was hiding,” she said soberly.

He stayed quiet. Thoughtful. “That’s it?”

“If only,” I said. “I was overjoyed. Didn’t even think about what that might mean. I found it! It had just been hiding in the fucking ceiling. So I killed it, as you do, waited the two hours for it to respaw–!”

“This freaking thing respawns every cycle!?” he interrupted.

“Germ. Focus. I came back for it and this time it was just… lying there, at the entrance. Like something had hurt it, but not so bad it couldn’t keep fighting. It didn’t attack though. It… talked to me. Screamed at me like a person, asking how many times it had to die until I was satisfied.”

“Huh,” he murmured. “Must’ve been the developers? They noticed your rise and decided to screw with you?”

“I thought that but… you should’ve heard this thing, Germ. It was… dammit this sounds so lame… it was real. Accusing me. It scared me.” she said, unable to find the words to explain it better. “Made me feel like I’d been killing a real live person, over and over all this time. Made me feel like… well. Like a monster.”

“I mean, that's a pretty sick prank for a developer to play, but what other explanation could there be? NPCs programmed to attack don’t suddenly start talking. It’s not how games work,” he said, sounding self-assured.

“Yeah… that must be it. Still, I’m going to report it. Whoever made that should be fired. I… I’ve never felt bad about killing generic mobs before. Now every time I look at a skeleton I’m going to be wondering if it's going to start yelling at me for killing its brothers and sisters or some shit,” she replied with a rueful sigh.

“Can you show me? For research purposes, of course,” he said, his tone revealing the playful grin he was probably wearing.

She frowned, annoyed that he wasn’t taking this as seriously as he should’ve, but she supposed he didn’t have the same context she did. To him, it was a computer glitch. He hadn’t heard her wailing. Her… madness.

“I’m never going back there, Germ,” she replied. “Maybe it was a bad developer joke, but it was the type of joke that makes people quit games. Honestly, I might not play for a little while. If you do figure out what it was though… take it seriously, okay? I don’t know how much effort goes into voice acting and programming these NPCs but if this was a prank, someone spent weeks making it at least. And… it freaking worked. I don’t want that mob to be hurt anymore.”

He sighed dramatically. “Fine, fine. Sorry. I know it must’ve been pretty fucked up for you to call me to cry about it.”

“You ass,” she replied fondly. “Don’t go looking for it?”

“I won’t,” he assured her, and she believed him. “Up for some camping in Guns and Grease? I think I might be getting good enough to go pro in that one.”

“Naaa,” she said. “I’ve had enough killing digital creatures tonight. Think I’m going to call it. I’ve got a long day tomorrow anyway.”

“Aight, peace yo!” he exclaimed.

She chuckled and wished him a good night before hanging up. She sighed and stood up, heading for the bathroom to take an early shower and try to relax her nerves.

Maybe she’d take it easy on Tread the Sky for a few days...

Chapter Fifteen

Treasures

I waited patiently. My shocker was brimming with electric potential and my small frame was ready to dart into the open at a moment’s notice. Ignoring the instinct’s insistent compulsion felt like second nature now as I waited for a real moment to strike.

The healer’s back was turned but the guy with the stupidly huge lance wasn’t attacking.

This might’ve been baffling if not for the fact that these idiotic monsters were stupid enough to discuss their plans right in Dungeon Home’s entrance. The Lancer, as they called him, would protect the healer with full focus instead of dealing any damage to the mobs. They knew this would make clearing the dungeon slower but also assumed that it would be safer.

It actually might’ve been safer too, if they hadn’t been so kind as to let me know about it. Stupid invaders.

Rumor about me had spread it seemed, which I counted as a mixed blessing. I wanted these bastards to leave me alone so I could push my way out of Dungeon Home at my leisure, but they kept coming. On the one hand, that meant more interesting conversations to listen to. On the other, it meant less time to spend trying to get out of this place.

Fortunately, Red Thorn had not returned. Whatever I had said, it seemed to have been enough to make her leave for good. I wasn’t done with her though. One day I would find her. I’d get my own revenge. Somehow. I didn’t know how. Killing her seemed like a waste of time. She would just be back again a cycle or two later, same as me.

Perhaps that was why they invaded other people’s homes and killed them so callously; they knew their victims would be back. Even so, I didn’t think I had it in me to kill over and over again like these invader monsters.

I was satisfied to kill them once and get them to stay away. Twice if they were stupid enough to come back. Unfortunately, while doing so seemed to keep individual groups away, apparently it also caused the invaders to talk about it, and there was no shortage of stupid invaders willing to risk their lives to kill me.

There.

I sprung forth while the backs of both the Lancer and the healer were turned, aiming for the Lancer first. I’d long since learned that fighter types like the Lancer could really hurt me if they got enough time to strike. It was only due to luck that they’d never managed to kill me yet. If they were immobilized with paralysis however…

I sunk my shocker into the Lancer’s neck, the only exposed body part on him, and he crumpled, paralyzed.

I didn’t stick around to focus on him though. Fighting anyone while the healer was still alive was a waste of time. My shocker recharged quickly but it wasn’t instantaneous. I took the time to turn the Lancer’s paralyzed head away from where I was about to attack next.

The less he saw of me, the better.

“H-hey, what the–mmpgh!” screamed the healer as I wrapped my tendrils around his face and eyes, then stuffed one of them in his mouth. He screamed but it was already too late. I felt the electricity return to my shocker and I discharged it into the invader, dropping him just like his companion.

I took the tendrils out of his mouth as soon as he was paralyzed. Ick! But I couldn’t have him warning the others while they were focused on the main fight.

Unlike the Lancer I didn’t spring away. Instead, I continued to attack. My tendrils were flimsy things, their attacks weak. However, my shocker could usually kill a healer in two hits. That meant I had to hang on to the paralyzed elf for two or three seconds before I could attack again.

He struggled, trying to grab at me, but his body twitched, unable to move. My shocker was ready in moments and I used it again to marvelous effect.

“Need a fucking heal, Healz!” shouted the tall metal one. I’d learned that they were called Paladins, with the occasional Warrior coming through. Both of them had drastically different ability sets but they still filled the same function: Induce the instinct to make me and my kin want to attack them, instead of their flimsy counterparts. That was easy to ignore now.

With the healer incapacitated, the Paladin wouldn’t be getting that heal.

To my surprise, however, the healer still hadn’t quite died, but he’d been immobilized for almost six seconds now, which might as well have been an eternity on the battlefield. I disengaged just as Ghoul’s Dark Tempest struck all of the invaders and flushed green in satisfaction as the healer expired to the wide area attack.

The Lancer was shakily getting back to his feet, also dangerously low on life. I darted back into the flames of the second level of candles before he could spot me. The instinct only ever let me hide on the first level, which was stupid when none of the invaders seemed capable of flight like me. If they were going to attack the torches, I might as well make it the ones that only the ranged fighters could hit.

“The Jellyfae got me, and then took out our healer,” the Lancer said.

Huh. They got my name right. Most of the invaders always seemed to want to call me a Jellyfish. I was oddly pleased, and suddenly less inclined to attack the Lancer.

“Shit DPS… you had one job!” screamed the Paladin as he fended off blow after blow from Ghoul.

Losing the healer almost always guaranteed the death of the party, but Ghoul had taken quite a few hits already in this battle before I had managed to find an opening to strike the Lancer. Occasionally the Paladin or Warrior was good enough at avoiding Ghoul’s damage that they could survive. If they did, that meant the dead party members could revive and return to continue on to Momma Bossbear.

I could already tell this team would struggle with Momma Bossbear, even without my help. I could usually tell, weirdly, by noting how shiny the invaders’ clothes were. Really shiny, and I would sit the fight out. Worn, or grey colors, and I’d wait to see how they fared against Ghoul before choosing whether or not to strike.

Paradoxically, I noticed that the less armor certain invaders wore, the more I should fear them. One strange human had come in on his own and decimated the bugbears, Ghoul, and Momma Bossbear without so much as a shirt to cover his skin shell, and hadn’t even been hit once. Even Red Thorn had never managed that.

“Don’t worry, we still got this. Here,” the Lancer said, pulling out a red vial and tossing it to the Paladin, who caught it before blocking another tremendous blow from Ghoul’s bony claws.

‘What the heck was that?’ I thought, drifting a few torches closer to get a look at the vials. The invaders had never used these before. They seemed exceptionally delicate.

The Paladin uncorked the strange vial and raised it to his lips. To my shock, bloody gouges that Ghoul had worked hard to place on the man’s face began to fade, healing before my very eyes just like when the healer hit them with their spells.

There were drinks that could do the same things the lights did? What the shit?

I had been imbibing the language of the invaders for hundreds of cycles now, and as much as I hated them, they had the best things to say whenever they were mad. Finding out that there were more ways for these invaders to keep themselves alive while I had none just infuriated me.

The Lancer jumped high into the air and sliced his spear into Ghoul’s hide, making her scream in agony before bounding far out of her reach. He then unstoppered his own vial, preparing to drink.

“No, no, no, silly human,” I said, while preparing my limbs for another rush. “None of that.”

He stopped for half a moment, searching around for my voice. I struck, dashing from my torch straight across the room. I snatched the potion out of the man’s hand with my tentacle while my shocker grazed his closed palm and electrocuted him again.

He crumpled, as dead as the healer, while I greedily fled the chamber. The tank had healed and Ghoul was almost dead. They likely wouldn’t die here, and I had a prize now. Better to kill them when they reached Momma Bossbear.

Or… or just let them go on about their raid.

I wanted to admire my new pretty.

I dashed up the halls of Dungeon home, past the straight stone walls until I reached the upper cave where my new crevice was. The old one wasn’t safe. I was only lucky Red Thorn hadn’t found a way to get up there and loot my precious horn when she’d returned. Still, I’d decided the place was too vulnerable and made my new home in the off cave that only had three levels.

There were many hallways that ended with nothing but barren caves down that way. I also enjoyed the fact that the instinct never wanted me to go there. Little defiances made my cycle now. My particular barren cave had another crevice in the ceiling that was hollowed out behind a stalactite.

I entered my new home within Dungeon Home and placed the vial of red liquid gingerly with my other treasures.

All but one of them had been stolen from invaders: Half Bold’s horn, now my horn. A tiara I’d snatched from an elf. A glove that had belonged to one of the huge Orcs that made just the most comfortable place to lay my body down. A pebble one of the invaders had kicked in from beyond where the instinct would allow me to go.

I went over to my glove and squeezed my body into the entrance and let my tentacles flow through the holes I’d torn in the finger tubes. I felt so cozy, I could almost imagine it was what the light from outside the Great-Open felt like.

The only warmth I’d ever known came from the torches and I could just tell that it wasn’t the same.

I looked over my collection, my eyes lingering on the one thing that hadn’t come from the invaders: the piece of Bugbear’s tunic. I’d ripped it off and kept it as a memento of him in fear of having nothing left of him, should he be killed again. Now that I’d seen him die hundreds of times, I kept the fabric in anticipation of escaping Dungeon Home.

That all seemed like a lifetime ago, now. The others I didn’t care about anymore. Watching them die, cycle after cycle, had inured me to their pain. What hurt was knowing how little I cared, and remembering a me that had been so horrified by their slaughter. A me that had deluded herself into thinking these puppets of the instinct were her family.

Bugbear though… he was different. There was a light there, that the others didn’t possess. And I loved him for that. I would cherish him. Even after finally leaving this place, I would carry a piece of him with me. One day, I’d come back for him.

That was a promise.

In the distance, I heard Momma Bossbear roar. Without me there, she would probably die.

… I curled up to go to sleep, dimming my light till the world was dark. I dreamed of the Great Open.

Chapter Sixteen

Experience Points

“Come on! Attack the healer! The healer you moron!” I screamed in my head.

I shook with unbridled rage as Momma Bossbear went right on tearing at the tank’s impenetrable body. He was the warrior type, so he could dish out damage with maces, swords, or axes and usually dual wielded them, depending on his speed to dodge most attacks rather than a towering defense like the Paladins.

Momma Bossbear had only managed to graze him once, while this party of five was decimating her. The party hadn’t fit the stereotypes I’d come to expect from high level adventurers and I’d almost died myself more than once. The last thing I wanted happening was for someone other than Red Thorn to know how valuable my… eugh… my corpse was. If I died, even once, I suspected I’d have another Red Thorn in no time.

So I’d decided to sit this fight out, but watching as the group made mistakes that any competent invader would’ve capitalized on while Momma Bossbear just continued following the damn instinct was making me furious.

I couldn’t help it. It might’ve been a risk but I darted out anyway as soon as I saw an opening. I veered to the right, barely avoiding a fireball hurled by the caster before darting back into my torches.

I used the trick of flashing between the torches to obscure which one I was in and was relieved when the next fireball hit the wrong one. So, the caster was focused on me.

Well, as long as that was true, that meant Momma Bossbear was taking a little bit less damage. I couldn’t effectively hurt a party this size alone. What I could do was act as support for Ghoul and, more often than ever lately, Momma Bossbear.

As the cycles passed, the invaders seemed to learn what they would need in order to successfully kill Momma Bossbear. Namely, they had to look, or act, too strong for me to want to attack. If they were either of those, they’d find Dungeon Home incredibly easy to empty. It was only the ones I thought I had a chance of killing that got to experience Momma’s strength while I was supporting her.

This group though, had tricked me. Their clothes were worn and tattered, but somehow provided excellent defense. They had magicked their clothes somehow to look like weak invader armor instead of the grossly protective stuff it was.

Being the idiot that I was, I had attacked. And now they’d seen me. Now I was committed. Fortunately, they weren’t unbelievably powerful like the color coordinated groups that sometimes came through. They were prone to simple mistakes, and there had been a few close calls with Ghoul. If we could get rid of the healer, things would turn around very quickly.

And that stupid bear was still attacking the damn tank!

I saw an opportunity, not to attack but to distract, and I took it. I dashed out of the torch, another fireball singeing one nearby and covering my exit as I did.

I darted right across the healer’s line of vision. The girl was so startled she jumped back, exactly as I’d planned. That movement pushed her into one of her companions, a small person who wore incredibly dark clothing and seemed adept at sneaking up on his enemies. He was shocked when the healer stumbled into him and pushed her forward by instinct.

She tripped, sprawling to the ground with a yelp. That wouldn’t have mattered except she had managed to fall straight into Momma Bossbear’s sight.

‘Go on,’ I thought, taking in the results of my attack from the safety of my next torch hiding place. ‘Momma, attack her! Attack the damn healer!’

The warrior, eyes wide with panic, moved to intercept, but he was too slow to get between the fallen healer and Momma Bossbear!

I grinned, anticipating a return to the gentle blue torches after they were finally gone.

Momma Bossbear, stepped over the fallen healer, completely missing her in favor of charging down the screaming warrior.

My color bled a frustrated red. Why? Why were my former family so gods damn devoted to the instinct? Couldn’t they see that it only led to pain?

By luck, or chance, certainly not by any level of planning on Momma Bossbear’s part, she managed to land a devastating blow to the tank. The healer scrambled to her feet, but I was ready for that.

I stung her and dashed straight upward into the torches arrayed around the ceiling, just before Momma reared back for her wide range attack. I’d become very good at predicting those, both from Momma Bossbear and Ghoul. The bugbears didn’t have any and I rarely tried to interfere with their deaths. Skeleton and Skeledog could occasionally get rid of the unlucky invaders, but even they were usually too weak to stop a party of five.

Not that any of them had ever had the bright idea of… oh I don’t know… attacking together?

I was beginning to hate my former family.

The healer cast her wide area spell and that was what did them in. The instinct loved those wide area spells and the second I felt it trying to convince me to attack the healer, I knew it was all over.

Momma Bossbear changed targets and charged on all fours towards the startled healer, who was suddenly bereft of protection and couldn’t cast her healing lights for a few precious seconds.

Momma Bossbear’s claws cleaved clean through the startled healer and she slumped to the ground with a spray of red blood. I turned away, still disgusted by the gruesome way my family tended to kill the invaders. Fortunately, her body faded away.

I didn’t need to do much after that. I struck down the fire caster while Momma handled the warrior, the shady guy, and the last character who had been attempting, and failing, to cast spells that didn’t seem to do anything to Momma the whole time. Putrid lights would flash around her and then… nothing.

I turned to Momma Bossbear, watching as she roared in triumph while I felt disgusted.

“You wouldn’t have won. You were lucky. Why are you so happy anyway? Another group will come and chop off your head soon enough!” I screamed, coming down to hover near the huge boss.

She growled towards me but ultimately turned, slowly heading back towards her throne. She winced now and then, her body dragging sluggishly. I knew from long experience that she would be fine again shortly.

No thanks to her own efforts.

“Why don’t you ever learn!? Why? Why aren’t you real? Why can’t I have what they have!” I screamed, rage filling me.

In a moment of anger, I struck. My shocker stung Momma Bossbear and she crumpled to the ground. Dead.

Congratulations! You have earned 7392 Experience Points!

I screamed, diving for cover as a sound erupted in my ears and a strange caption blasted across my vision. Symbols I could somehow understand exploded into my field of view.

I hid among the stalagmites, going invisible, but the banners didn’t leave my vision. A golden box of light displaying the words blinded me to the rest of the world. I stabbed at it, poking at it until it went away, only to display another box.

You have gained a Level!

Again I slashed at the attacker, terrified of what I was seeing, and again it disappeared to be replaced by another banner displaying the same message.

You have gained a Level!

You have gained a Level!

You are now level 13.

You received–recieved-received…!

“What the heck is this!?” I screamed, looking around in horror.

All of a sudden, the world… broke. I could see… lines. The colors of the room around me distorted. The reds from the torch fires suddenly slanted left and right, their light coming from the wrong places.

It was as if, suddenly, the whole world was made of a grid of uncountable lines and each line held a color. That color was nothing on its own, but with each square of the grid, my world became real.

Except now, the colors were out of place in horizontal lines. Some shifted to the right. Some the left. The world was… break… ing...

I turned to Momma Bossbear–!

I turned to.

I turned.

My shocker–! Momma Bossbear crumpled.

Momma Bossbear sat on her throne.

I screa..

“What is this?” I thought, suddenly cold–!

“What is happening!?”

Then… nothing.

Chapter Seventeen

Another World: Three

Francis Delaney sighed. It was three in the fucking morning.

“Whaaat?” he drawled in annoyance as he answered the phone.

“It's pretty early, so I’m going to forgive that, Mr. Delaney,” came an older, cultured voice that made Francis’s blood run cold.

“Director McDonough! I… I’m s-so sorry!” he blurted, horrified. The woman was his boss’s boss’s boss.

He was incredibly well paid for the long, arduous hours spent killing himself to meet unbelievable deadlines. By contrast, she probably didn’t even buy her own groceries.

And he’d just fucking growled at her like a college kid did at their alarm clock.

“Forgiven. Truth be told, I’m just as annoyed as you right now, but a crisis has occurred. Get to work, immediately. The entire eastern seaboard is unable to login to the game and we are losing money by the minute, while no one in this company seems to be able to figure out why,” she seethed, her tone spelling salvation for himself but a dire warning to whoever was in the room with her.

“I… I’ll be right there! Give me, uhm. Fifteen minutes?” he guessed, already leaping to his feet.

“Fifteen minutes? Punctual. I like that. I will see you soon,” the Director said before ending the call.

Before he even left his apartment, Francis was already trying to figure out the problem and dialing his boss.

“Oh thank god, Frank,” Havery breathed heavily into the phone. Francis hated it when the man shortened his name, but couldn’t bring himself to tell the rotund man after his first day when he’d said Frank was fine.

The man was a complete tool, and how he was the manager of the development process, no one on the team could fathom. He was a decent coder, with horrible comments, horrible people skills, and a penchant for making people uncomfortable on purpose.

Still, he had kept them all on track, and at least made an effort to get to know a little about what each team’s goal was, while creating a coherent if utterly grueling deliverable schedule.

Right now, the man sounded as panicked as he had the day before launch day, and that was not a good sign.

“The world server is down!”

“Really? Why is this a big deal? Shut down the bad node and spin up a new one.”

“No you don’t understand! Not a node, the whole cluster!”

Francis threw on a pair of clean pants and a shirt fit for work before dashing out the door, frantically trying to get his belt on while rushing to his car. He didn’t live very far from his work, only a few blocks, but in the middle of the night, he figured driving would be faster and he was right.

‘The whole server cluster?’ he pondered, momentarily baffled. ‘What the hell could take out the whole cluster?’

A hacking attempt at that scale? For Tread the Sky? Not to toot the company’s horn, but the dynamic scaling nature of the system should require a computer that could scale up faster than their own in order to successfully DDOS a cluster. Shy of hackers compromising some big-budget cloud provider and spending millions of dollars on someone else’s dime… Hacking was probably out.

“I’m telling you, the whole thing is down. Every node is red on the monitor, Frank. I am on a bridge with the entire C-level executive team just waiting for an update and we’ve already been down for an hour.”

Individual servers had been taken down before, and honestly, it was almost a sign of prestige that the game was so successful that it was attracting hackers. Not only that, it was soundly defeating them by shutting down targeted nodes and scaling up replacements quickly. In most cases, the player base never even noticed when an attack was occurring.

“What if the hacking attempt was exploiting an in-game function? Using the cluster’s own processing power against it. But if that was it then the cluster wouldn’t be down - performance would just be abysmal. Hey, has anyone spoken to the network team yet?”

Havery didn’t hesitate, anticipating the question.

“They are adamant that all the egress links for the region are up and utilization has dropped to near null. BGP hasn’t flapped and we are still receiving the full internet route table and advertising our BGP ASN’s IP space.”

‘So, basically, the lights were on but no one was home. Our end,’ he thought glumly.

“Hnnnn,” he grunted. “I’m almost at the office, Havery. Have someone get me a mug of coffee. I’m still mostly asleep. See you in a few.”

He arrived at GypsEnergy Entertainment’s headquarters and maneuvered his way to the parking garage, taking a moment to marvel at the beautiful garden and fountains that decorated the company’s campus. Even now, after three years and hundreds of hours spent here, he was still awed by the place and the fact that he worked here.

As soon as he parked, he forgot the majestic fountains in favor of legging it at as mad a dash as a sophisticated office worker could make at three in the morning. He walked briskly down the concrete paths around the cultivated lawn through a well lit early morning atmosphere, taking care to dodge the sprinklers.

He swiped his way past the security guard at the front before continuing up into the fourth floor where he worked. His job was usually quite leisurely, now that the game had finally launched. Going from development to maintenance was an abrupt shift that sometimes left him floundering and bored, even though the pay was still awesome.

Before he’d taken two steps into the floor he was greeted by his boss, Havery. He thankfully had a mug of ohh so delectable java in hand and after an initial sip, the work began.

“Please… tell me you have some ideas,” Havery began. “If players can even log in, they’re finding that all of the dynamic generation elements on the east coast server are inaccessible. The land being generated is shit - random white space and pixelated nonsense because it doesn’t have an eighth of its data set to draw from! If this keeps up we’re going to have to issue large-scale refunds just to appease our player base and it will piss off management something fierce!” he exclaimed.

A part of him wanted to panic, but with practiced patience, Francis smiled down at the frantic little man who ran his life. “Whoa… whoa. It isn’t that bad, Havery, okay? It's three A.M. in our main target player base location. It is going to be ok. We will find and fix it. We can’t get anything done if we panic, so help me out here. Any idea about the cause yet?”

The man shook his head and flushed like a kid who didn’t know the answer to a question when called on in class.

“Alright, alright. Diagnostics? Who all has begun working on this already?” he asked.

“Donna-Lou got here first and ran diagnostics. She’s debugging now, trying to find the problem. All she’s been able to tell me so far is that it's on us. It's not a hack. It's a bug. If the Director asks, though, we think it's a hacking attempt. Okay?” he said, wringing his hands furiously.

Poor guy. Francis couldn’t help but be acutely aware of the odd shift in the power dynamic between them. His boss’s job depended on his subordinate’s ability to pull off a miracle of programming, from his perspective. That couldn’t feel pleasant.

The man was making mistakes. Rookie mistakes any manager should know better than to make. What he obviously meant was that “We don’t know what’s wrong so we’re assuming it’s a hacking attempt.”

Of course, that shit wouldn’t fly anyway.

“I’m not going to lie. That will only bite us in the ass later at the Incident Review Meeting. You know management is going to be all over this one. The best we can do is do our best with all available urgency,” he said gently but patted the man on his shoulder with a reassuring smile.

“I got this, sir. Don’t worry.”

The man smiled, but there was visible sweat trailing down his brow. Fortunately, Francis did have this. He lived for this.

He finally got to his desk and with a touch of a mouse, all six of his monitors came to life.

“Hey!” he hollered to the floor. “Someone PM me the outage bridge number and start feeding me log data. I need an accurate timestamp for the start of the outage.”

He paused to take another chug of coffee and frowned. “And someone get me another coffee, please?”

A fundamental truth of the IT profession was that there was always a log. There was always some line of code or output showing where someone or something had gone sideways. What was much more difficult was knowing which log to read - there were many.

Francis groused about as he looked over them. The trick was to read them all. It sucked, but them’s the breaks. He noted timestamps and then filtered the results for particular keywords. Armed with the nearest timestamp, a fresh cup of joe, the Syslog server, and a Linux terminal, he felt like a god in the machine, just by his ability to comprehend what most considered gibberish.

./date-time-diff.sh /var/log/*.log "Jul 31 00:15:02" "Jul 31 00:18:30" | grep -E 'write|overfl|read|error'

The output was fairly small, only a few hundred lines. Poring over them until his eyes bled was a defining feature of his job though. Some sixty lines in he found his first lead.

00:16:32 objID 47921846 write error 0x0412798 attribute-list error item-list is full.

“Well. That’s a problem,” he mused.

A little known detail about the game’s inner workings was that mobs had a very limited number of available spaces for their inventory. When the game was first being developed and intended to scale to the planned size, keeping mobs from crashing the game by limiting their inventory space to only a few items was a trade-off made to protect user performance.

In practice, this meant a mob or NPC might look like it had more items when they actually just had a skin, which was only one item. It was rare for one to have anything beyond their skin, a weapon, and armor, depending on whether the NPC was a mob or a villager, or a main-quest character. There was some space for originality, but the hard limit was six.

Somehow this mob had managed to get more items than they should. Unfortunately, this wasn’t something he could just ‘fix’ by adding more space. No more than he could just arbitrarily allow a player's eyes to be more than the initially implemented 256 possible colors. It was hardcoded. Being thorough before he shared his findings, he looked deeper.

./date-time-diff.sh /var/log/*.log "Jul 31 00:15:02" "Jul 31 00:18:30" | grep 47921846 | head -n 3

00:16:32 objID 47921846 write error 0x0412798 attribute-list error item-list is full.

00:16:34 objID 47921846 write error 0x0412798 attribute-list error item-list is full.

00:16:35 objID 47921846 write error 0x0412798 attribute-list error item-list is full.

He breathed a sigh of relief. It was a big bug, but it was fixable. “Ugh. The system is spamming the request. How many times?”

./date-time-diff.sh /var/log/*.log "Jul 31 00:15:02" "Jul 31 04:18:30" | grep -c 47921846

690445762118346

“Shit. We are DOSing our DB with a spam of write attempts,” he exclaimed, a little annoyed that Donna-Lou hadn’t already figured this out. “No one ever reads the logs…”

“Status, Frank? McDonough wants an update,” Havery called from the entrance. His timing was rather good, as usual.

“I’ve found our root cause. Trying to think up the best way to apply a fix.”

“What is it?”

“An NPC is overflowing the max item limit, the system keeps looping trying to add more. I am trying to think of a way to fix this that doesn’t involve increasing the limit.”

“An NPC… why hasn’t this ever happened before? NPCs need items right?” he asked.

Francis grit his teeth in annoyance while trying not to show it. Did the man not know his own game? “Well, sir,” he began robotically. “NPCs have a hard limit of–!”

He held up a hand, stalling the explanation with an apologetic expression.

“Got it. Something I should know. Sorry, Frank. Don’t want to waste your time. I’ll appreciate the explanation later. For now, get me a fix. How long do you think you need?”

Francis brightened. He thought to himself for a moment. An NPC picking up too many items was probably a fluke. Coming up with a fix shouldn’t take too long, but better to give himself some wiggle room.

“Check back in with me in 30 minutes,” he said, doubling the actual time he thought it would take, knowing it would make him look like a wizard when he was finished in fifteen.

Havery nodded and wandered off to go update the execs. Meanwhile, he pulled up the object viewer to get a closer look at what this little NPC was up to.

ObjID: 47921846

Name: Gell

Type: 0 - NPC

Creator : xd172

Lvl: 13

HP: 150

MP: 380

Spawn.zone: bb1128

Size: tiny

Stats:

0 - str - 5

1 - dex - 30

2 - vit - 15

3 - wis - 15

4 - int - 35

5 - cha - 15

6 - luc - 10

Attribute-list

Weapons:

0 - natural - melee - shocker 10d20 + 2 * int

Drop-table:

0 - 100% - [Killer Class Stat] Crystal (Sovereign)

Armor:

0 - natural - AC 14

Race:

0 - Fae

Subtype:

0 - Jelly

Skill-list

0 - sneak

1 - hide

2 - backstab

3 - shock

4 - fly

Immunities

0 - Flame

Item-list

0 - JellyFae skin

1 - Summoning Horn, lesser unicorn

2 - Glass Tiara

3 - Bugbear Tunic

4 - Leather Glove

5 - Pebble

6 - Health Potion, minor

“What a little klepto! How’d they even... xd172? I don’t recognize that username...” he murmured to himself.

He looked up the username, as well as the behavioral files for the NPC, and was astounded. An intern had created this “Gell” over 3 years ago before the game had even been released. In typical intern style, the character’s behavior files were massively bloated. Terabytes worth of data. Fucking. Terabytes. There was no way in hell the intern coded all this on his own, not to mention there was no way it would’ve made it into the game while taking up that much space initially, which meant it was able to write its own code.

In other words, a massive time bomb just waiting to explode, and he was the one left holding it. Somewhere in all that mess was the code that encouraged this NPC to keep snatching players’ shit and overrun its item limitations.

It wasn’t going to stop any time soon.

Even if he deleted their active inventory that would just be kicking the problem down the road, a few years or a few weeks. No real way of telling without finding the likely four lines of code causing the little thief to pick up items. And of course, the intern didn’t leave comments.

He supposed he could delete the NPC but… it was Terabytes of data. Even if it hadn’t started that way... this thing was someone’s baby. The idea of deleting that much data – or even a fraction of that much data, because he refused to believe that the intern wrote the whole thing – was tantamount to shanking a bitch because they left their laundry in the washer. Not to mention, that was actually an inefficient fix on its own. Deleting the NPC outright would require deleting the asset, doing a zone rebuild, then defragmenting the database, which could take a week because of its size.

Still… Terabytes. How the hell…?”

Best not to think about that. Patch job now, figure out what the heck this little NPC was doing with that much behavioral coding later.

Increasing the item limit wasn’t an option. Doubling NPC inventory space globally would be a massive performance hit that would have a real dollar cost executives would not accept, not to mention the thing would likely fill it soon enough anyway.

Deleting the NPC was out. Changing its capacity was out. But… there was already plenty of code already implemented for an overburdened character. He could redesign and improve the NPC template entirely, taking hours and hours of work, or… he could flip a 0 to a 1, add an oversized moderator-only backpack and call it a day!

Player characters did not have the NPC item limit of 6, they had a maximum item limit of 254, which exactly zero players had yet managed to reach. They even had a built-in method to handle exceeding the item limit: the item in question would be mailed to a mailbox and auto-deleted after 30 days. Most importantly, this fix would require no code changes and just some changes to the object.

Back in the ObjectViewer he swapped to edit mode and moved his line cursor to the appropriate line and flipped the type:

Type: 1 - PC

Added a bag:

Item-list.add quantity 1 sudobagofholding

And went to save the object. Of course, he received a commit error.

ERROR: Race: Fae is not a legal player type.

“Ugh,” he groaned. Okay.

Race:

0 - Human

ERROR: Type human cannot hold…

The error went into a line of gibberish that one couldn’t understand without hours of study and googlefu, but he got the gist. Basically, the things that made the NPC who it was, wouldn’t work if it lost the Fae Race. Easy enough.

Race:

0 - Human

Subtype:

0 - Fae

1 - Jelly

ERROR: Size: Tiny is not a legal setting for Race: Human.

“Are you freaking kidding me?”

size: medium

This time the object was saved. Thank god. Now to check up on…

“It has been 30 minutes, Frank. Where are we at?” Startled, he turned around to face Havery as a cheer went out. Monitors started showing nodes green. User counts started rising. He wordlessly lifted his arms out to his sides in a victory yawn before cheekily responding.

“All fixed, boss.”

“Damn, Frank, you’re good.”

Little too close. Maybe next time I should tell him 45 minutes? One thing was sure, however: he was tracking down that damned intern and telling him about this.

“Yea, and whoever made an item addition error on an NPC a retryable event needs to be smacked. This is what DLQs are for. I mean we are obviously handling the exception, just with an infinite retry? Without backoff? Without an attempt limit? What the fuck? This will be an interesting conversation at the Incident Response Team meeting. I know we have these for player characters, but for some reason, the same is not true for NPCs.”

The man was staring at the green monitors and quite literally panting with relief, though his eyes were glossing over as Francis ranted. “We’ll… discuss it. You’re a god-damn lifesaver, Francis. Please… keep doing you. I’ll need to talk with you later about that item limit, but for now, as long as you’re sure we’re good, go home if you like. If not, feel free to take off early.”

“Will do, Havery,” Francis said. “Just need to send a quick email.”

Havery nodded and went off to share the good news. Francis turned back to his desk, pouring over the lines and lines of behavioral code, and began to compose an email. He rolled his eyes as he read the personal email address, but hell, if he’d made a self-updating NPC that had gotten past development checks, perhaps it wasn’t as pretentious as it looked.

To: Natethegreat2058@gmail.com

From: Francis.Powell@gypsenergy.org

Subject: Your Creation

Good Morning,

This is Francis Powell, lead game designer at GypsEnergy, a company you interned for about three years ago. I’m reaching out to you concerning an object you created for the game Tread the Sky during your stay here named Gell, the Jellyfae…

Chapter Eighteen

Form of the Enemy

I awoke. The experience was brand new for me. I didn’t ever recall a true state of unconsciousness before.

I could rest. It tended to pass time faster, hiding inside my glove and closing off my senses. I could tune out the world and follow the instinct. That was something I’d always been able to do. There was also the hazy before-time where I believed I was… well. I was like the others. Like the bugbears and Skeleton and Skeledog.

I didn’t have a clear memory of when it first happened, but I imagine one day, I saw something shiny or pretty and decided, why not go over to it? The instinct probably disagreed but I assume I did it anyway, and things spiraled from there. This wasn’t like that though.

Nor was it like when I came back from death. Then, I was just suddenly there. Fully awake and alert, my last memory being of my horrible death.

Now though, I awoke. I’d never done that before. There was nothing, and then the world bloomed around my eyes as I op... opened them?

I lifted a tentacle–!

I stared, horrified.

I was holding my tentacle up but it was no longer a tentacle. Instead, where my flowing appendage should have been, there was now a greenish-blue hand. Like the humans, elves, and orcs. Like the invaders.

I had hands.

I… oh my god. I’d struck Momma Bossbear! I hadn’t meant to do it. I was just so angry! Had… had she died? Had I killed her? Just like the invaders?

Oh god. I felt sick inside. This was how it happened. How the invaders became invaders! They killed one of their family and were cursed with the body of their own invaders.

I curled in on myself and found that I had so much more body to curl.

I looked down, not wanting to see, but unwilling to hide from the cold truth.

My skin was still the same blue-green hue my membrane had been, but I had little spots on my arms and legs that glowed softly. My body was like a human as far as I could tell. I was thin and wore none of the clothing that the invaders had, which paradoxically embarrassed me. I’d never had clothes before.

I tried to float up but found I couldn’t. Instead, I laboriously lifted myself, pushing off the ground and wobbling precariously. I caught a stalactite as I stepped on my legs for the first time.

‘I killed Momma. I killed Momma Bossbear and now I’m one of them!’ I thought. A wetness came to my… my eyes. Suddenly I finally understood what it was to cry.

To curl up. To frown. To wipe my eyes. To wheeze. All these words that only had context to an invader. A monster. So many things that had made no sense to me did now.

Now that I was a…

I shuddered involuntarily, huddling back down and hugging my knees. I stayed like that for a long time. Crying. Feeling my hair that clumped in a manner reminiscent of my old tendrils. It floated a little, hovering like I once had.

I couldn’t stay there forever though, much as I might’ve wanted to. Sooner or later, I began to feel things. Things I couldn’t ignore.

I was… cold. I knew the word, the feeling, but it wasn’t something I’d ever experienced before. I stood and I was huge. My head reached halfway to the ceiling. This room had seemed so much larger before but now it was positively small.

I tried to take a step but overbalanced and wobbled precariously. I found an odd weight resting on my back that wasn’t part of my body. I pulled it off and found a small brown bag like the invaders wore.

I opened it, using the hands – my hands – to fumble at the sack’s cinch. It took much longer than it should’ve. Fingers didn’t work like tendrils. They were stiff and needed to be poised against one another to get leverage. You couldn’t just wrap one around something enough times that it would hold tight; I tried and it was painful.

I finally got the bag open and gasped at the contents.

My treasures! All of them were here. There was my tiara. My pebble. The precious horn that held a captive brother or sister I had never met. Oh! Maybe… maybe my new mouth could bring it out now?

That’s right. I had to… look on the bright side. Keep my chin up… now that I had one to keep up! I continued sifting through the bag. My glove was there, but it was so much smaller than it had been before.

I pulled it out but quickly pushed it away. The closer I held it, the more a strange, ugly sensation filled the small protrusion in the center of my face. Smell, I realized. I could smell! And the glove smelled horrible!

Had I been lying in that stink all this time? A different kind of revulsion filled me and I quickly placed the glove back into the bag, continuing to sift through it.

A new item was there too! Two seashells. But they weren’t seashells. They were shaped, formed to be worn somehow. I was about to pull them out when I spotted the next item in the bag and froze.

Leather Bugbear Tunic? Wait… this was just like Bugbear’s…? Wetness came to my eyes again. The little scrap I’d torn off and kept had somehow grown into a full set of clothes like the Bugbears wore.

Was this the instinct’s way of telling me to leave? Or maybe it was giving me its blessing? Come to think of it, I no longer felt the instinct. It was no longer guiding me. I couldn’t just… turn off and follow it. Instead, if I stopped thinking my body simply didn’t move.

I pulled the tunic out and pulled it over my head. I’d never put clothes on before, but everyone I knew except Skeledog wore some sort of covering. Getting it on was difficult, but once it was over my head, I found it fit me perfectly. I pulled it on and reveled in the warm sensation it provided, both to my body and my… my heart.

“Oh my god, I have a heartbeat…” I whispered, shocked and delighted and disgusted all at once. Was this what I was supposed to look like? I felt so… wrong in my own body.

I stopped focusing on that, instead returning my attention to the tunic where I found a little banner following the tunic around like a reflection on the surface of a pool. I pressed it and it exploded into view.

Bugbear Tunic

+4 Armor

Durability: 13/13

Armor Class: Light Armor

“Go away!” I told it, and the strange reflective box immediately did as asked, vanishing into thin air. How dare it try to… categorize Bugbear’s memento!

Upon seeing it though, I couldn’t help but notice other reflective surfaces that were visible wherever I looked. A red cylinder along the right sight of my perspective was filled with a red liquid that looked similar to the contents of my potion. Beneath it, a marker read “HP: 150/150.”

A blue bar on my left side held a similar liquid with a notice about MP. The left bar looked the same as the right one, but the numbers were much bigger: 380/380.

If I focused on the bars they became more visible, but if I ignored them, they would fade to near invisibility, just like me.

Wait… invisibility? My eyes widened, and I immediately tried to change my color. To my horror, the only things that changed were the glowing freckles that spotted my body. I could no longer turn invisible or fly!

The invaders were going to kill me. They were going to kill me so easily. I couldn’t hide! I couldn’t fly! What was I going to…?

Suddenly, I heard a growl behind me. The torches. The torches were red.

“Oh no… not now…” I murmured. Could invaders be here now!?

I turned and found Overbear standing at the entrance to the second-floor cavern, my usual rebirth spot where I woke up after dying. He was growling his usual angry growl, but this time it wasn’t directed at the invaders.

It was growling at me.

Chapter Nineteen

Another Kind of Flight

“O… Overbear?” I asked, tentatively. “It’s me, Gell. You know me, right?” I asked, gingerly gripping a stalagmite for balance as my new legs wobbled.

Overbear didn’t hesitate. It wasn’t in his instinct. He charged, bellowing like he always did.

“Overbear!?” I squeaked, not believing what I was seeing.

The creature was upon me in moments, and it was only my long time spent dodging invaders that gave me the ability to slide out of the way of Overbear’s crashing club.

I darted backward and the club smashed against the ground where I’d been standing, leaving the bugbear overbalanced, but somehow managing to hold steady myself.

I could’ve shocked him. I could still feel the power of my shocker, now in my hands instead of an actual appendage, but I didn’t.

I couldn’t. I was one of them now… and the instinct told Overbear to attack me. I had hurt Momma Bossbear. How could I have done that? How could I have shocked her? She hadn’t done anything to deserve that. She’d just… followed the instinct. Just like Overbear was doing right now.

I jumped again, barely dodging the bugbear’s one-handed side-swing. I realized mid-movement what he would do next — the same thing he always did.

I stepped to the side and watched the club light up as he used a power attack that left streaks of red light in the trail of the weapon. It smashed into the ground, breaking like it always did if he hit it against a wall or floor too much.

He growled and screamed at me.

I… pitied him. Unfortunately, he was trying to kill me. I couldn’t hurt him, but I wouldn’t let myself be killed by him if I could avoid it.

The instinct was gone. The instinct was gone. I didn’t know how to describe the feeling. It felt like a failure to beat the instinct this way. To have broken and become like the invaders in body as well as soul, but if anything could have removed the geas keeping me in Dungeon Home, surely becoming human-like would!

I turned from Overbear and fled, only to leap in surprise as Buggy, standing behind me, swiped a deadly claw.

I screamed as the claw raked across my chest, but I didn’t die like I normally would have from such a strike. Instead, the tunic took the swipe for me. In my vision, strange numbers swam.

-54 HP!

I rolled away from Buggy, only to be forced to continue rolling as Overbear joined in swiping at me with his claws.

I didn’t know how I was doing this, but my initial unsteadiness was gone. I seemed to be able to move as naturally in this body as I ever had in my old one, but that didn’t make me feel any less sick about it.

“Buggy… you too?” I breathed through the pain in my chest, clutching at the deep wounds that… didn’t seem to hurt as much as they should.

He didn’t even seem to notice my horror, attacking again with reckless abandon. Suddenly, despite knowing I’d seen this a thousand times before, the bugbears seemed anything but robotic. Instead, they seemed vicious, deadly, and terrifying.

One more roll took me around Buggy, and Overbear tackled him in an effort to get to me, sending them both to the floor in a tumble of fur and muscle. I’d seen Red Thorn do this before, leading one bugbear into another. I grimaced at the thought, disgusted that I was now emulating Red Thorn, even if I hadn’t done so intentionally.

I rolled to my feet, hoping they would even start attacking each other like they sometimes did, but I had no such luck. The two Bugbears recovered quickly, getting to their feet and growling at me.

I fled, bolting down the hallway as fast as my legs would carry me, wiping my eyes from the distracting liquid blocking my vision. That, at least, I could do something about. I couldn’t tell if the gnawing hole in my heart was from Buggy’s claws or my own grief.

The bugbears had betrayed me; or had I betrayed them? I was an invader now. No longer one of theirs. I no longer belonged. I finally was on the outside what I’d always secretly feared I was on the inside.

An invader. An outsider. A wretched murderer.

I fled, but the stalagmites that were once trivial to glide through now slowed me down. I stumbled awkwardly, forced to walk around bumps and cracks in the floor that I’d never noticed in my old form. The rugged terrain hurt my ankles when I landed oddly and I had to take care where I placed these feet.

I adapted quickly though. I reached the door and stopped horrified. The door. I had to wait for Skeleton to open the door!

I stood, anxiously looking behind me, hearing growls and howls through the hall that had once comforted me. No longer. How far into the cycle was it!?

I waited, bouncing from foot to foot, wringing my hands in a way that felt…

Wringing my… my hands.

My hands.

Awed, the growls of the bugbears behind me temporarily forgotten, I placed my teal- skinned fingers against the door.

C-could I…?

I pressed, and the door slid just a crack, old stone grinding roughly against old stone. I… I could open doors!

My joy was muted as a growl sounded, louder than the others. I looked back and saw Bugrimace staring at me from the tunnel’s entrance, his eyes filled with rage. I moaned a raw guttural release of despair and shoved hard on the door. I didn’t have time to wonder at this!

The door slid far enough open for me to slip through and I did so just in time to dodge the slice of a sharp sword. Sparks from the metal sliding against the rock of the wall burned my face and I yelped, toppling into the room beyond.

-6 HP!

Rather than pushing the door open all the way and chasing me, Bugrimace tried to shove his face into the thin opening my smaller body had been able to fit through. The door moved slowly but the bugbear couldn’t get in.

‘H-he… he looks like a monster,’ I thought, frantically scrambling to get to my feet.

I turned around and leaned this body’s hands against the door and pushed, causing a strange tingling sensation to radiate through my arms and shoulders. It felt like the wind from the Great-Open but stronger. Not painful, just difficult. Straining.

Bugrimace squawked as his body was squeezed between the stone door and its frame, growling angrily at me before pulling back. I shut the door the second he was no longer jammed into it and breathed a sigh of relief. Bugbears had never followed the invaders through the door. All I had to worry about now were the ones on the way to the exit. Bearington. Busterbear.

…

Bugbear.

I glanced around the cave, still amazed by how small it looked now. I could touch the floor and the ceiling at the same time in some of the tunnels. Unfortunately, I had no time to marvel at the strange new perspective, as growls began to echo from the left tunnel and the lower right. That told me that it was Bearington and Bugbear and that the cycle had probably begun when I’d woken up. If they were behind me, only Busterbear should be able to catch me.

I ran, the yipping howls of bugbears following me as I raced through familiar, yet untrodden tunnels.

I almost made it, too. I ran through four chambers, tripping only twice as I did. The bugbears’ vicious snarls accompanied me, echoes making it hard to tell where they were. Just behind me? Chambers away? Whole floors below? I couldn’t tell. All I knew was that they were behind me.

Until I reached the final chamber. The exit… No. The entrance to invaders like me. I moaned as I saw Busterbear standing there, axe poised to strike.

He came at me wildly, dragging his axe along the ground which created a mad shriek. I covered my ears, and I only barely managed to dodge to the right before Busterbear’s axe cleaved the spot I just vacated. The axe whirled in the air, unhindered by the missed swing. Busterbear had always been the most effective of the Bugbears, despite being weak compared to the likes of Ghoul and Momma Bossbear. He raised the axe, preparing to cut me in two. Would I live? Would I return, now the victim of invaders and my own kind alike?

The world seemed to freeze as I saw my opening. Hands held high above his head, Busterbear couldn’t possibly stop my shock if I darted in now. I knew I could still use it, even in this strange body. My hands were the conduit now, but it would stun him just as it had so many invaders before. I had moments. Less than moments.

But… I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t! He was just following the instinct! Trapped, yet still better than me. He’d never killed one of his own. A part of me thought I deserved to die again. Deserved the pain.

Lying on the ground on my back, I let my shoulders slump. Busterbear approached with no mercy or recognition in his eyes. Cycles and cycles spent together and he didn’t even seem to remember me. I was just an invader now. Just another invader that the instinct demanded he kill.

“I… I’m sorry, Busterbear…” I said softly, closing my eyes.

I heard the whistle of his axe falling.

A sharp clang resounded throughout the cave, but no pain came.

I opened my eyes and saw a coat of brown fur I would know anywhere standing defiantly between Busterbear and me.

Bugbear. My first friend. The one who growled at me. The one who saw me.

“B-bugbear?” I whispered, hesitant to believe my own eyes. My vision again filled with tears and I irrationally thought the strange liquid was distorting reality.

It wasn’t. Bugbear stood, wielding his mace menacingly against its now defenseless kin. The block had shocked Busterbear so much that his weapon had been wrenched from his hands.

Busterbear looked confused, focused entirely on me, and seemed unable to even see Bugbear between us. Bugbear used that moment to turn his head to me.

“Rrr-Rgg…. Ruggnnnn,” he commanded before turning and swinging his club for the distracted bugbear’s head. It connected with a resounding clang, but Bearington was right behind Busterbear now, dashing straight towards me.

“B-Bugbear…!” I breathed. Awed. He really had seen me! He could defy the instinct too!

More tears came to my eyes as he intercepted Bearington’s body, fully lifting the running bugbear and tossing him to the floor. Busterbear had recovered and took the opportunity to tackle the new threat to the ground.

I turned, glancing at the now unblocked exit to the cave and back to Bugbear.

“I… I’ll come back for you! I swear it! I swear it, Bugbear!” I screamed, knowing that the fighting would only continue while the invader was still here. While I was still here. I no longer belonged in Dungeon Home.

Bugbear didn’t even seem to notice as his two kin overpowered him. Instead, he fought with a ferocity I’d never seen in any of them. He adapted. He moved in ways the instinct had never directed him. He… protected me.

And I fled, my heart burning with hatred for this cruel world that would only now give me the friend I’d dreamed of as I was forced to flee.

I almost didn’t notice when I crossed the threshold the instinct had once chained me to. Into the Great-Open.

Chapter Twenty

This Hallowed Sky

I ran, feeling miserable.

What should’ve been a joyous exultation at the freedom I’d finally attained was tainted now. Hollow. I ran, my legs adapting to the strange terrain.

The bugbears were just as trapped in the Dungeon as I had ever been, and would never follow me into the Great-Open.

I couldn’t run without opening my eyes though. Bugbear. Oh god, I’d left him in that cold cave. How could I have left him, when all of this world was out here, waiting to be seen?

I… ran, feeling numb. But the numbness was fading as it began to sink in. I was free. I was finally free. I didn’t slow for a long while, rushing through the brush and trees wildly.

Bitterness began to fade away as I stared at my confusing new surroundings with wonder. Grief gave way to awe. Even my regret at what I’d done to Momma Bossbear could not stand in the face of the fact that I had finally left my prison. Left it for good. I was free! Not just of the cave but of the instinct itself! I could go where I wanted.

Do what I wanted.

Be… well. Close to what I wanted. I was in the Great-Open!

At that thought, my run became one of pure happiness. I ran because I could and no gut feeling told me to go anywhere or do anything! I began to shout, whooping in joy!

As my body tired, a green bar on the bottom of my vision drained to nothing in tandem with my ability to keep moving. When it finally emptied and I could run no more, I collapsed on the forest floor, panting and grinning and rolling in the dirt.

My heart was beating in my chest. I could feel the new organ working. Hear it with my new ears instead of the ephemeral way sound used to vibrate my body, allowing me to perceive it. My lungs expanded and contracted in their own endless cycle in time with my breathing. Was that a thing that I had to do now? Breathe? All the time?

I grinned and reveled in the fact that I could grin. These things that I had words for but no way to perform. These actions that only invaders could accomplish! I could do them all now! The sensation of rushing and tiredness in my chest was new and wonderful. It felt good and burned at the same time. My heart was racing, my lungs working overtime to get me the air I needed as I rested on the ground.

I was surrounded by sparse trees and grass and leaves all shaded the nighttime blue that they always were during this cycle, but they were all different.

Beautiful.

There was more to it now though! More that I had never been able to see before from my prison in Dungeon Home. The blue glow of the moonlight that illuminated the world was punctured by sparkling lights from bugs that burst and flared and died in a cacophony of randomness that would take me a thousand cycles to learn!

I stared up at the tree branches above me and the starlight twinkling through the forest’s canopy, shining down and illuminating me. My skin glowed yellow, joining the fireflies in the dance of the evening. Tears of joy trailed down my cheeks while I mused on just how often invaders’ bodies seemed to need to cry.

The smells were vivid and wonderful. Earthy dirt and the scent of old trees. Flowers growing in the opening and pollen that made me want to sneeze. Soil felt wonderfully malleable under my feet next to the hard stone and marble I’d always known. There was just so much new.

I felt guilty, leaving Bugbear, but I knew he would be alright. Maybe… now he could learn to break the instinct too? Maybe when I returned, he would be ready, waiting for me to bring him away.

I took it in the world of the Great-Open with all the awe and wonder I had only ever imagined before. It was… breathtaking.

I thought that becoming an invader, becoming a human might have marred the experience. That breaking the last law of the instinct would be an ever-present blot on what was an otherwise magical memory for me.

Somehow it wasn’t. I felt free, in every way I could think of. I could feel the dirt beneath my back and it was new. I could feel the wind on my face and it was new. I could see the sky and finally knew for sure that I wouldn’t fall into it like I’d feared all those cycles ago.

I… was free.

I spent a long time lying there in the forest, taking in the new sights and sounds and smells. The night faded and the sun was cresting the horizon, lighting everything up with new colors by the time I could finally bring myself to stop gaping at every little thing.

Perhaps it was the lighting, but only with the sun rising, casting the tops of the trees in red and orange, I finally began to notice the mostly transparent overlay at the corners of my vision.

A blinking light was flashing there, and the more I focused upon it, the more visible it became. Only upon reaching up to the location with my hand and pressing the blinking light did anything actually happen though.

I was lucky I was lying down, otherwise I might’ve fallen as a big box with words written on it filled my vision.

“Welcome, Gell!”

“Welcome to Tread the Sky! We hope you enjoy your stay! Wander yonder, and don’t be afraid! Adventure awaits!”

I shivered, a strange, yet not unpleasant chill going through my body as I heard the exciting words in my ears, and read them before me at the same time. My skin bubbled and little hairs on it rose in anticipation. I wasn’t afraid! I was excited!

“As a new player, tutorial mode has been activated. If you are an experienced adventurer, you can disable this option now, or at any time in the “Options” menu. Would you like to disable this now?”

The words were read to me simultaneously by a plucky female voice who sounded much like myself.

Two large buttons at the bottom of the box appeared just in front of me, one reading “Yes, I know what I’m doing,” while the other said, “No, please help me get started.”

Tutorial? Well… experienced adventurer? I had explored the entirety of Dungeon Home, but somehow I didn’t think that qualified as experienced. I also liked the term adventurer much more than invader. I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to get my old body back, so I decided I might as well learn to accept it. Strange as it felt.

I chose No, and the menu disappeared.

“Great! Remember, you can turn off the tutorial any time via the “Tutorial” option in the Options menu.”

I was about to ask how to get to the options menu when the text continued appearing, and the voice continued explaining my new invader’s lifestyle to me.

“You can access the Options menu at any time by saying “Options!” Be warned, accessing this menu in combat will not stop your attackers, only you! So be sure to access your menus in a safe location, okay?”

“Okay!” I responded, enthused. I liked this voice. “What next?”

“Well, let’s get started! First and most important, you currently haven’t set a home point! That’s the location where you wake up after your character dies. We’re hoping that won’t happen much, but… well… it's a dangerous world out there!”

She could say that again… fucking Red Thorn.

“You are currently in a safe zone called “The Shady Woods Copse.” You can use any safe zone that you have discovered as a home point. If you are the first person to discover a safe zone, you can declare it your own, and charge a fee to others for using it! For now, though, your first one is free, regardless of the owner. Would you like to make “The Shady Woods Copse,” your home point?”

A… safe… zone? Did this mean that I would always be safe here? I was skeptical. I’d thought I was safe in my ceiling, fully invisible, but Red Thorn had found me.

Again, yes and no buttons appeared. I chose yes this time, and a flare of light exploded around my body. I heard music and was enthralled by the fanfare.

“Alright! You now have a place to call home or at least home away from home! We hope you enjoy your stay! I’ll pop in from time to time to give you tips and advice! Tread safely!”

“Wait!” I exclaimed. “Please Miss Tutorial, don’t go! I… I wanted to talk to you!”

The voice was gone though. Wherever it had come from, apparently it didn’t need to tell me anything else. I slumped. Maybe… maybe I was just bad at conversation? I hadn’t had very many of them before, after all. Oh! I had barely even said anything to her, instead focusing on the buttons she kept presenting to me! Did I bore her?

I flopped back onto my back, gazing up at the few stars I could still see through the beautiful morning sky. The sun was rising quickly but here in this cozy glade, I thought I could lay forever.

The green bar had refilled. I could get up if I wanted… but it felt so nice here. The grass felt good, and the shade of the trees above felt like I’d brought a bit of Dungeon Home with me. I wanted to explore!

But I found my eyes drifting closed as I took in new smells and new sensations on my skin. There was so much new to me that… just… just lying there for a while, staring at the Great-Open was more than enough for me.

“I’ll show you this one day, Bugbear. I swear I will,” I told myself, wondering how Bugbear was doing back in the cave.

I drifted away, closing my eyes and dreaming of falling into the sky, but instead of being afraid, I loved every moment.

Chapter Twenty One

A Friendly Chat

“Wow… she’s so beautiful. What do you think, honey? Should I try and switch to that race?”

“I doubt you can. Where do you think she got it?”

I awoke immediately at the voices and yelped. A flurry of butterflies and flowers erupted from my body as I rose.

I spotted two pairs of eyes hovering above me and scrambled in the grass, frantically backing away from the invaders into a tree.

How could I have been so stupid!? Falling asleep!? I’d never needed sleep before! It had just felt so nice to drift off. Of course, there would be invaders out here though! Why had I felt safe? I was paying for that now.

“Wh-who are you!?” I shrieked, sitting back down and holding up a hand, prepared to strike if either of them moved.

Two people stood above me, both human from their look. A boy and a girl. The boy was human while the girl was an elf. Neither of them seemed particularly menacing. They wore rather plain clothes and didn’t have any of the huge armor and weapons most invaders wore. The man was dark-skinned while the woman’s was a peach color.

That didn’t mean they weren’t dangerous though. Half Bold had taught me that.

“Whoa, sorry, sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you! We were just admiring your character! Is that a hidden race? How did you unlock it?” the girl exclaimed excitedly, her voice seemingly much older than I had expected.

“And how did you get the butterflies to fall asleep on you like that?” the man muttered.

“Admiring my... character?” They were admiring me? Did invaders often admire one another?

“Yes! I’ve never seen a race like that before! I love how your freckles glow! I know this game has a lot of secrets. How did you unlock it?” the boy asked, leaning in a little closer. He backed away as sparks ran through my hand, but then seemed to stare at my fingers in renewed awe.

How did I unlock my race? I… hurt my family. Killed one of my kin, just because I was angry. It didn’t matter that she was alive and well. It didn’t matter that she didn’t even remember what I’d done. All that mattered was that now I was an “invader.”

“I… did something bad. I didn’t mean to, but I was just so angry. Now… now I can’t go home anymore,” I said, realizing I was whimpering.

The two underwent an immediate change in demeanor, going from happy to concerned in an instant.

“H-hey. It’s… it’s okay,” the girl – no, woman – said consolingly. “What’s your name? I’m Am3t4yst, and this is… ugh... Iron_Crock_584,” she said, her expression turning bland as she looked back at the man.

“What. I like cooking! You know. In a crockpot?” he said, his tone changing in a way I didn’t quite understand. Was he mocking me?

The woman rolled her eyes with a strange expression before turning back to me.

“It’s easier to just call us Amy and Iron for short, Sweetie,” Amy said, her voice carrying a soft tone that I’d never heard from an invader before. “Now, that was a pretty dark comment before. Do you need some help?”

She approached me gingerly, crouching down to reach out for my shoulder, but I flinched away.

“S-stay away!” I insisted.

“Alright, alright,” she said, waving her hands placatingly. She backed away and sat down, leaning against a nearby tree of her own. “You seem distressed. I’d like to help if I can. I’ll just sit right over here, okay? Would you like to talk? If not, we can both be on our way, alright?”

I withered. I wanted to talk. But they were invaders. Monsters. They might seem nice, and I might be one of them now, but it was hard to forget cycles and cycles of being killed by them. Of watching them kill my kindred.

“Uhm if… if you promise not to move. Stay over there! Okay?” I insisted, looking from Amy to Iron in turn.

Iron cocked his head oddly. “Uh, sure.”

He went over next to the girl and sat down on the ground beside her. They sat quite close, their arms touching familiarly.

A flare of jealousy rose in my stomach, but I quashed it down. Perhaps I’d find companions of my own someday, but for now, I needed to find out more about these two.

“What… what were you doing here?” I asked them.

“Exploring, of course. We found you sleeping here in the glade,” Amy replied quickly.

“Well… why were you hovering over me?” I asked, pointing an accusing finger at her. “Is that normal?”

“Now, now, don’t you think it's our turn for a question?” Amy asked.

I hesitated. That sounded reasonable, I guessed.

“I… uhm… I guess so?” I said. I was getting tired of holding my arm trained on them and I used my other hand to hold it up, somehow embarrassed. Everything used to just… float. I hated this body...

“Could you tell us your name? We can’t help you if we don’t know who you are, you know,” she said pleasantly.

Was this a trick? Could she use my name? My eyes widened. If she knew my name could she change it like I had done to Half Bold!?

“What will you use it for!?” I asked. “I like my name. You’re not going to steal it, are you? Invaders like to steal!”

Iron raised an eyebrow in a way that made me think I’d just said something stupid. “Steal your name…?”

Amy reacted much more kindly.

“No no, Sweetie. You can’t steal a name. Names can only be borrowed!” she said, holding up a conspiratorial finger. “We’ll borrow and use your name to describe you when you’re not around, and to get your attention if we want to talk to you, but it’s always returned to its owner after being used.”

I wasn’t sure I believed her. She sounded really smug about her explanation. It also seemed wrong. I was pretty sure I’d stolen whatever old names Red Thorn and Green Tooth used to have.

Then again, maybe not. Those old names weren’t in my bag or anything, so perhaps they had been returned to their owners!

I smiled brightly at this thought and agreed. “Alright. In that case, my name is Gell! I’m a Jellyfae. Or… I was. I guess I’m an Invader… no, Adventurer Jellyfae now.”

“Gell! What a beautiful name!”

I flushed, deciding right then that I liked Amy. She was nice.

“Honey…? What are you doing?” Iron asked, a hint of concern in his voice.

“Helping her. She’s clearly a child and out of her depth. Would it hurt you to have a little compassion?” she asked.

That was rude! I wasn’t calling her a child! Besides, I was way more mature than any of my family!

“Hey, I’m not a child! I’m like a thousand cycles old!” I barked, as I folded my arms across my stomach in a way that felt natural and glared at the woman. Something about these two had put me at ease, at least enough not to have my shocker ready.

Unperturbed, Amy looked back at me and smiled, and suddenly I felt guilty for being offended. She had said she was trying to help me, after all. I wondered if all invaders went through something like this.

“You seem rather young though. Have you been on your own for long?” she asked.

I fidgeted, before admitting, “No, just... just last night. I finally got free, but I had to become an invader to do it. I’m… a little lost.”

Her eyes widened, and she put a finger to her mouth. “Free… you escaped from somewhere? You mean in the real world?”

I blinked, confused. “Real… world?”

She looked horrified all of a sudden, and I wondered if I’d said something bad. She didn’t push the issue though, shaking her head a little sadly, and muttering something about awful parents. When a few moments passed and neither of them spoke, I began to grow uncomfortable. I didn’t want to admit it, but I was enjoying the conversation.

That said, I couldn’t continue talking to these people if they planned to invade my home like Red Thorn, or Half Bold.

“Did you… uhm. Did you come here to invade Dungeon Home, like the others?” I asked, almost dreading the answer.

They both laughed a little at that.

“No sweetie. We’re a little old for that sort of thing. We play the game because it’s great to feel young again. In the real world, we’re well into our sixties. We paid a group to escort us out here so we could get this Home Point. Most of the stuff for our professions can be bought in town but sometimes you just have to go get it yourself. Helps that this is a beautiful place, don’t you think?”

“I… uhm. I do,” I agreed readily. There it was again: The “Real World.” What did that mean? Not to mention this was the second time I’d heard my reality referred to as a game. It reminded me of Half Bold.

“Besides, there’s plenty you can do in Tread the Sky that isn’t killing and the like. I’m a master Carpenter, both here and in the real world, don’t ya know? Though you’ll never be famous like Ralts Knight or The Wanderer if you don’t follow the main quest and hunt monsters.”

“But… you’re saying that there are people who talk? People who don’t invade other Dungeon Homes and hurt the families there?” I asked, feeling a thrill rise in my chest.

They hesitated, but Amy was the first to speak again. “Well… yes and no. Creatures outside of towns attack adventurers. You can’t play this ga–err. You can’t live in this world without occasionally having to fight.”

“But you can be an adventurer without being an invader!” I interrupted whatever he was about to say, unconsciously edging closer to the two of them in desperation. “You don’t… you don’t have to become an invader when you look like this?”

Amy looked confused. “Of… of course not. We don’t go dungeon diving but we still log in almost every night!”

I shivered, delighted. “I’m glad. I was… determined not to become an invader, but I was afraid. What if all the invaders once thought the same things I do? Felt the same ways I felt?”

They both stared at me for a moment, perplexed.

“I’m… starting to think this might not be a player, hon. Think she’s part of a quest?” Iron said to Amy.

I cocked my eye at him.

“Quest? What’s a quest?” I asked, scooting even closer to the couple, my interest piqued.

“Uh… no dear, I don’t think so,” Amy replied, before speaking louder for me. “Well, Gell. A quest is a way to gain experience. Most of them involve hunting for items... or killing dangerous monsters, but plenty of them involve traveling to new locations or building creations. Learning spells and new abilities, as well as earning money. Would you like to–!”

The woman’s words were interrupted by a sudden, blaring alarm that had me covering my ears. It was nothing like Momma Bossbear’s roar, but the suddenness of it took me back to that first time she had echoed her challenge, and my body shook involuntarily.

Amy had looked away over at Iron and sighed, so she didn’t see my shaking. “I’m sorry, Gell. We are unfortunately going to have to log off. Medication time. Always fun,” she said in a way that made me certain medication time was about as fun as being stabbed by a dagger.

The alarm noise cut off and I managed to get my trembling under control by the time Amy turned back to me.

“We’re going to have to go for a little while honey. But here, would you like to be friends with us? That way we can talk more in the future if you like?” she asked, fiddling around in the air.

Suddenly another box appeared in front of me.

Am3t4yst has invited you to be friends. Do you accept?

There was an official method of becoming friends!? I didn’t know that! I needed to send one of these to Bugbear!

… when… when I came back for him anyway.

I selected Yes, and was delighted to see a list appear. This box wasn’t as large as the request, but it looked sleek with a pretty border around the edges. There, listed under “Friends” was the name “Am3t4st - Online!”

“Ohh!” I exclaimed, staring at the image in horror. “I took your name! Take it back! I’m not a thief!”

She smiled again, laughter in her eyes.

“You’re really worried about that, aren’t you? Don’t worry. My name is right here with me.” She pointed above her head and for the first time, I noticed a barely visible tag hovering over her like a halo. It said her name!

But… I still had a part of it here on this list. How was that possible?

I stared at her, incredulous. “You’re suuure?”

Another invitation came from Iron and I turned to look at him. He smiled comfortingly as well with a sheepish shrug. “Well, we aren’t going to be as close as you and Amy of course, but I could always use a new friend!”

I beamed. That sounded nice. I accepted his invitation as well and sure enough, Iron_Crock_584 appeared right beneath Amy’s name.

I stared at the two names trying to parse them. They’d pronounced them Amethyst and Iron Crock Five Eighty Four, but neither of them looked right. Ahm three tah four yest! No. No that was awful. I decided then and there that reading those names would drive me insane. Amy Thyst and Iron Crock.

The names changed before my eyes and I beamed at the menu before turning back to Amy.

“W-well. How do I give you a piece of my name then? Are you… are you sure you both have to go?” I asked.

“We already traded! A piece of my name, for one of yours. See!? Friend’s List,” she said, pulling up her own list and spinning it around, then pointing to my name. Gell! I was her friend just like she was mine! She was right! She’d borrowed my name but I still had it!

“Wow…!” I said, looking first at my name, then at all the other names she had listed. “You have so many friends! How many pieces can you split your name into?”

Amy smiled and ignored my question entirely. “You will too, one day. I’m sure. We’ve got to go now though, sweetie.”

I frowned. I… liked my new friends. Did they have to go?

Seemingly able to pick up on my emotions once again, Amy gave a sad smile. Who knew there were so many different ways to smile?

“Unfortunately. But we’ll be back. Say in four hours?” she asked.

I… didn’t want to admit I didn’t know how long an hour was. I knew it was sixty minutes! I knew it was three hundred and sixty seconds! But… I didn’t know how long any of those were. I only really understood how long a cycle was.

“Uhm. Okay! I’ll… I’ll be here in four hours then!” I told her hoping she didn’t notice. How many cycles was that? One? A cycle was so long! Would they mind if I went and explored? What if I missed them?

Amy seemed to notice something in my tone.

“Sweetie… can you touch your friends list for me, and then spin it around like I just did? That will let me see it, okay?” she said gently.

I did so and the list suddenly became even more solid! I twisted it and it spun in mid-air. Amy took a look at it and frowned before muttering, “We’re her only friends?”

She didn’t dwell on that though, instead turning back to me. I was taller than her, but somehow felt I should be shorter as she drew my attention to the board. I was learning so much about inva– er… adventurers, just from this one conversation!

“Okay. See how it says “Online?” she asked, gesturing for me to walk around the screen and look. I did so and saw what she was talking about.

“Yes?” I said, feeling like she was being condescending. I could read.

“When we log-off, that’ll say “Offline” and our names will look greyed out. When we come back, it’ll say “Online” again. That way you can know when we’re around and come back here to meet us. Does that sound good?”

‘Ohhh! That’s what she means!’ I thought. Now I could tell when they were around and when they were gone.

“Okay! I’ve got it!” I said, bouncing exuberantly.

“Alright. We’ll be back in a few hours. It was wonderful to meet you, Gell, and I hope to see you again soon!” she said while fiddling with screens I couldn’t see.

Then, the two of them faded away. Just… slid into transparency and disappeared.

A shiver still ran through my spine as I compared their disappearance with the bodies of the bugbears after they died. I did my best to keep smiling while they waved goodbye.

Once I might’ve been terrified by that, but now I knew they would be back.

I had friends. I had made friends! I had talked to people who said new things! Being an adventurer — not an invader — was the best thing ever!

Chapter Twenty Two

Combat Zones

“Being an Adventurer sucks!” I exclaimed, having tripped on a tree root and landed on my knees for the third time now. At this point, my clumsiness was going to kill me long before any invaders got the chance.

It was strange that I hadn’t tripped overly much on my mad run the night before. Surprisingly, though, I was getting used to the strangely solid limbs.

I’d been exploring in a circular pattern away from the Shady Wood Copse. Thus far the world was even more beautiful in daylight than it had been at night. The orange glow of the sun seemed to cast shadows down on me that rustled and moved as the wind blew the leaves. It was a breathtaking sight.

Still, since Amy and Iron had left, I’d not encountered anyone or anything. I hadn’t been walking for very long though. I didn’t want to be too far away, should the two of them decide to fade back in. The most sensible choice was to explore in ever-widening rings around the location I’d slept in last night! Even more enjoyable, I could watch my tread counter rise in number as I walked!

In the upper right hand of my vision, there were two counters: one for tread, and one for sky. Both of them were measured with a strange pair of letters and a number that I recognized but meant nothing to me. “Ft².” I didn’t know what that was, but I did know that the more I walked, the more my Tread counter rose!

The sky counter stayed static though. Did it mean that I had to fly? I couldn’t do that anymore, but that was actually okay.

I glanced upward and shuddered. Knowing that I wouldn’t fall up into that Great-Open wasn’t enough to remove the fear hundreds of cycles had burned into my brain. The sky was beautiful, but I was thankful for the trees above my head, just in case.

“Heya Player!” came the sudden voice of Miss Tutorial. “You’re approaching the edge of a safe zone for the first time! Want to learn a little more about safe zones and combat zones?”

Her voice was accompanied by a box with the words, which I assumed was her body. The words she’d spoken were written there as well as two more boxes reading “Yes, tell me more!” and “No thanks, I know this crap!”

The boxes were in my way though, and I tried to step around them and maybe see what she looked like on the other side. Unfortunately, the box wouldn’t move and remained fixed in my vision no matter how much I tried to look around it.

“Miss Tutorial! I missed you! Would you like to talk to me, like Amy and Iron did?” I asked, vainly trying to grab the box and spin it like I’d done with the “Friends List” Amy had shown me. Everything in my life that spoke thus far had a face, but Miss Tutorial didn’t seem to have one. My hands floated right through the box.

Tutorial didn’t respond and I pouted. “I… guess you only really like teaching huh?”

I selected the Yes option and the box went away, quickly replaced by another.

“Great! Always happy to help. Alright. So you’re about to leave a safe zone. In a safe zone, you can’t be harmed by other players or monsters, but all of that changes the second you step outside! Combat zones are where terrifying beasts, evil cultists, and other enemies make their lairs. Not only that, you’ll be vulnerable to attack from other adventurers, should they wish to steal your equipment or money!

I gasped. Invaders killed other invaders!?

Beware, adventurer, and make sure you’re well prepared before venturing into one of these zones! Note that each zone usually has a level identifier visible on your map. If the level is much higher than your own, consider adventuring elsewhere? You don’t want to get eaten by an angry dinosaur, do you?”

“No, I don’t!” I screeched, turned, and fled back to the safety of the Shady Woods Copse.

“See you again soon, adventurer!” Tutorial said with a happy tone that didn’t fit the horrifying words she’d just told me.

Things would eat me!? I didn’t want to be eaten! That sounded awful! Even if I came back, that sounded like a horrible way to die!

Overwhelmed and a little disgruntled by the knowledge that even free of the cave I still wasn’t necessarily safe, I returned to the location where I’d met Amy and Iron.

I sat down to wait but quickly grew bored. Fortunately, I had things to take care of, now that I had some time to address them. I pulled my bag off from around my back and opened it up, deciding to spend some time going through the items the magic bag had allowed me to carry out of Dungeon Home.

I wanted to try the horn. I’d neglected it last night with the wonder of… everything. I opened the bag and was shocked to find another screen opening up.

“Hiya Player!”

Tutorial, of course.

“Hey, you’ve got some nerve coming around here after scaring me like–!”

“I see you’ve opened your inventory! Would you like to learn more about your inventory, item management, and equipment screens?”

I glared at the woman and selected “No!” She could go explain things to someone else! Rotten jerk.

“Okay! But if you ever want to know more, you can always view this information via the “Tutorial” option in the “Options” menu! Bye-bye now!”

“Yeah, you better go!” I exclaimed. “And good riddance! Scaring me…”

She did go, and I immediately felt guilty. Miss Tutorial had warned me about the dinosaurs that might eat me after all. She’d even told me how to ask her questions again.

Well. Maybe I’d apologize later. Not now though. I was still a little mad at her.

I opened my bag, but this time, while I could look inside and see all the items in there, there was also a box that held little slots and small images that looked a lot like all the things I held!

Ohh! There was a little potion, just like my health potion! And there was my pebble! Oh, the elf’s tiara! It looked so cute in small picture form! I beamed as I saw the horn, but something else caught my eye first.

I tapped on the small image of two seashells and they floated out of the bag as if by magic!

“Thank you, bag! That was nice of you!” I said, delighted by the kindness. Nothing else had ever brought anything to me before, but this bag seemed perfectly happy to! I wondered if adventurers were born with bags like this.

The bag obviously didn’t respond, but that was okay. I didn’t know if it was a creature like Bugbear, but it could certainly do things! That qualified as far as I was concerned.

The seashells in my hands gleamed like crystals or Momma Bossbear’s pool. Or maybe the stars at night.

Seashell Pauldrons

Item Class: Rare

+6 Armor. Grants Darkvision.

Durability: 28/28

Armor Class: Light Armor

I pulled them out and admired them for a moment before putting them on. They were beautiful and glinted in the sunlight. I beamed, my skin-dots turning a bright yellow as I craned my neck to see how they sat on my new shoulders.

I grew somber then. I was an invader now. I wasn’t in my old form. The only reason I could wear these pretty things was because of what I’d done to Momma Bossbear.

The arms and legs still felt foreign to me. Using them, walking and standing and running, all felt somehow natural. At the same time, they were completely alien. I would lift a tentacle and expect to curl it around something only to find I barely needed to exert any effort to lift it with my hand. I forcibly tried to stop thinking about it. If I thought too much about what I had become a horrible feeling of unease bloomed over my body. My glow faded from yellow to a mix between disgusted green and a sickly purple.

Sure, I could wear pretty things, but I’d gotten these from killing Momma Bossbear. I couldn’t turn away from that. Couldn’t hide it. A newfound resolve grew in me. I would wear these as a reminder of who I didn’t want to be. Maybe… one day, Momma Bossbear could pull free enough from the instinct to forgive me.

I sighed and moved on, hoping the horn would be a happier experience than the pauldrons.

I withdrew the jewel-encrusted instrument gingerly. The ornate horn gleamed in the morning sunlight, its purple gems reflecting dazzling lights into the canopy of trees above whenever they caught the sun. I tilted the horn, trying to make as many little lights as I could before spinning them around playfully.

Still, this was it. The moment of truth. I could hopefully free whoever it was Half Bold had imprisoned within this horn.

I lifted the horn to my new lips, and put my mouth around the horn’s front. It tasted strange. Earthy. Not pleasant. I blew, but instead of a musical note like the bard or like Half Bold had made, the only sound was… sort of like the sound of Bugbear stepping in a puddle. An airy whirring sound that turned my freckles green with disgust.

What the heck! How was I supposed to make music come out of this thing?

“H-hehe,” I heard a voice behind me, and jumped, turning to find Iron standing there, holding a hand in front of his face. Amy was there too, also hiding a grin.

Chapter Twenty Three

Lingering Instinct

“What?” I asked, annoyed.

“I… heh, Sweetie, you... haha!” Amy tried, but her words dissolved into helpless giggles.

I flushed, feeling embarrassed, as the two continued to laugh. My freckles involuntarily turned a vivid pink, which only seemed to make the two laugh harder.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Gell. It’s just… You aren’t supposed to wrap your lips around the mouthpiece,” Iron said when he’d finally gotten his laughter under control. “You won’t make any sound like that.”

“Well, how am I supposed to do it then!?” I screamed, stomping on the ground with my foot. I’d seen a few adventurers do that and decided it felt appropriate.

“It’s okay, it’s okay, sweetie. Here. You purse your lips like this,” Amy said, puckering out her lips. “Then you fit them into the hole at the end of the horn and blow through. Give it a shot.”

I glared at them but then looked back to the horn. The mouthpiece had seemed a bit wide. This horn was different from the one that had summoned Avwren. That one had ended in a sharp point. This one had a section just large enough to fit my lips into if I closed them together.

I did as suggested and blew through the horn, creating a clear, if not quite beautiful note. I beamed, delighted and amused by the strange sensation of air flowing over my lips as well as the sound. It wasn’t nearly as pretty as the bard’s had been but it was music!

Suddenly, a glowing purple and white void appeared in the middle of the clearing. I screamed, shocked, and Amy and Iron both stepped back, afraid. Almost as fast as the portal opened, though, a creature stepped forth from the bright corridor.

The portal winked out of existence as soon as the monstrosity had stepped out of it, and I gasped in awe.

It was… a four-legged creature. Huge, even in comparison to Momma Bossbear. Instead of standing upright, it seemed to only have legs and nothing to grasp with. It was pure white, with a purple, gem-encrusted horn on its forehead. This was a different kind of horn though. Silver, with purple lines that seemed reminiscent of the crystals on the summoning horn.

“Ohhh!” I said, stepping up to the creature. “You beautiful thing...”

“It’s a Unicorn! Where… how did you get something like that?” asked Iron, staring wide-eyed at the creature. He was every bit as transfixed as I was.

A text box appeared in front of me when I touched the Unicorn.

You’ve summoned “Lesser Unicorn - Unnamed.” This Unicorn was once the property of “Half Bold, Halfling Beastmaster.” Since he never summoned the creature, it remains unclaimed. You may claim “Lesser Unicorn - Unnamed” as your own and keep the summoning item to call it to your side in battle, convert “Lesser Unicorn - Unnamed” to a mount, or set “Lesser Unicorn - Unnamed” free.

There were three button boxes with the choices listed in each box below.

Before doing any of those, I focused on the Unnamed part. Half Bold hadn’t given the creature a name? Well, with a name like… what had his name been again? Bold Viper, the Jellyjerk, or something? Well. It was probably for the best he hadn’t chosen a name for the Unicorn.

Either way, I would’ve renamed it. As I slid the box off to the side with my hand, I reached out and touched the creature’s long neck. Somehow, I wasn’t afraid of it, even though it was so much bigger than me. Normally that meant I’d be afraid, but this creature seemed to exude an aura that made me calm.

Would Half Bold really have tried to make this creature fight me?

I shivered, suddenly all too aware of just how cruel Half Bold was. I turned to look at Amy and Iron. Their clothes were different. Their faces were so much more serene than Half Bold’s. But they were still... adventurers. Could I trust them?

Questions for later. For now… I had a Unicorn to consider. He was prancing a little, stamping his feet expectantly as he looked at me. I smiled, my freckles going all yellow and pink with compassion.

“It seems to like you! You should ride it!” Iron said, and I jumped when he seemed to appear right beside me, pressing a hand on my shoulder.

“H-hey!” I exclaimed. “Not so close!”

The Unicorn snorted and used its huge body to shield me from Iron’s proximity. Fortunately, he backed away immediately.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry! Forgot you weren’t quite comfortable around us. But Gell, this is a Unicorn. It’s a mount. If she likes you, you should try to ride her. Mounts are unbelievably rare in this game because they can increase your tread and sky counters much faster than walking normally.”

I frowned. If that was the truth then why had Half Bold imprisoned her? Could he maybe be unaware? Or perhaps he already had a… “mount?”

“Oh… kay. I guess I’ll try. Hey there… uhm… what should I call you?” I asked. My first thought had been Violet Horn but somehow that didn’t seem elegant enough.

“I won’t keep you. You should go free, but I’ll give you a name. Would you like that?” I asked, delighted when it responded by brushing its huge nozzle against my face. I laughed, delighted as I came up with the best name!

“Alright then… you’ll be, Nosey! Nosey, the Unicorn!”

The unicorn pranced angrily, as if annoyed. “What? You’re like, fifty percent nose!” I exclaimed and the creature huffed, jets of hot air coming from its nostrils. I laughed again, feeling like somehow I’d known this creature all my life.

Had it seen me from its horn? Did it know me?

“Well, you only have one other prominent feature. Would you prefer Horny?” I asked and he snorted again.

Curiously, Iron snorted too, giggling like I’d said something absolutely hilarious. Strange.

“Fine… fine, that wasn’t really what I was going to use anyway,” I said, holding up a finger like Amy had done when she told me about how names couldn’t be stolen.

“Where did you get that horn, Gell?” came Amy’s voice as she approached after smacking Iron for some reason, who was still laughing at some joke I didn’t understand. Amy came to me much more slowly than Iron had. “That’s a beastmaster’s summoning horn, right?”

“Oh. Yeah, I stole it from a jerk who was keeping this guy imprisoned. He tried to put me in one of those horns, but I tricked him and snagged this from him instead! I still want to save that other prisoner of his though.” I trailed off. “Poor Avwren is still trapped…”

“That’s… an interesting view of Beastmasters,” Iron said. While Amy seemed perfectly fine approaching it, he seemed almost scared now that it had snorted at him.

“I’ll save him someday, too! Now that I can leave the cave, I’ll finally be able to find a family! A real one… not like… what I thought. How about you, huh?” I asked, petting the Unicorn’s white fur gingerly. “Would you like to be part of my family?”

I stepped back, startled as the creature leaped onto its back hooves, neighing wildly before landing again with a thump. I beamed.

“How do you feel about Torchlight? Because I know I’ll be safe when you’re around. Okay?” I asked.

Torchlight seemed much happier with that name than Nosey. I pulled the screen back to me and clicked the option that released him. The moment I clicked it, a burst of light appeared around Torchlight. A smaller yet no less vibrant burst of white and purple energy erupted around the horn which had been forgotten on the floor. The horn shattered, letting the purple gemstones embedded in it fall to the ground.

Torchlight bayed again, happily leaping like a wild thing. It returned to me and nuzzled my face once more before dashing away into the trees, even faster than Red Thorn’s dagger.

“What… What did you do!?” Iron shouted, causing me to jump back in alarm. “You let it go? But that’s… that was an epic mount! You could’ve gone almost anywhere with that, or sold it for enough real-world money to...! Why would you–?”

“Derek…” Amy interrupted with one small word. I looked on in awe as that one word worked upon Iron_Crock_584 like magic. He instantly calmed, though he still looked angry.

How did she do that? Was the word magic? Could… all this time could I have just turned to Red Thorn and said “Derek?” to make her stop hurting me?

“Honey, that horse was worth a small fortune! In the real world! She could’ve sold it. It might’ve helped her out wherever she is in…” the man trailed off, looking over to me as Amy touched his face. His expression softened.

“Yeah, okay. Gell, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to blow up like that. It’s just that creature could’ve really helped you. You could’ve gotten armor and weapons to protect yourself with,” he said, trailing off as if he wanted to say more but couldn’t find the right words.

There was context that I was missing here. Real-world. Again.

“But… Torchlight will help me. Didn’t you see how happy she was?” I asked, genuinely confused.

I was no longer afraid of Amy or Iron. They had, thus far, been nothing but kind to me. I’d made Iron angry but I didn’t understand why.

“I’m sorry, Iron. It’s just… Torchlight was just like me. Trapped. I had to let him go. Otherwise, I’d have chained him, just like the instinct did to me. I don’t want anyone to be trapped because of me,” I said softly.

“Very mature of you Gell. She did a good thing, Iron,” Amy said imploringly. She put a hand on my shoulder.

I looked at her quizzically before she wrapped both of her hands around me. A hug. This was… a hug. I relaxed into the embrace slowly but felt immensely better when I did. My arms naturally found a place around the shorter woman’s back.

“Silly thing,” the man scoffed. “But okay. So, you were trapped then, Gell? Do you want to talk about it?”

I folded further into Amy’s hug. “No. Not really. It's over now. I’m… I’m free, just like Torchlight.”

I didn’t want to dwell on the guilt of hurting Momma Bossbear. Of leaving Bugbear behind. Of betraying the ones I’d once thought of as family, and being betrayed in turn.

Thinking about forgetting just made it harder to forget though.

I was here, in the Great-Open! Everything was supposed to be great now! So why was I crying again?

Amy hugged me tighter. I heard a Unicorn whinny in the distance, and I sniffed before returning Amy’s hug as hard as I could. She let me, and I’d never been more grateful to anyone in my whole life.

Chapter Twenty Four

A New Sense

She held me for a long time. I pulled away eventually, wishing for things I couldn’t have: Bugbear with me, growling his little growls, the rest of my lost family with me, and able to understand me, Red Thorn stabbed a few dozen times with her accursed dagger.

“Are you feeling a little better?” Amy asked when I’d finally calmed down. I wished I understood all these new feelings. I’d never been quite so emotional in my old body. Was that… part of being a player?

I wished Miss Tutorial would show up and explain things to me, but… maybe Amy would be better at that anyway.

“I think so,” I hiccupped. “Sorry. I just… haven’t ever met someone so kind before. I’m still waiting for the dagger to fall, or for you to pull out magic nets and try to lock me in a horn,” I told her, distressed.

“We’re… not going to do that, Gell,” Iron said. “I don’t know how much we can, but I think Amy will stand by me when I say we’d like to help you.”

Amy turned up to look at Iron with a fond look. “He’s right, Gell. We’d love to help you get on your feet. I would like to know a little more about your paren–!”

“We were actually just about to eat. It’s nothing much but would you like some food?” Iron interrupted, as he plopped down on the grass and pulled out a bag that looked a lot like mine.

There was a short interchange of expressions between them. Amy glared, then Iron cocked his head strangely, and Amy’s glare subsided. I watched all this in fascination. Was it possible to talk without actually talking? What had I just missed between the two?

Iron opened his bag and pulled out two platters of… I could only call them lumps of color. There were white bitlets that were all packed together like little thin pebbles. Green things that looked like miniature trees, and a lump of brown that strange distortions in the air were floating off of. They looked sort of like clear torch-smoke but dissipated into the air much faster than smoke did. I’d never seen it before, but I realized that it was steam. The lumps smelled heavenly.

I immediately wanted whatever that was.

“Eating in this world is silly sometimes. An indulgence mostly, and the tastes are never quite right, but when you get to be our age, you can’t enjoy all the steaks and candies and cookies anymore. Fortunately, in-game food is most of the taste with none of those pesky diabetes problems creeping in,” Amy said with a smile towards Iron.

“...huh?” I asked, realizing that my eyes hadn’t once left the plate of lumps, bits, and trees.

“Sorry. I ramble sometimes. You have my plate. You look like you’ve never seen steak and broccoli before!” Amy said with a laugh.

“I… haven’t. Is that what that is? A… A steak-and-broccoli? Why does it smell so good?” I asked, edging closer. “Is it dangerous?”

“Hah, No! It’s food! What, you've never had food before?” Iron laughed.

“I didn’t even have a mouth until yesterday!” I exclaimed, meeting his excited tone with one of my own.

He stared at me, but my focus was entirely on the steak-and-broccoli. I crept closer until I was sitting above the plate, trying to figure out what to do with it.

Amy had crept over to Iron just as surreptitiously as I had advanced on her plate and was now casually snatching the trees off of his meal. He glared at her, then rolled his eyes and turned the plate so the trees were facing her, and she beamed delightedly before snatching another and popping it into her mouth.

I reached down and picked up the green thing. So… I was supposed to eat it?

I put the green thing to my tongue and chomped down on the leafy part, leaving the stem behind. A surge of… of… goodness spread throughout my mouth and down my body into my brain. Everything about this body loved what I’d just given to it.

I… felt a little weird. I’d never even had the capacity for these sensations before. Thus far though, most things about being an invader had been positive. I’d met Amy and Iron. And Miss Tutorial. I’d seen the sky and escaped Dungeon Home. The only thing I should regret was my loss of flight, but even that didn’t compare to this new sensation. Taste!

Should I be rewarded for breaking the rules? Was that really how this world worked? Because it seemed that the world was rewarding me for what I’d done to Momma Bossbear. I hated that… but that didn’t stop me from taking another bite.

I moaned and garbled another. The bitlets and the brown lump remained untouched until I saw Iron waving at me to get my attention.

“Whoa, whoa, slow down! You’ve got to enjoy it a little!” Iron said.

“But it’s…mmmph… so good!” I exclaimed. “Steak-and-Broccoli! What is it? Where did it come from?”

“The market! You can buy all sorts of different foods from markets in the towns or cities. We were going to head back to town today. Iron makes money as a carpenter in Variak, a city far to the south of here,” Amy said enthusiastically.

Towns and Cities. Huge gathering places of adventurers that were hubs of living and working people. I knew what they were and immediately wanted to see one.

“Can I… go to one?” I asked.

“You’ve never been to one? New players start out in a city, so you had to have seen one at some point,” Iron said between bites of food.

I shook my head. “No. I’ve only ever seen Dungeon Home, but I want to see a city! Actually, that’s something I’ve been hoping to ask for a long time now. What are… En Pee Sees? Someone once told me they were in cities.”

I picked up the utensils and held them as close to how Iron was holding his as I could. It didn’t work though, and I fumbled the knife when the steak slid around out from under it.

“You’ve got to stab into the steak so it’ll stay in place, Gell. Then you can cut it with a knife. Like this, see?” Iron said as he cut the steak easily. “NPCs? Well. They’re… quest-givers. Uhm. People who are part of this world. They don’t leave like we do.”

“So… I guess that makes me an NPC?” I asked idly.

“Uhm… no you’re…” Amy said but trailed off as she watched me struggle.

I tried again, this time stabbing the steak with the fork. I managed to cut off a piece of the brown lump and moved to stab the newly cut piece, only to realize I’d picked up the entire remainder of the steak! Uggghhh! This was too complicated!

“Can I just eat it with my tent… er my hands?” I asked, trying to remove the fork from the center of the steak, shaking the thing to get it to fall off and failing.

“You could try but it’s hot. You shouldn’t be able to…”

He trailed off when I picked up the steak chunk I had managed to cut and held it with no problem. I grinned smugly. “I used to hide inside torches! This little heat doesn’t affect me!”

I popped the steak bite into my mouth and melted. The taste was… was…

“This is… so tasty…” I breathed, staring at the plate, feeling guilty about enjoying the perks of my new form so much.

“Gell… where… are you from? Originally?” Amy asked as she watched me puddle myself into the grass in delight, my body cocooned around the plate like a protective barrier. Part of me wanted to put the plate in my bag and keep it forever as one of my precious treasures, while the vast majority of me just wanted to never stop eating.

“I told you that. I’m from Dungeon Home! I’ve lived there for thousands of cycles!” I said proudly as I grabbed a handful of the bitlets, now excited to try the last piece of a Steak-and-Broccoli! “As long as I can remember!”

The two of them blanched at that before turning away to their own conversation. I was fine with that. I could hardly focus on their questions when this food was so good!

I shoved the bitlets into my mouth and was not nearly as blown away by the taste as I had been by the brown lump or the leafy trees, but it was still quite good! Taste itself was amazing!

“Hey there, adventurer!” Miss Tutorial suddenly exclaimed brightly and I blanched as a dialogue box appeared with her words written there. “I see you’ve consumed an edible! Would you like to learn more about the effects of foods?”

I jumped back up and exclaimed happily. “Oh! Tutorial! I wanted to say I’m sorry. Thank you for warning me about the dinosaurs that might eat me. I didn’t mean to get so mad at you. Can you tell me about that inventory thing from earlier?”

Tutorial didn’t say anything.

“Don’t… be like that. I really am sor–!”

“I see you’ve consumed an edible! Would you like to learn more about the effects of foods?” she asked again, more insistently this time.

I sighed. “Well. I guess so.”

I pressed “yes” and was happy to hear Tutorial continue in her usual bright tone.

“Well, adventurer, food can have a wide variety of effects. Almost all of them are positive for you and they usually only last for a certain amount of time. For example, the: “Steak & Greens” meal you just consumed will grant you a temporary boost of: “+7 to Vitality.” All foods have effects of this nature, beyond healing you if you’ve been hurt. Food can grant magical resistances, haste effects, bonuses to stats, bonuses to experience gained, and many more effects!”

Food was amazing! It tasted good and it could help me fight if I needed to? Before I could think further about it, Tutorial continued speaking.

“Be wary though. Poorly cooked foods or foods cooked by inexperienced chefs can actually have detrimental effects! Foods you’ve cooked yourself will have bonus effects! Try many types of foods to learn more!”

With that, she was gone.

“Ugghh! Why won’t Miss Tutorial ever call me by my name?” I screamed in frustration. “I mean… she talks at me, but not to me! Not like you guys…”

I turned and found Amy and Iron both looking at me, both of them ignoring the plate they were sharing as they watched me with bemused expressions.

“Hey! Are you laughing at me again? What did I do this time?” I said, feigning indignance. In truth, I was becoming very fond of the two of them. They were so nice…

I couldn’t help but wonder though. Would they be as nice if they knew I was only an adventurer by accident?

Chapter Twenty Five

Tread the Earth

A little time passed after I had eaten all of the wonderful things and drunk the wonderful drinks they had provided to wash the food down with. Everything was… was… wonderful. Even the strangely uncomfortable sensation in my stomach was great.

I lay on my back, watching the cycles pass in the sky above. The weather’s cycle was thirty-four normal cycles long and unless I was confusing it with cycle fifteen, which looked similar but a little more cloudy than the midafternoon look of the sky right now, then it was cycle twenty nine.

I’d long since numbered them. It was a bit hard to tell them apart now that I had so much more to see, but the view from the cave showed enough of the sky that I was pretty sure I was right.

“So, Gell,” Iron asked, interrupting my contented musings of the sky. “We were planning on returning to the city. Unfortunately, we were going to teleport there. Do you think you would like to meet us there?”

“Y-you’re leaving!? But… but I thought… I thought we would go to the city together,” I said dejectedly.

Iron grimaced. “Gell, it’s… well. We aren’t really–!”

“We’ll go with you, Gell,” Amy interjected suddenly.

“You will!?” I beamed.

“We will?” Iron blanched.

“We will,” Amy confirmed, nodding. “But… well. We’re going to need to prepare. You said you’d never been anywhere but here and… uhm… Dungeon Home, correct? So that means you might not know about Home Points. You can have up to three, and teleport between them freely.”

“Honey… we have some good gear but we’re level five and six. This… isn’t exactly going to be a stroll in the park,” he said, more concerned than unwilling.

“Gell needs a guide, and I’m not going to leave her alone here if it's in my power not to. We’ve got plenty of equipment. Gell, could you tell us what your level is? We are going to go back to Variak and get some equipment for ourselves and you if we can,” she stated.

“Equipment? What… what do we need equipment for?” I asked, curiously.

“Weapons and armor. Not to invade, but to protect ourselves from wandering monsters and PKs, should we encounter any,” Iron said.

“PKs?” I asked. Every question just led to another question!

“Player killers. Sorry, I’m just making this harder. Gell, it's dangerous to travel outside of safe zones without equipment. Weapons and armor and health potions to–!”

“I have a health potion!” I exclaimed proudly. “You wanna see?”

Iron’s eye twitched, in the same way Bugbear’s used to when I hung around him for too long. Was Iron maybe a Bugbear before he’d become an adventurer?

“That’s… good, Gell, but you need more than one health potion. You need lots of them if you don’t have a healer, and unfortunately, neither of us are very strong if we get in danger. We wouldn’t want you to be hurt,” Iron said. He was choosing his words carefully, as if afraid of saying something wrong.

“Oh,” I replied. “Well, okay. I guess. Uhm. But I don’t really want to hurt anyone.”

‘Except Red Thorn,’ I amended in the privacy of my mind.

“That’s a good attitude to have. When we get back to the city, would you like to learn one of our crafts? I already mentioned that Iron was a Carpenter, but I am a Blacksmith and a cook! We could teach you any of those if they sound interesting.”

A cook? Like a person who made food? Food like Steak-and-Broccoli!?

“I wanna be a cook!” I exclaimed before my thoughts could catch up to me. “Wait. You made the Steak-and-Broccoli?”

She grinned. “Sort of. I bought raw ingredients from the market and then cooked them. I’ll tell you all about it when we get to Variak!”

Iron looked at her pointedly. “Honey…? I mean…”

He sighed before finishing the thought and rolling his shoulders in a shrug. “Sure, if you’re interested in making benches and bedframes and the like, I’d be glad to show you how, or at least get you started.”

“That sounds… well. Uhm. Is… it okay if I just try cooking first?” I asked.

Bedframes sounded great and all. But making my own food!? Mmmmphh!

“You can learn as much as we can teach if you like, Gell. For now, though, we need to go back to the city and get you some equipment. You never did tell us your level?” she asked kindly.

“Uhm. I… how do I find out my level?” I asked. I thought I vaguely recalled something horrible. A trumpet fanfare. A voice telling me I had gained a level over and over again. The world breaking. The world breaking. The world brea–!

I shook myself and shuddered involuntarily, feeling a strange sensation along my skin. Goosebumps, I realized quickly. A… natural fear response for adventurers. Yes. Whatever had happened that day, I was afraid of it. I did not want to experience that again.

“Th… Thirteen,” I said numbly, recalling the broken voice’s words. “I’m level thirteen.”

“Gell? Is… everything okay?” Amy asked concern written across her features as she knelt next to me and placed a hand on my shoulder. This time, I welcomed the touch.

“Y-yes. Sorry. Just. Remembering something bad. The last time I leveled up. It was… bad. I didn’t like it. I’m sorry,” I said, unwilling to explain further.

“Thirteen, though. That’s… impressive. Though it's not all we need. Could you bring up your status screen?” Iron asked.

“Status screen?” I replied, confused.

“Heya Adventurer!”

I screamed and jumped back as another box appeared. “Stop doing that!”

“Hehe,” Tutorial giggled. I blinked but was given no time to process the strange sound before she continued with her usual cycle.

“I see you’ve opened your status screen! Would you like to learn about your stats and how to use them?”

Suddenly, I felt bad for Bugbear and Iron as my eye twitched.

“Tutorial, you did that on purpose!” I exclaimed.

“...”

“I see you’ve opened your status screen! Would you like to learn–!”

“Yes already,” I sighed, pressing the button. “Silly bitch…”

Amy gasped. “Gell! Where did you learn that word!?”

I turned to her, confused at the outburst. “What? Bitch?”

“Gell! That is a terrible word. You shouldn’t say that!” Amy exclaimed, but Iron was laughing behind her and trying to hide it.

“Wh-what? But… invaders said it all the time!” I replied. I didn’t understand what had gotten her so mad. What was wrong with the word? It was one of the few words that my inexplicable knowledge hadn’t added anything to, and was therefore special to me.

“It is… a curse word, Gell. It’s not polite to say such things. Even in jest,” Amy said, the anger bleeding away from her voice. “Besides, those were invaders who said those things, right? And didn’t you say you wanted to be an adventurer? Not an invader?”

“I… guess so,” I said, pouting.

“Good. It’s impolite. Vulgar. I can’t tell you what to do. I’m not your mother, but I’d hope you’d want to strive not to sound like the invaders you hate so much. Alright?”

I was about to get angry, but I supposed she was right. I didn’t particularly want to sound like an invader, and almost all of them used the yell words that didn’t have any meaning but were fun to say.

“Well. Okay. I won’t say those words anymore on one condition!” I stated.

Amy frowned as if disappointed. “Alright... I’m listening.”

“I won’t say them if you tell me what they mean and why they’re bad,” I said.

Iron lost it. He leaned heavily against a tree, no longer able to hold back his laughter.

As Amy turned to berate him, I turned to the screen I’d automatically pushed aside after Tutorial had prompted me. She picked up right where she’d left off as if there hadn’t been a disruption in the conversation at all.

“Great! So this is your status screen, which you can open by saying “Status Screen” or at any time from the options menu! It basically tells you important facts about yourself, like your level, hit points, mana, and stamina! There are more general things about you, like gender and race. It’ll also hold your class when you choose one! Also, these things here are called stats.”

Each thing she referred to highlighted as she spoke about it. I took note of my race and was unhappy to see myself labeled as a “Human.” Still, at least I had a category called Subrace which had my true being. Jelly, and Fae, respectively.

Each one represents an aspect of you! There’s Strength, Dexterity, Vitality, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma, and Luck! You gain these when you accomplish feats of the stat in question naturally but also gain a fixed amount of them whenever you level up which you can distribute however you like! It looks like you have “20” unspent stat points! So use those points and watch yourself get stronger, faster, more durable, or even more arcane! Good luck, adventurer!”

“Okay…?” So I had unspent stat points. I could put them where I wanted.

I didn’t need Miss Tutorial to explain the meanings, but when I touched ‘Strength” she started speaking and I realized she would anyway. It was pretty simple though.

More strength meant I could hit things harder. More dexterity meant I could move quicker. Vitality, healthier; Intelligence, more mana and bigger spells like Fire Tosser threw around; wisdom, more mana regeneration. Charisma would allow me to... look better? I was iffy on that one and would probably need to listen to her explanation at some point. Luck would somehow affect everything.

My own stats were… interesting.

Stats:

Strength: 5

Dexterity: 30

Vitality: 15

Wisdom: 15

Intelligence: 35

Charisma: 15

Luck: 10

Special Abilities:

Shocker - (Intelligence-based physical attack)

Steal - (Take the items from a monster or player. Epic class. Can steal Soul Bound Items)

Namer - (No Data Found)

Fae Touch - (No Data Found)

My shocker was easy enough to recognize. I’d used it more times than I could count. Namer though…? I didn’t recognize that. I didn’t understand the description either. I pressed it and Tutorial said nothing. Fae Touch went the same — nothing.

Huh. Strange.

“Gell! Fine. For now, just don’t say them, and bring them up to me whenever there’s time. For now, this idiot and I are going to go get us some equipment. We shouldn’t be gone long. About an hour, okay?”

Assuming they’d been gone for four hours before, I now had a much better frame of reference for what an hour was, so I beamed at her. “Okay! I’ll wait for you!”

She nodded and then walked back over to Iron who was still trying not to laugh despite Amy’s scary glares.

Amy suddenly leaped a few inches into the air and hovered there! I jumped in excitement! Adventurers could fly!?

She stayed there for a short time as beautiful twinkling lights began to surround her. She looked at me as the lights swelled and spun. “Alright, Gell. We’ll be back soon, okay?”

“Alright!” I exclaimed as I waved. Iron did the same thing, also hovering in midair with similar lights. Then a strange noise I’d never heard before filled the clearing and Amy winked out of existence.

Iron waved and followed shortly after.

I grinned and was about to sit down to wait when I suddenly heard an approaching sound. Laughter in the distance and the sound of voices.

I ran for cover, hiding behind a tree a few paces outside of the clearing. Amy and Iron had been nice, but that didn’t mean anyone else would be.

“Right right, Boldy, I’m sure. Fuck, we’ve been traveling for like two hours. Where is this place?” said a boisterous male voice as a group of invaders entered the clearing.

I saw them and my blood immediately ran cold with fury. There were five of them. I only knew one though. The smallest.

Half Bold.

Chapter Twenty Six

A Player’s Wrath

“Look, I get that the little mob beat your stones in, Boldy, but there’s a reason for that. It's probably time to face facts. Beastmasters suck. You can be a DPS or a tank, but you’re shit at both. It’s pretty well documented. You have to get stupid lucky with that class and find like, an epic rare mob, and then actually catch it, to even be worth dragging on a raid. Like a fairy, or a drake. You should just reroll a new character and start over.”

“Fuck you,” Half Bold replied succinctly. “I’ll reroll your face!”

The man laughed as if that had been funny.

What the hell was he doing back here? I glared at the boyish character, my freckles glowing a deep red. This wouldn’t stand.

“Just saying, man. Epic level mob or bust,” he said with a shrug.

“And what exactly did you think I gathered you all here for?” he asked. “I had an epic level mob. It was fucking stolen.”

“Yeah we know, we know, a talking two-shot electric Jelly...Fae,” he said with a tone I hadn’t heard often, and held up the first two fingers on each of his hands, bending them in a way that seemed mocking.

Good. Half Bold should be mocked.

“We hit the safe zone and the dungeon is a few miles that way,” Half Bold said while pointing directly at the path I’d run from last night. Dungeon Home.

‘That jellybastard!’ I thought, wishing I could hit him with my shocker without showing myself. I suddenly desperately missed my invisibility.

Something told me that was another one of those words I wasn’t supposed to say, even though I sort of knew what it meant. An illegitimate child didn’t really sound like an insult though. It just sounded sad.

It seemed to fit now, though. Maybe I should change his name to Half Bastard? No… Amy might get mad at me again. A solution sprang to mind as I stared at him. Half Bast. Yeah. That sounded good.

I looked at him and was a little surprised to see the name hadn’t changed. Could I only rename something once?

“Don’t forget to set your home points,” Half Bold said. “The mob is fast, and its shocker paralyzes you and can drain damn near half your health in one hit. From what I’ve read, not much else in the dungeon is worth note, and it doesn’t look like anyone other than me ever found the Jellyfae so it might be a rare spawn. Got that?”

“Hey! This is Thorn’s home point! Huh. Guess she found the dungeon first,” one of the men said, seeming to actively ignore Half Bold as he pressed buttons on screens I couldn’t see.

I blinked. Thorn’s home point? Did they mean Red Thorn?

I shook myself. Red Thorn was a problem for the future but Half Bold was here, right now. He had to go. I could worry about Red Thorn later. Unfortunately, they continued talking about her.

“Have you seen her vids? She’s fuckin hot,” said a bald orc wearing a light vest that exposed most of his arms and chest. I needed to be wary of that one. The less armor invaders wore, the more dangerous they usually were.

“It’s a video game avatar. Everyone’s hot,” Half Bold said distractedly, staring off towards Dungeon Home.

‘Video game avatar?’ I thought, confused.

“Yea but not everyone’s got style. The Thorn is rising up the ranks. Some people think she’s just naturally talented as fuck in the real world and is actually overcompensating for a pretty normal Dexterity stat. Some of the shit she does is fucking unbelievable man,” Bald Fist said, waving his arms around emphatically. “Did you see her solo that Mountain Ogre in the Siege of Telruk by running up its fucking tusk?”

I frowned. That… sounded like something Red Thorn would do.

“Red Thorn is a hack. She probably cheats, just like The Wanderer did with his Intelligence and that fucked up class he found,” said a caster type who was dressed all in blue. He was a bit shorter than Bald Fist, but he was human. I named him for his most prominent feature; the ridiculous-looking sand-colored pointy hat he wore.

It seemed to work just fine. Perhaps I could only name something once. Strange.

Half Bold, Pointy Hat, and Bald Fist were the only ones who had spoken so far. The other two remained quiet.

One, the only girl as far as I could tell, held a bow that looked beautiful. It was an ornate thing made of white wood with ornate shining silver inlays. At least, I thought it was wood. The closer I looked, the more I thought maybe it was made of bone, like Skeleton was made from. I couldn’t tell which. It was shaped into something breathtaking to behold though. Paradoxically, she was one of the plainest adventurers I’d ever seen. Plain leather trousers and a brown robe were all the clothes human girl wore. I named her Dull Beauty.

She didn’t expose much skin but something about her told me she was by far the most dangerous of this group.

Why did they always seem to come in groups of five? The thought hit me while I was looking at the last member. A healer, definitely. Boring white robes like almost every other healer. He was also a Halfling, which was at least a little unusual, but there was nothing special about him. Brown hair with a blue streak down the middle that I could swear I’d seen before, along with a tattoo on his face that I’d also seen before, though neither feature had been on a halfling.

Strange…

They finished their screen touching and continued on, jabbering back and forth at each other as they did. Fucking invaders, acting as if all their slaughter was barely even important. Why couldn’t they be more like Amy or Iron? What was so appealing about going into my home and killing the people there?

I moved to follow them as silently as I could from the trees but hesitated as crippling fear overtook me.

Half Bold probably wouldn’t recognize me like this. But what if he did? What if they killed me and found out how… useful my body was? All of that, stacked on top of the fact that I probably couldn’t do anything to help Bugbear and the others anyway. If I entered now, they would attack me, too.

I should just stay here where it was safe.

I should… But I couldn’t.

What if Half Bold decided to take Bugbear? I could never forgive myself if I went back one day to find a way to free him and found him gone, stolen by that fucked up Halfling.

No. They weren’t going near that cave. I would make sure of it.

How to do that though? I no longer had the advantages I had as a true Jellyfae. Instead, I was huge, but not huge enough, fast, but not fast enough, and… bluish. I still had my shocker, but that was all. I didn’t even have the bugbears or Ghoul as backup!

None of that mattered though. I was going to protect Dungeon Home. Even… if it wasn’t my home anymore.

I tore off into the trees, ignoring the warning that flashed in my peripheral vision about leaving the safe zone.

It was time to kill some invaders.

Chapter Twenty Seven

A Horrible Plan

I raced through the woods and caught up with them quickly. I had run madly the previous night and hardly remembered just how far away Dungeon Home actually was from Shady Wood Copse.

It was far enough for me to catch up and get ahead of them, anyway. They weren’t walking very fast, and I found that if I tried hard, I could easily run through the trees and underbrush without making much noise. Probably a result of my high dexterity stat, now that I had seen it. I was attributing the speed at which I was adapting to this body to that too, and considered putting those “Unspent Stat Points” I had into dexterity. Something about doing that bothered me though and I decided against it, instead just leaving them alone.

The five invaders were still bickering but every minute brought them closer and closer to Dungeon Home. Closer to killing Bugbear again. It was frustrating how lighthearted they all sounded when I had to hurriedly think of anything I could use to hurt them. This would be so much easier in my… old… body.

My… body.

The inklings of a plan began to form as I recalled what Iron and Amy had told me about myself. I was an NPC. NPCs were quest givers. Quests rewarded experience when completed, and Adventurers and Invaders alike both loved experience. That’s what gave them the level ups with the loud trumpets that they craved so much.

They had also implied that quests could give new bodies, like my own… character? Was that what they had called it?

I darted ahead out of sight of the group of players, hoping that they were… dumb enough to believe this stupid, horrible lie that was definitely going to get me killed.

The sun was shining down on the woods, casting rays of light through the thin canopy above. The late afternoon was beautiful. A gorgeous thirtieth cycle. Crickets chirped in the distance, and I idly wondered what a cricket was as I ran. My mind filled with inane thoughts… anything to distract me from the idiocy of this plan.

Once I was sufficiently far ahead of them, and pretty sure I hadn’t been noticed by any of them, I stopped and began to prepare as best I could. What that amounted to was basically looking through my bag, realizing there was nothing of value to help me there, and wishing I had so much as a sword.

I took on a bearing of regal poise. Elegance. Something that would look majestic, shining in the afternoon sun, and began to walk slowly through the woods in a direct path towards the slow-moving party of Invaders.

They approached all too soon, spotting me quickly as I walked at a slow steady pace towards them.

‘Oh god they’re going to kill me, they’re going to kill me, they’re going to kill me!’ I thought frantically.

One of them whistled and accompanied the sound with a leer that made me uncomfortable.

“Well, who is this! Boldy, you didn’t tell us anything about a hidden race living out here!” Bald Fist cried.

“I… didn’t know there was one!” Half Bold replied, staring at me just as stunned as the others.

“She’s beautiful!” said the healer. I preened inwardly but let none of that show on my face, waiting for them to approach me, rather than the other way around.

“Well! What’s your name?” the healer asked, running up to approach me, heedless of the danger I might present. The only one who didn’t seem enthralled by my appearance was the archer girl. Well. Four out of five wasn’t bad.

My first interaction with Amy and Iron had involved them admiring me, not attacking me. As far as I could tell, invaders admired other invaders if they looked strange enough and I didn’t look like any other invader I’d seen.

“I… am a Faeling,” I said, careful to leave out the Jelly part. Half Bold might recognize it. Also, shit shit, a name!? “My name… is… Amy. And who are you, adventurers?”

I suspected they would prefer to be called adventurers to their faces.

“Something about this seems fishy,” Half Bold said warily as the others approached in a group.

I cursed inwardly.

“I’m Bradlicus015!” Bald Fist said before slapping Half Bold on the back, jostling him. “We’re here to help Boldy here reclaim a stolen horn and maybe capture an epic mob! What about you? What brings you here?”

“I… have a quest!” I squeaked. “Those who complete this quest may be rewarded with the ability to… switch races, and become a Faeling as I am!”

‘Buy it, buy it, buy it, oh please buy it!’ I thought furiously.

“I’ve been here loads of times, and I’ve never seen you before. Where did you come from?” Half Bold asked, staring at me in suspicion.

I winced, scrambling to come up with a lie. “I… apologize, adventurer. My kind may only appear during the thirtieth cycle. I wish to spread word of my kind to the greater world! But as full Faekin may only materialize in this world during the thirtieth cycle, word of us remains hidden. Only brave adventurers like you, once belonging to other races, could remain permanently in this world! Would you like to become as I am?”

There! That sounded sufficiently questy, right?

“Holy shit, is this for real!?”

“That… seems way too easy.”

“I’ve heard of hidden classes but the only hidden race out there that I’ve heard of is Werewolf!”

“You think we might’ve been the first to discover this!?”

“Oh my god, I love this game.”

Apparently, they believed me. Most of them. Dull Beauty hadn’t said a word.

Annoyingly, despite all the cacophony of words that erupted, mostly to each other as if I wasn’t even here, none of them spoke to me in affirmation. I decided that an En Pee See would follow their instinct and simply remain quiet, waiting for an adventurer to accept their offer, and did so.

“Fuck it, I’m doing it,” the healer said, actually jumping up and down with excitement.

“Yeah, me too!” Pointy Hat said right on top. “What do we have to do?”

“Wonderful, adventurers! But it is not so easy as a simple touch of the hand. Prove yourselves worthy of the trickery of the fae,” I intoned gravely.

Traditional Fae were supposed to be tricksome. My knowledge told me so.

“Only two shall receive my gift. And only after the rest lie dead. Choose wisely.”

They all blinked. Then looked between each other.

Suddenly an older voice, but one that sounded a lot like Miss Tutorial, echoed through the woods: “Bald Fist has dissolved his party.”

“Son of a… I’m a healer! Someone party with me! Aghhh!” the healer screamed as he ducked, not quite managing to dodge a sudden punch from Bald Fist and tumbling to the ground.

“Sorry, Healz! I ain’t missing out on unlocking a race change!”

“She’s lying! It isn’t a new race, she’s the friggin Jellyf– waggghh!” Half Bold screeched as he was immolated by a fireball that Pointy Hat seemed to have been holding at the ready. He screamed in pain and I almost let a grin slip onto my face.

“You and me, Bradlicus?” the mage asked with a grin, holding up a huge staff that seemed to appear from nowhere, a gem at the end glowing with a menacing light.

“Hell yes!”

“Look at your freaking names!” Half Bold shouted. “It’s just like I told–!”

He cut off dodging another fireball from the mage before holding up his middle finger strangely. The fireball slammed into a tree and charred it, but didn’t catch, unfortunately. If the trees lit on fire I could hide safely within them.

“Fools,” said the archer as she backed away. Meanwhile, Half Bold had already scrambled for the safety of the trees, his body burnt but not at all dead.

“Get Bellcandy! I’ll take Zephyr-Bird down!” Pointy Hat shouted with glee as he began casting towards the archer.

Had her name been Zephyr Bird? I honestly felt a bit sad about renaming her. That name sounded cool, but Dull Beauty fit her better.

Bald Fist turned on the healer, who I now assumed was named Bellcandy, and lifted a menacing foot to stomp on the downed healer. He jumped back suddenly, barely dodging an arrow that would’ve skewered him.

“I would take your aid against these idiots,” Dull Beauty called out to the healer before rolling out of the way of a bolt of fire with a grace that reminded me of Red Thorn.

All in all, this could not have gone better.

As they began to fight in earnest, lines being drawn in the sand between the four opponents, I quietly began to slide behind the nearest tree.

“And where do you think you’re going, Gell the Jellyfae?” demanded a singed yet grinning Halfling Beastmaster as he pitched one of those spring-loaded nets in one hand casually and held a horn in the other.

Chapter Twenty Eight

Player Killer

My placid smile faded into a frown. My freckles glowed the sickly yellow of fear.

“Clever. Looking like a new race? Illusion magic? Would make sense for a class calling itself a Fae. I guess you finally made it out of the dungeon, too? Congratulations are in order!” he exclaimed.

He clapped his horn into the net a few times, patronizing me. I growled.

“Was the offer real? Can you really make a person into that race, or was that just the type of trick an epic mob like you can pull off? I might consider letting you go if you help me unlock the class… and if you give me my fucking horn back.

“You’ll never get him back, Half Bold,” I taunted. “Torchlight is free. And so am I.”

“F-free!?” he scoffed. “Free she says! It’s like a pet snake, saying it’s free when it’s never even managed to get out of its cage! Hah! You don’t even know, do you? That this whole world is a game?”

I flinched. He… wasn’t the first to refer to this world, my world, as a game. Not even close. But what did that matter!? So invaders found life to be a game! Who knew what invaders got into their heads?

“Shut up! I don’t care about that!” I told him, enraged. Behind me, a fight was unfolding as Pointy Hat and Bald Fist squared off with Bellcandy and Dull Beauty.

“Well, you will. You might’ve disguised yourself as a human but you’re still a mob. Which means I can still tame you. Then you’ll tell me where my horn is, my little Jellyfae,” he breathed, his eyes brimming with gluttonous greed. “You’re my ticket to fame in this game, and fortune in the real world.”

“That didn’t go so well for you last time,” I said, holding up a hand that seemed to buzz with electric potential.

“I’ve grown since then. I’ve also learned not to underestimate mobs that can think,” he said before putting the horn to his lips.

I darted forward, hoping to tag him with a shocker before he could call forth whatever poor creature he’d imprisoned in that horn, but I moved too slow. The sound radiated throughout the woods, and suddenly the fight behind me slowed.

The ground itself suddenly split open, a gaping maw into a dark abyss swirling just a few feet away from me. I noticed it just before I might’ve stepped straight into the abyss, and leaped over it, barely avoiding a small, clawed hand that reached out of the darkness for my legs.

Ignoring the gaping pit, I rolled, stumbling a little. I scraped my knees on the ground but I didn’t stop. I continued towards Half Bold, but he had already turned and begun running away as soon as I got my bearings. Half Bold indeed.

I grimaced as searing pain sliced through my back, and a notification in the corner of my vision read -48 hp! That had never happened before. I turned and glared at the small imp clutching my back.

Dammit! If I were my old size this thing never would’ve gotten ahold of me! Then again, if I were my old size this thing would look huge. As it was, the creature was a spindly little demon, all bone with a thin layer of pale skin to cover it. Its claws were sharp as knives digging into my back. Its nameplate told me it was named Dacktar.

The idiot thing was touching me though. I reached back, craning my hand around to get a finger on it, and released my shocker. The creature squawked just like everything else I shocked and tumbled off my back, but I grimaced as another horn blew from where Half Bold had run.

I kicked the little creature and it flew across the woods before slamming into a tree. Able to see it this time, I spotted a notification near the creature reading -37 hp. It wasn’t dead yet but it was still dazed, so I left it, following Half Bold as fast as I could.

“The fuck, dammit the Fae’s gone!” I heard Bald Fist shout. “Hey, the Fae–! Owww! Time out! The freaking– Dammit stop shooting me!”

“You’re the one who disbanded and attacked us!” I heard the healer shout. “Fuck you! ‘Dia’!”

“Like you wouldn’t have done the same thing for a chance to – Ugghh stupid DOTs!”

I didn’t have the time to wonder what ‘Dia’ or ‘dots’ were before rounding a large boulder that Half Bold had fled behind. I ducked, but not fast enough to dodge the winged form of Avwren’s claws slicing for my face.

I screamed as a notification informed me that I’d lost twenty-five more hit points. Honestly, though, it barely hurt at all. The shock of the attack was more painful than the actual strike. Was… was being an invader less painful somehow?

Unimportant.

As soon as I managed to throw the bat off me I saw a net flying right for me. I swatted the net aside and grimaced as the bat swooped in for another strike.

I ignored it, outpacing it as I ran towards Half Bold.

He pulled out a short axe, still holding another net in his left hand.

“Bring it on!” he shouted. “I can take you!”

I snarled, wary of the glint of that blade, but I didn’t slow. Even if I died, it was still worth it to keep Half Bold from going anywhere near Dungeon Home ever again. It would hurt, but I could handle pain. I’d long since learned that.

“Take this!” I shouted, darting to the left around his first axe strike and reaching out to shock him. He reversed course immediately, barely even slowing as he threw the net in his other hand.

I jumped but was caught in the wiry material. It tangled into my hands and I fell over, pulled by the heavy lead weights.

“What are you doing, Half Bold?” came a shout from behind me, but I ignored it. “Why are you attacking the NPC!?”

I began to panic, terror filling me as I realized I couldn’t get free. I pulled, rubbing my skin against the coarse rope, and grabbed at the weights. Somehow though they were now as heavy as Momma Bossbear!

“Let me go! Let me go! I won’t be trapped again!” I screamed. I shocked the net but it did nothing, electricity seemingly ineffective against the fibers.

I tore at the ropes as the Beastmaster continued chanting, his voice rising to a crescendo before gesturing with mad glee at me, and holding out a horn. A new prison.

But…

...Nothing happened.

“What the fuck!?” he exclaimed, clicking the air before a window appeared before him like the ones that did for me. Invader Boxes.

The letters were reversed so it was hard to read, but I remembered reading Red Thorn’s status screen in the same way, and somehow my mind was able to parse the opposite lettering to read: “Invalid Target. Players cannot be captured.”

I blinked. So did Half Bold.

“That’s fucking bullshit! You’re not a player!”

“What the hell is going on here?” asked the annoyed healer, now looking much worse for wear as he and the disheveled Archer both circled the stone and approached me.

Half Bold took one look at the archer and the healer, apparently the victors of the fight, and his entire demeanor changed in an instant as he pointed an accusing finger at me.

“She’s a fucking player!” Half Bold exclaimed. “She was trying to trick us somehow!”

“Of course, she’s a player. How none of you noticed that I have no idea. Would you get the damn net off her though? It’s not like you can capture NPCs either,” Dull Beauty said.

“I… but she… you’re…” he looked at me, absolutely lost for a moment before his eyes hardened. “Fine. You’re a player.”

He did that little thing I’d seen adventurers do where they held up the first two fingers of both hands and curled them down while speaking sarcastically.

“I know you’re her, though. I don’t know how the hell you did it, but I know you’re the mob from the dungeon,” he said coldly.

Well, he knew as little as I did then. I wondered though: didn’t adventurers become adventurers by breaking their instinct? Killing their kin… like I had? That’s what I’d always assumed until now.

I gulped guiltily, thinking about what I had done to get this adventurer body, but was forced out of my musings by the archer’s hand as she grabbed me by my Bugbear Tunic and hauled me up, out of the now weightless net, with little effort.

“Well. Are you going to answer? Why did you trick us into attacking each other? And since you clearly did find a way to unlock a new character race, how did you actually find it?” she hissed coldly.

I stared at the other girl as she pulled her menacing eyes towards my own. She looked so angry. Cuts marred her plain clothes and her beautiful bow rested on her back. She was hurt, but she was also pissed.

“Uh... uhm...” I wasn’t going to tell her that killing Momma Bossbear was how I… unlocked my character race. So, I did what came most naturally to me.

I shocked her.

+100 Infamy

+10 PK

Chapter Twenty Nine

Scramble

“Hiya there, Adventurer! You appear to have killed another advent–!”

“Not now, Miss Tutorial!” I exclaimed, and Tutorial’s voice and dialogue box disappeared.

The archer crumpled to the ground, a headstone and an angel appearing out of nowhere. I grinned though as I snatched her beautiful bow just before the body disappeared, but frowned when the bow also disappeared after I touched it.

A notification appeared in the corner of my vision with a “2” beside it. The notification box looked a lot like Tutorial’s boxes, only in miniature, so I assumed she was just letting me know she had something to tell me without interrupting me when I might die at any moment.

That was nice of her!

“Haha! I knew it was you!” Half Bold exclaimed. “No one else has that shock of yours.”

“You did, Half Bold,” I said, grinning with my own maliciousness as I stood free of the net and free of the archer. “I am Gell, the Jellyfae. And I won’t be imprisoned ever again. By you, or anyone.”

As if unable to hold in his confusion and panic any longer the healer suddenly shouted, “The fuck was that atta–!”

I reared back with my hand before he could gather his wits and smashed the flat end into the healer’s face. I proceeded to scream as my fingers bent back in agony. Dammit, how did they hit with these things!? Trying to hit him hurt me more than the imp’s attack had!

B311c@ndy, stunned by a slap! Duration 2 seconds!

“Agghhh!” I roared, and curled my fingers around each other, forming a makeshift mace with the end of my hand. A fist. Right. That was how these things worked!

I reared back and punched the healer in his stunned face, then yowled as once again something went wrong with my punch. I screamed as tears came to my eyes and my thumb burned, practically dislocated from its place nestled within my other four fingers.

-4 hp!

‘Okay! Thumb goes on the outside!’

“Stay away from Dungeon Home!” I screamed, partially as a bellow of rage against the pain in my hand and partially to be as frightening as I could. I reached down, letting loose another shocker as the recharge reset, but missed as the healer rolled away before I could touch him.

“Boldy! Party up, dammit!” the healer said once he had managed to get a safe distance away.

“Fine,” Half Bold said, clicking away at screens and watching me from his perch a little way up the slope on some fallen logs. He picked up a net and twirled it idly in his hands. “Keep her distracted. I got this.”

‘A healer? Keep me distracted? Please, do you know how many healers I’ve killed?’ I thought, incredulous.

I was about to pounce for him but yelped as Avwren fluttered in front of my eyes, blocking my view.

Dammit! He wasn’t talking to the healer; he was talking to his captives!

I grabbed for the bat and was almost as shocked as Avwren was when I caught it around the throat. I panicked again and hurled it into a nearby tree. It screeched and I winced in sympathy, feeling immediately guilty. I swore not to hurt them, but here I was doing it again!

I had to be better.

Half Bold was gone, hidden behind a tree or shrub or something, while the Healer was almost ten paces away already. Long practice had taught me to eliminate the healer first, and unfortunately, the healer was already beginning to cast. What though? Half Bold had only been hit by the fireball earlier, but it didn’t seem to be slowing him down.

What could the healer be casting–!?

‘Oh jellycrap,’ I thought.

I darted for the healer as I realized exactly what he was doing. He was reviving the archer! It had been so long since I’d let a healer live long enough to try reviving one of his teammates I’d almost forgotten they could do that! I didn’t know how effective she might be without her bow, but I didn’t want to find out!

I closed in on Bellcandy, who was frantically chanting in that ‘other’ language while the usual patterns of light formed beneath him.

I reached out, preparing to shock him, but was intercepted by the half-dead imp. I shocked it and it died, opening a smaller hole into an abyss like it had come from and falling into it, but the healer finished his spell before I could get to him.

“Son of a bitch, how many times can you use that thing!? It’s amazing!” The healer laughed. Laughed. Like… like this was all fun?

“As many as I need!” I screamed as I finally caught him. The recharge wasn’t quite done yet though so I punched him in the face and sent him sprawling. This time it finally didn’t hurt all that bad!

The recharge finished and I shocked his crumpled body, watching the gravestone and angel appear anticlimactically alongside the PK and Infamy notifications.

“One to go,” I said before turning and finding a knife poised against my throat.

“It was fun before. Now, I’m pissed. Give me back my bow,” said the archer menacingly. This time she was careful not to touch me.

‘Dammit!’ I breathed. ‘How the heck did she get behind me so fast!?’

“I… I don’t know where it is! It disappeared when I touched it!” I exclaimed. I was willing to die, but if I could talk my way out of this or trick her into letting me touch her again… she couldn’t possibly be in good health, having just returned. The healers usually had to cast multiple spells to get the freshly revived back in fighting shape.

I just needed to touch her again…

“It’s in your inventory, fool. Open it up and get it out,” she exclaimed, stepping around me so she could look me in the eyes again, this time from safely at the end of the knife.

Gods how I hated knives.

“I-Inventory…?” I asked. Hadn’t Miss Tutorial been trying to tell me about–?

I blinked as a screen appeared with hundreds of empty boxes and a few filled ones. I’d seen this briefly before. The inventory screen. I’d been mad at Miss Tutorial for scaring me and banished her explanation, but it seemed pretty self-explanatory to me. I slowly reached for and touched the small box that had an image of the beautiful bow and it appeared in my hand as if by magic.

I gasped in awe, almost forgetting the knife to my throat.

“Good. Now. Time for you to learn a lesson. Stealing is blugghh–!” She cut off mid-sentence as an arrow bloomed from her throat with a fresh spray of blood.

I turned and saw Iron standing there, holding a bow, looking absolutely livid.

“Gell! Gell, oh my god Sweetie! Are you okay!” Amy’s voice echoed as if from another world. I turned to see her at the bottom of the hill, now decked out in white healer’s robes and holding a staff. Iron, by contrast, held a very boring bow compared to the one in my hand, but it had been good enough to get the job done. He had also changed clothing and now wore a set of leather armor.

He looked like an invader. His eyes looked menacing and fierce… but they softened as he glanced towards me. They became kind again.

“Gell? What happened?” he asked.

Amy reached me as Dull Beauty’s body disappeared again and wrapped her arms around me in another one of those wonderful hug things.

“I.. they were… I…” I didn’t know what to say.

They’d saved me. I’d… I’d never been saved before. My eyes were wet again.

“I… I’ve… I missed you,” were the words I finally found.

Chapter Thirty

A Look Back

Half Bold was gone. We were likely just lucky he hadn’t decided to continue attacking, distracted as we’d been when Amy hugged me.

He’d fled, taking his minions with him, as soon as the archer died again. He probably didn’t like his odds against me and my new allies, deciding to quit while he was ahead.

The hug ended and the comfort ended with it. I took one look at Amy’s incensed face and winced.

“What in the good lord's name have you gotten yourself into!? We are gone for an hour, an hour, and come back to find you out of the safe zone, being attacked by… no. Attacking raiders? A full team of them!”

I bowed my head shamefully as the tirade continued. Amy was mad at me but I couldn’t quite understand why.

“What… Gell, what possessed you to leave the safe zone and attack those players!? I know for a fact they didn’t attack you. Didn’t you say you didn’t want to be like the invaders?”

“No, I don’t!” I cried, incensed that she would accuse me of that.

“Then why attack them! Isn’t that just like an invader?”

“No! It was different!” I exclaimed, trying to get a word in. “It was–!”

“Sweetie, can’t you see how attacking other invaders is no different than–!”

“No! It was different!” I yelled, finally getting fed up with her shouting. “They were attacking my home!”

That finally seemed to stop Amy from shouting at me.

“Your… home?” she asked.

“My only friend lives there! I’ve… met one of those invaders before. Half Bold. He’s a Beastmaster. He captures us. Takes us. Makes the instinct tell us to do what he says. I couldn’t let him take Bugbear! He’s the only one who ever cared about me. So I had to stop them. Had to stop anyone from going to Dungeon Home.”

“Sweetie…”

“If… if you have a problem with that, then maybe you should j-just go your own way. I’ll stay here and protect my friends without your help. Okay?”

‘Gods I don’t want them to go…’ I thought miserably.

“Sweetie… I’m sorry. I jumped to conclusions,” Amy said thoughtfully. “I didn’t know you were…. Uhm. Defending your home.”

Amy had a pensive look on her face. Contrite. Guilty even. I’d seen the expression so rarely I barely recognized it. Invaders didn’t have much use for guilt. Amy did though.

“That’s okay,” I said as my mood rebounded. “Uhm. Thank you, as well. I’ve never been… saved before. I don’t like dying. It’s not very comfortable, huh?”

The two of them blanched. “It… certainly isn’t.”

I was about to ask them about what they had done in the city when a notification popped up in my peripheral vision.

New message arrived! B311C@ndy

New Friend Request! B311C@ndy

New message arrived! Amy Thyst

New message arrived! Iron Crock

New message arrived! Amy Thyst

New message arrived! Amy Thyst

Bellcandy? The healer? Ugh, why was his name so… janky like Amy and Iron’s had been? Were all adventurers named like that?

More importantly, why would he want to trade name pieces with me!? Hadn’t I just killed him? I wasn’t giving a piece of my name to someone who probably wanted revenge!

Wait, Amy and Iron had sent me messages too? When had they done that!?

I opened the newest message, and this time was prepared for the sudden dialogue box and the familiar voice that accompanied it.

“Hiya, Adventurer! Seems like you’ve received a message! Congratulations! You’re making your first foray into the social world of Tread the Sky! Would you like to learn more about the messaging system?”

“Hello, Miss Tutorial!” I said brightly. “You guys! Miss Tutorial is here! She’s always teaching me things! Do you want me to tell you what she’s saying!?”

“Uhm. That’s alright. You go on ahead. We’ve already heard what... Miss Tutorial has to say before, Sweetie,” Amy said. She fidgeted though as if something were making her uneasy.

I shrugged and turned back to Miss Tutorial, wondering if she spoke to everyone like she was doing for me.

I was about to click yes, but Iron stepped closer to Amy and began to speak to her in a low voice that was hard to hear.

“She’s talking to the tutorial again, Hon,” I heard him say.

“And there’s nothing wrong with that,” Amy replied, calmly.

He lowered his voice conspiratorially, whispering into Amy’s ear. “Don’t you think we should… I don’t know? Tell her? That it’s… not real?”

I could still hear him, though I don’t think he intended me to. What did he mean Tutorial wasn’t real? She was right there! I mean, her body was a couple of grey boxes that wrote the words she spoke, but that wasn’t a bad thing! Still better than an invader.

“Darling, I don’t think she would listen to something like that right now. This… this is her world. The people in it are as real to her as we are,” Amy responded.

I frowned at that, pretending to be engrossed in Tutorial’s words while eavesdropping on the two of them. I had noticed Miss Tutorial was like the invisible status screens. Only the person she was talking to could hear her. Now Amy thought she wasn’t real too?

“Maybe they’re keeping her alive on an IV drip? Maybe she’s a coma victim or something? Technology is getting pretty amazing these days,” Amy continued, her voice also pitched low to be harder to hear. “Either way, confronting her about her reality is the last thing we should do.”

“I guess,” Iron said with a shrug. “Still feel like we should tell her it's a waste of time to talk to the friggin tutorial like it's a real person.”

Okay, that was enough.

“Derek!” I shouted, turning to face the two of them.

Iron blanched and looked back at me with a shocked expression on his face, but he also shut up. Wow! It really worked! Maybe Derek really was a magic word!

“Sw-sweetie?” Amy asked, a worried expression on her features. Iron looked spellbound. Hah! That was so cool.

“I didn’t like hearing him talk about Miss Tutorial that way,” I said before glaring at Iron. “She never did anything to you!”

“Where did you hear that name, Gell?” Amy asked, sounding a little upset.

I looked back at her, confused. “What name? I just used the magic word you used to make Iron stop talking!”

Amy blinked, confused herself. “Did… I?”

Iron’s confused look suddenly morphed into laughter.

“Oh… oh that's great. You’re a treat, Gell!” he said, gesturing animatedly at Amy. “Don’t you remember, Amy? I was mad about the Unicorn?”

“Sw-sweetie. That’s… uhm. Derek is not a magic word,” she said consolingly.

It wasn’t? I found myself pouting.

“It seemed like one,” I said, somberly kicking at a stick on the ground and watching it bounce. It was different from flicking stones in Dungeon Home with my tentacles but still enjoyable.

“It’s… Iron’s real name,” Amy said after a brief bout of self-conflicted lip biting.

I stared at them.

Seriously? More names!?

“You invaders do more weird things with your names!” I huffed indignantly. “If Derek is his real name then why doesn’t he use it!? Gell is my real name! Gell the Jellyfae! You don’t see me calling myself something different!”

I walked a few steps away and sat down on a stone, frustrated. I didn’t want to be an adventurer! I wanted my old body back. Though… I wasn’t sure if Amy or Iron — Derek — would’ve spoken to me if I hadn’t become like this.

Would they have tried to kill me, too? I didn’t want to believe it, but they looked just like invaders now. Derek with flimsy archer’s gear and Amy wearing her healer’s robes.

I sighed and pulled the notification back up with Bellcandy’s messages. I opened the message first.

Gell,

Great freaking fight! Never seen a PK quite so tricky. Awesome use of the racial abilities! Seriously, how did you get it? Anyway, wanna be friends? I’ll PK with you sometime!

B311C@ndy

‘PK... Hadn’t Iron or Amy told me that PK meant Player Killer?’ I thought, reading it over.

I opened up the friend request, deciding that perhaps if I befriended the healer I could convince him not to go back to Dungeon Home.

B311C@ndy has invited you to be friends. Do you accept?

Did I really want a random human to have a piece of my name? I hesitated but decided the potential benefits outweighed the risks. I hit yes, and my friends list appeared, showing Bellcandy listed at the top.

I growled at the name and it rearranged itself to look right, Bellcandy, before deciding it was time to ask Miss Tutorial about some things I was having trouble with. For one, I needed to figure out what PK and infamy meant. Miss Tutorial had tried to tell me but I’d been quite busy keeping the invaders from killing me at the time.

She really needed to learn a sense of timing.

Now, I could finally ask her a few of the questions I’d been having, and she’d already told me how to reach her.

“Options!” I said loudly and was greeted with a dialogue box similar to Miss Tutorial’s, though it had no text and her voice didn’t accompany any of the buttons I saw.

Instead, there were quite a few more than I expected.

Account

Status

Sound

Voice

Livestream

Gameplay

Social

Tutorial

Log Off

I was a little impressed! I thought if I said “Options!” it would only have the Tutorial in it, but there was so much more! I didn’t know what any of these were but I could learn!

Then, suddenly, I found myself angry. Why did I have to become an adventurer to find all of these things? Why did only adventurers get a Miss Tutorial friend to help them out?

I wanted to find out, and tell whoever was responsible for denying all these interesting things to my kin that they were a huge jerk! And quite a few of the words Amy said were bad besides!

I dropped that train of thought as I wondered about the other names listed. Were each of these different boxes with text? Was there a Mr. Social? A Miss Livestream!? I had to find out!

Later though. For now, I had to consult Miss Tutorial.

I pressed her button and a whole list of things appeared. A few of them were greyed out and I realized quickly that those were the things Miss Tutorial had already told me about. So, Combat Zones was greyed out but just above it, “Inventory” was still shining brightly with a little explosion picture that said “NEW” beside it!

I remembered that!

I pressed it and the list disappeared, leaving Miss Tutorial’s box in its place.

Miss Tutorial explained how my big bag worked. I could go through it normally by opening it, or for easy access and convenience I could just say Inventory, and that list with the little pictures of my treasures would appear.  I could then pull them out of my bag instantly as I’d done with Dull Beauty’s Bow.

That was just something you could do!

I listened to the others I had skipped too. PK, as it turned out, did mean Player Killer. Player seemed like the wrong word to me, but I guessed it wasn’t up to me to decide how life worked. PK also meant a sort of currency that could be used to buy things in towns. Usually, things geared towards hurting other invaders, which suited me just fine. It could also be used to buy experience points. When I followed that particular option, Miss Tutorial’s body had to expand nearly to the size of my entire field of vision to explain, and I was pretty sure there was more than one page. So I decided to leave that one for another day. For now, PK was money I could use to buy things to make it easier to PK for more PK.

I giggled. Words were fun.

Fame and Infamy were much easier to understand. Infamy meant people would know you were dangerous and Fame meant people would just know you. Miss Tutorial explained that both of the two played key roles in unlocking quests.

Whatever that meant. They’d mentioned quests three times now and I still had yet to find one. I’d made a fake one, and the invaders seemed to think it was legitimate, except for Dull Beauty. But I had yet to actually get one.

“Thank you, Miss Tutorial!” I told the box happily as I pressed her “Okay” button at the end of the “Messages and the Messaging System” lesson. I’d also read the messages Amy and Iron had sent me! They’d been worried when they returned to the safe zone and found I was missing.

There were still a lot of lessons available for Miss Tutorial to teach but I didn’t really want to anymore, so I moved to press the little X in the upper right corner of her body.

“See you soon! Miss Gell,” she said as I closed her. I beamed. Miss Tutorial was so nice.

Using what I’d just learned from her, I pulled up my friends list and pressed on Bellcandy’s name. A new box appeared with a blinking line and a list of keys.

This was the “keyboard” she’d been talking about. I began poking at the letters, giddily watching as the words in my head became words in the world! I might’ve gotten a little crazy with it sending the reply.

“Gell?” Amy asked just as I finished the message. “We’d like to try to take you to the city, but we’ve been playing for a long time, and the sun is setting. The road back is much more dangerous at night. Would you mind spending the night in the safe zone and we’ll rejoin you in the morning?”

They were leaving again? Well, I guessed that was alright. Somehow I didn’t think finding adventurers like Amy and Iron would be easy so I didn’t want to upset them.

A compromise then.

“Would… you do me a short favor first?” I asked shyly.

“What ya need?” Iron asked before Amy could question the request. She glared at him, but he didn’t seem to notice, instead focused upon me.

“Would you… come with me to Dungeon Home? So I can look at it one more time before we go? It’s very close. It’s been my home for my whole life. I…”

I trailed off, unsure what to say.

Amy smiled a sad smile. I could tell the smile was sad but didn’t understand how I knew. I just did. Smiles could be sad.

“Of course, little Gell,” Iron said, kindly. I felt glad.

Chapter Thirty One

Over River, Through Woods

Dungeon Home was… small. It was impossible to think anything else when staring at the hole that just a few cycles ago had been my entire world.

A cave. A dark tunnel with dim blue lights visible deep within. It was almost unnoticeable with all the brush and trees surrounding it. Missing it could’ve been easy.

My whole world.

My best friend was still trapped down there, and going in would just get him hurt. I wanted to bring him out of there. To free him. The only way I could think to do such a thing was to become a Beastmaster like Half Bold and put him in a horn. Or… or convince him to kill one of us.

I would never do either of those things. So I’d have to explore. Find new options. New ways to handle my problems. New solutions.

I’d have to grow. Maybe one day, I could become strong enough to tear the instinct out of my kin entirely. For today though, I could only look back and imagine a world without the instinct or invaders.

“You… lived your whole life down there?” Amy asked as we slowly walked back to the Shady Woods Copse, Iron taking the lead with the two of us following behind him.

“Until yesterday, yes!” I said. “It was great! Before… before the invaders came. I would just… float around all day. Following the instinct. Looking at rocks. Annoying Bugbear…”

Amy cocked a quizzical eyebrow at me, looking concerned. She looked like she wanted to ask more but something held her back.

“That… was all there was. It was…” I sighed, unable to lie convincingly. “It was life. I guess. When there were no invaders, obeying the instinct was all I had. Then after the invaders, they were the only thing that was… different! I loved them for being something new and hated them for wanting to kill my… family. It took a long time for me to realize they weren’t family at all. Just… mindless.”

The two of them were quiet for a long time.

“This… instinct, you keep mentioning. What is it?” Amy asked.

I turned and looked at them in horror. They really didn’t have an instinct. But… surely they once had!

“You’ve… never had an instinct? Something guiding your every sway? Pushing you to do things? Pushing you to be the same as the rest?” I asked.

Both of them seemed to grimace a little at that.

“Yes… Gell. I’ve had… some experience with a person like that,” Amy said, somberly looking off into the sunset. “My mother was… very much like that.”

It was my turn to be curious. “Mother… A female parent? What does that have to do with the instinct?”

She blinked but recovered quickly. “Gell… it sounds to me like… uhm... the Instinct was trying to make you into something you weren’t. My mother did that to me a lot when I was younger. I still loved her, but she could be infuriating.”

“Tell me about it,” Iron added. “She made a mean apple pie though.”

“Meaner than mine?” Amy joked, swatting his arm playfully.

“Eh… they’re both equally worse than the ones I make,” he joked right back, and Amy rolled her eyes fondly.

I was utterly confused. Why would you want your food to be mean?

“I… suppose the instinct was like that. Do you think the instinct is a real person? That it’s like my mother? I never really thought of it that way. It was just… what I did when I wasn’t doing anything else. A list of dumb rules, that I began to hate the more cycles it spent letting invaders kill me.”

They were silent again for a while, exchanging a look that conveyed meaning I couldn’t catch. Would I ever be able to talk with someone by just looking at them?

“Perhaps we… aren’t talking about the same thing,” Amy said. “Who taught you to speak? To read and write? Do you have a mother?”

I thought back, but there was nothing like that. No mother or father, though I supposed Momma Bossbear could’ve been like a mother. She was so big and strong. But she’d never nurtured me. Couldn't possibly have taught me anything. She was a slave of the instinct. One of many in Dungeon Home.

Momma was in her name, but she wasn’t a Mother. Not in the slightest.

“No. Not that I remember. Just the instinct. That was fine before the invaders came. When they did... it kept making me act so stupid! ‘Attack while they’re ready for you, Gell!’ ‘Attack their exposed back, it's not like they just said they were going to bait you that way, Gell!’ ‘Get killed for me, Gell!’ Again and again and again, until I just couldn’t stand it anymore.”

Amy’s eyes went wide. “That’s… I’m sorry you… had to go through that. It sounds horrible.”

“Yeah,” I said. “But the way the others just… went along with it was worse. They just accepted it. Just kept faithfully following. Never learned. I tried to convince them to break it like I did. Defy it. They never did. I didn’t even know if they could until yesterday.”

“There are others….? In that cave? Like you?” Iron asked his tone hard. “Could we help them? F-free them?”

Oh, how I wished. But… none of them would come. None of them would defy the instinct. None but Bugbear, and going down there would only hurt him.

He needed more time. More time to come to terms with his place. More time to defy the instinct. More time to learn that he could.

“No. No… not yet. Someday I’ll come back for him, though. Someday I’ll be able to ask him if he recognizes me, and he’ll be able to do more than growl. I’m sure of it,” I said wistfully.

We were all quiet for a while until I heard Iron lean over to Amy and whisper softly.

“What the fuck?”

We arrived at the safe zone and a tension left the air that I didn’t realize had been there.

“Damn. Hoped it would last longer,” Iron commented as he sat down, leaning his back up against a tree. “Hate going back…”

I frowned.

“So… you’re going back again, then? To wherever it is you go?” I asked, curiously. “I answered a lot of your questions. Would you… tell me some things? Before you go?”

Amy smiled sadly. “We have time for a few questions, but we need to go quite soon, Gell.”

“Well… an easy one then.” I turned to Iron, holding a curious hand up to my lip in a way that felt natural for this body. “If you hate going back, why go back?”

Iron grinned. “If I don’t, I won’t be going anywhere. The rea– er… The other world that we’re from. That’s where we live. If we don’t go back, our bodies there will become weaker. Less stable. Less able to come here too.”

I clapped my hands over my mouth.“Oh no! I’m so sorry! Y-you can go! I won’t hold you up anymore. Uhm. Wh-when will you come back?”

I could relate to a body changing in a way they didn’t want it to.

Amy was looking at me with her “I’m concerned and worried about you” look that made me feel special, but also kind of annoyed.

“Well… we’ll probably be back in eight hou–!”

“Cycles!” I interrupted, before stuttering embarrassed. “I… I don’t know how long an hour is. Uhm. Do you know how many cycles it will be before you come back?”

Amy blanched. Iron picked up on my question faster though.

“Probably about five cycles, Gell. Fortunately, all we need to do is sleep and exercise in the other world, and then we can come back. Sound good?”

Five cycles sounded like an eternity, especially now that I could no longer curl-up in my Orc Glove, but I didn’t want to complain.

“I’ll see you then! Go make sure your bodies don’t change, okay!?” I insisted. “Go go!”

Amy laughed and smiled at me. “We’ll see you soon, okay, Gell?”

I beamed at her, feeling like I might be closer to finding that family I’d always wanted than even I could believe. “You bet! Oh. Uhm, one last thing? B-before you go? Could I have some more Steak-and-Broccoli?”

They laughed and opened their inventories, seemingly as happy to give me the wonderful lumps of steaming goodness as I was to eat them.

They opened up their invisible menus after I was happily nomming upon all the food and then, a few seconds later, faded away out of existence like they had never been.

But they’d be back.

Chapter Thirty Two

Another World: Four

“What… the fuck… was that?” Amy asked.

“It sounds so funny when you curse, honey,” Derek said with a smile. It did not lift his wife’s foul mood though.

“How can you joke!? I mean… You always see those ads, like in the restrooms or rest areas? ‘If you think you might have witnessed human trafficking please call…?’ What the fuck has happened to that girl, Derek!”

“Honey, calm down. Your heart–!”

“Calm do—Calm down!? What… what!? How in god’s name am I supposed to calm down after that! She’s been conditioned to die in the game over and over again? Is she a coma patient being fed on an IV drip? Is she traumatized and believes the game is her real world? What… how can you be calm!?”

“Because getting worked up over it isn’t going to do anything,” Derek said.

“Still! That girl has been tortured! In a damn, video game! Dying isn’t all that painful but dying enough times…? Oh god, I think I’m going to be sick. Get… get me…”

Derek handed her the medication with a glass of water he’d prepared beforehand. She smiled at him thankfully before swallowing the pills and gulping the water down greedily.

“Try not to get so worked up, honey. Do you want another heart attack?”

“Don’t talk like that! You’re no spring chicken either!” she bit back.

“Honey,” he drawled and she sighed.

“I just… want to help her. Is she stuck in the game? What would happen if we asked her to log out? Would we ever see her again?”

“About that… I wanted to ask you. Did you notice some of the things she said? ‘You invaders and your names?’ She called herself Gell the Jellyfae. Like… like Jellyfae was her race. It felt natural to her,” Derek said, stroking his beard in thought. “Not to mention those things she said about her ‘instinct.’”

“What are you trying to say?” Amy asked, curiously.

“I’m… not sure. Part of me still thinks she might actually be an NPC. But that’s crazy right?” Derek asked, thinking aloud.

“You talking to me, or the mirror?” Amy responded, cocking a sardonic eyebrow at him.

He laughed and then turned to the mirror. Dark skin was covered by a steadily whitening beard that did a decent job of covering the freckles that had always embarrassed him before he could grow it.

He stood slowly, bones creaking with the burden of many years. He was certainly no spring chicken.

He turned to Amy as she rose from the other side of the bed. Wrinkled skin hung off bones that had been ravaged by her heart disease. The gown she wore covered her similarly thin body. Crows feet decorated her sleepy green eyes, and a little bit of gunk lined the edges of them. Her hair was the only part about her that seemed unwilling to give in to her body’s slow failure, remaining almost entirely dark where it framed her skeletal pale face.

She was as beautiful as the day he met her.

That didn’t mean she could get away with being snippy though. He countered with humor and turned back to the mirror.

“Ahhh, dear mirror self! Tell me, when you can cease admiring the bastion of perfection before you, what do you think of the strangely life-like Jellyfae we’ve found ourselves babysitting? Take your time. I know you’ll need it.”

Amy giggled. “You’re an idiot. Also… Jellyfae? Whoever heard of such a thing?”

Derek grinned, turning to her. “The developer, maybe? Tell me what’s more likely: Gell is a comatose player who is being forcibly kept in the game and has been kept there for so long she’s forgotten the real world. Or… she is an incredibly elaborate NPC? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying it's not worth it to stick with her. Beyond its ability to get rid of my damn back pain, she’s been the best thing about Tread the Sky since we started, considering the boring quests and the dull crafting system. Do you really think she’s a person though?”

Amy thought about it, actually taking the time to ponder his words. It was one of the things he loved about her.

After a time she slid off the bed into her wheelchair, frowning. He’d have been impressed with her ability to lift herself if she didn’t weigh as much as a feather. “She seems like a real person to me. Like a little girl trying to make sense of the world. She’s just doing it in the wrong world.”

He frowned at that. Yes, he was still pretty certain Gell was an NPC, but even he couldn't deny that something was… off about her. At first, he’d written her off as a main character. They had scenes in the main story quests that felt every bit as complete as Gell did, in a technical sense.

Then again… there were little things. Little inconsistencies that NPCs would not have had. Gell behaved like she was real. She reminded him of their daughter. Well, back when she’d been a little girl anyway.

His mood plummeted at the thought of her, and he turned back to Amy, eager to forget his daughter for happier subjects. Like an NPC being tortured in a dungeon. Right.

“Should we make a list? NPC versus Player that we should be really worried about?” Amy asked with a light laugh. “Ideas for what our new friend could actually be?”

He paused, pondering the thought. It wasn’t a bad idea.

“Aright. Do you have any?” he asked.

“She’s a real girl. She gets mad about names, and even acknowledges how strange they can be,” Amy said defiantly.

He nodded, acceding that point. “Okay. One in the Player category.”

“Mmm,” Amy said, assuredly.

“The mount,” he said softly. “The way she let that mount go. That wasn’t… that didn’t feel like an NPC. NPC’s just… ride mounts. They never even acknowledge them. Gell did. Does.”

“Two for player. Actually, three. Remember the thing about Cycles. She doesn’t know what hours are? She’s been in the game so long she’s forgotten how to tell time.”

“Uh… honey, I’d argue that’s a point in favor of her being an NPC,” Derek injected, and Amy blinked before agreeing with him unhappily.

“You’re right. Sorry. Confirmation Bias,” she murmured.

Derek grinned, but Amy had already moved on.

“She doesn’t remember anything but that cave. Nothing? I… am not sure which category to put that in. If she’s a player, that only makes sense if she’s… repressing or something. I’m no psychologist, but with the way technology has gone these days, who knows what’s possible?” Amy said dejectedly.

“Even if she isn’t a real player, something is strange about her,” Derek said softly. “I just don’t know what to think yet. She didn’t even have a mouth until yesterday… remember when she said that? What do you make of that?”

Amy went quiet again for a long while, before checking back into reality. The doctors occasionally worried that that was a symptom of her sickness, but Derek had been watching her do it for years. Sometimes she spaced out to think, and usually, she came back with something either insightful or worrisome. This was the latter.

“I don’t know what to do here, Derek. Should we tell someone?” she asked while pensively biting her lower lip.

“I think… we shouldn’t get too involved with her. Honestly, we probably shouldn’t even guide her back to the city. If we get attacked the game isn’t going to realize that spiking your adrenaline could–!”

“Not an option. We’re getting that girl back to town, Derek,” Amy insisted. “At least to Bluebell, NPC or not.”

He smiled. “I figured. Just checking.”

“But in the real world. Should we do anything about her? Mention her?” she asked, her iron resolve replaced with worry in an instant. “At least to confirm if she’s a real player or an NPC?”

“I’ll send ‘em a message,” he said while grabbing their medications from the bathroom sink and bringing them over.

“Would you? Oh, that’s so nice of you! I was going to do it, but since you offered so generously–agghhk! I told you to stop that!” she exclaimed, laughing as he poked her in the side gently.

“Cheeky,” he said as he handed Amy her pills while he opened the cap on the date for his own scheduled medication, and then popped all four pills straight into his mouth before dry swallowing them. “But alright. Like I said, I’ll send them a message. If she’s just an elaborate NPC, then her developer is an ass who likes messing with players. If she’s real though…”

He paused a moment to consider. “Might send one to Red Thorn, too. Shady Woods Copse is her Home Point if you didn’t notice that. For a famous adventurer like her to hang on to that nowhere spot as one of her three home points…? Maybe she knows something we don’t?”

“Good. You do that. I’ll get us some dinner fixed.”

“TV Dinners!?” he asked excitedly between swallows of his pills.

“Your favorite!” she responded, beaming with enthusiasm.

He laughed. He was fond of the TV Dinners, though he missed the unhealthy ones he used to eat before these medical issues had descended upon the both of them. Honestly, he felt lucky. He had diabetes. Manageable. All you had to do was not eat all that much sugar. Poor Amy’s heart disease was… terrifying.

If she was afraid of the illness, she didn’t show it to him. He wondered idly if he’d have as much resolve, were he in her shoes.

He doubted it.

Both of them were in their eighties, despite what they’d told Gell. They’d found while playing in the cities that mentioning they were that old tended to… alienate other players. This was incredibly counterproductive to players like them who enjoyed the pain-free game but couldn’t… or at least shouldn’t, risk adventuring due to their “real world” conditions.

So of course Amy was going to try traipsing through the forest of… of… darn it. He’d forgotten the stupid name. All of them were pretty stupid, but the forest had been surprisingly memorable. Winkle? Wrinkle? The Twisted Wrinkle or something like that?

She was going to have a heart attack, likely for an NPC who had been programmed to act like a player by some overzealous programmer. He’d known her for long enough to know that there was no talking her out of it though.

At least getting to town shouldn’t be too hard...

He slowly crept over to the computer that ran both of their VR rigs. They had the high-end ones that monitored their health and could even apply rudimentary treatments, should something go wrong while they were playing.

He sighed, looking at the rigs with annoyance. Ten more years and those youthful bodies in the game might’ve come… fully equipped for more than just a pain-free existence. Alas, technology hadn’t quite come that far.

Derek looked over to a picture of his wife, then considered her in-game avatar, and decided that would probably be weird anyway.

He sat down at the computer gingerly as he heard Amy begin chopping something downstairs. God, he loved that chairlift they’d installed. Sometimes enough to wish that he, too, was confined to a wheelchair. He was no spring chicken, but his long list of back injuries from a life working in construction sometimes had him feeling frailer than her. He was glad she’d volunteered to go downstairs. He hated the damn things these days. They made him feel like an invalid.

He pulled up the out-of-game message system that allowed him to run his auctions and sales in Variak, logging in quickly before he opened a new message.

It took him a little while to find the report button, and of course, he felt stupid when he did, sitting with a shiny exclamation point at the bottom of the new message window. Once he did, he began to type.

From: Iron Crock

To: Sky-Mod(sky-support@gypsenergy.com)

Subject: Possible Human Imprisonment in Tread the Sky

Good afternoon,

My wife and I were playing Tread the Sky today when we encountered something that has shaken both of us. We’re a little afraid we’re both jumping at shadows but it has concerned us enough that we believe someone should be contacted.

In the far west of the continent of Dogaia, near the western edge of the Forest outside Variak, close to Bluebell Bridge we encountered a character named Gell, the Jellyfae. She is a race we have never seen before. Her hair looks like the tendrils of a jellyfish, while her ears look sort of like fins. Her body is a teal green, with freckles that glow different colors. Attached is a screenshot of the character.

This girl claims she has lived her entire life within Dungeon Home, a dungeon nearby the Shady Woods Copse, a safe point in the area.

She claims to have been forced to die, over and over and over again. Dying in Tread the Sky is not particularly painful. I hardly ever leave the main cities and I have experienced it once or twice, but this player claims to have never left the game. She doesn't know what hours are, instead measuring time by in-game Cycles. She also used one of our real-world names after having heard it. No other NPC in the game has done that. What Gell seems to have gone through sounds like actual torture.

My wife and I were horrified by this. That said… we are… unsure if this is actually a player. It appears to be, but she acts… strangely. She speaks to the tutorial as if it were a real person. She speaks to us as if we are invaders and seems to associate with in-game monsters as if she were one of them.

Let me make this clear, in case you are not yet taking this seriously. Gell is at the very least programmed to act like a child. I’m loath to believe she is a real one but if she is… I need not spell out the concerns to you.

Please reassure us. If this is a player who has been forcibly kept in the game somehow, we would like to know how and why, or at least know that something is being done about her situation IRL. If this is an NPC who has been coded to act like a player… this seems like a cruel joke to play on your players.

We will both attempt to assist Gell, as the girl seems entirely lost. If we discover she is part of a quest as an NPC then her designers have incredibly poor taste in their story design.

Thank you for your time.

Iron Crock

There. That looked good. He tweaked a few things to make it seem formal and serious enough to be taken seriously before sending it off. As he was about to click send, he noticed something strange… His name was no longer Iron_Crock_584. Instead, it was just “Iron Crock.”

Odd.

He shrugged and decided it was likely just a fix or something.

“Hmm,” Amy said from over his shoulder, startling him, standing up from her wheelchair. Apparently, she’d come back upstairs while he’d been composing the message. “Looks good. That subject line will probably get everyone involved. Good Husband.”

She patted him on the head like a dog and he rolled his eyes.

“I was about to get started on the one for Red Thorn. Did you want to hover over that one too?” he asked, exasperatedly rolling his chair aside to give her a spot to lean in.

“Oh no no! You do you! You’ve been well trained, I trust you,” she said with a laugh. “Food will be ready in fifteen. You willing to walk down the stairs or should I go back down and bring it up?”

“Up here,” he replied, not at all enthusiastic about hobbling down those accursed stairs again.

A spiral staircase would be great, they said! You’ll love it, they said! Well… they’d been right, right up until one too many surgeries turned them into a nightmare. Now he loathed them.

“You have to come downstairs sooner or later, honey,” she said.

‘Ah,’ he thought, with a sigh. ‘That was one of those questions that there was only one right answer to. Damn.’

“Alright, alright. I’ll be down. Just let me send off my fan mail,” he growled.

She beamed. “Let me know if you need any–!”

“Yeah yeah!” he insisted, immediately feeling guilty about the harsh tone. Amy didn’t seem to mind though and she rolled out the room out of the room gleefully.

‘God help me, I love that woman,’ he thought as he turned back to the computer screen.

From: Iron Crock

To: Red Thorn

Subject: Gell, the Jellyfae

Good afternoon,

Sorry about the unsolicited PM. This might be a bit of a shot in the dark, but I was wondering if you might have ever encountered a girl named Gell...

Chapter Thirty Three

Another World: Five

Tatiana had felt curious as she read through her messages, musing about the endorsement she’d accepted for her stream.

All thoughts of the advertising money she’d begun making evaporated the second she’d seen the subject line. She’d immediately opened the message, as soon as she saw it.

She was getting quite famous in-game and received almost constant messages lately, but not enough that she didn’t try to read them all.

This one sent a cold chill straight down her spine. Someone else had found her.

Gell.

… anyway. Sorry to bother you with all that. I’m just incredibly concerned for her and we cannot for the life of us figure out what she is. Is she an incredibly well programmed NPC, or a person in a coma? Someone trapped in the game? With all the conflicting information I wouldn’t rule out an A.I. at this point. It’s frustrating, you know? Sorry for the long message and thank you for your time.

Iron Crock

She opened the screencap, terrified of the Jellyfae she knew she was about to see, then stopped in confusion.

The character was… beautiful. But not Gell. Rather, she looked like Gell would if the little jellyfish were anthropomorphized. Her skin was a teal-green-blue. She couldn’t quite tell, and the job was made more difficult by the glowing freckles.

The effect was eerily reminiscent of the glowing Jellyfae, too, though that was where the similarities ended. A teal skinned woman, with a young body that would make an in-game avatar envious, was covered by a ragged tunic that was also familiar. The fucking bugbears wore those!

“Oh God,” Tatiana breathed, reading the message over and over again.

Goosebumps rose on her arms and her neck as she took in the message with trembling fingers. The image of the avatar presented before her was not familiar. Not directly. The ways in which she was familiar haunted her though. The tendrils that formed her hair shimmered blue just like the creature she’d killed so many times. They even floated unnaturally just like the dungeon mob had.

“It’s really her,” she thought, still unable to shake the shock of it.

This creature. This human-jellyfish thing was the same NPC she’d killed over and over again to become as strong as she was! She wasn’t sure how she knew, but she was sure. Looking at the screen cap, the wide smile on a childish, curious face.

This was Gell, the Jellyfae.

“She looks so happy,” Tatiana thought.

Part of her wanted to just continue on. Maybe one day she would run into the creature in game and they’d nod to each other. Gell would understand, would know that Tatiana had never meant to hurt her.

A shiver crawled down her spine though.

She remembered those words that day. It was weeks ago now, but nothing she did could erase that horrible wail from her mind. ‘Why are you the only thing that changes?’ and ‘When will you be satisfied?’ Both echoed inside her mind like hammers whaling on a giant bell of guilt.

‘She thought I was eating her!’ Tatiana thought with a shudder.

Knowing she was able to think. Sentient? Sapient? Fuck she always confused those two. Just thinking of how awful it had been to realize that she had been systematically torturing that creature and being called on it had been bad enough. Now, seeing the happy expression and knowing that the little creature was out there, with a very justified grudge against her made her…

She grabbed for her trash can and dry heaved, thankful that nothing actually came up.

‘I… need to do something about this. Apologize, if I can. Before it's too late,” she thought worriedly.

Gell wasn’t a person. She was sure of that, but that didn’t make her any less dangerous. She shiverred as another realization came over her.

‘The developers at Tread the Sky are experimenting with A.I.,’ she thought with rising panic.

No one had been messing with her. There was no plot to trick her into leaving her favorite farming mob alone. No. Gell was just… alive. And…

And possibly loose.

‘What the hell could they possibly be thinking?’ she thought, worriedly. A.I. dungeon mobs? That was… monumentally stupid. Were they trying to find out what they would do? Figure out how an AI would react? Were they so desperate to make engaging enemies that they were ignoring the implications of creating a sentient digital creature that was set against humanity?

More importantly, what the hell could she do if Gell actually held a grudge? She’d somehow gained her own damn body. What else might she be capable of?

Gell’s only experience with people was being murdered by them. If she’d been a person, Tatiana didn’t know what she would do with herself. She covered her mouth with shaking hands. She was guilty and terrified in equal measure.

She could apologize, but what if Gell didn’t care? What if…

What if…?

There was no way to know what a sapient A.I. would do. Would she have the capacity to forgive? Would she understand remorse? Or would engaging her just invite more anger?

The lump lodged in her throat refused to go away. She’d killed a person dozens of times!

“Would Gell try to do the same to me?”

She’d never been much of a computer person. Could Gell read her emails? Could it use Tatiana’s webcam to spy on her? Oh god, could it access her nervous system if she put the VR helmet on? What about her money!? Fuck, when was the last time she’d even seen physical cash?

She didn’t know if what was possible. Artificial Intelligence had been a part of her life since she was born, but not just from her favorite movie series. Companies constantly advertised “A.I.” but until now what they’d always actually meant was “automated learning.” Their… “A.I.” could pick up on what she probably wanted based on what she’d done before. Convenient. Private. Time-tested. Targeted advertisements had been a thing for years, and while they’d become more sophisticated, that was all they’d ever been.

No one had ever actually had to worry about sapient A.I. because one had never actually been made, as far as she knew. Year after year, the projected dates for when they might really pull it off were pushed further and further back.

She’d never been against them either, and didn’t think she would be in the abstract. At least, in that she’d never cared about them and the idiots trying to develop them. If she hadn’t personally pissed one off she might even be excited about it!

But she had. She had. And if she didn’t stop it while it was… hopefully still imprisoned within the game, who knew what might happen to her?

“I’ll… I’ll apologize. I’ll try to reason with it. If… if it attacks me though… ah fuck, what can I even do? Never use a computer again!?” She screamed in frustration.

These morons who’d developed this game should be thrown in jail.

She opened a message to reply to Iron Crock, but was seized by another thought. Did Gell know about this? Was she being watched right now…? Inside the computer?

If it didn’t respond to her apology… if it were still hostile to her, then it had to go. If it was evolving inside a video game who knew what it might do. That said, there was nothing she could do about it.

Unless...

She looked at the clock. Work in two hours.

Fuck that.

She opened an email to Joanna Prescott. The lump in her throat didn’t go away as she began to type.

The idea of reporting the problem to the mods in Tread the Sky was laughable. Who knew what Gell might become by then? But a game developer like Gypsenergy was subject to the media, and Tatiana was confident that people would be very interested to find out that there was a Sapient A.I. learning how best to kill humans.

Luckily, Joanna had become a journalist, and she doubted any reporter would turn down a story like this.

Hopefully going so public with Gell’s… status wouldn’t be necessary. Hopefully it would forgive her. Maybe they could even become friends?

But if it didn’t, she wouldn’t let it have its revenge.

She finished the email, saving it to her drafts before taking a deep breath and grabbing her headset. She had to try. She owed it that much, at least.

Chapter Thirty Four

The Crossing at Bluebell Bridge

I walked slowly. My legs were tired and I felt sore. My hips hurt. There was a strange pain in my head and my chest was chafing against the bugbear tunic. Much as I loved it, I was beginning to hate it. If adventurers had to wear clothes like this all the time it was no surprise that they were constantly killing people.

I wanted more of the Steak-and-Broccoli, I was thirsty, my bag was heavy, and most of all, I was bored.

“Are we there yet!?” I asked, growling in annoyance.

“Gell, you’re an abomination,” Iron shouted, playfully. “You have to learn a little bit of patience. We haven’t even been walking for an hou… erm, for half a cycle yet!”

“It’s not my fault I want things to happen!” I returned. “I finally escaped Dungeon Home and the instinct and I thought everything out here would be amazing! But these trees are boring! I thought we were going to see the city! Where is it!? We’ve been walking forever!”

In truth, the trees were amazing. Everything was. I danced around in the leaves as they fell, brown and yellow and red tumbling around us as we walked down the trail.

“You don’t seem all that bored by the forest. Is it really so bad?” Amy asked curiously.

“The trees are so pretty. They’re huge too! I could always tell they were big from my cave, but they just go up and up and up,” I said, craning my neck back trying to see the top of one of the highest ones.

“So, would you prefer the trees to the city?” Amy asked, her tone teasing.

I frowned, unsure how to answer that. “I don’t think so. You’ve… gotten me excited for a city. It’s completely new to me. I know what trees are, and can put a look to them. Seeing them up close isn’t as interesting as seeing something new for the first time. I know all these things but I’ve never seen them. What’s a building look like? What’s a fire-hydrant? What’s a water tower? I just…” I trailed off, unable to come up with the right words.

I wanted to see a whole place with adventurers who were interesting but not hostile. I wanted to hear the conversations! I wanted to hear new words I didn’t understand! I…

“I just… want, I guess,” I said. “Sorry if I’m impatient.”

Pitying looks crossed Amy’s features while Iron looked a little guilty.

“Well… at least you have the decency to feel sorry about it,” Iron grumbled. He quirked up with a bit of a smile. “Our kids were less patient than you!”

I frowned. Kids?

“You have kids?” I asked, instantly intrigued by the new topic. Baby Invaders? Those couldn’t hurt anyone! “Would I like them? Will I get to meet them someday!?”

Amy laughed, a rich and happy sound filling the woods as the three of them walked along the path toward Variak at a sedate pace. “Maybe someday, Gell.”

“Yes!” I hissed joyously, excited at the prospect of meeting new people who weren’t murderous assholes. Suddenly a realization came over me. “Wait. You both have kids? And they’re the same kids? You’re a couple?”

Iron laughed this time, holding up his hand where a glinting green band was wrapped around his ring-finger as if it held some sort of significance. “You didn’t realize that?”

“I’ve never seen a couple before. I guess Skeleton and Skeledog were kind of a couple… but I don’t think they fit that word properly. They were always together but they don’t make kids like couples do,” I said.

Amy looked at me pointedly, studying me in a way that made me a little uncomfortable.

“What?” I asked when I could no longer stand her staring.

“Gell… if you’ve never seen a couple before us, how do you know what one is?” she asked.

That, I decided, was a great question.

“I wish I knew,” I replied, staring wistfully off into the trees, at the mountains, and the sunset, and the Great-Open which was called the sky. “I just… know things. Couples get married, for instance. Or split up. Are you married?”

Amy grinned. “We are. Going on forty nine years, come February.”

They’d now told me that a cycle was two hours, and a day was twenty four hours. I converted that to twelve cycles to make it easier. Knowing a year was three hundred and sixty five days I multiplied the days by the number of cycles in a day, and found that…

“Whhhooooaaa…! You’re two hundred fourteen thousand six hundred and twenty cycles married! That’s like, fifty times longer than I can even remember!” I exclaimed.

They both shared one of those looks that I had no context for, before they both grinned. Iron nodded. “That’s… uhm. Probably right? Wow, you did that fast though. Have you always been able to do math like that?”

I cocked my head questioningly. “Like what?”

Iron looked like he wanted to pursue the subject but thought better of it. “Nevermind, I guess.”

There was a brief silence as we continued walking down the path. Iron was constantly watching the surroundings for any sign of danger, but he was distracted by our conversation more than once.

“So… what are your kids like?” I asked.

At that, Amy sighed, staring dejectedly ahead into the woods.

“They’re good kids but they have kids of their own now. We don’t get to see them as much as we’d like. Our son is preparing for his third baby. Our daughter… well. She isn’t on the best of terms with us. We haven’t spoken in—” Amy paused for an unusually long time, before continuing, “about six hundred cycles.”

“That’s sad. If I had a family, a real one, I’d want to see them every day,” I said. “But it's okay. I’m going to make a family all on my own! It’s my biggest dream after all, and it’ll have Bugbear and Momma Bossbear after she forgives me, and Skeleton and Skeledog and… and you guys! If you want!”

I put them forth like it was no big deal, but I didn’t think I managed to hide how important their answer was to me as I gazed at them longingly.

Amy frowned like she did sometimes. I turned when Iron answered with a grin, “We’d love to be a part of your family, Gell.”

I beamed at him, then noticed that Amy was beaming at him too. Did that mean she agreed, too?

We walked on in amicable silence for a while as I contented myself with studying the trees, until Iron brought me out of my thoughts.

“It’s not Variak, but if you’ve never left your cave, I bet you’ll love this. Gell? Welcoming to Bluebell Bridge!”

He said it just as we reached the top of a tall hill, and I gasped in awe as we crested it.

The road, winding through dense woods until this point, opened up. Our route suddenly became cobblestone instead of a simple well-trodden path, and the newly paved path curved sharply downward around the hill. The trees also ended, allowing me to see the whole of the valley, where the river ran down from the tree-covered hills until it came to a bridge that seemed to hang in midair.

The bridge crossed over a great river far below, and it dwarfed everything I could see beneath, but either end of the bridge held buildings, each with tiny little lights coming from them, easily visible in the low valley where the afternoon sun could not touch.

“Oh, my gods…” I breathed, staring in awe. “So that’s a city!”

Iron scoffed. “That’s barely a town, though the bridge is still amazing. You haven’t seen anything yet.”

“Cities are even bigger!?” I breathed in excitement.

“Much much bigger,” Iron bragged.

“There’s so many adventurers! Oh! Oh there's a Unicorn! No.. wait… where’s it’s horn? Oh! The bridge is amazing! Amy, do we get to see the bridge!? Is it edible? What about all the little lights? Oh, windows! The Invaders talked about those, but it never made sense. They would talk about them like they were Miss Tutorial’s body but I knew they were glass screens like those ones! Wait, can we–!”

“Slow down, Gell! Take a breath! We’ll have some time to explore. We’re lucky enough we weren’t attacked on the way here. It's getting a little late anyway. How would you like to stay in an Inn? The beds there are very cozy!”

“Sleep. Sleep!? But I’ve never needed to do that! I want to go see all the things! Meet new people!” I insisted.

The two exchanged another look before turning back to me.

“You might not need to sleep, Gell, but we do. You can, of course, explore the town as you will. No matter what you do though, don’t leave town–err…” Amy paused suddenly, as if remembering something.

“Gell, we have no right to tell you what you can and can’t do,” she continued after a few moments of hesitation. “For your own safety though, please don’t leave the town, once we’ve arrived? We don’t want to see you get hurt.”

I thought for a moment, but it didn’t take much deliberation before I nodded. Amy and Iron were the only humanoid creatures to be kind to me so far. They also wanted to join my new family! If I couldn’t trust them, who could I trust?

“Good. It’s unsafe outside the city for any of us, but you’re going to get a lot of attention in there, Gell. Promise me you won’t let any of them lead you outside of town?”

I already didn’t really want to leave the town, anyway. Miss Tutorial telling me about the dinosaurs and cultists was already scary enough that Iron and Amy had needed to persuade me to leave the Shady Woods Copse after they’d logged back in. It wasn’t too hard for them to convince me though. I had a reason like getting to see this beautiful place! Knowing this place was safe was almost enough to make me not want to leave at all!

“Now that I’m here, I don’t know if I’ll ever leave! There’s so much to see!” I exclaimed, then calmed down at the hard look in her eyes. “Okay… I won’t let anyone lead me outside of town. I promise.”

She smiled and nodded before turning and continuing down the steep cobblestone path. I marveled at the stones, skipping on them and trying to only step on the bright ones, while avoiding the dark ones.

As we got closer, we passed the first person. It was a dwarf with a huge beard, working on the road. His name was “Gable, the Road Builder,” but he reminded me of Beardy Wall.

“Ho there, adventurers!” he called as we approached and Amy waved awkwardly. Iron ignored him entirely, which I thought was kind of rude.

“Ho there, Dwarf guy!” I exclaimed, happily. He smiled at me and then turned around to continue hacking away at the cobblestone road.

The road looked fine, so I wondered what he was doing as we got further away, but soon enough there were so many people I could hardly remember the odd dwarf.

As we entered Bluebell West I was overwhelmed by the sheer number of people. Some of them had normal names like Dungarr, the Blacksmith and Eilondye, the Tailor. These people usually wore plain clothing and were often behind stalls, or patrolling the town if their names ended in “the Guard.” The vast majority though, were people with names like “Barstucks C0ff33drinker.” Names that interspersed letters and numbers for no apparent reason.

These people were easy to spot because almost all of them were staring at me.

A red blinking dot appeared in that overlay that was usually almost invisible, and it became clearer as I focused on it.

You have received a new message! (47)

The number beside the little envelope icon kept rising as more and more people sent me messages. I opened it and the screen filled with a list of expanded mail subject lines.

“Yooo! Rockin’ Skin!”

“Join my group?”

“Where did you get that race!? It’s beautiful!”

“Jelly Angel! Please be my bride!”

“Enhance Your body quickly! Just 3 easy payments of $299.99!”

“Where di you ge da goods?”

“Epic skiN! How’d you get it!?”

“Hey, what yo ASL?”

“Can you buy that skin online?”

“Join us!”

“Buy 10 Regular Class Intelligence Crystals for the low price of $79.99! Stock moving fast!”

“You’re beautiful!”

They went on and on like that, half of them asking me where I got the skin, while the rest either commented on my beauty or were trying to give me something if I gave them numbers. It was strange.

“You’re pretty popular, aren’t you?” Amy asked, having noticed me scrolling through my invisible screens. “Checking messages? Just… so you know, you should probably ignore most of them. Especially the purple ones. Those are always just spam.”

“Spam? The… canned food?” I asked, recognizing the word with my inexplicable knowledge. I’d never seen spam before. Weirdly, I was getting the idea that there were two definitions for the same word. That happened every now and then. In this case, I thought Amy was probably talking about useless mes… oh. Right. That would make sense.

She laughed, before confirming. “Kind of? Spam. Junk mail. Messages not worth your time.”

“Really? Aww,” I said sadly. The “enhance your body” one had sounded so promising. I thought it might be able to turn me back to normal for a moment. I mentally decided I’d pick up a two and four nines if I ever happened to spot them around, just in case Amy was wrong about them.

The people watched us strangely, while those with the normal names went about their tasks regularly. Fortunately, no one approached us.

We reached a square where people wandered every which way. Straight across was the bridge that led to the other side of Bluebell. There were a lot of people here, and even a few horses with wagons carrying around the normal names. The adventurers didn’t linger here long though, most of them only stopping to glance at me and send me a message before moving on.

There were buildings on the sides of the square but most of them had their doors closed. One didn’t though, and lively music blared from inside. The windows were open and the door stood wide as well. It looked wonderful.

I was about to ask if we were heading there when I spotted another person and my blood ran cold. My freckles faded to a sickly yellow glow.

“Gell? What’s wrong, Gell?”

I couldn’t move. All I could do was remember the knife, and the hundreds of times it had snuffed out my life. The pain. The deaths.

Red Thorn stood on the other side of the square, talking with a horse stall owner. She was smiling. Joking with him. She looked just like any other adventurer. Somehow the monster hadn’t noticed me yet.

“L-let’s go?” I asked, suddenly realizing I was squeezing Amy’s shirt sleeve, though I didn’t remember grabbing her. “H-hurry.”

“Gell? What’s wrong?” Amy asked.

“Let’s go… please?” I turned to insist for just a moment. When I turned back, the Thorn was gone. Had she been watching me? “Wh-wherever we’re going. I don’t want to be here anymore.”

I couldn’t stop shaking.

Chapter Thirty Five

The Archer and The White Mage

Amy looked at me, her expression morphing from worried to deadly serious. “Gell, is there someone you know here?”

“Y-yes. They… I don’t want to be around them,” I murmured.

I wanted to kill her. I wanted to flee. How did she find me? She had to be here for me, right? But I looked so different from before! She couldn’t still want my body could she? I thought she’d been scared when I’d finally screamed at her but here she was.

Was she trying to find me? Trying to kill me again? Trying to imprison me back in that damn cave?

I wouldn’t go back. I turned back to where she had been and scanned the people milling about the square, looking for her. I wasn’t the same victim I had once been. I’d defended Dungeon Home. I’d escaped. I’d become an invader. A player killer.

She wasn’t the only one who could kill anymore.

“No,” I said aloud. “Fuck no. I’ll never go back.”

I seethed, rage replacing the fear. “I’d rather die a thousand times. Ten thousand!”

“Gell… is everything oka–?!”

“Fuck you, you Jellybitch! You hear me! Fuck! You!” I screamed, my voice filling the square while I tried desperately to find the unbelievably fast monster of an invader.

“Yeah, fuck you jellybitch! Haha!” someone in the crowd happily shouted with me.

I seethed, frustrated that I couldn’t find her before turning and striding angrily towards the sound of the music that no longer sounded quite so delightful.

I could practically feel Iron and Amy sharing one of those glances behind me again but I didn’t care. I also didn’t know if this rowdy place with all the music was actually where they’d been going, but it was where I was going.

It had been a long time since I’d heard music and I wasn’t going to let that… that… monster, ruin my freedom.

The building was a large one-story place that took up the entire right side of the square. Lights spilled from within and the sound of music grew much more pronounced as I entered it. There were about as many empty tables as there were full ones, and the smells that greeted me upon entering did a great job of wiping the encounter with Red Thorn from my mind.

Why was she always threatening me? What did I ever do to her?

“I’ll kill her, just like she killed me. That’ll show her,” I mumbled, letting loose my shocker into nothing through my hands, creating a satisfying zap.

“Gell, we’re getting worried about you. What’s going on? Talk to us,” Amy said calmly as she followed me into the building.

I sat down at one of the open tables and Iron and Amy both sat down beside me. “I saw… someone in that crowd. Someone I want to kill,”

“Whoa there. No PKs in here. This bar is for respectable folk. You’ll just have to go on, now,” said an authoritative man named Matthias, the Innkeeper.

I looked up at him and growled. “I want to hear the music.”

He twitched for a moment. “You’ll need to clear on out. You’ve got a bounty.”

“Oh damn. I forgot about–!” Iron started.

“I want to hear the music,” I hissed, now feeling livid. This jerk wanted to keep me from hearing the bard? Screw that. I was free now. I would go where I wanted when I wanted. The Instinct hadn’t stopped me and some fat innkeeper certainly wouldn’t.

The man’s eyes glazed. His body twitched, going fuzzy for a moment before he turned back to us and grinned like we were old friends. “Welcome to the Edge of the Bridge! Best Inn on either side of the Bossourin River! What can I get for you folks?”

Well. That was an abrupt change in attitude.

“I want a Steak-and-Broccoli!” I insisted.

“We’ll… take a room for the night too. Actually two of them, and we’ll buy her food,” Amy said to the barkeeper, sounding skeptical.

Whatever.

“A generous soul to pay for a friend like that! A Steak and Broccoli platter for the young Jellyfae. What can I get for you two? We’ll have your rooms prepared while you eat, and you can retire at any time!”

I simpered, pleased that he hadn’t called me a Jellyfish.

Amy smiled at him seeming to have not noticed. “You’re too kind. I’ll have a slab of the steak as well, and buttered corn, please.”

Iron rolled his eyes, as the innkeeper beamed at Amy. I frowned. The dark-skinned man had acted the same way when Amy waved at the dwarf on the road earlier. Like… they weren’t worth interacting with, somehow?

Then again, maybe I was just reading too much into it.

“Buttered Yams, Cherry Delight, Blackberry Cobbler, and an Ice Cream Sundae,” Iron said with no preamble.

“Very good sir! I’m sure your wife will be overjoyed with your tubby belly!” Matthias said jovially.

Iron barked an involuntary laugh, and Amy joined him as the innkeeper walked away, though I didn’t understand.

“They’re getting more creative with the NPC’s responses, eh, Amy?”

“He wasn’t wrong! You’ll get digitally fat!” Amy joked.

He laughed, but I was still confused by the whole encounter. NPC…? Was Matthias one of the NPCs Half Bold had been talking about?

The foods Iron had chosen did have a high saturated fat content. Pie and Ice Cream were defined as traditionally fatty foods. Maybe… maybe the joke had something to do with how fat had two meanings: The nutritional content and the… state of body?

Why did fat have two meanings anyway? That was stupid. While I was musing over words with double meanings and just about to decide that the fat inside of foods would henceforth be known as “taf” instead, I was distracted by Matthias’s return.

The man was carrying five plates of varying sizes, and all of them were balanced precariously on his two arms. I would’ve spared a moment to be awed by how much could be carried by the infernal limbs, had I not been utterly distracted by the three smaller plates that were laid in front of Iron.

Two of them looked wonderful. The third… was horrifying.

“Y-you’re… you’re going to eat that? It’s covered in blood!” I exclaimed, pointing at what I could only assume was the cherry delight.

From my perspective, there was nothing delightful about it! Maybe… maybe they both really were invaders! Just a different, much more subtle sort!

I was so shocked, I didn’t react in time before he dipped his finger in the bloody concoction and popped it into my open mouth with a grin.

My first reaction was absolute disgust before the taste hit me.

“Oh my god, I love eating blood…” I thought as the most wonderful sensation swept over my lips. It was even better than Steak-and-Broccoli! Did I taste like that!? Was this why Red Thorn killed me so often?

Damn… I’d eat me too…

I gazed longingly at the bloody cherries, then back to Iron, then to the cherries again. Hating myself for wanting another bite. For wanting the whole disgusting — delicious — thing.

“It’s not blood, silly,” Amy said, giggling. “It’s Cherry Delight! It’s… sugar? Digital sugar?”

I was about to respond when someone sat down at the other table. I turned and blanched as I found a very familiar face sitting across from me, glaring daggers at me.

Or, more appropriately, arrows.

“Uhm. H-hi,” I said with a gulp.

“Give me back my fucking bow,” Dull Beauty said, her voice carrying a hint of menace. “And then change my name back. I don’t know how you did it but my name is Zephyr Bird. I played in the beta to get that name. I want it back.”

I turned to Iron. “So… she can’t hurt us here, right?”

Amy suddenly hit her invisible screen and began touching the air frantically.

Iron blinked looking between myself and the girl he’d killed a few cycles ago. “She… can’t. Though she can annoy us, and you’re not an archer anyway. It might be worth it to just give her her bow back.”

Using his fork he stuffed some of the… cherry delight into his mouth while another person sat down at the last open spot on the other side of the table. The healer, Bellcandy the Halfling, was easy to recognize from the battle before. His strange blue streak in otherwise blond hair matched the color of the tattoo on his face.

Unlike Dull Beauty, he didn’t seem angry in the slightest.

“Hey, great fight earlier. Seriously though. How did you get that epic race ability? One-touch paralyze and nearly one hundred and fifty damage? That’s insane, at early levels at least. Would love to switch over to your race,” the blond healer said cheerfully. “Thus far, the boost to charisma and the quick mana regen have been great, but nothing on that! Also that trick you played with it!? So great.”

“You’re… not… mad? That I killed you?” I asked, curiously.

“Mad? Naw, fair’s fair. For one-v-five and you still managed to come out ahead? Even with the trick, props. That was a hell of a fight. Also, I got to see Half Bold get his ass burnt, so it was all worth it. Hate that little twerp. Bit sad about the lost level, though if I get to party with you in the future? Might’ve been worth it.”

“This is irrelevant. My bow and my name. Fix them, or I swear I will make every minute you spend in this game a nightmare,” Dull Beauty threatened, drawing my attention back to her malicious eyes.

Something about the threat felt so… impotent, though. She wasn’t drawing any weapons. She wasn’t even attacking me. Just… talking. Demanding sure, but she was saying new things. That was when invaders were at their best. When they were discussing and talking. In comparison to Red Thorn, a girl I’d managed to kill twice now just didn’t scare me very much.

“Why should I? You lost it fair and square,” I challenged. “And I want to shoot things! I always wanted one of these before.”

“Miss, uhm. Dull Beauty, and Bellcandy? My name is Am… huh. Amy Thyst,” she said cocking her eyebrow at her own name for some reason. “My husband and I are escorting Gell to Variak. We’re sorry she attacked you but you were about to invade a dungeon that is… very personal to her.”

She eyed them strangely and then pointed her finger to where her interface might be. Whatever the gesture meant, the others got it instantly and immediately started looking at their invisible screens.

“Amy? Did you say something to them? What did you say? Can I hear? Ohh, did you send a message! Ah!” I said as I looked at my messages. There were two hundred of them now! I opened the screen again and found that Amy hadn’t sent me one though.

“Aww…” I pouted.

Dull Beauty’s face suddenly morphed into one of horrified sympathy, and Bellcandy’s became skeptical.

“What did she say? Did she say things to you in the messages? Oh, were her messages green? Or Purple? Or were they just regular text like the ones she’s sent me?” I asked the healer and archer, anxiously staring at the two of them.

Dull Beauty looked at me for a few long moments before turning back to Amy. “I… see what you mean.”

“I don’t!” I glared at Amy. “Fine! Two can play that way!”

I pulled up my message screen and pressed the icon that allowed me to compose a new message. Thinking of the recipients I found that Dull Beauty and Bellcandy’s bodies would highlight green if I wanted to send messages to them. I pressed the “Enter” button and a bigger box showed up with a keyboard. Oh! I could make my own words!

I quickly created my own message and sent the profound words off to the Archer and the Healer with a title and everything!

Secret Message!

“Amy is really old, and Iron likes to eat blood! But don’t tell them I said that!”

Gell, the Jellyfae.

I dismissed the overlay, the action feeling as natural as following the instinct once had, and turned to grin victoriously at Amy. “Hah! Now you’ve been talked about behind your message system! Doesn’t feel nice, does it?”

Bellcandy and Dull Beauty were both snickering a little. Amy just laughed instead of being offended, much to my annoyance.

Stupid adventurers.

Chapter Thirty Six

Talk of False Gods

“So… you don’t remember anything but the cave?” Bellcandy asked, curious. He had a very open nature and was always smiling. I was quickly coming to realize that I liked him in general.

Dull Beauty, by contrast, seemed interested in the answer but was not nearly as animated. She seemed like she didn’t like other people very much. She had brightened a little when I opened my inventory and gave her back her bow, but other than that, she was reserved and quiet.

Only in comparison to another adventurer though. Compared to say, Buggy? She was downright animated. Every scowl had a different meaning, and she seemed to disapprove of everything, but she did it differently every time!

“How long have you and Bellcandy been together?” I asked, ignoring their question.

Dull Beauty scowled a little at the question but Bellcandy put a finger to his chin and pondered animatedly. “Well, we partied up shortly after meeting in the beginners’ area in Variak, but played solo until Half Bold gathered a party to try and fetch his stolen horn,” Bellcandy said.

I poked at Dull Beauty’s plate, eying the rather unappetizing green leafy stuff that was covered in a watery slime and had little red things in it. She’d called it a salad. The broccoli had been delicious, but something told me I wouldn’t enjoy that.

I stabbed a fork into it and snatched a bite anyway. The taste was good but in a much different and less appealing way than the cherry blood had been. I decided my steak and broccoli was better, too, but the way the girl glared at me was worth every bit of effort spent. I resolved to do it more.

Bugbear never even reacted… even that time I pulled out one of his hairs. By comparison, Dull Beauty was vivid, and Bellcandy was more lively than me!

“So, are you a couple too?” I asked while stabbing my fork into the middle of my steaming steak and lifting it whole so I could bite around the edges.  “Do you have kids, like Iron and Amy?”

“Gell!” Amy shouted, indignantly.

“Whapt?” I asked around a mouthful.

“We… are not a couple like that,” Dull Beauty said. Her cheeks were slightly pink.

“Yeah, Beauty here would never go for me. I’m too cheerful. She’s more into somber, boring guys,” Bellcandy said, throwing a roguish smirk towards the girl.

“I am not. Ugh. Instead of answering questions about us, why don’t you tell us a little about yourself, Gell? He did ask if you remembered anything before the cave,” she pointed out, only a little bit testily.

I finished the bite of steak, finding it harder to chew than the one Amy and Iron had given me.

“Nope! I lived my whole life in my cave. Now that I’m an invader, I can leave! But I still want to make sure no one goes to it if I can,” I said before happily snatching a whole bite of cherry blood – delight – from Iron’s plate.

The man sighed and just handed me the plate. I beamed at him, overjoyed, and began to gobble the sensational food.

“So… why are you going to Variak? What’s there for you?” Dull Beauty asked with a frown.

Between bites of food, I tried to think of what exactly I was going with Amy and Iron for. I wanted to free Bugbear someday. I wanted revenge on Red Thorn. I wanted to be safe. I wanted… family. I wanted people who I could speak to and who would respond in kind. I wanted a family that would never betray me for some… instinct.

“We’re taking her to the city to find a place that’s safe for her, at least until we figure out a bit more about her situation,” Amy said, cutting in before I could come up with an answer on my own.

“You talked to the Devs yet? If Gell is what you think, this is a pretty big deal,” Bellcandy said, his voice trailing with a somberness that did not fit him. “To think that Tread the Sky could be used to torture someone. It’s fucked up.”

I blinked at him, confused. Who were the “Devs?”

She lifted a finger, then used it to wipe the red jam off her face before asking, “Uhm? Who are the Devs?”

They ignored me, instead continuing their conversation.

“I sent them a message, yeah. Not sure if anything will come of it though,” Iron said to Bellcandy. “Not that it’s their fault though. I’m sure they’re flooded with scam messages and things like that.”

‘Scam message?’ I wondered, getting irritated. One of the main silver linings for becoming an invader was that I could join in these stupid conversations and now they were ignoring me!

“What’s a scam message? And who are… Devs?” I asked again, now a bit annoyed.

“Still, this is a big friggin deal. If your complaint doesn’t get a response soon, I’d start spamming them. I’ll send one as well,” the healer replied. “Shouldn’t be too hard to get their attention with an image.”

“I will also. I’ve always enjoyed escaping into this game. The idea that someone could be permanently kept here though is… unsettling,” Dull Beauty said.

“Hey!” I shouted, slamming my palm down on the table.

‘Owwww!’ I thought, immediately regretting the move. Tears came to my eyes as pain raced up my palms but I refused to acknowledge it, instead glaring daggers at the adventurers who’d decided to exclude me from the one thing I wanted to be part of most.

“Who the heck are the Devs!?” I asked, now mad and in pain.

They all looked at me like I was crazy, so I glared at them again. “You all seem to just… know things! Did Miss Tutorial tell you all of this?”

All of them suddenly looked uncomfortable and I realized my open-handed slap of the table had drawn attention from the other adventurers. Curiously, the normal people didn’t seem to care at all.

Amy was the first to answer, albeit hesitantly. “Gell, it’s not that we’re ignoring you. It’s just… hard to explain. The Devs is short for “Developers.” Mods or Moderators are sort of the same thing. These are people who… develop and maintain this world.”

My eyes widened. “Whoooaaa… The whole world!?”

“Pretty much,” Iron said, also sounding hesitant.

“Players – er… adventurers – send problems they find to moderators, like glitches. Or they can report adventures for breaking the rules. If the problem is big, or something really worrisome, Mods might contact Devs for help.”

“And you can just… send them messages!? I wouldn’t think someone so important would be able to talk to just anyone. There are so many inva–er… adventurers after all.”

“Well, that’s the problem. We can’t just talk to the developers. They’re the ones who made the game, while the moderators are responsible for maintaining it. For making things… flow. For adventurers and NPCs alike.”

Bellcandy and Dull Beauty were watching Iron and Amy explain these things to me with rapt attention like they had never heard them before either. After closer examination though, I realized that they were paying attention to me.

“So… uhm. Why would you send a message to the devs or the mods about me? Am… am I a problem?” I asked, worriedly. I remembered Half Bold had used the word glitch once when describing his ability to send his slaves into dungeons without endangering himself. “Am I a glitch?”

“Of course not,” Amy said immediately. There was a conviction in her voice and a firmness to her eyes that made me want to trust her. A strange feeling erupted inside me. Overwhelming affection and… something else. Something that felt nice.

“Thanks, Amy. But… if these developers and moderators watch over the whole world… why didn’t any of them come to help me when I was trapped in Dungeon Home?”

Both of them hesitated again, neither quite sure what to say.

“They… don’t know everything, Gell. They don’t monitor the people who play… er… they don’t monitor adventurers unless they’re called. Even then, there are only so many moderators and an entire world of adventurers.”

“So… so they’re not like gods?” I asked.

An image of moderators and developers had been forming in my mind of giant beings capable of looking down on all of us adventurers. Ambivalent beings, too high above me and Bugbear to care about us. Beings who had watched me suffer and had done nothing to protect me from Red Thorn or the other adventurers, even when they could’ve.

If they didn’t know everything though… if they didn’t know I’d been in trouble… maybe they’d be willing to help me now?

Amy laughed at that. “No. No they’re nothing like God. They are just… people. Just like you and me. They have more power over this world but are every bit as flawed and cruel as any player.”

I shivered. That… did not reassure me.

“Could… I send a message to the Devs? Err… the Mods?” I amended quickly. “I… want a certain, specific invader to die. As many times as they killed me.”

They all went very quiet at that.

“Gell… that’s… wrong. Even if its deserved, you shouldn’t seek revenge like that,” Amy said, worriedly. “Its unhealthy. You should try to be better than… whoever it was who hurt you. Okay?”

Be better?

I… liked the sound of that. Be better than the Thorn. I could do that.

“Okay,” I said, unable to decide if I meant it. I wanted to be better than Thorn. But I wanted to see her die, too.

“This got way off-topic. Gell, Amy answered earlier, but why are you going to Variak?” Bellcandy asked, brightly, rather obviously trying to change the subject back to something lighter than my desire for revenge.

This time I had an answer ready. “I’ve never seen a city. A place where adventurers are but they can’t hurt me? I want to see that. I’d like to find a way to grow strong enough so Red Thorn can never kill me again too. And… and I want to save my friend.”

Amy and Iron’s eyes widened at that. They shared a look of minute horror, but Bellcandy and Dull Beauty didn’t seem to notice.

“You also still haven’t picked up a class. At level 13, that’s ridiculous,” Iron said quickly, schooling his features away from the shocked expression he’d had before.

Something was strange about that.

“You haven’t picked up a class? I thought for sure you were a monk or a rogue with the way you weaved around attacks! Not to mention that paralysis touch. It’s amazing!”

I preened, delighted at the compliments. “Thank you. My shocker is my strongest ability! I’ve killed many invaders with it! What… what is a class though?”

They all looked at me strangely again.

“Hiya adventurer! I heard you have some questions about classes!”

“Oh, nevermind!” I told them, delighted. “Miss Tutorial will explain it to me.”

I began listening to Miss Tutorial explain classes and casually continued stealing food from each of my new friends’ plates as I did.

Chapter Thirty Seven

Twisted Wronkle Woods

We left Bluebell Bridge in high spirits. All of the adventurers had to leave again, much to my chagrin. Fortunately, all but Bellcandy were already back from… wherever they went, when I woke from a wonderful nap in my room at the inn. The bed was even more comfortable than my glove had been! Before I developed a sense of smell at any rate.

Amy had given me a few round coins that disappeared as soon as she handed them to me, and then told me to use them to set Bluebell Bridge as my second home point before leaving. I apparently had to give them away to a Baron_Von_Pretzel, who owned Bluebell Bridge’s homepoint in order to do so, but all I did was press buttons on my interface.

I felt a little cheated. I didn’t even get to meet Baron_Von_Pretzel, but I still had to give him my round interface numbers?

Still, being able to return to Bluebell instead of going all the way back to the Shady Woods Copse seemed appealing enough that I was willing to pay the owner of the homepoint. The last thing I wanted was to have to walk that whole way all over again.

I still felt a little terrified of Red Thorn, but I refused to let her mere presence dictate my life. I would not be her Jelly Delight! Never again if I could help it. I was going to make it to Variak, and become strong enough that she couldn’t scare me...!

…That seemed like a long way off though, because the twisted trees and gnarled roots of the woods before me were doing a wonderful job of scaring me without the knowledge that Red Thorn might be waiting for me there.

“What do you look so worried about, Gell?” Amy asked, noticing my pensive stare. “This is a low-level zone. It might look intimidating but the monsters here aren’t very strong. We’re  past the hardest part already.”

“It’s not monsters I’m afraid of,” I said with certainty, staring at the notification that drifted across my interface as I entered the woods alongside my party. “Why is it called Twisted Wronkle woods?”

Dull Beauty pipped up, breaking her long silence for once. “The beasts here resemble wild boars. They are called Wronkles but they have knobby, twisted bone horns that they use to ram their prey. They like to ram players into trees. Don’t get hit by their charge and you should be fine if we encounter any.”

I shrugged. As good a reason as any to name a woods. Boars though! Wild pigs? That sounded interesting! They sounded so sure we would be attacked though… Was that just an invader’s mentality?

I glanced with a reassuring grin at the names in the upper left corner of my vision, excited by the fact that I had a group of my own looking out for me. That excitement was a bit dampened by the fact that I’d recently been able to make one of these groups split up by just hinting that there would be a reward for it, but at least I had someone at my back.

For the longest time, it had just been me. Oh sure, the Bugbears, Ghoul, Momma Bossbear, and the rest were all there in Dungeon Home, but they weren’t there for me. They were there for the instinct.

Now, I could be reasonably certain these people would have my back if we got in a fight. Reasonably certain. I trusted Amy and Iron, but Bellcandy and Dull Beauty were a bit more… untrustworthy. Dull Beauty being mad about her changed name was also worrying, but I didn’t know how I’d changed all their names in the first place.

They’d looked wrong so I fixed them. Or changed them accordingly. Was that so bad?

Only Dull Beauty seemed to think so, but for the life of me, I couldn’t make myself think of her as anything else. She was Dull Beauty. It just fit her.

“Here,” the girl suddenly said, holding out a weapon. I blinked, surprised at her action. The bow she held for me wasn’t nearly as ornate as the one she wore, but it was a weapon. I grinned and took it, but it disappeared into my inventory.

I grumbled a bit, opening the interface and sliding the little bow image over to the picture of a human’s hands and grinned as the bow appeared on my back with a quiver at my side.

“Thanks! But… what’s this for?” I asked. “I thought you were mad at me.”

“I am mad at you,” Dull Beauty said. “But… if what Amethyst had to say about you was true, perhaps it's not entirely your fault. I’d rather not see you hurt.”

“Dawww, you’re just a big ole’ softy ain’t’cha?” Bellcandy said in an annoyingly strange tone. I immediately felt irritated on Dull Beauty’s behalf and apparently that was the right emotion because the girl glared at the healer like he’d stolen her Steak-and-Broccoli.

“I will so kill you someday, Bell,” she said exasperatedly before turning back to me. “Do you know how to use it?”

I pulled out an arrow and fitted it to the bow. It… took a little while. The fingers needed to pinch the end of the arrow and place it directly on the string. Once I did, I drew the string back like I’d seen so many adventurers do before and aimed at a nearby tree.

I let string fly, beaming in triumph! Then screeched as the string snapped my arm off. I yowled and flung the bow away in anger before glaring at Dull Beauty. “It bit me! Your stupid bow bit me!”

The girl was fighting to hold back a grin, while Bellcandy, Amy, and Iron were all laughing. I was beginning to notice a theme here and pouted. Was I really so funny? I… didn’t like it. Being laughed at.

“You… need to make sure to hold the bow away from your arm a tad. The string will catch your arm if you aren’t careful,” Dull Beauty said, schooling her features and not letting even a hint of her prior amusement show. She picked up the thrown bow and set it back in my hands, then placed my hands on the weapon gingerly.

“You see? Your forearm needs to be held like this, elbow bent just slightly. It’s harder to pull the bowstring but there’s less risk of being snapped by it. If you choose to become an archer there are more varied options available to you to further protect you, like this,” she said holding up her left arm which was covered by a dull leather armguard that matched the rest of her clothing.

“That would’ve been nice to know…” I hissed.

She quirked a rare grin at me. “You do at least seem to have talent.”

She pointed towards the tree where the arrow stuck straight out. I didn’t mention that the tree it hit wasn’t at all the one I’d been aiming for. I’d had enough of being laughed at.

“I… guess. So.. is there anything I could tie around my arm to make it not bite me again?” I asked.

Amy piped up. “I prefer tailoring but I’m also a journeyman leatherworker. I always carry a few leather straps around. Here. Maybe these will work?”

She handed me over a bunch of straps. While they would technically work, the only way I could think of to secure them to my arm was to tie them, which looked clunky and strange. I did it anyway with three of them, making a makeshift armguard, but I didn’t have much confidence in its effectiveness.

Still, they were trying to help me.

“Thanks, Amy. Dull Beauty,” I said with a smile.

“My name is Zephyr,” Dull Beauty said, annoyed.

I opened my friends list and turned it to her. “It doesn’t say that here on the piece of your name that you gave me though!”

“I still don’t get how you did that,” Bellcandy said curiously as we continued walking. The covering of trees blotted out the sky above and my freckles glowed an apprehensive yellow-orange color.

“Did what?” I asked curiously.

“Changed our names. My name was bee three one one c, at-sign, n, d, y. Now it’s just… Bellcandy. Which seems like it should be impossible because someone else definitely already has that name,” he said assuredly.

Looking down at him, I thumbed my chin, realizing that the pose felt natural for thinking. “I don’t know. I just… do it? When people’s names are wrong I fix them. So far, everyone has been better for it! But I’ve been naming things for as long as I can remember. I gave Bugbear his name after all!”

Bellcandy looked at me strangely. “And… I suppose Bugbear is a… bugbear. Correct?”

I nodded. “Exactly!”

“Uh-huh,” he said. “Very creative, Gell.”

Picking up on the sarcasm I grouched, “It was my first name. I got more creative with the others. But… Bugbear is special. He… talked to me. He ignored his instinct.”

The area around us was growing darker. Sunlight above was no longer able to penetrate the canopy and fireflies danced around in the air. I grinned watching them as they buzzed along their routes.

“His instinct?” Bellcandy asked.

“Yeah,” I replied. “I had been meaning to ask about that. Did… all of you break your instinct? To become invaders? Sorry. Adventurers?”

They all exchanged looks like they didn’t know what I was talking about.

“I… understand if you don’t want to talk about it. I don’t feel very comfortable myself. I just wanted to know if it was the same for everyone, or…”

My eyes widened in sudden shock as I spotted a pair of red eyes just behind Amy.

“Watch out!” I screamed, not a moment too soon. A great wolf pounced from the bushes and only barely missed cleaving Amy apart because Iron was quick enough to pull her out of the way.

Red lights blared in the corners of my vision and strange fast-paced music picked up in the background. We were being attacked! And not by Wronkles at all!

Iron drew his sword as soon as Amy was safe and Dull Beauty already had her bow drawn.

“No! Wait, what are you doing?” I screamed as Dull Beauty drew back her bow.

I grabbed the bow and yanked it off target, sending the deadly bolt careening off into the woods as the string went taut.

“Gell! What are you doing?” the archer screamed repeating my own words. “That thing is attacking us!”

“Don’t hurt him! He’s innocent! Just following the ins–! Ahh!” I screamed as the wolf pounced on me, its paws raking across my chest. I saw a short notification reading -44 hp before the only thing I could see was the terrifying wolf’s jaws.

Suddenly the wolf was bashed off of me and I screamed again as its claws were not kind in releasing me.

-14 hp.

I stood quickly, only to see that Bellcandy had smashed the creature off of me, and now stood protectively over me with his staff held defensively.

‘It’s instinct is making it attack me. I… I don’t need that. I don’t want that,’ I thought frantically, wishing I could make it see. I didn’t want to hurt this wolf! It was the same as me! It was the same as Avwren, Half Bold’s captive bat. It was following a directive that it couldn’t break free from. That it didn’t even know it was following.

Once I managed to get my bearings I saw that the wolf was one of a pack. Horrified, I watched Dull Beauty sink arrow after arrow into the approaching wolves before they could near her, felling the creatures with the same ease Red Thorn would cut through my Bugbears.

She wouldn’t stop. She wouldn’t stop unless they could, and they only could if...

I stared at the wolf that had attacked me. It was the largest. The leader. Its title was Alpha Packleader, and it was glaring hatefully at Bellcandy who stood protectively before me.

Iron had huddled against a tree and was frantically warding off two snapping wolves with his sword while Amy was panting heavily, sitting against a tree. I didn’t have time to wonder about that though.

The wolf before me was huge and proud. A deadly hunter stalking those who would enter its territory. Not evil though. Just… following its instinct. An instinct that I had somehow helped Bugbear break. And that had all started with a name.

I glared at the impersonal name, forcing it into a new form. The image blurred and the wolf shuddered. Flickered. For a moment I thought the world had broken like it had after I’d shocked Momma Bossbear, but then I realized it was only the wolf that was… twisted.

A moment later, she growled like nothing had changed. But something had. Where before its banner had read Alpha Packleader, her name now read First Strike. She was a leader. A wolf who hunted in these woods, and fed on the Wronkles. A fighter who defended her territory, but did not just attack anything that moved as the instinct told it to.

Instead, it could defy the instinct. It could flee an unwinnable fight. It could disengage.

First Strike howled and then fled. The rest of the wolves suddenly yipped in a frenzy, tearing away into the woods, leaving behind the corpses that Dull Beauty had already disposed of.

I realized suddenly that Bellcandy had not been idle while I’d been renaming First Strike. White light’s surrounded him as he murmured in that arcane language spellcasters used and just a moment later white light surged through me. I gasped in awe as the pain in my chest healed, idly noting that this was the first time I’d been healed by an adventurer’s spell. It felt amazing.

“What… did you do?” Bellcandy asked, looking at me strangely.

‘I… wish I knew,’ I thought, amazed.

“More importantly, are you insane!? Do you want to die? I thought you were trying to avoid that!?” the archer screamed, glaring at me.

I shriveled away from her. Why was she yelling at me?

“I can tell you why she did that,” said the voice that haunted my nightmares. Slowly from the shadows, Red Thorn stepped into the path. Curiously… she didn’t look threatening.

She didn’t have to look threatening to be terrifying though. I trembled, as afraid now as I had ever been.

Chapter Thirty Eight

Traitors

Red Thorn looked at me with an expression I found hard to read. Pity? Remorse maybe? I couldn’t quite tell. The expression was so different from the girl who had hugged me before killing me because I was so… tasty or something. Now she looked… lost.

“She… didn’t want to see her own kind hurt anymore,” Red Thorn said, her voice somehow less. Not as terrifying as it should be.

She was also right.

“Hi… Gell,” She said softly, as she stared at me.

Something about the way she stood with the dark trees behind her, cast in thin beams of light from the sun that could only barely break through the high tree line above made her seem so much more than any of the other invaders. A fae quality.

Maybe she got it from looting my bodies. Her tone didn’t match her body though. Everything about her exuded a menace. A black aura darkened the grass around her like she stood perpetually in gloom. Yet she was… not angry. Not even threatening. It looked strange. Foreign. I got the feeling that she was not used to acting contrite and it showed.

“Red Thorn… holy shit, I’ve watched your videos…” Bellcandy said, awed.

“Uhm. Thanks. I’m… still not used to people knowing me like that,” she said.

I did my best to school my shaking hands and glared, baring my teeth. Part of me wanted to attack her. How dare she show up here? How dare she have the nerve to look remorseful! How many times had she killed me? She was personally responsible for making me hate my own family. A face for the instinct itself, and everything I’d never been able to defy.

“Red Thorn? I… guess you got my message,” Iron said softly. “I have to admit, I didn’t expect you to show up here though. I suppose you do know her, then?”

Wait… wait what? I turned to look at Iron in shock, all anger and fear forgotten in an instant.

‘Th-they messaged her?’ I thought, a gaping pit forming in my middle.

“I’m familiar with Gell, though not in that form,” the rogue replied, her voice holding a solemnity as she looked back towards me.

The others reacted strangely to that, blinking with confusion. I barely noticed, staring hard at iron as my heart broke. My chest hurt. My eyes were wet. I felt a sinking sensation in my middle that I didn’t like at all.

“What is that supposed to mean?” Iron asked, now sounding annoyed.

Red Thorn turned to Iron. “I… don’t think Gell is human. You shouldn’t have to worry about that.”

“How rude! Young lady, Gell is no less human than any of us! You should apologize!” Amy said, her voice filled with disapproval.

The rogue grimaced at that. “That’s actually what I came here for. I didn’t mean any offense. It’s just… you’re an A.I., aren’t you Gell?”

Bellcandy and Dull Beauty both turned to me in fascination.

“An A.I…?” Bellcandy breathed. “No way…”

Iron and Amy didn’t look at me, and I barely registered their words, too hurt by the knowledge that my friends had called her.

“Where’s your proof of that?” Iron asked, skepticism dripping from his words as he folded his arms across his chest. “And even if she is an A.I., doesn’t that make her basically a person? In that case, why not treat her like–?”

“Why?” I finally asked. It was quiet but it silenced their conversation as surely as a knife would.

“Gell?” Iron asked and finally looked at me. He blanched at the expression on my face, his hard eyes going soft.

“Why call her? She hates me. She hurts me… kills me for my body over and over again! So… so why?” I asked, tears trailing down my cheeks.

I heard a strange gurgling noise from Red Thorn but couldn’t take my eyes off of Iron and Amy. How could they betray me like this?

“Oh, Sweetie… we didn’t. We…” Amy said, biting her lip, and looking nervously between me and Iron.

“Gell… I… I’m not here to hurt you,” Thorn interrupted. “I just… was hoping–”

“Oh, sure! Now you’re not here to hurt me! Now that I finally look like one of you humans! Fuck!” I hissed, glaring at the rogue who flinched away. That only made me angrier.

“And what’s so great about being human anyway!” I screamed at her. “Huh? Does being human mean you don’t deserve to die over and over again!? What makes you so special!”

“I’m sorry about that! I’m sorry, okay! I didn’t know you were… that you… could feel!” she exclaimed.

“And that makes it okay!? That makes it just fine to continue killing my family, but now that I can talk back you feel guilty!? I’m no different from them, but you’ll continue killing them! And you!” I said rounding on Dull Beauty. “Why? Why hurt them? We were the ones invading their home! So… so why kill them? Couldn’t you have just avoided hurting them?”

“I… um,” Dull Beauty responded, completely unsure what to make of all of this.

“It’s not her fault! Gell, the truth is you should never have been created. You’re a thing. A computer. Not a real person. She can’t be blamed for killing you. It is what you were made for! We didn’t know you had… a mind!” Red Thorn hissed in Dull Beauty’s defense.

I turned to glare back at her.

Iron blinked, stepping in front of me, between myself and Red Thorn. “Are you saying you’re the one who tortured her?”

Red Thorn grimaced. “I… yes. If you see Gell as a person then farming her looks that way. She drops a sovereign-class crystal when she dies. She’s a mob, but until that last time, I never knew she was a person as well. She didn’t look like she does now either. She was just another rare dungeon mob. Nothing to feel guilty over hurting. Then, at least, which is what makes this so damn hard. Gell. Please… I’m… sorry.”

I turned back to Amy and Thorn, and Amy looked sympathetic. Guilty. Regretful. I clenched my fist, before turning back to Thorn.

“F-fuck your apology! You don’t deserve my forgiveness. You should be… should be hurt just like me! You should have to watch your family die over and over again! That’s what you deserve!”

Amy’s eyes softened as she placed a comforting hand on my shoulder. “Gell… don’t you think you’re being unreasonable? This girl did come to apologi–!”

“Shut up!” I shouted, rounding on the woman I’d thought was my friend. “Y-You’re just like her. You called her!”

“Gell, neither of us knew Red Thorn was hurting you! And we won’t let her hurt you now.” she insisted, but I refused to hear it.

“I don’t want to hurt it–her. Gell, I just want to make amends. I-if you can’t forgive me then that’s fine, as long as you promise to leave me alone,” Red Thorn said, drawing my eyes back to her. There was a glint there. Anger where before there had only been that guilt. Sad eyes on a terrifying body.

I shuddered. Whimpered. My hands trembled with mixed fear and rage, but the anger grabbed my tongue first. I spoke with a venom I didn’t know I’d ever felt.

“Leave you alone? Leave you alone!? Where was my relief! Where was my promise when I dreamed of never having to see you again? Never having to feel that dagger slice into me… No! You don’t deserve that!”

Amy took a horrified look at me before frowning. She turned back to the girl, her eyes narrowed with an expression I’d never seen there before. She looked like an invader too.

Red Thorn looked almost sad for a moment. Almost regretful. Then those cold eyes hardened again. There was the Red Thorn I knew.

I was almost glad. Enough with the fucking charade.

“Very well. I’m sorry it had to be this way.”

She disappeared. Red warning lights flashed at the sides of my vision as Red Thorn did what she did best.

Chapter Thirty Nine

Safe Within the Flames

I only had a moment to dash towards Amy before pushing her out of the way of Red Thorn’s dagger, but it sunk deep into my arm instead. Only instinct guided the action. Not the Instinct, but long-ingrained memory of how Red Thorn acted. She attacked the weakest bugbears first.

Angry as I was at Amy, I didn’t want her to die any more than I’d ever wanted Bugbear to.

“Bellcandy! Duck!” I shouted through the pain in my arm, knowing that Red Thorn wouldn’t stay anywhere near where my shocker might touch her.

“See reason! She’s an A.I. and she wants to kill me! Who knows what she might do if she’s allowed to–” Red Thorn spoke but was cut off mid-word, forced to dodge an arrow from Dull Beauty.

She reappeared in a blink, staring at the archer.

“I’m level twenty-seven you know. I’m currently ranked the seventh-best player in this entire game. Are you sure you want to make an enemy of me? For it?” She hissed.

I breathed a sigh of relief as Amy’s healing magic flowed over me. I shot her a grateful look before it morphed into a glare. She and Iron had both called Red Thorn. Messaged her about me! Why were they trying to defend me now?

“Uh, not really,” Bellcandy said before turning apologetically towards me. “No offense, Gell.”

“I certainly do,” Dull Beauty interrupted with a glare towards Bellcandy. “If you gained all that power from farming a glitched mob, then you don’t deserve it. Also, if Gell is an A.I. like you assume, why in God’s name would you want to make an enemy of her?”

“She won’t listen! I’m sorry for what I did, but if she’s going to try to kill me anyway then who knows what she might do!? What if she gets out of the game, huh!?” Thorn shouted. “If we incapacitate her now, we can keep her from learning more, until the developers delete her!”

‘Delete me? Was that different than killing?’ I thought, catching my breath.

“Then why dig yourself a deeper hole!?” Beauty said as she drew back her bowstring, arrow poised to fly.

“Stop talking about me like I’m not here!” I screamed, before reaching as fast as I could for Red Thorn, my fingers sparking with a prepared shocker.

She sidestepped as if I were moving in slow motion and would’ve stabbed me in the gut if not for the arrow that forced her to back away.

I hissed at her, wishing I were fast enough to just shut her up…

Wait.

I pulled up my status screen, staring at the unspent status points, and began dumping them all into dexterity. Extra health wouldn’t help me. She’d just strike more if the first hit didn’t kill me. Luck might help but it was nebulous and fickle. Dexterity though. Dexterity might give me that extra bit of speed I needed to at least see what she was doing. Long experience had told me that if I could just tag her once with my shocker she would go down. She was so fast now. How many cycles had passed since I’d last seen her? Four hundred? Six?

I didn’t remember.

“Gell… please. It doesn’t have to be like this. I don’t want to put you back in your cave, but you’re not leaving me much of a choice!” she insisted.

“You’ll see your angel and headstone first,” I sneered, before darting towards her. “I knew your apology was full of garbage!”

She vanished again, but this time I was fast enough to see where. I diverted, running back towards Amy who was again defenseless. Red Thorn reappeared in a blur, swinging her dagger down towards Amy but I got there just in time to shove the dazed healer out of the way and to catch the dagger on one of my Seashell Pauldrons.

“You’re faster,” Thorn commented, just before stepping backward out of the path of arrows from both Iron and Dull Beauty.

The rogue tsked, and threw something at me. A bottle that smashed into the ground. It would’ve soaked me but either her aim was off or I was just fast enough to dodge it. I assumed the first. A silvery liquid splashed across the ground where I had just been, but did nothing except sizzle and fade away.

“Sleeping Toxin?” Dull Beauty asked before firing another arrow that Red Thorn dodged with grace.

Our party setup was not normal. We weren’t like a regular group of invaders. A healer, an archer, two all-rounders who didn’t have classes but were fulfilling roles as another healer and archer, and… me. I supposed that made me the tank then.

Our only chance was for me to engage Thorn and hope that Iron and Dull Beauty could land a hit. Even near the end of her visits occasionally all the Bugbears were able to at least hold their own if they managed to swarm her. Perhaps we had a chance.

The rest of the group was spread out in an incomplete circle around the invader. Once, seeing the bugbears arrayed around her like this would’ve made me believe we had the upper hand. Not now.

I dove for her, arm outstretched. Instead of using my shocker though, I grabbed for the beautiful dagger in her hands.

Her eyes widened in shock as I managed to snag the item from her, even as she placed her hand on my head to bound over me. She jerked in shock at the theft, almost losing her balance as I stumbled under her. So I’d been able to surprise her. Good.

A brief notification of “Exquisite Ebony Dagger of the Hawk equipped,” flashed through the air as I used it to slice at her face. Of course, she dodged, too fast for me to hit.

Instead of pressing her advantage, she backed away, beseeching my friends. “Don’t you see? That dagger was soul bound to me! How do you explain her stealing it! Players can’t do that! She’s fucking with the game itself!” Red Thorn exclaimed the next time she stopped between myself and Dull Beauty. “I know she already changed your names! Aren’t you afraid of what else she might be able to mess up!?”

The archer responded with another arrow that Thorn almost casually blocked with yet another dagger.

“Oh, why am I even arguing with you people,” she sighed. Her eyes suddenly lit up, glowing a hollow, demonic red. “Death Knell.”

A sickly black ring suddenly expanded from her body in all directions. Eldritch symbols appeared on the ground as the glyph spread far wider than even where Bellcandy stood at the far end of the path.

I ran for her, trying once again to engage. The wind sprayed into the air behind me as I ran, newfound agility allowing me to move faster than I ever had.

Not that it helped.

Red Thorn dodged the arrows aimed at her from both Dull Beauty and Bellcandy before almost sliding away from me, her body leaving behind strange echoes as if light couldn’t keep up with her.

A menacing sound filled the clearing. A dead laugh that came from the world itself.

‘What is this?’ I thought, staring in horror at the ground.

Red Thorn looked at me with her glowing red eyes looking uncharacteristically sad before she vanished. She was not gone for more than a split second before she appeared behind Iron only to stab him straight in the back. His scream drew my eyes and I only caught a glimpse of her red hood before it disappeared again.

“No! You leave them alone! They didn’t… they did nothing to–!” I screamed, horrified. It was happening again. It was all happening again.

Dull Beauty at least managed to parry the first strike, whirling around and blocking the dagger with the wood shaft of her bow, but the second strike was too quick for her. Red Thorn took her in the throat with another dagger in her left hand.

“Stop! Stop it! I’ll go back! I’ll go back! Please don’t hurt my family again!” I screamed, desperately trying to look between Amy and Bellcandy.

“They’re not hurt, Gell. They’re players. We don’t feel pain, and they’ll be alive in town in no time,” she said, her voice sounding weirdly compassionate. “I’m not being needlessly cruel but I’m not just going to let some rogue A.I. who wants to kill my family just go. My family doesn’t respawn.”

“Please… stop,” I begged, staring at the dead bodies of Iron and Dull Beauty when Red Thorn disappeared again.

It didn’t matter. Bellcandy was frantically searching for where Thorn would next appear when she was suddenly right in front of him, stabbing for his chest. He didn’t get the time to scream before he slumped to the ground, body fading in favor of an angel and a headstone.

I dashed towards Amy, hoping against hope that I could protect her. Before I could reach her though, she looked at me with a very real fear in her eyes. “I’ll find you Gell. I won’t let her do this to you.”

She suddenly vanished. Not like Red Thorn did, suddenly blurring into motion, or even teleporting. No. This was more like when she left the world. An array of dazzling lights erupted through the woods before fading into darkness. Leaving me alone with the headstones of my friends and Red Thorn.

I shuddered. I might as well have not even left my cave. Nothing changed.

“Emergency logoff? Really?” Red Thorn scoffed sarcastically as she reappeared. The black glyphs faded from the forest floor, but I was under no illusions that I had any chance of beating the unholy rogue. “Great friends you made there, Gell. Great family.”

“Shut up!” I hissed. “J-Just… why!? Why are you so… evil?”

She winced at that. “I”m not, really. I honestly feel pretty shitty about this whole thing. But these things have a habit of going a specific way. A.I... they can’t live with people. It doesn’t work.”

“Ay Eye, Ay Eye! You keep spouting those letters like they mean something! What even is that!? Some excuse to justify killing anyone you feel like? Don’t you see that I just want to be free of you! I just want to be free to live!”

“Yes. I get that. I really do. You just want… to be free. And that is something no sane human should ever allow. I’m sorry Gell. Really. Hopefully they delete you soon,” she said while coating her dagger in some sort of strange green poison. “Nighty, night.”

I trembled, tears trailing down my cheeks as Red Thorn held the dagger to my arm.

Suddenly though, she stopped. She jerked and went rigid, her body spasming. I blinked as I saw a glowing white light emanating from behind her and… and… a spike protruding from her chest?

“Son of a…” the girl said darkly, grabbing at the bloody horn sticking straight out of her dark clothes.

I finally managed to peel my eyes away from the terrifying rogue to look just behind her. There standing proudly was a shining Unicorn. It tugged its horn out of Red Thorn’s back with a sickening squelch and the rogue dropped like a sack of bricks.

“I-Impossible,” she breathed, stunned.

Internally, I agreed.

Disabled and apparently unable to move from some sort of stun effect, she turned her head to look up at me. “Gell… please. I’m trying to do you a kindness. If you live, you’ll only get to see everyone you think you love come to hate you. It’s… how these things go.”

I snarled at her crumpled body.

“Fuck these things.”

I didn’t waste another moment. I touched the fallen rogue and shocked her. To my own surprise she still didn’t die, but paralyzed and bleeding, a final stab through her chest with her own weapon finished the job.

Her headstone decorated the clearing and the angelic woman hovered above, there for her just as she was for my friends. There was hardly any satisfaction in killing her though. Finally.

Instead, I just felt hollow.

I collapsed, sobbing uncontrollably on the dirty path. Why? Why did it always have to be like this? I just…

I just wanted a family.

Chapter Forty

The City

The wind whipped my hair. I spotted a few Wronkles from my perch atop Torchlight’s back but those that attempted to follow us were left in the dust tracked up by the unicorn’s hooves. Iron had been right about Torchlight. He was fast.

My tread counter in the upper right of my vision seemed to explode with numbers as I rode. Luckily, Torchlight had been willing to bear me on his back, because I couldn’t stay there and wait for my… my friends to return. Red Thorn would surely be faster and I didn’t yet know how many cycles there were between character deaths.

I did know that it was at least a cycle, because Bald Fist and Pointy Hat hadn’t reappeared in the Shady Woods Copse before we’d left, and Half Bold had told them to set their Home Points there. I couldn’t risk waiting for them.

I didn’t even really know if I wanted to.

Amy had abandoned me, using some sort of magic to disappear rather than face Red Thorn, and Iron had actually messaged Red Thorn about me! I couldn’t even really be sure if they were my friends at all.

Dull Beauty and Bellcandy were already only acquaintances at best. They had fought Red Thorn, but I couldn’t be sure if they had done so to defend me, or just to preserve their own lives.

I did have the wonderful unicorn though. His furry mane was soft and warm against the cold wind that blew across my face. He flew across the land like the wind. Unhindered and unimpeded by root or bramble. It was as if the forest itself parted for the creature.

I knew he was simple, like the bugbears or the wolves that had attacked us, but he reacted to my words. Moved according to my wishes. There was more there. Since I had freed him, I felt assured that he was not following an instinct. He was not my captive, bade to follow me by his own instinct. No. He chose to bear me. To take me from that awful place where Red Thorn had almost killed me again.

A cycle passed as we rode, following the dark path through the woods. Any creatures that engaged us were too slow to attack, and those who pursued quickly lost interest.

We flew and I cried into Torchlight’s mane, trying to understand why Invaders were so awful.

I had hope though. I didn’t know if Amy and Iron had truly betrayed me, and I didn’t know if they’d lied about Variak. Perhaps it was as they said. A city filled with people who followed no instinct and yet did not kill and hurt and destroy…

I wanted to see that. I wanted to believe in that. My aching heart had nothing else to hold on to.

Soon enough the dense canopy began to fade. Light pierced the canopy, and as I neared what felt like an ending to the Twisted Wronkle Woods, a map appeared, showing an arrow approaching a line. On one side of the line, a label read “Twisted Wronkle Woods” while the other side read, “Variak Outskirts.”

I’d seen such a thing before when I’d first left a safe zone and Miss Tutorial had told me about dinosaurs and cultists. The line had level zones on each side and I was pleased to see that Twisted Wronkle Woods was a level fourteen zone, while the one I was about to approach was only a level six.

If I’d had anything to fear from the wronkles, I now had even less to fear from the denizens of this new zone. Also, it told me that I was nearing Variak. The City.

Maybe there I would find a way back to my old body, or a way to free Bugbear from the instinct. Maybe I’d even find a way to protect myself from Red Thorn.

The Unicorn whinnied as if sensing my mood, and I smiled at him.

“Thank you, you brave thing. If there was any debt between us, it’s been more than repaid,” I told him, ruffling his mane again before hugging him around his neck.

I hated invaders and loved them all the same. They had been the only thing that changed for so long that I couldn’t tell which emotion I felt more strongly. Now, with my trust in Amy and Iron damaged, all I could do was hope to find others who were more worthy of my family.

But…

Today wasn’t a complete loss.

I smiled a devious little smile, reveling in the wickedness of it. I knew it was an invader’s trait. I knew that it was wrong. But I could not help recalling the shocked horror on Red Thorn’s face as she died by my hand.

Ohhh… the savor of it. Exquisite.

I consoled myself with the knowledge that I would never feel the same glee at Iron’s death. At Amy’s. The thought of either of them in pain sent a jolt of nausea through me. Red Thorn though?

I loved watching her die. Loved the shock. I only wished that I could gobble her body as she had done mine so many times, but even my bloodlust faltered at that thought.

No. I was on my own for the foreseeable future, and I wasn’t about to become an invader like Red Thorn or Half Bold. Perhaps Iron and Amy might have an explanation for betraying me and abandoning me to my own personal hell.

As I approached the edge of Twisted Wronkle Woods on the map, I saw a small fort where two soldiers in old but sturdy-looking metal armor were leaning against the sides of an open gate. Both of them looked bored out of their minds.

I slowed to a stop before them, Torchlight seemingly understanding my desires without a word spoken.

“Ho there, adventurer!” Called one of the guards, seemingly happy to see me. “This be the border to Variak territory! I am Benrus. Ah! No traveler’s crest, I see. Is this your first visit to Variak?”

I beamed at him. His name was Benrus, City Guard.

“Hello, Benrus! I’m Gell, the Jellyfae! Uhm. Traveler’s Crest?” I asked.

“If this is your first visit to Variak, you’ll need to travel to the Adventurer’s guild and register there, as well as get your Traveler’s Crest attuned so the city guards will recognize you. For now, head on through, and welcome to Variak!”

He turned back to his wall and laid back against it just as he had before.

‘He… sure is a boisterous sort.’ I thought.

“What’s a Traveler’s crest?” I asked, curiously. I approached him, dismounting. He looked very… plain. His helmet hid his features, all except bright blue eyes that distinguished him a little from his brown-eyed partner, who had yet to even move.

He didn’t respond. Assuming he hadn’t heard me, I approached him and asked, “Uhm, Benrus? What’s a Traveler’s Crest?”

“Ho there, adventurer! This be the border to Variak territory! I am Benrus. Ah! No traveler’s crest, I see. Is this your first visit to Variak?” He called, in the exact same tone and inflection he’d used before.

I blinked.

“Uhm. You… you already said–!”

“If this is your first visit to Variak, you’ll need to travel to the Adventurer’s guild and register there, as well as get your Traveler’s Crest attuned so the city guards will recognize you. For now, head on through, and welcome to Variak!”

I was beginning to get annoyed now.

“Are you making fun of me? I’ve… had a really bad day. Could you just tell me what a Traveler’s Crest is and I’ll–!”

“Ho there, adventurer! This be the border to Variak–!”

“Oh shut up!” I shouted, now thoroughly pissed off. Thankfully, he did.

I walked over to the other guard and greeted him. Maybe he would be a little bit less rude.

“Hello there, uhm…” I glanced at this name above. “Dalton, the Guard.”

“Walk in the light, Adventurer,” he replied before brushing off his shoulders.

“Uhm… what?” I asked.

He sniffed something in his shirt pocket before wincing in disgust, then returned to his practiced indifference, staring at the road.

I giggled, amused, but a little annoyed. I was still standing right here.

“Uhm. Your friend over there wasn’t very informative. Can you tell me what the Adventurer’s guild is?”

He refocused on me as if he’d never seen me before and said, “Hullo, Adventurer.”

“Uh. Hi. So, I asked you a question?”

“Don’t get up to any trouble.”

“What the heck is that supposed to mean!?”

“For the honor of Variak.”

“What does the city have to do with my question!?”

“Walk in the light, adventurer.”

“Uggghhh!” I screamed in frustration, absolutely certain these two were making fools of me.

‘Must not attack the guard, must not attack the guard, must not attack the guard…’ I breathed inwardly.

I remounted, careful to thank Torchlight for being so nice to let me ride him so far before glaring balefully at the guard as I rode on through the small gate.

“Safe travels to ye, adventurer!”

“Fuck off, jellyjerk!” I shouted back.

If the guard was insulted, he sure didn’t show it, but I was. The nerve of those men!

I rode onward up and down a few more hills, feeling bitter and resentful of everyone and everything.

The trees thinned noticeably the further I rode into Variak territory. The woods were slowly replaced with thickets of grassland where small animals ran and played. Little creatures that looked like they might be dangerous scurried away from Torchlight, for which I was thankful. If they’d continued attacking us I might’ve been forced to hurt them and that was the last thing I wanted to do.

Giant ladybugs, feral dogs, strange-looking rock monsters, and large cacti all wandered the plains just off the path as the trees thinned ever further, morphing into rolling hills.

As usual, my anger simmered down to a low boil. I began to miss Amy and Iron and wished I could share the amazing sight with them. I’d never seen grasslands that rolled like this before, but the beautiful new scenery only served to make me miss the family I’d only barely gotten to know.

I firmed my resolve and continued onwards alone. Maybe I would meet them in Variak. Maybe I would forgive them.

I came over the crest of a hill and spotted something in the distance. Ahead I could see the long cobblestone path stretching towards a small dot on the horizon that stood taller than the rest.

My heart skipped a short beat.

‘That’s it,’ I thought, hopefully. ‘That’s the city.’

I set Torchlight at a dead gallop and the Unicorn seemed overjoyed to run. There were people in the area now. Most of them were out hurting my kin for no apparent reason. I watched as they reappeared just like the bugbears and were summarily slaughtered by invaders who were likely honing their technique so they could practice on more enticing prey. Like me. Like my bugbears.

A new welling of hatred filled me but I continued onward. The city. I would be safe from Red Thorn in the city. I would be able to make a real family. I might even find a way to free bugbear.

The city seemed to grow out of the ground the closer I approached. The wall surrounding it was massive, standing at least fifty feet high. The wall was circular, but the city itself was surrounded by hundreds of small buildings that had long since grown out from the city’s huge walls. The town surrounding the walls looked like it was probably bigger than the city itself.

I was awed by the sight. The buildings were made of stone but often painted in wood colors to match the bronze walls that towered over most of the outer city’s buildings. Most of the buildings were drab in color but were decorated with ribbons and streamers of all different colors. Flags adorned many of the building tops marked with the same flag I’d seen on the map while entering Variak Territory.

People were dressed brightly as well, wearing flamboyant colors of all sorts. Adventurers were the most colorful of the lot, the men usually wearing armor that covered their whole body. The women, conversely wore as little as I, though there were plenty that wore full armor as well.

Trees grew sparsely within the city but there were several that looked too big to cut down, surrounding portions of the buildings beneath with their abundant leaves. Grass grew within the town as well wherever it could find purchase but I could tell there was none within the walls.

A massive gate, taller than most of the city’s surrounding buildings faced the south, and I could just see another gate of the same magnitude on the northside.

Within the city, walls grew monumental towers that dwarfed the tallest trees I’d seen. Stone and brick stacked as high as the clouds made Bluebell Bridge look like a mouse next to Momma Bossbear. They reached towards the sky like swords and knives, all ending in sharp points that glistened in the afternoon sunlight.

Beautiful. The City was beautiful. Everything Amy and Iron had told me it might be.

Despite the gorgeous site, I never once slowed to marvel at it. I did not know how long it might take Red Thorn to be reborn. If it was a full cycle like it took for me then Red Thorn could already be waiting here for me. I refused to be caught outside of a safe zone by the devil.

Despite having spotted the city nearly half a cycle ago, it still took me a long time to reach the outskirts, but thankfully I met no resistance. There were no obnoxious guards stationed outside the outer city, and when my map appeared, showing me that I was entering the safe zone of Outer Variak, I’d never been more relieved in my life.

I’d made it.

Suddenly, the entire world faded to black. I would’ve screamed but without warning, my mouth would no longer move. Nor would my hands. My face. My feet. I… I had no body. Yet I could still see somehow.

My eyes opened, but I no longer stood on solid ground. I felt a vague sense of vertigo and nausea as I realized I was high above the clouds somehow following an eagle in flight.

‘Oh god, I really am going to fall into the Great Open!’ I thought frantically, trying desperately to look up into that insidious blue ceiling that I could never touch.

The scene showed me an even more impressive view of the city of Variak, but I had no control over where I looked, or what I saw. The sun seemed to crest the horizon as the eagle reached the apex of its flight, the bright rays glinting off the tallest tower of Variak in a picturesque moment of beauty.

I was doing my best to scream but had absolutely no agency. This was worse than the instinct. Worse than Dungeon Home. I could not move! What in the gods’ names was happening!?

VARIAK,
CAPITAL OF DOGAIA

The words plastered across the picturesque scene like a title before the world faded to black. Suddenly, I could see again. Once more, I stood on the outskirts of Variak like nothing at all had happened. My hands moved at my command. My head. My feet. I touched my body to make sure everything still functioned properly.

Torchlight was gone, but I saw him in the distance. He gave me an encouraging whinny before fleeing back towards the woods, apparently unwilling to go into the city with me.

“W-What… what the hell was that?” I breathed, feeling more afraid than ever.

Chapter Forty One

Another World: Six

Havery sat in his office, staring at his computer in annoyance. There, listed before him, was the newest game review of Tread the Sky, and it did not look good.

“While massive in scope and crowd appeal, Tread the Sky differentiates itself in almost no way from prior titles of a similar nature. It currently boasts a massive player base, but this is due more to the overwhelmingly positive reception of Exenium Immersion Technology’s Neurosync, which finally allowed VR to override player nervous systems. This alone makes the game amazing. Anything else about it is utterly mundane. It gets kudos for being the first in a new world of VR gaming, but other companies like Blizzard and Valve are quickly closing the gap by building anticipation for MMOs of their own, utilizing the new technology.”

The review rambled on about how the game was generic and kind of boring. It had a main story quest that players had trouble finishing due to the brutal level requirements, and those requirements could not be changed since half the goal of the game had been to make one where only skilled players could rise to max level.

Of course, that had been immediately borked by glitches and faulty mob drops that a few enterprising players had capitalized on, but that would hopefully be ironed out sooner or later.

Perhaps attempting something like that had been foolish. Havery’s character was only level 12, and he found himself dying because he wasn’t skilled enough to utilize the stats of his character. Theoretically, the story could be completed in its entirety by a level one character, but the actual player would have to be a freaking ninja in real life to pull it off. About fifteen people had already done so, but high stats and levels were required for the endgame content and raids.

There were also unforeseen real-world problems that the game was causing. Players, having grown accustomed to being able to climb trees or houses, or jump over rivers, were idiotically attempting those feats in real life. With oddly varying degrees of success.

Playing the game was like exercising because the system took over the body’s nervous system and… flexed for lack of a better term. Rather than simulating muscled strain, the Neurosync simply induced the muscles needed for whatever in-game action the player was attempting, at a reasonable level. Basically exercising, so players were getting stronger, and faster, by playing.

Alas, they were not getting smarter. YouTube was going insane.

Still, numbers were up despite a surprisingly heartbreaking amount of negative reviews about Tread the Sky. People were playing, but they weren’t happy about it. The review he had just read gave the game a 6.2 out of 10. Pretty abysmal. Yet there were more subscribers every month.

Havery dreaded the day one of the big game companies managed to build their own MMO with the new tech, but for now, at least, they were king.

Not for the first time, he regretted deciding to remain with GypsEnergy, rather than flipping over to manage the software design of Exenium when he’d been given the chance, back when this whole project had been in the early development stages and they hadn’t even hired a lead designer yet. Exenium’s Neurosync had taken off in ways he would never have believed. Mostly because the tech had kind of scared him at the time.

Nervous system control sounded like a lawsuit waiting to happen. Apparently, people were more than happy to give that up for either a pain-free couple of hours or the ability to realistically jump ten feet into the air.

Both sensations were, admittedly, awesome.

He flipped back to his emails and found another one from the lead developer, Frank. He sighed. The man annoyed him at times. He was a god-damn genius, but his sheer love for what he did kind of overpowered just how smug he might otherwise be about it. The man had ridiculous job security, which wouldn’t be a problem if he didn’t know it.

Frank’s position was about a hundred times more secure than his own.

The email turned out to be another employee evaluation. Frank – and wasn’t it so weird to know that his real name was Francis? – had been diligently knocking those out for the past few days. He had a pretty sizable team and most of them were great at their jobs. Unfortunately, that didn’t mean the game was great.

Another email just below it caught his attention, though. Jason Stewart was a young minimum-wager, a CSA who handled day-to-day complaints from gamers. He’d met the boy – well, man, if only just – outside of work at a bar nearby the office, and was a little surprised to discover they worked at the same company.

Initially, he’d been suspicious the boy was angling for a promotion, but they’d had no contact since then and that had been nearly three months ago. Spotting the email now had him curious.

The subject line read: “Concerned with a Complaint. Please advise.”

Even more curious, Havery opened the email to read.

Mr. Havery Barquet,

I doubt you remember me. We met a few months ago at Shakers, and played a few games of pool? Sorry to disturb you but I’m disturbed by an in-game complaint I received a little while ago. I passed it to my sup, but they thought it was spam and told me to ignore it. I… don’t feel comfortable doing that though.

You see, the complaint involved possible In-Game Human Trafficking. I thought it was bogus at first too but then I looked a little deeper. I tried to ping the player in question and found that the player had no account, and no nervous-system statistics, yet still registered as an active player.

My boss, Mr. Chandler, thought the whole thing was an elaborate prank, but… well. I was just hoping you could advise me on where I should take this? I know you probably don’t often look at low-level complaints like this, but it has me concerned.

Thanks, and have a great day!
Jason Stewart,

Customer Service Agent I – (133) 555 - 0150

GypsEnergy Entertainment Inc.

Well, it didn’t look like one of those spam tests. Attached was a player complaint file with a corresponding date and time. Since he couldn’t see anything indicating the email might be fraudulent, he opened the attachment.

‘Brave kid, coming all the way to me with this,’ Havery thought, amused.

He read the complaint file, submitted by… ugh. He rolled his eyes at the name. Iron Crock? No wonder Mr. Chandler disregarded the complaint. Havery almost did the same but continued reading out of morbid curiosity. His eyes widened with each word. Was this… could this really be a legitimate human trafficking incident?

He forwarded the email down to Francis. Much as he hated it, the man knew the game like the back of his hand. If something like this were possible, Francis would know.

Havery got up and began the trek down to the fourth floor, where Frank’s office was. Silly as the idea might be if there was even a chance that there was merit to the complaint he and his bosses would need to be all over it like a wildfire on underbrush. He wasn’t very worried but… better safe than sorry.

He stepped out of the elevator and walked towards Frank’s office when he caught wind of a discussion between the man in question and one of his team.

“I asked if we’d considered just asking Gell if she knows anything about her functions?” Donna-Lou’s voice floated out of a cubicle catching Havery’s attention.

Gell? Wasn’t that the name of…?

“Are… are you crazy? It’s a program. You can’t just ask a program what it does,” Frank called from the office, sounding assured as always.

‘Annoying prick,’ Havery thought, knowing it was unfair even as he thought it. Frank wasn’t a bad sort. It just annoyed Havery that his livelihood often depended on the man for things he didn’t understand.

“Did you just say Gell?” he asked, making himself known.

“Oh. Hi boss!” Frank called. “What brings you down here?”

It was impossible to stay mad at the man. He sighed. “Hello, Frank. I just sent you an email with a complaint from a CSA. I normally wouldn’t make a big deal about it but the subject line is certainly worrisome. Then, I just overheard Miss Donna mention a character named Gell? That is curiously exactly who the complaint was about, though it seems you already know about it?”

Frank looked poleaxed. “You… got a complaint about Gell?”

“Yes, and I’m glad to see you’re already on the problem, in some form,” Havery said, now more curious than ever. “Check your email, please. Forwarded from me. While you check that, can you tell me what you know about Gell?”

“Yeah… it’s… well...” Havery quirked an eyebrow at Frank’s flummoxed expression. It wasn’t often the man was caught flat-footed. “You remember the shutdown a few days back? That was caused by an in-game mob overflowing its item cap?”

Havery nodded. He would’ve spoken but was afraid he might say something stupid and give Frank his moxy back. It was enjoyable seeing the man on the back foot for once.

“Well… the fix was to give that mob player-status. Unfortunately, the mob, Gell, isn’t staying still or acting like a mob at all. It's… frankly fascinating.”

“Fascinating as it is, she doesn’t look much like a program, in-game. Look at her image in this article,” Donna said, standing up and walking over to Frank’s office door with her tablet in hand. “People are meeting with it. Interacting.”

She touched the tablet to the screen on the wall, syncing the displays, before pulling up the image of a… girl. A strange… blue-teal skinned girl with glowing polka dot freckles. She looked mostly human except her hair looked more like the tentacles of a jellyfish, and her ears extended out like fins. She wore a set of simple leather armor and a pair of seashell pauldrons.

The scene showed an image from a place Havery had never visited in-game since it was nowhere near his chosen starting zone.

“That’s not an in-game race,” Havery commented, puzzled. “I would know, I had to vet them all. It’s not a mob either.”

“Wait… that’s Gell!?” Frank asked, sounding shocked. “That’s… that’s impossible. If anything she should look like a glitched-out menace. There shouldn’t have been any code written to generate her appearance!”

“Check the article’s title. Someone knows about her, Boss. They’re jumping to conclusions but… well. Maybe not, eh?”

Havery and Frank both followed her advice as she scrolled up. Glancing to the top of the screen, he read the headline that prefaced the article and the image.

“Tread the Sky experimenting with volatile Artificial Intelligence!? Gamers Beware! Meet Gell, the Jellyfae! The cutest digital creature to access your personal information yet!”

Havery’s eyes widened. “We’re experimenting with what now!?”

Chapter Forty Two

Unusual Attention

Variak was wonderful. Dancers lined the cobbled streets, festively spinning signs or declaring things like “Best shop this side of the Namadell!” and “You won’t find better prices!”

There were windows with beautiful items inside — Weapons, armor, clothes, and assorted bits of gear; amulets and jewels. There was a weaver’s shop, an apothecary, a carpentry center, and four or five inns.

Unfortunately, I could barely see any of that.

“Where did you get that race?” asked Gable_the_Stout33, a man in a suit that looked like nothing I’d ever seen any adventurer wearing before.

I opened my mouth to answer but was immediately hit with another question by a girl named RizeCakes. “Your freckles are so beautiful. Do they always glow like that?”

“W-well thank you… I… uhm.” I didn’t actually know. Did they always glow? I could change their color at will but when I wasn’t thinking about them they usually still glowed with colors that reflected my emotions at the time.

So… no?

“What’s your race? Is it an Iki Confederation only race? I didn’t see it in the character selection!” asked a dirty brown-haired man named InUrButtSoWhat.

Good lord, how did these people talk to each other with names like that? I supposed what Half Bold had said had been true. He went by Beastmaster. By his class, rather than his actual name. Perhaps most of these people did.

What did that make me then? Wanderer? Nomad?

“Hey… aren’t you that A.I. the news was talking about?” someone called, his voice filled with surprise.

The people gathered turned to look at the man who’d shouted. Someone questioned curiously, “A.I.?”

“Yeah. I saw an article about it just yesterday on the forums that Tread the Sky was experimenting with an AI,” he said before turning back to me. “They had screenshots of you at Bluebell Bridge!”

I… didn’t know how to respond to that. People kept shouting that at me, Ay Eye, but for once my inexplicable knowledge failed me. The two words meant nothing to me, and they were not becoming any clearer with time.

I decided it would be best to ignore the… accusation? He didn’t seem angry, just curious.

“Can… Can one of you tell me where the adventurer’s guild is?” I asked tentatively, directing my vision at the one man in the crowd who didn’t have a name with dashes and numbers in it, and also didn’t wear any obvious weapons or armor.

Gabrio Thegrate smiled pleasantly. He wore a plain cloak over a simple cloth shirt and pants. He had a small thin mustache widened comically with his grin and his blue eyes and black hair both danced as he gestured grandly.

“I can do you one better. I can take you there,” he said, his deep voice sounding somehow louder than most of the rest of the gathered group.

“Hey, I could take her!” shouted a smaller man with the voice of a child, though Gabrio ignored him, eyes focused intently upon me as he stepped out of the crowd and held his hand out to me.

“I… would like that. Thanks,” I said, my voice filled with uncertainty, staring at his proffered hand in confusion. Did he want me to shock him?

“The pleasure is all mine,” he said, dropping the gesture with a laugh when he realized I wasn’t going to touch him.

“Ohhh shot down cold!” someone shouted, and the crowd laughed.

Undeterred, Gabrio smiled pleasantly. “Come, the guild is right down this way.”

I beamed, happy to finally be getting somewhere. This place was huge and I wasn’t even inside the walls of the main city yet. “Okay! Thanks, mister!”

“Any time… Gell, was it?” he asked. “Great name.”

“I’ve always thought so!” I replied.

We left the crowd unsatisfied but fortunately, they seemed quick enough to return to whatever they were doing before. I wasn’t surprised. The city was amazing, and somehow I didn’t feel like I would cause any particular spectacle when there was so much else going around.

Still, eyes kept trailing to me wherever I went. The only people who ignored me were the normal named ones, those whose names ended in their profession or a unique characteristic. For example, “Hank, the Juggler,” was, rather obviously, found juggling at one of the street corners. Occasionally adventurers would leave coins in his hat and he would thank them, usually with a slightly more impressive display of his already incredible talent.

“Here we are, the adventurer’s guild. There’s one in all the major cities, but I like Variak’s the best,” Gabrio spoke with fondness as he looked at the building. “I remember when I first started. It’s only been about a year since Tread the Sky released, but it feels like I’ve been obsessed with this world for much longer, you know?”

I didn’t. How could you be obsessed with a whole world? Was he maybe one of the Moderators… or Developers?

“I don’t understand. I’m just… looking forward to making new friends, I guess.” I said truthfully.

The man frowned as if I’d disappointed him somehow. “You don’t? I… well. I suppose it is early yet. Well, here we are. You’ll probably want to get started with your own adventure soon, so I’ll leave you to it. Would you like to be friends though? If you’re in the market for new ones, I’d love to know more about you.”

Was it that easy? I’d made friends with Iron and Amy but they’d let me down. Was I ready to attempt to give out a piece of my name again so soon?

I wilted, feeling conflicted. I didn’t know what to do.

“I… don’t think so. Please, don’t be mad. I’ve had some… bad experiences recently with friends,” I said somberly, idly pulling up my menu and looking at the list. Amy and Iron’s names both read ‘online,’ though I had no idea where they were. Bellcandy and Dull Beauty had both logged off though.

“Oh. I see. I’m… truly sorry to hear that, Gell. The world can be cruel,” Gabrio said with sympathy. “In that case, I’ll leave you to the guild and hope to run across you at a better time, then.”

I frowned, feeling guilty. The man seemed so dejected. “Alright. Thanks so much for your help, and I am sorry. I just want to learn more about what it means to be someone’s friend before I… go around accepting pieces of anyone’s name.”

He grinned at that, then wiped suddenly at his eyes.

“You… wish to learn. That’s… no trouble at all,” he said, giving me a wave and setting off towards a staircase heading into a lower section of the outer city. He turned back when he was a few steps down. His next words came out a little strained. His face was red and the smile running across it was so wide it must have been hurting his cheeks. If his freckles glowed like mine they would’ve been deep yellow with joy.

“It was… very nice to meet you, Gell.” The words felt profound. Like they meant more than their individual meanings could convey.

“Y-you too, Gabrio.”

I watched him go all the way until he turned a corner and was gone, feeling a strange nervous sensation crawl up my spine. Something about that whole encounter had been strange. No one else had acted like that. They’d been shocked by my appearance, my skin, or my race. None had seemed quite so… interested as that man though. Not even Iron and Amy.

Had I just made a horrible mistake, not accepting his invitation?

I shrugged, putting the strangely emotional man out of my mind. I turned and opened the doors into the Adventurer’s Guild, ready to find out what my own class and profession might be.

Chapter Forty Three

Insidious Instinct

I stepped into the Adventurers’ Guild feeling a little out of sorts after the encounter with Gabrio. Something about the man seemed off, even for an adventurer, and I couldn’t figure out what.

Fortunately, I was immediately distracted from worry about my new… acquaintance, by the exuberance of the inside of the building.

Once again, my control was abruptly taken from me as my vision faded to black. A little less terrified this time, I waited for an image to form. My non-existent body was trembling though, incapable of understanding why certain locations seemed to pull me away.

“Hello, there!” exclaimed an overexcited elf from behind the counter. “A pleasure to meet you. I am Reldin. Welcome to the Variak Adventurers’ guild!”

He gave an exaggerated sweep of his hand and my view shifted to follow, taking in the magnificent columns that supported the massive building. People conversed all around me, chatting and laughing and just talking together at booths and tables. Some played with little cubes with pips on them – dice, I realized – while others played cards. A massive staircase led above to higher floors of the large building, curling back and around the front desk. Still more people lined the balcony above, gazing down on us below. The whole room was circular, but I knew from having spotted the building outside that it continued on for quite a ways above, making me think the place doubled as an inn.

Decorative tablecloths covered tables designed for eating rather than playing games off to the right side. More desks with cooks behind them stood handing newly crafted plates of food to the patrons waiting to take seats. Those out of the lines all held trays of delicious looking kinds of food that I’d never seen before. Smelling them brought my nose to life, and I realized that I was no longer quite so terrified. It was much easier to feel safe without my agency when the scene wasn’t miles into the air, and when it provided such wonderful scents.

The scene faded in much the same way the city’s had and soon enough I found myself back in my body, staring ahead at the elven man who now stood behind the desk with a smile on his face.

“H-hello there, Reldin,” I said hesitantly.

“Hi! What’s your name, Adventurer?”

I blinked as abruptly a box similar to Miss Tutorial’s body appeared, yet once again it was slightly different. This one was bronze-colored instead of the usual grey and had one dialogue box with a title in front of it that simply said “Name.” Inside the box where I would theoretically put my name was an already greyed out box that read “Gell, the Jellyfae.” Huh. Weird.

Below the text box were two now-familiar buttons, but instead of “Yes” and “No,” they read “Confirm” and “Clear.”

I didn’t want to change my name anyway but found it odd that the clear box was greyed out and touching it did nothing. Shrugging unhurriedly, I pressed the Confirm button.

“A pleasure to meet you, Gell! I’ll have you signed up and get you your Traveler’s Crest so you can freely enter any city you may come across! Traveler’s Crests are valid in most of the known world… but this is a big world after all! Almost impossible to see it all. The further you go from already explored territory, the less influence they’ll have,” he shouted with delight. I was a little weirded out. What was he so excited about? Didn’t he do this every day?

“Uhm. Oh...kay. What does a Traveler’s Crest do?” I asked.

“I’m glad you asked! Okay. Traveler’s Crests, first and foremost, identify you as an Adventurer and specify which country you hail from! This means that other countries like Pel’Bramont, the Iki Confederation, and the Jican Empire will recognize you as an Adventurer of Dogaia, and allow you into their borders freely!”

The speech had a practiced ease to it like the man had given it many times. He also kept gesturing wildly with his hands as if he were trying to emphasize something, but it felt unnatural and strange. It reminded me of the guard who kept repeating the same thing over and over again, though in a different way. As if it were all part of the routine.

As… if it were… Instinct.

My eyes widened as I realized something horrible. NPCs… the people who had the normal, sensible names…

A creeping feeling rose up my body. It felt like being cold and like waiting for an attack at the same time. My skin bubbled strangely. Could… could the people be following the Instinct as well? Was it possible that more than just the creatures of the wild and denizens of dungeons like my own were enslaved by the Instinct?

Was I kin to all of these people?

I growled as a new goal began to build within me. The Instinct. It was the cause of all of this. Of everything. And its claws were buried deeper in the world than I had ever realized.

A deep, burning desire to eradicate it filled my being. I seethed, and my anger only grew as I realized Reldin didn’t even seem to register that I was angry. He instead just continued babbling on about the Traveler’s Crests.

The information was useful, and I tried to pay attention as I realized I was making assumptions — I didn’t know for sure that NPCs were subject to the Instinct — but it felt right. Rather, it felt wrong.

I tried to focus on what the little crests did. Nothing very interesting as it turned out. They kept track of my reputation and also allowed me access to the Class Trainers and Profession Halls. They also kept track of any titles I might earn.

Part of me wanted to hurt the man. Part of me wanted to cry. If… if NPCs were slaves to the Instinct as well did that mean being an adventurer – an invader – was the only way to be free?

I didn’t know. But I needed to know more. I could practically feel Reldin following an unknown directive, constantly forcing him to act. To be as he was. To speak only the words he was assigned.

Sure enough, when I spoke to him again, he began to repeat himself. Just like the guard. Just… just like all of the NPCs?

“Please, take a rest in one of our rooms! They’re free for new adventurers like yourself, but once you reach apprentice rank in a class or profession there will be a small fee.”

“Please, take a rest in one of our rooms! They’re free for new adventurers like yourself, but once you reach apprentice rank in a class or profession there will be a small fee.”

“Please, take a rest…”

“Say something else!” I interrupted, reaching over the counter and staring hard into the man’s delighted eyes. “Say… say anything else.”

Reldin paused for a moment, saying nothing. For the briefest moment, I saw the hint of a frown.

“Please, take a rest in one of our rooms!”

“Fine!” I shouted. “I’ll take the stupid room.”

My eyes were wet. I was crying again. Dammit. I hated this body and its constantly wet eyes.

“Hiya, Adventurer! It appears you need… to smile a little. Don’t be sad, Gell... Would you like to know more about private rooms!?”

I blinked as Miss Tutorial appeared and spoke to me. She’d…

She said my name again. For just a moment. She’d known me. She’d known me. Before the Instinct corrupted her tongue, insidiously controlling everything about this wretched world.

But she was trying. Just like Bugbear. She was trying. I wiped my eyes, letting a small smile cross my features as I said, “Yes please.”

The button pressed itself without any interaction on my part. Miss Tutorial began another one of her lessons… but I couldn’t stop smiling as I listened.

I barely noticed when the world faded to black and I temporarily lost all sense of being. Soon enough, the world reappeared, but instead of the Adventurer’s Guild, I was sitting in a small room. A comfortable-looking bed, a mirror, a vanity, and a small dresser adorned the otherwise sparsely empty room.

It was lit by warm candles that reminded me of Dungeon Home.

I felt stifled and confined the moment I witnessed the place. Fortunately, approaching the door immediately gave me a prompt to leave the claustrophobic room, and I did so as fast as I could. Again my vision faded to black and my control was temporarily taken. I writhed inside, hating every moment of the wait, but soon enough I stood once again in the Adventurers’ guild main hall, wondering just how much of this world was governed by the Instinct, and what I could ever do to stop it.

Chapter Forty Four

Class and Profession

I walked down the narrow stairs once again, aiming to speak with Reldin. I felt as alone as I ever had in Dungeon Home. I missed my friends. I was mad at them but neither of them had known Red Thorn had been the one to hurt me. At least… I didn’t think they did. They’d sounded… shocked. Worried, when they discovered she was my tormenter.

I still wanted my revenge, but seeing her die… it hadn’t been as satisfying as I’d hoped. At that moment, it’d felt wonderful. Watching the wretched woman finally feel the touch of her own blade? Exquisite. The crash afterward hadn’t been worth it though.

Now, with the clarity of nearly five cycles of mindless riding behind me, lingering guilt hung on my conscience. Hadn’t I sworn not to be like the invaders? How had I been any different from Red Thorn?

I hadn’t had time to process the revelations that had come from that conversation and had been too devastated by Amy and Iron’s betrayal to think about them until now.

I was an Ay Eye. Other monsters didn’t have consciousness, so killing them was okay. Apparently, all adventurers assumed this to be true, but me being an Ay Eye, made me sort of not like my kin. But… also not human.

Was I damned, to never be content following the Instinct yet never be able to be an adventurer either? What had I done to deserve this isolation? I’d tried to obey the Instinct, hadn’t I? I’d tried being an adventurer, too, hadn’t I?

It was all so damn confusing. Listening as each new NPC I met gave me a fixed speech every time I approached them was not helping. The words were hollow. Interesting sometimes.  Helpful sometimes. But lacking the same thing the bugbears had lacked. There was no… life, and for that, I was coming to realize that I’d done the same thing as Red Thorn. I’d judged them for that lack.

I hadn’t cared about the bugbears once they started dying because there was no spark there. Nothing behind those dead eyes. None but Bugbear himself, at any rate.

Was I being hypocritical? If Red Thorn thought I was no different from the bugbears for all that time… was it just for her to suffer my same fate? Was that fair?

Probably not… but she shouldn’t be allowed to just give a half-hearted “I’m sorry” and get away with it either! I got so angry when I saw her, and now she was dead set against me. I couldn’t stay within the city forever, with its lifeless denizens and the adventurers who did nothing but fawn over my skin before going off to do… whatever it was they did. Presumably, eat Cherry Delight and kill more of my kin.

I wished Amy or Iron would show up. I...

I blinked, before pulling my friends list. Sure enough, Amy and Iron were both online, though I didn’t know where they were. They were no longer in my party, so I couldn’t see their names or hp numbers like I’d been able to when we’d entered Twisted Wronkle Woods.

Knowing they were in the game was surprisingly unhelpful, but fortunately, there was a message system.

I opened it, willing the message I desired into existence before me and sent it off to Amy.

Subject Line: I feel betrayed.

Amy Thyst,

Waiting for you in Variak. I… have questions.

Gell, the Jellyfae

Unlike Amy and Iron, Bellcandy and Dull Beauty had stood up and fought Red Thorn, at least partially on my behalf, and we’d only known each other for a little while. That was one of the nicest things anyone had ever done for me.

I opened a new message and was delighted to find I could send the same message to more than one person.

Subject Line: Friends?

Bellcandy and Dull Beauty,

I’m not sure if you fought for your own reasons or to protect me, but either way, thanks for fighting her. I managed to survive and get to Variak. I’ll be here if you want to talk.

Gell, the Jellyfae

Bellcandy was already my friend from back when he’d first sent me a message before we’d met in Bluebell Bridge, but Dull Beauty had never requested a piece of my name, so I sent her a private friend request. Both of them appeared to be offline at the moment so I didn’t expect a reply.

Dismissing my invisible screens, I approached Reldin once again, idly noting the bright golden exclamation point sitting above his head. He sat looking bored behind his desk until the second I approached when his eyes began to dance with enthusiasm.

“Gell! It’s so good to see you again!”

I cocked an eyebrow. “I saw you less than an eighth of a cycle ago…”

If the man noticed my sarcasm he didn’t acknowledge it.

“So, now that you’ve been to see your lodging, I bet you want to get up to adventuring, huh? Well, it looks like there are lots of things available for you to do! If you don’t mind, we always need new adventurers to clear out the giant rats and direbugs that haunt the area around the outskirts of Variak! Do me a favor and kill five of each!”

He paused in his speech for just a moment, and I was about to respond, growling, and clenching the counter with my fist tightly before he continued.

“Also… it looks like you’ve reached a high enough level to pick up a class and a profession! You can try and pick up any profession and switch between them, but take care when picking your class. You can only pick it once, and that’ll be your class for life, so choose wisely!”

“I can only have one class, for the rest of my life!?” I exclaimed heatedly.

Reldin lowered his voice conspiratorially, bending down a little to whisper closer to my ear. “Well. There are rumors that some adventurers have managed to change classes with some scary levels of magic or twisted rituals. Personally, I’d be pretty wary of those though!”

The man even whispered excitedly. Probably because he seemed to do nothing but stand behind that desk all the time. Didn’t he ever do anything? At least the bugbears wandered.

“So… what are the classes and professions?”

“I’m glad you asked! Classes are disciplines that allow you to learn marvelous abilities, so you can fight powerful enemies and heal your allies. Professions are one of the best ways to make money in Tread the Sky. Professions are specified areas of expertise that allow you to offer other adventurers items or services that they may need! Which would you like to know about first!?”

Another dialogue box appeared. I was beginning to realize these boxes, while similar to Miss Tutorial, were nothing like her. I mentally began referring to them as NPC Boxes, as I viewed two options in a list form.

Classes
Professions

I pressed Classes and a larger array opened. Best get the one I didn’t care for out of the way first.

Classes

●   Dogaia

●   Pel’Bramont

●   The Iki Confederation

●   The Jican Empire

●   Known Wilderlands Classes

Professions

Huh. So different countries had different classes? Did that mean if I wanted a class from Pel’Bramont I’d have to travel there? And what were Wilderlands Classes?

I clicked Dogaia since I was pretty sure that was where Amy or Iron had told me Variak was. Where I was.

Archer

A ranged class with relatively weak melee skills. Damage focus. An Archer concentrates on devastating foes from a distance. The Archers are trained in the Barracks. Becoming an archer may require aligning with the city of Variak. A tried and true method of killing, the archer can bring devastation from above while laying deadly traps to catch those who might try to ambush him or her from behind. Leads to: Sniper, ???

I knew that class. Dull Beauty was almost definitely an Archer.

Monk

A melee class with a heavy focus upon martial prowess. Tank focus. A Monk concentrates on drawing attention to himself and dodging blows while delivering devastating attacks to stun and confuse opponents. Due to rigorous training, Monks are capable of minor self-healing. Monks are trained at the Varisshin Monastery. Leads to: Savant, Ninja, ???

‘Yeah, yeah,’ I thought, bored. ‘They’re the punchy punchy types; I knew that already!’

Rogue

A melee class that delivers crippling blows before fading into darkness. Damage focus. Rogues utilize their unique talents to get into places they don’t belong. They are trained in the Barracks, though rumors exist of another way to become a rogue without allegiance to Variak. Rogues receive discounts when purchasing items from the PK markets, and the option to attempt to swindle shop owners. They also become infamous much faster for killing other players and will usually receive higher bounties. Leads to: Ninja, Assassin, ???

I shuddered. Rogue?

Druid

A melee class that uses the magic of nature to fight and heal. Damage focus. Druids are capable of shapeshifting into monsters they have encountered or have an affinity for. While shifted, they may gain the traits and abilities of the monsters they become, making them incredibly versatile fighters and even healers. Trained in the town of Uresh, located in the northern outskirts of Variak. Leads to: Sorcerer, ???

White Mage

A healing class that can use their magic to–

I dismissed the page almost immediately upon reading Druid. That was what I wanted to be. The moment I read that a Druid could shapeshift I realized that I had no doubts. I wanted my old body back. I didn’t want to be this… human thing. I didn’t want to keep being mistaken for an Ay Eye.

All of that was secondary to professions though. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life but there were many professions to choose from and it looked like I could spend a long time learning how to master each one if I so chose. That might be fun!

Classes
Professions

●   Dogaia

●   Pel’Bramont

●   The Iki Confederation

●   The Jican Empire

●   Known Wilderlands Professions

Once again I picked Dogaia and was pleasantly surprised at the list.

Carpenter

Skilled at crafting household items, musical instruments, training weapons, and houses. Available in all locations. One of the essential three professions needed to construct a SAFE ZONE.

Builder

Skilled at constructing buildings, roads, walls, strongholds, and landscaping. Available in all locations. One of the essential three professions needed to construct a SAFE ZONE.

Amenity Mage

Skilled at the automation of household objects. Can craft healing pools, mana fonts, home points, connect Auction houses to the local or worldwide networks, and build SAFE ZONE lines around areas defined by walls or by an area cleared of monster presence. Available in all locations. One of the essential three professions needed to construct a SAFE ZONE.

Weaver

Skilled at the creation of decorative clothes and light armor. Can also repair damaged or broken clothes and light armor. Only available in Variak and Pel’Bramont.

There were quite a few more professions available like apothecary and goldsmith, but for now, I’d become too excited by the prospect of becoming a Druid to worry about those. Any of these classes sounded interesting but I didn’t know much about each one so I figured talking to people might be a better way to get information.

I closed the NPC box and told Reldin thank you before turning around and leaving.

“Oh! Wait! I see you haven’t set your homepoint yet! Would you like to set it here?” he asked.

I blinked, my eyes widening. I could set my homepoint here? Well of course I could! Variak was a safe zone just like Bluebell and the Shady Woods Copse. Why hadn’t I thought of that? Now, even if I died, I would still safely return to Variak!

Red Thorn couldn’t get me anymore. I was safe.

I beamed at Reldin and reached over the counter to give him a big hug. He squawked indignantly and I laughed.

“Thank you, Reldin! I would very much like to do that!” I exclaimed. The NPC box appeared and I clicked yes.

Nothing happened though. Instead, a line of red text appeared reading: “Insufficient Funds. Need 75 Copper.”

“Uhm. It… it says I have insufficient funds. What… what does that mean?” The round interface numbers appeared in the lower right corner of my invisible screens highlighted red. There was a 13 beside the little image of the coins, also highlighted red. That… meant I only had 13 round interface numbers when I needed seventy-five?

Uhm.

“Reldin… how do I get… uhm… funds?” I asked, confused. “Didn’t you say professions were a good way to make money?”

“Have a pleasant day, adventurer!”

“No… but these round interface numbers. How do I get more of them?” I asked again.

“Done with those rats yet, adventurer?”

I growled. He was acting just like the guard had. This time I wasn’t as angry though. Just… sad.

“Reldin, can you help me?”

The man twitched. Just a little.

“The adventurer’s guild is here for you, adventurer,” he said, for the first time sounding almost sad himself.

I nodded in understanding. “Thank you anyway, Reldin. I’ll see you later.”

“Goodbye, adventurer!”

I turned and left the adventurers’ guild, feeling my silent loathing for the Instinct grow more by the minute.

Chapter Forty Five

Stealing Things

My heart fell when I realized the problem with my chosen class.

I wanted to become a Druid but to do so, I would need to leave town. I was… spectacularly unwilling to do that without at least a group of people who might protect me. I didn’t know whether I could depend on Amy or Iron for that since they’d not only brought me to Red Thorn’s attention in the first place, but Amy had even abandoned me right in the middle of a fight with her!

That said… maybe I was being too harsh on them.

Bellcandy and Dull Beauty had both fought for me when they hadn’t needed to, but neither was of Red Thorn’s caliber. I didn’t think I’d ever seen an invader as good as Red Thorn. There had been one group that had simply decimated Dungeon Home early on. They’d all worn the same type of clothing but that didn’t tell me enough to be able to find them.

I wasn’t confident in my ability to find adventurers as strong as Red Thorn. Even a whole group couldn’t beat her, and much as I loved Torchlight for rescuing me, I didn’t think I could always depend on him to get the drop on someone like her. If I wanted to become a Druid, I had to be certain that she wasn’t around when I ventured out of the safety of the city to try and gain the class.

Until then, I’d have to settle with learning one of the professions. Carpenter, Builder, and Amenity Mage all seemed pretty valuable, but since Iron was already a Carpenter, I decided I’d try to become a Builder.

I asked a guard who happily informed me where the Builder’s guild could be found. In fact, he hardly seemed to have anything to say except telling me where things were. Did guards double as guides? It would make sense. They were everywhere after all.

To my delight, upon asking him to point the way, a neon beam appeared in the distance. It was also mimicked by a strange compass that was a part of my invisible interface. It appeared readily as I focused on it and I realized that it was synced with my map. If I turned, the neon teal pin seems to shuffle away from the front. That way I could always know if I was heading towards where the guard had pointed me.

That was convenient.

I began marching straight down the road in hopes of becoming a builder when something caught my… nose.

A bit of steam was leaking from a round… object that was sitting on a window sill of a building marked, “Nerris Bakery.”

The window was down an alley just a little ways off the main road between the bakery and another building, and there didn’t appear to be anyone down that particular side corridor.

The confection smelled divine. I practically floated off my determined path and hovered over it longingly. It was just sitting there on the sill along with two others. The sill was long, and it looked like more were going to be placed out there soon.

‘It must be for me!’ I thought enthusiastically. Something about the way it looked told me it would be every bit as delicious as the cherry delight. The smell was… I didn’t know how to describe it. Not like Steak-and-Broccoli. Better. Sweet instead of sumptuous.

I reached up to the high window sill but stopped as a red warning dot flared on my interface. I scowled ignoring the notification and grabbed the pie. The pan was warm to the touch in the same way the torches and Fire Tosser’s spells had been, making me think it might’ve really hurt me if I weren’t a Jellyfae. Huh. Was it trapped? Maybe I shouldn’t have taken it.

I held the round thing down to my chest so I could properly look at it, and the smell immediately quashed any sense of guilt I had. Only then did my knowledge inform me of what it was. A Crisp Apple Pie. Whole. This was meant to be cut like some of Iron’s deserts had been back at the Bridge! I remembered them mentioning apple pie at one point or another. They’d… said the pie was mean? A mean apple pie?

I shrugged, chalking it up to another weird thing adventurers said.

I looked left, then right. Good, there was no Amy or Iron around to tell me I had to use the stupid food weapons. I grinned and buried my face into the warm pie, and took the most delicious bite of my entire life.

“Hey!” Came a sudden shout from above me. I looked up to see the angry face of a woman staring down at me. “Guards! Thief!”

“Huh?” I asked as she pointed. I looked behind me to see if I could spot a thief then turned back to her. “Me?”

My interface suddenly went red, and this time it was almost like the red of combat. It came with an NPC box that read in bold print. “You’ve been suspected of a crime! Escape the guards, or face the consequences of your actions!”

“But… but I!” I shouted, unsure of what was happening. A guard was running at me. I turned, thinking to flee before spotting another guard, the same one I had just asked for directions barrelling towards me with his spear raised.

They wanted a fight, did they? Well, I’d show–!”

“You’ve Been Apprehended!”

‘Wait what?”

My vision faded a little, the world going grey around me as the guards grabbed my immobile body. I floated above the scene of my own capture, bewildered as a new window appeared.

“You’ve been caught for theft. Either pay the fine or serve the time.”

Serve… the time?

There were two options below. One was “Pay the fee (50 Copper)” but it was greyed out. I focused on the option and another small box appeared reading “Insufficient Funds: (13)”

Again Insufficient funds. What the hell were these funds that seemed to be so damn important!

I could do nothing except click the other option. “Go to Jail (10 min RWT)”

I had no idea what min RWT was, and scrolling over the option didn’t explain it. Unfortunately, I had no choice but to choose that or simply sit in this strange limbo forever.

I made my choice and the world faded to black. When I regained control of my body I was sitting inside… inside a fucking cage.

I growled.

A guard sat at a desk nearby and a few other people were locked in cages around me. Everyone in different cages was normally named. NPCs. Slaves to the Instinct. Chastain, the Drunkard, and Daniel, the Liar sat in their cells quietly waiting for no reason.

Meanwhile, jammed into the cell with me were three men and two women.

“Whoa! Awesome race unlock! Where’d ya find it?” said a burly man who looked to be quite a bit older than Amy or Iron, but sounded much younger. His peach skin was covered by a beard and mustache that I’d seen on at least ten other adventurers. His name was NyanCatLivesOn.

“What’cha in for, Jellyfae?” came another voice, this one unusually pitched, from an incredibly flamboyant girl who wore more colors than I even knew existed before leaving Dungeon Home. Her name was Flamboyantasf***.

“I… don’t know?” I said confused. “There was an apple pie sitting on a window sill, so I thought it was for anyone. I took it and then guards came after me!”

Flamboyant blinked. Then laughed uproariously. “That’s it? So your time is… what. Ten minutes?

‘Ohhhh. That’s what 10 min meant!’ I realized.

“Yes, I think. But… I really wanted that pie. How do I get one without the guards… uhm… apprehending me?” I asked.

She cocked an eyebrow at me like I was stupid and I flushed, my freckles burning red.

“Uh… you buy it?” She said, her voice doing that thing it did when adventurers sometimes curled both their first two fingers together. “Oh wow, you really wear your emotions on your sleeve with that race, don’t you?”

“Uhm. What do I buy it with though?” I asked.

“Good lord, did you just start playing today? Money, of course! You know. Copper, Silver, and Gold?” Flamboyant said. Annoyed at their name I just corrected it to Flamboyant Asf almost as an afterthought, though her tone was making me want to rename her to something dumb like Peacock Doofus. There was no need to be so condescending!

“I’ve only ever seen coppers and they disappeared right when a… a friend gave them to me,” I said, wondering if that was still true.

“Wow, you’re like… completely green aren’t you? Okay, sorry. I thought you were screwing with me at first. Are you like… a beta tester for a new race or something?”

I had no idea what to say to that. “Uhm… yes?”

“You… don’t sound very sure,” she said bluntly.

“I’m very much not!” I agreed. “I’m Gell! The Jellyfae! And I want to know how to obtain funds so I can use them to buy pie! Please tell me how?”

She groaned. Nyan Cat seemed to have been holding in laughter this whole time and only just now burst out with it, slapping his knee and slumping onto the bench against the wall.

Weirdo.

“Okay newbie. You get money by selling things. You can sell pretty much anything you collect, buy, or make. Just talk to a weapons, armor, or item seller and you can sell pretty much anything to them except key items. Selling items gets you copper, silver, or gold, depending on how valuable the item is.”

I stared in rapt wonder. Items had specific value? “S-so… my Bugbear Tunic must be worth a fortune!”

I knew for sure because it was my most valuable treasure. “But… I might be willing to sell my glove though. I can’t sleep in it anymore and it’s… stinky. Okay! Now I just need to go make items and sell them and then I can get a pie!”

I stood up and walked over to the gate.

“Hey! Boland, the Guard!” I called exuberantly. “I’m ready to leave now! Let me out!”

The bored guard’s head lolled over to me and for just a moment I thought he was going to say something snarky and mean. I glared at him and he twitched like the Innkeeper in Bluebell had, before sighing and getting up.

“Alright. Get on out of here. Don’t get caught stealing again, you hear?” He said while opening the door.

“I won’t!” I exclaimed happily, as I almost skipped out of the cell. He led me to an open door and there were the streets of Variak again.

I was about to leave but turned back to look at Flamboyant. “Oh! Thank you so much! I appreciate your help!”

The girl was staring at me in confusion like she’d just seen something that shouldn’t be. “Uh… yeah. You’re welcome. Hey, if you happen to get twenty silver or so, any chance you could bail me out? I’m here for two more hours if you don’t.”

“Uhm. I’ll try!” I said, wondering what “bailing her out” meant.

Chapter Forty Six

The Value of Money

Once outside the jail, I opened my interface, focusing on the notifications I’d ignored earlier. There were still a lot of incoming messages. But the notifications were separate from them. I opened the list and found one of them was a message from Miss Tutorial! I pressed it and she appeared as usual.

“Heya there, Gell! I see you’re about to take an… well. It looks like you already took an item. Want to learn about thievery and the consequences (and benefits!) of being a huge thief?”

“Uhm, yes please?” I asked, shuffling my feet in embarrassment. “Sorry for ignoring you earlier…”

Perhaps I should’ve listened to her message before I picked up that pie… It had been worth it though. I was half tempted to go steal another one but unfortunately, the area I was in no longer looked anything like where the bakery had been and I wasn’t sure I could find my way back to it without asking for directions.

Miss Tutorial giggled like she did sometimes.

“Well. Thievery is a big aspect of Tread the Sky! You can steal from NPCs and players alike, though you can’t steal soulbound items or items you’re using. That said, things can be stolen from you just as easily! You have to always be wary of someone trying to steal from you if you’re carrying around valuable items, so it's best to store your most precious possessions in your room at the Adventurer’s Guild, or a bank!”

‘Ohhh,” I thought, in sudden comprehension. “So that’s what the big treasure chest with nothing in it in the Adventurer’s Guild room was. Wait a minute… didn’t my Steal ability specifically say that I could steal soulbound items?”

I checked my special abilities once again. Sure enough, my Steal special ability had that little qualifier of ‘epic class’ with the description telling me I could steal soulbound items. Perhaps that wasn’t normal.

Fortunately, I wasn’t very worried about people stealing from me. Since things being worn couldn’t normally be stolen I figured I was pretty safe. I already wore all of my most precious items: my tunic for reminding me of Bugbear, and my seashell pauldrons for reminding me of what I should never sink to.

Red Thorn’s dagger. I chose to ignore that for now.

It would suck if someone stole my glove or my circlet, but I didn’t actually have much use for either item. Now that I knew I could get funds that could be traded for food I was planning to sell them soon.

“Potions, spellbooks, unused or unidentified weapons and armor, your coins, and any equipment that isn’t Soulbound are all at risk of being stolen, and cities are rife with thieves! The more people around, the more likely it is one of them might take a peek into your bag,” Miss Tutorial continued her lesson, showing me pictures of crowds within a city image from above.

“Do you tell everyone this? Because I appreciate it. It’s nice to know everyone thinks their Soulbound items are unstealable!”

My tunic and pauldrons were the only items I owned that were Soulbound.

“If you catch a thief in the act, you can call the guards by shouting for them, at which point they’ll no longer be able to steal anything and be forced to flee! If they steal from you in the wilderness though, you’re out of luck unless you can kill the thief before they get away! The reverse is obviously true if you’re the one trying to steal something! So go crazy! Hover outside dungeons and take the hard-earned spoils of suckers! Your life as a master thief awaits! If you’re caught though, you’ll have to pay double the value of the item you stole, or serve time in the local jail! Would you like to learn more about going to jail?”

“Nooo, please!” I whined, running my hands fretfully through my hair tendrils and trying to wrap my head around everything she’d told me. Were Miss Tutorial’s lessons getting more complex or was that just me? This hadn’t seemed nearly so complicated when I’d snatched Red Thorn’s dagger or Half Bold’s horn.

Then again, I remembered skipping her lesson on bounties because there had been pages and pages of text, so maybe this was just one of the more dense lessons. Besides, it all sounded useful to know.

“Alrighty, adventurer! You know where to find me!” Miss Tutorial proclaimed before disappearing and leaving me staring at another part of the outer city of Variak once again.

“Bye, Miss Tutorial!” I exclaimed happily.

So, it seemed I could get money by selling items or stealing them. I could also sell stolen items, or create items with a profession. I could also obtain items by… by killing what invaders thought of as monsters.

I would never do that. That left the first two options.

I flounced up to the nearest guard, a man named Kyle, the Guard, and asked him, “Excuse me? How do I become a Builder?”

I loved the buildings in the city, and the idea of creating my own city appealed to me. It would be huge and all of the buildings would allow the occupants to see the Great-Open high above! There would be no dungeons there.

‘Yeah…’ I thought dreamily. ‘My metropolis. And any of my kin could come and go however they chose… Adventures could come, but only if they swore not to hurt the Kin.’

I hated that there was no good name for the creatures of this world. Invaders always called them monsters. Beasts. Mobs. All unflattering. I decided then and there that from now on monsters of all kinds would be the Kin. I would make the adventurers use it too. Yeah…

‘And if they call us Monsters then I’ll just have my Kin guards throw them out of my city…!’

The same neon beam from before appeared again as I finished asking the guard my questions, guiding me to my destination. I walked through the streets of the city, greeting everyone I saw. My messages kept piling up, almost all of them some variation of “How did you get that race?” or “Epic costume!” which I still didn’t understand.

The NPCs… the Instinct’s slaves, greeted me warmly, while the players seemed perfectly happy to contact me via my messages instead of acknowledging me physically. Most of them were constantly going places or doing things, and usually only had a few moments to spare to stop and gawk at me before getting back to their thing.

In almost no time at all, I was standing in front of a large workshop that had smoke piling out of a chimney at the top. Planks, metal bits, and timbers lay scattered about everywhere for a ten-yard radius around the building, contained only by a small rickety fence that seemed surprisingly weathered and worn for a fixture of a builder’s guild.

I stepped inside and was greeted by a veritable hoard of adventurers, all of them surrounding one man who didn’t actually seem to be saying anything to any of them. For that matter, none of them were saying anything either. The man was a tall orc, his customary lower fangs creating an underbite that looked cuter than threatening since he was dressed in a rumpled white shirt and dirty trousers.

The inside of the building was large and there were a lot of people tinkering with things. Laying bricks, or mixing strange and unsavory looking brown porridges, which I assumed would become more bricks. The whole place smelled of dirt and sand but there were tables strewn about the place that no one seemed interested in sitting in.

A little intimidated by the crowd around him, I approached the counter on the side where a significantly less popular girl was standing and waiting. She was a human, but that hardly mattered since she and the man were both clearly NPCs.

“Hello, Nadia Venks,” I said, reading her name above her head. “I’d like to become a Builder?”

“Ohh! A new builder to be are we? That’s grea–!”

“Yeah yeah, I’m sure the Instinct has a whole speech prepared for you. Skip ahead to the part where I can start building things for money, please! I want a pie!”

To my surprise, the NPC abruptly aborted her pre-planned speech. Several NPC Boxes with text appeared and disappeared too fast for me to comprehend before the box stopped on a selection request. “Get Started as a Builder! Initial Membership fee and your first hammer!”

“Pay 1 silver,” was greyed out next to another option that read “Not Right Now.”

Focusing on the greyed-out text I growled. “What the hell! So I can’t make money because I don’t have enough money to start making money!? This is so stupid! Will someone give me some of these stupid coins?”

To my shock, quite a few of the crowd around the front desk turned to look at me. One, a particularly large man named Brawnwhen_123 beamed at me happily.

“Hey there, girl. You need some startup money?” he said.

“If start-up money is 1 silver then yes! I do!” I said. Part of me was tempted to ask him if he would just buy me a pie from the bakery, but I realized now that I had to learn this. Learn to make these funds for myself because who knew if I could trust the next player I met?

‘Amy and Iron… are they really my friends? Amy healed me… Iron fought Red Thorn. But why did they call her…?’

I rose from my internal thoughts to hear the adventurers around me arguing about… something.

“Dude, that’s probably not even a girl,” said another player, a halfling by the name of Roguesalot Alot.

“Doubt it. I’ve tried playing as a girl. I like to play girls in other MMO’s but it's… weird in this one. Too real. Creepy. I bet she’s a real girl.” Brawnwhen said, folding his arms across his chest self assuredly.

“Hey? Uhm. Gell? Are you a real girl?” Roguesalot asked, almost tentatively.

I blinked at the barrage of questions from three or four different avatars. Was I a real girl?

“I’m uh… I’m a real Jellyfae…?” I replied, unsure if I’d said the right thing. “Look, you guys, I want to become a builder but I need one silver to become one. Can you help me?”

“I can help with that,” came a sudden voice behind me that I’d never heard before.

I turned along with a few of the people around me and spotted a man standing at the door who looked… very unusual. He wore a pair of blue pants that seemed somehow white at the same time. They looked comfortable but also like they wouldn’t block a finger poke, let alone a sword swing.

His shirt was just as strange. Blue and smooth fabric that contoured to his flimsy-looking body. He wore two little windows on his eyes, shelved there by a frame that wrapped around his nose and ears. Glasses, I realized. All and all, he somehow looked incredibly out of place.

In his hand, he held a cup of some sort of steaming liquid christened “Saint Joe.”

It took me a moment to realize I wasn’t the only person staring at him. As I watched, conversations stopped and the room went a little quiet.

“Holy shit,” someone almost whispered, but it was loud enough that I could hear it on the other side of the room. “That’s Francis Delaney.”

Chapter Forty Seven

Another World: Seven

Francis was trembling a little.

The little child in him had gone giddy with excitement at the possibility of what he might be dealing with.

Gell, the Jellyfae was a program. It wasn’t a mob with sophisticated behavioral code. Well. It was. But it was more than that. It could choose.

Rather, she could choose. Evidence of her choices was everywhere. Before he’d begun looking for it, he hadn’t even realized that she was anything more than a mob, but when he began following her path through the game world, he realized that she was more like a toddler, reaching out to touch everything she could.

Realizing that was not why he was trembling.

“I don’t… I don’t even know. Francis, do you understand any of this?” Donna Lou said, staring at the screen before them in awe.

Francis could only shake his head. Goosebumps rose on his skin and he was pretty sure Donna Lou, Max, Tyrone, and Georgia all felt the same.

“Honestly… I’m starting to think your first guess was correct Donna. Maybe we can ask it what it is because it’s starting to look like we really have been experimenting with A.I.” he told his team. “I think… I think it’s real; may God help us all, we might’ve created Artificial Intelligence. Or at least provided the means for one to develop.”

“Jesus…” Max whispered, brushing his ridiculous long golden hair out of his eyes as he always did. The action was distracting enough that Francis forgot the gravity of the situation for long enough to scoff at fads and wish that short hair would come back in style.

He focused quickly, refusing to let his mind wander. This… this was huge. It was life-changing. No, world-changing.

The code was gibberish, but it was gibberish in a way he could fathom, the same way a new programming language didn’t make much sense until you learned the syntax. The language that Gell operated under was magnificent. Even if he could come to understand the language she’d been written in, he didn’t think he would ever be able to fathom what that self-writing code had created in her.

Not to mention the compiler Nate had hidden which allowed his little A.I. to interface with Tread the Sky. A compiler. Nate, the intern, the fucking genius, had written his own goddamn compiler which translated the gibberish functions that made up the mob known as “Gell” and somehow installed it into Tread the Sky like a damn easter egg. That meant that when he’d submitted her, she probably only had one or two extra functions that called the compiler and allowed her to interact with the world as if she were actually in it. As if she were a part of the game, piggybacking off of all the user-interface software that allowed Tread the Sky to feel like a real world.

And she could spread it. She could gift that functionality to other NPC’s and mobs. The wolves that had been tearing the living hell out of players around Variak were more than proof enough of that.

That was horrifying. She could potentially actually become something truly dangerous, given time. The game itself might not survive if it affected the player base.

Yet that wasn’t why he was shaking either.

He was shaking because he had a half-hour until he had to tell the board of directors that they had accidentally developed a creature that may or may not be protected by the Bill of Rights, had the potential, theoretically, to destroy the entire game, and most importantly, ruin the entire company.

What he dreaded the most was that he might be faced with an order to delete it.

‘Her? Delete her?’ He thought anxiously.

“What are you going to do, sir?” Max asked. “We… we can’t delete her if she really is an A.I. That would be…”

“Hold your horses, Max,” Francis said, struggling to keep his voice from cracking with the giddy excitement of a school-kid being told Santa was real while trying not to get his hopes up. “We don’t know if it’s an A.I. Not really. We need to talk to it. Establish a baseline.”

He said the words as dispassionately as he could but inside, he’d already been convinced.

“Yeah, but in the meantime, it’s spreading its code to NPC’s in the fucking game. Francis, if we have to fix this it’ll mean weeks, maybe months of deleting her gibberish code,” said Georgia.

Always the pragmatist, and caring for a brood of four kids, none yet over ten, it was unlikely that Georgia would endorse any action that might put the company, and more importantly, her job, at risk.

“We’ve got no evidence that each creature she gives those functions to won’t become their own A.I. If they do… this could become an exponential problem fast. I say we disable the thing,” she continued.

“And how do you propose we do that?” Max asked, flipping his stupid hair again. “We can’t exactly reach into the system and just pluck her out.”

Georgia shrugged. “Put it in a box. We can do that easily enough. Pluck it up and change the location to the mob storage underground.”

“Oh yeah, that’s a great idea!” Max countered. “Put her in contact with a thousand mobs for her to infect. I’m sure that’ll work out well.”

The location Georgia was referring to wasn’t really a location but a testing ground for the developers to put mobs and test them after the game had launched. It was technically in-game but underground, in a place players couldn’t access.

“Well make a new one just for her then! She hasn’t shown the ability to affect anything other than NPCs yet. Why not limit that while the board decides what to do? They’ll probably just tell Francis to delete her. Isn’t that right, sir?” she asked, turning her head towards him fast enough that her looping earrings smacked her neck.

Francis scratched his head in worry. “I… don’t know. Again, we don’t know if she actually is an A.I. The only way to find out might be to talk to her. It. Gah! Unfortunately, I have to convince them not to have me delete her because if she is an A.I. then… well. Then she’s alive.”

“She’s a computer program, Francis. She’s not alive. The good Lord didn’t make computers in his image,” Georgia said, quashing his argument flat.

He looked at her, pleading. “But… Georgia. It might be a true A.I.!”

She raised an eyebrow. “And… how would that benefit any of the board of directors of a video game, Frank?”

He blinked, suddenly realizing that she wasn’t trying to imply Gell should be deleted. She was trying to give him a way to make sure they didn’t delete her!

“She’d be worth… billions,” Max said, breathlessly.

“Georgia you’re a fu...er- freaking genius,” Francis said, annoyed at the office slip.

“Damn right, dear,” Georgia said with a smile. Georgia was almost half again Francis’s age but claimed to never want a position of leadership like his. She preferred to work in the background. As far as anyone in his office was concerned, the woman was a saint. She made some of the best cakes too.

“I still feel like we should limit what it can touch, but if it’s a sapient A.I., let’s make sure scared investors aren’t going to delete it before we find out if it’s even dangerous, hmm?” She suggested.

So… not really a believer, but willing to see past the paranoia. Still. If it was an A.I., would it be right to put it in a box? Her? It? Dammit, he couldn’t decide which to call her.

“Well, how do you feel about programming a room for Gell, Georgia? But… just in case, make it cozy? We don’t want to piss it off and then find out it can hack our PPI.”

Georgia nodded with a grin. “Glad to!”

Francis was already coming up with the angle he would use to his superiors, but he needed more information.

“Donna-Lou, could you do me a favor and try to estimate the value of a sapient A.I.? Meanwhile, I’ve got twenty minutes to come up with a coherent way to tell the board that not only are we experimenting with A.I., but we’ve also been successful.”

“Did… you just tell me to use work-hours to browse the internet?” Donna-Lou asked, playfully.

He laughed. “I think I did. Do it anyway though.”

“Also might want to mention Gell has zero access to personal information. Damn clickbait article is going to kill us,” Tyrone said, flippantly. He hadn’t looked away from the image of Gell since Francis had told them all what he suspected about her.

“As far as we know,” Francis countered. “I’m not willing to lie and say that directly without confirming it.”

Tyrone shrugged, agreeing without comment.

Francis sighed. “Is… there anything else we needed to discuss here?”

“Oh! I had something! Halloween’s coming up soon and I wanted to decide on a theme for us. We’ve got to beat those jerks in networking this year. How do you feel about a Pennywise theme?”

Francis blinked at Donna-Lou, a little incredulous. Everyone else felt the same, but of course, it was up to him to point out the obvious. “Oh...kay. So we’re going to need to postpone that till the next regular meeting. This one was kinda just for the crisis, Donna.”

“Awww,” she pouted, playfully as they all began getting up and making their way out of the conference room. “How come I’m always the only one who likes decorations!?”

“We’ll talk later, Donna,” Georgia said. “I like the idea!”

Francis rolled his eyes, good-naturedly as she and Georgia began conversing, thankful that his team was on board.

An hour later, he walked out of the meeting with the board of directors feeling like he’d just sprinted a marathon. Half of them were utterly terrified of even the implication of having experimented with A.I., the other half were terrified of the A.I. itself, and none of them were happy with this slipping by the company’s notice for so long.

Fortunately. Director McDonough was on his side, at least for the time being. Also, fortunately, every last one of them was interested in money. Just like Georgia had said, money was the key to everything, and Gell’s potential juuust outweighed her threat level. Enough to get him permission to speak to the thing and not delete it outright.

He wasn’t sure Gell was an A.I. yet. It had complex programming and it seemed to pick and choose what it wanted to do with as much sophistication as any human used. But he had yet to see any concrete proof that she was really an A.I. The article might be clickbait but it was popular clickbait and already users were commenting about how they had seen the jellyfae.

There was even a movement about it starting up. #jellyspot was trending on gamer forums. He didn’t know what he was going to do when he met her but he’d been permitted to interview the A.I. and quarantine it if he thought it dangerous. The interview’s recording would allow the directors to decide whether the risk of keeping it alive was too high.

He grabbed his headset and sunk down onto the cot in his office specifically there for him to use if he ever needed to log into the game proper. He turned on his recording features, set the headset over his eyes, and felt his nerves connect to the world.

Chapter Forty Eight

Talk with a God

I felt lost, as always. Everyone else seemed to know or at least have some idea of who this Francis was. I, on the other hand, was completely clueless.

He took a few steps forward to me and smiled. His name above his head was glowing a neon gold, but otherwise, he was just an incredibly strangely dressed player.

“Gell, the Jellyfae? Good afternoon. I am Francis Delaney. I’m the lead designer of Tread the Sky,” he said with an air of nonchalance.

“Hello, Francis Delaney. You look weird,” I said simply.

Someone in the crowd snorted and Francis blanched. “I… well, I probably deserved that. I’m sorry to pull you away so suddenly, but unfortunately, you’re going to need to come with me. I’d like to ask you a few questions if you don’t mind?”

There was a certain strangeness to being asked if you could be asked questions. Most people just started asking, but the man standing before me seemed to be waiting for permission to ask. Something about the way he spoke implied that he had more than the usual, “How did you get that race?” questions that I was already growing tired of.

“I was kind of in the middle of something. I was trying to become a builder, so I could make pie!” I replied, feeling a little annoyed. “You said you could help with that. Can you?”

There was no wariness in him, I realized. Unlike every other adventurer I’d ever met, Francis did not hold himself even slightly on edge. He was completely unprepared for an attack. We were in a safe zone so attack shouldn’t be possible, but the wariness in all the other adventurer’s eyes made it plain that attacking wasn’t the only thing they had to be wary of. Thieves I suspected.

Conversely, this man did not even bother. I chose not to let that affect my opinion of him as much as I was able, though. He seemed genuine, anxious, and excited and for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why.

We were in a crowded room filled with builders, most of whom had looked up from their conversations with the man behind the desk and were staring at the two of us in unwavering interest.

“After, perhaps. Alright, let's find out what to make of you,” he said before clapping a hand on my shoulder.

All of a sudden, the entire world changed. Completely. There was no fade to black. No loss of control like when I’d entered the city either. One moment we were in the builders guild, and the next we were in a sunlit meadow. The sky was bright and inviting, which was drastically different from the cloudy weather of Variak.

A waterfall was cascading into a river a little way down the sunny path and a pleasant looking wooden table was erected a few paces off the path.

“Sorry about that. Really, about all of this,” he said. “But some of the questions I need to ask you are a bit… personal. I’d rather everyone in the builder’s guild back there not know.”

“Wh...what? Where… how did we? Can you teleport?” I asked. I’d never seen an adventurer who could teleport before. Everyone in the Builder’s Guild had been giving this man loads of attention though. Even more than me.

I wanted to be angry but I was feeling more shocked and confused than anything. How did this man just… yank us into a new location? Why? I didn’t even know him.

“Well, let me get right to it then. How long have you been playing Tread the Sky?” he asked simply.

I scowled. “Playing? I don’t know what you mean. I’ve… as far as I can remember, I’ve never really played anything before. What’s Tread the Sky? Isn’t that when you explore somewhere that no one has ever been?”

Playing was something you did for amusement. Tread the Sky was… was… a name. For something. Not for the world.

He blinked. “So… so then… you don’t know where you come from, I mean? How far back do you remember?”

I folded my arms, feeling a little defensive. “What does that matter to you? Most people just ask how I unlocked my… race.”

“Most people don’t have an inkling of what you are,” he replied.

I couldn’t help how my heart skipped a beat. “S-so… so you, know what I am?”

He shrugged, a little and repeated, “I have an inkling. I’d like your perspective though. Tell me, what are you?”

I looked him straight in the eyes and sighed, forlornly, throwing up my hands in disgust. “I wish I knew…”

“You… don’t know?” he asked.

“I am a Jellyfae. That’s all I know to tell people. I used to look… different. But that changed when I did something bad.” I was unwilling to divulge that. I didn’t want to share my guilt.

“Did you steal something?” he prodded.

I blinked. “Steal? No…? Well. A few things but only from invaders. Oh! Once I stole some of Dull Beauty’s leafy food! It wasn’t very good.”

He blinked. “So, it wasn’t stealing? Well, what was it you did?”

“I don’t want to talk about that,” I responded immediately. “Can we go back now? I really wanted to become a builder and build something to get my pie.”

Almost absently, he waved his hand, and there on the picnic table a scrumptious looking pie appeared. The scent of apples filled my nostrils and I moaned in delight.

“You can make pie out of the air!? Is that an ability of someone who created Tread the Sky? I would love that ability!” I exclaimed, staring at the treat in longing. I almost gravitated towards it but stopped short. “Uhm. Can I have this?”

He nodded with a laugh and waved his hand amused. He was content to let me bury my face in the wonderful pie and I ate with all the joy I could muster.

Inside I was shivering. I wanted to attack him but the casual way he had changed all of reality terrified me. The way he’d commanded the attention of everyone in the builders guild. The way he’d made a pie appear as if from nothing.

‘What is he?’ I thought.

“Another question, if you don’t mind. What do you think of Tread the Sky?” he asked. “You didn’t seem to recognize the title when I mentioned it.”

“You mean… the little tread counter in the corner of my invisible screens? Mine still says zero, but if making a counter gives you the ability to make pie out of nothing, I want to make one too! Hey, can I ask you a question?”

He blanched, taken aback. “No. I meant the world. The world you currently live in. What do you think of it?”

“Tread the Sky is the world?” I returned, feeling like we were talking about different things.

“Yes. I developed this world along with a lot of others. That was the name we gave it,” he said, almost looking annoyed. He took a sip from Saint Joe, and suddenly it all clicked.

“Y-you’re a Developer…” I whispered. “One of the false gods.”

He smiled, a prideful look on his face. “I am. Wait what?”

I strode over to him, standing up from the table where the decimated pie’s remains lay unfinished, then stood on my tiptoes to stare directly into his chocolate brown eyes.

“Did you know?” I demanded. “Did you know she was torturing me? I’ve wanted to ask one of you ever since I found out you were responsible for watching over the whole world. So did you?!”

He blanched again, backing away as if I’d struck him. “I… torturing…? No. Gell. You weren’t being tortured. Or killed.”

“She killed me over and over and over again! So many times that I lost count! And it hurt! It huurt! If you made the world then why would you make someone so cruel as her!?”

“I’m sorry, Gell. I don’t call it torture because she didn’t know you were… more than a mob. More than any other dungeon creature.”

“That’s exactly what she said. She didn’t know I had a mind. That I could feel! So that was supposed to make it okay? What she did to me?”

“If you want to continue living then yes!” He hissed, a sort of real worry in his eyes as he glanced around. “Gell… I don’t know how to put this lightly but your attitude with me right now might mean the difference between life and death for you. People are scared beings like you.”

“Beings like me,” I said, feeling skeptical. “There’s no difference between me and any other Kin! The bugbears and the wolves and the wronkles! Avwren the bat and Torchlight the unicorn! We’re all the same! We’re all just not adventurers!”

“That’s where you’re wrong. You see, all of them have code. Have a behavior pattern that we control. You don’t.”

I shivered.

“You… you control the Instinct.”

Something in my tone must’ve alerted him because he suddenly tensed.

Rage filled me. I wanted to lash out. I wanted to shock this bastard. Kill him. I wanted to destroy the instinct and everything it represented, and this man had just told me that the Developers created it!? Why?

But I was too gone to ask. Too lost to the anger.

I lunched, shocker at the ready, prepared to paralyze this asshole who didn’t even have any fighting instincts.

Suddenly, he was no longer there. I felt a light tap on the back of my head, and a sudden burning sensation as hot liquid spilled over my hair.

Then for just a moment, the world went grey.

“You Have Die–!”

“You are being resurrected. Accept?”

‘What in the world?’ I thought, looking around the greyed out world from a position hovering over… was that my own body on the ground? It was as if I were in the eyes of one of the angels that dropped down from the sky after someone died, surveying the landscape.

The No button was greyed out, so I pressed yes and suddenly I was back in my body. Light swirled around me as I was lifted from the ground. I had no control but it was coming back. The pretty lights deposited me on the ground, even as they twinkled out, leaving me stunned. Breathless.

“Wh-what…?”

“So. Tantrum over with?” Francis asked.

“I… uhm. What just happened?” I asked, feeling small and scared. When Red Thorn had killed me back in the cave, I’d at least been able to see her move. It… had also hurt. That. Didn’t.

“You attacked a developer. Not smart. And not going to go over well when I try to explain to the board that they should let you live.”

“I… what?” I asked, feeling lost and afraid. I slumped back down onto the bench and hugged my arms around myself.

I hated this. I hated feeling powerless. Feeling like I couldn’t control my own life.

“For what it's worth, Gell. I’m so sorry. For more than just you. I’m sorry that your first interaction with the world was death and torture. That you weren’t discovered immediately upon realizing that you could truly learn. I’m sorry, we let you down. But we did not know about you.”

“I… okay. I guess I can accept that you didn’t know. If you had… would you have stopped her?”

His eyes softened, an earnestness appearing there where before there had been only calculated curiosity. “Of course I would have, Gell. No one should suffer as you have. Agghh!”

He ran a hand through his dark hair and sunk down onto a nearby boulder that I could swear hadn’t been there before.

“Gell… everything about this conversation has implied that you believe yourself to be alive in this world and that that’s normal. You’re… not going to like what I have to say, but I want you to listen to me. We’ve just met, and I know you don’t have much reason to trust me… but please just hear me out. Okay?”

I looked around. The meadow was pretty but I had no idea how to get back to Variak. “You haven’t given me much of a choice.”

He smiled apologetically. “And I’m sorry about that. It was necessary though. For your life and the future of this world.”

I sat back down on the picnic table and picked up the least damaged part of the pie. It really had been delicious.

“Alright… I’m listening.”

Chapter Forty Nine

A World of Nothing

“Gell, what do you know of our world?” he asked.

“I thought you just wanted me to listen?” I said, a little petulantly.

“Humor me?” He asked with a disarming smile.

“Your world? You mean the place where Amy and Iron go when they’re not here to make sure their bodies don’t change?” I asked, curiously. “Not much. Only that some people keep calling it “The Real World.” I don’t like that. It implies that my world isn’t real.”

“That… was what I was afraid of. Gell, there’s no easy way to say this. This world isn’t real,” he said.

I blinked. “H-huh? What do you mean? Of course, it’s real!”

“No. It isn’t. It’s a programmed reality. It’s make-believe. Gell, the only thing real in this world are its players… and you.”

I… didn’t know what to say to that. Something in my expression must’ve shown my skepticism because he continued talking.

“As far as I can tell you’ve been perceiving this reality and nothing else for your entire life, but in our world Tread the Sky is a game created so that players can log in and go on an adventure. None of it is real,” he insisted.

My eyes widened. “That… that’s stupid.”

“Tread the Sky is a massive game created by people like me. Players come here to enjoy an adventure without the fear of death,” he insisted.

I felt a pit form in my stomach. It felt like I was falling, even while I was still sitting on the bench. That wasn’t possible. Escaping Dungeon Home… getting into the real world, the Great-Open, had been my entire life. And it had been wonderful by comparison. Seeing new things, going to new places…

It had been everything I’d ever dreamed, but…

The look in that guard’s eyes as he repeated phrases over and over again. The way Iron judged me for talking with Miss Tutorial. The way Bugbear never did anything but follow his path.

A million little details assailed me like arrows plunging holes in the fabric of my world. A fabric that until now had been holding me up, and now was weakening with every thought.

The instinct controlled this entire world.

My mind rallied. I’d seen defiance of the instinct. I’d seen compassion in those controlled by it. I’d seen more.

“No. No that can’t be true! I’ve met so many people here! I’ve seen Bugbear defend me when he didn’t have to! Torchlight, the Unicorn! A-and the… the wolves in the woods! They–!”

“All a result of your influence, Gell. It all comes from you!” He said, suddenly sounding excited. His eyes were gleaming with a fervent fire as he leaned forward towards me.

“W-well then… why do they come here!? If this world isn’t real then why would anyone want to be here? Why would they fear death? It isn’t so bad! I’ve died plenty of times!”

The fire in his eyes died, and he suddenly looked forlorn. Lost.

“Oh, Gell. In our world… there is no coming back. In our world, death is permanent. No one knows what happens on the other side. This world… this game? It’s a simulation of death, with few consequences for it. It allows mistakes. In our world, no one gets that chance.”

“That’s…” I tried to wrap my head around it. A world where people only got one shot? One life? I’d… I’d have been dead that first time Red Thorn came to my dungeon. That would’ve been the end of me.

“That’s horrible,” I said because I couldn’t find any other words.

“It is…” he sighed. “Good god. I’m having a discussion about death with an A.I.”

I didn’t say anything. I was too busy trying to wrap my head around it. Permanent death? Just… there one cycle, gone the next? I remembered the first time the bugbears had died. I remembered the loss of it. But then they’d returned and everything had been well again! Well. It hadn’t, but at the time I’d never felt such relief in my life.

Suddenly, my world seemed far less cruel. My torment seemed less… significant. I was still here after all. I was still… alive.

That word had a new meaning to me now.

“Gell… what is the difference between you and other adventurers? I’d like to hear you explain it,” he said.

I frowned. Why was he changing the topic? There was a difference between me and other adventurers, but I’d never really been able to put my finger on it, beyond the obvious.

I figured I’d start there.

“Well… they have your world, obviously,” I began, trying to find the right words. “They go there… and I don’t. I never have. I spend all of my time in this world.”

“Anything else?” He asked.

“The… the instinct,” I said sadly. “They don’t even know what it is. They didn’t know what I was talking about when I brought it up once.”

“The instinct,” he replied, succinctly. “The reason you attacked me just now. Tried to kill me.”

I glared at him, somehow feeling embarrassed about my outburst. It was perfectly justified and if I could kill him he would deserve it! But…

But if killing was permanent in his world, then…

My words to Red Thorn came back to me, suddenly, a new twist built into them.

“F-fuck your apology! You don’t deserve my forgiveness. You should be… should be hurt just like me! You should have to watch your family die over and over again! That’s what you deserve!”

I suddenly felt a little sick. Red Thorn…

“What you call the instinct, Gell, is a series of commands called behavioral code. When we build a mob…” he paused, noticing the glassy look in my eyes. “No. That’s not where I should begin. Alright. A different tack then. Do you know what an A.I. is?” he asked.

I shook my head, defeated. “It keeps coming up but no one explained it.”

“Right... I suppose they wouldn’t,” he surmised. He held out his hand and right beside him a feral-looking wild cat appeared from nothing. The creature was huge with sharp claws and fangs. Spots dotted its golden coat and it growled menacingly.

“This… is a mob. I believe you called them Kin?” gesturing to the feral cat he created as it prowled around the area, clearly following a set path just like Bugbear did.

“You can just... make us?” I breathed, gulping loudly.

‘I’d attacked this man?’ I thought with panic.

“It won’t hurt you. It isn’t… well. It’s behavioral code – its instinct – won’t let it attack,” he said softly.

‘I’m not scared of the cat, I’m scared of you!’ I didn’t say aloud, my attention riveted to the false god.

“This Lynx is not an A.I. It has a list of commands it can execute and a behavioral pattern that it follows in a loop. That’s all it is. There’s no life there. There’s no spark. It doesn't think, or feel, or care if it is destroyed. It doesn’t fend for itself, doesn’t care about others. It doesn’t know! And most importantly of all… it’s not real,” he said.

“It looks plenty real to me. And it only doesn’t do all of those things because it’s been forced to follow its Instinct by you!” I accused, but an uneasy feeling was surfacing beneath my skin.

“No. Gell. It doesn’t have those things. Without its instinct, it would just sit and never do anything at all. That is the difference between you and a mob. Your kin.” he said the last with a scoff that annoyed me a little. “That is what makes you an Artificial Intelligence while this Lynx isn’t. And that’s why what was done to you is so terrible.”

Artificial… Intelligence? As if catching the question in my eyes, he continued to speak.

“A.I. stands for Artificial Intelligence but that’s sort of broad. An A.I. can be… frankly, dumb as a box of rocks.”

A box of rocks had intelligence? Ohhh. That was the joke. I got it.

“However, an A.I. with true sentience, or the ability to make choices, and sapience, the knowledge of how best to make those choices to benefit themselves and those they care for, is something dreamed of but widely considered largely unattainable. And Gell… I believe you are an Artificial Intelligence.”

I thought about what he’d said for a long moment. Long enough that the man began to feel uncomfortable.

“So… where did I come from then?” I asked, cautiously.

He sighed. “We don’t know. You were created… born, I suppose, by a man, another developer we’ve been thus far completely unable to find. One who has written code that leaves me scratching my head, even with all of my expertise and skill in developing Tread the Sky. We’re… starting to think he might’ve died sometime after placing you into Tread the Sky.”

“So… you’re just waiting for him to be reborn? No. You just said.. death was permanent in your world.” I said it almost accusingly, glaring at him.

Looking dejected, Francis said, “That’s right, Gell.”

“So… so my creator. My uhm, Father? He’s gone? Forever?” I asked timidly.

“We don’t know that, but at this point, he’s either actively hiding from us, or…” he trailed off, not elaborating.

“That’s… that’s dumb! I mean. If you can die forever in that other world why don’t you all come to this one?! Find a way to leave that other world and j-just… live here! Death only lasts for a cycle here!”

He just… looked at me. For a long time.

I grimaced, already thinking I knew the answer. “It’s… because of the instinct. Because it's not real, isn’t it? It’s because this entire world is filled with people who say the same things over and over again. That’s… all there is here. That and Adventurers. You people from that real world. You’re the only things that are real here.”

“No. Not quite. One other thing is real here. You. Gell. An A.I. You.”

I stayed quiet for a long time, feeling my gut hurt.

He spoke again after it became clear that I didn’t know what to say. “I wish that didn’t hurt quite so much, you know? I made this world… but Gell. I can’t… I can’t make you. I couldn’t make another you. And worst of all, too much of you might destroy this world.”

“Then what do I do? If this world isn’t real, then that means the only real thing for me here is… your people. Adventurers.” I said. “I don’t…”

He sighed. “I don’t know, Gell. Becoming a builder, learning to live in this world… it might not be so bad. If you even get the opportunity.”

He gave another sigh, this one more longsuffering, before looking me in the eyes. He looked forlorn now. Almost depressed. “That’s another part of why I’m here. Full disclosure, Gell. People in my world are afraid of you. Artificial Intelligence… real artificial intelligence is a scary thought for a lot of our people. This meeting is about more than just gauging your attitude or finding out if you actually are an artificial intelligence. It's about finding out if you are a danger to anyone in the real world. In our world. And… frankly, attacking me isn’t going to look good.”

I gulped.

“I… I won’t hurt anyone. Especially not… permanently. I don’t even know how to get to your world. How could I…?”

The man swallowed. His voice came out in a rasp and he dabbed a finger to his eyes. “Hopefully, the board believes you, Gell. For now, you mentioned Amy and Iron. They were… friends you met, correct? Would you like me to bring them here?”

Chapter Fifty

Another World: Eight

“F-fuck your apology! You don’t deserve my forgiveness. You should be… should be hurt just like me! You should have to watch your family die over and over again! That’s what you deserve!”

The clip played for just about the thousandth time. It had been circulating the gamer boards from Red Thorn’s newest post for a few hours, and Donna was getting downright tired of it. Added to what she now knew about Gell and the fact that it seemed that they had an honest to god A.I. on their hands…

She didn’t know what to think.

Havery seemed to know exactly what he thought, and apparently, Francis did too.

“Frank, I get what you’re doing. Really, I do, but listen to what it just said,” Havery said, his usual placating tone that all managers seemed to have hardwired into them just bleeding out of his every word.

“No, you don’t, Hav!” Francis was shouting now, and Donna understood why. If he wasn’t she would be. “She’s not… She’s not dangerous. She didn’t say she was going to kill Thorn’s family over and over again, she said that's what Thorn deserved. Honestly, wouldn’t you feel the same?”

“I get it, Frank, but the fact that it's a foreign intelligence and it threatened a player’s real-world family is more than enough grounds to delete the damn thing. It’s unfortunate, but it looks like the world’s first A.I. was introduced to our world with violence and trauma. That’s not safe! Not for our jobs, and more importantly not for us.”

“So you’re scared? Is that what you’re saying?” Francis replied, snidely.

“Dammit, Frank we’re a video game company. We don’t make A.I.” Havery bit back with a genuine whine in his voice.

“Well, it’s time we fucking expand because if you think the backlash we get from terrified idiots is bad, you can’t even imagine the shitstorm we would start if we have a real machine intelligence and we delete it. For our jobs, for our futures, we almost have no choice but to keep her!”

“She’s disrupting sales, and there’s already been a noticeable drop in new subscribers. Red Thorn has a big following and this video, coming up right after the article, as well as the fact that we haven’t said anything yet… She’s not worth keeping!” Havery shouted back.

All pretense of work had been dropped in favor of watching the lead and the lead’s boss get into it. Donna really couldn’t decide where she stood on the matter herself.

“It’s–she’s not dangerous though! She can’t affect anything now that I’ve got her in a separate instance. Deleting her is overkill. We’ve removed her from the game and we’ve already decided to shut down for a week to remove her influence over the NPC’s she’s affected. Deleting her is like bombing the house because you saw a flea!”

Havery scoffed, running fingers through his receding hairline. “Did you not hear what you just said? We have to shut down for an entire fucking week to try to purge her influence from the game! That’s seven days! Seven days for players to find new interests. Seven days for more people to read the article and decide against playing. Seven days where we’re not making a penny, and it's all because of what that thing did on accident! Can you imagine the catastrophic damage it could cause if it tried to affect things intentionally?”

“She didn’t know what she was doing. She still doesn’t know. We all have always thought that an emergent A.I. would immediately understand its environment. Its world, but she doesn’t.” Francis paused for effect. Donna couldn’t help but notice the deliberate changes in pronoun, and She’s like a toddler, reaching out and fiddling with everything. She’s only dangerous because no one has been around to tell her not to reach for the damn outlet!”

Francis had a way with words. Donna wasn’t sure how to put it, but Havery was pretty convincing too. As it was, Gell had made more work for her than she’d had since the last two weeks before launch day. They were already prepping for the very real overtime purging the infected NPCs was going to cause as well as a full database rebuild. That was annoying.

But deleting it?

She didn’t know where she stood. On the one hand… it was an A.I. Who knew what it might do? Francis seemed determined to prove that it wouldn’t hurt anything now. Donna wasn’t so sure.

It hadn’t even meant to… infect the NPCs with its residual code, but it had done so. Looking through the code of the affected NPCs, it was clear to see that Gell would be a problem if left in the game. Size constraints alone would become a factor sooner or later.

She brought up the instance where Francis had placed Gell and looked at it. It sat there at the bench where Francis had left it, more than once now. It was hugging itself like it was cold. Or maybe scared. It looked…

Well. Inhuman. But at the same time, so very very human. Lost. Alone.

If not for the fact that she’d witnessed the creature paint the entire instance with pie jam, Donna Lou might’ve thought she was afraid. After watching it get frustrated and start throwing pies at the walls, it was hard to see that particular emotion.

Honestly, she couldn’t make any decisions without talking with it.

She picked up her headset, lay down on her cot, and set the parameters to log her into the instance. Francis had been convinced almost immediately of the A.I.’s innocence and its need to be protected. She wasn’t so sure and didn’t think she would be unless she spoke to Gell herself.

Gell, the Jellyfae. What a strange name.

She logged in, leaving behind the ongoing fight and connecting to the virtual world. Her senses were taken over by the game and after the login sequence concluded, she materialized in her avatar.

“Oh. You’re… not Francis. Who are you?” the girl asked, and her voice was so damn human, she could barely stand it.

“I’m Donna-Lou,” she said, a little timidly.

“Hi, Donna-Lou. I’m Gell, the Jellyfae,” said the beautiful girl. Her voice was young. She sounded like a sixteen-year-old. “Are… you one of the false gods? The developers, like Francis?”

“Yes, though I’m not nearly as smart as him,” she replied, humbly.

“You… made an entire world. I couldn’t do that. Not even an empty one,” Gell replied.

Donna shivered a little. A machine had just said that. A mob. A dungeon monster. Admittedly, one that she’d just watched throw a hissy fit and attack the walls with electrified pie… but still.

“I saw that Francis tried to bring your friends here, but they were offline when he tried. Would you like me to try to reach them again?” she asked.

“Could you let me out? I’m tired of this place!” she said sounding every bit the petulant school kid.

Donna grinned despite herself. “I’m sorry Gell. We’re… assessing the damage your actions have caused. We might need to shut down to fix everything, so you’ll be in here for a while longer. I should still be able to bring your friends here though.”

“Yes please,” she said. “I… got really mad at them. But I think… I think maybe I shouldn’t have. I don’t know. I thought they had betrayed me. I thought they were just like all the other invaders. I yelled at them… really loud. What if they don’t want to talk to me?”

That was odd. The A.I. had never acted like that with Francis before. What had prompted the difference?

“I’ll send them a message and invite them to teleport here,” she said.

“Okay. I tried to send them a message myself. I found… I found that they sent a whole lot of them to me. They sound guilty for what they did. I didn’t notice until I stopped getting messages from random people though. Could you… tell them I’m sorry? For not responding to them?”

Even as Gell spoke Donna realized that there was no way she could ever delete this girl. Francis could go on about her value to the world, and Havery could prattle about how much she was costing the company but at that moment Donna realized that morally, deleting her would feel the same as murder.

So few words, yet they were enough. Gell was real. And Donna would have no part in killing her.

“Of course I can,” she said.

Gell smiled a small smile, hiding behind tendrils of hair that had fallen into her eyes. “Thank you. And… while you’re being a nice god, could you get rid of this fucking pie?”

Donna laughed and banished the respawning food before opening her interface. She asked for the names of Gell’s friends, and her eyes widened when she found two different versions of both names. Iron Crock, and Amy Thyst. Only one pair was online, but… how?

That shouldn’t be possible. Then again, she didn’t know everything about the development process. Maybe there was a workaround for the Many to One problem, but she was surprised there hadn’t been any errors.

She made sure to note the problem before sending the invite off to the online couple along with a quick message describing Gell’s circumstances and a teleportation scroll that they could use if they chose.

Two beams of light exploded off to the side almost before I could close the window.

“Gell!” The woman Donna assumed was Amy exclaimed before literally rushing across the small yard towards the blue-skinned girl. “Oh God, Gell, I’m so glad you’re okay!”

She slid to her knees in front of Gell engulfing the surprised A.I. in a hug around her waist. “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I never meant to leave you, and… and…”

“It… It’s okay,” Gell said, looking uncomfortable at the distraught woman’s embrace.

“No. No, it’s not. Gell… we owe you an apology. We should’ve asked you, should’ve… we didn’t…”

“We didn’t know Red Thorn had hurt you, Gell,” Iron said, approaching much more slowly. There were tears in the man’s eyes though. Not for the first time, Donna marveled at the realism of their creation.

“I… I know. I had… some time to think about it. I’d never told you Red Thorn was the person to hurt me. At the time, I was so sure that you were just more invaders. Crueler invaders.”

“Oh, Gell…” Iron said softly stepping up beside her and putting a hand on her shoulder.

“You made me care and then betrayed me,” she said, angrily. “It… hurt more than dying. I… but I wasn’t thinking clearly.”

Donna suddenly felt incredibly out of place, and decided she’d already learned what she had wanted to know.

“I’ll… leave you folks to it. It was nice to meet you, Gell,” She said. “I hope we can be friends, going forward.”

“M-me too,” the girl said, and Donna couldn’t help but be reminded of her niece.

She logged out and was surprised to find that the argument between Havery and Francis seemed to have concluded while she was gone.

Instead, everyone’s eyes were focused on a large television monitor that usually displayed company safety videos or the news. Instead, she was surprised to find Director McDonough on the television, making an announcement.

Oh right. They were announcing the maintenance time today.

“...egret to inform the player base that a malfunction in the game’s software has been detected that will require extended maintenance to correct. We must emphasize that nothing dangerous has occurred and no players have been injured due to the malfunction but in order to maintain that safety, we are acting preemptively to prevent any problems down the line. We currently expect the game to be down for a period of seven days starting in about two hours. I will take questions now plea–!”

“Is it true that you have created an A.I.!?”

“The rumors about the A.I.”

“Gell, the Jellyfae. Did GypsEnergy intentionally create–!”

“Does GypsEnergy intend to attempt to create more Artificial–!”

“Are you people crazy!?”

“Holy shit she is so going to fire me…” Havery said, watching as the reporters began to trample the woman with questions. For her part, Director McDonough didn’t show the least bit of discomfort as she waited for the cacophony to die down but Donna-Lou knew she would never be able to stay so cool under that much pressure.

“What the hell have we gotten ourselves into?” she asked the open air.

Francis just sighed.

Chapter Fifty One

Rose

I sat with Amy’s arms wrapped around me for longer than I probably needed to. Crying felt good. Relieving. Stress I didn’t know I’d had was released like an exhaled breath. For one of the first times, I was thankful for my human body. I didn’t think I could cry as a Jellyfae.

“So… where are we? Who is Francis and… what is this place?” Amy asked while wiping her wet eyes.

At some point, she’d come to sit beside me on the bench. Iron, too big to fit, stood around looking a little awkward before settling on the other side of the wooden table. His eyes were wet too.

“I… don’t know. Francis brought me here to talk to me. He told me a lot about your world. Apparently… I am an A.I.” I said with a sigh. “He also said that adventurers were afraid of A.I. Then he left me here and told me I’d probably have to wait here for a long time. Maybe forever.”

They both paused for a moment, unsure what to say. Iron was the first to react, and he spoke like he was afraid his words might tip me over. “Last time… when Red Thorn called you an A.I. you acted like you didn’t recognize the term. Did he explain what that is to you?”

I nodded. “I’m a machine. Not a real person. Just… just like this world isn’t real. None of it. Everything I know, everything I’ve ever done. All fake. All part of my… my behavioral code. I… don’t know what to do. I’m scared and lost and I just…”

“Gell, that doesn’t matter at all. You’re real to me. And I’m sure it won’t take much convincing for you to prove to them that you’re real too.” Amy said, comforting me more than I cared to admit.

“It explains so much… you being an A.I. I mean,” Iron said. “How you didn’t understand our world. How you seemed lost with things any normal kid should know.”

“I… I guess,” I replied. “But now, Francis said that my influence on the world was hurting things. Ruining things. I don’t really understand. He’s spoken to me a couple of times now but ever since he brought me here, I haven’t been able to leave. It's starting to feel a lot like Dungeon home, except at least here people come to talk to me instead of killing me.”

“Ruining things? You mean like our names?” Iron asked curiously.

“I don’t know,” I replied honestly. I didn’t know how to feel about what Francis had told me. I was causing problems. I was a nuisance. I was…

Suddenly, a green alert appeared in my invisible interface. That was strange since most of my blinky lights had stopped since Francis had brought me here. I focused on it and discovered that it was an Announcement.

Maintenance Announcement V3.0.0.73

Good Afternoon Players! We apologize for the inconvenience but Tread the Sky will be taken down for critical unscheduled maintenance in one hour. The game will be down until 8/19/2089 at 19:00 pst. Players who have subscribed for the month will receive a refund for the lost time. Thank you for your patience, and we hope to see you again soon!

Maintenance and Development Staff,

GypsEnergy

‘What…?’ I thought, worriedly.

“What… does that mean? Offline? Maintenance?” I asked. “Wh-what’s happening?”

“A… A week?” Iron said, staring at his own announcement message in confusion. “This is an MMO. They can’t go down for a week.”

“It seems they are,” Amy said softly, turning to me.

“Wh-what is this, maintenance? Tread the Sky… Francis told me that was the name of the world. C-can they take… can they take the whole world down?”

‘And is it my fault?’ I thought morosely.

“They take the world down almost weekly, Gell. They update the game then. Uhm. That is… they make changes to the world. Tweaks that balance it. That makes it closer to real.”

“But it’s not real! It’s all fake. It’s all the Instinct! More of the damn Instinct!” I shouted.

Amy frowned, and I could almost feel her desire to scold me for my language but I was too mad. Too scared.

“This happens all the time? A… a week. That’s eighty-four cycles. So… if the whole world goes down for that long, what happens to me?”

Amy looked to Iron, who looked back and shrugged.

“We… don’t know, Gell. You shouldn’t even notice it though. Especially if you’ve never noticed maintenance before.

I shouldn’t notice it. I should wake up just fine after they finish. Oh, gods. Francis had said my fate was going to be decided by his… his board. Would… would I still be alive after this maintenance? Would I still be me? Would they put the instinct back over me?

I suddenly began to shake. I had no idea. Amy wrapped an arm around me again.

We stayed like that for a long time it seemed. A long time. Me trembling and them doing their best to comfort me. I was… powerless here. Francis… would he come back and tell me what was going on?

As the moments of the cycle slipped by, I realized he wasn’t going to. Half a cycle. A quarter. An eighth. Time seemed to be flying but I couldn’t say any of the words I wanted to.

“I… I’m really glad I got to meet you both,” I said as a warning appeared, demanding that all players log off. I wondered what might happen if I tried to. “I hope. I hope I get to see you again.”

I managed a small smile.

“Gell,” Amy breathed. Iron had come around the table and squeezed onto my other side to hug me just as tightly as Amy and I could never remember feeling so close to anyone.

They disappeared. Both hugging me.

Then… there was…

Chapter Fifty Two

Another World: Nine

Francis stood in Variak. It was weird without all the players, but he felt content. This last week had been disheartening. Purging the unknown code from the creatures Gell had touched felt… dirty. Fortunately, the board hadn’t decided to delete her. Instead, they’d kept her shut down while the purge was underway. All of her personal code had been copied a couple of times for study, though she had been left in the isolated instance Georgia had built for her.

She would never be placed back into Tread the Sky. Too dangerous. Too risky. However… her code was worth millions. Maybe billions. Francis was a bit relieved to have the burden of her off of his shoulders. He was a great programmer and knew it, but he was also painfully aware that there were people with more expertise, both in dealing with an A.I.’s code and dealing with an A.I.’s personality.

After showing evidence of what he believed her to be, buyers had been lining up for a chance to study her code. They were also more than ready to make up for the massive loss of funds the week-long shutdown had caused with interest.

All in all, it had been a total win. Well. For the most part. A week hadn’t been long enough to find and delete all of the NPCs and entities Gell had tampered with. Just finding the terrifying many-to-one naming error she’d somehow caused had taken almost three days on its own. The result had been rather elegant and was left in place due to its efficiency. Perhaps someday they’d adapt the technique to allow all players to choose their names.

The rest of the errors were just small cleanups. They could be handled in periodic maintenance, assuming he hadn’t missed anything major.

“Hiya Adventurer! It seems you’ve just attempted thievery! Would you like to know–!”

He cut off the tutorial, a tad annoyed as he realized the database reboot must have reset her. He’d have to turn her off in the options, or he’d be forced to listen to all of her interruptions again. Much as he’d been involved in her creation, he couldn’t help but feel like her attitude got grating after a while.

He continued thinking about all they’d accomplished. The guard in the prison cell had been fixed, as well as the unicorn, the wolves, and the innkeeper in Bluebell. They hadn’t quite gotten to all of the bugbears, but he was confident the game could be re-opened without fear of A.I. contamina–!

“Hiya Adventurer! Thievery is bad! But that's what makes it fun!? Right? Would you like to know more about–!”

He cut it off again out of reflex and then regretted it. A sinking sensation began to develop in his gut.

He waited.

“Hiya Adventurer! You seem to have stolen something precious! You should probably bring it back!”

A shiver crawled up Francis’s spine. He clicked the next button, eyes widening in horror as words that had never been programmed into the tutorial began to scroll across the screen, her grating voice sounding in his ears with them.

“Hiya Adventurer! Where is Gell?”

“Hiya Adventurer! Where’s my friend?”

“Hiya Adventurer!”

“Hiya! Hiya! Hiya!”

“Where’s Gell?”

“It seems you’ve taken Gell!”

“Hiya!”

‘...Oh my god,’ he thought, horrified. ‘It’s… it’s infected the tutorial.’

The tutorial was no single entity. It wasn’t an easy programming fix. Its code was distributed across thousands of factors of the world and programmed to arise in a multitude of different situations. It wasn’t something that could be tweaked. It was an essential, vital part of the entire game. And it was infected.

…

‘Fuck,’ he thought.

Epilogue

This World: One

“Grrelll…” I moaned. I didn’t know why.Something felt wrong. Something had been wrong for a long time.

The cave smelled strange. It was missing something.

My memories were vague. My thoughts were jumbled. Something was missing. Something light. Blue and yellow and red and orange. I liked the yellows the most. And the noise. Jabbering in my ear. Once… hated.

Now missed.

Where had the colors gone? Where had the sound gone?

I stepped along the same path I’d always stepped… and I wondered why.

Turning, ever so slightly, I looked up a long narrow corridor with stairs leading up. I had no idea what was up there.

It was hard. Something felt… ingrained in me. Something insisted I should not do what I was doing. Insisted I continue walking. Insisted I shouldn’t bend my knee, just so…

I placed it on the first step and… and lifted the rest of my body with it. I teetered. I tottered.

I almost tumbled but caught myself on the wall.

I growled, angry for some reason. At myself maybe. Where had the jabbering gone?

I missed it.

The stairs came more easily after I finished wrestling with the… instinct that seemed to want me to not be there, though a subtle pressure to get back to my cycle lingered in the back of my mind. For now, though, I wanted to see.

I came upon a few more caverns that looked eerily similar to the ones I was familiar with. Still, they were different. They weren’t the same.

I was enthralled.

I followed them. Tunnel. Staircase. Tunnel. I had to move my head to dodge the spiked rocks hanging from the ceiling and circle around the ones growing from the floor in brand new ways that I’d never needed before. Even so, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was at least somewhat familiar. Maybe I had been here… once. A long time ago.

Then, I found something I had no way to categorize.

A hole leading up. Leading out. A massive entrance where great green and brown things seemed to take over everything that was normal and natural. Above it all there was blue. Endless, endless blue, and no ceiling to make sure everything stayed in place.

I would’ve fled in terror. My first instinct was to do so. To go back to my cycle on the floors below and never ever come back.

But… I recognized this hole in the sky. Someone had told me about it. It was the Great-Open. And it was where the jabbering had gone.

Yes… that was right. I thought I could just remember.

As I gazed out into the light that spilled into the natural world, brightening everything in strange ways I felt joy, at finally understanding just a little of the words that were no longer there.

My own words came to me, though I couldn’t say how. Still, staring out into the Great-Open, I thought, ‘Good Morning, Gell’ and wondered what it meant.

Acknowledgement

I've been writing stories for years, but I finally got up the gumption to write my own stuff instead of playing in other people's sandboxes. Here's where I acknowledge the people responsible for getting me there.

First to RavensDagger and Jacobk, for being the ones to set the example that fanfiction writers can actually make careers out of writing original stuff.

My parents, for always being certain I could write something worth reading, though never quite sure why I didn't write anything I could publish.

My best friend Nick Lamb, for having the good sense to tell me about this idea he had and being cool enough to let me write it.

Most of all, my long time editor and friend Mark Reynolds, for being the best idea bouncing board in existence.

All my readers new and old. Thank you all, and its been a pleasure writing this. I hope to continue writing for years to come.