by Raelyn Drake
D4rkHunter’s avatar pixelated and vanished.
Words floated in the sky above the spot:
D4RKHUNTER: DEATH 1 OF 3
Chapter 3
“Electric eels,” Rox_Ur_Sox said in a horrified whisper.
It took a full minute for D4rkHunter to respawn. He appeared on the dock next to the rest of the party.
“What happened?” he asked.
“You died,” E1_Kapitan said.
“Aw man! And it’s only the first level.”
“You must’ve lost all your Health before your red crystal could recharge,” E1_Kapitan said.
“At least our Health and Power recharge fully when we respawn.” D4rkHunter showed them that the red and blue crystals on his wristband were both glowing brightly.
“I think we’ll have to get rid of those eels before you can get whatever is under the water,” Rox_Ur_Sox said.
Something splashed in the water. D4rkHunter turned and fired an arrow at the spot. “I could shoot them from the dock, but I still need to dive for the object.”
“No offense, but I’m a better swimmer,” Em3ra1d said. “Why can’t I get it?”
D4rkHunter shook his head. “If the whole point of these levels is to face our fears, then it really should be me. You guys will have to protect me while I get it.”
“We’re going to have an easier time fighting them if we’re in the water. I can’t see anything from up here.” Rox_Ur_Sox headed for the ladder.
“Wait!” Em3ra1d said. “What if you get electrocuted like Hunter?”
“You’ve got to take chances in games, n00b,” Rox_Ur_Sox said.
“Em’s right,” E1_Kapitan said. “Video games are all about timing. Let’s just give it a second and see if there’s some sort of pattern we can figure out.”
They waited a moment, watching the water. Here and there, they caught glimpses of the eels. Then the clicking started.
“Count them!” Em3ra1d said.
They all counted silently until the clicking stopped and the water glowed purple for a moment.
“Five, right?” Em3ra1d asked.
The other players nodded.
“All right, so as soon as you hear that clicking,” she instructed, “swim for the ladders as fast as you can. You’ll have five clicks.”
E1_Kapitan aimed his staff at the eels, and thick strands of seaweed shot out, wrapping around the eels and binding them. Three of the eels wriggled and vanished in a burst of dark green pixels. Rox_Ur_Sox slashed at a few more of them with her sword.
Em3ra1d jumped into the frigid water and swam away from the ladder with smooth, confident strokes. She still couldn’t see much. Fog clung to the ocean’s surface.
She took a deep breath and dived under. The visibility shouldn’t have been much better, but when Em3ra1d opened her eyes, she found that she could see everything perfectly. The virtual water was dark green but crystal clear. And it didn’t sting her eyes like real salt water.
The golden glow seemed to come from an object buried under a pile of white rocks.
No, Em3ra1d realized with a shudder, a pile of bones.
A dozen electric eels glided through the water. Every time D4rkHunter swam toward the glowing object, they blocked his path, nipping at his arms and legs.
Em3ra1d tried to think of a spell that would be useful. She had left her spell book on the pier since she didn’t know if it would be waterproof. She could use Lightning Bolt.
But would that fry the water just like the eels?
There was a spell called Fireball.
Would that work underwater? Does magic in video games have to follow the laws of physics?
Virtual water or not, her lungs were beginning to burn from lack of oxygen. One of the eels rushed toward her.
Em3ra1d stuck out her hand. She spoke without opening her mouth, hoping that the mumbled spell would still work.
“Acid!”
A green cloud bubbled out from her hand. It surrounded the eel, and when it disappeared a moment later, the eel was gone.
Em3ra1d kicked her legs and shot up. Just as her head broke the surface and she gasped for air, the clicking started.
Click.
One, she thought, swimming as fast as she could toward the ladder.
Click.
Two. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Rox_Ur_Sox pull herself up out the water.
Click.
Three. E1_Kapitan had made it too. How did I let myself get this far out?
Click.
Four. Even D4rkHunter had reached the pier. Em3ra1d was almost there. She grabbed desperately for the ladder and heaved.
Click.
Five.
Em3ra1d’s foot had just cleared the water when the electricity sparked. She could feel the static and heat as the purple energy surged below her.
The water turned still and black again. Em3ra1d nearly sobbed with relief, her arms shaking as she clung to the ladder. She had always assumed people played video games for fun. And if there was one thing she wasn’t having right now it was—
Em3ra1d screamed as an eel lunged from the water and bit her leg. She lost her grip on the ladder, tumbling back into the cold water.
The eels closed in around her, their gaping mouths filled with jagged teeth.
The world faded to black, but there were words written on the blackness:
EM3RALD_WITH_3NVY: DEATH 1 OF 3
Chapter 4
When Em3ra1d respawned on the dock, it felt like only one or two seconds had passed, but she remembered that it had taken sixty seconds for D4rkHunter to come back to life.
Em3ra1d tried to get her bearings. Rox_Ur_Sox had found a rowboat somewhere and had paddled out to the middle of the bay. She was leaning over the side, trying to hack at eels with her sword without tipping over the boat. E1_Kapitan was on the dock, sending more thorn darts shooting into the water from his staff.
Em3ra1d knew she would be more helpful in the water. She ran along the dock, jumped, and dove into the water, coming up next to Rox_Ur_Sox in her rowboat.
“Oh good, you’re back,” Rox_Ur_Sox said, rolling her eyes. “I don’t know how we’d ever survive without your powerful Mage spells.” She brought the hilt of her sword down on the nose of an eel that had come too close, and it disappeared. “I’m just glad I found this boat tied to the dock. Do you know how hard it is to tread water when you’re weighed down with Warrior armor?”
Em3ra1d ducked under the water and pointed at the eels that had clustered around the boat.
“Confusion!” Once again, the spell seemed to work even when it was gurgled underwater. The eels started to drift slowly in circles, changing direction randomly. Some of them bumped into each other.
Em3ra1d popped above the water. “I think I confused them!” she called to Rox_Ur_Sox.
“I guess that helps? It would have been better if you could’ve just killed some.” Rox_Ur_Sox slashed at another eel and it disappeared. “This does make them easier to hit, though.”
Back underwater, Em3ra1d used another cloud of Acid. Her Power was very low from spellcasting, and multiple eel bites had drained her red Health crystal, but now there was only one eel left. And besides, she could see that D4rkHunter had almost uncovered the glowing object in the pile of bones.
The final eel darted through the water to attack D4rkHunter from behind. The clicking started again. One click. Two clicks. Three clicks.
Em3ra1d was torn between swimming for the ladder and helping D4rkHunter. The eels were the ones electrifying the water, so if they killed the last one . . .
She had just raised her hand to cast a spell when D4rkHunter spun around in the water, his cloak billowing out behind him. He had what looked like a leg bone in his hand. Four clicks. He smacked the eel in the face.
Five clicks.
Em3ra1d braced herself for the jolt of purple electricity, but at the last possible second, the eel pixelated and vanished.
D4rkHunter surfaced a moment a
fter Em3ra1d_with_3nvy. He looked like he was having trouble, so Em3ra1d swam over and helped him to the ladder.
He flopped on the pier. He was breathing heavily, but he raised his hand up in triumph. He was holding a glowing golden key.
“I don’t know about ‘facing my fears,’ ” D4rkHunter said with a tight laugh. “If anything, I’m more freaked out by swimming now.” He looked over his shoulder at the dark water. “Let’s get out of here.”
“Guess it’s time for us to head for the next level,” said E1_Kapitan.
They stepped off the pier and headed toward the forest. Tall trees loomed above them—dark pines and gnarled oaks draped with moss. Thorn bushes and ferns filled the ground between the trees, so the only clear place to walk was a narrow path. The moon was full in the sky above the trees, but none of that light seemed to reach the path below. Em3ra1d couldn’t see more than a few feet into the forest. Everything beyond that looked pitch-black, as though the game’s programmers had forgotten to fill in the rest of the trees.
They found a large wooden treasure chest sitting at the edge of the forest.
D4rkHunter looked at the glowing key in his hand, shrugged, and knelt down in front of the chest. He inserted the key into the keyhole and turned it with a loud clunk. As they watched, the key turned to water in his hands. It maintained its shape for a moment and then splashed to the ground. The lid of the chest creaked open, revealing a bow and a quiver of arrows.
Now that she had something to compare them to, Em3ra1d realized how basic D4rkHunter’s starting bow and arrows had been. Those had been made of plain wood. The new bow was made of glossy black wood and carved with runes. The arrows were tipped with polished black stone. The feathers at the end gleamed purple in the moonlight.
Words appeared above the chest:
SPARK BOW
“Awesome!” D4rkHunter said, examining his loot.
“All the best weapons have names,” Rox_Ur_Sox said wistfully. “I can’t wait to see what my new weapon will be called.” She swept an arm toward the forest path. “Shall we?”
Chapter 5
They entered the forest and were abruptly swallowed up in the darkness. The forest wasn’t just dark. It seemed as though every last bit of light had been sucked out of the world in a split second. The change was so sudden and overwhelming that Em3ra1d felt like she’d been punched in the stomach.
The players stumbled along the path, finding their way by touch. Em3ra1d kept one hand on D4rkHunter’s shoulder in front of her and one hand out to the side. Her palm brushed against rough tree bark, damp tangles of moss, and thick, waxy leaves. Once, she thought she felt fur. She gasped and jerked her hand back, hoping she had imagined it.
“I literally can’t see anything.” Em3ra1d peered into the dark. She closed her eyes and opened them again, but there was no difference.
“Why don’t you use your Light spell, Em?” E1_Kapitan asked.
Rox_Ur_Sox laughed harshly. “You saw what happened in the tutorial. We’d make it five feet before the spell fizzled out.”
Em3ra1d felt her face grow hot and was glad no one could see her.
“It’s not that dark,” D4rkHunter protested.
“You’re a Ranger,” Rox_Ur_Sox said. “Rangers usually have great eyesight even in darkness.”
“Good for him.” E1_Kapitan’s voice sounded strained.
“This is your level, isn’t it, Kap?” Rox_Ur_Sox asked. “Are you afraid of the woods?”
“The dark?” Em3ra1d asked.
“Look, guys, I don’t want to talk about it, okay?” E1_Kapitan said.
“Are you scared of squirrels?” D4rkHunter asked.
This seemed to break E1_Kapitan’s unease for a moment. “Squirrels? For real, man? Why would I be scared of squirrels?”
There was a crackling sound, and a brilliant purple flare of light burst in the forest to their left.
They spun to look. D4rkHunter had fired an arrow from his new Spark Bow at a creature that crouched on a low branch above their heads.
In the light from the arrow’s electricity, Em3ra1d could see that it was a squirrel, all right, but it was bigger and looked much meaner than any she had seen. It had oversized yellow eyes like an owl, and when it opened its mouth to shriek, Em3ra1d could see that it had multiple rows of shark-like teeth. The electricity coursed across its body for a few seconds, and then with a twitch the squirrel fell out of the tree. It pixelated and vanished, but the smell of burnt hair lingered.
Right before the light from the arrow went out, Em3ra1d saw the glowing green circles of countless eyes in the trees surrounding them.
And then the light was gone, and Em3ra1d felt blinder than before, like after a camera flash in a dark room. Purple afterimages splotched her vision as her eyes tried to readjust to the dark.
Answering shrieks and rasping barks echoed in the dark forest all around them. Branches rustled, and there was a sound of claws scrabbling on bark.
Em3ra1d yelped in surprise as a heavy weight landed on her shoulders, sharp claws scratching and tangling in her hair. Pain tingled across her scalp, and she saw her red Health crystal dim.
An arrow streaked out of the darkness like a lightning bolt, missing her by inches but knocking the squirrel off her back. In the light from the arrow, Em3ra1d could see the squirrels diving at them from all directions.
E1_Kapitan knocked one away with his staff. Another squirrel jumped at Rox_Ur_Sox from above. She swung her shield over her head to deflect the attack and the squirrel bounced off and fell to the ground, chittering angrily.
D4rkHunter continued to fire his electric arrows, picking off squirrels one by one. The arrows lit up the night, turning the dark into twisting nightmarish shadows filled with glowing eyes and gleaming teeth. Each time the arrows flared, the party had a brief moment where they could see the monstrous squirrels that were attacking them. But the light would soon fade and leave them blind again.
Em3ra1d flipped through her spell book desperately during the times the arrows lit up the dark forest and gave her enough light to read by. She didn’t dare use the Light spell again after how badly it had failed during the tutorial. She needed something good, something to prove that she was useful. Why were there so many spells?
Finally, she found it. She aimed her hand at the squirrels, which were currently swarming Rox_Ur_Sox.
“Fireball!” A ball of green flames shot from her hand and swept over the squirrels. When the flame flickered away, all of the squirrels had vanished, either defeated or scared off into the woods.
I did it! Em3ra1d thought excitedly. Maybe she could be a useful party member after all—
“You. Are. Such. An. IDIOT!” Rox_Ur_Sox’s voice growled from the darkness.
Em3ra1d’s confidence vanished as quickly as it had come. “Why? We beat them!”
“Couple of notes, n00b.” Rox_Ur_Sox sounded like she was trying to keep her temper. “First of all, it’s called ‘friendly fire’ when you attack the enemy and end up hurting your own party members.”
In the dark, Em3ra1d_with_3nvy saw a faint red glow and realized it was Rox_Ur_Sox’s Health crystal. The Fireball spell had drained almost all of it.
Em3ra1d felt her stomach drop. “I’m sorry—”
“Chill, Roxy,” E1_Kapitan said. “Your Health will recharge soon.”
“Second,” Rox_Ur_Sox continued, ignoring him, “you never want to waste a high-level spell on low-level enemies.”
Em3ra1d looked down at her blue Power crystal. It was as depleted as Rox_Ur_Sox’s red Health crystal. She would have to wait for her Power to recharge before she could cast any sort of useful spell again.
“Wait,” she said, “what do you mean ‘low-level’? Wasn’t that the enemy we were supposed to defeat for the Earth Level?”
“Those little guys were too easy, Em,” D4rkHunter explained quietly. “They were just a distraction.”
Em3ra1d’s heart beat faster. “A distraction from what?”
&
nbsp; Another lightning arrow flared from D4rkHunter’s Spark Bow just in time to illuminate a giant bear as it lumbered from the shadows. It was already taller than them at the shoulder when it was on all four legs. Em3ra1d didn’t want to think about how tall it would be if it stood on its hind legs. Two long, dagger-shaped teeth jutted from its mouth, each one as thick as her arm. A saber-toothed bear. The lightning from the arrow made its fur bristle with static but didn’t seem to do as much damage as it did to the squirrels.
The saber-toothed bear narrowed its huge green eyes and snarled. Its breath smelled like rotting meat.
In one quick motion, its paw darted out and swatted Rox_Ur_Sox.
Her Health crystal never had a chance to recharge.
ROX_UR_SOX: DEATH 1 OF 3
Chapter 6
Em3ra1d knew it would only be a minute until Rox_Ur_Sox respawned. But the saber-toothed bear growled, a deep rumbling bass that vibrated her bones, and sixty seconds felt like a lifetime.
“Keep your head in the game, Em!” D4rkHunter called. “Everyone makes mistakes.”
He shot a couple of arrows at the beast, but it just wasn’t enough. The saber-toothed bear lunged at D4rkHunter. Em3ra1d saw a flash of giant, razor-sharp teeth, and then D4rkHunter’s avatar pixelated and vanished.
D4RKHUNTER: DEATH 2 OF 3
The light from the arrow went out, plunging them once more into darkness. Em3ra1d braced herself for the attack, but it never came. She hardly dared to breathe.
“Why isn’t it attacking us, Kap?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
“I think it’s hunting us. For fun,” E1_Kapitan replied in a shaky voice.
He sounded close, so Em3ra1d reached out, found his hand, and squeezed it reassuringly. It was clammy and trembling.
“What do we do now?” he asked. “Can you use a spell?”
Em3ra1d checked her Power. It was recharging slowly, but the crystal was still a very faint blue. “I don’t have enough Power yet for a high-level spell.” They couldn’t afford to wait for her Power to recharge or for D4rkHunter and Rox_Ur_Sox to respawn. The saber-toothed bear had to be lurking nearby.
