“Why?”
“Because it’s a lot more fun than watchin’ you drown like a dog in a well. Now, please, try and pay attention to your surroundings. This is the tour.”
“Wait, what?” I asked as I looked around in a panic, recognizing nothing.
“Don’t freak, okay? If you get confused when you’re tottlin’ around the island I’ll come around and save your stupid ass.”
“Hey,” I snapped while trying to absorb the environment around me at the same time, “where’d that come from?”
“You pissed me off is where that came from,” Jesse barked, “that’s lesson one right there. Piss people off, they’ll be pissed off.”
“Well, you’re not exactly peop-”
“Pick your next words very carefully, friend,” Jesse warned, “or I might just be inclined to whip around and end this tour quick smart.”
Struggling to find something sharp or witty to say, I simply said “You’re a very mean lizard.”
“And you’re a very stupid human.”
I didn’t wholly appreciate the way he spoke to me, as I’m sure is already clear, but there was some part of me that found it somewhat entertaining that I was talking to a cowboy lizard named Jesse who was leading me around an island.
It was an… interesting start.
CHAPTER 3
There wasn’t much talking after Jesse and I had exchanged those little insults, instead Jesse let me look around in silence, either because he wanted me to have the best chance of getting to know the space or because he was simply too annoyed to bother trying.
It didn’t matter either way because after a few more minutes of wandering around we’d reached the beach’s end.
Nothing but a pretty craggy shore to our left, nothing but ocean to our right, and a stretch of water that would’ve been at least four hundred feet across in front of us.
“So, we turn around, right?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
“Pfft, no,” Jesse scoffed as he waded into the water, “we’re goin’ across.”
“Is that really the best idea?”
“When are you gonna stop bein’ so fuckin’ timid and trust me? C’mon, it’s not that far.”
Before I could say another word Jesse had gone out of earshot, leaving me to look down the thousand or so foot stretch of shore that went towards the center of the island with equal parts sand and small rocky cliffs.
“No way around…” I quietly muttered, the mere idea of going into the freezing water again sending a shiver up my spine.
“Come on!” Jesse called from the middle of the water, “It’s not that far once you start swimming!”
I really didn’t want to go back in the water, but at the same time there was a little voice in my head telling me that if I didn’t I’d end up losing Jesse and, as a result, my only hope of figuring out how to get to the harem part of the game.
“I’m so gonna regret this…” I whispered to myself before slowly wading into the water, inch-by-inch.
At first the water was freezing, as expected, but the deeper I got the more the sun seemed to affect it and by the time I was up to chest height I was warmer than I’d been on the land.
“There you go!” Jesse laughed, his voice carrying over the water with ease as the ground sort of gave out beneath me and I was forced to swim, “Now you’re getting it!”
“I know how to swim!” I called back angrily after starting a breaststroke, “I just don’t like being forced into unknown waters!”
“You’re a ‘last in the beach’ kinda fellow, aren’t you?” Jesse joked as I slowly but surely caught up with him, “Well, there ain’t nothin’ to be ‘fraid of in here except me, not for the moment anyway.”
“I don’t like that ‘for the moment’ modifier,” I replied after sneaking a quick look around the water for large shadows, “makes me uneasy.”
“Don’t worry, friend,” Jesse said, “I’ll make sure we get out o’ the water before any nasties try to take a nip at your nasties. Keep up, I wanna get through this before the end of the day.”
From there I swam in silence, trying my best to seem semi-pissed that I wasn’t getting laid as I actually started to enjoy my time in the water to the point where I was actually kind of upset when we reached the shoreline.
“Water’s nice, huh?” Jesse asked after I’d spent a few seconds doing my best to get the sand out from between my thighs.
“It’s not bad,” I lied, “so, where to next?”
“Just along the beach a little while longer,” Jesse replied before turning around and leading me again, “we’ll worry about the jungle later.”
“Makes sense to me,” I said after quickly catching up and walking beside him instead of behind, “how much further ‘til we’re done?”
“You’ll see.”
And then he stopped, right at the point where we rounded the curve of the beach and the waterway was no longer visible.
“Ta-da,” Jesse let out unenthusiastically, “back where we started.”
“What?” I scoffed as I looked around and half-recognized my surroundings, “What do you mean?”
“This is it,” Jesse replied, “this is the island.”
“How is that even possible?” I asked after a few seconds of looking for some kind of trickery, “We’ve only been walking, what, twenty minutes?”
“Try about an hour,” Jesse said, “I think there were a few times there where you went on autopilot, happens to some people when they first drop in.”
“Still though, an hour?” I half-chuckled, skipping over the fact that he’d just told me I was on autopilot, “How big is this place?”
“Somewhere in the ballpark of sixty acres, doesn’t matter,” Jesse replied before using his head to gesture out to the ocean, “looks like you’ve got a package.”
Without saying a word I turned around and looked at the water, seeing nothing at first as a wave rose high, but then as it crashed I spotted what Jesse was referring to.
“That’s… odd.” I said as I watched the cardboard box bob its way towards me, a life-preserver attached to the bottom keeping it afloat as it did.
A few seconds went by before the box finally hit the shore, and despite its harmless-looking exterior, I couldn’t help but be cautious.
“Go on,” Jesse said, “I promise I wouldn’t bring you this far just to kill you with a cardboard box.”
“I honestly wouldn’t put it past you,” I joked as I slowly approached the box, “but I’m going to go against my better judgment and trust you…”
My caution was unnecessary though, as was proven by the fact that, as soon as I opened the box, a whole lot of nothing happened.
“What’s this?” I asked after pulling the purple, palm-sized cube out of the box and turning back to face Jesse.
“Toolbox.” Jesse replied matter-of-factly, “It’s what is going to help you create and… whatnot in this big ol’ world.”
“Doesn’t seem all that big to me…” I trailed off as I walked towards Jesse, turning the cube over in my hand as I did so.
“The world doesn’t stop at these shores, William,” Jesse said, clearly trying to sound more mysterious and wise man-like than he did, “whole lot of explorin’ for you to do once we get you good and set up.”
“Alright,” I sighed, deciding it was for the best if I just took his word on it, “so, how do you get this thing to work?”
“Dunno.” Jesse replied with a shrug.
“What do you mean ‘dunno’?” I asked, “Isn’t your whole job to teach me about all this stuff?”
“My job’s to guide you ‘round the island and help you with the basic mechanics,” Jesse said before growing a small smile, “I mean, wouldn’t be much of a game if I held your hand all the way through, would it?”
“S’pose not…” I replied as I ran my thumb over a slight groove in the cube.
Then, without warning, the top of the cube lit up with three simple words in white, bloc
ky text.
“Accept survival packag-”
I didn’t get to finish my sentence as the left side of the cube opened up and basically vomited out a bunch of random stuff, launching itself out of my hand with the sheer force that came with expelling the items.
“I’ll get the Toolbox,” Jesse said as he walked over to the cube, ignoring the utterly stunned expression on my face, “you sift through that stuff, see if you can find anything useful.”
My brain wouldn’t quite process the pile at first, or maybe the game just hadn’t rendered it in yet and it was causing some kind of mess in my head, but I was eventually able to start making out the shapes.
There was a simple stone hand-axe, a pair of beige cargo pants, a white shirt that looked about five sizes too large, and a dark green satchel.
“Where’d all this come from?” I asked as I picked up and started shaking off the long-sleeved shirt.
“Who knows,” Jesse replied, “maybe some distant god or someone who wanted to see how you’d react. Or, you know, it’s a timed event to make sure you don’t just run around naked forever.”
“Alright, alright, fair enough.” I weakly chuckled before pulling the shirt on over my head and taking a moment to enjoy the way the soft fabric felt on my skin.
It was like one of those shirts you see in historical and pirate movies and stuff, the ones that look insanely comfortable.
“Maybe get the pants on?” Jesse suggested as he walked over with the cube on his head, “I’m kinda sick of turnin’ around and seein’ your thigh-slapper.”
“Fair enough,” I replied, pretending that the fact that I didn’t get to keep running my fingers over the shirt didn’t upset me before grabbing the pants and pulling them on, “you reckon anyone’ll send shoes?”
“It’s possible,” Jesse said as I picked up the satchel and put the strap over my head then grabbed the hand-axe, “but it might be an idea to just keep an eye out for sharp rocks and stuff for now. Want to grab this thing? I don’t like it sittin’ so close to where I keep my brain.”
I let out a little laugh at that and grabbed the cube from Jesse’s head, to which he let out a little sigh of relief and anxiously licked all around his face.
“What am I supposed to do with this now?” I asked, not really wanting to put the radioactive-looking cube in my bag.
“Where would it be most convenient for you?” Jesse replied, “I mean, where would you want it so you could access it at a moment’s notice?”
I had to think on that for a few seconds, but I eventually came to a conclusion.
“I think I’d like it on my-”
Again, the cube didn’t let me finish my sentence, instead opting to simply leap over to my left hand where it, with a series of sounds and movements that made my hand jerk around and caused me to drop my axe, wrapped and converted into a sort of glove.
“Bit Michael Jackson, isn’t it?” Jesse joked.
I went to agree but was stopped as the cube changed form again, latching onto my palm and spreading out over my fingers before fusing into my skin with a searing pain that caused me to drop to my knees and desperately squeeze my wrist in agony.
“That looks like it hurts.” Jesse said while I struggled to breathe through the pain, “Just a few more seconds I reckon.”
I wanted to growl something at him, though he turned out to be right as the Toolbox finished its work of burrowing into my flesh and the pain instantly disappeared.
“What… the Hell?” I huffed out as I watched a few purple and white lights flashed dully from within my palm.
“That, William, was the Toolbox,” Jesse replied after I’d slowly gotten back to my feet, “it’s basically going to act as your HUD and… other stuff, don’t worry, it’ll become clearer as we go on.”
“What do you mean ‘as we go on’?” I asked without taking my eyes off my hand, “What am I supposed to do now? So far I’ve just been led around by a cowboy lizard and assaulted by a cube. I haven’t seen a single woman since I got here, human or otherwise, and I’m seriously starting to wonder if it’s even worth it to find one.”
Jesse rolled his eyes at that and let out a little huff of amusement, “Really? You’re going to give up now? After all that trouble?”
I hesitated to answer, then sighed and nodded, “Fine, what do I do now?”
“That’s up to you,” Jesse said before gesturing his head over to the jungle, “but it might be an idea to give these trees a whack.”
My lizard guide started moving towards the jungle after that, leaving me to regard it with a little smile, quietly wondering to myself if it wouldn’t be better for me to simply find another game, something a tad easier and with slightly more on the girl front.
“You really gonna make me ask you to hurry up again?” Jesse called back as I stared at the trees.
“Quit pestering me,” I replied with a smile as I scooped up the hand-axe and gave it a quick twirl around my finger, “I’m just doing some thinking.”
“Don’t overdo it,” Jesse chuckled, “you might do some damage.”
“You really are a very mean lizard.” I joked.
“Eh, I try my best.”
CHAPTER 4
After making our way about ten feet into the jungle we found a clearing of around twenty-by-twenty feet, as much of a clearing as we were going to get anyway.
“Ain’t going to chop itself down, you know.” Jesse remarked as I raised and rotated my axe around in an effort to find the best place to start hacking.
“I haven’t done this before, alright?”
“Haven’t done what? Chopped a tree down?” Jesse scoffed, “William, it really ain’t that hard. I mean, you have seen movies, right?”
“I understand the basic physics of it,” I replied defensively, “hit tree with blade, tree fall down.”
“What’s the problem then?”
“The problem is that I don’t want to chop my leg off,” I said after finding what I hoped was more or less the right angle, “seriously, I imagine that if I hit the tree at the wrong angle I’m going to glance off and really mess myself up.”
Jesse let out an unimpressed groan at that, though he was courteous enough not to actually say anything as I raised my axe over my shoulder for the third time since I’d started.
“What if I-”
“Just swing the fuckin’ axe!”
And with that, I swung, the blade burying itself deep into the wood as it sent what felt like a massive electric shock through my arm.
“See?” Jesse chuckled, “Easy.”
I wanted to tell him he was wrong, but at the same time I didn’t want to come off as a pussy, so I simply pulled the axe out and, without hesitation, took another swing, taking a large chunk of wood out of the tree.
“I think they make ‘em a bit more brittle when you’re starting out,” Jesse said as I took another swing, “still though, you seem to be taking to it pretty wel-”
“Timber!” I called out as the tree started to creak and groan before falling with the almighty sound of splintering wood and crashing branches.
It couldn’t have been more than fifteen foot high, but it seemed to fall forever before finally getting caught at an angle in another tree’s strong branches.
“I’ve always wanted to say that,” I quietly laughed as I walked around the tree, looking for a way to get it down, “any idea how to get this thing down?”
“You could start by not walking under it,” Jesse practically snapped with what sounded a lot like concern, “but other than that… Well, why don’t you take a look at your hand?”
I didn’t catch his meaning at first, mostly because I was looking down at my axe-wielding right hand, but then I noticed the white and purple lights in my left.
“What’s that fo-” I started then stopped as some barely decipherable words started floating above my palm, “What does ‘point at new object’ mean?”
“I’m guessing it means the tree, friend.”
Again, I was briefly confused, but I was starting to feel like I’d used up all my requests for help.
So, with no small amount of trepidation, I pointed my hand at the newly felled tree and watched in amazement as purple, blue, and white light shot out of my hand and encased the tree in a wireframe for a while.
“Am I… Am I supposed to do anything else?” I asked as the Toolbox continued to scan over the tree.
“Just give it a few seconds,” Jesse replied, “won’t normally take this long, I think it’s just kinda showing off.”
Then, right as the last word left Jesse’s lips, the scan stopped and the words ‘Object Scanned’ briefly flashed over the tree before disappearing along with the wireframe and the tree.
“Alright…” I trailed off after looking at my hand and making sure it didn’t need to do anything else, “What now?”
“Nothin’,” Jesse said nonchalantly, “unless you want to spawn a copy of that there tree.”
“Why would I want to do that?”
“Dunno, sure you’ll find a reason to do it at some point,” Jesse replied, “but basically you can scan just about anything.”
“Doesn’t that make the game… I don’t know, easy?” I asked, hoping that it was that easy.
“In a way,” Jesse said as I walked through the space where the tree had been, “it just takes out the requirement for resource harvesting.”
“And why wouldn’t I want to resource harvest?”
“Seriously?” Jesse laughed, “You’ve been moanin’ about how annoying it is that you haven’t been able to get laid and now you’re going to tell me you wanna spend all day tryin’ to find wood to build stuff?”
“I don’t know, it just seems kind of weird to me that this is where the game draws the line,” I replied with a shrug before jumping up and sitting on the stump I’d made with my axe in my lap, “don’t get me wrong, I’m glad I can build a house and that now, but I-”
“Woah, slow your roll there,” Jesse interjected, “just ‘cause you got that log doesn’t mean you’re able to just start droppin’ houses everywhere. I mean, unless you want a place that’ll just fall on you at the first gust of a butterfly’s fart.”
Build-A-Harem- The Island Collection Page 2
