“Eyes,” I told Devi’lynn, pointing at my eyes and blinking a few times.

“Eyes,” Devi’lynn repeated after me, memorizing the word. She then added the Sylven translation for me to learn. “Eyes.”

“Eyes,” I said, nodding. This one wouldn’t be too difficult to remember. “Alright, it’s your turn.”

The Sylven girl held up a finger for a moment, then touched her nose—dainty little nose, with a slight upturn to it. She then looked at me, pausing briefly, then booped me on the nose as well.

“Nose.”

“Nose,” I repeated after her, distracted by her closeness. Only now did I realize that Devi’lynn had the Sylven equivalent of freckles; lighter blue spots on her dark blue skin, splattered across the bridge of her nose and the top of her cheeks. If I had decided to draw a blue-skinned and silver-haired elf with a pair of horns, I never would have thought to add freckles as well … but there they were. They suited her nicely.

I wondered what Sarah would say if she saw me at that moment. Something nasty, most likely. She had never really understood that I could find someone aesthetically pleasing without wanting to sleep with them. Ugh. I shook my head, annoyed at my wandering thoughts. Thinking about Sarah had always been bittersweet—and now that we were separated by who knew how many lightyears, it felt doubly so.

“Randel?” Devi’lynn asked.

“I’m alright,” I said. “Just thinking about the people I’ve left behind.”

There weren’t many of them, truth be told. It would probably take a while till someone noticed that I was missing. I spoke with my parents only three or four times a year these days, and Sarah … well, the last time she had told me that she never wanted to see me again was about two months ago, so she’d be back soon. Perhaps she’d be the one to notice that my apartment was empty. She, or the landlord. Damn, I hoped to see that old dude again. He still owed me a drink for that one time I had managed to beat him in chess.

“Whoa—”

Teva’ryn pushed past me suddenly, watching the trees ahead of us. I followed his gaze and spotted a large, dark shape hanging high up on a branch. A bird with black feathers, larger than any bird I had seen before. I would have compared it to a vulture, but the head on the end of its long neck looked more like a goose’s.

We had a clear view on this upside-down bird as it hung like a bat, and it watched us with its coal-black eyes in turn. It didn’t seem to be afraid of us. Teva’ryn said something quietly, but he spoke too fast for me to catch any word.

“Dinner?” I asked in a hopeful manner. Fortunately the rest of our group noticed that something was up. They came back, loud at first but falling silent quickly upon seeing the bat-goose. Imaya readied her bow but held her fire. Only a single arrow remained from her original ten, so she would have to make it count.

“It might attack us if it feels threatened,” Imaya whispered. “Should I try hitting its head, or its body?”

“The body,” Simon said. “I’m going to throw a fireball after you shoot, just in case you miss.”

“Can you even throw that far?” Imaya asked. “You’ll just burn down the forest.”

“I can control my fire, thank you very much.”

“Only as long as you have Stamina,” Tamara objected. “I wouldn’t rely on something like that. I could trap the bird with my Gravity Orb instead.”

“But that would make my arrow go awry,” Imaya said. “We’ll need to time it right—”

Teva’ryn interrupted her by stepping forward and thrusting his left hand upwards. A translucent streak of blue substance sprang forth as an extension of his arm, moving almost too fast for my eyes to follow. The black bird let out a strangled honk as Teva’ryn’s phantom hand struck like a viper, closing around the bird’s neck. The goose opened its enormous wings to fly away—but Teva’ryn pulled his phantom limb back in, making the goose crash to the ground. Teva’ryn sprang forward and swung his sword once, twice, three times, beheading the animal. White mist erupted from the animal’s headless body, parting into seven tiny streaks before getting absorbed by our collars.

“I guess that works too,” Imaya broke the shocked silence. Teva’ryn tossed the severed head away and proceeded to wipe his bloody sword clean on a leafy plant.

Everyone felt just as hungry as I did, so we concluded the day’s journey at that point in order to cook the bird. A closer inspection of the animal revealed talons on its feet similar to an eagle’s, and a beak full of pointed little teeth. Sharp things on both end that I was glad we had avoided. We dragged the bird to a clear spot by the river and Teva’ryn sat down to defeather it.

Preparing the camp for the night was routine by this point. Simon picked rocks from the river, Pell and Tamara wandered off to gather firewood, and I collected some of the large-leaved plants with Imaya and Devi’lynn. They weren’t as soft as a feather bed, but they beat sleeping on the ground.

When we were done setting up the camp, I offered Soul Eater as a skewer and Simon roasted the meat with the help of his pyromancy. The result was a bland but filling meal. I wouldn’t have minded a more varied menu, but beggars couldn’t be choosers; we didn’t even have a cooking pot, let alone seasonings. In fact, none of us dared to eat any of the mushrooms or berries because we feared they might be poisonous. Tamara had voiced quite a lot of her concerns about ingesting alien stuff too; according to her, our immune system might not be able to handle the new viruses and bacteria that this alien planet would throw at us. If that was the case, a world of suffering awaited us before our untimely demise.

It had been a nice little speech for scaring the crap out of everyone, but for my part, I placed my trust in the competency of our captors. Surely they hadn’t abducted us just to see us drop dead from some exotic bacteria that we happened to breathe in. The Inspector had mentioned initiating other Players before us, so this wasn’t even their first rodeo. Not that this would make me eat those purple mushrooms and forest crawlies anytime soon, of course. I preferred starving a little before entering full survival mode.

We had debated the reason of our abduction a lot, dissecting what the Inspector told us. The winning theory was that we were test subjects in this world; much like lab rats, but with an entire planet as our labyrinth. Our opinions about what the three-eyed aliens were testing differed, however. Imaya claimed that it was the game interface, while Simon thought it was about how various people adapted to this world. Personally, I was leaning toward Imaya’s explanation. It seemed to be more fitting, considering that the Inspector had called Soul Eater a prototype.