I opened my eyes and squinted at the two suns burning bright in a cobalt blue sky high above me. I quickly figured out I was lying on my back and that something was painfully jabbing into my spine. I grunted as I rolled off of whatever it was and then struggled to sit up, causing more pain to shoot up my butt as whatever it was jabbed me there as well.

“Ah! Ow! Ah!!”

Rolling onto my hands I finally pressed up on the tiny rocks littering the hard packed red earth beneath me. It felt like I was crawling on marbles or damn Lego pieces. I finally got to my feet and realized two things.

One, the small rocks were actually tiny bones and two…I definitely wasn’t in Chicago anymore. I looked up at the twin suns again and my heart began to race. All around me tall trees sprung towards the sky at over thirty feet or more, overgrown with thick vines.

I was in some kind of clearing in the middle of a damn jungle. The call of birds and other animals I couldn’t quite identify echoed throughout the treetops, accompanied by the buzz of insects in my ears.

Where was I? And was this all real?

The blazing heat from the suns and the thick humidity in the air said that it was. My white shirt was already soaked through with sweat and my khaki dockers were sticking to my thighs. Thankfully my loafers prevented the tiny bones or whatever the hell they were from jabbing into my feet. I looked at them more closely and realized they were fragments of bigger bones that had somehow been crushed.

But by what…?

You have gained 1 Insight!

I blinked as the words appeared in front of me, hovering over my vision like the HUD on a video game. It felt alien and familiar all at once. I’d played enough VR games for something like that to not come as a shock, but something like this couldn’t be happening in the real world, could it? I glanced about me at the all too real jungle and again wondered if maybe this was still part of a prank. Were those lights some elaborate hoax to get me into some top secret VR testing lab? Some new game that wasn’t supposed to exist yet?

It kind of made more sense than aliens visiting me and teleporting me to some alien jungle planet. Fuck it, I’m going with top secret video game for now.

“Stats,” I said and to my amazement a page of text scrolled before my eyes.

Name: Cole Jacobs

Race: Human

Class: None

Insight Level: 1

Strength 5

Agility 6

Dexterity 4

Constitution 3

Will 5

Intellect 4

Charisma 6

Mana pool: 0

Okay, this was definitely a game.

“Skills,” I said.

Unarmed Combat (6)

Sword(3)

Staff(4)

Engineering(4)

Oratory(3)

Negotiation(4)

Seduction(1)

“A one in seduction?” I said with chagrin. “What the hell, game?”

But at least it seemed to have translated my martial arts skills properly. I was pretty handy when it came to the Jo and bokken in Aikido training. But what did the numbers actually mean? Were they out of ten perhaps? And how did that actually work anyway?

Then something else occurred to me. This game had pain that was for sure—those bone shards had hurt like hell. But did this game have hitpoints? Could I die?

“Health,” I said.

I expected to see a list of HP and Endurance or something, but instead only one thing popped up.

Health: Diseased – Touched by Death

A sinking feeling filled my gut as I read it. Did this thing actually translate my cancer too?

“That’s totally messed up,” I said and pondered how a game could even detect something like that. And why would the developers even make it able to do that. It made no sense, but the alternative made even less sense—that I was really taken from Earth and seeing gaming stats floating before my eyes on an alien world.

Maybe this was some kind of crazy dream brought on by the tumor in my head.

That made me think of Susan.

I pictured her waiting for me at her doctor’s office, growing more confused, disappointed and hurt as time dragged on. She was waiting vainly for the guy who finally asked her on a date, but who never showed up.

Fuck…

I reached instinctively for the cell phone in my top pocket as if to call her, but found the thing dead, of course. No charge at all. Maybe it was even fried. A chill ran through me as slowly the reality of my predicament began to set it.

I really am on another world.

A horrid screech filled the air and shook me from my thoughts.

It sounded like a parrot, but one that had to be the size of a bus by how loud it was. I scanned about in a panic, my heart slamming against my chest. Whatever made that sounds screeched again and it seemed to be closer this time.

The earth shook with the sounds of heavy footfalls, accompanied by the snapping of tree limbs. My heartbeat thundered in my ears. I didn’t know what it was but it was heading my way and I wasn’t about to wait for it to show up.

I turned away from the sound and ran into the jungle behind me. I spotted a large tree and quickly scaled up its side with the aid of the thick vines curling about its massive trunk. Reaching the top branches some thirty feet in the air, I released a sigh of relief, feeling a heck of a lot safer. I looked back into the clearing just as something burst through the treeline and into the clearing. I was expecting some kind of monster, but instead I saw a person.

An Arab looking dude wearing red robes and a white turban immediately slipped on the Lego-bone shards as he dashed into the clearing. He cried out as he fell on his ass, shouting what had to be curses in a language I didn’t understand.

From my higher vantage I could see into the opposite side of the jungle and my heart stopped when I saw a bird the size of a dinosaur stomping through the trees not far behind him. It was covered in dark green feathers and was shaped like a flamingo with a curved neck that ended in a black beak that could easily engulf a man’s head. The Arab guy scrambled onto his feet still cursing.

“Hey, yo!” I shouted to him. “Up here, man!”

The guy finally spotted me and a huge grin lit up on his face.

“By Aziz!” he said in what sounded like English, but with a heavy accent. “A human has come to save me? How fortunate indeed!”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever!” I shouted back. “Just get up here, quick! That thing is right behind you!”

The guy continued smiling as he trotted in my direction. I vaguely wondered if he knew just how much danger he was in as he merely walked the last few steps out of the clearing and into the tree line. I descended the tree and grasped his hand to help him up just as the massive bird creature came crashing into the clearing.

The Arab guy, who I could now see up-close was middle-aged with a finely trimmed beard, pressed a finger to his lips for us to remain quiet. He didn’t have to tell me twice. I held my breath as the enormous bird slid to a halt atop the small fragments of bone.

We seemed to be up high enough and out of the reach of its long neck, but if that thing could fly we were totally screwed. I looked over at my new companion and saw him grinning with a giddy excitement as he looked down upon the massive bird.

“Ooo…. I think I’ve got him,” he said in hushed whispered while still grinning.

Got him?

Before I could ask the question out loud, the tree began to shake and the giant bird let out a shrill screech as it lost its footing. All at once the hard packed earth beneath it fell in on itself and the bird disappeared into the giant tooth filled throat of what I could only describe as one of those giant worms from the movie Dune.

The enormous worm creature swallowed the giant bird whole. The flaps of its mouth then closed to form a segmented head that looked somewhat like a peeled orange. It sunk back into the ground again and then opened its mouth and vomited up a torrent of red mud that filled the hole, making it a muddy forest clearing once more.

I stared stupefied as the whole thing played out in just a few seconds. “Holy shit…”

“Success!” Arab dude shouted next to me and then slapped me on my shoulder. “Let’s see what we’ve gotten, my friend.”

He jumped out of the tree and ran into the clearing that was now a sopping mud hole of stinking worm vomit. My stomach lurched at just the sight of it as he stooped down to pick through the small pieces of freshly vomited bone.

At least I know where the bones came from now, I thought.

“Hey what are you doing?” I called down to him. “You sure that’s safe?”

“Perfectly safe, my friend,” he said and then demonstrated by hopping up and down in the mud. “Pit worms only eat big prey. They won’t come out for a small fry like me. And besides…it just ate! We are safe. Come!”

I hesitated for half a second but then figured he at least seemed to know what he was doing. He knew a hell of a lot more than me that was for sure. And right now I could really use some answers. I dropped down out of the tree and covered my nose in the crook of my elbow as I ventured into the puke mud.

“Dude, this is frigging disgusting,” I said. “What are you looking for?”

“Theses,” he said and picked something out of the mud to show me. “High quality mana shards.”

I squinted at the small piece of translucent blue crystal as he cleaned it between his thumb and forefinger. It looked like a rough cut diamond and seemed to gleam with a faint light of its own.

“The worm consumes most of them from the bird of course,” he continued. “But there are always some left over. Not many people know this, but using pit worms is one of the best ways to hunt Terror Bird crystals.”

“Terror bird?” I said. “That’s its name?”

“Fitting no?” The guy grinned at me and then his eyes opened wide. “By Aziz! Where are my manners? I have not yet introduced myself.”

He made a small bow before throwing his arms wide in an overly dramatic fashion.

“I am Yaya Shareef Eldeen!” he announced and then pushed his robes back in a pose, fists on hips. “Adventurer extreme!”

He stayed like that for a few seconds and I couldn’t tell if it was some kind of joke or not. Before it got too embarrassing for the both of us, I nodded with a polite smile. “Ah… cool. Very nice to meet you. I’m—holy shit!”

I stopped myself mid-sentence as I looked down at his feet, or what were supposed to be feet. Stuck in the mud were two black hooves leading to a pair of shaggy goat’s legs.

“Holy shit…hmmm,” he said stroking his short beard. “An odd name indeed!”

“No, sorry,” I said, unable to take my eyes off his hooves. “That’s not my name.”

“Then what is it?”

“Cole,” I said clearing my throat. “My name’s Cole. Cole Jacobs.”

“Ah! Cole. An excellent name,” he said curling his fist. “Monosyllabic. Powerful! Like the black stone that fuels the mighty forges of Zinbaba!”

I flinched away from the weird, half goat man as he practically shouted in my face.

“Yeah, I guess…” I said with a nervous smile. “It’s spelled kind of differently though. C-O-L-E not C-O-A-L. If that even means anything to you.”

“No matter,” he said. “It’s powerful nonetheless. And yes, those things you said mean nothing to me!”

He shouted the word ‘nothing’ while cutting his hand through the air, causing me the flinch again. Whoever this guy was, I was quickly ascertaining he was borderline nuts. Although he probably had to be, to be using himself as bait to lure a giant killer bird into the mouth of an even more giant killer worm.

“So…ah,” I said, glancing down at his hooves again. “What exactly are you?”

He furrowed his brow at me. “I already told you. I’m an adventurer and an extreme one at that. As you no doubt can tell.” He then grinned and twirled the little crystal between his fingers as if for proof.

Perhaps it was kind of rude of me to be asking if he’s a goat dude. I began searching through my years of playing games and Greek mythology. Half goat people had a name, didn’t they? If only I could remember it.

Suddenly more text scrolled onto my vision as I continued to study him.

Identification: Minor Success!

Name: Yaya Shareef Eldeen

Race: Satyr

Class: Unknown

Insight Level: Unknown

Strength: Unknown

Agility: Unknown

Dexterity: Unknown

Constitution: Unknown

Will: Unknown

Intellect: Unknown

Charisma: Unknown

Whoa…I can actually see his character? Well…Sort of anyway.

“No, I meant your…lineage,” I said as tactfully as I could. “Are you per chance…a satyr?”

“Why yes,” he said. “And I see that you are a human. How lucky for you! A powerful name and a master of your own destiny. But you seem to be under equipped to be this far into the Vult alone. Are you a mage per chance? That armor does not look very suitable for hand to hand combat.”

Whoa, he just said a mouthful.

“Um…no I’m not a mage,” I said. “At least I don’t think I am. I am human, though. And I am alone. But where did you say I was again? The Vult?”

“Yes,” he said. “Are you here to gather mana shards like me?”

Mana shards…As soon as I thought it, my stat sheet came up again.

Mana: 0

Mana usually meant magic. Maybe I was a mage, but my class still read ‘none’.

“I collect them only for sale, of course,” he said. “Would you be interested in this one? It’s quite potent. I will sell to you for only fifteen gold.”

“I don’t think I have any gold on me.”

“Ah a shame, you will have to pay much more for this in town.”

“Town? There’s a town nearby?”

“Yes, did you not come from there?”

“Um… no. Where’s this town? Can we go there?”

“Why, of course,” he said. “But I have a few more birds to hunt first. And I’ll need to find a new worm hole as well. I’ll take you to town afterwards.”

“Cool, how long would that be?”

The goat man furrowed his brow in thought. “Another two or three days perhaps?”

“Two or three days?” Fuck that. “Maybe you can just point me in the right direction or something. How close is it?”

“New Haven?”

“Yes, if that’s its name.”

“Yes, New Haven is close, about half a day’s travel to the west from here.”

Half a day in this crazy jungle certainly sounded a lot better than two or three. But I didn’t really feel safe going it alone. “You wouldn’t mind accompanying me would you?”

“Absolutely not!” he shouted looking offended. “That would be an entire day’s lost production for me. That could amount to a loss of at least 100 gold easily.”

“Geeze, okay man,” I said, raising my palms in a ‘calm down’ fashion. “I can find my own way, I guess.”

“Of course, if you’re willing to sign a contract with me…then perhaps you could compensate me for my lost time.”

“A contract?”

“Yes a contract,” he said. “It’s a legally binding document, you see. Whatever we agree to, if signed, must be honored, by both parties. Many do not understand this concept, but it’s a perfectly safe and guaranteed way to obtain things of value for essentially no payment with a promise of a future payment to come.”

“Yeah, I know what a contract is,” I said.

“You do?” he said looking surprised. “Well…excellent! I just so happen to be a contractor, you see.”

“A contractor?” I laughed. “You build houses and stuff?”

“Build houses?” he said, sounding offended again. “Why on Grandia would you assume I build houses? I said I was a contractor. I write contracts. That’s my specialty. I’m not a mason.”

“Yeah, I get it,” I said. “Sorry, it was just a joke. We call people who work for contracts, contractors, where I come from.”

“How confusing and illogical,” he said. “No matter.” He then whipped open his robes and produced a piece of parchment and a quill as if by magic. He began scribbling on them in a flurry. “See here, my good friend, Cole. Let us form a contract between us. You compensate me 100 gold plus interest for my lost time in order to escort you to New Haven. How’s that?”

“Whoa, hold on sec,” I said, squinting at the writing which looked like Arabic to me. “You want to charge me for walking me to town? You sure you’re not a damn contractor?”

“Sir, I just established that I am indeed a contractor.”

I sighed. “Never mind, that’s not what I meant. Look, I just saved your life for free and now you want to charge me 100 gold just to walk me back to town? I don’t even know how much that is?”

“You did not save me,” he said, indignant. “In fact, you are doing nothing but waste my time at the moment.”

Okay, I guess he had a point about me not actually saving him, but he was still being a dick about the whole thing. “Just forget it.”

He then smiled as if nothing had happened between us. “A deal for another day perhaps. A pleasure meeting you, Cole. I hope you make it back to town.”

He then turned his back to me and began picking through the mud some more.

Man, this guy really was kind of a dick. And I thought he was cool at first. I considered my stat sheet again. My mana was zero, but maybe mana was more like experience points than magic. If there was one thing I knew about how game systems worked, it was that if you could level, you could win. If I could gain power from these crystals to advance myself, then I wouldn’t need his help to survive this damn jungle. I’d be powerful enough to make it back to town on my own. Wherever that was.

“Hey, Yaya,” I called to him.

“Please, call me Shareef,” he said, looking over his shoulder with a smile. “Yaya is more of a title.”

“Yeah, okay, Shareef,” I said. “I have another deal for you. How about we write a contract for however many crystals you find in that pit. But fifteen gold sounds a little steep. How about we make it ten?”

Negotiation vs Shareef: Failure

“Sir!” he said sounding insulted. “Do you mean to haggle me for my hard earned wares?”

I thought quick on my feet as I saw the notification appear in my vision. “Of course not,” I said. “It’s just I’ve giving you the opportunity for unlimited gain and I have to control my risk somehow.”

He raised a brow. “How do you mean?”

I pointed down into the pit. “Well I don’t know how many crystals you’ll find in there but I just agreed to buy them all at a set price. Surely you can understand my need to control how much I’ll spend. You could pull out a hundred for example and I’ll still have to buy them all, right?”

Shareef stroked his goat like chin. “Ah I see.”

Oratory vs Shareef : Success!

The satyr then straightened and nodded succinctly. “Powerful as well as shrewd. This I can respect! You make an excellent proposition, Cole! Ten gold for every crystal found. On this we can agree.”

With that Shareef dove into the mud and together we then spent the next few minutes wading through the muck in search of crystals. We came up with a total of only five. Not as many as I had hoped, but just like my logic dictated, at least I didn’t have to pay full price for them either.

“That’s fifty gold my friend,” Shareef said, showing me the contract.

I looked at the black writing on the parchment and could make no sense of it save for the number 50 and what I assumed was the symbol for gold currency. But ultimately that didn’t matter. From the looks of this jungle it seemed a slim chance that I’d ever see this guy again much less have to pay him his money back. Or at least not right away. And paying back 50 gold would be a heck of a lot easier than trying to pay back 100. And at least now I had some value in my hand for it. If I took the offer of the escort all I’d have is a 100 gold of debt when I got to town and no way to pay it off. But now, if I used only one or two of the crystals to advance myself then I could probably sell the extra ones in town and have enough money to pay him back. Or so I hoped. Either way it was a win-win for me.

“Done deal,” I said and signed it.

He grinned and rolled the parchment, tucking it into his robes before handing me the five mana crystals. “A pleasure doing business.”

“So… how do I find you again to pay you back?” I asked. Although I still thought the chances of him finding me again were slim, I didn’t want to be dishonest about it. An agreement was an agreement after all. “Will you be back in town in a few days?”

“Oh, no need for us to meet again directly to settle this matter,” he said. “I’ll redeem the contract for its full value at a contract exchange or simply sell it to someone else for a small loss. Don’t worry. The enforcers will find you in due course for payment.”

I gulped. “Enforcers?”

“They will give you some grace for payment, but I’d be keen to settle your debts promptly. Forced servitude on this side of the world is not pleasant.”

Shit…I had assumed this was some simple IOU between just me and him. “Wow…I had no idea things were this sophisticated here. You have a contract exchange?”

He harrumphed. “Just because you found me in a jungle don’t take me for a savage. I hail from the great Northern city of Aziz, the heart of the exchange. The enforcer imps would find you even there, so don’t even think to flee via ship.”

“Imps?”

“They’ll track you by your signature. Contracts are bound by the sacred laws of magic here. To default is a sin. I would not temp the fates, Cole. No matter how powerful your name is.”

Fuck, magically enforced contracts? I thought, looked down at the crystals. I hope these are worth it.

I looked to Shareef again. “Hey, how do I use them, anyway?”

He threw his hands up in the air. “The hells if I know. I’m not a human nor a mage. I trust they serve you well, though.” He then grinned. “Good bye, Cole! And try not to die!”

The goat man then departed swiftly, sprinting out of the cleaning as fast as a gazelle.

Shit, I thought. It was no wonder he had no problem being bait for those Terror Birds. That sucker was fast. But as he disappeared into the jungle a sinking feeling began filling my gut. I looked at the five crystals in my hand again. I thought I was the one making off with the better deal but now I wasn’t so sure.

I was in the middle of a monster filled jungle on an alien world and I just bought five supposed ‘mana crystals’ on credit from a Satyr I’d just met who’s departing words were, “try not to die.”

“Shit,” I said.

I hope I didn’t just get screwed.