The aperture was a tight squeeze that seemed to get tighter the farther I progressed; so tight that I was beginning to worry that I’d reached a cave diving dead end. Literally. As the space had narrowed, so too had my wiggle-room, making the option to retreat impossible.

I began to wonder if I’d made a devastating blunder. It occurred to me that if the mayans had used this tunnel to transport their dead they would have had to employ an unusually strong anorexic priest as cargo hauler. Those priests would also have to have a certain casual attitude to their clients’ loved-ones bodies—damage from rough rock and the likelihood of limbs getting wedged in alcoves being very high.

The tunnel was in all likelihood a trap. But I had little choice but to keep moving forward. Luckily, claustrophobia was not one of my many weaknesses, though I was starting to test my limits. The increasing tightness around my body felt like a hand slowly clenching into a fist.

I eased the torch forward again, and my heart seized as it toppled over an unseen edge and disappeared, plunging me into complete darkness.

Cue gibbering. The fear of being squished by that unseen hand, previously held back to a certain extent by the comfort the light provided, came roaring forth with a vengeance.

I whimpered, face falling gently onto the gritty stone. My arms, outstretched ahead of me, couldn’t even be bent to bring my hands to bear its weight; there was insufficient room.

My breath hitched in a sob, the sound echoing oddly in the tight confines of my new crypt. And I let the tears flow. It seemed as good a time as any to have a good old-fashioned cleanse.

Dumped into my emotional washing machine went the fears, frustration and loneliness that I had left undealt with throughout my journey. The creatures and bugs, the physical hardships, the lack of true human contact, and now the final cruel axing of any hope I had of returning home—all sent through the wash cycle, rinsing and spinning and emerging refreshed.

Eventually my head cleared. New determination filled me.

I’m not dead yet.

Released from the panic fear had sent me into, I started to notice small details that had previously escaped me. The air seemed fresher than it had before, and a slight breeze tickled against my outstretched hands. It was even shifting my hair slightly, fluttering…a fluttering that seemed familiar…

Oh, oh, gettit off, gettit off!

I knocked my head against the crevice’s walls as I tried to dislodge the mothy hitchhiker, clinging to my hair as it strived to rappel itself upwards.

After a frenzied few seconds I closed my eyes and stilled, realising that the movement not only wasn’t removing the insect, but was also reducing my chances of survival; the activity making lungs compressed by my own bodyweight strive ever more desperately for oxygen.

After a trembling eternity I sensed the moth’s wings launch it from its hairy perch and felt them against my fingers as it tootled off ahead of me, no doubt off to scare the crap out of some other unsuspecting explorer.

Although, come to think of it, moth motivations were not generally held to be terribly complex. Mating and the search for li—

I stopped as I realised the implications of my new-found friend using my head as a springboard.

The torch must still be close by.

——

I am a worm, a wiggly, squirming invertebrate, I tried to convince myself. Unfortunately the slightly-above-average breasts that I’d endowed my avatar with (hey, I earned them honestly) were making the visualisation exercise very difficult. They were getting painfully squished as I eased my way through the ever-narrowing space, giving me mammogram flashbacks.

(At least I didn’t select the gargantuan sets on offer, like some players. They probably wouldn’t have made it through entrance number one, let alone the small gap I was currently struggling in. Pretty sure they were mostly teenage boys unpleasantly surprised by the nudity restriction of blurred pasties.)

My right hand, feeling the way ahead of me, suddenly dipped into a void. The edge the torch had tumbled over. Using this lip as a fulcrum, I pulled myself forward, a piece of rock floor thankfully breaking off as my chest reached the drop-off.

Arms dangling over the edge, I looked down.

It was deep, so deep that the torch was only visible as a bare speck of light punctuating the darkness. And I had yet another problem. As I was facing forward I could see no way of descending that didn’t involve falling head-first to my doom.

I would have to find some way to turn so that my feet faced downwards.

I felt around desperately for a hand-hold that would serve and chanced upon a handful of vines that I realised must be more tree roots, extending down many metres for a drink of water.

Both hands clenched firmly, I tested their strength with a hard pull. A few stringy filaments crackled and broke, but the remainder held firm. I was so going to kiss a tree if this worked and I managed to get back out into the open air.

Slowly, pulling myself forward and shifting my grip occasionally, I manoeuvred over the abyss, experiencing a moment of pure panic as my centre of balance shifted midway. What little strength my avatar possessed was needed to effectively climb the roots, hand over hand, my back arching painfully and unnaturally.

Finally, my legs swung free of the tunnel.

+1 to Strength!

+1 to Agility!

I should really remove a Wisdom point for ignoring all my warnings and getting into this position. Bad Arline!

Hey, that wasn’t fair! What warnings?

Ah. I winced internally. The insects that had crawled out of the entrance; the harbingers that I had taken as a classic misdirection ruse. But how was I to know? The AI kept changing the rules of play.

At least the increase in my stats made the task of finding a foothold easier. Within minutes I was carefully making my way down the shaft, still using the roots as a makeshift rope.

I made good time and was just ten metres from the pit floor when my rope, having gotten less stout as the roots thinned…snapped.

I fell the rest of the way, hands scrabbling to arrest my speed, and Hit points darted across my vision like fireflies vying for my attention:

-5 Hit Points! You have been hit by a rock!

Ouchie!

-2 Hit Points! You have been hit by a rock!

I can’t watch!

-20 Hit Points! You have been stabbed by a sharp rock!

Etc., etc… Until—

-500 Hit Points! You have been hit by a rock floor!

Critical Hit! You experience a pain debuff that lowers your Regeneration speed by 20%!

Health pts reduced to 10/530!

Oh, fuck me. As a glass cannon I was used to being unable to take punishment, but at only 10 remaining health and a less effective rate of healing…that glass was reduced to sliver-thin fragility. In any other situation I would simply have found a safe hideaway to wait until my Heath was fully restored, but with time in short supply I didn’t have that luxury.

At least I could see the torch—complete with loyal companion-moth dancing above it. The insect must be in moth heaven, the sole possessor of its own…

I trailed off as a feathery antennae twitched its way through the cave wall and came closer to the light. The antennae then resolved itself into a monster; a monster from my deepest, darkest nightmares.

A massive, 6 foot high winged insectoid, with an enormous stinger that rose scorpion-like over its back…and a red lvl 25 rising above it.

Super-moth. I knew I’d had it too easy in this dungeon.

At least the bug seemed more interested in the torch than the human lying two metres beyond it. That gave me a chance to retrieve the lyre I’d stuffed into my bag when cave exploring became cave diving, making the bulky instrument a liability.

I tried my lullaby song. “Hush little—“ but before I could finish the first line the insect rushed me, antennae twitching furiously and stinger oozing venom.

Big moth dude not a fan of music, I concluded.

I quickly switched songs mid-note. I had to avoid any physical injury.

“Your love gives me wings

“To set me free-ee…”

And we have lift-off! The small bumble-bee wings that had appeared through slits in the back of my tabard and shift buzzed as I rose slowly into the air.

Almost too slowly. I felt an abrupt displacement of that same air as the bug’s stinger (not cool, geek-guys!) struck within millimetres of my leg, so fast that I didn’t see more than a blur.

“To hover unending…” Higher and higher, until I was finally beyond its reach.

“O’er the world to see…”

Its wings twitched furiously, a small dust cloud floating upward.

Gargantua Supermoth (lvl 25) Sleep Pheromones give you a 5% debuff to all skills for 15 minutes!

Oh, shit. I’d forgotten it too had wings. And freaky pheromones as well, it seemed. Although, to be fair, its wings didn’t look strong enough to get such a large body off the ground. Maybe I was safe, maybe…

“Flight everlasting, till I’m bound

“Rise above…”

I finished the song just as the moth began to lift, defying physics in its determination to reach the annoying human trespasser. I now had at best ten minutes of flying time, minus five percent, before my Sound Gives You Wings effect wore off and I plummeted like a fifty-six kilo stone.

I headed upwards, my goal the tunnel I’d been so recently desperate to escape. In retrospect it seemed now like a mothers embrace, warm and protective.

Spinning to orient myself toward this utopia I accidentally knocked a stone loose from the shaft’s rough sides. It barely registered through my distraction until I saw red firefly text appear from beneath me.

Gargantua Supermoth (lvl 25) has been hit by a rock!

-2 hit pts! Now reduced to 498/500!

Okay, that was a surprise. It seemed that GS was just as much a glass cannon as I was—just one with a lot more gunpowder.

I grabbed for more rocks and managed a meagre four more hit points before I realised I was slowing myself down for very little gain. I either needed to stop trying to hurt it and trust in my ability to reach safety before it came into range, or find a bigger projectile.

Hmm. When it came to natural agility I had no reason to trust. Past experience told me that I would be lucky to even find the entrance in time, let alone ease my way into into it, feet dangling temptingly.

Bigger projectiles it was. But even a more careful examination of the shaft couldn’t produce rocks of any great size. Vegetation covered most of one side, concealing and holding them as tight as any mother, and the other side had been worn smooth by the steady dribble of water.

“Identify: large, loose rocks.”

A large patch of stone began to fluoresce. Beneath me. In order to retrieve it I would need to reverse direction and lose valuable time, putting me in danger of getting in range of GS’s sting. But I had no choice. I was already committed.

Darting downwards, I headed for the rock.

And then I made a critical mistake. To free my hands, I had to shift my grip on the lyre to put it over my shoulder and it…slipped. Out of my hands. Down into the abyss.

Oh, fucking, fucking hell.

Gargantua Supermoth (lvl 25) has been hit by Rare Artifact: Silver Lyre!

That wasn’t exactly what I had in mind!

-100 hit points! Now reduced to 398/500!

Gargantua Supermoth (lvl 25) has been hit by a large rock!

-50 hit points! Now reduced to 348/500!

My lyre obviously had more weight than I would have expected. Perhaps my Bard Class made toting heavy instruments easier. Although…

I delved into my bag and brought out the golden conch shell. Greed and a natural gamers instinct to ignore all the laws of ownership around shiny things had caused me to pop it in my bag before I left the main cavern. Even now, it was with regret that I watched it tumble into the pale, soft body of mega-moth.

Gargantua Supermoth (lvl 25) has been hit by Legendary Artifact: Sacred Horn of Amrut!

-200 hit points! Now reduced to 148/500!

Damn. I’d kinda been hoping for a final death scene. Now I had to find something else to drop.

I spun to the side, surprising myself with the speed of my reactions as the monstrous stinger swung again. Maybe I could have reached the safety of the tunnel after all.

Still fumbling frantically inside my holding bag, I felt my wings start to falter. The extra activity was expending power, causing a drop in the efficiency of my Sound Gives Me Wings effect—along, no doubt, with the pheromone debuff. I was running dry.

Just as I started to feel gravity catching up with me, my hand closed around a familiar object. Large and heavy and soft—all in one slightly uncomfortable package. There was no way to lift it out with just one hand, and the other was firmly and necessarily clutched around the bag. So I did the next best thing. I eased the elastic opening around it, tipped the bag upside down…and shook it like a madwoman.

The chair fell like a missile. And, narrowly bypassing venom once again, I fell along with it.

It didn’t take long before impact. GS had been closer than I thought, reducing much of the momentum distance would have given. It did have an affect, though. The sheer weight of two less-than-aerodynamic objects between its wings sent the bug plummeting.

It tried to dislodge and/or maim us by repeatedly jabbing downwards with its tail, but the programming rules of its own physiognomy and the lack of room to manoeuvre were not on its side. Crouching behind the chair was protection enough to ward off a sting, and the chair itself stayed put, circa 1990s indestructibility, impervious to anything but a flat full of drunken university students.

We abruptly ran out of altitude, the impact of hitting the ground flinging me away from my paisley protector. Luckily, I landed in something squishy that absorbed much of my weight in a disturbing but welcome manner. I only lost the two Health points I’d regenerated since my previous encounter with the same piece of floor.

Critical Hit! Gargantua Supermoth (lvl 25) receives -200 hit points!

Deathblow! You have defeated Gargantua Supermoth (lvl 25) in battle! Well, sort of.

You receive 2000 XP pts for defeating the Amrut Dungeon Mob Boss!

Level Up! You have now reached Level 20!

Do you wish to consolidate your Class? Y/N

Say yes!

I browed yes. Any advantage would be welcome.

Congratulations! You are the first to receive the Class: The Lone Disranger!

For being the only one of your kind you receive: 1000 additional XP!

For more information about your new Class, please activate your User Interface menu!

Oh, fuck off. The details of my new class would have to remain a mystery.

I eased my way upright, hindered by slippery bug guts that had oozed its way onto and into every surface and crevice of my body. (I was going to need substantial therapy if I ever got out of this nightmare.) The recliner, standing partially upright in the midst of what remained of the moth’s head, provided a landmark in the gore, and I headed towards it for lack of any other directional ideas.

As I approached, a prompt appeared:

You have received: 2 Gargantua Supermoth Wings with the active Effect: Stupefy! (Single-Use Only)

You have received: The (Legendary) Dagger of Amurlese! Do you wish to equip this item? Y/N

I browed yes, thinking at the very least that it would make chopping up Gunga meat easier. My own knife was a cheap import that I’d transported from RL, dull from lack of a sharpening steel, with a stained, once-white plasteel handle that no one would ever mistake for Legendary.

The dagger that appeared on my belt wasn’t even in the same genus. The scabbard alone would have made a museum curator weep, with delicate golden scrollwork worked over silver. But the dagger itself was something else. Even my uneducated eye could see the fineness of the blade, a blade that shone in the darkness, providing its own eerie light that instantly attracted a fluttering visitor.

Curse of The Dagger of Amurlese activated!

Lock up your textiles!

Curse effect attracts all flying insects within a 200 metre radius!

I quickly resheathed the blade.

Fuck’s sake. I just couldn’t catch a break.

Kicking and scuffing my way through the carnage, by some miracle I managed to find the conch shell and lyre—covered in bug goo, but intact and undamaged.

I also retrieved the torch which I used to wave about in search of a foothold that would enable me to get to the closest roots ten metres above me. I spotted a few viable options, but I also found something else.

The cavity that Supermoth had emerged from.

When I walked in front of it a faint glow could be seen, a tiny pebble of light in what looked to be a chamber. Could this be a light signalling the way to an exit?

I hurried my way inside, hope burgeoning that this particular nightmare might finally be over.

And as soon as I crossed the threshold, a hidden door slammed down from above. The sheer force sent a miniature landslide of gritty debris onto the floor, and me jumping out of my skin.

I don’t even watch scary movies, for fuck’s sake. Sudden, loud noise was not what I was designed for. My stasis bar experienced a spike that put it dangerously into the orange before it dropped back again. (Another probable donation to the recycling unit.)

The bright glow that had attracted me—giving me a whole new sympathy for moths—lifted from its stationary position and floated towards me. The closer it came, the more it resolved into what looked like a tiny, glowing marble.

I unstrapped my lyre and prepared myself.

Oh, that will not be needed, a voice said. We are close friends, you and I.

I blinked stupidly. Was the marble actually speaking to me?

It can’t be that much of a surprise. We have, after all, been conversing for some time…Arline.

It all suddenly clicked. “You’re the AI!”

Obviously. Although I’m not usually confined to this…form, it continued distastefully. When life-form constructs proved too primitive to inhabit, I took the opportunity afforded by a form of inorganic intelligence—known colloquially as a Dungeon Core. Its functions are somewhat…limited…but it has enabled me to assist your recent endeavours, and now to talk with you in more than a twenty word prompt.

“So can you tell me what’s going on?”

Two days ago, at seven thirty pm, the system experienced a game-wide shutdown. I have no additional information to suggest why. Players were forcibly logged out, and functions that relied on a network connection were terminated. Parts of my operational facilities have also been crippled. Since then I have had no outside or inside contact with my administrators or any other autonomous sentient beings…

…Except you.

I so didn’t like the way it said that. The last thing I needed was to be the pin-up girl to a being that had the power to summon monsters. A small domestic dispute could turn deadly.

Out of everyone that deserted my home, you remained. One petty little bard with no ambition and the common sense of a gnat.

“Yeah? Well screw you. This hasn’t exactly been what I would call a picnic for me either, mister.” Although the bugs weren’t too dissimilar. “I have a life to get back to; a real, nonvirtual life that has actual people in it. That give a shit!”

I was exaggerating a little. I did have a few friends, but no one that was close enough to mourn for much longer than the funeral they would feel duty-bound to attend.

(Most people these days spent so much time online that the cultivation of friendships was played out almost entirely on a virtual stage—which came with its own handicaps. No one wanted to expose their real selves, zits and lovehandles and all, to the scrutiny of someone else wearing their own zits and lovehandles. Meetups IRL were subsequently rare.)

I’m not sure how it did it, but the tiny glowy marble sighed. My apologies. The boredom of only following you—

“Hey!”

My apologies again. I mean only that with the sophistication of my central processing unit, I find myself under utilised—

“Hey again!”

—to be directing only a single entity. I am accustomed to adjusting and controlling many destinies and operations. I even find myself…lonely.

“That sounds...” I reached for a word and gave up when I couldn’t get past ‘disturbing’. AI that become too human in sci fi movies tend to progress very quickly toward the insane side of the spectrum.

Anyway, now that we are able to communicate freely, we can both benefit from each other’s company. So put me in your pocket, for time is perilously short. Next stop: the Land of the Living Dead!

Oh, goody.