33 – The descent into madness

Jacob went downstairs, and hooked up all of his new machines to the power line. They came to life, one by one, in a symphony of noise.

Carbon nanotubes, black steel, integrated circuits. Everything was within reach now. It was too bad that he didn’t have his digital storage yet because, even discarding the end-game items, its autocrafting feature together with its storage all in one place made it one of the most important quality of life items in the whole game.

Still, even without it, Jacob set to work on a side project to help the elves. He felt that he had postponed this for far too long, and now it was finally time to put things in motion. Two rows of large batteries were charging at several alcove by the wall, drawing in the power from the wind coming from the roof. Meanwhile, at the crafting table, item after item was being assembled out of carbon and steel.

Simple materials became pieces, which in turn became more complex pieces, and then even more complex parts, and all together they were crafted into the final thing. Hundred of ingots, diamonds, gems and wires all went into one single item. Jacob plucked it out of the right-hand square of the crafting table, feeling it in his hand like a model toy.

He opened the large doors of his lab, and went out. Behind him, he placed the little toy, and a gigantic robot, so black it seemed to be night itself, stomped its huge legs on the ground. Its immense weight, however, did nothing to the soft dirt. Even the grass was left untouched after the electrical golem lifted its metal foot. Minecraft game mechanics ensured that, and the integration further cemented it.

Lumia came running, shoving people aside while yelling in a panicked voice.

“Oops.” Jacob muttered, his face the same as a kid who just realized he forgot his homework.

“Jacob, behind!”

“Uhhh,” he tried to stop her, but she shoved him aside.

It was interesting to notice how he could choose how his body was supposed to react to that. He chose to make the weight of the inventory count as inertial mass, just for fun, and looked at the elf who instead of shoving him aside pushed herself out of the way and tumbling to the ground. He suppressed a laugh, and instead helped her on her feet.

“I was about to stop you, but I was too slow it seems.”

She looked at him in panic. “Jacob! The monster, behind.”

“Oh, that? Nah, I made it. It’s as good as a puppy.”

Hearing this, the golem sat down.

“See?”

Lumia shook her head.

“Jerk!” She said, and walked away.

Jacob was puzzled. “Did I do anything wrong?”

“Lad! You got to learn how to deal with women proper!” The dwarf chuckled under his beard. Then, he looked at the towering mass of moving metal. “What the hell is that infernal contraption!”

“A gift! For you! It’s a work golem I made, entirely electrical. It will help do all the heavy lifting you’re you. When it’s about to deplete its battery it automatically goes back to that alcove over there next to the tower to recharge.”

Gyhlot shook his head. “Madness. How do I even use it?”

“Just tell it what to do, of course.”

“But how did you even do that?”

“Magic, I think. I mean I used my own ability, but then something happened and drained energy out of me. I suppose that to be mana, and if I’m right then saying magic makes sense. No need for logic, when you have magic.”

He went away, before the dwarf could ask him any questions, and made the animals breed again. Then, he went to the farms and replanted all the seeds. By the time he was done with all that, barely a few minutes had passed but it felt to him like he spent ages doing this menial work. He craved automation.

He craved his end game. He needed to kill the end dragon, and fast.

And he also needed to deal with the mechanical wolf on the ground.

And see what was the matter with Lumia.

And maybe make the access ladder to the floating island a little bit nicer.

And, and and…

“This is quite stressful.”

There was something wrong. It was not supposed to be like this, with more and more things to do constantly coming up like crazy. If only he had his gear. Yes, everything would be fixed with his end-game stuff. Accessing the digital storage, he would have access to so many things and tools that most of these problems, Lumia aside, would become trivial.

“Lumia!”

Tyla, who was meditating, heard her daughter come in. She was about to voice her complaints about the meditation session being interrupted, but sensing the mood from her daughter made her change her mind.

“What’s wrong, sweetie?”

“It’s Jacob. I wanted to say that he’s a jerk, that I’m angry and he should apologize but… I don’t know. He feels odd. I know that I’ve only know him for a few days but, still, I feel like something’s wrong with him.”

“He’s just stressed out, that’s all. Aren’t we all, with our new responsibilities?”

“I want to help him, mom.”

“Me too, sweetie, me too.”

Jacob punched a wall. His fingers hurt.

“Fuck this! I’m speedrunning the game now.” He said, then made his way towards the nether portal.

In his mind, the only thing that mattered was the roadmap to follow to get to the end as quickly as possible. All thoughts of integration, of how his ability worked, were utterly absent. As if he never even thought them. It was how the mods were, and what the message said, and nothing else.

A fixation.

After all, all his behavior ever since the village could be summed up as that. A fixation of progressing through this world as if it was indeed a modded playthrough of Minecraft. As if those rules still mattered. The arbitrary decision of some developers, working on their free time at a side project, now were absolute laws here. But why? He never asked. But was it really like this? He never wondered.

Or maybe he did, but his mind always suppressed those thoughts. They were useless, and distracting. He needed to do stuff first.

A cold and calculative madness. Tunnel vision.

The objective and only one path towards it. Any other possible scenario just discarded.

Never once did he ask himself why.

Barely two days later, he emerged back from the portal. Disheveled, equipment broken and half-molten. Barely alive himself, left with barely half a heart. All the damage he didn’t feel while inside the dimension becoming real the moment he stepped into the real world.

He collapsed on the floor.