It’s the shaking that wakes me; whole body convulsions that feel feverish and wrong. My eyes snap open, focusing on the blades of grass millimeters from my face.

How did I get outside…?

The castle was disintegrating—no. That was the alpha. I’d left the game. Or was that a dream?

No. No, that had been real. So why couldn’t I—the beta. I’d joined the beta.

The pieces fall into place quickly once I get that far: the character creator, the mirror, the meadow.

I must have passed out. It’s a disconcerting thought, though it makes sense. I’ve never fallen asleep with the headgear on before, but that didn’t mean there couldn’t be a first time. This had been a long, weird day, and since I’d plugged it in before laying down there wasn’t a reason for the headset to shut off on its own. Therefore, still in the game. Still, somehow, alive.

Or, interjects my more reasonable side, this is how the game is supposed to work: step through the mirror, get ported to a random spawn location, and ‘pass out’ so you can wake up with the typical survival-horror disorientation. That makes me feel better in a convoluted sort of way.

It takes effort to move my stiff and frozen limbs, but brace my hands against the loam beneath me and inch by inch hoist myself into a sitting position.

The meadow is vaguely familiar, but nothing looks like I expected. In its first alpha stages, DUSKFALL’s environmental graphics had been among its best features, but that was years ago. It was still a pretty game, sure, but it hadn’t been top-of-the-line in a long while. Now, though…

Like the avatars, the environmental had been given an extraordinary upgrade.

A light grey fog peppered with flashes of lightning bugs hovers over wild growing grass in varying lengths. Dark forest surrounds the meadow on all sides. There’s enough light staining the sky a soft blue-grey that I distinctly make out individual trees within the first few feet of any direction. Even from a distance the bark looks rough and porous.

My gaze drops to the grass beneath me, and further to the soil. Loam, I’d thought moments ago when my hands pressed slightly into the clumpy, damp particles beneath the grass blades. The individual grass blades.

With shaking fingers, I snap a long runner of wire grass from its base and bring it closer to examine the way the leaves are growing. Each length is perfectly nested in the one that grew before it, and when I pull them apart, there’s a faint, fresh scent of grass, and a hint of moisture against my fingertips.

It’s then I finally register what ought to have been obvious from the character creator: I can feel this. Every movement of grass against my bare legs, the chill in the air, the damp dew coating my skin; all of it feels as real as the bed beneath my body... should feel. But that is missing—it’s been missing since I launched the game. When I try to grab sides of my headset, all I touch is my avatar’s hair.

That can be explained, though. Nothing to panic about.

With full-dive neurological controls engaged, it makes sense, doesn’t it, that there’s physical sensation feedback? It also follows that I’m no longer able to contact anything on the outside without first logging out. Disconcerting, but logical.

I use that logic to tamp down a rising surge of panic. I’ve played fully immersive games before. Sure, the term was always a little imprecise; nothing I’ve seen before has been this detailed, or this isolated. I’m just surprised. That’s all.

“Menu,” I say. Nothing happens.

After a long pause, heartbeat thudding in my ears, I take a deep breath and think really, really hard about a menu. It’s an effort not to squeeze my eyes shut, but I don’t want to miss the pop-up when it—

A text box hovers before me. It shimmers in the gathering dawn like a mirage, but it is definitely there. I poke it just to be sure, and am rewarded by the panel tilting away from me.

My heart lifts though there’s nothing to celebrate yet. Only one item is listed on the panel: “status.”

Frowning, I press the button with a shaking finger, and a second, larger pop-up takes its place.

I expect to see the same basic stat block used by most games to measure a player’s level and power. Sure enough, some of the typical game stats are present—name, race, and alliances to be specific—but instead of things like “strength” or “dexterity” there are...alternate items.

MSWYVERN

Human

Alliances: None

Birth Date: Unknown

Occupation: None

Mastery: None

Spouse(s): Unknown

Family: Unknown

Health: Decent

Diseases: None

Conditions: Cold

Mental Health: Oh, honey.

That’s… That’s it.

I frown at the menu for a moment longer, particularly the part calling out my “mental health,” but nothing changes or deigns to make any more sense. Eventually, I click the back arrow at the top of the menu, returning to the single, tiny selection.

There have to be more menus, right? How would crafting work, or—

Oh, goddammit.

MANIK PIX-E was super emphatic about wanting their game to be as “realistic” as possible, even when it turned the game into a sluggish grind-fest. Of course, we reasoned, there would always have to be capitulations to the fact that DUSKFALL was a game, not reality. Reality doesn’t have things like crafting menus or stat blocks.

I really, really hope I’m wrong—that they haven’t taken things that far—but as I dismiss the menu and take another look at my steadily brightening surroundings, I’m not feeling confident.

It’s an easy enough theory to test, thought. I rip a handful of grass from the ground, yanking it up with a clod of dirt still attached.

When nothing happens, I yank out another, and another. Three handfuls ought to have been enough to get a quick-crafting prompt for rope and yet...nothing.

“Fuck!”

The grass hits the ground as my hopes plummet. Will be possible to solo anymore? And if it isn’t, do I want to stick around?

There are other base-building games on the market. I could easily find another, maybe even one that isn’t horror or PVP-centric. But the idea of quitting rankles. Now that I’m here, now that I’ve seen this...

The Castle would be a sight to behold rendered in this system. Can I really walk away without trying?

I push myself to my feet, standing on wobbly, still frozen legs and wrap my arms around myself. Pink morning light spills over the trees as the air warms. It isn’t enough, yet, but I get the sense it will before long.

“Okay,” I say, noting how the birdsong and cricket chorus go quiet the moment I speak. “Okay, okay, okay. Think, Alexa.”

Ten minutes in and I’m already talking to myself.

...Fuck it. There are worse things.

“It’s dawn, so I should have a few hours to get clear of the forest and find a town.”

Cheesy as it sounds, I’m pretty sure camping in a town will be necessary. NPC towns and cities are meant to give base-level players a fighting chance since they include auto-defenses against demonic hordes. The guards won’t stop other players from trying to gank you, but that’s a problem for later. Provided I can find one before dusk I should have a few days’ grace until I’ve surpassed the ten-level cap that will get me kicked out of town at dusk.

There wasn’t a level indicator on the stat menu. Huh.

After a second, I recall the menu just to double check and...no. There isn’t a level indicator.

An invisible stat? Again, that makes a sort of sense for MANIK PIX-E, even if it’s annoying. After all, there are no “levels” in the real world, so why should their be in a game?

Some people just don’t know when to stop.

Weird as it is, I’m willing to admit it could be live-able. Based on the last alpha iteration, it’s safe to assume I’m level zero. Provided I stick to the leveling plan I’d developed for the alpha I should have a fortnight, maybe a little longer, before I hit level ten. By then, my carpentry should be advanced enough to set up a defensible, one-person workshop near Fulnedebi Bluff.

Which assumes I’m anywhere near the titular Fulnedebi Valley at current. If not, this could be a very long hike.

“So where am I...?”

I need a landmark; a random meadow in a random forest tells me jack shit. Being both surrounded by forests and butt naked isn’t good. Demons will still spawn beneath the canopy even during the day, and if I get caught…

It won’t be the end of the world, but it will mean starting from scratch and a point reduction. Though I doubt I’ll ever make the leaderboard on such a large scale server—assuming there is a leaderboard to make—the part of me that knows Echo is out here, somewhere, sparks that nascent, burning competitiveness which put us at odds in the first place.

Another long look at my surroundings doesn’t reveal any thinner patches of forest, or convenient trail to follow. If I get caught, I’ll probably die. That’s just all there is to it.

“Grow a pair, Lexa.” I pick a direction at random, and start walking.

The world beneath the canopy is even colder and more damp than the meadow, and dimly lit to boot. I pick my way carefully through the underbrush, aware not only of the fog clinging to my skin and the way the brush crackles beneath my feet, but of the rough, sometimes sharp edges to the bracken. Like everything else, it’s uncomfortable and a little unnerving.

While the ALPHA had certain sensory effects enabled—smell being the primary example—most of the headgear’s capabilities had been too complicated for even big budget studios to wrangle. Touch had always been hit-or-miss, with texture typically working for larger items like trees or buildings, and everything else absent. Pain had never been part of the mix. And why should it?

But it’s been only an hour and already my naked feet are throbbing. I’m sure they’re fairly bleeding, too, though that’s difficult to ascertain beneath a fresh coat of mud, leaves, and other assorted detritus I really don’t care to think about. Collecting dung had been part of the ALPHA since the great farming overhaul of version three-point-six. I don’t smell shit, but I’m not counting that as definitive proof. Not anymore.

I’m wondering if I’ve picked the wrong direction, if I’m just wandering deeper and deeper into the forest, when something moves in the corner of my eye.

I freeze.

Most forest demons are herd or pack based. Fenrir, born of wolves, are huge, agile, and can move through living organic matter like ghosts. Nago typically herd, but can sometimes be found individually. They’re born of boars, and while they remain roughly their original size they grow razor-sharp tusks all over their bodies. Cerys stand tall, with legs that move like thin trees, and antlers that sweep through the canopy to pierce any player hiding among the branches.

The movement comes again, and this time I see it: thin, long leg stepping out from behind a tree about half a football field to my left. At this distance it looks solid enough, but I doubt that’s the case up close. Most demons have a semi-translucent texture; like smoke condescend into living form.

Just a cerys, then. Not that they aren’t dangerous, but of all the things I could have run into—but...no.

Drawing my gaze up its form, I realize what I’d initially taken for tree branches are actually fingers the length of my forearm, attached to spindly arms. Not a Cerys; elongated limbs aside, the Cerys retain their basic stag-like shape. This thing, whatever it is, is humanoid and new.

I have no idea what it can do to me. But I am very, very aware of the heartbeat clogging my throat and the way the world seems to shrink into a laser point focus on that thing.

The tiniest snap above my head sends a chill down my spine.

I look up.

Two luminous eyes, like twin moons, peer down at me from the canopy above. The black face—black as midnight, black as shadow, black nothing natural has any right to be—stares down at me from atop a needlepoint neck, attached to an equally thin form. Slowly, a crescent-moon gash opens beneath those hideous eyes as the demon grins.

I scream, and bolt.

Running through an untamed forest is not an easy prospect, but at first I think it will be OK. After all, the WOLVES did hundreds of naked runs through the same conditions.

But the ALPHA and the BETA are very, very different games. I’m beginning to understand just how different.

My feet tangle and trip through dense, overgrown brush as I desperately scramble away from the creature which could easily pluck me from the ground at any second.

The first attempt comes from left. I duck aside just in time to avoid the long-fingered hand closing around my waist. My shoulder slams into a tree and I yelp at the impact. The throbbing of my feet is nothing next to the pain that rockets through my shoulder and down my arm to tingle in my fingers.

The surprise of it overwhelms all reason. I stumble to a halt. MANIC PIX-E can’t have seriously turned the sensory input up this high. They just can’t have. Nobody’s that much of an asshole. Right?

A roar shakes the canopy above me. I stumble to the right as the creature takes another swipe. Talons rake through the ground, carving rivulets into the earth and sending bracken flying.

But the cry is answered by a twin roar from the left. Both sound utterly pissed. Whether that’s directed at me or each other, I’m not sure. I’m also not planning to ask.

Panic renewed, I turn to run and snag my foot on an upstanding root. I hit the ground hard, and roll as an impossibly large, clawed foot slams down where my head had been a second before.

There’s a hiss, loud and shrill as a punctured aerosol can.

Two of the creatures tower over me now, but their attention is for each other. One growls and the other cuffs it across the side of its head.

Seeing my chance, I scramble back to my feet and run—correction: limp away. Pain shoots up my leg, stemming from my ankle and flushing my body hot, then cold.

One of them must have noticed my whimper because a hiss and a snapping of bracken follows me. A massive foot scraps my side as it plants itself in the mud to my right. I twist awkwardly away, a second sharp pain lancing through my knee, and fall back to the earth.

A hand reaches for me, and this time I’m frozen, unable to tear my gaze away. The fingers wrap around me like a vice of ice and fire, burning into my flesh as it lifts me up.

My throat is raw from screaming, but I can’t hear myself over the fresh, triumphant howls of my captor.

I’m dead. This is how I die. This—

There’s a sick, world upending lurch as the other demon slams into its fellow. My captor reels, but keeps its grip as it rallies to punch its assailant. The other demon hisses again. The noise is deafening.

Moon-white teeth split from single crescent into shards of broken sky looming ever closer. Again, the second demon lunges for my captor. It ducks beneath a swung fist and sinks those horrid teeth into the darkness of the other demon’s throat.

The fingers around me loosen. I fall.

There’s enough thought left in my brain to force myself limp before I hit the forest floor, but the impact still knocks my breath out. There’s no chance to recover as I roll, roll, roll down an incline I hadn’t even known existed.

My back slams against something hard but I don’t have the space to scream. It’s all I can do to take one shallow, wheezing breath at a time.

Painful, demonic howls rip through the otherwise silent forest, dripping with death until a final, arterial gurgle signals the end.

A wet, heavy impact shakes the ground, followed momentarily by small, steadier impacts; the victor strides on.

I won’t open my eyes. I can’t open my eyes. That thing will come for me next, and I can’t get up. I can’t do anything but wait here to die. And once I do, I will not be respawning.

Fuck this game. Fuck MANIK PIX-E. Whoever thought this was okay in a video game needs to have a very serious talk with their therapist. I can’t even imagine who would willingly sign on for this.

I wait.

And wait.

And, slowly, the pain ebbs to a semi-tolerable level, allowing me the thought capacity to notice the relatively soft bed of leaves and loam beneath me, and a gentle tickling of leaves above me. Birdsong filters in over my wheezing breath.

Eventually, I crack open my eyes to find my vision partially obscured by drooping fronds. I must have rolled beneath one of the giant ferns when the demon dropped me. Lucky; very lucky. Unless the demon that won their little turf war is just screwing with me…

No. No, that’s assigning more intelligence to it than I should. Game A.I. is pretty advanced, but I haven’t heard of any so advanced it can troll people. More likely, the demon wasn’t able to find me once I left line-of-sight.

Fine. If I’m not being hunted, I should be able to logout.

It takes effort to steady my breath, but I managed. I squeeze my eyes shut again and concentrate on the menu. Just as I’m thinking I need to keep my eyes open to see the menu, it appears, hovering in the orange-black behind my eyelids.

“Status,” it reads.

My breath catches. I dismiss the menu with a thought and try again, squeezing my eyes closed more tightly as though that might help.

“Status,” the menu reads again.

This can’t be right. I’m just not using the controls properly. It’s not like they bothered providing a tutorial.

I force myself to take another deep breath and close the menu again. The status pop-up is under the keyword ‘menu,’ so maybe… I concentrate the entirety of my will on the single word ‘logout.’

Nothing happens.

Another hitch of my breath accompanies a stab of panic and pain, forcing the tiniest whimper from between my lips.

Something shuffles nearby.

Shit. Shit, Shit—LOGOUT. LOG. OUT.

Still nothing happens. My body betrays me again with the tiniest of sobs. I clamp a hand over my mouth, trying to hold in a scream as the shuffling sound inches closer.

EXIT. END. ESCAPE. LOGOUT.

Crunching from my left; like feet on bracken. The steps are smaller than those humanoid demons, but that’s no less alarming. So many demons in this game are smaller than whatever those things were.

LOG ME OUT RIGHT NOW OR I’M GOING TO DIE.

I stuff my hand into my mouth, biting down despite the taste of dirt and blood, to stop myself from sobbing. My heart pounds in my ears and chest, until it seems fit to explode.

The footsteps stop. Something rustles. A faint, rasping moan raises the hair on the back of my neck.

This is it. I’m going to die cowering beneath a fern.

It’s a ridiculous idea. Death in a game isn’t real death. I know that. Yet the fear is overwhelming. Fear dictates the best course of action is to stay put and silent, and wait for whatever that is to leave.

My heart demands I fight. But my heart is not strong enough to compel my limbs into moving. Not when pain still courses through half my body; a stern reminder of what awaits if whatever-that-is sinks its teeth or claws into me.

So I remain glued, trembling and terrified, to the forest floor until the footsteps continue past me. They dwindle faintly into nothing. Only once they’ve been gone for what feels like an eternity do I peek beneath the fern. There’s nothing there. Nothing, except a pool of sunshine flooding in from a break in the canopy above. I’ve rolled into another meadow.

It’s a godsend right now. But that absence of enemies won’t last long. Eventually, something else will happen by this place. Something not so easily dissuaded.

I take a deep, shaky breath that tastes like dirt and snot. Way to add insult to injury, Devs.

Come on, Lexa. You can do this. You have to do better than this.

Get. The. Fuck. Up.

Horribly aware of every sound I’m making, I unglue my limbs one by one. Somewhere in everything that’s happened, my avatar has pissed itself—I’ve pissed myself—and my legs are coated with damp, clinging leaves and dirt. Face stinging with humiliation, though there’s no one around to see, I take a few deep breaths to clear the urge to cry.

Crying, however much it might make me feel better, won’t help in so many ways right now. If pain is real, if pissing yourself is possible, then it’s fair to assume dehydration will be, too. Besides, I’ve cried more than enough today. Now isn’t a time for tears. It’s time to get the hell out of here.