You have leveled up!

Congratulations! You have survived level 1!

He didn’t know what he did. The world had gone completely white hot and red all at the same time. It was some kind of blur, and he didn’t know if it was a blessing or a curse, because he was utterly drenched in inky black, sludge-like liquid.

The lizard’s head was completely unrecognizable. It was more gore than substance, and Cillian had never really liked horror movies. When he was seventeen, he had gone to a film camp and learned how to make intestines out of latex and aluminum foil. Fake blood was made of ketchup and chocolate syrup, and it tasted sweet and tangy and wrong under the hot sun. After that, he could stomach zombie movies, but horror movies were still beyond him.

This was real, this time, and he felt nauseated as he stared at the broken bone and brain matter splattered all over the wet stone.

He couldn’t vomit right now, but the urge was inescapable. His hand went to his mouth, and without another word, he dashed to the water and proceeded to vomit out all of the toast and soup left in his stomach. It burned his throat, his nose, his eyes teared up with the strain, and he tried to remember the last time he had thrown up. It had to be years now. Everything was wrong, and there was a ding right over his head.

Julius Strange has requested to accompany you.

Y/N?

Cillian barely registered the words before another wave of nausea overtook him, and he hacked out the next round of vomit, more bile and stomach acid than substance. When was the last time he ate? He couldn’t recall. It had maybe been a day; he didn’t have a great eating schedule.

It stung. Everything hurt. He was winded, and it was still hard to breathe, harder now that he was puking his guts out. His chest felt mangled in the worst of ways, and a timer started to click.

Auto reject in 15 seconds.

What the hell did accompany even mean? That was the least of his concerns right now. He felt absolutely horrid. Cillian had just killed something, brutally, without mercy.

When he was 12, his father had finally relented to his constant pestering and let him go quail hunting with him. Cillian could still remember the jitters. He had been out shooting since he was ten, and was a damned good shot, so he knew he could make it. Moving targets, stationary targets, none of it had ever been an issue for him. His dad had considered putting him in competitions until the quail hunting incident of ‘08.

Cillian had taken it out in one shot. And then he had promptly thrown up all over his dad’s feet when they went to retrieve the body.

“It’s just not for her,” Dad had said, rather sympathetically.

He hadn’t liked shooting after that, and thoughts of competition had faded away. Guns killed, and he hadn’t really realized it until it was already done. It was the cycle of life, but he was a coward. He couldn’t face the cycle head on. It was easier, safer to buy your meat from the market, removed from the death and gore.

He had it in him to kill, and he didn’t like it.

Cillian managed to catch his breath and stare at the ripples in the pond. It was over. He didn’t want to turn around and look at the body.

There was another ding, and he looked up with watery eyes.

Accompany request auto-rejected.

View your stats?

Y/N

Shakily, more out of reflex than anything else, he clicked yes. A blue screen flickered in front of him, and he wiped at his eyes to see more clearly.

CILLIAN JAMES

LEVEL 2

STR 15

DEX 15

INT 15

WIS 15

MANA 15

VIT 35

LUCK 50

SKILLS: NONE

STAT POINTS TO ALLOT: 10

A standard stat block. Cillian sat back on his heels to wipe at his eyes and nose again once more as something made a shimmering noise behind him, reminiscent of a Bluth animation. Slowly, he looked back, only to be greeted at the sight of the body shimmering and disappearing into blocks of glowing blue. So, that was how that happened. Left behind was a chest and a bundle of cloth. A cloak, he registered, and slowly stood up, but then he stopped.

Deep in the water, something glimmered. He stared down with wide, wide eyes, and it twinkled a second time. It wasn’t moving. Was something else there? Wasn’t the level complete?

His mouth was dry, and for a long, long moment, he remained stock-still. There was no movement, and the ripples from his vomit were calmed.

“... System?” he called hesitantly, and there was no reply.

Something was down there, and he slowly crept forward. It glimmered again, but he couldn’t get a good image of what it looked like.

He should leave it, he thought. It wasn’t winking at him like a creature, wasn’t moving in the slightest. It was just sitting there. Waiting for him, so to speak.

He really should leave it, but he knew enough about video games to know about hidden treasures. The smart choice would be to go get it. The risky choice would be to go get it. It could be nothing. But, whatever it was, it would probably give him an edge, right?

Cillian inched forward just a bit more, the handle slick with blood in his grasp, and he dimly registered that he was still filthy from the brutal murder he had just committed. A dip in the water wouldn’t be so bad. As he focused on the fact that he was soaked, he suddenly became more and more aware of the chunks of flesh on him, the filth, the grime, the way he was all broken out in a cold sweat and disgusting and---

It was like his brain turned off for a second time, and before he even realized what he was doing, he was surrounded in burning cold water. He hadn’t even had time to get a deep breath, but now he was soaked to the bone, splashing around. What the hell was he doing?!

There was no going back. Cillian just took a deep breath and plunged down, kicking as the inky blackness enveloped him in inescapable coldness. Kicking down, down, down, he reached out a hand towards the object glinting in the dim light. Now that he was closer, he couldn’t quite make it out, but it was glowing, and wasn’t that a good sign? His hand reached out further, and he glanced up at the dim glow from the moss up above him.

The water turned, and if he could freeze, he would. Something black whooshed past him, and he almost let out a breath of pure terror, but that was interrupted by sudden, burning pain in his leg.

There were teeth in his leg, and he twisted so fast pain lit up his spine into his neck. There was a fish, with long, spiky teeth, buried in his leg, and what the fuck did these things even have to eat?! What the hell was he doing here?! What possessed him to jump into the water?! He had no self preservation instincts at all!!

Panicking, he lashed out with his hatchet, smacking it once, twice in the head. Black blood leached out into the water, turning it warm as it mixed with his. The glimmering object was three feet below him, and the fish floated away, thoroughly dead, but it couldn’t be alone.

Hurriedly, he kicked down, and his hand closed around something smooth and metallic. He started to kick up, only for another black body to come out of nowhere and set its teeth into his side. Bright, white hot pain lit up, and he actually let out a scream of pain, muffled by the water in a stream of bubbles as he hacked at the body. Another one came right at him, and now all of his air was gone. Barely aware, he hacked at it, and it went spiraling away as more and more appeared out of the darkness. The water boiled, and he frantically kicked towards the surface as they all split their attention between attacking him and the dead, bleeding bodies.

Another one bit into his mangled leg just as he crested the surface, and he slammed the hatchet into its head as he scrambled to grab the edge.

I’m gonna die.

The thought was so loud, and he kicked frantically, knocking something out of the way before a third bit into his injured leg and another latched onto his side, and Cillian screamed as he hauled himself out of the water with two fish in toe. Another one leapt out, teeth gnashing as it landed on the ground and flopped around, and he lashed out wildly with the hatchet. One fish dead, two, three, and the water was still boiling as they swarmed the surface, but he was out of the way.

He was bleeding. He was bleeding everywhere, and his brain was hazy. His chest still hurt from the hit before, and he staggered to his feet.

You have leveled up!

You have leveled up!

Congratulations! You have completed the hidden quest: The Writer’s Secret!

… What?

Cillian looked down at the metal puck on a chain in his hand. There was a crystal set into it, carved with strange runes, crested in gold, and then looked at the thrashing fish still trying to reach him in the water. Blood was landing in a puddle around him, from his side, from his leg, and he dimly wondered how he was standing right now.

He needed to stop the bleeding, he thought distantly, and the world spun around him as a bright blue portal formed and the three dead fish shimmered, turning into neatly wrapped packages of meat.

Get to the next level, he thought distantly. He had to get to the next level. It was important.

He was bleeding everywhere. Painfully, he limped to the piles on the ground and picked up his loot, first from the fish of his nightmares, and then from the salamander. Why was he bleeding again? Oh, his head did not feel right, not at all.

“Status window,” he ordered, and it flicked on in front of him.

VIT 15/35

Fifteen. Fifteen wasn’t great, but he could work with it. He wasn’t going to die.

VIT 14/35

Oh. It was going down the further he continued to bleed. He had to get to the next level. In games, you generally healed once you exited the dungeon. That was a common thing, and this seemed to go off of video game logic.

He was going to die.

An image filtered to his mind, of paramedic hands lifting him onto a stretcher, thick bandages on his---

He looked down at the blue and green flag tattooed over a raised keloid. The pink and blue tattoo on his other wrist. The colors spelling out his story, and he struggled forward towards the portal.

No, he wasn’t going to die.

There were black spots in his vision, and his breathing was labored, and the items were heavy, but he was going to make it. At the very least, he could say he reached level two before he died. That would be enough.

The portal was warm as his hand went through, and he exhaled a sigh as it surrounded him like a blanket.

He made it to level two.