I didn’t let the suicidal urge to breathe in the water win over me. I kept persisting, propelling myself up tirelessly.

I was rewarded plentifully when I broke the surface. The air was true nectar. Never had I appreciated the fragrance of air more.

I floated to the bank where Tulip was anxiously waiting. I lifted the unconscious Kanim on my shoulder and transported him some distance from the river and laid him down over some smooth rocks.

I gave the unconscious boy a good shake. However, he showed no signs of consciousness.

“He is dead!” the younger Tulip wailed, and for all I knew he was right.

“Shut up,” I snapped. I was not angry at the small boy, rather I was pissed off at myself.

I pinched Kanim’s nose and breathed into his mouth repeatedly, but to no avail. I felt so miserable as Tulip’s sobs played in the background. I began administering CPR to Kanim. If only I had some health vials, it would have been an easy trick to revive Kani. Alas! The game world had taken those away from me, and there was no way to save this little soul.

I realized that as I was pushing down onto the boy’s chest, I was crying. Kanim was dead. I kept putting in the effort, like some deranged man who had lost all sense of reality.

And then, magically, after a minute of CPR Kanim drew in a breath and began to cough out water.

What a joy it was to see him open his eyes. Kanim stared at me with a dazed expression. I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him tight, as tears streamed down my cheeks. The younger Tulip too embraced the two of us, and together we cried for a while.

“How long are we going to stay like this?” Tulip said in his innocent voice after a few minutes. I couldn’t help but giggle.

“Why did you jump into the river, father?” Kanim said.

“Well… I thought of something,” I replied, bowing my head, not sure what to say.

“Of what, father?” Kanim insisted on knowing.

“Why did you jump into the river after me if you didn’t know how to swim?” I asked. Kanim hung his head in shame.

“I thought I would be able to swim.”

Tulip pointed at him and laughed.

“I can swim better than you!” he taunted. Kanim squinted his eyes at his brother.

“I will throw you into the river again, let’s see how good a fish you are.”

“All right, all right, easy,” I said. “I think it’s time we go home.”

Except I didn’t recall ever being in this part of the forest. The best I could do was keep moving along the course of the river and hope to reach a portion of the forest I was familiar with. I could make my way to the village of the zombies afterwards. It was depressing to think that the zombie village was my destination, and not the town. I would have even preferred my old palace.

It struck me that the boys probably knew where the village was. It was just a possibility, because they were very young, so I decided to find out through a game.

I cleared my throat.

“So, all right, boys.” I said. “I am going to pretend that I don’t know the way back home, and you have to lead me?”

This got the boys pumped up. They began guiding me through the dense jungle. I just tagged along blindly. After about an hour, when we had reached an elevation a distance away from the river, the boys declared they didn’t know the way.

I should have stuck with my first idea of following the river.

“Where have you brought me?” I asked the boys, swatting a mosquito. There was quite a swarm here. The brothers were biting their fingers, confused.

Tulip burst into tears.

“I want to go home to mama,” he wiped the mucus leaking out of his nose. I picked him up and consoled him, rubbing his back.

“All right,” I said, “I will get you to her.”

That was easier said than done. The fact was, we were lost.

I didn’t break the news to the boys, not wishing to scare them. I carried Tulip while Kanim followed closely in my wake. My only hope was that Dieana would send her followers to scour the wilderness after realizing we were taking too long to return.

Eventually I decided it was best we didn’t move at all and stayed put in one place. Out of the blue, Kanim let out a shriek which sent birds flying from the tree tops and left my ears ringing.

“Stop it,” I admonished. “We will get home, don’t be a scaredy cat.”

“Look there, father,” Kanim said with a shiver, pointing at some bones lying half buried on the ground.

My heart skipped a beat.

Human bones. As soon as Tulip’s eyes fell on the remains, he howled, terrifying more birds.

“Shut up, it’s just bones,” I said and I put him down. I approached the bones, identifying a cranium and ribs. A little way ahead there was another skull grinning, with some long strands of hair attached to it.

Two names echoed in my mind.

Killerguy and Roxy.

I had killed them such a long time ago. And now I squatted next to their skeletons, looking at their hollow eye cavities, and their yellow-tinged bones, observing the ants and beetles moving about them and remembered the night when I had slain them.

Killerguy had probably respawned after I had killed him, but his old body had gone through the natural decomposition process. Roxy was an NPC, so there was no rebirth for her.

Seeing my old victims I guessed that the dwelling of the sage should be in the neighborhood.

And sure enough, after a short investigation I rediscovered the boulder, covering the time-bound entrance to the sage’s dwelling. The place had become overgrown with plants. As I stood in front of the huge rock, holding the hands of the kids, I wondered what time of the day it was.

If I was reading the sun correctly, it was past noon. The fissure should be appearing in a while.

I spotted the detached branch of a tree lying nearby, and an idea popped in my head. If fate had decided to bring me to the sage then I might as well meet him. I examined the branch and found it to be strong. I removed the twigs attached to it.

I inserted the branch into a small gap under one side of the boulder. Next, I began to apply force, hoping that the boulder would roll over. Yes, I could no longer become a monster capable of moving huge weights with bare hands, but I was still a human. Weren’t humans known for coming up with ingenious inventions to solve their problems?