Hours had passed since I woke, head tingling with new sensations as I lay dazed against the trunk of a tree. I was clearly somewhere else, as in not home safe in bed, as forest birds chirped and trees whispered overhead. Opening my eyes confirmed such suspicions.

  Sitting up, I realized that yes I was indeed sitting in the middle of a storybook forest. It was beautiful. But how had I gotten here?

  I stood up.

  Achievement gained!

  Baby steps.

  Stand up for the first time.

  Text scrawled across my vision like I was wearing some kind of hologram glasses.

  “What in the…”

  XP gained: 100! Level up!

  Level one has been gained!

  Class: unassigned

  It sounded like video game jargon. Levels. A class? This wasn’t a dream but what was happening I didn't know.

  The text disappeared and I wandered around the clearing a bit in confusion, looking for something to give me a clue, but there were none... only forest and foliage.

  “Welp, I guess that’s a sign that I’ll just have to figure it out on my own,” I said, keeping my spirits up. With that, I walked into the forest.

  Hungry, I came to a set of bushes whose tantalizing red berries called to me like a pretty lady with cherry red lipstick. The fruit was fat and hard and when I pressed one between my fingers, it snapped open like a grape.

  “Hm. Should I eat this?” My stomach grumbled like I hadn’t eaten in days.

  I popped the berry into my mouth. It was so sweet I thought I’d eaten a spoonful of syrup. I took another one, and another, until my intense hunger was satiated for the moment. I knew I’d need something more though to survive.

  !Achievement

  Feed yourself.

  10 XP

  “Oh? I just earned XP from eating a berry. And here I thought I’d just poisoned myself.” I knew XP was short for Experience Points.

  “So leveling up is a thing now? Hm.” I guess I’d find out what that meant when it happened.

  As I walked further, the forest grew thicker and thicker, blocking a little more sunshine with their shaggy heads each few yards I travelled.

  “Is it getting dark or am I going deeper into the forest? Maybe I should make a camp before I go any further?”

  I set up a small makeshift camp where I stopped which meant I cleared away brush and debris from a clearing, wrapped some vines, which I hoped weren’t poisonous, around sticks I stuck into the ground and made a small covered bed. Then, I used the recently cleared brush and some dried sticks to make a fire. Well, I tried to anyway. I couldn’t make the fire. It was too difficult. But I had somewhere to return to, at least, and rest safely when it grew dark.

  !Achievement

  Make camp

  10 XP

  "Nice. I wonder how much XP until I level up.”

  My next objective was finding some real food. I didn’t know anything about hunting but I was going to give it a shot.

  After an exhausting amount of time, I finally crept up on a bunny in a clearing. In my hands trembled nervously a makeshift spear I’d fashioned out of a long branch. A stone helped me finish the end to a point. There was no telling if it was good enough to do the job, though.

  As if expecting me, the bunny hopped into the grass before I even got a chance.

  “I shouldn’t have expected it to be that easy.”

  As the hours grew on I found my second chance. This time, a snake slithered across my trail, sliding through the grass with ease. As I lifted the spear to strike, the creature coiled in defence baring fangs with a deadly hiss.

  Dead to rights, it was mine… but looking at it, imagining the carnage I’d have to dish out on the little animal, I couldn’t strike. Leaving it there with a sigh, my conscience reasoned that a snake wouldn’t have much meat anyways. I knew better, though. I’d have to harden my heart to survive.

  In my defense, however, I had no idea how to even eat a snake.

  As I was hunting for a third chance, my ears perked up at a special noise in the woods. It sounded like… voices.

  “People!” As much fun as it was being stranded in a random forest, traipsing around like a silly boy with a hunting spear, I was very much ready to get out of here. My feet carried me swiftly to the sound. As I grew closer however, it became more recognizable.

  It was just one grumbly, gravelly voice that seemed to be… singing. No. Chanting. I crouched low and slowed my advance, the rhythm and noise of this new voice oddly strange and unsettling. Using the foliage, I poked closer until I came upon a clearing where a campfire burned brightly.

  There, in the center, was a giant stone whose inside must have been carved out because a shoddy wooden door, as if a large piece of bark had been ripped off of a tree, covered a hole in the rock face. A little camp was set up before it, complete with a kettle, crude wooden bowls and plates stacked in rows, odds and ends, rusty trinkets, a map on a boar skin, overflowing brass coins, and various odds bowls and scraps of parchment covered in different ingredients.

  This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

  A staff, a rusty knife, metal working tools, and other items were strewn about the fire as if in worship to it. And dancing all around it was a little green man.

  Gangly and knobby, the little man danced barefoot, feet bearing extremely long toenails and hands with crusted fingernails. A wooden mask hung on his face, a scary looking expression exaggerated onto its surface. The little guy danced his little heart out, chanting in some strange language.

  A part of me was afraid to catch the attention of the man and I questioned whether or not I should leave the safety of my bush at all. But, the promise of at least another human at my side was too much to resist. I stepped out into plain sight.

  The man stopped, looking me over for a full second in silence. The fire crackled. I said nothing in return. Then, without warning, the little man cried out at the top of his lungs, the most ghastly noise imaginable.

  He reached to the ground, grabbing something pointy. It was a little wooden spear with a sharp rock tip.

  “Uh, oh.” The little man jabbed at me with it but I parried with my hunting stick.

  Angered further, he threw a flurry of jabs, forcing me back and away with each deflection. Backing away frantically, my feet trampled all over the little man’s camp but he followed, strike after strike.

  “What’s your problem? I am just looking for a way out of here!” I cried.

  “Yag!” The man countered, stabbing at me again. We continued our dance all over the man’s camp, knocking over pots, pans, and bowls, smashing shiny things and cracking ceramic. At the end, the little man had done more damage to himself than I had.

  Stopping finally, we both huffed and puffed, out of breath.

  “Are you done yet?” I asked.

  “Yag,” the man said simply.

  “Alright then. I’m glad it’s settled. Sorry about the mess but if you just point me in the right direction, I’ll be on my way and out of your hai–” I’d misunderstood what “yag” had meant, apparently, as without hesitation the little man drove his spear dead center into my tennis shoe. The pain was overwhelming.

  “Ouch!” I yelled out, hobbling back.

  “Yag!” He jumped forward with every intention of striking me again. Angered, I leaned on a back foot and wound up my stick with one hand.

  “You want to play? Then take this you little freak!” I swung as hard as I could just as he came in for a thrust. Thwack! My hunting stick cracked in half and the man’s head broke to the side.

  He stood there for a second, head tilted, as if thinking about something. Then, slowly, he fell backwards without a sound, plopping loudly onto his back. My heart jumped instantly at the sight.

  “Oh, no. Please don’t be dead, mister.” I hurried over him and felt for a pulse around his leathery neck. Nothing. “Oh, no. I’m a murderer.” Hoping it wasn’t true, I removed the mask to check to see if he was breathing. I stopped dead in my action.

  Below the mask was the ugliest man I had ever seen. As a matter of fact, he looked more beast than man. Big nose. Big ears. Exaggerated lips and big ol eyes. I recognized what he was instantly.

  “Oh, thank god. It was just a goblin.” I paused for a second. “A goblin!” The word nearly gave me a stroke.

  I gave myself a long time to come to terms with what had just transpired… with what it all meant. None of this made any sense, of course, but with no options, there wasn’t much to do but accept what was happening.

  “Well,” I said, finally, “I guess it makes sense now with all of the level ups and XP. I’m trapped in some game world… or having a terrible nightmare. Or worse. I’m going nuts.”

  Feeling put off, I touched the goblin’s face with the flat end of its own spear to see if it was really dead. It was. And worse, it looked real enough.

  “Yup. I’ve gone crazy.”

  !Achievement

  Finish the fight

  Have your first battle

  50 XP

  Goblin slain!

  50 XP

  “Woah! So, it is a goblin. And that made, what, one hundred and twenty XP in total? If level one required one hundred XP then level two must need two hundred.” I couldn’t believe I was thinking in levels. I must’ve hit my head somewhere.

  Class Accepted!

  Class: Warrior

  Suddenly, out before me, materialized out of white light a solid iron sword. When I didn’t catch it, the weapon fell to the leaves.

  “Woah! A warrior. And is that my sword? So, it gives me weapons too.” I picked up the blade. The pointy end gleamed like star light and the edges looked able to slice through steel.

  “I could do damage with this,” I said mischievously. “So if it gave me a sword then I can get other stuff too. Hm. Well, if I’m stuck in a video, or my own insane day dream, I may as well embrace it.”

  Searching the camp provided some good valuables, but there wasn’t anywhere to put them so I was forced to leave them behind. The camp itself was nice. I thought about taking it over but when I moved the door from the stone, a ghastly smell wafted out and the echo of my movements bounced down a long and dark tunnel. There was no telling where or how far down it led.

  “No thanks,” I said, putting the door back. Plus, the dead goblin was too hard to move.

  I left the camp a mess, fire sputtering, goblin dead on his back. Hopefully, his friends wouldn’t find him like that.

  As for me… Now that I had a blade, I was going hunting.

  As I did before, I spent a couple hours of daylight waiting and watching. I’d found a new hunting stick and tied my sword to the end to fashion a true spear. Like that, I hid in some tall shrubs for my next game.

  Eventually, prey came along. It was a bunny. As a matter of fact, I think it was the same one from earlier in the day.

  “Yeah. I see that lil pink nose and that little black spot on the side of your face. This time you’re mine,” I whispered to myself.

  I waited until the cute little thing was settled and nibbling on a long blade of grass. It was so adorable, chewing on a long stem with a cat tail on the end. The way the rabbit was chewing looked akin to the way a farmer would chew on a stem of hay.

  “So cute. But I bet you’re twice as tasty,” I whispered.

  The moment had to be perfect. The bunny proved it was fast already. One mistake would be a night going hungry. The sun was already lowering. There would barely be enough time for a fire.

  Then, it happened. The bunny hopped to greener pastures, enclosing itself on two sides by giant rocks. With its back to me, I steadily moved forward.

  I was close. So close! I couldn’t believe I’d made it so close to the rabbit. I was practically standing over it. With bloodlust I raised my spear, ready to strike… but I hesitated.

  Suddenly, sensing my presence, the bunny turned to look, nearly hopping ten feet straight into the air upon sight of me. I pushed myself to strike, strike before it was too late! But again, my hand stayed in place.

  The bunny sat alone, trembling, too afraid to move as it waited for the inevitable. Eventually, arms shaking, I lowered my spear.

  “Ah, who am I kidding. You’re too cute to eat. Go on. Get out of here,” I said, belly aching. The bunny dashed away into the bushes.

  Achievement!

  Show mercy to your first opponent.

  10 XP

  “My opponent? You mean the bunny was an opponent? I guess everything is now, technically. So it still gives me XP for showing mercy? I wonder if I get anything for starving through the night,” I asked out loud, trudging my way back to camp with my spirit broken.

  Later the next morning, when I awoke, a message pinged in my brain.

  Achievement!

  Endured a night of starvation.

  10 XP