My mind, or my soul, or whatever thing you imagine experiences the world of this game, it swirled in a pit of blackness. Light hovered above me somewhere I couldn’t see. Voices reached out to me as if from above water that threatened to pull me under.

  Then I saw my mother, as if from out of the shadows, beautiful, younger than she ever was. Then she was gone, and I felt hollow. Then I saw Sofia, brown haired and blue eyed, smoking a cigarette on the curb, looking at me with the saddest, wettest eyes. Did she want me to follow her?

  Then she dove off of the curb, and into the inky blackness. I thought to follow, meant to. I yearned for something in that blackness. I wasn’t sure if it was her, or just the comfort of supposed oblivion. But then I saw Rachel. She had an old Super NES controller in her hand, a bit of Cheeto dust on the corner of her lips. She was snort-laughing. And the light of the TV washed over her.

  And then she raised up, and out of view, yanked away by invisible strings.

  I couldn’t think. I just felt. Inside me was a riot of feelings. I could feel the pain, I could feel the desire to just succumb to the blackness. It could all be over. I knew that. I knew that I could just let it take me.

  A sound cut through the blackness and the disorientation. A clarion call. A sob.

  “Damnit!” the voice said. “Damnit Zachary! Come back!”

  Bernadette’s voice was louder, stronger, still distant, still somewhere above me in that far away light I couldn’t see.

  “You can’t leave me. I love you, you idiot. You can’t.”

  I didn’t decide to go up towards the light, but I didn’t refuse it either.

  Then, I was pulled up, swiftly. Then I felt her arms around me, tight. And her chest was smushed firm against my face, and ear. And she laughed, she laughed that beautiful laugh.

  “Oh my God! You did it! He’s alive!” she said.

  I opened my eyes, and I saw her beautiful, tear stained, red and puffy face. Her mascara ran in streaks down her cheeks, her hair stood wild in all directions.

  The library, the tower. I was still there. I tried to sit up, but the muscles of my stomach seared in pain.

  “Just lay here for a moment,” she said. “You almost died.”

  “Is the fight over?”

  “For a bit,” I heard Rachel say.

  Bernadette caressed my face, and bent to kiss my forehead. Then someone pulled me up, to lay against the side of a bookcase. I fought a feeling of drowsiness. I blinked, fighting unconsciousness.

  Berryhop was suddenly here, and she put a bottle to my lips. I drank, and the drowsiness receded. I could suddenly think a little better.

  Rachel sat on one side of me, and Bernadette the other. My vision focused finally, and I could see the room better.

  At first, I thought that maybe I was on the floor we started in, but then I noticed the lack of tents, and the overturned bookcases, and the iron bars over the shelves, and I realized that we were on the floor up. The remains of a dozen robots littered the floor. Just a little ways, mere feet from me, was the corpse of some kind of giant lizard or raptor. Some kind of dinosaur?

  “How long do we have before I need to stand?” I asked.

  “We have a bit,” Rachel said, rapier in her lap.

  “Good.”

  Bernadette put her head on my shoulder.

  “I’m so glad you’re safe,” I said.

  “I’m sorry I screamed,” she said.

  “Nah,” Rachel cut in. “We were gonna fight anyway. Glad we just got to it.”

  “Is that a dinosaur?” I asked.

  “I think so,” Bernie said.

  “I could have screamed too,” I admitted.

  “I think he has more further up,” she said. “But the narrow stairs keep them from moving between floors easily.”

  I noticed across the room lay Annie. Berryhop was at her feet, messing with some part on her shoulder.

  I stood, and walked closer. Her eyes followed me.

  “What else is up there?” I asked.

  Berryhop looked at me with some scorn. Anne’s mechanical voice echoed from her throat.

  “Climb further at your own peril,” she said. “Once he learns what you did to me he will kill you.”

  I took in the damage we’d done to her. A crack split her porcelain face. Her legs were crushed, rendered useless. Her shoulder was missing parts, and Berryhop had a screwdriver in one hand, and a gear in the other, as she worked to fix it.

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  I reached into my pocket, and took the gear from it. I placed it next to them.

  “Have you ever been this damaged before?” I asked.

  “Never,” she said.

  “Then what makes you so sure he’ll take you back?”

  She turned her gaze from me.

  “That was cruel,” Berryhop mumbled.

  “She sort of killed me,” I responded.

  Berryhop stayed focused on her work.

  I shrugged, walked to a chair, turned it right side up, and sat.

  I felt a riot of emotions twist in my chest.

  I’d just died.

  I saw Bernadette, her eyes sweeping for threats, concern and worry creasing her brow, and I felt love and terror at what she’d have to have seen while I was out, add itself in the mix. I remembered what I felt when I held her in my arms, dying, and I didn’t want that for her. I hated that.

  Every time I got hurt, it was a wound for her too.

  Something about the way we approached combat was wrong. I don’t think we were too impulsive. Greenvalley Village had needed our help. Bernadette needed my help. Nothing about when we rushed headlong into danger seemed off to me.

  We just needed to be better once we found ourselves in danger.

  How could we get better?

  Well, for one, I needed to take my role as support more seriously. I was the only one in the party with good magic. I had up to third level spells, some of the best for our tier of play back in The Game. If I’d had some way to counterspell, I could have stopped Anne from using her lightning bolt.

  I needed to step back from the front line, and further, stop thinking like a front line fighter. I wondered if it was possible to change out my spells? Hell, why stop there? I wondered if it was possible to reclass just into a bard?

  I stood, and began unlatching the magic belt.

  “Rachel, Cal,” I said. “Come here for a second.”

  They approached.

  “We need to change up how we fight. Which one of y’all thinks they could use the greatsword? Because it should probably go with anyone that uses the belt.”

  We talked it through for a bit, and we eventually settled on the idea of Cal using the belt, and Certainty. I was probably slightly better at it, but the sword and belt combo was so strong that even a subpar use of it would still be very effective.

  Cal was our best shot, but we tended to get into fights where Rachel just couldn’t hold the frontline on her own. The way fights happened here, we tended to get into scrapes where we were already overrun. Fights in tight dungeons, narrow streets, or tight brush seemed to be more than common. They were the rule.

  If we were the ones ambushing, rather than being ambushed, keeping to three ranged fighters would have made more sense. History said that we couldn’t rely on that.

  We also briefly considered giving Rachel back her belt. We decided against it because her shoulder was too much of a problem still. Even if Certainty wasn’t very heavy with the belt, just using that other arm for stability still put it in a position where it was moving too much.

  I wondered if there was a spell that could fix that.

  So, Rachel kept her rapier.

  Cal gave me his axe. It was a returning axe, and made a great surprise attack in the scrum.

  I resolved to keep improving my use of the bow.

  With a change of tactics finally settled. We also decided to move up to the next floor. Cal led.

  Berryhop said she would stay behind, with Anne.

  We’d not even reached the top of the stairs when Cal screamed, and charged up.

  I followed, sucking air now that I just had my own strength, but managing to keep up.

  As soon as my head rose above the third floor, I saw Cal engaged with three robots. They didn’t fear his sword at all, and so he knocked their legs and arms off with each swing. A fourth robot peaked out from behind a bookcase. I let loose an arrow, and it thudded into the wood behind him.

  I roared wordlessly, and charged off the stairs, breaking for the cover of an overturned side table. I knelt behind it and cast [Magic Quiver]. I nocked a glowing arrow.

  Rachel vaulted the landing of the stairs, and put herself next to Cal. She pierced a knee of one robot, then let Cal come in and cut off his head. The robot stumbled back, but put his arms forward, waving blind, and advanced again. These guys just didn’t stay down.

  I plinked an arrow off of the robot’s shoulder. I nocked another. I sent it flying. The arrow pierced its chest, right behind the porcelain plate, and broke something there that sent the construct to the ground.

  A robot behind me kicked a stray book. I turned around just in time to see it paces from me, metal fingers outstretched.

  Bernadette appeared and cut first the one hand then the other clean off. I ran to another spot and knelt.

  “Rachel, Cal! I believe in you!”

  Cal and Rachel became a blur, metal parts flying from clanging, concussive blows. I glanced at Bernie and launched an arrow at the robot’s foot. I missed. Bernie lopped its head off, but of course it kept going. But now Bernie could easily stay out of its reach. She ducked behind it and started hacking at its back.

  In moments the robots were parts on the ground, and the fight was over. Overall, there were ten. No dinosaurs, so that was good.

  We took a moment to rest and eat, then searched this floor.

  Another library floor. More iron bars over shelves. Thin narrow windows arrayed around. More seating, but less maintained. Cobwebs, dust, overturned chairs lay here and there.

  “Found something,” Cal called.

  Upon approaching, we saw him hunched over a pile of dust near a bookcase.

  “See this?” he asked, pointing to the pile of dust. “At first, it looks undisturbed. No footprints. Stange, since the robots seem to patrol here, and there is plenty of evidence of that nearby. But look closer, and you’ll see a kind of wave-like pattern in it.”

  I looked, and indeed there was a pattern on the dust. Like windblown sand, or sediment after the rain.

  “Whatcha’ thinking?” Bernadette asked.

  “Something not touching it, but wafting across it. Like wings above water,” he said.

  “Maybe robes?” I asked.

  “Could be,” Rachel added.

  “Secret door?” I prodded further.

  Cal stood and we searched for this possible secret door. He hadn’t seen Scooby Doo, so he wasn’t sure where to start, but I ran my hand around at shoulder level on the bookcase, checking behind books for a wire or lever.

  I was right! A wire connected from the spine of a book, through a hole in the bookcase.

  I pointed it out. We readied our weapons. I pulled the book, and with a click, something seemed to move in the wall, and the bookcase swung open.

  I held Redeemer in one hand, and pulled the secret door open with the other.

  Inside was a small nook, with a single narrow window, a small bookcase, and a simple cot. Sitting on the cot was a man in black robes.

  He looked up at us; green eyes, dark hair, and patchy beard. He looked supremely unwashed.

  “Shit,” he said.