text: Dhane broke free of the tight gripping stone that had wrapped around him. Crumbled pieces of shale, pieces that looked identical to him, lay in green grass. His stone-carved face, a bit of statue that could withstand the test of time, revealed his eyes half shut, mouth contorted in protest.
  
  "A warning would have been nice...."
  
  The grass swayed in a soft breeze, dancing along rolling hills. Trees with bunched-up tops, like cotton balls of pink leaves, cast flittered shadows. Boulders and jutting stones carved through the land, surrounded by bushes sprinkled with flowers.
  
  There wasn't a person in sight. But what a wondrous world! The way the trees grew with twisting branches, the birds and their metallic blue wings, shimmering in sunlight, the vast stretch of green and pink in every direction.
  
  Yet . . . what was he supposed to do?
  
  It was one thing to get lost on purpose, and a totally different thing to be truly lost. When he would drive up to the mountains, there had always been an anchor that tethered him to society: roads, trails, people, his compass, and the general understanding of where things were. Walk far enough east and he'd hit the city. Easy peasy.
  
  That's all he needed, a map. And wasn't there an app for that?
  
  Oh . . . shit brownies! Where was his phone? He had it right before being turned into a statue. His pockets were empty. The only things around him were the crumbled bits of shale.
  
  But it was supposed to be a piece of his soul! Could he have lost it . . . dropped it on the mountaintop when he fell? Of course he did, that was what happened with all new phones: get the pristine box, the pretty screen, and five minutes later, a crack down the center.
  
  Did they sell screen protectors in heaven?
  
  If there ever was a time for a handy Find My Phone app, this was that time. Then again, he wasn't on a mountain top anymore. Who knew how far away Gameus had sent him.
  
  With that thought, he turned and there, soaring into the stratosphere, was a dull gray of a shape, like an upside-down funnel, distinct from all other mountains, and no doubt, the mountain he had—moments ago—been standing on.
  
  It would be impossible to climb that, a dozen miles of cliffs. To even reach it would take weeks.
  
  "Gameus?" Dhane tried and waited. The only reply was flittering leaves. Then, feeling silly for the thought, though enough on the verge of panic that it was worth a try, he called out, "Customer support?"
  
  Nothing. Just thinking heaven had game masters made him cringe. But there had obviously been a mistake, a glitch in the matrix. Not only did he not get to choose a divinity, but he was also now without the single device that contained any hope of finding information.
  
  A footstep, tiny as it were, crinkled leaves. Dhane turned and a small, green . . . goblin?—for lack of a better term—had his head poked out from behind a tree. He had a leather helmet that cupped his head, leaving enough room for two large ears, each nearly half the size of his head, lined with tiny brass ring piercings.
  
  The goblin arched an eyebrow, seemingly confused, then slowly moved back behind the tree, as if by moving slowly, it couldn't be seen.
  
  "Coru burrah . . ." came a whisper.
  
  "Pfff! Tatti?"
  
  Another goblin stuck her head out from the other side of the tree. This one didn't have a helmet. She had short, spiky black hair, like a green Barbie doll with her hair chopped off. Her eyes were large and expressive, shimmering in tones of gray. She carried a tiny bow, an arrow nocked at the ready, quiver hanging at her side.
  
  The goblin squinted for a long moment. Something touched him, like a feather, drawn through his chest. She loosened her arrow and looked back behind the tree. "Au, coru burrah."
  
  "Au au!" the other said and jumped out with a wide, crooked tooth smile. They approached slowly, barely three feet tall. The archer looped the bow over her head into a more casual placement. The other goblin sheathed his sword—well, sword for a goblin, more like a slightly long dagger to any human-sized person.
  
  The archer made a soothing, shushing sound. She held her hands out in front of herself, padding the air. When Dhane didn't move, she smiled and hooked a thumb at her chest. "Aia, Desley," she said.
  
  "Aia, Knock," the other said.
  
  Usually, in a video game, goblins weren't your friends. . . . But having no weapon, no phone, and a complete lack of knowledge about how the world worked, Dhane played along. He hooked a thumb toward his chest and said, "Aia, Dhane."
  
  The goblins smiled and nodded. Desley held out her hand, palm up, and mimed pushing buttons.
  
  "My phone?"
  
  She nodded again, ears perched, as if in anticipation.
  
  "I don't know where it is."
  
  Desley frowned and shook her head, then pointed to her ear. She didn't understand what he was saying. For a goblin, she seemed rather smart.
  
  She reached out her green little hands with long black nails and took his hand gently. She turned his palm up, pointed to her head, then squinted, as if in thought, before tapping his palm like it were the phone.
  
  Dhane considered this for a moment. Things like telepathy or telekinesis just weren't real, though neither were turning into stone, teleportation, or imps and goblins. He looked at his hand and imagined his phone.
  
  His thoughts snagged on something deep within, like fishing and the line caught a nibble. He gave it a bit more thought, digging into that sensation, then the phone was there, nothing special about it. No shimmering lights, no brush of cold air, no crack down the center, it merely existed.
  
  Maybe heaven did have game masters. . ..
  
  Desley laughed and threw her arms up in celebration. She tried to swipe the screen, though her finger went through the device, blurring the material.
  
  He swiped the screen, which filled with even more apps. The top-left app was one for translation. He tapped it, and Desley held her hand out, palm up. The app had three little white balls projected off the screen. Two were listed as free, but to buy another would cost 1 silver.
  
  Dhane pulled on one of the balls and it popped out of the screen. He dropped it into Desley's hand and she . . . ate it. He gave Knock a ball as well, then paused to consider if he needed to eat one as well, and if he did, what would it taste like, this white ball of light?
  
  "Ho, Dhane of corruption," Desley said.
  
  "Corruption?"
  
  "Yes, you like us, from Shadow, not Light."
  
  "Shadow, Shadow," Knock said, nodding vigorously.
  
  "I don't understand. I'm not from this world," Dhane said.
  
  "Ah," Desley said, examining the ill-fitted vest, "you are fresh Shadow, I see. But you, strong fresh Shadow."
  
  "Fresh shadow?"
  
  "Yes, new. We show you the way."
  
  And with that she turned and hurried back to the tree they were hiding behind, waving for him to follow. The other side had a rather large hole, big enough even for him to crawl into. It was a tunnel that wound around the roots of the tree.
  
  Desley nodded and pointed to the hole. "Inside, you see soon."
  
  There was a good chance he wouldn't see anything inside of a dark hole. There was also a good chance these goblins were just trying to get him back to where they could more easily butcher him.
  
  He pushed away, shaking his head. "I . . . you know what, I'm good up here."
  
  "You must!" Desley said. "You are fresh Shadow—lost Shadow. We find you for reason and take you to Mother of Shadows."
  
  Somehow that sounded even worse.
  
  Knock moved behind him and started pushing. "You. Go. In. Hole! In hole! In hole!"
  
  "Knock!" Desley said. "He is strong Shadow, you respect!"
  
  Bushes shook behind them, maybe twenty or so feet away. The two goblins immediately drew their weapons, crouching.
  
  "What's wrong?" Dhane asked in a whisper, really wishing he had something sharp or dense or anything at all. Why hadn't Gameus given him a weapon, or was that what the divinity was supposed to do?
  
  Desley shushed him, then nocked an arrow. Knock, on the other hand, drew his sword and moved off to the side. He put two fingers in his mouth and whistled sharply.
  
  A boar, no smaller than the two goblins were tall, broke out of the bush. It had large, jagged tusks and its head was covered in bone, like an exoskeleton. The boar completely ignored Knock and charged Dhane instead.
  
  He yelped and ran perpendicular to the boar, only to have it change direction and give chase. Desley yelled something, something that was lost to the pounding of fat hooves on dirt.
  
  He should have run around the tree. An arrow whistled from behind and struck the boar. A -4 in red materialized and the boar's health . . . health? The boar had a health bar, showing 49/53.
  
  At this point, the boar slammed into the back of his legs, launching him up and over itself. He twisted in the air—yelling random profanities—and landed heavily on his neck. A dense pain shot through his body, taking his breath with it. A moment later, the pain was completely gone.
  
  This sent a series of worrying thoughts that he might be paralyzed. That mere minutes into this afterlife, this heaven, and he would soon be dead, or maybe worse, forever a cripple in a fantasy world that begged to be explored, begged to have its mysteries discovered.
  
  Could he move? Could he feel his toes?
  
  Yes. . ..
  
  This all happened in a span of three seconds, long enough for the boar to turn and start its charge again, and just long enough to see the -6 above him fade, displaying his own health bar as 34/40.
  
  "Fresh Shadow!" Desley called. "Move!"
  
  He didn't need more encouragement than that. Really, he didn't need anything more than the enraged boar charging. Dhane rolled twice, barely escaping the edge of a jagged tusk, then pushed himself back to his feet.
  
  Knock yelled a war cry, then dove off a rock with all the courage of a berserker charging into battle. He held his small sword with both hands, angled down. His body made an audible slap against the dirt, a perfect bellyflop, two feet from the boar.
  
  "Idiot!" Desley yelled, releasing another arrow, this one caught the boar in the left hind leg. -6 in damage lifted from the creature, dropping it to 43/53.
  
  It tried to tear the arrow out, though couldn't reach it. But just as pain had quickly stopped affecting Dhane, it seemed to stop affecting the boar. It turned and this time charged Desley.
  
  Dhane ran to Knock and took his sword.
  
  "Did. I. Kill it?" Knock asked, trying to push himself to his feet.
  
  Desley shot at the boar and missed. She started to shoot again, but decided to abandon her spot and jump into the hole. Unfortunately, the boar had no problem with this and followed.
  
  Dhane went in after the boar on hands and knees, knocking bits of dirt loose. After a dozen or so feet, the tunnel opened up a lot more. He could almost stand.
  
  Desley yelled, followed by the telltale whistle of another arrow. The boar made a snorting noise, dug at the dirt, and charged.
  
  While everything should have been pitch-black down here, Dhane had no problem seeing. It was as if everything gave off the slightest amount of glow, not enough to see colors, though enough that all the details of rocks and roots and . . . freaking bugs!—spiders and worms and centipedes squirmed from all around, enough to give anyone a nightmare. What was he thinking!
  
  And yet, the boar was not that far ahead. Who would just let random friendly . . . monsters—but that was beside the point; friendly entities—die without doing something?
  
  He ducked his head and ran, short blade in hand. Knock was somewhere behind, scurrying to catch up. Desley screamed, and something like bone scraped against rock.
  
  The tunnel opened into a room of sorts. Platforms lined the walls and there was a dip in the middle, like a small court or arena. Desley was down below, her leg pierced by the boar's tusk, bow snapped into two pieces, arrows scattered about. She was trying to crawl away, though the jagged spines along the boar's tusk made that impossible.
  
  She punched the boar's exoskeleton snout, which didn't seem to do anything but hurt her hand. The boar's life sat at 34/53. It yanked at its tusks, tearing at her leg. Little red -1s and -2s drained from her wound. She only had a maximum of 24 health, and it was now down to 10/24, glowing red.
  
  Dhane charged. The dip of the arena made it so he could stand upright, or sprint without worrying about smashing his head on one of the gnarled roots that twisting along the ceiling.
  
  He crashed into the boar, knocking it to its side. It writhed, twisting to reclaim foothold, tearing life from Desley.
  
  Dhane slammed the blade into the boar over and over and over, slicing chunks of numbers from it, but not blood. Each cut seemed to open slits of light, of its . . . soul?
  
  With one last hit, the boar stopped moving, yet a screeching Knock jumped from one of the side platforms, somehow having another dagger in hand, and promptly bellyflopped to the ground, three feet from the boar.
  
  "Idiot," Desley said through clenched teeth. Her leg remained speared through, however the damage had stopped, and luckily so since her life had dropped to 4/24.
  
  The challenge, now, was how to get her leg free without killing her. Maybe they had a health potion or healing spell, or—
  
  The inner lights of the boar seeped from its wounds and seemed to coat its hide, hair, tusks, and exoskeleton snout. Then all at once, it burst to a tiny shimmer of lights and was gone, releasing Desley's leg. Various items hovered in the air.
  
  ─ 2x Durum Boar Meat
  
  ─ 1x Leather Scrap
  
  ─ 32 Copper
  
  "Can you see that?" Dhane asked, pointing to the items.
  
  "Yes, we see our loot, but not see your loot."
  
  "Did. I. Kill it?" Knock asked, peeling himself off the stone floor. His eyes lit up when he saw the loot and quickly fished invisible things out of the air with a wide smile. "Meat, meat, meat!"
  
  Desley rolled her eyes, then focused on Dhane. "I don't get you. Why you no use Shadow?"
  
  Dhane tapped the items and they turned into tiny balls of light that shot into his chest. "I don't know what you mean by my shadow. I didn't have any weapons, so I took this from Knock," he said and handed the dagger back to the goblin.
  
  "No, strong Shadow," Knock said, waggling a finger. "You save my Desley. You take great sword—my gift. I find other!"
  
  Desley stood without any pain. Her leg wasn't bleeding light anymore. In fact, her health had already increased to 8/24. "You had sword, but no Shadow?"
  
  There was a very good chance his phone would tell him about this shadow. Perhaps it was a skill, a way to deal damage by using mana or some sort of resource. He shook his head.
  
  "Most curious. It be why you need to see Shadow mother. She show you." Desley marched up the sloping ground to the other side of the pit where the tunnel continued.
  
  "What is this place?" Dhane asked. It really did look like an arena with indistinct stone seats lining the walls.
  
  "Fodder pit." At the confused look he gave her, she continued, "Adventurers of Light kill we Cobalins. They evil, but dumb. We sacrifice ourselves and give treasure to appease their needs. You see."
  
  Desley led the way. They were moving downward and the tunnel's ceiling was now a good seven feet high. She stopped and pointed at a pit that covered the full width of the tunnel, jagged spikes were carved into the bottom. "This is great Cobalin illusion," she said with wiggly, magical fingers. "You see only tunnel stone, though—"
  
  "It's a pit," he said.
  
  "You see pit?" Desley looked to Knock and Knock shrugged. "More curious. You have sight through illusion. Can you see illusion?"
  
  Now that she asked, there did seem to be something unique about the pit: tiny sparks of purple flickered here and there, barely noticeable. He focused on them and the pit disappeared, covered by stone and dirt, perfectly matching real stone. "It's a really good illusion."
  
  Desley smiled with a bit of pride and hooked her thumb at her chest. "Me and Knock cast illusion. Fodder responsible for renewing magics."
  
  "Wait, you guys are fodder? You're just meant to die."
  
  "Yes. You understand. To appease evil adventurers." She jumped over the pit and Knock followed.
  
  How could they just send their people here to die, people like Desley who seemed to be quite smart and capable? She could fight and cast illusion spells. But to her people, she was just fodder?
  
  He followed them to an old, wooden treasure chest at the end of the tunnel, surrounded by a pit in the shape of a horseshoe. This pit, however, didn't have any illusion magic hiding it.
  
  "Fodder responsible for treasure chest. We each deposit one item to gain entry to tribe. It is passage tax. If adventurers are appeased by items, they no more reason to look further."
  
  Both Desley and Knock dropped a scrap piece of leather into the box, then looked at him expectantly.
  
  Dhane summoned his phone and opened the Inventory app. The scrap leather, when tapped, displayed additional information. Its base value was worth 16 copper if he sold it to the System, while the stupid red-laced bra was worth 15. He selected the bra and tapped Withdraw.
  
  A small ball of light jumped from his phone and morphed into an outline of the bra. When he touched it, the outline filled in with the soft silky material.
  
  Desley scrunched her brow. "Boar drop . . . sexy cloth? Poor boar. . . . See! Adventurers evil, do nasty things."
  
  "Gah, it's a long story," he said and tossed the bra.
  
  Knock caught it and quickly stashed it into a bag.
  
  "Knock!" Desley said. "You no take from treasure!"
  
  "Was not in treasure," Knock said, then pulled a chunk of boar meat from his bag and put it in the box.
  
  "Sexy cloth more important than meat?" This most definitely surprised Desley, though, with the entry tax paid, she didn't seem to have an argument to stand on and instead shrugged.
  
  She closed the treasure chest's lid and drew a symbol in the air over the chest. The symbol glowed green for a moment, then the bits of light shifted to the treasure chest and stone grated on stone.
  
  "Doors to Dedu Tedu accept we offerings and give welcome," Desley said. She walked to the pit on the right, swung her legs over the side, turned, and climbed down what appeared to be a ladder. The floor of spikes had moved to the side, providing a long vertical shaft.
  
  Knock slapped Dhane on the butt and smiled. "Get in my hole. I follow."
  
  Those words aside . . . there was something about a deep, dark unknown that was exciting. A place to get lost in. A place of mystery. And since he was of Shadow, perhaps he was the only human that could experience it.
  
  And so, driven by curiosity, he swung his legs over the side, turned, and climbed down into a new world waiting to be discovered.