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Chapter ??? - Happy Birthday to Me.

 

Chapter ??? - Happy Birthday to me.

 

Day 365

 

So here I am. My sixteenth birthday. What a waste of a year. I’m still stuck on level two. No closer to seeing my Mama. No closer to escape.

I laid on my tree branch, looking at the vibrant greens of the leaves sparkling with sunlight, and humming the birthday song to myself.

Well done, Kieran, you lasted a whole year in this hell hole. Good job.

But then it was only because I‘m not capable enough to get out of this level. Besides, if I can’t beat this one boss, how can I move up? I could do it in a team, but the last one I had I drove away. My stupidity left me here. That and my messed up reflexes.

Yeah, but you managed to survive this long. And the majority of that time was alone, too.

Hmmm…

Hey, you’re at that age of consent.

That thought made me laugh. I hadn’t thought of it until now. Jeez, who would I even do it with? No one, I guess.

I sat up eventually, stretching and twisting so my back wasn’t knotted and aching. Looking down to the bushes and my fake camp below me, I smiled. Good morning world.

I easily scrambled down the tree, grabbing my axe and daggers as I went.

Not much has changed over the past year, to be honest. It’s just same old, same old. I actually went back to the old camp where I was with my last group, but they were long gone. They took all their stuff too. My stuff. What a*sholes.

Oh well.

The winter was horribly bitter. The weather never changed, but it gradually got colder and colder until if you got your hair wet it’d freeze. The sun gave off almost no heat, and I had to move down to ground level so I could stay by the fire at nights and keep warm. Which was dangerous, but it was get killed by people or Spinners, or freeze to death. I preferred the idea of a quick gruesome death by a Spinner. Luckily, neither of those things happened, though, and here I am.

I grabbed my bag and hauled it onto my shoulders, now used to carrying such heavy weights, and loped off into the deep and dark forest. Upon spotting a crudely cut X, one of many, I dropped down low and felt around in the tangled weeds until the tips of my grubby fingers touched the familiar cold metal. I pulled the golden chest out from it’s foliage cocoon and looked through the bounty.

Just more cloth.

My brow furrowed as I thought and looked at my hand: wrapped in very dirty pieces of cloth, sparing my fingers and thumb so I could still use them. Hm..

I grabbed the piece of cloth just in case and shoved it in the side pocket of my bag.

“Happy birthday to me.. Happy birthday to me..” I mumbled to myself, prowling through the bushes like a predator and brushing my long strands of dirty hair out of my face.

I walked for a long time, listening to my steady breaths and the rustling of foliage around me.

When I came to my twenty fifth X, I spotted two guys standing by it. One of them had a black cap turned slightly to the side, his dark unruly hair peeking out from beneath, and he had his hand tracing the chipped X. In his hand he held a dark handled long sword, with a glittering blade the colour of sea foam. It was slender, and unlike the only type of sword you can get in level two. How did he get that?