BOOM!
I shake from my stupor as a large black tentacle smashes into the ground in front of me. Following it with my eyes, I find it connected to a wall of black squirming flesh with hundreds of other random limbs attached to it.
“NOPE!” I exclaim and turn around as fast as my electrified feet can take me. I make it a good ten meters, before something hits me in the back and sends me flying some more meters. Getting up and turning around, I find nothing, except a large mound of flesh behind me. I continue to run as recognition dawns on me, that’s an Abomination, and a huge one at that!
Luckily they don’t give chase and once I have gotten far enough away, I feel confident enough to stop and actually look at it. Far enough might be a kilometer, probably less, but I don’t want to chance it.
What I see when turning around is a huge fleshy body, covered with all kinds of random bodyparts and at least two dozen large tentacles and three large magenta crystals.
Large flashes of light and sounds of explosion can be seen from the other side of it. What’s going on here? Last I remember, I stared at my computer screen trying to figure out why the model I was working on felt off.
Honestly I want to get farther away from that THING before I stop to contemplate. So I do just that, and continue to run away from it, towards a far off hill in this desolate landscape.
It takes me probably half an hour to get to the peak of the hill, even with lightning coursing through my body, speeding me up considerably. How can I even do that? That’s not something my fat ass can do. I know HOW to do it, but I can’t remember doing it before.
After catching my breath, I turn around and survey the landscape that surrounds me. I can only describe it as a desolate hellscape. Dead trees, barren dirt, the occasional dust devil and perpetually overcast. I spot no less than a dozen abominations roaming around, though none larger than the one I ran away from.
How did I get here? Where is here? It kinda reminds me of the endlands from Arcadium, which is where you end up once you travel too far in any direction. Infinitely expanding and equally desolate. It’s also the only place that I know of that has roaming abominations in this quantity.
The large abomination seems to have finished its battle, and has left behind the mangled corpse of a much smaller abomination. Seriously, how did I end up here?
I catch a glimpse of my tail and think nothing of it, at least until my rational mind catches up. Humans don’t have tails… Why do I have one? I grab it and feel the thick white fur. Feels nice to hold, and be held.
I study the rest of my observable body and find that I am covered in pearly white, short fur, which is new, since I had a nice sun tan from what I remember. I also don’t remember having claws. I really do wish I had a mirror available right now, even a puddle of water would be nice.
Speaking of water, I can’t see any around. I guess I should focus on surviving this surreal experience, at least until I wake up.
Gradually sparkles of lightning start to jump around my body and I can feel that my mana capacity is reaching full. The feeling of electricity arcing around me fills me with excitement. It’s weird as I have never felt anything like it before, but it feels great.
I know that with just a thought, I can direct those sparks. Having them jump between my outstretched hands causes the sound to increase drastically in volume, but it doesn’t bother me in the slightest, even though it’s really loud.
Pointing at the closest tree, I flex my mental muscle and a lightning strike goes from my finger and strikes the tree. The dry wood explodes into splinters, and the smaller sparks on my body dies out along with the energizing feeling. Shortly afterwards, the sparkles return as I regenerate the mana I spent.
I recognize this pattern! It’s the same as the mod I made for my character Anana in Arcadium. Whenever her mana was full, sparkles would flow all around her. Took so many hours to get that right. Even more to make her character model just perfect.
Placing my hand where my human ears would be, causes a tingle from the electricity, but I fail to find any ears. Moving my hands on top of my head, I find the pointy ears that I would find on Anana. Honestly, now I REALLY want a mirror. If I am inhabiting her model, I’ll be overjoyed. I spend so much time on it and seeing it come to life would be a dream come true.
I start to giggle uncontrollably at the possibility, breaking out in a proper laughter with my crackling lightning increasing in intensity as I do so.
“Greetings Anna”
I am taken out of my laughing fit by a voice coming from behind me. It’s both regal sounding and disturbingly eerie.
Turning around, I find the source of the voice. A demon that’s easily twice as tall as me. It’s six horns, majestic and awesome, and the face sitting comfortably in the uncanny valley. Four muscly arms and red partially scaled skin combined with the rest of the body comes together to form an awe inspiring image that is both majestic and deeply unnerving.
I can’t help but stare as my mind races to figure out where I recognize it from. That it knows my name, completely slips my mind.
It, she, I realize, waves one of her arms and say “Are you there?”
“Yes!” I exclaim, probably a bit louder than necessary. “Who are you!”
“You of all people don’t recognize me? And I spent so much time making this model.” She puts all of her hands on her chest feigning hurt.
I stare a little harder at her, the arcs of electricity moving more to my head as I do so, as if to help my thinking.
“Omigosh! Those sparks are so cool! No wonder you bragged about them on the forums.” She explained in apparent admiration of my work.
Suddenly it clicks in my head.
“Danievil!” I shout excitedly at her. “I’m a huge fan of your work!” I excitedly jump around as if spurred on by the electricity coursing around me. Which is kinda odd since I have always been a calm person. Not gonna complain though, as it feels so RIGHT to do it.
“WOW, you are sooo cute! You really did a fantastic job on that character.” She continues gushing over me and we go back and forth complementing each others characters for a bit.
As we are apparently stuck in a loop of admiring each other's work, I spontaneously decide to run up to her and give her a hug. I have to jump a bit to meet her torso.
“That tickles!” she exclaims, as the lightning coursing through my body makes contact with her when she reciprocates my hug.
Danievil! I'm so glad to see that name did stick, and I love that she is Anana's first encounter with the devs.