Black Cats and Misfortunes

Moments before he was transported to the world of Heroes of Destiny, Silas was hurriedly packing his things to his black knapsack. He kept glancing behind him for fear that the door to his room would suddenly burst open. And that his father would finally discover his plan to runaway.

He zipped off the zipper, stood, and turned around at his room, which had sheltered him for the last seventeen years of his life. The peeling wallpaper was his witness to the nights when he felt hopeless the most.

A bittersweet smile crossed his face as he realized he would never see these walls again. His emotions were torn between the joy and nostalgia. He laughed softly at the irony of his thoughts.

He went downstairs and made it to the front door before his father saw him. 

"You're leaving for school? Why not buy me another drink before you leave?"

Silas scoffed, "Why don't you just drink my piss." 

Then he gave him the finger before he shut the door loudly behind him, running as fast as he could. 

Whenever his father was in a good mood, he would boast about his high school achievements on the Track and Field Team, claiming they reached the nationals.

Silas didn't want to verify the truth behind that story now that he was so close to leaving home.

'I hope he drinks the piss I put in that bottle of beer in the refrigerator.'

Silas glanced at his watch. He still have twenty minutes until the bus for the next city departed. He sighed, turning into an alleyway which was the quickest route to the bus station. He shouldn't have lingered in his room. Now, he had to run to avoid missing his chance at freedom.

He abruptly stopped as he nearly step on a black cat. The animal leaped back, scared. Its green eyes gleaming with suspicion. Superstition about black cats and the misfortunes it brought crossed his mind. Silas let the cat pass before he continued walking, but a sudden crash behind him made him glanced on his back.

Poof!

The black cat vanished like smoke. Silas turned around and saw the cat standing on the opposite side of the alleyway. Instead of seeing the front of a red fast-food restaurant, what he saw in the alley's exit was a thick and flowing mist that resembled waves of clouded water.

The black cat's tail moved in a slow, rhythmic motion, mirroring the mist's movements. Silas stepped back, unease prickling at his senses. Turning to where he came from, he found the path also shrouded by the same mist.

The black cat smiled, baring sharp, glinting teeth. The mist exploded outward, blinding him in an instant. Silas covered his face and crouched down, remembering his lessons about fire drills. But the ground beneath him started wobbling. While the mist forced its way to the spaces between his fingers. He felt a sudden drowsiness as his vision slowly faded to black.

As Silas fell into sleep, he heard a voice whispering in his ear. "You'll do well." 

---

A creaking sound woke him up. Silas blinked a few times. Slowly, he saw the silhouette of a tree emerging through the thick mist. He rubbed his hands against his face, trying to shake off his disorientation.

He tried moving. And soon realized that his body was leaning against a rough surface. Looking up, he saw a face with shut eyelids and a half-open mouth staring down at him. Silas jumped back, raising his hand defensively before him.

"What the hell is that?" he muttered. The rough surface he had been leaning on was the body of a fir tree, and the face was just its malformed trunk. He laughed nervously but approached the tree with caution.

Silas frowned as he ran his hand over the crevices of the trunk's face. "Now, what do we have here?"

He looked around, bewildered by his surroundings. He was in the middle of the forest with mist veiling it. But unlike the mist he had saw in the alley, this one was softer to look at. Thoughts started racing through his mind: Was he kidnapped? Is this some kind of arena where contestants fight to the death for freedom?

Scratching his head, Silas began pacing and realized he was barefoot. Looking in the ground, he spotted a pair of brown sandals nearby, their unique design catching his eye. He checked his clothes and found he was wearing a tight white shirt with three missing buttons. His dark green jacket was gone.

"What in the…" he said, his voice echoing in the forest's emptiness.

Surrounded by mist, Silas circled the towering tree, trying to piece together what had happened. A sharp sound rang in his ear. He spun around, searching for its source, but it seemed to come from right beside him. Suddenly, a blue box materialized in front of him.

Silas tried to shake it away, but it stayed firmly in place. Finally, he stopped and focused on the text. He swallowed hard on what he saw

[Welcome to the Forest of Faces]

"It must be a dream. I will wake up now that I realize it is a dream." He nodded confidently, but the pull of wakefulness never came. His consciousness stayed in this new body, and the box before him remained stubbornly present.

He closed the box, but new ones of different sizes and shapes began appearing. He saw a skill sheet and a checklist, but his attention was caught by a character sheet. 'Just like the one in a game.'

Silas frowned. The name on the character sheet was Silas Hawthorne.

He felt a jolt of recognition. Silas mumbled to himself, recalling the smell of coffee, the bright glow emitted by a computer screen, and the clatter of a keyboard.

Silas Hawthorne. The name was familiar because it belonged to a character he had encountered before, not in real life, but in the game he played tirelessly at the internet café.

"Why this person of all characters?!"

He swore, his body trembling with nervousness and dread. Silas Hawthorne was one of the Twelve Main Bosses in Heroes of Destiny. A chill ran through him. He rubbed his hands together, both in frustration and against the coldness that gripped him.

"You could have put me in any other main character; I'd even take Selegrad, the weakest hero in the game." His voice echoed back, and he thought he heard a giggle.

Silas Hawthorne was a character everyone knew. Ranked third among the Twelve Main Bosses, he was the first boss each player had to face. In short, Silas was destined to die first.

After much screaming and swearing, Silas realized he had to escape the forest. The game was known for having all sorts of monsters. He never know when a Curse-Stricken Monster would appear and find him and his flimsy arms useful as toothpicks.

He walked cautiously, then froze at a screech from behind. As he stopped the forest fell eerily silent. From the distance, the mist veiling the trees grew thicker. He was about to start walking, but he caught a shadow moving among the trees.

He resumed walking, but the sound grew faster. Silas ran, gasping as he leaped over roots. The mist parted ahead, offering a fleeting sense of relief, but the pursuer felt close. He could now hear footfalls.

Silas tripped and scrambled to his feet. Soon he found himself in the edge of the forest. He stopped before a hill, forgetting his fear for a moment as he saw the magnificent scenery downhill.

A hand grabbed him from behind. "Bah!"

"Ah!" Silas shouted back, triggering another shout. He tried to escape but his balance failed. He grabbed on his pursuer's shirt to regain his balance. But the two tumbled down the hill, screaming and cursing until they reached the flatlands.

The wind rustled the leaves. Silas groaned from the pain he received from his wounds. He untangled himself and stepped away. A blond boy stared at him, confused, brushing dirt off his pants.

Silas calmed his breath, scanning his surroundings until his eyes found a towering volcano, its peak blurred by sunlight.

"Truly magnificent," he said.

The boy stood, dusting off his pants. "What? It's just Mount Vruna. Hadn't you've been dreaming about seeing the sea for a week."

Silas shook his head. He used to live in a coastal town and he had grown tired of its salty morning air, and the blinding afternoon glare as he biked through the coastal road. The sight of the giant mountain now towering before him made him swallow hard, a mix of certainty and fear settling in his chest. He was really in the game's world. It brought fear and at the same time relief because, finally, the life he wanted to leave behind couldn't reach him here.

----

A week had passed before Silas fully accepted his new situation. He had been transported into Heroes of Destiny, a game he had once played obsessively until the developers decided to stop updating the game further which would eventually lead to its complete shutdown.

Ever since that day, he had jumped from game to game, chasing the same thrill that Heroes of Destiny once gave him.

'They could at least give us proper endgame content!' he thought bitterly.

Silas stared at his dirt-covered hands. The man who called himself his father had sent him to scavenge the forest for a root crop by the streams. It was called Water Potatoes. He was familiar with it as it was used for crafting [Bread] and [Normal Potions]. The similarity felt eerie. If the world followed the game's storyline, he was destined to die at the hands of the main character during the beginning of the Bloodrose Rebellion.

"I have to find a way to avoid that," he muttered.

His mood lifted when he spotted a grass with a red tip. Water Potatoes. Silas crouched by the stream, unearthing the crops. As he pulled up the first root, a box appeared before him.

[You have collected Water Potatoes x1]

Silas continued on his work; he was on his third Water Potato when he heard a grunting sound. He looked around, expecting to see Art. That twerp called himself Silas's best friend. He waited; this time, he decided not to get caught on his petty tricks. 

The sound came again. It sounded closer. He could now hear the stranger's labore3d breathing. Silas stood and put down the basket. He followed the sound of the man's voice until the grunts turned into the sound of a fitting cough.

He waved the last of the branches blocking his sight and found himself in a clearing. There he found what he was looking for, a man was lying close to a tree. As he walked closer to him, Silas saw that the man was taking each breath with evident pain on his face. 

He clutched onto his bleeding stomach. But his attempts were futile to stop the blood from flowing. The glassy eyes of the stranger flickered to him; his lips quivered as he tried to utter a word. 

Silas found himself dumbfounded, and he would've been rooted from where he was standing if the man hadn't started coughing blood. He rushed to his side, but as soon as he was close to the man, he realized he didn't know what he could do to save him. He had no skills that could heal him, not even a single potion he could use to treat his wounds. Hell! even his hands were dirty from unearthing those Water Potatoes.

"What happened?" He asked and looked around them. 

"Wait for me here. I'm going to call someone in the village."

The man only looked at him, his breath heaving. Just before Silas could stand, the man clung to the hem of his shirt. Then, slowly, he opened his lips and told him his name. 

"Arlen Kastro," he said, opening his palm for him and revealing a silver ring with a small sapphire stone. He remained staring at it. Arlen then snatched his hand and put it in his palms. 

[You have acquired Sapphire Ringx1]

[You have equipped Sapphire Ring]

A surge of energy came rushing into him. It reminded him of large an powerful tides that he could only remember on the day he swam on the beach despite of the news agencies' warnings about an oncoming storm.

'So, this was how equipping items feels like,' he thought absentmindedly.

"Go to Maglem." He spoke. "Tell them how I die."

His body trembled, eyes rolling at the back of his head as series of spasms came over Arlen's body. Silas watched the scene, horrified. He wanted to leave but his conscience wouldn't allow him to leave the man, not that he was dying before his lap. He held his shoulder tightly, trying to prevent the man from hitting his head on the tree.

Soon he stilled. His eyes remained open, staring at him as his pupils shrunk.

Silas looked at his hand. The ring had already vanished from his palm. He heard another sound. This time, a group of three men in white coats appeared on the other side of the clearing.

"I didn't expect that a rat would defeat us from finding that man," one of them said.