The adrenaline was gone. All that remained was the cold.

  Kai sat on the edge of the fountain, shivering. The water in Oakhaven wasn't the "warm, jelly blue" of safety mode anymore. It was freezing & wet. It soaked through his hoodie, clinging to his skin making him shiver.

  "I am... vibrating," Pigglesworth chattered, clutching his velvet coat. He was hopping on his one good shoe; his other foot was bare and turning a concerning shade of pink against the cold stone. "Is this an effect?"

  "It's shivering, Viscount," Maya said, squeezing water out of her long hair. She looked at her hands. Her knuckles were scraped red from climbing out of the fountain. "We're cold."

  She touched the scrape. She winced.

  "It stings," she whispered, looking at Kai.

  Kai nodded, his stomach twisting. "The safety buffers are gone, Maya. The guardrails are gone. If we fall now, we will break our bones."

  He looked at his own hands. For the first time, he wondered how many hits his own body could actually take…..

  "And if we get hit by a sword?" Maya asked quietly.

  "We die," Gideon finished, stepping out of the fountain.

  The Knight looked majestic, in a trashy sort of way. His blue plastic costume armor is gone, now steel surface dripped water. His pink roller skates still survived though and struggled for traction on the mossy stones.

  He slammed his fist against his chest. CLANG. It sounded like a car crash.

  "Glorious!" Gideon roared, though his teeth were chattering. "The weight! The burden! I feel the gravity pressing upon my soul! My spine compresses under the glory of existence!"

  "My spine just hurts," Pigglesworth moaned. "I require a fire. And a cobbler. And perhaps a holiday in the sun"

  "To the Tavern," Kai said, standing up and offering a hand to Maya. "We need to dry off before we catch hypothermia. I don't think even here they have a cure for the common cold."

  [ REAL WORLD: LONDON ]

  Dave stared at the wall.

  Specifically, he was staring at the dent in the plaster where his expensive ergonomic mouse had impacted three minutes ago. The mouse lay on the carpet, shattered into three pieces. The scroll wheel had rolled under his desk.

  "Okay," Dave whispered. He looked around the open-plan office. No one had seen it. The office was empty except for the cleaning crew vacuuming the far corner.

  He looked back at his monitor. The admin console was humming innocently.

  "Kinetic feedback," Dave muttered, his voice trembling. "It was a driver surge. The haptic engine malfunctioned and... created a magnetic repulsor field."

  He grabbed a sticky note and a pen. His hands were shaking so hard he could barely write.

  [ IT TICKET #49201 ] [ SUBJECT: MOUSE ATTACKED ME ] [ PRIORITY: LOW (Please don't look at my browser history) ] Description: Peripheral experienced sudden rapid acceleration away from user. Possible voltage spike? Requesting replacement mouse. Preferably one with a cord. And an exorcism perhaps?.

  He stuck the note on his monitor.

  He leaned in close to the screen, eyeing the little pixelated figure of Kai standing in the town square.

  "I don't know what glitch you triggered," Dave hissed at the screen, grabbing a piece of electrical tape. "But you owe me forty quid for that hardware."

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  He taped over his webcam.

  "No one watches Dave," he whispered. "No one."

  [ THE GAME WORLD: THE BROKEN BARREL INN ]

  They walked past the signpost. The wooden sign, which used to float delightfully in safety mode, had succumbed to gravity. It had crashed onto the pavement, splitting down the middle.

  It used to read: THE BARREL INN.

  Now, with the wood splintered on the ground, it kind of read like: THE BROKEN BARREL.

  "Appropriate," Gideon grunted, stepping over the debris.

  The tavern was warm. That was the first relief. The fire in the hearth wasn't a looping GIF anymore; it crackled, popped, and threw out actual heat.

  The party huddled around a wooden table near the fire.

  Generic_NPC_01 (The Bartender) walked over. He looked tired. His apron had a new stain on it.

  "Greetings, travelers," the bartender droned. "Would you like a [BEVERAGE] or perhaps a [RUMOR]?"

  "We would like towels," Kai said. "And hot tea. Four cups."

  "I have Ale and water” the bartender said.

  "Ale," Gideon slammed his fist on the table. THUD. The table didn't wobble. It felt solid. "The strongest swill you have, Barkeep! My throat demands the burn of reality!"

  The bartender placed four wooden tankards on the table.

  Gideon grabbed his tankard, he threw his head back and poured the liquid into his mouth.

  In safety mode, drink animations were fake; liquid simply vanished on contact. Here, gravity was law.

  SPLASH.

  Gideon choked. The ale went down his windpipe, up his nose, and spilled all over his breastplate.

  "GACK! COUGH! HACK!" Gideon flailed, slamming his hands on the table. "POISON! THE LIQUID FIGHTS BACK!"

  "It's called swallowing, Gideon," Maya said, hiding a smile behind her own cup. She took a sip. She grimaced. "Ugh. It actually tastes like yeast and old socks."

  "Flavor!" Pigglesworth wept, taking a dainty sip. "It has a profile! It is terrible, but it is complex! Oh, how I missed the misery of a bad vintage!"

  Kai didn't drink. He was watching Maya.

  She was staring into the fire, the orange light reflecting in her eyes. She looked tired. The paint stains on her hoodie were dry and cracking.

  "You okay?" Kai asked quietly.

  Maya didn't look up. "I almost fell, Kai. When the floor shattered in the white zone. I slipped. If you hadn't grabbed my hoodie..."

  "But I did," Kai said.

  "But if you missed," she looked at him. "I would be gone. Deleted, dead"

  She poked the wooden table.

  "I used to hate this place because it was fake," she whispered. "Now I hate it because it's too real. I don't want to die in a game, Kai. I want to die of old age, in bed, after eating too much chocolate."

  Kai reached into his inventory.

  He hesitated. He had deleted almost everything to fix the weight limit previously but he had kept one thing, he pulled out the Low-Poly flower object.

  It was a red block on a green stick. It had no texture, just flat color. It looked like something a 5 year old made in minecraft.

  "Here," Kai slid it across the table.

  Maya looked at it. She laughed, a short, sharp sound. "You have this? The 'Rose_Asset_01'?"

  "Because it has no physics. It's safe."

  Maya picked up the blocky flower. She twirled it. The sharp corners poked her fingers, but she didn't mind.

  "Thanks, Lord Kai," she smiled. It was a small, genuine smile. "I'll keep it in my inventory. Next to the giant brush."

  "My Lord!" Gideon suddenly shouted, wiping ale from his nose. "I require medical attention!"

  "What now?" Kai sighed.

  "I have bitten my tongue!" Gideon stuck out his tongue. A tiny drop of pixelated blood welled up. "It throbs! It stings! I can feel the pulse of my own life force!"

  He looked ecstatic.

  "I am alive!" Gideon roared, raising his tankard. "To pain! To the biting cold! To the ale that tries to drown us! WE ARE REAL!"

  "To pain," Pigglesworth grumbled, looking at his bare foot, which he had wrapped in a lettuce leaf he stole from the salad bar. "And to improvised footwear."

  Kai raised his cup. "To surviving!!."

  They clinked cups. It wasn't a hollow tink. It was a solid, wooden thunk.

  Suddenly, the tavern door opened.

  A cold wind blew in. The candles flickered.

  But it wasn't the wind that made Pigglesworth freeze. It was the sound.

  Crinkle. Crinkle. Pop.

  A man walked in. He wasn't a warrior. He was a messenger. And he was wearing a suit made entirely of yellow caution tape.

  He scanned the room. He spotted Pigglesworth.

  "Viscount," the messenger sneered, the tape on his suit squeaking. "The Duke has arrived in the sector. He is asking for you."

  Pigglesworth dropped his tankard. It hit the floor and didn't bounce. It shattered.

  "Hide me," Pigglesworth whispered, sliding under the table. "The Smooth One has come."