"Failure is only the opportunity to try again, only this time more wisely."

- Henry Ford

Text

'Thought'

"Speech"

THE GAMER

In a small border town close to Canada there was a group of teenagers inside of their high-school library. They were gathered around two desks pushed together. The desks were covered in multicolored dice with varying amounts of sides. Beside the tallest of them was a group of three books he is checking behind a fiery red screen blocking the other teenagers view.

He's wearing a blue and grey striped hoodie, has dark hair, dark eyes, tan skin, and an average figure.

He opens up his mouth and says with a domineering tone in his voice, "Foolish mortals! I am the undefeatable dragon god! I will devour you whole and take dominion over this plane for myself! No one will be able to stop me from obtaining the core of this planet and using it to turn me into a greater god!"

A boy with thick-rimmed glasses stands up and says, "I am Lucifer, Satan reincarnated! None will be able to stop me from guiding this party to victory with my bardic experti-"

"Oh pipe down will ya?" the boy behind the screen interrupts in a different, but equally tough sounding voice. "Let me do the talking to this overgrown lizard."

He takes a deep breath and lets out a small yell saying, "Oi! Listen here you giant gecko. I'm gonna be kind enough to let you know what kinda hell I'm about to put you through!"

The other players roll their eyes at this voice and start to grab dice to roll for initiative. 'I guess they're becoming accustomed to this pattern,' thought the dark-haired boy.

He continues, "First, I'm gonna break your legs! Then, I'll chop off your useless wings! I'll force you to the ground and make you watch as I shove them so far up your rectum, they'll poke out your eyes. You'll look much better that way you scaly fuck!"

The dark-haired boy rolls a die for intimidation getting something mediocre.

"You dare speak such words in front of me!" the 'dragon god' says in an enraged voice.

"Yeah, I do dare!" 'Reytar' yells back.

"Roll for initiative!" the boy says to the players, who are still laughing at him having an argument with himself.

They return to the dice and start rolling while looking for their initiative modifier.

"23!"

"15!"

"17!"

"30!"

They all yell out in succession.

"Jesus Christ! A thirty!? Did you roll a natural twenty or something?" the dark-haired boy asks in a shocked tone.

"I used my luck feature to reroll my two and got a nineteen instead Mr. Dungeon Master," the boy explains.

"If you say so… Well anyways, let's begin the fight we've been anticipating for the past year and a half!" the dark-haired boy says with excitement.

The rest of them cheer and put on fierce expressions for the occasion while shaking the dice in their hands.

And like that, the battle began.

*First Person POV*

*4 Hours Later*

"The dragon breathes heavily and glares at Cue with resent as he cast his Mass Healing Word giving everybody some hit points to stand back up and fight while Cue gets healed from this as well due to his clerical domain," the Dungeon Master or well I say to my friends.

"Lucifer, you're up. What do you wanna do?" I ask him with a serious tone.

"I stand up tall and stare daggers at the dragon," he begins. "I would like to use my 9th level spell slot to cast Power Word Kill."

I look down at my sheet of paper and look at the Hit Points of the dragon. It has only one HP left.

I calmly look up and say, "Okay. You can definitely attempt to do that."

"Don't tell me it still has a legendary resistance left!?" he yells after seeing my composure.

"No. The spell doesn't work that way," I say to appease him. "But there is one small problem… " I say leading him on. "How would you like to do this!?"

"YES!" they all scream at the top of their lungs. One of them is even crying.

Well, it is understandable. After four encounters with this dragon, they finally defeated it. One of which ended up with the death of his in-game wife's death, whom's soul was being held prisoner inside the dragon's lair at this very moment.

'Lucifer' looks into the eyes of the dragon and with and aura of death and rage he says fiercely, "Contrario mortem et malum!"

The dragon stills. All that pervades the interior of the cave now is silence. Then… slowly the life fades from its eyes and it falls to the ground, dead.

The moment of silence continues. Until Reytar screams. His scream is like wildfire as it starts spreading like the plague and the rest are yelling loudly in appreciation of the sweet release of the burden they'd been carrying for a long while.

"And that's where we'll end it for today. We've been going for quite a while now. It's time to go home now," I say in a tired voice.

They all nod in agreement and start packing up their things.

Suddenly, the power inside the building turns off.

"Is this a power outage?" I ask them curiously.

"I guess so," replies Tony, one of my closest friends.

Macie, my ex-girlfriend who's still on good terms with me, tries to open the door, but it won't budge.

"Uh, guys. The door won't open. It looks like the electrici- Ah!" her word is interrupted by her own scream.

I walk around the corner in concern and see her caught in the arms of a man with a black ski mask and a gun in his right hand.

"Don't come over here or I'll shoot you!" he yells at the top of his lungs.

I stare at the man, dazed by the sudden turn of events.

Then I feel my heartbeat quicken, breathing getting heavier, and scalp tingling all while trying to hold back a scream.

'Calm down. Calm down. Calm down.'

I attempt to calm myself down to think rationally and find a way to get her out of this situation.

'Shit! I'm not calming down!'

But that didn't work…

So next best thing.

'Alright. Get angry! Get mad! Ignore the fear and get mad at this man for daring to do such a thing to my friend!'

Attempting to pump myself up, I succeed.

Another one of my friends comes around and sees the situation.

"The hell!?" he shouts.

It seemed to be a trigger as the others in the game club start to come over one by one and exclaim in surprise at the scene. They all stand there, shocked still and seemingly unable to find out what to do.

Suddenly I go out from the crowd and start making my way towards the man.

*Bang*

He shot a bullet in front of my foot. I pause for just a second. My instincts are telling me to go back. But I continue on.

"You motherfucker…" I say in a rage-filled voice. "First, you dare to come onto my territory! This school is where I learn an therefore under my protection." I continue on in and enraged and arrogant voice. I can feel myself changing character and becoming braver as someone else. I continue walking in larger strides than before.

"Second, you dare to shoot at me!? You deserve to skinned alive for what you've done already."

The man is surprised at my attitude in front of a gun. But not only him, everyone else in the room is too! My friends clearly understand how much I don't like dangerous things. I still get scared of the traffic at school when I walk home from school!

"And finally… YOU DARE TAKE MY FRIEND AS A HOSTAGE!?" I shout out mustering all the rage I could into my voice.

I have many memories of this place already. This town is my home, so everything else here is too. I won't allow him to ruin that for me. This man whom I've never seen before is about receive the wrath of the Dragon God!

*Cough*

Ignoring my slip up I continue to walk towards this man.

*Bang*

Halfway through my walk, the man raises his gun and shoots me in the stomach.

"Gah!"

The sudden intense pain coming from my belly makes me kneel and contort.

A few of my friends try to come help me, but when the gun starts to point at them, they stop in their tracks.

''I'll fucking kill him!' I scream in my head.

Attempting to get the adrenaline flowing to make the pain lessen I hype myself up and slowly stand up. One hand is still pressing on my stomach.

"Aaaarrgghh!" in a pain filled screech I start sprinting at the man.

He shoots again and hits my left arm. Still screaming out I use my right hand to take his gun away and throw it towards the crowd behind me.

Then, before he could do anything I jump on him and push him down. I use my right hand to beat him in the jaw.

I hit him over and over again until all my energy has been exhausted.

He has a bloody jaw as I fall off of him and to the side.

I can feel my body getting colder.

Then I feel the warmth. I look up and see my friends standing above me.

"I got ya," says Tony in a comforting voice. He's trying to see how bad the damage is and calm me down.

"Damn it! Why aren't the phones working!? We need to get him to a hospital!" yells Jake.

I've been best friends with Jake since first grade. Our moms worked together, so when we went to the same school, we just clicked together. We stayed friends all these years and are as good of friends as we can be.

*Cough* *Cough* I cough up more blood. It burns. Everything hurts. I can feel it start to fade as time goes on though.

"Is Macie alright?" I ask Tony.

With tears in his eyes, he slowly nods.

"Is anybody else hurt?" I ask him.

"No," he says while choking on his words.

"Good," I say while resigning myself to this unfair fate.

"Take care of Jake will ya?" I tell him with a somber expression.

"I will," he says with tears going down his eyes. He doesn't want this to happen. However, he knows he can't do anything about it. I can't either. I hope for the love of god he ends up alright.

I close my eyes. "Thank you," I managed to spit out before falling into a deep, deep sleep into the darkness.

*In the Void*

...Is this where I go when I die?

Maybe this is purgatory or something. Do I have to stay here for eternity or until I get sent to hell or heaven?

I wish I knew.

I'm so bored. I want to do something. Anything.

…

…

…

…

What seems like an eternity passes as I drift in and out of consciousness. How much time has passed? It could be mere seconds. Or possibly as long as years.

…

…

…

WELCOME GAMER

START GAME?

YES | NO

…

…

…

I take a deep breath. 'Oh hell yes!' I shout eagerly in my head.

WELCOME TO THE GAME

…

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I hope you enjoyed it. I tried fixing some parts I thought were lacking and I'll continue to do so if I have the time to. Reviews are appreciated. See you later.