Imagine you are walking down the street with your friends and you find an abandoned car, you can't believe what's inside.

The Mushroom

"What is it?"
"Dunno."
"Should we see?"
The thing within the car was moving, and frantically too, "You open it Ying." I tried to peer inside, but the windows were tinted heavily.
"Me? Eh…" I cautiously moved towards the handle, and yanked the door open and ran back to the Alexine, Steph and Rach. We huddled together and glanced inside. "It's pixilated." I breathed. It appeared to be a mushroom; it was practically taking up the whole car. It was large and orange.
"It's from Maple Story." Steph's eyes had glazed over in awe. "What's that?" asked Rach.

"It's the game we've been telling you about.."
"Wow! It's so cute!" Alexine ran forward and held her finger out as if she was going to poke it.

"…uh, Alexine? Remember from Maple, if you touch a monster you get hurt?" I reminded her just before she made contact with the mushroom.

"Well, what do we do with it?"
"Dunno." By now we were just 30 centimeters away from it. Our shoulders were touching and we had formed a circle semi-around the door.

"Well, we should go now." Rach turned around and stopped. She began to scream, but she never finished, because whatever she had seen had pushed us into the car, and we had all made contact with the mushroom, we were now spinning in a vortex.
"I guess were going somewhere…" I looked over at the others who didn't look to well, I watched with amazement as our clothes turned into cloaks and robes, and in our arms were wands and bows, and over our left arms were shields. We were turning into our characters from the game, but unlike the mushroom, we weren't pixilated. I glanced over at Rach who had obtained a white top and red miniskirt and she was holding a sword.

Everyone had their equipment from the last time we had played.
We landed with a THUMP onto some hard dirt ground. Everyone was getting up and prodding at each others equipment.
Rach was the most confused of all of us. "Where are we?"
"I think we're in Maple Story, and since you've never played you've become a Beginner." I looked down at my purple robe and long staff, I grabbed at where my witches hat would be. "Why did I have to keep the weird hat?" I wailed.
Steph began to laugh. She pulled out her bow and aimed at a tree, TWANG! The arrow was sent flying and it hit the center of a knob in the tree with direct precision. "Wow. I've never used a bow before, except in Maple. Ying, can you heal us?"
In the game I was a cleric, who could heal others, but I would normally press the key 'H' on the keyboard and a green aura would engulf me and my friends and we'd have full HP.
"Well, I don't know how, do I say magic words?" I thought for a moment before a few words came to my head, "Abra kadabra, Alakazam!" Nothing happened.
"Well, now what?" Alexine had her wand resting against her shoulder and decided to drop it just then. She let out a powerful gust of magic.
"That must be your Magic Claw, but what about Ying's heal?"
Rach piped up just then, "What's with the funny utility belt Ying?" Hanging off my hips was a belt with letters on it. One of them was H. "Try it." I pressed the button and grinned as we were covered in green light.

Steph had adopted the powers of the leader. "Okay, so now we're ready. Rach, stay near Ying. I'll stay with Alexine."

As we walked I kept thinking about my utility belt, and thought about the rest of the letters, H was for he-"YING!" Rach's voice interrupted my thoughts. I glanced up at her to see everyone's head sparkle with green light that meant I had just finished healing.
"Why'd you heal us?" inquired Steph.

"I didn't, I was just thinking about it…"
Just then Alexine let out yet another wave of magic. "I didn't move my arms okay," she answered Steph's look before she could say anything. "I just thought about my magic…"
"Well, that's settled, we mages use our power when we just think about it." I thought of doing Magic Claw twice a was surprised to see my staff let out 2 waves of powerful magic.
"Wow! Can I do that?" Rach looked at us hopefully.
"Well, you haven't fought anything yet, so according to the game your level 1 and a Beginner."
"Dang…hey! What's that?" She pointed at a large blue snail with her sword.

"It's a blue snail; you'll have to kill it. Don't worry, I'll keep healing you, and the others will be on stand-by." I glared to the others to make them nod.
"Okay…so do I just run up to it a swing my sword around?"
"Yup." Steph nodded to add to her words.

"Okay, here goes." I began to think HEAL as Rach swung her sword around like a deranged cat.
"Ding, Ding, Ding." The rising notes of leveling up made me open my eyes.
"You leveled Rach! You're level 2!"
"Congratulations!" We grinned at her and have her hugs.
"I'm starting to like this…"
Our commotion had attracted others, and a thief was heading towards us with a worried expression on his face. Hovering under his feet was a label saying, 'Taiishiy'. That would mean that was his name. "You guys are human!"
"...and you aren't?" Rach looked at him; he looked just like us, except he looked like a ninja. "Wait…haven't I seen you before?"
"No, I was born here," he had ignored Rachel's question, "you, are from Earth. It must be the stupid mushroom again." We all had a vacant expression plastered over our faces.
"You must've made physical contact with a mushroom, you'll have to kill it to come back."
"Kill it!"
"Yup." and with those words he had disappeared.

Soon he re-appeared, and we look at him skeptically.
"Stupid Invisibility." He muttered as he disappeared once again.

"How do we find a mushroom?"
"Well, we seem to be near Henesys, and there are millions of mushrooms there."
"…millions? Great."
"Don't worry."
"There it is!" Alexine had spotted the mushroom, and it was heading towards us!
Steph quickly organized us. She and Alexine were to take on the mushroom, with occasional help from me, while I would heal everyone, and Rach would stay out of danger as much as possible.

"Okay, go!" Everyone ran towards the mushroom, Steph and Alexine stopped a few meters in front of the mushroom and began to attack, Steph shooting arrows and Alexine with her magic.

All I thought through the battle was, Heal. Heal. Heal.
Rach was stuck doing nothing, and all she could do was run.

Eventually there was a long moan that shook the ground beneath us, we were on our knees, and I looked up at where the mushroom was. In its place was Taiishiy standing with an old magician. She had a label underneath her saying, 'Alex the Wise'. They nodded at us and Alex the Wise waved her hand over us. Suddenly the world went black and we fainted.

"Everyone, did we die?" Rach look around us, we were all in our original clothes and we were standing where the car was.
"I guess we're home."

"We did beat the thing after all."
We grinned and congratulated each other.

"That was fun as!" said Rach as were walking to our homes.
"Yea, but I don't think I want to do it ag-" Steph had suddenly stopped. She was staring at a mushroom with Taiishiy standing next to it.