It took me two hours of trekking through the bush, leaving marks on the trees to help me find the way back, to find the stream.

And it was more than a stream. It was a large freshwater pond, full of life. Frogs sitting around it, birds and other strange animals drinking from it and many fish swimming in it. Of course, before this, I had only ever seen stereotypical fish in resemblance to goldfish and the many variates in the pond startled me. More than that, I felt a great relief. No more mushroom soup for me!

I immediately created a makeshift fishing rod out of a stick, some loose thread from the bottom of my pouch and a worm tooth lying on the ground. I had already caught a good five fish before something occurred to me.

A worm tooth?

On the ground?

The only way to get a worm tooth is to kill a Devourer or an Eater of Worlds. And you can only find them in the corruption.

So was there corruption nearby?

I thought I had rid the world of the corruption, but then again, if I haven't been here before, then is the world is bigger than just the land of Terraria?

Hmph. Just the land of Terraria.

But even if there was corruption nearby, someone else must have gone there, fought a devourer and claimed it's teeth? But even then, why would they just leave their prize here?

This new place was starting to give me the creeps.

How could I be sure that the corruption wasn't just going to creep over the top of the mountains any minute now, bringing Eater of Souls with it?

Banishing these thoughts from my mind, I began to head back and greeted the Guide with a pouch stuffed with fish and bottles full of water. He greeted me equally triumphantly with a pile of thick branches.

"Better start building, then." I say with a grin. "I've missed it, you know. I've built everything that I needed to build and more, but I've been so bored without having to do it."

"Fair enough," he replied. All of a sudden his expression turned from understanding to horrified. "Zelda68! My books! They're in my house! What am I going to do without my books?"

"Relax, Guide, relax!" I said, grinning. "You know them all off by heart, anyway."

"Yeah, but there were some really good survival tips in there!"

"Hang on, you have a pouch too. Could they be in there?" The Guide immediately started fishing around inside it. He brought out a rope and chucked it onto the ground like it was useless, and frowned at me.

"Why aren't you worried about them? You risked life and limb to get them from that dungeon."

"True," I replied, remembering my surprise at finding such trivial items in such a dangerous place and immediately thinking of the Guide, "But I risked my life every day back then. Besides, the Water Bolt spellbook was the only one I cared about, and you needed a bigger vocabulary."

He finally drew out a large volume titled "How to survive in Terraria without a Gun, written by the Arms Dealer". He let out a sigh of relief and I frowned.

"Hang on, I never noticed that," I remarked. "The Arms Dealer wrote a book?"

"Yep," replied the Guide with a smile, clutching the book tightly. "I'm a fan of his now."

"But you live in the same building as him." I remarked. "And you know that he's . . . not a very nice person."

"Doesn't mean he isn't a good author."

We started building, chatting in a rare moment of calm between us. Almost immediately however, our conversation turned to how it was that we got here.

"What was the last thing you remember?" the Guide asked. I closed my eyes, trying to think.

"I remember . . ." my voice trailed off as I tried to concentrate.

Yesterday morning, I woke up and played with the idea of digging for ore, but scrapped it soon after. I greeted everyone and asked the Nurse to have a look at a scar that had been troubling me.

The Nurse . . . I remember her giving me some ointment and saying that I'd be fine in a few days. I wish she was here now . . .

I remember muffled explosions and the occasional curse coming from the Demolitionist's room, followed up by him asking the Nurse to sew one of his legs back on. Again.

The Demolitionist . . . he was always losing limbs to his work, but he was so tough about it . . . I wish he was here to help with the building . . .

I remember the Dryad, in a rare moment of rage, telling the Merchant to stop pestering her.

The Dryad . . . with her long braid of green hair woven through with flowers, she was always so calm and peaceful . . . I could do with some of her wisdom now . . .

I remember the Merchant, upon asking him what he was trying to sell her, remarking that angel statues did do something and that he just didn't know what yet. And I remember remembering that he had claimed, upon my asking him about angel statues, that he did not deal in rubbish . . .

The Merchant . . . even though he was enough of a bastard to charge 8 gold coins for a mining helmet, I miss him too . . .

I remember the Arms Dealer coming out of his room with a bouquet of flowers, and upon seeing me trying to hide them behind his back.

"The Nurse?" I asked. "Or the Dryad?"

"What?" he asked, suddenly blushing. "I don't know what you're talking about!" But as he passed me I heard him mumble "The Dryad is such a prude . . ."

The Arms Dealer . . . he was always so manly and tough when you met him in his shop, but whenever the Nurse was around he would stammer and blush. He just wasn't man enough to ask her out. The man who had stood his ground against an Eater of Souls just wasn't man enough . . .

And I remember the Clothier asking me, once again, if I could supply him with some dye. He obviously didn't understand just where it was jungle grass seeds, the main ingredient of green dye, came from. The jungle.

The Clothier . . . even though the first time I met him he turned into a giant skeleton and tried to kill me, I wish he was here . . .

"Hey!" the Guide said, calling me back to reality. "I'm doing all the work here!"

"Sorry," I call back. "Just a minute."

The Guide . . . where had the Guide been that day?

I remember getting bored and starting on a long trek to the shore.

To the beach.

To the end of the world.

I spent many days there in the last two years, trying to make sense of things.

It was the end of the world. It had to be. The water went on forever.

But some gut instinct inside me told me that there had to be more. Every now and then I thought I saw the sail of a boat in the distance, or the shore of a faraway island.

I had been there for a few hours, lost in my own thoughts, when the Guide had tuned up behind me.

"What are you doing here?" I asked.

"Is this where you've been going every day?" he asked, avoiding my question. "To the end of the world?"

"Is it though?"

"Is it what?" he asked with a frown.

"The end of the world." I answered, as if it was the most obvious thing ever. "There must be more than this. Is there? Do you think?"

He paused for a moment. "It's possible," he admitted. "You never know."

"If there is more, why can't we go there?"

". . . maybe we just aren't meant to." he suggested. We were born in Terraria, and maybe that's where we should stay."

"But if there is more out there, why is it hiding from us? What's to stop whoever lives there from just building a bridge and going here?"

"What's stopping you?" he had asked with a smile. "Right now, you could just swim out there and find whatever secrets are being hidden from you. You could find a new land. You could be Zelda68, Saviour of Terraria and of the Entire World from the Corruption!"

I paused. "I think, for the moment at least, I'm happy just being Zelda68."

"But being Zelda68 means being a hero." he responded.

I stood up and stared out to the horizon. "Maybe . . . I'll start tomorrow. Build a bridge to the new world."

"If you do, can I come?"

I stared at him and smiled. "Guide, you know how much I hate you, but at the moment I love you more than anything in the world."

"Hey," he responded with a smirk. "Fair enough. I am pretty handsome."

"Shut up!" I laughed, punching him playfully in the shoulder.

We stared out at the horizon for a few minutes, until he asked, "Do you want to head back now? I think you should. It's getting pretty cold."

"I'll stay for a bit," I replied.

He got up to leave, but I stopped him and said, "Tomorrow, yeah?"

"Tomorrow." he agreed. "I'll tell the others. We start building the bridge tomorrow."

Shortly after he left, I made a small shelter out of wood and fell asleep to the sound of the waves.

"Tomorrow . . . tomorrow is today now." I concluded, looking up at the Guide's puzzled face. "The bridge. The end of the world."

He thought for a moment and remembered.

"Yes! The Bridge! I told the others and then . . ." he paused for a moment. "And then I went to bed, and I woke up here."

"They must be wondering where we are . . ." I paused then sighed. "I never imagined it would be like this."

"What would be like what?" he asked.

I shook my head. "More of the world, but just with you. I always imagined that the Merchant, and the Nurse, and the Demolitionist, and the Clothier, and the Dryad and the Arms Dealer would be here with us. That . . . we'd build the bridge until we saw the shore and then swim the rest of the way. We'd find a brand new land with no corruption, no zombies, no nothing. A kind of paradise."

"Well, hey, who's to say there's corruption here?" he asked. "I haven't seen a slime all day, and they were everywhere in Terraria, even with the corruption gone!"

". . . that's true." I admitted. "But I found this."

I showed him the worm tooth and explained what it was. "Well . . ." he began, but couldn't finish. There was no explaining this.

"Actually, we'd better get moving!" I exclaimed, noticing that the sky was tinted pink. "Sundown soon! They might not have slimes here but god knows what they have to make up for it!"

The Guide gave a short laugh and we resumed our work.

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