A gasping breath. Mine, I hope.

Pain. Definitely mine. Good thing you have to be alive to feel pain.

I open my eyes. Notifications.

[Warning! Life threatening injuries detected: Severe blood loss; Multiple fractures detected; Organ function reduced] [Energy pool completely depleted. Total Energy pool increased +1! Energy: 1/11] [Congratulations! Skill levels gained: Transfuse Energy +2] [Congratulations! Your Endurance Statistic was tested and found adequate: Endurance +1] [Congratulations! Skill levels gained: Energy Manipulation +2]

Huh… that’s a good amount of growth for being stabbed. Still never want to do that again. I’ll take a hundred papercuts instead, thank you.

My head throbs, my vision whirls for a bit, but settles. Sitting up, I see my clothing soaked with blood. A lot of blood. I feel a little silly about thinking the paper cut I made was anything to sniff at. God I never want to do that again.

I spread the cut in my shirt to get a better look at the wound. Right in the sternum dead center in the chest. Not the worst spot, all things considered. The knife wasn’t long enough to hurt my spine, but certainly long enough to slice my lungs and destroy my bones. I’m stunned. My teacher was not only strong enough to punch through my bone, but fast enough to do it without me even seeing when he was right in front of me.

Why did my life have to become so terrifying.

The scar this time is much longer, but not much thicker. It looks particularly red and angry, and something still doesn’t feel right in my chest, but it’s… well, I’m not dead, and I should be. Would be, back home.

“You could have warned me, you know.”

The guru merely nods.

“Should have, in fact”

~ “Will your enemies do so?”

I shrug, and sigh, disheartened. “No... I guess not” I can’t will myself to be angry. The blood loss really calms you down. I wonder if I could fix that with Energy? I take a brief look at my Energy state. Although I know from the notification that I’m almost on empty, I want to see what that translates to visually.

There is a striking amount of emptiness in my system. There are a few strands of green around my head and lingering strands at the site of the chest wound, but mostly there’s nothing. I don’t even know how I would go about making blood… and I’m in no mood to figure it out. Mostly, I want to sleep. I have no idea how long I’ve been up, and I’m fucking exhausted. I turn to ask the guru if I can sleep here only to see it standing over me. Instinctively, I flinch away lest it stab me again, but it makes no move.

~”Allow me to rejuvenate you”

Well… it could definitely kill me whenever it wants, so might as well try?

I nod in response. It raises a hand and places it on my head.

“Umm…” I trail off as the strangeness of the action is replaced with a flood of pleasant, light feelings. I feel all my muscles start to relax, and all the pain and exhaustion dissipates in the wake of a wave of happiness. It only takes a few seconds, but it feels like waking up after a perfect night's rest. I’m ready to take on the world again. Whichever one that ends up being.

~ “One last thing before you move on. Do you now understand my earlier meaning?”

Earlier meaning? What is it going on ab- ohhhh. The menu thing.

I shake my head. I was way too busy with the other ‘lessons’ to have time for that.

I’m rewarded for my ignorance with another deep sigh.

~ “Try opening the menu differently. Intuitively.”

I try quietly whispering “menu 2”; the normal screen pops up. I try waving my hands wanting an extended menu, the normal screen pops up.

No success. Unless you count ‘bothering the alien nearby’ as a success. Which I’m considering.

~ “Imagine yourself.”

Ah, yes, of course. Such an intuitive design.

I try picturing what I look like in my mind’s eye… god I’m hideous. Sometimes you just have to hope other people see you differently than you see yourself. But that isn’t right. Now I’m just imagining myself and nothing else, I don’t feel the… pull? See, what I’ve noticed is that the infrastructure of the game feels right when used correctly, like a jigsaw piece fitting into place. It just *snaps* nicely. This feels like nothing, so either I’m doing it wrong or the alien is messing with me. A quick glance reminds me that this thing might look zen on the surface, but really seems to be a ‘no nonsense’ sort. No, I’m thinking about this wrong. What am I? A self, with a lot of desires and flaws, and some serious ego.

People are layered. A person has an outward facing ‘self’ that is usually constructed to accomplish social goals like making friends, completing business deals, offending others, whatever. That ‘outer self’ is decided on by active thought. Do you speak to someone or not? Help the old lady cross the street or carry on as normal? What do you gain and lose through each decision? The narrator. Then, deeper than that, there’s the culmination of experience that forms that narrator. People aren’t born bitter, suspicious, courageous, or perceptive, they’re born screaming. Not much to be said for that, but the gaps are filled in with experience. Eventually, there’s a reason you’re screaming. Experience colors the narrator that determines what is shown to the outside world.

I imagine all that, carefully wrapping it up in my mind’s eye, constructing a tangled ball that symbolizes my mind.

This. This is right. This is what I wanted. It’s like a 3D map that hasn’t been filled out with any of my specifics, but it’s the right format.

It’s probably a bit unflattering that even my image of my mind is a tangled mess…

Which, as with most unflattering things, likely means it’s accurate. I open my eyes, having forgotten at what point I closed them, and I'm greeted by another menu. This one looks different in a lot of ways, but the most apparent thing is how much shittier it is. It looks pixelated and bad, without any of the fancy auto-contrast from the regular one. There are no tabs or choices, just a shitty rectangle with the tangled ball I imagined floating and slowly spinning in the center.

“What am I looking at here?” On the surface, this seems useless. Games never have something there for no reason… but this isn’t a normal game.

~”Information.”

“...You don’t say.”

The alien nods, as though pleased. Clearly sarcasm doesn’t mean anything outside #$%#- I lurch suddenly backward, falling.

“AHH FUCK!”

The sudden missing memory is more jarring this time. I hate this.

~ “See something you did not like?” As expected, there’s no concern on its face, it seems to be merely asking out of curiosity.

I really don't give a shit about its curiosity.

The alien stares and remains silent, waiting for a reply I'm not going to give.

~ “There is one last thing I will teach you.” Ignoring me. Fine.

It produces the knife again.

“NOPE. NO, NOT HAPPENING.” I beat a hasty retreat, keeping the homicidal guru in my sights. “No more of that shit.”

The alien, however, makes no moves, aggressive or otherwise, towards me. It only sighs deeply and the knife disappears in the folds of its clothing. What emerges in its place is…

“A… stick?”

The guru nods, places it on the ground, and steps a few paces back before gesturing at it.

Cautiously, I approach. It just looks like an ordinary stick, so I pick it up and examine it. My menu even confirms ‘it’s an ordinary stick’ so… “What do I do with it?” I ask, puzzled.

~ “Break it” it states, as though this was completely normal.

I shrug and easily snap the stick. “Now what?”

~ “Make use of your 'Imbue Energy' skill. Make this mere piece of wood into an extension of yourself.”

Ok… sounds like your average weapons training mind games. 'Treat the weapon like an extension of your own arm', and all that. I look down at the stick again to find it whole and unbroken. Momentarily narrowing my eyes at my teacher, I relent and begin focusing on pushing Energy into the stick. Much like before, there is a stark resistance toward the golden threads leaving my body, but by steadily increasing the pressure and willing it out, the Energy tendrils slowly leak into the stick. Once they leave my hand, I can no longer sense them as well, so all I can do to verify my efforts is watch my Energy bar slowly tick down. After emptying about half my Energy pool, the stick begins to change. A soft, yellow light emerges as a sort of aura around the stick. It feels oddly comfortable in my hand now, like it belongs instead of being just a foreign object.

[Congratulations! Skill levels gained: Imbue Energy +1]

~ “Now break it.” Breaking from my admiration, I find myself almost unwilling to act on what I’ve just been told to do.

“This is my stick. Why would I break it?” Why do I care? Why am I acting like someone asked me to kick a puppy, when it's just a stick I broke without hesitation mere moments ago. The barest hint of a smile flashes across the gurus face.

~ “Try.”

I guess if my teacher can fix it as easily as last time, it won’t be so bad… I grasp the stick again and break it.

Or rather, try to break it. The stick bends a little, but this dry, brittle piece of wood no longer breaks under only a slight effort. I strain, trying to bend it further, but I only get a slight curvature out of it. I start to use my leg as leverage when the gurus hand on my shoulder stops me. I cringe slightly, unconsciously reacting to the stabbing memory, but it doesn’t look like harm is intended so I resist the urge to move away.

~ “You see now the utility of your abilities. You are… as ready as you can be.” This thing should never write motivational speeches. Far too much realism.

My teacher inclines its head slightly.

~ “Best of luck. May we meet again.”

I have mixed feelings about this stab happy guru, but I cannot be argued that it was anything but useful. Ok, and maybe a bit of a dick.

“Thank you-” is all I get out before the gut wrenching feeling of moving very fast overwhelms me.