Afterlife Dream

Devin Wentworth's face appeared. A thin trail of blood flowed from the top of his head. I had actually stabbed so hard that the pointy end of my sickle managed to give him a shallow wound.

But that was not the most surprising thing. The red HP bar above his head disappeared. He was no longer the final boss of the level 150 raid. In the Dimensional Master's place, Devin Wentworth blinked at me in confusion.

"Where am I? He asked. What am I doing here?"

That was a weird question coming from someone who was about to kill us.

"Do you not remember?" I asked incredulously.

Devin Wentworth clutched his head.

"I don't know," he repeated. "I was in the MMORPG Convention. I was giving a speech, and then..."

"And then you became the Dimensional Master and tried to kill us," ZhaoYun completed his sentence.

Devin Wentworth's head snapped in ZhaoYun's direction. "What are you talking about? How do you know about the Dimensional Master?"

"Um... well. The game announced it."

"What game?"

"Afterlife Dream, of course."

Devin Wentworth struggled to stand up and retreated a few steps away from us. "I don't know who you all are and what you are talking about. The Dimensional Master is the final boss in Afterlife Dream, the game I invented. You are not supposed to know about him yet, I have not made any announcement about him!"

Devin stumbled over an undead and shrieked out of terror.

"What is this place? Why am I here???"

We were speechless. We did not know where to start.

"Dude, calm down..." ZhaoYun tried to grab Devin, but the latter became even more terrified.

"Don't touch me! You... you are dressed like... Are you cosplayers or something???"

"..."

"..."

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"Calm down, what exactly do you remember?" Cecilia stepped forward. "Don't worry, we won't hurt you."

I didn't know about that. I glanced at the digital clock above our heads. Ten minutes left. We were supposed to defeat the Dimensional Master, but what to do if the Dimensional Master transformed into Devin Wentworth in the middle of the battle?

"I already said, I was at the convention... I was supposed to finish and then go back to the company to work on the game..."

"Wait a second!" I shouted. "How do you know that you are supposed to do all that?"

Devin looked part scared and part uncomfortable when confronted with the question.

"I uh..."

"You are also stuck in a time loop, aren't you?" HellWitch queried.

"Also? What do you mean also? Are you all...?"

Devin pointed at us one by one. We nodded.

"Oh."

"Don't be shocked but it seems that you were also dead and were reborn in the Afterlife Dream," I tried to explain as fast as possible. For some reason, possibly because there was nothing else we could do, I felt that it was very important to make Devin understand what he was.

"Dead? Me? No! Impossible!" Devin rejected the idea right away.

"I did not die!"

"You were!" Livina also spoke up. "You were reincarnated in Afterlife Dream! If you don't believe us, why don't you try logging into the game..."

"I don't have time for that," Devin said with a frown. "I have to develop the game..."

"For goodness sake, how can you develop a game if you never even tried playing it!!!" ZhaoYun grabbed Devin by his collar in rage.

I glanced at the digital clock and saw that only forty-seven seconds were left.

"Please!" I turned to beg Devin. "Please help us! Our objective in this raid is to defeat you, but you suddenly changed back to Devin Wentworth!"

Thirty seconds...

"But I... I don't know what you are talking about. What can I do to help?"

Devin looked terrified, but we were the ones on the brink of elimination!

Twenty seconds...

"Just... I don't know, you are the one who invented the Afterlife Dream. Can you not do something to the Dimensional Master? It is your creation!"

"You guys are insane," Devin started to get angry. "The Dimensional Master is an in-game boss. He is not real. He is not walking around. How am I supposed to do anything to him???"

Ten seconds.

"I don't know, just think! Eliminate him or something!"

Devin glared at ZhaoYun. "Eliminate him? Now? I am not a God, I can't just eliminate him on a whim. Even if I want to eliminate him, I need to... HEY!!!!"

Beneath our feet, the floor crumbled and revealed a lava lake. The exact lake that swallowed Suzuran and the others!

Cecilia and I spread our Angel Wings at the same time. I managed to catch HellWitch, who was holding on to Lazarus. Cecilia caught ZhaoYun who was holding up Livina.

"Oh God," I mumbled, out of breath.

The floor completely collapsed. All the undeads fell into the lava lake along with the floor debris, sending splashes of hot lava upward. Devin was fine, though. He also had Angel Wings, and he was floating in the air.

"What the?" he yelled as he saw that the floor beneath his feet already crumbled. "Why am I flying???"

I gritted my teeth as I tried hard to sustain the weight of two players who were dragging me down. I could feel my Angel Wings screaming from the weight.

"You... can you at least help us?" I asked Devin.

"Help what???"

"Forget it, Antares," Cecilia snapped. "We need to get out of here. Now."

Cecilia was right. The raid was officially a failure. The only reason why we had not been eliminated was because of the two pairs of Angel Wings. Unfortunately, the wings also had their limitations. We could not expect them to work wonders such as saving us from the lake of lava.

While dragging the weight of two more people, both Cecilia and I flew around in search of an exit but there was none.

After the raid was over, the hall disappeared. We were no longer inside the skyscraper building but something close to a cave that was swimming in a lake of lava. Now that the cave floor had collapsed, only the lava lake was left.

"No hope..."

Cecilia's eyes were glistening with tears. "Oh God," she wailed. "I am going to die here. We are all going to die here."

My heart was broken when I realized that we had dragged Cecilia with us to this hell hole. She wanted to stay within the time loop.

"Cecil, I am so sorry," HellWitch spoke up. "If I knew, I..."

Cecilia shook her head repeatedly while tears fell across her cheeks.

"No, it's fine. It is all just an illusion anyway. I just thought that we could somehow make it. I did not expect to be eliminated for good just because we fail the raid..."

"You are wrong," Devin spoke up.

He flew toward us and grabbed Lazarus's other hand and also Livina's other hand, sharing my and Cecilia's burden.

"Players do not get eliminated for failing a raid."

"You say that, but..." I heaved a breath. "Look at what is happening to us. We failed your raid and the game is trying to eliminate us."

"No," Devin said, furrowing his brows. "Something is wrong here."

"Hey," Lazarus called out to Devin. "You are the creator of this game, right? Surely you put in some cheat code to escape when the game goes wrong?"

Devin pursed his lips.

"How do you know that?"

"I... I play a lot of MMORPGs! They always put in some codes for emergencies! Look, is this not an emergency??? Please help us. We need to get out. You also want to get out of here, right???"

Devin was silent for a while, but then he finally gave in.

"Fine," he mumbled unhappily.

My arms were hurting so much from carrying HellWitch and Lazarus that I thought I might just drop them anytime soon.

Devin Wentworth then spoke the word, "BlackPuma."

I was so shocked that I might just drop my two friends. Cecilia did not look less shocked than me.

The word "BlackPuma" worked wonders. The lava lake disappeared, and the scene from hell vanished. The map was replaced by a dark room with a gigantic computer, a cozy leather seat, and two standing lamps that barely illuminated the inside of the room. The computer had three screens that were as big as my TV screen at home.

Cecilia and I collapsed onto the marble floor and struggled to breathe.

HellWitch and Lazarus went to hug my neck. "Thanks, Antares," HellWitch whispered. "Sorry, it must hurt," Lazarus added.

ZhaoYun and Livina both hugged Cecilia, almost suffocating her.

"Cecilia, you are the best," Livina started to sob. "I am so sorry for being mean to you back in your house."

"Stop it! Stop it!" Cecilia flailed on the ground, snapping after oxygen. "I need to breathe!"

We were safe.

At least for the moment.

And then we all turned to face Devin, who was staring at us with an impassive expression on his face. He was no longer clothed in the Dimensional Master's armor. We too have returned to our normal clothing.

"Devin, are you... are you BlackPuma?" I asked the question on everyone's mind.