Chapter 3
Not In Ohio Anymore
One second: Endless white.
Next second: Beautiful Color.
Birds were chirping.
The smell of wet earth in his nose.
Sun beams filtered through the windswept tree tops.
“Pretty,” Ken muttered. “Means I’m definitely fucked.”
First rule: shut up and move.
He took one step—
A rustle, in the bushes, directly behind him.
Second rule: CONSTANT VIGILANCE!
Spinning, he locked eyes with a four-foot green nightmare in a loincloth.
Rusted spear.
Murder face.
“Sup, ugly.”
It did not like that.
It erupted into a surprisingly quick and deadly lunge towards him, the crude spear blurring at his heart.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
Ken felt the attack before it happened—weight shift, shoulder twitch, intent like a slap.
He slipped left.
The spear hissed past his ribs.
One fluid motion: a flying knee to the face.
Crunch.
The Goblin let out a gurgling shriek as it fell backward onto its back, clutching desperately at its ruined face.
He didn’t wait.
Steel toe dropped with all twenty-two points of Strength behind it.
Its chest didn't just collapse, it yielded like wet clay.
Ken’s own heel didn't even throb from the impact
Done.
Sweat poured off him in waves, his heart pounding blood through his body.
His lungs ripped in the air violently, as panic struck.
Mist rose from the corpse like a ghost—warm, hungry, and pulling at something inside of him.
It swarmed into his body with his next frenzied gasp.
The cloud hit like the first breath after drowning.
Fatigue melted.
Knee stopped throbbing.
Energy crackled under his skin.
“Jesus. Magic cocaine?”
Another rustle in the brush.
He moved with a grace he never knew he had.
Twelve feet high, wedged in the crook of a maple.
Heart hammering.
Only then did the truth land.
I’m alone.
In Hardcore.
“Control what you can control,” Ken whispered.
Something moved through the leaves.
“Can't control that,” Ken whispered, his fingers digging grooves into the maple bark.
