A wizened old man travelled the world. A world full of mysteries, magic, danger, death at every corner but somehow this man managed to survive wherever he went with ease. He continued his journey for two years straight without any break to rest, any food to eat or any water to drink. He only stopped to do one thing, at every town he talked to groups of people to see if they where the right ones to accomplish his goal. He only had a month left to get back and it took three weeks to get here so he had to hurry, he couldn’t afford get picky. He knew he wouldn’t find the perfect group after all but he didn’t think it would be this bad. He walked around the town asking groups of people questions. “Would you consider yourself smart?” “I don’t need to be smart!” answered a man interrupting the old man who was talking to someone else “I’m strong, rich and a knight. How would being smart help me?” Not that group thought the old man, definitely not. He walked to another group, his last chance, a group of four and said: “What are your names?” “Bill” yelled a big, red-haired, muscly man in shiny bronze armour with cyan eyes. “Sam” said another one, this one with black hair and bright gold eyes which turned a neon green at night, dressed in black leather armour and a hood covering his head some knives strapped to his side and many more hidden around his body. “Violet” shyly whispered a woman with purple eyes, a purple robe, a purple hat and purple shoes, purple hair, a purple mage staff and even a purple book strapped to her purple belt which also had a purple scroll, a purple knife and a wand which, you guessed it, was also purple. “Hudson” I declared proudly and confidently. It was a long time ago but I remember I like it just happened a few seconds ago. I was the most exotic-looking out of the group since I had naturally brown eyes and hair. What are the odds of that happening? I don’t know but it is so rare that I got stares everywhere I went. I had all sorts of gadgets stuck to my belt, some tools in my bag (which could carry way more than it seemed because I upgraded it), a shield which seemed to be a small, steel circle until I pressed a button and a bright, transparent, orange light surrounded and protected me and a G.U.N. which stands for guardian of utiliser nanotechnology because it shoots some very little R.O.B.O.T.s (really original beast offing technology) cases which are filled with the little things that kill from the inside without even being seen (R.O.B.O.T.s). “Well I saw a great team of adventurers and thought you could help me. I’ve got a quest for you, hold this map. IT WASN’T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN THIS EARLY” the old man shrieked that last bit at the top of his lungs right before he disappeared.
Two years later
I walked up to my teammates and threw the map down on the table. They all instantly knew what happened. Lately, we haven’t gotten any quests so we decided that if we didn’t get any quests for more than six months we would do the old man’s quest. Not much changed in the two years since we last saw the old man. At least not for us. The defensive technology changed a lot so we weren’t getting any more quests to kill beasts or orcs or really any quest that we got before so we said that if we didn’t get a quest for six months we would do the old man’s quest and sadly, we didn’t. So everyone packed their things and got ready to go.
We travelled in silence. All of us were worried about this, except Bill who was grinning from ear to ear, because we left so much back home to go on this SIX MONTH quest. Times were bad for us and if we stayed back home we would have run out of money quick but that doesn’t mean we didn’t have doubts. I was so deep in thought that I wasn’t aware that our surroundings have changed until Bill started yelling as he flew into a wall. We were in a spherical room with a flat floor, it was all white and bright but didn’t radiate any light, somehow we could still see. In the middle of the room there was a HUGE pen made of ink in the middle of the room. Some of the ink out of which the pen was made from detached from the massive pen, whipped Bill and then it splatted on the floor leaving behind letters which said: “I am The Writer! If you want to meet The Author you have to fight me first!” But before I could even do anything another splotch of ink separated off of the pen and tried to smack Violet but apparently she has faster reflexes than me because she already had her wand out and managed to invoke a purple field of flowers. Unfortunately for The Writer, Violet wasn’t a normal druid. Violet had trained for attack for so long that she managed to train her plants to find her enemies weaknesses and attack. She made the flower wall hold the ink in place and then cast the spell needed to find the weaknesses and I thought she was safe but when turned around to shoot the main pen I heard violet screech. I turned around and saw that she fell to her knees and I saw her spiritual power (magic) drain from her which means that she was using a massive amount of power I started running towards when I saw every flower shooting massive amounts of water at the ink trying to dissipate it. And by massive I mean MASSIVE and it just wouldn’t stop pouring out the flowers. The room was getting full and I could see Bill and Sam, who were fighting the rest of the pen until the room started flooding struggling to breath. As the room finished filling up I heard a loud, monotonous voice say: “Trial one completed. Teleporting…”
I fell on the floor of a room which looked much the same as the first but was bigger. I heaved up water and I could hear the others doing it too. “Hello” I heard a tired, hoarse voice say and during the time he said that word I wanted to do nothing more than lay down and cry. “I am The Editor and as you may have noticed my power is to make you feel down or blue or in the dumps when I talk. So I’m gonna start by taking about my day. Today was much the same as any other day…….” The saddening old man said while he slowly sipped out of his coffee cup. He had grey hair, glasses and a small beard. He had dark circles and under his eyes and looked like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. I could barely make myself look up and everything was blurry from all the tears spraying from my eyes. We were going to dehydrate soon if we didn’t stop him so I knew what to do even if I thought it would cost me dearly. I slowly moved my hand to my belt and grabbed a sound B.O.M.B. (stands for Boom, Ow, Mega Blast) which releases powerful waves of sound in a small area and deafens the enemy but this time I didn’t use use it on the enemy (I couldn’t have done it even if I wanted to because of the amazing power of The Editor’s voice) I used the sound B.O.M.B. on myself. BOOM I felt pain in my ears and blood running down from them. I couldn’t hear The Editor’s voice anymore so that was a small win. I got up, wiped my tears, got out my G.U.N. and shot out the R.O.B.O.T.s straight at the old man. But before they could hit him he disappeared. I turned around to see my teammates rising off of the floor but before I could approach any of them we got teleported again.
It was another room but this time dark. I took a flare out my bag and it lit up the whole room (which was slightly smaller than the first one) and saw my teammates talking to me. I pointed to my ears then made an X shape with my arms. Violet understood immediately and made a purple flower curl round my ear which fixed my hearing quite quickly. As if it was waiting for my hearing to get repaired (which it was probably doing) a calm, nice voice said: “And so the heroes make it to the final obstacle in their quest to find The Author me, The Narrator!” We were all looking around to see where the voice was coming from when suddenly in a brilliant flash of light what I assumed to be The Narrator appeared. It was like a huge bit of skin in the shape of a pill with a mouth stuck to it. Whenever it talked the mouth encompassed the whole front bit of The Narrator and I could see the rest of the face inside it. It had eyes as white as piece of paper with inky black irises pouring down to meet its lopsided mouth of ink. The thing really creeped me out. It started talking and just when I was thinking about why it hasn’t shown its powers yet it opened its mouth again. “Violet will be stuck in the ground for the rest of the fight.” it said in a voice which could shake the heavens while putting a baby to sleep at the same time. What it said happened and Violet was stuck in the ground but while this happened I could visibly see it’s mouth shrink which showed the toll the amazing powers took on The Narrator. Unfortunately I knew that it would defeat us before its mouth disappeared. We needed to do something unexpected, something no-one would think of, something brilliant. I did one of the only things The Narrator couldn’t have ever thought of. I did nothing. “Bill will levitate for the rest of the fight. Sam will be trapped in a massive ice cube for the rest of the fight.” then the huge, pill-shaped thing, now with a smaller mouth, turned around to face me “I will know what Hudson is doing.” uttered The Narrator ” Nothing?! He can’t be doing nothing. I will know what Hudson is doing.” and so The Narrator did this until its mouth disappeared and no sound came out from it. When that happened I got a B.O.M.B. I made especially for big beasts and threw it at it. As it happened with The Editor he disappeared as the B.O.M.B. exploded. Then I heard the same loud, monotonous voice I heard in trial one say: Test completed. Teleporting to The Author.”
I was in another room, this on much smaller than all of the others. In front of me there was a blinding orb of light which looked a bit like a face the “mouth” opened and I realised it was the same loud, monotonous voice I heard at the end of the trials that declared: “I am The Author and since you passed the trials you can be the most important bit of every story and book: The Readers. So before I make any changes to this world you will read them and tell me what you think unless you choose to go back to your world and live in ignorance of the higher beings controlling your each and every move.” “Wait!” I replied ” Does that mean that you controlled the old man who gave us the map and you controlled us fighting The Writer, The Editor and The Narrator?” “The Editor was the one who gave you that map at my orders and the moment you got teleported here I lost all control over you. So what do you say ignorance or being The Readers?”
In case you were wondering what everyone chose Bill was the only one who chose ignorance. He wanted to fight and there isn’t much fighting as a reader. As for us who chose to be The Readers well, we are just like you!
Very nice