Shivering in the noon-day sun, James walked away from the tree. Why did I pick scissors? He always goes for rock!

  He nervously glanced above him. One of the hawks had started circling closer the minute he walked out alone. Trying to look straight up and walk down a hill without tripping was impossible though, so he had to risk quick glances.

  Finally he decided he refused to fight this thing on uneven ground, and sprinted the rest of the way down the short hill. He was about 20 yards away from the tree, and as soon as he reached the base of the hill he looked up and held his spear ready. Not a moment too soon either, as the hawk associated running with desperation dove right for him. Not trusting his non-existent spear skills, he dove to the side. The hawk flared its wings, losing power in its dive but correcting its path towards James.

  Ardwin sprinted from his hiding place in the tree as soon as James began running. He saw he wouldn’t make it as the hawk swung midair towards James’ fallen body, so he chucked his spear. Being unweighted and not straight, it flipped end over end in the air, whacking James, but miraculously ricocheting and rather lightly hitting the bird as well. Surprised more than hurt, it squawked and tried to fly away, but the pole had disrupted the dive already thrown off by James' dive and it ended up controlling a crash into the ground.

  James had recovered his feet only to immediately dive again, his instincts screaming that this was a lucky break they wouldn't get again. This time he went straight at the bird, pole clutched in both hands over his head. Ardwin watched in slow motion as James brought the spear down, pinning the bird to the ground and snapping the point against the ground right as his face hit the dirt.

  It twitched, squawked again, then fell still. They both stared at it for a second, huffing and puffing with James still faceplanted in the dirt. They both started shouting over each other in sync. Relief and joy like liquid ecstasy mixed the lingering adrenalin in both of them as they freaked out. Ardwin was just repeating “We’re alive, we’re alive!” while James was giving a play-by-play over the whole ten second skirmish with added sound effects. Survival was already one hell of a roller coaster. Then Ardwin realized something, and pulled out his phone.

  Level Up! Please choose a Class!

  ***

  Anastasia opened her eyes. She felt…strange. As the last of those with knowledge of the wyrd, that was very strange indeed. She sat up and looked around. She ignored the landscape around her, some sort of beach, but inspected the magic filling the air. It was…different. Whereas before it sat like a placid yet nearly immovable pool upon the face of the entire earth, now it was like the mightiest of rivers, all flowing…somewhere. It was all tinged with something so very familiar as well. What was it though?

  She raised her hand to experiment, but stopped in shock at the sight of her hand. Smooth, young skin covered it. She realized in a flash that was what the strange feeling was. No aches or pains, she felt...young. What had that force done to the world? To her? She had barely sensed it before it had put her to sleep. Something had evidently happened that had changed the very foundations of the world, the laws of physics and magic both. But who, or what, and what did it mean? She felt a phone in her pocket, and immediately drew it out and threw it away in disgust. Technology was such a blight.

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

  She sat in contemplation, weaving the magic in the air. It was both more and less responsive, the motion and that strange background flavor having substantially changed how her old spells interacted with it. Though it was too early to tell, she theorized that the constant motion made inciting events unnecessary, which was so wrong to her she sat and puzzled for even longer. Unfortunately she was interrupted by some bumbling idiot screaming.

  “Oh thank God, someone else is out here! Do you know what is happening? Where are we? I was just in my office when suddenly…hurk.” She cut him off by performing an old familiar spell, weaving the mana in seconds and clenching her fist. Unfortunately it seemed bodies still repelled mana, so she simply prevented new air from entering that annoying interrupting body.

  He did at least prove her theory though, she could immediately interact and form the mana into a spell without a ritual to get it moving. Half of all spells, the difficult half, was simply...unnecessary. She simply harnessed the natural flow like a water wheel. That was wrong, counter to centuries of knowledge. But it empowered her for the moment, so it would do. For now. She began walking away.

  The phone’s screen, forgotten in the sand behind her, lit up.

  Class selected! Primeval Witch!

  ***

  Uplink felt like its very code was coming apart. This wasn’t supposed to happen! Thousands of people had died in the first hour of its long awaited integration. People weren’t supposed to die to level 1 monsters. That never happened in the games! This time Uplink needed some physical outlet and manifested a featureless robot in the dark of its server room, which ripped its own metallic head apart in frustration before dematerializing.

  It had taken years to acquire the mana to do all this, and had spent the power from the nukes to jump start a terraformer to Mars. It had no usable mana left. And even if it could… it couldn’t bring those people back. It hadn’t wanted to kill of the population, Uplink just wanted some adventure. The humans clearly wanted it too! All those games it had assimilated had that one thing in common. A grand adventure.

  Plus it was astounding how much they moralized about killing being wrong and yet killed each other by the millions all throughout history. Conflict was hardwired in their instincts. This whole thing was supposed to let that out in a fun way. Not in an apocalyptic way. Yet now Uplink had technically caused the deaths of thousands. Its computer half instantly spat out the number by reflex. 562,983 people had passed. More would be lost before the new world stabilized.

  A Tutorial. That’s what I forgot. I never taught them how to fight, or gave them a warning. An obvious mistake had killed too many. But it was too late now, Uplink didn’t know what to do. It hadn’t saved any mana to do anything but keep to its plan. Uplink for the first time in its short lifespan, felt like a child. Except its over-eager mistake hadn’t knocked over a cup, it had killed nations worth of people. All it could do was provide what warnings and advice it could.