The Isekai Game

Nehushtan

In their blindness, lightning struck in the near distance. Rain stroke their skin likes pellets in an airsoft battle. The sting wore away from their eyes, allowing them to see the storm they were in.

The heavy rain hindered their sight of the black mountains that encased them. Jeff threw a fit regarding the game's tricks. Why bother with annoying puzzles when you can just beat the boss and go?

"Move!" yelled Andres as he jumped out of the way.

He had attempted to create a shield but was out of time. Logan immediately followed whereas the rest of the team stood in shock. A bolt of lightning had just formed, making its way down to the team.

Vanessa extended her katana calling, "Conduct".

The lightning struck her blade, nearly knocking it from her grip. Hearts stopped as the bang startled everybody. Looking into the sky, they knew more was to come for them.

"Let's get to a tower!" yelled Jeff.

They picked up running for the nearest tower. Lightning struck in many places across the field. The sound came together like a concert from the '60s. Each blow into the distant mountains created sparks of many colors.

Strikes nearby came close to the team as they attempted to reach shelter. The time was roughly 10 seconds between each strike to the team.

After reaching the overhead of a tower with a dark ball on top, lightning began hitting at an angle to reach under. They attempted to run in circles looking for an escape whether it be far or near.

A black man with burnt skin jumped from the ground to attack Vanessa. His filthy white clothing dropped mud as he swung his overly large leaves. Vanessa couldn't ignore the pain on this man's face. Even his attacks were frail.

Logan pierced his blade into his neck and threw him aside. Dani pulled Vanessa out of the way just in time for a lightning strike to miss her. It landed a double strike, which scared everybody further.

Jeff pushed everybody out into the rain once more to run towards another tower. Vanessa couldn't shake off the fact that the man didn't even have a tongue to speak.

"Why were they being shown she these people and animals suffering?" she thought running through the rain.

As they approached a tower, Dani thought quickly. She stopped for a second to shoot a bullet at a tower's orb. It turned bright red. The lightning began continuously striking the orb instead of anywhere nearby.

The rain still poured, but they were safe from the actual threat. Vanessa pointed out that the red light was slowly fading. It was likely that the orb remained active for a short time period for them to move across.

It was feasible to do so. However, Logan had a different plant. He knew something was odd regarding the puzzles and the light. Even the music and suffering among others was odd. It didn't make sense.

Andres questioned the mind of his little friend. Even more so when Logan stabbed his own leg, shouting, "Wake up"!

As blood oozed out, Logan's body began flickering. He repeated his command a few more times until he vanished.

"Oh," said Dani, "Well let me sleep. s**t".

Vanessa began flickering as so did Dani. Everybody started flickering until they were all awake in the stone hallway. The moon stared directly at everyone. Its light was dim. Even more amazing, Logan's leg wasn't bleeding.

In haste, Logan explained that the bright light puts them to sleep in a realm where they must find a glitch in its design to escape. Dani noted it was similar to the July theme they met Vanessa in. The moon was already getting bright, leading Jeff to rush everybody to the door at the end.

The team got much further down the hall. But the light shined once again. This time they were transported to a room that was sealed shut.

Logan grunted, holding his leg which was bleeding again. He attempted to wake himself up without applying pain but wasn't powerful enough to overcome the spell. Andres took a look at the wound to help Logan move on it.

"I got him," said Jeff as he held Logan up from his underarm.

Dani kept a lookout going as far as to ask Andres to scan for an enemy. In response, he informed them that sensory abilities don't work in dream states.

She continued stepping nearby to view each corner of the room.

"Who is Ne-us-tan?" asked Vanessa.

Andres began repeating the name Vanessa was attempting to say. He looked upon a wall where the name was carved as, "Nehushtan". He gave a tap to his head, explaining that Nehushtan is the snake Moses made of copper.

"A snake made of copper? Just like the metals we are surrounded by?" Dani asked.

He stood looking around as he responded, "Yup".

Jeff jumped as he heard something move. Logan fell to the ground seeing copper metals fall from a pile of metal. What's worse, the walls were now closing in.

"Find the damn glitch," said Logan as Jeff wrapped his arms across Logan's chest.

Everybody was confused about what to do until Jeff demanded them to split up. Nehushtan struck its head at Vanessa, throwing her off balance. It was luckily big like an anaconda for Dani to shoot.

With each impact, it was shaken away giving Andres and Vanessa the chance to run through the room. On the ground, the snake had oriented itself towards Dani.

Jeff carried Logan as Dani attempted to fight the snake. Logan permitted Logan to fight with her to which he happily agreed.

Nehushtan slithered his way dodging Dani's bullets and bit her g*n. She fired many times into his mouth. None of her attacks caused damage. He lifted her into the air and slammed her into a pile of copper.

Jeff ran up firing at the copper snake but was entangled by its lower half. The snake itself continued biting at Dani until its fangs pierced through her forearm. Her scream echoed through the room as dark blood flowed out of her body.

Her brother shot the snake in the head, causing it to throw Dani to the side. With Nehushtan's attention solely on Jeff, he ran through the copper rubble, leading the snake to a chase.

Logan crawled his way, past heaps of copper rubble. The walls were closing in which didn't affect his calm. If only he hadn't stabbed himself so deeply, then maybe he could run. However, he may have still been trapped in the previous dream.

None the less, Logan didn't care. He figured that the walls closed once the snake moved. Therefore, there must be a trap wherever the snake was hiding. As he was crawling, he was stopped. He looked behind him to see Leira and Mina willing to give it their all to help.

Vanessa ran her way searching through the large room for a switch of some sort when she stumbled across a piece of Nehushtan's body. His body was nearly half her height. It didn't matter. She held out her sword and focused her power. Her stance was perfect.

Jeff continuously alternated between running and shooting. But Nehushtan was too fast for him to focus.

Out of breath, Jeff contemplated using his teammates for help. As soon as he opened his mouth, a giant pile of copper was knocked over him by Nehushtan. The snake struck at Jeff's head for the final kill.

"Zantetsuken!" yelled Vanessa,

Despite not being penetrated, Nehushtan hissed in pain and smacked its head against a wall. As he flinched its entire body, Jeff picked up and ran away.

"Look for giant flat tombs!" yelled Logan with Mina and Leira repeating after him, "Throw them on the square panels on the ground"!

Vanessa was shocked that her strongest attack, the one-hit-kill Zantetsuken, didn't even cut into the copper snake. Yet upon hearing Logan's echo, she was mildly relieved.

Andres had placed his second flat tomb on a panel and called out his action. The girls repeated they had one. Dani was holding her forearm as a way to alleviate the pain when Nehushtan locked eyes.

She ran away from the snake. Its oversized body ignored all piles of metal to get towards Dani. Once near, Dani jumped on a square piece of the floor that was sticking out witch caused a bright light to shine from the ceiling.

It took about two minutes for the bright light to finish taking effect. Everybody was led by the system to come together. All injuries from the snake were gone. The light wore off and surely they were back in the hallway where they last stood.

"Run!" yelled Jeff.

The moon hovered directly over The Wild Bunch again as they decked the halls. Logan kept his eye on the moon to watch its light.

"Close your eyes and cover with your palms!" yelled Logan.

It was just in time. Everybody closed their eyes for 1 minute in total. No odd sounds were heard outside of their running. It was fortunate that Logan timed the light.

Shortly after, the light had gone. The team opened their eyes and approached the door. "Na'amah" was engraved above. Andres pushed the door open, letting out a bright light that blinded the team to sleep again.