[System] You are running a text-based adventure game set in a grim fantasy world. Narrate events with rich detail, maintain consistent characters, and let the player's decisions drive the story — even toward dark outcomes.

[User] Continue

[Assistant]
The next few missions go a lot smoother and there are no casualties, your physical condition gives you advantages over some of the others and you become a fairly popular scavenging partner. You actually begin enjoying living there and even feel like you have begun to properly adapt to their rations and pass your weapon handling so can take a gun with you, though you still prefer the trusty bat for shamblers.

Life goes pretty well for another week or two and you even think that settling here might not be so bad after all even if that wasn't close to your intent when you first walked in the doors.

Sadly things do not last that way for long.

It's barely been a month since you arrived in the stadium ruins when the scavenging team fails to return. They decide to send a larger squad after them so find out what happened and ask for volunteers.

[User] You keep quiet, you know full well what happened and don't want to be next

[Assistant]
You remember what happened on your first mission, going after them will be suicide and probably a trap.

Luckily 8 men volunteer quickly enough and no-one blames those who don't so you get away with no shame from it, you head off to your normal duty for that day, you're on balcony 6 for the next 4 hours or so. You'll be the only one there since it isn't really an important one, kind of to the side of the main entrance and not looking at anything of interest.

Its half way through your shift when you hear some muffled sounds coming from over the city and it seems another sentry heard it too, you report hearing it then head back up. Once you get off duty though and come back down it's not to a pretty sight. It seems that they worked out that the noise was gun fire and the 'rescue' team was now also overdue.

You think back again to your first mission and what seemed like a trap, your starting to get a bad feeling about the city now. Seems like scavenging too close to the city center isn't such a good plan anymore.

You have to choose whether to dump these guys and head out alone now or hold out until they are ready to make a larger push for the colony to the east, sure you have lost men recently but true to their word, they have recruited nearly a dozen in the last month. You had no idea there were so many survivors up in this area or you'd have come North a lot sooner.

You're also pretty sure that the Capt. is going to order a push East soon too, even with the losses, their numbers are still good and they have the guns and equipment for a full military push through the open streets, the scouts have everything planed out route wise with backups for it things go wrong.

[User] You leave them, their tactics aren't working

[Assistant]
You really can't work out why people keep using tactics right out of old movies when they never work. You have to get out of here before you get taken down with everyone else on their suicide mission.

You start your preparations, gathering spare food and supplies and get your bag ready to leave when your friend from the first mission approaches you about leaving with some others who share your opinion. You sign on immediately and get ready to sneak out.

[User] You sneaking out

[Assistant]
You've been thinking the same for a while. If an even larger group of military couldn't hold the infected at bay, then what will this small team do? Especially if the harbinger from before COULD control the infected, you'll have to think about that more later, for now it's time to get out.

"I'm in, betting a small team can move a lot quieter than a large group too. Let's go."

You grab you pack and bat, leaving the gun behind as you never liked using it anyway and head for a North-East balcony where you all climb down some piping and Begin heading East. There are 5 people in your little team including yourself. A few brought guns, but everyone needs something to make them feel safe you guess, even if all it does is draw more infected.

The plan gets laid out as you walk. Seems that you are heading East along a route further North of the route the jeep will be taking, getting up to a highway that should take you most of the way to the river. It was too clogged with cars for the main group for no problem for 5 guys on foot.

You all walk quietly for the next few hours before stopping to eat having covered a good distance. You pick a low rooftop that you think once belonged to a barber shop to rest. One of the men finally speaks up.

"We are a few hours clear and this roof is pretty safe, shall we break for the rest of the night and head out again at dawn?"

You all agree and settle down for the rest of the night on the rooftop. You spend the next few hours thinking about getting to the safe colony to the east and why you were originally heading there before getting so caught up with the stadium people before eventually falling asleep.

[User] You morning hunger

[Assistant]
You wake with the dawn and find two of the others already up. "We couldn't sleep so great being exposed out here." One of them says to you.

As the last two get up, you realize just how hungry you are and remember that you didn't eat anything last night. You dig in your bag for your meat strips but find nothing there, remembering that you finished them off on the third day in the stadium. You accept some rations from the other guys but it seems to do little to your hunger.  You think back to when you used to feel this hunger practically all the time, seems your days of living happily in the stadium and not feeling hungry are over for the time being.

You all check your surroundings but it's all clear and you head off again about an hour after dawn.

"Won't the others catchup to us at this rate?" one of the others asks out loud. It's your friend that answers. "Nah, we are a few roads North of them and will be heading up to the highway by lunchtime, so even if they do move faster than us, they will pass right by us to the South and never see us. Hey if all goes well we will meet up with them in a few weeks at the colony and have a great laugh about this all!"

The mood seems to lighten a little after that and you all keep moving with some quiet chatter going on. You even join in some of the joking and in the light atmosphere begin to forget about feeling hungry again.

It's a few hours later and you are getting close to the on ramps for the highway when you begin hearing the noises.

Its very faint but you call it out anyway. "Low rumbling to the South." The others pause and listen for a time before one turns and says. "I hear it now, sounds like the Jeep, they will be passing us soon. Those are some ears you have mate!"

"Seems they are making great time if they are passing us already, they might actually do it at this rate!" one of the men jokes as you all start walking again, listening to the low rumble get louder, then start to get quieter as they pass you a few roads to the South.

Its only a few minutes later that you hear a crashing noise and the rumbling stop.

"Gorram Harbinger! They are being ambushed aren't they, we should go help them!"

[User] You agree to run and help, they aren't too far away after all

[Assistant]
You immediately agree. "Well we can't just leave them there and even if it's the harbinger, he won't expect us. Your friend reluctantly agrees as do the others. You all set off at a run. There hasn't been any other noise yet and you start to hear the Jeep again. "The jeeps just idling! They were probably just clearing a car off the road!" one of the guys says when you are only a couple of blocks away.

Almost on cue you hear the 50cal. Starting up and blocking out any other noise. Swearing out loud you round the corner a couple of blocks behind the stadium group and find a bus between you and them, as well as a horde of the infected.

One man with you drops to his knees. "It's just like when the stadium fell. It's the harbinger."

The 50cal. Falls silent, looking through the buss's windows you see the infected swarming towards the jeep. "It's already over, let's get out of here!" You drag the kneeling man to his feet but he breaks free, rushing towards the buss firing his rifle.

"We can still save them! It's not too late!" He barely gets 20 feet before you see a couple of fast types sprinting from an alleyway, taking him down and beginning to feed on him.

"Everyone run!" You hear someone shout. You don't even check who it was and start sprinting back in the direction you came as you see  3 more fast types headed your way. You never even notice your friend and one other falling behind and getting eaten. You only stop once you are several blocks away and turn to see the last member of your group some distance behind trying to keep up.

"Forgot how much faster I was" You think to yourself as you wait for him.

"Where are the other two?" You ask, thinking about your friend.

"Got, taken, down…" He stammers, out of breath. "None of us could keep up with you and the fast ones don't tire like us. I only got away because they stopped to eat the other two."

"AAHH Gorramit!" you say out loud, you know it was only the 3 fast types and if you had helped then you could have easily taken them down, it's not as if a bite of two would inconvenience you much, you've had enough before to know they will have no more effect on you.

"Let's just go before more come. We know what the plan was at least."

You head North and quickly get to the highway without further signs of pursuit. The lighthearted atmosphere from before has vanished leaving you and the last remaining survivor from the stadium walking in silence and brooding. You can feel your hunger returning with a vengeance now that you have little else good to think about and eating a trail bar doesn't help at all. Your mind keeps wandering to how anyone you try and get close to dies anyway.

You both walk until night when you find a van to climb into and shut the door behind you. "So they are all dead." You mutter out loud as you both check for what food there is left, your hunger is killing you. Seems that between you, you have enough basic rations for a few days.

"Right, I REALLY need to eat, let's have a proper meal then we can scavenge more as we go." Your new partner seems too depressed to argue about anything so you divide the food into two big meals and 1 day's rations. You both eat up quickly and he curls up into a corner of the van to sleep.

You spend the next few hours awake thinking about all those dead people and about talk of harbingers being able to control the infected. You hunger hasn't gone down at all despite the meal.

[User] You late night munchies

[Assistant]
It's near midnight and the old hunger is eating at you and you come to a decision. "I tried, I tried for weeks. No-one can blame me now, since everyone around me dies, it may as well be to my plan like it used to be."

The other survivor doesn't even move as you take out your bat and kill him with a single blow.

Your hunger is finally sated and like returning to an old addiction, everything feels better than ever. You pack up what's left of his remains to take with you as food for your journey and fall asleep happy in the fact that you have made you mind up at last. You will reach the colony to the East. And once there you will eat them one by one, you are a harbinger after all, it's what you do.

[User] You morning in the blood stained van

[Assistant]
The morning comes and you wake happy again, not the relaxed happiness of the stadium, a happiness with an edge. You have great things to do after all. You check that the other survivors remains are carefully wrapped up and in your packs, the last meat strips from that crazy you killed and ate had run out so you have to make sure you bring enough with you. You almost laugh out loud that the idiots in the stadium never thought you were a harbinger and the strips of mean were from a human.

But time to move on. You need to test out these ideas of controlling infected.

You walk slowly East on the highway, from memory this thing circles most of the city so it will be a much longer way round to the bridge but you still don't want to be near the city centre. Mutants are still mutants whether you admit to yourself what you are or not.

After a few hours you see a shambler down below, slowly making its way down a road. You pause and concentrate for hours on it. Concentrating, trying to feel its mind, trying to order it to do something mentally but to no avail. It slowly keeps walking down the road and eventually you give up following it, starting to walk along the highway looking for a closer target to test your theories on.

You finally come across a car which had crashed into the van in front leaving the driver trapped. You thought it was dead at first but once you are close, it twitches a little and makes a weak movement with its arm.

"Seems you've been trapped here a really long time little shambler." You say to it, looking carefully in the car you see from all the bones that there must have been at least one other passenger in the car which the shambler was eating to have sustained itself this long. Either way it was still trapped and near death. A perfect test subject.

You decide to use the van it crashed into for your bed and spent the next couple of hours concentrating on it. Still no luck, no reaction at all really. It seems the same as always, it wants to eat you and you have no effect.

You sigh as you settle down for the night in the back of the van.

You might have to give up on the stupid rumors, you've been a harbinger for years and never had an inkling of controlling infected with 'mind powers' sure it's the apocalypse but its not some stupid movie. You've already seen the infected swarming towards noise and that jeep could be heard for miles, they just made too much noise and attracted everything in the area to them so when they stopped to push cars around, they got swarmed, they probably tried to use the bus to block the infected from getting to them and failed.

[User] You give it up. Who are you kidding that you have amazing mind powers that you simply never noticed before?

[Assistant]
You head East, following the highway for several days and strangely find it mostly deserted, like someone had cleared it out some time before and only the occasional straggler came back.

The going is easy and the worst you are left to contend with are the occasional shambler amidst the parked and crashed cars. Its not long before you see the bridge ahead of you. There are a few shamblers visible on it but it looks clear enough for you to make a try at getting across, "Then its right onto the Eastern Colony!" you say to yourself.

You're a harbinger through and through and you're going to enjoy infiltrating the colony then eating everyone inside, one by one.

Unfortunately as you take your first step onto the bridge you feel a sudden pain hit your mind, like the worst migraine you ever had described to you. You collapse gripping your head but the pain vanishes just as suddenly, leaving a strange numb feeling in your mind.

A voice suddenly appears in your head "Too close to being red my friend, we can't have you coming here to try and destroy us now can we?" You feel a second wave of pain then nothing more


[System] Run a text-based dark fantasy adventure game. Describe the world with gritty realism, respond to player actions with narrative consequences, and maintain the tone of a world where survival is never guaranteed.

[User] You leave her alone

[Assistant] It was best to just leave the girl alone. She had her own problems, and if she wanted to keep them to herself until she left this world for good, then it was on her. It would only cause problems if you tried to get involved and she started freaking out or something, besides everyone seemed to have a happy day today, best not to ruin it.


[System] You are the game master of a dark fantasy text adventure. The world is dangerous and choices matter. Narrate with immersive detail and let the story unfold naturally from the player's decisions.

[User] You pay for Starflower

[Assistant] You pay for Starflower, and all others live. You quickly undress, and allow your animal instincts to take over. Over the next hour you make sure to enjoy every inch of the young elf's body, and learn she's very, very skilled at her job. After an hour you finish, clean yourself up and leave, happier than you've ever been.


[System] You are narrating an interactive fiction game in a dark fantasy setting. Bring the world to life with vivid prose, react meaningfully to player choices, and don't pull punches when the story demands it.

[User] Continue

[Assistant]
You decide that keeping a bit of distance from Julie might be for the best for now. After last night you don't want her to think you're lingering around her because there is something there between you two.

Johnny seems a bit odd, but then you're certainly used to odd people. You grab a trash bag and start cleaning up left over beer cans.

"Thanks, but you don't need to help me. Your girlfriend probably could use the help more than I do." Johnny says.
"Well I do live here now, so it's gotta get clean or I'm living in a pig pen! And Julie isn't my girlfriend." You say.
"Oh. Sorry, I just assumed that you two coming out of the same room together…"
"Eh, long story. But she's just my friend and I consoled her on a troubling topic. It got emotional and she slept in my room, though I'm fairly certain Julie wishes it had gone farther."
"Hm, I see. Well your sister didn't mention you had a girlfriend when she spoke about you last night, so I was sort of wondering."
"Wow, I must've really pissed my sister off yesterday if she was talking about me to a stranger. Would've thought she would've been focusing on other things during a party. What exactly did she say?"
"Are you sure you want to know?" Johnny asks.
"It probably isn't going to be anything I haven't already heard before from her, so go ahead."
"Well…she was sort of drunk when she started talking to me. I was actually surprised, since a girl like her doesn't normally just go up and talk to a guy like me, well at least not when there are other guys around. Anyway, she at first propositioned me to go into the basement with her. When I declined, she got more hostile and started calling me a faggot and said I didn't know how to have fun just like her sister Suzy."
"And that's when she went on a tirade?"
"Yeah, I was about to leave her since it isn't my idea of a good time to be ranted at and insulted, but she grabbed my arm and practically forced me to listen. She went on about you being good and perfect and never doing anything wrong. Basically she said all this stuff about you as if they were supposed to be bad things, but I didn't see it. I guess that just made her even madder so she eventually told me to fuck off and later on I saw her leave with that group I mentioned earlier."
"Yeah sounds like her. (Sigh) I jut hope she hasn't gone and done anything more stupid than usual. Family. What can ya do?" you say.
"Heh, don't need to tell me. I had an older sister just like your younger one. Partied all the time, lot of sex, lot of drugs, pissed my mom off something fierce when we were still living with her." Johnny says continuing to pick up cans and placing them in a bag.
"Oh I got an older sister too, but she's even worse than Donna."
"Party girl too huh?"
"No, she's just a fucking sadistic bully. Had to put up with her abuse for years."
"Your older sister sounds like my mother."

While the tone of his voice reflects no anger though, you notice when Johnny mentions that, his hand crushes one of the beer cans he has. He looks at it briefly and then tosses it in the bag.

You wonder if you should stop talking altogether, but Johnny has already noticed that you've been staring at what he's done.

"Sorry, bad memories. I didn't meant to scare you there." Johnny says.
"I wasn't scared, just more surprised. We can get off the topic of families."
"Heh, actually I was thinking we were kind of bonding a bit. Sounds like both of us come from fucked up families. Probably made us stronger right?"
"I dunno. I mean I suppose I've survived, not sure if that's the same thing. I mean this is like the second day I've spent away from home. I only moved out yesterday and only then due to being under duress from my sister Kelly. I've always been a bit introverted and spent most of my life avoiding the outside world."
"Eh, you're not missing much. To be honest, I'm almost jealous you managed to do it for so long. I'm a bit of an introvert too, but occasionally I to mix with the crowd as it were. Just to see if I feel any different. Hence one of the reasons why I came to your friend's party last night."
"And?"
"And, I don't feel any different. Just like I figured. It's like I spoke with several other people last night even before your sister and everyone was just…dull…boring…like they were just empty shells. Like they weren't even real people to me. To be quite honest before your sister started complaining about you to me, I was getting bored and nearly left the party." Johnny says as he motions over to a few of the sleeping lumps still in the living room.
"What about your friend that you came with?"
"Oh him? I came here independently of him. Hell, he didn't even show up. Really, he's more of an acquaintance than a friend anyway…"

Johnny's eyes sort of glaze over when he says this and he breaks in the middle of his sentence. Almost like he's in a different "place." '

"Johnny?" you say.
"Hrm? Sorry, I just kind of spaced out there. Anyway as I was saying, you haven't missed much by not being a social butterfly, I think this group here is proof of that. And as far as not being strong, you're stronger than you think. Despite coming from a dysfunctional family, you haven't succumbed to drug and sex filled escapism like your younger sister and you obviously haven't grown to become a mean bully like your older sister. The fact that you told me you spent the night consoling your best friend rather than indulging in some sort of meaningless hedonistic pleasure tells me that you're a kind and gentle soul. That's a rarity in this shitty world."

You have to admit, as strange as this Johnny is, you do get the sense he's being genuine when he says this to you.

"Well thank you Johnny." You say.

Just as you're about to converse more with him, you hear some loud noise coming from the second floor. You hear a man's voice and a female voice, and then a very familiar voice. Sounds like Julie and it sounds like she's gone back to distracting herself from last night's concerns.

"Oh yes! Ohhhh yeah! Give it to me daddy!" you hear Julie scream.

A little disturbing choice of words considering what you both talked about last night.

Some of the people sleeping in the living room are even awakened by this. One of them looks at his watch and immediately runs out the front door like he's late for something. A couple of others return to sleep.

"Sounds like your friend is feeling better." Johnny says a little disdainfully.
"Mm, well she always was one to get over things quickly. Well looks like we're all done in this room anyway."
"Yeah, hey why don't you take a break? I mean obviously we don't need to clean this place spotlessly. Your friend Julie is just going to have another party tonight right?" Johnny says.
"True. Yeah, I guess you're right. No point in me cleaning especially if Julie isn't even going to be helping anymore, but what about you?" you ask.
"Me? Well I'm just going to dump out the trash and maybe pick up a few more of the bottles in the kitchen on the way. I'll probably also take another pursue down in the basement. It was a mess down there, but I think I cleaned most of it. Nearly tripped on a bad step down there though. Anyway then I guess I'll head home, I need the sleep anyway seeing as I haven't been yet."
"You didn't sleep here?"
"Nope. I've been awake the whole time, but I find I'm more of a night owl and don't sleep much anyway."
"Well I understand that, but I'm just surprised you stayed. You told me you were getting bored with the party and were about to go home at one point."
"Ah, but I also mentioned that after your sister complained about you to me, my interest was increased." Johnny says.

You pause because you almost can't believe what he's implying.

"Wait a minute. Are you saying you just stayed at the party through the night AND this morning just to meet me at some point? Just solely based on what my sister bitched about to you?"
"What can I say? You sounded interesting and after speaking with you I can see I wasn't wrong."

Johnny smiles and you smile with a nervous laugh. On one hand it's a little stalkerish and combined with Johnny's oddness, he's starting to come off a lot creepier.

On the other hand, in a strange way you're sort of flattered. You always did attract the weird ones Suzy.

"Wow…I'm not exactly sure what to say to that." You say.
"No need to say anything. The pleasure of speaking with you is all mine. Oh but one more thing, did you want me to get rid of these useless sloths still sleeping in the living room before I leave?"
"Well, they're probably just going to be here for tonight's party, so might as well just leave 'em I suppose. No need to trouble yourself."
"Okay then, as I said, it was nice talking with you Suzy."
"It was…interesting talking with you too Johnny." You reply back and head towards your room as Johnny starts taking a couple of garbage bags to the kitchen.

What a strange person. Even stranger is that your self-esteem has been a little boosted by Johnny's stalkerish behavior.

Before Johnny's praising of you, in the back of your mind you were still a little upset about Bobby and starting to realize you were alone again. Not that you had any major problems with being alone and you're certainly used to it, but it still was nice to have a boyfriend every now and then.

After Johnny going on about how most people suck and putting you on a minor pedestal you don't feel as bad anymore about Bobby. Screw him right? He's the one missing out.

You enter your room and lock your door fully content on tuning out the rest of the world like you always do. You go back to fucking around on the Internet, playing games and when the mood strikes you, getting out your mechanical "boyfriend" who never disappoints you.

Hours pass…

Eventually the silence from outside your door becomes less silent. Looks like Julie's party is getting started or at least getting louder.

You don't really pay it too much mind as you pretty much managed to block it somewhat yesterday, but then you get a knock on the door.

"Julie?" you ask instinctively.
"Um, no it's me." A familiar voice answers.
"Johnny?" you say and then slowly get up to answer the door.

You open it up a little and see Johnny standing before you (Along with some party people passing by in the hallway).

"Hi again." He says with a brief smile.

"What are you doing here? Did you even go home?" you ask.
"Oh yeah, I did, but just as I was finishing up in the kitchen, your friend Julie had come in to get some more booze. She mentioned that she appreciated my cleaning up and invited me back for tonight's party. So I came back."
"Really?"
"Well technically she also invited me to come join her and the couple up in her room, but I declined as you might aspect. Not an orgy guy."
"Yeah, which is why I'm really wondering why you came back at all. I mean I have to live here, but this really isn't your thing. You said as much earlier today."
"I know what I said…but I also said…"
Johnny's expression becomes… not quite flustered, not quite angry, but more like he's having a hard time and you've just put him on the spot.

"(Sigh) Look. This is really difficult for me. I'm probably coming off like a creepy stalker and god knows you probably get a lot of guys hitting on you…but I like you. I know that sounds like third grade shit, but there it is. I really like you and I'd like to get to know you better. That's why I came back tonight."

Oddly that was honest enough to actually be kind of charming. Lot better than the "Show us your tits" pick up line that you've heard before.

Then again, Johnny is still pretty damn weird and much like how you didn't want to lead on Julie; you don't necessarily want to lead Johnny on either.

[User] You decline

[Assistant]
As charmingly strange as Johnny's awkwardness is you're still not quite ready to go jumping into a relationship with another guy.

"That's sweet Johnny. Really it is. It's just… I'm not looking for another relationship right now. I just broke up with my boyfriend and I think I need to be by myself for a while." You say.
"Boyfriend? I see. I suppose a pretty girl like you would have a lot of them." Johnny says. You notice his tone sort of becomes "flat" when he says this.
"Pfft hardly. He was my first and only one." You say.

And as quickly as his demeanor changed before, it changes AGAIN just as quickly. Before you got the impression he was almost pissed upon hearing you even HAD a boyfriend despite the fact he was your ex. After your additional information, it's almost like he's perked up again.

"Ah, okay…I understand. First love and lost. Been there before. Say no more, I'll leave you be. It was a long shot anyway."

Just as Johnny is about to leave, you sort of feel like you should say something helpful.

"Johnny?"
"Yes, Suzy?"
"You're a good guy Johnny, and I'm sure there's some girl out there for you."
"I know, but she probably killed herself when she found out I was the guy for her." Johnny says with a small chuckle.

"Anyway, thank you for being upfront and trying to be encouraging. I must say though, whoever your ex was, he must've been an idiot to let you get away."

You watch as Johnny disappears into the crowd and you shut your door.

Having dealt with your momentary break up of your usual routine, you briefly check your phone for the time and to see if maybe your sister tried to call (You still think she probably got hauled in by the cops) but nobody has called.

Having little else to do, you go back to what you were doing before.

Hours pass and you start to get hungry which unfortunately means you're going to have to brave going out there and raiding the kitchen assuming there's even anything in there.

You exit your room and find that the party is still as lively as ever. Nobody pays too much attention to you as you creep through the crowd.

The kitchen is a complete wreck. You don't exactly know what went on in here, but there is some guy lying face down on a broken kitchen table. His head is bleeding and there are several broken beer bottles all over the floor. You almost hesitate to step inside the room, though there are a couple of other people just standing around in the kitchen drinking as if nothing was wrong.

"Jesus Christ." You say. "Does that guy need an ambulance?" you ask.

Eventually one of the people in the kitchen realizes you were asking them.

"Hrm? Oh him? Yeah he's fine. Just got drunk, got into a fight and then well as you can see he wasn't the winner. He does this all the time." A girl says in a bored tone.
"Yeah well I'd appreciate it, if he and whoever else was involved hadn't wrecked the goddamn kitchen in the process!"
"What's the big deal and what concern is it of yours? It's Julie's kitchen and she won't care."
"I happen to live here so it actually is somewhat of my concern, and where is Julie anyway?"
"I dunno. Probably getting fucked as usual. Still don't know why you're worried about it. Besides some weird guy said he was getting something to clean up the mess anyway." The girl says and goes back to talking with the guy she was previously talking to.

"Weird guy?" you say to yourself.
"Hey, Suzy."

You turn around and see Johnny behind you with a broom, a dustpan and some sort of cleaning product.

"Johnny, what are you still doing…wait, have you been lingering all night around hoping that I might come out of my room?"

Johnny looks away a bit as if you hit the nail on the head.

"Well…actually at first I was kind of hoping that maybe you'd change your mind and come running out of your room to find me. A silly storybook fantasy really…but then after about an hour of indulging in that delusion I realized I needed to accept reality. I was going to leave, but then I suddenly got offered a video game controller from a guy that stopped playing, so I started playing. I ended up getting sort of wrapped up in the game, shooting people in the face, murdering hookers and such. Sort of fun, and made me feel better."

Johnny passes you by and starts sweeping up broken glass and continues talking.

"After my escapism with virtual violence then I decided to go home, but then I heard about a fight going on in the kitchen so I decided to be a spectator, but by the time I got here, it was already over and the winner went out the back door. I didn't think it was right to just leave your kitchen like this even if nobody else cared, so I tried to find your friend Julie because I didn't want to bother you again since you made your feelings quite clear to me and I didn't want to look like a stalker."
"A little late for that, Johnny." You say.
"Heh, well anyway I couldn't find her. I asked around and someone said she left wit ha couple guys. So not knowing what else to do, I just decided to clean up the mess myself before I left."

"Wait a minute, are you telling me Julie isn't here for her own fucking party?"
"Uh, no it appears she isn't."

It's one thing to have to put up with the parties when she's actually here, but if she's not even going to be here then why the hell do you have to still put up with it? So much for Julie's sob story about going to turn over a new leaf after your talk. You're annoyed and to top it off you're still really hungry.

"Goddamnit all I wanted to do is get some food from the fucking kitchen…" you say.
"Did you want me to order a pizza for you?"
"I don't have any money."
"So? I got some money, I'll be happy to buy you a pizza, I'll get you a drink too."

Actually you don't have anything against Johnny's offer, but you're hesitant to accept.

"Johnny, I'll accept your offer, BUT I don't want YOU to get it in your head that I owe you something because of it."
"Thought never crossed my mind." Johnny says. He doesn't even seem hurt by your implication.
"Okay. Sorry, I got a little authoritative there."
"No, no, I get it. It's smart for you to lay that out there immediately. Anyway I'll call up the place and I'll get it to you when it's here. In the meantime you can go back and relax in your room if you wish." Johnny says continuing to sweep.

"Oh. Um okay. Thanks. Hey, do you think we should call an ambulance for that guy on the floor?" you ask Johnny.
"Him? Nah, he's fine. I actually checked him soon after I came in here. Really I would've rolled him over on his back, but with all the broken glass on the floor I probably would've done more harm. Anyway I got this, don't worry." Johnny says.

Well he might be a weird guy who seems creepy at times and is definitely stalking you a bit, but at least he's helpful which is more that can be said for Julie who has seemingly just abandoned her own party. You try to call her up, but you get no answer, but you weren't really expecting one anyway.

Still it is weird that she left. Julie's always been irresponsible, but she's like you in that she barely ever leaves the house. After all, why would she go get fucked, drunk and high elsewhere when she can do it right here?

In any case, she'll probably be back, and you go back to wasting your time on the Internet. After a half hour passes and there's a knock on the door.

"Pizza delivery." Johnny says.
"Okay." You answer and get up to open the door.
"Here you go. I ordered a standard pepperoni and cheese pizza and got you Coke. Hope that's okay, since I forgot to ask what you like."
"It's fine. Thank you."
"Alright then, I'll leave you be." Johnny says starting to leave.

You don't know what it is about this guy but…

"Hey Johnny, did you want some pizza?"
"Huh? Oh, nah. I'm good. I ate a little earlier. I don't tend to eat much anyway."
"Hm, don't eat much, don't sleep much. You sure you're human?" you half joke.

This causes an unusual guffaw of laughter that you didn't expect from him.

"I sometimes wonder that myself." He says still chuckling. "Enjoy the rest of your evening Suzy."

Johnny once again disappears into the crowd in the living room and you lock your door.

The rest of your night is pretty much eating your pizza, drinking your coke, taking a quick shower and then eventually settling in for the night. You have no idea if the part is still going on outside, but the noise has decreased a little, so maybe it's starting to wind down.

Well at least you don't need to share your bed this time.

[User] Next day…

[Assistant]
WEDNESDAY

You wake up to the hum of a vacuum passing the outside your door. You shake your head, because you know who that probably is.

You check your phone for the time and see that you've slept through the morning as usual and nobody has called.

As you go through your bathroom routine of brushing your teeth and such, you ponder on whether or not you should check how trashed the house is or just stay in your room and not deal with it.

Ultimately you decide to check despite not really wanting to. Besides Johnny is obviously out there and you're going to have to do something about him.

You exit your room and find that the hallway is fairly clean and the hum of the vacuum is now coming from the living room.

"At it again are you Johnny?" you say walking into the living room. The living room is spotless and you notice that unlike the last time you don't see anyone flopped out on the floor or sofa.

"Hi Suzy, did you sleep well last night?" Johnny asks while turning off the vacuum.
"Yeah. So did Julie ever come back?"
"Nope, I never saw her again. Guess she might've stayed the night somewhere else."
"(Sigh) I see. Is there anyone else here?"
"Nope, you'll be pleased to know that I eventually managed to kick everyone out of the house, of course some just left anyway, but I figured you'd be glad to not have your home resemble a flophouse when you woke up."
"Wait, so are you telling me there's nobody else here?"
"Nope, except me of course."

That makes you feel a little uneasy.

"Uh…okay…" you say and start backing away a bit. You briefly wonder how fast you could run to the back door and escape and then you wonder if you could run into your room and grab that pistol that's still in Julie's dad's desk.

Johnny already senses your distress.

"Shit. I've done it again. I've made you uncomfortable. I'm sorry Suzy, I just…I dunno. I don't mean to be creepy, I just wanted to make things nice for you." Johnny says and actually starts walking backwards from you in an effort to put you more at ease.

"Johnny, I know you mean well and I know that you like me, but like I said, I'm just not ready for anyone right now."
"I know, I know, I know you said so before…but how can I win your heart if I don't continue to try? Couldn't we at least just talk more? I mean we really haven't gotten to talk a lot one on one with just us around." Johnny says.

"Johnny…" you start to say, but then you're interrupted from something loud outside.
"What the hell…" Johnny says and walks over to one of the windows to peek.

"Holy shit, there's a bunch of military guys, a couple of military trucks and even an A.P.C. coming down the street!" Johnny remarks.

At first you can't believe him, but that soon disappears when a loudspeaker is heard.

"ATTENTION! THIS TOWN IS UNDER MARSHAL LAW AND THIS NEIGHBORHOOD IS NOW UNDER WATCH BY THE U.S. NATIONAL GUARD. A GOVERNMENT REPRESENTATIVE WILL SOON VISIT ALL OF YOU AND ASSIST IN ANYTHING THAT YOU MAY NEED DURING THIS STATE OF EMERGENCY. STAY IN YOUR HOMES. DO NOT COME OUT FOR ANY REASON. FAILURE TO DO SO MAY RESULT IN THE USE OF LETHAL FORCE."

Well that is certainly something you didn't expect. You also don't know what you're going to do. Why is this town under marshal law? What the hell is going on?

While you're not sure of why this is happening, Johnny has some thoughts on the matter though.

"Wow, I really hope this isn't something serious, like some biological weapon or something…but then I've been watching the news while vacuuming and there's been no emergency broadcast about such a thing or anything. Just those Ground Zero infomercials, which have been increasing as of late."

Johnny turns back to you.

"Well anyway, I suppose one upside to all this. With us being stuck inside, we can talk and get to know each other better like I was suggesting before." Johnny remarks.

While Johnny has been just slightly on the side of creepy there actually is no proof that he isn't just someone that lacks proper social skills and is a bit head over heels for you. And considering your last boyfriend was going around sacrificing people and could be very outwardly charming and charismatic, the way someone acts isn't necessarily who they really are deep down inside.

Maybe if you did get to know Johnny a bit better, you might feel different. Not ready to spread your legs different, but if you like what you hear he might actually make that step towards "winning your heart" as he put it. (Something about that phrase sounded so quaint that it actually was endearing)

"Oh…all right. It's not like I've got anything better to do at this point, but I'm warning you, don't get the wrong impression. This isn't a date or anything." You say.
"No, no, I got it. I just want a chance that's all."

After you sit on the living room couch and motion that he sit in the chair you begin.
"Okay then…well what should we talk about first? It isn't like I'm usually that much of a conversationalist myself." You say.
"Well what do you like?" Johhny asks.

A general question, but a perfectly reasonable one for getting straight to the point on wanting to know more about someone.

The funny thing is there isn't much about you to know. Since you don't get out much, you don't DO much. The only time you did get out a little more was when you were with Bobby, and you can't very well talk about shit you did with your ex.

So you mention hobbies such as watching movies, playing games, and reading shit on the Internet. (You leave out masturbation) Sounds like a pretty dull life to the average person, but Johnny doesn't seem to care.

"You don't find what I said boring?" you ask.
"Simple perhaps, but I wouldn't say boring. Are you happy?"
"Well I was happier when I could live in my basement and not have to deal with the rest of the world, and it would've been nicer to not have to put up with Kelly, but yeah I suppose I was happy just living like that."
"Then that's all that matters. Me? I've been sort of drifting from place to place ever since I left home. To be honest it would be nice to have some place to call a permanent home, but something always happens and I end up having to move on again. As you might aspect I've had several lines of employment, I'm not rich but I suppose I at least know a little bit of everything to make a living."
"Sounds like you've had way more luck in that department at least. I'm flat broke and can't even get a job. So why did you leave home in the first place?"
"It was time. Really don't want to go back either. Not fond of the memories… so hey did you hear from your sister? I mean did she call or leave a message or something?" Johnny asks, changing the topic.
"Nope, and now with this marshal law thing going on, I'm a little concerned about her. Julie too. Who knows where the hell either of them are. I'm even wondering if I should call my brother Peter to see if things are all right with him, though I imagine he's probably fine."
"You have a brother too? Wow, two sisters and a brother. You have a big family."
"I actually had an older brother Ben as well, but he died."
"Oh? Sorry to hear that. Should I ask how?"
"He killed his family and then blew his brains out in our house." You say.
"Wait…what? Why?" Johnny says a bit off guard.
"Well I wasn't there for the final show, but he apparently thought the government was coming to get him and that it would be better if he killed his wife and son rather than they get captured and brainwashed. Something like that. He always was paranoid and just got worse as he got older."
"I see. And you say there was no truth to his stories about the government?"
"Of course not."
"Are you sure? I mean just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean that they aren't still trying to get you."
"Pretty sure if he was that much of a threat to the government they would've assassinated him long before he killed himself. And even if they were out to get him, there wasn't any need for him to kill his wife and kid."
"Well I guess I can just see it from his point of view. He genuinely believed in his mind that the government was going to get him and seeing it as a losing battle and not wanting to lose those he loved to the enemy, his act of killing them was out of love. Kind of romantic really."

Johnny is so deadpan, you think he's attempting some sort of dark humor, but you realize he's being completely serious. Somehow you're not really surprised.

"…yeah well I'm just glad he didn't love me then…" you remark.
"I'm glad that's the case too." Johnny says with a smile.
"So what about you? You said you had a mother and an older sister." You ask.
"Oh them. Eh, not much to tell I suppose. Like I said yesterday, your younger sister sounds very much like my older one, and your older sister sounds very much like my mother."
"You mother participated in illegal underground fight clubs and roller derby races?"
"No. Wait, your sister really does all that?" Johnny asks.
"Yeah, so what makes your mom so bad?"
"Very domineering. Verbally abusive, sometimes physically. Emotionally too I guess."
"What about your father?"
"Dunno, never knew him. Took off before I was born. My sister is only one year older than me, so she doesn't remember him either. Just know that my mom hated his guts. Didn't keep any pictures of him. What about yours?"
"Eh, he was a travelling lightning rod salesman, so it was like he was never home. When mom died of the flesh-eating virus though he was practically home all the time and just gradually drank himself to death over the years. Still wasn't really there for any of us."

Johnny nods and continues the conversation.

"After hearing about your family…I'm starting to wonder if I really had it all that bad and perhaps I just think I did."
"What do you mean?"
"Well like I said, my mother was very domineering, but I pretty much did what my mom said. I mean I hate to say I was a mama's boy, but I didn't really step out of line compared to my sister."
"Heh, sounds a little like me. Did pretty much what my mom told me too though she was the nicest one in my family. She probably was a little too sheltering of me though."

You go on a bit more about your mother since you're actually enjoying remembering the good times you did have with her. Johnny listens intently. Most of the time he looks like he's displaying happiness because you're mentioning positive memories, but sometimes you catch a glimpse of him looking away from you as if he's in another place.

"She sounds like a very nice person and I can see where you get your kind qualities from. Sorry to hear that she died in such an awful way…just yet another example of how you've overcome so much hardship in your life."

Now Johnny looks as if he's completely gone to another place. He stares downward vacantly, if he was staring in your direction, you'd feel like he would be staring through you.

"Johnny? Johnny? You with me?" you say.

Takes him a few moments, but eventually he answers.

"I'm not feeling…myself… I should go."
"What? Go? Where are you going to go? Are you sick?"

Once again Johnny doesn't answer right away.

"Yes." He answers.

The monotone voice he answers with, isn't exactly relaxing and you get the strong impression when he acknowledged that he's sick, he didn't mean physically.

He starts to get up, and he wobbles a bit. At first you think maybe he is physically sick, but then he also said he was tired. Considering he was cleaning up earlier, he probably never went home and stayed up all night again.

"Johnny you can't go out there, especially in your condition. The National Guard is out there, remember?"
"I'm not worried about some weekend warriors, I can be stealthy when I want to be. I'm just glad you gave me a chance Suzy, but I fear I've wasted your time. I'm sorry." Johnny says and then attempts to walk out the front door, but his balance isn't the best.

You aren't sure what's going on with Johnny right now, but it's even weirder than usual.

[User] You let him leave

[Assistant]
As much you don't necessarily relish the idea of possibly sending a man to his death, he's not your responsibility and it's already weird he's been sticking around when there isn't anyone else here maybe it would be best if you let him leave especially if he's implying that he's mentally ill.

Besides if he claims he can sneak past the National Guard, then who are you to disbelieve him.

"Okay, but you probably should go out the backdoor at least." You say.
"Yeah, good idea. You're so thoughtful to look out for my well being. I just wish…things could've been different…" Johhny says and starts stumbling back towards the kitchen.

You follow Johnny just to make sure he doesn't fall or something similar. When you reach the kitchen you're impressed with how clean it is. You'd never know there was a drunk fool lying on a broken table yesterday.

"How the hell did you get this so clean?" you ask.
"Oh, I'm very (yawn) good at cleaning. Always have been. There's also some pizza and another drink for you in the fridge. I got an (yawn) extra one yesterday in case you got hungry today. Don't worry, I made sure nobody touched it."
"Wow Johnny, that was pretty thoughtful. Thank you."
"No problem. I just hope someone will be as good to you as you deserve. Goodbye Suzy." Johnny says and walks out the backdoor.

You walk to the door and peer out the window to see if he's going to jump the fence, but you see him walk around the house. You hope he isn't going to try to go through the front gate again and is just going to cut through a neighbor's yard.

You run back to a couple of other rooms peering out windows, but you don't see him anymore. You look out one of the front windows and he's not out there either. He must've already made his escape you guess or at least you hope so.

Lacking any other ideas of what to do at this particular time, you grab the pizza and drink from the fridge and head back to your room. You also attempt to call up Donna, Julie and even Peter to see if you can find out more information on their situations, but you get no answer from any of them.

After passing some time on your laptop, you suddenly hear a loud banging on a door.
Not the door to your room, but somewhere in the house. Upon exiting your room, it sounds like its coming from the front door.

You remember that the loudspeaker from earlier did say there was going to be a government representative coming to visit the houses in the neighborhood.

You head to the living room and look through the door window and see a well-dressed man and one soldier at the door.

Since you get the impression the government will most likely just break the door down if you don't answer the best thing you can do is be polite and accommodating.

You grab the handle…

"Greetings miss. I'm Mr. Zoll and I've been assigned to be the government representative for this area. May we come in?" Mr. Zoll asks, though it's pretty obvious that this is more of a polite formality rather than asking permission.
"Of course." You answer and let Mr. Zoll and his soldier companion in.

Mr. Zoll sits on the chair while his soldier buddy stands nearby and you sit on the other side of the couch and ask what all this is about.

"My name's Suzy, so how can we help exactly?" you ask.
"Well, before we start I know this isn't an ideal situation. You're probably already concerned about what's going on and why this town is under marshal law in the first place." Mr. Zoll answers.
"It is all a bit worrying." You reply.
"I'm sure. Unfortunately I can't talk about it too much, however I'm sure you're aware that this town has experienced a vast increase in criminal activity and rioting. More than your police force can handle. So until we get the situation under control again, we're here to stay."
"Well I certainly can understand that. I haven't experienced any criminal activity in this neighborhood though, well at least not to my knowledge."
"Hmm, yes this is one of the quieter ones. Some places I'm hearing about are pretty bad. Anyway I'd like to ask a few questions before deciding if we need to search this house further."
"Oh. Um, okay then. I have nothing to hide."
"Good glad to… hear it." Mr. Zoll says.
"So do you own this place?"
"My friend Julie does."
"Oh? You're not the owner? Where is this Julie?"
"Uh, don't know. She skipped out on her own party yesterday and never came back home. She's a bit of a free spirit."
"Hmmm…" Mr. Zoll says and begins to write something down.
"Why are you writing? Did I say something wrong? I mean not that I meant to say anything is wrong, that is. Everything is just fine! Ha ha."

Mr. Zoll's staring and questioning makes you nervous and now Mr. Zoll is looking at you a bit mistrustfully. He thinks something is wrong and now that you're shifting a bit uncomfortably, he starts to think you're covering up something even though you aren't!

"Okay, you know what. I think it'll be easier to just give a brief search of the house." Mr. Zoll says standing up to say.
"Um, all right then. I have nothing to hide as I said." You say.

Mr. Zoll tells his man to go take a quick look through all the rooms while the two of you stay in the living room. The soldier nods and follows his orders. He first goes upstairs and looks through. You half expect him to find a stash of drugs in Julie or Donna's room, but he either doesn't or that isn't their primary concern.

Next the soldier comes back downstairs and searches the ground floor, but once again finds nothing that is going to get you into trouble.

"Searched everywhere sir, well except the basement." The soldier says when he comes back.
"Well you might as well search that too." Mr. Zoll remarks.

The soldier nods and heads back towards the hallway. You hear the door open to the basement and then a few footsteps going down and then nothing.

You and Mr. Zoll sit in silence for a while. You don't say anything, in fact you don't even look in his direction for fear of giving Mr. Zoll an excuse to do something else which might not be as pleasant as a simple search.

"Where the hell is he…shouldn't be taking this long… Jacobs! Jacobs! Did you find anything?! Because if not, we've got other houses to go to!" Mr. Zoll shouts.

There is no answer. Mr. Zoll calls again and still nothing. Mr. Zoll looks at you as if it's your fault.

"Is there someone down there?" Mr. Zoll asks.
"What? No! I mean isn't your man Jacobs the only one down there?" you say nervously.
"That's what I'm asking you…let's go find out shall we?" Mr. Zoll says and then turns your nervousness into flat out fear by suddenly pulling out a pistol from his suit pocket.

You put up your hands and attempt to say you have no idea what's going on, but Mr. Zoll won't hear it, he's convinced you're hiding someone in the basement and you're going first down there. He also tells you to be completely quiet and not make any fuss or else he's just going to shoot you on the spot and have a squad come in and burn this place to the ground.

Meekly you comply and you head towards the basement with Mr. Zoll pointing his gun at you from behind.

You reach the bottom of the stairs and you notice blood on the floor nearby and then suddenly a knife is plunged into your throat from an arm around the corner.

You fall to the floor in what almost feels like slow motion as you gurgle your last words and breathe your last breaths.

With your last vision from the cold basement floor, you think you see Johnny standing over you. You can't hear him, but he's obvious upset when he sees you. Then you see a burst of blood come out of his head and then you feel the heavy weight of his body collapse on top of you before the darkness envelopes your world.


[System] Narrate a grim fantasy text adventure. The Empire's world is brutal, its people hardened. Respond to the player's choices with immersive storytelling and let consequences flow naturally.

[User] You say "What's your name?"

[Assistant]
You flash the young girl a warm smile

"Hello there, what's your name?"

The girl stammers out an answer

"L-lynette, milord"

You nod solemnly

"A very pretty name. Who gave it to you?"

While you spoke, Lynette had slipped on her threadbare tunic, in her panic she has managed to entangle the fabric around her face, and the cloth muffles her voice

"My mother works in the kitchen, milord"

"And the father?"

You inquire

"I don't know, milord"

She replies quietly, having finally wrestled her tunic into its proper position. With her attention switched from her tunic back to you, her embarrassment returns

"If milord will excuse me, I should be getting back to the kitchens"

"Of course"

Blushing profusely, the young servant girl scurries towards the door, executing a clumsy curtsy as she passes you. Your son stares after her longingly, he sighs, and you nod knowingly

"Is she a favorite of yours?"

Your son looks shocked

"I love her, father"


[System] Narrate a grim fantasy text adventure. The Empire's world is brutal, its people hardened. Respond to the player's choices with immersive storytelling and let consequences flow naturally.

[User] You lie

[Assistant]
"She was taken off to be ransomed off by one of the travelling ratlings."

You see the runes of the blade glowing, as the man snarls.

"Liar. The knife speaks to your honesty. The truth, now, or you die."


[System] You are narrating an interactive fiction game in a dark fantasy setting. Bring the world to life with vivid prose, react meaningfully to player choices, and don't pull punches when the story demands it.

[User] You hide in the burnt out cottage

[Assistant] You quickly make your way to the burnt out cottage. As you reach the clearing and see the blackened thatch and ash and the burnt stone, you feel nervous. Still, with your crucifix clutched tightly in your hands, you move forward into the burnt out cottage. You step through the doorway, crouching down into the ash. You pause, as you notice several black, burnt bones sit in the ash. You frown and wince, realizing that Rose's mother does, as a matter of fact, still live in this house… or at least, she stays here. You don't want Rose to have to come here and relive whatever awful memories he has. You wonder whether this is a good spot to hide.

[User] You stay here

[Assistant]
You wait there in the burnt out cottage for at least an hour, far longer than it ever took Rose to find you before. Eventually, you see her cautiously approaching towards the house, sniffing the air.

"Jacob? You're not in the house, are you? If you are, come out, please, she says nervously.

You step up, peering out at her from behind the stone wall. She frowns, looking annoyed.

"Jacob! I told you to stay away from here!" she says, sprinting towards you and grabbing you by the wrist.

She begins dragging you along the path home.

"What? I needed somewhere to hide," you say.

"Not there!" Rose complains, fiddling with her wooden ring. "It's going to take forever to get your scent out of the ash so she doesn't know you were there!"

"She's..." you begin to say, before deciding to hold your tongue.

"What?" Rose asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Nothing," you say. "I'm sorry. I won't go near there again."

"It's OK," Rose says. "Come on, it's been a while. You need to get home."

You nod, and walk home alongside her.


[System] Narrate a grim fantasy text adventure. The Empire's world is brutal, its people hardened. Respond to the player's choices with immersive storytelling and let consequences flow naturally.

[User] Continue

[Assistant]
You really didn't have any desire to know these people before, why bother now? You only worked there because you needed to. Now that it appears the whole world is going to hell, you might as well just stay home. You wonder if you shouldn't have prepared yourself for this inevitable event, but it's too late now. Last time you heard, the city was in complete anarchy, riots were breaking out and the National Guard was shooting people, can't get supplies from there now. The nearest general store closed up by its owner who headed up north with his family a month ago. Whatever supplies you have in your house will have to do. You start walking around armed at all times as you often think you'll be attacked by stray looters, who have escaped the city, but then again you live in a house on the dead end of wilderness, nobody ever comes out this way normally, and you never see another living soul.

You're all alone.

You spend much of your time watching TV and on the internet keeping up on events, one day blurring into the next as you often fall asleep after spending long amounts of time of being awake…

Monday 8:00 AM

You groggily wake up from the sofa.

"…BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE…."

You wake up to a test pattern on TV.

This is it.

[User] You head down to your basement

[Assistant]
It's always been like you to do things at the last minute.

After grabbing your pistol and all the food and drink you can, then heading down in the basement with it, you think that things probably won't be that bad. After all you don't live in the city, or even by an important city, surely not EVERY place will get bombed. It's not like you live on the east or west coast, now those people are going to be fucked.

No, all you have to do is wait this out, and then things will get back to normal…okay well maybe not normal, but surely the government will restore order of some sort, you're sure they have a complex plan for this kind of thing.

Eventually you hear a very loud noise; whatever light you had on in the basement immediately goes out as you can hear your house being hit by a powerful force. You curl up in a ball and hold your ears half expecting the entire house to collapse in on you, but it doesn't happen.

You stay in the basement, for what you guess to be a week. You mostly stumble around in the darkness as reality begins to set in and destroy your previous delusions. You mainly think about how you should've planned things out better, especially since your food and drink are running out. The only thing you know really know about nuclear attacks is what you've learned from movies, video games and comic books. You can only hope some of that shit was helpful, as you have little choice, but to leave your basement, the bucket you were using to relieve yourself down there was really starting to stink anyway.

You open up your basement door, which remarkably stayed intact, along with most of your house. The windows and other glass objects have all broke, and there's no power, but that's about it. You can only guess that whatever it was that hit, was far enough away and probably very low yield. You don't really want to think about the radioactivity factor though; you'll know if you're catching a lethal dose soon enough if your hair and teeth start falling out and you begin vomiting blood.

Damn you wish you bought that bomb shelter…

You check the refrigerator again for more food, but there won't be enough to last you one day. You wonder if the water is still working and turn on the faucet, of course it doesn't, you don't think you'd want to risk drinking any of it anyway. Well it looks like you can't stay in your house either; you're going to have to leave to find food and some sort of drinkable liquid.

Damn you wish you bought that bomb shelter…

Well if you're going to leave, you decide some sort of protection is in order; you grab some dishwashing gloves underneath the sink, some safety goggles you've had since you college chemistry class, a winter coat and finally a scarf your grandmother knit you for one of your birthdays to wrap over your mouth. You look somewhat silly in this getup and it probably won't protect you at all, but you're back to deluding yourself again which is probably a good thing since your relapses into fantasy are keeping you from breaking down completely.

You open your dented garage door and get in your old van expecting it not to work, surprisingly it does. You thought it wouldn't due to all that stuff you remember hearing about EMP waves or something, then again your car was built in a year before they started mounting entire computers in the fucking things, so maybe that's why it still works. You don't know, you're just glad its one of the things you still have that functions, you didn't want to be riding that bike you bought and hardly ever used. You throw your backpack of useful items (flashlight, small tool set, first aid kit, etc) into the van and ponder where to go.

You've got two choices that immediately come to mind assuming both still exist; one is that "Mom & Pop" General Store that was abandoned at least a month ago. You can't imagine they took everything from the place. The other choice is to risk going to the city and finding something there. Despite all the looting and mass exodus that was going on there before any of this went down, the city's still a big place and there's probably lots of useful stuff there, the problem is wondering if you'll be heading into a death zone. That radioactivity concern is still in the back of your mind.

Damn you wish you bought that bomb shelter…

[User] You head to the general store

[Assistant]
You might be absorbing more rads than usual now, but heading to the city would just be retarded. You'd probably die of cancer just going near the place; everything there would be contaminated anyway. You don't even want to see the survivors what the survivors might look like assuming there were any. You head for the general store, that's at least a safer bet.

You drive your Van to the general store not very far from your house. You remember the old guy who ran the place; Billy. He was always alright with you. Whenever you went in to buy food, he was always talking about how bad the state of world was getting and how he was going to be  prepared for when the nukes started flying. You're guessing he probably invested in one of those Ground Zero Survival Shelters you always saw for sale on TV and took himself and his wife to it. The last time you saw the place it was all boarded up and looked closed up for good, still it's a start.

You arrive at the store which is still all boarded up like the last time you've seen it. You always found it weird that Billy bothered to board the place up, if he was going to abandon it. Surely he couldn't have thought things would be restored so quickly after a nuclear exchange that he'd be able to return some day.

You get out of your van and study the store more closely which you never bothered to do before, the windows are boarded up from the outside, but upon closer inspection the door hasn't been boarded up at all. You try the door, but it's firmly locked. Nothing else for it, but to bash it down. You begin prying, slamming, kicking and everything else to the door, but its not budging and you only succeed in bruising your shoulder. In frustration you pull out your pistol and finally just shoot at the lock and then try to open it, which it does slightly, something else is barring the door from the inside though. You're going to have to start ramming the thing again to shove it open enough to get inside.

Suddenly you hear some noise from inside and the click of a shotgun, it's also only just then you realize that Billy's pick up truck is still parked by the side of his store. He's obviously still here and you were oblivious to the fact.

"Goddamn it Martha, hasn't been a month yet an' we already got scum tryin' ta loot the place!"

It's Billy. You thought he left, but apparently not. He just made it look like he did and barricaded himself inside.

"Alright you looting shit stain, you better just get the fuck outta here right now, 'fore you find yourself with a new hole in your chest!" Billy says from inside.
"Whoa Billy it's me! I used to shop here! Come on open up, I'm not a looter!" you reply.
"…(sigh) hold on, and back away from the goddamn door."

You back away as Billy presumably moves whatever was still blocking the door. When he finally opens it up, he stands in the doorway still pointing his shotgun at you.

"Damnation boy, I coulda blown your head off! You fuckin' destroyed my lock! What the hell are you wearin'?" Billy asks looking at your silly form of protection.
"I'm sorry; I thought you abandoned this place."
"Oh and that gave you the excuse to break in? What're you think yer doin' anyway? Why aren't you in your shelter or something?"
"Cause I don't have one that's why! I was going to see if this place had any supplies and maybe stay here, if it wasn't in bad condition."
"Oh. Well, sorry to crush yer dreams, but this place is still occupied and OWNED by me. You're gonna have to skedaddle. Just enough supplies for me and my wife."
"But…"
"No buts! Now you were a good customer an' all, but this is a new world and the rules have severely changed! It's all about survival now. And it's not my fault your ass didn't prepare for somethin' that was comin' for a long time! Now if you don't leave now I'm gonna be less understanding about this lack of judgment on your part. Bye and good luck."
"No wait!"

At this point Billy slams the door shut mumbling about the lock being destroyed and going to have to fix it. Billy must have some sort of private bomb shelter of his own, if he barricaded himself inside his own store. One that must be stocked pretty well to sustain him and his wife for a good amount of time.

An idea races through your head that you never thought you'd consider, well not before the nukes hit anyway, but Billy's statement of "This is about survival" rings true. It IS about survival, and not just his.

You don't really want to do this, but you feel like you have no other choice.

Billy is still trying to barricade the door, when you take another forceful charge into it.
Your attempt is successful this time as it flies open causing Billy to fall and drop the heavy box he was going to place in front of it. The box half lands on Billy causing him crushing pain while he struggles to grab his shotgun from the floor. You're quicker though and point your own pistol at him.

"Don't grab that shotgun Billy…I don't want to kill you." you say
"Goddamn sonofabitch, you ain't taking this…"
"Billy what's… OH MY GOD!"

When you hear Martha's outburst, it startles you during this already tense moment, you end up turning around and firing. You hit Martha square in the chest; she looks down briefly in shock before falling over dead. You're a little in shock yourself.

"MARTHA!" Billy screams, causing you to face him once more, he's now actually grabbed the shotgun, and you begin babbling.

"Oh God! Oh man! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to do that! She came up and…Billy don't do that…I don't want to…please…"

You fire again, hitting Billy in the head, splattering his brains all over the floor and killing him instantly.

You feel sick and promptly run outside to vomit. You've never killed anyone before, though you don't think it was that, that made you sick. It was the fact you murdered two people who were really innocent. You were the trespasser and when you couldn't get what you wanted, you took it by force. You acted like a criminal even if there's no such thing as "law" anymore. You sit down in a daze for a few minute trying to take all this in, before realizing you have to take care of some clean up first.

You remove the bodies of Billy and Martha from the store. (You also remove your silly "protection wear", well except the dishwashing gloves for moving the bodies) You wonder where you're going put them, but eventually you decide to just dump them in the wilderness nearby, you figure nature will take its course.

You go back to the store and re-barricade it. The store itself is empty, but in a back room, you discover a trapdoor. You descend and discover a large shelter with a treasure of food and water supplies, along with other useful items like first aid kits. Looks like Billy was more prepared than you could've imagined. One necessity you're glad to find is a bathroom facility with a sink and toilet, there's a little bit of water seeping from the cracks of the walls. Billy must've hit the jackpot and found an underground water source and built a crude plumbing system. He's also installed a small hydro generator which would explain how come there's dim lighting down here.

Finally you see some survivalist books Billy had on a small bookshelf by a bed and a couple of hunting rifles along with ammunition for them and the shotgun you've recently acquired as well.

Well you're certainly set up, and all you had to do was kill an old couple. As you lie down on the bed you think about your actions in greater depth now. You're not sure how to feel. Part of you wants to feel bad, but somehow you can't make yourself feel as bad as you probably should. In fact you're already starting to rationalize your actions. The first murder was a mistake, and the second one was self-defense.

"And this is survival." You say and fall asleep.

The next day you wake up, you feel the most refreshed than you have in a long time.

Something has changed within you. You don't recognize immediately, but as a few months go by you begin to.

Granted you were never a big one for human contact, anti-social and reclusive even, but this "line" you've crossed recently, your continued isolation, and the absence of civilization have made you become a little unhinged.

You also start becoming paranoid, about other people stumbling across your new place and attempt to break in and take it like you did. Using the knowledge you've been getting from the survivalist books, you start setting up traps, inside and outside the store. One time, you spend just about a whole day doing that. When the darkness approaches you go back to your underground haven to descend further into quiet madness, before you fall asleep.

Suddenly in the middle of the night you hear a noise and a scream from above. Sounds like it's coming from outside and from more than one person. You immediately grab your shotgun and head upstairs.

After going through the typical routine of taking down the barricades, you open the door and see a family in panic. A man is lying on the ground yelling in pain from the snap trap that has obviously broken his leg. A woman and a little boy are screaming frantically and totally clueless of what to do in this situation.

Looks like your traps work.

The family hasn't seen you yet and don't know your intentions, come to think of it, you aren't even sure of your intentions…

[User] You finish them off

[Assistant]
Obviously they thought they could just stroll in and take shelter here, bad mistake on
their part…

You calmly point the shotgun at the man caught in the trap and blast him before he even notices you. The little boy now really begins screaming, but the woman just becomes silent and falls into shock turning her head in your direction covered in the blood of her husband.

You don't feel sick like you did last time; you do feel an overwhelming sense of power though.

The woman grabs her son's hand and turns to run, but realizes two seconds later that she's only holding on to his hand and the rest of him is lying on the ground, one arm less, from your second blast.

"WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?!" the woman screams.
"Because I can, and there's nobody around to stop me." You say and briskly walk over to the woman. After a pathetic struggle you knock her out and drag her into your new home.

After all, you're not sure when you'll get to see another woman again…

A couple days after the incident with the family (and disposing of all three bodies) you begin keeping yourself in better shape. You start exercising regularly, and fixing up your home. You need to be prepared, in case more people ever show up. You MUST defend yourself and your home. You don't get many, but every now and then another poor soul stumbles across your death lair. You're merciless. Soon you begin to arrange the vehicles of your victims to form a semi "wall" around your home and place some grisly totems as "decoration".

A year passes…

You don't get visitors anymore, though that's probably because of the unfriendly image you've projected with all the skulls you've stuck on the spikes outside. Part of you is glad that you aren't being disturbed anymore, but the other part misses the killing. You begin to wonder if you shouldn't start venturing out more, but you'd hate to leave your home.

One day you're awakened by the roar of motorcycles. You've got visitors again, you ready your weapons. As you head upstairs you hear that inevitable "SNAP!" sound followed by screaming. Yet another victim to your traps, though you hear the typical sounds of distress, you also hear some laughter, taunting even, which has got you more curious than anything.

You check through a little peephole you made and see a bunch of biker types, one is lying on the ground, his leg nearly severed by the hidden bear trap. While one is trying to free him, a couple of the others are just laughing and remarking about how it looks like it really hurts.

"AAAAAARGH! AGHHH!"
"Look are you assholes going to help or not?" one of them asks.
"Hey, I told you fuckers not to go traipsing into a place that has skulls stuck on stakes. Y'all should've known it wasn't exactly going to be a friendly place."
"We need fuckin' gas Jim, and this place has a lot of vehicles, and maybe some of them have gas. We had to go check!"
"Well yeah, but that didn't mean just walking around unaware of your surroundings…shit that leg looks bad."
"GET IT OFF! AAAAHHHH!"

"That leg is bad. Even if you did get it off of him, he's probably going to lose it to infection. I wiped my own shit on it, not to mention it was developing a nice set of rust on it when I found it.  I'd say his bike riding days are over." You say standing your doorway with your shotgun ready. The bikers look in your direction, one looks like he's going to pull his pistol, but the one called Jim stops him. He's obviously the leader.

"You might be right, stranger, but that still leaves you outnumbered one to three. You sure you wanna take those odds?" Jim says.
"I'll take 'em and I'll enjoy it. It's been a long time since I've killed a whole mess of people."
"Oh, so you're a REAL killer eh?"
"Better killer than you."
"Hah! I doubt that! See me an' the boys here have been raisin' hell where ever we can. Come across a few towns and let's just say we're not real welcome there anymore. It's a brand new world, and only the strong are gonna survive it."
"Yeah? Well it looks like one of your flock isn't so strong now."
"Yeah…well you might be right about that stranger…maybe someone should put him out of his misery. Can't very well ride with one leg, that'd be kind of silly."

The biker trying to help speaks up.

"Oh come on Jim man! Clyde here saved all of our asses about a month ago!"
"Yeah? Well what has he done for us lately? The stranger's right, we gotta put him down, it's the kind thing to do really. You gonna do it, Dan?"
"No…I…mean…well…"
"Pussy. Nevermind. Ramon you gonna do it?"
"Shit yeah! Here hold on, oh fuck." Ramon says pulling out his pistol and then dropping it on the ground. Jim just shakes his head.

"Ramon, its amazing you've even lasted this long with your clumsy ass. Fuck it, I'LL do it."

[User] You let Jim kill Clyde

[Assistant]
As strange as it may seem, you're kind of glad for the company believe it or not, so you'd rather just let this play out and see where it leads. You can always kill them all later.

Meanwhile Jim is pointing his gun at Clyde's head in an overly dramatic manner.

"Alright Clyde you knew the risks. No begging or pleadin' now."
"Come on Jim! Don't do this! I can still ride…I'll…"
"Goddamn it, get a fuckin' hold of yourself you fuckin' sissy! Fuck, I was givin' you a chance to go out like a man! Guess you fucked that up. Die bitch!"

Jim blows Clyde's brains out, and turns his attention back to you.

"Can't say I didn't give him a fair chance."
"Yes…so what do you have planned now?" you ask, forming an idea in your mind.
"Planned? Ha ha! We don't do a whole lotta planning, we just kinda roam from place to place causing meaningless violence! I think there's a town around in this area somewhere…"
"You probably should look for a more reliable fuel source, if you're going to continue with this line of work."
"Yeah, well we'll be good after Ramon here sucks out the remaining gas from this vehicle graveyard you got here. I trust YOU won't have a problem with that right?"
"I'm sucking what?!" Ramon says with a surprised look on his face.
"No, I don't have a problem with it, but what happens when that runs out? Are you going hope you find some more in your travels?"
"It's worked so far…what the hell are you getting at?"
"Instead of spreading meaningless violence on a small scale, how about spreading meaningful violence on a grand scale for a change?"

You explain how you've been reading in the survivalist books about how to create a still, except not being a drinker; you never felt the need to create one. However that same cheap hooch could probably work as a substitute for real gas, if certain modifications were made to the vehicles. Basically the vehicles would be running on "garbage" given that's what the booze is made out of. It would smell horrible, but you get the impression that Jim and his boys wouldn't know the difference anyway. You begin to explain even more technical aspects as well, but you soon realize it's too much to process for them, so you stop before their heads explode.

They do realize you seem to be a lot smarter than the rest of them though, so they agree to your "grand" plan. You tell one of them that they should drive to the nearest town by themselves, try to get a feel of the place, to scout the entire place out, find out what the defenses are and all of that.

Ultimately Dan is chosen for this task since he can actually come off as being a nice guy. You give him some canned food and some bottled water you have. You explain that he should use the stuff as something to barter with, so it looks like he's just a wandering traveler.

While Dan goes and does some scouting, you get to work on the still and Jim and Ramon, work on their altering their bikes (At least they know how to do that) a few days pass and you all generally start getting along. Unsurprisingly Jim and the rest of his gang were criminals even before the bombs dropped. You lie and say you were in the life of crime as well, nothing too specific though and just common and vague enough for Jim to believe. Of course all the people you killed after the bombs, you don't need to lie about at all.

When Dan comes back, he does so with some interesting news. He mentions the closest town is Cinderville. He mentions it's not a completely harmonious town and it does have its rougher elements, but the local law enforcement is still in control of the place and relies on a vigilante mindset of some of the townspeople. Apparently they're trying to keep the resemblance of the "old world". He mentions there's another gang that hangs around the outskirts of it which attempts raids every now and then, but they're poorly lead. Finally he states they have a small farming area with animals like cows and pigs. Not all for eating, but to mainly produce shit for biofuel to run the law enforcement vehicles.

Originally you were just thinking you could strike hard and fast and get out, every few months to break up the monotony, with the still to keep your vehicle running so you could engage in this behavior. But with this new information, of other gangs in the area and bad elements in the actual little oasis of civilization, you wonder if you couldn't actually take over the town, at the very least you could destabilize it. The biofuel center wouldn't be a bad acquisition either. You're confident you can pull this off, you just need more help.

[User] You recruit some of the locals

[Assistant]
You decide that the locals have more intimate knowledge of the town and would probably be better to enlist help from. You suggest that you all go to Cinderville and do just that.

After re-trapping your home, and gathering what supplies you think you'll need, you and the bikers all take a trip to Cinderville (You take your Van). After about a day of traveling you arrive at the place.

However you don't get very far. The townsfolk remember Dan, and the cops were watching him the whole time he entered town. They didn't really buy his whole "wandering traveler" act and neither did most other people. They figured he was up to no good. So when all of you come rolling in, the cops instantly arrive and tell you to leave immediately.

Normally you might've done that and come up with another strategy, but Jim begins revving up his cycle and shooting at the fuckers and disregards whatever plan you had. His boys follow suit.

After seeing Ramon getting his head blown off and Jim get shot off his bike, you have no intention of sharing that fate, so you swerve to turn the van around…which promptly dies on the spot.

"SHIT! GODDAMN IT! I JUST FIXED IT!" you shout beating on the wheel.
"GIVE UP, ALL YOUR LOWLIFE BUDDIES ARE DEAD! GET OUTTA THE VAN NOW ASSHOLE!" you hear one of the cops shout in a bullhorn.

Do they really expect you to give up? This is a brand new world, the cops don't need to put anyone in jail anymore; they can just shoot criminals. Not to mention, Dan had mentioned a vigilante mindset of the common townsfolk. They probably have every intention in hanging your ass, assuming they don't shoot you immediately after you give up.

Fuck it; you ain't going out without a fight. Hell maybe you'll even get back home, probably not. (Sigh) you think maybe you should've just stayed in your nice home waylaying wanderers when they came by. Too late for that now though.

You grab the hunting rifle and put it on your back, check your pistol, and grab your shotgun to be your primary weapon. You take a deep breath and open up sliding door of your van and blast the first pig you see and make a break for it.

You manage to get a few blocks with the cops in pursuit, before one of the neighborhood "Rambos" shoots at you, hitting you in the leg. You fall to the street hard, dropping your shotgun which spirals out of your hand several feet from you. You get some pay back by blasting the shithead who shot you in the leg when he came closer to confirm the "kill".

You struggle to stand up, only to get hit by a fucking police car fully intent on running you down, except you go flying in the air instead and land on your face again with a pair of broken legs now. The car stops and a police woman with dreadlocks gets out, she shoots you in the arm, when you attempt to go for your pistol.

"You're under arrest suga!" she says in a high voice.

You merely turn to look at her, and laugh at the absurdity of it all.

"Fuck you bitch."
"You wish honey!"

And with that last snappy come back, she decides that you were resisting arrest and shoots you.


[System] You are the game master of a dark fantasy text adventure. The world is dangerous and choices matter. Narrate with immersive detail and let the story unfold naturally from the player's decisions.

[User] Next day...

[Assistant]
THURSDAY

"SUZY! WAKE UP! GET UP NOW!" you hear Donna scream followed by her pulling and shaking you.
"Wha…the fuck?!" you utter completely confused. You're even more confused when Donna grabs the rifle near you and fires it, succeeding in smashing her shoulder due to being unprepared by the kick back and not holding it right in the first place. She cries out an obscenity and drops the rifle.

While you still aren't completely sure of what's going on, you do look in the direction that Donna was firing and see what she was firing at.

Several people are loping in your direction snarling and generally making unpleasant sounds. You don't know who they are or what's wrong with them, but you follow Donna's lead and pull your pistol to fire at them.

You aren't exactly the best shot in the world, but after a couple shots you clearly hit the closest one in the chest, who stops temporarily, but then recovers until you hit him again, at which point he falls. It doesn't deter any of the others though and they just continue to run at you.

Meanwhile Donna gets off another shot, but misses wildly. Seeing their numbers and knowing you don't have the skill or the ammo to deal with these obviously insane people, you tell Donna you and her need to run and you don't need to do it twice.

You and Donna run towards the group of tents still in the distance. You still don't know if it's a military encampment or what, but the key thing is it's in the opposite direction of those things chasing you.

You're about half way towards your destination and your sister becomes a horror movie cliché by falling behind and then tripping and falling on her face.

"Suzy!" you hear her scream and you turn around to see several of those things almost on her.

You run back and shoot a couple of them, but by the time you grab her hand to help her up, one of them manages to grab her and bite her shoulder.

Donna screams pierce your ears and you blast the thing in the head splattering its blood on you and Donna. The two that you shot (but failed to obviously kill) at this point have recovered and are already attacking you and Donna.

You're tackled to the ground and you just barely manage to keep the thing from biting you by putting your forearm against its throat as it desperately tries to bite your face off. You get a good look at the thing at this range, while its dirty, crazed and making the animalistic growling noises, it looks completely human. Rabies perhaps?

In any case you manage to get your pistol arm free of the thing's grip and bring your weapon to its temple and blow its brains out. It slumps on top of you and you're quick to get out from under it.

Meanwhile, Donna is on the ground again screaming for you to help her and her assailant chewing on her leg. You wonder helping Donna's even an option at this point. Donna's badly wounded and there are still several of those things coming at you, not counting the one currently munching on Donna's leg.

You don't know what these things are except they look like dirty rabid humans. And maybe that's all they are, but if there's anything you've learned from situations like this is those same clichéd horror movies is when someone is bitten…

Donna's eyes widen as soon as she realizes that you're aiming at her. You don't give her time to do anything else before you pull the trigger.

Having done the grim task of putting your sister out of her misery, you run back towards the tents though you're in a bit of a daze at this point.

The noise you and those things have caused, start bringing out the occupants of the tents, or at least whoever is using them. You see a few figures with rifles, possibly in uniforms. It's apparent that they've caught sight of you and your pursuers and are yelling something at you, but again your brain has partially "shut down" after killing your sister so you're stilling running towards them, ignoring the fact that they're ready to open fire. It wouldn't matter anyway, since it isn't like you can run backwards with those things chasing you.

Bullets whiz in your direction missing you; at first maybe they AREN'T actually aiming at you and are aiming at the creatures chasing you. Maybe your luck is changing.

But then you catch one in the head. You don't even feel it. You just drop like a sack. The military wasn't taking any chances.


[System] Narrate an interactive dark fantasy adventure. The world is brutal and unforgiving. Respond to the player's actions with vivid, immersive descriptions and let their choices carry real weight.

[User] You regroup and charge the enemy

[Assistant]
You quickly regroup, blowing a bone horn to bring the Red Blades together.

"Come on! There is blood to be spilt! Ha!"

You break into a charge, moving quickly forward. You swing your sword, sending a head through the air. After about a minute, you've pushed your way past the Orc lines and got yourself surrounded. You take an arrow to the shoulder and fall backwards, before you take a spear through the throat.


[System] You are narrating an interactive fiction game in a dark fantasy setting. Bring the world to life with vivid prose, react meaningfully to player choices, and don't pull punches when the story demands it.

[User] You eat moderately

[Assistant]
You are lucky you are able to resist over-indulging (William Hook is found dead the next morning) and a week later you reach Johnson's Ranch, having passed a third rescue party led by William Eddy and William Foster going the other way. You thank them for warning the people of California of your plight but regrettably have to tell Eddy his wife and youngest child have died. The parties separate and soon after you are overjoyed to reach Johnson's Ranch, a place of supplies and safety. There you rest for a month.

Meanwhile the relief parties continue to bring survivors in. James Reed and William McCutchen return with just three having abandoned more further up the trail. Another man called John Stark brings eleven of these in himself. Finally Eddy and Foster return with five more. They report that the remaining survivors in the mountains: George Donner, his wife Tamzene, their nephew Samuel, Louis Keseberg and Levinah Jackson, have resorted to cannibalism to stay alive. At the start of April William Foster begins organising a final Relief Party to bring in these survivors, if they are still alive. You can either accompany this group or remain safely at Sutter's Fort.

What do you do?


[System] Narrate a grim fantasy text adventure. The Empire's world is brutal, its people hardened. Respond to the player's choices with immersive storytelling and let consequences flow naturally.

[User] You attempt to lie

[Assistant]
Quickly remembering the lie you thought up on the way, you sputter it out with some stress.

"I…I was captured by a vampire! A really fucking sadistic one! He killed my scouting party and took me to say he was going to drain me slowly for fun! He took me to some cave in the hills and it was only by luck that I managed to kill him and escape! I would've made my way back sooner, but their were large groups of marauding orc raiders and demons escaping the ruins of the former Tulan Kingdom, so I was extra cautious and…"

At this point the Captain bashes you in the head with the hilt of her sword. You fall off the chair and onto the floor.

"LIAR! You expect me to believe this horse shit? I've had patrols going all through this area and there aren't any orcs in the damn area. They all fled further north long ago and the remaining demons mostly ran to the west! Not to mention the closest hills have no caves! You obviously think so low of me that you thought you could fool me OR you're just a complete idiot as well as a coward! Either way you haven't convinced me, and you're fit only for execution! You're a deserter at best and a spy at worst!"

"No…wait…" are your last words before the Captain severs your head from your body.


[System] Run a text-based dark fantasy adventure game. Describe the world with gritty realism, respond to player actions with narrative consequences, and maintain the tone of a world where survival is never guaranteed.

[User] You begin the long trek back to the village

[Assistant] You turn around, and begin trekking back to the village. Within a half hour, the cold is so brutal that you lose all feeling. The snow's bad you have no idea where you're going. After two hours of walking, you feel a sudden sensation of warmth. You begin unstrapping your armor to cool down. You're hot and tired. A quick nap in the snow would be nice...


[System] You are the game master of a dark fantasy text adventure. The world is dangerous and choices matter. Narrate with immersive detail and let the story unfold naturally from the player's decisions.

[User] You will leave the coach, weaving offensive magic to support the guards.

[Assistant]
As J'Arel, suddenly engulfed in a flaming aura, leaps out of the coach, you take the exit on the other side.

Immediatley you find yourself dodging panicked horses and stray arrows. Before you get your bearing, a loud crackle is heared, and something like lightning seems to strike nearby. A piercing scream barely recognizable as human tells you that the lightning must have found a target - it came from J'Arel's side of the coach.