Story Arc #1 Castle of Shadows

A Strange and Secret Land

A Chapter of a Choose Your Own Adventure Story

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The villagers will pounce on you any second. So you go against conventional wisdom and choose — the black doorway.

As your body merges with the translucent film, all sorts of doubts run through your head: Doesn’t black mean death and green mean peace and safety? What possessed you to choose the black door? You hold your breath, fully expecting to encounter a monster like the snow beast, or worse.

To your amazement, when you emerge back into the world, there is no death awaiting you. Instead, you see an endless expanse of nothing. Everything around you is white, not like the snow, but like the blank screen of a frozen computer.

You breathe in deeply. It certainly doesn’t feel like the afterlife, since you thought that whatever an afterlife may be, it would be more populated. Not like this dismal land of emptiness.

But is it truly empty?

While you can’t hear or see anything as you walk through this white matter, you swear that you can feel something under your feet.

Then you reflect on your choice of words: white matter? As technologically advanced as these villagers are, you’re sure that they couldn’t teleport you into someone’s brain, and make you walk through their grey and white matter.

Your spine tingles with unease at the thought of wading through invisible neurons and other brain cells, especially as the drawings of neurons, with their wildly branching heads, have always struck you as creepy, like something from a sci-fi horror movie. Your vivid imagination can be a curse sometimes.

What you’re treading on doesn’t feel creepy, though. If anything, it makes you think of sponges, or even sponge cake. But it’s not soggy or sticky.

Just then, you hear a click. You halt. There are no more clicks, but — you hear some strange music wafting towards you from above. A swan’s song, you think. But you tell yourself to get a grip. Sensory deprivation is apt to cause hallucinations, so you shouldn’t jump to conclusions about things you hear.

And as much as you hope to stay alive, you’re also so worn down by this white, silent monotony all around you. So even this chilling, bizarre music is satisfying and sweet to your ears. Any stimuli, no matter how eerie, is much better than nothing!

Once again, you choose the path that seems the most dangerous. You will move towards the music rather than persisting on this death march to nowhere.

You spread your arms to steady yourself. To your delight, you step on what is clearly a slope. The ground is soft but firm.

Before you know it, you have climbed a few meters above the ground as the odd music plays louder and louder. Perhaps doom is waiting on the other side. But dying is much better than losing your sanity in this relentless white abyss.

Then your hand touches what feels like a door and you almost sob with relief. But when you push the door open, the music stops and —

You’re back where you started, inside the cave with a pool.

Disappointment fills you. Death and danger, even sensory deprivation, you could handle. But being thrown back to the beginning as if all your hard work had never existed? It was unbearable.

In this moment of dejection, you gaze out at the pool. You see a familiar hatch, just a short way beneath the surface…

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