Rules A

In a flash of light, the tablet disappeared and as if magic it became two wristwatches in our arms.

It was quite high technological with a digital clock and a big screen on it.

“The other rules you should be careful are written in this watch that is exclusive to your team so be really careful with it, the chances of a team receiving new ones are quite low without a good reason.” The video with the robot ended and an app was automatically opened to me and the woman at my side to see.

1. Dangerous things, murderous or suicidal thoughts aren’t allowed. For consequence, going to the Red Ocean is forbidden.
2. At the six hours, noon and eight hours p.m, at least one of the team must stay still in a space determined by the team to receive the food earned by doing the quests.
3. All teams need to designate ‘Houses’ to them and sleep in such locations, we can’t have the teams getting sick or hurt by sleeping at the ‘outside’.
4. All teams are to participate in the ‘Killing Game’ - euphemism and plagiarism intended - that will occur in the Trials which will be explained later on after enough time to the teams’ members know each other a little.
5. [Locked]

I felt light headed with the explosion of information in my head and with me thinking, no, predicting what will happen to me in the future.

“Are you okay? Your face isn’t looking good.” The blond woman at side asked with clear worry in her voice, she didn’t have any malicious thoughts towards me and was handling this situation better than me.

“Yes, I’m fine. Thank you for asking.” I sighed and decided to confront this reality that probably wasn’t a dream, as getting into this situation doesn’t seem like a kink of mine.

I don’t want to starve to and all paths to escape are closed.

And by the rules, it was clear the importance of my partner so I will try to get along with her. Even if I get along too ‘well’ and backfire at me, at least my ‘precious things’ will belong to someone I don’t hate.

“I don’t really know what’s happening, but this doesn’t seem like a dream to me. How about we do the introductions and try to get along? Dying by starving isn’t also in your immediate plans, right?” I smiled, trying to be friendly. “I’m Leo, I want to become an electrical engineer and… oh, amazing. Not even I know what I have of special beyond my future career.” I was genuinely impressed with my lack of qualities, no wonder Mother always complained to me how I was wasting the family’s money.

The woman laughed, not ridiculing me. She seemed to be laughing in joy as if a weight was taken off her shoulders and was visibly relaxed around me as if we were friends of a long date. “Never saw someone give such a sloppy introduction and be self-depreciative at the same time. With this though, you don’t seem like a bad guy, but we will need to work on with your confidence later on.”

She extended her hand to me with a brilliant smile that couldn’t be bought anywhere. “Be sure to remember my favorite juice that is the almighty guava and that my name is Emma. My hobbies as you can guess by my outfit are to play games and pass a good time in forums, drawing become more of my job, unfortunately. People tend to call me a shut-in, but it just that my job can be done on the PC, so I see no reason to leave my house. I’m currently working by myself as a freelance artist.”

I also laughed at remembering how a friend of mine always started any conversation with some facts about guavas or a meme about them, and shook her hand. “It’s pleasure to meet you… so, what do we do now?”

“We should first analyze the rules to see if there’s any hint or trap to our predicament,” Emma’s voice got weaker at the end, “this is at least what normally happens in some games. Or do you have experience in surviving in an isolated island to suggest something else?”

“No, I at most saw some movies but I never paid attention to the details of the survival, I always liked more to focus on the main characters.”

“That’s so? But still, your opinion will be valuable because I don’t think this is our world or that everything here was made using sci-fi technology. Look at this.” Emma showed to me her headphone cable’s end perfectly cut. “It’s one thing to be kidnapped but I don’t know how or why this would happen by using technology to do it, and looking to the sky also give more credibility to it. I think these sci-fi things are just a distraction to the truth that is more fantasious. Have you ever saw of a plot twist like this in any of the movies you saw?”

“I actually saw the contrary, the characters thought at first their plight was caused by magic but in the end, it was only advanced technology. So the reverse is actually possible if you think about it.”

“True… but let’s focus on the rules for now. We are getting sidetracked.” Emma read aloud the rules and then asked me about its important points. “We can’t do anything about the ‘locked’ rule or the red ocean that really look poisonous, but the third and fourth rules are the most important ones if we consider that we always finish all quests for food. Will we really be to a ‘killing game’? I don’t feel comfortable with that.”

“Most likely, if that robot was right about you being… you know what.” I was still a little shy to talk about it.

“Yeah, however, believe in me when I say I don’t know why that robot thinks I’m horny or . This is clear slander.” She coughed and changed the subject. “Anyways, the most important part for us is that we need to get along to survive whatever a Trial will be, and we need to get along so well that betrayal will be impossible.”

“I agree with you, do you have a good plan for it?”

“Let’s focus now in the third rule.” Emma averted my eyes so obviously that it was clear she didn’t know what to do and was expecting me to come up with something. I couldn’t blame her though, becoming best friends with someone you only met for some minutes does sound impossible. “We need to find a place to sleep and we will probably be punished if not. Let’s go explore our side of the island, is that fine?”

“No problem, I was getting annoyed already of this sand on my sandals.” Both of us walked away from the shore to the evergreen forest.

But when getting near the forest I ended up perceiving the path would be full of pointy stones and small spikes, and that Emma was only in her stockings.

I took out one of my sandals and threw it at her front. “Use it, we can’t have you get hurt here.”

With her feet on the right sandal, she asked bemused. “But why only one of them? It will be harder to walk and normally in this kind of scenes the female party receives all sandals.”

“What? Are you ungrateful? Of course I only gave you one of them, don’t I also need to protect my important feet?”

Emma uncontrollably laughed as if I had said some joke and quietly said. “This is so like you to do this.”

“What do you mean?” I asked with more confusion than what she had earlier.

“Nothing, let’s go.” She walked at my front, happier than before for some reason.