Gaming Nightmare 1 (Patreon)

Gaming Nightmare - or 'The Tale of a Failed Path to a New Heaven gone glorious and legendary' (Erma Webcomic Gamer!Young!Insert)

EDIT: This one is a full-on SFW story.

It was morning, but, to a certain boy, he could tell this was not a good day. Not when he woke up in a place that wasn’t his nice bed back home.

8 years-old John Bukharin definitely didn’t go to sleep in any forest or garden or his Mama would have been upset after finding him. He was also sure he hadn’t sleepwalked to this place as his home was meant to be impossible for him to leave without the doors being unlocked and his parents kept the keys out of reach.

Plus, this was nothing like home. Nothing like the park close to it and… and it felt weird. The air was odd, thicker, and it was… cleaner. There was confusion, then unease and then fright. And as he tried to remember anything that could explain how he wound up in this unfamiliar place, the chirp of a little bird that had landed right behind him set him up for quite the reaction.

Chirp?

“WAH!”

Tense as he was, the boy jumped and he instantly realized that something was wrong. Eyes widening astronomically, the child saw himself staring well above the trees as he had made such a tall jump that he ended up several feet up in the sky and… soon he was descending fast.

Panic reigned during those tense moments as he felt the pressure of the air upon his skin as he fell fast. He closed his eyes, thinking of the potential pain coming from this fall but… Thud. He landed on his feet and he was actually fine. A bit shaken, but actually fine.

His eyes were once again wide, but instead of dread he was… excited. He had just made a super-jump and landed it without hurting himself. It had been so terrifying but so… soooo!

“That’s so cool!”

A brief respite, one that made him giggle as he accomplished something impressive… but that was before his thoughts on the situation got back to him, yanking back to the very issue of it all- he was still lost in an unfamiliar setting, away from his parents.

He felt a bit deflated by this, tears swelling up in preparation to commemorate his current state of distress when-

DING!

The loud noise shook him from his gloom, gaze aimed upward to find the source of it. A floating window with words written in it in his language.

Congratulations! You discovered your unique main ability!

Hello John, and I am sorry for bringing you to this world without asking for permission. I know you are missing your parents, but there is something I need you to do for the sake of others, little hero. See, this world has some spooky things, but there are some bad guys that want to hurt good ones and I need your help to stop them. Right now, you are a ‘Gamer’, or someone with the abilities to behave like a Game Main Character. In this instance, however, you were bestowed with a few unique skills to start with and to fit within a more ‘familiar’ system. Here, take a look:

As he finished reading ‘look’, he saw a large item fall from the sky and… land softly in front of him. A brown suitcase. Blinking, his attention was stolen by the suitcase’s content as it opened to him and-

It was a very familiar pattern.

That’s the suitcase from Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga!

Well, similar to it. The passport looked more exhaustive compared to the one in the game, and there were more options inside. Dungeon? Prestige? What were those? As he questioned this, his attention was aimed at the floating box as a new ‘DING’ noise got his eyes back to it.

Yes, Superstar, you are going to be a lil’ Jumpman. Now that this is out of the way, however, here is the situation- there are three individuals that you will face:

1- Yureimoto Osamu;
2- Tamamo-no-mae;
3- ‘The Wicked One’.

You will only need to defeat them. Nothing more. Understood?

“Si.”

Good! Then, I leave you with a quest to find the exit to this forest. Worry not, just ‘follow the Goblins’.

John frowned, then tilted his head to the side. “What’s a Goblin?” He asked in Italian, and that’s when a ‘Goblin’ appeared. Tiny, even tinier than John, the green-skinned bald creature screeched at him, waving a small club in his general direction. He was wearing just a brown cloth around his chest to cover his lower body.

“Gih Gih!”

Music started to play and… John smiled despite how creepy the thing was as his little mind focused on the song itself.

[Battle Music: Come On! Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga + Bowser’s Minions]

Like in the game, some elements appeared to his attention. His HP and BP were now visible and three boxes hovered over his head, with the prominent one being ‘Solo Attack’.

John jumped up to it, the boy’s fist slamming softly against the semi-solid cube and ‘selecting it’. Energy pumped up within him as he rushed to his opponent, the goblin doing the same but- seemingly unprepared as John jumped a few feets over it before slamming down with his shoes.

GOOD!
2!

“GIIH!”

Propelled by the jump, John landed right behind the green mob. Said monster snarling and rushing again, this time with John on the defensive and-

Time slowed down a lot as a new window appeared.

You are on the Defensive! Most attacks you can dodge with your jumps, but some of these occasions can allow you to ‘Counter-Attack’. Keep an eye out, however, as those are not as common as you may think.

A nod, and time went back to move as normal. The Goblin’s assault was once more given full focus and John timed his jump and-

“GIHIH!”

The Goblin fell to his knees, holding his head while waving his club trying to hit the boy. But now, it was the child’s turn to resume the fight and John didn’t waste a moment in jumping onto the weak Goblin’s head for this last time.

“HYAH!”

GOOD!
2!

The critter exploded in dark mist, releasing money and some EXP.

“YEAH!” John exclaimed giddily, cheering on his first victory and… turning around to see for any other goblins.

The Window Lady said that there were more so… he could see them? Small groups, all of them forming a somewhat ‘irregular’ line that led into the eastern section of the forest.

Smiling, he prepared to find his way back out of this place and ask for his parents! Surely, they were somewhere around and Window Lady hadn’t kidnapped her- she sounded so nice after all!

A boy’s innocence at his finest- subjected to quite a few future disappointments and… chances to make odd friends.

—------d-d-d-d—-----

AN

Lets-a-go!