Mike woke up in the bed of his home back on Earth. Everything was the same as it was before he was dragged to another world where he had to fight for his life, use magic, and more. There was his shelf of highly prized dice divided into sections ranging from four-sided dice to the singular 1000 sided dice that he bought. His room was pretty normal and bare besides that as he had no posters hanging from the walls, no real toys or knickknacks that he used to take up time as he was 100% committed to the craft of roleplaying games as there were bins under his bed that held his character sheets, miniatures, notebooks, and more in their depths. Mike was slightly confused though as to why he was here instead of back at the church or someplace else like how it usually would happen when someone faints.
Mike remembered everything that happened and did not think that this was a dream because when he slept he was just too lazy to try to remember them.
Mike looks at his right hand and sees that it was actually a stump which would usually freak people out when they saw this, but Mike kinda shrugged it off because he knew that magic could heal him easily.
"Anyone there?" Mike says out loud
He receives no response from anyone or anything though prompting Mike to get up from his bed and try the door to his 'room' to see where it led.
***Abandonded Church***
'Micheal?!' Sarenthia was trying to reach him but he was not responding as he just was laying on the floor
Mike was currently lying on the floor of the church after he fell to the ground and lost consciousness Sarenthia took it upon herself to make sure that he would be relatively alright by guarding his body against anything that approached him.
She had also stopped the bleeding from Mike's missing hand as she was able to heat the sword by using her own energy to do so and burn the wound shut preventing any further blood loss. Still, that had happened awhile ago and Mike still was not moving which was worrying her greatly and since she was a spirit she could not really do much herself to figure out what was wrong with him.
Synthia was also unable to help as she did not even know what had happened to Mike yet as she was using the mana that Mike gave her to continue the mass purification spell on the people down in the underground. The spell required her full concentration so she had no idea what was happening beyond her own voice chanting and expenditure of mana.
'What can I do?' Sarenthia thinks to herself as she knows that something is wrong with Mike if he is taking so for him to wake up
'I can try that... but will it work...' Sarenthia thinks further as she gets an idea on how to check on Mike's condition and if the need arose to help him she would
'Alright Micheal I came coming in' Sarenthia says as the sword floats to the ground and trembles for a bit before Sarenthia appears from the blade in her spirit form
She floats over to Mike and enters his body in the hope of figuring things out.
...
"Ah Mike your up early," Mike's mom says from the kitchen as the wonderful smell of bacon and eggs wafts from the kitchen
"Uh yeah, I guess so..." Mike says a bit confused
Their kitchen was connected to the dining room allowing easy access but the thing was that his mother usually would not talk to him like this in the morning or at all until she had a cup of coffee and he did not smell anything like that.
"Heya skipper how'd you sleep?" Mike's dad says as he reads the morning paper
"I slept fine but I think I lost my hand," Mike says
"Ah I am sure it's fine," Mike's dad says not concerned in the least in fact he does not even move the paper away from his face
Mike sits down at the table and waits for his mother to tell him when she has finished making breakfast for everyone. Mike had another younger brother but he was doted on by their parents and could get away with anything not too serious, sleeping in was one of the things that he tended to get away with in the morning.
"So what day is it again?" Mike says while placing his stump on the table
"DON'T RUIN THE TABLE CLOTH!" Mike's mother shouts out as something runs out of the kitchen waving a knife and stabbing at Mike
"Holy!" Mike says as he falls out of his chair and avoiding the knife-wielding maniac thing that sounded like his mother
The thing looked like a literal living shadow but it was able to hold onto a physical knife and stab at Mike with the intent to harm him.
"DIE!" The thing says as it tries stabbing Mike in the chest but Mike rolls out of the way
"Oh, Dear? Is breakfast done?" Mike's 'father' asks from his position at the table and Mike was able to see that he shifted once more so that he cannot see his father at all
"DIE!" The shadow screams out once again and stabs at Mike who scrambles up and runs back to the stairs up into his room, shutting the door behind him and locking it.
Mike is now breathing heavily as that took a lot out of him as he feels like he was back in the same condition that his body was in before he got the fated D20 well minus the missing hand that is. Still, as Mike was trying to calm himself down while in his room he was able to realize that there was no one trying to get in his room, so Mike unlocks the door and takes a peek outside his room.
There was no one coming up the stairs just the smell of bacon wafting in from the first floor of the house and some slight humming.
'Okay, what is going on...' Mike thinks as he walks to the stairs and looks down with the full intent to run away if necessary
There was nothing on the stairs or the bottom of it so Mike after a few seconds of hyping himself up he walks down the stairs while trying to make the least amount of noise as possible by sticking to the sides of the stairs which are more stable than the middle of the stairs decreasing the amount of noise that he would make as he moves down. Mike reaches the first floor and makes the least amount of noise as possible so unless these things downstairs pretending to be his parents had superhuman hearing then Mik would be fine and could get the drop on them.
"Oh Mike your up early," Mike's mom says from the kitchen
"..."
"Breakfast is almost ready so go ahead and take a seat while I finish up," She says from the kitchen
"Alright... mom"
Mike sits down and waits for his breakfast to be finished
***Church***
"There!" Synthia shouts out and the dark glow coming off her body stops and the people in the pit stop cursing and muttering at them before silence resounds in the church
"Alright, Micheal now we can... Micheal!"
Synthia had just turned to the side to see Mike's body sprawled out on the floor not moving
"Wha... Ah!" Synthia just realized that she had Mike's detached hand in her own
"Micheal?!" Synthia says as she moves to him and checks his pulse after she places his hand on the ground nearby
He was alive but his pulse was irregular with it beating in strange rhythms, slowing down, and speeding up at times which is defiantly strange.
"Hey get your hands off him!" A voice shouts out of nowhere
"Wha-Micheal is that you?" Synthia asks clearly confused
It was at this moment that Sarenthia appears out of Mike's body in her spirit form.
"I am not Micheal," she says
"How can I trust the words of a vengeful spirit!" Synthia says as she stands her ground and mobilizes her mana in her body to form an ethereal sword
"What makes you think that I am a vengeful spirit?" Sarenthia asks as she is clearly confused why people are thinking like that
"I won't let you harm him!" Synthia says
"Jeez, how did Micheal ever deal with you?"
"Wait you know Micheal?" Synthia asks
"Of course I do I have been with him longer than you have"
"Impossible I would have noticed you before!" Synthia says
"Oh well I was in there," Sarenthia says as she points to Mike's sword on the ground
"..." Synthia has nothing to say to that as she had found Mike's sword strange but she just assumed that he had placed some formations on it that caused it to attack whenever he commanded it to
"Anyway enough of that we need to figure out what is wrong with Micheal!" Sarenthia says drawing Synthia from her thoughts
"Ah right!" She says as she moves to check on Mike with her magic powers
***Mike***
While Synthia and Sarenthia were busy figuring out what was wrong with him Mike was figuring out what was going on the other side.
What Mike had found was that he was in some sort of Groundhogs Day type scenario turned into a crappy blockbuster film with Mike as the unlucky protagonist who has to get out of the loop and back to the other world.
What he had found out through some testing was that whenever he opened his door and left it for a few seconds then this weird reality would reset with him being able to go downstairs and talking with his parents. Unfortunately, Mike was not able to leave the house no matter how many times he tried either by breaking down the door or playing along with his 'parents'.
Right now he was sitting on his bed in his room trying his best to come up with a plan to get out of the strange loop. Currently, there was nothing that was coming to mind as Mike knew that he was not really in a dream as he was able to read the paper his 'father' was reading with clarity and pain seemed to not work as all he had now was a cut on his right arm from a kitchen knife that he had taken and was now in his room with him. Those shadow things could not be hurt by him but they could hurt him with anything heavy or deadly to be their weapons against him with various cuts and bruises on his body being a testament to that.
His parent's shadows would never be able to enter the room even with the door open as he once forgot to do so in the heat of the moment and when they reached his room the door closed and locked by itself. This was comforting to know but Mike did not want to rely on it to much in case it did not work and he was faced with shadow monsters attempting to kill him. These shadows were normally docile until Mike actually saw them or did something that he should not have done which causes them to attack him.
'So what can I do?' Mike thinks to himself as he starts thinking of anything that seemed to be weird
Besides his parents obviously they seemed to be nothing else strange except his room.
'Wait my room?'
Mike gets off his bed and starts scrounging around his room to see if there was anything different or out out of place here. Still after searching there is nothing that he can find after what he assumes to be a few hours.
"Could it be something related to magic?" Mike mutters to himself as he tries feeling anything in the air around him as he sits in the meditative postion
After a few hours of meditation Mike does not feel anything but he does not give up and continues searching for anything related to mana or magic in the air that Mike can feel.
'Wait what is that?'
Mike felt something flicker into existence as he was in the meditative position on the floor originating from behind the door.
Mike opens his eyes and opens up his door before sitting back down once more in the hopes that whatever is flickering he will be able to find it. After a few more hours Mike finds the flickering downstairs so he follows it. Soon enough he is sitting downstairs at the dinning room table while his 'Father' was still reading the paper and his 'Mother' was making something to eat for them.
Mike was meditating while sitting hoping to find where the flicker was coming from but even after what felt like hours Mike could not see it anymore. It was like it disappeared from existence.
"Heya Mike w how'd you sleep?" Mike's dad asks
"..."
Mike just gets out of the chair and heads back upstairs not wanting to deal with them right now as he just wants to get out of this Hell.
Mike closes the door and sits down to meditate in the hopes of trying to find that flicker once again.
After a long time Mike finally sees it again and rushes out his room once again to find it. Mike went through the same process but only to find that he had lost the trail once more at the dinning room table leaving him fustrated.
'What is the problem?' Mike thinks to himself as he starts meditating again
Mike goes through the same process over and over again of meditaing to find the flicker and then chasing after it, countless times with the same result of being unable to find anything. Still Mike perservers and also starts doing other things to take up the time. He starts asking philosophical questions to his 'parents' just to see how they react to them but the only responses he gets from them are "You want more bacon" or "You don't need to think about these things". He also tried tripping them up by doing things that he would normally not due such as wearing no clothes in the house to see how they would react or making pranks to play on them as well, buy they did nothing like usual.
Besides doing stuff to his 'parents' he also worked out even though his body was not changing Mike came up with some good workouts to do when he gets back as Abbey did say he could improve himself by working out so he might as well be ready when he gets out of here. Mike also began working on the limited grammar that he had learned from reading things and seeing if they made anything but he eventually gave up on that since manaul learning without a teacher helping him was practically impossible.
He still continued meditating to the point where he could meditate while standing which evolved into him doing meager tasks like walking. This was useful in that he was now able to see the flickers more often while he moved around the house and had some awareness of his surroundings at least.
Eventually one day he finally was able to see the flickering with his own eyes. It was right there in his face moving in and out of existance as if to taunt him as he was making a new work out routine for his abs.
"Huh..." Mike says as he follows the flickering
It leads him downstairs and back into his kitchen but this time Mike was able to see that the flicker split off with one of the parts moving to where his father was and the second into the kitchen where his mother was.
"..."
'Really all this time and it was right in my face...' Mike thinks to himself as his mouth turns into sour frown
"Hey dad can you and mom let me go outside for a bit?" Mike asks as he sits down
"No can do kiddo it is raining outside" Mike's dad says
Whenever Mike asked his 'parents' about going outside they would always say he could not because of the weather or something like that to prevent him from moving.
"Alright then can you at least answer me something?" Mike asks
"Sure thing"
"What are you?" Mike asks
This was the first time doing so as Mike presumed them to be shadows he figured not to ask them that question as he would probably be attacked by that thing passing to be his 'father' and his 'mother'.
Surpsisingly that does not happen as Mike's dad places down the paper to reveal one of the shadow figures.
"Now that is an excellent question my boy," The shadow says
"So then you are going to answer me?" Mike asks a bit skeptical
"Why of course I will. Dear can you come in here for a bit our son has a question for us," The shadow calls out
The smell of bacon disappears and the shadow that sounded like his mother came into the dinning room table and sits by the other one.
"Now then son we are your parents and we l-"
"Cut the crap already I know that you are not my parents just tell me how to leave this place already I have been in here long enough alright," Mike cuts in
"..."
The shadow does not respond to him.
"Your the onl things I have seen here so you should know how I can leave so tell me how to do it," Mike says
"Alright if you want to leave so badly you can but first you must find two halves of the key to the front door which ha-"
"Your the keys" Mike cuts in again
"..."
Silence once again and Mike waits patiently for the shadow to speak once more.
"Correct you may now leave Mike" The shadow says as the two shadows meld together and a key falls onto the table
Mike picks up the key and moves to the front door. He inserts the key and unlocks the door before opening it and stepping through.