MidReal Story
Secrets of the Midnight Forest
Scenario: 121212
Create my version of this story
The first sensation was a taste on my lips.
I blinked and tried to open my eyes, but the light was blinding and I shut them again, my head throbbing.
I could feel the blood dripping down my cheeks and chin.
I tried to touch my face but found I was unable to move my arms.
My heart began to race, and I struggled, remembering the fear that had gripped me just moments before.
The fear of losing my life.
And then it all came back to me in a rush.
The room, the man who had shot me, the pain as I’d fallen to the ground, the distant sound of a woman screaming my name.
I realized with a start that I was still alive.
But if that was true, then where was I?
It took some effort, but I was finally able to pry my eyes open and take in my surroundings.
I was lying on the ground in a dense forest, wrapped in some kind of plastic cocoon that reminded me of a giant trash bag.
It was eerily quiet, and I could hear nothing but the sound of my own shallow breathing.
Looking around, I realized that it was still nighttime, although the sky was starting to brighten with the approach of dawn.
There were no stars visible, and the moon was obscured behind a thick layer of clouds.
The only light came from a huge tower in the distance that seemed to pierce the sky itself.
It was at this point that I realized something was very wrong.
I tried to remember what had happened before I’d woken up here—where “here” even was—but all I could think about was the man who’d shot me and the pain as I’d fallen to the ground.
But that had to have been a dream, right?
No matter how real it had seemed at the time…
It was a dream…right?
My head was killing me and I had no idea what was going on or where I was or how I’d gotten here.
What if it wasn’t a dream?”
“Hey!”
I jerked and turned at the sound of a voice behind me, only to find two people standing there, watching me with wide-eyed expressions.
They were both around my age—twins, by the looks of them—and they looked just as confused as I felt.
“Are you guys okay?”
I asked, my voice hoarse from screaming for help.
They both nodded, although they didn’t seem entirely sure of that themselves.
“Who are you?”
one of them asked once he’d cleared his throat.
“Nathan,” I said.
He blinked at me.
“It’s mine too.”
The other one gave him an incredulous look that clearly said, “Really?”
If they were just pretending everything was fine and playing along with whatever this strange situation was, then so would I.
“Yeah,” Nathan said with a nod.
“What’s going on?”
“I have no idea,” I admitted.
But that was a lie.
I knew exactly what was going on.
We were all protagonists now, caught up in a story that was beyond our control.
Which meant that we were all in a lot of trouble.
“Hey, you guys!”
We all turned at the sound of another voice behind us, and I felt a jolt of shock when I saw who it was.
A young boy, probably no more than ten or eleven years old, was running toward us, tears streaming down his face.
“What’s going on?”
he asked as he reached us.
“Why are we here?”
The three of us stayed silent, unsure of how to answer.
The boy looked around, his gaze moving from me to one of the twins to the other.
“Are…are we really trapped here?”
The fear and confusion in his voice was clear, and he started to cry even harder.
The oldest of us, one of the twins, approached him and put a hand on his shoulder.
“It’s okay,” he said gently.
“We’ll figure this out together.”
“But what if we can’t?”
the boy asked.
“I don’t want to be here forever…”
“The same goes for all of us,” Nathan said.
What do you mean?”
the boy asked, his tears forgotten as he gave Nathan a confused look.
“What’s going on?
Why are we here?”
Nathan looked around, as if searching for any sign of help, any clue as to what had happened.
But there was nothing.
Nothing but us and a dense forest that stretched out in all directions.
“We’re all characters in a story,” Nathan said eventually.
“The same story, actually.But something went wrong, and now we’re stuck here.”
“We have to find a way to get back to our world,” the other twin said.
“And how exactly are we supposed to do that?”
Nathan asked.
The twins both turned to me, and I swallowed, feeling their gazes like two physical weights pressing down on me.
I didn’t have any answers—although I did know what was going on.
But I wasn’t about to admit that.
“We need to keep moving,” I said instead.
“We’ll figure something out along the way.”
“Where are we even going?”
the boy asked nervously.
“I don’t know,” I admitted.
“But we have to try.”
We all nodded in agreement, and after one last look around at our surroundings, we started walking.
Silently, but with purpose, as if we knew exactly what we were looking for.
Which, in a way, we did.
We walked for hours, the sun rising higher in the sky until it was directly overhead.
But despite that, it never got any warmer, and I could feel my lips starting to crack from the dryness in the air.
Every now and then one of us would speak up, asking if anyone had come up with a plan yet.
But no one ever did, no matter how long we walked.
Finally I couldn’t take it anymore and I stopped, turning to face the others just as they were about to ask the same question again.
“I know you all think something’s going to happen if we just keep walking,” I said.
“But we can’t just keep wandering around like this, hoping for some kind of miracle to save us.We need to find the answers ourselves.”
The others nodded in agreement, and I felt a surge of pride.
This was what a protagonist did—they took charge and made things happen.
Now if only I could figure out what we were supposed to do next…
The others followed me as I led the way deeper into the forest, the shadows growing denser as the trees grew closer together.
A few times we got so lost that I was sure we’d never be able to find our way out again, but then a small ray of light would break through the leaves above us and we’d be able to see the tower in the distance once more.
It was still so far away that it seemed more like a mirage than anything else.
But with nothing else to focus on, it became our one constant as we continued to walk through the forest together.
Eventually even the silence got to be too much and I opened my mouth to speak, hoping that maybe if I broke the spell I’d be able to think more clearly again.
“Maybe we should—”
I started to say.
The words were no longer just in my head.
All of us had heard them.
“We’re going the wrong way.”
It was our creator.
We all stopped and looked around, but there was no sign of anyone near us.
“We need to keep moving,” the voice said.
“This forest is full of dangerous creatures.
“But where are we supposed to go?”
I asked when it became clear that the voice wasn’t going to elaborate further.
“To the castle,” it replied.
I could almost hear the impatience in its voice.
“There you will find the protagonist who doesn’t belong.”
“But what do we do once we get there?”
I asked.
But the voice didn’t answer me.
Instead it told us which way to go and then fell silent once more.
Our footsteps were quick as we hurried through the forest in our rush to get out of there.
But even so it still felt like it took forever before we finally made it to the edge.
We’d been walking for so long when we finally made it out of the forest that it was hard to believe that this was the same day.
But as soon as I saw the castle in front of us, all my doubts were erased.
It stood tall and proud, its grand spires reaching up into the sky, calling out to all who saw them and inviting them inside.
But even though it looked beautiful, there was something about it that still made me shiver in fear.
“We need to go inside,” the voice said, echoing my thoughts from earlier.
“Once you do, find the protagonist who doesn’t belong and kill them.If you fail, you will be trapped here forever.”
The doors creaked open as I pushed them inward, revealing the grand hall before us.
I looked around at the other figures in the room with me, all of whom were wearing masks of some kind.
They moved slowly, but with an otherworldly grace that made it look like they were floating on air without touching the ground at all.
