January 14, 2024

I was getting my hair cut as I had gotten called for additional military training, however the barber was only willing to give half of a buzzcut before moving on to the next person. We were later herded into the cafeteria and had to pick out our own plates from the many racks of trays. There was a form on the wall which asked which boss monster players encounter at level 1 in Path of Exile. A few of the rows had already been filled in with Merveil, so I followed along without much thought.

It was a few moments later that I realized the answer should have been Hailrake¹, which appears much earlier in Act 1, but everyone got primed by the first couple of responses. This simple mistake made me lose my mind in a laughing fit. Moments later I was on a grassy hill and my cousin was asking me if something traumatic had happened during the Covid years. She started talking about family back home and the time she and her uncle went to “Casino Dueno”. I couldn’t concentrate on her story as my jaw locked up and abs started to hurt from the constant jerking of my diaphragm.

I sat up and started pulling on a string from the inside of my mouth. The string seemed to have no end and out with it came several pieces of a plastic mouthguard. I had been locked up in this hysteria for an entire day and felt trapped in an uncontrollable body.

“I just want to wake up from this pain,” I thought to myself.