Sapnap found the smoke to be a small, cute house in the woods. It was weird to be out in the forest by itself, but he had already been face to face with a murderer today; What was one more?

He limped towards it, pain pounding through his body, and saw a tall figure in a garden on the side. His head was feeling lighter and the world started to spin, preventing him from any more coherent thoughts.

"H-help-.." He tried to say, but talking combined with the walking made him cough. Blood splattered onto the grass below and dripped from his lip. The gardener didn't seem to notice.

"He-help!" He tried again, a bit louder. He slipped from the stick a little bit, but caught himself. All of the walking and the energy drain from the fight was finally catching up to him, and made him feel exhausted. The gardener noticed the coughing this time and started to run over.

"Oh! Are you ok son?!" The man asked, running towards Sapnap. Sapnap shook his head, his vision starting to blur more.

"Do you need help?" He asked.

Duh.

Sapnap nodded, feeling really dizzy, then blacked out.

The next thing he knew, he was in a house on top of a thin bed. He jolted upright, causing huge amounts of pain through his whole chest. "Agh!"

"Take it easy mate. You're still not in good shape."

Sapnap looked around. "Where am I?" He took a second to think, seeing as this place wasn't an immediate threat, and suddenly remembered everything. The fight, the fall, the forest.

"Where am I and how long have I been out?!" Sapnap asked quickly. His voice was still raspy from the hacking but it didn't cause more than a small bit of itching in the back of his throat. He felt pain in his chest as he talked but it was significantly less painful than before.

"In a safe place, and only a half hour, you really should rest up more." The man said calmly.

"30 minutes! I have to go! I need to find Dream! He could be long gone,...or worse if he found the others.." Sapnap mumbled. He started to move his legs off the bed trying to get up, wincing with every movement. The man walked over holding a cup of tea. There was an odd glimer to it, but it was probably just a reflection of the light from the windows.

"Calm down son. You are in no condition to get up right now. How about you drink this tea and tell me what happened to get you so beat up?" He said, motioning for Sapnap to stay in the bed.

Sapnap looked at himself, the man, and the tea being offered to him. He looked around the place more.

Most of the light was natural, from the windows, and it washed over the wood floors and walls. It felt old, but lived in and cozy. There were picture frames on a shelf over the unlit fireplace, but he couldn't make out what was in them.

The man had a kind smile and oddly even with the known fact that his friend had become an insane murderer, Sapnap felt safe. He sighed, the man was right. He couldn't go anywhere in this condition and with no respawn crystal it wasn't safe to go after Dream alone again. He nodded and took the tea. It swirled with a sparkle he couldn;t pinpoint the origin of. If it was poison he was going to be really fucking pissed.

"Careful, it's hot." The man said as he passed it over. "Now what is your name mate? Mine is Philza, but you can call me Phil."

"Sapnap," Sapnap said, taking a sip of the tea. He stuck out his tongue, "Bleh!" The heat of it didn't really bother him, but the taste sure did.

Phil chuckled, "It might not taste great, but it'll help you heal up faster."

Sapnaps shoulders sank, and he glared at the cup as he reluctantly took another smaller sip. He was still awake and not dead, so at least it wasn't poison.

"Now why were you in the forest alone so beat up?" Philza asked kindly. Sapnap just met this man, but he seemed kind and was nice enough to take him in after he stumbled in front of his house. Sapnap felt he could trust this man enough for now, and so he explained carefully.

"A dangerous man is one the loose. He used to be my friend, but he went crazy and we don't know why, and we gotta catch him before he hurts people."

"We?"

Sapnap carefully worded what he was saying as to not give too much away. For all he knew this was a random man in the forest and it was probably not best to tell him about the hub and other stuff like that. He looked down at his chest and finally noticed the bandages wrapped around his torso. His arms had thin bandaids on them too, which was weird because he didn't even remember them hurting.

"I was- uhm.. traveling with some friends in the forest. But then I got excited and ran off-" Sapnap then realized that was really stupid of him. Like, really stupid. Only took falling off a moving train and a cliff and breaking a few bones to realize, so improvement from last time! Sapnap made a mental note to punch himself in the face for that later, but continued on with the story as this was not the time for that. "And then this guy in the woods, who we are uhm... tracking? Yeah..... Well h-he's a psychopath, and we fought, and then I fell off a-... cliff."

Sapnap paused, "That's believable right?" He thought. "And the guy said he was going to kill my friend, and so I need to find them and warn them and it's my fault and I lost something and-" Sapnap was starting to breathe faster and tears started to fall down his cheeks. His hands were shaking and Philza took the tea cup from him right before it was about to fall.

"Oh mate, it sounds like you've been through a lot. Don't worry. You are safe here, and we will find your friends too."

Philza leaned in to hug Sapnap and comfort him. "Where the hell is Techno when I need him?" Philza thought to himself.

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Looks like Dadza has come to the rescue!

So in short my upload schedule is wack. And also in editing this, I'm deleting some of these paragraphs about nonsense, you're welcome for sparing you future readers, and having a great day or night!