Interactive Article
Only 20% of people return home at the end of this “Choose your Own Adventure Jungle Survival Game
*DISCLAIMER this story is purely fiction! All events happening in this can’t happen in real life...YET.*
by Vivega Saravana Prabhu
You're an average person living in the year 2019 (because 2020 sucks too much).
Choose your character:
Choose your character:
27-year-old Karate Instructor: Section 1
50-year-old Chef: Section 2
16-year-old High School student: Section 3
Section 1
The last thing you remember is going to bed, after teaching Karate Lessons the entire day, and your head hitting the pillow. The next thing you know you’re awakened by a loud buzzing noise and you’re drenched in sweat (the room feels like it’s a 100°).
As you open your eyes, you’re greeted with an extremely bright light so you close them again.
*sigh* “BAAAABE DID YOU TURN THE LIGHTS ON????” *no answer* “BAAAABE why aren’t you responding?” *still no answer* “Babe?”
Confused, you slowly turn over to your side and open your eyes once more.
It takes your eyes some time to adjust but you are finally able to take note of where you are. You are lying on a hard and swampy floor surrounded by dense trees, and a sunlit canopy above. You rub your eyes a couple of times to see if you’re still dreaming, but after your eyes start to sting from all the rubbing, you realize that this is NOT a dream.
Somehow you ended up in the middle of a jungle with nothing but yourself, and the clothes you slept in─ a white t-shirt, checkered pajama pants, and a hello kitty sleep mask.
“Where am─”
Before you can finish your sentence, the buzzing you heard before starts once again.
Your Options:
If you want to explore, go to Section 4
If want to find a way out of the jungle, go to Section 5
If you’re too scared, go to Section 6
Section 2
You are preparing a luxury meal for a VIP guest at a 5 star restaurant, you’re already done with preparing the caviar and have started slicing the beef to make some steak. However, as skillful as you are, you’re still nervous, as you are cooking for the most important guest who has ever set foot at your restaurant. The future of your career depends on this.
As you’re slicing through the meat, you accidentally get a small cut on the tip of your index finger.
Unfortunately for you, your weak and fragile mind cannot handle the sight of even a tiny bit of blood.
“Oh please no not right no─” *passes out*
After a while, you wake up to the smell of damp wood and wildflowers, and it reminds you of the time when you would go to your grandma’s house, in the countryside, as a kid to cook with her. The blood on your finger has dried out and you slowly get up with a grunt and rub your sore back.
*groan* “Am I going crazy or is this not my kitchen?!?! WHY AM I IN A FOREST??!?!
As you stand up, your head feels dizzy and your whole body throbs in pain.
While standing in the middle of nowhere not knowing what to do, you try to piece together what might’ve happened. Somehow you ended up here, in the middle of a jungle, with nothing but yourself, in your chef uniform─toque Blanche (white hat), white double-breasted jacket, black pants and gray apron─and with the knife you had in hand before you passed out.
While you try to come up with possible reasons why you’re here, you are distracted by a loud buzzing noise coming from above you.
If you want to explore the noise, go to Section 4
If want to find a way out of the jungle, go to Section 5
If you’re too scared, go to Section 6
Section 3
You are preparing hard for your AP tests which are only three days away. You have pulled nearly four all-nighters trying to get every piece of information from AP Biology, AP Stats, AP Psych, and AP Chem completely etched into your memory. However, you are only halfway done with your studying, and there is still a ton of information to memorize.
*sigh* “I’m only halfway there… I guess I’m gonna have to pull another all-nighter!”
As you continue to study your never-ending AP subjects, you start to get an unbearable headache, so you leave your room to get a cup of warm water.
But, as soon as you open your bedroom door…
“Wha─ What the heck is happening??!!!”
On the other side of that door, you see a jungle filled with dense trees and small streams of sunlight gently pour in. The floor, which was supposed to be covered in nylon carpet, is now hard and swampy, covered in leaves, twigs, and shrubs. The scenery is astonishing, yet this is NOT your house.
You are drawn to this unexpected phenomenon and you enter the jungle environment. You gradually look around, absorbing your new surroundings. You pause and take a long, deep breath.
“Wow! The air smells so fresh!”
After a few minutes, when you turn to leave, you realize that the door you previously entered is no longer there. You are standing in this new and unknown place, alone, in your onesie, and with your still-moist-facemask firm on your face.
You start to panic and try to put together what just happened. Then, you suddenly hear a loud buzzing noise coming from above you.
If you want to explore the noise, go to Section 4
If want to find a way out of the jungle, go to Section 5
If you’re too scared, go to Section 6
Section 4
The sound produced by the buzzing noise is loud and constant, and even though your gut instincts are telling you not to go near it, your curiosity gets the best of you and you decide to check it out.
As expected, your gut instincts were right. You see a massive beehive, but what made you even more frightened was the fact that the bees were abnormally large.
“I-is it just me, or do those bees look almost the size of my DOG!”
At this time, your brain is screaming for you to run, but you become immobilized with fear. Then, a single bee from above spots you standing paralyzed below. Feeling threatened by your presence, it flies below, chasing you around, and finally stinging you right above your left eye. Unable to react fast enough and in unbearable pain, you let out an ear-piercing and UGLY scream that awakens the birds, making them scatter from the branches and fly towards the sky.
And of course, something other than the birds is awakened as well…
The leaves and branches of the highest trees begin to rustle as if something colossal was walking through, and you hear a loud screeching noise, similar to what you would usually hear while watching Godzilla or Jurassic Park.
“Ohhh no. Please don’t let it be what I think it is…”
If you are the 27-year-old Karate instructor, go to Section 7.
If you are the 50-year-old Chef, go to Section 8.
If you are the 16-year-old High School student, go to Section 9.
Section 5
Your instincts tell you that the weird buzzing is probably something bad, like bees or WORSE, wasps. So you decide not to worry, because that’s the least of your worries. Where the heck even are you? You go to look for a way out of the jungle as soon as you can.
“I really hope I’m not actually stuck here and that there’s actually a way out!”
You start walking, slowly and quietly away from the clearing you first found yourself in, trying to avoid drawing any attention. You continue to walk for what seemed like hours, but you realize that you’ve been walking in a circle all along. Tired, hungry, and with nowhere to go you decide to rest beneath a tree and plan your next move.
If you are the 27-year- old Karate instructor, go to Section 10.
If you are the 50-year-old Chef, go to Section 11.
If you are the 16-year-old High School student, go to Section 12 .
Section 6
As soon as you hear the buzzing, a chill runs down your spine and you where it’s coming from.
“BEEEEESSS!!”
Ever since that one fat bee stung you when you were 5 years old, the thing that scares you the most are dreadful, horrible, atrocious bees (no hate). The second you notice them, your body goes into flight mode and you start to run madly across the jungle clearing.
But, you don’t make it far…
“AHhhhhh” *oof* “Oh shoot… where did this root come from? And why NOW? Aghh, I KNEW I should have gone to church last Sunday!”
You trip over a root sticking out of the ground. You slam into the cold, moist dirt and you’ve done something to your ankle. Ughh. The excessive pain jolting up your leg forces you to unleash a loud scream. Birds perched on the trees scattered. They, unfortunately, agitate the beehive.
Soooo… you probably by now have figured out what happens next.
A massive swarm of prehistoric bees the size of a modern-day dog attack you all at once with their venomous stingers. Your efforts to fight back the bees are no match. There are too many.
“Get away from you disgusting bugs!!”
*you swing frantically trying to ward away the bees*
*gets stung once again*
“Owww, I can’t even get away!!! Is this it…? I-is this the end…”
And, yes, that was the end.
Your body cannot handle the large quantities of venom these bees are releasing as they sting you, and even if they weren’t venomous, the pain each sting has caused would have been unbearable, and you would have wished you had died instead.
So, on the brightside, at least you weren’t in pain for too long, right?
This is where your character’s story ends. He pulled through as much as he could, but he wasn’t brave enough to make it to the end. Hope he finds a nice place in heaven.
May his fictional soul rest in peace…
Section 7
Out of the dense trees emerges a Spinosaurus (yes that’s actually a dinosaur), the biggest carnivorous dinosaur known to exist. Its finlike spine, jarring face, and 50 feet long shadow towers over your average 6 foot 2 frame. As you watch this enormous monster tower over you, you start to put together the pieces regarding your location. It doesn’t take long to figure out that you are now in the cretaceous period, and that you have time travelled back over MILLIONS OF YEARS!!!
*gasp* “oh shoot… how the heck did I get into this mess and HOW DO I GET OUT?!”
At this point your instincts tell you it’s best to run, so you grab your chance and sprint deeper into the jungle. Lucky for you, the Spinosaurus can only run 11 miles per hour, and being athletic, you are easily able to outrun the dinosaur. On the other hand, the stinging sensation on your left eye progressively starts to get worse, until you are practically blind. At this point, you are relying only on one eye and self-assurance to get away from this terrifying beast.
“gahhh! I can’t see from one of my eyes anymore! I really wish this was a dream right now. Ohh god why me??!! WHY of all people why was I the one that ended up he─ ahhhhhhh!”
*slide… thump*
While running frantically, you accidentally lose your footing and slip and fall down a steep hill. You get scratched, and scrapped by twigs as you slide down the wet forest floor. By the time you come to a stop, you are covered in cuts and bruises and the stinging sensation in your eye is only getting worse. It seems as though the stinger inside your eye is venomous, but you are too afraid to touch it. You try to get up, but you discover your right ankle to be sprained and you’re unable to move. An entire day passes, and you manage to survive by consuming some sort of fruit and leaves from the vegetation around you. You manage to muster up the courage to try and stand up once more, but of course the pain from your ankle and eye is intolerable as you left your injuries to go untreated.
*step* “OW!” *step* “OW!” *steps* “Ow─” *falls… sighs and sits back*
“I don’t think I’ll ever get out of this place dead or alive… I really wish I had one more chance to stay goodbye.”
Wincing, you lean back against a tree trunk and take in your surroundings one more time. You close your eyes and think of all the good memories. Something rolls down your cheek. A tear. You start to sob as the tears roll down your cheeks. And what starts as a small and subtle sniffle gradually turns into a devastating cry.
After your eyes are swollen from your uncontrollable sobbing, you pull yourself together and open your eyes once more, ready to face this monstrosity of a jungle. You stand up, expecting to see the bright green leaves towering over you, but wait… this looks different. Instead of standing in the middle of that pit amid the jungle’s vegetation, you seem to be somewhere else? What? As you see the dry terrain of the new location, you realize that this is all another game. Another adventure staring you down, right in the face…
“Aw man, NOT AGAIN!”
-THE END-
Section 8
Out emerges a Spinosaurus, the biggest carnivorous dinosaur known to exist. Its finlike spine, jarring face, and 50 feet long shadow towers over your tiny 5 foot frame. As you watch this enormous monster tower over you, you start to put together the pieces regarding your location. It doesn’t take long to figure out that you are now in the cretaceous period, and that you have time travelled back over MILLIONS OF YEARS!!!
*sigh* “Right about now, I’d rather be cooking for that grumpy old man instead…”
At this point your brain tells you to run, but as soon as you start running, your antique body says otherwise.
“Crap, I REALLY didn’t want to do this.”
So, you decide to go with plan B.
Play. Dead.
You drop to the floor and use your knife to give yourself a tiny cut across the risk. “I hope this fools it.”
But sadly, you didn’t even need to put up an act, since you actually pass out after seeing the blood (ah, THIS is why I didn’t go to med school). When you wake up, the dinosaur is gone, and you are yet again in another place. It seems that someone has patched up your cuts, but there was no one around except yourself.
“Wha─ where am I? And who the heck cleaned up and bandaged my cuts? Whoever is doing this, this is NOT funny, I need you to get me out NOW!!” *silence* “HELLOOOO?”
*silence again*
“Huhh, I guess I am gonna have to go through this one as well …”
-THE END-
Section 9
Out of the dense trees emerges a Spinosaurus, the biggest carnivorous dinosaur known to exist. Its finlike spine, jarring face, and 50 feet long shadow towers over your average 5.4 foot frame. As you watch the enormous monster tower over you, you start to put together the pieces regarding your location. It doesn't take long to figure out that you are now in the cretaceous period, and that you have time travelled back over MILLIONS OF YEARS!!!
*gasp* “Ohhh God, please no. I promise I’ll never complain about my life ever again. JUST GET ME OUT OF HERE!”
Your instincts tell you it’s best to run, so you grab your chance and swiftly run deeper into the jungle. Lucky for you, the Spinosaurus can only run 11 miles per hour, and you’re able to easily outrun the dinosaur. On the other hand, the stinging sensation on your left eye progressively starts to get worse, until you are practically blind. As you're running, you trip and fall over a branch, and before you can get up, the dinosaur catches up to you.
It’s fangs glisten in the sunlight peeking through the thick vegetation. It’s merely a few inches away from your face and it has YOU targeted, ready to attack.
As you’re faced with life and death, your inner GEN Z emerges, and without a second thought, you take off your korean facemask and FLING IT into the Spinosaurus's eyes. With your experiences in the real world, specifically throwing pencils at the teachers back during class (whoops), your aim is exceptional. The mask lands into the dinosaur's right eye, and it screeches in agony as the chemicals seep into its cornea. You think you’re free until you notice the beast’s other eye, staring right at you.
“Ahh crap, it HAS to have 2 eyes, doesn’t it?”
It looks angrier than before, and before you know it, it jumps its claws at your neck. As it pins you to the ground, between it’s sharp nails, you gasp for air. It continues to tighten its grasp around your neck. There’s NO way to escape.
Conscious of its fatal grasp around your flimsy neck, at this point, you don’t even care anymore.
“Oh well, screw this god forsaken world, I hated it anyway.”
You close your eyes one last time, accepting your inevitable fate.
-THE END-
If you are the 27 year old Karate instructor go to Section 10
If you are the 50 year old Chef go to Section 11
If you are the 16 year old High School student go to Section 12
Section 10
Your fatigue fades pretty quickly thanks to your extremely fit and athletic body, so you carry on with your expedition. As you walk through the thick terraces of vegetation, you hear something nearby. What could it be? You venture a bit further and come face to face with a Utahrapator. “Wait… a dinosaur?”
It all comes crashing down, and thanks to your 2nd grade science class, you realize you’re stuck in no ordinary jungle, but a jungle from the Cretaceous period. You have time traveled back nearly MILLIONS of years!!!.
“OH MY─”
When you thought there was only one Utaharaptor, two more of its kind emerged from the darkness.
“Ah crap! How many of you are there?”
You try to outrun them, and thanks to your experience as an all-star track athlete (I’m definitely not bragging), you manage to quickly climb up a tree and escape. You peer down through the thick vegetation and see that you’ve lost them. You have successfully avoided the Utaharaptors.
However, during your time up in the tree, while distracted, you slowly get constricted by GIGANTIC prehistoric snake
“Ahhhhhhh hiiiyyyaaaa!”
Lucky for you, you were able to fight off the snake with your incredible Karate skills! But, after beating it away, you lose grip on the branch and fall down, unconscious.
After a while, you wake up once again, but this time in a hospital room. The police inform you that you were missing for nearly a month, and then were miraculously found unconscious in your bedroom. What just happened…?
-THE END-
Section 11
Due to your unathletic body, your fatigue doesn't seem to fade away and your hunger only gets worse, so you decide to consume the berries from those bushes that you saw recently.
“They seem abnormally bright and fuzzy, but I guess it’s just a different kind of raspberry? Ah, I don’t care, I’d rather die from food poisoning than hunger.”
So you end up refueling as much as you can and carry on with your expedition. As you walk through the thick terraces of vegetation, you hear something nearby. What could it be? You venture a bit further and come face to face with a Utahrapator. “Wait… a dinosaur?”
It all comes crashing down, and thanks to your 2nd grade science class, you realize you’re stuck in no ordinary jungle, but a jungle from the Cretaceous period. You have time traveled back nearly MILLIONS of years!!!.
You KNOW you can't out run this beast because of all those extra hamburgers you knew you weren’t supposed to eat, but wait… you have your handy dandy knife! You pull the sharp metal out of your pocket and flip around, again, coming face to face with its shiny fangs. “Ah crap, I’m gonna die.” With a quick fist (thanks to your experience as a chef), you slash the beast’s neck, letting its warm blood spill on the damp ground.
“Take that mom! (for constantly telling me being a chef is gonna leave me homeless). I KNEW that one day I’d be useful!” *sad violin music in background*
Yet, even though you were successful, you suddenly start feeling dizzy (either because of the blood from the dinosaur or the berries you ate a few minutes ago), and you pass out.
The next thing you know, you're awake in a hospital, where the doctor informs you that you fainted at the restaurant from a mild cut. But upon arriving at the ICU, your blood was found poisoned, as if you ate some sort of deadly fruit? After three long weeks in a coma, you finally wake up. It’s a miracle.
-THE END-
Section 12
Your fatigue slowly fades away since you’re somewhat fit, so you decide to continue looking for a way out. Out of nowhere, you suddenly come face to face with a Utaharaptor, over 6 feet tall, and you realize you are in a jungle from the Cretaceous period. For some reason, your bedroom door has time traveled you back MILLIONS OF YEARS!!!
“Of course out of ALL the other time periods I could have entered, I end up in the one with giant ravaging lizards.”
You are infuriated by your unlucky fate, but you take the time to think through your current situation. You notice that the Utaharaptor has not spotted you and was busy devouring it’s freshly killed prey. So you use this chance to hide behind a bush and wait out the raptor.
By the time the dinosaur leaves, the sky is darkening: it’s close to nightfall. You decide to look for a place to hide out and find yourself camped out on top of a tree, in the hopes of the forest creatures not bothering you.
“Thank god my sister taught me how to climb a tree. If she didn’t, I’m pretty sure I’d be dead right now.”
The next morning, you wake and still see the dense terraces of the jungle. Ughh. You’re disappointed to find out that the jungle was not a dream and you are still stuck in this sultry mess.
*yawn* “On the brightside, I guess no more AP classes right?”
You slowly climb down from the tree and make your way up a hill to get a better view. By the time you reach the top, you’re covered in cuts from twigs and insects. Annoyed, and somewhat disgusted, you begin to pick out the bugs and notice a red button drilled into the ground.
On top of the button it says: YOU MAY HAVE SURVIVED THIS MISSION, BUT WHAT ABOUT THE NEXT…?
Then, a sudden countdown starts to blare throughout the jungle. Birds are dashing around, and you can hear dinosaurs screeching in the background. The countdown sounds like a self destructing alarm, so you instinctively close your eyes, awaiting an explosion and your death.
“3, 2, 1” *silence*
You’re standing there, waiting for the blast, but after many seconds of silence, you slowly open your eyes and find yourself standing in another place.
It wasn’t the jungle. Or your room.
“Aww MAN not again…”
-THE END-