Yamete Kimochi sat on the edge of Glitchvale's central fountain, watching the water glitch between liquid and solid states. His reflection in the water kept changing between his current disheveled appearance and what looked suspiciously like a low-poly chicken.
GLich-chan materialized upside-down above him, her pigtails defying gravity. "So, about that bridge..."
Yamete groaned. "Don't remind me."
"But I have to! It's literally in your quest log with a big flashing 'UNFINISHED' sign." She flipped right-side up and summoned the offending notification:
[Current Quest: "Bridge the Gap"]
- Status: Failed spectacularly
- Hint: Maybe try something that won't crash the world this time?
Yamete rubbed his temples. "Fine. But we're doing this properly. No more experimental cheat functions, no more void-walking, and absolutely no trusting floating error messages."
GLich-chan gasped dramatically. "You're taking away all my fun!"
---
The second attempt began with actual planning. Yamete stood at the bridge's broken edge, this time with proper equipment - a length of rope (duplicated three times until one version worked), some wooden planks (stolen from an NPC house that kept respawning them), and a determined scowl.
"Okay," Yamete said, tying the rope around his waist. "I'm going to anchor this to that tree, and we'll use the planks to—"
Before he could finish, GLich-chan grabbed the rope and flew across the gap, tying it to a tree on the far side. The rope stretched taut... then promptly turned bright pink and started playing carnival music.
Yamete blinked. "What."
GLich-chan shrugged. "Rope of Holding. Sometimes it does that."
With a sigh, Yamete tested the rope. It held his weight, even if it did occasionally vibrate. He began carefully crossing hand-over-hand, the endless void yawning beneath him. Halfway across, his inventory suddenly opened by itself, dumping several mushrooms into the abyss.
"Hey! Those were for emergencies!"
GLich-chan floated alongside him. "The game thinks you're overweight. Inventory management is important!"
Yamete growled but kept moving. When his hands finally touched solid ground on the other side, he collapsed onto the dirt - which immediately changed texture to imitation hardwood flooring.
---
The bridge reconstruction went about as well as expected. Every time Yamete placed a plank, it would either float two inches above where it should be or merge with adjacent planks in unnatural ways. The nails refused to stay hammered in, vibrating at high frequency until they launched themselves into the forest.
At one point, Yamete looked up to see a deer standing on air where the bridge should have been. It took two steps forward, realized its mistake, and promptly fell through the world with a startled bleat.
GLich-chan tapped her chin. "Huh. Maybe we need to trick the physics engine."
She flew down into the ravine and began stacking rocks in a specific pattern. When Yamete placed the next plank, it miraculously stayed in place.
"It worked!" GLich-chan cheered.
Yamete narrowed his eyes. "What did you do?"
"Made a fake collision box! The game thinks there's ground here now."
For the next hour, they repeated the process - GLich-chan creating invisible supports, Yamete carefully placing planks. Slowly, painstakingly, a rickety but functional bridge took shape. It leaned slightly to the left, and certain steps would play a squeaky sound effect no matter how gently you stepped on them, but it was a bridge.
Yamete took the final step onto solid ground on the far side. The quest notification updated with a cheerful ping:
[Quest Complete: "Bridge the Gap"]
- Reward: 200 Gold (deposited directly into your non-existent bank account)
- New Area Unlocked: The Glitched Forest
GLich-chan did a loop-the-loop. "See? Proper planning and exploiting game mechanics works every time!"
Yamete was about to respond when the first plank fell into the chasm with a pathetic squeak. Then another. And another.
They watched in silence as their hard work collapsed in slow motion, each piece disappearing into the void until only the anchor ropes remained.
GLich-chan coughed. "Okay, maybe 87% of the time."
---
As the sun set (or at least as the lighting values decreased to simulate sunset), Yamete sat by a campfire that couldn't decide if it wanted to be flames or just orange polygons. GLich-chan floated nearby, humming a tune that kept skipping like a scratched CD.
"So," Yamete said, poking the fire and watching it briefly turn into a fish, "we built a bridge. It worked. Then it didn't."
GLich-chan nodded. "Technically, you completed the quest! The game just... disagreed with our methods."
Yamete sighed and lay back, staring at the stars - or what passed for them in this world. Some were clearly just white dots, while others were elaborate constellations that would occasionally rearrange themselves. One particularly bright star kept changing shape between a star, a cat face, and the game developer's logo.
"Tomorrow," Yamete said, "we're finding whoever made this mess and having words with them."
GLich-chan's glow dimmed slightly. "About that..."
But Yamete was already asleep, his snores synchronizing perfectly with the campfire's flickering cycle. The last thing he heard before drifting off was GLich-chan muttering, "We really need to patch that day-night cycle bug."