Mined

All I could see was a cuboid world simultaneously more vibrant than my own yet seeming more desolate. 

I didn't know what to do so I just started walking seeing if there was anyone to talk to.

All I could find were some messed-up looking junkies trying to grab at me.

I did what I could and started swinging.

I've fought plenty and killed before but this was different. Instead of going down with my punches, he combusted and all that was left was rotten flesh and a potato for some reason.

I didn't know when I'd get to eat next so I grabbed the potato and kept walking.

Then I heard a hissing sound, at first I looked down because I thought it might be an animal and I didn't see anything. 

Then I looked up and saw what looked like a walking bush coming at me. All I could do was try to stay away because it wasn't approaching with good intentions.

I wasn't ready for the explosion.

I barely survived but I fell into a pit with gems around me and a ringing in my ear.

I had to make sure I was alive but somehow I was and these were real, of course I grabbed those floating gems.

I saw some more embedded in the ground below me so I started digging with my pure hands.

My hands became bloodied and raw trying to break what looked like mere clay to me.

I finally punched it enough to break and I didn't even get the gem.

Worse though, there was no ground directly below so I started falling without a way to catch myself.

Falling without breaking is the Ziggy way though so I was still breathing somehow but I didn't know for sure.

All that surrounded me was lava and brimstone.

That existential question of what I deserve bubbled up.

Is this what the virus has done to me?

Am I damned to this eternity when my corporeal form no longer exists?

Am I going to burn forever?

Did I somehow find a living quarters worse than Gary?

Then I realized I didn't hear my parents or anyone for that matter, I wasn't in hell not yet anyway.

Then it dawned on me, what if I was fated to something worse?

At least in hell, the screams are a sort of commiseration amongst the pain. 

Underneath the world, closer to hell than heaven just feels like a void.

The absence of life and sound turned into the absence of hope.

Death eventually felt like an escape down there long enough.

I thought to myself you can't have an island without a volcano.

I walked into the lava and woke up still in that cuboid world.

In front of me was a sign that simply said seek shelter at night.

I should have read the signs and maybe I would have crafted instead of being forced to mine.