《Quantum Katana Online: Websuit 0.Ɛ (Archived)》
Chapter 1: Do You Want to Play a Game?
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Difficulty at the Beginning
Chie Shibuyama had lied to herself again, but she was used to it, mostly.
"Guess the flavor," she said to her seven-year-old son Hayden as he sipped the cough medicine from the plastic measuring cup.
"Cherry!" Hayden said.
She kissed him on the cheek, tucked him under the covers, and said, "Now, you need to rest."
"But, Mom, it''s too early, I don''t feel sleepy at all!"
"I guess there''s too much light outside." She pulled the drapes over the blinds and then sat back down on the bed.
"Just remember, the faster you get better, the faster you get to play with Daddy, okay?" She hugged him and kissed him on his forehead.
"The White Imperium!" he said.
She frowned and stood up. "I''m going to have a long talk with your father..."
"Mom, tell me a story."
She shook her head.
A sudden gust of cold air blew the drapes open. She shivered. It was freezing.
Why didn''t I notice that the window was open when I closed the drapes? "Did you open the window today?"
"Nope." He coughed.
She walked over, slammed the window shut to make sure it locked, and then walked back around the bed.
"Please, please, just a short one?" He pushed himself up onto his elbows.
Knowing kids, with all the commotion, he''d be too excited to fall asleep. Slipping under the warm coverlet, she rested her back against the headboard and stretched her legs out next to his. "Okay, mister." She tousled his shoulder-length black hair.
He nestled his head back into his pillow and he blinked away the sleep.
"Mukashi, mukashi, a young boy and his childhood friend walked up a mountain searching for a famed treasure that would make them rich beyond all their dreams. It was said it was hidden in a series of caves and abandoned mine shafts near the ice-encrusted peak."
"Is this a real story or did you make it up?"
"Aren''t both kinds real?"
"I like your made-up ones the best." He grabbed her hand and pulled his head into her armpit. "It''s been a long time"
She reached over and pressed her finger to his lips.
She wasn''t sure how to proceed from there. Her phone dinged with a text message. An unknown number. More spam. She picked it up from the dresser and nearly dropped it. It was as cold as a glass of iced tea and a fine sheen of water droplets had condensed on it. She wiped it on her jeans and then placed her finger on the screen to slide it up to dismiss it, but ended up tapping it open instead.
Yuki Onna.
-Yuri Sensei
She didn''t remember any Yuri Sensei. Maybe someone from her parents'' church? But why would they be texting her? And how did they get her number? Creepy. She blocked it. Yuki Onna? That fairytale? Oh, but that''s a good idea.
"The boy and his friend reached a ledge before the last sheer vertical climb to the cave, which was the entrance to a labyrinth of tunnels. The ledge itself was a small cave inset into the cliffside. But it was dark already, so they decided to spend the night on the ledge and ascend to the cave entrance first thing in the morning."
"How long did it take to get there? To the cliff." He sniffled.
"Hmm..." She tapped her nose with a forefinger. "Of course, at least a few months to arrive at the base of the mountain and then maybe a week to make it to the base of the peak. Finally, about another three or four days to ascend to the ledge."
"How much farther until they find the treasure?" His eyes started to droop.
"It''s an arduous climb, and then, who knows how deep into the caverns they''ll have to travel?"
Just because she felt like it and wanted to hear him laugh, she slipped her hand under the sheets and poked his ribs. He squirmed and giggled.
"They fell asleep right awaylike you should be doing right now" She tickled him again. "In the early morning, a sudden freezing gust blew into the small cave and woke the boy up. He shivered and rolled over on his side to see if his friend was awake too. But his friend was sound asleep. A shadow hovered over his friend."
"Oh no!" Hayden pulled Chie''s arm deeper under the comforter and nestled it over his chest.
"The boy clicked his flashlight on. Bent over his friend, close enough to kiss him, was a woman with long black hair and she was draped in an ivory kimono. She blew ice-cold fog onto his face. Tiny icicles coated his eyelashes. Teardrops of ice sealed his eyelids. The boy screamed and grabbed his friend to get him to run away, but then recoiled. His friend''s body was frozen solid. The woman looked up with black beckoning eyes and white skin as uniform as fresh fallen snow. The boy was rooted to the"
"Aww... it''s not your story, it''s Yuki Onna."
"No, no, it''s Yuki Onna Version 2.0."
"But I know what''s going to happen. She''s going to say, ''Oh, you''re too handsome and I''ll let you live, but you must never tell anyone about me and''"
She put her finger to her lips. "Shh... but there''s more. Do you think he found the treasure?"
Hayden''s eyes opened wide. "Did he?"
"That, mister, will have to wait until the next bedtime episode."
"Aww... just like five minutes more?"
"I can''t." She slipped out from under the coverlet.
"Okay, three minutes!"
"But I haven''t figured out the rest yet."
After kissing Hayden good night again, she closed his door and plopped herself down on the couch in the living room. She strapped on her integrated VR helmet, grabbed her controller, and logged in to Three Kingdoms, the precursor to the most immersive MMORPG everas Ken was fond of proclaiming every time a new trailer came outQuantum Katana Online: The White Imperium. Whatever, her old Three Kingdoms stomping grounds were more than enough.
Out of habit, she cranked up the dubstep until her earlobes vibrated like bees. She used to use its heavy bass to drown out the chanting crowds dissing her and her fans lambasting her opponent. In order to win, she had to enter her inner state. Her head and shoulders bobbed to the beat. Adrenalin pumped through her veins, making her entire body tingle.
The VR visor faded to black. She was about to enter the game sector. She broke out in a cold sweat, her armpits clammy. Her hands clamped down on the sides of the helmet. She was about to rip it off and throw it in the corner, but she told herself to take deep breaths. Then, she remembered. The Chie in-game was not the shy, geeky mathematician outside the game. In-game, she had nerves of steel, magic as life-affirming as the rosy dawn, and the cunning of a crow. Rose Crow.
A system message popped up.
System Time: 17:?:4B:99 1210-08-?
Caution: Fatalities resulting from last month''s swattings in three US cities have been traced back to activity in Three Kingdoms. Three Kingdoms (recently acquired by Websuit International) takes your security and safety seriously... We advise that you do not share any personal information with unknown PCs. In the terms of service...
The usual cover-your-ass verbiage. She reached under the edge of the three-quarters helmet and rubbed her temples. Everyone knew what they were referring to and it was all too familiar. The father of a teenage boy had been shot in the chest by the police when he''d answered the door with a pool stick in his hand. And last week, her niece''s high school had been locked down because of a threat. She punched her thumb down onto the controller button to accept it without reading the rest.
"Welcome, Rose Crow!" a deep male voice said. "Just wanted to let you know that the client software upgrade is proceeding as a background process."
"By the way, I love your hairstyle. The short and straight no-nonsense professional cut looks so good on you."
"Who is this? How do you know what I look like?" As part of the registration process everyone had to submit a federally-certified ID. The photo on her California Real ID hadn''t changed in years. But employees couldn''t access account information, except by request of the account holder. "That''s against the terms of service."
"This might take a while, but don''t worry. You can still play while the upgrade completes. If you need any help, simply ping me, Marco Kang. Have a splendiferous game!"
Her face blushed. It was an automated but also templated welcome message. She grunted. Whatever. Trying to make their messages all personalized and chummy, now aren''t they? She wasn''t one of those all-looks and no-brains social media stars gaming companies were always trying to court.
The visor lightened into a full VR scene, fading in like the beginning of a movie. She was in-game, standing in a small clearing. Ice-encrusted mountains ringed the horizon in all directions, imprisoning her. The gray sheen of clouds blanketed the sky like the roof of a monstrous cage. Doesn''t look like a safe zone to me.
Peering into the forest, she searched for a path. Even though the dim light muted her depth perception, she saw something luminous and white on one side of the clearing. She shivered. Spider webs. Gargantuan ones too. They coated the trees from top to bottom and were so thick they practically formed a single massive cocoon. She hated spiders.
Who said hell had to be all fire and brimstone? Whoever created this part of Three Kingdoms must''ve been clinically depressed. It could drive a woman insane.
A strong wind blew and the giant redwoods swayed like dancing mimes. Now this is more like it! She flipped off the dubstep playing in the helmet''s noise-canceling headphones to see if the environmental sounds were improved too. Craning her head to listen, she heard the rush of the wind blow past her ears, her rose cloak billowing. How about gross and fine motor movements? She moved the controller pointer over her arm and raised it. Each individual joint, the shoulder, elbow, and wrist, moved in lock-step. Such detail!
"Stats," Chie said. Her character sheet displayed in the left side of her field of vision, overlaying the scenery like in the usual HUD every player was used to. At least that command''s still the same. Ken had insisted on paying the annual renewal fee for a non-operational character.
General
Equipped
Name
Rose Crow
Naginata
Leather Armor
Species
Human
Ring
Armored Cloak
Sex
Female
Class
Mage
Level
97
EXP
1,315,115
Standards
101,278
Universe
alpha-test-WI03
Everything looked in order. Wait, what''s universe? "Help," she said. Nothing happened. It''s the same as the node she was redirected to. Must be something like another sector. She read through her attributes.
Attributes
Strength
47
Dexterity
88
IQ
90
STA
87
REP
100
Magic
98
Mana
245
Chi
225
Hit Points
94
She didn''t remember Chi. Martial energy? Trying to call up the help probably won''t work, but I can''t improve efficiently through trial and error. "Character Guide." Again, nothing happened. She shrugged her shoulders. At any rate, it was really high and that could only be good.This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Items
NaginataL97
Tanto
Leather Armor
Armored CloakL78
Backpack
Magic RingL54
While holding her naginata polearm in one hand, she held up her other arm and studied the diaphanous pink fabric of her sleeve as it fluttered in the breeze: armored cloak, level 78. It was as thin and light as silk crepe but as tough as tank armor. Then she zoomed out and looked at her back. It was bare. Dammit! Where''re my wings? "List item transaction history for wings."
Date
Item
Action
Location
User
2019-05-30
Wings
Transferred
Unknown
Unknown
2016-06-06
Wings
Acquired
Crow''s Nest Dungeon/Blood TenguNPC
Rose Crow
She hadn''t been online since 2020. Somehow she''d lost them. Had there had been a catastrophic system event at the castle where her character was stored? No message had been provided when she logged in. That left only one possibility. Someone had stolen it. She slammed her fist down on the couch arm. Dammit! What is Rose Crow without her wings? I''m going make that thief pay.
"RS 1," said a voice over private chat. "This is Rogue X1."
She knew that call sign right away and sighed. "Hayden, how do you expect to get better for your field trip?"
"Couldn''t sleep. Coughing."
"How did you get in? This is an eighteen-plus universe."
He mumbled something and then coughed again.
She frowned. It was Ken. He must have corroborated Hayden''s age. "Your father and I"
"Dad didn''t"
She clenched her jaw. "Young man, log out, right this minute."
"But Mom, you''re on a quest right? I can help you. I''ve been here."
"I know, with your father." She crossed her arms. Ken should know better. The violence is extremely graphic and there''s explicit nudity!
"It was an accident," he said. "And it was only for like way less than five minutes. Then Dad figured out where we were."
Her face softened. Of course, Ken hadn''t done it on purpose.
She couldn''t fly and she didn''t know the area, but she had to meet her old nemesis and iron out the details of the challenge. Even after all these years, she couldn''t give up the chance to redo her final match. But she wasn''t going to fight yet, so she''d have Hayden help her get her bearings and then he''d log off.
"Just for a little while."
"Yay!"
"But we''re not here to play."
She told him to come out of his bedroom and sit with her on the couch.
In-game, he was in the town and after she described where she was, he knew exactly how to get there. He wasn''t too far away because they were in the same party. After all, they were from the same IP, so the system grouped them together. Although on occasion a glitch might occur. On one dungeon crawl, Lucy had been logged in to the dining hall of the Blood Tengu''s dungeon when the rest of them had appeared at the entrance up top. Good thing she''d been a rogue; otherwise, she would''ve been lunchmeat.
After fifteen minutes, she thought he was taking too long and private-messaged him. He said he was almost there and on one of the trails. Through a break in the trees, she spied a narrow path and decided to meet him there. As she started walking towards it, she heard the crunch of leaves behind her. Oh! He came another way. She turned around.
Something dark and spindly lunged at her. In an almost autonomic response, she hit her left controller button and struck straight down with her naginata. The curved blade sliced clean through its head. Black blood spurted out and splashed all over her chest and arms.
The momentum of its segmented body carried it forward, slamming into her body full-on; she stumbled backwards and fell down onto her back. The tsuchigumo''s body thrashed about on top of her. I''ve got to get to Hayden! He could be in the same trouble! Her heart was beating so hard, she thought it would burst out of her chest. She pushed up off of the couch, but the tsuchigumo didn''t budge.
"Mom!" Hayden pushed the twitching corpse off of her. Blood and sticky fluids coated her cloak.
Her avatar jumped up and hugged Hayden''s halfling rogue. "Thank God! I was going to call 911."
"911?"
She felt his small fingers on her bare forearm, but they were covered by kote armored sleeves. There was no way she could feel his fingers.
"Mom, we''re in a game."
? ? ?
Chie decided to go back into town, as that was the best place to ask around about her old nemesis Prokreashun, the player she''d lost the championship to. But he wasn''t going by that handle anymore. That asshole gave me a math riddle:
? +? = 22.
If you could call it a riddle. What an idiot._ Now all she had to to was find something or someone that matched a duodenary system.
"I''m bored," Hayden said and drew a snowflake in the dirt with his dagger. "The new game is so much better." He started drawing another snowflake.
"You haven''t even played it," she said. Hayden had wanted to register in the new game, but she''d put the kibosh on that right away.
"But Dad said it''s so much more immersive than Three Kingdoms. Three Kingdoms is as useless as a stinky, holey sock. The White Imperium is the true simulacrum."
"Stop it! Stop parroting your father right this minute. Or we''re logging out." Ken had been talking about it non-stop for weeks. Ken kept saying things like immersive and the true simulacrum. Then, last night, he''d rambled on and on about her mobotacts and founding a stealth startup together with her, and, of course, Mas. Just like old times, he''d said. She gritted her teeth and growled to herself. She was sick of his dreams and VRMMORPGs. Or, if she was really honest with herself, scared of them. Too much had changedit had become too realalmost hyperreal. Even logging into Three Kingdoms was a huge risk. It had been seven long years and as many major versions since she''d been on. She hadn''t doubted it was going to be even more immersive than before and it now it had proven that.
Hayden made a sour face and crossed his arms.
Chie laughed. She couldn''t help herself. He crossed his arms exactly like Ken.
She thought out loud, "I didn''t touch the controller. So how did my avatar hug Hayden''s?"
"Dad said the websuit translates your body moves into the game."
She turned to stare at him. "Websuit?"
"It''s like a wetsuit for diving. It stimulates the different kinds of nerves."
"No techno-babble. Speak English, please."
"That''s what Dad said. You''re good at math, you can get it. You''ve been playing with that math thing all today." Hayden turned his back to her and sat his butt down in the dirt. "Instead of with me!"
"You guys have been hanging out too much." She wasn''t jealous. His being there for Hayden was one of myriad reasons she''d married Kenin contrast to her own father.
"Yeah, Dad plays with me way more than you do!" Hayden spun around on his butt, again and again.
"To get back to the wetsuits"
"Web Suits, Mom!"
"Correction accepted, sir!" She saluted. "We''re not wearing any Web Suits."
"Oh right, but Dad said that in The White Imperium software in the helmet can also read body movements in a limited fashion."
"We''re not in The White Imperium either." Neither did she ever want to be in that overwhelming level of immersion. Even right now with only sounds and sight, it was almost too much for her. The fine-tuned movements of Hayden crossing his arms and the childishness of his scowl. Birds chirping. The sound of the breeze whistling past her ears. The crunch of dry leaves under her boots. She couldn''t imagine what it would feel like if she were wearing a websuit in The White Imperium. To actually feel the smooth silk of her cloak between her own fingers, the heft of her naginata, the swing of it, the resistance of flesh and bone as it sliced through a challenger''s chest. She''d never want to leave. She shuddered and hid her black desire deep down within her subconscious.
Then from behind her, she heard a squelching sound. She spun around, her naginata poised in a guard position. She grabbed Hayden and hid him within the folds of her cloak.
The abdomen of the tsuchigumo ripped open. Innards splattered all over her face. She wiped red and yellow goop out of her eyes with a single forefinger. Joint movements are even down to individual digits!
Her view automatically zoomed in on the tsuchigumo. Claws peeked out of the opening and, with a sound like raw chicken legs being torn apart, ripped it even wider. A kappa imp NPC crawled out. I think that was a video. Yes, that''s it, a short clip is automatically played to emphasize the action sequence. It was so real, it was eerie.
It bowed to her with a flourish of one hand, its six sharp claws dripping with blood. Spider juices sloshed over the lip of the bowl-like depression on top of its head. "Greetings, Dr. Chie Shibuyama! I''m so glad that I was able to finally catch you."
It can''t know my real name! The system didn''t save any personally identifiable information with a user account, not even for payments. Could it be... but kappas aren''t playable characters. She opened the private chat to Hayden. "This isn''t the player, is it? The one that sent your dad the challenge?"
"I don''t know, I mean, me and Dad never met the player," Hayden said.
She eyed the kappa and backed up. Before she quit, the NPCs had turned devious. While sweet-talking you, they inched closer and closer to you. Then, before you knew what hit you, they''d already bitten off a chunk of your armor and taken a hefty piece of your flesh with it. The result: your hit points were knocked down by twenty percentif you were lucky. Unlucky? A critical hit.
"I come in peace." The kappa held its hands out, palms up. "Her majesty, the Empress, sent me, her envoy, to deliver a message."
She tightened her grip on the shaft of the naginata.
The kappa fished a scroll out of its pouch and read it. "Dr. Chie Shibuyama, I invite you to participate in a quest in The White Imperium." It private-messaged her the quest details and rolled the scroll back up. It held its hands behind its back and whistled while waiting.
She didn''t even bother opening the private message to read the quest. It wasn''t like she had any time to spend traipsing around a fantasy world on some irrelevant adventure. Those were the old days, the days of irresponsible youth. She was only here to find her nemesis. She also had to finish a coding project and editing the game theory mathematical article back in real life.
She turned around to head into town to find some player characters and see if they knew anything about that jerk Prokreashun or anything exhibiting duodecimal attributes.
"Wait, so what do you think?" the kappa asked.
"Not interested." She dismissed him with a flick of her wrist.
"What? Not even a million Ether?"
She shrugged her shoulders and started walking away, Hayden still hidden under her cloak. She loved teaching and solving mathematical problems. She had family and friends. What did she need an obscene amount of money for?
"Just between you and me," the kappa said to her back, "I''d accept the quest. You don''t want to get on her bad side, you know."
She laughed under her breath. She''d never been concerned about offending any big-name players, even as a newbie. She got real good, real fast at leveling up after respawningmany times hitting her daily respawn max.
The kappa jogged after her. "Do you remember when Brian''s Brigands razed a village to the ground a few weeks ago?"
Is the quest to bring Brian''s Brigands to justice? Or maybe the brigands were exacting retribution for an intrusion on their territory. Could be the beginnings of a war. Her mathematical modeling curiosity was piqued. In an open and persistent world like Three Kingdoms, large-scale player-initiated events could have a large impact on a game.
She turned around and shook her head.
"Where have you been? In a cave?" The kappa laughed at her.
What? This doesn''t sound scripted.
Hayden peeked out from in-between the folds of Chie''s cloak. "Don''t talk like that to my mom! She''s the great Rose Crow!"
She shushed him.
"Oh, a halfling." Its eyes glazed over and it clapped its webbed hands together. "Do you want to play a game? Maybe hide and seek?" It stretched its arms out and waddled towards them.
"No shirikodama organs for you today," Chie said and thrust her naginata out in front of the kappa.
The kappa bumped into the blade with its nose and fell onto its rump. "Ouch!" The kappa shook its head, stood up, and rubbed its butt. "Sorry about that, instincts are sometimes hard to overcome."
It was almost like it was improvising, but it could still be a very complex script. If it could continue in this open-ended conversation for another thirty minutes or so, it could pass the Turing test. But that''s impossible. Is it a new feature allowing gamers to masquerade as NPCs? I can''t believe they''d allow that. With stealth like that everyone would become a PKer. I''m going to test it with a meta-question.
"I didn''t know NPCs could overcome their programming."
"Not if you were borne by The White Imperium."
"Dammit, you''re a player! This is outrageous! They can''t allow players to take on NPC avatars!"
"I''m not a player."
She put one hand on her hip and struck the shaft of her naginata on the ground. "Can''t fool me. What''s your handle?"
Laughing, the kappa held its belly and then tilted its head to the side. Sticky spider juices spilled out. "Oops!" It grabbed its head on both sides and righted itself.
"Mom, they don''t have that feature," Hayden said over the private chat.
"What do you mean?" Chie responded in chat. Clearly, it made an appropriate response about the nature of its own existence, that it''s in a game, and it''s too ad hoc to have been scripted.
"Maybe it''s telling the truth. You know how Dad''s raving about the invitation-only alpha."
Oh, the alpha test. Could it really be that advanced? But how could it be here in Three Kingdoms? Whatever, it doesn''t matter whether it''s a player or an advanced NPC. Its behavior''s the same and after all, reacting as though it''s an advanced NPC is the pragmatic thing to do. But I''ll be really pissed off if it''s a player lying to me.
The kappa scrunched up his bushy eyebrows and looked her up and down. "You are the real Rose Crow, aren''t you. The signature pink cloakbut waitwhere are your wings? Oh, they''re under it, right? You wouldn''t want to have them exposed all the time. You are quite the legend, you know?"
"Do you know anything about a player who challenged me and knows my real name? Or has twelve characters in their handle?" That would be a start. "Or is level 12?"
"Is it true you got married in Three Kingdoms?" the kappa said.
Oh God, does everyone still remember that? And I even scrubbed it from every website I could find.
"I''m such an admirer of yours!" The kappa smiled. Its thin lips exposed jagged lines of shark teeth protruding all along the length of its jaws. It wiped saliva off its chin. "Now that you''re back, are you going to start up your party again?"
My party? I can''t. I can''t get stuck back in here. She was starting to breath fast. Her arms and legs were paralyzed. A sudden clap of thunder. She jumped. Dark clouds swirled in the sky and it started to rain. The pitter-patter of raindrops sounded so real that she touched her fingertips to her cheeks to see if they were wet.
"Mom, it looks scary."
Back on the couch, she felt his hands tug on her arm. She was so immersed in the game that she''d forgotten about Hayden. She squeezed his shoulder. "You''ve been such a huge help, but Mom can handle it going forward. Why don''t you to log out now?"
He logged out.
"I was just playing with my son."
"Oh well, you wouldn''t have time for your own adventures anyway, here in The White Imperium, I mean, with the quest the Empress has planned for you and all."
"I''m not in The White"
"Don''t tell me you missed the announcement that you were entering the alpha test node and the software update?"
Then she remembered the message: alpha-test-WI03 node. Her chest tightened up. No, it can''t be. I can''t stay here. She grasped her helmet with sweat-soaked hands.
"Calm down, don''t you want to find the challenger?" asked her black desire.
She released her helmet and then grasped and squeezed her controller with both hands. "As I already said, I''m here for my son. I''m not going on any quest for anyone. And about that player"
"I see." The kappa turned to go.
"Wait!" she yelled after it.
It spun around and smiled at her. "Second thoughts?"
"No, the player"
It sighed. "You can contact me whenever you want." It sent its handle and public key to her.
"But you''re an NPC!" Why would an NPC need a public key?
"Did I say that?"
"I asked you and"
"And I said I''m not a player."
"You boldfaced liar!" She pointed her finger at the kappa.
"Liar? I''ll have you know I''m the Empress''s chief diplomatic envoy and as such I am obligated to tell the truth or otherwise say nothing. Furthermore, I am forever in her debt. For those reasons, you will never find a more effective diplomat."
She still didn''t believe it and it had ignored her question time and again. "Answer me! Do you know a player who knows my real name? Or anything having to do with the number 12?"
"No," the kappa said with a straight face and then picked at its teeth.
Was it really telling the truth? Maybe if what had caused it to be indebted to this so-called Empress were great enough, then she might believe it this one time. "What did she do for you? The Empress."
"I have another errand to attend to, so let''s keep it brief. When I was a mere pup, she personally saved my tribe from freezing to death. The Empress is most merciful and kind, except for those who cross her, like those brigands who burned one of her villages."
Is it trying to be in-character again? In-game punishment, so what? "Brian''s Brigands, right? What happened to them?"
"Of course, it goes without saying." The kappa paused, reached up to its mouth with one hand, and used the tip of one of its six claws to pick black spider skin out from between its teeth.
As though hypnotized, she watched it scrape and scrape between its pointed incisors. The kappa had been waiting for her. It knew her real name. Six claws + six claws = 12. Doudenary.
"You, you''re the one."
It smiled and stared her straight in the eyes. "The leaders were all swatted."
Chapter 2: Seepage (Part 1 of 2)
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Inner Truth
"Hey, Hayden!" Kenji Shibuyama said, his mobile phone to his ear. "Aren''t you supposed to be in bed resting?"
"I guess so," Hayden said, blowing his nose. "But it''s too light."
Hayden was one of those kids who was always active. "It''s okay, I get it," Ken said. "Can I talk to your mom?" Ken took a sip of coffee and set his mug back down on the desk.
"She''s still into the game."
"I see, that game theory mathematics paper is intense, huh?"
"It''s not"
"I know you''re bored." Ken laid his phone on the desk and pressed his thumb on the screen to turn on the speaker. He winced when a hairline crack along the side of his thumbnail ruptured and bled. He massaged lotion into his hands. The A/C dried out his skin. "I''ll be home lickety-split and we''ll playif you haven''t conked out by then."
"But Dad! I''m not tired, and Mom''s in the Three Kingdoms, not her math paper."
Ken jumped up, knocked his mug onto the carpet, and coffee spilled out. "What''s she doing in there?" he asked.
"Looking for the challenger."
Dammit, I shouldn''t have told her. "Is she okay? How long has she been in?"
"It was scary, the kappa" Hayden coughed.
Hayden went in too. An under-thirteen environment with its anime-style, bumbling kappa clowns can''t be that bad. "Scary?"
"And a tsuchigumo exploded and guts flew all around."
Ken laughed a little.
"It was gross." Hayden whimpered.
"Sorry, Hayden. So tell me, what happened, next?"
"And then the kappa tried to grab my shirikodama," Hayden said and sniffled.
That''s not right. "That''s a serious bug. I''m going to report it. There''s no place in the children''s environment for that kind of aggressive behavior."
"It''s not a bug. Me and Mom, we were... you know, it was the same one you and me accidentally got into last week."
"The eighteen-plus!" That''s so irresponsible! But wait, I''m sure she had a good reason. Besides, she''d never let Hayden get hurt.
Hayden sniffled again.
"Hayden," Ken said. "Your mom stopped the kappa, right?
"Yeah."
"Remember that. Neither me nor your mother would ever let you get hurteven in-game."
After reassuring Hayden, Ken told him to have his mother call him right after she got out, and then hung up.
Pushing gray-streaked hair out of his eyes, he glanced at his work email. His eyes popped open. An email from Websuit International was at the top. He forwarded it to his personal email. For months, the other players on the Three Kingdoms forums had been gushing about the invitation-only alpha testing for a new game, Quantum Katana Online. Full immersion and AI so powerful the NPCs could pass the Turing test.
He quit the spreadsheet Mas had sent him, opened his personal email on his home virtual machine image, and then clicked the Youtube video in the Websuit International email. He inched closer to the screen until he was sitting on the edge of his chair.
The video trailer started. While the screen lightened from midnight black to dawn, nohkan flutes lilted and screamed like ghosts. A gnarled foot stomped down onto a tree root and then stepped behind another one; its heel and toes stuck out on either side of an oak''s huge trunk. The crisp crunch of leaves echoed in his office''s surround-sound speakers. He pumped up the volume. The Pop! Pop, pop, pop! of coordinated tanegashima musket fire raked the room from one end to the other.
Mas walked in and slapped his hands over his ears. "Jesus, you''re going to blow the windows out."
Ken leaned forward and stared into the screen.
The smoke from the gunfire cleared. Silence. In ordered rows, a squad of soldiers stood on one side of the provincial road. The screen zoomed in on a sergeant''s face, smudged with dirt and sweat under the black-lacqured iron rim of his jingasa helmet. His eyes scanned the tree line on the other side of the muddy road.
"Yoshi!" he yelled in Japanese, "Souten!"
Ken glanced down at the subtitles. Good! Reload!
Mas sat down in a leather chair in front of Ken''s desk and started shaking his leg. "Did you look at the spreadsheet"
Ken held up one hand. With the other, he hit F5 and the ninety-inch flat-panel on the wall lit up.
An inhuman roar rumbled from the sub-woofer under the desk. On the screen, two gargantuan hairy feet launched themselves out of the trees and pounded across the road in three easy strides. A volley of gunfire pierced the air and echoed around the room. A wooden club the size of a man''s torso plowed through the ranks of soldiers. Men screamed. The rest ran.If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
The scene zoomed out. Men lay on the ground and moaned. Two shadows. One blocked the rising sun; the other, outlined by the gray sky.
Cut to the sergeant''s face. Blood streamed down his cheek and onto his neck from a raw piece of meat that used to be his eye socket. His good eye stared at his opponent. He fixed a bayonet under the muzzle of his tanegashima.
"Oni! Kakugo shiro!" he screamed and shook his bayonet high in the sky. Sleet splattered his face.
Ken and Mas read the subtitles. Oni! Prepare to die!
As the sergeant rushed the oni, the squelch of his steps in the mud bounced from one side of the room to the other.
The oni roared and swung his club, but at the last second in a burst of speed the sergeant lunged forward. The bayonet stabbed the oni in the abdomen just as the club smashed into the sergeant''s side. The sergeant groaned as his feet rose up off the ground. In slow motion, he flew twenty feet through the air and slammed into an oak.
The credits started to roll and Ken paused it.
Mas turned away from the screen to look at Ken. "You know," Mas said, "the number of attempted intrusions has risen dramatically and a surprising number of employees''s phones are getting hacked, not to mention the unprecedented spike in spear phishing attacks in just the last week and"
"Yeah, yeah, I saw the numbers." Ken nodded and then, grinning from ear to ear, said, "What did you think of the trailer? And guess what the big feature is?"
"You can barely hold it in, tell me already." Mas frowned and crossed his arms.
Ken jabbed his finger at the screen. "Total sensory immersion!"
In that instant, Ken restarted the trailer and the game''s title started to appear, each character displayed in sequence, pounding across the registration page like Yeti footprints stamped into the side of a glacier. The windows shook from the subwoofer blasts.
Quantum Katana Online
? The White Imperium ?
(夭)
For a limited time only, bonus stat points and free websuit shipping and handling. For early bird registration, click here.
Mas glared at Ken. "You didn''t click the link, did you?"
"Don''t get your panties all in a bunch. I just got the trailer a few minutes ago and it''s on my home VM."
"C''mon, man, is it too much to ask for the head of information security to set a good example?"
"Nothing happened that time," Ken said.
"Yeah, that time, and it was because I was the one who remediated that trojan horse before it opened a backdoor."
"Well, I was the one who alerted you to a potential intruder."
"God, man, you have some nerve! You let it in in the first place. Sometimes I wonder if you''re lacking in the brains department," Mas said, tapping his temple. "How did Hayden end up plugging in the USB stick from your gaming rig into your work laptop?" He held up his hand. "Don''t tell me. Regardless, you need to be a responsible parent. Don''t let your kid play with your adult toys, okay?"
Ken stood up and bowed. "By your command, Masaru Hashimoto, Oh Most Esteemed Daimyo of Network Security," Ken said and slunk behind his two twenty-four-inch monitors.
Mas snorted a laugh. "About the numbers. They''ve quadrupled within the past month."
Ken grunted in affirmation, sliding the pointer towards the link, Click here.
"Don''t," Mas said.
"Shit." Ken disconnected the TV from his computer. "Hey, it''s on my home VM."
"Geez, I know already, but we''re at work," Mas said to the back of the monitors. "Grow up."
Ken closed the registration page and peeked out from behind the monitors. "Don''t you remember?"
"I told you last week and my answer hasn''t changed."
"It''ll be like the good old days, instead of this stuffed shirt job." Ken flipped his silk tie.
"You''re seriously going to throw it all away? The rest of your options?"
"It''ll be a stealth startupjust like we wantedand those guys are already doing it." Ken pointed at the blank TV. "Total immersion."
"That? Impressive visuals, but still no different than any other MMORPG on the market. What''s its market differentiator?" Mas held up a hand. "Don''t tell me. A pod. Whoever thought up that trope didn''t know a damn thing about psychology. I mean for Chrissakes, it''s like climbing into your own coffin."
"It''s the websuit."
"Wetsuit?" Mas squinted. "Surfing?"
"Here." Ken looked over at his monitor. The registration page was still displayed. He would''ve sworn he''d closed it. His pointer was still hovering over Click here as though imploring him. He hit F5 and the TV switched back on. "''Free websuit shipping and handling.'' They were talking about it on the forums. It''s a wetsuit embedded with nano-sized electrodes. They can--"
"Shock you," Mas said.
"Kind of. They stimulate different sensory nerves, pressure, pain, heat, you know, nociceptors"
Mas jumped up and flung his arms up in the air. "Pain? You want to feel pain in a goddamn game? Are you out of your fucking mind?"
"I''m not talking about dropping a hammer on your big toe. Just a few pinpricks, it''ll be totally immersive."
"Immersive?" Mas waved his arms in the air. "I''ll tell you what''s immersive: Life, IRL. Remember the two-week vacation on the hot sands of Maui in December that we all took together last year. And the year before that, first class on Japan Air. All the booze you can guzzle on an eight-hour flight, non-stop, San Francisco to Tokyo. And then in a few months, a full-week stay at a ryokan with a fancy onsen. That''s the kind of immersion your options can buy."
Ken bobbed his arms up and down at Mas. "Calm down, everything''ll be fine. You''ll take over as VP and then after I get things established, you''ll come over. You should''ve been VP from the beginning, anyways."
Mas dropped back down into his chair. "You know I''m not a people person like you."
"You''ll get the options," Ken said. "Then we can buy that condo on Maui. All of us, me and Chie, you and Audrey and the kids. We can all go there any time we want."
Mas started to push up out of his chair. "Don''t be so irresponsible."
"Is this really what you want?" Ken swept his arm around the office. "Remember? We wanted to make a difference."
"We missed it, man, the Internet boom is over."
"VR, AR, total immersion. Chie''s mobotacts," Ken said.
"Impractical," Mas said. "Never could solve the power consumption issue. The big guys are way ahead of us with the AR/VR glasses and headsets now."
"Chips are way down in their power needs since twenty years ago. Pair up VR gear with the websuit. There are so many apps. It''s an entire ecosystem."
"At our age, aren''t you satisfied?" Mas snatched up Ken''s nameplate and shoved it in Ken''s face. "Look!"
Kenji Shibuyama
Vice-President of Information Security
California Silicon Investment Corporation
"We''re on the fortieth floor of the Transamerica. We''re set for life," Mas said.
"Mobotacts plus websuit. They''re a game changer."
"You''re a dreamer." Mas jerked himself out of his chair and stomped towards the door.
Ken ran around the desk, grabbed Mas''s arm, and said, "Mas, remember when we were kids"
Mas''s phone alarm went off.
"Dammit, I forgot about the meeting with the pentesting contractors. They''re gouging us." He closed his eyes and rubbed his temples with his fingers. "Can''t you talk to Mabel and get a budget for employee security training? The people are always the weakest link, you know."
Ken nodded and sat back down behind his twin monitors.
Mas grabbed the doorknob and then turned his head around. "Also, do me a favor and do a quick read of the spreadsheet and my report. Especially check out the profile we compiled on one interesting visitor. Goes by the handle, Aika_Gordian. A gamer. Maybe you could ask around"
"Why don''t you?" Ken chuckled. "She sounds like your typedominant, muscular."
Mas gave Ken a blank stare.
"Gordian? Get it?" Ken held his hands out, palms up.
Mas grimaced. "What the fuck are you talking about?"
Ken sighed. "You''re always bugging me to go to the women''s MMA whenever a bout comes to San Franciso."
"I only asked you twice," Mas said. "Okay, maybe three times. At least, they don''t fake it like the men''s. The men''s MMA has practically turned into the WWW."
"Sure, whatever you say, Mas."
"Shut up, man," Mas said. "Like I was saying, find out about this hacker in the forums."
Ken frowned. "You need to get out more. A gamer does not a hacker make."
"But a hacker makes a deadly gamer. You know, if I had one one-hundrenth of a bitcoin for every hacker in the Three Kingdoms, I''d have a yacht the size of a cruise ship parked in a slip in Honolulu."
The door slid shut.
"Asshole." Ken laughed and rolled his eyes.
He heard two shutter clicks and whipped his head around to stare at his phone in its cradle.
Chapter 2: Seepage (Part 2 of 2)
After running the corporate remediation tool, Ken stuffed his phone into his blazer''s inner pocket. The tool had found viruses attached to the camera and ftp libraries. The logs had shown that pictures had been transferred to a known hacker site, but it was anyone''s guess where they''d gone after that. He smiled. At least, they weren''t sensitive documentsjust his ugly mug. The usual malware detection hadn''t found them because they were unknown. But not for long. Mas''s team would make short work of them.
Mas was the best and he made Ken look good. That was one of Ken''s talents, getting the best on his team and keeping them happy. But Mas was one of the few that could get under Ken''s skin. Of course, it was because they''d always be friends, even when on opposing sides of the battlefield, which would never happenin this world, anyway. Ken picked up a picture frame from his desk and gazed at the eight people. Ken, his brother, sister and father and Mas, Mas''s parents and sister on their pilgrimmage to Poston. They stood in front of replicas of wooden bungalows built on hard-pack dirt. Dusty mountains rose up low in the background. He pulled a microfiber cloth out of his glasses case and wiped the dust from the picture frame''s pane of glass. He rubbed again and again on a smudge, but it wouldn''t come off. Then he realized it was a dust cloud in the background. His dad had said that there was so much sand and dust you could never get away from it. It even got under your sheets and sometimes into your underwear and rubbed your balls raw.
He walked over to the window. The sunset bathed the Golden Gate in glistening beams of real light. He loved that bridge. He ran his first marathon across it. Sunlight had warmed his sweaty biceps as his legs pumped up and down, propelling him across the golden steel road. That had been years ago. It had taken too much time and his family came first, but now he could see that beautiful creation almost every day of the week. Yes, as Mas had said, he''d made it to the top, literally. Yet, he''d never felt really satisfied, working at a company making money off of money, off of symbols of money, self-referential simulacrums devoid of any grounding in physical reality.
But the stealth company Websuit International had built something beautiful, glorious and creative: the websuit.
Glowing tendrils of fog rolled in under the Golden Gate. It seeped into his bones. The fog was stealth and would wend its way through the streets in a cool dispersed mist and then all of a sudden it would be everywhere. That was stealth and just like an immersive gaming experience, he wanted to be a part of a technology that could sneak into the everyday lives of people all over the world.
The soft pitter-patter of rain coming out of the surround-sound speakers broke him out of his reverie. He was sure he''d turned off the trailer. He swiveled his head around and looked back over his shoulder at the monitor. The trailer was off, but the registration page was displayed.
The environmental sounds of sleet now turned to rain hitting the muddy road and the lonely whining of nohkan beckoned him. Underneath the melody, a voice was singing. A woman''s voice. A lullaby punctuated by the dripping of rain and then lifted up by the waves of the wind rustling leaves. Closing his eyes, he rocked his head back and forth to the tune. It was a soft voice. Mukashi, mukashi. Like how his mother used to start her bedtime stories. And then, he heard it. He wasn''t certain, but he thought he heard his mother Tomomi singing his name, Kenji. Tears welled up and he clenched his eyes shut.
Mukashi, mukashi, a young farmer boy passed by the train station on his way home and chanced to see a girl debarking the platform. Her skin was as white as snow and her eyes were large and black like obsidian. She looked lost and, being the kind lad that he was, he stopped to offer his assistance. She was on her way to Tokyo to stay with her sister and become a nurse, but the train had a mechanical breakdown and she had to stay overnight in the boy''s quaint village. She didn''t know where to stay. In the off-season, his mother rented out rooms in the farmhouse for laborers, so he offered her such accomodations.
She never did make it to Tokyo. They
Thunder boomed from the speakers. His eyes popped open. The room careened from one side to the other. The books fell out of the bookshelf on the other side of the room. Earthquake! He was about to duck under the desk, but then the shaking stopped.
Is it the big one? His phone displayed no voice service, but 2G was still available for cell data. He texted Chie to find out if she and Hayden were okay and then she texted him back.
It shook pretty bad, but we''re okay. The news says 7.7. Are you still at work?
He texted back.
I''m fine.
He didn''t want her to worry. She had to concentrate on Hayden and herself even though the Berkeley hills were on solid rock.
Then cell data dropped out completely.
He grabbed his backpack and was just about to rush out when the monitor screen caught his eye.
On the registration page of his home VM display, Click here glowed red. How can the wired connections even be active? I mean it''s a 7.7, the underground fiberoptic cables must be a mess.
Curious to see if it was really live, he sat down and clicked it. A new page was displayed:
Hey there, good-looking!
Only five minutes left until your registration period expires.
You''d better complete your registration or else it''s going to be transferred to the next registrant in the queue.
And you definitely don''t want that to happen, do you?
Because then you won''t get to meet li''l ''ol meAikaonline. ^_-
I''m easy. Just click here.
What? Was I redirected to a camgirl site? He manually retyped the URL, but it was the right one.
Only 4 minutes left now, dummy. ^_-
You''ve got to be kidding? He clicked it, but nothing happened. Dammit! His finger jerked and spasmed on the mouse button. Blood seeped out from the crack in his thumb.
A dialog box popped up.
VM host SHIBUYAMA-FAM-WIN2016-1 disconnected.
Shoot, lost the connection to my home VM. He pinged it but all the requests timed out. Yep, the network''s dead now, but maybe the company''s private link to the backbone is still operational. He remotely logged into one of the security servers that managed the routing to the various exchanges. There was a slight delay, probably caused by rerouting of network traffic. He copied the URL embedded with his unique registration code from the work email. He completely isolated the VM from the internal network, including shutting down all the ports on the VM, and opened the purpose-built browser that sandboxed all activity. He held his breath. He followed the SOP for investigating hacking sources to a T, but there was always a riskand it wasn''t an official company investigation.A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
He copy-pasted the link into the browser and raised his forefinger over the Return key. He paused. He had less than four minutes left. It was a typical phishing tactic, but he was the one who had submitted his request in the first place. It was a trusted company and its SSL was verified. He had to answer a ten-page questionnaire. It proved he was one of the chosen few and there was no way he was going to let this opportunity get away.
He licked his dry lips and punched Return with his forefinger.
The registration page opened. He verified his email and identity through his private key registered with a third-party certificate authority and paid for an annual subscription with Ether from his digital wallet. To reduce liability, Websuit International, exactly like Three Kingdoms, didn''t want to save any personally identifiable information in their system. They just wanted to get paid.
The pointer hovered over Submit and he lifted his finger.
The floor began to sway back and forth like the deck of a sailboat in a squall. Then, it rocked faster and the bookshelf toppled over. "Oh shit!" He dove under the table.
After several seconds, the shaking stopped and then his phone rang.
"Where are you?" Mas said.
"In my office."
"What the fuck? You''ve gotta get out!"
"Yeah, just need to do one more thing." He crawled out from under the table.
"What? I''m already down on the thirty-fifth floor. The emergency text said we''ve only felt the precursor. The Big One''s gonna hit!"
"I''m coming."
Voice is back up. He grabbed onto the edge of the table and pulled himself up. Then he called Chie and she picked up.
He moved the mouse over the Submit button and then told a white lie. "Hey, I''m almost out of the building. Where are you?"
"What? You''re still inside?"
"Don''t worry, weMas and meare making our way down the stairs. Where are you? How''s Hayden? Is he scared?"
"What? Mas''s still there too? I thought he had more sense than you. But anyways, the lights are out, but we have the flashlights and the emergency kit. It''s like a camp-out, right Hayden. Here, say ''hi'' to Daddy."
Now he was really glad that they''d put together a plan and an emergency kit years ago.
"Hi Dad! We''re in the truck in the garage and"
Then it hit. The shaking was even more intense than before. The blinds tore from their mountings, struck the top of his head, and tore a gash across his face. He shoved the blinds off of him. Shit! It''ll take less than a second, then I''ll get the hell out of here. At least Hayden and Chie are safe. He slammed his hand back down on the mouse. He was just about to click the button when the filing cabinet toppled over onto his leg. He yelled out in pain, fell to his knees and grabbed his leg with both hands. An alarm sounded through the computer speakers. He looked up and saw a message box pop up with a countdown timer starting at sixty seconds. He grabbed the mouse and moved it over the Submit button.
He clicked.
Taiko drums beat a slow dirge. On the page, a white ring like the tail of a snow fox appeared. It spun and spun. His eyes were glued to the spinning ring like the circumference of a drum head.
? ? ?
Mas slammed the door open. Ken was in a catatonic state and staring at the screen.
A huge gash cut across Ken''s cheekbone and blood streamed down into his mouth. He licked the blood from his lips.
Mas ran over and grabbed Ken''s arm. "We gotta go!" Mas glanced at the screen and saw a spinning white ring. He was about to turn away but then he saw it and gasped. It was irrational, but the hairs on the back of his neck rose and he almost screamed. Behind the spinning ring, a woman stared out at him with her pale white face and red eyes, which then bled away, leaving two empty black circlesvoids so black it was as though they were completely dilated and so deep he felt like he was falling into them. He had seen those eyes before and he didn''t know how he knew but he knew he had loved them.
Long black hair swayed back and forth in a dark rhythm just above her knees. White arms in translucent sleeves stretched out to grab him. They seemed to be reaching out through the very screen. He felt cold like he was almost frozen solid and rooted to the ground. The hands were mere inches away from him, but he couldn''t lift his legs. His breathing slowed and he started to shiver. Am I going to die?
An aftershock jolted the room, the monitor toppled off the desk, crashed onto the floor, and the screen cracked. Mas shook his head clear and tried to move his foot. The sole of his wingtip lifted off of the carpet and he took a step. After looping one of Ken''s arms over his shoulders, Mas dragged Ken out of the room and they made their way down the stairs.
With only the red glare from the emergency lights illuminating each concrete step, they descended the deserted stairwell. In a trance, Ken dragged his feet from one step to the other.
Mas''s phone beeped and he read the emergency text. More aftershocks were imminent.
Balancing Ken''s bulk all the while, Mas trudged down flight after flight of stairs. Every other flight, he stopped to catch his breath. Every so often he''d slap Ken''s face and yell at him, "Ken! Wake up!" But Ken would only stare back with the same expressionless eyes that Mas had seen when he pried Ken away from the monitor thirty minutes ago. A fleeting thought passed through Mas''s head. I should leave him here and get the EMT to come back and get him? No, it''ll take too long. Maybe it''s better we perish together? But Katie and Robin need me. Yet if Ken died, I''d never forgive myselfand neither would Chie. He buried that last thought.
They made it down to the fourth floor before the walls started to heave back and forth. Mas grabbed the railing and held onto it as hard as he could. The shaking stopped. Dust sprayed into his face. He coughed and squinted. His mouth tasted like concrete and spiderwebs. He spat. His eyes itched something fierce from the paste of stinging sweat and dust. He rubbed them with the cuffs of his dress shirt.
Finally, they reached the landing at the top of the last flight of stairs. To get a better hold of Ken, Mas pulled Ken''s arm back up across his shoulders. Sunlight outlined the edges of the door at the bottom of the last flight of stairs. He laughed out loud and almost started to cry. He patted Ken''s shoulder. "We made it, man!"
Then the entire building started to sway. After a second, it stopped. Thank God!
That''s when Mas heard it, a deafening grinding noise. He jerked his head around to look behind him. The concrete wall was starting to rip apart. He slapped Ken''s face hard, again and again. "Ken! Ken!" Ken''s eyes brightened and he looked at Mas in sudden recognition.
Then the landing buckled. The stairway tore away from the wall behind them.
"Run!" Mas said.
Mas ran and bounded down several steps at a time. Ken limped after him as fast as he could. Mas lost his balance and toppled over the railing, but Ken grabbed his hand just in time and pulled him back over.
Ken leaped off of the last step and landed on the ground floor. He yelled in pain as his bad leg crumpled underneath him and he lost his footing, twisting his ankle and slamming his shoulder onto the ground.
Mas jumped down, picked him up, and together they hobbled over to the door. Then everything went black. The emergency lights had gone out.
Mas and Ken took a few tentative steps in their original direction. Mas extended his arms in front of him and felt for the door. He whacked something with his hand. It was the door knob. He grabbed it and pulled, but it didn''t budge. He looked up. Light from outside outlined the top of the door frame; the door was askew. It was jammed. If he didn''t force it, the entire wall would come down.
Then another aftershock hit. The floor shuddered. Now, he didn''t have a choice. They''d be buried alive if they didn''t get out now. He grasped the door knob with both hands and yanked it with all his strength. The door wrenched open with a loud shriek and they rushed through. The sunlight blinded them. They were out.
From the evacation area in the center of the street, Mabel and the others frantically waved their arms at Ken and Mas and yelled, "run!"
A burst of pain exploded in Mas''s back. Falling. Glancing behind. Broken chunks of concrete crashed down on Ken who then collapsed on top of Mas.
Chapter 3: What Is Love? (Part 1 of 2)
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The Turning Point
Pork bones simmered in a huge stock pot on the gas stove. At the kitchen table, Chie edited another mathematics paper. This time it was for a symposium. She watched Ken in his white apron hobble over to the other side of the stove and slide a carving knife out of the block. Even though Hayden stood on a stepping stool, his chin only barely crested the countertop. The four-pound raw pork butt on the counter stared the two of them in their faces. Ken cut it into four parts. "Now cover them with the salt."
Hayden shook the salt shaker.
"Do the same with the pepper, coriander, and cumin."
The cumin top fell off and half the bottle poured over the meat before Hayden stopped it. "I''m sorry!"
Hayden looked like he was about to cry.
"It''s okay, Hayden, you have to make mistakes to learn and make as many of them as you can when you''re young and get them all out of your system. So you don''t make them when you''re older and the problems bigger."
Hayden still didn''t look quite convinced.
"All right then, now let''s massage the pig''s butt."
Hayden laughed.
They gripped and rubbed, twisted and pinched the pig''s muscular hindquarters.
"The pig loves it," Ken said. "Can you hear it oinking?"
"Dad," Hayden giggled. "I''m not that little anymore, I know it''s dead."
Chie laughed too, but not at Hayden''s innocence. Her thoughts were elsewhere. She appraised the smooth arc of Ken''s muscular butt framed by the apron.
"Ha!" Ken reached over to rustle Hayden''s hair, but then stopped. He showed his hands to Chie. They were caked with spices and raw pork juices.
She smiled. They grow so fast. It''s a blessing in disguise. Ken hadn''t taken a vacation since his promotion six months ago.
"Dad?" Hayden tugged on Ken''s sleeve. "Do pigs have shirikodama?"
Chie''s eyes met Ken''s. They had talked about it. Hayden''s nightmares. It had been her fault and she hadn''t had the nerve to tell Ken about the quest. Even though she was sure he knew why she''d gone in. After all, what did he expect her to do after telling her about the challenge.
Ken pinched the stubble on his chin. "Insofar as a soul goes, being that I''m agnostic, I''d have to say that I don''t know. But, you know, if we understand a soul to be some kind of insubstantial spirit, then it''s impossible to have a soul exist in that digital environment. Therefore, it''s impossible to have a shirikodama stolen in-game."
"But Mrs. Dun said the neurons in the brain and the nerves use electro... chemical pulses. And games are powered by electricity. So, couldn''t a shirikodama exist in a game?"
"Well..." Ken glanced over at Chie. "That''s true, but I would think that a soul needs organic material."
"Oh, like pesticide-free food?"
"No, something alive."
"The kappa was alive, well, more alive than in any other game, I mean it was more alive than" Hayden looked over at his mother and then pulled his father down and whispered in his ear, "More alive than... the eighteen-plus we were in."
"Kappa?" Ken looked over at her and raised his eyebrows.
She smiled and nodded back at him.
Ken nodded. "I see, but it wasn''t really alive because it was all electricity and bits and bytesnot flesh and bones and" Ken pinched Hayden''s shoulder.
"Ow!" Hayden said.
"it can''t feel pain or..." Ken tickled Hayden''s stomach. "Tickling!"
"Dad, stop! I''m serious."
"Oh sorry," Ken raised his eyebrows. "Let''s continue with our Socratic discussion."
"When Grandma and Grandpa took me to church, Reverend Asakawa said the soul might be made up of quan...quantum energy."
"Reverend Asakawa is quite the studious one. I wonder if quantum theory is alluded to in the Lotus or Diamond sutras?" He stared off into space. "Quantum energy. Could be, could be..." He nodded his head up and down.
All the while massaging the pork butt with one small hand, Hayden looked up at his father waiting for him to continue.
After almost a minute, Chie said, "Ken?"
"Oh right. Quantum energy. The thing is that even if the soul were made of quantum energy, it''s all locked up inside of subatomic particles"
"Subatomic"
"Like electrons in electricity. So, it''s doubtful that your quantum soul could be transmitted via the VR helmet to the game. Because the quantum energy in the subatomic particles can''t get out and be directly transferred." Ken looked down at Hayden.
"I can see directly in-game"
"But that''s through your eyes, not from the electrochemical impulses in your brain into the game."
"Oh!" Hayden''s eyes brightened. "I get it!"
Chie gave Ken a thumbs up. Mission accomplished.
Ken and Hayden went back to creating their culinary delight. Ken browned the pork butt pieces in the Presto pressure cooker. Then he poured in a cup of water and rotated the cover to seal it. He pressed the pressure cook button and set the timer for fifty minutes.
After combining the flour and egg, Ken said to Hayden, "Now roll ''em flat like a steamroller."
They both made machine-like humming noises.
While Ken threaded the flat sheets through the pasta machine, Hayden turned its handle. Yellow linguine strands spun out the other end like threads of gold. He held them up to Chie. "Not quite ramen noodles, but you have to make do with what you''ve got and adapt."
"Mmm... looks tasty, oishi!"
She walked up behind them, stretched her arms out, grabbed their shoulders, and hugged them. "My two little chefs."
She rubbed her pelvis against his hip, kissed his ear, and whispered, "Let''s do it later."
Roaring like a lion, Ken wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her in. He kissed her again and again, their lips making loud smacking noises.
The pressure cooker let out a wolf-whistle and shot out a geyser of steam. Then, its steam release pin clicked shut.
"Shh... Mommy, Daddy," Hayden put a finger to his lips. "The pig''s enjoying its soak in the onsen."
Both Chie and Ken kissed Hayden on his cheeks.
Chie''s phone rang.
"Hi, Mrs. Shibuyama. I''m Detective Rostov from the Berkeley Police Department."
"Oh, hi, Detective Rostov, can you hold on for just a minute, please." Chie rushed out of the kitchen and into the office. "Sorry about that, is this regarding the threat?"
"Right, I''m handling them. I just wanted to assure you that since there have been a number of attempted swattings over the past six months, we''ve taken extra precautions. We''ve placed your home address in Berkeley on our list of swatting threats."
She sighed in relief. "Thank you. Not to be a pain, but would you be able to start an investigation?"
"Unfortunately, Mrs. Shibuyama, I''m the only one managing swatting, in addition to my other cases, and an online game threat"
"I mean, it didn''t sound like an idle threat." She couldn''t say it was from an NPC kappa.
"Didn''t they say it would happen in twenty-four hours and wasn''t that two weeks ago?"
She hadn''t told him the twenty-four hour deadline was to sign up for the quest, but it would complicate matters if she told the police all that. She hadn''t signed up and it was true that it had been two whole weeks since she''d been online. Nothing had happened. That was good news. It was all a bluff and there was no need to tell Ken. Still, they might try again and it couldn''t hurt to ask the police to start an investigation. "But"
"See? Plus, not being able to provide a real name makes it a very resource intensive investigation. To be honest, you''re lucky to even get on the watch list. If it wasn''t for the fact that someone over in San Mateo was swatted in a game also run by Websuit International last weekend, we never would have considered it."
The same company? Could the same kappa have swatted someone else? But an NPC can''t call out of the game. Does it even have that much initiative? Maybe the Empress ordered it? That must be it! The Empress is really a player. "Oh, is that person okay?"
"You haven''t heard? It''s been all over the news. The JamminChat employee? No one was hurt, but after the swatting, he went missing. Turns out he was under suspicion of embezzlement. That reminds me now. This might be good news for youand for me. As a result of this high profile case, an FBI agent is going to be assigned to our department for a few months. Boy, we''re sure going to make some good headway through our backlog."
"What''s his name? The FBI agent?" Chie said.
"Oh... Jim Nithyanandan. But please don''t bother him, Mrs. Shibuyama, he''s going to be extremely busy. I''ll still be the one in charge and I''ll be more than happy to answer any questions you might have. In fact, we''ll be in touch and give you a status update if anything comes up, at least once a month."
She thanked the detective and hung up. She told herself that now with their address on the watch list, she had a good enough reason to avoid telling Ken about the swatting threat. Obviously, telling him would be way too much stress and interfere with his recovery.
After stuffing themselves with ramen, Ken and Chie put Hayden to bed.
? ? ?
In their own bed, Ken caressed Chie''s hair and then slid his hand under the covers to rest on her shoulders. She rolled over on her side and kissed him. As he moved his leg with the cast to rest on top of the other, he winced at the tightness in the hip. It was amazing that only one leg was broken. Well, he''d had a concussion too. Four weeks to be healed completely and two weeks had already passed.
"It''s okay, I''ll do it," she said. She rolled him onto his back. He reached over and opened the nightstand drawer, but she told him not to bother. Her period had ended yesterday. She climbed on top of him and they made love.
Afterwards, Chie held Ken''s hand underneath the sheets and pink silk quilt. She kissed his adam''s apple and his stubble scratched the tip of her nose. She laughed, lifted her head up, and touched the scab on his cheekbone.
"I was afraid," she said. She laid her head on his chest and pulled at the hairs around his nipples.
"Stop it." He smiled.
She wrapped herself in her bathrobe to get glasses of water.
While filling up the glasses in the kitchen, her phone rang. "Hi, Mom."
"Are you guys, okay? I mean all of you, Ken and Hayden?" Chie''s mother said.
"Well, nothing''s changed since we saw you Sunday when you picked Hayden up," Chie said.
"Did your phone get hacked?" her mother said.
"No, well not that I know of. Why? Yours did?"
"Yes, both mine and your dad''s and the FBI came and confiscated them."
"What? Today?" Chie almost dropped the glass of water. She turned off the faucet.
"They left an hour ago."
"But why?" Chie said.
"They asked a lot of questions about you," Chie''s mother said.
"Me?"
"And Ken and Hayden and... about your involvement in the Three Kingdoms."
"But they just can''t barge in," Chie said.
"They had a warrant. It was so exhausting, and at our age. You know, honey, your father and I are proud of you." Her mother paused.
Here, it was coming, the lecture, Chie could feel it in her mother''s tone. She cinched her bathrobe belt around her already tightened abdominal muscles.
"And what you do with your time is your own but we thought you''d given up on those, what do you call them, e-sports?"
She ignored her mother''s rhetorical question. There were more important questions, more important facts to verify. "By any chance, the name of any of the FBI agents wasn''t Jim Nithyanandan, was it?"
"How in the world did you know?" her mother said and then continued to tell Chie how last night at the church''s meditation session, the phones of many of her mother''s friends had also been hacked, but none had been visited by the FBI yet. Her mother prattled on about the virtues of the spiritual life which was antithetical to online fighting games, but by then Chie had tuned her mother out. Right before they said their goodbyes, her mother said that she and Chie''s father would come over on Thursday and make nabe hotpot.
On her way back, she opened Hayden''s door a crack. He was still sleeping. He wasn''t tossing and turning and he wasn''t waking up in the middle of the night anymore. And, of course, with Ken back into his master chef role with Hayden as his sous-chef, the family was back into their usual rhythm, like before his promotion.
Chie handed Ken his glass and she slipped back under the sheets, her back resting against the headboard.
"Mom called, they''re coming over on Thursday to make nabe," Chie said and then guzzled down her entire glass.
Ken said yum and rubbed his stomach. "Nabe''s so good when the cold weather starts to settle in."
"The FBI interviewed them today," Chie said.
He jerked his head back and hit it on the headboard.
She told him about the conversation with her mother but omitted that she knew the FBI agent''s name.
? ? ?
"It has nothing to do with you going back into the Three Kingdoms," Ken said, massaging her shoulders. "It''s just a coincidence." He wasn''t sure why she''d been avoiding talking about what happened to her in the Three Kingdoms, but he thought it had something to do with letting Hayden into the eighteen-plus environment. But now that Hayden was starting to talk about his traumatic experience and he hadn''t had a nightmare in a week, it was probably okay. Besides, Ken''s curiosity was killing him.Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.
He hugged her. "Talking about the Three Kingdoms, did you ever find him? Prokreashun?"
She threw off the sheets and slipped her legs over the edge of the mattress.
"Sorry," he said, kissing her on the cheek. "It''s not your fault. I was the one who let Hayden into the eighteen-plus environment in the first place. It couldn''t have been that anyways. The real shocker was when he saw me in the ICU. That affected him way more than some virtual environment, right?"
"It was a kappa," Chie said.
He hugged her tighter. "How was Prokreashun able to change his character to a cute little kappa NPC?"
She shrugged her shoulders.
He nestled his nose and moist lips on her neck. "Did you get him to bow?" he said, kissing the nape of her neck.
She shivered and then snorted a laugh.
He tickled her side.
She grabbed his fingers and twisted them.
He grabbed her waist with both hands and pulled her down. His hip throbbed some, but the sex had loosened it up a little. He looked down into her honey-brown eyes and he kissed them both. Each one had a soft ridge of skin underneath like the first rise of bread dough. He had seen those eyes for the first time in first semester physics. Her stiff and straight bob cut boxed in her eyes. No other girl wore such unfashionable hair. And after almost two decades, she still wore the same cut. But those eyes, those wide, deep, dark eyes, hinted at an intelligence far beyond his own. And they were more than adequate to get him all the way through his undergrad physics requirement for computer science.
He squeezed her tight and gave her a quick peck on the lips. The Three Kingdoms was much improved from seven years ago and he was sure she''d had quite a shock. But the new system in Quantum Katana Online would be even worse for her. But now having experienced the Three Kingdoms, the way for her into Quantum Katana Online: The White Imperium had been eased. It''ll be exactly like the good old days.
He bit his lower lip. He''d manipulated her by telling her about Prokreashun. He could''ve ignored Prokreashun''s email just like he''d conveniently ignored the fact that he knew she''d go in and try to find her old nemesis. He regretted doing it, but after they''d argued about the stealth startup, this was really the only way. Besides, she really wanted to dive again. She had that competitive nature, the drive to reach her utmost potential in whatever field she chose. That''s why he loved her.
Now that Hayden''s better, I just know she''ll be willing to give The White Imperium a go. Then I could tell her I registered for it. The alpha test websuit is going to be coming real soon too, maybe even today. He stared into her eyes again and looked for a sign showing she could handle the immersion, but he knew the eyes were not the windows to a person''s soul.
? ? ?
Chie had taken a small step towards telling him all about the quest, but then he''d tell her to take it and in fact he''d want to join up as well. She hadn''t told him about having been in the actual White Imperium. Hayden had been too traumatized with the kappa envoy to say anything about it either, plus seeing Ken all bandaged up, but now the cat was out of the bag.
She broke away from his gaze.
"I bet you beat him to a pulp." Ken said.
"I logged off."
"What? Why?"
"Hayden," she said.
"Oh, right."
"What were you thinking?" She pushed herself up onto her hands. "Did you think I backed down?"
"There''s nothing to be embarrassed about." He grabbed her hand.
"Embarrassed?" She bolted upright, sitting as straight as the stave of a naginata. "Rose Crow never backs down."
"Okay, okay, calm down." He tugged on her hand. "It''s only a game."
With her lips thinned to a grim line across her face, she stared at him. He smiled back. Reflected in the mirror behind him, she saw her steel-eyed gaze and she realized just how silly she was being. She looked down at their entwined fingers. "The graphics. The quality was photorealistic. Not to mention the environmental sounds."
"Wow, I heard the graphics chips on the new helmets are going to be upgraded, but I didn''t know the software upgrade on the old ones would already be that good."
Her face relaxed. "But it could never have this level of reality." Desperate to prove to herself how much the real world meant to her, she grasped his cheeks in both of her hands and kissed him full on the mouth, sliding her lips all over his. She let them linger together for several long seconds and then released him.
He reached around her waist to pull her back into another kiss, but she leaned back, away from him. Was it really right for her to keep the quest from him? Didn''t they share everyhing? "It offered me a quest, but I refused it. From the Empress of The White Imperium."
Ken''s eyes lit up. "An empress! No one''s ever said anything about an empress!" Then he knitted his brow. "But you were in the Three Kingdoms..."
"It was weird. The kappa claimed we were logged into The White Imperium test server, and there were new stats." She told him about the Chi attribute and the universe property.
"Then, it was The White Imperium."
Chie shrugged. "I guess, but it was just a clearing in a forest. Nothing special. A tsuchigumo attacked me, but I dispatched it quickly."
"You were logged in to the wild? Not a town?"
"Yeah, I know, definitely not a safe zone, come to think of it."
His mouth was agape. "The alpha hadn''t even been opened yet. How could you behow about the quest? What was the quest about?"
The private message describing the quest had made her heart do backflips. The Mirror of Truth. She had seen hand-crafted replicas of ancient Japanese bronze mirrors many times on the mantle in the church foyer. "To be honest, it was kind of boring..."
"Really? What was it? A dungeon crawl? Escort mission? Rescue?" He was like a dog straining at the leash to chase a cat.
The quest for the shards of the Mirror of Truth. "No, nothing like that, it''s kind of like your typical adventurer party on a scavenger hunt"
The doorbell rang. The alarm clock displayed 2313. Ken threw on shorts and a t-shirt.
"What, you''re going to get it at this time of night?"
He smiled. "I''m expecting something."
She followed him to the front door.
He turned on the porch light, peeked through the peep hole and then opened the door.
"Good evening, Sir," A delivery man in a purple and yellow uniform said. "Are you Mr. Kenji Shibuyama?" Websuit International was emblazoned in bright white letters across the front of his black cap. His gloved hand rested on a handtruck which held a large packing box.
"Yes," Ken said. "You''re sure out late."
"Overtime," the delivery man said as he handed Ken the digital delivery recorder to sign. "Plus a hefty bonus directly from the customer." He tipped brim of his cap.
After signing, Ken opened the box in the living room. Inside was a lifeless black wetsuit wrapped in vacuum-sealed plastic.
After having heard Hayden describe it, she knew what it was right away and crossed her arms. "I won''t allow that thing in here."
"You know what"
"Of course," Chie said. "Your son is more forthcoming than his own father."
"I was going to tell you, but the time just didn''t seem right." His smile looked like a painted-on clown''s.
She glared at him.
"Get your VR headset. You can wear it and get a feel for it. You''ll get a real kick out of it." He held it up to show her.
"That? It''s too big. Was it custom-made for you?"
"Yeah, they asked me to take a 3D, three-hundred sixty degree video. Just wear the pants. We can roll up the cuffs."
"No way." She backed up and put her hands up in front of her. "I''m not going to put on a form-fitting body bag."
Ken cut open the vacuum bag and laid the cuff of one of the pantlegs in Chie''s hand.
She rubbed the polymer between her fingers and shuddered. It repulsed her. It was cool and smooth like the burnished wood of a coffin. She tossed it back at him. "It''s only an alpha, anyways. It''s bound to have tons of bugs."
"I heard they''re restricting the initial period to a training town to work out the basic bugs and the websuit doesn''t have all the bells and whistles, in fact, it''s pretty bare bones. Sensitivity''s hardcoded at the min level." He held out the pants to her. "Just put it on and it''ll automatically calibrate to you body upon login."
"It doesn''t feel right. Hayden said that it translates your actual physical movements into the game and it stimulates your nerves. What exactly does that mean?"
Ken gave her the exact explanation he''d given Mas and she had the same reaction.
"Who the hell wants to feel pain in a game?" She wrapped her arms around herself in a hug.
"It''s going to be totally immersive!" he said.
"Not on my watch. What if Hayden tries to use it?"
"What''re you talking about?" He held the jacket up by its sleeves. Spread out, it looked like a baby manta ray. "It''s way too big."
"I don''t care, send it back." If it made the game more immersive than what she''d experienced so far, she didn''t want anything to do with it. She turned her back on him and walked out of the living room and into the kitchen.
? ? ?
A week later at three-thirty AM on a Sunday morning, Chie woke up to go to the bathroom. Ken''s side of the bed was empty. She wasn''t surprised. In fact, she was used to it, but that didn''t mean she had to like it. Since he''d gotten his cast off three days ago, he''d been playing almost non-stopeven in the middle of the night. They''d argued and since then they''d stopped talking. She walked down the hallway and heard his voice coming from downstairs. After descending the stairs, she turned the corner and opened the sliding door that opened into the living room. Ken was standing in his websuit in the center, swinging his arms and bokken around.
He was at it again. Her blood pressure started to rise. "Get off! Right now!"
He couldn''t hear her through the noise-cancelling headphones of his VR helmet. The new one looked exactly like a full-face motorcycle helmet, its faceplate tinted black. He couldn''t even see her.
"Retreat!" Ken said. "Teddy, protect the flank!"
He thrust his bokken in front of him. "I know right, did you hear about the prize money?"
He ran into the sofa chair against the wall. "Oh, shit!" he toppled over it. "That archer shot me out of nowhere! Guys, where''s my screen of scouts?"
"All right, I''m respawning." He stood up and waited for two minutes.
Then he jumped and smacked into the wall. "Dammit! Ran into the wall again!"
As though fending off multiple attackers, he swept his bokken in wide arcs all around him. "When are we going to get the fully functional websuits? Next week, right? Cool. We''ll be out of this lame-ass training town and be able to freely traverse the open world."
He stuck his arm straight out. "Fireball! Ha, fried his ass."
He waved his arms in the air. "All right, everyone, come over here. Let''s huddle up and plan for the next battle." He stretched his arms out on both sides and let them hang in mid-air. "Stop talking shit, Ricardo, it''s all idle speculation, no one knows anything more about the quest other than what was stated in the official rules, although even they''re sketchy. Maybe they''re still working out the details." He thrust his hands out in front of him and waved them up and down. "What the hell, you didn''t read them? Okay, how many of you idiots haven''t read the rules yet? Geez, guys, I know you all have careers and family stuff, but still..."
"All right, listen up, it''s"he pointed his finger"yes, Ricardo? Yeah, yeah, you saw how immersive it is, right? The usual HUD, but you''re right, you can''t switch to the third-person view, and a single health bar... sure, you can bring up your stats, but in the heat of battle, rely on your health bar, got it? It''s all intended to support full immersion."
He pointed his finger again. "Jamie." He scratched his nose. "That''s true, the NPCs are supposed to be even more advanced in their natural language processing than the Three Kingdoms, but don''t get tricked into thinking they''re other players. Their scripts are still restricted to their roles and they don''t respond to gaming terms."
He held his hand up. "Look guys, just read the FAQ, we gotta talk about the campaign. So, it''s a full campaign"he pointed his finger again"no, Jamie, it doesn''t say how many adventures are in the campaign, maybe it''s open-ended, I don''t knowso each adventure is centered around collecting unique legendary items. I know, totally boss, right?" He fist-bumped someone. "Get this, my wife called it a typical scavenger hunt. Well, no, no one knows what the items are exactly. Yep, as usual every player in the party shares equally in the winand the campaign finally ends with the typical boss dungeon. The boss? Yeah, yeah, ''Berserker'' something. It''s not named in the rules but that''s the current rumor."
She walked over and rapped her knuckles on his helmet.
He ignored her. She stomped out, crossed the entryway, and plodded into the kitchen. She sipped her water.
Calm down. What''s your problem? said her black desire. Don''t you want to play too?
Shut up. She walked over the office adjoining the living room and yanked the router plug out of the surge protector.
Ken''s heavy footsteps echoed on the hardwood floor.
Holding the VR helmet in one hand, he stared at the cord in her hand. "Why''d you do that?"
She didn''t say anything and started to cry. "Why?" she asked.
"Huh? Oh, they''re going to announce the very first quest at 1200 UTC. ''Defeat the Berserker... Blizzard Berserker King'', yeah, that''s it!'' That''s, uh..." He peeked inside his helmet at the HUD. "In five minutes." He glared at her.
Blizzard Berserker King? It sounded familiar. She tried to think, but then her crying turned into sobs. "No... fired... why?" she asked. He had told her a few days ago, but that was it. No reason. And it hurt her, that he hadn''t trusted her.
He looked down at his polyurethene-encased feet. "I already told you. I mean, how could they? Right after the doctor gave me the okay. Heartless, you know."
"The truth... I want the truth."
He walked over to her and embraced her.
"No, stop, please." She placed her hands on his chest and tried to push him away. "I don''t want you to..." She didn''t want to feel comforted. She didn''t want to feel her own love for him, her trust in him. She didn''t really want to know the truth. What she did want to know was what had hurt him, so she could be the one to comfort him. To tell him that it was okay. That he needn''t feel ashamed in front of her.
But his firm chest touching her breasts, his hands caressing her back calmed her and her sobbing subsided. Then he hugged her tighter and she felt her love for him flare up in her chest. She reached up, cupped his cheeks in both of her hands, stood up on the balls of her feet, and kissed him. "Everyone makes mistakes," she said, still holding his face in her hands. She searched his eyes for his thoughts.
He plugged the power cord back in, took one of her hands, and walked her back to the living room.
After slipping her old VR helmet over her head, he put his new one on. Then he shared his HUD with her. She watched him log in first and that''s when she saw the registration date. It was the exact same datetime stamp as the earthquake. "You were registering when the quake hit, didn''t you?"
He looked down and fiddled with the zipper on the front of the websuit jacket.
She yanked off her helmet. It was just as Mas had said. Wasn''t it an addiction? It''s not like I hadn''t seen it coming. But it wasn''t simply an addiction to a game or even gaming in general. It was something more, something deeper, a dissatisfaction. With our family? With me?
The dark glass faceplate of his helmet hid his expression, but she knew it wasn''t anger or rebellion. He slipped it off and dropped it to the floor. His eyes were wet. He touched her bare arm and held it. Her skin tingled. He held her close. Wrapping her arms around him, she felt the muscles of his back convulse as he cried.
"I''m sorry, I didn''t want to make you worry. I''m so selfish."
She shook her head, rubbing her forehead against the stubble on his chin. "You could''ve been killed! And for what? A stupid game!"
He caressed her hair. "It''s not just any game"
"I know, it''s the simulacrum." She sighed and pushed him away.
"That''s right!" He smiled and wiped his eyes.
"But what does this have to do with being fired?" She stopped and then answered her own question. "Was it from inside the network? They found out, didn''t they?"
"It was worse."
Chie furrowed her brow. What could be worse than the head of information security circumventing company policy and connecting to a game from within the corporate network? Oh. "Malware intrusion."
Ken bowed his head and told her about all the precautions he''d taken and how they hadn''t been enough. "I feel like someone''s targeting me. It''s not just the credit reports, but also my college records, and even public school. Remember that?"
She nodded. "How did they catch it?"
"It wasn''t too hard. Even though it was fast, it was also huge."
"How much damage?"
"It collected a whole slew of customer account data. Overwrote terabytes of apps and infrastructure, it was like just gobbling up disk space and rewriting it with its own encrypted code and gobs of data." He snapped his fingers. "Like training data for a neural network. I''ve got to tell Mas. Now that he''s at the helm."
She pulled him into an embrace. They held each other for a long time.
Ken sighed. "I''m so relieved, now that I''ve told you."
"Let''s go back to bed," Chie said.
"What? I''m training."
She caressed his cheek. She saw several red dots on the side of his neck. They looked like tiny punctures, needle marks. She touched them.
He jerked away. "It''s tender."
She knew in her heart that Ken, the Ken she knew and loved, would never do drugs. "I''m sorry, what happened?"
"I don''t know, stop being so damn nosy." He scowled at her.
Her body recoiled and she took a step back. What''s wrong? He''d never been short with her or anyone. He was that happy-go-lucky kind of person. A people person, but not emotional.
"Sorry," he said. "Maybe the VR helmet''s not fitting right, sometimes, I don''t know how much time has passed or what was happening in-game. And then when I take a break, my neck''s all sore."
"You''re playing too much. Come back to reality, please?"
He threw up his hands. "To this fucked-up reality? They fired me. People talk. I''m virtually unemployable. I''ll have to start from scratch ormaybe in another field."
"What are you talking about? You can do whatever you want. The money''s not important. You know that on my job alone, we can have a modest retirement." She threw her arms around his neck and smiled at him. "You can do whatever you want. You already volunteer at the library''s literacy program. You''re a great teacher. How about running free privacy workshops?"
"You''re right, I can do whatever I want. And now I''ve got my chance. Check this out. I chatted with the CEO two days ago. Sorry, I didn''t tell you, but anyways he said whoever completes the quest first will get a full-time position on their development team! It''s a dream come true!"
"Oh, that sounds... great." Her smile waned and she dropped her arms to her sides.
"Hey, I''m going to sell them on your mobotacts prototype. I mean, they weren''t interested when I presented to the M&A guy, but when I''m in, they''ll have to listen to me."
"You told them about that? It''s so old and I don''t even know where it isin one of the boxes in the garage, I guessbut I''m sure they have their own projects and"
"What''re you talking about, it''s an idea before its time!"
She had to stop him. The mobotacts just weren''t worth it. And this dream job. She clutched his hands in hers. "You know, you''re right, you should start a new job, but maybe something that won''t take you away from the family so much. I didn''t realize how much Hayden and I missed you after your promotion. How about you go back to programming or maybe a pentester? I''m sure some of your contacts would help."
His face drooped a little. "Don''t you remember? Me and you and Mas? Our dream?"
"I do." She squeezed his hands.
His face brightened up.
She looked him straight in his eyes. "But I haven''t changed my mind. We''re in a different stage of our lives now..."
He broke eye contact, wriggled his hands out of hers, and picked up the helmet.
She wasn''t getting through to him and she was starting to get desperate. "I know I said the money wasn''t importantbut we''ve gone through the interview process at a few private schools for Hayden and our savings" The moment she said it, she knew she''d made a mistake.
Then his eyes lit up. "A million Ether!"
"Ether?" she asked.
"You know, the cryptocurrency."
"I know what it is, but what about it?" She remembered something about Ether.
"For winning the quest. There''s only one hundred alpha testers competing. So, the odds are really good and Ether''s been stable at one hundred dollars per unit for years now. We could send him to any private school and any college. And then there''s the condo on Maui."
It''s gambling. He''s just not thinking straight. She should know after clawing her way up the gaming ranks. "Depends on who they are, if they''re real good"
"That''s why I need you." He grabbed her hand and squeezed it. "Let''s do it together. Each alpha tester can add on one family member. We''ll kill the Blizzard Berserker boss at his mountain fortress before the other teams even make it out of their safe zones."
Clutching both of her hands to her chest, her elbows in, she remembered and drew her knees inwards like magnets. All of her muscles tensed. Oh my god, a million Ether, that''s the prize that the Empress offered. And the white mountain fortress that never thawed. An eternal winter. It''s the Empress''s quest! "No, no, I can''t go back." Didn''t he understand? She couldn''t go back into The White Imperium.
It was just a test node, it said. The real one will be safer.
She stared at Ken. "Did you say something?"
"What? Yeah, I said one family member can join."
"No, did you say it was safer?"
"Safer? Than what?" Ken touched the needle pricks on his neck. "But don''t worry, they have max settings for sensorial input." He glanced at the clock on the wall. "Oh, I might be able to catch tail end of the announcement." Ken slipped on his helmet.
Chie grabbed his hand and clutched it to her chest.
"Hey," Ken said. "The CEO said the first quest is going to start in a week and half. So, you still have some time to think about it, okay?"
She squeezed his hand tighter.
"By the way, they''re sending the collapsible sphere, so I''ll need to clear the living room."
She shook her head and pushed his hand away. "No, we are not turning the living room into a gaming zone!"
He turned around and walked out of the kitchen. "It''s about eight by eight, so I''ll need to take down the chandelier. I''ll have to turn off the breakers for the light switches and..."
She walked back to the bedroom and slipped back under the cold sheets. She couldn''t sleep, alone and trembling until dawn.
Chapter 3: What Is Love? (Part 2 of 2)
As Ken opened his apartment door, the electronic horn red-shifted as its train left the nearby Lake Merritt BART station in Oakland. A huge cardboard box the size of a bookcase blocked the doorway. He dragged it in.
A week and a half ago, after hearing the announcement of The White Imperium''s very first quest, he''d ordered the fully functional package. Odd. He ordered one websuit, but two had come. He pushed the box with the smaller one in it to the side of the room to return later.
The instructions said that it was an immersive bubble, the Websuit International CVRG (collapsible VR gaming) sphere. He imagined himself floundering around the apartment like an indoor bubble soccer player. He laughed to himself wondering who would help him if he ended up on his head with his legs flailing about in the air.
He flipped back to the table of contents, scanned it, and found what he was looking for: Campaigns. So far, all he''d been able to do was roam around the medieval training town and have mock battles, but now he''d actually be able to go on adventures. Once logged in through the new websuit-CVRG interface, he would have to calibrate it in a training arena before being assigned to the first tutorial campaign. He could do a hard reset on the websuit if he needed to recalibrate.
He went back to the CVRG section. He was supposed to play the game inside the sphere. Inside were two cameras, front and rear, and it was eight feet in diameter, just like it was rumored. It was freaking huge! He pushed the coffee table and couch into the breakfast nook and wedged them in between the kitchen table and the wall.
Folded in the box was the sphere, which consisted of a strong, tear- and puncture-proof polymer fabric encased in snap-in geodesic clear polymer triangular tiles. The semi-transparent fabric looked like the pool lining of an above-ground pool. It was even the same bright blue color. The fabric itself was actually two layers. In between the two layers was a thick oil, but it was an electrorheological fluid and its viscosity, and hence its coefficient of friction, could be varied by the application of an electrical field. In this way, the sphere could freely rotate in three dimensions and could emulate traversing difficult terrain in a game like a mountain trail, deep snow, or even climbing a sheer cliff.
The tiles on the outside were smooth and the ones on the inside were lined with a spongy material. He unfolded the fabric and tiles and spread it out over the floor in the middle of the living room. He snapped several two-foot-high semicircular plastic pieces together into a ring, which formed the base of the sphere, and then in turn snapped the ring onto the tiles.
Now, he was supposed to raise the top of the sphere to the ceiling. He had to screw a metal plate with several bolts into the ceiling studs. Then he''d need to raise the sphere with its corresponding plate and it would snap in place. Well, he didn''t have a ladder or screwdriver.
Ken walked down to the end of the block and was about to knock on the door when the building manager Valentino opened it. They shook hands, but Valentino didn''t let go of Ken''s hand and Ken couldn''t break free. Valentino''s face broke into a broad smile and then all of a sudden he yanked Ken down and into his body and simultaneously reached his other thick arm behind and around Ken''s neck.
Ken elbowed Valentino in his solar plexus.
After Valentino caught his breath, they both laughed.
"I told you," Ken said and looked up into Valentino''s ruddy face. "Take that jujustu class."
"It''s your fault." Valentino shook his head. "You never tell Mr. Hashimoto to let his weekend security off early."
They both guffawed. Even if Ken was Mas''s boss, Ken could never tell Mas how to run his department.
"Hey," Ken said. "I have to mount my new flatscreen TV on the wall."
"No problem, I can do it for you."
"It''s okay, can you just give me a power screwdriver and a ladder?"
"Sorry, my friend, liability."
They walked back to Ken''s apartment.
"What the hell is that?" Valentino stared at the geodesic sphere spread out all over the bare concrete floor of the living room. "That sure ain''t no flat screen TV."
Ken sighed and scratched his chin. "Uh, it''s a new kind of tent."
"I don''t think we allow them."
"Oh c''mon, Valentino, didn''t I give you my old PS5 for Javier? Doesn''t he love it?"
"Yeah man, you really didn''t do me any favors." Valentino shook his finger at Ken. "I had to take it away from him on Wednesday. He wasn''t doing his homework."
Ken grimaced.
He was about to apologize when Valentino slugged him in the shoulder. "But he does love it, my friend. You know I was trying to save up for his birthday, but Maria was against it and it''s nearly impossible to hide it from Mrs. Penny Pincher. She can tell a dollar bill''s missing from her purse just by looking at it."
After Valentino screwed the metal plate into the ceiling, he asked Ken, "My friend, what is this really?"
"It''s the latest MMORPG, Quantum Katana"
"Hey, I got an invite for it yesterday."
"Awesome!" Ken said and clapped him on the shoulder. "Have you played in the Three Kingdoms before?"
"Nope," Valentino said.
"Oh really, I thought it was only for Three Kingdoms players."
Valentino shrugged his shoulders. "What''s your handle?"
"Yamabushi Rock."
"Mine is ''Xiuhtecuhtli''." Valentino stuck his hand out. "Let''s make a pact to be friends and work together. There''s strength in numbers."
Ken pinched the stubble on his chin. Valentino was definitely a newbie and he didn''t want a newbie slowing him down. But then again, sometimes you needed loyal friends and the best ones were from real life.
Ken grabbed Valentino''s hand and they squeezed each other''s until Ken cried uncle.
The front door deadbolt clicked open. Chie walked in and then slipped off her tennis shoes.
Sitting cross-legged on the carpet in the middle of the living room, Ken faced a huge box as though it were an altar. He glanced at her once and then went back to reading something on his phone. He held the VR helmet in his lap. "Start, my name is Yamabushi Rock, let''s play, show stats..."
Carrying a bag of groceries, she padded into the kitchenette. The inner pot of a Presto all-one cooker was soaking in the sink. Bloated rice grains like maggots floated in the water. She opened the refrigerator. It was bare except for a few cans of beer, a half a bag of carrots, leftover pork butt, leftover rice, and two packages of Japanese curry. At least he''s eating okay.
After unloading the groceries, she tossed baby spinach, dried cranberries, arugala, and tomatoes in a salad bowl, and set it on the folding table along with a bottle of blue cheese dressing. Then, she unwrapped, rinsed and dried the pink salmon fillet. She bought a belly cut for the extra fat. Dipping it in a lightly scrambled egg in a white plate, she coated it thoroughly, and then moved it to another plate filled with a layer of panko. She flipped it from one side to the other to coat it evenly.
After the sunflower oil heated up in the pan, she fried the fillet to a perfect golden brown on both sides.
"Dinner''s ready," Chie said as she placed the salmon and large bowl of microwaved brown rice in the middle of the table.
"Five minutes," Ken said.
She walked to the edge of the living room and crossed her arms.
Ken had looped fishing line, which had come in the package, through small holes in both of the metal plates. He pulled on the fishing line and raised the center of the geodesic sphere. As it rose, each triangular piece snapped into place with the other three surrounding triangles. They made snapping sounds like crab claws clicking. With a resounding clunk, clamps on a heavy metal plate in the center of the ceiling locked onto a sister place at the top of the sphere.
It formed a heavily tinted rigid sphere, a temple to some unborn god.
As Chie took a bite of rice and salmon, she glanced over at Ken to see if he was looking at her. Hoping. Then she glanced at the geodesic sphere. A vertical zipper sliced it in half from top to bottom like the sealed lips of a shark. Next to it, lay Ken''s websuit. She wanted to reach out and touch it. To feel its smooth latex and rubber. No, I don''t. It would pull me under like the undertow and then sweep me out into the infinite ocean of the simulacrum.
The crunch of the panko contrasted with the soft flesh inside. I crush the bones of my opponents into dust. Their warm fat like sweet slime bursts in my mouth.
"What''re you smiling about?" Ken asked.
Broken out of her reverie, her face placid again, she put her chopsticks and rice bowl down and heaped more salad onto her plate.
"I know you want it, to play. That''s why you came here."
Yes, that''s the real reason, the same voice in Chie''s head said.
"No, I" she reached across the table and laid her hand on his. "I want to apologize, I shouldn''t have told you to leave just because you wanted to play."
"Maybe it was for the best..."
"No, no, come back." Tears started to come to her eyes. "Hayden misses you. I miss you. Please?"
"Well, I don''t want to set it all back up at the house..." he massaged his neck. "Hey, I know, why don''t we all have a game here?"
"What''s wrong with you? You''ve changed."
"Changed?" His voice rose. "Maybe you''re the one who''s changed. I mean, don''t you get it? What I''m trying to achieve here. For me, for you, for us? The mobotacts."
"What? Are you still stuck on that?"The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
He slammed his fist down on the table and started up out of his chair.
She jumped. "Ken! Your dad called. You don''t even return calls from your parents. Aren''t you worried about them? They were interviewed by the FBI two days ago."
His face softened. "II''m sorry." He walked around the table. She stood up and he hugged her. "Are they okay?"
"Yes, but you need to" On his neck were numerous scabbed-over pinpricks like a patchwork quilt.
"Your neck." She knew he wasn''t, but what other explanation was there? "You''re not doing drugs, are you?"
"Of course not. See?" He held up his arms. "No tracks." He let his arms fall back down to his side.
"It''s the VR helmet. It''s still rubbing me the wrong way. A new one came with the VR sphere. I''m sure it''ll fit better."
He kissed her on the lips. "C''mon..."
His moist lips. It had been a long time. She closed her eyes and kissed him back.
He tugged on her arm and she followed him to the sphere, a sacrificial chamber.
"You give it the first go," Ken said and pulled a websuit out of a box. Its skin was as black and smooth as a killer whale''s.
"Is this a new one?" she said. Did Ken know the real reason for her coming here? Even better than she knew herself?
"Right, in addition to tracking your movements and coverage of the major areas with nano-sensors, coverage is now extended to all parts of the body touched by the websuit, including the fingertips." He held up a pair of gloves and its fingers wiggled like eels. "And instead of a sensor every few inches, the detail is down to the square millimeter." Then, like a salesman, he held the jacket up to her and moved his palm in circles on the front of the jacket like he was waxing a car.
"But don''t you have to calibrate it to your own body?" Chie said.
"It''s okay, I''ll just recalibrate it back to" He slapped his forehead. "What a dummy?" He walked over to the corner of the living room, carried back another box, and dropped it on the floor in front of her. He opened it up and pulled out another vacuum-sealed websuit. This one was smaller. "Here, this one is extra small. They sent two by accident."
Just once. For a little while. There''s no harm in it, her black voice said.
Is this what Ken wanted from her? Had this been his plan all along? The spare apartment key wrapped up in the note on the kitchen table. How long was he planning to stay here? Doesn''t he miss me and Hayden? Surely, he does. It''s my fault. It''s because I drove him away. The game, it''s such a small thing. He just needs time to recover from getting fired.
She took his hand. "You''ll come home, right? After we play?"
He looked her in the eyes and then dropped his gaze to his socked feet. He massaged his neck on the side with the scabs. "Sure, I could break down the sphere in a couple of hours."
She undressed down to her bra and undies and then slipped on the websuit top. It felt cool on her bare skin.
"It''s a thermoactive polymer, which is activated by your body heat. It molds itself to your body."
She gasped as it clung to her arms and then her breasts and torso like thousands of writhing sticky gecko feet. "It feels like frogs are crawling all over me." She squirmed and grabbed Ken''s arm with both her hands.
"It''s okay, it''s okay," Ken said. He held her close and caressed her hair. "I''ve always been there for you. Remember, at your final competition?"
She nodded.
"From then on, we always played together."
She wrapped her arms around him and hugged him tighter.
He kissed her forehead. "I''m your tank and your my mage. And I need your whip-smart brain. You''re the fastest mage in the West."
She laughed and her face flushed.
"I''m serious. It was because of your quick thinking we were able to escape the Blood Tengu boss''s Hurricane Strike and that''s not to mention the trajectory calculations you''d do in your head. You''d be done before anyone''s assistant came online." He locked his eyes on hers. "And this time is no different."
"What do you mean?" she said.
"I''ll be a fly on the wall." He tapped his old helmet. "It''s interfaced with the new one. They allow you to bring in a companion for trial purposes. You don''t have to use the CVRG sphere. We''ll just log in to the usual training town and take in the sights, okay?"
She grinned like a little girl. We''ll be together, just like old times.
She pulled up the pants and donned the helmet, but with the suit touching her bare skin, she still felt naked.
"Wow, a perfect fit." Ken raised his eyebrows and wrapped her in his arms. "What a coincidence." He released her. "Start," he said. "I already trained it to my voice."
The VR HUD darkened.
"User account credentials, please, honey," said a sultry yet somehow too-perfect voice.
"That''s not a real person, is it?" Chie said. No game had one for a simple login procedure, but it sounded so real, like a J-pop singer.
"You don''t recognize it?" Ken chuckled.
She shook her head.
"Hatsune Miku." He laughed that carefree laugh of his. "They probably have a deep manly vocaloid voice for the women, right?"
Hey, I love your hair style echoed in her memory. It was the same automated welcome message that greeted her. But didn''t it also sound like someone she knew? Hadn''t someone said that to her before? Someone who wasn''t Ken. Oh that''s right, he worked with Ken. He was married, to Audrey. I''d kissed him before. Back in college, before I''d met Kenbefore Mas had introduced Ken and I. Why am I thinking of Mas now? In the back of my mind, I''ve been thinking of him, of his voice for a week and a half already, after talking to him over the phone about Ken moving out. But I''m back with Ken now and the old feelings are back too.
"I could do a man''s voice," the sultry vocaloid voice said. "And more, if you prefer."
"What?" Ken said.
"Just kidding." The voice tittered. "User account credentials, please."
"Geez, those programmers sure like to yank your chain." He laughed to himself. "Handle: Yamabushi Rock. Passphrase: Rose Crow, my love," Ken said and then answered a few more questions.
Chie tapped the faceplate right in front of her nose. The voice didn''t sound completely scripted; in fact, it was almost ad hoc.
"Voice ID confirmed, security questions confirmed," the voice said and then cleared its throat. "I see you''re bringing a companion. Why the famed Yamabushi Rock would need a companion is beyond me, but the customer''s always right. Handle, please."
"Rose Crow," Ken said.
"If you need any help, simply ping me, Aika."
"That''s it? No qualifier like family name?"
"I''ll have you know that no one is permitted to use a miko''s name nor any portion of a miko''s name as a handle. Login proceeding."
The HUD began to darken.
"Can''t wait until we meet in-game, sexy boy."
The HUD gradually lit up. She was outside the entrance to a cave halfway up a white-capped mountain. The wind howled like wild wolves and blew snow all around her. Her stomach tightened up. She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. She was only wearing a light cloak, shirt, and pants. How could I feel this cold in the game? I''m freezing! She looked down. Her legs were buried up to her thighs in a snow drift. She tried to move, but she was stuck in place. Solid ice was hidden underneath the snow. Where was Ken? "Ken!"
"I''m coming! This blizzard"
I don''t have to stay here. "Log out."
"Companions cannot log out," a deep male voice said.
She stared into the cave.
Cradling a helmet under one arm, a warrior in full armor, all the way from his shin guards, to a lacquer-polished chest plate and kote-armored sleeves, walked out of the back of the cave and stopped a mere five feet from Chie.
"Help me!" She reached out to him with both hands.
He stared behind her at the frozen mountain range. "I''m inside of the barrier surrounding the Empress''s stronghold." His body shimmered like a wave. Sometimes, if she caught him at the right angle, she could see through him into the darkness of the cave behind him.
Two swords like veteran fangs hung from his left hip. He unsheathed one of them, raised it over his head, stepped forward, and sliced down directly on her head.
She jerked her body to one side, but the blade still grazed her shoulder and cut through her cotton shirt like water. She gritted her teeth in pain and searched her body for some kind of weapon. Any kind.
He pulled his sword back again and made ready to strike her in a horizontal sweep. This time, she wouldn''t be able to avoid it.
Hummingbird wings vibrated next to her ear. The warrior stumbled backwards into the cave, fell to the ground, and dropped his sword. An arrow with a clear glass shaft and white feathers stuck out of his shoulder. He groaned and yanked the arrow out. The transparent barbed tip ripped through his flesh and blood spurted out like a hose. He slammed the arrow down on the rock floor, but instead of breaking it, he lost his grip on it, and it slid across the ground like a skate.
Again, something vibrated near her ear and another arrow struck the man in the thigh. This time, he screamed. But through his pain, he was able to scowl at Chie. "We''ll meet again, soonand without those pesky miko."
Reaching out with his one good hand and finding purchase on the cave floor, his fingernails scraped through the gravel. Inching and squirming like a snake, he crawled to the back of the cave. His armor and then his body faded into the nothingness.
"Shit! Why don''t I ever get logged into a safe zone?" She couldn''t be sure that whoever it was who had shot the warrior wasn''t going to shoot her too. She searched the forest behind her, but didn''t see anyone. She had to get out of the game as soon as possible. Her shivering fingers fumbled for her helmet''s chin strap. She jumped at a sudden yelping. There were wolves here and they were coming closer. She scanned the tree line behind her. Nothing moved except for the sharp points of pine needles rustling together. The tree branches scraped against each other like a surgeon''s saw on raw bone.
At the very moment when a spot of light sparking on the peak of the tallest mountain caught her eye, a wolf darted from behind a tree and lunged at her neck. She blocked it with her forearm. Its jaws clamped onto her arm and ripped flesh from the bone. The wolf hung on and dragged her torso to the ground. Her back twisted as her arm and shoulder impacted the hard-packed snow. Her spine erupted in a tearing pain. This is it. At least, I''ll be logged out and the pain will be gone.
Cold air blasted her face, the humming of wings mere inches away.
The wolf''s head exploded as a transparent barbed arrowhead exited one of its eyes. Blood, small bone fragments, bloody gray goop, and matted fur sprayed her torso and face.
She didn''t know how long she lay moaning in the freezing snow, but by the time she opened her eyes, it had stopped snowing. Off in the distance, the tallest of the white mountains loomed, monumental and majestic yet threatening. Near the peak, a dark spot pulsed like a growth on a neck. It grew. Another identical spot sprouted on the other side. The ground shook before she heard the low bass noise rumbling out of the mountain.
Having ceased their howling, the wolves had slunk away to the cover of the pine trees.
The two black growths erupted like dual volcanoes, spewing red magma and black clouds of ash into the sky. The ash lingered in the air and then spread out into ovals glowing red in the centers like the pupils of an oni. The clouds of smoke like lids snapped shut, obscuring both of the red pupils, and then opened again like naval signal lamp shutters. Did they just blink?
They''re growing larger. No, not larger, they''re getting closer. They''re coming at me! Somehow she was able to stand up and she grabbed one of her legs with both hands and yanked it this way and that, but they were still frozen fast. I''ve got to get out of here! She grabbed her helmet with both hands. Even though she couldn''t see it, it felt solid and reassuring in her grip. A reminder of reality.
Who are you? her black desire asked.
II''m... Chie
Liar! Answer me again. Who do you want to be, at your core?
Aa mother, a mathemetician...
It laughed. Rose Crow. Don''t you want to be Rose Crow? Don''t you want to cleave clean through an enemy''s flesh? Don''t you want to live fully and fly and encircle your enemies from above and then descend upon them and rend their flesh and strip their bones clean? As you''ve done so many times before?
She winced and clapped her hand over her neck where something had stung her. She began to feel light-headed. Then she remembered the defining moment of her youth that had given her the competitive edge.
"You geeky gook. What you gonna do? Use your martial arts on me?" John laughed at her. She felt the mush of spaghetti sauce and noodles on her neck. She jumped up on top of the cafeteria table and started whaling on him with both fists. With one blow he swept her off. Her butt struck the bench and then she was on the concrete floor. Jumping up, she ran at him. But a yard duty grabbed her from behind, locking both arms to her sides.
She dropped her hand from her neck and then laughed. Rose Crow laughed, straight from her belly, and it rose all the way through her diaphragm, her chest, and out the flute of her throat, and it made her lips tremble like the reed of a clarinet.
She pulled herself up and thrust her hands up into the air. Adrenalin coursed through her veins.
"Equip wings!"
Like moles under a lawn, lumps of muscle rippled back and forth underneath the skin around her shoulder blades. She screamed and fell forwards onto her hands. Oh God, where''s the max setting?
Her back and shoulder muscles burst out of her skin in a sudden explosion of growth. Cracking like concrete during an earthquake, skin ripped and bled. Rivulets of blood cascaded down her pants and dripped off the hem of her cloak.
Then it stopped. Her back and shoulders bulged like layers of rock.
She gulped air in loud gasps. Thank God, it''s over. It was never like this. I can''t handle much more.
Then her back erupted again. She howled in pain like wolves calling the pack for the hunt and then collapsed face down in the dirt. Saliva flowed out of her open mouth and mixed in with the snow and dirt. Gray slush coated her tongue and lips as she yelled and groveled before whatever it was that was causing her this pain. She was so paralyzed that she couldn''t even lift her hands up to rip off her helmet.
Again, the back muscles rippled. Two parallel lines tore through her back from top to bottom. She twisted her head around. Blood squirted out in jets. A sudden gust of cold wind blew globs of mixed blood and slush onto her face. She coughed and licked her lips and tasted iron.
Twin spikes of white bone coated with her own blood rose up into the gray sky like spires on some deserted plain. With sharp knuckle-cracking noises, the bones snapped open in quick succession, spreading out into a series of interlocking blades. A tight weave of black feathers splashed with red fluttered within twin fans of bone.
Ability: Flight
Adj. STR = 67 (+20 buff)
Adj. DEX = 108 (+20 buff)
CHI COST = 1/15 min
Ashen eyes with purple pupils like scabs peered down at her from the overcast sky.
Exhausted, Chie could only close her eyes and surrender herself to the cold darkness of her unconscious to quell the fire raking across her back.
Chapter 4: Ambition or Obsession? (Part 1 of 3)
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Pushing Upward
The two ceiling lights blinded Chie. She lay on her back with her head on the floor and her legs straight up against the wall. Ken was shaking her shoulders.
"Thank God!" he said.
She coughed.
He helped her sit up and she leaned into him for support. Holding up a glass to her lips, he tipped it and she sipped cold water, soothing her raw throat.
"What happened?" he asked as he squeezed her in his arms.
"So much"she coughed again and took a sip"pain... wasn''t the sensorial setting dialed down?"
"It was at its lowest." Ken''s eyes brightened. "So, what happened? Was it a duel? I was logged in to the training town again and was ten miles away from you. I''d only made it two miles when we were kicked off the server. What did it feel like? I mean not the pain, of course, but the fight."
"I... just fell."
"You lost consciousness from a fall?"
"Down the mountainside, I slipped off the edge." If she told him about the warrior and the glass arrows, he''d get even more excited than he already was. "Must be a bug," she said, searching for the helmet, her gaze panned the room. Like a lost head waiting for its rider, the helmet sat on the floor next to the sphere.
"Well, we''d have to submit a bug report." He walked over, picked the helmet up and then used the phone app to check the settings.
While he fiddled with the phone app, she peeled off the websuit like a molting snake and chucked it into the bedroom. She shivered from the cold sweat, dried herself with a bathroom towel, and slipped on her jeans and t-shirt. She never wanted to see that abomination again.
"Yes, it''s at 1," Ken said.
"Obviously, it''s defective."
"Then I''ll just have to give it a go myself." He grinned and started to lift it up over his head.
"No, Ken!" She twisted the helmet out of his hands. "I almost died in there."
"What''re you talking about? No one''s ever gonna die in a game. They''ll just log out."
"I couldn''t, companions can''t log out. I tried to take off my helmet, but I"she looked down at her feet"I lost consciousness before I could."
"Well, I''m not going to lose consciousness from a stupid little fall." He tried to snatch it from her.
She held the helmet behind her back. He just wasn''t getting it. After what she''d been through, she couldn''t let him. "It was steep, I probably hit my head on a tree."
"It''s a bug with companions. Don''t worry, I
ll be logged into the safe zone again. Just give it back." He grabbed for it again. "It''s mine."
She scuttled back against the wall. "It''s dangerous."If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
"It''s my life." He reached around her and was able to latch onto the strap with one hand, but she held on to it with a steel grip.
"I..." She tried to think about what she should do. "I''m going to file a report with the Consumer Protection Agency."
"The hell you will." Ken''s face contorted as his other hand grabbed the bottom edge of the helmet.
"What''s wrong with you!" She was losing her grip.
"All this week." Ken yanked hard. "There''s no way," he grunted, "I''m going to give this up now that I''ve gotten a taste of the real game. After leaving the safe zone, I felt the freezing blizzard, the wind whipping around me, I mean feeling all of that, really feeling it on my skin, and then boom, here I am back in IRL. All these weeks, I''ve been stuck in the stupid training town and right away you''re thrown into the open world! I''ve got to go back! And no one"he pulled hard and dragged Chie, her bare feet sliding, across the carpet"no one is going to stop me."
The doorbell rang.
His grip loosened for just a moment. She jerked the helmet out of his hand, ran to the door, and yanked it open.
"Hey!" Mas said and smiled at her.
"Mom!" Hayden said.
"What''re you doing here?" Chie said.
"Didn''t you get my text?" Mas asked.
Hayden rushed past her, ran over, and hugged Ken.
"Hi Hayden," Ken said and hugged him back. "I missed you!"
Hayden buried his face in Ken''s stomach. "Are you coming home now? Uncle Mas said we''re coming to get you." He looked up at Ken with wet eyes.
"Oh yeah, well, your mom and I were just talking about having a game here."
With his arms akimbo, Mas glared at Ken.
"No, Dad!" Hayden said. "Come now!" He grabbed Ken''s hand and started pulling him towards the door.
"Okay, okay," Ken said. "Let me grab some stuff." He walked to the bedroom. Hayden didn''t let go of his hand and trailed after him.
She turned to Mas. Right before he closed the door behind him, she saw a huge black van drive through the main intersection.
The helmet was torn from her hands.
Whirling around, she watched Ken disappear with the helmet into the bedroom.
"Dammit!" She charged after him.
Mas grabbed her upper arm. "Great, Ken''s coming back," he said.
Chie stopped and turned back around.
He took his hand away.
She took a deep breath. "I had everything under control."
"I know you did."
She crossed her arms. "You shouldn''t have brought Hayden."
"A little extra help never hurt, right?"
"I told you to take him to your place so he could play with Rob."
He shrugged his shoulders and gave her a big smile.
"Can''t hide everything, kid''s pick up"
"It''s not your family," she said.
Mas''s jaw tightened. "I''m as good as"
"You should''ve checked with me." She would''ve said no out of pride, but now she didn''t have to handle Ken''s addiction by herself.
"I texted you," he said.
"Whatever." She turned her back to him. She was angry. But not at Mas. She was angry at Ken, angry that she had let him convince her to go back in. But, no, not even that was completely true. If she were honest with herself, she''d admit that she was angry at herself, for letting herself feel those black feelings again, after having quit competitive gaming years ago.
He laid his hand on her shoulder and turned her around. "Your neck''s bleeding."
She touched her neck. Her fingertips came away red. "I guess Ken was right, the helmet doesn''t fit right." But the helmet she had worn was the new one.
"I''ll get my firstaid kit in the car," he said.
She hugged him. "Thanks for coming."
"Uh, sure," he said and patted her shoulder with his good arm. In a cast, his right arm hung down by his side. "Anything for you, I mean we are basically family, right?"
She looked up at him. Mas and Audrey, Ken and herself, and their kids did almost everything together. Vacations, schools, camping. "I shouldn''t have said that. I''m proud to have you as a friend. I don''t know what I would''ve done, what Hayden would''ve done, if Ken had died."
"Ha! Couldn''t let my boss die, there''d be no one to take the blame when things went wrong. But it was all for nought. Now I have to blame myself."
Chie stepped back and punched him. "That''s not what I meant. Audrey is so lucky to have someone rock solid like you."
He looked away. "Oh right, well, the domestic front isn''t always rosylately more like guns and roses." He laughed. "But, yeah, we make it work."
With a wakizashi bokken in one hand and wearing the helmet, Ken stumbled out of the bedroom. He was all suited up. Sobbing, Hayden clung onto Ken''s leg. "Dad, don''t! You said we''re going home."
"Just wanna test the defect your mom found so I can send them a bug report. One hour," Ken said through the helmet.
"Hayden!" Chie ran over and tried to pull Hayden off of Ken, but he hung on for dear life. She avoided touching the skin of the websuit. It shone with a gloss as though coated with alien saliva.
"Hayden..." she said. "Wewe''ll stay here until Dad''s done and we''ll all leave together, okay?"
Ken pushed his helmet up until he eyes peeked out from under the edge. "That''s right!" He smiled and patted Hayden''s head.
She glared at Ken and then lifted her eyebrows at Mas.
"Thirty minutes, that''s it," Mas said. "Or else..."
"I''ll pull the plug," Chie said.
"Yeah, yeah, no problem, I''ll be back lickety-split," Ken said, slipped the bokken into his belt, unzipped the zipper on one side of the sphere, and walked in.
Chapter 4: Ambition or Obsession? (Part 2 of 3)
As Ken entered the sphere, it tilted to one side and he slipped on the foam. He toppled forward and fell onto his hands and knees. His bokken fell out of his belt. After getting back up, he told the CVRG sphere system to boot up. It ran through the startup sequence. He logged in, but this time it went through two-factor authentication. Maybe because of liability issues with the sphere? He remotely nabbed his private and public keys from his rooted phone sitting on the kitchen table.
"We need to calibrate the websuit," a female voice said.
Is that Aika?
"Spin around," the voice said. "Jump up and down, and do a few practice kicks and punches for me. Let me see you break a sweat."
Now this is a proper procedure. Why didn''t they have Chie do this? I knew it, it was a glitch with companions.
He kicked the wall and fell over.
"Are you a noob? Try not to get a hernia," the female voice said, now with a hard edge to it.
This isn''t Aika''s sexy voice. Is she trying to make fun of me like on a reality show? Am I on a live video feed? "I didn''t give my permission to be streamed."
"Pardon me? You''re not, but just for the record, you did agree to any likenesses of you being used in advertisements and that includes video."
"Are you a bot or a real person? Am I on a group call or something?"
"I''m you''re trainer."
"What are you talking about? I don''t need training. I''ve been practicing all week in the"
"You call jumping into walls and playing footsie with your friends training?" the voice said. "Just because you were level one hundred with your special Immovable Rock spell in Three Kingdoms, you think you''re hot stuff in The White Imperium."
"We were practicing tactics and teamwork!" His neck muscles tightened up and he felt his veins pop out. "And how do you know about my secret spell?" He only used it in dire emergencies and Chie was the only one who had ever seen it. This voice wasn''t the usual login bot. Could it be one of the rumored AI NPCs? No, it must be a real person. An admin? "Who are you? Show yourself!"
"Calibration complete, prepare for full immersion," said a deep male voice.
"No time, Hot Stuff," said the female voice. "We''re diving."
Everything went dark.
His HUD lightened. Reflections of the flames of the fire in front of him danced on the surrounding rock walls. A thin spiral of smoke rose up and then drifted out of the entrance behind him. He wasn''t in the sphere anymore; he was in a cave. The fire crackled and he felt the heat on his face. He stretched his hand out towards the flames. It was hotter. Curious, he thrust his palm into the raging fire and held it there. He yelled and jerked his hand back. It was red. That sure hurt like hell! It''s definitely more than fifty percent of real sensory input. The pain in the training was dialed down to one percent and a sword piercing your gut hurt no worse than stepping on a tack. He recalled the welcome message in the websuit and CVRG sphere instruction manual.
Oh my God, this is it, isn''t it? I can''t believe it. His face broke into a huge smile. Full immersion. Exactly like he and Mas had talked about. Even now, those nano-electrodes were stimulating his nociceptors. Having roasted his hand in the virtual fire had given him a taste of the kind of intense pain this digital world could deliver and it wasn''t merely the cold wind of a blizzard. He was starting to have a few minor doubts.
"Mr. Shibuyama, you''re to sign this document," the same female voice said.
He jerked his head around, this way and that. Then he saw her. In the glint of the fire, a woman''s pale white face shone like the full moon. He was entranced by her. Her glossy black eyes shimmered in the flames. Pointed ears poked out from between her silky black hair tied back in a ponytail with a maroon ribbon. They twitched, breaking his trance.
"Are you a kitsune?" he asked.
"I am from the Shiromoriku Confederacy," she said. As she strode around the cave, the sleeves of her white haori jacket and maroon hakama trousers swished like blades slicing through air. Her matching swords, a katana and wakizashi, swayed from her left hip.
"Are you an admin?"
She held up a hand. "One moment."
"Greetings, Empress, I am at your service," she said and bowed, her head almost touching the ground.
The Empress! Ken looked behind him and around, but no one else was in the cave with them. Private chat. He focused on their conversation.
"Yes, he''s almost ready to proceed on the quest. Only mere legalities remain." With her face focused in utmost concentration, she nodded her head several times.
They''re talking about me, but nothing he didn''t already know. He decided to check his stats, but none of the usual commands worked.
"By your quantum consciousness, it is become reality." She bowed again.
Ken chuckled. Wow, they really love their role-play, don''t they?
Turning her attention back to him, she said, "now, the document."
"But I couldn''t get my stats to come up," Ken said.
"Do you have wax in your ears? Legal documents have to be taken care of before access is provided to the system." She private-messaged a document to him.
"Sign it with your public key."
Even though it was standard legalese, it did make him wonder what could happen if the websuit malfunctioned. "Could I die from my nerves being stimulated too much?"
The sleeves of her robe rustled as she waved her hand in dismissal. "It''s been fully tested. Nothing will happen, unless the maximum pain threshold is disabled, which will also never happen."
"But what if the pain level goes beyond the max?" he said.
"There''s an emergency shutoff switch."
"Where?"
"Nobody ever reads the instructions, do they?" She sighed.
"I hadn''t gotten to that part," he said.
She rolled her eyes. "In between your shoulder blades."
He twisted his arm behind his back, but didn''t feel anything. "How can you possibly expect anyone to be able to reach back there?" Then he remembered how Chie had been knocked unconscious. How could he forget? Something must be seriously wrong with him if only now he was starting to have second thoughts. What if he really did die or was incapacitated? Now that he''d been fired, all of his options and benefits were gone. Hayden might not be able to get the education that could give him a leg up in the world. If he signed away his right to recover damages in this waiver of liability... But they offered him a job on the team. I don''t have to sign any stinking waiver. "I''m not going to sign it."If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.
"Are you really going to throw away all of your chances of winning the quest?"
"You''re not going to kick me out of the game, are you? They know me." His hands clenched.
"Who knows you?" she said.
"Jake, Jake Robertson, he''s the founder of Quantum Katana Online. Just talk to him and he''ll clear..."
Her black eyes bored into his. "Whoever he is, he has no jurisdiction in the portal between the real and the virtualonly The Empress rules here and this is her law."
She was reporting to the Empress earlier. He could talk directly to the Empress if he buttered up this kitsune. He smiled. He could role-play her game, even better than she could. "Is the Empress part of Websuit International? Is she your employer?"
With her thumb and five fingers, she gripped the hilt of her wakizashi. "How dare you insult us!"
He quickly bowed. "Sorry, sorry!" The last thing he wanted to do was to get into a duel over honor with a gatekeeper before he even entered the game.
Her hand dropped from the hilt to her side. "We are not lowly employees. For over a hundred and twenty-one centuries, the entire Shiromiroku Confederacy has served the Empress and we miko have been honored in our role as her personal guard."
Miko? He should''ve known. He bowed low again. "You serve the Empress well."
She straightened up and stood taller.
He clasped his hands together in front of him. "Do you think just maybe I could talk to her now about the legal documents?"
She narrowed her eyes. "Such insolence! Do you think the Empress has time to waste on the likes of you?" With a flourish she waved her hand in the air and a timer popped up. "You have thirty seconds to decide."
Shit, maybe I should log out and contact Robertson myself, but I''m here right now and I can''t let myself get kicked out of the game. Then I''d have to go through a lot of bureaucratic nonsense to get back in.
I mean, really, what could happen? I''m healthy, more or less, now that I got the cast off. What if I did feel the max pain? Of course, that wouldn''t happen. This suit has gone through rigorous testing by Quantum Katana Online. And Robertson sure knows his stuff. Before Quantum Katana, he was the CEO of the Three Kingdoms, which has been raking in the bucks for almost a decade now. They wouldn''t let something defective out. I wouldn''t die, but it would kick my ass. I cut my finger before. I''ve even been struck in the throat guard with a shinai. And hey, I was even crushed by a concrete wall. I''m sure I could handle a little pain, right?
He signed with his public key.
"Now you are to proceed on your quest," she said.
"Let me at least check my stats! Stats!"
Nothing happened. What''s the command? "Character attributes."
"My apologies, time is up." She pointed to the cave entrance. "We wish you success."
"Wait! Can''t you tell me how to access my stats?"
"So," she said and arched one eyebrow. "You mean you want to be trained?"
He was hypnotized by her solid black eyes again. He was going to accept her offer, but then she smiled, displaying her rows of sharp incisors glistening with saliva.
"Well, not exactly, just technical assistance," he said. He sensed her indistinct yet palpable hunger.
"We only offer the complete package deal, but I could give you a sample, if you''d like?" Her grin widened to expose even more of her teeth. "As far as the commands are concerned, they''re basically the same as in the Three Kingdoms with a few minor nuances."
He really did need to know the basics as well as the so-called minor nuances, and what could the training be? "Ookay, sure."
"The nuances, you''ll soon discover for yourself, but there''re more important components of your training," she said. Her body tensed.
Oh shit, we''re going to spar.
She was shorter than him by three or four inches. Still, he had to be prepared for the outlier. She moved well and even under her loose sleeves, he could tell her arms were well-muscled. He had to be careful not to let her get in close and grapple with him. He''d seen it many a time in a jujutsu tournament, when Chie had taken down a hulking bear of a man.
All these assessments had gone through his mind at the moment he''d first seen her and in the milliseconds after he''d anticipated her attack. It was his in-game mind.
She released the hilt of her wakizashi from its scabbard with a sharp click.
"Real weapons?" he said. The hand he''d tested in the fire shook a little.
"You can''t die."
He reached for the wakizashi on his belt but all he grabbed was empty air. Shit! He searched all around the cave. Then, he caught a glimpse of it in the corner. The glint of the fire reflected off of the ji of the blade.
"Unarmed combat for now." She snapped her wakizashi back into its scabbard. "But I hope you can get to it so we can have a full training session."
And then in a split second she was on him. She grabbed one of his arms and was going to get under him for the flip. He got lower than her and aimed a kick at her kneecap, hitting her thigh instead. She flinched enough to let him slip out of her grip, but she was solid and didn''t budge. He whirled around to kick her again, but she slid in low and tackled his legs. It was exactly what he had feared. She pinned him to the ground with her legs around his neck and cut off his circulation with a leg armbar.
He was starting to lose consciousness. If he didn''t slip out of her lock soon, that would be it. Somehow he twisted his head around and his neck hyperextended. It hurt like hell, but he kept stretching his chin forward. Crack! He winced but bit down on her thigh as hard as he could.
She yelped and loosened her hold a little, just enough for him to slip his head out. He rolled away, and, scrambling on all fours, ran for his wakizashi, and then dove for it.
Clambering up into a kneel, he whipped his wakizashi into a guard position above his head.
Clang!
The sharp sound of metal on metal resounded throughout the cave.
His left shoulder flared up in pain and he stumbled backwards to put distance between them.
Her wakizashi sliced through the air in front of his face and he flipped backwards, barely landing on his feet, but he lost his balance and fell down on his butt.
She taunted him. "It''ll take more than fancy acrobatics to survive out there."
With the tip of her blade pointing down, his blood dripped down from it onto the dirt floor.
It''s insulting. She doesn''t even bother keeping her guard up. Blood soaked through his long-sleeve shirt at the shoulder seam and a few of the disks in his neck had popped out. It was now or never.
"Don''t you want to know your sensei''s name so you can address her properly?"
"You''re not my"
In a flash, she whipped around to his side, flipped her wakizashi around, and slammed the hilt into his stomach.
He doubled over and fell to his knees. Gasping for air, he coughed up vomit and it dribbled down his chin. He glanced at his health bar. It had dropped twenty-five percent. He tried to stand up, but couldn''t move. To the right of the health bar, a status message blinked.
Stunned: 30 seconds
The formerly bright green health bar was now covered over by a faded yellow bar that crept to the left every second to reveal the bright green.
"Only one knee is required." She turned her back to him and swaggered back to her former location. "Nevertheless, I wish all my students were as polite as you."
She motioned with her hand for him to rise. "Now, let''s start from the beginning, shall we?"
The faded yellow bar had disappeared. He wiped the vomit off of his lips and stood up, but he could only manage a crouch.
"Bow and repeat after me, ''I, Kenji Shibuyama..."
He didn''t need this kind of training. What kind of sadistic player would abuse another one like this? She''s worse than a PKer. At least, they get it over with fast because all they want is the loot or the XP. "I don''t see the point. I mean why so harsh?"
"Frankly, I''m disappointed. Clearly, you lack the drive to win."
"What''re you talking about? In Three Kingdoms"
She harrumphed. "The White Imperium has revolutionized gaming. Didn''t you feel the difference?" She held her wakizashi up to him. His blood had dried in marroon globs in a few places on the hasaki. She scrunched up her face and pulled out a small rectangular box and a flask from inside her haori jacket. After slipping a piece of ivory paper out of the box, she dampened the paper with water from the flask, wiped down the blade, and sheathed it.
"Don''t you want to toughen up as fast as you can? The other players aren''t anything to sneeze at, you know?"
"Other players?" He hadn''t really thought about the competition.
"Yes, like Sally the Steamroller and Killer Kumar the Tsar."
His eyes bugged out. Holy shit! If they''re in here... He wasn''t even a seven-dan, but he was still highly respected in his dojo. He felt degraded having to bow to someone cruel like this crazy miko. But, in a pragmatic sense, he had no choice. "I, Kenji Shibuyama..."
She smiled. "Promise to honor and obey..."
"Promise to honor and obey..."
"Yuri Sensei."
"Yuri Sensei." He repeated.
"Now, give me the passcode to your phoneand your wife''s too," she said, "if you know it, but no need to bother with her number."
"But that''s private!" Ken said.
"Remember your pledge."
"But that''s only for in-game."
She laughed and slapped her thigh. "There were no qualifications, but don''t you want to win the one-hundred million Ether? Now is that a mere in-game result?"
"What kind of twisted logic is that? I''m not giving my password to another player."
"I''m not a player."
He frowned. What did she take him for? Even if she was an alleged AI NPC, he''d still be giving his personal data to a corporation. And, hell, for an AI on her level, they''d still need a quantum computer to train the neural network and the biggest was the 100-cubit IBM Feynman. Good luck getting a slice of processing time much less dedicated time for a fucking game. "Ha ha, neither am I."
She sighed. "You should be honored that the Empress would deign to have you perform this duty for her. She only has your best interests at heart."
"But"
She held up her hand and then bowed.
Another private chat with the Empress?
"The Empress''s Quantum Katana?" Her eyes opened wide. "No, no, my Empress, I was merely caught unawares, after all, this is only the third" She nodded her head vigorously. "Of course, my body, my mind, the sole purpose of my entire existence is to serve you." She bowed low. "By your quantum consciousness, it is become reality!"
Yuri Sensei turned to him. "Stay right here! Don''t log out. Chie and Hayden and your best friend Mas are at your apartment and"
"How did you know?" Did she hack my connection. Could she be seeing the apartment through the sphere''s cameras? And how does she know their names?
She closed her eyes, pressed the tips of the thumb and middle finger of each hand together, and stood stock still. A few seconds later, she spoke from her trance. "Via the Empress''s consciousness, the hacking procedure of yours and your wife''s phone has completed. If you do not follow my instructions, they could die."
Chapter 4: Ambition or Obsession? (Part 3 of 3)
Chie sat on the couch and held Hayden in her lap. He was exhausted from all the emotional trauma and had fallen into a deep sleep. She clenched her hands into fists. She was incensed at how uncaring and insensitive Ken could be to Hayden, his own son. But it was only thirty minutes. They''d start family counseling and he would start individual counseling for his... addiction. There, she''d said the word: addiction. She''d insist on the counseling. It was the only effective therapy. She knew from first-hand experience. Then the healing could start.
Holding her phone in one hand, she reached over her shoulder and massaged her shoulder blades. They were sure getting sore all of a sudden. Mas sat next to her and faced the living room window that looked out onto the street below.
Chie watched Ken''s blurry shadow playing around in the sphere. Well, that''s what it was: playing. Still, the technology that could make the sphere was fascinating. Whenever Ken ran into the walls, they flexed, and when he ran, the inner sphere spun with him, but the outer one stayed anchored to the platform on the floor.
Oh shit! Ken fell down on the floor and rolled around. He kicked the zipper and it tore open in a few places.
Then he got up. She heard his muffled voice talking to someone. All of a sudden he yelled out and collapsed onto his knees. Oh my God! She jumped up from the couch, almost dropping Hayden on the floor.
Mas snorted, got up from the couch, and limped around the sphere over to the window, and looked out into the dim twilight. "Hey, I think someone''s on top of the church roof across the street," he said. "And I just saw two police officers cross the intersection. Is this area safe?"
"Three blocks away from BART. About what you''d expect." She stared at Ken''s figure and her fingers clawed at her jeans. Who is he talking to? Is it that arrogant kappa? Or Aika?
"True, and this complex looks run-down too." Mas picked at the paint peeling off of the window sill. "How about downstairs in the back? I noticed a lot of people going back there. May be an illegal grow operation."
"Oh, I don''t know." She watched Ken and then shook her head. I can''t help him. If I''m so worried, I might as well join him. And hell if I''m going to do that. Real life is more important. "Mas, come back and sit with us." She patted the cushion next to her.
? ? ?
Mas sat down and he immediately started shaking his leg. Ken''s shadow caught his eye. Well, there''s wasn''t much else to look at in the barebones apartment except for Ken playing his stupid game. Why are we even indulging him? On Saturday, Audrey and I argued about the extra hours I was putting in, but I didn''t move out.
He looked down and saw Chie''s phone lying at her feet on the carpet. The screen was on and apps were flickering. Some were typing by themselves. The air around it shimmered with a rainbow of colors like heat radiating from the asphalt roadway. He caught a whiff of the acrid smell of sparking wires. She must''ve dropped it when she stood up. Mas pointed at the phone. "Look''s like your phone''s"
She reached for it.
He grabbed her arm. "Don''t"
She picked it up. "Ow!" she dropped it, and shook her hand.
"Are you okay?" He took her hand in his and spread her fingers out. "They''re red." Wait a minute. He drew her hand closer to his face. "What are the hell are those?" Black threads wriggled within the creases of her palm.
"What?" she said.
"Right there, black lines," he said as he gently turned her palm to her. It was still red, but there were no black lines. "Ha, maybe just my imagination." He scratched his head. "I''ll get some ice." He started to get up.
"No, it''s fine." She laid Hayden''s head back in her lap.
"Are you sure?"
She nodded.
"Looks like your phone''s been hacked," he said as he sat back down.
"Seems like it''s been happening to a lot of people we know... Ken''s parents, my mom..." She reached behind and scratched both sides of her back. "Geez, does this place have fleas?"
Her shoulders seemed larger, more muscular than he remembered. Almost like the MMA fighter, Hiroko Tsugimoto. He liked her. She had bulked up in order to get into middleweight, so she was on the small side for her weight category. But she could slip in an almost unbreakable leg armbar.
Chie had bags under her eyes, her hair was oily, and she smelled, well, sour and her body had that air of stale sweat, like she''d been working out. Ken''s stupid, obsessive behavior was taking its toll on her. "You need to rest instead of watching that idiot," Mas said.
She bowed her head and looked down at Hayden sleeping in her lap.
Fuck, what a heel I am. Why do I always blurt things out? "Why don''t you take a nap? I''ll watch out for Ken."
"Really I''m fine." Tiny beads of sweat dotted her forehead. She plucked at the collar of her t-shirt.
"You could be catching a cold." He couldn''t help but stare at her chest. No, she didn''t get a boob job. That wasn''t like her at all. But it was unmistakeable. Her whole upper body was amazing. Like Hiroko. No, even more so. It would be rude to say something, but why hadn''t he noticed before? Had he just not paid any attention? Of course, he''d been distracted from the moment he arrived here at the apartment. Oh, it''s some kind of inflammation! I need to get her to the emergency room. "Chie, look at your chest, it''s"Stolen novel; please report.
The front door burst open. Three SWAT team members in body armor and semiautomatic rifles swarmed into the room. Tactical lights streaming out from under the rifle barrels blinded Chie and Mas.
"Everyone, down on the floor!"
Chie rolled onto the floor and covered Hayden with her arms and chest. Hayden woke up and whimpered.
Mas laid his arms across both Chie and Hayden''s shoulders and heads. Her back muscles throbbed like Boa constrictors rippling under her skin and rocked his cast up and down.
"Hands on your head!"
? ? ?
Ken''s entire body trembled. He seethed at Yuri who stood stock-still in her trance. What the hell was going on? Was becoming her student some kind of con game to get me to give her my passcode? And what did she mean about Chie, Hayden and Mas possibly dying if I didn''t do what she said? That''s a threat if I ever heard one. She must be a cracker? How could Webuit let a cracker into their midst? And did she really hack mine and Chie''s phones?
Then, all over her right sleeve, threads here and there started turning gray and then black. Pinpoints of light sparkled amongst the threads like stars in a nebula. Then, the black threads grew and spread across the skin of her hand. Blisters rose and then burst in a flash of red light. Wriggling like sentient animals, the threads snaked their way though the shoulder fabric, burrowed into the unblemished flesh of her neck and then her cheek. They finally spread like the lines of an infection into her right eye, squirming in its socket like anemone tentacles.
She awoke from her trance. "Now attack me, kodan position."
For a moment, he was speechless and couldn''t peel his eyes away from her face and arm, but then he remembered what she had said mere moments ago. "Are you threatening me?"
"I''m defenseless." Her arms hung loosely at her sides. "We''re only trying to help."
"I don''t get it. How is attacking you going to help? And how do I even know what you''re saying is true?"
She took a deep breath in. "See?" She raised her hand palm up in the air and his apartment was displayed. Chie, Hayden, and Mas were face-down on the floor and a three-member SWAT team was pointing their semiautomatic weapons down at them. Ken was standing in the middle of the sphere. The SWAT team hadn''t seen him. "I swatted your apartment."
He loosened the helmet strap. I''ve got to get back!
"Don''t! If you make any sudden movement inside the sphere, the SWAT team will be caught off guard and anything could happen." She stretched her one arm out to him. "Come, attack me! If you kill me, an order saying that it was a mistake will be broadcasted to the entire SWAT team."
Nothing made sense. First, she swatted my family and now she wants to save them? "It must be some elaborate hoax. It''s got to be." He dropped his fingers from the strap and gripped his wakizashi with both hands.
"Do you really want to take that chance?" she said.
He lifted his wakizashi up to his waist and held its tip up, pointing at Yuri. His entire body started to shake. "It''s only a game. II''ll just stand here and it''ll be over."
Yuri''s sleeve and hand were completely black and sparkling like the stars in the night sky.
"I''ll strike you down." Yuri said and with her left hand grasped the hilt of her wakizashi in a reverse grip. "And your body falling in the sphere will catch the police off guard and they will spray bullets all over the apartment."
? ? ?
From her prone position, Chie saw the roof of the church across the street.
"Zoom in on that," said a smooth contralto voice from her phone lying three feet away.
"Bird''s Eye View skill, activate zoom," Chie said without questioning. She didn''t have time to think, only react.
Magnified to one hundred times, her eyes caught the glint of sunlight glancing off of the lens of a mounted scope. A skinny red laser beam pierced through the living room window and wandered to and fro around the apartment, but it couldn''t penetrate the sphere.
Then, the realization hit Chie like a fist to the jaw: the police and the veiled threat of the Empress''s diplomatic envoy. But how could this be happening? Detective Rostov registered their address as a potential swatting threatthat is, their home, which was in Berkeley.
"Clear the bedroom," the SWAT team leader yelled to his teammate at the end of the line. He peeled off from the group and with his rifle pointed forward walked in a crouch position cautiously down the hallway.
? ? ?
Tears streamed down Ken''s face. "I don''t get it. What the hell do you have to gain? Why are you doing this?" His hands were still weak and they shook as he raised his wakizashi high above his head. He knew he had to do it. Because if it wasn''t a hoax and if Yuri wasn''t lying, then the risk to his family and his best friend was too great. Besides, he wasn''t afraid of mere physical pain. It wasn''t like he could die in a game, right? But then, why was he crying?
He let out a yell from the depths of his diaphragm and rushed her with all the speed he could muster.
? ? ?
Chie watched Ken raise his bokken high over his head and he started running inside the sphere.
"No!" Chie said. Get down, Ken! Time slowed.
The SWAT team saw his moving shadow and swung their rifles around to bear on him.
In a head-splitting pain, her back muscles burst open; black wings interlaced with her own bleached white bones like katanas snapped open, scraping the ceiling, and she lunged forward.
One of the bone katanas sliced clean through Mas''s biceps. "Fuck!" Blood soaked into his long-sleeve shirt. "What the fuck''s that?" Mas said, staring at Chie''s black wings. From under the sleeve of her t-shirt, hundreds of black threads sparkling with glitter snaked down her arm, across the carpet, and into her phone. All along her arm, pustules rose and burst, leaking yellow pus and blood onto the carpet.
He hugged a sobbing Hayden to his chest, hiding Hayden''s eyes in his strong arms.
Ken tore through the weakened zipper, holding his bokken high in the air above the two SWAT team members.
Before they could fire, one of her black wings snatched both of them and then wrapped them up. They started firing. Even at point blank range, no bullets shot through her wings. Only the dull thuds of bullets echoed off of the apartment walls. She sniffed the invigorating smell of gunpowder smoke and then squeezed her wing as though wringing a wet towel. The satisfying sound of cracking bones like walnut shells resounded throughout the apartment before they screamed.
Her wing dropped the twisted carcasses and lashed out at the SWAT teammate right before his rifle muzzle peeked around the corner of the hallway. Her wing''s razor-sharp blades slashed through his armor and lacerated his body in horizontal stripes from head to toe. His head fell onto the floor and rolled to a rest against the wall.
A red dot flashed on Ken''s head. She flexed her wings propelling her body to tackle Ken. Her short hair vibrated like cicada and her long strong arms reached out for Ken, her tank, her love. Pulling him in and hugging him, she rested her head on his chest. With his beautiful heart beating in her ear, she cradled him in her wings.
But then he struck down with his bokken hard on top of her wing and his head popped up above her wing''s topmost ridge.
In a loud cacophony of clashing cymbals, the window shattered.
Ken collapsed onto the floor.
Chie fell down onto her knees at his side and then slumped onto his chest. Blood pooled under his head, soaking into the carpet.
"No!" She seized his head in both of her hands and wailed like the guttural cawing of hundreds of dying crows. It should be me.
Chapter 5: What Is the Nature of Consciousness? (Part 1 of 2)
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Glancing at the IV tube snaking across the sheets and into the crook of Ken''s arm, Chie trimmed his beard short and neat, exactly how she liked it. "No complaining now, honey." With a damp towel, she brushed the trimmings off of his neck. Caressing the soft bristles on his cheeks, she wiped tears from her eyes and then pushed Ken''s hair out of his closed eyes. "You''ll be due for a haircut soon too. Now stop being your old lazy self, you''ve got to look decent when you go to churchnot like a shaggy dogI know, I know, it''s only once a month, but Mom and Dad always go and you know how they are." She tucked her mother''s pink silk quilt with a floral border under his chin.
If only she''d been faster; if only she''d been the real Rose Crow.
She pulled a chair up closer to the bed, and rested her head on her crossed arms next to his head. "I also found out about Jake Robertson, you know, the founder and now the VP of the combined Three Kingdoms and Quantum Katana Online division. Did you know, he''s also on the board of Nano Crisper. They"
There was a knock at the door and Dr. Kiyo Ng walked in. After shaking Chie''s hand, Dr. Ng looked at Ken''s chart and then sat down in a chair next to Chie.
Dr. Ng smiled. "He can go home tomorrow," she said. "You''ll need the help of a nurse for his bodily functions. And even though the cranial MRI was negative, you''ll have to watch for signs of seizures or numbing of his limbs."
Chie nodded.
"How''s Hayden doing now that he''s back at school?" Dr. Ng said.
"I guess he''s getting back into the swing of things. At least, he doesn''t have time to be depressed around the house and he has his friends."
"Is he still somnambulating?"
"Less." Chie looked down at her phone to see if she had any new notifications.
"Don''t worry, children are reslient."
Chie stared out of the window. Bare spindly branches of the tree outside shook in the cold wind like the claws of a kappa.
Dr. Ng walked in between Chie and the window and Chie broke out of her reverie.
"Adults, less so," Dr. Ng said. "Get some rest."
"I''m fine." She glanced down at her phone.
"Although, occasionally, I can pass"Dr. Ng pulled something red out of the pocket of her white lab coat"for a clown!" She stuck a red ball on her nose.
Chie laughed, stood up, and clapped.
Dr. Ng bowed with a florid flourish of her hands. "I can assure you that I am a doctor, and I can certainly tell when someone is exhausted."
"Really, I''m fine." Chie tugged at the long-sleeved cuffs of her cropped denim jacket and straightened her back, lifting the hem of her t-shirt just above the top of her jeans.
With both of her hands, Dr. Ng grasped Chie''s shoulders.
Chie winced.
Dr. Ng let go. "I''m sorry, did I touch a tender spot?
"Just minor scratches on my back."
"And they''re still hurting after three days? I mean you should really have them looked at. I don''t want to pry, but did the gang members attack you?" Dr. Ng said.
"Gang members?" Chie said. "Oh right, I mean, no." Chie laughed under her breath.
"Here, let me take a look." Dr. Ng reached out to turn Chie around.
"No, really, it''s just sore muscles from a little stress," Chie took a quick step back.
Dr. Ng put her hands on her hips. "A little stress? You have bags under your eyes. And when you haven''t been here, you''ve been taking care of your son or God knows what elsecrime scene investigation, if I know your typeand you have the temerity to tell me you''re okay?"
Chie shrugged her shoulders.
"Mr. Hashimoto comes around every day after work," Dr. Ng said. "So, he can call you right away if Ken regains consciousness. Sometimes, his wife comes during the day. And the sangha too. You are truly blessed to have such good friends and a caring community."
Chie smiled and thanked Dr. Ng. Chie massaged her phone in one hand. "Did a detective from the Berkeley police department call you?"
"Oh, yes, but how did you know?"
"I talked to the detective and he said he was going to call you. They were having a hard time getting a warrant."
"I did send him a statement about the injection points on Ken''s neck," Dr. Ng said.
"Thank you!" Chie grabbed Dr. Ng''s hands and squeezed them. "I know they''re going to get a warrant for Websuit International now."
"ButI know how you feel and I trust you when you say Ken didn''t do drugs and there were no tracesbut, you know, it''s really anyone''s guess how the wounds got there."
"But it has to be them!" Chie smacked her fist into her hand and started pacing the room.
"I''m no detective, but I''m sure it''s one of their lines of investigation," Dr. Ng said and guided Chie back to her chair.
"It''s so obvious." Chie sat down and stared across the room. "If only we knew where the helmet went."
"Didn''t the police collect it as evidence?" Dr. Kiyo Ng said.
"The detective said they did. I mean, it couldn''t have disappeared into thin air, right?" Chie bent over and hid her head in her hands. She''d even called the FBI agent who''d been assigned to the Berkeley police department, but he hadn''t returned her call. "If only, if only, they had the helmet, then those negligent, irresponsible Websuit execsthose assholeswould be in jail by now."
? ? ?
Kiyo had seen people react in every kind of way, rage, despondency, but only a few were as driven as Chie. Kiyo sat down next to Chie again. "Mrs. Shibuyama, they have a process. I''m sure they''ll find it."Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Kiyo hugged Chie''s shoulders.
Chie flinched.
"I''m sorry," Kiyo said, letting go. "I did it again."
Chie kneaded one of her shoulders.
"More troubling," Kiyo said, "is that the gang members are still at large. And, I''m sure, that is the police department''s main concern now."
Chie pulled at her hair. "They just don''t get it!"
"I know, I know. Why people do such terrible things is incomprehensible." Kiyo was merely mouthing the therapist in her. She had seen so many injuries in the emergency room, it was more the horror of it than incomprehensible. And how three members of a SWAT team could be killed by gang members with swordsand one was even decapitatedwas the unbelievable part.
"No, no, The gang is a dead end. Websuit, they should be investigating all those slimy, greedy bastards."
"But by your own and Mr. Hashimoto''s corroborating statements"
"I know what I said, but... I know differently now. There''s new evidence."
"Then you should tell the detective"
Chie chuckled. "No one would believe me."
"Let the detective be the judge." With her fingertips, Kiyo touched the back of Chie''s hand. "But I could tell you if it sounds reasonable. I could support you. It''s strictly confidential, even though I''m not your doctor. Why not try me?"
Chie let her head fall forward, resting her chin on her chest. "Ken... he talks to me."
Kiyo''s jaw almost dropped. Chie seemed to be the rational, composed, scientific type. She was a mathemetician after all. Kiyo mentally noted to check if Chie was really going to therapy. "Oh, uh, yes, how does he contact you?"
"Not in my dreams. Not in my head." She held out her phone. "From here."
Is she delusional? Definitely need to talk to her therapist today.
"Mrs. Shibuyama, you need rest." She patted Chie''s arm.
"See?" Chie laughed. Then she straightened her back and her lips settled into a straight line. "But of course, you''re right. What a silly outburst that was, wasn''t it?" she said in a monotone.
Sudden changes in mood. "My shift doesn''t end until eight PM. I''ll be sure to call you right away if Ken wakes up."
"I know you will. The staff here has been so excellent." Chie squeezed one of Dr. Ng''s hands in both of hers.
Kiyo started to the door. "You''re going to need rest and get some help around the house too. Remember, even though your physical injuries were very minor, just a few cuts and bruises, the mind and spirit also need time to recover. Don''t exhaust yourself."
"Absolutely!" Chie said. "In fact, I''ll leave with you, right now."
At least, it''s a sudden change in a positive direction. Kiyo smiled.
Chie streteched her arms up and yawned and then leaned over to kiss Ken''s lips. Her cropped denim jacket and t-shirt hiked halfway up her back.
Kiyo made a sharp intake of breath.
On either side of Chie''s spine, twin ridges of dry cracked scabs snaked up her back.
? ? ?
Hiking along the side trails shaded on all sided by tall redwood trees, Hayden held onto Chie''s hand in a tight grip.
"Mom, aren''t we going to the carousel?"
"Remember, it doesn''t open until ten? It''ll be open right when we circle back on this trail." She sucked in the brisk early morning air and swung his hand back and forth. "Do you smell the pine trees?"
"Mmm, smells like Dad''s aftershave," he said.
"Right you are!" she said and reminded herself to bring the aftershave next time she visited Ken. She''d need to shave his neck near his Adam''s apple to keep it even.
"Okay, get ready, I''m going to spin you!" she said as she grabbed both his hands. He ran around her and she pulled him and she spun faster, around and around. As his feet lifted off of the ground, his laughter rose higher and echoed throughout the forest. Her back spasmed in pain and she almost dropped him. Oh shit, are the scabs ripping apart? She slowly lowered him to the ground. His tennis shoes scraped the dry dirt and kicked up puffs of dust. She stuck a hand under her t-shirt and her fingertips came out red.
After returning back to the picnic area near the carousel, they sat down at a table to eat their snack. They both scooped handfuls of her father-in-law''s pomegranate seeds out of the plastic bag and shoveled them into their greedy mouths. The seeds were so tender you didn''t have to spit them out like the store-bought ones.
"When are we going to see Grandpa?" he mumbled in between chews.
"What? We just saw him yesterday." Ken''s father had come to the hospital and stayed overnight at Chie and Ken''s.
"I want to go next week when Dad wakes up, then we''ll all go together."
"Of course," Chie said and hugged him tight and he hugged her back, even tighter.
"Dad''s only sleeping, right?"
She nodded.
Then it all came spewing out. Something that Hayden had been thinking about. "Then is he awake somewhere else? Like when you''re sleeping sometimes you''re dreaming. And in your dreams you''re not sleeping, but you''re not in the real world either, so you must be in another world like in a game. Sometimes, I dream I''m back in the game, in the Three Kingdoms... or in The White Imperium, but those are more like nightmares, but a nightmare is like a dream, right? But just not a pleasant dream."
"A dream isn''t another world. It''s your brain working and refreshing itself."
"But I see colors, people talking, so why couldn''t it be another world like a kitsune world under the porch. Maybe someone made Dad''s quantum energy go under the porch?"
She didn''t want to burst his bubble but neither did she want to lie to him. "It takes a lot of energy to break apart a subatomic particle. One might say an otherworldly energy."
"Rose Crow is otherworldly. If anyone could bring Dad back, I know it''s going to be you." He pressed his cheek to her chest. "I mean you have to find him and bring him back. We can''t be a family without Dad."
After Hayden rode the carousel, they drove back home down Grizzly Peak Road. She constantly glanced at her phone in its holder. A few weeks ago before the swatting, she''d turned off notifications because the spam had been increasing. It was spooky how much ads knew about you. Dating ads too. They kept sending her pictures of men with beards. Imagine, married me getting barraged by pictures of bearded men? I''ll have you know I already have my own lovely man with his own lovely beard, thank you. But yesterday, she''d turned notifications back on.
When is Ken going to call again? But was it really Ken? Am I going crazy? Is my need to believe so strong that I''m projecting my own desires onto reality? Of course, why else would I have broken down in front of Dr. Ng? Now what''s she going to think? That woman is obviously losing it. Just what I need, a professional to tell every other professional that my judgment is suspect. Her grip tightened on the wheel. She had to think about the situation objectively, just like Ken would.
Yesterday, someone who had claimed he was Ken had left a message. It had sounded like he was yelling from the top of a mountain peak. The wind was blowing so hard it almost drowned out his voice, but she knew it was him. Rationally speaking, she should really be saying someone who was potentially Ken had tried to contact her. That is, a potential Ken. She liked that. What was the probability that whoever called her was really Ken? Not Ken in the physical sense, of course. She wasn''t that far gone, yet. Ken, in a spiritual sense. Or perhaps in a digital sense? After all, the call had originated from in-game. Mas had helped her trace the call to a Websuit International network entry point.
What''s the probability it was the digital Ken? It''s the subset of the measure of all probabilities. So, she should be able to integrate it. Take some function Ken in the digitial world K(d) integrated over all possibilities and that should be equal to some function Ken in the real world K; that is:
K( r) = K(d)
Was the integral from negative infinity to infinity? Or zero to infinity? Or some delimited set of real numbers? For probability that would be zero to one hundred. What is K( r), then? It''s a function that describes his behaviors in the real world; similarly, K(d) describes his behaviors in the digital world. Depending on the other parameters in the digital world, he would behave differently, so K(d) would have to have those parameters taken out of it in order to equal K( r). We could describe those parameters in a coefficient like Planck''s constant, call it the reality difference Rd. Therefore the equation would become:
K( r) = Rd * K(d)
His behavior in the real world would include things involving the five senses and his thoughts as exemplified by what he says and does. Then the equation would be:
K( r) = Visual + Auditory + Tactile + Olfactory + Gustation + Language + Action
K( r) = V( r) + A( r) + T( r) + S( r) + O( r) + G( r) + L( r) + A( r)
and
K(d) = Visual + Auditory + Tactile + Language + Action
K(d) = V(d) + A(d) + T(d) + L( r) + A( r)
She was getting tired. Too many variables and functions. How much data do you need to hold a human''s memory anyway? Terabytes from one study, but terabyte drives were dirt cheap these days. Only a hundred dollars per terabyte. It''s really all about the processing power.
You would need a huge neural network and processing power far beyond even the 100-cubit quantum computer at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) to be able to handle all of a person''s behaviorsand they kept changing. And for that reason alone it was impossible for there to be a digital Ken. And yet she had heard him. Even over the howling of the wind and its vocaloid-synthesized voice. It was a terribly human-like fabrication. It was amazing how far voice technology had come in the past few years. She could even hear Ken''s vocal undertones. And, of course, it was quintissentially Ken''s manner of speaking. So, was it Ken? Was he somehow speaking to her from his comatose mind? Or, was it a ghost? A digital ghost?
Ding.
She jumped. A message notification popped up. She didn''t recognize the phone number. Reaching out with her finger, she was about to tap it, but then she jerked her finger back. Was it really him? She wouldn''t be able to find out if she didn''t read it. The tires went bump, bump. A honk. She pulled back into her lane and then tapped the message.
It wasn''t from Ken.
Meet me in The White Imperium public chatroom.
My handle is 1c3f0x012.
Chapter 5: What Is the Nature of Consciousness? (Part 2 of 2)
Chie had asked Mas and Audrey to let Hayden stay the night at their place. Mas had asked if everything was all right, but she''d put him off.
She grabbed the helmet off of the kitchen table and tossed it on the leather couch in the living room. Then she picked up her phone. It was cold as though it had been in the refrigerator. She felt its coolness through the bandages wrapped around the burns on her right palm and fingers. The screen faded in. Ken hadn''t sent another message. The old one had been confiscated as evidence, but its internals had been fried anyways. She''d bought a new phone and kept her old number, as a matter of course. A cold burst of air from the ceiling vent blew her bangs into her eyes. I didn''t accidentally turn the A/C on, did I? She checked her phone app, but the A/C wasn''t on. All of a sudden it was freezing. She rubbed her upper arms and shoulders through Ken''s long-sleeve dress shirt to warm them up. Tapping the app, the heat to the kitchen and living room kicked in.
After settling down on the leather couch in the living room, she donned her helmet and started the login process for The White Imperium public chatroom. The helmet still had the software update that was installed when she was rerouted to a White Imperium server, but it had been almost a month ago, so another update started to install. Could the Websuit neurologist really help wake Ken up? They must. They knew the drug that was used, so they knew its biochemistry. That was the major advantage they had over Ken''s current doctors. Obviously, they didn''t want to officially admit anything. God, how she hated them. But she had to control herself if she wanted them to help.
The caller''s handle was 1c3f0x012 and the avatar was a white fox. Almost immediately after she logged in and joined the public chatroom, 1c3f0x012 pinged her with a join request to a private chatroom and they shunted over to it.
"I''m so sorry to hear what happened to your husband," said a soothing older woman''s voice.
Chie crossed her arms. "Who the hell cares about your platitudes." Dammit. "I mean, thanks for your concern."
"I know it must seem callous to meet like this, but"
"Do tell? Then why not meet in person?" Chie said. It wasn''t going like she''s planned. Oh, to hell with it.
"Mrs. Shibuyama, I sincerely apologize for having to meet you like this and"
Chie snorted. "Just get to the point and tell me how"
"Shouldn''t we get to know each other?" 1c3f0x001''s unblemished face sporting cold pewter glasses displayed in a webcam." She clipped several stray strands of jet black hair back into one of four barrettes. Each barrette, a row of three silver snowflakes, glued her hair onto the smooth curve of her skull. At the back of her head, a larger matching clip gathered her short stiff hair together and it fanned out like a witch''s broom. Two full moons, one on each of her shoulders, were stitched into a blood red kimono and its ivory collar bound her neck like a noose soaked in holy water.
"I''m not going to get on a webcam," Chie said.
"No need, I already know your plain Jane look, but your intelligence is what we value." 1c3f0x001 adjusted her glasses higher up on the bridge of her nose. "My name is Aya Yamasaki. I''m a patent lawyer, specializing in medical devices in the neurology field. You can find me online or even call my office to verify my identity, if you so desire."
"What? I thought you were a neurologist." Chie almost screamed. "I don''t want to talk to a goddamn lawyer."
"I am a neuroligist as well."
Were they going to try and force her to sign some kind of agreement waiving her right to sue before they helped her? Corporate attorneys were leaches onto society; they were just there to blockade suits from everyday people. "What''s Websuit trying to pull?"
"I''m sorry, Mrs. Shibuyama, but just to be clear, I don''t represent any such organization. I''m here on my own cognizance to offer whatever assistance I possibly can," Aya said in a voice simultaneously soothing and threatening as only a corporate attorney''s could be.
"But you said you were from ''the company'' and obviously that''s Web"
"I know it must seem terribly inappropriate, but, unfortunately, because of the ongoing police investigation as well as legal liabilities, no one from the company would be able to meet in a situation that could be documented or that could somehow be put forward as prima facie evidence before a judge in order to produce a warrant." Aya rattled off the legal disclaimers with alacrity. "On the other hand, I really want to help you. I hope you understand."If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.
"Understand? You ask me to understand? After Websuit injected a drug into my husbandand probably me tooand made him addicted to your game? And then he was shot because he didn''t know we were being swatted. And now all the evidence has somehow been lost?"
Aya blinked and knit her brow. "A drug?"
"Don''t play all innocent with me." Chie banged her fist on the kitchen table.
"No, really, I didn''t know. Were there any traces of the drug in the body?"
"God, I don''t know how you can say that with a straight face. Of course not. That''s why we need the helmet, the helmet had needles to inject a drug and now it''s gonegone from the evidence lockers at the Berkeley police department."
"Oh, interesting." Aya pulled on her ear lobe.
"That''s all you can say." Chie grabbed the controller. "This conversation is over!"
"Wait, Mrs. Shibuyama, this might be difficult for you to believe, but although I can''t bring your husband out of his coma
"You saidyou said you could get him back..." Chie clenched her eyes shut and let her head fall forwards. The helmet banged hard on the table. She hung onto the back of the helmet with both hands and sobbed. "Then why? Why are you torturing me?" She was angry at herself again, for lying over and over to herself about what was probable and giving her false hope; about herself and what she really wanted. Unable to accept herself for who she truly was, imperfections and all. But Ken had loved her and accepted her for all that she was and wasn''tand now he was gone.
Shoving her hands underneath the hem of the dress shirt, she clawed at her back and chunks of moist scabs tore away from pink baby flesh, red mush piled under her fingernails. She winced. She could feel pain. And if she could feel pain, she could feel joy. Therefore, she still had hope.
"As I was saying, ChieI can call you by your first name, can''t I?I can''t bring your physical husband out of his coma, but you can still meet him."
Chie opened her eyes and, through her tears, watched Aya''s blurry image.
Aya took off her glasses, cleaned them with a cloth, and then put them back on. "Meet him in-game, that is, Ken''s consciousness. It''s in the game, in The White Imperium."
Chie chuckled, then she laughed and guffawed, and finally, she cried again. But it couldn''t be possible, could it? Could Quantum Katana Online be some kind of elaborate cover for a sinister quantum computing secret military project? Had they broken open the subatomic particles of a person''s brain, their thoughts, and then reassembled them in-game? Had they transferred Ken''s soul? She wiped her tears. "He called me."
"Oh?" Aya pushed her glasses back onto the bridge of her nose. "Who helped him?"
Chie knitted her brow. "No one. He was far away, like he was calling from the mountains."
"A yamabiko," Aya said.
"A yamawhat?"
"An echo, they''re all over the central highlands of Tl?n."
"Tl?n?"
Aya sighed. "Don''t you want to meet him?"
Of course, Chie wanted to, but nono, it wasn''t possible. "It''s a hoax, a cruel joke. Who''s behind it?" Chie glared at Aya. "You know, don''t you."
"I know, but it''s no joke," Aya said.
"Then tell me! Someone at Websuit"then it dawned on her"It''s you, isn''t it!" Chie raised her head and pointed a finger at Aya.
"Me?" Aya shot up out of her chair. Standing straight and true like a regal staff, she narrowed her eyes. "How dare you? You insolent knave. You''re lucky the Empress even deigns notice your insignificant existence. And after all she''s done for you in all her magnanimity become reality through her quantum consciousness."
"Done for me? The Empress? From The White Imperium?"
Her face frozen, Aya blinked several times and then turned her back on Chie. After a few seconds, she faced Chie again. Smiling her cold professional smile, Aya said, "How do like your beautiful black wings?"
"How did you know?" Mas was the only person who had ever seen them. It hadn''t been a nightmare or an in-game battle. Reaching under her shirt, she caressed the rough scales and bloody goop of one of the long scabs.
Aya smiled. "Through her miko, the Empress can work the most wondrous miracles."
What the hell is she talking about? The Empress? An NPC? This isn''t some game, it''s the real world. Maybe some kind of genetic engineering? "Nano Crisper. Did you inject me with some kind of CRISPR biotech?"
Aya lifted her chin up. "Well, who can say?" She flicked an earlobe with her forefinger. "But if that''s what you want to believe."
Chie bolted up and knocked the chair back. The chair slammed down on its back, slid across the tile floor, and banged into the stove. "Then inject Ken with the antidote, please, and bring him back."
"I''m not like some god."
"Please." Chie clasped her hands together and bowed over the table in the proper position of a supplicant.
"I''m only a lesser daemon," Aya said.
"You can call yourself whatever you want, but just let me talk to him!" Chie sobbed. It didn''t matter anymore, wherever he was, whatever he was, if only she could talk to him for her own sanityand for Hayden''s sake.
"There''s only one way now," Aya said and she slipped a pendant out from under her kimono collar. Grasping the pendant''s wire cord with her thumb and five fingers, she held it up in front of her face and then leaned into the webcam. The pendant swallowed up the entire view.
Out of the corner of her eye, Chie saw her phone''s screen come to life and then the helmet''s webcam flicked on. Reflected in the small shard of a bronze mirror was her wet face, stringy hair pasted across her cheeks like parasitic nematodes.
"Only one way," Aya''s voice intoned fron behind the pendant.
Black wings laced with Chie''s own bleached white bones shivered in the mirror. Chie drank in the iron of her bloodletting and inhaled the alkaline aroma of battlefield urine.
Aya''s rosy lips peeked around the jagged edge of the pendant. Stretching her lips back to expose two rows of sharp-tipped teeth meant for tearing flesh, she whispered, "dive."
Chapter 6: Is the Turing Test Valid? (Part 1 of 5)
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Breakthrough
Ken''s eyes snapped open. Gray sky instead of dark cave walls. Am I looking out of the cave entrance? Did I hit her? His body rotated. The wind whipped his bangs. Cold white snow. A wall of snow was going to slam into the cave. He looked around for a place to run to, but all he saw was wide open empty air.
Oh shit, I''m falling! He plummetted down through the air like an artillery shell and then his face plowed into a deep snow drift.
God, my head hurts like a sonofabitch, like that time I hit the back of my head on the ice in the skating rink. He stood up slowly. The ground wobbled. Easy boy. He stuck out his arms to steady himself and winced at the pain in his right shoulder. His heart and soul hurt and his insides were all twisted up in knots. I''ve got to get out. I have to see with my own two eyesthat everyone''s okay!
His fingers grabbed for the helmet strap under his chin, but he didn''t find it. He stuck his hands on both sided of his neck and pushed up. They slid up through empty air.
"Log off." Nothing. "Menu." There was no log off menu command. He scrolled through all of the menu items, but there was no "Exit" or "Quit", or any other remotely related synonym for "Logoff". No "Chat" or "Contact Admin", not even "Help". It was like he was really in an ancient world without any modern conveniences. "What the hell''s going on?" He started breathing fast, then he winced from a pain in his ribs. Now get a hold of yourself. It has to be around her somewhere. Be systematic about it. His trembling hands rubbed all over his neck and face and then he raked his fingers through his hair. No, no! I''m not trapped in here am I? Like in the trope-filled but lovable litrpg novels I used to suck up years ago? Before the book subscription model died. I mean that''s just fiction, isn''t it? Am I in some pod or could that helmet have used wetware and attached itself to my neck like a cybernetic octopus. Was that the real reason why my neck was raw with sores? Maybe I''ve been sealed in a pod of synth-amniotic fluid to keep The Machine running. He yanked at his hair and scratched his cheeks. Scraped his neck and ears.
Feeling the pain, he stopped. But it was an odd pain, like the sensorial max was dialed down to the min. Still, it was hard to focus on other things and his brain kept distracting him, screaming there''s pain! Pain where you scratched! "At least I''m still alive."
"Chat," he said, but exactly like before, there was no way to access the chat feature nor any in-game or real-life communications.
"Chie! Are you okay?" he yelled at the top of his lungs. His voice echoed off of the mountain sides. He cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled even louder. "I can''t log out! Can you take my helmet off?"
His words bounced from one mountain peak to the other. It was like a heavenly choir was repeating his words and then trumpets sounded. The echoes shot up to a deafening volume. He slapped his hands over his ears. Suddenly, a tsunami of sub-bass waves struck him in the chest and knocked him down. What the hell was that?
"Chie! Hayden! Mas!" No one answerednot even a single echo.
Am I still be attached to my body, but for some reason no one can remove my helmet. Are the tentacles stuck in my neck like electro-mechanical leeches? What is my body doing in the sphere now right now? Is it moving around on its own? Am I talking out loud? Do they think I''ve been hypnotized or that I''m in a lucid dream completely detached from reality. Or am I immobilized? But the websuit detects the movement, so if I were immobilized I wouldn''t be able to move around like I am now, right?Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.
Nothing''s making sense. The only way is to get back out. I have to warn them. But how? Think, think. In some games, you have to log out from a safe zone; otherwise, the player would lose all of their experience and loot gained during that session. The White Imperium was even more hardcore and only allowed logging out from the safe zones. Right, the cave. In his heavy trenchcoat and bootsat least the system had given him season-appropriate clothing to go over his thin shirt and pantshe stomped through the snow, breathing hard, his face in a grimace.
As he trudged through the snow back to the cave, the steady rhythm of his boots plunging through the snow up to his knees calmed his mind. He felt tired. Snow began to fall. It was quiet. His inner voice stopped talking. He stuck out his tongue and a snowflake fell on it and then it melted right away. It felt faint yet distinctly cool on his tongue.
He remembered cross-country skiing up on Hetch Hetchy ridge near Yosemite. Hayden laughing behind him as he caught snowflake after snowflake on his tongue. The silence of snow. The dependable Captain Chie bringing up the rear. The swishing of skiis on fresh powder. The snow had started coming down harder, so they stopped and pitched the tent for the night. Lighting up the propane burner and eating a hearty dehydrated chicken and rice soup while playing bridge by LED lamplight.
A snowflake melted on his tongue and he started to cry. Stopping dead in his tracks, he clenched his hands. How could I have done that to them? I was so selfish and stupid. It was my fault. II abandoned my own son, just for this game? I fought with Chie, the love of my life. She''d even told me I was addicted. Why didn''t I listen to her? I even lost my job. It wasn''t about the money, but rather another symptom of my addiction.
Tears streamed down his cheeks. He shouldn''t have been able to feel themlike he shouldn''t have been able to taste the snowflakes because the websuit didn''t extend over his head nor did it have any kind of mouth insert with the nano-electrodes and neither did the helmetbut somehow he did feel them. He shrugged his shoulders. He didn''t have any idea how to even start investigating that.
He wiped the tears away. No use getting all guilt-ridden now. They''re in danger and they need me. I need to focus on getting out. He started stepping through the soft snow again. It was slow going. If only the snow had been hard pack. He was almost there, just ten more feet.
The ground shook. Another earthquake! He threw himself onto the snow and hugged it for dear life. A few seconds later, the shaking stopped. He stood up but his legs were wobbly and his entire body was trembling. He took another step towards the cave. Suddenly, a rockslide came crashing down the mountainside. A wall of rocks, soil, and ice rushed towards him. He hunkered down in the snow and covered his head and neck with his arms. He winced as rocks hit his arms and shoulders. He coughed at the dust.
Oh my God, am I buried alive? He panicked and pushed up, but more dust fell down and he coughed again. It was pitch black, but he felt around. His arms and shoulders had formed a rough dome around him from his waist up and he had a little bit of clean air to breathe. The top of the dome was only an inch away from his head and could collapse at any moment. He clawed away at the rocks in front of him until his nails broke and bleed. If his stamina dropped to zero, he''d fall unconscious and start losing hit points. "Remaining stamina."
He was glad that command was still the same. Twenty-seven minutes. He could already tell he was getting tired, but it was reassuring to know an exact time. He reached out in front of him and started clawing away at the compacted wall of soil and rocks again, but then stopped. Oh man, I''m so stupid, there wasn''t as much of the slide behind me since the mountainside was in front. And I should dig under it through the snow. Immediately, he twisted his body around as best he could in the tight space. His hips and legs had room enough for him rotate about forty-five degrees around. He started digging through the snow. His arms felt heavy like in Kendo practicing kirikaeshi, but Akiyama Sensei had always preached the basics and now he was thankful for it. "Men, men, men!" he yelled as he pried another rock from inside the snow drift and dropped it down by his waist.
Duration = 25 sec
Thank God! So, Chi responds to your willpower. It''s a repository of spiritual strength. After five more minutes of digging, the rocks and soil above the tunnel he''d made in the snow drift collapsed, opening a hole. At the end of it he saw a dim light. He crawled out.
Standing out in the open, he looked back at the cave. Its entrance was completely covered by the slide. He shook his head. A one time portal.
The wind howled. If he did''t find shelter soon, he''d freeze to death. He saw an outcropping downslope and he pushed through the snow towards it. With each step, he sunk deeper into the snow until it was up to his hips. Finally, he pulled himself up onto the outcropping and sat down against its leeward side. Exhausted, cold, and wet, he ran his hands through his hair. Now what?
"Ken!"
He looked up. Breaking through the ceiling of gray clouds, Rose Crow on her black wings glided in.
Chapter 6: Is the Turing Test Valid? (Part 2 of 5)
Ken awoke with a start but didn''t dare open his eyes. His hand clutched at a soft silk quilt like the pink one on his own and Chie''s bed instead of the rough wool blankets at the dingy inn in Ishigumi, a village in the country of Tl?n. He knew that when he opened his eyes he would see all of his friends around him. He was safe and so were Chie, Hayden, and Mas. He smiled.
A bell tower tolled the hour. But the only one within hearing distance of his home was The Campanile and they''d decommissioned its bell years ago.
He opened his eyes and stared up at the cobwebs in the bare rafters of the inn.
He had been dreaming about what had happened mere hours agoexcept for the part about being rescuedhow Yuri had avoided his strike with ease and then thrown him out of the cave. Then, he''d finally he''d made it to Ishigumi, one of the safe zones.
Feeling a warmth over his heart spreading outwards, enfusing his whole body with energy, he opened his eyes.
A woman was bending over him. Her white hands and each of their six spindly digits were splayed out across his bare chest. Her long black hair cascaded all over his upper body and hid her face. The wide sleeves of her white kimono spread out over the gray blanket.
Letting go of her silk sleeve, he pushed himself up onto his hands. "Whwhat are you doing?" He backed himself against the headboard and pulled his shirt down.
Standing up at the edge of the bed, she flipped her hair back over her shoulders.
Her thin pink lips spread across her face in a warm smile. "I was helping you regenerate."
He pulled off his shirt. Sure enough, the open cut on his shoulder had healed up into a scar. "Thanks." He squinted at her. "But who are you? You can''t just barge into someone''s room." He probably hadn''t even bothered to lock the door. He was still in his dirty, bloody t-shirt, pants, and laced-up boots. Dry clumps of mud littered the blankets. He hadn''t remembered taking off his trenchcoat, but it hung over the back of a chair pushed up against a small table next to a potbelly stove.
"I apologize for my unannounced intrusion," she said, but she did not bow, not in the slightest. Her dark eyes spoke with authority and they sparkled in the moonlight streaming in from the open window on the other side of the bed. The window framed twin rabbits peeking out of the two moons, bathing the room in a twilight aura.
She made a sweeping gesture with her hand, palm up, towards the other side of the room. "But the window was unlocked."
She pushed a wide silver hair band inset with black onyx gemstones deeper into her lush hair. The gemstones were set in four rows of twelve each, although the fifth and sixth rows were without gemstones, only empty recesses. Each gemstone was in the shape of a perfect g stone and polished to such a gloss that it reflected a mirror image of the two moons.
"Although belatedly, allow me to introduce myself." She raised her chin and looked down at him. She was at least six feet tall. "I am the Empress."
Wow, the Empress of the White Imperium. At first, Ken''s jaw dropped, but then his eyes narrowed. As a player, she could notify the admins and they''d log him out. Heck, she might even be an admin herself. But would she believe him? Would she believe that he couldn''t log out? If he was straight and determined, how could she not? She might even contact Chie for him or make a voice call.
Fat chance. What was he thinking? They''re the hackers behind the swatting. But the Empress did heal him. Who knows? Yuri could have been pretending to be the Empress''s minion. I never did actually see or hear the Empress when Yuri was supposedly talking to her. It could''ve all been an act. Damm that bitch Yuri. Why did she attack my family? If anyone''s hurt, I''m going to find Yuri and whoever else was involved, even the Empress, in the real world and make them pay.
He rubbed the stubble on his chin. Should he confront the Empress or let her make the first move? For one thing, he didn''t know anything about her, but she apparently knew a lot about him. To paraphrase Miyamoto Musashi, ''unless you know the character of others, you can''t know yourself.'' That is, how could he know how he should respond if he didn''t know what kind of person the Empress was. One thing he did know was that, whoever they were, they sure loved their role-play. Here we go again. He wasn''t sure about the exact protocol, but the most ingratiating position of a supplicant was most likely par for the course, considering that the Empress would deign to visit him and even heal him. Ken jumped out of bed on the other side and bowed down on his hands and knees. The flimsy floorboards creaked under his weight. "Forgive my impertinence, most exalted one! If I had known"
"Perfectly understandable, please rise."
After standing up, he asked, "To what do I owe the honor of your visit, I have so many questions."
"Indeed, all of your questions will be answered in due course, but we have only a limited time. First, the purpose of my visit."
A freezing wind blew in from the window. Her white kimono fluttered in the wind like a butterfly and chimes tinkled as ice crystals shook free from the kimono''s folds and danced across the floor.
"Allow me inform you about your quest."
He nodded.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
"I''ve spread false rumors that one of the shards of the Mirror of Truth is in the Greater Southern Archipelago. Now I shall bless you with the one true hint: the first shard is across the Great Abyss."
"What''s the Great Abyss?"
"Remember, this is a contest to the death."
"And what''s a shard?"
"The more contestants you kill, the higher your final ranking," the Empress said. The right sleeve of her kimono shimmered and for a moment he could see through it to the window behind her.
"What? Is this a battle royale?" he said.
"Finally, the most important rule of all: only one player can deliver all the shards."
"But the quest announcement said it was the usual shared party win."
"And if you win the quest, you''ll be able to log out," the Empress said. "But you have to complete it in twenty-four days."
What the hell? I''m not going on any quest when I can get her to help me right now!
"Ganbatte," the Empress said. Making a loop around the bed, she walked towards the window. The hem of her kimono swished across the floor, ripping deep cuts into the wood. Loud sawing noises echoed off the walls.
This isn''t working. "But wait, I have one question." He stretched his hand towards her. "Why can''t I log out?"
"You don''t know?" She whipped around in place to face him, her glowing figure spotlighted by moonbeams like a star celebrity. Her kimono from the waist down shimmered like poor television reception. "That''s why you only have twenty-four days. They must''ve given up on you. Did you know? When your loved ones don''t believe in you anymore, when they stop waiting for you, then the portal won''t open. And after twenty-four days, it closes permanently."
"What are you talking about? What I meant was: why can''t I log out in the first place?" He stood up and planted his hands on his hips. "And can''t you stop role-playing for just one minute?"
She laughed hard and her eyes crinkled up into stars. "Isn''t life one complex role-play? A splendid and unique mask for every occasion, like being able to switch to the next fancy ball with a snap of the fingers." She smiled and fiddled with a wire necklace cord around her neck.
I guess we''re back to the role play again. "Look, uh, you wanted Chie on the quest anyways. So if you could help me get back to the real world, then I''ll tell her, okay?"
The Empress creased her brow. "Chie... why would I..." Her face took on a faraway look, then she chuckled. "Oh, of course." She smiled at Ken. "But I don''t really need her anymore. And neither do you. She''s given up on you anyway. Hayden and Mas too. Why do you even need them? Remember, it''s a battle royale. You''d have to kill them, eventuallyor they''d kill you." First the Empress''s face flickered, then her entire kimono.
What''s happening? Is she disappearing? "Wait!" He grabbed her arm. It was still solid, but it was as cold as the snow outside of the cave. "You''ve got to help me!" He tried to grab her other arm but his hand slipped through.
"You dare touch me!" Twisting her arm out of his grip, she leaped backwards up onto the windowsill. In one smooth motion, she slid a kwaiken out of her sleeve pocket and unsheathed it. Its smooth blade glinted like ice in the moonlight.
"II''m sorry!" He clasped his hands in front of him and bowed. "Please, please, help me get out."
"It''s your own fault, you know? You wanted to get into the game so badly. And, well"she cackled"your wish is my command." She raised her forefinger up in the air in front of his face and looped it slowly around in a circle. His eyes followed her finger around and around.
His mind was turning to mush. What''s happening? He shook his head to clear it. "You''re a cracker, aren''t you, what do you want?" He clenched his jaw. "Money? But if you wanted money, why did you swat my family?"
After hearing himself say it again, tears started to well up in his eyes. He ground his teeth together. "If you hurt Hayden, I''ll hunt you down and bring you to justice!"
She laughed, her mouth wide open. "What do I care about one un-matured being out of hundreds of millions of them. There are so many here, you don''t even cherish them. Where I come from, we''re lucky to have even one in a millenium."
Crazy talk... Don''t let her derail you. Stay focused on the goal. Eyes on the prize. If it''s not money, then what''s their motivation? Revenge? It must be revenge. "I don''t know what I did to you, but tell me and I''ll make it up to you. Please get an admin."
"Jake''s an admin," she said.
"Jake Robertson, the CEO?"
She waved her hand in dismissal. "I see, you know him too. I apologize but even though I could easily call himI have his ear, you knowI choose not to accede to your request." Resheathing her kwaiken, she pointed a finger at him. "This is your punishment. Complete the quest."
I was really losing it there, grasping at straws, but now we''re getting somewhere. "So, what did I do? I mean, I''m sorry whatever it was and I''ll do whatever you want. Just call Jake Robertson."
"Didn''t you notice?" Balancing herself on the windowsill, she lifted both arms up from her sides. The wide sleeves of her kimono hung from her arms like snowy owl wings. She snapped them. A sharp crack resounded throughout the room and echoed back out into the freezing night air. A barrage of snow erupted from the sleeves and blasted him like a tsunami.
His feet lifted off of the floor and his body flew backwards through the air. Hitting the floor, he slid five feet and then his head slammed against the door. Shit! He got up on his elbows and licked his lips. Cold, freezing cold. Then, refreshing water. Mixed with iron. He smelled it too, the pungent iron aroma. He touched his lips with his fingers and they came away bloodied. He rubbed his hands all over his face and it stung like hundreds of razor blade nicks. Droplets of blood sprung out of micro-cuts all over the back of his hands and sleeves.
"Oh my God, why did you do that?" He sat up with his back against the door. A searing pain spread all over his skin like he''d been doused in a bucketful of hydrogen peroxide.
"See?" she said.
"See what?" This was the end. He''d lost. He couldn''t win her over. "That you''re a sadistic sonofabitch!" He shivered in pain.
The Empress got a faraway look. "How did it taste? Snowflake brushed with blood?" She tilted her head to the right and stared up at the cobwebs. "Don''t you find it strange?"
In a flash, she was right in front of him and lifted him up off of his feet like he weighed no more than a down pillow. She flung him against the door and then grasped his cheeks in her two hands. They were so cold they could''ve been made of dry ice. His cheeks were going numb. She was a full head taller than him. Her hair glistened with snowflakes and small icicles of frost. He stared up into her eyes like black pools of water. He was swimming in them. His feet were frozen to the floor and he couldn''t even think.
"I really like it here. At first, I didn''t, but then I realized how much better it was than my old world, even though it was the same. You''ll like it here just as much, in time." She leaned in close to his ear and whispered to him, "You see, your body is dead and now you''re like us."
A gust blew in from the window and her form shimmered. Then, her entire body disappeared leaving only a pale white face, obsidian eyes, and lush hair spiraling out like tentacles of dark energy. "... and in time, you could become exactly like uslesser daemons."
Her face and hair faded away like fog under a summer sun.
Chapter 6: Is the Turing Test Valid? (Part 3 of 5)
Ken slumped to the floor. His health bar was at about seventy-five percent. "Attributes," he said and winced.
Only eighty-nine strength? I''m a tank and the legendary Yamabushi Rock! Level one-hundred twenty! What the hell''s going on? "Basic stats."
General
Equipped
Name
Yamabushi Rock
Species
Human
Sex
Male
Class
Warrior
Level
0
EXP
0
? (Standards)
0
Universe
alpha-test-WI?
Level zero! That''s bullshit! They said players could start with their characters from the Three Kingdoms. How am I going to win the quest in twenty-four days. And the other players are going to carry over their high-level characters.
The blood in the hundreds of micro-lacerations had clotted and his perforated shirt was soaked red. He stood up. Although his skin stung all over, he didn''t feel horrible. No broken bones. No vomiting or numbness indicating poisoning. His eyes traveled back up to his attributes. You''ve got to be kidding? That was only a minor hit from the Empress. I''d hate to think what a full-on major attack would do. And what critical hit? Damn, this constant pain, sure is distracting. "Update sensorial max." Did he really believe for a moment it would work when logging out didn''t? Nothing happened. He tried a bunch of different commands and even reached behind his back to push the emergency cutoff switch, but nothing worked. He wasn''t surprised.
Twenty-four days would soon turn into twenty-three and a few little bee stings never hurt anyone. Along with the Empress, all of his hopes for a quick escape had now evaporated. There was no time to waste. He needed to start on the quest right away. Wait, shouldn''t he ask the NPC clerk at the front desk to send a message? I mean they wouldn''t have set it up so only admins could communicate outside the game, right? There must be some kind of emergency notification system. He must''ve been really out of it not to have asked her last night.
Loud running outside in the hallway. "Is this where it was coming from?" a woman said.
"Yes, Ma''am," another woman said.
He pulled himself up by the doorknob and took a step with his right leg. The wooden floorboard creaked. Then an excruciating pain shot through his kneecap and he collapsed onto the floor.
Banging on the door. "Are you okay in there?" the first woman said.
It was the NPC clerk.
The doorknob rattled.
"Hand me the master key," the NPC clerk said on the other side of the door.If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
The doorknob turned and the door swung open.
The clerk and another woman in a dull gold kimono, a tiny ruby set in between her eyebrows, and a white bandana covering her hair rushed in.
The clerk dropped down on both knees next to Ken. "Let me see," she said, lifting his hands off of his knee. The blood-soaked pantleg was ripped in several places.
The clerk held his leg up. "Qian, grab him under the arms," the clerk said to the other woman. "The bed."
Qian stumbled on one of the gouges in the floor.
As the clerk ripped the tear in his pantleg above his knee wider, he sucked in air through gritted teeth.
While the clerk examined Ken''s kneecap, Qian slipped her long fingers underneath his wrist and, with her thumb on top, squeezed. With eyes narrowed in concentration, she watched Ken''s face.
Ken was about to ask her whether she was applying acupressure when she let go and turned her back to him.
She surveyed the room. "It''s a mess, I can''t clean it up all by myself." After kicking at one of the gouges with the toe of her boot, she crossed her arms and harrumphed. "And look at these floorboards, they''re all torn up. Sebastian is going to have to fix them before I do anything in here." She glanced back at Ken over her shoulder. "Looks like a brawl happened in here and that''s against the house rules."
"Stop your yapping and get the first aid kit," the clerk said and shooed Qian out.
Qian rushed out.
"My goodness, what in the Empress''s true name happened to you?" the clerk said, standing up. "The kneecap''s fractured in multiple places and you''re cut up all over. And look at your shirt."
"It''s a skin condition," Ken said. "And I fell down." He didn''t need to get into any more trouble, no matter how small.
She squinted at him.
He smiled and shrugged his shoulders. The clerk had helped him to his room last night. He''d forgotten her name and tried to pull up her NPC character sheet but nothing displayed. "Thanks, Mrs..."
"Harriet." She pulled a long hairpin out of her bun at the back of her head and then reinserted it.
Qian walked into the room and set a basin of steaming hot water on the table. After sliding clothes off of her shoulder and flipping them onto the back of the chair, she slipped a bag off of her other shoulder and handed it to Harriet.
Harriet pulled a towel out of the bag, poured a clear liquid on it from a flask, dipped the towel in the hot water and wiped his knee.
"Shit!" Ken said. It stung like hell. Must be an antiseptic.
"What''s this?" Harriet held up a small metal canister.
"An instant healing balm." Qian frowned.
"It''s not part of the first aid kit."
"So what, just use it on him." Qian walked over to the window, wiped the steam from one of the panes with the wide sleeve of her kimono, and looked out, her back to Ken and Harriet.
Harriet spread glob of the balm over his kneecap.
His health bar instantly jumped up to ninety percent.
"Oh my God, stop wasting it." Qian snatched the canister from Harriet''s hand.
"My word," Harriet said but didn''t argue back.
"Like this." Qian scooped a smidgen of balm with two fingers. "Close your eyes," she said to Ken.
After closing them, he felt her fingers spreading and rubbing the balm all over his face. She pushed his head around like it was a soccer ball. "Can''t you keep your head still?" She grabbed the back of his head with her other hand to steady him.
It was soothing.
"Ma''am, you do it now."
He opened his eyes.
Qian grasped the bottom of his t-shirt and pulled it up over his head and then she shucked his pants and underwear off.
After Harriet finished rubbing balm all over his body, his health bar had topped off at one-hundred percent.
"Thank you so much," Ken, still naked, said clasped his hands together in front of him and bowed to them on his hands and knees on the bed. "I really owe you two."
"Think nothing of it," Harriet said.
"If there''s nothing more, Ma''am, I''ll be going. My shift''s over," Qian said and turned to go without waiting for an answer.
"Of course," Harriet said to Qian''s back.
Qian opened the door and, without turning, said, "Don''t forget the clothes on the chair. There''re always unclaimed clothes in the laundry room, so I grabbed a few. Besides, if I were you, I wouldn''t be caught dead in a dungeon quest in your old ones. They''re so last year''s style." She slammed the door behind her.
His mouth agape, Ken stared at the back of the door, pockmarked by the Empress''s Blizzard Shuriken. Was dungeon quest a gaming term?
Harriet laughed. "Don''t pay her any mind, she''s a really caring person, and my hardest worker."
The emergency notification system. He opened and shut his mouth several times like a fish. "Uh, I hate to ask you for another favor after all you''ve already done for me, but could you send a message to my wife?"
"Sure, the messenger comes every afternoon."
"No, I meant a message out of the game."
"Out of the game?" She scratched her head.
"Yeah, you know, through a chat or an email. Can you contact the admins?"
"Admins?" She tilted her head and closed one eye.
"Administrators, leaders."
"I''m sorry, but I have no idea what you''re talking about. You were exhausted when you stumbled in last night, near death, I should say. I should''ve called the doctor, but after we got you up to bed and got some hot soup into you, you slept like a baby." She gathered up the first aid kit into her bag. "I''m going to ask Margie to get the doctor right now."
Ken laughed. "No need. I was just joking. Ha ha, see I''m fine." He jumped off the bed and spun around on his formerly injured leg. "I''m going to get a little fresh air."
She harrumphed. "Okay, I hope you know you won''t last out there very long in your birthday suit." She pointed to the clean clothes on the chair.
"Yes, Ma''am." He saluted.
"You''re still not fully recovered, so don''t wander off anywhere, stay on the porch, okay? I''m going to come out and check on you in a half an hour." She started to the door.
Out of the corner of his eye, Ken saw the canister of balm lying on the bed. "Harriet, you left the balm." He picked it up and handed it to her.
She held her hand up. "Why don''t you keep it and return it to Qian? She went to her kendo practice. She always does after her shift. But she''ll be back this evening. She lives right at the end of this floor, room two-eleven." She winked and left.
Chapter 6: Is the Turing Test Valid? (Part 4 of 5)
Ken put on the clean clothes, hefted on his thick trench coat, and stuffed the balm into one of the coat''s many inner pockets. Hanging his head, he shuffled like a zombie down the stairs and through the lobby to the front door. Well, that was a dead end. Even though the local inn always doubled as the post office of a safe zone, it had turned out exactly as the rules had said: in order to maintain full immersion, NPC scripts don''t respond to gaming terms. His eyes followed the squiggle of the grain of one of the wooden planks. It stopped at the edge of the wooden plank and his eyes switched to the next squiggle. That''s what he''d been doing. Following one possible path to a solution after another and each squiggle was one such path. One squiggle was the logs. The admins would check the logs and find an anomaly, Kenji Shibuyamaa player who''d been logged in for more than twenty-four hours straight. But how long would that take? An algorithm might periodically check. Still, he couldn''t stand around twiddling his thumbs and leave it up to algorithmic fate. He had to be proactive.
What if they did find him? They''d simply log the anomaly out. Because, by definition, an anomaly wasn''t supposed to happen. Or they might think he was a virus or a Trojan horse or any of the multitude of various malware, only one subset of the multitude of anomalies. They would kill his process and he would be deleted from memory. Where would he go? Back to his body, of course. But what if his body was dead, exactly as the Empress had said. Then where would he go? The anomalous virus shuddered.
He pushed the door open and stepped out onto the stone porch. The clouds glowed from the bright disks in the sky. Twelve of them in all. He could look direclty at them without being blinded. They weren''t suns but moons. He paced back and forth. Patches of ominous grey clouds passed overhead and darkened the porch.
That left only one squiggle, only one chance of getting out of this prison and back to his family: the quest, which meant he had to cross the Great Abyss. Whatever that was. He knew it wasn''t going to be easy. He had to increase his attributes and skills as fast as possible and he had to do it in a hell of a lot fewer days than twenty-three. One thing for sure, he didn''t have time for grinding. Neither did he have time for the random dungeon crawl. He had to be on the quest and accept every challenge, whether it was a newbie pick lock or a level one hundred dungeon boss. Needless to say, he wouldn''t be leveling up appropriately. Even with unique legendary item dropsif they even had themhe''d never get his level up fast enough to use them. He needed to find other higher level players or even NPCs. In other words, he had to form an adventurer party. And if he found other players, then they could get a message to Chie. But this quest is a battle royale and what if the other players didn''t want to form a party. Instead, they might player kill
He was knocked off his feet.
Dazed, he rose up on all fours.
Hands grabbed his shoulders and hauled him back up. It was Rob, the blacksmith apprentice NPC who had brought him to this inn. Ken had been so deep in thought, he''d crossed right in front of Rob who was on his way to work at the blacksmith shop. Ken hadn''t thought of it, but every player needed weapons and who else other than the local blacksmith would be ideal for telling him about other players.
Together they sauntered down the cobblestone street to the blacksmith shop.
Ken tried to pull up Rob''s stats, but as expected nothing came up. "At the blacksmith," Ken said, "I bet you get a lot of adventurers, don''t you?"
"Oh, if you mean traders or mercenaries or treasure hunters." Rob''s breath fogged up. "Yep, all the time. Why?
"Do you know about a quest for the shards?"
"Of course." Rob shrugged his shoulders. "Everyone knows about the Empress''s quest."
"So, what are the shards?"
Rob stopped and squinted at Ken. "You don''t know what the shards of the Mirror of Truth are?"
Ken shook his head.
"How could you not know?" Rob crossed his arms.
"I''m not from around here."
"Don''t play me for a fool," Rob said and turned on his heel. "Everyone knows."
Ken ran after Rob. "Wait! II''ve got amnesia. I must''ve hit my head or something up in the mountains. I don''t even remember where I''m from."
Rob walked faster.
Ken walked faster too. What''s going on? Even though NPC guides like Rob were restricted in their responses, they were still supposed to help you. The game was so life-like, he''d forgotten Rob was an NPC. He needed to get back on the NPC''s script. "You know, I''m going to need some weapons."
Rob slowed. "Oh, we have a complete armory. Do you want to drop by and take a look?"
"Absolutely," Ken said. "Say, have you had any the adventurers come by who were going on the Empress''s quest? Do you know how I could contact them?"
"No," Rob said.
Ken''s head drooped.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
"You know that''s a legendary quest," Rob said and looked Ken up and down. "You''re not at that level yet."
"I know, but I have to. The Empress told me"
Rob glared at him. "You liar!"
"No, really, this morning, she"
"Everyone knows she''s been exiled in her own citadel for centuries."
Ken frowned, put his hands on his hips, and stared into Rob''s eyes. "I saw her with my own two eyes. She appeared in my room and then disappeared."
"Are you mad?" Rob said and turned up his collar. The wind had picked up.
Ken bowed his head and raked his hands through his hair. Snow blew in his face.
Rob rubbed his chin. "The Empress hasn''t visited anyone since at least 10,586 when the Blizzard Berserker King devastated her last stronghold on this side of the Great Abyss." Then, Rob smiled at Ken. "But if you''re telling the truth, it could''ve been teleportation."
Ken sighed, smiled back, and pulled the hood out of the pocket on the inside of the trench coat''s collar. Since this line of conversation seemed to be part of Rob''s script, Ken asked Rob about something that had been bugging him ever since he''d met the Empress. "What will the Mirror of Truth do once it''s reconstructed?"
"It can tell you if others are lying or"Rob smirked"if you''re lying to yourself."
The snow was starting to come down heavy and Rob pulled his hood over his head. "Let''s hurry."
Ken mentally hit himself on the head. It wasn''t the blacksmith, but the inn that was always the center of the comings and goings of adventurers. He told Rob he''d come to over later and waved goodbye. He couldn''t buy anything anyways. He didn''t have any money. He didn''t even know how he''d managed to pay for his room. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his trench coat and trudged back to the inn. Deep in thought, he wandered through the winding streets. He walked through a crowded open air market.
He bumped into someone.
"Hey, buddy, watch where you''re going," a grizzled man said.
"Sorry," Ken said. "Do you know about the Empress?"
The man walked on.
Ken bumped into a woman carrying a bag of green leafy vegetables. It looked like nappa cabbage. "Pardon me, but do you know..."
Not even glancing at him, she walked away.
Townspeople, your typical low-level NPCs who''re just around to add to the atmosphere. He walked past the last stall in the marketplace.
Teleportation? How much mana would he need for a magic spell like that. Just in the off chance, he said, "help mana."
Information displayed.
Mana: Magic supply
Oh, c''mon, that''s it? "Help." Nothing. "Help mana." The same message displayed. Lame UI. If the item of interest doesn''t exist, then nothing is returned, not even a ''topic does not exist'' message. Looks like these are the minor nuances Yuri had mentioned.
"Help mana spells."
Mana Spells:
Summoning
Shapeshifting
Possession
Spell creation
Item creation
Nothing like teleportation. "Help teleportation." Nothing.
He rounded the corner of the block. The inn was two more doors down on the left.
What was that other term for it? He snapped his fingers inside of the warm pocket. Projection... "Help Astral Projection."
Astral Projection
Description: Projects an astral body to the astral plane, which allows it to travel almost instantaneously an unlimited distance to any location.
Type: Chi
Cost: 10/min
Level: 100
Limitations: Original body is unconscious and cannot respond even if attacked.
Chi is extremely powerful! What else can it do? "Help chi spells." Nothing displayed. "Help chi skills?"
Chi skills:
Description: Spiritual ability and supply.
Flight
Astral projection
Long-distance running
Speed enchancement
Predicting combat actions
Stealth
Armor enhancement
Critical hit enhancement
Telekinesis
Telepathy
Healing (including medications)
Poison and disease resistance (including medications)
Magic and mana were separate attributes, but Chi was a single attribute. Could Chi as a supply go up indefinitely like mana? Chi was focused on enhancing existing attributes and skills, not on creating new things like magic. If he could get astral projection, then he could collect the shards the fastest. It was a crazy thought, but what if he could use astral projection to project himself outside of the game? Dammit, it was a level one hundred skill.
He shoved the door open, stomped the slush off of his boots, and strode up to the front desk.
"My word, I was worried. I went out to look for you." Harriet smiled at him.
"Sorry, I ran into someone." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Uh, this is kind of embarrassing, but how did I pay for my room?"
"You don''t remember?"
He shook his head.
"You were so bone-tired and cold and didn''t have any money, so I told you you could work it off."
"I see, how much is it per night?"
"Forty-eight standards, including room and board."
"I could start working now, but before that I have a question."
She nodded.
"Do you know anyone who''s going across the Great Abyss?"
"What? Why in the true name of the Empress would you want to do that?" Harriet said. "You look honest and healthy and to be frank I was hoping you''d stay on. Our inn needs an extra hand in the kitchen. Enough for room and board and then a little extra to save up to start a family."
"Thanks, but I''ve already got a family and I need to get back to them. That''s why I need to find"
"You know, people have been leaving our small village for the big port city Shimonoseki. I''m on a committee in the chamber of commerce and we recently started a program encouraging people to make our village their home. I know a nice girl, Betsy. She arrived here ten days ago and she''s already landed a job as a maid in the Johnson household. They''re merchants."
His eyes lit up. "Does Mr. Johnson do much traveling?"
"Not these days, but... Betsy, she usually comes in around in the morning to pick up something from our bakery for the Johnsons..." She smiled and winked at Ken.
Ken only smiled back.
"People these days have such outlandish dreams." She sighed. "Speaking of the Johnsons, he does entertain traders fairly often. He might know of someone you could sign on with."
The front door flew open and a person in a blue trench coat, the front emblazoned with a fiery golden Phoenix, stepped through. Snow blew in and the person slammed the door shut. A hood and a balaclava hid the head and face, a wide rough belt cinched around the waist, hands snug inside matching gloves. In regimented and well-practiced movements, the person stomped the snow off of their boots and slapped the freshly fallen snow off of their shoulders. After slipping off their gloves and sliding them into the trench coat pockets, the person flipped back the hood and slipped off the balaclava. Straight jet black hair jagged cut to right above the shoulders. A tiny ruby no larger than a pinky fingernail glinted in the center of the forehead. Hard brown eyes set in a triangular face stared at him.
"Well, look what the blizzard blew in," Harriet said as she waved the woman over. "Betsy, come in, come in."
Chapter 6: Is the Turing Test Valid? (Part 5 of 5)
"It''s only a snow flurry," Betsy said and marched into the waiting area. As she passed Ken, she glanced sidewise at him. She stuck her calloused hands out around the potbelly stove and rubbed them together.
Harriet waddled around the front desk, grabbed Ken''s arm and guided him into the waiting area. "This is Ken."
Betsy turned around and bowed slightly to Ken, who bowed back.
"Would you take him back with you to the Johnson''s?" Harriet said.
"Yes, Mrs. Lawrence," Betsy said.
"But what about the work?" Ken said.
Harriet waved her hand. "Don''t bother with it until after you get back," Harriet said and then leaned in close to his ear. "I won''t come looking for you if you get lost." She winked at him.
Ken followed Betsy into the kitchen where she filled two boxes with manju sweets, a dozen each, and tied them up with a blue furoshiki cloth. By the time they were ready to leave the inn, the snow flurry had stopped. They didn''t need their hoods. With only an occasional word of direction, Betsy led them on a winding path through the piles of snow and patches of black ice on the streets. They passed by a two-storied stone building with a huge metal sign above its double-door entrance identifying it as the city hall. The NPC townspeople had faded away like water seeping through the crevices of the stone buildings. Their boots slapping the puddles and smooth cobblestones echoed off the stone buildings and punctuated the silence.
Ken slipped on a pane of black ice. In a flash, Betsy stepped up beside him and, wrapping one arm around his waist, steadied him, her legs wide like a warrior''s defensive stance.
"Thanks," he said, staring at her. The top of her head barely reached his shoulders, but underneath that trench coat was muscle sinew knitted together as tight as a bamboo forest.
"No problem," she said.
They resumed their short journey. After less than a mile out, they passed the last house. Then, the street rose and crested a hillock. He looked back out over the city. It was a mere village straddling the intersection of two major highways. They were heading northeast along the same road he''d come into town on. After Ken had looked at his own character sheet and said he was from Sakhalin Island, the messenger had fled like he''d seen a nightmare. To the north, a range of hills and thick woodlands paralleled the road. It could be an effective hiding spot for his future party.
The road was elevated and well-drained, its stones regular in size and laid down in a tight professional pattern. It was built to convey heavy loads as well as frequent traffic, but most important of all, it was built to last. Now that they were on the open road, Betsy sped up to a fast clip as though she was on a forced march, but she wasn''t even breaking a sweat. On the other hand, Ken was breathing hard and falling behind. He brought up his attributes and saw his stamina had dropped by twenty-five percent.
She wasn''t very talkative, but she was only an NPC servant after all. Nevertheless, what he needed was basic information and who better to ask than a lowly servant as long as it as part of her script. He sped up and caught up with her, pacing her on her right. "You know, I hope you don''t think I''m trying to mock you or anything, but I had an accident in the mountains and I kind of lost some of my memories and I have a few questions about The White Imperium."
"Oh really?" Her eyes narrowed and she widened the distance between them, but maintained the same pace. "Where in the mountains?"
"I don''t recall exactly, but three miles ahead I met a messenger on horseback."
"I see." Her body tensed. "Why do you want to meet Mr. Johnson? Are you looking for employment? Do you have any special skills in trading?" she said. She handed off the furoshiki to her left hand and her right hand disappeared into her trench coat pocket.
"There''s a trading skill? What''s its key attribute? REP?"
She narrowed her eyes and started to say something, but closed it again without saying a word.
That was dumb. Why did he keep making the same mistake? They''re not players. "Uh, I need to find a trader that will take me over the Great Abyss and I heard Mr. Johnson entertains traders."
"The Great Abyss? But why?" She came to a complete stop. Her jaw dropped but then she quickly looked away.
"I have to start on the Empress''s quest." He raised his fist in the air and forced his face into a show of stoicism.
Her eyes opened wide in surprise. "But why over there? I mean the shards aren''tI mean, it sounds terribly dangerous."
"The shards aren''t what? Over there? Do you know anything about them?" He clasped his hands together. "Please tell me."
"What? A poor servant girl like me?" She pulled her hand holding a folded-up fan out of the coat pocket and covered her heart with them. "Good heavens, no. But everyone knows they''re either in the Northern Wastes or in the Greater Southern Archipelago."
What''s with the flirting? First, she''s a docile NPC servant, then a helper NPC like Rob, and now a coquette. What was with that warrior stance too? Could she be one of those AI NPCs? Hey, I bet she could become a loyal sidekick. It happened to me once in the Three Kingdoms. Or she could be an NPC heroine in disguise, maybe even a legendary warrior. She could really save me.
She''s heard one of the rumors the Empress spread, but the Northern Wastes... is that another rumor? "The shards, do you know"
"Won''t you tell me where you''re from, I mean, really from?" She cocked her head and smiled, her eyes glistening.
"Yeah..." The last time, he''d said he was from Sakhalin, it had gone over like a lead balloon.
"Still can''t remember? Well, wherever you''re from, are they all strong like you?" She flipped the fan open and covered the bottom half of her face, her brown eyes shining over the fan''s landscape of islands and purple clouds. Sharp tips at the ends of the fan''s metal tines sparkled in the dim light. "You could easily protect a weak young thing like me."Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.
He laughed. NPCs can hit on you now?
"Do you remember what kind of trade you were in?" Betsy said. "A tank, perhaps?"
"You know about tanks?" His heart jumped but he tried to remain calm. She could send a message! "You''re not an adventurer, are you?"
"Me?" She tittered. "I''m just a lowly servant."
"Then how do you know?"
"Mr. Johnson has entertained many odd travelers seeking fame and fortune."
Disappointed but with his mood buoyed nonetheless, he smiled. Mr. Johnson could be his ticket across the Great Abyss.
"Unfortunately, not one has returned." She cast her gaze downwards at the muddy ground and sighed. Then she turned away and started walking again but not at her forced-march pace.
He wanted to ask her about the other players who had been to visit Mr. Johnson, but her mood had turned somber and he didn''t want to intrude. He laughed at himself. What was he thinking? She was only an NPC.
After walking to the top of a gentle slope, Ken spied a large manor to the south at the end of a private road that branched off of the main one. They arrived at the backdoor of the manor and she rapped its thick wood. She turned her head around. "You know, Ken, sometimes, things aren''t as they seemeven the Empress''s quest."
Ken''s eyes brightened at the mention of the quest. "About those travelers, when did the most recent one visit?"
"A week ago, but they... disappeared." She clasped her hands together in front of her.
"How do you know?" he said.
She bowed her head. "They were friends."
She''s definitely an NPC sidekick! She''s going to give me a quest now, a quest to find them. But I can''t let myself get distracted from the Empress''s quest.
"Did they go over the Great Abyss?"
She nodded.
Hold on, if I could find them, they could get me out. His heartbeat sped up. "Were they supposed to contact you?"
She looked down at her hands and twiddled her thumbs. "Yes, through our bindi." She pointed at the tiny ruby embedded between her eyebrows.
"Is that a magical item?" His mouth opened wide. "Oh, Qian had one. Do"
The hinges squeaked as the door lurched open. A middle-aged woman filled the doorway with her massive build. "Hey there, Betsy, took you a right long while."
"Sorry, Mrs. Suzuki, I brought someone to see Mr. Johnson."
Mrs. Suzuki eyed Ken up and down. "Shorter than the last one, methinks, but it ain''t none of my business."
Then, her arms akimbo, she turned to Betsy and scowled at her. "You should''ve properly taken him up through the front door. This here''s the service entrance, if you''ve forgotten, girl."
"Sorry, Ma''am, yes, Ma''am," Betsy said and bowed. Her jaw was tight and her eyes shot daggers at Mrs. Suzuki.
"Don''t just stand there like a stump, take him up, now."
Betsy grabbed Ken''s wrist, raced past Mrs. Suzuki, and up the stairs.
"Phew! What a battleaxe," Ken said when they reached the top and began walking down the carpeted hallway.
"Ha, that bitch, I could fell her with one leg sweep," Betsy said. "And then I''d pound her with my bare" She stopped and then looked sideways at him.
e
His lower jaw dropped.
She rushed ahead of him and stopped at a door about halfway down the hall. "You can wait here in the study." She opened it. I''ll tell Mr. Johnson, you''re here."
He could use her bindi to talk to other players. "But wait, aren''t you going to offer me a quest to find your friends? And your bindi"
She held a finger up to her lips and shushed him. "The walls have ears." Then she ran off back down the stairwell. He went in and sank down in a plush pastel purple sofa chair.
What a personality switch! I can''t believe AI NPCs could be this complex and their facial reactions are so life-like. I mean, it''s almost like I''m talking to a real warrior class player. I wonder how much cloud processing power they''re leasing? But not every NPC is an AI NPC. Harriet and the messenger on horseback were both simpleespecially the NPC townspeople. That''s how they manage their cloud resources.
His throat was parched. He picked up a pitcher from the coffee table in front of him, poured water into a glass, and guzzled it down all at once. The floorboards creaked behind him. He turned around but no one was there. Ten feet of empty space separated him from the wall made of wood paneling with intricate paintings of heavenly deities riding kubi-kire-uma up into the swirling clouds of the deva heavens while in the narakas below them cackling demons tossed anchor-sized fishhooks into a stench-filled bitter river to catch the naked sinners bobbing up and down.
Soon enough, a man built like a sumo wrestler lumbered in.
They bowed to each other. Then the man reached out with a large hand.
"I''m Mr. Johnson, Calvin Johnson. Just call me, Calvin." Ken''s hand disappeared in Calvin''s gorilla grip. Short white hair stuck out of the cuffs of his long sleeve shirt and matted the back of his hands like carpets.
"Kenji Shibuyama. I go by Ken." He didn''t know why he''d used his real name with Harriet, but it seemed like a solid idea because his name would show up in the logs. Then, he shuddered.
Calvin squeezed himself into a matching sofa chair opposite Ken. "I heard you''re on the Quest for the Shards?" Calvin said in his deep bass voice.
"How in the world did you know?
"It''s my job to know what goes on in this village."
"Then you''ll also know I need to cross the Great Abyss. Do you know any merchants who are crossing it?" Ken said.
Calvin leaned forward, his hands on his knees. "Are you sure you want to do that? Cross the Great Abyss?"
Behind the intricate paintings of the deva heavens and narakas, the floorboards creaked.
Behind Calvin, from the crack in the door, sunlight glinted off of a shiny red object.
"Absolutely!" Ken pressed his lips together in a firm line and pumped his fist.
Calvin furrowed his brow and his crow''s feet crinkled. The wrinkles in his leather-worn face sunk even deeper into his face. He took a deep breath in and then let it out. "There aren''t many who''re foolhardy enough to make that journey." His jowls sporting a full white beard bounced like a dog''s. "The initial insertion into the current is treacherous."
"But you have to know someone." Ken grasped the arms of the chair and lifted himself partway out of the chair.
"You don''t even know what an abyss is, do you?" Calvin''s eyes bore into Ken''s. "If you did, you wouldn''t be so eager."
Ken''s fingers dug into the plush arms. "Well, it''s a deep... ocean? Like the Mariana Trench? I don''t know, but it doesn''t matter, I have to get across."
Calvin ran his stubby fingers through a mass of bright white hair and stood up. "You look like a right nice fellow, why don''t you settle down here like I did. Lots of nice girls around."
"I''ve only got twenty-four days to complete the quest."
"I used to think the same things in my youth. I only have so much time, always in a rush. But as you establish yourself, things aren''t so rushed and there''s satisfaction in that. Now I have all these responsibilities, to my family, to my employees, to my city, I can''t really give in to my spur of the moment desires and I think that''s good. It gives one''s life stability and meaning."
"I really appreciate all your sage advice, but, Sir"
"Calvin, please call me Calvin."
"Right"Ken gritted his teeth"Calvin. I already do have a family and I''m going to do whatever it takes to win this quest and get back to them. So, I''ll have to take my chances. When''s the next trip?"
Calvin''s face drooped and his shoulders hunched forward. "I understand, but it also makes me terribly, terribly sad." He rose up out of his chair like a great bear and stood straight. "The next trip is"he raised his hand up in the air and let it fall like a flagman at a car race"right now!"
Men in black, their faces hidden under balaclava, flooded out of secret panels in the walls behind Ken.
Shit! Ken leaped up and ran for the door. He twisted the doorknob this way and that, but it was locked. One of the men tackled him from behind. They rolled on the ground. Getting on top, Ken pummeled the man. Two others twisted Ken''s arms behind him and dragged him off. Ken''s shoulder joints cracked and he grimaced. Two more held onto his legs.
They tied him up.
He lay face down on the floor, his hands and ankles tied together behind his back.
"Please believe me when I say I wish I didn''t have to do this," Calvin said.
Ken twisted his head to look up over his shoulder.
Calvin towered over Ken. "But the Blizzard Berserker King rules this territory with an iron fist and I have my own merchant business and employees to take care of."
"What the hell are you going to do with me?" Ken said.
"Orders are that any adventurers on the Empress''s quest are to be executed."
Chapter 7: Singularity? (Part 1 of 3)
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The Arousing (Shock, Thunder)
As the men carried Ken in a suffocating canvas bag, he twisted this way and that. But it was no use; the men held him fast. The gag muffled his screams for help.
Before being taken into the hidden passageways of the mansion, he''d counted seven of them. Four of them we''re carrying him, two of them single file in front and one as rearguard, probably. He hadn''t actually seen them, but that made the most sense.
After about thirteen minutes of walking, he was thrown onto some wooden slats. He rocked a little. A cart. Some light filtered through the fabric of the bag. Oh good, we''re going somewhere else. At least they haven''t killed me here and now. I have a chance at escaping. Didn''t want to dirty up their floors and leave any evidence. I guess Mr. Johnsonoh excuse me, Calvinis quite the fastidious one. I''ll remember that when I make it back and kill you, you bastard. You no good lackey! "I''m not going to die, do you hear me! I''m never going to die!" He kicked and pummeled the canvas bag. If my body is, in fact, already dead, then I''ve only got this one life in the simulacrumoh God, it must be the lack of oxygen, but my head''s about to explodethus, this simulacrum isn''t merely any simulacrum but the absolute and singular true simulacrumthe Singularity. And I''m part of it, I''m a component in the Singularity. I''ve got to deliver this epiphany to the outside world.
"Stand down!" a female voice yelled. It sounded familiar.
The clashing of swords and the screams and yelling of men and women lasted barely a minute.
The top of the bag opened, light streamed in through the opening, and he blinked. Two brown eyes peered in. A ruby bindi. "Betsy?" he mumbled through the gag.
Betsy and another person pulled Ken out of the bag, untied him, and removed his gag.
"Betsy, thanks for saving me!" Ken coughed and gasped for air.
"Hey, that''s Slicer Sarge, to you, noob," a young man with a loose ponytail and an impish grin said.
"Thanks, Slicer Sarge," Ken said. He started coughing again and then sat up on the edge of a wagon bed. They were in a stable. An animal shuffled about in an adjacent room.
Betsy wore beige hakama and a loose long-sleeve t-shirt instead of a blouse with lace and a long skirt. She still wore the same knee-high boots. Her hair was tied up in a tight bun instead of a pony tail.
Without responding or even a nod of her head, Betsy stretched out her hand to the young man. "Water."
He unlooped a flask from his shoulder and handed it to her and then she handed it to Ken. He gulped down the cold water.
"Let''s move," Betsy said, tossed a grey cloak over her shoulders.
The young man did the same and then tossed a matching cloak over to Ken.
Both of them about-faced and started walking out of the barn.
Ken stepped over a body. Its hand was stuck to its neck in what had been a vain effort to staunch the bleeding. Critical hit. Ken walked past the six others gagged and tied up against the walls of the barn. To think that minutes before, they had been leading him to his execution.
The young man turned his head around to look back at Ken. "You heard the Sarge, c''mon, get a move on."
Right outside the barn doors, were eight others, who joined up with the three of them as they charged across the meadow towards the edge of the woods. Three others were waiting for them with mounts. They weren''t horses. "Hey, noob, you can ride with me." the young man said as he jumped up on one of them.
Ken clambered up the side. He slipped and slid on its slick scales.
The young man grabbed his arm and pulled him up. "Get your foot into that." He pointed.
Ken stuck his foot into a stirrup and hoisted the other side of his body up and over the back of the beast. He settled into the saddle and held onto the pommel with both hands. He stared back at the dark mansion, its windows, empty eye sockets. They all bundled up in trenchcoats and started off. To where, he didn''t care. They traveled at an easy gait in single file along a narrow trail. The rhythm of the ride and the shady cover of the canopy of the deciduous trees calmed him. The thick feet of the animals kicked up dust and decomposing leaves and he inhaled their aroma. The animals smelled like wet leather.
It had been a long time since he''d taken the family camping. He wiped the tears from his eyes.
No one talked.
"Hey, my name''s Ken. What''s yours?" Ken whispered.
"Ray," he said. "Now no talking until we get to the camp." He pulled the trenchcoat''s hood over his twitching triangular ears.
Ken settled into his saddle. They were some kind of an NPC band and Betsy was their leader. That''s right, their in-game function was to rescue adventurers like himself and Betsy must be an AI NPC, a legendary warrior, exactly as he''d suspected. He watched Ray''s back sway back and forth. Ray too. He must be an AI NPC. After about an hour, they crested a low ridge and descended into a narrow valley near a stream. Fifteen tents were arrayed in two neat rows up slope from the shallow stream. They passed a couple of sentries, one had a hairy faceit was so dense it was almost fur-likeand a slight snout like Calvin. Then they dismounted in front of the tents within a clearing.
He walked up to Betsy. "Excuse me, but do you think we could talk about the quest?"
She raised her eyebrows. "Now? I don''t know about you, but after that workout, I''m starving."
"I''m not" His stomach growled.
She walked to the front of the line and he got in behind her. In spite of his stomach growling, he still didn''t feel hungry. It was because the websuit didn''t extend to the nerves in his stomach.
"Hey, buddy, don''t say ''I''m with her'' ''cuz that don''t cut it ''round here," a guy with a beard and only one ear said and he stuck his thumb out, pointing to the back of the line.
Ken walked to the back of the already long line. The guy in front of him was in the group that had saved him.
Ken tapped him on the shoulder. "Hey, I don''t know how to express my gratitude, but"
"Don''t mention it," the guy said and he turned back to face the front of the line.
Why doesn''t anyone want to talk to me? NPCs are supposed to be helpful. I''ll have to do my own research. The cook was the same race as the sentry. "Help race," he whispered. Nothing. "Help species." Four species came up: Kitsune, Tanuki, Human, Tengu. Right, they''re tanuki, dog raccoon people. "Help tanuki."
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Tanuki-ningen
Alignment: Unaligned
Traders. No large empire because it was destroyed by an alliance between the Kitsune and Tengu.
Class Effects
Mage+
Shapeshifting+
Warrior-
Ninja-
No wonder Calvin was a merchant.
On his way over to talk to Betsy, Ken wondered if the Analyze command still worked. "Analyze dish," he said.
Sergeant Parikh''s table was already full. He looked around for Ray, but didn''t see him. The cook and some others were laughing it up, so he jaunted over to them and gave them his biggest smile.
The cook flourished his yakitori stick in the air and then stabbed it straight at Ken''s grinning mouth. "And then Sarge says, ''Fleecing the common folk? Now that''s not honoring The Empress!'', and lickety split she trussed up that sorry-ass excuse of an MP upside down like a wild turkey plucked clean."
"That''ll teach ''em!"
"Ha! Shoulda heard him cuss up a storm. His face was beet red from all of the blood rushing down to it."
"Hope his balls froze off!" said one.
Everyone guffawed.
"Hi!" Ken said.
The laughing stopped. Unsmiling, they all turned to stare at him.
"Mind if I join you?"
Then, as though synchronized, they turned their eyes away from him.
"Well, did they?" the woman next to the cook said and elbowed him.
The cook scrunched up his face at her.
"His balls." She reached down and grabbed her crotch. "Did they freeze?"
"Before or after," the cook said, "his teeny weenie fell off?"
Everyone roared.
Ken sat his bum down at an empty table.
"What''s up?" Ray said as he slid onto the bench on the other side of the table.
"Hey, Ray!" Ken''s face lit up. "So..." Ken was nervous because Ray might give him the silent treatment too. "Why doesn''t anyone want to talk to me?"
Ray stuck a spoonful of curry into his mouth and chewed. "You''re a noob."
"But NPCs like you are supposed to help noobs."
"I shouldn''t be telling you this," Ray mumbled as he shoved another spoonful of curry into his mouth that never stopped chewing. "But I''m one of the few NPCs here."
Ken''s metal fork clattered onto the table. "But aren''t you all in an NPC party that''s supposed to rescue adventurers?"
"Geez, didn''t you hear what I said." Ray rolled his eyes. "This is an adventurers party, you know the kind that go on quests? They don''t make it a habit of picking up every little stray."
Any one of them could be a PKer. "Oh shit, everyone knows I''m a noob, a player. How many are there? Who''s a player?"
"I can''t reveal that. You need to wait until they reveal themselves."
Worse yet, they might believe he''s a PKer. He had to clear this misunderstanding up before it was too late. Ken shoveled the rest of the curry and gruel into his mouth, swallowed pieces of yakitori whole, and quaffed down his cup of water in one swig. After scrambling up on the table, he thrust his arms up in the air and shouted, "I''m not a PKer! Please believe me!"
Some of them sitting at Betsy''s table raised their heads to glance at him and then went back to scarfing down their curry and gruel like it was their last meal. Without the slightest interruption, Betsy scooped up steaming forkfuls like a well-maintained waterwheel. Nobody at the cook''s table even batted an eye as they continued their bawdy banter; their raucous laughter grated on Ken now more than ever.
Deflated, he slumped back down on the bench. Then, he slapped his forehead with the palm of his hand. He had to go to the top. Betsy. Even though she was an NPC, they had to trust her as their leader. Besides, she wasn''t your run-of-the-mill NPC; she was an AI NPC and a legendary heroic character at that. She was his only hope, in more ways than one.
He rushed over to Betsy''s table. "Excuse me, but we have to talk."
"Right now?" Betsy looked up at him and scowled.
He nodded.
"Well, I guess I''m done." She stood up and motioned with her arm in an arc over her shoulder. "Follow me."
Ray jogged to a tent in the middle of the first row and went inside.
She walked over to to the water jugs, poured water into her hands, splashed it all over her face, and then dried it with the bottom of her loose jerkin.
They walked into the tent, but Ray wasn''t inside anymore. A map was laid out on a large waist-high table with metal tube legs in the center of the room. A jagged black scar comprised most of the map. Various shades of brown, green and white spots marred the blackness and ivory arrows curved and curled in complex patterns. They looked like islands and ocean currents. She motioned to a fold-out canvas chair on one side of a low square folding coffee table positioned in the back of the tent.
After sitting down on the other side, Betsy poured an orange tea from a white porcelain teapot decorated with red hibiscus blossoms and blue irises into two matching teacups.
"Sergeant Slicer, I''m not"
She held up her hand and then using a small pair of tongs, she reached into another matching bowl. "Sugar?"
"Oh, no thanks." Ken didn''t like his tea sweet.
"Cream?" She lifted up a delicate cup with a spout and cover.
"Yes, please."
As she poured, her face brightened.
He waited until she served herself and picked up her teacup.
He picked up his teacup by its tiny looped handle through which he couldn''t even slip his pinky.
He had urgent business. His life could be in danger. But nobody would PK him in the leader''s presence or even in broad daylight. They''d wait until he was asleep or alone. He calmed down. If this was Betsy''s ritual, he surely didn''t want to offend her. After all, she''d rescued him from certain death. It was pleasant to be able to sit in silence without having to feel like he had to talk. Like meditation. He distracted himself by contemplating on the flavors of the tea. "Analyze tea," he subvocalized to himself.
Orange pekoe.
He liked its mild yet distinctive flavor. Then again, he couldn''t really taste it. He was only going on memory. The Indian restaurant a few blocks away from his home served chai but it was too sweet. He liked Red Label. Most people would say it was cheapand it wasbut he still found it refreshing.
While she sipped her tea, she watched him. She didn''t stare, but after each sip she would look at him, sometimes at his eyes, sometimes at his hands, and sometimes at his shoulders.
He was almost down to the bottom. He thought she must be about finished too.
She set her teacup down on its saucer and rose from her chair.
Wait, we didn''t even get to talk. He set his teacup down too and was just about to blurt out and tell her he wasn''t a PKer and to tell all of the other players too. She turned around and walked to a chest in the corner of the room. She took out a brushed steel rectangular box. She sat back down, placed it in the middle of the table and pried off the cover. Inside were three rows of identical cookies.
"Almost forgot the biscuits." She held out her hand, palm up. "Help yourself. Sorry, I don''t have much of a selection. This is the last tin from the raid."
He thanked her and reached for one.
"Not that you''ll be able to taste them, but they do look quite attractive, don''t they?"
He stopped before taking a biscuit. "You know I can''t taste things?"
She blinked her eyes.
"How much do AI NPCs know about players? Are they aware they''re in a game?" he said.
She creased her brow and almost went cross-eyed. "AI NPC?"
"I mean this is my first time meeting one. I didn''t really know what to expect."
"Me?" Pointing at herself, she laughed. "Amazing! My servant girl act really paid off."
"Obviously, it did. I would''ve never suspected you were a legendary NPC heroine."
"No, no, you''re not getting it." She placed her hand over his. He flinched but didn''t take his hand away. "I''m a player too."
He jerked his hand back and his brain started to spin, his thoughts racing along the surface of a mobius strip. Oh God, is she going to PK me, right here and now? Or is the AI NPC playing a joke on me? But why? Nothing''s making sense.
"Don''t worry, I''m not a PKer, nor is anyone in this party."
Slackjawed, he stared at her. He was on a train of thought and he couldn''t get off.
"Why the hell would I have rescued you, only to PK you now?"
True. But why would an AI NPC lie and say they were a player? Maybe she really is a player? She could''ve even PK''d me on the way to Calvin''s mansion. Yet, all along that road, she''d tried to hide her knowledge of the quest. I have to say that it was very clever to use the flirtatious servant girl to test me. Could even the best AI create an NPC as complex as Betsy? Had I been so enamored with the concept of ''AI so powerful the NPCs could pass the Turing test'' that I''d fallen, hook line and sinker, for all the hype? He stopped the train and got off the mobius strip.
Slumping back in his chair, he let out a huge exhalation.
"What''s your real handle?" she said.
"KenKenji Shibuyama."
"Is that your real name?"
"It''s my handle too," he said.
"No one uses their real name. I need your handle for the team."
"Okay, Yamabushi Rock."
"Kind of long. On the battle channel, you''ll simply be ''Rock''."
My handle''s ''Slicer Sarge''. ''Sarge'' for the battle channel, if you didn''t already pick up on that." She held up the tin of biscuits to him. "Here, take one."
He took a bite of the biscuit, chewed it, and slid the mush all over his mouth and tongue. A smooth buttery texture. Not too sweet. "Hey, I can taste"
She held up her hand. "Did you ever wonder why I bothered rescuing you, another alpha player on the quest? After all, there''d be one less competitor, no?"
He almost jumped out of his chair. Oh my God, that''s right, she''s a player, but not any run-of-the-mill player. She didn''t reveal herself right away and now she''s plying me with food and drink before springing the ''hey, there''s this one little thing I was hoping you could help me with'' line. "To be honest," he said, "at first I thought you were a band of NPCs whose function was to rescue players, but since it''s only been mere minutes since I found out you''re a player, I haven''t really had time to process it all, but if I had to take a wild guess, I''d say out of the goodness of your heart?" He hoped.
"Bingo." She clicked her tongue and pointed her finger gun at him. "I couldn''t let another playerlet alone a noob\get knocked out of the running so soon. Then again, a noob lollygagging around in a safe zone isn''t really a threat." She chuckled and poured more tea. "Please." She motioned with her hand, palm up. "But not many are so noble these days, don''t you agree?" She took a dainty sip.
He took a sip too.
"There is this one little problem," she said.
"A little problem?" he said.
Chapter 7: Singularity? (Part 2 of 3)
As the leader, Betsy couldn''t show any weakness, but her hand shook a little and her teacup clattered as she placed it on its saucer. "My brother. A week ago, he disappeared in-game," she said.
"During the training period?" he said.
"I don''t know how he was able to get out of the safe zone, but in one of my chat sessions with him, he said he was going to meet up with a Calvin Johnson."
"Oh my God, that Calvin, the merchant?"
She nodded.
"Was your brother?"
"I don''t know, but even if he was, he could''ve simply respawned."
"With your bindi, you"
"It degrades with distance and other conditions."
"His mobile?"
"He''s gone in IRL too."
"You''ve contacted the admins?" he said.
"They''re stonewalling. I even hired an attorney but it''s taking too long," she said.
"The police are looking for him, right?"
"Of course, outside. But they think it''s crazy to look in a game for him and Websuit won''t release any information about their players citing privacy regulations and the fact that they can''t even get to it because personal player data, like IP and location history, etcetera, is encrypted."
He was looking past her. There was nothing to see except the blank cloth canvas wall of the tent.
"Don''t you think that''s hiding behind the law?" she said.
After he didn''t say anything for five seconds, she snapped her fingers. "If I''m boring you with my small problem, I don''t mind looking up the closest therapist."
"Huh? I''m sorry, I was just thinking..." He scratched the top of his head. "that my wife and son miss me."
"Oh, do you have to log off?" She gazed down at her hands and twiddled her fingers, spinning one forefinger around the other.
"It''s fine, so do you have any clue where to start looking for your brother?"
"I sure do." She stopped herself from smiling. "Two days after he went missing in IRL, he emailed me and told me he was transported to a different country across the Great Abyss. And even though I have a map of the Great Abyss"she pointed to the table"there aren''t any maps of the lands beyond the Great Abyss. So if I can find him in-game, that will give me clues as to where he is in IRL."
"Betsy, I don''t mean to belittle you, but don''t you think that believing your brother''s stuck here in-game is maybe just a tad bit crazy?"
"What are you talking about? I''m making total sense." She banged her fist on the table. "I''ve thought it all out. He''s been taken hostage and they''re forcing him to play the game and win the quest and then they''ll take all the money." Her hands began to shake, then her arms, her shoulders. "I mean, that has to be it." Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes. "He''s alive and I''m going to prove it by finding him in the game."
"You two must be very close in age," he said.
Her eyes snapped open. "How did you know?"
"Just the way you talk about him. And you''re crying."
She couldn''t help it. If she lost him, who would she go bowling with? Who would she go smelt fishing with? What about their weekly lunches? On the other hand, if her boyfriend suddenly keeled over, she''d still be able to go on, but if Kumarshe dug her nails into the palm of her hand and it smarted. She could still feel. "Wewe''re twins."
"Must be nice. I''m an only child," he said. "I bet if your twin brother was somehow stuck in the game, you''d do everything you could to get him out, wouldn''t you?"
Get a hold of yourself. Leaders have to be strong. She turned around, wiped her cheeks with her hands, and turned back to him. "You want to cross the Great Abyss, right?" she said, her eyes hard.
He nodded.
"Well, so do I, but nobody on the team wants to," she said, walking over to the map. He followed her. "Here." She tapped a mountainous land mass at the top of the map. The Northern Wastes. Common knowledge is that one shard is here." It was completely white. Huge glaciers stretched their ghostly fingers south and then west into a brown swath bordering the jagged black scarwhat is named the Great Abyss.This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
He leaned over to get a closer looks at the map, "What are these?" He pointed at the green pockmarks and lacerations littered amongst the brown, as though the green were the cruft.
"Fertile land."
"There''s hardly any. It''s not a very entertaining world for gamers if it''s all ice. I wonder why they made it this way?"
"That''s not important, right now. Look here," she said, laying her finger on a jumbled mass of brown and grey islands. "Another shard is in the Greater Southern Archipelago. It''s closer and it''s been verified by multiple independent sourcesexactly the opposite of the shard on the other side of the Great Abyss. They want to go for the easy one first and get the loot. As usual for a legendary item, we expect they''ll be a lot of high-level magical items accompanying it. Another team already left early this morning. So that''s where we''re heading bright and early tomorrow morning, unless I can change their minds." She looked straight into his brown eyes. "This is where you come in. You''re the second person who''s told me one of the shards is over here." She struck her finger down on the cross-hatched area of the map, labeled Unknown. The first person to tell her had been Kumar, in his last email. "I want you to support me when I make the proposal tonight."
"I don''t know if it''ll do any good. No one knows me and I''m a noob after all," Ken said. "But I''ll give it my best shot."
She stuck out her hand. "Let''s do it then."
He gave her hand firm shake.
They smiled at each other.
"Let''s hash out exactly what we''re going to say tonight," she said.
"Absolutely, since this is your team, why don''t you tell me what you think that script should be."
What a relief. He doesn''t have that gamer ego.
They sat back down.
"Before we start," he said, "I should tell you that the Greater Southern Archipelago is a red herring."
"I haven''t heard anything of the sort. What''s your source?"
"You wouldn''t believe me if I told you."
"We can''t be on the same team if we don''t trust each other." She twisted her mouth.
"I know but before we go there, I need to clear up one thing." He scratched the back of his head. "It''s even more unbelievable, but something similar to your brother going missing happened to me."
"Oh my God, no." She clasped her hands in front of her and wrinkled her brow. This couldn''t be happening. "What? Someone you know went missing too?"
"Yes"Ken looked her straight in the eyes"me. I can''t log out."
Her eyes bugged out. Then she grabbed her sides and doubled over in laughter.
He didn''t smile.
She finally stopped laughing and looked up at him.
"I''m serious. I can''t log out."
"Look, enough is enough. You had your little joke."
"I''m not kidding around. It doesn''t work if I say, ''log out''." He stood up. "Log out."
Nothing happened.
"See?" he said.
"What does that prove?" She dismissed his claim with a wave of her hand. "Your menu still works."
"Public," Ken said. His HUD popped up in between them. "Menu." His menu displayed and he scrolled through each drop-down list.
"What the hell?" Betsy displayed her HUD next to his. "You''ve got to have ''logout''." There it was: right off of her File menu, Logout.
She stared at his HUD and then at him. "You hacked it."
"Look, I''m not trying to pull some elaborate joke on you. I need to get out of here." He reached both of his hands out supplication. "Can you help me? No one knows I''m trapped in here. Can you send a message to my wife? Then"
"Just use your email."
"I can''t get to anything outside of the game," he said. "Look"he displayed his contacts list"here''s my address and my wife''s name and her phone number. You can call her."
"What the hell are you trying to pull!" she said and clenched her teeth. And to think I was starting to trust him. It was all a ploy. "You think I''m stupid? I''m not going to call any number you give me. When I call this so-called wife of yours, she''s going to dox me. Then you''re going to get your people to mess with me in real life and my team''d be forced off the quest. One hundred million Ether down the drain." Not to mention Kumar. I can''t rescue him all by myself. I need help and I can get some really good help: my team. But if they won''t go, then by God I will do it on my own!
"No, no, I swear that''s not it!" He waved his hands back and forth in front of him.
Betsy stood up and paced the width of the tent. Dammit, I really want to believe him.
"I know my wife is worried sick about me." He walked over to her and squeezed her shoulder. "Just like you''re worried about your brother."
"That''s not playing fair." Betsy pushed his arm away. "Stop bothering me, I''m trying to think."
He smiled and shrugged his shoulders.
She continued her pacing. Do I really have a choice? Let''s see. Greg''s on my side but then again he always is. Rox, I can count on too. Qian''s going to be a tough nut to crack, but she always is. She''s smart but has no interest in small unit tactics. On the other hand, she''s someone you''d always want to have your back in a knife fight. Plus, she always invests in healing skills. For those reasons, everyone else always sticks with her when she''s adamant about something. I guess that''s that. I need another ally; otherwise, I won''t stand a chance tonight. She turned back to Ken. "Okay, I''ll call"
"Look, my wife Chie Shibuyma''s a math professor at Berkeley. Call her work number."
Right, I can find it on the university department''s website and that''s more trustworthy than from him, although they could''ve hacked the website too. Nevertheless, I already decided to trust him. This is merely due diligence. She looked up the number and dialed. It rang a few times, then it clicked, and then started ringing again. "Hey, it forwarded to another number."
"It''s her mobile. She''s on sabbatical."
She snorted. He didn''t say anything. Suspicious.
"Please, please, pick up," Ken whispered.
It rolled over to voicemail. "Hi, you''ve reached the voicemail of professor Shibuyama. I''m on sabbatical but if you''d like to leave a message, I''ll return your call at my earliest convenience."
Sabbatical confirmed. Seems like everything''s on the up-and-up. "You want to leave a message?" Betsy said.
Squeezing his eyes shut, he nodded.
Betsy added him to the call.
"Hey, honey, I''m okay, but I''m trapped"
The line clicked. A woman''s voice whispered his name. "Ken?"
Chapter 7: Singularity? (Part 3 of 3)
Ken choked up. She''s okay. It''s been so long since I heard her voice. Wasn''t she gliding down to rescue me from this frozen wasteland?
"Who is this?" Chie said. "What have you done to Ken?"
Betsy nudged his shoulder.
"It''s me, Ken," he bawled. "Chie, I''m sorry. I love you. Are you okay? I don''t know how I could''ve done this to you and Hayden. Hayden, is he okay?" Tears streamed down his cheeks. It all came flooding out. All of his love, his regret, his guilt, his loneliness. Why couldn''t they be next to him again? Why? Of course, Yuri was right. It was my own fault. I''d lied about wanting Chie in the game and emotionally blackmailed her. I''d lied about wanting just another thirty minutes in-game. I''d even walked out on my family. All because I was obsessed with making my dream come true. All because I''d been promised my dream job, my dream career, making the most immersive game ever. I did get my dream. And now I''m stuck with itand lost everything else.
"How can I trust you? The number''s blocked."
Dammit, get a hold of yourself. He wiped his eyes and cleared his throat. "You had your nipple pierced."
"I didn''t."
"On the left side, after graduation, in Honolulu."
Silence.
Then she started to sob. "Ken, what happened to you? I don''t understand. I was so afraid. Hayden"
"Hayden? Is he okay?"
"Yes, yes, he''s fine, he''s at Mas''s, but... we both miss you." Her sobbing slowed.
Now that he could actually find out, he wasn''t sure he wanted to know. "Am I... is my body... is it still"
"You''re in a coma." She took a deep breath. "The helmet injected you with a drug and that''s how you became addicted. I knew you weren''t yourself."
His hand flew up to his neck. It was smooth now, in-game. "How did the helmet do it? What kind of drug was it?"
Chie pinged Betsy''s line for a video call and Betsy accepted.
Chie told him that the helmets had been stolen from the Berkeley police department and there were no traces of drugs in their bodies. She was sure Websuit was hiding the evidence. And then she told him that Aya, the Websuit attorney, had told her she could get him out by completing the quest.
That confirmed the Empress''s pronouncements, except in one important aspect: the quest was a battle royalenot the standard shared group win. Then, he explained his encounters with Yuri and the Empress and how he''d concluded that they were hackers.
"Yes, the drugs. Jake Robertson is on the board of Nano Crisper biotech and that''s how he got the drugs." Chie said. "But how can a drug transfer your consciousness into a game?"
"It''s difficult to believe. Maybe it''s something like LSD and I''m hallucinating all of this, right?" He sighed. But it''s just too real. How could a drugged-out mind create such an elaborate world? "This is going to sound crazy but it has to be something supernatural like black magic or the work of a devil worshipping cult."
"You don''t know the half of it. Whatever it is, supernatural, drug-induced, or a crazy new technology, I believe it. I''ve experienced it myself."
"What, you sprouted horns?" He laughed.
"No." Her head drooped and she hugged herself. "Wings," she whispered.
Wings? He was about to make another joke, but then he saw her face. She had closed her eyes and her entire face was squeezed into the center like it had collapsed into a sinkhole. Rose Crow''s wings. Of course. It made logical sense in the in-game world, so why not in reality, if the supernatural existed? "I''m sorry. How?"
"I''ll tell you after I log in." Her face relaxed, and then she wiped her eyes and tried to smile.
He frowned. Now that he was level-headed instead of pumped full of drugs, he knew it was dangerous for her. "I know we could figure out something else. It''s like we''re playing right into those hackers'' hands." Then it hit him. Why didn''t he think of it before? "They''ve wanted you in the quest from the very beginning. I''m just bait. We''ve got to contact the police, even the FBI."
"The FBI''s already working with the police, but Websuit''s stalling and who would believe us? Like you said, it''s black magic."
He clenched his hands into fists. "Is this really the only way?"
"I''d already determined that before you so rudely interrupted my login preparations." She gave him a big smile. "With you by my side, I can do anything and with Yamabushi Rock and Rose Crow united again, we''ll vanquish any foe, including the Blizzard Berserker King and finally the Empress herself."Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
"The ''Rose Crow''?" Betsy said.
"Who the hell''s that?" Chie said.
"Betsy, Betsy Parikh," Betsy said and added herself to the video call. "I''m sorry, I didn''t mean to eavesdrop, but I didn''t want to interrupt such a beautiful moment and intense planning."
"She helped me," Ken said. "We''re using her line. If it wasn''t for her, we wouldn''t be talking now. She''s one of the alpha players."
Betsy held her breath.
Ken knew Chie was thinking about how to respond, whether to trust this new person or not. As the team leader, she always had the veto on who was accepted onto the team.
Chie didn''t answer for a full minute.
"I have to agree with you, Rose Crow," Betsy finally said. "The authorities won''t help. My brother has gone missing in IRL and he''s missing in-game as well. I''m looking for him in-game and I think that will lead me to him in IRL. Needless to say, the police think I''ve gone completely insane."
Chie raised her eyebrows. "So, your brother was in-game when he disappeared?"
Betsy took a deep breath. "I''m positive it has something to do with the game"Chie glanced sidewise at Ken and Ken nodded once"He was online all the time, truly addicted to it. He was chosen as one of the first alpha players. And his websuit and CVRG weren''t at his apartment. He would''ve contacted me, if he could''ve, I''m sure of it."
Ken nodded. He had to admit that they''d have to go it alone until they were able to uncover more convincing evidence.
"I see..." Chie tapped her nose. "Thanks for helping Ken, Betsy. We really owe you." She gave Betsy a thumbs up.
With her face practically glowing with joy, Betsy responded with her own thumbs-up sign.
Carrying her phone, Chie walked through the kitchen and into the garage. "Hold on, I''m switching over, stepping into the CVRG."
"But wasn''t everything taken as evidence and then Websuit stole it?" Ken said.
"Ayathe kind soul that she iswas nice enough to send me replacements to accomplish her noble goals."
"And who is Aya?"
"I already told you, Websuit''s hatchet woman, also known as a corporate attorney. I''m logging in now, so where are you?"
"Replacements? The helmet too?" he said.
"Yes, don''t worry, I made sure there weren''t any needles."
"The old helmets!" Ken said. "Betsy"
A shock wave tore through the side of the tent and slammed Betsy in her side. Her feet lifted off the dirt floor and she flew through the air, impacting the tent''s metal tubing.
The tent collapsed.
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The connection dropped. Chie was in the dark, caught in the netherworld before spawning into the game world.
That was an explosion! I can''t log in without knowing where they are. "Log out."
Nothing happened.
Neither the logout menu nor her helmet were there. She felt for her phone. While she was talking to Ken and Betsy, she''d brought it with her into the CVRG in the garage. Feeling something hot next to her hand, she fumbled towards it. She grabbed it and then her hand started to burn like she was holding onto a stovetop burner coil. I''ve got to hold on, onto this snippet of reality. If I could just hold on, I''ll get out. She lifted her phone up to dial 911 and screamed. The flesh of her palm sizzled and bubbled like frying bacon. Gulping air, acrid smoke filled her mouth and nostrils. Her lungs spasmed and she coughed.
Tendrils like black hair sprung out of the phone and reached out for her through the wisps of grey smoke. She threw the phone away and tried to run, but it was like she was running in space, no up or down. The tendrils wrapped around her and some thrust into her back like hundreds of needles and coiled around and around her spine, and her wings. Screaming, she fell down into nothingness as blood seeped down her back.
I can''t die! What will happen to my body if I die in-game? Who''s going to save Ken? Who''s going to take care of Hayden? At least I won''t go missing like that JamminChat employee. Mas will find my body in a few hours. I''m so relieved we named Mom and Dad as Hayden''s official guardians in our trust last year.
? ? ?
"East side!" someone yelled from outside the tent. "Along the road."
"God, that hurts like hell." Betsy moaned. What happened to the max settings. Didn''t I set them to the min? She was groggy.
Ken lay a few feet away from her. He stood up and limped over to her. "You''re in a lot of pain. Why don''t you log out?" he said.
"Yeah, I''ll do that," she said, but didn''t do anything. Her mind was blank. She didn''t know how long she sat there until she decided to try and stand up. After getting up into a squatting position, she groaned at the pain in her leg and sat back down. "I''ve got to check on everyone. Help me up." She stuck her arm out to Ken.
Ken grabbed her around her waist and looped her arm over his shoulder. He had to stoop because she was shorter than him by about four inches. Together, they limped out of the tent.
She felt like something was missing too. Some part of her consciousness. No, some of her memories from long ago like when she was in kindergarten and didn''t she have a dog named Snoopy? Yes, but I think he was brown, not white. Or maybe gray.
"Well, you should log out anyways," Ken said. "If you have a medical condition, you could be at risk for stress-induced injury. Chie was knocked out."
"Who?"
"Chie, my wife."
"Rose Crow? That''s right, Rose Crow is your wife." I can''t believe I actually talked to the real Rose Crow. I watched all of her fights. Every single boss battle, every single competitive match, and every single battle royale. She''d almost made it to the top when she lost to Prokreashun. She had had a nervous breakdown, but she could''ve easily come back. Instead, she quit. She was making beaucoup bucks too, easily six figures. And she just threw it all away. Not that money is everything, but just that she could''ve saved it all and retired. Or she could''ve kept donating all her winnings to charities. But there was something else, something ineffable that I loved about Rose Crow. It was drive, drive to be the best, and the drive to do the right thing. She was a role model for me. I wouldn''t be who I am if it wasn''t for Rose Crow. "Rose Crow''s in The White Imperium?" Betsy smiled. "So the rumors are true. Rose Crow is back."
"Betsy, your speech is slurred. You really need to log out and call 911. Okay? Promise?"
"Yes, of course." The hibscus flowers at mom and dad''s will be blooming in a few months. Spring is my favorite season of the year. Not too hot, not too cold, but just right. So said Goldilocks. Such an independent girl.
Someone was shaking her shoulder. "Hey, Betsy. Log out!"
It''s Ken. "Oh right."
Ken shook her again.
Betsy finally said it, "log out."
Ten seconds passed by.
Thirty seconds.
Nothing happened.
Chapter 8: What Is the Nature of Sentience? (Part 1 of 3)
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Biting Through
Sitting on a block of granite shaped like a sofa, Jake Robertson tapped his fingers on its arm. With her back to him and standing at the edge of the granite shelf, Aya gazed out at the overcast San Francisco Bay. The image of the Bay was piped in from his private webcam on the roof of Websuit International''s office building.
She turned around, pulled a few wisps of black hair out of her eyes, and clipped them back into her barrettes. Displayed in the finest detail in his helmet''s HUD, her brown eyes caught a reflection of the small whitecaps of the Bay''s choppy surface. The weather report had said a thunderstorm was rolling in. Without giving him so much as a glance, she sauntered back into her cave, the tails of the red hair ribbon swaying back and forth like a hangman''s noose.
He followed her in like a wet tanuki raccoon dogbecause he was one. They walked to the back of the dim cave past the calcium-encrusted stalagmites and stalactites. He snapped his katana in its scabbard into the sword rack right outside her metal office door. After tightening his belt around his wakizashi and taking off his boots, he walked into her office. She waved her hand at the wall and it brightened into a screen displaying the Bay again. She motioned to a brown suede leather recliner in front of her metal desk. He sank down in it. He picked up a steaming caf latt in a raku pottery mug from a low table next to the recliner.
She sat down in a straight-backed black office chair behind her desk. The fragment of an intricately carved hand-held mirror crafted into a pendant hung down from her neck. Its subtle blends stood out against the blood red of her kimono and its ivory collar. It was a replica of a bronze mirror like the ones he''d seen on his many trips to the Asian Art Museumof which he had been a regular donor member for close to a decade. The wide daring sweep of the kimono collar encircled her bare shoulders in an ivory band. Her skin unblemished and tight. His heart rate sped up. He''d given up trying to control it. It was his baser nature he had to live with. Besides, her beauty wasn''t really anything to get excited over. Exactly like her entire sim office was custom-built, so her image in The White Imperium was also exactly that, an elaborate photorealistic artifice. Her image was the ideal product of her imagination and wasn''t art the idealization of the real? Therefore, if he were able to shuffle off his crass physical self for this digital idealization, wouldn''t he himself become art?
Casting her gaze on him, the brown of her eyes shifted to a glossy black reflecting the harsh fluorescents in her sim office. She slipped on her pewter glasses and stared down her nose at him. Under her whithering stare, he sensed her aloofness and unrelenting disappointment in him. About what, he didn''t know, but he didn''t give a shit.
"If that ever happens again..." Aya said to him.
"What exactly is the problem?" He stirred the caf latt with a stainless steel spoon.
"You know exactly what I''m talking about," she said.
"I''m not clairvoyant," he said and swept his sandy brown hair off of his forehead. "You''re the one who asked for the status update." Even though she wasn''t an official part of the project team, he''d consented, as a mere courtesy. That''s right, ever since he''d entered hi-tech, he''d always been the one to call the shots. No one had ever had the drop on Jake Robertson and there was no way in hell he was going to let Aya be the first. After all, it wasn''t like she had him by the ballsanyway, they were too big for her, even in real life.
"The swatting."
"Oh, that little thing?" He sipped his latt. Dammit! How did she find out? She couldn''t have hacked him. He used the latest encryption technologies on all his devices.
She glared at him.Stolen novel; please report.
Through his hakama and pants, he pushed his baseball-sized testicles up from between his thighs. During character generation, he''d made sure to specify the smallest size possible for tanuki-ningen, but even sprawled out at their widest angle, his legs still squeezed his balls together. "How''d you know about that, anyways?"
"Need you even ask? Through the other miko."
He clenched his hands and bent the spoon handle. Dammit, I should''ve known. Aya and all those other little fuckers! God, how I hate them and how the Empress''s REST services have control over every registration, authentication and authorization, every login and every log out of every single user in the entire fucking system.
He rubbed his white-gold, embossed class ring. "No one was hurt."
"He was shot! What do you call that?"
"He''s fine"
"If you call being in a coma, ''fine''."
"Good news travels fast, and bad news even faster." He smirked. They''d probably traced Ken''s IP and watched that neighborhood. But still, how did they find out what his condition was? Did they hack the hospital? Or maybe it was as simple as someone staking out his apartment. But the most vexing question of all was why spend so much effort on two people? "Why do you even care about him, or that woman?"
She dismissed his question with a wave of her hand. "What if the un-matured had been hurt?"
Shit, how did she know the kid was there, too? Maybe they hacked the sphere''s webcams? I had it all planned out too. It was at Ken''s apartment, so his son shouldn''t have been there. Man, I have fucking shit for luck. "How was I to know he''d be there? But he wasn''t hurt anyways."
"You can thank your lucky stars for that. Don''t you understand the word ''dox''? That means getting some dirt on her, not swatting."
"It was just a warning."
"It doesn''t matter, if you didn''t really care about the inviolable nature of an un-matured''s life, then you should''ve never have signed the contract."
"You''re not going to go on your rant about children in Syria, again, are you?" He himself donated to worthy causes like the Red Cross. "Of course I care," he said. I didn''t want to hurt anyone. "Stop treating me like a serial killer. Never even shot a gun. It was an accident."
"If the Empress ever finds out..."
He shrugged his shoulders and rolled his eyes. God dammit! I''d be seriously fucked if the Empress denied me access to her REST services. Would she really do it? For whatever reason, the quest was her motivation for integrating with his game. She didn''t even want any money or IPO shares. It boggled his mind. After all, what kind of blackhat hacker would forego money? He crossed his arms and tapped his socked foot on the office carpet. "So, what do we do now? I could still dox her."
She turned to gaze at the image of the Bay, glanced sideways at him, and grinned. "No need. The path has been smoothed."
"Smoothed? What''s that supposed to mean?" He squinted at her.
"She should''ve received the requisite equipment by now."
"I have to approve every single"
She waved his authority away with her hand. "Why so surprised? Everyone has their price."
He gritted his teeth. "So what? She''s got the websuit and CVRG, but that doesn''t mean she''s going to use them."
She spun her chair around to face him. "Could it have escaped your notice?" She raised an eyebrow. "No, it''s impossible for you to have missed it with your almost obsessive attention to detail." She glowered at him. "Observe." She subvocalized and the wall monitor faded to an in-game scene.
A tent in a forest clearing. Deciduous trees crowded together in the background. Ken and a woman entered the tent.
Fade out to black. A deafening explosion.
Immediate cut to a shaky video recording running towards the tent, which has now collapsed and its right side burning.
"East side, along the road!" the man taking the video said to three men and a woman. "Capture the Berserker King''s shinobi operatives. We need to interrogate them."
"Yes, sir," they said in unison and jogged off-screen.
"This is X-Ray-one-oh-seven," the man said. "Reporting minor assault by BBK shinobi team. We''ll be relocating the base within the next twenty-four hours."
A close-up of the collapsed tent. The man''s tanto dagger tore a path through the heavy canvas. Then, ahead of the camera, another blade ripped through the canvas and Ken''s head popped up out of the opening. "Ray!" Ken said, "grab the first aid kit. Betsy''s hurt."
Aya froze the video.
"How did you get that footage?" he said. Not those little fuckers again. "It''s against the contract, miko can''t go beyond"
"And they didn''t. The Empress''s command is always obeyed, on penalty of dispersal."
"Then how in hell"
"Spies, of course. Even though we''re constrained to our respective domains"she made a wide sweep of the room with her hand"we entertain frequently. However, barring an in-person meeting, live video feeds are the next best option."
Get a handle on the situation, you shit for brains. He really wasn''t any good at this cloak and dagger business. He''d conveniently forgotten about the shinobi of the Broken Mirror; they were like vermin, everywhere and nowhere. Those forces were mix of bots, advanced AIs, and players. Even though the Berserker King and his Uqbarian allies had routed the Empress''s army at the Battle of Black Cliffs, the Empress had left behind a core guerrilla group and then grown it into a force worth reckoning.
She pressed a finger to her thin lips. "Now I have a question for you. A very important question. How can he be both in-game and in a coma?"
He couldn''t tell her everything about his pet project. Nevertheless, he had to tell her something that sounded somewhat believable. "Oh that?" He couldn''t help but smile a little. "It''s not really Ken in the game, it''s his copy."
Chapter 8: What Is the Nature of Sentience? (Part 2 of 3)
"I see, so it''s true, you drugged him," she said.
Tapping his fingers on his thigh, he looked away and at the wall screen. "Drugs? Are you sure? I can''t imagine how that could happen," he said.
"The Empress does not approve of indiscriminate actions, especially those that harbor the potential to harm the un-matured. Perhaps a temporary moratorium on beta registrations would miraculously boost your creativity to unprecedented levels."
"Okay, okay, it was only an experiment." The CEO would hit the roof. Growth, growth, growth was the corporate mantra.
"How did you do it?"
"An injection from the synthetic foam cushion lining the helmet''s neck," he said.
"Show me," she said.
"It''s a trade secret."
"I''m not asking for schematics, a demo would do."
"It''s on a need-to-know basis," he said.
She tapped her fingers on the desk. "Need I remind you of the moratorium?"
"Fine," he said through gritted teeth, "pass me control."
A 3D wireframe model of the helmet displayed on the wall monitor. It was the shape of a typical full-face motorcycle helmet with one important difference: it didn''t have a visor. Jake rotated the view so that they were looking directly at the bottom of the helmet.
"The 3D polymer screen is bonded to the interior of the helmet casing. So, they are one piece. The screen covers the wearer''s visual angle, which takes head rotation and peripheral vision into account.
"Now, looking at the bottom edge of the helmet, you can see the padding. When the algorithm detects that the helmet has been placed on the head and the helmet''s Websuit operating system has connected to a server, then"the padding expanded to enclose the neck on all sides"the padding expands to touch the neck and the needle can''t be seen, even up close, much less to the casual observer. At the same time, having the padding wrap all around the neck provides a steady platform for the needle to achieve maximum efficacy."
She raised an eyebrow and nodded. "Well done."
His chest puffed out. "Now watch." The view zoomed in to the padding. A needle on the helmet''s left side emerged out of the padding. "In order to be effective, the needle must be able to perform an intramuscular injection at a depth of five millimeters. Unfortunately, with frequent injections, this could result in scar tissue build-up, thus reducing its effectiveness over time. Our latest prototoype, which hasn''t gone into production yet, looks promising in terms of the reduction of scarring."
"Just out of curiosity, did he know?" she said.
"Of course not." Oh fuck, why did I admit that?The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
"I see, no FDA approval for human trials." She tugged her earlobe.
His eyes opened wide. "Uh, therethere''s no way the FDA would''ve approved it, even with the fact that it''s only a modification of a well-known drug prescribed by psychologists and at the current dosage levels for the specified trial period, side effects are nominal and long-term adverse effects non-existent. All participants have been screened for medical conditions, not only because of the drug but also because of the websuit''s potential stress on a participant''s physiology. Furthermore, this variant leaves such small trace amounts that they are virtually undetectable in urine and no standard drug test would screen for them."
"Nominal side effects? Then, why haven''t you taken your own medicine?" She smiled.
"Well, it''s not like I''m afraid of something happening." He twisted his ring around and around his finger. "I''m not that callous. I would never have authorized its use on real people, if I''d thought that there was one iota of a one percent chance of a negative outcome." Holding his hand up, he pressed his thumb and forefinger together. "But if anything happens to me, the project will be torpedoed."
"How does the drug work? What does it do?"
"You mean you want to know about the drug''s biochemistry?" His body stiffened and he sat up straighter. Of course, a neurologist would want to know how the brain is affected.
She dismissed the question with a wave of her hand. "Its biochemical properties are of no significance."
What a ploy, neurologist my ass. He relaxed and sunk back into the recliner. The less she knew about the drug, the better.
"It promotes integration with the websuit''s nano-electrodes and the helmet''s VR system."
"Playing cat and mouse," she said, "isn''t one of my favorite pastimes. The drug promotes addiction, addiction to gaming, correct? But isn''t the serotonin effects of leveling up enough?"
Dammit, did she know everything? "It''s original intent was to help with the neuro-digital interface and it does that quite well, but"he shrugged his shoulders"one of its side effects is enhanced addiction, and the more users who get addicted to the game, the more we''re gonna be raking in the money from the extra content passes." He ran his hand through his hair. His palms were getting sweaty in the real. The latest enhanced Websuit design could detect moisture on the skin.
"Impressive." She pushed her glasses back onto the bridge of her nose. "But that can''t be all, correct?"
"It''s not like we''re building a rocket to Mars."
"Is he really only a copy? From what my sources tell me, his interactions are indistinguishable from a real player."
"Wow, I''m really pleased to hear that." His face beamed with pride, the pride of a software developer, a creator. If only he could see Ken in-game, Jake could verify that the system worked. Ken was the only one who was actually unconscious in the real world. There was the guy from JamminChat who went missing, but there was no evidence that proved he was unconscious. Jake could watch videos of Ken until his brain turned to mush, but there wouldn''t be any incontrovertible evidence until he was able to interview Ken himself.
He laughed out loud and took a big swig of the latt. He guzzled all of it down to the bottom of the cup, a line of brown sludge streamed out of the corner of his mouth and down his stubbled chin. He wiped it with his fingers before it dripped onto his shirt and then grabbed a tissue from the box on top of the side table and dried his hand.
Aya made a wry face.
He smacked his lips. Wow, that was mind-numbingly tasty. I can''t wait to try it out the dynamic world instead of this jail. When this new optional Websuit gustation ora-nasal cavity insert hits the market after general availability, we''re going to make a killing. "Anyway, the drug also made him susceptible to hypnosis," he said. "And while he was in that state, my team made him recite all of his memories. Then, we hacked his extended family and friend''s phones and scoured the net for all traces of his life. We even paid an FBI agent to conduct mock interviews of close family and friends. We''ve used the same protocol for every single one of the hundred alpha testers." He tapped his temple with a forefinger. "See? I thought of everything."
She tilted her head and furrowed her brow. "Somewhat off-topic, but do you believe in a soul?"
Chapter 8: What Is the Nature of Sentience? (Part 3 of 3)
"Soul?" He doubled over in laughter, leaned forward, and almost fell out of the recliner. A corporate attorney asking about a soul?
"The Self, then." She raised her voice and made chopping staccato motions with two fingers. "Some immutable personality that transcends physical termination."
"What the hell are you talking about?" He shook both of his hands in the air. He was getting excited again, too much for his own good. "There is no immutable self, we''re constantly changing. Each person is the sum total of his or her experiences, actions, and thoughts. All of which can be collected, digitized, collated, and then input provided and output delivered."
"There are bound to be gaps... you really believe the digital Ken is a complete copy of the Ken in this universe, don''t you?" she said and then took a deep breath and exhaled loudly while shaking her head. "Only through the Empress''s"
"Yeah, yeah, I get it, through the all-powerful Empress everything will be made right."
"Don''t disparage the power of the Empress."
"I''m sorry," he bowed his head, his chin touching his chest, and smiled.
"You''ll rue the day." She pointed her finger at him.
Talk about bad role-playing. What a shitload of hokum! She''s talking as though the Empress was some kind of god, or a demon out of some B-movie horror flick.
"You haven''t been exactly forthcoming this entire conversation," she said. "You know, to be the best partners, we have to trust each other."
He only nodded.
"The copy''s not perfect, but it''ll suit the Empress''s purpose." She smiled and looked into his eyes. "Keep up the good work."
"What is the Empress''s purpose?" he said.
She stared at him and narrowed her eyes. Then, she stood and walked up to the wall monitor. "Let''s get back to the operational aspects," she said. "We need to lower our risk of lawsuits, so don''t send any of the special helmets to households with minors in them. But we do have a common need to keep the game running, now don''t we? And if addiction helps ensure that goal, then why would I or the Empress object as long as the risk is manageable within reasonable parameters?"
His superficial answer had worked, but he wondered how long their goal would remain a common one.
"By the way, the path has been smoothed, so Chie''s family is the obvious exception," she said.
"Chie''s path smoothed..." He furrowed his brow and then struck his fist on the recliner arm. "I get it, she''s going to go after the copy of Ken."
"Bravo," she said and clapped her hands. "Now that a good enough copy of Ken"she wiped her glasses and then repositioned them on her nose"that is to say, good enough to fool her, is in-game, she has no choice."
"Only a copy," he said to himself, frowning and pinching his lower lip.
"You''re the one who said the Ken in-game is only a copy."
"I know, I know...," he said, frowned again, and laughed.
"His soul could''ve been transferred," she said.
"I already told you, there is no soul," he said. But what if the in-game Ken was a perfect copy. Soul or no soul, it wouldn''t matter. It would be all the proof he needed.
"Could it be you''re afraid? The hyper-intelligent Jake Robertson who clawed his way to the apex of the corporate ladder. The founder and former CEO of the Three Kingdoms and now the vice-president of the Quantum Katana Online division. The inventor of the websuit, holder of over one hundred patents, ranging from biotech to quantum computing. That same Jake Robertson is afraid of entering his own creation?"A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
He choked back his words and gritted his teeth.
"There''s only one way now... only one way to find out." She grinned, her thin lips stretched back, displaying her rows of demonic incisors.
His jaw went slack and then he shivered and clutched at his chest, above his implantable cardioverter defribrillator.
Her laughter echoing around the office, she switched the wall monitor to a map, stood up, and motioned for him to join her at the map. "Next question. Where is Ken?"
"Uh, let''s see..." He walked up and pointed to a green jagged line bordered by a brown gradient on one side and a white expanse on the other. The brown edged around a gigantic black scar thousands of times bigger than the Pacific Ocean. The scale of The White Imperium was unimaginable, like a superearth exoplanet. It was called the Great Abyss. One of many abysses, but it was the largest. "Locate player Yamabushi Rock." The map zoomed in on a village at the intersection of two highways, then moved to the northeast along one. Finally, it zoomed in on the mansion. "Here, well outside of the town''s safe area."
She turned to him. "Excellent, an operative of the Shinobi of the Broken Mirror manages that sector. He''ll help Ken on the quest." She grinned. "If he survives."
"What''s so important about this quest? What do you hackers get out of it?"
"Hackers? You think we''re mere hackers?"
Dammit, why didn''t I think of it before? They must be state actors or irregular elements of a hybrid warfare organization. "Russia? China? Iran?"
"Tl?n," she said.
He sputtered and his face turned red. "Stop fucking with me."
She laughed.
"So, you''re from a third world country?" he said.
"Third world? I guess you could call it that, although your third world pales in comparison."
"North Korea?" he said.
"They have secret police, correct? And a dictator. Its winters are long and harsh and it doesn''t have much arable land." She sat back in her chair and switched the wall monitor back to the Bay. "Close enough. I''m from North Korea, then."
He layed his hands flat on her cold metal desk. "You know, when I found that forgotten code on the National Lab''s high-performance computers and then booted up the NVRAM it was on, I had the shakes so bad. I thought I was going to get arrested."
"Isn''t the meeting over? I get really bored listening to people reminisce."
"And the code''s timestamp was 1989-10-18 00:04 UTC. I can remember it even now, it''s permanently etched into my memory. And still, after all these years, I could get arrested because it''s still running. I don''t get it? Why don''t they know it''s there?"
She stared past him at the image of the Bay.
"Even though I was the one who found the Empress''s trojan horse code and activated it, I still don''t understand what you''re after, what''s so important about this quest."
She sighed. "The Mirror of Truth."
"Truth? What truth? It''s only an in-game legendary item that grants its bearer the ability to see the targeted NPC''s lie. Hardly seems to rate a legendary level to me. Legendary''s level one hundred, by the way."
"That''s only what we''ve heard. Its description and stats are all blacked out. But the Empress informed all of usthat is, all of those who had a need to knowthat once it''s reconstructed, everything will change."
"So she must know more than that, she''s the one who designed the quest."
"She said she didn''t know, only that the world would be forever changed."
"Some kind of apocalyptic game event? Like an asteroid striking the mountains and melting the glaciers?"
"She said ''world'' without qualification."
"But it''s just a game! Or"he snapped his fingers"a virus, is it going to let out a virus?"
"Well, who can say?" She flicked her earlobe with her finger. "If that''s what you want to believe."
She held her pendant up to him. His eyes were drawn to it. His tanuki face, a wide swath of black eyeshadow stretching across his face from ear to ear, was reflected in the fragment of a bronze mirror. His blue eyes burned like flames from gas stove burners. He heard a lone taiko drum begin to beat from far away. The drumming came closer and quickly rose to a deafening roar like ten thousand drums were beating in the center of his head. He grabbed his ears and tried to push his palms into the ear canals. Stumbling backwards, he clenched his eyes shut, but his own face still stared back at him. His reflection faded into innumerable white hexadecimal characters that circled and swirled into the maelstorm of an abyss of black emptiness. The drumming ceased.
Shaking the vision from his head, he stood up. "What the hell was that?"
"What''re you talking about?" Aya said and grinned, her eyes beaming. "You were asking me what I believe."
His mind went blank and he blinked a couple of times. "Oh right... what do you believe is going to happen when the Mirror of Truth is reconstructed?"
Her hand with its six digits gripped her wakizashi hilt and clicked it free from its scabbard. "I believe"she unsheathed the blade in a lightning draw and thrust it straight up into the air"we''ll fight again and feast upon our enemy''s quantum energy.
? ? ?
In the training room on the ground floor of the Websuit International office building, formerly the Three Kingdoms office, Jake strode up to the CVRG sphere. It was the enterprise model. Twelve feet in diameter. With the latest prototype helmet resting in the crook of his arm like the gigantic egg of an undiscovered dinosaur, he stared at the slit in the side of the sphere for almost a minute. Sliding the zipper down, it peeled open like crocodile jaws. He hesitated for a brief moment and then stepped through. After zipping it back up and padding to the center of the sphere, he slipped on the helmet.
A needle punctured his neck.
Chapter 9: Art or Artifice?
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Possession in Great Measure
"You heard about Rose Crow, right?" the tanuki mage guard said to the kitsune shinobi guard. They were both on duty inside a gatehouse at the drawbridge to a fortress.
"Is that a rare artifact?" the shinobi said. As soon as he sat down at the table, he started shaking his leg.
"Are you a stupid noob? She''s a legendary," the mage said and sidled over to the potbelly stove to warm his backside.
"Oh right, brain fart," the shinobi said.
The mage grabbed two hand-sized balls tied up in brown paper from the side pocket of his backback and unwrapped one. He took a big bite of a piece of maki sushi with a huge hunk of bloody fish flesh in its center.
+25 chi
Duration: 24 hrs
Side effect: Foul Breath
"Want one?" the mage mumbled with this mouth full and started to hand the shinobi the other.
Staring at the raw red fish flesh, the shinobi grimaced and waved it away. "Why''re you wasting the temp boost on the usual guard duty grind. Kill a few rats, easy XP, hey, might even get to confiscate contraband from some smugglers."
"Tastes good." A slender piece of flesh slipped out of the mage''s mouth and hung over his lower lip like a live flipper.
The shinobi frowned. "Why anyone would pay extra for a websuit flap extension in the mouth is beyond me. It''s only a game"
"Only a" The mage almost choked on a bite of his sushi.
"I mean, why not concentrate on winning the quest, for Chrissakes?"
The mage guzzled down cold o-cha to wash down the clump of rice and nori stuck in his throat. "Full immersion," he croaked. "Listen up, asshole, what business is it of yours what I do and anyways I know a bunch more shit about gaming than you do, noob. I was ranked in the top ten in the Three"
The shinobi laughed. "Hey, sorry, man, you''re right." He bobbed his head up and down like a marionette. "I''m just a stupid noob."
"Anyways," the mage said. "She''s backand she''s in the White Imperium. The Flaming Fox Brigade''s going to fucking shit their pants."
The shinobi''s eyes glazed over and stared back at the mage.
"You really are a noob, aren''t you? I thought they only let experienced players into the alpha."
"Lucky, I guess. But from the moment I logged in here, I could tell you were a vet. You have that aura about you. In fact, you could almost be a legendary, yourself, right? I mean, look at the detailed moon power inscriptions on that magically enhanced trenchcoat." He stuck his hand out palm up and made a wide appraising sweep. "It must''ve cost at least a thousand standards, right?" He rubbed the stubble on his chin. "And check out your staff. No less than a level eighty-nine item, right?"
The mage stuck out his chin. "Ha! A level ninety lightning bolt staff, I''ll have you know."
"Wow," the shinobi said. "Do you think... maybe, I could friend you?"
"Me? Friend a noob?" The mage narrowed his eyes and appraised the shinobi. "Well, sure, we all need friends." The mage stuck out his hand and the shinobi shook it. Their public keys and basic account information automatically transferred to one another.
"Hanzo," the mage laughed. "You really are a noob. I don''t think I''ve seen a level zero in... I don''t know, I can''t even remember."
Hanzo eyes opened wide. "You can see my level?"
"Oh my fucking God, you didn''t know? Whenever you friend someone, you can see each other''s basic stats. Like handle, species, sex, class, and" the mage doubled over in laughter "level." He wiped the tears from his eyes and then grabbed Hanzo''s hand and manhandled him in close to his body. "My handle says ''Digory'', but I just go by ''Dig''." He smiled and then burped. Red and gray fumes emanated from his mouth.
Hanzo took an involuntary step back.
Foul breath. Character stunned. Minor effect. Recovery in 500 milliseconds.
Dig waved his hand in front of his mouth. "Sorry, Hanyou don''t mind if I shorten it, right? Everybody does." Dig didn''t even wait for Han to respond. "I forgot about the power-up sushi''s area of effect."
"So... Dig." Hanzo spread both of his hands out flat on the table. "Did you hear where she is?"
"Who?" Hanzo said as he pulled another power-up sushi from the same side pocket on his backpack.
"Rose Crow, it''s kind of... important." Hanzo clenched and unclenched his hands.
"What? You wanna bone her or something?" Dig leered.
"She''s married," Hanzo said, looking down at his hands. "But I was thinking of, you know, joining her party."
"A noob? Joining the famed Rose Crow team?" Dig strutted around the room. "The vanquisher of not only the final boss in the Red district"he flourished his hand in a wide arc"that was, by the way, the Blood Tengu boss, if you didn''t happen to know." Dig continued his promenade around the guardroom. "Not only the vanquisher of the Blood Tengu but also the first clan to establish their district strongholdin the Red district, that isand which went on to become the capital of one of the three imperial provinces in the Three Kingdoms?" Having completed his circuitous route, he halted in front of Hanzo. "That Rose Crow, correct?"Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.
Hanzo nodded.
"Good luck," Dig said and then burst out in loud laughter.
Suddenly, he stopped. "Did you get it?"
"Get what?" Hanzo said.
"C''mon man, at least get on the right newsfeed." Dig sat down in a chair next to Hanzo and projected a public window in front of them. "Check it out, it''s the only live newsfeed you''ll ever need: Dub-A Papparazi."
"Hey, Playerz!" a deep male voice said. Filling the screen: huge, bare bronze pecs pumped up, flexed, sweat dripping down and caressing rippled abs. An agonizingly slow pan up. Tanned, chiseled chin, dark sunglasses, sculpted wavy jet black hair. "Level up with Dub-A and get your breaking news and cheats, so your ass stays intact on your next dungeon dive."
In the background: blue sky, palm trees, white beach, light blue white-capped waves. Taiko drums beating a fast deep rhythm.
"Aloha, Bruddas and Sistas, A-O-K and A-K-O, here. Today, we''re bringing you breaking news on the comeback of Rose Crow."
"Our very own, A-K-O, who is always hot!with incisive commentaryis live at the Crow Fortress in the Three Kingdoms Red district."
Cut to a woman, honey brown eyes chiseled from her face, facets of an unblemished topaz. From a high collar, over her firm shoulders, and down to her ankles, a white dress hugged her body like a boa constrictor. Her biceps bare and bulging.
Hanzo jumped up out of his chair. "No way, that''s Annie, the K.O. Queen."
"You know women''s MMA?" Dig pointed his thumb at his chest. "Me too."
"How about Hiroko Tsugimoto? She''s tops in my book," Hanzo said.
"Fuck yeah," Dig said.
They fist-bumped. An ad for preorders of the GA version of the websuit played.
"Fucking A, Annie Ko is such a hot dish, isn''t she?" Hanzo said and grabbed his crotch. "Now getting a taste of her would be worth getting a mouth flap extension, wouldn''t it?" Dig elbowed Hanzo.
"Maybe they''ll come out with a form-fitting underwear extension," Dig said. Hanzo and Dig both guffawed and then turned back to the newsfeed.
The ad faded out.
"Enough of this crass talk," he blurted out. Sighing, he rested his chin in his hand. "She''ll be perfect as digitized art."
"What''d you say?" Hanzo said.
Annie faded in.
Dig shushed Hanzo. "Listen to her mellifluous voice."
With a hand on her hip, Annie smiled and she began to speak. Her voice was a syncopated jazz melody emanating from her luscious pink lips. "Well, Alex, I''m outside Crow Castle and, sure enough, the lights are on, but nobody''s home, nary a sign of Rose Crow or Yamabushi Rock."
"That isn''t all you can tell us, right?"
"Funny you should ask," Annie said as she sauntered across the bridge spanning the deep but empty moat. "Like polite guests, we knocked and, lo and behold, the door was unlocked." The massive steel-alloy gates creaked open a sliver.
"But we haven''t been invited," Alex said in the picture-in-picture window.
"What? And not take advantage of their legendary hospitality?" she said and grunted as she pushed the gates wider. "And don''t worry, I disabled all of the traps before we came online." She peeked in. "Hello, anyone home?"
"Everyone''s seen the interior of the famed Crow Castle, so let''s skip the tour and teleport to their armory."
In a flash, they were deep in the bowels of the castle. Numerous torches burned bright, casting wavering shadows on the walls. Annie descended to the main floor of the armory. Her heels clicking on the stone steps echoed in the gloomy silence.
"Oh, what do we have here?" Annie said with a flourish of her bare arms. "An empty space where Rose Crow''s infamous Blood Tengu wings should be hanging."
"And here." Annie stepped over to the alcove next to it. "Bare as well. No Negative Shield Naginata forged by the legendary mage Kato in the fires of the Naraka of Pestilence."
"That confirms it then," Alex said. "No one leaves behind their best equipment on an important new adventure in a"
"New world," Annie said. "Especially one as mysterious as"
"The White Imperium," they intoned together.
A thin smile spread across Dig''s face, his eyelids hooded like a snake''s. "It''s exactly as she said," he whispered to himself.
Hanzo glanced sidewise at Dig.
The screen flipped back to Alex. "Remember! Tell your peeps you heard it first on Dub-A and follow us at [A-O-K] and [A-K-O] on Disjoint." He raised his hand and stuck out his thumb and pinky. "Hang loose and aloha."
"Wait, look at this," Annie said.
The screen flickered and then zoomed in on the floor of the empty alcove of the Negative Shield Naginata. Black, white, and green splotches of paint wavered on the stone tiles that made up the armory floor. Black tendrils like maggots wiggled on its surface.
"What the fuck is that?" Hanzo said, gripping the arms of his chair and rising halfway out. "Is it hair? Long black hair?" he said to himself.
"Annie, get back, get back, right now," Alex said.
"But there are words here." Annie leaned over closer to the writhing surface. "It says: ''The Great Abyss''."
The black mass bubbled up like a living vat of worms and, as though with conscious intent, reached out to Annie,
"It''s going to boil over," Alex said.
"And over here it says: Tl?n," Annie said, pointing, her finger mere inches from the simmering surface.
Then it happened. Black tendrils burst out and wrapped themselves around her arm and yanked. She fell down into the black muck, coating her white dress with globs of oil. Then it sucked her into the center of the black and green pool and down, disappearing into its gullet.
"Wow, that was some amazing shit." Alex said, staring at the black cesspool. "How did she do that? She didn''t even tell me she was going to pull a stunt like that. This is going to be great for ratings." He turned and stared directly into the camera. "Let''s check out Annie''s apartment. She should have finished her logout sequence and be ready for guests. Sometimes it takes a minute or two for her to get reoriented in IRL. But" he got up close to the camera and put one hand to the side of his mouth "just between you all and me, the real reason is Annie likes diving in the buff." He made googly eyes and winked. "But let''s be polite and knock first." Alex fiddled off-camera. After a minute, he said, "Hmm... she''s not answering. Well, a long time ago, she gave me her admin password just in case of an emergency and I needed to get files or something."
The camera switched to the apartment interior looking in from the entry way. A loveseat had been jammed up against the kitchen table. "We have a surprise in store for you too," Alex said.
The camera panned to the living room. Ensconced on its steel alloy ring, a geodesic sphere filled the room from top to bottom. "That''s it, boys and girls, the CVRG sphere and our very own A-O-K was chosen for the alpha. Websuit 0.? can interface with Three Kingdoms, so she wanted to try it out on our live stream before taking the real plunge."
The camera scanned the room.
"She''s probably just hiding, waiting to pounce on us unawares."
"Hey, there''s someone in the sphere, on the floor," Hanzo said, pointing his finger. "No, it can''t be."
"Is that Annie?" Alex said and he switched to the sphere''s interior camera. A motionless figure was lying on the ground in a websuit with their helmet still on. The camera zoomed in on the head. A jagged line of blood ran down from the neck just under the bottom of the helmet.
"Annie!" Alex said, "911" The screen went dark.
Dig clapped his hands. "Damn, that was some show."
Hanzo buried his head into his hands. "Not again," Hanzo said.
"Get a hold of yourself, Han, that wasn''t for real."
"Not for real? I saw it happen before," Hanzo said into his hands. "Websuit''s purposely injecting the alpha players with a drug to enhance their addiction to the game. And then, somehow, they go into a coma and get stuck in the game."
Dig snorted. "Man, are you going to believe every little rumor you hear on the forums?"
"My friends are in there. Rose Crow and Yamabushi Rock. And I''m going to get them back out," Hanzo said and jerked himself out of his chair.
"Oh, they''re friends of yours? Well, fucking A! I used to be on her team, back in the day. That''s how I know all about the history of their clan. I''m privy to many more"Dig cleared his throat"intimate details, but it wouldn''t be proper to simply blurt it out to someone I just met." He patted Hanzo''s shoulder. "Even though I''m not sure if I really believe you about them being stuck in-game, I''m still going to help you find them if they are indeed in here," Dig said, slipping a ring on and off his finger.
Suddenly, Dig grabbed Hanzo in a bear hug.
Hanzo squirmed in Dig''s embrace and finally extricated himself. "You don''t have to, but if you really want to, I could definitely use the help of veteran such as yourself."
"I couldn''t look myself in the mirror if I didn''t help my new friend"Dig cracked his knuckles as a thin smile spread across his face"Masaru Hashimoto."
Chapter 10: What Is Death? (Part 1 of 2)
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Peace
Chie floated in her own mind, devoid of thought, weightless in the dark as the pain subsided to the throbbing of her heart. The aroma of sandalwood incense drifted throughout the space around her.
"Rose Crow," a female voice said. "Won''t you ever learn to come when you''re called?"
"Who''s that?" Chie could only whisper.
"I am your teacher, Yuri Sensei."
One of the hackers! The one who swatted Ken! Calm down, Chie, don''t blow up. Don''t make the same mistake you did with their hatchet woman. You''ve got to play their game. You''re in their world now. And the name of the game is to find Ken. "You trained Ken, didn''t you? Is your job to train anyone who''s new?"
"Yuri Sensei, I have her character sheet out now? Should I start filling it out?" the soprano voice of another woman said.
"Ai-chan, I''ve already started, come over and sit with me."
A rustling of silk. Sticky footsteps of tender bare soles on polished wood flooring. Ripples of incense smoke like skipping stones across a calm lake at sunrise.
"But I''m all ready," Ai-chan said with a catch in her voice, "and you promised."
"Ai-chan, please, I promised only if you were ready. Next time. For now, watch me, okay?"
"I''m more than ready! It''s not like I''m an un-matured."
"Have you memorized her profile?" Yuri said.
"Not exactly, but... enough."
"Excuse me," Chie said, "but are you talking about me? What profile?"
"Indeed," Yuri said. "Instead of applying yourself to the prioritized tasks, you were watching the live feeds, weren''t you?"
"Well..." Ai-chan said, "I have to do something to relieve the boredom. Being the one and only greeter is so astoundingly mind-numbing. You probably forgot what it''s like. And there''s only so many ways to tweak a system messagemy other astoundingly important responsibility."
"Yuri," Chie said, "are you going to train me too? I''d really appreciate knowing about this game world and where I could find Ken."
"See, my student, our newest player reflects your own impatience. We don''t have time for your issue right now."
"But it''s been over two centuriestwo interminable centuries of practicingsince I was matriculated as a matured," Ai-chan said.
"We''ve all been practicing for this momentous opportunity and each step must be executed perfectly. Would you want the Empress to be disappointed in us, Ai-chan?"
"No, of course not."
"Then, please observe."
"Yes, Yuri Sensei, I submit my quantum mind to your magnanimous tutelage." Swirling tendrils of smoke drifted in the darkness. The fading fragrance of sandalwood.
The sound of one hand clapping resounded in Chie''s mind. In a sudden rush of static, like ocean waves washing up the sandy beach, the dark respired, exhaling gray points of dusk.
"Brace yourself, Rose Crow, you''re materializing," Yuri said.
Her body dropped like she''d been thrown out of a plane. She screamed. Screamed until her throat was raw. Terror. Hyperventilating. She slowed her breathing. She hadn''t hit the ground yet. She was still alive. Plummeting through gray clouds, the cold and humid mist dampened her hair. The mist began to thin and then she popped into clear air. Staring up at a ceiling a gray clouds stretching out into infinity all around her, she had no sense of how far she''d fallen. But the rush of air was accelerating. When was she going to hit the ground? Dare she turn herself to face down? Although her breathing was regular, she still felt light-headed. How high up was she? It''s only a game, but I''d already felt the horrible pain of my wings bursting out of my back, both in-game and in the real. I''m stuck like Ken. From now on, I need to accept whatever happens as reality. No sense in trying to rationally figure things out and attempt to relate them to the rules of a world that clearly no longer apply. When I couldn''t tell if the kappa was an NPC or a player, I took the pragmatic approach. She jerked and twisted her body around. Below her was complete and utter darkness. What if she kept falling forever? Icicles formed in her hair. Shivering, she rubbed her numb fingertips through her gloves. She''d freeze to death.
Then she saw it, barely. A speck of white dust, a mote. A mountain peak. She turned to face towards it, spread out her arms and legs, and tried to swim towards it. Am I even moving? It''s hopeless.
"Extend your wings," from faraway, a woman yelled over the roaring of the rushing air.
Chie looked around her. "Yuri?"
"Your wings," Yuri said.
"But my back, it''s not healed yet."
"Through her miko, the Empress works in the most wondrous ways."
That was a stupid thing to say. I''m going to die if I don''t try something. "Equip wings," Chie said. Ripping through the back of her trenchcoat, black wings framed in razor-sharp bleached bones snapped out like switchblades. There was no pain or blood. Tensing her back and shoulder muscles, her body whipped around and up. Gliding towards the mountain peak, Chie searched all around her, but there was no sign of Yuri. "Yuri? I need to ask you where Ken is?"
"You''re in the northern arm of the Great Abyss," Yuri said, her voice echoing in Chie''s head.
"You trained Ken when he first logged in, didn''t you?"
Yuri Sensei sighed. "We don''t have an unlimited amount of time to chit-chat."
"Is this where Ken was?"
"No, he was spawned in the mountains of Tl?n outside the city of Ishigumi."
"Why didn''t you log me in there?"
"Your quest is to collect all of the shards of the Mirror of Truth and return it to the Empress in her fortress."
"How do I get to Ken?"
"After the Mirror of Truth is returned to the Empress and she restores it, then it can be used to return you to the real world." Yuri''s voice sounded farther away.
"How do I get to the city of Ishigumi?"
"You can team up with as many people as you want. In fact, you could include all one-hundred alpha PCs, if you so desired."
"Won''t you at least tell me the general direction of Tl?n?"
Chie''s eyeballs were tugged to the right.
"East," Yuri said.
Chie could barely hear her. "Don''t go! How am I supposed to get there?"
Silence.If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
"Remember, only twenty-four days to complete the quest." Yuri''s voice faded away.
"Yuri!"
There was no answer.
Chie continued to glide towards the mountain peak. Dim light penetrated through the interminable ceiling of gray clouds. Below, stretched a blackness. It was as though she was trapped in a dank abandoned well, its top nailed shut with plywood slats.
After spreading her wings out to the position providing the most efficient lift, she turned her attention to the practical. "Attributes." Many times, the basic commands were still the same as in the Three Kingdoms, but with a stricter syntax and no error messages. No different from real life, where often the only corrective feedback was a quick smack upside the head, and, mostly, no permanent brain damage ensued.
Attributes
Strength (STR)
47
Dexterity (DEX)
88
IQ
90
Stamina (STA)
87
Reputation (REP)
0
Magic (MAG)
57
Mana
21
Chi
51
Hit Points
94
Only fifty-one? It should be at least two hundred. "Basic stats."
General
Equipped
Name
Rose Crow
Wakizashi
Leather Armor
Species
Tengu-Ningen
Katana
Shuriken (11)
Sex
Female
Smoke Bombs (2)
Standard Equipment & Rations
Class
Shinobi
Glow Sticks (5)
Level
0
EXP
0
Standards
100
"Blood Tengu Wings." Nothing was displayed. "Wings."
Ability: Flight
Speed (Max) = 50kph
Speed (Endurance) = 28kph
Range = 32 hrs
CHI Cost = 1/5 min
STA Cost = 1/30 min
They''re plain wingsnot the Blood Tengu Wings. No kidding, who''s going to get legendary wings at level zero?
Chi was the gating factor because it was five times more expensive than stamina. At a rate of five minutes per point of chi, she had four and a quarter hours to make it to the mountain. If she were lucky, she''d see land before she reached the mountain. However, she had no point of triangulation nor scale to figure out how far away she actually was. She couldn''t go all out; she had to pace herself at the endurance speed of twenty-eight kilometers per hour, which would mean she could cover a total of one-hundred and nineteen kilometers.
She clenched her eyes shut and gasped. A shooting pain lanced through her head behind her eyes. She massaged her temples. She only had one more task to complete, then she could replenish her physical energy and switch her brain to auto-mode. Exhausted, tired, and terribly cold, she said, "Time." Nothing was displayed. She made several attempts, including ''clock''. "System time," she finally said.
System Time: 0?:09:4?:00 1210-09-17
Let''s see, so that''s hours, minutes, seconds, milliseconds. The servers must be in a different time zone, but boy that date sure is messed up. All right, that''s three oh-nine AM. I''ll do a checkpoint in two hours. With a little more fumbling around she was able to set an alarm for five oh-nine AM.
She pushed her hands in their gloves deeper into her trenchcoat pockets and tied the hood as tight as she could around her head. Although the trenchcoat wrapped her legs like a sheath of down and her boots looked insulated, her shins and feet were freezing and her wings even colder. She kept stretching and shaking all of her limbs. Nevertheless, the standard equipment, including the internal frame hiking backpack, wasn''t bad. She couldn''t imagine being thrown into this harsh world with anything less than the standard equipment and rations. She reached into the small rations pouch inside her trenchcoat. She bit off a hunk of a rolled-up chapati stuffed with some kind of flour-based paste sweetened with dried fruit, chewed, and washed it down with a mouthful of water. More substantial than the energy gels she used to wolf down on her endurance rides. The gel hadn''t given her that satiated full feeling. She kept stuffing her mouth and guzzling water. She reached into the small pouch again, searched around with her hand. Oh damn, they''re all gone. Then she tipped the mouth of the metal canteen over her lips and poured the last few drops of water down her parched throat.
She settled into a steady rhythm like when she used to ride her bicycle on Highway One for an entire afternoon. Breathing in the cold, fresh ocean breeze, her legs pumped up and down in an almost autonomous action. In the same way, she almost didn''t have to think about moving her wings. She was so tired. It wouldn''t hurt to close her eyes for a few minutes.
Chie''s sticky eyelids peeled open. The mountain loomed ahead of her. Its snow-capped peak and crags towered at least a kilomoeter above her. Gray and glacial rocks covered its slopes. She still couldn''t see the foot of the mountain, only an inky black. More freezing landscape, but at least I''ll be able to rest. It was then she noticed she''d dropped in altitude. Sheets of ice coated the front of her wings. If I don''t get rid of that ice, I''m going to start dropping like a rock and I''m so close!
She had no idea how long she''d been dozing and checked the system time again.
System Time: 13:46:39:09 1210-09-17
Oh my God, the alarm didn''t go off! But that''s more than ten hours. All of my chi should''ve been exhausted hours ago.
"Chi."
Chi = 3
Only three left! That means I''ve been flying for four hours and I only have fifteen minutes left! How could the system clock be so off?
She flapped her wings harder, but the ice restricted her movement and with its additional weight, she fell below the base of the mountain. She groaned as her muscles began to cramp. She slowed down and glided for a minute. Staring up at the peak from below, it was black, like it was empty. There was nothing underneath the peak. It was an island, an island floating in the sky, but why was she falling? No matter how hard she beat her wings, her fall kept accelerating. If only the ice would melt.
Heat. The smoke bombs! She removed her backpack and pulled out a smoke bomb. She tied a rope and grappling hook to it. She had to get it as close to the joint as possible. After lighting the fuse, she flung it on top of her right wing. It bounced off the ridge of ice on the main bone in front. She reeled the smoke bomb back in and while she was readying to throw it again smoke started billowing out of it. She coughed and her eyes watered. She stared through an opening in the smoke then tossed it underhanded. This time, the hook landed where the minor bone extended from the main joint and she set it tight. After waiting a few minutes, she flexed her wing joint to fold it in, but it didn''t budge. She jerked the joint again as hard as she could. Crack! She jerked it again and the ice shattered, sending huge chunks flying off. She kept folding and unfolding it until all the ice had fallen off. Then she did the same for the left wing. Now, free of the ice, she felt almost weightless.
She only had five minutes left and sprinted for it. Putting all her power into it, she lunged upwards, towards the rocky underbelly of the island. Both wings cramped up, but she forced her mind to focus like in the championship. Nothing can stop me. She visualized Ken and Hayden clinging onto the jagged rocks and stalactites. Only I can save them. I have to save them. The freezing air rushed past her ears and stabbed her throat and lungs like thousands of needles. Her whole body was numb. She visualized reaching her hand out to them and they reaching out their hands to her.
Chi depleted.
Her wings stopped beating at the exact moment her hand latched onto Ken''s. I made it. His hand dissolved into dust. The stalactite in her hand broke and crumbled. As she tumbled backwards, she grabbed another stalactite with her other hand and swung to a stalactite twice the width of her body. Gasping for air, she spied a ledge ten feet above her. She waited until she caught her breath, untied the grappling hooks from the depleted smoke bombs, and threw one of them up to the ledge. The fourth throw finally caught hold and she ascended to the ledge. Crawling away from the edge and then collapsing onto the hard rock, she pulled her legs up to her chest, wrapped her arms around her knees, and folded her wings around her entire body. Out of the path of the freezing wind, her shivering body warmed.
Having survived but with scant idea about where she was, she stood up and winced when the top of her head hit the low ceiling. It was a small cave. Appraising the area, she saw two rocks with frayed ropes tied around them. People had used this ledge before. She walked to the edge and examined the rock face to her right and left. The freezing wind ripped her hood off and whipped her bangs into her eyes. Ice, ice and more ice. Gray and white rock streaked with black: granite. She saw at least five crevices on each side similar to hers. It wasn''t blind luck that had brought her here. Is this a bird colony? She shivered, envisioning hundreds of Blood Tengu bosses plucking the eyes out of hapless adventurers. Their diamond-tipped beaks coated with red, wet blood.
Chapter 10: What Is Death? (Part 2 of 2)
Chie''s throat was parched and her left foot was still numb. Flipping the hood back over her head and cinching its cords in a tight knot under her chin, she unclipped a shuriken from her belt, lay down on her stomach, and reached down over the edge. The freezing wind turned her nose red. Holding the shuriken, she hacked at a section of the ice lining the underside of the ledge lip. After five solid hits, it broke off. After crawling backwards away from the ledge, she sat up and shoved a corner of the hunk of dirty ice into her mouth. She bit at it and scraped her teeth along its cold, hard surface. Blood from her cracked lips streaked the ice in bright red rivulets. She felt something pungent and slimy on her tongue, like spoiled oysters. She spat it out and then looked at the ice. Part of a worm. From then on, she made sure to look before she bit. She picked out pebbles and sharp finger-sized rocks, but swallowed the grit and sand along with the water. Every few minutes she took a break to let her mouth defrost.
After thirty minutes of gnawing on the ice, her thirst was quenched, but she was nauseous from all the mud sloshing around in her stomach.
A message displayed.
Epic quest: Save yourself from certain death by making your way to an island in the Great Abyss.
Status: Completed.
XP = +500
New level = 3
Skills = +4 (Select 4 new skills.)
Attributes = +40 (Available for distribution between Mana, Chi, and Rep.)
Level three already? Four new skills and a whopping forty attribute points! But what''s the deal? I can''t add them to any attribute. If I were a mage, it''d be a no-brainer. What kind of spells are available? She stumbled through the voice commands but finally sorted them out. Although the commands were basically the same as in the Three Kingdoms, there were a few small differences.
"Mana spells."
Mana Spells:
Summoning (L1)
Shapeshifting (L4)
Possession (L25)
It would be an understatement to say summoning a flying beast to carry her would be lifesaver, but after checking out the details, the best she could do at her current level was a silly messenger raven. She slid her hands down her waist. Her body was still its endurance sports self, but she wasn''t emaciated enough to saddle up on a raven without breaking its back. "Shapeshifting."
Player, this skill isn''t available at your current lowly level. Contact the sensei responsible for your local area for assistance with this skill.
They sure like keeping players in the dark. Then again, it was an alpha. She clenched her jaw and pursed her lips. "I''m behaving exactly like some helpless child." Instead of wasting time asking Yuri about Ken, I should''ve been extracting as much of the actual mechanics I could wring out of that hacker neck of hers. This is not the kind of leader I was. Stop getting overwhelmed by emotion.
She brought up the help topic for Rep. It was the career track for leadership and shinobi weren''t groomed as leaders outside of their own guild. She decided to dump it all into chi to power her wings. They might be her only way off this godforesaken rock.
Chi (updated) = 91
What should she do with her skills? She had the feel of the interface now. If she didn''t use their exact terminology, nothing would come back. For a system so advanced, she thought they''d have better help. On the other hand, maybe they didn''t want to help and that was part of the challenge, that is, to learn from others and a player''s own mistakes like in the real world. No career skills. Perhaps players had to apprenticeagain, like in the real world. Checking out the specific class and species skills, she found that the species and classes only added and subtracted from the skills. "Chi skills."
There were the usual combat skills like unarmed combat, which included dodge, parry, sweep, frontal, joint locks, and so forth and were available at level one. Flight could come in handy if her wings failed or she ran out of chi, but it was only available at level twenty-five. Stealth was a shinobi skill, but it was reduced by the tengu-ningen species negative adjustment. Tengu-ningen were also dinged negatively for mages, but enhanced for warriors. Also, on the positive side, tengu-ningen automatically received shapeshiftingbut only at level twenty-five.
That Yuri! Chie punched her fist into the palm of her other hand. She''d chosen my class and species for me. I''d have chosen human, which is balanced. But then again I wouldn''t have received wings and been able to save myself. I''d had wings in real life. Was that why Yuri chose tengu-ningen for me?
Yuri did have a soft spot for that girl. What was her name? Ai-chan. A kid. Not an un-matured, but a matured? An adult? Not that flirt Aika? I can''t make sense of it. It doesn''t matter. Having a family doesn''t change the fact that they swatted Ken and now we''re both trapped in the game for the sole purpose of completing their quest. She shook her head. "It''s so... so twisted."
As she leveled up, the effect of the species adjustment would be diminished. Stealth paired well with the critical hit enhancement for sneak attacks and speed enhancement for a quick getaway. It was probably a mistake to neglect armor enhancement at her low level, but she''d have to avoid open combat and large set battles. "Skill selection: unarmed combat, stealth, speed enhancement, critical hit enhancement."
Skill selection complete.
Now to figure out how to get out of the Great Abyss and onto Ishigumi. The Great Abyss must be gigantic, but all I need to do is to go east. But how do I get off this rock? How do players even get here? Fly, but they''d have to be really high level. And why would they want to? Well, it''s a dungeon, and dungeon''s have treasure, dummy. She went over and kicked one of the ropes. The rope disintegrated and a cloud of dust burst in her face. She coughed and spat. The rope had decomposed. The dungeon had already been cleared. That meant no treasure, which meant no magical items to help her get off of this barren rock. Still, it wasn''t like she was going to roll over and die.
There might be a tunnel that goes up to the surface. She crouched down and felt her way to the back of the dark cave. Glow sticks. They had them in the Three Kingdoms. She pulled one out of her backpack and crimped it. The green light of her glow stick illuminated the darkness and she saw a crevice that was about two chest-widths. Bingo. Dungeon always equals tunnels, corridors, and passageways.
After fifty-two steps, she saw flourescent red and green lichen and algae coating the walls. The air was fresher. A warm breeze caressed her cheeks. She was heading in the right direction. After another twenty-three steps, she stopped at a narrow band of water that had flooded across the path. Spying a rivulet of water flowing down the wall, she filled her water bottle. After guzzling down the entire bottle, she refilled it again as well as a water bladder she''d found stashed at the bottom of the backpack. After one-hundred twenty-three steps, the crevice ended at a proper corridor with stone block walls and arched ceilings. A discarded glow stick lay against the wall to the right, so she turned that way.If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.
She''d been walking for a couple of hours and it had been slow going with the limp caused by the frostbitten toes on her left foot. She''d stopped checking for traps because either there hadn''t been any in the first place or they''d already been cleared. Call it intuition or experience, regardless of the game, after a while players could tell these things. Besides, she had more important matters to consider. Why am I at level zero? Well duh, it''s a campaign. You always start at the beginning. You have to prove you''re worthy. Who do these hackers think they are? Not only computer hackers but bio-hackers too. Or, like Ken said, the supernatural. She snorted at herself and shook her head.
Upon reaching a T intersection, she peeked around the left corner. Without any noticeable elevation gain, she was hoping to see stairs. Instead, at the end of the long corridor, she saw a large archway through which bright light was streaming. And she heard voices. She almost leaped for joy. They could help her get off this rock. Calm down, remember, there''s obviously some confusion over whether the quest is a battle royale or cooperative and even if it were cooperative, there are more than enough greedy players too go around. And who''s to say they''re players. There''s only one hundred. Meeting a chaotic evil NPC would be the absolute worst. Neutral evil wouldn''t be much better. What was Yuri? Lawful evil.
"Execute stealth."
Executing Stealth.
Chi cost: 1/min
Contributing attributes
CHI = 51 * 0.05 = +2.55%
DEX = 88 * 0.01 = +0.88%
IQ = 90 * 0.01 = +0.9%
Species adjustment: -10% (Tengu)
Class adjustment = +20% (Shinobi)
Total adjustment = +14.33%
Chi is weighted an astounding five times as much as the other attributes. Even with the species hit, I still have an almost fifteen percent bonus, but who knows what the adjustments the target characters have.
She crept down the hallway and up to the side of the archway. As she shuffled her feet to position herself right next to the opening of the archway, she stubbed the toe of her left boot on a crate. She held her breath, but nobody noticed. Behind her was a shallow recess in the wall. Broken, rusted hinges and splinters of wood hung from its edges, a utility closet. She peeked around the corner.
Ten people were carrying boxes or crates onto a wooden platform at the other end of the room, which opened out to the sky. They all wore black, gray, or brown trenchcoats, skullcaps or balaclavas, and goggles hung from their necks or were strapped to their foreheads. A huge pole in the middle of the platform rose up beyond the opening and wide heavy fabric hung down from it. It was a sailing ship. Both fore and aft, sails of various shapes and sizes, some triangular, fluttered in the wind. But what in the world was a sailing ship doing here in the sky?
"Are we loaded up?" a woman from the deck of the ship said. A one-inch silver bar on the right chest of her trenchcoat glinted in the dim light. A matching one was mounted front and the center on her tan skullcap.
Twenty or so other people scuttled around on deck and a few climbed up the mast.
"Just the last crate out in the hallway." A man with goggles strapped to his forehead turned to walk in her direction.
She yanked her head back behind the wall. The crate. His footsteps were coming closer. She didn''t know if they were friendly or not and she turned to run for the intersection down the hallway. Her boot caught on the crate and she toppled head over heels. She broke her fall with her hands, but the sound of them slapping the cold stone floor resounded throughout the hallway. Her body was mostly inside of the utility closet, but her boot stuck out, clearly visible.
She heard the man pick up the crate and walk away. "Man," he said, "I can''t wait to get off this hunk of rock. Pirates won''t like it if they find us pilfering their supplies."
Minor skill use: Stealth successful.
XP = +50
No kidding. "Quiesce status messages," Chie subvocalized as she stood up and crept back to the archway.
The woman with the silver bar turned to the others. "All right, everyone, man your stations. We''re casting off."
What? They''re leaving! "Exit stealth." Chie walked out into the open, stretched out her arms, empty palms up, and gave them her biggest smile. "Hi! I''m not a pirate."
The man stopped dead in his tracks, dropped the crate, and reached for his katana. "Oh shit, who the hell are you?"
Everyone turned to stare at Chie. The woman rushed down the ramp to Jim. She held her katana out in front of her.
"I''m Rose Crow. It looks like you''re all leaving and I was hoping I could hitch a ride with you. I have a hundred standards, but if that isn''t enough I could work for passage." It didn''t matter where they were going. Any place was better than this island in the sky out in the middle of nowhere.
"We don''t need any help," the woman said.
"Yeah, we don''t need any NPCs," the man said.
"But I''m not, I''m a player." Were they players or NPCs? Chie took a step forward.
The man and woman shuffled backwards several feet, but always kept their eyes on Chie.
"I''ll hold her off, " the woman said. "You, get on the ship."
Chie had to get on that ship too. Dropping to her knees, she clasped her hands together. "Please, take me. I just joined the game and I was dropped into the sky. I was falling and barely made it to this island."
"Hey, Captain," Jim said, "She seems kind of different. Maybe she''s not an NPC."
"What the hell are you drinking? Don''t you remember what happened to Mai the last time we picked up a straggler?" the captain said.
A woman climbed up from below decks and ran up to the other side of the captain.
"What did she say her name was?" the woman said. Tufts of blue-black hair stuck out from underneath her skullcap.
"Rose Crow," Jim said.
"The legendary Rose Crow?" the woman with blue-black hair said. "That''s a real player handle, you know. From the Three Kingdoms. I was in her clan."
"Then you can ask her something only she would know," the captain said.
"Nothing that isn''t public knowledge," the woman said and then rubbed her chin with one hand and examined Chie. "But she looks kind of like her real life pictures."
"C''mon, we can change our looks anytime we want and AI NPCs can do even more. We learned our lesson the hard way and don''t tell me you''ve contracted a sudden bout of amnesia." The captain glowered at the woman. "Besides, what player is going to come to this deserted hunk of rock? The dungeon was cleaned out ages ago."
They were sure acting like real players, but if they were PKers, it might be all over for her. She checked her stats and she''d recovered all her stamina. She could run and hide from them and then when they left, she could grapple onto their ship and stow away somehow. That was plan B, but it was very risky. She hoped they were moral. "I am Rose Crow, my real name is Chie Shibuyama. I live at"
"It''s not going to do you any good," the captain said. "We can''t verify it."
Chie threw herself prone on the hard stone floor. "Please, I''ll do anything. You can chain me up. Just take me with you. I''ve got to find my husband!"
"Geez, why didn''t I think of this before," the woman standing next to the captain slapped her hand on top of her head. "Why don''t we have her pass control of her char sheet to us?"
"You can do that?" the captain said. "We could''ve tested that berserker and Mai wouldn''t be"
The woman jerked her hands up in front of her. "Me and Ronnie got it figured out only just this morning."
"Sorry, Solaria," the captain said, her shoulders bowed.
Solaria laid her hand on the captain''s forearm. "We all miss her."
The captain straightened up and pointed her katana at Chie. Jim and Solaria unsheathed theirs. Together, the three of them formed an impenetrable wall of razor sharp steel between Chie and the ship.
The ever-vigilant group leader Chie battled with her intuitive assessment of the captain and her team. Was it even possible to pass a modicum of control to another player? Even exposing your entire char sheet, treasure, equipment, weaknesses and all was reserved for your closest teammates.
"Not so eager any more, now are we? You''d better give me control." The captain''s cold blue eyes bored into Chie''s. "Or get the hell out of my sight."
Chapter 11: Construction of Memories (Part 1 of 3)
X
0 1 0
1 0 0
0 1 0
1 0 0
0 0 0
0 1 1
q
Retreat
Day 3
"I''ll double it, one-thousand standards!" Betsy said and slammed a furoshiki-wrapped bag down on the table. "Here''s the original offer of five-hundred as the down." Everyone in the party had pitched in all of their standards from the scant week they''d been in the alpha. Qian had earned the most and hence had grumbled the loudest. It would''ve been no problem if they could bring their accounts over from the Three Kingdoms.
"To cross the Great Abyss? On my tiny sloop?" The captain shook his grizzled jowls. "Are you out of your mind?"
"What kind of smuggler are you?" Ken said from his chair next to Betsy.
"Hey, you didn''t even say ''Great Abyss'' at first." He patted the wheel behind him. "My little girl''s sleek and fast but strictly a coast runner." Squinting at Betsy, he poked the furoshiki with a fat finger. "I''ll tell you what, for five-hundred, I''ll run you down to Shimonoseki. It''s only hundred kilometers. It''s the main port of call for the Southern Archipelago. You could find a bigger ship there. What do you say?"
Betsy harrumphed and swept the furoshiki up in her hand. "If I wanted to take a detour, I wouldn''t have upped my offer." She turned to Ken. "Let''s get out of here. All of a sudden it smells like piss in here, the stale piss of cowards."
Minor Encounter: You sure showed that greedy sonofabitch who''s the boss!
Rep +5
Rep (updated)= 50
XP = +50
XP (updated) = 300
They walked out of the steering house, clambered over the bulwark, and then climbed down the rope ladder to the dock.
"You''re not going to find anyone in this backwater town who''ll take you," the captain yelled down at them. "You''ll be back."
Betsy and Ken stomped down the dock. Their boots fitted with ankle weights shook the planks.
Betsy stumbled. "What''re we going to do now?" she said, after catching her balance. "He was our last chance and it''s already day three." Twenty-one days left to complete the quest. Two days ago, both Ken and Chie had independently verified that the quest had to be completed in twenty-four days. And now they''d wasted one entire day down at the docks.
She tripped. "Ow!" she yelped when she banged her shin on the end of a timber sticking out from the airship''s hull. She hopped on one foot a couple of times. Brittle rubber sealant crunched under the soles of her boots.
"I, for one," Ken smiled and smacked her shoulder, "am glad we didn''t take this piece of shit. We would''ve sunk before we even made it out of the berth."
She laughed. "Let''s go get tea." She was hungry; they''d skipped lunch and had only had one char-siu BBQ pork bun each for breakfast from the kitchen downstairs at their inn.
They started walking back to the tea shop next door to their inn in the entertainment district and took a shortcut through the warehouse district. As they passed the warehouses, Ken gaped at the palettes of goods stacked all the way up to the ceilings.
He walked into one warehouse right inside the large bay doors and read the packing labels. "What?" She nudged him with her shoulder. "Never been down to the watch the cranes unload the containers in the port of Oakland?" He''d told her he''d grown up in Berkeley.
"Nope. Too busy game programming or on church retreats, but I''d better learn the basic economics of this world. Look here." He pointed to a packing label on which was written one-hundred kilograms of unrefined iron ore. He pointed to others and read them off. "Five-hundred kilos of sail canvas, three-hundred thirty-five kilos of furs, two-hundred sixty-one kilos of hemp rope."
"Those aren''t the most important goods," she said.
"What the hell are you doing in here?" a man in a one-piece jumper suit jabbed a crowbar in their direction. "This here''s private property!"
"We''re expecting a shipment of brain foam," Betsy said.
The man narrowed his eyes. "Is that so? Well, we ain''t got none of that."
"Execute Persuasion with max Rep," she sub-vocalized, staring into the man''s eyes. "Are you sure a shipment didn''t come in the last two days?"
His eyes dilated and glazed over. "Maybe, what''s the name?"
Menial encounter: You rock! Are you sure you weren''t born a con artist?
Effective attributes
IQ = 89 * 0.01 = +0.089%
Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.Rep = 50 * 0.05 = +2.5%%
Species adjustment: 0% (Boring, Balanced Human)
Class adjustment = +20% (Kick-ass Warrior)
Target adjustment = -10% (Run-of-the-mill Warehouse Manager)
Success probability = 12.589%
Result = Success
Rep = +1
XP = +1
Rep (Updated)= 50 - 50 + 1 = 1
What luck!
Suddenly, the high shriek of neighing horses as loud as police sirens echoed throughout the warehouse.
They all clapped their hands over their ears.
After the shriek dissipated, the man turned his steely gaze on them. "Get the hell out of here, right now." Eight others ran up, flanking him on both sides. They all held black crowbars.
Ken and Betsy''s hands flashed down to the hilts of their katanas.
The shrieking negated the Rep effect.
The man pointed to two of his men. "Go shut them up." They took off to the back of the warehouse.
"We don''t want any trouble," Betsy said as they backed out of the bay doors. All the while, the men glared at them.
Walking down the muddy street away from the warehouse, Ken kept glancing back, but no one was following them. "Phew, that was close. "What was their problem?"
"You needn''t have worried, they''re location-anchored NPCs. Their purpose is to protect the warehouse."
They rounded the corner of their inn''s street.
"Excuse me, kind sir," a balding man in a tattered trench coat said to Ken, "could you spare some change for"
"Sure, here you go," Ken said and handed him a half-a-standard coin.
"Thank you, thank you," the man said as he threaded a metal cord hung around his neck through the hole in the center of the coin. The jingle of the coins as the man bobbed his head up and down faded away behind Ken and Betsy as they marched away in lock step.
Ken turned his face to Betsy. "Well, I thought for sure they were going to attack us. It wasn''t like we were stealing anything or kidnapping their baby."
"They''re smuggling contraband."
He scrunched up his brow.
"Brain foam," Betsy said.
"Brains?" He gagged.
She laughed. "Not the human kind, not even the animal kind."
He took several deep breaths.
"It''s the street name for quantite," she said.
"Duh." He slapped himself on the cheek. "You told me on our way here. The ore that gives the airships their lift. But you didn''t tell me it was contraband."
"Quantite wasn''t in the help entry for airships when I first looked it up in Ishigumi, but this morning it appearedapparently, after Greg had heard about it from the dockworkers on his early morning jaunt down here. Seems like the system only let''s us see things in context. Anyways, its market price is through the roof because it''s one of the few goods banned by the Blizzard Berserker King. All of the mines are state-owned and any illicit ore they find is confiscated. Often, quantite''s hidden in the iron because in its unrefined form it looks very similar to iron and then when they''re mixed together, they''re almost indistinguishable." She pinched her lips with her fingers. Anyone would take them across for that obscene amount of money and she and Ken would be able to level up faster. They could complete the raid operation tonight. Her heartbeat sped up. "It''s a lot of loot."
"You''re not thinking of"
"It never hurts to know what your options are." She winked at him.
"Look, it won''t work. No one''s going to take us no matter how much we pay them and the ships are all way too smallthey gotta be at least frigate-sizeand they''re so run-down a rat wouldn''t even stow away on them."
She sighed. "What was I thinking? You sure are one smart cookie and, on top of that, a real slick talker. You had everyone sold on the idea."
"I didn''t have to convince anyone that we have to finish the quest as soon as possible. Everyone got the same ultimatum when they couldn''t log out."
"No." She laughed. "I meant convincing everyone that one of the shards was across the Great Abyss."
He held up a finger. "Except for Qian."
They stepped into the tea shop. None of Betsy''s team had gotten back. They ordered chai and a waiter brought over two sturdy white mugs filled to the brim with steaming golden brown chai.
Betsy sipped her chai and inhaled the aromatic cardamom, prompting memories of the early morning breakfasts at home. She smiled and took another sip. One time, she had told a joke that was so funny Kumar blew tea out of his nostrils. Poor Kumar. In spite of the fact that his nose had certainly smarted, she''d felt particularly proud of her purposeful timing, which had earned her Kumar''s dish duty for the rest of that week. Additional time for contemplating on the nature of true reality, so their mother had said. She wrapped her hands around the mug and sipped again. The ocean of tea spiced with ginger and black pepper washed all over her tongue, a living beach. What was the nature of true reality? A game world where she could taste and smell andher palms absorbed the warmth from the sides of the mugfeel. But she couldn''t log out and neither could anyone else. It was all exactly as Ken had said and although they could all deal with the fact that they were stuck in the game, what was worse was what he didn''t know. Would they respawn? Or would theyBetsy swallowed the wrong way and coughedwhich begged the question about their bodies. What had happened to their bodies back in
The door blew open and Greg tumbled in. Rain blasted in behind him.
"Shut that door for Chrissakes," the tanuki owner at the counter yelled, wiping his hands on his yellow-stained overalls.
Greg slammed it behind him. Betsy waved him over. He sauntered up to the table, shrugged off his drenched trench coat, and dropped down onto the bench. The waiter brought over another mug of hot tea and they ordered yosenabe snow quail egg stew in a heavy iron pot. As they ate, she told Greg about the warehouse with the quantite contraband.
"Sweet," Greg said, slurping a spoonful of rice and half a boiled egg. "You''ll never guess what I found."
"I''ll bite," she said, plucking tofu and long chives out of the pot with her chopsticks and then submerging them in her dashi dipping bowl. "A jet plane."
"Have you ever even seen anything remotely technological in the White Imperium? Even a steam engine?" Greg laughed. "How about a level ninety wizard who could teleport us over the Great Abyss."
Her eyes opened wide.
At a table in the dark back of the tea shop, red-striped kitsune ears perked up.
"But it''s going to cost us a lot more than the thousand we got," Greg said.
"What are we talking here? Ten thousand?" she said.
"Yep," Greg said. "Per person."
"That''s highway robbery," Ken said.
"That''s our job," Greg said, pointing his chin at Betsy.
She nodded. "Yep, our nickname''s ''Robbing for the Hood''."
"That was you?" Ken almost choked on a satoimo taro. "We always made sure to fund at least one dollar-for-dollar match on your gaming charity drives."
"I know." She smiled.
"But this time it''s not just a game, someone could really die tonight," Greg said.
"It is a risk," she said.
"Tonight?" Ken said. "We don''t have a quest tonight."
Betsy and Greg grinned at each other. "Now we do."
Ken turned first to Betsy and then to Greg.
"The quest to raid the warehouse and retrieve the contraband," they intoned in perfect synchronicity.
Chapter 11: Construction of Memories (Part 2 of 3)
After the rest of the party had returned from scouting out other opportunities, a heated discussion ensued. In the end, everyone agreed that stealing the quantite was the only choice. They''d decided to initiate the raid at 0300 when all twelve of the moons would finally disappear below the horizon.
Now at 0300, they stood at the back of the warehouse in front of the single door that opened into the alleyway.
"Greg, your fireteam''s got the back," Betsy said and left Greg and the two Tanuki warriors, Jeremy and Pete, the cook. Qian''s team automatically took point, as Betsy directed the rest of them around the block of buildings to the huge double doors on the other side of the warehouse. Betsy pointed at the fist-sized padlock on the metal doors. "Gideon."
After five minutes, Gideon said, "Didn''t work. I could try again?"
"Time''s a wasting. Hopefully, this won''t wake the neighbors," Betsy said and turned to Rox. "Your turn."
"Cover your eyes, everyone." Rox touched the tip of her short staff to the padlock shackle and chanted, "Execute lightning."
A small but blinding flash. Bang!
The padlock shackle sizzled and glowed a bright orange. A stream of smoke spiraled up from the padlock and then it dropped to the ground.
"Qian," Betsy said, "we don''t have the tactical team chat nor the bindi. So you''re on your own recognizance. Report back in forty-five minutes."
"Understood, Sarge," Qian said and then turned to Gideon, the short kitsune shinobi. "Do it."
"Yes, Ma''am," Gideon said, snuck up to the warehouse doors, and tossed in two black marbles. Without a sound, they rolled into the darkness. After half a minute, Gideon pulled down his common magical night vision goggles and sprinted in.
"All clear," Gideon yelled back.
Qian motioned for her team to follow her. Prasuna queued up behind Qian, and then Stef brought up the rear. All clad in black bodysuits, they disappeared into the maw of the warehouse.
Betsy led Ken, Rox and Marge, the other mage, into the warehouse and closed the door behind them. They waited in silence. Even though Marge was normally part of Greg''s team, she''d decided to keep her back since Marge also doubled as the associate medic. Not that she was expecting any casualties on a stealth mission. Plus, their level two offensive magic was laughable. Lots of flash and boom but actual damage would be negligible against well-armored opponents. And with a dispersed team and no communication, she wanted to maintain a larger reserve. She''d learned that the hard way on their encounter with the Berserker King irregulars on the road out of Ishigumi. To get hit with a major encounter when everyone had been knocked down to level zero had been the worst timing ever. But with sheer luck, there had only been minor injuries and everyone had leveled up to two. But an effective commander never relied on luck.
? ? ?
Prasuna covered the corridor from the left approach and Stef the right. She perked up her ears. A loud neighing, then screeching and banging echoed from deep within the warehouse. Prasuna opened the door a crack. "Qian, did you hear the horses?"
Qian stood with her shoulder against the wall and scribbled in the black notebook in her other hand. "Yeah, so what," she said without looking up.
Gideon squatted in the corner in front of a safe.
"They sound scared," Prasuna said.
Gideon sniggered.
"It''ll have to wait," Qian said and stuffed her notebook and pencil into an inner pocket of her bodysuit and zipped it up.
"It''ll take only a few minutes," Prasuna said. "Besides, Gideon isn''t done yet." She gave Qian her saddest puppy dog eyes. "Please..."
Whinnying.
"They sound like rat squeals to me," Gideon said.
"Shut up," Prasuna said. "I know how rats sound. I have two of them at home, they''re names are Charley and Vikram."
Stef guffawed from down the hall. "Figures."
"And they can pick a lock faster than you," Prasuna said.
"Ouch," Gideon said. "Now I know how they feel, all caged up."
"II take good care of them." Prasuna pouted.
Qian glared at Gideon''s back. She gave him the finger and then whipped around and strode to the door "Let''s go, but we gotta make it quick."The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
Prasuna led the way. As Qian ran after Prasuna, Qian yelled to Stef, "Get in there and watch Gideon''s back. If we''re not back in thirty, let Sarge know."
? ? ?
While Stef watched the door, Gideon ran his hands all around the safe. It was a smooth block of metal without any seams. Its only adornment was a wooden clock face. He''d seen the type before in the Three Kingdoms. A magical lock. This was his specialty, code work, not the stupid keyed locks like the padlock. He had to make up for the embarrassment. After moving the hour hand to twelve and the minute hand to one, a row of twelve blank rectangles with a phosphorescent green background appeared in place of the clock face. Idiots, they didn''t even reset the default access code. He brought up his Decipher skill.
Standard skill: Decipher
Effective attributes
IQ = 75 * 0.01 = +0.75%
Chi = 70 * 0.05 +3.5%
Success probability = 4.25%
He was really disappointed in The White Imperium gaming system. Even though chi contributed five times as much as the other attributes, the actual percentages were minuscule for level two. What kind of lame gaming system is this? If it weren''t for the immersive environment and the websuit, he''d have quit the alpha. Kind of late to be thinking that, isn''t it, dufus?
Man, at face value, that''s some shitty success probability, even if I use up my chi. But in a real-world sense, with twelve integers and a trillion permutations, it''s pretty darn good. Should I wing it and rely on my own intuition? Let''s see how dumb they made these NPCs. The name of the company was Beryl Mining and Moving. The owner''s name was Sledwin Beryl. Couldn''t be, could it? ''S'' is 19, but I''ll truncate it to 1 digit. Each time he tapped one of the rectangles, a number incremented. He typed: 1, 1, 5, 4, 2, 9, 1, 2, 5, 1, 2, 1. The seam at the top of the safe popped open. Bingo!
Standard skill test: Awesome! That''s using the old noggin. For that feat, I''m going to make this a major skill test. By the way, that bumps you up to level 3.
Result = Success
XP = +200
Skills = +2 +2 (level 3)
Chi = +20
Attributes = +20 (level 3)
"Dude, you rock!" Stef said and punched Gideon in the shoulder. "That was like hella fast."
Gideon peeped inside the safe. A lone glowing pouch sat in the corner. He grabbed it and untied the opening. Threads of light flickered around palm-sized rocks. He dumped three of them into his hand. Some sides were smooth, others pumice-rough with whorls like the hair of the statue of Buddha he''d seen when his parents and brother had gone sightseeing at the Todai-ji temple. He brought his hand up to his nose and sniffed. A faint metallic odor. He gripped a rock with his thumb and forefinger and they sunk into it. Spongy. The threads of light danced on his fingertips.
"That''s it, right?" Stef said, his nose almost touching Gideon''s fingers. "That''s what the help said unrefined quantite rocks were like."
Gideon smiled. After stuffing them back into the pouch, Gideon tossed it up and down in his hand and it almost floated away before he grabbed it again and stuffed it into his fanny bag belted around his waist.
Stef looped his arm over Gideon''s shoulder. Drunk on their success, they staggered towards the door.
Gideon''s knee banged into the metal desk and he cursed. "Hey, we gotta wait for Qian and Prasuna."
Stef sat down in one of the chairs next to the desk and crimped a glow stick.
"We''re supposed to be in stealth," Gideon said.
"C''mon, man, these are cheap-ass models. They pinch my ears." Stef threw his goggles onto the table and fluffed up his triangular ears.
"Sheesh," Gideon said. "I didn''t hear you make any suggestions. Qian''s the one who ran around and bought the right ones."
Stef harrumphed and unsnapped a shuriken from his belt. "Besides, it''s been like twenty minutes since we got here and no night watchman has even walked by. No traps, either. It''s like one of those noob quests."
Gideon pressed his ear against the door. "I don''t know, remember"
"Yeah, I remember when you got spooked by some stupid bats and almost fell backwards into a pit of bamboo spears."
Gideon laughed. "You almost got pulled in too when you grabbed my collar."
"We were such stupid noobs." Stef said.
"That was before Qian found us lollygagging around in the black forest around Lui Bei''s castle," Gideon said.
"What do you mean ''found us''? She was spying on us." Stef stabbed one of the shuriken points into the table top, denting it.
"Minor technicalities," Gideon said and plopped down in the other chair. "With her we leveled up like Fourth of July fireworks."
"Shit man, she''s always riding me," Stef etched his name into the table top and then said in a high-pitched voice, "''Stef, you idiot, hit the legs, not the trunk. Go for the critical hit. La la lala la. My grandmother''s ghost could swing harder than you.''"
Gideon burst out in laughter and banged the table with his fist. "But she always gives all of us more loot and the best items, except for healing potions and stuff."
"I know"Stef scratched ''was'' into the table top"I guess I''m kind of glad we got stuck in here with her."
"What?" Gideon said. "Did Stefanos the Stupendous grudgingly admit his admiration for the Qian the Taskmaster?"
"Don''t fucking tell her," Stef said as he wrote ''here'' on the table. "She might start digging her spurs into me like I was her personal horse or something."
"Ha, you might love it too," Gideon said.
Stef blew the metal filings off the table and ran his forefinger along the ridges of the letters.
"Ho, ho, ho, you gonna carve a heart next, huh, Mr. Sensitive?" Gideon said.
"Shut up, man," Stef said in a whisper, staring down at the tattooed table top.
Gideon laid his hand on Stef''s forearm. What an idiot I am. And here I thought he was over it, flirting with any sweet little thing that happened by when we were in Honolulu last month, which was... oh shoot, the same month a year ago when Sybil left him. "Hey"Gideon zipped his lips with a hand"your secret''s got a passcode even I couldn''t break."
Stef gave Gideon a silly grin and slugged him in the shoulder. "Hey, man," he said, "I got a really important question for you." Stef snapped the shuriken back onto his belt. "Have you gone to the head?"
Gideon blinked. "Uh, not since this morning."
"I think it''s been longer than that. Think about it. I can''t remember taking a piss after Sarge figured out we couldn''t log out."
Gideon''s hand flew down to his crotch and he felt around. Two balls. A dick. "Phew."
"Oh shit." Stef jumped out of his chair. "It''s been thirty minutes."
Gideon grabbed the glow stick. Qian was a hard-ass about nearly everything, but if there was one thing she''d kick you off the fireteam for, it was being late. And she walked the talk. She was never ever late.
They ran to the door and Gideon yanked it open.
Blocking the doorway, shadowed figures towered over Gideon. The dim light of Gideon''s glow stick reflected off of their matte black helmets with matching armored half-faceplates and black trench coats emblazoned with red-orange tails shaped into flames.
Chapter 11: Construction of Memories (Part 3 of 3)
"Their heads are cut off!" Qian said as she stepped back from the cage. Who could''ve done this? Five horses each with six legs paced back and forth across the cement floor.
"They couldn''t have been," Prasuna said. "Look how calm they are." She leaned against the bars and pet the black one''s mane. "It''s their natural state."
"But how can they be alive? They have no brain."
"Maybe it''s somewhere else, like in their necks," Prasuna said.
"Why do they even have a neck?" Qian said.
"For balance?" Prasuna shrugged her shoulders. "The tops of their necks are absolutely adorable." She tousled the tufts of black hair sprouting from the rounded top.
It whinnied.
"Where''d that come from?" Qian said.
"From its mouth?" Prasuna said.
"But where is it?"
Prasuna brushed her hand through its mane and all over its neck, but didn''t find a mouth. "Oh no, look at this huge scar."
Qian shuffled up next to Prasuna and bent forward to look through the bars. A wide swath of scabs and scar tissue ringed the neck. "How horrible. They were chained up."
"It''s okay, little one," Prasuna pet the neck of the shortest horse. "What''s your name?"
It tossed its head and nickered.
"Mits? Its name is Mits!" Prasuna said, wide-eyed. "I heard it in my head."
Qian''s jaw dropped. Then her in-game clock caught her eye. "We''ve got to head back. Only ten minutes left." She spun around and her belt banged on the bars. A shuriken popped off and clanged against the bars before hitting the ground.
Mits reared up on its hind legs.
"Watch out!" Qian grabbed Prasuna''s arm and yanked her away from the cage.
"You''re going to spook them with sudden movements like that," Prasuna said and frowned.
"Look, we''ve got to get back." Qian stooped over and picked up her shuriken.
"But we can''t just leave them," Prasuna said.
"We have the Ostrokars back at camp. We don''t need any more pack animals," Qian said.
Prasuna took out her tanto and started sawing at the combination lock on the cage.
"What''re you doing?" Qian reached out and grabbed hold of Prasuna''s biceps. "You heard me."
The horses started to whinny and stamp their feet.
"See?" Prasuna started to cry. "They want to escape. Just like the poor cats and dogs"she wiped her eyes with her sleeve"at the shelter." She sawed at the padlock even faster.
"You know your tanto blade''s going to snap in half before you make a scratch in that lock," Qian said.
"Then use your Decipher skill," Prasuna said.
"No way." Qian crossed her arms. "That''s a digital lock, it''s going to use up all my chi."
"Please?" Prasuna grabbed Qian''s hand. Qian felt Prasuna''s rough hands, calloused from holding brushes to make the manes and fur of every kind of known animal shiny and beautiful. She yanked her hands out of Prasuna''s as a spine-tingling shiver ran up the nape of her neck. The game had replicated that detail?
"Please"? Prasuna grabbed for her hand again.
Qian spun around and walked away. She didn''t want to feel. Holding the padlock in her hand, she said, "preview pick lock."
Effective attributes
IQ = 89 * 0.01 = +0.89%
Chi = 138 * 0.05 = +0.98%
Success probability = 7.79%
I can''t take this chance. Even with all my chi... Qian dropped the padlock.
"Underneath that straight-laced demeanor is a kind and caring heart." Prasuna said.
Qian closed her eyes and took a deep breath. That wasn''t it at all. And what did Prasuna really know about her. They''d only met in college six years ago. "I can''t waste chi points. It''ll take me almost a half a day to regain them. What if we run into trouble?" Qian said.
"Look at them, it''s the right thing to do and you know it." Stretched through the bars, Prasuna''s hand caressed Mit''s silky mane. He nickered, rumbling soft and low.
In sympathetic syncopation, a tic resonated in Qian''s cheek. Qian gazed upon the headless horses and picked the padlock back up. "Execute decipher with max chi."
Standard skill test: You suck! But, hey, when you have a spare moment, I''d love to help you out. ^_- Ping me. @aika
Result = Dismal failure
Chi (Updated)= 138 - 138 = 0
Qian clenched her hands into fists. Aren''t these hardcoded system messages? Who''s mocking me? Her face flushed red. Is this twit Aika a developer? A dungeon core? She slammed her fist into the bars.
Mits neighed and reared up, his massive hooves flailing in the air like morning stars.
"Shh, Mits, nobody''s going to hurt you anymore," Prasuna said.
In a lightning strike, a hoof crashed down on Prasuna''s forearm.
? ? ?
Gideon backed up. I don''t think your average warehouse security would wear battlefield armor. In addition to the faceplate, they were wearing greaves and gloves with metal plates stitched into them. They probably had a chestplate underneath their trench coats. Bandits. NPCs or players? It didn''t matter. Sarge had told the whole team to treat everyone else as an alpha player. Otherwise, they might get caught off-guard and PK''d. "What''re you doing in here?" Gideon snarled, "I''m going to call security."
Flanked on each side by three others, the tallest said in a man''s resonant baritone, "Don''t play dumb," and stretched his hand out, palm up, to Gideon and Stef. "Just hand it over and no one gets hurt."
"Standards?" Gideon pointed to the safe. "In there, but I don''t have the combo."
"Look, do you wanna get hurt like those guys outside?" In a well-practiced quick draw, the man whipped out his wakizashi and sliced it through the air inches away from Gideon and Stef''s faces.
They stumbled backwards and fell down. Stef leaned in close to Gideon''s ear and whispered, "They''re going to kill us. Give it to them."
Shit, they got Jeremy, Peter, and Greg. Gideon held the bag up to the man.
Wrenching it out of Gideon''s hands, the man yanked it open, and thrust his hand inside. Pulling out a crystal-encrusted black rock, he stared and laughed at it. "Closer." He waved over one of his men who was holding a glow stick. After resheathing his wakizashi and taking a cutter''s lens out of his inner pocket, the man squinted through it as he examined the rock in the palm of his hand. "Jackpot!"
After dropping it back into the bag, which he then stuffed into an inner pocket, he pointed to Gideon and Stef. "Tie them up and frisk them."
"We don''t have any more," Gideon said.If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
"Shut the fuck up!" the man said.
The rope cinched tight around Gideon''s wrists, Shit! He grimaced. Why does the websuit hurt so damn much? I only set it to the midpoint, five. "Pain threshold," he subvocalized. Nothing displayed. Calm down, remember, you''re trapped. At least I won''t piss my pants.
"Nothing else?" the man said to his men. They shook their heads. "How disappointing." He loosened his helmet strap. "What''s your level?" he said to Gideon and Stef sitting next to each other on the floor with their backs against the wall.
Gideon eyed him. Level? If we''re higher than him, he might kill us for the XP. Leveling up is pretty easy, but I''d better not take any chances. "Zero."
Gideon nudged Stef with his shoulder. "Zero," Stef said.
"That''s it? Not even level five? Even if you just joined today, it only takes a few hours. We''ve been in-game for three days now and we''ve already hit level twelve." He scowled at Gideon and Stef. "Worthless pieces of shit." He started to turn around. "Let''s go."
"But, you told us..." two of his men said at the same time.
"You know, the XP gain is only worth a menial encounter," the man said. Seeing their hard faces, he sighed. "I think it''s a waste, but go ahead and have your fun."
The two men grinned like maniacs and unsheathed their tanto. They gripped Gideon and Stef''s hair and jerked their heads back to expose their bare white necks.
"Wait, wait, I can open the safe for you," Gideon said through gritted teeth.
"I got what I want," the man said and patted his trench coat above the pocketed bag of quantite. "Nothing could be more valuable than these babies."
"No, no, there''s more in the safe," Stef said.
"You think I''m going to give you a chance to pull a fast one on me." He walked over and slammed his fist into Stef''s face.
Stef grunted as his head snapped back. The cracking of cartilage echoed off the walls.
"No one treats me like an idiot." He cleared his throat and spat a green glob of mucous in Stef''s eye. "Let this be a lesson to our would-be competitors and let our exploits strike awe and fear into their hearts." The man unstrapped his helmet and his faceplate. From the sides of his head, two red-striped ears coated with fine hairs popped out and twitched. From the back of his head, a braid sprung out like a flame, and his beard was a raging wildfire all across his face.
He pointed at Gideon. "You, be my messenger. Tell everyone it was Hiro of the Flaming Fox Brigade."
The color drained from Gideon''s face. Just our luck, out of the hundred players, we just had to run into the Flaming Fox Brigade.
Hiro bowed to Stef. "You, be my example. I wish you better luck in your next spawn." With a flourish of his hand, Hiro proffered Stef''s neck to his men.
Tanto blades caressed Stef''s neck and he screamed.
Stef twisted his head away from the blade and he yelled at the top of his lungs, "log out, log out!"
Seconds ticked away in silence. They''d all tried it before, but Stef had panicked.
Hiro''s men had dropped their tanto to their sides.
"Oh my fucking God," Hiro said as he knitted his brow. "Everyone, check your logout menu," Hiro said.
While Hiro''s men fumbled around exactly like Gideon and everyone else on Sarge''s team had days ago, Gideon slid his wrists up and down to loosen the rope and whispered, "execute escape with max chi."
Standard skill test: You suck too! Boy, you guys are having a bad day. Ganbatte, Foxy!
Effective attributes
Dex = 66 * 0.01 = +0.66%
Chi = 90 * 0.05 +4.5%
Success probability = 5.91%
Result = Utter failure
Chi (Updated)= 70 - 70 = 0
I forgot to allocate my twenty free attributes from leveling up.
"Did it work?" Stef whispered, his voice hoarse. The smooth cut in his neck dribbled blood onto his black bodysuit.
Gideon shook his head.
"Fuck, me neither," Stef said.
Not one of Hiro''s men could log out, connect to chat outside of their party, or take off their VR helmets or websuits. "Dammit, I''m at level zero!" one of Hiro''s men said. "Me too," said another.
"Well, I''ll be ass-fucked," Hiro said.
Gideon chuckled to himself. Only now did they figure out they couldn''t log out. Hiro sure likes to talk. If I could keep him talking until Sarge gets here, we could get the quantite back. "It''s the rumor." Gideon smiled.
"What rumor?" Hiro said.
"How could you not hear?" Gideon said.
"We don''t get a lot of Internet access in the Alcatraz of the Rockies."
Gideon and Stef gave Hiro a blank look.
"Do I have to carve it out of your gut?" Hiro said and slipped a tanto out from his belt underneath his trench coat.
"No, no, we heard that players are getting stuck in the game," Gideon said.
"That''s fucking nuts. I don''t believe it."
"Then why can''t you log out? Why can''t anyone log out?"
"How the fuck am I supposed to know?" Hiro said.
"Maybe they immobilized our bodies?" Gideon said.
"Whatever," Hiro said. Then his eyes hardened and he smirked. "When I was locked up, some guysthey were from Arizona or Nevada or somewhere out Westsaid they had their own land until it was stolen by the government. They said it was their right and they were going to fight for it. So, I got to thinking about having my own plot of land away from the cityand the cops." He chuckled. "There''s a lot of free land here." Sheathing his tanto, he glanced up at the ceiling. "Shit, I''ve been running at the mouth again. Their friends could get here any minute." He turned around and took a step towards the door.
"But what about them?" the man who''d almost slit Stef''s throat said and stabbed his tanto in Gideon and Stef''s direction.
"What the fuck are you smoking? Or maybe your brain froze over because obviously you forgot we''re down to level zero." As Hiro reached for the door knob, something bumped against the wall.
Hiro took several steps back. "Form up on me!" They formed a V with its open end facing the door and Hiro at its apex. They waited, each one in a middle-position fighting stance, a wakizashi in one hand and a tanto in the other.
Hiro''s gang waited for the attackers to charge through the door, but Gideon knew Sarge was patient.
Gideon and Stef yawned.
Hiro and the two men on either side of him swayed back and forth like they were drunk.
"Sleep spell!" Hiro pushed the men on either side of him towards the door. "Prof, you next. Charge!"
A man threw the door open and they all piled through, one stumbled. Two baseball-sized fireballs rocketed across the open doorway and exploded with loud bangs. Harmless sparks splashed into the room and sputtered on the floor.
Hiro''s gang disappeared down the corridor.
Sarge, Marge, and Rox strode into the room. Greg limped in after them. Rox bent a glow stick and set it down on the desk. Both of her hands were singed.
Marge set the first aid kit down on the ground and cleaned up Stef''s face, including his broken nose.
"Keep watch outside," Sarge said to Greg and Rox.
"We''ve got to go after them!" Gideon said.
"No need," Sarge said. "Ken''s trailing them."
"I''m sorry," Gideon said as he hung his head, "they got it, the quantite."
"All of it?" Sarge said.
Gideon nodded.
Sarge smacked her fist into the palm of her other hand. "Dammit, who are they?" Sarge asked.
He told her about the Flaming Fox Brigade, how they hadn''t realized they were trapped in the game, and that they were reset back to level zero.
"Isn''t that just dandy, the Flaming Fox Brigade''s on the quest too," Sarge said.
"Those guys are bloodthirsty killers," he said. "They wanted to cut our throats just for the pleasure of it."
"I know, Hiro''s a gang-banger," Sarge said. Then she said to herself, "I thought they put him away and threw away the key?"
"Yeah, they said they didn''t have Internet access in Alcatraz," Gideon said.
"That tourist spot?" Sarge said.
"Uh, what did he say exactly?" Gideon said and tilted his head.
"''Alcatraz of the Rockies''." Stef said.
"Great, that''s the Florence Supermax." She ran her hand through her hair. "They must all be hardcore criminals. How could they let jailed convicts into the game?"
Gideon covered his eyes with both of his hands. He felt like shit. How could he had let them get away? It was because he was a coward. He''d been afraid of being killed not only in-game but also in real life. He didn''t know if his body would die without his consciousness. Then, to his horror, he remembered. "Sarge. Greg, Jeremy, and Pete were in back"
? ? ?
"Didn''t you see Greg?" Betsy said. Poor Gideon, he''s still in shock and groggy from Marge''s sleep spell.
"Greg?" Gideon searched the room.
"Hey, Gideon," Greg said from the doorway. "Over here."
Gideon''s face lit up, but then he frowned. "What about Pete? And Jeremy?"
Qian rushed into the room. "What happened? Where''s Gideon and Stef?"
"Everyone''s fine," Sarge said and stood up straight. "Report."
Qian glanced around. "Prasuna''s"
Prasuna plodded in, her arm wrapped in a makeshift sling.
"Marge, help her," Betsy said.
"Where''s Ken?" Qian said.
"He''s on recon," Betsy glared at Qian. It wasn''t like Qian to get flustered like this, but Betsy had to reestablish order. "Report. Why weren''t you at your post?"
II''m sorry, Sarge," Qian said. "I decided we had to let the headless horses out."
"Headless horses?" Sarge said. She knew it was a fantasy game, but with all these new creatures and species it was getting to be a little too much to process.
"It was..." Prasuna said and started to stand up from the chair, but Marge put her hand on Prasuna''s shoulder and continued to ice her forearm.
"Yeah, they were some kind of weird creature, but I take full responsibility," Qian said.
"Don''t worry about it," Betsy said, sat down in a chair at the desk across from Prasuna, and crossed her legs. She stared out into space.
Qian turned to Marge. "What''s going on?"
After Marge brought Qian and Prasuna up to speed, Prasuna shook Betsy''s shoulder. "Hey, Sarge, what''re we going to do?"
Betsy stared at nothing. How could I have let this happen? Jeremy and Pete are gone. We''re all trapped and now there are gang-bangers in the game. Did I make the right decisions? I should''ve charged into the room. I should''ve known they''d be at level zero. But Greg barely got away. What if they hadn''t been level zero? We might all be dead. Did she really have the mettle to be a leader? The goals was to get as many of them out of the game alive as she could, nevertheless it was a given that some would die. She''d been too cautious, too unwilling to risk even one of her friends dying. They would simply disappear. No corpse to bury. That''s what Greg had said. He''d been shaken to his very core. On the one hand, without a corpse, it wasn''t real. They could still hope they were alive, but on the other hand, there was no closure and the hope and the fear might eat her team alive. She brought up her in-game clock. It was day four. She propped her elbow up on the table, rested her chin in her hand, and massaged her temples. Their only hope was Ken. If he could follow the Flaming Fox Brigade to their base, then her team could raid them and retrieve the quantite.
The door flew open. With Ken''s arm draped over Greg''s shoulder, Greg dragged Ken''s slumped form into the room and lowered him into the chair across the table from Betsy.
Ken rested one hand on the table and pushed himself up. The broken shaft of an arrow protruded out of his chest through his blood-soaked trench coat. "I lost them."
Chapter 12: Is Reality Objective or Relative? (Part 1 of 2)
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Coming to Meet
Betsy bolted out of her chair. He couldn''t have lost them. "How could you?"
"I''m not a shinobi class."
Qian walked up to Ken. "Tailing doesn''t take a shinobi class, noob." She stared down at him.
Ken looked down at the table. "I''m sorry. I don''t know why but all of sudden I felt dizzy, kind of disoriented."
Rox rested her hand on Ken''s shoulder and glared at Qian. "Give him a break, it was a spell of confusion."
"Whatever, man, if he was experienced, he would''ve powered through it. That''s what I would''ve done." Qian pointed her thumb at her chest.
"You got that right," Prasuna said. "Besides, wasn''t he supposed to be extremely knowledgeable and therefore invaluable to our team."
"Enough," Betsy said and sliced through the air with her hand. She couldn''t let this bickering tear the team apart.
"''Enough'' isn''t good enough anymore," Qian snorted. "You got us into this mess."
"And I''m going to get us out of it," Betsy said.
"Is that right?" Qian said. "Don''t tell me your idea is to go south to Shimonoseki. That''s going to waste two whole days! That''ll take us down to nineteen days."
"That''s right," Prasuna said. "The ultimatum said we only have twenty-four days and we already spent two days getting here and another day wasted trying to steal the quantite."
"Or maybe you think we can sprout wings and fly over the Great Abyss?" Qian cackled.
Betsy gritted her teeth. If only Ken hadn''t screwed up. No, no, it was her own fault. She should''ve sent Marge. The stress was getting to her. After all, it wasn''t a game anymore.
"I propose a no-confidence motion," Qian said and in turn stared each person in the eyes. "Who''s going to second me?"
"Who''s going to lead? You?" Greg pointed his chin at Qian.
"Damn right," Qian said and stuck her thumbs into her belt.
"Well, let''s hear it. We can''t have a no-confidence vote without hearing your idea on how''re we going to get our first shard," Greg said.
"We gotta find those thieves and get our quantite back," Qian said.
"Sounds like a plan to me," Stef said and elbowed Gideon in the side.
"Yeah, me too," Gideon said.
Stef and Gideon shuffled closer to Qian and Prasuna.
"They''re long gone," Ken said.
"Do a divination," Qian pointed at Greg.
"It''s not that easy," Greg said. "We don''t have anything of theirs."
"Just do it, dammit," Qian said. "That''s an order."
"You can''t order me around." Greg glared at her. "Sarge is still"
"I resign," Betsy said.
"What?" Greg sputtered. "You can''tI won''t accept it, right, Ken?"
Ken strode up and stood shoulder to shoulder with Greg. "Marge? Rox?"
Marge and Rox bowed their heads and looked down at the cold, concrete floor.
Staring at Marge and Rox, Greg stretched his upraised palm out towards Qian. "What does she know, anyways? Compared to Sarge, she''s no better than a level 1 mob."
"What the hell?" Qian clicked her wakizashi out of its scabbard.
Sarge stepped in between the two groups. "Now wait a sec"
The hallway resounded with the sound of neighing and the thunder of horses galloping.
"Why are they still here?" Prasuna ran to the door.
"What are they?" Ken asked.
"They''re headless horses," Prasuna said and ran to the door. "Poor headless horses, but we freed them. Why do they want to stay here, what used to be their torture chamber?"
"Headless horses?" Ken said.
Prasuna turned the doorknob and the door flew open. Outside stood gigantic horse legs like pillars that rose up to its belly. Its body was wider than two doors. It lowered its headless neck and stuck it through the doorway. Prasuna pet its brown mane with her hand. It nickered.
"I can''t believe it, we''re saved!" Ken exclaimed.
"What the hell are you yelling about?" Qian said, her arms akimbo.
"They''re kubi-kire-uma," Ken said. "They can fly."
? ? ?
Day 5
Betsy stood in a slush-filled field on the leeward side of a massive granite outcropping, her head bent backwards, eyes staring up into the clear night sky, the stars rotating like clockwork. The headland gales whistled over their heads. The howling of ghosts surged through the cracks and crevices of the wall of rock, the ramparts of an ancient fortress staving off the hunger of the Great Abyss.
With their aviator caps and goggles strapped over animal hide balaclava, all nine of them stood next to five mounts. Insulated trench coats wrapped their bodies in a tight embrace. Their arms hung at their sides and ended in gloves as thick as a boxer''s. They inhaled as one and exhaled as one, creating a circle of glowing ground fog.
Prasuna walked around hugging and talking to each kubi-kire-uma in turn. The last one was the smallest, a scrawny uma. "Now, don''t be scared, Mits. I know you can do it. We gave you only one rider." Prasuna smiled at Rox who tightened up the straps holding the four supply packs onto the back of Mit. "Even though you get extra packs."Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
She walked up to Betsy. "All ready to rock ''n roll, Sarge."
She patted Prasuna on the shoulder. "We couldn''t have done it without you. Your animal husbandry skill was such a life saver."
"I don''t know how I got it, but I''ve always loved animals."
Betsy only smiled. She didn''t want to worry everyone. The system knew what their strengths were in real life. Even though they''d all been busted down to level zero, each one of them had a skill that was three levels higher. Betsy''s skill was leadership.
Betsy took a deep breath. "Mount up!" After Ken''s pronouncement, Betsy had handily defeated the no-confidence vote. Qian''s vote had stood alone.
Everyone climbed up rope ladders and settled on the backs of their uma: two per uma, except for Greg, her second in command, and Rox, who was seated on her uma in front of them. They were arranged in a line facing Rox. One by one, starting with Betsy, Rox pointed her stave and began the incantation to bring up an individual shield for each uma and mounted riders. She had to be the last because you couldn''t cast through shields. Betsy had arranged it so Rox and their smallest and slowest uma was behind the screen, which faced any potential attack from the road, and within the shelter of the outcropping. The road rather than a ship behind them was the most likely direction of an attack, but by placing their position right behind the outcropping, she''d also protected them against a potential ship-borne attack. She''d feel a lot better when they were actually airborne.
Something caught her eye in one of the picture-in-picture screens in her in-game HUD. As the leader, she could see from every team member''s point of view as well as see their stats updated in real-time. She pulled up Stef''s view in split-screen mode. His skill was scout and she''d positioned him at the end of the line opposite from herself. Placing her forefinger on the section of the road hidden by a small hill, she said, "zoom." Bare branches stuck out from behind the crest of the hillock.
Out of the corner of her eye, Betsy watched Rox turned her stave on herself to activate her own shield.
She focused back on Stef''s view. Those aren''t tree branches. "Everyone, fall back to my position!" Dammit, Rox''s shield''s not up and she''s the slowest. "Stef and Gideon protect Rox!"
Stef and Gideon galloped over to Rox. A salvo of arrows flew through the air and bounced off their shields, but one struck Rox in the thigh.
"Run, Mits!" Rox said. It ran as fast as its short legs could carry it.
Betsy checked Rox''s stats.
HP = 30 (35)
She''s still okay.
Another flight of arrows clattered off the shields. An arrow skewered Rox''s neck and she slumped down in her saddle.
Critical hit
Damage: 6 * 5
HP (remaining): 0 (unconscious)
Stef jumped off of his uma and onto Rox''s and held Rox upright. Staunching the flow of blood from her neck with his bare hand, they galloped away from the onslaught of arrows.
Once Stef and Rox were on the line, Betsy ordered everyone to follow Greg to the launch point. Hail after hail of arrows rained down on them, but the arrows inflicted only a single point of damage each. Their shields were fifty points each. Betsy sighed in relief. Buying the shield scroll today had been a smart choice. Everyone had been busy preparing for their flight across the Great Abyss and consequently nobody had gotten an ounce of sleep since the failed raid to steal the quantite early this morning.
One after the other, they galloped full speed down the path around the outcropping. Once there they''d launch themselves out into the void. Betsy and Ken on their own umas would be the last ones. After surveying the battlefield with a quick glance, she turned the uma and started down the path.
The rain of arrows stopped.
Not good. I was hoping they were cowards. She twisted around in her saddle.
A huge man with white hair and a white beard stood on the crest of the hill and with both hands shook his tachi in the air. "You can''t escape! The Blizzard Berserker King has ordered your execution and it''s my job to bring you back!" He wasn''t human; he was a tanuki-ningen. Calvin.
Scores of tanuki-ningen soldiers in heavy trench coats and brandishing katanas and naginatas marched up on either side of him. Underneath their bronze helmets glinting in the dull light, dirty balaclava hid their faces. They roared as one roughly spined animal and charged down the slope towards Betsy and Ken.
"Hurry," Ken said. "We can still launch before they catch up to us."
"No, we have injured." This was their first launch. Ken had read the online manual. Because of the lower gravity in abysses, kubi-kire-uma could fly in abysses but not over land. They were lucky he knew the proper name for them. The online manual didn''t have a table of contents nor even an index.
How did Calvin find us? At least, he''s not a legendary level. With these shields, a mount, and the two of us, we might be able to take him out. It''s risky if I let them follow us down to the launch point. Betsy slid her katana and wakizashi out of their scabbards. "All we need to do is take out Calvin."
"Got it," Ken said as he drew his own katana and wakizashi.
He was a good man.
"Charge!" she subvocalized to Branine, her uma, and pointed at Calvin who was in the center of the incoming mob.
Branine rocketed forwards, his hooves tore up the slush and mud and flung globs of it up in the air. Betsy and Ken lurched back and forth.
The shield knocked two soldiers out of the way, but one of the soldiers on their left stood still and let the shield pass around him. Once inside, he slashed at Betsy. She parried it and the soldier''s blade struck Branine''s side, but it bounced off as though it had hit plate armor.
Non-penetrating hit
Kubi-kire-uma
Armor Class: 75
Ken''s wakizashi sliced into the soldier''s shoulder and stopped when it hit the collarbone. Ken yanked it out. Blood leaked out around the cut. When the soldier took a step back out of range, another one stepped in through the shield and slashed at Ken with a naginata. Its tip easily penetrated through the trench coat and hide armor and gouged his side. He grimaced. The soldier came in with his naginata again, but Ken parried it.
More soldiers entered the shield, but Calvin stayed outside.
"We''re getting swarmed! We have to dismount," Betsy said. "Cover me."
Ken nodded.
As Betsy slid off, Ken blocked a naginata strike from the right.
Ken jumped off and his boots sunk into the mud up over his ankles. He took two sinking steps and turned himself around. His back touched hers for a moment. Back to back, Betsy hacked right and left clearing a way to Calvin. When she stepped, Ken stepped with her. When he started to step, she followed. They were in a rhythm. Moving in lock-step, he parried and thrust, protecting her rear and their flanks while she moved them closer to Calvin. Adrenalin pumped throughout her body and brain. It was a rush she''d never felt before.
After moving beyond the safety of their shield, she swung her katana at Calvin. He blocked it and shoved her blade aside. Then, the path of his strike made a physically impossible correction and curved in towards her body. She was barely able to move her wakizashi in to block it. Their blades clanged together, but the momentum of Calvin''s pushed her own back and his blade cut a deep swath across her abdomen. It sliced through her trench coat and hide armor underneath like they were dried leaves.
Gasping, she stumbled backwards.
"Just give up!" Calvin boomed, his two massive hands wrapped around the hilt of his five-foot tachi. "I won''t kill you. I only need to stop Ken."
He''s lying, he must know we''re all going on the Empress''s quest. Wait, I get it, that was a special attack and now he''s trying to distract me during in its cooldown phase. "Switch!"
They spun around in place and Ken charged Calvin exactly like a tank should. Moving with him, she deflected strikes from either side. Using his tank combo, he body slammed Calvin, stunning Calvin and then he slashed with his katana, cutting deep into Calvin''s chest. Calvin stumbled backwards two steps. Ken moved in for his special attack and thrust his katana straight into Calvin''s abdomen. "Switch!" Ken said.
They spun around in-place again.
Calvin''s health bar was in the yellow and his hulking body lumbered like a zombie. The front of his trench coat was soaked red.
She grimaced. Each move stretched and tore the gash in her abdomen even wider and blood gushed out. She was dizzy, but she only needed to keep Calvin at bay until Ken recovered his special attack. Having been handed the leader specialty, she didn''t have any special combos. She aimed a low sweeping blow at his legs just in case she got lucky and scored a critical hit. She missed.
Calvin''s tachi came whistling down on her head. Deflecting it with her wakizashi, it slid off of her blade and sunk deep into her shoulder. She grimaced as blood seeped out through the cut in the her armor and trench coat. Her health bar was in the red and she could feel it. She was more than winded.
"Switch," Ken said.
There were three soldiers attacking them now. As she parried their strikes, two strikes got through. One slashed her arm and another stabbed her in the chest. Ten or twenty soldiers had surrounded Branine and we''re hammering away at him. Dumb mobs. They couldn''t stray too far away from their boss.
In her other picture-in-picture screens, she saw that everyone had already launched. Good, we don''t need to kill Calvin. Then again, the XP would be a big boost and Calvin was already in the red.
Activating his special combo again, Ken charged Calvin. She stumbled after Ken as best she could. She didn''t even have to think about it. They were like a single gear with its axis centered in the space between their backs. Sometimes, their backs grazed each other and she felt the straining of his muscles, the power of his will. She felt him thrust his katana into Calvin.
Ken''s shoulder bumped into hers as he readied to strike again. Vocal communication had become superfluous. In her HUD, Calvin''s health bar was a mere sliver of red. Ken was going to strike the final blow, but Calvin was also readying his final boss combo. What would it be?
Legs as thick as stone pillars slid around her right side. In front of her, the flash of a tachi blade.
As though welded together into a single human gear, Betsy and Ken swiveled around and spun up as their twin blades whirled about in a dervish fervor.
Betsy looked down at her legs. Blood gushed out of the femoral arteries of both her legs. The kisaki tip of a five-foot tachi lay embedded in the brown sludge. Her boots and her legs up to the middle of their thighs flew through the air away from her.
Chapter 12: Is Reality Objective or Relative? (Part 2 of 2)
A light breeze streamed through Betsy''s hair, fluttering like tendrils of fog. She opened her eyes to blackness. She was falling. The stench of stale sweat and dried blood assaulted her nostrils. I can still smell things in the deva heavens? No, I must be in one of the narakas. Which one? What crimes did I commit? It must be the eternally-falling naraka. I forgot what sin one had to commit to be incarcerated in it, but isn''t that what the Great Abyss is? After Calvin dismembered my legs from my body, he and his henchmen threw me into the Great Abyss. Oh God, I hope Ken was able to get away with the others. Regret. One of the attachments. If I can''t let go, I''ll never be able to move on. Oh, Kumaris Kumar okay? I''ve got to save him!
"Betsy! How do you feel? Can you talk?"
The voice sounded familiar, a man''s comforting voice. She turned her head to the side, towards the voice. Ken smiled at her and wiped the tears from his eyes with the back of his hand.
"You can''t be here!" She swallowed and a lump formed in her throat. "You have to take care of the others, you have to find"
"We''re all here, it''s okay," Ken said and patted her shoulder.
"No, no, it can''t be." Her heart beat faster. "He was in the red."
"That''s right! Thanks to you, we defeated Calvin and now we''re crossing the Great Abyss." He squeezed her shoulder.
"But why are we falling in the Great Abyss?" She lifted her head up, her neck and jaw tightening up like a vice. "Why are we dead?"
"We''re not falling. We''re crossing the Great Abyss on the kure-kiri-uma." He massaged her shoulders. "And we''re not dead." He slid his hands under her head and held it as though she were a newborn. "Lay your head back down."
Her hands clutched at something silky. No, something softer than silk. She turned her head. like wild grass, long tufts of horse''s hair sprung out from in between her fingers. The hair spread out all across the back of the kure-kiri-uma and it felt like a plush carpet with a pile inches thick supporting her.
She started to heave herself up on her elbows.
"No, you still need to rest." Ken held her down with his strong hands on her shoulders. "The balm can''t completely heal critical hits, but it did bring you back up to almost half strength. Now you need to rest to get back up to full strength.
"What balm?"
"Qian''s," he said.
"Qian has a healing balm?" she said. It was a rule that upon acquisition all items were to become team property. "I have to see," Betsy said and propped herself up on her elbows. No legs. To be accurate, they''d been cut off mid-thigh. She should be dead. "Why didn''t you run?"
"Didn''t have to. We''d already dispatched Calvin and I carried you off the battlefield. Now lie back down."
While she lowered herself, he supported her with his hands under her back and neck.
"You make it sound so easy," Betsy said and held his hand.
He laughed that childish laugh of his. "Wading through the crowd of NPC soldiers wasn''t exactly a walk in the park, but we made it."
"Did my dead weight slow you down that much?" Betsy said.
Ken''s face drooped.
"Next time, I''ll be sure to get cut off at the neck." She smiled and tried to punch him in the arm, but only tapped him instead.
They both laughed.
She lifted her head to look around. Two uma flanked them on either side and one behind. They alternated their altitude like clockwork to cover the approaches from above and below. Greg was in command and floated here and there. They were well-trained. She was so proud of them.
Behind her, Rox lay on the back of Mits who was hitched by a long rope to Betsy and Ken''s. A tear slid from the corner of Betsy''s eye and down her temple. Ken told her that Rox was going to be fine, having had received the same treatment. He also told her that according the map of the Great Abyss, they were on schedule with an ETA of ten hours to the first waypoint, a floating island.
Betsy slept.
? ? ?
Day 5
Standing in a rock-walled foyer, Qian turned on the steel faucet and fresh water poured into the silk-like bladder. Qian handed the full bladder to Prasuna who screwed the plug in and tied the bladder to a wooden pole with the seven others for a total of eight, four on each end.
"This cistern cave''s like an amazing oasis," Prasuna said, gazing around as she grasped the pole with both hands, got under it in a squat position, and then hefted it up with her broad shoulders. Illuminated by the glow sticks belted to Prasuna and Qian''s waists, the rock walls glistened with rivulets of water. In patches here and there on the walls, fluorescent green and red lichen pulsated like lungs inhaling and exhaling. Cool and humid air circulated in the cave like in a redwood forest. Prasuna inhaled the aroma of pine and bark with a hint of dried leaves.
"I bet the uma would love it here," Prasuna said. "Especially Mits."
"We don''t have time for your childish games," Qian said, resting her hand on Prasuna''s shoulder and then letting is slide off, her fingertips brushing Prasuna''s upper sleeve. Currents of air circulated around Qian, making her close-cropped black hair wave like fresh-cut grass in a summer breeze. "They''re waiting back at the dock. We gotta get moving."
As they hoofed it back through the dark passageways, it wasn''t long before they were winded. Only after having breathed the fresh air in the cistern cave, did Qian realize that the air in the passageways stunk, literally. Black mold and black mushrooms dotted the cracks and crevices in the walls, ceiling, and floor. She sure was stupid not to have thought of it before, but they were probably releasing thousands of spores and they were inhaling them deep into their lungs. Her spine tingled. She picked up the pace.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.
"Can''t we take a break?" Prasuna said from far behind Qian. "I got a stitch in my side." As a shinobi class, Qian wasn''t as strong as the warrior-class Prasuna and so Qian had to play point. That''s why Qian was carrying only two bladders on her pole. That was their team tactic: tank and stealth.
Qian slowed down until they were side by side. "We''ll keep this pace until your cramp is gone, but it''s not safe here."
"It''s abandoned, this island, and its dungeon cleared. Even if they''re some boss minions still here, we''ll take care of them." Prasuna slapped Qian in the back with a bladder.
Qian stumbled. "Stop it."
Qian glared at Prasuna and then laughed. "It''s not that, it''s the"
"What is it, then? Just because everyone''s been busted down to level zero, doesn''t mean we can''t do our jobs. We weren''t the best in the Three Kingdoms, but if we hadn''t cleared the path to the Drunken Oni boss, Sarge would''ve never gotten in position."
Qian slapped at Prasuna with one of her bladders but missed.
Prasuna stuck her tongue out. "Right? Am I right?"
"Yeah, yeah, but remember, we only do it ''cuz the loot''s good," Qian said.
"You can''t fool me, Qian Trang. You actually care about other people\besides me, your BFF."
Qian frowned and snorted. "Sarge gives out the best of the loot to her team. Remember the Jacks?"
"Don''t remind me," Prasuna said and smacked a fist into her hand. "The leaders got all the high-level items, but we were like bragging to everyone when we got a shitload of cryptocurrency. Then it crashed the next day. My sister never let me live it down."
"It was like we''d already worked our asses off." Qian spat. "Then they said bend over and pull your pants down a little further. They should''ve called it Buttcoin."
"Oh my virgin ears," Prasuna said. "I just know that somewhere underneath that crude, rough exterior lurks a gentle and caring person. I mean, how else could the noob get a hold of the last of your secret stash of instant healing balm?"
"It was for Sarge."
"A little bird told me that he''d magically pulled it out of his trench coat pocket."
Qian shrugged her shoulders and sprinted ahead.
Huffing and puffing, Prasuna finally caught up to her. "II also heard he stayed at the Snow Rabbit Inn."
Qian stared straight ahead.
"Did you see him?"
"I was off on a hunt."
Prasuna''s eyes glittered. "Did you do your divination on him?"
"Are you stupid? Exactly like everyone else, I lost all of my skills when we got trapped and reset back to level zero."
"That was days before the reset." Prasuna gulped. "Whawhat was the hexagram number?"
Qian was silent for more than a minute. The slapping of their boots on the stone blocks echoed from one end of the passageway to the other. They turned the corner into the last passageway that connected to the dock. The light from the dock shone a hundred feet in front of them.
Prasuna latched a hand on Qian''s biceps, but Qian shook her off. Prasuna fell behind.
"Twenty-nine, The Abysmal (Water), but with two changing lines," Qian said.
Prasuna was almost out of earshot. "Twenty what?"
"Twenty-nine!" Then, Qian''s boot squelched on a mat of red-veined black mushrooms. A velvet black liquid squirted out. An odor like rotting meat mixed with feces assaulted her nostrils. Covering her mouth with one hand, Qian gagged. Then, her eyes began to burn. While bolting ahead, Qian waved Prasuna away with one arm. "Stay back!"
Qian''s lungs burned and she coughed and vomited. She tripped and flew through the air, slamming down on her hands and knees. She skidded to a halt. The pole with the bladders banged against the wall. "Poison gas!"
Poison gas attack
Damage: 4 * 3
HP (remaining): 63
Continuous damage: 1/min.
Prasuna cupped her hands around her mouth. "Help! It''s me, Prasuna! Qian''s hurt!"
With each gasp for air, Qian''s lungs burned. Water. With her eyes clenched shut, she reached to her right. Nothing. She scrambled to her left. Nothing.
"Behind you!"
She scuttled around. Her arm banged into a soft bag. After picking it up, she unscrewed the top, and guzzled water down. It soothed her throat but it started to burn again after only a few seconds and she guzzled more, again and again.
Neighing. Pounding of footsteps. Hands picking her up and carrying her.
"Qian! We have it, your balm," Prasuna said.
Qian''s stomach heaved and she vomited for a full minute.
She opened her mouth, pointed down her throat, and then made swirling motions with her hand. "Mix\" She started coughing again.
"She''s in the yellow," Prasuna said. "Hand me the cup."
Someone''s hands grabbed Qian''s cheeks and put a cup to her mouth.
"Sip but don''t gulp it down," Prasuna said.
Qian couldn''t swallow past the huge lump in her throat. She let the liquid pool in the back of her mouth. It seeped down into her throat. It felt so cool. Hands massaged balm into her eyes and all over her face. It stung but then her eyes cooled as well.
"Her health bar isn''t dropping anymore. She''s stabilized. Let''s get her back," Sarge said.
Qian reached out, her hand floundering around. Another hand, calloused on the palm at the base of the fingers, squeezed Qian''s.
? ? ?
Day 9
"Solid land," Ken said, leaping off his uma. After lying down prone on the beach, he kissed the brown sand. He spat and then hefted himself up and wiped his mouth.
Greg clapped Ken on the shoulder. "Man, would you just look at those beautiful mountains off in the distance?" The daytime moonlight glinted off the hulking glaciers omnipresent in The White Imperium. Ken never would''ve thought he''d be happy to see those frozen monstrosities you could see off in the distance from anywhere except in the Great Abyss. It meant they were finally across, on the other side. It had been six days.
Everyone else except for Betsy and Qian had dismounted as well and were milling about in a daze.
"All right, let''s start heading to the town unless everyone wants to rough it another night," Betsy said.
Everyone groaned.
One after another, the twelve moons descended below the horizon. By the time the group reached the small town, the last moon had gone to sleep. It was the darkest and the coldest time of the twenty-four hour day in The White Imperium.
"How did we get graveyard shift again?" Stef said as he swayed back and forth on his uma.
"Sarge said we were used to it," Gideon said. "And we put all our points from the island battles into shinobi skills." He stuck his finger up one nostril and picked at the dry snot. "Hey, turn right. We just passed through the gate, you knucklehead."
"Oh right," Stef said and groaned. "Geez man, I don''t sleep well at all during daylightwell day moonlight."
"Stop you''re whining, we got to chow down first," Stef said. "Tasty, lamb stew over rice." He rubbed his belly. "Man, if I see one more chapati before the day I die, it''ll be too soon."
"And red lentils, ugh," Gideon said. "I mean I really love them both, but day after day, and you''d think Ken was a fire hydrant. My mouth turns into a forest fire every time he''s the cook."
Stef whipped his head around to look at the gate behind them. "Hey, did you hear that?"
"What?" Gideon whispered.
"The wind," Stef said.
Yanking their mounts around, they charged towards the gate.
A black blur flew down the road, hugging the sides of the buildings.
Stef leaned over close to the headless neck. "Go, Mits!" he whispered. "You see it, don''t you boy?"
Mits neighed and sped up.
The blur sped into an alley that was too narrow for either Mits or Gideon''s mount. Mits slammed to a halt and Stef leaped off onto the roof of the building. He ran, his feet clanging on the metal roof. Less than a second later, Gideon was running on the roof of the building on the other side of the alley. Stef unclipped two shuriken from his belt and threw them at the blur running in the alley below.
At the same exact moment, Gideon rocketed forward like rock from a catapult.
One shuriken whipped by the blur, mere millimeters in front, and the other one to its right. Slowing, the blur swerved to the left. Gideon caught one shuriken between his thumb and forefinger and skidded to a halt. The blur slid low and twisted, found purchase on the wall and flipped up to the roof.
"Well, what have we here," Stef said, with his arms crossed and tapping his boot on the roof.
Appendix: Playlist
Everyone has their own take on a story, but here''s some music that I imagine matches something--mood, feelings, action, characters, themes--in each chapter.
Chapters
Compositions
1 - 2
ElectroCity Far Out Ft. Karra - Truest Lies (VIP Mix)
https://soundcloud.com/user-16974873/far-out-ft-karra-truest-lies-vip-mix
Extended: MllKlGN Far Out - Truest Lies (ft. KARRA) (Loop)(Edit)
https://soundcloud.com/user-mllklgn/far-out-truest-lies-ft-karra-fixed
3
saucey Vaski ft. Ava - Insane (Original Mix)
https://soundcloud.com/sauceey/vaski-ft-ava-insane-original
How Do I Get To Invincible (feat. Ambre)
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.https://soundcloud.com/theglitchmob/how-do-i-get-to-invincible
6
Silence Nogood Blackmill - Let It Be (feat. Veela)
https://soundcloud.com/silencenogood/blackmill-veela-let-it-be
7
TBD
8
TBD
9
TBD
10
Rectormable Feed Me - Strange Behaviour (ft. Tasha Baxter)
https://soundcloud.com/rectormable/feed-me-strange-behaviour-ft
Appendix B: Background
Describes the novel''s inspiration, ideas, and source material.
Technology
Mobotacts
Portmanteau of mobo from motherboard and tacts from contacts.
For prototype technology, see:
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/515666/contact-lens-computer-like-google-glass-without-the-glasses/.
https://www.inverse.com/article/31034-augmented-reality-contact-lenses
Websuit
Simple combination of the term for the Internet and suit. For prototype technology, see: https://www.rehab.research.va.gov/jour/2015/524/jrrd-2014-05-0128.html
https://teslasuit.io/the-suit/
Collapsible VR Gaming Sphere (CVRG)
Based on the geodesic sphere invented by Walther Bauersfeld and popularized by Buckminster Fuller.
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Mythology and military