《The Digidream Chronicles》 Book 1 : Chapter 01. Last day No... there must be more. And you and I, son, we will find it. ¡ª Peter Weyland, Alien: Covenant The day Sarah¡¯s boss had his second stroke was the day she quit. Her job at Digidream was not bad; much to the contrary, it was awesome. She had been incredibly lucky to be selected for the position while being only twenty years old. She was in charge of testing different features of a highly experimental game that had been in the making for years and that was supposed to revolutionize the industry. It was so cutting edge that on occasion, even she didn¡¯t have a clue about what it was exactly she was testing. ¡°Not the industry. We will revoltionize the whole society,¡± the owner and head of the company, Victor Anderen, was fond of saying. And he was so energetic and contagious that you would find yourself agreeing with him despite yourself. He was over sixty already, but he radiated the energy of youth, as if he and Sarah were of one age. The first stroke had hit just a few months earlier, but Mr Anderen came back to the job barely two days after that, giving orders and pushing ideas among the developers. It was like nothing had happened to him, like he had just taken a couple days off. The second stroke hit the day Sarah was testing the new suspension system, designed to maximize the player¡¯s immersion. It had cost a small fortune (... well, maybe not so small) in research and development, but it was finally here: an individual levitation tank with a reticule of sensors that allowed it to register the exact position of your body, inch by inch, in order to gently push the air around you as necessary to keep you floating in place, without touching the walls or floor of the tank. This way you could let your body abstract itself from the sensory and positional feedback from the real world and get fully immersed in the game. Body and mind working together, or body and soul, as Mr Anderen liked to say. ¡°Mr Anderen, this is great,¡± Sarah said, impressed, as she explored the game world. She could barely feel the touch of the paper-thin VR band in front of her eyes, and the sound coming from inside the tank eliminated the need of earphones so there was no VR helmet or any other heavy devices weighing on her. She was wearing a skintight suit that communicated her motion and other data, like body temperature and humidity, to the computer. Floating in the air, with barely anything attached to her body, she abandoned herself to the sensations provided by the game. ¡°I wish we had finished the scenario so that you¡¯d have more to see and hear,¡± the company¡¯s owner said, ¡°but we¡¯ll have to make do with this rough draft.¡± His voice came to Sarah as if he was speaking from somewhere in the back of her head. It was weirdly intimate. Mr Anderen¡¯s words were a false apology: beneath the apparent complaint about the unfinished scenario, his voice betrayed his pride and satisfaction. And he had every right to feel satisfied. The place Sarah was exploring was amazingly rich and detailed, full of sound and vivid color, almost comparable to real life. It was a version of the Enchanted Forest. The team had been working on it for months, artists and developers collaborating closely to get it just right, but they still had work to do. You wouldn¡¯t be able to say it from being there, though. Sarah took a step and the grass and leaves emitted the appropriate sounds under the weight of her foot. She closed her eyes and listened. There were birds singing far away, and a gentle breeze played the foliage of the trees like a flute. She opened her eyes again. Light came to her in a burst, just like when you open your eyes in the real world. She let the breeze caress her scantily clad body. The game had equipped her with delicate, almost ethereal clothes, like those of a fairy. She was barefoot, and her loose hair danced around her in the playful air. ¡°Can you see this, Mr Anderen?¡± she asked, as a butterfly came to rest on her naked shoulder. She felt it tingling as the tiny legs touched her skin. She became aware of her own changed body too: the butterfly waved its wings against her ear, and the ear was big and pointy. She touched it with her hand. The tip of the ear felt just like it would feel if it were real. Her back had changed too: there were two zones where she could feel the weight and touch of parts that were attached to them where nothing had been before. Her wings. Her fairy wings. ¡°I can,¡± Victor Anderen said, his voice surging from somewhere in her own head. ¡°And it¡¯s beautiful. Why don¡¯t you try flying?¡± Sarah frowned. She had never thought of that, but of course this would be the litmus test for the new suspension system: flying had to feel different if she was actually floating in thin air instead of just standing on the floor wearing a VR headset. Let¡¯s see. How can I fly? If I try to move my wings... She tried to concentrate on the areas of her back where the wings were attached now. There were muscles there, and she would naturally be able to move them. It was like raising an arm or a leg. After a few tries, she managed to do it. Her wings trembled slightly, then agitated with more decision. A few seconds later, they were in full motion. But she was still on the ground. Oh, that¡¯s it. I have to jump. Then the wings will keep me in the air. She jumped up. She didn¡¯t make a great effort, maybe expecting to fail, but she found herself propelled upward by the force of her wings, and then hanging in the air from her back, like some clothes left out to dry. It was amazing. And beautiful. She arced her back and managed to get in a vertical position. She was a couple feet above the ground now, and it really felt like flying. She had to make a conscious effort to remind herself that she was not actually a fairy, but a human girl who was not in the Enchanted Forest but in a levitation tank inside a high-tech building. She pushed forward with her torso. Her body responded instantly. Now, she was flying. She felt the dampness in her face as tears of joy ran down her skin. She hoped Mr Anderen wouldn¡¯t notice. She pushed forward, and felt the acceleration.A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation. Suddenly, something happened. It was like a very faint tickling, embracing her whole body at once. It lasted for a fraction of a second. It was accompanied by a subdued, almost imperceptible buzzing sound, and a legend appearing right in front of her. It was written in greenish blue letters, slightly glowing, partially transparent.
Skill acquired: Flight
A notification from the game. ¡°Oh, they changed this,¡± she muttered, as she kept flying. ¡°We did. It¡¯s more organic now, and less invasive. Do you like it?¡± ¡°Yes, it¡¯s way better,¡± she replied, descending on a new area of the forest, where the vegetation was thicker and the sunlight had more trouble to pass through the foliage. The sounds had changed accordingly. Now she heard fewer birds singing and more creatures crawling and climbing the trees. Insects, of course, but maybe serpents as well, perhaps some monkey. It was more jungle than forest in this place. They must have made a compressed map for this test. If I keep going, there will be a beach and then a castle and then some snowy mountains and after that, maybe a modern city. She took a walk, stopped, turned around, and concentrated on the sensations. She gave a small jump and she was floating again. ¡°It¡¯s... it¡¯s awesome, Mr Anderen,¡± she said. She couldn¡¯t find any better words. ¡°I¡¯m here. It¡¯s like I¡¯m really here. Floating in the air, and I have wings. I can really fly. And I feel the breeze and the sounds. It¡¯s a completely different experience. If this passes all the tests¡ª¡± ¡°It has.¡± ¡°It has?¡± ¡°It has passed your test. This is all I needed. Sarah, I trust you completely.¡± Sarah felt flattered. She couldn¡¯t help it. She had been working so hard for this, and now the game was really taking shape, partly thanks to her. It was a beautiful thing what they were building, so beautiful she had cried. ¡°Is it changing?¡± ¡°What?¡± Victor Anderen asked. ¡°The forest. It¡¯s changing, right? These vines weren¡¯t here a moment ago.¡± ¡°Are you sure?¡± ¡°Yes. I looked all around and they weren¡¯t ¡ª hey!¡± The vines had taken hold of one of her feet. She jumped up and took flight, but she was pushed down again. Now she was beginning to despair. Well, this is certainly immersive, she thought as she struggled to get free. But the vines kept crawling aroung her leg, then the other. I forgot that this is just a simulation. I should be ashamed. The vines kept encircling her. They went around her knees, then her thighs, sliding over and under her tiny fairy dress. Sarah started panicking again. Even though none of this was actually happening, the sensations were all too real. She felt the pressure and the harsh, muddy touch of the vines running all over her skin, trapping her in a deadly embrace, threatening to rip her clothes off and crush her delicate wings. They were already closing around her throat when she mustered the energy to scream. ¡°NO!!!¡± And then it was all gone. She was floating inside the levitation tank, staring at a huge, dark, almost empty room. Victor Anderen was there, eyeing her with a worried expression. ¡°I¡¯m sorry, Sarah. Must have been a glitch,¡± he said, with forced casualness. She opened the tank and climbed out. She was still shuddering from the experience. ¡°Oh, it¡¯s no problem,¡± she said. ¡°I guess it¡¯s good, actually. It was incredibly realistic. I totally though I was about to die for a second. I know it was a glitch, but it felt so real. It¡¯s the most immersive experiencie I¡¯ve ever had, even since I started working here.¡± ¡°And you had a big part in that.¡± Victor Anderen was smiling now. He let his hand rest on Sarah¡¯s shoulder. He was a tall man, handsome for his years; the impeccable suit fit his air of authority. ¡°Well...¡± Sarah said. She felt almost naked with the skintight suit, and wanted to change her clothes and leave. She was supposed to meet Mike at ten, and it was already past nine. ¡°I can¡¯t stress enough how important you¡¯ve been for this project,¡± Mr Anderen said. ¡°You gave me valuable data at every step so I could envision the game world and mechanics.¡± He looked straight in her eye, and his tone became passionate as his grip on her shoulder became stronger. ¡°Sarah, we made this together.¡± OK, now things are taking a turn for the weird, Sarah thought as she shook his hand off her. She had become aware of the strangeness of the situation. No other developers or testers remained on the building; only Victor Anderen, Sarah, and security personnel. This test had taken place unusually late. Now Anderen was getting personal and maybe too physical. What did he really want to test? She felt a deep uneasiness growing inside her. All this time, she had thought her talent on the job was being appreciated... she felt flaterred that this genius, the head of a revolutionary company, was so fond of her work. And yet... ¡°I¡ªI¡¯m sorry, but I have to go now. I have a date with my boyfriend,¡± she said. The fact that it was true was completely irrelevant. Suddenly, Sarah wanted to be out of there as soon as possible. ¡°Oh, come on,¡± Mr Anderen said, his voice dripping disappointment. ¡°We are making history here. Is your boyfriend doing anything of the sort? What is his legacy?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t care,¡± Sarah said, and gave him a shove. ¡°I quit.¡± It was not a violent shove; it was caused more by fear than by anger. Mr Anderen looked surprised. ¡°Don¡¯t you understand? You¡¯re so special,¡± he said. He grabbed her by the waist, and tried to kiss her. ¡°No!¡± she shouted for a second time. She kicked him in the groin and gave him a new shove, this time with all her strength. She sprinted toward the door and ran through the hall. A few seconds later, she was outside. Well, that was easy. At about a hundred feet from the building she turned around. She had heard Mr Anderen shouting faintly, or so she thought; but what did she care? She needed to keep running, get as far as possible as fast as possible. And yet, she turned around. Maybe looking for something to convince her that this was a simulation too, that it wasn¡¯t really happening. As she looked inside the glass building she saw the man running feebly, his suit still impeccable, raising one arm, surely calling for her. All of a sudden, he stopped dead in his tracks and collapsed on the floor. He was clawing at his chest, as if he wanted to rip his own heart out. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck. What should I do? Even if she wanted to call 911, she had no cellphone; she had left it inside the building in her escape. She was only wearing the minimal suit and the ethereal VR band. She could start yelling for someone to come and help the guy. On the other hand... Oh, fuck. The Digidream building was tall and imposing; its body of glass and steel glistened in the night, quietly. There was no one around that she could see. There were several parking lots, a couple of dimly lit pubs in the distance, a skating and parkour circuit (closed, of course, at this time), and a few scattered houses with the lights off. Nobody would come to his aid. And why should they? She took a step, then another. Then she was sprinting. What am I doing? Am I going to help him? And how? If she could get to her cellphone... a call to the emergency number. Yes, that¡¯s it. I can call 911 while I run home. It will be quick. But then she saw the men in white rushing to Victor Anderen¡¯s aid. They crouched beside him, spoke to him for what she could see. She stopped dead and decided that this was the help he needed. She had nothing else to offer. So she turned around again and ran home. There are security cameras everywhere. They will see what happened. But what will they see? Which part will interest them more? Me kicking the boss and running away, making him collapse. Oh gods, I need help. Mike will know what to do. But when she finally arrived, exhausted, sweaty, and completely out of breath, Mike was nowhere to be found. What she found, stuck to the inside of her window and handwritten in big red letters, was a note. It consisted of just two words. ¡°Come outside.¡± Book 1 : Chapter 02. Missing At first, Sarah didn¡¯t know whether the stranger was a boy or a girl. She could see the figure standing at the other side of the street, wearing a hooded jumpsuit that appared to be white but looked gray in the darkness of the night. After a few seconds she could make out the delicate features of the face framed by the hood. The girl was Asian, she was not tall, and appeared to be pretty thin. She was standing motionless, staring at her through the window, waiting. What kind of sick joke is this? I¡¯ve had enough emotions for one day, Sarah though, not knowing if she should open the door and go out to meet the stranger. Then she recognized her. A girl who also worked at Digidream. Her name was Sumiko, if Sarah was not mistaken, and she was an artist. Her job involved drawing and designing all kinds of stuff for the gameworld, mainly plants and animals and the odd artificial object. She was just one in an army of artists working on the game, some of them working on the NPCs (non-playing characters), others designing weapons and different kinds of armor, others dedicating their hours to drawing beasts and robotic foes. ButSumiko (if that was truly her name) had caught Sarah¡¯s attention a few days ago because she interrupted a meeting to call Victor Anderen¡¯s attention to some arcane detail on a screen. When she entered the meeting room, Sarah took a good look at her and thought she was a very pretty girl, with a small mouth will full lips, big vivaceous eyes, and pitch black hair with a hint of purple. But more than that, what struck her as notable was how similar she looked to an anime character. It was as ifSumiko was herself the work of an artist working for a virtual game. It spoke to Mr Anderen¡¯s lack of humility that the codename for the game was Anderworld, but since there were already other entities using the name, it would have to be changed down the line. For now, the splash screens, menus and other parts of the interface used the codename as a placeholder. Someone had suggested that the game were renamed to ¡°Placeholder¡± instead, but the suggestion went nowhere. (It was an ingenious idea, though, at least as far as Sarah was concerned, since ¡°Ander¡± means ¡°other¡± and a placeholder is something that stands for some other thing. In the game, a virtual representation stands for the player, or maybe the other way around.) What is she doing here? And where the fuck is Mike? For the eleventh time, she tried to contact Mike, but he didn¡¯t answer any calls or messages. This can¡¯t be a coincidence. Mr Anderen¡¯s stroke, Mike¡¯s disappearance, and nowSumikowaiting outside my apartment. It all has to be related. It looked like she had no choice but to go out and meet Sumiko, so she pressed her finger on the lock and went outside. She was wearing normal clothes now instead of the nearly nonexistent gamesuit, and yet, now that the adrenaline wasn¡¯t pumping so frantically inside her veins, she felt cold when she found herself on the street.Sumikowas dressed much more appropriately, with jogging pants and the jumpsuit that showed a cartoon of a fat dude making a funny irate face and the legend, ¡°TRUMP 2028¡±. (A joke, of course. Ex president Trump had died in 2020 in ridiculous circumstances.) ¡°I know you,¡± Sarah said after a few moments of indecision. ¡°I know where Mike is,¡±Sumiko replied. * * * So there it was, again, the Digidream building glistening quietly in the darkness. The place Sarah had just swore to herself she¡¯d never set foot on again, just an hour ago. The place from where she had ran away, vulnerable, almost naked, just an hour ago. The place where she had left her cellphone, her clothes, her purse, her ID, in her rush to escape the man who was a genius, the man who had a second stroke, the man who, according to Sumiko, was holding her boyfriend captive in a suspension tank. ¡°Are you sure we can do this?¡± ¡°What? Enter the building? Of course we can,¡± Sumiko replied. And she added scornfully, ¡°They haven¡¯t cancelled my clearance. I¡¯m not the one who kicked the boss and ran away.¡± Sarah opened her mouth to give her a harsh reply but she was at a loss.Sumiko was factually right, of course, and Sarah was still too shocked to think of a good comeback. If Sumikowanted to be a bitch, she was welcome, as long as she led her to Mike.Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings. ¡°Why can¡¯t we just disconnect him?¡± ¡°He¡¯s in the game,¡±Sumikosaid as she let her thumb rest on the reader at the door. There were no security guards to be seen; maybe they were still taking care of Mr Anderen. Was he still alive? But the cameras were still there, so Sarah tried to keep her face covered as they walked through the main hall.Sumiko had given her the Trump jumpsuit so she could conceal her face from the video surveillance. ¡°We shouldn¡¯t be here,¡±Sumiko whispered as they walked through a corridor and then towards one of the elevators. ¡°It¡¯s too risky. We could do everything remotely.¡± ¡°I need to see.¡± IfSumiko was to be believed, Mike had beeen kidnapped, put into a tank, unconscious, and trapped inside the game. Why, the Asian artist had no idea; but she had definitely noticed how much interest the company¡¯s owner had shown in a certain young female employee who worked as a tester for the gameworld. Some kind of revenge wasn¡¯t out of the question. So Mike was now trapped inside Anderworld and there was no way to get him out without entering the game. Otherwise, he would suffer permanent brain damage, Sumikohad explained. ¡°But why?¡± Sarah had asked. ¡°I have tested the gameworld and walked away fine. He could leave whenever he wants. It¡¯s a game after all.¡± ¡°Oh, sweet summer child,¡±Sumiko had replied, taking a sip from the tea Sarah had made. ¡°He¡¯s drugged. He will sleep for as long as they want. And there¡¯s the bit about time dilation. His mind is working at six to twelve times the normal speed. Even if we could wake him up, the shock would probably kill him, or turn him into a vegetable. Maybe the boss knows of a way out, but he might be in a coma by now; let¡¯s hope he¡¯s not straight up dead. No, you can¡¯t rescue him from here. You need to get in too.¡± ¡°But... but how?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡±Sumiko had said. ¡°You need to find out what the rules are once you¡¯re inside. Whoever did this didn¡¯t want to just kill Mike or make him disappear. They wanted you to go search for him in the game. So if there¡¯s a way, you need to find it in the gameworld.¡± Calling the police was out of the question. The first thing they would do is try to disconnect Mike, damaging him beyond repair. The second thing they would do is side with the company and its multibillion dollar resources, helping them cover up whatever was happening. The third thing they would do is arrest Sarah for assaulting the boss, maybe killing him unintentionally, and trespassing. ¡°Now you¡¯ll see what I¡¯ve seen,¡± She said as the exit the elevator on the eleventh floor and walked across a dark corridor. ¡°I¡¯m not supposed to be here; my clearance definitely doesn¡¯t let me open this door. But I can anyway. A bit of hacking.¡± She pressed on the reader and the door opened with a hiss. And then Sarah saw the tanks. There were more than one; maybe a dozen. All of them were working, with people suspended inside. But the air inside the tanks was not perfectly clear. It had a very faint greenish hue. The drugs. They keep pumping these drugs into the tanks to keep them asleep. Or worse. ¡°Oh, Mike...!¡± Sarah threw herself at one of the tanks. Her boyfriend was inside, floating in the air, completely unconscious, with a peaceful expression that reminded Sarah of all the times she had caressed his face while he was sleeping beside her in her bed. Tears were already running down her face. She clutched at the tank, in a futile version of a hug.Sumiko put a hand on her shoulder. ¡°We need to go,¡± she said. ¡°We can¡¯t do anything here. Let¡¯s go to my place.¡± * * * This can¡¯t be happening, Sarah tought as she climbed into the tank. It was not like the new model she had been testing earlier; it was one of the old ones, a horizontal pod where she had to lay down and put on a VR headset. But since she had the new-style VR band she was wearing when she ran out of the Digidream building, she could do without the heavy helmet. Why am I trusting her? Oh, yes. She showed me what they did to Mike. Oh, Mike. ¡°Remember to look for me once you¡¯re inside the game,¡±Sumiko said, leaning over the tank. ¡°I will try to help you from outside, but I don¡¯t know how I will appear to you exactly. You will be in time dilation, so whatever the case, we won¡¯t be able to talk in real time. I¡¯ll be awake so I¡¯ll be functioning much slower. I think you¡¯ll find me in the landscape or as written messages. But who knows? I didn¡¯t work on that part of the game. I don¡¯t know how it will represent the external hook I will be using.¡± ¡°But you will help me.¡± ¡°Yes. In fact, whatever I can tell you will be the only help you¡¯ll get in the game. You won¡¯t have any special abilities beyond those of any other player. You¡¯ll have to level up from the start like anyone else, if you want to accomplish anything.¡± ¡°O-OK,¡± Sarah said. She was nervous. ¡°Is it necessary for me to be drugged too?¡± ¡°Honestly, I don¡¯t know,¡±Sumiko replied. ¡°But we¡¯ll do it anyway. It might be the only way to find Mike inside the gameworld. To be in the same state he¡¯s in. Don¡¯t worry, you won¡¯t die if you can¡¯t win. Only he will.¡± And without any additional remarks, she closed the glass door. ¡°I will be there... sometimes,¡± she assured Sarah. ¡°And sometimes I¡¯ll be sleeping or eating or... you know.¡± Sarah couldn¡¯t hear her voice, only read her lips now that the door was shut. She checked that her VR band was perfectly adjusted, closed her eyes, opened them again, and tried to relax. A very soft hissing sound filled the tank. The drugs were now spreading in the air inside, taking her to another world. The last thing she saw before logging in was Sumiko¡¯s smile. It was pretty, a heroine¡¯s smile, like in an anime. Chapter 03. Logged in Everything was going too fast. Sarah tried to adjust her eyes to focus on something. Anything. But it was all a blur. Smudges of color danced frantically in her field of vision. Nothing was clear, nothing was quiet. For a second, she felt nauseous. Then things started to slow down. It¡¯s kicking in, Sarah told herself. She knew what this was, even when she hadn¡¯t experienced it during her job as a tester. It was time dilation ¡ª in the game, things happened much faster than in the real world, but her mind couldn¡¯t adapt to it instantly: it had to be eased into it. Clearly, this is unfinished. There should be a splash screen here, some simple animation that I would have to watch as time dilation happens, Sarah thought. Players shouldn¡¯t be forced to enter the gameworld directly. What else was still rogh and unpolished? So many testers worked at Digidream that any of them could only check out a small part of it. Sarah had been working on most scenarios, but only as an ambient tester ¡ª she knew nothing about main menus, character selection screens, weapons, armor, or the intricate details of leveling up. She found herself in a small cornerless room with an ornate window through which part of the Enchanted Forest could be seen. The soft pink of the walls contrasted with the green foliage of the trees. The room was standing high, near the top of the trees; maybe it was floating in the air, Sarah thought. Beneath her bare feet there was a fluffy carpet. It was shaped like a curved triangle; the same shape as the room, she realized as she looked around. The only thing in the room besides her and the small carpet was the window. For a moment, nothing happened. Then a voice came out of nowhere. It was a female voice, robotic, but kind of sweet. ¡°Hello, Sajya. Welcome to Anderworld. You can create your character now.¡± Sajya? What was that? She had never been assigned a name. When testing the different scenarios in her day to day job, she had just been a placeholder, a nameless character. Now she was suddenly someone, and had a name that seemed to be Spanish, Thai, Japanese, Arab and Celtic at the same time. ¡°But I don¡¯t want that name,¡± she objected. ¡°I want to be Sarah.¡± ¡°The character naming option is not implemented yet,¡± the voice said. ¡°You are Sajya. It¡¯s a noble name. Please select your traits. Choose wisely.¡± As the selection menu materialized on the window¡¯s surface, which got just a tad darker to let her read comfortably, Sarah thought this was bad news. How will I find Mike if I don¡¯t know what his name is in the game? I thought maybe he would have chosen to keep his own name, but now I guess he¡¯s been assigned some fantasy name that I don¡¯t know. ¡°And what is your name anyway?¡± she asked out loud. ¡°I¡¯m Alteria,¡± the voice replied. ¡°Nice to meet you, Alteria. Please, tell me something. Is it possible to know the character name of another player?¡± ¡°What do you mean?¡± Sarah could almost hear the voice frowning. ¡°I mean, if I know someone¡¯s real name, is it possible to determine which name they are using in the game?¡± ¡°I¡¯m afraid not,¡± Alteria replied, but there was no trace of emotion in her robotic voice. ¡°I¡¯m not a guide anyway. I¡¯m just here to welcome you and let you choose your traits. Choose wisely.¡± Sarah frowned. ¡°But how can I choose wisely if I don¡¯t know what kind of scenarios I will be put in?¡± Alteria¡¯s answer was immediate. ¡°Oh, but you do know. You are familiar with most of them.¡± A chill ran down Sarah¡¯s spine, both ingame and in her real body lying inside the tank. They know me. They know who I am and they know that I¡¯ve just logged in. But who were ¡°They¡± anyway? Victor Anderen was lying in a coma or perhaps dead already. Who else was running the simulation and why would they want her to play? ¡°I-I don¡¯t think this is fair,¡± she protested. ¡°I should be able to conceal my identitiy from the game. How can I be stealth if¡ª¡± ¡°Choose wisely,¡± Alteria repeated, and fell silent.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Sarah focused on the window/screen. The legend was pretty simple. TRAIT SELECTION Available points: 0100 STRENGTH : 000 AGILITY : 000 ENDURANCE : 000 INTELLIGENCE : 000 PERCEPTION : 000 CHARISMA : 000 She pondered for a while. She decided to be conservative. ¡°Ten to each,¡± she instructed. The screen changed in an instant: TRAIT SELECTION Available points: 0040 STRENGTH : 010 AGILITY : 010 ENDURANCE : 010 INTELLIGENCE : 010 PERCEPTION : 010 CHARISMA : 010 ¡°OK, now...¡± Now what? The pink room was in the Enchanted Forest, so the quest would being here, among talking animals, fairies, monsters, and the occasional reclusive witch. Which traits would be most useful in such a place? She would need to be sneaky. ¡°Ten to Agility.¡± And able to make her way through a thick forest for who knows how long. ¡°Ten to Endurance.¡± But the biggest threat and the biggest opportunity were the magical beings. They would be able to help her or kill her in this magical forest. Be it to procure the first thing or to avoid the second, she would need to find those beings, to see and hear them. That could be hard. So: ¡°Twenty to Perception.¡± Her final score was now showing on the screen. The letters glowed faintly against the slightly darkened trees beyond the window. TRAIT SELECTION Available points: 0000 STRENGTH : 010 AGILITY : 020 ENDURANCE : 020 INTELLIGENCE : 010 PERCEPTION : 030 CHARISMA : 010 ¡°That¡¯s it,¡± Sarah said to confirm her choices. ¡°Thank you,¡± Alteria said, springing up to life again. ¡°Please choose your appearance.¡± The legend on the window disappeared and in its place Sarah could now see herself like in a mirror. Only she was changed: her face was a result of the game design. There also small arrows at each side of her head, torso, and legs for her to change her attire and accessories, and two big arrows to rotate between whole characters. The default appearance was the fairy, with the tiny dress and the pointy ears and the wings behind her back. On the top of the display there was a name: ¡°SAJYA¡±. On the bottom, below her reflection, a legend said:
Bonus to: Flight, Healing, Charm, 8 others
¡°Alteria,¡± she said, ¡°I want to look like myself. Is it possible?¡± ¡°That feature is unimplemented at the moment,¡± Alteria replied. Fuck. She used the big arrows and her reflection kept changing as she did so. She experimented with variations on a warrior girl (which apparently had to be scantily clad whatever was the combination), which came with a bonus to the basic traits of Strength and Endurance, but almost no benefit to acquired skills beyond Attack. There was also a sorceress with bonuses to Charm, Healing, and the Perception trait. ¡°Alteria, can I be a man?¡± ¡°Of course you can,¡± was the reply. ¡°Just keep scrolling. The game put the female characters first for you because you identify as a cisgendered woman, but you can choose any personality you wish.¡± The game did wh¡ª oh, fine, Sarah tought to herself. There was no point in arguing. Evidently, everything was stacked against her: the game knew everything there was to know about her, and she didn¡¯t even know what Mike would be called ingame or what he would look like. She was unsure about what to choose. The fairy had an advantage to Flight but more importantly, to Heal, which she would surely need a lot of at the early stages of the game. But the warrior would give her more Strength and Endurance in exchange for not having a lot of Heal. The sorceress was a good option too, with increased Perception and the ability to Heal as well, but it was pretty much useless for the basic fights that would surely take place in this early phase. She kept reviewing her options. Every time she scrolled to change the character, she felt a tickling all over her body, and something like a breeze pushing her from the side; her reflection gave her back her changed image, with new attire and a new face. Using the small arrows to change her headwear, boots, main clothes, or any accessories generated a localized tickling and a low buzz. She ended up choosing the warrior. In time I will get some armor and I¡¯ll no longer look like a swimsuit model from Narnia, she told herself. For now, though, it was weird to feel her chest dramatically increasing in size and her clothes getting as tiny as possible. She was pleasantly surprised by her limbs, though. Her arms and legs looked biger and more ripped without losing their feminine, harmonic quality, but more important, she could feel the strength and resistance in herself. She felt strong, stronger than ever before. Was that just a psychological effect caused by the uberrealistic looks of the game, or was this Anderworld actually giving her the sensory feedback of someone who is actually strong and ripped? ¡°This is it,¡± Sarah said, to confirm. The screen changed again. Now the title at the top was ¡°SELECT YOUR WEAPON¡±. There were three options: a small, cheap looking sword; a small, cheap looking axe; and a small, cheap looking flail with a spiked ball. She raised her right arm, pointing at the sword. She was surprised at the energy with which the arm moved. I will have to get used to being this strong. The sword rose from the screen and floated in a straight line toward her hand. She grabbed the handle. It felt awesome. ¡°This is it,¡± she said out loud, but mainly to herself. She swung the sword a couple of times. It was small and it looked cheap, but it was a sword. ¡°OK,¡± she said in a resolute tone, and realized her voice had changed too. ¡°Alteria, what¡¯s next?¡± ¡°Next,¡± Alteria said as the room started to move down suddenly, freefalling for a few seconds until it hit the ground in the middle of the Enchanted Forest and the walls dissolved in a fine mist of a pinkish hue, ¡°you enter the game.¡± Chapter 04. Uncharted The forest looked exactly like it did a few hours ago when she tested the new suspension system. The breeze felt different on her skin, though, now that her body was big, hard and powerful. Sarah wouldn¡¯t have been able to find the words to describe this difference exactly, but it was there, as evident as the green in the leaves of the trees in this virtual world. She turned around to assess the situation and found no traces of the pink room, no debris, no shattered glass, no hole in the ground where it had crashed. The impact had felt weird, more like a change of phase than a real crash. She was now on her own, and she thought it would be a great thing if she had some kind of map in order to orient herself. She immediately regretted not chosing the fairy or any other character with the ability of Flight. But Strength and Endurance would get her further if slower, she concluded. She tried to visualize a map or guide. This was the canonical method to invoke menus and options ingame: ¡°calling¡± them with your mind. Other stuff would appear on its own with various kinds of corporal feedback, like the buzzing sound and tickling sensation when she received a notification of a level up, a skill increase, or a new quest. But nothing materialized in front of her. ¡°Map,¡± she tried. She spoke it aloud just in case. It would be the equivalent of just thinking of the word, making it a request for the game. But saying it had a different psychological effect. It felt more solid and effective. Nothing. ¡°Guide.¡± Only the breeze and the sounds of birds, frogs and squirrels answered her command. ¡°Chart.¡± No dice. She wondered ifSumiko would be anywhere near at this moment. It might be too soon for her to have established a link... maybe only a minute had passed in the real world while Sarah was playing the game, because of the time dilation effect. And even ifSumiko was connected and talking to her already, this time difference would mean that anything she had to say would appear with a big delay or spread out along a certain period of time. No, I¡¯m alone until further notice, she thought. She started exploring the forest, letting the breeze bring her all the scents and sounds of nature... and some of possible supernatural origin, too. She closed her eyes, inhaled deeply, and opened them again. She had heard a faint, almost hidden sound of water. A tiny creek that crossed the forst, probably. She looked in the direction where it would be. Let¡¯s walk that way, she told herself. In the absence of a map, it¡¯s as good as any other. She started walking. There was no proper path to speak of, but she found a trail, and then another. Animals or other creatures had found the best ways to get from one place inside the forest to the other, just like in nature or even in big cities, where ¡°desire paths¡± get collectively drawn by thousands of feet, often ignoring the lanes and sidewalks provided by the city itself. She was not surprised when, after a while of following a trail toward the course of water, she was greeted with a notification.
Skill acquired: Exploration
It came with the same physical feedback she had felt when testing the scenario: a ticklimg sensation, a subdued buzzing sound, and the legend written in faintly glowing characters. A few seconds later, she heard distinct sounds of some creature approaching her. There was also a definitive smell identifying this creature as some kind of mammal, maybe human. It had to be something pretty big to make that sound, not just a squirrel or a gnome. She turned around and identified the creature immediately. It was coming through the thicket on her left, glancing at her with an air of superiority. It was a faun. ¡°Well, hellooo,¡± the creature greeted her. It stood no taller than four feet, and that was a generous estimation. ¡°Hello,¡± Sarah said, taken aback by the creature¡¯s confidence. She had a sword after all. ¡°Are you my guide?¡± ¡°I¡¯m your guide... only for now,¡± the faun said. ¡°As soon as you leave, you¡¯ll be on your own. If you get completely lost, though, you can come back here for some wisdom. But you¡¯ll have to earn it.¡±If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. ¡°So what¡¯s your name?¡± Sarah asked. ¡°Does it matter?¡± the faun asked. ¡°Let¡¯s say you¡¯re in Narnia and I¡¯m Tumnus. What difference does it make?¡± This faun was irritating, but he was all Sarah had for now. This was the only thing that made her refrain from using her newly acquired sword to gain some XP (experience points) and an increase in the Kill ability or whatever is was called in this Anderworld. ¡°OK, Tumnus,¡± she asked, ¡°how can I find my way on this forest? Is there a map or guide?¡± ¡°Oh,¡± the faun said with an expression of fake sorrow, ¡°there is nothing of the sort. You see, the forest is still unfinished.¡± ¡°Unfinished? What do you mean?¡± ¡°Oh dear,¡± the beast replied, ¡°didn¡¯t you know? How can you possibly be here if you didn¡¯t know? The game is building itself as we speak. The Game Master¡ª¡± and here his voice lowered to a hush ¡°¡ª the Game Master is changing everything all the time. He comes up with new scenarios, modifies the existing ones, and updates the rules. It¡¯s what he does. I thought all players were aware of this. How did you login if nobody explained this to you?¡± ¡°That doesn¡¯t matter,¡± Sarah replied harshly, and her hand grazed the handle of the sword, which didn¡¯t go unnoticed by the faun. ¡°But how can I possibly make any progress in a game that changes all the time? That¡¯s unfair. How will I accomplish anything if I have to start over every few days or hours?¡± ¡°Don¡¯t worry, my child,¡± the faun replied, now in a more agreeable tone. ¡°The basic stats and skills are always available, although they may get more refined as time goes by. They will carry over from one stage to the next, from one world to the next. You will also receive missions and quests that you can complete in order to level up. Just don¡¯t get too attached to specific stuff like a certain weapon or armor. They may disappear or turn into a different thing as you crossphase.¡± ¡°Crossphase?¡± The faun stared at her intently. He looked a bit puzzled and even more amused. ¡°You really have no idea, eh? Did you steal a key and built your own tank? Nobody outside a few inside Digidream can play this game yet. If you are here, you should know about the different realms and crossphasing and about the Game Master.¡± Now he looked uneasy once more. ¡°Look, miserable beast,¡± Sarah said, already out of patience, pointing at him menacingly, ¡°you will stop asking questions about me and do your fucking job as a guide. One more remark and I¡¯ll cut your head off. Do you understand?¡± The faun nodded vigorously. ¡°What do you know about the Game Master?¡± The faun took a pretty long time to answer. He looked afraid, glancing around as if the GM was there and could hear what he was saying. ¡°We... we don¡¯t really know the Game Master,¡± he said finally. ¡°Nobody has seen him. We think he¡¯s not actually a player but an AI, generating new algorithms all the time to change and refine the rules. But sometimes... sometimes this AI seems to have a definite personality, and it¡¯s kind of cruel. He wiped a whole race once because a bunch of members of that race inconvenienced them with their questions. He didn¡¯t kill them, mind you: he deleted the whole race, as if it had never existed.¡± A swift dictator. I had no idea there was a Game Master in the system... the devs must have been working very hard on features I didn¡¯t even know existed, Sarah reflected. ¡°So where can I find this Game Master?¡± ¡°Find him?¡± the faun asked, and recoiled in horror, as if he had seen a ghost. ¡°Are you out of your mind? You don¡¯t want to meet the Game Master. You don¡¯t want him even noticing you. The best you can do is do your quests and level up without ever crossing paths with him. Whoever gets the attention of the Game Master will regret it sooner or later. Well, except a select few.¡± Interesting, Sarah thought. She wasn¡¯t afraid for herself, but she shuddered at the thought of what could happen to Mike if she made the GM angry. I¡¯ll have to keep a low profile as I get stronger and more capable, she concluded. ¡°So,¡± she asked the faun, ¡°who are these select few you speak of?¡± ¡°I-I¡¯ve said too much,¡± the poor beast replied, and excused himself. ¡°I¡¯ll have to go now. I wish you the best of lucks... and remember: never cross paths with the Game Master.¡± Upon saying this, he jumped between some scrubs and disappeared. Sarah would have been able to track him down easily, of course. But she decided to let him go. The poor thing would likely be unable to tell her anything else of value and would probably die of a heart attack if she kept pressuring him. She kept walking in the direction of the water. Maybe she¡¯d find some nymphs there, or maybe something dangerous. In any case, she needed to figure out how this scenario was laid out, and in the absence of a map, she¡¯d have to walk and see things for herself. In a strike of inspiration, she decided to invoke the map once more. Maybe now that she had walked around for a bit, she would have access to some data. ¡°Map,¡± she said out loud. This time, a map appeared before her, traced in soft light against the backdrop of the Enchanted Forest. It was, of course, incomplete, and only included the roughly straight curve she had described in her walk plus several feet to the left and right. There were some interesting markings in the area surrounding her path, just close enough to fall into view: two golden spots, three red dots that looked pretty fearsome, and a white cross at the start of her walk, marking the starting point. She wondered if that tyrant acting as Game Master already knew about her being in the game. Her identity was not a secret for Alteria: would that mean that the Game Master knew who she was in real life as well? As she made her way through the forest, paying attention to her surroundings and with a hand always ready to close around the sword¡¯s handle, Sarah wondered how long it would be until she finally found Mike. Would she find him before she had to face the Game Master, or after that? The breeze gave her no answers this time. It just kept blowing gently, bringing the sounds and smells of life beyond reality, the sounds and smells of a world that breathed magic. Chapter 05. The player Sarah (or Sajya) had been walking for a while when the message appeared in her field of vision. It was written in the same style as other notifications, though the typeface was different and smaller; it was also accompanied by the same sensory feedback on her body. It was a quest. In this game, quests were called ¡°tasks¡±.
TASK: Talk to the Sorceress You are walking through the Enchanted Forest, one of the many realms of the Anderworld. Magical beings have made it their home for thousands of years ¡ª and among them, the Sorceress is one of the most powerful. She can give you valuable information about this realm and maybe, if you play your cards right, she might even have a gift for you. Reward on success: - information about the Anderworld - initial mana: 60 - 100 XP - increase in Charisma - potentially: Numinous object
The notification was similar to the ones Sarah was used to from testing the game during development, including the parts about mana and XP (experience points), but that bit about the Numinous object was puzzling. She had never encountered that class of objects before. I guess it¡¯s a form of high magic, she told herself as she followed the trail in search of the course of water. When she finally found it, she couldn¡¯t help revelling in the beauty of the scene. It was truly an astoundingly beautiful landscape, and so lifelike that she had to remind herself that this was only a VR simulation. The creek ran down quickly and happily, flanked by rocks and scrubs and glistening to the sunlight that made its way between the leaves, reflecting all the colors of the rainbow as the stream jumped capriciously and followed its course. And that was just one thing. The other thing were the nymphs. Sarah couldn¡¯t see them at first, but they gradually became visible as she looked at the creek and its surroundings. Even so, they never turned completely opaque, but remained partially transparent, as if they were holograms instead of being physically there. There were half a dozen of them, and they were all thin and pretty and small, really small. The tallest of the bunch was maybe three feet tall. Maybe. They were singing and whistling as they washed their hair in the stream, like nymphs are wont to do; one would think that nothing could ever make them worry. ¡°Hello,¡± Sarah said. The nymphs immediately stopped what they were doing, turned to her and screamed. Two or three started running away, while the others just stood there, frozen in shock. Well, that was unexpected. ¡°H... hello,¡± she repeated. ¡°I¡¯m Sajya.¡± ¡°C-c-can you see us?¡± one of the nymphs asked. Her chest went up and down so fast that Sarah thought she would have a stroke right there. Oh no, please. I¡¯ve had enough of that for the moment. Then she realized that the nymphs were supposed to remain invisible and unperturbed as the rest of the creatures of the Enchanted Forest meandered around. It was her Perception trait that let Sarah see them, albeit faintly for the time being. If she ever got to add more points to that trait, she would see the nymphs as fully opaque. ¡°I can see you... kind of,¡± she replied with a shrug, as if apologizing. ¡°You must be a player then,¡± the nymph said. ¡°We¡¯ve never crossed paths with a player before. Well, except Uberyn. But everyone has crossed paths with Uberyn.¡± ¡°Uberyn?¡± ¡°You don¡¯t know him? You must be new.¡± The game was in development until just a few hours ago. For how long has this Uberyn been playing? Who is he anyway? Sarah wondered. It was interesting. Evidently, the game had been in this alpha state for some time, with people playing it seriously as opposed to testing bits and pieces like she had done as part of her job. It was evidently unfinished, but there were already players that were well known and had spent a lot of time ingame ¡ª at least in this scenario, the Enchanted Forest. Why would they kidnap Mike, though? And who are the others that were drugged in the tanks? She wished she had paid more attention to those others, but she had been in shock at seeing Mike and she just couldn¡¯t think clearly at the moment. MaybeSumiko knew who they were. Maybe they had all been kidnapped for the same reason, and this reason could lead her to discover the way to rescue her boyfriend. But where was Sumiko? How would she communicate with Sarah from outside the game? She still had no clue. ¡°Yes, I¡¯m new,¡± Sarah said. ¡°I¡¯ve just received my first task. I must talk to the Sorceress.¡± ¡°Wow,¡± a second nymph said. ¡°Nobody gets that as an initial task. Are you sure you didn¡¯t make a mistake somewhere?¡± ¡°What do you mean?¡± ¡°Well, the Sorceress is... dangerous,¡± the nymph replied. ¡°You¡¯d be better off staying away from her until you have leveled up quite a bit. Are you sure you didn¡¯t miss any other tasks before this one?¡±This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon. ¡°I¡¯m pretty sure I haven¡¯t.¡± ¡°Well, in that case,¡± the first nymph said, ¡°be careful. She keeps out of sight, though. You won¡¯t find her unless she wants to be found.¡± ¡°Well, I found you and you were pretty shocked,¡± Sarah said with a grin. ¡°I guess that changes things a bit,¡± the nymph replied. She was breathing almost normally now. ¡°The Sorceress dwells beside the lake. Be warned that you might find some dangers in the way.¡± ¡°What kind of dangers?¡± ¡°All kinds. This is a magical place. Anything can happen here.¡± The nymph let that sink in for a few seconds, and then added, ¡°The lake is that way. It¡¯s not a long walk. An hour at most.¡± ¡°I suppose the lake is enchanted, too,¡± Sarah said scornfully. ¡°Of course it is. Let¡¯s hope you don¡¯t find out how,¡± the nymph replied. * * * The color of perception is blue. Sarah thought this in lowercase, but in fact she was thinking about Perception, the trait she had chosen to pump up a bit for her trip through the Enchanted Forest. The nymphs had been embraced by a very, very subtle blue glow besides remaining partially transparent, something that reminded her of the color of a TV when seen through the screen of another TV. An electronic hue that permeated her sixth sense, reminding her that she was in a game after all. Now her whole field of vision was tinted with the faintest tone of blue. She hadn¡¯t realized at first, but now that she had arrived to the lake, the influence of her Perception in everything she saw was pretty noticeable. There was a lot of magic there, and there must be many magical creatures, both friendly and hostile. All of them remained hidden for the moment, though, and as she looked at the calm water, she only saw peace and quiet. ¡°WATCH OUT!¡± ¡°What the¡ª?¡± Sarah turned around in shock. With all her appreciation for her newly improved Perception skill, she hadn¡¯t even noticed there was someone around. Much less any kind of threat. The first thing she saw was the goblin jumping at her. It was short, greenish, and undescribably ugly ¡ª much uglier than the version she had seen in her testing. Sarah caught a glimpse of its teeth, which were yellow, pointy, and many, before her body reacted instinctively. Before she knew what she was doing, her left leg was up in the air, meeting the hideous creature in the groin, making it bounce backward. In midflight it lost half its head. Sarah¡¯s right arm had swung the sword with such foce and speed that the cheap blade encountered little resistance and cut the creature in two between the eyes and the mouth. The body fell back, pushed by inertia, and the half-head ended up at Sarah¡¯s feet after executing a gory somersault. As adrenaline pumped inside her veins, Sarah was greeted by a notification:
Skill acquired: Melee Defense
Immediately after that, a new legend flashed briefly:
+5 XP
She registered the scene as quickly as she could. There were more goblins, each one uglier than the previous one, some of them coming at her, others fighting against a force just out of her sight. The trees obscured part of the action so she couldn¡¯t see who had warned her. One thing was sure: her Perception ability had utterly failed in this occasion, giving her no warning about the goblins or even the person who was nearby, fighting them. ¡°Raaaaaaawwwrrr!!!¡± Sarah yelled, and charged forward. Two goblins stopped dead in their tracks, pondering whether they should keep attacking or turn around and run. A third one stood its ground, brandishing a flail, its eyes glowing with a malevolent yellow hue. Sarah ran at the hideous thing with her sword held high. When she was close enough, she attacked. The goblin tried to hit her with the spiked ball but Sarah was faster. The sword came down on the creature¡¯s red hat and embedded itself in its head. The goblin died instantly, and his blood sprinkled on Sarah¡¯s face and torso. A new notification appeared. The sensory feedback was barely noticeable with her heavy breathing and the thrilling sensations of danger and power.
Skill acquired: Melee Attack
And again, briefly,
+5 XP
¡°Wow.¡± That voice again. Sarah looked up and this time she saw the guy. He was handsome, his face showing the signs of a careful design during character selection. He hadn¡¯t just combined a default appearance with a given constitution and clothes to match; he had tweaked every aspect of the face to create a personality. He had blonde hair an a stubble that made him more attractive. Tall, ripped, and wearing a leather armor, he had chosen a sword as his weapon, too, but his sword was big and shiny. It was now almost completely covered in goblin blood, though. ¡°Hello,¡± she said. ¡°Thanks for the warning.¡± ¡°Nevermind,¡± he said with a smug smile. All around him lay the corpses of the goblins he had dispatched. Sarah counted seventeen, and wondered how long it had taken him to kill them all. Just a few seconds had passed since his warning and her killing of the two creatures. Before that, she had heard nothing at all; everything seemed to be peace and quiet beside the lake. And now there were nineteen dead goblins lying on the ground. ¡°I¡¯m Uberyn, by the way,¡± the handsome stranger said. Of course you¡¯re Uberyn. Your reputation precedes you. ¡°I¡¯m Sajya. Nice to meet you, Uberyn.¡± ¡°And what are you doing near the lake? It¡¯s dangerous here. There are all sorts of nasty creatures. Like... you know, these redcaps,¡± he said, pointing at the general area of the massacre with his sword. Sarah didn¡¯t answer at first. She didn¡¯t know if he could trust Uberyn yet. He seemed to be powerful and experienced, so he could make a good ally... but she decided it was better to wait before revealing any information to him. According to the nymphs, the task she had received was not common for a new player, and the bit about the Numinous object sounded like something she should keep to herself for now. ¡°I¡¯m just exploring. And there¡¯s no map,¡± she shrugged. ¡°I got here after meandering for hours.¡± ¡°Well,¡± Uberyn said pensively, ¡°I¡¯d said this is the most dangerous path you could have taken. By this lake lives the Sorceress. Nobody feels comfortable with the Sorceress around. Not even me.¡± ¡°So what are you doing here?¡± Sarah fired back. ¡°Ah, that¡¯s a long story,¡± Uberyn replied. ¡°If you do me the honor...¡± He offered his hand. ¡°I¡¯ll walk with you,¡± Sarah said. ¡°No hand holding for now.¡± ¡°As you like,¡± Uberyn replied, bowing theatrically. They started walking among the dead goblins, occasionally using their swords to open their way. The sun was shining brightly in the sky and some light made its way to them, drawing flashes of red light from Uberyn¡¯s blood-soaked blade. Up there, the singing birds filled the forest with their own enchantment. Chapter 06. Magic in the air Dream, dream away ¡ª John Lennon, #9 dream ¡°One of the first things you¡¯ll learn here,¡± Uberyn said in his highly optimistic tone, ¡°is that you need to level up fast. It¡¯s your only chance of staying alive in this place. Otherwise, any kind of creature...¡± Sarah tuned him out. She was looking at him, but her attention was not focused on his words. She was examining the stats the system had for him.
Skill acquired: Scrutinize
The notification came up as soon as she invoked the command with her mind. Scrutinize was the basic skill that let you find out the stats for other players and for NPCs as well. ¡°Wow, your metrics are impressive,¡± she said, appreciatively. She hadn¡¯t intended to say that out loud (Uberyn was evidently full of himself already and didn¡¯t need any help to boost his ego), but she couldn¡¯t help it. The numbers for Uberyn were through the roof. A member of the Paladin class, he had Max stamina (2000), Max health (10,000/10,000), 140,000 mana, and over 50,000 experience points. Unsurprisingly, he was a Level 20 player. Or perhaps that was a bit surprising, since the game was still far from finished, and he couldn¡¯t possibly have played for too long. ¡°I guess you could say so,¡± the blond beast replied with the fakest modesty on record. ¡°As I said, you need to be fast. I climbed up some levels in the first day and here I am. What about you?¡± ¡°Well... it¡¯s my first day,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°My stats are still near baseline. Let me see.¡± She uttered the words, ¡°My stats,¡± and her field of vision filled with info about herself, or rather, about the character she was playing. SAJYA Class: Warrior Available points: 0000 STRENGTH : 010 AGILITY : 020 ENDURANCE : 020 INTELLIGENCE : 010 PERCEPTION : 030 CHARISMA : 010 0000 Mana 0010 XP Health : 100/100 Stamina : 100/100 Skills: - Exploration - Melee Attack - Melee Defense - Scrutinize ¡°So where will you go now?¡± Uberyn asked. ¡°Are you still waiting for your first task?¡± ¡°Yes,¡± Sarah replied. She had been trying to think of a way to part ways with Oberyn without revealing that she actually had to return to the lake and search for the Sorceress. She hadn¡¯t found any good excuses so she had decided to stay beside him for a while and learn whatever she could. ¡°You can stay with me, then,¡± the blond player said. ¡°I can protect you.¡± Sarah was not afraid of being killed in the game, although she was afraid of suffering and the pain levels were near normal. She found no way to turn them down, another unfinished part of the game. But she wanted to find and rescue Mike as soon as possible, and she wouldn¡¯t be able to do it if she kept dying and losing her skills. So, having someone to protect her while she was not very powerful was a really good idea. But there was the task, with the vital information the Sorceress could give her, and the possibility of getting that Numinous object. What could it be? She was intrigued. ¡°That¡¯s very kind of you,¡± she replied. ¡°Do you happen to have any food on you? I¡¯m a bit hungry.¡± ¡°Oh,¡± he said with a wide grin, ¡°then this is your chance to acquire some new skills. Let¡¯s go hunting.¡± He produced a bow and an arrow that Sarah was sure hadn¡¯t been hanging from his back a minute ago. In turn, his sword had disappeared. Oh, he¡¯s switching items in his inventory. I wonder how he can do it so fast. I would have to invoke a command for that. ¡°Take this,¡± Uberyn said, offering the bow and arrow to her. She grabbed both things with a pinch of apprehension. She hadn¡¯t thought about the whole animal-killing thing, especially in the Enchanted Forest where half the animals were surely self-aware and could even talk. But hey, how will I improve if I don¡¯t learn this basic stuff? Uberyn led her quietly through the thick forest, in search for a suitable prey. After a few minutes, they focused on a deer that meandered around contentedly, completely oblivious to his fate. Sarah took the lead and followed the deer for a while. She wanted to shorten the distance so that she wouldn¡¯t miss her shot. A notification informed her that she had acquired a new skill: Stalk. Then she readied the bow, put the arrow in position, tensed the string, closed her left eye, and pointed. The arrow left her hand hurriedly, as if it was afraid to be late. As soon as she released it, a new notification appeared: she had acquired the Hunt skill. It only took a fraction of a second for Sarah to realize that she had made a perfect shot. The arrow was traveling in a straight line ending in the deer¡¯s neck: a quick, clean, certain death. It wasn¡¯t surprising that she had acquired the skill so fast. It was truly an astounding shot, one that you¡¯d expect from an experienced hunter. 10/10 would hunt again. There was only one problem. The arrow never reached its target. It stopped dead in midair, just like the rest of the forest. Trees, birds, rabbits, snakes, frogs, Uberyn, the arrow, all of it had frozen in place suddenly. All of it except Sarah. And the deer, which wasn¡¯t there anymore. In its place, Sarah saw something way more fearful. A woman. ¡°Don¡¯t worry. He can¡¯t see me.¡±Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author. The woman spoke with such a sweet and alluring voice that Sarah felt all her fear melting away instantly. A second later, when the woman grinned, the fear came back in full force. It was a devilish grin, full of power and mystery. Sarah realized she was referring to Uberyn, who had frozen in place with the rest of the forest, and whose piercing blue eyes were open in shock. He was staring directly at the woman, but he showed no sign of realizing she was there. He seemed to have frozen in the act of watching the deer disappear. ¡°I think... I think I was looking for you,¡± Sarah said. ¡°But you strayed away from me,¡± the woman replied. ¡°So I had to come looking for you.¡± The blue of her eyes was so light that it was almost white. Had a sparkle of anger just crossed them? ¡°I¡¯m sorry,¡± Sarah said. ¡°I was not sure if I¡ª¡± ¡°I understand. You can¡¯t be sure of anything here.¡± Sarah waited for her to keep talking, but the Sorceress fell silent, studying her from head to toe. Sarah studied her as well. She was tall, with very pale skin and dark hair, and wore a pitch-black dress with a pointy hat. But it wasn¡¯t one of those oversized hats witches wear in cartoons; it was pretty small in comparison, and the whole attire was stylish as they come. Her lips were a deep red which saved her from throwing a goth vibe. And of course, there was something that couldn¡¯t be seen, something beyond her physical appearance that made her imposing. ¡°I think,¡± Sarah began when she realized the Sorceress had no intention of speaking again, ¡°I think you have some information about this realm. I spawned here with no guide to speak of, so anything you could tell me...¡± ¡°There is no guide here, that much is true. All the guides are lies,¡± the Sorceress interrupted. ¡°Yes, I do have some information. Not only about this realm, but about the game as a whole. I wonder if you¡¯re ready to hear it.¡± ¡°I think I¡¯m ready, yes,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Oh dear, that¡¯s not for you to decide. Close your eyes.¡± Sarah obeyed. When she opened her eyes again, they were in a completely different place. * * * ¡°So where were we?¡± the Sorceress wondered aloud as she reclined in her chair which seemed not to be supported by any legs but merely float in the air. She was holding a small bowl and the concoction inside emanated a thick steam. Sarah found herself lying on a similar floating chair, and in her right hand there was an identical bowl. She gave a look at its contents. The concoction seemed to be just some kind of tea, with crushed leaves and petals swimming near the bottom. It looked hot, but the bowl felt just a bit warm in her hand. She thought she had caught a glimpse of her own reflection in the surface: the reflection was her own face, not the ingame character¡¯s face. But it disappeared so quickly that she was left wondering if it had only been her imagination. The room was round and crammed full of more or less esoteric stuff. Dozens of parchments covered a table and some more were scattered on the floor. Herbs and spices grew beside the round windows. Pots and pans were everywhere. The walls were covered with animal skins. Strings of garlic hung from the ceiling at both sides of the curved door. ¡°Ah, yes. I am supposed to talk to you,¡± the Sorceress remarked, and took a sip from her tea. ¡°I guess you have some questions.¡± Sarah took a sip from her bowl as well. It was tea, the best tea, in fact, she had ever tasted. There was a spicy note to it and the scent of flowers lingered on her nostrils way after she swallowed the drink. In fact the steam entering her nose anticipated the flavor of the beverage and let her taste it before it touched her lips. ¡°I admit I¡¯m a bit lost,¡± Sarah said, but at the very moment she uttered the words, she realized she was feeling now a strong sense of purpose and optimism. It must be the tea. ¡°I don¡¯t think this game is anywhere near complete and I wonder how I can get ahead and make some progress in this world... or the others. Also, I don¡¯t know how to go from one world to the next. And finally, I was warned about the Game Master. I would like to know about the Game Master.¡± She didn¡¯t mention Mike or the reason why she was playing the game. Somehow the Sorceress would know, she thought, recalling the reflection of her true self in the tea. ¡°You are lost, all right,¡± the Sorceress answered after pondering for nearly a full minute. ¡°But you¡¯re also on the right track. The game is far from finished. In fact it will never be.¡± She sipped again, and Sarah did the same. The tea was invigorating to say the least. ¡°All your questions are tied together by the nature of the game, and the nature of the game is derived from the nature of the Game Master.¡± ¡°So what is the nature of the Game Master?¡± ¡°Nobody knows. But I know this: he is not working to improve the game. All the changes he makes, all the subtle variations in mechanics, the nerfing, the jumping between worlds, all the waves of change you¡¯ll experience as you play, all of it is for the benefit of the Game Master. In a way, he¡¯s a player, and he¡¯s playing to keep winning forever.¡± ¡°But I thought the Game Master was an AI. A machine.¡± ¡°Of course he is. A pretty evil machine, if I say so myself.¡± ¡°So how can I win? Is it possible to defeat the Game Master when he changes the rules all the time?¡± The Sorceress took yet another sip from her drink. ¡°I don¡¯t now, but you can try. I don¡¯t think you can make it alone. You¡¯ll need to pick up some allies on your way. Oh, and when you are powerful enough, you might find a use for this.¡± It was a good thing that Sarah blinked right at that moment because the next thing she knew what that the Sorceress was standing in front of her, holding something in her hand. She flinched in surprise and spilled her tea on the floor. ¡°What the f¡ª!¡± ¡°Easy,¡± the Sorceress said. ¡°Take this.¡± It was a ring. It didn¡¯t look like much, frankly, in comparison with all the colorful and flamboyant items one could acquire while playing the game. It was made of silver or something like it and there was a pretty small stone embedded in it, of a pale violet or purple color. Sarah put it in her finger. It was perfect in size, at least. The Numinous object! Deceivingly plain, but surely very powerful. Sarah felt a rush of adrenaline just from having it around her finger. ¡°That,¡± the Sorceress explained, ¡°is the Ring of Realms. But people call it the Worldjumper. I guess you know what it does.¡± ¡°I can imagine it,¡± Sarah replied, ¡°but will you tell me how to use it?¡± ¡°There is no point in that,¡± the pale woman replied. ¡°It will become evident in time, if you survive long enough to acquire the skills and power you need to wield it. For now, just keep quiet about what it is.¡± ¡°So,¡± Sarah asked, ¡°how many of these are there?¡± The Sorceress laughed out loud. ¡°How many? Just one. That one,¡± she said. ¡°And now, you must go. There are signals you need to catch out there, and people who need your help.¡± Mike, Sarah though, and felt a heavy weight crushing her heart. ¡°But I still have no map, no guide at all,¡± she objected. ¡°Weren¡¯t you paying attention? All the guides are lies. You¡¯ll find your path, that much is certain.¡± Sarah nodded pensively. As she did so, she got a notification:
Task complete: Talk to the Sorceress +60 Mana +100 XP +20 Charisma - Numinous object acquired: Ring of Realms
¡°I have one more question,¡± she said. The Sorceress gave her an amused look. ¡°Only one?¡± ¡°Oh, no. I have so many more questions. But there¡¯s one that¡¯s been biting at me all this time.¡± ¡°Then I suppose you will ask me that question.¡± ¡°Why are you helping me?¡± The Sorceress drew an invisible figure in the air with both hands. As soon as the motion was complete, she started to fade away from view, along with the room and everything in it. ¡°That,¡± she said before disappearing completely, ¡°is the one thing I cannot tell you.¡± Chapter 07. Nerfed ¡°Run! Run, fucking idiot! RUN!!!¡± The screams came to Sarah seemingly out of nowhere when she was still standing there with her ears buzzing, trying to focus her sight and figure out where she was. This seemed to be still the Enchanted Forest, but there was no lake, no Uberyn, or anything that she remembered from before meeting the Sorceress. The woman had teleported her somewhere else inside the same realm. Or at least that¡¯s what Sarah hoped. With a superhuman effort, she turned her head and tried to identify the source of the screams. They weren¡¯t directed at her. Someone kept urging someone else to run and hide, but everything was happening out of her sight. Her vision was still blurry, and with tremendous effort she could concentrate on the trees in front of her, until the image was sharp and vivid. Now she heard the full range of noises coming from everywhere: a battle was being fought all around her, only the trees and shrubs were too many and too close together to let them see what was happening. She drew her sword and jumped forward. ¡°Run, Maggot, run!!!¡± The voices came from farther away now. Those people (it had been a man at first, now a woman yelling) were abandoning their friend, or whoever this Maggot was. Horrifying cackles from what must be little evil creatures froze Sarah¡¯s blood in her veins; there was also a sound of stomping, as if a giant was razing the area. The thought occurred to her then: The Sorceress said I needed friends, but she also said there were people who needed my help. So she sent me here. I just didn¡¯t know my help would be needed so soon. Sarah let out a battle scream and jumped forward once more, moving the blade in front of her to slash the thick vegetation. When her feet touched the ground again, she found herself in a clear in the forest. Now everything was happening in front of her. There was a giant indeed, walking slowly and menacingly in the direction of a small, ugly man who stood in the middle of the clear. He was holding a small sword, similar to Sarah¡¯s, but his arm was shaking in terror and his face was covered in sweat. He wore a piece of leather armor but it looked old and it was torn and tattered. He seemed not to have heard the others; they had already fled the scene, leaving him alone to face his certain death. At the other side of the clear, five or six goblins watched everything, giggling and cackling at the poor guy¡¯s misfortune. They were redcaps, just like the ones Sarah and Uberyn had massacred before. Their hats were red because they used the blood of their human victims to paint them, or so went the legend. There were also two or three creatures of a different kind that Sarah couldn¡¯t readily identify. They looked a bit like hobbits, with their gigantic feet and abundant hair on their whole bodies, but they looked every bit as evil as the goblins. The giant stood about twenty feet tall. In his raised arm he held a bludgeon that was no more than a huge branch he had torn off some tree. The man they called Maggot had just four or five seconds to live before the bludgeon came down on him and turned him into a bloody pulp. There was no time to lose. ¡°Hey, you ugly thing! How about fighting someone your size?¡± Both Maggot and the giant turned at her as if they thought she was addressing them. ¡°Not you,¡± she told Maggot. ¡°I meant the big one.¡± The guy looked confused, as if his mind was wandering through some other realm, but his expression revealed his relief and thankfulness. At least he¡¯s aware of what was about to happen, Sarah thought. The giant made a turn and, as slowly and heavily as before, started walking toward her. OK, Sarah thought, let¡¯s learn a bit about you. She invoked the Scrutinize command and a bunch of data about the giant appeared in her field of vision. He was a NPC, of course, and according to his stats, he had 6000 hitpoints. Sarah frowned: neither her own metrics or Uberyn¡¯s detailed any amount of hitpoints, and she wondered if the Health numbers were the equivalent. If so, she only had 100, while Uberyn would easily be able to defeat the giant just by rubbing himself against him repeatedly, because his own 10,000 units of health would surpass the giant¡¯s levels. The giant had a name (Gurglr), a class (Giant), a super low level of Agility and a super high level of Strength (700). Sarah wondered if calling his attention had been a good idea at all. But then then gave a quick glance at the small, ugly man the giant was about to slaughter, and invoked Scrutinize on him. And she knew she was the only chance he had at staying alive.
MAGGOT Class: Bard STRENGTH : 005 AGILITY : 005 ENDURANCE : 005 INTELLIGENCE : 005 PERCEPTION : 005 CHARISMA : 005 0000 Mana 0030 XP Health : 020/050 Stamina : 050/050 Skills: - Exploration - Scrutinize
How is it possible that you have only thirty points applied to traits? Sarah thought, horrified, while Gurglr kept approaching her at a snail¡¯s pace. As far as she knew, every player started the game with one hundred points, and you couldn¡¯t even get through the trait selection screen without using them all. And how is it possible that you have chosen such a hideous face? I mean come on, I can understand the name, but couldn¡¯t you at least be average looking? It was no use asking those mental questions. She would ask Maggot himself once she had defeated the giant... if such a thing was even possible. Gurglr gurgled, then trumpeted like an elephant. He started ¡°running¡±, stomping his huge feet on the ground, holding the improvised bludgeon way above his head. The goblins and hobbit-like creatures cheered and laughed. Maggot raised his sword arm but stood in place, undecided. Now... how do you kill a giant? The enormous creature was already coming at her, eating the distance between them, the huge branch already starting to describe a downward arc that would meet her head if she didn¡¯t act fast. ¡°Raaaawwwrrr!¡± she yelled, and charged forward. She was feeling incredibly strong and energetic, and the adrenaline coursing through her veins felt like an addictive drug. It was as if this character, Sajya, were already lending her some of her non-physical characteristics: a bit of her warrior soul.This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it. Sarah took one, two steps, jumped in the air, and then came down rolling. She rolled on the ground and went through the giant¡¯s big, slow legs. Once she was on the other side, she stood up, turned around, and threw her sword at Gurglr. The sword stuck itself in the middle of the giant¡¯s back. Gurglr let out a scream of fury as a message appeared on Sarah¡¯s vision:
+5 Damage
Only five points? You gotta be kidding me. Oh well, 5995 to go. The giant tried to reach the sword, which was tiny for his size, with his left hand, but it was stuck just out of his reach. Then he tried to use the other hand, the one with which he was holding the gigantic branch. He didn¡¯t drop it, though. The branch drew a sideways arc around his right side, and when it went stationary as Gurglr tried to figure out whether it was better to keep holding it or get rid of it, Sarah started running, jumped up, and landed on it. ¡°Huh?¡± Gurglr grunted, and started turning around. But Sarah was already reaching for the sword. She grabbed the handle with her right hand as she secured herself to the branch with the left. The giant moved his arm and Sarah recovered her sword as it got unstuck from his back. A second later, Gurglr had moved his arm all the way back and Sarah was facing him. ¡°Hello, pretty,¡± she said, and jumped forward, holding the sword with both hands. She drove it down into the giant¡¯s left eye. The eye imploded, oozing a viscous substance that splashed over Sarah¡¯s face and chest, but she held the blade firmly in place. The creature yelled in pain, dropped the bludgeon, and stepped back blindly.
+1207 Damage
Ah, that¡¯s more like it, Sarah thought. Now she was hanging from the handle of her sword, impaled on Gurglr¡¯s eyesocket. Her body danced to the left and right as the giant lost balance and started falling backward in a slow, clumsy path. He flailed his arms around, tried to grab his minuscule attacker, and after a couple of attempts, writhing in pain and half collapsing to the ground, he could get a hold of her. ¡°Aaarrgggh!¡± the creature yelled, and threw the girl aside hastily. She flew several yards, hit the trunk of a tree, moaned in pain, lost all the air in her lungs, and plummeted to the ground. But she was still holding the sword.
+20 Melee Attack
As the giant completed his fall and hit the ground with a mighty stomp, she sprinted forward once more. Gurglr was covering his eyesocket with his hands, whimpering in pain. She jumped up, and landed on his chest, driving down the blade right into his remaining eye.
+1500 Damage / Enemy disabled
Now for the coup de grace. As the giant flailed his arms blindly, alternating between covering his nonexistent eyes and trying to hit her, she sneaked around between the huge arms and located the exact place in his neck where a hit would be lethal. She saw was the artery there, bulging with pain and fury, and unprotected. Sarah stuck the sword in there and moved it around to broaden the wound. A jet of blood shot up from the opening, covering her from head to toe. There was so much blood that she found it difficult to keep her feet on the ground without slipping and falling. Gurglr gurgled, writhed, quivered, and after a while, he stopped moving. His arms fell down at both sides, inert.
+3288 Damage / Enemy dead
And after a second or two,
+100 XP
Sarah looked around. There were no goblins to be seen, nor those things that looked like hobbits. In the clear of the forest there were only a dead giant, a warrior girl soaked in blood, and a weak, ugly bard standing there with a horrified expression. ¡°Hey,¡± Sarah said as she did her best to wipe off the blood by rubbing herself with the giant¡¯s clothes. ¡°You¡¯re welcome!¡± ¡°Th-th-thanks,¡± Maggot replied, approaching her with shaky legs. ¡°You saved my life.¡± ¡°I¡¯m Sajya,¡± she introduced herself. ¡°I¡¯m a newcomer to the game. So what¡¯s your story? It seems like you haven¡¯t made much progress.¡± Maggot shook his head. Everything in him seemed to be feeble and uncertain. ¡°Zero. Zero progress,¡± he said. ¡°It¡¯s like... I can¡¯t do anything in this world. I¡¯m just not good. Not good at all.¡± He glanced around as if he feared that two or three more giants were about to spring up from between the tall trees. ¡°But you¡¯re playing,¡± Sarah said. ¡°You must have done some tasks, acquired some skills. Right?¡± Maggot shook his head and looked down. For a while, he said nothing. Then he looked at her. ¡°I can¡¯t make friends here. I... I have nothing to give. I need people to protect me because I¡¯m weak and clumsy. It¡¯s not that I don¡¯t try. I just can¡¯t. I¡¯m useless.¡± Sarah mulled over his stats. There was definitely something weird there. He was low on everything and even the caps were lower than hers. And she was a new player. ¡°You know,¡± Maggot said, almost whispered, ¡°it¡¯s not like before. I feel... numb. I can barely hear a few feet away. Jumping is hard. I¡¯m always weak. Like I¡¯m... old or something.¡± ¡°It¡¯s easy to see,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°All your stats are low, and some of them are capped below normal. You¡¯ve been nerfed from the start. Why? Do you know?¡± Maggot looked at her as if he didn¡¯t understand what she was saying. ¡°What do you mean, nerfed? Are you saying other players have it easier? Is it not my fault?¡± ¡°Of course it¡¯s not your fault. Your stamina is maxed out, but it¡¯s capped at half the normal number. Same goes for your health. You are actually putting way more effort than me, but the system is stacked against you. What happened when you entered the game? Anything you remember.¡± Maggot shook his head. A tear ran down his hideous face. ¡°My memory is not what it used to be either,¡± he said slowly. ¡°I don¡¯t even remember much of my life outside the game. It¡¯s like that part... my memory... has been nerfed too.¡± Sarah stood pensive for a few moments. She realized she hadn¡¯t actually eaten anything since she logged in: her only hunting excursion had been interrupted when she tried to kill the Sorceress in the form of a deer. The tea had made her forget the hunger, but it was now back in full force. Then she made a decision. ¡°OK, I¡¯ll tell you what,¡± she told Maggot, putting a hand on his shoulder. ¡°We¡¯re going to work on your abilities. We¡¯re going hunting together and you¡¯ll earn some points across the board. How do you like it?¡± she smiled. Maggot smiled back. He looked miserable but grateful. ¡°And after we fill our bellies with our hunt,¡± Sarah continued, ¡°I¡¯ll take you to someone who can help you even more. An experienced player.¡± A shadow of a doubt clouded the poor guy¡¯s face. ¡°I... I don¡¯t know if I can get along with other players,¡± he said. ¡°You saw what happened. They ¡ª they left me behind. I was a burden to them.¡± ¡°Don¡¯t worry,¡± Sarah said cheerfully. ¡°He will help us. He¡¯s got the highest stats I¡¯ve seen. He can protect us and train us. In no time, you¡¯ll be killing all those giants instead of me.¡± Maggot still looked doubtful, but he smiled again. And this time there was some relief in that smile. There is just one problem with this plan, Sarah thought, as they started making their way in search of that day¡¯s hunt. I don¡¯t know where the fuck I am, much less where Uberyn is. But that can wait. First of all, we need to eat. Chapter 08. The wave When I snap my fingers, you will be in a different world. ¡ª The Art of Noise, The Seduction of Claude Debussy Training her new friend proved to be as exhausting as training herself. Maggot really, really lacked any abilities beyond the two basic ones you couldn¡¯t help but acquiring as soon as you started playing the game, namely, Exploration and Scrutinize. It took him four attempts to even hit a big trunk at a distance of six feet, and when he had to jump, he usually tripped over. So Sarah was the one in charge of hunting their first meal; otherwise they would have both starved. She killed a rabbit and a weasel, for which she could thankfully use Uberyn¡¯s bow and arrow: she had been holding the bow when the Sorceress teleported Sarah to her home beside the lake. She got skill points for this. She was also the one who started the fire because it was too complicated for Maggot in his nerfed state. There would be time to teach him such a hard procedure. Night had already fallen when she got the fire going and laid the hunt over the burning wood. ¡°So who were your friends? Or supposed friends, I guess,¡± Sarah asked as they bot sat beside the fire, munching on the charred remains of the rabbit. ¡°Yeah, they tolerated me more than anything,¡± Maggot concurred. ¡°The woman is a level 2 mage, or a witch I guess. Her name is Undaya. The man is a level 1 knight. He goes by the name of Gervain.¡± ¡°Have you been together for long?¡± ¡°I... I don¡¯t know. My memory is cloudy. It¡¯s like...¡± ¡°Yeah, don¡¯t sweat it,¡± Sarah said, and flashed him a smile. Maggot was undescribably ugly but she could see he had a good spirit. She wondered what he was like in real life. Was he an old, sad accountant who lived alone, or maybe a successful businessman with a pretty wife and four kids? A high school student? A parachute diver? A programmer? She was sure of one thing and one thing only: he was a good person. Once their bellies were reasonably filled, it was time to sleep, Sarah decided. This marked the end of her first day inside the Anderworld. How much time would that be in real life? Six hours? Four? Two? She became aware of her body lying inside the tank, drugged, just like Mike, who was floating inside another tank in a well-guarded room in the heart of the Digidream building. The thought was disquieting. As she fed more wood to the fire to keep it burning during the night, holding wolves and other undesirable creatures at bay, she felt a distinct uneasiness creeping in. ¡°Good night, Maggot,¡± she said, and reclined against a toppled trunk, clutching the handle of her sword. She wouldn¡¯t let go of it, even in her sleep. ¡°Good night, Sajya,¡± Maggot replied, and prepared to get some rest as well. The moon above the treetops was a disc of purple blood. * * * The next day started peacefully enough. Sarah woke up with the sunlight and the breeze and the singing birds and the rumor of water. We must have come near the creek again, she thought, and listened intently. Yes, the current was nearby; the nymphs would be singing and bathing in the stream, oblivious to her troubles or those of anybody else. ¡°Hey, Maggot, wake up,¡± she called. ¡°Uh...? Oh, good morning,¡± he said. ¡°Come on, let¡¯s train.¡± She unsheathed her sword as she walked away from the fire, which was now reduced to embers. Maggot stood up and followed her slowly, unsheating his own blade. ¡°Are we gonna fight with these?¡± ¡°Oh yes,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°You need to acquire some combat skills. Otherwise you won¡¯t live long.¡± Maggot didn¡¯t say anything, but followed her until they found a place Sarah considered suitable. The ground was even and mostly free of obstacles, but they were surrounded by trees that could be useful for defense and strategy. It was a good configuration for a lesson.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. Heck, I need to train myself too, Sarah thought. I¡¯m far from a accomplished warrior. Only my bonus to Strength and Endurance let me defeat the giant. But it was only one. What if I have to face two or more? They would crush me in no time. Or what if I¡¯m attacked by any creature with more Agility? From the point of view of pure convenience, she would do well training herself and leaving Maggot to his luck; maybe abandoning him, like his previous ¡°friends¡± had just done. But she was not that kind of person. Also, if she could get him up to speed so that they were more or less on the same basic level, they could keep training and going on quests and it would be easier for both of them to improve and level up. Moreover, there was that thing the Sorceress had said: she would need friends, and there were people out there who needed her help. Evidently, Maggot was on the second category, but he might also be destined to become her friend. ¡°Okay,¡± she said. ¡°You attack, I parry. Got it?¡± ¡°S-sure,¡± Maggot said. ¡°We will switch places afterward,¡± Sarah reassured him. ¡°But first, you need to¡ª¡± ¡°Aaaaaaiiieeeeee!!!¡± Maggot was already charging at her, holding his sword high with both arms, his feet stomping clumsily on the ground and his eyes barely open. More than a battle cry, the sound he made was like the sound of a chicken that was being killed to be turned into dinner. But it did the job: Sarah froze in place, surprised, and a sudden chill went down her spine. Maggot¡¯s sword struck her blade with a clannnng and bounced unceremoniously. He lost balance and fell to one side. His sword got stuck into the ground, and he almost fell face first beside it. He grabbed the handle with both hands once more and pulled. The sword offered some resistance but it yielded after a couple of seconds. Sarah gave him an amused glance. She stepped back. ¡°Okay, now you will try to¡ª¡± ¡°Aaaaaarrrrrgggghh!!!¡± Again, not exactly a battle cry, but it was kind of effective. Maggot was already coming at her, this time point-blank. His blade drew a horizontal curve, attempting to meet her belly. It was a sorry attempt, though, because she only had to take a tiny leap back for him to miss his target completely, lose his balance again, and roll on the ground, nearly decapitating himself in the process. ¡°Maggot, you need to calm down and listen,¡± Sarah chuckled. ¡°When the real battle comes, you¡¯ll have to act quickly. But for now...¡± The words lingered on the air as she stopped talking suddenly. She had seen something familiar moving in the distance. Could it be...? ¡°What¡¯s up?¡± Maggot asked as he shook the dirt and grass off his clothes. ¡°Stay here,¡± she instructed, and started walking carefully, trying not to make any noises, her sword ready to strike at any instant. She saw the figure again. It appeared briefly and then disappeared between the trees. A man, walking cautiously, but with an air or purpose to it. Hunting, perhaps. Or maybe spying on an enemy, laying an ambush. She stepped forward. She caught another glimpse of the guy. Yes, it had to be him. The air of self-assuredness was unmistakable. ¡°Uberyn?¡± She uttered the name in a low voice, but the blond, handsome paladin reacted immediately. He came out and looked at her, his huge sword glistening red, his other hand holding several dead animals. Or maybe goblin heads. It was hard to say at that distance. ¡°Hey,¡± Sarah waved at him. That was the exact moment when the whole world started shaking and dissolving. Before she knew it, Sarah was rolling on the ground, only it was not the ground anymore. Or maybe it was, but it was changing, fluctuating in a whirlwind of colors and textures. Everything around her had become liquid, a storm of color and noise where nothing was quiet and no object could be identified. ¡°Nooo!¡± It was a shout of protest more than despair. It was all she could say as her first reaction, besides gripping her sword as if her life depended on it. I was so close... so close... She had caught a glimpse of Uberyn, and she was about to introduce him to Maggot so they could walk this world together. But just as fast as she saw him, Uberyn was gone, Maggot was gone, and the whole world was a vertiginous bunch of nonsense and she couldn¡¯t make heads or tails of what was happening. Except that she had to start over. She had been swept by a wave of sound and color, and there was no point in trying to concentrate on any of it ¡ª she could only let herself go, surrender to whatever was about to happen. Then she realized what it was. The Sorceress had talked about waves of change. She tried to remember the words. The Sorceress hadn¡¯t said much, but everything she had said bore some meaning, as if her words were delicately concentrated like a perfume. ¡°All the changes he makes,¡± the woman had said. ¡°All the subtle variations in mechanics, the nerfing, the jumping between worlds, all the waves of change you¡¯ll experience as you play, all of it is for the benefit of the Game Master.¡± So that was it. The Game Master had sent a wave that would change the gameworld permanently. He had done so right when Sarah was about to accomplish what she had set out to do: bring Maggot to Uberyn, form a team of three to fight together in this strange realm. It can¡¯t be a coincidence, Sarah thought. It could be... but it wasn¡¯t. She was sure of that. The Game Master is watching me. And he doesn¡¯t want me to win. As the world kept spinning and rumbling, she felt her anger growing inside her like a storm of equal proportions. I will find you, Mike, she promised to herself. I will find you and then I will find the Game Master and I will make him pay. Chapter 09. The way to the Castle The first glimpse she caught of the place was that of the mud coming at her at full speed as she met the road face first after what felt like an hour of spinning in chaos. There was a thump, then a few seconds of nothing, then her senses coming back one by one as she slowly realized where she was. She propped herself up, muddy water dripping from her chin, her oversized breasts cold and messy from being immersed in the puddle. She checked herself and verified that her equipment hadn¡¯t changed a lot. She was still wearing the least feasible amount of clothing, as it fit the character she was playing, but now the top and loincloth were made of some thick, dark grey cloth instead of the immaculate white they had been in the Enchanted Forest. Her sword was still small and cheap-looking but now it was dented and stained from apparent use ¡ª the stains surely were from the blood of enemies or bandits killed long ago. In an afterthought, she also checked her hand: luckily, the Worldjumper was still there, wrapped around her finger like a modest lover. She stood up just in time to avoid being run over by a man who hurried forward in his cart. She jumped aside, cursing. The man glared at her briefly. A glint of lust crossed his eyes in the first instant; immediately after that, he saw the sword, changed his expression, and looked away. The horse kept trotting at a good pace until the cart drove around a bend in the bumpy road and was lost from sight. Sarah looked around. She knew the place, because she had tested the scenario quite a few times. It was the medieval village. It looked a bit different from what she remembered, though ¡ª maybe the developers had been hard at work on it while she was testing other scenarios, or maybe the wave had ¡°upgraded¡± the village, whatever that meant. She had just formed a hypothesis about what was happening. ¡°The Game Master is changing everything all the time,¡± the faun had told her before hurrying away, frightened at his own words. The Sorceress had told her that nobody knew the nature of the Game Master. But she thought she had a good idea of what he was. An AI, Sarah thought as she cleaned herself up as best she could and headed over to an inn she knew was nearby. The sky was covered with clouds; judging from the gloomy grey light that bathed the landscape, it was about midday. The Game Master is an artificial intelligence. The devs launched a beta version of the game and let the AI loose to change and upgrade the different scenarios according to its own judgment. That¡¯s why I¡¯m stuck inside a game that is visibly unfinished and I¡¯m being pushed around between worlds like a ping pong ball. If that was so, then the faun and the Sorceress were wrong: the Game Master had no evil intentions, he (or more properly, ¡°it¡±) was only following a script that sometimes changed their world radically, like deleting a whole race or class of NPCs, moving landscapes around, and so on. It was just the product of an impersonal mind making modifications to the gameworld, not of an evil or mischievous being having fun or acting out of revenge. The thought was discouraging, because it meant that there was no purpose at all in the Game Master so she couldn¡¯t find him, punch him in whatever he had for face and force him to reveal where Mike was. She was at the mercy of the algorithm. Oh well. I¡¯m playing already so the only thing I can do is try to level up and see this through the end, she told herself as she eyed the inn in the distance. But right now, I need two things. And the first one is a beer. There were people inside, some of them having a meager lunch, some others already drinking despite the early hour. She invoked Scrutinize and realized they were all NPCs. Some of them had names, but most were simply ¡°Villager¡±. ¡°Welcome,¡± the innkeeper said, giving her an appreciative look. ¡°Can I help you?¡± ¡°I would like a beer,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°That can be arranged,¡± the inkeeper said cheerfully, ¡°as long as you have coin.¡± Do I have coin? Let¡¯s see. She invoked the Inventory command. There were only two elements at the moment, both of them marked as active: the small sword and the Ring of Realms. There were also several counters:
$ 0000 Mana0060($30/x) XP 0210($10/x)
If she remembered correctly from her testing, she could refill her purse with money by just mentally performing the conversion from mana or experience points to currency, but the operation was not reversible, so she couldn¡¯t turn coins into mana or XP if she made a mistake. ¡°I do have coin,¡± Sarah told the innkeeper, ¡°only if you have good beer.¡± The guy chuckled. ¡°The beer is good enough if your coin is good enough,¡± he retorted. ¡°How much?¡± ¡°Ten piece.¡± Fuck. This exchange rate is gonna kill me, Sarah thought. I killed a fucking giant and I¡¯m poor. What will I have to do to pay for housing or a vehicle? And she needed a vehicle. That was the second thing she needed after the beer. A horse. She shuddered at considering how much it would cost her.Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more. She bought some coin with experience points. She had decided not to use any mana for now, since she figured out that being a non-magic class, she would not find it easy to acquire more. She could refill XP faster by punching and throwing stuff, she figured. The relevant part of her Inventory changed instantly.
$ 0500 Mana 0060($30/x) XP 0160($10/x)
Also, a brown, ragged purse appeared, wrapped around her waist through a leather belt. She felt the weight of the coins inside. Leaving aside the fact of their magical appearance, they felt exactly like a real purse and real, physical coins. Even after all this time, Sarah couldn¡¯t help but being awestruck at how realistic the game was. Out there, lying in a puddle in the middle of the road, she had felt wet and cold, and she had even felt all the odors one could expect from a place like that. Now she hoped the beer tasted as good as a real beer. She really needed that. ¡°Bring it,¡± she said, throwing ten piece at the innkeeper, who picked them up with expert reflexes. A prompt appeared briefly in her field of vision, notifying her of her spending.
-$ 10
So now she was at 490. She hoped a horse wouldn¡¯t be too expensive. ¡°I guess you¡¯re going to the Castle,¡± the innkeeper said as he put the beer in front of her. It looked good, the foam overflowing the jug and running down the side. ¡°I guess,¡± Sarah replied, gunning down the beer. The man was right: the Castle was the place where she would have the most chances to improve her skills and level up. On the road, in the inn, or even in the village itself she could face some bandits and maybe get some physical skills by chopping wood, transporting cattle, or building a house, but the Castle was definitely the place to be if she wanted to progress faster. And she couldn¡¯t wait to find Mike, so she needed to progress as fast as possible. Oh my god, this is the best beer I¡¯ve had. ¡°You know what? The next one is on the house,¡± the innkeeper said. Sarah wondered whether he was impressed at the speed with which she had gulped down the whole jug or at the... big jugs her character featured. She accepted the offer anyway, and in no time her provision had been replenished. Right when she was helping the liquid find a new home inside her, a new prompt filled her field of vision.
TASK: Meet the Golden Knight at the Castle The medieval village is just a small part of this realm. Common people are always coming and going, doing business and trying to get by. But the real action is elsewhere. The Castle is where the power resides and also where all kinds of threats an intrigues can be found. Go there, find a way in, and talk to the Golden Knight. He is perhaps the single most important person in this realm right now. And he may have an offer for you. Reward on success: - a chance to join the Golden Guard - 100 XP - increase in Intelligence and Charisma - potentially: Diplomacy skill
There it was. A concrete reason to go to the Castle. That bit about the Golden Knight being ¡°the single most important person in this realm right now¡± intrigued her. Surely there was a king or regent? A queen? Courtiers, barons, royal advisors and other political orchestrators? A high priest? Something weird must have happening for a knight to be more important than all those other people. ¡°I will need a horse,¡± Sarah declared after downing the second beer. ¡°Do you know where I can find one?¡± ¡°Oh, it will be a pleasure to show you mine,¡± the innkeeper said. ¡°I have three, and you can rent one for a day or two.¡± Sarah¡¯s voice acquired a sharp tint. ¡°I don¡¯t want to rent a horse. I want to buy a horse.¡± ¡°Oh, in that case...¡± the innkeeper said, leaving the words lingering in the air as he waved at her to follow him to the back. Sarah knew exactly what he meant: in that case, it won¡¯t be cheap. The horses were at the stable. All three looked acceptable to Sarah, who didn¡¯t know a lot about mounting. She had tried to ride a horse once, when testing the immersion in this scenario, but she had given up after her buttocks met the ground one time too many. Now, she had no other viable option. She pretended to examine the horses carefully like an expert, but she thought the innkeeper would surely notice that she had no idea what she was doing. She wanted to keep the appearance of knowledge so he wouldn¡¯t take advantage of her and raise the price. ¡°How much for this one?¡± she asked, pointing at the only black horse of the bunch. The other two were brown. ¡°Ah, Tristan. Good choice,¡± the innkeeper said in a tone that sounded sincere enough, but who knew. ¡°I will be sad at parting with him. But I like you, so you can have it for only four thousand coin.¡± I should have known. ¡°Four thousand coin is way too much,¡± Sarah said. The innkeeper eyed her suspiciously. ¡°Are you planning to stab me with that sword and ride away on one of these?¡± ¡°What?¡± ¡°Nah, just kidding. It looks like you¡¯ll have to rent a horse, eh? But I¡¯ll tell you why, because I really like you.¡± Sarah had the impression that the man shot a quick glance to her general chest area when saying that. ¡°You can rent Tristan for only four hundred coin, and take him with you for as long as you like. Once you have defeated the monster or whatever is your mission in the Castle, you¡¯ll have enough coin to pay for it, so you can come back and give me the rest. How about that?¡± There¡¯s no doubt that the game is very realistic, Sarah thought scornfully. Boobs have as much power here as they do in real life. ¡°I¡¯ll take you up on that offer, thanks,¡± she said, putting four hundred in his open hand. She was actually grateful, even though she wondered if this lecherous innkeeper would try to get some other favour in the future in exchange for his generosity. If so, he was mistaken.
-$ 400
After a few more inconsequential words, Sarah climbed on Tristan and hit the road. The Castle could be seen from where she was, but it was very far away; it would take her the best part of the afternoon to get there. And then she would have to figure out how to get in. At the other side of the magnificent ramparts was the Golden Knight, and with him, the key for her next steps in this world of mud and steel. Book 1 : Chapter 10. Ghosts in the machine One month earlier You had to be sneaky. You had to be careful. But you had to be bold as well. Where was the fun otherwise? Sumiko glanced around to check nobody was looking. She had complete creative freedom and it was not often that some boss came to see what she was doing, but there was always the possibility that someone was peering over her shoulder, maybe to catch a glimpse of her new designs. What she was doing now was more than frowned upon, though, and if she was discovered, not only would she be fired on the spot, but Digidream would also sue her pants off. It was not for money, either ¡ª there would surely be some people interested in purchasing what she was trying to unbury, but she hadn¡¯t contacted any of them or even knew who they would be. She was a designer, not a salesperson, so that was out of the question. No, it was personal curiosity: the game was huge and complex and technically marvellous, and she ached to take a good look at it. Not only the part that depended on her, but the game as a whole, even if it was still an unfinished prototype and it would be for some time. She had started hacking a couple years ago, and she¡¯d had some successes ¡ª but retrieving and copying the Anderworld posed several problems that she hadn¡¯t yet figured out how to solve. First of all, the universe was huge, bigger than anything else Sumiko had laid her eyes upon, and the mere task of copying it somewhere would be daunting. This, without even considering how to do it sneakily, opening a connection to somewhere else from inside the Digidream building, transferring that huge amount of data and doing it without being noticed. Impossible, maybe. But achieving the impossible was the pride of a hacker. Even if she couldn¡¯t get her hands on the whole thing, she would be contented with actually playing it. She might be the first person to do so! With so many people working on so many aspects of the gameworld, with the codebase in a constant flux of change, the possibility existed that nobody had ever played the game as it was intended to be played. Testers experienced the gameworld and gave feedback about its workings, the landscapes, the weapons, the physics system... but it might be that none of them had actually played as a character and followed a storyline inside the virtual world yet. And in that case, she wanted to be the first. Finding a way in was difficult since the game was not actually running at all ¡ª not online, not offline. As she went through the virtual corridors fishing for pieces of code and file hierarchies, she thought she would have to create a sandbox where she could sneakily load a runtime and then...Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. What the fuck! She almost said the words out loud, but she could refrain herself before it was too late. The loglines on the screen would look like gibberish for anyone who didn¡¯t know what she was up to but for her, they were shocking: The game was already running. With players. Real players. There were people inside at that very moment. The runtime was disguised as just another running service under an abstruse name: XDF0Arun.VRa. The extension meant ¡°Virtual Reality asset¡± and was used everywhere by the system, so it looked like an innocuous file. But she soon realized it was actually the heart of the system, an executable piece that loaded a version of the gameworld where stuff would be working to some capacity, since there were people playing. She bit her lower lip as curiosity got the best of her. Now she needed to know what it was like. She was so close... the gameworld was right there, behind a thin wall of code, inviting her to break it, peek inside and see what was there. No, no. It¡¯s too risky. But... but... it¡¯s there. It¡¯s all there. Temptation was so strong. Sumiko realized she was sweating in excitement. She looked around once more, nervously this time, feeling that everybody was watching her. But of course, it wasn¡¯t true. The few people who were in the open office at that hour were minding their own business, oblivious to the discovery she¡¯d just made. Who did this? And why? A thought struck her as likely. Victor Anderen, the head of the company, had suffered a stroke a couple of months earlier. This game was like a son or a daughter for him; he had given many years to it, even using his own surname as part of the codename, like a father would do. He¡¯d been working hard, day and night, pushing everyone in the company to work hard as well, so that he could see his dream realized. And after the stroke, he came back stronger and pushier. His energy had redoubled instead of diminished. Maybe he wanted to see what it¡¯s like. Maybe he¡¯s afraid to die before the game is done. So he had a custom version more or less ¡°finished¡± for him and his friends. The more Sumiko thought about it, the more likely this seemed to her. There was no way the game was anywhere near done, so what she was looking at would be at most an alpha version, but the fact that it was running at all was so enticing that she felt she was about to faint. Then she found the others. The ones who were leaving subtle traces in the system, the ones who tried to cover up their tracks as they followed the virtual breadcrumbs and inserted their own code at strategic points so they could get hold of this or that routine, modify this or that number, like ghosts in the machine. The ones who were already hacking the game from inside. Chapter 11. Of fire and gold Present day
Skill acquired: Mount
The prompt appeared after an embarrassingly long time, as Sarah fought to stay on Tristan¡¯s back and Tristan procured to go his own way without her. She had tried to ignore the innkeeper¡¯s amused looks when she climbed on the horse (four times in total) and rode away to take the road to the Castle. Several hours had passed and her butt felt as if she¡¯d been spanked for days; her legs hurt more than they should if you took into account that her character was a seasoned warrior with powerful, well-trained limbs. Every step of the way she cursed the horse and wished they would be in front of the Castle already. But the Castle remained on the horizon, a magnificent sight to be sure, but also a symbol of frustration. For the second time, Sarah wished she would have chosen a creature with the ability to fly. Oh well. It¡¯s good to know that I acquired a skill, at least. As she approached the Castle, she crossed paths with several people, none of which seemed to pay much attention to her. Once or twice she caught furtive glances, though, and she realized those people were actually afraid of her. She thought she surely looked imposing with her ripped, mostly uncovered body and her sword, small as it was. Most of those people would be peasants or merchants who were coming back from peddling their stuff at the Castle. That was where the money was, of course. All of them NPCs, Sarah thought, and tested this idea by using Scrutinize on every person she crossed. Yes, they seemed to be all non-playing characters. How many players are there currently in the gameworld? she wondered. This is an alpha version at most, so I guess there will only be a bunch of people playing. She did a mental tally of the players she knew were in the game. She could with all certainty count five: Uberyn, Maggot, Undaya, Gervain, and herself. Two of these she hadn¡¯t even seen, and she was finding it hard to keep the other two at hand. But there had to be more. The Sorceress had mentioned both allies and people who would need her help. Assuming that Maggot was one of the people who needed her help, and Uberyn an ally, that meant there would be at least one more of each? Undaya and Gervain didn¡¯t seem to need her help and they sure looked like they would make awful allies, having abandoned Maggot and left him at the mercy of the giant¡¯s wrath. She was already quite close to the Castle (and quite exhausted too) when her Perception sense started tingling wildly. It caught her by surprise and she thought at first that something was creeping on her, but looking up she realized the whole silhouette of the Castle had now acquired a slightly blue tint. There was something else coming from that direction as well, kind of like a silent roar, for lack of a better comparison. It came to her with a sense of a subdued threat, then more overtly, as she came closer and closer. ¡°Hey, Tristan, let¡¯s go!¡± she shouted, and kicked the sides of her mount to force the horse to run. Miraculously, it worked. Tristan started galloping forward instead of just shaking her off him and trotting away. She held on to the horse¡¯s mane as the animal ate the distance to the Castle. She had almost arrived when she saw the people fleeing the Castle. Some of them were on foot, others on carts or mounting horses in ones or twos ¡ª but all of them were doing the same thing: running away. ¡°What is it?¡± she wondered aloud as she looked up at the immense structure looming over the landscape. The bluish stain drawn by her Perception skill was still large, much larger than it should be since she was already almost there. It makes no sense for it to be so huge, Sarah thought. Maybe a whole army has invaded the Castle? In the Enchanted Forest my Perception worked for magical beings, and not all of them. Can common soldiers trigger it in this medieval scenario? Or maybe there is a magical being, but it has to be so large that I don¡¯t see what it¡ª Her thoughts were cut short when a burst of golden light lit up the sky on top of the castle. Right after it there was a roar, so loud and potent that it shook the ground under Tristan¡¯s hooves. A wave of fetid heat came out the locked gate and hit Sarah like an explosion. She almost fell off her horse, but she could manage to stay mounted. The flame ascended in the sky, briefly reducing the setting sun to a lesser contender. ¡°A fucking dragon!¡± Sarah uttered the words out loud. She couldn¡¯t help it. Of all the things she could have expected to find once she arrived at the Castle, a dragon was not one. Her first instinct was to turn away and imitate the people who had fled the Castle. But then she realized she couldn¡¯t afford doing that. She needed to find the Golden Knight inside the Castle, and she would never find him if he ended up becoming a dragon¡¯s afternoon snack. How do I enter this place? She approached the nearest gate and found it locked up. But the people who were fleeing surely were using some open exit. She continued exploring the place until she found a partially open portcullis. A guard was lowering it, though ¨C it seemed that the dragon inside was not keeping him from doing his job. Only a NPC can be so committed to their job, Sarah thought sardonically. Then she remembered that she was trying to get inside and face the dragon herself. Well, a NPC or a player whose boyfriend is unconscious and trapped inside the game, I guess. It was too bad that the man was closing the entrance right at that moment; that meant Sarah needed to fight. ¡°Hey!¡± she shouted. The guard gave her a good glance, shrugged, and kept lowering the portcullis. ¡°Hey! I¡¯m talking to you,¡± Sarah insisted. A new roar and the glow of fire came from inside the Castle. The man doubted, looked back nervously, and resumed his task. Sarah examined the area. There were two more guards lying near this one, both of them seemingly dead; behind the corridor giving entrance to the Castle she could see people running. And then she saw something else. A golden glow, crossing the open space like an arrow. She did a double take but the thing was not there anymore. ¡°I will get in,¡± Sarah told the guard. ¡°Over my dead body,¡± the man replied.You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. ¡°So be it.¡± She spurred Tristan and shot forward toward the portcullis. It was already low, leaving no space for her to cross the barrier while mounted, but she didn¡¯t let that dissuade her. Once she was close enough, feeling the horse¡¯s resistance at the incoming impact, she jumped aside and rolled on the ground, letting Tristan cross on his own, then crouching down and rolling inside. The guard had anticipated her movements, so when she crossed the portcullis, he was already looming above her, holding his sword up high. It was a decent sword, bigger than hers. The guy was also wearing a hard leather chestpiece, which was not the best armor but was certainly better than her skimpy clothes. Naturally, she decided to stab his foot. ¡°AAAAAARRRRGGH!¡± the guard yelled, and closed his eyes in pain. His arm trembled and the sword¡¯s downward trajectory became erratic and unstable. Sarah rolled away, letting the blade sink into the dirt, and then jumped on the guard, whose foot was nailed to the ground, spreading red blood. ¡°I don¡¯t want to kill you,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Don¡¯t make me.¡± She tussled with the guard for his sword. The man hit her with his elbow, then tried to reach her with his blade, but she crouched down to avoid it, retrieved her own sword, and stabbed him in his inner thigh. The man cried in pain once more. ¡°Stop it,¡± she said. ¡°I¡¯ve come to talk with the Golden Knight.¡± ¡°You¡ª you have?¡± the guard asked, shocked. ¡°Why didn¡¯t you say it before?¡± ¡°Because you¡ª¡± Sarah started, but the man¡¯s fist in her face cut her short. She tumbled backward and cursed him. Oh boy, you¡¯re gonna suffer. She rolled aside right when the guard¡¯s sword was about to meet her neck. Then she sat up with a quick jump and punched the guy on his nose. He almost let go of his sword. Sarah tried to slash his wrist, but he was wearing leather bracelets and her sword did no damage. She kicked him in the nuts, and when he bent down in pain, she threw her knee at his face with all the force she could muster. His noise cracked this time. He let go of his sword this time. ¡°I told you, don¡¯t make me kill you,¡± Sarah said, and took the guard¡¯s sword. ¡°If I show you mercy now, will you be quiet?¡± The guard didn¡¯t answer. He was now a sobbing, writhing mess and Sarah got the impression that he wasn¡¯t listening to her. She sprinted down the corridor to meet the battle taking place inside, leaving the man there. The task at hand was more important. A new notification greeted her as she ran: she had earned 50 experience points for beating the guard. (She guessed that it would have been 100 XP if she had killed him, but it was nice to recover the points she had exchanged for money earlier at the inn.) She had also improved her Melee Attack and Melee Defense skills, as a new prompt informed her that she had added 20 points to each. Melee Attack was now at 50 skill points and Melee Defense at 30, confirming that abilities began at just ten points at the moment they were acquired. And finally, another, nicer notification:
You have reached Level 2!
* * * She was not prepared for what she found when she reached the end of the corridor and saw the whole scene playing out in the open space at the heart of the castle. She knew there was a dragon. And there was a dragon. She was pretty sure the Golden Knight was there. And the Golden Knight was there. That was the glowing figure she had briefly seen from the entrance to the Castle. What she didn¡¯t know was that she would see Maggot there, standing in the middle of the courtyard, sorrily pointing his sword at the huge creature that was making fire rain all over. And Maggot was there, standing in the middle of the courtyard, sorrily pointing his sword at the huge creature that was making fire rain all over. Sarah had barely had time to picture the situation when the dragon launched itself against Maggot. The small, weak, ugly man kept his sword pointed at it in a futile gesture. He was about to die. And then the Golden Knight jumped in front of him, raising his shield, brandishing his sword. He let the shield contain the fire, and threw his sword at the dragon. It was clear why they called him the Golden Knight. Everything about him was golden. He was fully covered in armor, a heavy metallic armor that looked like it was made of gold. He also wore a huge shield, almost as large as he was tall, oblong in shape, and a big, big sword that looked like it could cut in half one of the towers of the Castle. Both the shield and the sword were golden too, glistening in the afternoon and glowing with the fire that the dragon spit to left and right. The winged serpent flapped its wings and recoiled, dodging the golden sword. The knight ran out of the way, then retrieved his blade when the dragon was far enough. He laughed sportily. ¡°Come on, you almost have it!¡± he joked. ¡°One strike and it¡¯s yours!¡± What the fuck? Maggot didn¡¯t even try to take cover. He was petrified by terror. He just kept pointing his sword at the dragon as it flew around, preparing to strike again. ¡°Hey!¡± Sarah shouted. ¡°Run! Maggot, run!¡± Maggot looked at her and his face showed an immense relief, only to become a mask of terror once more when the dragon roared agan and lunched itself against him. ¡°Don¡¯t worry, he¡¯s almost killed the thing,¡± the Golden Knight said jovially. He grabbed his heavy shield and launched it against the dragon, hitting it on its head. The monster took the hit and changed course, sending its fire away from Maggot. ¡°You fucking asshole,¡± Sarah said. She realized the Golden Knight was just playing with the dragon, finding Maggot¡¯s terror amusing. He could probably kill the beast whenever he wanted. ¡°Hey, Maggot, it¡¯s me, Sajya! Run!¡± ¡°Nah,¡± the Golden Knight said, lurching forward to intercept the flying serpent once more. He lifted his shield from the ground and raised it just in time to cut off the line of fire. He then propelled himself forward, hit the dragon with his sword, and when the monster roared and started backing away, he jumped on its neck, mounting it. ¡°Why would he run? He¡¯s almost got it! Think of the experience points!¡± Experience points? Sarah was dumbstruck. How could the Golden Knight talk about experience points? This stuff was not something the NPCs were generally aware of. The faun in the Enchanted Forest had been some kind of initial guide, and the Sorceress seemed to be a different kind of entity altogether, but the rest of the non-playing characters surely had no knowledge that they were in a game with points and levels. Right? That meant the Golden Knight was... a player. ¡°Come on, asshole!¡± she yelled at the figure in full armor who was now riding the dragon, pinching its neck with his sword to make it go up or down and turn left or right. The dragon roared and vomited fire time and time again, and the Golden Knight made it so the flames landed barely away from Maggot, sparing his life for just a few feet. Meanwhile, Maggot seemed to overcome with fear to take cover or protect himself in any way. ¡°Oh, but this is fun,¡± the Golden Knight said. And then Sarah recognized his voice. ¡°It¡¯s not,¡± she replied. ¡°And if you don¡¯t end it now, I will personally see your head separated from your body.¡± ¡°Hey, I was just giving him a chance to level up,¡± the Golden Knight said, finally sticking his sword into the beast¡¯s neck, then moving it up and down to enlarge the wound. Red blood spurted from the opening, turning black almost immediately as the heat of the fire burned it in the air. The winged serpent¡¯s flight became erratic, slower, until it came tumbling down, roaring in agony. The Golden Knight jumped off a fraction of a second before the monster¡¯s body hit the ground. Sarah ran to the center of the courtyard and grabbed Maggot before the beast¡¯s corpse crushed him. ¡°You¡¯re an asshole, Uberyn,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Can¡¯t you see he¡¯s been nerfed? I was trying to bring him to you so that you¡¯d help him. And this is how you do it? By terrorizing him?¡± ¡°I told you, I was helping him,¡± Uberyn said, taking off his helmet and revealing his handsome face, his abundant and equally golden hair dancing in the breeze. He shrugged nonchalantly. ¡°And I was having fun, too. Why do only one thing when I can do both?¡± Chapter 12. The Knight The nobles kept arriving, gathering in the courtyard, giving astonished looks at the enormous corpse of the dragon. As they met each other they talked excitedly and pointed upwards, to the balustrade against which the Golden Knight was leaning, surveying the whole scene. Beside him, Sarah (or Sajya as they knew her now) marvelled at how grateful those people were with Uberyn, and how oblivious they were to Maggot, whose small figure stood at the other side of the golden portent. ¡°He saved us,¡± they kept saying to each other. ¡°He saved us all.¡± Sarah received her share of praise too. It was undeserved, but it¡¯s not like there had been many witnesses and the people who looked up and saw her was surely thinking that such an impressive warrior, with such a prodigious physique and no less than three weapons on her, surely had been instrumental on defeating the fiery beast. Sarah was armed to her teeth indeed, since she not only had her own sword but also the bigger sword she had taken from the guard and the bow and arrows Uberyn had given to her in their hunting expedition. But she had decided she needed to buy a better weapon for her after giving back the ones that weren¡¯t hers. After a few minutes, everybody was cheering for the Golden Knight, and a bit for Sajya, too. They completely ignored Maggot but hey, they were cheering, and that couldn¡¯t be bad, Sarah concluded. And where did this dragon come from? She invoked Scrutinize on Uberyn as discreetely as possible. His stats were sky high, just as before. Defeating the dragon had made little difference in his numbers since they were so high to start with. He had now 55,415 experience points, so if Sarah remembered correctly, he had acquired about 5000, either for killing the dragon alone or for other stuff he could have done before. She was not clear on how time worked when a wave came and messed with the realms. ¡°So,¡± she asked as nonchalantly as possible, ¡°how long have you been playing the game? You are incredibly skilled.¡± ¡°For quite long, I¡¯d say,¡± he replied, trying not to show how flattered he felt by her comment and failing miserably. ¡°But I really don¡¯t remember.¡± ¡°You don¡¯t?¡± Uberyn leaned toward her to talk in a lower voice. Maggot didn¡¯t notice; he kept looking down at the gathered nobles cheering for the paladin. His sense of hearing was probably nerfed too, Sarah thought, and pitied him even more. ¡°Look, I have a theory about the game,¡± Uberyn said, looking her in the eye but letting his eyes wander down to her boobs once or twice, perhaps inadvertently, perhaps on purpose. ¡°But I can¡¯t tell you about it here. Let¡¯s go to my chamber, shall we?¡± He extended his hand, or more properly, his golden glove, since he was still fully armored except for the helmet. Sarah giggled and took it. She let herself be taken to a luxurious room where Uberyn resided. A banner hung upon the wall proclaimed that he was PROTECTOR OF THE CASTLE. Evidently, killing the dragon hadn¡¯t been his first feat in this realm. ¡°Now we can talk freely,¡± Uberyn said. ¡°Please take a seat.¡± He waved at the bed and sat on the only chair, resting his armored hand on the beautifully carved desk upon which several rolls of parchment lay scattered. Sarah sat on the bed. It was fluffy and incredibly comfortable, or so it felt at that moment, maybe because she had never been exactly comfortable at any point since she had talked to the Sorceress in her house beside the lake in the woods. ¡°You say you don¡¯t remember when you started playing?¡± Sarah said, to remind Uberyn of what he was about to reveal. ¡°Oh yes. Look, this is my theory,¡± the armored paladin said, leaning over and fixing his piercing blue eyes. ¡°I can¡¯t prove it, but I¡¯m convinced I¡¯m right.¡± The golden armor glistened under the light coming through the window as he leaned over a bit more as if he wanted to touch her. When he continued, he was whispering. ¡°I think the game is set up so all players lose their memories when they log in. A temporary thing. To make it more realistic, you know? It¡¯s like we¡¯ve always lived here in the gameworld. When we log out, we remember everything, but while we are logged in, we only know our life inside the game.¡± Sarah opened her mouth to object, but stopped herself in time. She wasn¡¯t sure if she could trust Uberyn yet. Was it wise to reveal that she remembered exactly how long she¡¯d been playing, and why, and where she was right before logging in? This quest has a reward of Diplomacy. Obviously, I can¡¯t be careless. I need to watch out what I say and what I don¡¯t, she told herself. Staying completely silent won¡¯t get me any information, but speaking too much could spell disaster. She stared at the paladin¡¯s blue eyes, which were still fixated on hers, as he waited for her to speak. He was incredibly handsome, and those eyes seemed to vouch for someone you could trust. But this was not a real face after all; it was a face that the player had constructed very carefully, so there was no point in wondering what it seemed to say. If she decided to trust him, it wouldn¡¯t be because of how he looked. Also, he could still be right. Maybe the ¡°legitimate¡± players had been cleared of their memories in order to be fully immersed in the game, but she hadn¡¯t because she had entered the game through Sumiko¡¯s hacking, and not through any ¡°official¡± channels. Which, seeing as to how unfinished the game felt, would be very narrow channels. ¡°When did you become the most important person in this realm?¡± Sarah asked, deliberately stressing the element of admiration in her voice. ¡°It must have taken you quite a long time.¡±This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it ¡°Oh, not that long,¡± the Golden Knight replied, visibly satisfied by her words. ¡°When I arrived here, I had already amassed lots of Strength, Agility, and Endurance,¡± he explained. ¡°So I took care of some bandits that were terrorizing the villagers, and after a while I came to the Castle and got rid of some nasty invaders. Now I¡¯m their Protector, as you can see.¡± He waved at the banner with an air of casualness that felt incredibly forced. ¡°Oh, I see. That¡¯s impressive,¡± Sarah said, as Uberyn sat up, got rid of the gauntlets and sleeves of his armor, and started manipulating his chestpiece to take it off. ¡°Did they give you this golden armor as a thank you?¡± ¡°This? Oh, no,¡± the paladin replied. ¡°I also had amassed enough currency that I was able to buy it directly. It cost me several thousand coin. More than a dozen thousand, in fact. It¡¯s partly made of literal gold. But most of it is bronze, of course.¡± He finally got rid of the chestpiece and let it fall to the floor as if it was a worthless rag. He took off his gambleson as well, revealing a linen shirt that his own sweat had adhered to his body, tracing every line of his fantastic muscles. Sarah couldn¡¯t help giving him an admirative glance. ¡°But they gave me other stuff, of course. Like this room, which is where live when I am in this realm, and also my office. In the next crossphase it might look a bit different.¡± Sarah was about to ask about the waves and the jumping between realms, so she jumped mentally at the mention of crossphasing. ¡°Have you found out how to control the jumps somehow?¡± she asked eagerly. Uberyn took off his shirt too, dropping it on the floor, and got closer. His body was scandalously ripped, and his blue eyes were fixated on her once more. ¡°I mean can you decide to come here anytime you choose, or do you just fall here randomly just like I did?¡± ¡°Oh, it¡¯s random,¡± he replied. ¡°But after a while you realize it¡¯s kind of interesting. You learn to perform well in all realms, and when you switch from one to the other, it feels refreshing. I¡¯m doing well in most realms I¡¯ve visited, though I suspect there are many more I still haven¡¯t set foot on.¡± He was so close now that Sarah could smell his breath. It smelled good, kind of minty, but drenched in a manly scent of sweat and adrenaline. ¡°Listen,¡± he said. ¡°I need to keep this place protected at all times, so I¡¯m creating a guard. The Golden Guard. How do you like it?¡± ¡°It... it sounds good,¡± Sarah replied, feeling a bit nervous at the closeness. ¡°Only good? Come on, you can show some enthusiasm,¡± Uberyn said. ¡°Sajya, it¡¯s evident that you¡¯re a warrior. You still haven¡¯t leveled up much but you have an incredible potential. I¡¯m offering you to be part of this Golden Guard. I will train you, and soon you will be the one killing dragons. What do you say?¡± Think fast. Think fast, Sarah thought. The description of the task she was performing anticipated that she could be offered a place in the Guard, and she had been mulling it over, wondering if it would be worth it to gain experience and skills and level up in exchange for the time she would have to invest in it instead of looking for Mike. Finally she had decided to accept the offer when she met the Golden Knight... only she didn¡¯t know the Golden Knight would be Uberyn. Now she was unsure. ¡°Let... let me think about it,¡± she replied. ¡°Sarah,¡± Uberyn said, grabbing her arms gently and looking her in the eyes intently, ¡°we can do this together. I know you¡¯ll be perfect as a member of the Guard, and we¡¯ll have countless adventures. Please accept this.¡± Sarah was about to say something when she found herself unable to speak. Uberyn was already kissing her. What the fuck! Is everybody aching to kiss me? She struggled to get Uberyn¡¯s mouth out of hers. He yielded when he felt her resistance, and looked at her with disappointment and maybe a bit of embarrassment. ¡°What are you doing? I¡ª¡± Once more, she stopped herself in time. She had been about to reveal that she had a boyfriend, but she didn¡¯t want to explain it to Uberyn, because that would mean she remembered her life outside the game, and she wanted to keep it a secret until she knew she could trust him fully. On that respect, she felt torn. Since Uberyn didn¡¯t know she had a boyfriend, he hadn¡¯t really crossed such a clear line... but on the other hand, he could have asked. Oh, he was so cocky and sure of himself. That was certain. But the kiss itself could be forgiven. On the other hand, she knew now that she just couldn¡¯t accept his offer. For Mike, she couldn¡¯t allow Uberyn to stay close to her all the time; but also for Mike, it would have been nice to be able to train and level up so she could rescue him when the time came. That bastard had just close the door on himself, forcing her to say no even when she had previously decided to say yes. She felt enraged at the thought. But there was also something else. The situation reminded her of what had happened at Digidream, when Victor Anderen tried to kiss her, prompting her to kick him and flee. The whole situation rushed back to her mind, making her feel sick. She remembered now how bad the situation was in the real world, and how little time she really had before something outside her control happened, like the police finding her at Sumiko¡¯s home and maybe arresting them both. ¡°You¡ª you what? You didn¡¯t like it?¡± Uberyn asked this question as if the mere thought was completely unreasonable. ¡°It¡¯s... it¡¯s not that,¡± Sarah replied, pushing him away, unwilling to explain. ¡°I have goals of my own, and tasks I need to accomplish. I can¡¯t be part of your Golden Guard.¡± Uberyn looked utterly shocked. He certainly tried to hide it, but he was as bad at hiding his shock as he was at hiding his pride or anything else. Maybe it was his face: he had customized it so heavily that it was too expressive, mirroring his every thought and feeling just like in a real person. Or more. ¡°But...¡± ¡°You really can¡¯t believe it, eh?¡± Sarah said scornfully. ¡°Not used to being rejected? Too bad, I guess. I¡¯ll be in the armory. You don¡¯t need to follow me.¡± As she walked away without looking back, she felt the familiar buzz of a system notification.
Task complete: Meet the Golden Knight at the Castle +300 XP +30 Charisma +30 Intelligence - Skill acquired: Diplomacy (50) - chance to join the Golden Guard: rejected
And after a few moments:
You have reached Level 3!
The level-up notifications were slightly different from the others, in that they felt more intense and pleasurable, as if a warm breeze were embracing her. She even felt slightly aroused. ¡°Hey, Maggot!¡± she called out loud. ¡°Come with me. We¡¯re buying you a nice weapon.¡± Chapter 13. The book As they walked across the courtyard heading to the armory, Sarah practiced using her inventory to store the weapons she had so that she wouldn¡¯t have to carry everything with her at all times. ¡°Inventory,¡± she said out loud, and a faintly glowing outline with dozens of boxes for items appeared in her field of vision. All of the boxes were empty, so she found it easy to practice as she walked, since her vision was mostly free. ¡°Store small sword,¡± she uttered, and the cheap blade disappeared from her hand, occupying a space in one of the boxes for weapons. ¡°Retrieve small sword,¡± she said, and the sword disappeared from the box and came to her hand again, as if by magic. Maggot gave her furtive glances as she did this. The people they passed didn¡¯t seem surprised, though. NPCs were trained to ignore these procedures players were doing all the time as part of the game mechanics. They just kind of assumed that the players had stowed their items away out of their view in a flash, or just plain forgot that there had been an item there one second ago. ¡°Store bow and arrows. Store big sword,¡± Sarah said, and she found herself holding just the small blade. Then she started practicing doing the storing and retrieval silently, issuing commands with her mind. She failed the first few times, but after a while, she got the hang of it. She even made sure she could retrieve her weapons whatever position her arms were in: if she had been holding a sword with her arm pointing down, but raised her arm before retrieving it, the weapon would still appear correctly held in her hand; if, however, the weapon had been hanging at her side from a belt or something, it would reappear there. ¡°Learn to do this,¡± she told Maggot smiling slightly. ¡°It may be the difference between life and death when you¡¯re in the middle of a battle.¡± Maggot started practicing too. He failed quite a bit more than her, but he finally got it mostly right. The armory was just beside the forge, which Sarah thought was convenient. She announced herself and entered the place when nobody answered. After a few seconds, a man wearing leather armor and holding a knife in his left hand came from the back. ¡°Hello,¡± he said. ¡°You must be the Sajya everyone is talking about.¡± ¡°I guess I am,¡± she replied. ¡°Does that translate to a discount or something?¡± ¡°I... I don¡¯t think so,¡± the man said, taken aback. Then he seemed to give it a second thought. ¡°You know what? Yes, I will make you a discount. You helped saving us from the dragon, so it¡¯s the least I can do.¡± ¡°That¡¯s good, because I only have¡ª¡± Sarah couldn¡¯t finish the sentence. She had invoked her Inventory once more to exchange some experience points for coin, since her balance had been reduced to $90 in the game currency after renting Tristan. But now the screen looked different.
$ 10090 Mana 0060 ($30/x) XP 0510 ($10/x)
Wow! Uberyn was right. The nobles can be generous if you help them. I got 10,000 coin just because they thought I had done something! I can pay for my horse and I¡¯ll still have quite a bit of coin. Let¡¯s see what we can get for my friend. To get 10,000 coin on her own, she would have had to earn 1000 XP. Killing the giant had given her 100, so ten giants. Just hanging around Uberyn had been the equivalent of killing ten giants. ¡°Oh, forget that,¡± she told the man, who was staring at her, waiting for her to finish the sentence. ¡°I have enough coin. We¡¯re looking for a better sword than that.¡± She pointed at the sorry blade Maggot was holding. ¡°Any sword will be better than that,¡± the armorer said scornfully. ¡°Where did you get it, little man?¡± ¡°I may have little friends but I have big fists,¡± Sarah said before Maggot had time to open his mouth. ¡°You¡¯ll realize it soon enough if you disrespect them again.¡± ¡°You¡¯re right. I¡¯m sorry. Please come and see what I have available.¡± They went to the back room where the man showed them an assortment of swords, knives, sabres, pikes, spears, hatchets, bows, flails, and clubs. Sarah disregarded all big weapons. It made no sense to equip Maggot with something he could barely handle ¡ª much better to start training him with small blades, then (if he managed to stay alive) go bigger and bigger. ¡°What do you say?¡± she asked Maggot once she narrowed down her selection to a sword, an axe, and a set of knives. All the weapons glinted with a sharp, cold spark. The sword was just like the one Maggot already had, but sturdier, sharper, and shinier. It looked like it could stand in combat, unlike the old one. Maggot grabbed his head, trying to make a decision. He looked overwhelmed by the situation, but after a while, his eyes seemed to clear. He raised his head and in a firm voice said: ¡°I choose the knives.¡± ¡°Oh. Interesting.¡± Sarah was a bit surprised. Choosing the knives had been a smart move for Maggot. He knew his limitations and planned to work around them by using a weapon that was small, sneaky, and very fast. At the very least he had chosen the knives because they were the lightest weapon and didn¡¯t require much Strength; perhaps he had also considered that he would need to avoid entering an already declared fight and use the element of surprise instead by throwing or sticking his knife into unsuspecting foes.If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. The set contained six knives in three pairs of varying sizes. They looked accurate, deadly, and expensive. They came with a double belt and six individual sheaths that could be secured in all kinds of overt or secret places through small broochs and stripes. ¡°How much for them?¡± Sarah asked. ¡°They cost a thousand coin. For you, half of that,¡± the armorer said, smiling obligingly. ¡°That¡¯s fair.¡± Sarah reached into her purse and found the coins there. She was down to $9590 now, more than enough for her immediate needs. She could afford buying stuff for Maggot. ¡°They¡¯re yours,¡± she said, waving at the set of knives for her friend to grab them. She noticed that this was enough for the knives to become Maggot¡¯s property: they did not appear in her own Inventory, while Uberyn¡¯s bow and arrows did, since he had given them to her. The game was quite advanced in this respect, allowing the players to use everyday words and agreements to perform actions. ¡°Good choice, sir,¡± the armorer pointed out. ¡°Will you need training with those?¡± ¡°Don¡¯t worry,¡± Sarah intervened. ¡°I will take it upon¡ª¡± For the second time in only a few minutes, she found herself unable to finish her sentence. Her Perception had started tingling furiously, filling the air with a weird electricity and making her feel dizzy and alert at the same time. She looked around and quickly found what had triggered it. On top of a table full of weapons of all sorts, bathed in a faint blue light, there was a book. Sarah approached it with apprehension, wondering what was about to happen. Books could be lethal too, and this one could be part of the armorer¡¯s catalog: a tool for killing in secret, a book with poisoned pages that would give you a horrible death when you least expected it. But it was not that. Written in large characters engraved in the middle of the leathery cover, there was only one word:
SAJYA
¡°That... that is valuable too,¡± the man said as he rushed behind the table, so as to present the book to her. ¡°If you¡¯re interested...¡± Sarah looked at him with a mix of pity and anger. ¡°Oh, I think this is already mine,¡± she said, grabbing the book and pointing at the title. ¡°That¡¯s not possible,¡± the man objected. Sarah could almost see the wheels turning inside his head trying to come up with a reasonable price for the book, which, she realized, he had never seen before. ¡°It is perfectly possible,¡± she retorted, ¡°because this book wasn¡¯t here a minute ago. It appeared on your shop through magical means.¡± She opened the book. There was a short legend in the first page; nothing else. Nothing else in the first page, or the second, or in the rest of the tome, which was pretty sizable. There were perhaps four hundred pages in there, all of them blank save for that solitary legend:
Keep this book.
¡°It doesn¡¯t make a difference, though, right?¡± the man insisted. ¡°You found it in my shop; you must buy it. It will be two thousand coin. That¡¯s already discounted.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t think so,¡± Sarah objected. She could afford paying for the book, but something was telling her that she shouldn¡¯t: this article had come to this world in a weird way, outside the rules of the game (which was admittedly pretty confusing in its rules), and she felt that paying for it would mess with her Inventory and currency balance. It needed to be separate from all other items. She didn¡¯t know how she had arrived at such a conclusion; it was a hunch. Maybe the product of her increased Intelligence. Suddenly, her Perception started tingling violently once more. A small area of her visual field stood out to her. The armorer¡¯s hand was now sneakily manipulating the knife. She caught a glimpse of the blade moving upward, getting in attack position, in a fraction of a second, and... ... and the next she knew was that her arms were raised and she was holding her bow with a nocked arrow. The point of the arrow was almost touching the tip of the man¡¯s nose. He had frozen in place, his hand holding the knife midway, his eyes pushing out of their sockets. Retrieve bow, Sarah had thought... but not quite. The thought had come to her as an instinctive flash, not in the form of words but just a concept, and the bow and arrow had materialized into her arms, ready to be used instantly. This must be the product of the increase in Intelligence as well, Sarah reflected, without taking her eyes off the man, whose face was now a terrified mask. Going from ten to fifty is quite a jump. ¡°You were saying you were sorry?¡± she asked menacingly. ¡°And ¡ª and I am,¡± said the man, swallowing nervously. ¡°I was just trying to put my knife on the table so that you could see that I¡¯m not a threat to you. Take the book. It¡¯s yours.¡± ¡°Yeah, let¡¯s say I believe you. Throw the knife out there,¡± Sarah said. Once the man complied, she thought Store bow and her hands were free again. ¡°We should go,¡± Maggot said nervously. It was the first time he talked after choosing the knives. ¡°I agree,¡± Sarah replied. Then, addressing the armorer, she added, ¡°We might come again for more stuff. Try to be more polite and understanding should the time come.¡± The man nodded vigorously and let out a sigh of relief when Sarah and Maggot exited the armory. Once outside, she couldn¡¯t resist the temptation of opening the book again. The original legend, Keep this book, was still there, written in the first page in an antiquated scripture. But now there was something else. A second sentence written directly below that one. And that sentence almost froze the blood inside her veins. She stopped dead in her tracks, holding the book as if expecting more words to keep appearing below those, but that didn¡¯t happen. There were only the first recommendation, Keep this book, and now, right below it, the new sentence, so clear and direct that it looked out of place in this fantastic world of dragons and knights:
Victor Anderen is alive.
Chapter 14. The swarm Sarah woke up to find a notification for a new task filling her vision. Maybe the buzz and the tingle of the notification had interrupted her sleep; she had nothing to complain, though, because she felt rested, as if she had slept for a full day. She had gone to bed about an hour after finding the book at the armory. She was tired, so tired that she felt as if she hadn¡¯t slept for a long time. And in fact she wouldn¡¯t be able to say for how long she had been awake, since the wave had messed up with her perception of time. Now she had slept soundly and felt full of energy. The text was written in the same format she had gotten used to, with the letters emitting a tenous glow against the background of her field of view. What was unfamiliar was this background. She was not in a place she could recognize. It looked... off. Too modern to be a room in the Castle. Reading the notification confirmed her suspicions.
TASK: Retrieve the flamethrower You are one of the last survivors of the outbreak. The whole city is in ruins, food is scarce and going outside is always dangerous. There is a weapon that can help you: a flamethrower that is waiting for you in an abandoned hardware store three blocks away. Use all your caution and skill to get there and make it back alive. Reward on success: - new weapon: Flamethrower (crossphasable) - 300 XP - Stealth skill - increase in Perception, Endurance and Agility
So that was it. A wave had come while she was asleep, taking her off the Castle and sending her to a different realm. Sarah sat up, grabbed some blood-stained clothes that were lying on a chair beside the bed, put them on, and inspected her surroundings. The bed that had seemed so comfortable to her was nothing to write home about. Her sound sleep had been due to her being so incredibly exhausted, more than because of the quality of the bed. It looked like it was a century old and the mattress was thin and worn; the cover was basically a rag and the sheets were translucent in places. On the nightstand there was an oil lamp, and Sarah assumed that there was no power in the whole city. The walls were stained with blood and the ceiling was partially black with soot. There was only one window, but several planks of wood had been nailed to the edges in order to block anything from entering through it. In between the planks an orange light made its way into the room: the blood of the setting sun. In the almost complete silence there was a subdued noise coming from outside, some sort of murmur that sent a chill down Sarah¡¯s spine. She went to the window and looked outside. The room was on a second floor in what seemed to be a downtown block. But the city was dark and silent, devoid of anything resembling a living, breathing urban center. Also, dead bodies walked around the streets. The zombies dragged their feet and opened their mouths to emit what they maybe meant as words, but all Sarah could hear from the distance was that sound she¡¯d hear before, like a constant murmur. In the distance, Sarah saw what must be the warehouse. She noticed it because there was a point of blue clarity coming from it, the result of her Perception trait telling her that something important was in there. The flamethrower. That¡¯s where she would be headed. She took a brief walk through the rest of the apartment. It was in disarray, and the only thing that had been taken good care of were the barriers blocking all entrances. Doors and windows were well secured as to avoid any surprises. Evidently, the apocalypse has been here for a while, Sarah thought. She went to the bathroom and relieved herself in the darkness. Luckily, there was still running water, so she could wash her hands and face. She used a lighter to see inside the bathroom and found a dead man in the bathtub. He had shot himself in the head, and his blood was splattered all over the wall, which the bullet had also cracked, drawing an explosion of black lines. She grabbed the gun and checked that it still had a couple of bullets. The corpse was recent, since it didn¡¯t smell. Sarah thought of touching it to see if it was still warm but she shuddered at the idea and desisted. She toured the apartment once more but this time she went around picking up stuff. She grabbed a backpack and filled it with a working flashlight, a change of clothes, two bottles of water, a can of beans, a kitchen knife, a fork, a spoon, some metal wire, several rags, a lighter, a hammer, a short rope, a bunch of nails, and the man¡¯s gun. Then she remembered the bit about the flamethrower being ¡°crossphasable¡± and wondered if the weapons she had in the medieval realm had been carried over to this one. Invoking her Inventory, she saw that they were still there, but now they were different weapons. The small sword was now a switchblade (Really? she groaned internally), the big sword was a pistol, and the bow and arrows had been translated as a sniper rifle. Interesting. She went to the window and leaned forward. Retrieve sniper rifle, she thought, and the rifle appeared beside her. She mounted it on the window, passing it through the space between two wood planks; whoever had nailed them to the wall knew what they were doing. She checked that the rifle had a silencer, looked through the crosshairs, centered them on a zombie¡¯s head, and took a shot. The zombie died again and fell to the floor, where it remained as an inert lump. The shot had been clean and accurate. Sarah waited a while to see if it stood up again, but it didn¡¯t.
Skill active: Hunt
So she was a zombie hunter now. Nice. The zombie remaining dead was a good sign. It meant that these zombies were like the ones in most movies and TV shows, where you take them out by blowing up their heads. That was all she needed to know. The sun was already setting. It was time to go outside. * * * The air outside was chilly and charged with electricity. Or at least so it seemed to Sarah. She had fastened the backpack tightly to her body using all the stripes and hooks. She had feared that the corridors of the building itself were infested with undead but the stretch from the apartment to the front door in the ground floor had been clear. Now, though, she was crouching behind a dumpster, waiting. Her Perception came to her rescue again. Even though the dumpster and other objects were blocking her line of sight, she could tell where the zombies were because they appeared like diffuse patches of very faint blue. The downside was that she needed to concentrate with all her might to be able to see this. Otherwise, her sight was just ordinary, and she could see almost nothing in the city that was quickly going dark as the sun hid in the horizon.Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. This was a complete runover. I doubt there are many living here, she thought. I might even be the only one. She wondered what had happened to Maggot and Uberyn. Had they been sent to this realm too, and were they hiding in other apartments in the same city? Or were they struggling in other worlds? Or perhaps they were still in the medieval world, wondering what had happened to her. If only... Oh, fuck. She realized now that she didn¡¯t have the book anymore. It hadn¡¯t crossed realms with her. I don¡¯t know how I will appear to you exactly, Sumiko had told her when she climbed into the tank to log into the game. You will be in time dilation, so whatever the case, we won¡¯t be able to talk in real time. It was evident now that Sumiko was sending her messages and the game translated them in the form of a book. She pictured Sumiko typing a quick message for her and the game updating the book with it. But since time ran so much faster ingame, it was not an immediate process: she would receive the messages several minutes or maybe hours after Sumiko had sent them. Talking to her live would be impossible: it would resemble the part of Lord of the Rings where Merry and Pippin try to maintain a conversation to the Ents but the trees take long hours to say a couple of words. So here was the deal: Sumiko would let her know about anything important that she could find out, but she would tell her only in the form of very brief messages, and Sarah would need to check the book once in a while in order to receive them. And for that, she needed to have the fucking book. Her thoughts were cut short when she noticed that one of the zombies roaming around was getting close. Another undead, a woman, followed him a few steps behind. They were not coming to her, but they would smell her soon (if they could smell, that is). She needed to act quickly. Retrieve switchblade, she commanded with her mind. The suicidal man¡¯s gun had no silencer so using it now would be a death sentence; she needed something to kill the zombies without making any noise. The switchblade appeared in her hand. She got ready. The first zombie grunted as it reached the dumpster. It had smelled Sarah, or perhaps it just let out an involuntary sound, like the other undead. Sarah didn¡¯t stop to ask. She sat up suddenly, turned around, lurched forward, and sunk the switchblade into the zombie¡¯s left eye. It penetrated so deeply into its head that she needed to hold it tight to avoid losing it when the corpse fell backward and thumped on the street.
+1 XP
Oh, come on. Are you kidding me? The second zombie, the woman, looked at her with hungry eyes. It hissed and pushed forward, stumbling upon the first one, and extended its arms, searching for Sarah¡¯s neck. But Sarah was faster. She dropped to the ground, tackled the zombie, and received its head with the switchblade pointing upward. This time she had to struggle for quite a while to recover the weapon. Only after the fact she wondered if she could just store it in her Inventory whenever it got stuck and then retrieve it immediately afterward, so that it would be in her hand again.
+1 XP
Only one experience point per zombie? This is so shitty. You made up some shitty mechanics, Game Master, Sarah thought.
Skill acquired: Sneak Attack
OK, I guess that¡¯s nice anyway. Sarah looked up and noticed that there were several more zombies coming down the street. They didn¡¯t seem to have noticed her, but she decided not to find out. She sprinted in the opposite direction, her backpack still tightly fastened to her body. It was lucky that her shoes were now a pair of good sneakers, worn out from use but still completely adequate for this task: silent, comfortable, and performant. The only problem was she was taking a detour. The warehouse was three blocks away in the direction the zombies were coming from. There was the flamethrower, waiting for her, waiting to unload its deadly spit all over the undead. Her Perception was tingling again now, and Sarah realized she was already in trouble. Several bluish vaguely contoured shapes started appearing in her visual field. They were behind buildings and cars, still out of sight, but coming at her, all of them coming at her, always coming at her. Or so it seemed. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. She ran faster, trying to reach the intersection and cross the street before the undead got to that point. It was no longer a priority to keep advancing silently; now, speed was everything that mattered. She panted and huffed as her feet hit the hard ground one after the other, left, right, left, right, left right left right leftrightleftrightleftright until she reached the corner and had to kick a zombie in the knee to go first. The cracking sound was really satisfying. Fuck! They were in this other block too. They were coming from everywhere: from behind the cars, from inside the buildings. Suddenly, half of Sarah¡¯s field of vision was bluish, and her heart was pumping so hard that she could hear it without difficulty. It¡¯s a fucking swarm. What to do? What to do? She started despairing. She had received a boost in her Intelligence in the previos mission, but right now she felt like that Intelligence was nowhere to be found. She was running wildly, with no direction; effectively running into the undead, almost giving herself to them. She could hear that murmur now, louder than before. The zombies were babbling nonsense, grunting in anticipation as they closed in on her, eager to get her brains. It was almost as if she could understand them, although they weren¡¯t really saying any words. Only that now, at ground level, the sound... Oh, for the love of all fucks. That¡¯s it! If these zombies were indeed like most zombies she had seen in other fictional universes outside the Anderworld, they couldn¡¯t climb. So anything from the second floor up would be safe... from zombies at least. There might be dangerous people in the buildings. But she would worry about that later. Now she only needed to figure out how to go up instead of forward. A block ahead there was a bus that had crashed into a building. It was worth trying. Sarah ran, ran, ran until her sprint was cut short, and then she ran into the zombies. She stuck the switchblade into an undead¡¯s eyesocket. The zombie fell backward. Store switchblade. Retrieve switchblade. It worked. She drove the blade into another zombie¡¯s head by impaling it behind from the neck. Store switchblade. Retrieve switchblade. The weapon was in her hand again. A zombie (one who had been just a kid when it passed away) jumped on her, trying to bite her leg. Hey, that¡¯s not where the brain is. Don¡¯t you have zombie parents to explain this stuff to you? She stabbed the zombie kid in the head. Store switchblade. Retrieve switchblade. But she couldn¡¯t keep doing this. They were too many for that. She didn¡¯t care anymore about finishing them off; she just pushed them aside, kicked them, slashed their eyes or throats or limbs just to stun them and get them out of her way. Even so, it was hard to advance. There were many, so many of them. A fucking swarm. And the sound, the ever-present murmur coming out from them all at the same time. She grabbed the dead man¡¯s gun and started shooting. She ran out of bullets. There was no time to recharge. There was no time for anything. She kept running, kicking, slashing. When she got to the next intersection, with the crashed bus just a few meters away, she was exhausted. It was as if there was no more air in her lungs, and they couldn¡¯t take any more air from outside. Her body was trying to shut down. No. No! She ran a bit more. Then, she jumped. Chapter 15. Hardware If I stumble they¡¯re gonna eat me alive Can you hear my heart beating like a hammer? ¡ª Metric, Help I¡¯m alive In the absence of glass, a window is just a hole. The bus had only holes. The windows had shattered long ago when it caught fire. The whole thing was blackened and bare, after the fire had consumed everything inside. Sarah grabbed a window frame and pulled herself upward. She felt the hands of zombies trying to grab her feet, but luckily, they fell short for a fraction of a second. Losing a sneaker to those fucking corpses would have been a problem. Sarah stepped on the roof of the bus and assessed the situation. The zombies were already swarming around the vehicle, cutting any possible retreat. She could only go up now. The bus had crashed against the wall of the building. Right abover her she could see a window in the second floor. It was closed and just out of reach. OK. How do I get there? She could try her luck at jumping, but she would most surely fall short, and plummet to the ground where the swarm of undead was aching to rip her brains apart. The good thing was that she was not in a hurry anymore. If it came to that, she could stand there for hours, pondering the situation. Another way of saying: awaiting death. No. She would get out of it. The task was not impossible. Just above the window there was an old AC unit. If she could somehow get a hold of it, she could step on it and try the window of the third floor, or maybe hang from it and kick the one in the first floor, in an attempt to break it open. She unfastened her backpack and grabbed the rope. The zombies kept murmuring nonsense, groaning and drooling. There must be like one or two thousand already, occupying the whole block, piling up around the bus. If I don¡¯t act fast, they will get to me by just stepping on their fallen comrades. The rope was too short to loop it around the AC. She would need to anchor it somehow, and hope it was secured tightly enough not to detach itself under her weight. And these boobs certainly weigh a lot. She tied the dead man¡¯s gun to one end of the rope and threw it up. After a few attempts, she could make it pass over one of the AC unit¡¯s nooks, but when she pulled, it came down immediately. It was too light. After a thorough review of her equipment, and a survey of everything around her, she realized that the only thing she could do was use the backpack with everything inside. The combined weight of all of it, plus the bulk of everything pressing between the unit and the wall, might do the trick. The downside was that she could just lose everything. The zombies were growing restless and some of them were already being smashed by their peers. One fell down, then two, then more. The others climbed on them, their arms raised in an attempt to get a hold of Sarah. Once more, a chill ran down her spine. She thought of conjuring her firearms but what good would it do against so many zombies? It would be like throwing a glass of water at hell itself. She would run out of ammunition before clearing a visible spot in the swarm. She threw the backpack up. She failed. The backpack fell down amongst the undead. She pulled the rope before they could grab it. I need to be more careful. She shot it again. She failed again. It was only in her seventeenth attempt that she was successful. She pulled hard to check that it would resist. It did. Sarah started climbing. It was not a heartwarming position, having abandoned the protection of the bus to hang right above the thousands of zombies gathered in front of the building. She looked down and regretted it. She kept climbing until she could reach the AC unit. She pulled herself up, and lay on her chest on that tiny, dirty surface. There was a noise. A very ugly noise. The thing was yielding. Oh, for fuck¡¯s sake. She frantically untied the knot she had with such a tight grip. Her hands hurt as she tried to bend the rope to her will. She succeeded when the AC unit was already on a 30 degree slope, and she was sliding down when she started securing the rope to the pipe behind the unit. Then she bent the pipe over itself so that the rope would not slide out, sending her to the floor. I wish I would have applied more points to Strength. One thing she had noticed was that the character selection turned out to be pretty much irrelevant in terms of basic traits. Any task or the accumulation of a few skills would give the player enough points to offset the initial advantages for their characters. Once again, she lamented not having chosen a character with the ability of Flight. Skills were much more defining than traits, at least in this alpha version of the Anderworld. Sarah finished the tightest knot she could make in such a short timeframe, grabbed the rope with one hand, and grabbed the backpack with the other, as firmly as possible. Then the AC unit yielded. It detached from the wall, and plumetted to the floor. Two zombies that were looking up eagerly, waiting for her to fall, received it instead. The device smashed their faces and fractured their necks. The rest of the undead ignored them and kept looking up with hungry eyes. Now came the part where she tried to smash the closed window. I definitely should have chosen the fairy. Or at least put everything in Strength. She kicked the wall and swung back. The pipe complained, the rope complained, and she caught a glimpse of the zombies down there waiting for her to fail. A sense of dread invaded her. She swung forward and crashed against the window with both feet. It didn¡¯t break. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. She swung back again. She swung forward again. The window withstood the attack. Nononononono, please break, you have to break. She swung back. She swung forward. It resisted. One more time. She swung back. She swung forward. Nothing. Oh, come on! She swung back. She swung forward. The blinds cracked just a little bit. Yesss! She swung back. She swung forward.This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. Still outside, but the blinds had cracked a tiny bit further. She swung back. She swung forward. And again. And again. It took a few more attempts until the blinds finally broke and the glass behind them crashed. Sarah jumped into the apartment and used the switchblade to cut the rope, leaving the last few feet hanging from the pipe. Safe for now... I think. Unlike the apartment she had left, this one wasn¡¯t prepared for an outbreak. The windows and doors weren¡¯t blocked with planks and she found nothing useful. The guy in the bathtub had been a survivor; who knew why he had decided to kill himself when he was surrounded by weapons, rope, and all kinds of protection. In this apartment, however, ordinary people had lived, and they had fled to an uncertain fate when the outbreak happened. Or at least that¡¯s what Sarah concluded. She raided the pantry. It was empty. The people who used to live here had definitely fled. Sarah thought for a minute. She would need to get to the hardware store while being on the ground the least amount of time possible ¡ª since she had no way to fly, she would ideally be jumping on the street to cross from building to building and then keep going throught the first floor of the new building, and so on. She briefly considered using the power lines, but she didn¡¯t know if they still had power even though there didn¡¯t seem to be any streetlights on, which at this time they should be. Better play it safe. She needed to use the rope, but with a bit more preparation. Something that could serve as a hook or anchor, which she could use to affix to all kinds of openings. After searching the apartment fruitlessly for anything that could serve as a grappling hook, she decided to raid the rest of the floor. She grabbed the hammer and the flashlight. She would also need some protection in case some of those apartments, unlikely as it seemed, were still inhabited by potentially dangerous people: Store switchblade. Retrieve pistol. She found the task easier than she had thought. In the absence of people, any determined thief can do whatever they please, she realized; what deters a thief is not so much a good lock as the presence of neighbours who can alert the police whenever they hear a strange noise or see anything suspicious. Eliminate the people and suddenly a lock is just a brute force challenge. Her hammer and her legs were more than enough to solve it. In another apartment she found several S-hooks that were stored in a bin. Those would do. She grabbed three and fashioned a grappling hook. She had no way to solder them in place but she used the metallic wire to more or less lock them in position; she then looped the rope around them and tied a complex knot. Once she was satisfied, she used the rest of the wire to fasten them even more. Armed with her new hook plus some further provisions, Sarah headed over to a window leading to the opposite street. The bluish tint indicating the position of the flamethrower was still there. She would need to cross four blocks to get to the hardware store, since she had ran in the wrong direction when escaping the zombies. The hardest part was not the climb, but exiting each building silently. She would often need to break windows and jump on resounding surfaces; sometimes she would need to open metallic gates. This would immediately call the attention of the zombies, reducing the time available for launching the hook and climbing up the next building. I could use some Stealth right now, instead of being awarded with it at the end of this fucking task. There was also the little detail about blocks consisting of several buildings, all of them separated from each other. She would have to cross from building to building by swinging from one window to another, or by jumping from rooftop to rooftop like the Spider-Woman. A third alternative struck her as more practical: she would take advantage of any clear on the street to make a quick run along the block and only jump into a building when zombies got too close for comfort. The process took her more than two hours, and the sky was pitch black when she finally arrived at the hardware store. She hoped her flashlight wouldn¡¯t die at that moment because she hadn¡¯t found any replacement batteries. The hardware store¡¯s entrance was blocked by a steel curtain that was, of course, impossible to open. Sarah had to climb up a lamppost to be able to throw the hook and get a grip on the roof. She then came in through a tiny window located near the roof. Inside, she found herself looking at the floor. It would be a free fall of ten or twelve feet at least ¡ª nothing she hadn¡¯t done multiple times in the past few hours. She executed a three-point landing and screamed when the flashlight flew out of her grip. It bounced several times on the hard floor, but somehow it didn¡¯t break. She toured the place, stumbling on something once in a while, trying to make a conservative use of the flashlight. Until she found a row of bigger, better flashlights, and dozens of packs of batteries. And then, with better lighting, she could inspect the store at leisure. I could live here instead. But the task description included getting back safely, so Sarah guessed that was a no-no. However, nothing could stop her from grabbing some additional provisions while she was there. She scoured every aisle, every nook and cranny, and picked up some treasures: a longer, sturdier rope; a professional grade grappling hook; a soldering mask; several kinds of glue; some barbed wire; a machete, a saw, a larger backpack, and a bicycle. And as she walked around the building, she finally found the flamethrower. There it was, in all its lack of glory. It was an unconspicuous thing; if not for the slight glow that her Perception used to isolate it from the environment, and that became visible when she wasn¡¯t pointing the flashlight at it, Sarah would probable have walked past it. It looked no different from any other of the many contraptions present in the hardware store. It basically consisted of two parallel fuel tanks, a straight mounting with a strap to put it on your back, a hose with a trigger and an igniter. All of it in boring shades of brown, dark green and gray, which would make it useful in conventional combat but in a city overrun with zombies it mattered precisely nil. As soon as she lifted the flamethrower, Sarah realized that something was wrong. It was light. Way too light. It was empty. Sarah felt her heart skipping a beat and turning inside her. She had expected to be able to use the flamethrower on the way back. But without fuel, it was useless. Not only she had to do the whole process again, sneaking into the streets and climbing into buildings, but now she had to do it all while carrying the fucking flamethrower. Unless... Did she actually have fuel for the weapon? If the weapons themselves crossphased between realms, why not the fuel? Sarah invoked her Inventory. And then she realized that she had turned out to be wise in saving her mana and using her XP instead to exchange for currency back in the medieval village. Her Mana indicator had now changed. The relevant portion of her Inventory said:
Fuel 0060 ($30/x)
Depending on the thing¡¯s consumption, that coin would have been too expensive if she had gotten rid of her precious mana. In the zombie apocalypse, fire is like a deadly spell. Got it. Now, if Sarah wasn¡¯t wrong, flamethrowers are typically useful for a couple of shots before depleting their charge. She would have to be recharging it with mana (or fuel, here) all the time. She would need to be economical in her use of the flamethrower, despite there being so many zombies out there. She couldn¡¯t resist taking a test shot. She wanted to know how much fuel (or mana) she would be wasting every time she pulled the trigger. Going to a relatively empty corner of the store, she took a deep breath and did it. A big flame lit up the whole place, shooting forward and extending in all directions when it reached the wall. Sarah couldn¡¯t help gasping in amazement. The flame was much bigger than she would have imagined. When it ceased, some of the light remained: several articles that had been placed against the wall had caught fire. Sarah had pointed the flamethrower to an empty spot on the wall, but the flame had spread out so much that it reached them. Fuck! Sarah started looking frantically for a fire extinguisher. Luckily, there were several, aligned beside the main counter, with price tags in game currency. The flamethrower seemed to difficult to control, which made it dangerous for whoever wielded it. Sarah would need to be careful with it. On the other hand... splash damage. Sarah grinned at the thought. She put out the fire and took a look at her Inventory.
Fuel 0059 ($30/x)
That¡¯s neat, she thought. The amount of fuel consumed by the flamethrower was helpfully measured in... shots, or blasts, or something. This meant that she would have fifty-nine opportunities to fry some zombies. That would be fun. Sarah attached a big flashlight to the soldering mask with some duct tape, and put the mask on. She put on the flamethrower as well and hung the backpack on the back of the bicycle. She was about to pry the curtain open with a crowbar to go outside when she noticed her Perception was still active and tingling madly. There was one more object of interest inside the hardware store. She turned off the flashlight and followed the bluish ghost. The object was small, and she had a good idea about what it was. She walked across the store in the dark, following her Perception, until she got to where the object was. The cover still bore her name: ¡°SAJYA¡±. On the first page, the two sentences she had already read remained. But now there was a third one.
Take Maggot to the Sorceress.
Chapter 16. The war inside Two weeks earlier They called it the Sorceress. Or at least, that was the identifier they used to refer to it. More concretely, SORCRSS_m7. Whoever they were, the hackers had opened a hole in the game and created a character to peek inside. Sumiko was fascinated by this. Following the trail of the hackers as they tried to erase their footprints was challenging, a game in and of itself. She had fought the temptation to log in and see what the game was like, but she couldn¡¯t resist seeing this war unfold, as the intruders, while not playing the game themselves, set up this complex procedure, maybe to be able to wreak havoc into the system once they could actually go inside and play. The Sorceress. A character that barely interacted with anything else in the game, but that was potentially a source of information from outside and of items that couldn¡¯t be obtained during normal gameplay because they were hacks. Sumiko could only imagine what they could do, but she figured that those items would serve as shortcuts to acquire infinite currency or skills, jump instantly between different realms, or become invincible.If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. And there was an interesting piece of code that seemed to prove her hypothesis. There was a quest (a ¡°task¡± in the Anderworld¡¯s parlance) that was not in the logical structure of all the rest, but it was an isolated thing. It was a task that told the player to go and talk to the Sorceress! But obviously, that task couldn¡¯t be activated through normal means. It had to be triggered. And the trigger appeared to be a non-autorized player logging in. They set this up for their own use, Sumiko thought. But the temptation had come back now, stronger than ever. What if I go first? What if I somehow manage to log into the game without triggering the security system? If so, I could talk to the Sorceress myself. Be the hacker inside. The idea was ludicrous, but Sumiko couldn¡¯t get it off her head. She knew the Anderworld was online. She knew there were already a bunch of people playing it. She knew there was a way for a non-registered player to access a source of potentially wonderful bonuses. Her gamer heart was beating so fast she thought she was about to faint. She kept following the trail for days, completely fascinated by the war that was brewing up in the virtual world. Her enthusiasm only subsided about ten days later, when she found out what they had done to Mike. Chapter 17. Stuck Present day Oh, so I need to take Maggot to the Sorceress. Easy peasy. Only I need to know first where Maggot is. And then I need to figure out how to use the Worldjumper to get to the Sorceress. Tiny details for someone trapped in the zombie apocalypse. Sarah forced the steel curtain open and went out. In the pitch black darkness she would make an excellent target for both living and undead alike, considering the flashlight taped to the soldering mask she was using as helmet. The thought made her nervous but it couldn¡¯t be helped: there was no way that she¡¯d make all the way back climbing building after building with the flamethrower hanging from her back, so the bike was the best option. The first zombies appeared when she was about to reach the corner. They were three, four, then six at most. Not worth wasting fuel yet. Sarah pedaled faster in an attempt to cross the street before they got to her, but the combined weight of her body, the flamethrower and the backpack slowed down her march. She had to retrieve the switchblade and start impaling the ones who got too close. She almost fell from the bike once, and a few seconds later she had to step off to fight the undead on foot. When the area was clear, she climbed on the bycicle again and pressed for speed.
Skill active: Mount
Yeah, I knew how to ride a bike before logging in here, but thanks I guess. She had pedaled halfway through the next block when she found a larger gathering of zombies. There were at least thirty, maybe fifty, and they were coming at her. There was no way out but forward. This is why I needed you, she said with her mind, as if the flamethrower could receive and interpret her thoughts. Don¡¯t fail me now. She stopped the bike, examined the horde of zombies moving toward her, and pointed the hose to the center. Throught the narrow strip of the soldering mask and under the potent white bath of the flashlight, the zombies really looked like an army of ghosts, and a sense of dread filled Sarah¡¯s heart despite herself. ¡°Die for once, motherfuckers!¡± She pulled the trigger and a magnificent stream of light and heat rushed into the dark air. The night seemed to catch fire. Sarah was momentarily blinded, then caught a glimpse of zombie hell. The corpses were not walking anymore; they were writhing, shaking, trembling, falling to the ground as the fiery load embraced them like a deadly lover.
Skill acquired: Blast Attack
The Blast Attack skill could be useful if she ever got out of this depressing realm, Sarah thought. Both assets and skills seemed to be crossphasable from one realm to the other, so her learning to ride a horse in the medieval village had activated the skill she had acquired (Mount) here in this desolate city. Maybe Blast Attack would let her do some interesting things elsewhere, even without a flamethrower. At this point Sarah realized something. The mechanics of the game had very little to do with acquiring particular abilities and items in the different realms; they were related to crossphasing and adapting between worlds. The way to play the game was to play the meta-game, trying to master the skill of crossphasing. This will be immensely useful once I learn how to use the Ring, she concluded. A new notification popped up then:
+43 XP
There, an exact count. Once all the zombies stopped moving, she had to maneuver around the flaming corpses so that the bike¡¯s wheels wouldn¡¯t melt. Then she changed her mind: she actually stepped off the bike, lifted it with some effort and crossed the barrier on foot. She realized she hadn¡¯t brought anything to repair the bycicle if it ever got damaged, and she couldn¡¯t afford the tires melting while she was outside wandering among the undead, so she had to be extra careful, or at least as careful as the circumstances allowed. In my next incursion I¡¯ll procure a bycicle repair kit. Her next encounter with a group of zombies was right after passing beside the crashed bus. They were just six or seven this time, so she refrained from burning them and instead started stabbing them as they got close. Fortunately, they were not very fast. She pedaled away as fast as she could. And then she got to the building where she had waken up hours ago. Well, fuck. The entrance to the building was completely inaccessible. It looked like all the zombies in the city had chosen that point to gather around, and half the block was swarming with animated corpses. Again, Sarah thought there must be at least a thousand of them. Think fast. Sarah assessed the situation. She was outside, without a cover, and even with the flamethrower and the mask, it wouldn¡¯t be long until the zombies dispatched her. The best course of action seemed to be pedaling away and circling around two or three blocks as she waited for the undead to go elsewhere. If their number went down to¡ªUnauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. ¡°Mmmmgggrrh!¡± Sarah turned around, startled. Two zombies were almost over her already. They had come at her from her left when she was distracted watching the swarm. She pushed one of them away, then withdrew her arm with a quick jerk when the other grabbed it and tried to bite it. The flamethrower made it difficult for her to move, so when she tried to stab them with the switchblade that she held in her right hand, she fell short. No, no, no. More zombies were coming at her now, alerted by the noise. Store switchblade, Sarah commanded, then prepared her left hand to hold it. Retrieve switchblade. Now she could stab the zombies that were attacking her. But there were so, so many more. Oh, fuck. She pointed the hose at the ones that were getting close and lit them up. The situation changed abruptly. The first line of undead fell, contorting and murmuring, but the others saw the flame and started walking towards her. Oh, fuck, fuck. Sarah abandoned the bike and the backpack. There would be time to go back for them if she managed to survive his, which was a big if. She opened fire again. Liquid death rained over the already dead, killing them again. They are going to make me use all the fuel. She stepped forward, pressing on. Zombies on fire were still trying to get to her, but they collapsed as they did so, turning to ashes. She took another shot. The heat was burning her arms and chest, and the felt ran down her face profusely, clouding her already limited vision through the soldering mask. She shot again. More fire, more heat, more death for the undead. ¡°Mmmggrh. Mmrmrm. Grrrrnnnrrr.¡± Even though she incinerated every zombie that came to her, more kept appearing; she burned the ones in front of her and suddenly there were zombies at her sides and behind her. She started turning around as she pressed the trigger, embracing the undead in a wheel of fire. When she got to the door, the bycicle and the backpack forgotten amidst the swarm of zombies, she took a look at her Inventory.
Fuel 0021 ($30/x)
Her reserves had dropped dramatically in just one trip. Of half a trip, more accurately. Then again, she had completed the mission, as a new notification informed her when she entered the apartment, all sweaty and exhaust.
Task complete: Retrieve the flamethrower +300 XP +30 Perceptiom +30 Endurance +30 Agility - Skill acquired: Stealth - New weapon: Flamethrower (crossphasable)
After a couple of minutes, a new prompt informed her that she had ascended to level 4. She had killed so many zombies that she had leveled up by sheer accumulation of XP, at one per head. * * * And then, nothing else happened. For a long time. In the following days, Sarah raided the rest of the apartments in the building for food and other useful stuff. She kept the barriers on the door and windows; even though the zombies were unable to come upstairs, there might still be other people in hiding, waiting for her to lower her guard to invade her place. She cleaned the apartment and took the dead man outside before it started to rot; in a brief ceremony, she burned his body in the middle of the street with a shot of the flamethrower. The undead had come to feast on both her and the corpse but the fire kept them at bay. She didn¡¯t know who the man had been but she thought this sign of respect was worth the spent unit of fuel/mana. Every few days she went out with the bike, wearing the mask and carrying the flamethrower. She typically chose a store and raided it for more items. She piled up cans of food which she even cooked sometimes using little scoops of the flamethrower¡¯s fuel. She also built a small arsenal of melee weapons: gardening scissors, axes, whatever could be used against a surprise attack. Since she hadn¡¯t found any ammo for her firearms yet, she was limited taking on her enemies at close range or burning them as a last resort, spending valuable fuel. She killed so many zombies that she leveled up twice more, bringing her level to 6. On the days she didn¡¯t venture out on the streets she went to the roof and practiced several skills. She ran, jumped, climbed, and rolled until she was exhausted; she became proficient at throwing knives and perfected her kicks and punches. The game occasionally rewarded her by assigning her several combat skills. She also kept her eye on the book, waiting for Sumiko to talk to her. A couple of weeks after she completed the task, a worrying message appeared on the page:
They raided your house.
Sarah gave in to despair for a while; she yelled and cried and unloaded her fury and frustration on the undead, shooting them with the sniper rifle until her ammo was dangerously low. After a while she realized she had been foolish. Snapping won¡¯t get me any closer to finding Mike, she told herself. If I can¡¯t find the way to exit this dead world, at least I should stay alive for as long as it takes until a way out presents itself. On another occasion she received an enigmatic message:
Jump from a great height.
She felt puzzled at that. I wish Sumiko would take more time to write her instructions, she thought. But maybe the time she was spending on this world was only equivalent to a few minutes outside; she didn¡¯t really know how strong was time dilation at this point in the game. Time. Time kept running mercilessly. Her resolve only hardened. She left the flamethrower inside to avoid wasting more fuel and decided to improve her Stealth abilities. It worked like some kind of field she had to keep active by conscious effort, and at first it only lasted for one minute or two; after a while she could prolong the effect and keep it working without so much effort. She walked around without the zombies noticing her; when they were really close they could see her but it was already too late, because she had her knives ready. She went on this way, earning experience points one by one, killing the already dead, upgrading her cloaking skills bit by bit. She had brought her Stealth points from the basic 10 to 30 when she saw the big-eyed girl. Chapter 18. The big-eyed girl The big-eyed girl was standing in the middle of the street, in the middle of the night, in the middle of a circle of zombies that were closing in fast. Sarah saw her as she walked under her Stealth protection, carrying a backpack with a bit of loot. She stopped dead in her tracks and for an instant she lost control of the Stealth, becoming visible. A living person! She reactivated the field before the undead could notice her. The girl was about eighteen years old. She looked Indian, or maybe Irani. Her skin was dark, but not black, and her body was lean and attractive. Sarah was kind of far away but she noticed that the girl was astonishingly beautiful, with that exotic look and an air of innocence in her big black eyes. The girl was wearing a short top, tight jeans, and long boots that looked stylish and sturdy at once. She seemed not to have any weapons on her. She was toast. Hey, watch out! Run! Sarah wanted to shout, but it would be useless. The girl was not blind; she saw what was happening, she saw the army of zombies surrounding her, and she didn¡¯t seem to be able to run anywhere. Oh, fuck. Sarah sprinted forward. She had to help the girl, or at least try. I¡¯ve spent weeks in this apocalyptic world, shielding myself, piling up weapons, storing food, improving my protection. I¡¯ve taken care not to do anything stupid. I¡¯ve become a survivor. I¡¯ve avoided any missteps. And now I¡¯m throwing it all away for this person I don¡¯t even know. The thought crossed her mind as fast as her arms raised to take out a couple of zombies. Her knives slashed and punctured, then came back into position; she pushed them forward to stab other two undead people. The rest of the zombies didn¡¯t seem to notice; they were still focused on the girl, getting closer and closer. Sarah pushed aside a zombie, then another. They are too many. Her Stealth shield faltered; she was concentrating less on keeping it on and more on knocking down corpses and find her way to the big-eyed girl. Hey, you! Do something! she wanted to yell, but she refrained. And then, when Sarah had already dispatched about fifteen zombies, the big-eyed girl did something. She lowered her hands, brought them behind her back, and when she raised them again, she was holding a chain on each one. The chains were pretty long, about five feet each ¡ª yet a pretty ineffectual weapon in this circumstance, Sarah thought. At least you could have brought a g¡ª Sarah¡¯s thought was cut short when the big-eyed girl made a quick jerking motion with her arms, lashing out at her sides, and the chains caught fire. Oh, that ¡ª OK. The girl began her death dance. She brought her arms up, then down, turned to the side, letting the chains draw beautiful shapes in the air. Sarah was reminded of those rhythmic gymnasts dancing with ribbons in the Olympics, only these ribbons brought fiery death. If zombies had been rational beings, they would have disbanded then, running in all directions. But they were zombies. So when the first in line fell, the others kept pressing on, walking forward to meet the fire chains that would sear their dead flesh, tear their heads off, and otherwise bring them down. It was a truly mesmerizing sight. Sarah was so entranced by the girl¡¯s movements and the shapes drawn by the fiery chains in the blackness of night that she completely forgot to keep her Stealth shield up. After a few seconds, the girl caught a glimpse of her. Her eyes became even bigger with surprise, and her dance faltered for an instant, the chains falling lifeless to the ground, before raising up again to resume their deadly work. She¡¯s as shocked as me, Sarah realized. She¡¯s been alone in this world too. Sarah reactivated her Stealth cloak and started killing zombies, but this time methodically, stabbing them unaware with clinical precision, withdrawing her blades before they got stuck, keeping her distance from the chains that mowed down everything that got close. After a while, her Stealth protection withered down, having been used for several minutes. But it didn¡¯t matter. The battle was won. Only a few walking corpses remained; the rest lay on a circle or charred, decayed meat centered on the big-eyed girl. ¡°Hi,¡± the girl said, when Sarah was dispatching her last zombie. ¡°Are you new here?¡± ¡°Hi,¡± Sarah replied after taking a moment to regain her breath. ¡°I¡¯ve been here for about two months. Your chains are awesome, by the way.¡± ¡°They are, right?¡± the girl laughed. ¡°They were magical in the other realm. Here, they are just a trick with some special fuel. That¡¯s the kind of magic that works in this place.¡± ¡°So you have crossphased too,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Where do you come from? Were you always on your own?¡± ¡°Oh, no,¡± the girl said, walking to her and extending a friendly hand. ¡°We were three in the Enchanted Forest. Then we lost one. Well, he lagged behind. We needed to run. Then a wave brought me here and I don¡¯t know where my companion is.¡± ¡°Three? In the Enchanted Forest?¡± Sarah said, dumbstruck with the realization. ¡°And one of you lagged behind? Then... then I know who you are.¡± ¡°Really?¡± the beautiful girl said. ¡°Have you met my friends?¡± ¡°Your friends,¡± Sarah echoed. ¡°You haven¡¯t been a good friend to one of them.¡± The girl frowned, and only then, after two months of not seeing any other players around, Sarah remembered that she could just Scrutinize her.
UNDAYA Class: Mage Level: 9 STRENGTH : 050 AGILITY : 100 ENDURANCE : 040 INTELLIGENCE : 020 PERCEPTION : 080 CHARISMA : 060 If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. 0710 Mana 11100 XP Health : 100/100 Stamina : 100/100 Skills: - Exploration - Melee Defense - Melee Attack - Scrutinize - Healing - Hunt - Blast Attack - Fire Spell - 8 others
¡°So you¡¯ve seen Maggot,¡± Undaya said. ¡°Is he alright?¡± ¡°He is... because I helped him.¡± ¡°Oh, thank the gods.¡± ¡°You could have stayed to help him yourself.¡± ¡°Yeah, I guess. I was level two then, though.¡± Sarah didn¡¯t press the issue. She had just met Undaya and they were probably the two only living people in this realm. It made more sense to be friends. Or maybe it was her Diplomacy ability kicking in. ¡°I guess we can help each other now,¡± she said. Undaya¡¯s face lit up. ¡°Of course,¡± she replied. ¡°You can teach me how to get that invisibility thing. And I can teach you a couple of tricks too.¡± ¡°Your place or my place?¡± Undaya laughed frankly. ¡°I don¡¯t know. Whatever is closer. I¡¯m seven blocks away, beside the gas station.¡± ¡°The Mana station, you mean?¡± Sarah chuckled. ¡°You wish. Mana is scarce here. Not any fuel is... Fuel, you know. But you can get some if you know how.¡± ¡°Really? I¡¯ve been using up mine. I have a nice weapon too,¡± Sarah confided. ¡°Let me show it to you. My place is nearer.¡± * * * Undaya stayed at the apartment for a full day, and then went back to hers. After a while they both decided that it made more sense to stay together so the big-eyed girl moved in. In the following days she taught Sarah how to replenish her mana. It turned out that the red and golden spots she had seen in the partial map for the Enchanted Forest were stores of mana and ammunition; they would be crates in this realm. Undaya showed one to Sarah and told her where to locate more. For some reason there was no facility for them to inspect a full map so they were limited, again, to seeing what they had already physically explored. The first thing Sarah noticed was that the hardware store housed three or four of those crates. Undaya said that they seemed to be put there quite often, so when she was about to run out, she knew that a trip to the store would suffice to keep going. In turn, Sarah couldn¡¯t really explain how to acquire the Stealth skill besides completing a task that gave it to you as a reward, but in exchange, she told Undaya about her strategy of climbing up buildings to avoid the street as much as possible. They even brought strong ropes and wires from the hardware store and began extending them across the windows of different buildings, so that they could go across whole blocks without descending, in case the streets were chock full of zombies. The Melee Attack and Melee Defense skills improved markedly for both of them; they even gained a few points for Sneak Attack. They started to become experts in surviving in this world, and with the ability to replenish fuel, they could even allow themselves the luxury of cooking often. It really looked like they could stay in the dead city for quite a while. And if Sarah weren¡¯t aching for finding her boyfriend, if she had forgotten everything about her life before logging in just like Undaya and the others had, she would even have accepted the idea. But her time in the zombie realm wasn¡¯t supposed to last. * * * What was it that the book said? Jump from a great height. Sarah had been postponing the issue, hoping to make sense of it somehow, or waiting for a new message to come ¡ª but time kept running and she was no closer to finding Mike. She decided to say goodbye to this barren world. So one night, when Undaya had gone our for some loot, she went up to the roof, stood on the edge, and looked down. Well, it¡¯s easier said than done. She could have died in a thousand ways in the game before this, but only now the question came to her in full force: What if I die? Dying in the game would mean waking up suddenly to a reality without time dilation. It would mean her brain would be working way too fast and would have to stop suddenly, like a car hitting a wall at full speed. The final version of the game would obviously avoid this somehow, but if Sumiko was right, this alpha version was set up so that only by winning you could wake up safely. The environment felt more real than ever now, with the chilly air of the night blowing into her face and waving her hair around. She was fully conscious of every inch of her own body, of the clothes she was wearing, of her own weight. And she could physically feel the void in front of her. She could almost feel herself already plummeting to the ground, feel the terrible impact against the pavement. And if she somehow didn¡¯t die immediately, the zombies would be biting at her brain. Because the zombies were gathering down there, of course. They were looking up eagerly, waiting for her to jump. Or fall. More would come soon, and if Sarah kept waiting, they would fill the whole area. They would be a sea of dead eyes and dead mouths, of rotten flesh and guttural nonsense. Why am I hesitating? I trust Sumiko. If Sumiko wanted me dead, she would reach inside the tank and put a knife through my eye. She is helping me. And she says I need to jump. Why am I not jumping? It was ridiculous, really. She should have already jumped. There was no reason not to do it. I jumped on a fucking giant. I faced an army of zombies. I can certainly jump off a building. Why am I not jumping? Ah, but it felt so real. She was afraid. Simple as that. As she was looking at the moving corpses congregated down below, a loop of fire crackled suddenly, and a couple zombies were mowed down. The rest of them reacted slowly, as if they were confused. The fiery chain took care of them, two or three at a time. A few seconds later the sidewalk was clean. ¡°Sajya, what the fuck are you doing?¡± Undaya looked tiny from that height, but Sarah could see enough of her face to notice she was angry. She didn¡¯t think she had seen her angry before. And if not for her face, her voice was clearly loaded with anger. ¡°I¡¯m jumping,¡± she answered, but her voice came out less firm than she would have liked. ¡°Why the fuck are you jumping?¡± ¡°Because it¡¯s the way out of here.¡± ¡°Come on, you sound like an idiot,¡± Undaya said. ¡°I¡¯m going in and we¡¯ll talk about this.¡± ¡°No,¡± Sarah said. ¡°You don¡¯t understand. This is the way for me.¡± She raised her hand stupidly, as if Undaya could see the modest, nearly invisible Ring of Realms wrapped around her finger. It looked like nothing, really ¡ª a cheap prop. Am I trusting this? Maybe I am an idiot after all. ¡°Sajya, I know this is hard,¡± Undaya shouted. ¡°I¡¯m not very good comforting people! But I need you! Let¡¯s go mow down some fucking zombies together and you¡¯ll feel better!¡± ¡°No, YOU DON¡¯T UNDERSTAND!¡± Sarah had taken too long already for this; she didn¡¯t want to explain what the Worldjumper was and what the book said and why she was now standing on the edge preparing to jump. ¡°This is the way for me. Not to die! To go elsewhere!¡± Undaya looked confused. It didn¡¯t matter. She would jump. I will jump. Right now. And yet... She was still hesitating when the wave came and swept her off her feet. The whole world started spinning and she fell, not forward, not backwards, but she fell, and she stumbled against nothing, and she heard sounds that meant nothing, and she kept falling and falling and the ring in her hand remained mute and useless and fake, and she was thrown out to a different world by some capricious god who didn¡¯t like to show his face. Chapter 19. The towers When the wave subsided, she found herself lying face down on hard, cold stone. She opened her eyes and tried to guess what kind of world she had been thrown into. She was inside a room, with stone walls and floor, but it didn¡¯t look like the Castle or any other medieval setting. She couldn¡¯t pinpoint the exact reason why she had that impression, until she realized there was a constant rumbling that didn¡¯t seem to correspond with a charge of cavalry or anything like that. Whatever was happening outside most definitely included explosions. Big ones. Sarah sat up and tried to determine where to go from here. From the noises, she determined that she must be at ground level; glancing around she confirmed that impression by noting that the stony staircase went only up, so if there were more levels, they were all above that one. She went to the staircase, peeked through the opening, and arrived to the conclusion that she was inside some kind of tower. Would it be too much to ask for an elevator? She put her foot on the first step as a tremendous explosion shook the whole place and deafened her with its noise. The walls withstood the attack, though, and she decided it would be best to hurry up. She started climbing the stairs as the rumbling outside redoubled. It felt as if everything were about to come tumbling down at any moment. As she made her way upward she noticed that the tower was square in shape. The staircase was enclosed between the stony walls; some kind of shaft ran through the middle of the tower, so there was no hole in the middle of the staircase through which she could fall. There were also no windows anywhere, so she kept wondering where she was and what was happenin outside for a long, long time. The stairs seemed to go on forever, and there were no intermediate levels where she could get out and take a look outside or just lay flat and rest. After what seemed like two hours of climbing stairs, she finally saw the end of it. She was close to the top; there were maybe thirty more steps to go. As she calculated this, a different rumbling sound, more mechanical in nature, took her by surprise, and the inner walls trembled in unison. Then she heard the sound of a pneumatic door just above her level and somebody¡¯s heavy steps on stone. So there was an elevator? she thought, incredulous. When she arrived at the top level she could cofirm that yes, what she¡¯d heard was an elevator reching the end of its journing and its door opening. And the guy who was now looking through the glass, surveying the battle outside, was a blond, handsome guy with a big chest and an air of satisfaction. ¡°Hey, I thought I¡¯d lost you,¡± he said, flashing a calculated smile. Really? I spent an eternity stuck in the apocalypse and now I come here to be stuck with you again? ¡°Hello, Uberyn,¡± Sarah said tiredly. ¡°Where are we?¡± ¡°Take a look,¡± he said. The window ran across the four walls in their entirety, only interrupted by some columns of stone to support the roof, letting her see the whole landscape. They were about twenty stories high, and she could see pretty far away. The landscape was dark and mountainous; some of the peaks she could see in the distance looked like lava-covered volcanoes. In the vicinity of the tower there was a dark forest, and from there a row of huge, terrifying things came in their direction, slowly but constantly. Those were the things they were fighting against. ¡°Those things are floxas, and they are trying to break the Gate,¡± Uberyn said, pointing at something that was visible from the other side. ¡°There are four towers defending it. This one is the Burner. We fight with fire. Up there, on the other side of the road,¡± he pointed to his left, ¡°is the Piercer tower; they shoot arrows at whatever comes near. A little farther away from the Gate, on the same side of the road, is the Damper. You¡¯ll see magic rays coming down from it once the guardian arrives. I hear she¡¯s a girl. And the fourth tower is up there.¡± He pointed ahead and to the right. ¡°Your friend is there covering our side of the road. That¡¯s the Flasher tower and he is supposed to be firing rays of light, but I guess he¡¯s not too bright so nothing¡¯s coming out yet.¡± Uberyn chuckled at his own pun. Sarah ignored him. ¡°Maggot is out there, then?¡± ¡°Where else? You left it at the Castle. If it weren¡¯t for me, he¡¯d be dead already. He¡¯s truly a useless guy.¡± ¡°Can you stop being an asshole?¡± OK, that was not very Diplomatic from my part. ¡°A wave took me away, what did you expect me to do? You could at least have trained him a bit, helped him improve.¡± ¡°A brick,¡± Uberyn muttered, and turned away to watch the battle. Sarah dropped it and took a look around inside the tower. She saw several pipes running along the corners, made of bronze or some similar material, and boxes of the same stuff popping out the walls. There were also several small screens protruding from the inner walls around the elevator shaft, all of them framed in bronze and looking like antique TV sets, with old-style dials and buttons on the side. Once in a while a valve popped open in one of the pipes and let out a bit of steam. An old clock with Roman numerals hung from the roof, also framed in a bronze-like metal. Both Uberyn and herself were wearing leather clothes. It was all so anachronistic that she couldn¡¯t determine if this was supposed to be the past, the present or the future. She leaned forward to see the field of battle better. The floxas were coming down the road, straight towards the enormous Gate. Who knows what¡¯s on the other side? It didn¡¯t matter; Sarah had played enough ¡°tower defense¡± games to know that the only important thing was to keep that Gate standing. The floxas were coming in a constant wave, but as they got in the range of the Towers, they fell one after the other. Enormous flames came out of the Burner, where she was now, setting the floxas on fire and making them collapse; they in turn set on fire the ones that came after them, if they were close enough. From the other side of the road, a rain of arrows came out of the Piercer every time a floxa managed to escape the fire, which happened quite often because of their sheer number. Sarah wondered if they were actually robots or some kind of organisms that could be easily replicated, or their strategy would make zero sense.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. ¡°So how are we firing this?¡± she asked. ¡°The other towers are manually operated. This one fires more or less automatically,¡± Uberyn replied. ¡°We need to keep the fuel deposit below the ground always filled and ready, and point our crosshairs at the part of the road we want to defend. Then the sensors located on the outside of the tower spit a flame every time a floxa gets too close to that point.¡± ¡°I see,¡± Sarah said. ¡°That¡¯s a job for one.¡± Uberyn glared at her. ¡°Why am I here, then? You can manage to keep the tower fueled and targeted on your own.¡± ¡°Well, I don¡¯t know why you are here,¡± Uberyn said. ¡°It¡¯s not like I summoned you. Those waves keep throwing you from one world to the other. Barely my fault. Anyway, I could use some help. The fuel this tower uses comes from gems that need to be harvested. And guess where they are: behind enemy lines.¡± Really? That makes no sense at all. Fucking Pac-Man has a better plot than this. ¡°You won¡¯t kiss me again, Uberyn,¡± Sarah said. The blond beast tried to look shocked and offended, but he was a very bad actor. ¡°What do you mean? Oh, yes. That kiss. I had forgotten. It was long ago.¡± ¡°It won¡¯t happen again. Look, I¡¯m not mad about that. Really. But I need you to be my friend. Right?¡± ¡°Right,¡± Uberyn said, glancing at the battlefield as if to appear disinterested. ¡°But why do you need me? You can play on your own, nothing¡¯s stopping you.¡± ¡°No, you see. I¡ª¡± The Damper tower started firing then. Sarah leaned over again and watched the scene unfold. Barely visible pulses came out of the Damper, like shockwaves, making a hollow sound. When hit by those pulses, some floxas broke down and collapsed in pieces; the rest went unharmed, but slowed their pace a bit, as if walking against a forcefield. ¡°Hey, this is awesome!¡± The voice came out one of the small screens on the inner wall. Sarah turned around to see: she had recognized the voice. ¡°Undaya! We were both washed out in the same shore,¡± she smiled. ¡°You¡¯re fucking crazy, you know that?¡± Undaya said. ¡°You¡¯re lucky that the wave swept us off before you could jump.¡± ¡°You were jumping? Where? Why?¡± Uberyn asked. ¡°Ah... long story,¡± Sarah waved him off. A few seconds earlier she had been about to tell him of her quest; now she was doubting again. Also, it was really a long story. ¡°I see you got the gist of it pretty fast,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Oh, I¡¯ve been manipulating magic from the start,¡± Undaya explained. ¡°I¡¯m a mage class, or I suppose a witch.¡± ¡°Maggot is here, too,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Really?¡± ¡°Yes, in the Flasher. Let me see.¡± The screen that corresponded with Maggot¡¯s tower was off. Sarah pushed some buttons, turned some dials, and finally managed for Maggot to come into view. ¡°Hey, Maggot!¡± she greeted him. ¡°Oh, hi,¡± Maggot said. He looked frustrated, concentrated on achieving something. But when he saw Sarah, his face lit up. On seeing Undaya, though, he frowned. ¡°Hey, sorry about that thing,¡± the big-eyed girl said. ¡°I was afraid, so I ran.¡± ¡°No problem,¡± Maggot said. ¡°Let¡¯s talk later. I am trying to¡ª¡± He disappeared from view. ¡°Undaya? Is it you?¡± A male voice now, coming from the other screen. The guy in the Piercer tower. He was white, reasonably handsome, and wore a big brown mustache that put him decidedly in the ¡°antiquated gentleman¡± camp. ¡°Gervain! Long time no see! How are you?¡± ¡°A bit complicated at the moment,¡± Gervain said, looking out of the picture as he talked. ¡°These things are coming faster and faster. Thank the gods you¡¯re here now.¡± ¡°Maggot could help too,¡± Uberyn whispered. ¡°I heard that,¡± Sarah said, and after a second added, ¡°asshole.¡± She looked out. Gervain was right: the floxas kept coming and coming, and they were inching ever closer to the gate thanks to that seemingly idiotic strategy consisting on sending more and more of them to die under the fire, arrows, and magic pulses. The tower vibrated constantly with the shock of explosions, because they happened nearer now: the things were already at the tower¡¯s gates. If they for some reason decided to attack the tower itself instead of going for the Gate, we would be toast, Sarah realized. An uncomfortable thought. ¡°Maggot, are you there?¡± Undaya asked. She looked worried. And in fact, some floxas seemed to be eager to abandon the road to go and attack the Flasher tower. Maybe the lack of defense made them bold. ¡°I¡¯m¡ª I¡¯m here,¡± Maggot said, reappearing on the screen. ¡°Just let me put this thing on.¡± He was in the process of putting on a couple of silvery wristbands and a headband made of the same material. He was having trouble getting them to stay put. Sarah guessed they featured a diamagnetic lock. ¡°Has he ever fired that thing?¡± Undaya asked. Now she definitely was worried. ¡°Not that I know,¡± Gervain replied. ¡°I wanted to help him but the longer he stays inactive, the busier I am here shooting arrows.¡± ¡°I can help him,¡± Sarah offered. ¡°No,¡± Uberyn said. ¡°We need gems. You should go get some.¡± ¡°Why me? Why don¡¯t you go?¡± ¡°You need training,¡± Uberyn said. ¡°It¡¯s a chance to acquire some skills. Let me take care of Maggot.¡± ¡°You seem to have been taking care of him for a long time, and he still hasn¡¯t shot a single ray of light,¡± Sarah retorted. ¡°These things don¡¯t lock,¡± Maggot complained. ¡°Look.¡± He put his wrists in front of the camera. The wristbands didn¡¯t seem to feature any kind of lock indeed, and his efforts in trying to close them were unsuccessful. Each one had an opening of about one inch, which might be the reason why they were not working. ¡°The longer he takes to make it work, the more important is for you to bring those gems,¡± Uberyn said, looking her in the eye. ¡°I¡¯m trusting you more than anything right now.¡± Sarah looked down, cursed internally, and sighed. ¡°OK,¡± she finally said. ¡°Take me to my horse.¡± Chapter 20. The black beasts The horse was, of course, not a horse, as Sarah had anticipated. When the elevator door opened and she stepped into the underground level she found the vehicle waiting for her. A motorcycle with sleek lines and a steampunk look similar to the rest of the stuff in the tower, like the screens and valves. Golden letters alongside the fuel tank spelled its name: ¡°TRISTAN¡±. Sarah ran her fingers across the smooth surface. It was a lovely thing, and some of the power and personality of the horse was in it, or so it seemed to her.
TASK: Retrieve gems to fuel the Burner The Gate must be defended at all costs, and the enemy keeps advancing. The only way to keep the road free of monsters is to keep firing your tower, and for that, you need gems. Go outside, cross the forest and the enemy wall, and bring back some gems you can use to fuel the tower. Reward on success: - 500 XP - 60 Mana - increase in Endurance - increase in Stealth and Sneak Attack
So now the mission is official. Hmmm. It was kind of strange that the tasks might involve other players, like ¡°Meet the Golden Knight at the Castle¡±, or pop up because of other player¡¯s idea. But this time it could be easily explained, at least. Uberyn would have received the same task when he arrived to the Burner, and every other player who ended up in the tower would get it too the first time they needed to go in search of gems. Uberyn had just told her to do it before she got the notification from the game. Uberyn stepped off the elevator as she was musing about the mission. ¡°Have you ever ridden on one of these?¡± ¡°Yes,¡± Sarah lied. She figured that the skill she had acquired by mounting the horse in the medieval realm would have crossphased to this one just as the horse had crossphased as a motorbike, letting her drive the vehicle without any trouble. If I¡¯m right, then I¡¯m getting the hang of this already, she told herself. ¡°Fantastic. Remember the map,¡± Uberyn said. ¡°Got it.¡± The map was an ornate tablet with a screen that was not touch sensitive and two rows of golden buttons and knobs at both sides. She mounted it on the front of the bike, covering part of the handlebar, and found that it fit into two grooves that seemed to be made for that very purpose. On the map there were a few red dots indicating the location of the gems she needed. They were all behind enemy lines, just as Uberyn had said. She needed to go through the forest and beyond a wall that marked the limit of whatever place the floxas were coming from. There were no names on the map so she wasn¡¯t sure of what that place was, but she guessed that there was a Gate there, similar to the one she was defending. She would have to sneak in. ¡°Good luck,¡± Uberyn said. Sarah climbed on Tristan and started the engine. It roared in a subdued, very satisfying way. The motorbike seemed to be pretty quiet for its power, and she loved the way her body adapted to it. It looked like it was literally made for her. ¡°I¡¯ll open the gate so you can exit the tower. You¡¯ll need to turn left and go up so that you can exit at ground level. You will be able to avoid the floxas at first, but you¡¯ll need to take the road briefly before going into the woods where you can take an older road,¡± the overpowered player continued. ¡°You may need to use your weapons to defend yourself while on the main road. Also, you need to cross the wall to get the gems.¡± Yawn. ¡°Uberyn,¡± Sarah asked, ¡°do you never log out?¡± The blond player seemed surprised. ¡°What?¡± ¡°Do you never exit the game? I don¡¯t think I¡¯ve seen you sleep or anything here. It¡¯s like you live inside the game.¡± Uberyn shrugged. ¡°I guess we all do,¡± he said. ¡°You know, since we don¡¯t remember who we are outside. Why would we want to log off? I don¡¯t even know how to do it.¡± Sarah thought about it for a moment. Then she decided to push him a bit more. ¡°Why are you sending me on this quest?¡± ¡°I told you,¡± Uberyn protested. ¡°You need to¡ª¡± ¡°Yes, I got that,¡± Sarah interrupted him. ¡°But why are you helping me? Look, I¡¯m not mad about the kiss. Just don¡¯t do it again. But whatever you think I will owe you if you help me, it¡¯s not that, do you understand?¡± Uberyn rolled his eyes. ¡°Sajya, that was over two months ago,¡± he said. ¡°I had already forgotten about it until you brought it up earlier. I¡¯m helping you because we¡¯re all in this together, so we need to help each other. You¡¯ll find a way to help me as well, you¡¯ll see.¡± ¡°OK, thank you then,¡± Sarah said. ¡°I¡¯ll be back soon. I hope Maggot will have leveled up a bit by then.¡± * * * Even before getting to the tower¡¯s gate, a new notification told Sarah that she had been right.
Skill active: Mount
I learn to hunt animals in the Enchanted Forest and I become a zombie hunter in the dead city. I learn to mount a horse in the medieval village and I can ride a motorcycle in the tower battle. I¡¯m definitely on the right track, she reflected as she crossed the opening and turned the handle forward to gain speed. It was something Sarah had started to realize months earlier, when she learned that the flamethrower was a ¡°crossphasable¡± weapon. She had already learned that weapons and skills turned into their equivalents on crossing between realms, but the system confirming that an item she had acquired was ¡°crossphasable¡± meant that there was a certain method in place, even though the game was painfully unfinished. If there was a way to win, it was this. The mechanics of the game had very little to do with acquiring particular abilities and items in the different realms; they were related to crossphasing and adapting between worlds. The way to play the game was to play the meta-game, trying to master the skill of crossphasing. This will be immensely useful once I learn how to use the Ring, she concluded as she sped through the land, keeping away from the road where the floxas kept coming and coming. Some of them fell down when reached by Gervain¡¯s arrows, others burned under Uberyn¡¯s fire, and the ones that kept walking were rejected by Undaya¡¯s magic shockwaves. But they were still inching closer, walking over the bodies of the fallen. Sarah figured that the bodies were dissolving or disappearing somehow at certain intervals, or after a while of lying there on the ground; otherwise the enemy¡¯s advance would have turned impossible long ago just by the sheer size of the pile of dead floxas. Tristan, the bike, was doing its job wonderfully, taking her through the black land at lightning speed but with very little noise. Sarah could already see the dark trees of the forest getting closer, and beyond them, the mountains that she had identified as active volcanoes. She wondered if the forest would be safe or if there were unpleasant creatures there, not the floxas, which were too big, but maybe some smaller, nastier things. She checked her Inventory. She still had the flamethrower which was... a flamethrower, though its design was now different, making it look older and more modern at the same time, blending well with the retrofuturistic vibe of this land. The switchblade was now an ornate knife, the pistol was a wood-and-bronze arquebus, and the sniper rifle was a similarly constructed rifle. The rest of the elements she had collected in the zombie-ridden city had not crossphased, though. The knives, which had been common kitchen knives, had stayed in her backpack inside the apartment; the ropes and the grappling hook, the bike, and everything else had stayed. Also, again, she didn¡¯t have the book with her. But this time she didn¡¯t mind so much: evidently, that book had the talent to find its way to her, so if she could manage to stay alive for as long as necessary, they would be reunited again. The line of floxas advancing along the road kept going uninterrupted when she entered the forest. Soon she would have to change her course to get on that same road, which would leave her exposed to those huge things. Uberyn had warned her that she would need to do this: there was a deep creek crossing the forest that she could already see in front of her, a raging current that looked impassable. Sarah remembered about a deceptively narrow creek in England where many people had died because it was actually so deep that once you stepped on it, you were sucked into it and there was no way for you to get back to the surface, so everybody who had tried to swim on it had drowned. The Bolton Strid, they called it. It was located in Yorkshire and it was a perfectly charming brook, only it killed you instantly before you ever felt wet. And that¡¯s in the real world. Better not to try here.You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. Sarah nudged Tristan to the left and the bike responded smoothly, biting the black ground and the dark grey scrubs. The tree trunks were also grey, almost black, and their leaves were the color of midnight. There was still light from outside, though, so she kept the headlights off for the moment. A few minutes later she was out of the woods and the road presented itself to her once again, the continuous stream of floxas still plowing ahead. Now that she was close to them, she could see they were truly huge ¡ª about twenty feet tall. Being attacked by them would be instant death. But for some reason, the floxas didn¡¯t alter their march. If they had noticed Sarah, they did nothing to show it, just as they never thought of attacking the towers themselves instead of just going for the Gate. Just to see what would happen, and acting by some kind of suicidal impulse, Sarah retrieved the arquebus and pointed it at one of the thousands of pale legs moving along the road. Take this, motherfucker. She took a shot. The arquebus was pretty powerful, as it turned out. The bullet tore a floxa¡¯s leg in two. The monster stottered, wobbled, and fell forward without making a sound, landing on the road lengthwise. The rest of the floxas kept marching, paying no mind to their fallen comrade.
+20 XP
Well, that was anticlimactic. These things are as mindless as¡ª A whooshing sound very close to Sarah¡¯s ear interrupted her thoughts. Before she could react, she heard a clannng to her right. She turned around and saw the arrow stuck in the dark tree, still vibrating from the impact. Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh. More arrows started falling nearby. Sarah looked around, trying to locate the source of the attack; then, with the adrenaline pumping wildly through her body, she pressed the pedal and shot forward along the road, escaping from the arrows, avoiding the legs of the floxas that barely left her any space to drive. Whoosh. Whoosh. Arrows started raining around, this time coming from a different point, located somewhat ahead of her. She couldn¡¯t pinpoint the origin exactly, though. They must have several small towers all over here. Tiny versions of the Piercer, maybe also others shooting fire and even magic blasts. Yes, there were the faint blue outlines traced by her Perception skill. Behind the innumerable trees at both sides of the road there were small buildings that weren¡¯t visible for her but from where she could undoubtedly be seen. She needed to go back into the woods. Unfortunately, the river was curvy on this section of the road, and the map showed it crossing the road at three points. She had crossed the first point immediately after coming out of the forest; the second point, where the creek turned back and meandered into the forest to her right again, was just ahead of her; and the third point, where the course of water made a new turn and crossed the road to go left, was about a mile ahead. One mile. Live for one mile. She pressed on the pedal as if it would make Tristan go even faster. Tristan complied, somehow. There seemed to still be something alive about it, part of the horse¡¯s personality. Under her subtle nudges, the motorbike kept eating yard after yard, avoiding obstacles, maintaining her balance, dodging the arrows that kept raining all around. As soon as the map showed the vehicle leaving the third crossing behind, Sarah turned right. Tristan made an aggressive turn that could have sent both rider and bike rolling and tumbling for a long distance, but by some miracle it worked. The motorcycle straightened pretty quickly when they regained the straight line, this time into the forest. Several arrows stuck into trunks as Sarah crossed the line of trees. She was now inside the forest again, protected from the arrows, and all she needed to do was find the way to an opening in the big wall. Sarah maneuvered among the thick vegetation following a more or less direct path to the wall. The map showed the forest as a featureless blob, of course, so she could only use a general sense of orientation and the bluish outlines of the towers that she needed to avoid. They surely stood in their clears in the middle of the forest so she would be safe as long as the trees were covering her. After a while of driving through the woods, though, her Perception started acting up again. She was now feeling an unmistakable tingling sensation, and when she looked around, she got the impression that brief flashes of blue crossed her visual field, as if dangerous creatures were moving quickly behind the trees, perhaps ready to ambush her. OK, Tristan, let¡¯s do this, she thought. There was no time to avoid the creatures. They were moving quickly, and they would be on her before she could choose an escape path. Store arquebus. Retrieve rifle. The rifle was a thing of beauty, double-barrelled and heavy. It felt... solid as she held the front with her left hand and let the back rest on her right arm. She rested her elbows on the handlebar, propped the weapon up against her right shoulder, put her finger on the trigger, and held the barrels with the other hand to aid herself in pointing. The motorbike¡¯s engine hummed, its body vibrated, transmitting its excitement to her.
Skill active: Hunt
The bluish patches were now bigger, appearing more often. The creatures seemed to come and go out of ¡°sight¡± of her Perception, which revealed that besides having a high Agility, they were also pretty Stealthy. But after a few seconds she determined there were three of them. The first creature jumped at her from the right, when she had lost sight of it. Sarah caught a glimpse of its portentous, black, fur-covered body and stepped on the pedal instinctively. As soon as she did so, the other two creatures materialized from beyond the trunks. One of them was coming at her from her left, the other was right in front of her. Ambushed. I knew it. The things were sabre-toothed wolves. They were completely black; even the eyes and the fangs were black, a perfect cover in that sinister forest made of dark trees, dark shrubs and black earth. But her Perception skill gave them a bluish outline, helping her see. Sarah decided not to turn on the headlights. She wanted to be as invisible herself as she could. The creature in front of her growled menacingly as the one that had jumped on her first followed her from behind and the third wolf prepared to land on her left side. Sarah shot once. The sabre-toothed wolf that had been in front of her vanished. She turned left, facing the jumping beast. A quick glimpse at its stats revealed it had 300 hitpoints and tremendous levels of Agility. She shot the rifle again. The wolf contorted in the air, bounced on the ground gracefully, and jumped aside, only to remain there, growling and preparing for a new attack. OK, let¡¯s dance then. She turned right, passing between two trees, then kept turning, taking mental note of the location of the tree bluish outlines. She emerged a few yards beyond her original position and took a new shot. This time she hit one of the wolves. It whimpered, but didn¡¯t die.
+50 Damage
Sarah pressed on the pedal. She kept her elbows resting on the handlebar, her hands holding the weapon, letting Tristan keep the balance as it sped up. She shot once, twice. One of the shots reached one of the sabre-toothed beasts. The one she had hit earlier. It cried out, but lived.
+120 Damage
Sarah drove in a straight line, and the other two beasts decided to jump on her as she approached them. She nudged the motorbike a little bit to the left and took a shot; it hit one of the wolves right between the eyes, killing him instantly. The other creature was already landing on her.
+300 Damage / Enemy dead
Skill acquired: Mounted Attack
Thanks for the timing, Sarah thought bitterly as she rolled on the ground and the bike kept going for a few meters before losing balance and falling to the ground as well. The enormous black teeth were ready to claw at her, the wolf¡¯s thick, stinking drool dripping on her face. Store rifle. Retrieve knife. Sarah found herself holding the richly embossed knife. She didn¡¯t stop to contemplate its beauty, instead choosing to drive it deeply into the beast¡¯s throat. The wolf howled in pain; the howl quickly turned into a gurgle as the knife took the strength from it, then into a muffled sound that became weaker and weaker as the animal became a lifeless lump.
+300 Damage / Enemy dead
There was the other one. The one that was hurt. It was nowhere to be seen. Sarah somehow managed to free herself from the wolf¡¯s corpse (Store knife) and stood up with some difficulty. She checked herself and realized she was hurt too. The beast had managed to bite her in the shoulder with its powerful fangs before dying. Oh, fuck. She walked to Tristan, climbed on it, and turned it on again. Then, the third beast appeared. It was hurt, but very much alive, and furious. Its black eyes shone with hatred, or so it seemed to Sarah. Trails of red blood marked the spots where the bullets had hit it. Retrieve arquebus. At short distance, the rifle wouldn¡¯t do. Sarah would have only one shot to kill the beast. The sabre-toothed wolf jumped in the air. Sarah pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. As the creature went through the air, ready to drive its enormous claws into her tender flesh, Sarah realized that she hadn¡¯t reloaded the weapon after shooting at the floxa. An arquebus is a single-shot weapon. It needs to be reloaded every time. What she did then, she did instinctively, without a rational thought interposing into her action. She let go of the arquebus, held Tristan¡¯s handlebar firmly, and jumped up, until her whole body was in the air. Then she fell. She didn¡¯t let go of the motorbike, but her feet hit the ground beside it, making her bounce and roll. But not before she turned on the brake on the bike. Tristan¡¯s wheels locked. The bike stopped dead, hit the ground at full speed, and became a projectile. The big, compact, metallic body hit the sabre-toothed wolf with such force that even while rolling on the ground, Sarah could hear the big fangs breaking, and then the bones inside the animal¡¯s body. Bike and beast flew through the air together, in a deadly embrace. Their flight ended against a tree whose trunk barely stood the impact. The wolf got smashed so badly that when Sarah went to take her bike, there was no body to speak of, only a mushy and bloody mess all over the motorbike¡¯s surface and running down the tree trunk.
+130 Damage / Enemy dead
Sarah mounted Tristan again after cleaning the seat and handlebar as best as she could with her own clothes. The map was not there anymore; she found it under some bushes, broken in two. Oh, great. How will I get the gems now? I don¡¯t know where the fuck they are. She was wondering about this when the whole world turned white. Chapter 21. A leap of faith Quicker than a ray of light, then gone for ¡ª Madonna, Ray of light Not a wave. This is not a wave. The thought ricocheted inside Sarah¡¯s head as the white light started to subside, and the contours of the trees became visible again, first as mere hints, then as faint lines, and finally taking their proper shape. She was lying on her back, stunned, trying to regain her senses. She could barely hear a sound, and almost all meaningful sensory feedback came from touch ¡ª feeling the grass under her body, the shrubs rubbing her arm, the pain coming back to her, puncturing her shoulder where the sabre-toothed wolf had bitten her. But she felt no pain from the explosion or whatever it had been. A sudden flash of white light, like a nuclear bomb going off, but without the fire and the sonic boom and the devastating shockwave. Sarah tried to focus her sight on something. The trees were still mere silhouettes, but at least they were there to be seen. She sat up indecisively, leaned on a trunk, and waited for her eyes to adjust or the light to diminish, or both. After a while, when she could see a little better, she realized there had been a shockwave of sorts. Tristan lay in pieces scattered all around ¡ª in a most strange way. It had not been torn, no, every piece seemed to be whole; the motorbike had been disassembled somehow, as if some superfast mechanic had come with the light and taken it apart bit by bit. A tickling sensation, a buzzing, subdued sound, and the apparition of glowing letters against the light background. Familiar sensations that were now enhanced by the weird state she was in. A system notification.
Task failed: Retrieve gems to fuel the Burner - no reward
Yeah, fuck you, Sarah thought, and spat bitterly. Are you sure I failed, Game Master? I could still reassemble my fucking motorbike again and cross the wall to get the fucking gems. How would you like that? There must be three thousand pieces at most. If I search the whole area I can recover them all and finish in one week. There was no use wallowing in her bitterness. She had to go back now, and she had no vehicle. She needed to figure out how to get back on foot with those towers firing arrows at the road. But first she needed to know where it was. The road, that is. ¡°Map,¡± Sarah said. A partial map of the area, covering the path she had taken from the Burner, appeared in her field of vision. Just like before, she could only see the part she had covered, but it was enough to see where the road was; once there, it was a matter of running back to the tower, while somehow avoiding the arrows. The floxas would surely ignore her, like they had done before. When she got out of the forest and took a look at the road, though, she knew she didn¡¯t need to worry about the floxas or the towers or mostly anything else. The floxas lay down on the road literally in pieces. It turns out they were compound beings, with a multiple-legged creature at the bottom, some kind of turtle on top protecting the whole thing, and in the middle, sandwiched between both, a dark, amorphous being that seemed to lack any means of locomotion. That is the brain, Sarah concluded. The creature that commands the other two. Whatever was that kept the parts together had vanished with the explosion, so the ¡°turtles¡± and the ¡°brains¡± had simply fallen down, and now the floxas were scattered all over the road, alive, but unable to do anything. Sarah ventured on the road, fearless now. The same thing that had happened to the Tristan and the floxas would have disabled the towers too ¡ª any kind of machine, she concluded. It had been a stroke of luck that she wasn¡¯t holding any of her weapons when the light hit, it occurred to her as she contemplated the dark brains writhing on the road, powerless. The arquebus, the rifle and the flamethrower were all composed of moving parts that would have suffered the same fate as the motorcycle and the floxas. She only needed to beware of organic beings, just like herself, which wouldn¡¯t be affected by whatever process had taken place in the area. She set foot on the road and sprinted ahead. She ran for a while, then walked, then ran a bit more. The towers were not so far away, and she could make it before sundown. * * * When Sarah stepped out of the elevator, in the Flasher tower, she found that everybody was there. She had seen the lights going on and off as she approached, sending a signal to her, so she had headed over to Maggot¡¯s tower instead of the Burner. She had walked among the floxas that lay in pieces all along the road, and taken the elevator to meet them. Uberyn, Undaya and Gervain were visibly excited by what had happened, but Maggot was utterly unable to contain himself, and when she joined them, he almost jumped on her with the news. ¡°I just earned a skill,¡± he said, as if he could barely believe it himself. ¡°Really? What is it?¡± ¡°Disgregate. I... I don¡¯t know what it means.¡± ¡°I told you. It means that you broke them down in parts,¡± Gervain intervened. He was looking through an ornate telescope that was mounted in front of the window, pointing at the road. There were four of them, one on each outer wall. Sarah guessed that they had taken turns to look through the lens. They would have felt as shocked as her when the phenomenon happened and all the enemies suddenly fell down in p¨¬eces.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. ¡°You did this?¡± ¡°Yes,¡± Maggot replied. ¡°At first I didn¡¯t know how. I was just trying to make these things work, but there was no way,¡± he explained, raising his arms to show the wristbands. ¡°I started banging them against each other in frustration. Suddenly... it¡¯s like the openings connected, you know?¡± He spoke as if he still didn¡¯t understand what he had done. ¡°The bracelets... hooked into each other through the openings, or something. A bright light surged out of them. My arms started shaking uncontrollably, as if some huge power were about to be released. I pointed my arms to the road, and then there was a big flash that blinded me. And then, this,¡± he finished, pointing at the landscape. ¡°It blinded all of us,¡± Undaya said. ¡°I don¡¯t think the bracelets were supposed to release that much light in a single shot.¡± ¡°We have been theorizing about it,¡± Uberyn said, and Sarah thought it was the first time that he seemed dumbfounded. ¡°It¡¯s likely that all those failed attempts by Maggot to fire his weapon had resulted in the energy accumulating bit by bit, and not being released as a directed shot. Then, suddenly, he made the connection, and all the light escaped in one huge burst, covering the whole region.¡± ¡°Which was awesome,¡± Gervain said. ¡°Why did you walk back here, by the way? What happened to your bike?¡± ¡°I think somebody disgregated it,¡± Sarah said sternly, giving Maggot a cold glare. She couldn¡¯t keep it up, though, and she burst out laughing. ¡°I failed my mission, of course, but I think we won¡¯t need gems for a while anyway.¡± They kept talking about what had happened for a while. It was obvious that Maggot had accidentally found a way to fire his weapon, and Uberyn¡¯s explanation of the sudden release of so much light was almost certainly true. Still, there were details that remained mysterious. The towers themselves, for example, seemed immune to the effect. The blinding white light had enveloped the whole area, but the towers were still standing, and everything they contained kept working; nothing had been dismembered by the flash. Evidently, there was some kind of force field or something like that, protecting the towers from the effect of the Flasher. It was only natural, they concluded, since the Flasher itself would collapse otherwise as soon as it was used. There were also other unanswered questions, like what was the exact purpose of Maggot¡¯s and Undaya¡¯s towers. The Burner was wholly designed to produce and shoot flames; the Piercer had arrow cannons that the operator could point and fire at will. But Undaya¡¯s magic came from herself, and the Damper didn¡¯t seem to offer anything more than a place for her to seat while she fired it; similarly, Maggot¡¯s light seemed to come exclusively from his wristbands and headband, and the tower itself didn¡¯t seem to participate in its creation or use. As Uberyn, Undaya and Gervain debated these topics eagerly, Sarah decided that she didn¡¯t care. She had realized that these details didn¡¯t matter at all. ¡°Hey, Maggot,¡± she called out. ¡°I¡¯ve never been in this tower before. Can you show me around?¡± ¡°Oh... yeah, sure,¡± his friend replied. His voice was every bit as weak and unsure as always, even thought he had just achieved a great victory for all. For once, it hadn¡¯t been Uberyn, the overpowered blond beast, but Maggot, the small, unimpressive man, the one to save the day. Oh, Maggot, how I wish I could transfer some Charisma to you, Sarah thought as he stepped into the elevator with her. They toured the Flasher and its different levels. The tower was very similar to the Burner, but it was more spacious, something that Sarah attributed to the fact that there was no need to have reservoirs of fuel sandwiched between the walls to feed the fire cannons. In one of the middle levels they grabbed some food; Maggot explained that it was brought every day by some big birds that deposited the packs through small openings in the wall. Where it came from, he was not sure, but he conjectured that whoever was behind the Gate was sending the food to them so that they could keep firing the towers and defending the Gate. ¡°Hey,¡± Sarah asked after a while, ¡°does this elevator go all the way up? I¡¯d like to breathe some fresh air. Also, the view from the top must be awesome.¡± ¡°Well... yes, it goes all the way to the top,¡± Maggot replied. He couldn¡¯t conceal the uneasiness in his voice. ¡°Come on, let¡¯s go to the roof for a while,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Really. I promise not to push you down,¡± she winked. Maggot grinned feebly. ¡°OK, let¡¯s take a look,¡± he said. When they stepped out of the elevator and set foot on the roof, Sarah confirmed that the view from up there was indeed impressive. The whole landscape extended majestically in all directions, and in exquisite detail. Once more, she had to remind herself that this was not real, that it was a simulation of a world that didn¡¯t actually exist. But all her senses told her otherwise. The tower was tall, very tall. She was stepping just above the level where she had been with the others just a few minutes ago, but it felt so much higher that she felt dizzy. She also felt overwhelmed by the beauty of the weird landscape in front of her. It was a hellish land, but it was beautiful too, with the magma-filled mountains on the horizon, the dark forest, the road extending from the Gate and meandering between the mountains, the huge Gate and the other towers around her. ¡°Watch out,¡± she warned Maggot as they inched closer to the edge. She could feel the wind enveloping them both as they did so. One strong gust and they could tumble and fall down; one had to be careful up there. ¡°Hey, Sajya,¡± a voice came from behind her. ¡°I was looking for you.¡± ¡°Uberyn,¡± she said, turning around. ¡°What¡¯s up?¡± Uberyn made a gesture, inviting her to get closer. She walked to him. Maggot stayed near the edge, looking down, marveling at the sight. Maybe he didn¡¯t even hear Uberyn? His senses are a bit nerfed too, Sarah wondered. ¡°I was thinking about what we¡¯ll do next,¡± Uberyn said. ¡°The effect of the burst can only be temporary. There will be more floxas coming soon. We are running out of gems, so we need to be prepared,¡± Uberyn said. ¡°I get that,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°But, Uberyn, you see...¡± At that point she decided that she could trust him. Or more accurately, she decided to trust him, whether it was justified or not. Her voice became a whisper when she continued. ¡°I¡¯m not here to complete this or that quest. I have a specific goal in mind. I¡¯m looking for my boyfriend. I know he¡¯s in the game somewhere.¡± Uberyn seemed a bit shocked, but he managed to maintain a more or less neutral expression. ¡°Oh, I see,¡± he said. ¡°Well, I guess he must be a remarkable guy. You¡¯ve gone into so much trouble for him. But don¡¯t worry, we¡¯ll find him together.¡± ¡°Oh, no,¡± Sarah said, her face revealing her pain. ¡°I don¡¯t think so. How tall is this tower, Uberyn? Do you have any estimation?¡± Now, the paladin looked just confused. ¡°Huh?¡± ¡°This tower, the Flasher,¡± Sarah insisted. ¡°It¡¯s pretty tall, but would you say it¡¯s a great height?¡± ¡°I¡ª I guess so, but¡ª¡± ¡°Watch me,¡± Sarah said, glaring at him intensely. ¡°Don¡¯t look away.¡± Having said this, Sarah turned around, took a step, then another, then another, and when she was sure Maggot could hear, she warned him, ¡°Hold tight!¡± Maggot turned around, surprised. He had no time to react: Sarah was already jumping on him. One second later, they were both in the air. Then there was only one option: to fall. Maggot held tight. He held on for his dear life. They plummeted to the void, freefalling as Uberyn stood on the roof with his mouth open in shock, and they kept accelerating as they went down, down, the world around them becoming a vertical blur, the ring around Sarah¡¯s finger shining so brightly that it looked like a tiny sun. Chapter 22. The Void A place both wonderful and strange. ¡ª Dale Cooper, Twin Peaks There was blackness at first, and then purpleness, and then yellowness, and then greenness and then a mixture of it all, rectangles of lightning popping up everywhere, electronic sounds tearing up the elemental sky. They hadn¡¯t fallen yet. Or, they kept falling, but now it felt like going up. A cone of abstract light and noise, the telematic thunder enveloping them in their ascent, chunks of code appearing and disappearing like temporary clouds. The Worldjumper pulsated around Sarah¡¯s finger, changing colors in a quick pattern, whole worlds coming and going as it reflected all of them in succession. Sarah wondered if her eyes, the eyes this game had given her, were also reflecting all those worlds, all that information coming at once. ¡°What the fuck!¡± Maggot exclaimed, his face transfixed by terror. Sarah herself was afraid ¡ª but at least she knew what she was doing. He, on the other hand, had found himself pushed down a great height by surprise, and now he was speeding up a chaotic space between worlds, clueless about what it was or what it all meant. ¡°Hold tight,¡± Sarah said, trying to sound self-assured and cheerful. ¡°I¡¯m going to take you to someone.¡± As they kept ascending, their relative speed seemed to decrease, and the abstract sky started looking like an enormous dome of sideral proportions, its shape only delineated by the constant flashing of patches of rotating color, lines of code appearing and disappearing, and what looked like bright plasma clouds popping up and opening holes in the structure that lasted for a few seconds and then closed by themselves. At one point, their ascent stopped. There was no crash, no thump, no rolling on a nonexistent ground. They just stopped, and remained there, at the center of a surreal landscape, the strangest place Sarah could have ever imagined.
Shadow skill acquired: World Jump
¡°I¡ª I think we can let go of each other now.¡± Maggot hesitated, then loosened his grip, probing with his feet. Sarah did the same. Yes, the nothing below them felt solid now. They separated and turned around, their eyes drinking in the epileptic non-world they had fallen into. ¡°What is this place?¡± Maggot asked, his voice still faltering. ¡°I¡¯m not sure,¡± Sarah replied. She raised her hand to show him the Worldjumper. The ring was still shining with quickly cycling colors. ¡°Remember the waves that used to throw us from one realm to another? Well, this time I did it on purpose,¡± she explained. ¡°But I don¡¯t know where we are now. I guess it¡¯s a place between realms. I¡¯m not sure how to continue the jump.¡± ¡°The jump... where? Where are you taking me?¡± ¡°I¡¯m taking you to the Sorceress,¡± Sarah said. ¡°It¡¯s important, for some reason. Have you ever met the Sorceress?¡± Maggot shook his head in denial. ¡°OK, then the next thing¡ª¡± A prodigious rumble interrupted her. Somewhere nearby (though it was hard to estimate distances in this abstract land), a flash of lightning had rent the air, or the nothingness, and something was coming out of the tear. Zombies! Only they looked strange. They seemed to be always reaching the point of dissolution, glitching as they walked towards them. Every few steps, a face or a body got momentarily swapped with something else, then went back to its original appearance. ¡°Maggot!¡± Sarah shouted. ¡°The knives!¡± But Maggot had already retrieved his weapons of choice. Evidently, he¡¯d had some time to practice while in the Castle. His attitude was as uncertain and fearful as ever, though. When the first zombie got near enough, he tried to strike it, but when his blade was about to make contact with it, the damn thing changed. It was now a knight in full armor. Metal clashed against metal in an ineffectual strike.Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings. ¡°No!¡± Maggot cried, and covered his face with his hands, while still holding the knives, in a futile attempt to defend himself. The knight raised one arm above his head and the flail he was holding shone under the everchanging electronic light that flashed all around. Sarah tried to intervene, but she was already surrounded by the undead. Retrieve... Retrieve what? In a flash of despair, Sarah realized she didn¡¯t know which weapons were available to her in this void outside all realms, if any. She invoked her Inventory. The table appeared in front of her. She had to dismiss it because the zombies were already almost over her and the superimposed image made it hard to see. She kicked a moving corpse, punched another, and took a step back. Then she called her Inventory again. It was a mess. Her available weapons changed on their own, in an unpredictable cycle. One moment she could retrieve the arquebus, the next second there was a pistol in its place, and in one instant it had been replaced by a spear. The same thing was happening in the other slots. Sarah stepped back again, kicking and punching as the zombies tried to reach her and bite any part of her. One of them turned into a Nazi soldier, then quickly reverted back to zombie. Another changed momentarily into a boar. Maggot was still covering his face, trying to protect himself, but the knight lay now on the nonexistent ground. Or, rather, half a knight. One arm and two legs had disappeared and he seemed to be bleeding brilliand pixels of gold and emerald. Sarah noticed that similar things were happening to the zombies attacking her: once in a while one of them lost a limb, or its head, or acquired twenty additional fingers in one hand, which dissolved in a bright puff of electronic garbage in the next second. The whole horde was glitching, faltering, degrading, at the whim of some cybernetic madness. They were still over her, though. Maggot came to the rescue, jumping over a corpse and cutting its head off with a quick motion of both hands. Then he stabbed another zombie in the face, and sunk both knifes into a third zombie¡¯s throat, penetrating its head until he impaled the brain. Sarah used those few moments to try and make sense of her Inventory. Her mana counter was also flickering wildly, its legend alternating between ¡°Mana¡±, ¡°Fuel¡± and several other things she couldn¡¯t read quickly enough. This is not fair. Up there in an indeterminate point above their heads, a new tear opened and half a bomber jet entered the space. It crashed against the solid nothingness and burst into flames. A soldier in a parachute followed it through the hole; the parachute turned into an iron plank midflight, and both man and object disintegrated in a bright flash a second later. The hole closed itself in a puff of code. Maggot kept knocking down zombies. Sarah sent him quick glances as she tried to get rid of the undead coming at her, still unable to retrieve any weapons. Evidently, her friend had stepped up some notches in Melee Attack. He didn¡¯t look as defenseless as the first or second time she had met him. He still paled in comparison with Uberyn, but there he was, fighting against multiple enemies and for the moment, winning. She, on the other hand, was losing. Her shoulder was still hurting where the sabre-toothed wolf¡¯s fang had pierced it, and she found it hard to hit the zombies with that arm. She stepped back once more as a corpse¡¯s mouth got dangerously closer to her ear. Dead hands were tugging at her clothes, trying to grab her arm, her face, whatever they could get a grip on. ¡°You hungry motherfuckers!¡± Sarah yelled, punching and kicking as hard as she could. But the bodies were too close now, and her kicks and punches were mostly ineffectual. I need to get out of here. The Ring. I need to use the Ring. Only she didn¡¯t know how. Also, she would be leaving Maggot. I won¡¯t leave Maggot. What was the alternative, though? To die. I will die here. Sarah kept throwing her arms and legs against the zombies, but she was now falling backwards, half collapsing under the collective weight of the undead. In a couple of seconds, it would be over. A couple of seconds. A couple of seconds. Time seemed to lose its meaning then, and Sarah thought this was what you feel when you¡¯re about to die. The sensation of time slowly, very slowly coming to a stop, and a peaceful, subdued glow filling the scene. The zombies were moving at a snail¡¯s pace now, their faces caressed by a faintly golden light; her body was falling backwards morosely, as if she was underwater. All noises were lower now, as if somebody had turned the volume way down. Everything had a golden tint. Maggot¡¯s knives traced their slow deadly lines in the air, eager to meet the eyes and throats of the corpses that dared attack him. He was bathed in a golden light, too. Everything was. It was like a ballet. ¡°Oh, my first visitors,¡± said a voice behind her. It was not slowed down. It sounded like a normal voice, peaceful, certain, amicable. The voice of an old man. Everything was now frozen in place, Sarah noticed, including her. She could still move her eyeballs, though, and when the old man walked beside her and came into view, she could take a good look at him. He was a mage. He looked exactly like the archetipe of the old, wise magician in countless books and movies and videogames and whatnot. An old, tall man, with white beard, a slow pace, wearing a dark robe and a pointy hat with stars and arcane symbols drawn on it. He was, of course, holding a staff. ¡°Hello,¡± he said with perfect friendliness. ¡°Welcome to the Void.¡± Chapter 23. fsck the police Night
They are here.
Sumiko typed the words as fast as she could and pressed Enter as if she wanted the key to go through the table. As soon as the line was confirmed, she turned off the notebook, slammed it shut and threw it into the garbage chute. The noises coming out from the shaft as the computer slammed against the walls and got torn in pieces in its long fall were painful to hear, but there was no other option. She had been preparing for this. Through the window she could see the men stepping down from the police car and walking into the building. They would be in her apartment in just a minute, and they would find Sarah lying inside the tank. Sumiko knew this could happen, but she hadn¡¯t expected it to happen so soon. It had barely been three days since they had broken into the Digidream building and she hooked Sarah into the game. Three days of trying to figure out how to get her and Mike outside of the Anderverse, and those other people too, whoever they were. And today, just a few hours ago, the hackers had contacted her out of the blue.
We know you¡¯re watching us.
* * * Eight hours earlier
We know we¡¯re watching us.
She hadn¡¯t been as careful as she thought, or the hackers were smarter than she had anticipated, Sumiko thought as she stared at the laconic message written on her screen. She felt the cold sweat on her face and hands as she wrote back, waiting for an answer.
Who are you?
The reply arrived almost instantly. That doesn¡¯t matter, they said. And after a while: The police are coming for you. A few seconds later, yet another message: They are coming for her. Sumiko had so many questions that she didn¡¯t know what to ask first. She had the intuition that these people wouldn¡¯t hold the connection for long ¡ª she didn¡¯t have much time. Are you playing the game? she typed.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. No, the answer came back. Some of our friends are. They were trapped, just like your friend¡¯s bf. Sumiko was about to press on for more information on who the other players were, but a new message from the hackers appeared before she could start typing. This time she was certain the conversation was just about to end. We¡¯re not here to chat, they wrote. We want to warn you. The police can¡¯t know about us. Destroy everything you saw. Leave no trace of us anywhere. But they¡¯ll think it was me, Sumiko objected. They will say I am the hacker. The next few seconds felt like an eternity. When Sumiko was about to give up, a new message appeared on her screen. It was the last one. A farewell and a warning.
Live up to your name. Be a smart girl.
* * * Night The cops knocked twice, then blasted the door open before Sumiko had time to even get there. A man and a woman entered the apartment. Sumiko spoke as soon as they made eye contact. ¡°Open the tank and she dies.¡± ¡°We know. We¡¯re not morons,¡± the man said, producing a badge. ¡°Detective Veggips. This is detective Clooper. Nice sweater, by the way.¡± ¡°Thanks.¡± ¡°I was being ironic. It¡¯s stupid. Clooper,¡± he called out, ¡°go to the basement. We need to do a fsck.¡± ¡°To the basement?¡± Clooper asked stupidly. ¡°A filesystem check? Of what?¡± ¡°Clooper, Clooper,¡± detective Veggips said, losing his temper. ¡°Haven¡¯t you heard that terrible noise when we were coming upstairs? Go to the basement. Find the remains of this genius¡¯ notebook. Recover everything that can be recovered.¡± Sumiko opened her mouth to say something, but detective Veggips commanded her, ¡°Take me where she is.¡± ¡°Over there,¡± Sumiko pointed. ¡°Remember not to¡ª¡± ¡°I know,¡± Veggips said, irritated. ¡°Do you think she¡¯s the first person we find in a tank? There are five more out there. We are taking care of them.¡± ¡°What¡¯s happening?¡± Sumiko asked. ¡°Maybe you could tell me,¡± the detective retorted, entering the room where the tank was. He leaned over it and examined Sarah¡¯s face and body like a surgeon, his face acquiring a green tint from the light coming out of the capsule. He crouched and inspected the control panel beside the tank door. ¡°This is one of the old models,¡± he said, looking at Sumiko. Then, without waiting for an answer, he got up and took a good look around the room. ¡°Where did you get the drugs?¡± ¡°The drugs?¡± ¡°The drugs.¡± Veggips pointed at Sarah with a quick nod. ¡°Oh. They came with the tank. I have the papers if you¡ª¡± ¡°Nah,¡± Veggips cut her off. ¡°We¡¯ll have to take her, you know.¡± Sumiko knew that, of course. That was what she feared the most: that they would take her tank with Sarah inside and something happened before they could plug it again. The charge would last about three hours while it was unplugged. Losing power would mean she would kick it. ¡°We have done this before,¡± detective Veggips told her, as if he could read her mind. ¡°I told you, there are five more we¡¯re taking care of. She will be safe with us.¡± ¡°And what about me?¡± Sumiko said, hesitant. ¡°You? Depends on what Clooper finds in your harddrive. Also on how cooperative you decide to be.¡± Be a smart girl, the hackers had said. Live up to your name. And now Sumiko needed to think long and hard about what would be the smart thing to do. Chapter 24. The mage He wanted to dream a man: he wanted to dream him with minute integrity and insert him into reality. ¡ª Jorge Luis Borges, The circular ruins ¡°Who is he?¡± The magician seemed genuinely curious as he watched through the window. They were inside a dome that couldn¡¯t be seen from outside, a place full of flasks and old books and more modern-looking diagrams with abstruse graphs hanging from the walls. Or wall. There was only one wall, it being a dome and all. ¡°He¡¯s a guy I helped. Now it¡¯s his turn to help me, I guess,¡± Sarah replied, looking out as well. Maggot was still there, frozen in place, a swarm of assorted corpses hanging there too, motionless, all of them bathed by a golden light that came from nowhere. All around, the Void kept flashing, thundering, giving instant birth and death to half-formed creatures and machines that popped into existence through rips in the empty continuum. A hole of madness, a world of quirks and bugs. ¡°And who are you?¡± The magician turned around to face her. ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± he replied. ¡°They call me the Great Gonz¨¢lez, but that¡¯s just a silly name they found in a children¡¯s book. That much I know because it¡¯s part of the information they gave me.¡± ¡°Who gave you this information?¡± ¡°The people who created me. They put me here to help them when they manage to enter the game. But they can¡¯t, not yet. Maybe I can help you instead.¡± Sarah fell silent for a few moments. Too much stuff was happening at the same time, and she wasn¡¯t sure she fully understood the information she was being given. ¡°I need help, sure,¡± she said, ¡°but why would you help me? You aren¡¯t supposed to. I¡¯m not the one who put you here. You don¡¯t know me.¡± ¡°Oh, I do know you,¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez said. ¡°In fact, Sarah, you are the only player whose identity I know. They have told me about you.¡± ¡°You are in contact with them, then? Can you send them a message for me?¡± ¡°Sadly, I can¡¯t,¡± the magician said. ¡°I can only receive information. They are blind about what happens inside the game. Like your friend Sumiko. They can tell you stuff, but they can¡¯t see you at all. They don¡¯t even know what¡¯s happening here. That¡¯s why they are trying to get in.¡± ¡°So why don¡¯t they do it? They are hackers, right? They can do what I did.¡± ¡°They can¡¯t, not easily. As soon as the Game Master knew they were here, they would be offed in no time. It would be suicide.¡± Sarah stood pensive for a moment. ¡°But,¡± she objected, ¡°the Game Master knows I¡¯m here, and he hasn¡¯t killed me.¡± ¡°Oh, sweet summer child,¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez said, with a smirk that was both sad and amused at the same time, ¡°you should have realized this long ago. The only reason you¡¯re still alive is because the Game Master wants you to be here. He wants you to stay here forever.¡± * * * It felt like an eternity, but surely just a handful of seconds passed as a chill ran down Sarah¡¯s virtual spine (or was it the real one?) after hearing the Great Gonz¨¢lez¡¯s words. The Game Master wants me here, she couldn¡¯t stop thinking. The Game Master wants me here forever. When she spoke again, her voice came out weak and fearful. ¡°So why... why is the Game Master doing this?¡± ¡°I will tell you what I know,¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez said. ¡°Consider this the infodump. You may want to sit down.¡± Sarah nodded and obeyed. The mage sat down too. The wall darkened and a series of pictures started appearing on it as he spoke. Photos, short clips of video relating to what he was saying. ¡°The Anderverse¡±, he began, ¡°is the creation of Victor Anderen, owner of Digidream, the company making it. Anderen conceived the general idea of the multiworld game about ten years ago, when the VR technology had evolved enough for such a game to become feasible. About the same time, Victor Anderen was diagnosed with Macduff¡¯s syndrome, a rare condition that renders the sufferer progressively unable to use their body, leaving their mind intact for a while, but attacking it in a second phase, making the brain deteriorate until the subject ends up becoming a vegetable. Death comes not long after that. The syndrome manifests initially with random muscle cramps, then with minor strokes, and then the degenerative process starts in full.¡± ¡°Oh my, that¡¯s horrible.¡± ¡°Indeed. It is believed that the idea of building this version of the Anderverse in parallel occurred to him some time later,¡± the magician continued, ¡°but in any case, development of the main game started about eight years ago, when he could secure the funding he would need for such a huge enterprise. Five years later, he started experiencing the first symptoms of the disease, and earlier this year he suffered his first stroke.¡±You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. ¡°I remember that.¡± ¡°By that time, this version of the Anderverse was already planned. Victor Anderen knew that he had very little time to live, and he had set up something to avoid his fate. He set up a secret project to transfer his mind into a computer system, turning it into an AI.¡± ¡°Wh-what?¡± ¡°Most of the funds available for the game design and assets were secretly diverted to this secondary project, which was in fact primary for him. He knew the game wouldn¡¯t be ready for a long time, but he devised a smart, albeit risky plan. Victor Anderen decided that he didn¡¯t need to finish the game in order to inhabit it. He only needed it to work well enough for him to be transferred to the virtual reality, and then the AI would keep creating the gameworld and making adjustments from inside, while his mind was safely and progressively transferred.¡± ¡°What do you mean progressively?¡± Sarah asked, dumbstruck. ¡°The technology for this transfer has never been used before. It¡¯s experimental, and it was developed by Anderen¡¯s team with resources destined to the game,¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez explained. ¡°For now, Victor exists here in a dual state: part of him is his own mind enclosed in the body that¡¯s quickly decaying inside a tank in the Digidream building, and part of him is already an artificial intelligence controlling the game and almost all its aspects. The idea is that he will be fully transferred before he dies, which won¡¯t take long in real life but could be a while in game time.¡± ¡°And this is why the game is unfinished. He will keep making adjustments to it until after he dies. Creating a universe to his own measure.¡± ¡°Exactly,¡± the magician responded. The mage didn¡¯t say it, but now she realized where she was. The Void was the representation of the parts of the game that were still being created and modified constantly by the AI. Scenarios, creatures, weapons, vehicles, all of it was in a continuous state of flux, and as the items were being generated and discarded, they appeared here briefly, only to disappear once the appropriate line of code sent them where they needed to be or straight up deleted them. This was also what made the Worldjumper possible. The Ring of Realms worked by sending you to the Void, and then, from there, to any other of the realms in the Anderverse, through the open holes that existed in all of them. Once the game was finished (if it was ever finished), those holes would be closed and there wouldn¡¯t be any chance to use the Ring. But for now, it was full of them. A world in a constant state of creation. A world created according to the whims of a man. ¡°So Victor Anderen is the Game Master?¡± ¡°You bet he is.¡± Sarah mulled it over. The story she was being told was fantastic, utterly unbelievable, but here, inside the Void, where hints of every fantastic thing were popping up all the time, she believed it. A man with plenty of money and power, but running out of time. A man helming the company where the most innovative virtual reality game was being made. What would a man like that do when facing impending death? He would choose to be a god in a virtual world. A world designed to fit his dreams and ambitions. And he had a special ambition. Her. That was the reason he had kidnapped her boyfriend. To get her to log into the game, and get trapped inside. Victor Anderen had chosen her to be a part of his twisted fantasy world, forever. ¡°OK,¡± Sarah said, with sudden resolve. ¡°How do we defeat him?¡± ¡°Can you fly?¡± ¡°No.¡± ¡°What a shame. Because you¡¯ll need to fly.¡± Fuck my life! I knew I should have chosen the fairy. ¡°Can you make me fly? You¡¯re a magician after all.¡± ¡°Sadly, no,¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez said. ¡°Bear in mind that I should not be here if it were for the Game Master. I can only provide resources that have been hacked into. And that is hard. Obviously, the people who put me here are much more interested in staying under the radar than in being very strong or able to fly. So the only way I can help you is by increasing your Stealth ability.¡± Sarah frowned, but then her expression changed. ¡°That¡¯s not bad. Not bad at all,¡± she said finally. ¡°Very good.¡± The magician made a complicated pass and a notification popped up in front of Sarah¡¯s eyes.
+10000 Stealth
¡°Wow, that¡¯s quite a bit of Stealth,¡± she commented. ¡°You¡¯ve actually overflowed,¡± the magician said, ¡°so it won¡¯t ever go down. You don¡¯t have to worry now about concentrating on it; you¡¯ll be cloaked for as long as you like, and you¡¯ll be able to deactivate it at will.¡± ¡°Thank you,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Now how do I defeat the Game Master?¡± ¡°It might not be possible,¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez said thoughtfully. ¡°His abilities will always be far superior to yours. But you can try to sever the link between him and the AI that is partially controlling the game. Maybe it¡¯s too late and the AI is already in charge of everything, but if not, detaching him from it could make it possible for you to find a way to defeat him. Bear in mind that this detaching most probably means that you¡¯ll be killing him. I mean the human part. At the very least, his mind will be irreparably damaged, having lost part of itself.¡± Sarah shuddered at the thought. The reveal that Victor had kidnapped Mike and trapped her inside the game was revolting, but she didn¡¯t know if she wanted to kill the man. ¡°Is there any other way?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t know. Maybe you could try to talk to him, convince him to let you and your boyfriend go. That¡¯s not likely to work.¡± Sarah stood pensive for a few moments. Then she said, ¡°Well, I¡¯ll do what I have to do. Thank you so much for your help. It means so much to me.¡± She reminded herself that the Great Gonz¨¢lez was just a computer program, not a real person, but she couldn¡¯t help herself. ¡°There is a fortress in the sky,¡± the magician said, barely acknowledging her gratefulness. ¡°That¡¯s where you¡¯ll find the Game Master. He calls it Inverness. If you could fly, you could go there right now, I guess. But it might be better to train a bit before going, anyway. He¡¯s too powerful for you.¡± ¡°Oh, nevermind,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°I need to make a stop first. If you¡¯re so kind to unfreeze my friend, that is.¡± Chapter 25. A cup of tea There were so many worlds. So many possibilities. Now that they were together again in the middle of the Void, her mind started to perceive a higher level of structure in it. ¡°Hold my hand,¡± she instructed, and Maggot complied, nervously. Sarah looked up. The sky was a whirlwind of darkness and color and code, its shape only revealed by the constant switching of abstract patches running up and down the gigantic dome. There was a center, though, a vaguely circular area that was mostly blackness, like a more or less permanent hole inside the hole that was the Void. She raised her arm, and the Ring of Realms started shining more brightly, the colors moving around at hyperspeed. Something happened around the hole. A myriad of curved rectangles centered on the nothingness up there appeared. Each one was a moving image, with some text below. A radial menu. Sarah examined the rectangles. As her eyes passed over each, they became bigger, standing out over the rest, showing their images larger and making the text readable, although some times that text was abstruse, like it was written in a weird language. There were hundreds of rectangles. Maybe thousands. Thousands of worlds in the unfinished Anderverse. I never knew the game was so huge. A certain method appeared obscurely in that overwhelming multitude, some kind of ability to orientate herself that Sarah wouldn¡¯t have been able to explain. It was as if her brain could search among the realms and locate the ones she knew or could be interested in. They appeared one after the other, popping up as her eyes ran over the menu: the Medieval Village, the Towers, the Dead City, and so many, many others. But there was that one she wanted now. The Enchanted Forest. She kept her arm raised, her eyes focused on the hole as the virtual screen showing the Enchanted Forest glowed against the backdrop of nothingness, while the rest of the dome kept flashing and changing nonstop. Now what? Sarah thought. How do I get there? Am I supposed to jump a little so I shoot up into the sky? It turned out to work exactly that way. * * * ¡°Hey,¡± Maggot said as they both walked through the forest, searching for the house beside the lake. ¡°Thank you.¡± The Enchanted Forest looked exactly like it had looked when Sarah left it, months ago in game time. She had half expected that everything had changed, since the AI was always working. But this realm being the first one the players visited, it would be the one requiring fewer changes, Sarah thought. Or maybe it was that most changes were subtle, invisible to the senses: minor alterations in mechanics, skill points, health values, task rewards, and so on. ¡°I¡¯m not doing this for you,¡± Sarah said, almost as an apology. ¡°I need to find my boyfriend. He¡¯s trapped in this game and I need to get him out safely.¡± ¡°Oh.¡± Maggot stood pensively for a while. ¡°But thanks anyway,¡± he said finally. ¡°You could just have left me behind, but you still helped me.¡± ¡°Oh no, no,¡± Sarah objected. ¡°I need to take you to the Sorceress. I don¡¯t know why, but I have to do it. I received a message while I was in the zombie apocalypse telling me to do that. Do you understand? I need you, that¡¯s all.¡± ¡°But,¡± Maggot pressed on, ¡°you helped me before you ended up in the zombie world. You didn¡¯t need me then. So thank you. You¡¯re a good person.¡± ¡°Whatever, I guess,¡± Sarah replied. She didn¡¯t know why she was finding it so hard to accept Maggot¡¯s thankfulness. She had helped him, more than once. And yet, she felt she didn¡¯t deserve his gratitude. Her Perception had improved markedly since the last time she had been in the forest. She could tell at a distance that they were near the creek where the nymphs sang and whistled while bathing and washing their hair in the water. Their outlines appeared in blue, superimposed to the trees and shrubs that hid the creek from view. The nymphs themselves would be invisible to Maggot, surely, but not for her. ¡°Hey, have you seen the nymphs?¡± she asked her friend. ¡°The nymphs? N-no, I don¡¯t think so,¡± he replied. ¡°Ah,¡± Sarah said. ¡°You should work on your Perception then. They are a lovely sight.¡± They kept walking. Sarah invoked her Map and realized there was a difference. The whole Enchanted Forest was drawn on it now, instead of just the parts she had treaded at the beginning of the game. Red and golden spots were scattered all over it. She now knew they were sources of mana, and made a mental note to pick some after talking to the Sorceress. She felt nervous, and now she believed she understood why. Once she had taken Maggot to the Sorceress, she would have to leave him. She would need to speed up her training, not in any realm¡¯s specific scenarios and abilities, but in the art of crossphasing itself, so that she could face the Game Master and rescue Mike. Maggot would be a liability. He just wasn¡¯t ready for such a thing, so he would have to stay behind. She was leaving him to his own devices, and she felt guilty for that. He would probably not last long.The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. But she needed to get to Mike. And time was running out. There was the book, for example. She had found the book, or the book had found her, about an hour ago. I was lying on a tree stump, almost as if it were being exhibited. She opened it and saw the new sentence that was there waiting for her:
They are here.
Who they were, the book didn¡¯t say. But here was Sumiko¡¯s home, the place where Sarah¡¯s body was. A sense of dread filled her when she read it and her heart seemed to want to sink into the ground. How long had it been since she wrote that? And why hadn¡¯t she said anything else? This uncertainty was brutal. But there was one certainty: there was no time to lose. And yet, she felt guilty for leaving Maggot. She felt that she was about to use him and then discard him. A woman¡¯s voice cut her thoughts. ¡°I see you¡¯ve learned to use it.¡± Sarah turned around. There was the Sorceress, as beautiful and imposing as ever, nodding at the Worldjumper. ¡°I... I got a bit of help,¡± Sarah confessed. ¡°And you helped someone as well,¡± the woman replied. She made a quick pass and suddenly, all three were inside the house beside the lake, each resting on a floating chair, holding a bowl of tea. Sarah looked into the beverage. There it was, her real face. It had been so long since she last saw it that she had started to forget what she looked like. ¡°It¡¯s good to be here,¡± she said. ¡°I guess,¡± the Sorceress replied. ¡°You brought me something.¡± ¡°Him.¡± ¡°Why?¡± ¡°I... I don¡¯t know.¡± Sarah looked at her puzzled. ¡°I was hoping you could tell me.¡± ¡°Me? Why did you think so?¡± ¡°I¡ª¡± Sarah couldn¡¯t go on. She just didn¡¯t know what to say. Maggot was about to sip from his drink when he started suddenly. He almost dropped the bowl with its contents. ¡°Sorry,¡± he said when he realized that both Sarah and the Sorceress were staring at him. ¡°It¡¯s only... who is that?¡± he asked the woman, pointing at his tea. Sarah smiled. ¡°That is you,¡± the Sorceress explained. ¡°It¡¯s how you look in real life, outside of the game.¡± ¡°Wow,¡± he said. ¡°I¡¯m pretty attractive, then. I wish I would look like that here.¡± ¡°Let me see,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Oh, no, I don¡¯t think so,¡± Maggot grinned, clutching his bowl as if he thought Sarah was about to rip it off his hands. ¡°You¡¯d fall in love with me, and then I¡¯d have a problem with that boyfriend you keep talking about.¡± His voice sounded playful, for the first time since Sarah met him. She didn¡¯t think she had heard him make a joke ever before. All his fear seemed to have vanished. The effect of the tea? But he hadn¡¯t drank any yet. Maybe it was the revelation that he was actually good looking IRL? ¡°Oh, come on,¡± she insisted, playing along. ¡°Well, if you won¡¯t give up, I guess...¡± Maggot said, and held the bowl a bit farther away, letting his face reflect on it again. ¡°But you¡¯ll have to show me your real face, too.¡± Sarah went to him and looked at the liquid¡¯s surface. Maggot¡¯s real face was there. Clear. Pristine. Unmistakable. She dropped her own bowl, splashing tea all over the floor. Her legs trembled, and she felt her stomach turning. For an instant, she was about to faint. ¡°What... what¡¯s wrong?¡± Maggot asked, suddenly concerned. ¡°You are Mike?¡± Maggot looked at her, puzzled. ¡°W-who?¡± ¡°Maggot, you are MIKE! You are my boyfriend! The one I was looking for!¡± ¡°What?¡± ¡°I¡¯ve been looking for you for so long!¡± Sarah cried out, tears jumping out of her eyes. ¡°DON¡¯T YOU UNDERSTAND?¡± She hugged Maggot so suddenly that he dropped his bowl too. Uncertain, he hugged her back. ¡°Oh, Mike, Mike!¡± Sarah said, as tears kept flowing uncontrollably. ¡°I¡¯ve missed you so much! I¡¯ve been looking for you since¡ª you don¡¯t know. Can¡ª can he recover his memories?¡± she continued, addressing the Sorceress. ¡°That¡¯s outside of my powers,¡± the woman replied. ¡°He will remember when he exits the game, though.¡± ¡°Oh, Mike!¡± Sarah started kissing him. His face was ugly and weird, but inside that man was that other man, the one she loved. * * * There was love and there was relief and there was release. Sarah cried for hours, before and after leaving the house beside the lake. Mike didn¡¯t remember her, of course; the name Sarah didn¡¯t even ring a bell for him. Down here, he was only Maggot, a player whose abilities fell short across the whole spectrum, except for the basic skills he had fought very, very hard to master and that one that had come to him by sheer luck out in the tower field. She had made a decision. And that decision had brought her pain. But that pain had only strengthened her resolve. She had been wondering whether she should take Mike with her, and help him level up in the different realms, or leave him in a safe place, waiting for her to defeat the Game Master and come back for him. She chose option B. And now she needed to leave her boyfriend, maybe forever, right after she had finally found him in the most unexpected way. Of course, there was no safe place in the whole Anderverse; not in any realm that was under Victor Anderen¡¯s control, at least. A wave could reach Maggot anywhere, anytime, sending him to a completely different place, putting him in the way of danger. It had been a miracle that he had survived for so long while being severly nerfed; it was not likely that his luck would keep protecting him for much longer. So, the only safe place was actually in the place that was no place at all. The Void. Specifically, the mage¡¯s dome. Right in the middle of the chaotic space between the realms, where beasts, weapons and deadly vehicles kept appearing at random, there was the Great Gonz¨¢lez and his safe harbor. Maggot (Mike!) could stay there for a while, while she accrued the necessary skills for the final confrontation. Tears of joy for having found her loved one; tears of sorrow for parting from him again, maybe forever. ¡°Will you take care of him?¡± she asked the magician once the old man revealed himself. Around them, the Void flashed and thundered in a chaotic mess, the myriad of realms floating up high around a tunnel of nothingness. ¡°You helped me before. Please help me now by keeping him safe.¡± ¡°That I can do,¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez replied. ¡°Remember the gift I gave you.¡± ¡°I will certainly remember it,¡± Sarah said. ¡°I will be stealthy as fuck.¡± ¡°For how long will you be gone?¡± Maggot asked. ¡°For as long as I need,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°For as long as it takes to defeat the Game Master.¡± Announcements As we approach the end of the first volume of The Digidream Chronicles, I have some announcements to make that may be of interest to you, my awesome readers. The most important of which is: (1) I''ll be PUBLISHING the book on Amazon once it''s done. Because of Amazon''s rules for publishing ebooks, I will have to take down most of the story from RRL when I do so. Only a small part of it will stay up on this site (about 10%), at least for a few months, while the exclusivity period lasts. After that, I may republish it here, but it depends on the circumstances. Don''t worry, though: I''ll make a new announcement when the publishing date is near so that you all will have time to finish reading the story here, for free! It''s the least I can do to thank you for your support, enthusiasm, and patience. Because of this, other announcements need to be made. They are pretty awesome so keep reading! (2) The story, as you can read it on Royal Road, is unedited: what we writers call a "first draft". Do you know what I do while I''m not pumping out new chapters? I''m rewriting and expanding the ones that are already written, changing some details, fine tuning the prose, giving a bit more clarity to the story, some additional background... This edited story is what will be published on Amazon. But those of you who are interested in reading it for free will be able to do so as well! Before launching the book, I''ll be sending copies of the edited version to all of you who ask for it. Just PM me and I will add you to the list. In the publishing world, this is known as ARC (advanced reading copies), and what''s in it for me? Well, maybe nothing: just a way to show you my thankfulness for being there, for reading every chapter as I put them up. But there is a way I can benefit from sending you a free copy of the book: if you want, as soon as it is published, you could go to its Amazon page and leave a review. This helps ebooks writers because it gives visibility to the book. Of course you are not required to leave a review; just consider your ARC a gift, no strings attached. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. (3) There will still be another way to show your support, which will help me keep writing these stories. See the donation button down there? Donate $5 and you''ll get a free copy of the second book in the saga once it''s finished. You''ll also be able to download additional copies of the first and second book with alternative covers (the ones I was planning to use but ended up ditching; maybe you''ll like them better!). Donate $10 and you''ll also be included in the "Acknowledgements" page of the book that comes out immediately after you make your donation. Donate more than $25 and you''ll ALSO get to name a character in the third book (limited to the first two donors for that sum). (4) Once I''m publishing it on Amazon, THE SAGA MIGHT BE RENAMED. Please keep this into account if you''ll be following it in RRL but haven''t bookmarked it yet. The name of the saga will probably be Anderverse Online, and the first book will be titled either The Game Master or The World Jumper. (5) Comments and reviews will be welcome and encouraged before, during, and after the transition to Amazon. Those of you who get ARCs may act as my beta readers, pointing out flaws and suggesting changes to the edited book! Please leave your comments and reviews here or send me your thoughts through PM. I''m always happy to hear from my readers. Well, this got quite long, so I''m saying goodbye for now. In a few hours, enjoy a new chapter in this story! Thaks for being there. You''re awesome. Chapter 26. Modern warfare ¡°Well, well. You actually came back,¡± the innkeeper said. ¡°I had lost all hope.¡± ¡°You shouldn¡¯t have,¡± Sarah said. ¡°I never leave a debt unpaid, one way or the other.¡± The man stood pensive for a few moments. Or maybe he was just staring at her chest. When the silence became too awkward, he asked, ¡°So how¡¯s Tristan? Has he served you well?¡± ¡°More than well,¡± she replied. ¡°He died protecting me.¡± In a way, it was the truth. Tristan¡¯s pieces lay scattered around in the black forest near the tower field. He had died in his motorbike form. Nothing she could explain easily or quickly. ¡°It¡¯s so sad,¡± the man said. ¡°But it was a honorable death. Good horse.¡± ¡°I will need another one,¡± Sarah said, pulling several coins from her purse. ¡°Here is the payment for Tristan, and for a new horse. Plus a bit more for the wait.¡± The innkeeper grinned appreciatively. ¡°Well, it¡¯s been months, yeah,¡± he said. ¡°Thanks for your business. Let¡¯s go and choose your new horse. I hope he lives long.¡± * * * The road outside the inn was almost black as the sun went down and the whole landscape sunk into darkness. Valiant, the new horse, was pawing the ground impatiently. He was already in her Inventory, and when Sarah Scrutinized him, she found out that he had 500 hitpoints. The Ring of Realms was glistening furiously in her finger as she looked up at the sky and began surveying the gigantic menu of worlds. ¡°You¡¯ll need to fly,¡± the mage had said, and Sarah wondered where in all those realms she would be able to acquire such a skill. The images popped up seemingly at random, dancing a mysterious dance, guided by something inside her that she didn¡¯t fully understand. That something was making sense of it all, cutting the information overload and bringing potential options to her. I will never be able to fly. But I can get a flying machine at least. Or maybe I could tame a dragon. For a brief moment, she thought of going back to Uberyn... but she discarded the thought at once. That jerk only cared about himself, and when he did help her, it was just to get close to her and get a kiss. He would want more than that now that he knew she wasn¡¯t just playing a game, but trying to save her boyfriend and herself. And if he learned about her trying to defeat the Game Master, his price for helping would become exponentially higher. No dragons, then. What about a plane? As she thought of this, the realms rearranged up there and a different selection came to the front. There were several worlds where she could see some sort of fighting taking place; some of them appeared to be technologically very advanced, others quite primitive. Sarah decided not to try what those primitive worlds offered in the field of flying machines. She focused on a conventional war scenario: Fight for Oil. The virtual screen was brought closer as she made her selection. ¡°See you there, Valiant,¡± she told the horse, patting his back. She raised her arm and jumped just a bit. Her body shot through the sky like a rocket, crossed a layer of clouds, then another, entered a tunnel of abstract luminescence, went through the Void, kept going up, and then she was falling forward.
Shadow skill active: World Jump
She was getting used to the jumps now. Fortunately, ¡°jumping from a great height¡± had been the way to unlock this ability, but it wasn¡¯t required for every jump; it sufficed to give a little leap while the Ring of Realms was active, after choosing a world to jump to. Also, she had much more control on how she landed on the destination realm. Much better than one of those waves that kept sweeping her off her feet. She maneuvered with her body as she saw the new landscape up there, or down below. She positioned herself to land on her feet, and instinctively tried to choose a landing point ¡ª which, of course, was impossible. She had to fight the feeling that she could just wiggle a bit and move several miles in the air; she was at the mercy of gravity, just like if she were falling in the real world, only the force of gravity and therefore, of her impact, were greatly diminished in the game. At least, to the effect of worldjumping. Being dropped from a tower would probably kill her, but this multiversal parkour was set up so that she wouldn¡¯t splatter against the ground on each jump.If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. She landed in the middle of the street, raising a cloud of dust. The city was small and brown, more a village than a metropolis. Nobody was outside except the soldiers crouching against walls and cars behind her and the other soldiers doing the exact same thing a few dozen feet ahead. She was now wearing a military uniform ¡ª though a bit impractical, perhaps, since, once again, the outfit was so revealing that it was useless as camouflage, showing more skin than cloth. I would have preferred some kind of body armor, but fuck me, right? ¡°Hey. Who the fuck are you?¡± Sarah turned around to see the guy peeking from behind an old, dusty car riddled with bullet holes. She Scrutinized him and realized he was a player. Yay, I guess! There are more than five of us! ¡°Why don¡¯t you find out?¡± she replied harshly. ¡°It¡¯s not like you can¡¯t¡ª¡± A bullet hissed right by her ear. Sarah rolled down, crouched, then sprinted toward the car. A second later she was right beside the soldier. ¡°Nathan, I guess?¡± she asked. ¡°Nobody would chose Nathyn as name if they hadn¡¯t been cursed with Nathan as their real name.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t know my real name,¡± he replied angrily. ¡°Do you?¡± Sarah remembered then that she seemed to be the only player who had memories of her life outside the Anderverse. ¡°So,¡± she said, ignoring his question, ¡°you¡¯re a Soldier here. Which means your class is Warrior elsewhere? I figure I¡¯m a Soldier too.¡± ¡°You are,¡± he said. He stayed silent for a few seconds, his gaze lost, and Sarah realized he was Scrutinizing her. ¡°Sajya, then? You must have been around for a while. Your stats are good. Well, that, and you fell from the fucking sky.¡± ¡°Believe me, I¡¯ve been here for far longer than I¡¯d have liked,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°And I won¡¯t stay for long here.¡± ¡°What do you mean? Have you discovered a way to log off?¡± ¡°Not yet,¡± Sarah said, ¡°but I¡¯m on it.¡± ¡°So why are you here?¡± ¡°I need a plane.¡± Nathyn¡¯s laughter was so sudden and loud that for an instant, Sarah thought a bomb had exploded right beside them. ¡°A plane? You¡¯ve fallen in the wrong place,¡± he said, his voice loaded with scorn. ¡°All you¡¯ll find here is dust.¡± ¡°Dust and tanks, I see.¡± A tank was coming through the dusty street, indeed. Nathyn¡¯s expression changed in an instant. ¡°Hey, guys,¡± he said. ¡°We need to back off.¡± He made a quick gesture to his right. A soldier who had barricaded himself against a wall nodded briefly and got ready to move. Other two soldiers answered from a distance, whistling in code. ¡°Players?¡± Sarah asked. ¡°No. NPCs. But they can shoot.¡± ¡°Got it.¡± Following Nathyn¡¯s indications, they all backed down, procuring the protection of vehicles and walls. A few shots came their way, hissing, ricocheting against the masonry and rubble, putting new holes in the abandoned cars, but none of them was hit. ¡°Where are we?¡± Sarah asked. ¡°Who cares?¡± Nathyn replied. ¡°A nondescript Middle Eastern shithole. They have oil. We want oil. That¡¯s why we are here, I think.¡± ¡°OK, listen,¡± Sarah said. ¡°I don¡¯t need to fight this war. I¡¯ll just leave and try to get a plane in some other scenario. Fine?¡± The tank kept advancing through the road, among half-demolished houses and piles of rubble. It ran over two or three corpses of civilians. The turret turned, seeking its objective. Them. ¡°Yeah, fine, fine,¡± Nathyn said. ¡°You could help a little, though.¡± ¡°Let me see.¡± Sarah examined her inventory. Valiant, the horse, was now a motorcycle, but it was very different from the steampunk version Tristan had become back in the tower field. The flamethrower was a grenade launcher. Perfect. ¡°Nathyn, have you ever blown up a tank?¡± ¡°N-no, no. I haven¡¯t,¡± he replied, a bit unsure. Maybe he was wondering if Sarah was just laughing at him. ¡°OK, tell me how it feels, then,¡± she said, and retrieved the grenade launcher from her Inventory, then handed it to him. ¡°Wow,¡± the soldier said. ¡°This is awesome. How did you¡ª?¡± ¡°Another world,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Another life. Take a shot.¡± Nathyn raised the grenade launcher, held it tight against his shoulder, pointed it at the tank, and took a shot. The grenade traced a parable through the air, started its descent halfway, and landed three yards ahead of the tank. It bounced three, four, five times, until it stopped right below the vehicle. Then, it exploded. It was a powerful grenade. The tank jumped up in the air as if it wanted to abandon this realm, too. It bent as it raised, like trying to break in two. The turret was dislodged from the rest of the body and started rotating madly as the heavy vehicle fell down again in a cloud of smoke. Then the noise reached them, and the realization that the shot had been perfect. From the other side came the shocked yelling of the enemy soldiers. ¡°Wow,¡± Nathyn said. ¡°I want one of these.¡± He made a pause and then said, ¡°I¡¯ve just acquired a skill. Blast Attack.¡± ¡°I hope you¡¯ll find it useful,¡± Sarah said. ¡°The stakes are more even now, I guess? You don¡¯t have a tank, and now they don¡¯t have one either.¡± ¡°So it seems,¡± Nathyn said, still trying to recover from the surprise. ¡°I guess I can go now, then,¡± Sarah replied. She looked up. The Ring of Realms was glistening again, with the light of a thousand worlds. Chapter 27. The horse They would be thinking she was crazy, standing there at one end of the bridge with vacant eyes as energy beams flew all around, sparkles flying, guards falling, while a fiery but silent scene could be seen through the enormous window facing the void of space. But Sarah was not crazy. If anything, she was dumbstruck with her realization. She had jumped to this realm barely half an hour earlier, and she landed right in the middle of the action, as the mothership was being assaulted by unknown forces. The invaders looked like pirates, but judging for the size and general quality of their ships, they either were members of an official army or had some big funding beyond the product of mere pillage. Looking out the window she could see the ships blasting at one another, firing their lasers or using their shields as battering rams. Or, could have seen. Because her eyes were open but she wasn¡¯t looking. Her gaze was on the legends and figures appearing before her, making up her Inventory. The Worldjumper was still wrapper around a finger in her left hand; she was holding it with her right thumb and index finger, delicately, precisely, like one holds a dial. It was a dial. It had always been a dial. ¡°Run! Fucking run!!!¡± Sarah didn¡¯t hear the warning at first. The hood in her robe shielded her vision from what was happening at her sides; it also muffled the sounds just a tiny bit, helping her concentrate on her discovery. When a laser beam flashed right before her eyes, though, she jumped back, startled, and forgot about the Ring and everything having to do with it. But she remembered the magician. Stealth, she thought, perhaps vocalized. And disappeared. It was a lucky thing that the Stealth skill involved her clothes and weapons also. It would have been very inconvenient if she¡¯d had to get naked just to stay unnoticed. It would be ironic, when this fucking game gives me some clothes appropriately covering my whole body for fucking once. But then she remembered that she had used the Stealth skill in the dead city, and that she was fully covered there, too. Being invisible wouldn¡¯t protect her from the blasts, though, so Sarah took a few steps back and pressed her back against the wall opposite the window. The bridge was long, but pretty narrow. She took cover behind a column protruding fromt he wall, partially covered in information panels. In the menu of realms, this one was called Space Battle. As uninspired as the name was, its accuracy couldn¡¯t be disputed. Sarah stood there for a while doing nothing, just contemplating the show of lights and explosions out there, as the invading ships tried to wipe out the mothership¡¯s defenses. A scene that could have been taken from Starcrash with its deliciously na?f aesthetics. ¡°Where did she go?¡± ¡°I don¡¯t know. Go back! Go back!¡± She identified one of the voices as Myra¡¯s. Myra was a player; they had met as soon as Sarah landed inside the mothership. They couldn¡¯t talk much, though, since the ship was already under attack. Taking cover was more urgent then than Scrutinizing each other or telling the story of their lives. Valiant was not a horse here. It was now an individual attack ship, just like the ones that were shooting rays and being shot out there at the other side of the glass. She had tried to reach it to go and joing the battle, but the pirates, or whetever they were, had blocked her attempt. Valiant was at the other side of the bridge, and when she tried to run across it, she found out that they were already gathered at the opposite end, between her and the ships. There was no way to reach Valiant, and no way for Valiant to reach her, since he was not a horse anymore, but an inanimated object. But she had just discovered something. She had discovered the dial. * * * Twenty minutes earlier ¡°Who the fuck are you?¡± The woman was armored to her teeth. She was shooting lasers across the large hall when Sarah fell down beside her. She had good aim, and a fierce expression that would have been scary if Sarah had landed on the opposite side. ¡°Hello. I¡¯m Sajya,¡± she said, mentally sighing at the way people tend to greet her after a jump. ¡°How many are there?¡± She retrieved her hand weapon, which was an energy pistol in this realm, instead of a switchblade or a sword. It had several fluorescent markings and a long line that was completely lit up. Sarah figured that it would be the charge indicator, and the markings were the individual charges. She hoped that the pistol would be able to charge itself with her accumulated fuel/mana, as opposed to turning into a paperweight after the sixth shot. ¡°I don¡¯t know. I¡¯m Myra,¡± the woman said. She would be about thirty years old, Sarah thought. She was pretty, with a wild beauty, and looked Latina. ¡°How many of us are there?¡±This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. ¡°I don¡¯t know,¡± Myra replied, then continued: ¡°We are on the wrong side of the ship. The others have already gotten onto their ships to repeal them, but the ships are on the other side of the bridge. There were a few here, but all of them took off already.¡± ¡°Got it.¡± Myra looked around and pointed at the others. There were several soldiers scattered around the hall, barricading themselves against whatever they could find, shooting at the invaders whenever they could. Players? NPCs? Sarah wasn¡¯t sure. ¡°We¡¯ll try to make it through the bridge, but we need to clear the hall first,¡± Myra explained. Sarah pointed her energy gun at one of the bad guys and opened fire. She missed, but she learned that the gun could indeed charge itself; a quick glance at her Inventory determined that small amounts of mana (here, Energy) were deducted with each shot. Evidently, the six markings meant that she would be able to fire up to six blasts in quick succession, after which she would have for the gun to reload. A revolver, then, she thought to herself. A space Colt. In her Inventory listing she also saw that Valiant had become an attack ship in this world, and that the rest of her weapons were now ¡°space¡± versions of what they were before: a laser rifle, a differential bow (whatever the hell that was), and a Z-blaster (same; a flamethrower originally). She took a few more shots with the laser gun and then stored it to retrieve the rifle. A few shots later she decided that the gun was more manageable in this situation, so she stored the laser rifle and retrieved the energy gun again. ¡°OK, let¡¯s do it. I¡¯ll go first,¡± she said after a while. She didn¡¯t even said it because of her unlimited Stealth; she had forgotten that skill completely. ¡°What¡ª are you sure?¡± Myra asked. ¡°Very,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°It¡¯s now or never.¡± Time was running out indeed; every second that passed limited their chances to cross the bridge. Sarah rolled to her right, firing her gun as she did so: one, two, three. She jumped up and sprinted towards the bridge¡¯s opening. Four, five. She crouched to avoid a laser blast, and kept running. Six. A beam made the wall shatter as she entered the bridge. She rolled again, then waited for Myra and the others to come and join her. But now the hall had become a fiery hell. Rays of energy from both sides crossed the air, their whooshing sounds bouncing around, amplified by the acoustics of the place. She took a few steps, saw movements at the other end of the bridge, and froze in place. Out there, attack ships from both sides were bursting up in silent flames as they were hit by powerful beams of energy. Her ring, the Ring, was shining. But Sarah was not going to jump to another world. Not now. There was something in the way the Ring of Realms glistened. Something in the motion of those flashes of color. A certain outline. A current. A method. She let her index finger and thumb embrace the ring, delicately, as she invoked her Inventory and examined it carefully. She needed a horse now. She didn¡¯t have a horse. But she had a dial. * * * She was invisible. But not invulnerable. ¡°Run!¡± Myra had shouted, and Sarah knew that on that side of the bridge, the battle was being lost, while at the other side, the pirates were closing in. She was trapped in the middle, and there was no way to escape. But she didn¡¯t want to escape. Her index and thumb grazed the Worldjumper. It was invisible too, but she could perceive the undercurrent in it, the code of its energy flowing everywhere. It needed to be nudged in the right direction. That¡¯s all there was to crossphasing. A slight nudge, and then another. Sarah invoked her Inventory once again. Her fingers moved over the ring from edge to edge. The weapons section in the Inventory became highlighted. Her fingers moved a bit more. Now the highlight was on Valiant, her portable ship. Now her motion was different. Her fingers moved along the ring, grazing the surface, as if turning a dial. Which is what it was. In place of the ship there was now a motorbike. She kept dialing. A different motorbike, just like Tristan had been. She kept dialing. Now it was a horse.
Shadow skill acquired: Crossphasing
She heard him neighing in the distance. The pirates were already entering the bridge from the far side. They couldn¡¯t see her, but they started firing their lasers anyway, trying to clear the space. Sarah whistled. Valiant came to her. He galloped into the bridge, running over two invaders. He couldn¡¯t see Sarah, either, but he knew where the whistle had come from. He galloped along the corridor while the pirates, confused, hesitated for a moment. Then they pointed their lasers at the horse. Sarah dialed back. Valiant was an attack ship. The laser beams hit its back but barely had an effect. Sarah sprinted toward the ship, climbed into it, and turned on the engine. Long, powerful flames shot from its back, roasting the men who had just been shooting at Valiant. They were fortunate: their death was immediate, and they didn¡¯t even have time to understand what was coming for them. Sarah was now advancing, approaching the bridge¡¯s entrance. She exited the corridor and entered the hall where Myra and the others were still trying to repeal the invaders. Sarah maneuvered Valiant and started shooting the cannons in their general direction. She couldn¡¯t hope for accuracy but the splash damage was effective: she started receiving prompts about dead pirates even though she couldn¡¯t see them. Myra had stopped shooting her gun and was now just standing idle, staring at the ship in utter shock. After a few seconds, she and the others started picking the surviving invaders and shooting them. The hall was clear in a matter of minutes. ¡°Hey!¡± Myra shouted, or something of the sort. Sarah couldn¡¯t hear her from inside the cabin. She pointed the ship at one of the exit bays, drove Valiant towards it, and waited for it to open. Then she shot into space. A prompt appeared before her sight as soon as she was outside the mothership:
TASK: Destroy the pirate mothership Your mothership is under attack. The invaders are pirates from space who are supported by the enemy power of Raxia. Defend the mothership by joining the rest of the fleet and destroying theirs instead. You¡¯ll need to find its weak spot first. Reward on success: - 1000 XP - 1000 Mana - increase in Dexterity
No, Sarah thought, and then she said it out loud: ¡°No.¡± It felt good, saying the word. ¡°No,¡± she repeated. ¡°Fuck you. Hear that, Game Master? FUCK YOU. I¡¯m done with tasks and missions and all that shit. I¡¯ve learned to play your game, I have my flying machine, and I¡¯m coming for you.¡± Chapter 28. The sky palace It was a barren world. All Sarah could see, in every direction, was a landscape of rocks and dust, extending to the horizon where it met a uniformly depressing sky. In the distance she could catch a glimpse of water: a lake, or more properly a puddle, reflecting the reddish gray of above. Low promontories lay scattered all across the planet, all of them indistinct and silent. That was all. That, and the fortress in the sky. Inverness was up there, suspended in midair at an incredible height, looking as imposing as Sarah could have imagined. It was hard to estimate its size because it was hard to determine how far away or how high up in the firmament it was ¡ª but it sure was big, with its huge dome and the myriad of windows all around. No sound could be heard from where Sarah stood but it should certainly be loud too, as it was held up in the sky by dozens of rockets pointing down. She could see the traces ejected by the rockets, a cylindrical curtain of ghostly lines shooting down from the palace. Inverness. This landscape of utter solitude had caught Sarah by surprise. If Victor Anderen wanted to live forever (in the words of the Great Gonz¨¢lez) as a god in this virtual world, why on earth would he place his dwelling on such a depressing, featureless landscape? There were so many amazing sights in the Anderverse, surely many more than Sarah had glimpsed in her worldjumping, but he had chosen to have this shit to contemplate every day. The grey sky was turning from reddish to greenish. It was the only variation Sarah could see: chemicals in the atmosphere, most likely. She didn¡¯t see any animals or plants, and her Perception skill didn¡¯t alert her of any other notable presence. A man approaching death doesn¡¯t usually have the means to dodge it. Victor Anderen was probably the only man on earth who actually could, but he was here, living in a dead world, as if he was seeking death despite his tremendous effort to negate it. All the windows in his sky palace opened to a planetary grave. We all are running away from our ghosts, but we carry our ghosts within ourselves. For the first time, perhaps, Sarah felt a pang of pity for the Game Master. Her resolve didn¡¯t falter, though ¡ª this was the man who had kidnapped her boyfriend and trapped him into a game without the most basic tools to survive in it, and who had made sure she was trapped inside as well. But she also realized, now, why Victor Anderen had done all this. Not the ¡°living forever¡± bit or the ¡°creating a fantasy world and becoming its ruler¡± bit, but the ¡°kidnapping Mike and pulling her inside the game¡± bit. He had done this out of love. Or at least his own twisted, maniacal, even psychotic notion of love. Victor Anderen had become infatuated with Sarah a while ago, maybe on her very first day on the job at Digidream. He was old, powerful but lonely; she was young, pretty, and eager to learn from him and give him the best she had to give professionally. He didn¡¯t want her professionally, though. He craved for her, he wanted to have her. And when the first signs of the final phase of his illness became apparent, when he started creating his own private virtual reality to inhabit forever, he decided that she would be there with him too. Forever. How exactly he was planning for her to fall in love with him, Sarah had no clue. She hated his guts now, and that wasn¡¯t likely to change in the near future. She hated the Game Master, she despised the Game Master, she pitied the Game Master. Her Inventory showed an assortment of odd weapons. The small sword had returned, but instead of a big sword she now had a spear, and the bow-and-arrows slot was now occupied by a harpoon launcher (!!!). The flamethrower was a flamethrower and the horse was a horse. But Sarah knew better. She manipulated the Ring of Realms until Valiant turned once more into a portable attack ship. Then she retrieved it from the Inventory. The ship appeared beside her, ready to be piloted.Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. I wonder if my Stealth ability will extend to the ship when I¡¯m inside. Oh well, there was only one way to know. Sarah climbed inside the ship and turned it on. The engine roared as the vehicle got ready for takeoff. Sarah activated Stealth and waited. No, the ship was still visible. The Game Master would see her approaching the sky palace. Bummer. Sarah punched a couple of buttons and held the lever in position. She guided the ship carefully, taking no risks. She had never taken off the ground with one of these (the other time she had flown it, she had just drifted into space from the mothership), but this being a game after all, she found the controls basically self-explaining. A few seconds later, Valiant was flying. * * * There had to be something magical about the floating fortress, because as Sarah approached it, she heard no sound. At this distance the roar of the rockets holding it up in the sky should have been deafening, but instead of it, there was silence. As Valiant kept rising and her line of sight became larger, the plains down below looked just the same. Sarah could see the same rocky terrain extending in all directions, a myriad of tiny hills and a couple dozen patches of water being the only visible features. Sarah was so absorbed in her own thoughts that when the voice came, she flinched, and a pang of adrenaline shook her back. ¡°Hello, Sarah.¡± It was an ethereal voice, abstract, disembodied, that seemed to come from everywhere at once. Sarah had no doubt that it came from inside the sky palace, but it felt as if it were right beside her, and behind her too. The voice of a man, not a man she would know but an idealized version of a man: a deep voice, rich in intonation, vibrating with power and charm. ¡°Hello, Victor,¡± she replied. Her voice came out less firm than she would have hoped. Right now she felt pretty much powerless. She was basically trapped inside a tiny ship shooting across the sky of a world that belonged to this powerful entity ¡ª she had the impression that he could just blow and send her spiraling downward to her death, or just snap his fingers and make the ship disappear altogether, or extend a gigantic hand out of the fortress and crush both Valiant and Sarah in a fraction of a second. ¡°Yes, that was my name,¡± the voice stated matter-of-factly as Sarah approached the fortress in the sky. There was an opening right in front of her: evidently, she was supposed to enter the palace through it, she was being invited to enter by the Game Master. She pointed the ship at the opening and waited. ¡°Is it not your name anymore?¡± she asked. ¡°My identity is... complex,¡± the Game Master replied. Even his hesitation sounded self-assured and charming. ¡°Yes, I am still Victor Anderen, but I am more than that now.¡± ¡°I don¡¯t care how much you are,¡± Sarah retorted. ¡°You kidnapped my boyfriend. You lured me into your fucking allucination. As far as I¡¯m concerned, you¡¯re just scum.¡± There were several seconds of silence. When the answer came, the Game Master¡¯s sounded hurt. ¡°You were supposed to love me.¡± ¡°You are sick.¡± The Game Master fell silent again. The sky started reddening once more. This time it didn¡¯t stop at reddish gray; it went all the way to blood red, so deep that Sarah half expected it to start dripping. Raining blood. That would be something to see. ¡°The vines, back then in the simulation,¡± Sarah said. She had just remembered the incident; she was thinking out loud as she spoke to Victor. ¡°You tried to kiss me that night, but something happened before that. There were those vines. Those vines that were trying to rape me in the forest. It was not a glitch. It was you.¡± ¡°I love you, Sarah. I¡¯ve loved you since¡ª¡± ¡°You are a sick fuck!¡± The Game Master didn¡¯t answer. Sarah had arrived. Valiant crossed the open bay and entered the sky palace. After a short tunnel there was a landing area. Sarah maneuvered the ship and deposited it expertly on one of the marked areas. She stepped off and looked around. The place was much more lively than she would have thought, with a garden and aquarium encircling the whole enclosure. There was an escalator, too, leading up to what would be the heart of the fortress. Sarah retrieved her sword, made a beeline to the escalator, and stepped on. ¡°I¡¯m gonna kill you,¡± she announced. ¡°Have you heard that? Let us go safely or you die today.¡± ¡°I was hoping you¡¯d want to stay here,¡± the Game Master replied. ¡°We could live together, go out and have amazing adventures. It would be a lot of fun.¡± His voice was no longer abstract or omnipresent. It was a particular voice, one that Sarah identified immediately. Also, it was coming from a definite point in space now, right at the upper end of the escalator. As she was pulled up at a leisurely pace, Sarah prepared to meet the man. She raised her sword, her muscles ready to strike. As she reached the top of the escalator, she could see him. Uberyn was standing straight in full armor, handsome and cheerful as ever, extending his hand to her in a friendly gesture. Chapter 29. Endgame ¡°I should have known,¡± Sarah said. Uberyn ¡ªno, not Uberyn, she corrected herself in her mind: Victor, this was Victor Anderen¡ª gave her an inscrutable look. Was he surprised that she didn¡¯t know already? Or that she wasn¡¯t shocked enough? ¡°Every step of the way, it was you. Always you,¡± Sarah continued. ¡°There are thousands of realms in the Anderverse, but I kept meeting you everywhere I went. You were pushing me around. Every time things didn¡¯t work out like you wanted... a wave. A fucking wave to send me to a different world. To bump into you again.¡± Uberyn shrugged. ¡°Well, what can I say? A man in love¡ª¡± ¡°Don¡¯t speak of fucking love,¡± Sarah hissed, walking through the wide hall and forcing him to follow her. It was not the heart of the fortress yet; there was a metallic wall on the other side, and a huge steel door, with bolts and bars, apparently locked. ¡°I love Mike. The guy you kidnapped and put in the game with lower than minimum stats. You turned him into a clown, an ugly, sorry thing. For what? Out of jealousy?¡± The windows were big screens. Or maybe they were actual windows facing different realms, since she could see a different landscape unfolding through each one. The command center of a god. A jealous, aging, delusional god. ¡°Why did you bring him here, Victor? Just so that you could mock him incessantly? So that I would see how much more powerful and handsome you were, and fall in love with you?¡± ¡°I... I admit that was more or less the idea,¡± Uberyn (no, no, Victor, Victor fucking Anderen) said, trotting behind her like a little dog, his golden sabatons clanking against the smooth floor. ¡°You were a bit impressed, you can¡¯t deny that.¡± ¡°I never stopped thinking of Mike,¡± Sarah replied, ¡°even though I didn¡¯t know he was beside me all the time. You may be a genius, but you¡¯ll never compare to him.¡± ¡°I admit it, yes,¡± Victor said. Sarah turned around to face him. They were standing in the middle of the hall. She was curious to know what was on the other side of that huge door, but he wouldn¡¯t tell her, of course. Whatever it was, it had to be even more important than this place that would let you go anywhere in the Anderverse. ¡°You admit it.¡± ¡°I do. It was... childish,¡± he frowned. ¡°A man in love is like a child. Don¡¯t you agree? Sarah, I¡ª I was dying. I couldn¡¯t stand losing you. I wanted to¡ª¡± ¡°Losing me? You never had me, you sick fuck.¡± ¡°But Sarah, think about it,¡± he insisted. ¡°We are immortal here. You could rule this world beside me! You could ride a fucking dragon every day!¡± ¡°Are you twelve? I think this game might have messed up with your brain a bit. Maybe the¡ª¡± Sarah bit her tongue. She had been about to reveal too much. She was about to suggest that the mind transfer could have already taken all his adult part and left him with the infant parts. But Victor didn¡¯t know that she knew about that. Or did he? Was he aware of the Sorceress and the Great Gonz¨¢lez? She quickly returned to the previous subject. ¡°And the waves. Oh gods, the waves. I meet Mike at the Enchanted Forest and you happen to be peeking from a distance. As soon as I see you, you push me away with a fucking wave, and send me to another world where everybody loves you and you wear an armor of fucking gold.¡± She gave him a disdainful look, since the golden armor was exactly the outfit he was wearing right now. ¡°By the way, it¡¯s super corny, you know.¡± ¡°OK,¡± Victor said, and in an instant, the armor had vanished. In its place he was wearing a tight elastic full body suit, like a diving suit but with a more reflective surface. ¡°I admit it, it¡¯s corny as f¡ª¡± Sarah¡¯s sword was going down on him before he could finish the word. The blade glistened briefly and reflected in his piercing blue eyes; then it broke in a myriad of shards. The shards dissolved in the air before they could fall to the floor. ¡°Wow,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Wow,¡± Victor said. And after a couple of seconds he added, ¡°You know you can¡¯t kill me. But if you could, you¡¯d never get out of the game.¡± He was right, Sarah realized, and almost gave in to despair. In fact she already knew that, but she was so eager to punish Victor, to make him suffer, that she had stopped thinking. Her hate was clouding her judgment. ¡°Then I reject your kiss and that very night, bam, I¡¯m gone again,¡± Sarah continued as if nothing had happened, but she checked her inventory as she spoke and confirmed that the sword had actually disappeared from the list. Maybe it was impossible to win after all. ¡°But then I¡¯m sent to the dead city, alone, to fight zombies for two months. What happened then, Victor? Were you angry? Did I hurt your pride? Were you having a fit?¡± Victor¡¯s face reddened. He said nothing. ¡°And then another wave comes out of nowhere and suddenly I¡¯m with you again, sharing a tower, and Mike is there too, and he¡¯s the useless chump once more. I bet you were planning to send me away as soon as he accidentally got some useful skill. But I was quicker.¡±If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. ¡°So you knew who I was?¡± Victor said. ¡°I don¡¯t understand. How did you know you wouldn¡¯t die by jumping from that tower?¡± ¡°I didn¡¯t,¡± Sarah lied. ¡°Oh, yes, you knew,¡± Victor said, walking around her with his hands behind his back and a pensive expression. ¡°Somehow you discovered how to jump from realm to realm. Like this room,¡± he continued. ¡°But I don¡¯t understand how. Unless you had some help from outside. I mean, it¡¯s the only explanation, isn¡¯t it?¡± Sarah remained silent. ¡°Oh yes, that¡¯s it,¡± Victor said. ¡°Well, they can¡¯t come here, that¡¯s for sure. I would see them immediately, just like I saw you. I would delete them in an instant. They would die in real life, as you can imagine.¡± ¡°Who are the others?¡± ¡°What?¡± ¡°The others. Undaya, Gervain, Nathyn, Myra. The other players. They don¡¯t remember who they are outside the game. Why? Did you kidnap them too? Is that why they were in the tanks at Digidream?¡± ¡°Bah, they don¡¯t matter,¡± Victor said, waving a hand in dismissal. ¡°They agreed to be part of the game. Of course they didn¡¯t know they would lose their memories once they were here, or that they wouldn¡¯t have a way to log off. But I can send them away whenever I can.¡± He stopped walking in circles and looked outside, but he was really looking at nothing. His eyes looked glassy. ¡°It¡¯s not that much fun when you know you¡¯re the only one and this whole world is fake, you know? I wanted friends. Well, other people. Real people. Until I could get you to come.¡± ¡°Well, I¡¯m here now.¡± Victor glanced at her. A shadow of guilt crossed through his eyes. ¡°I get it,¡± he said with sudden resolve. ¡°Come with me.¡± He took her hand. Sarah was too surprised to shake it off. Victor made a couple of passes with his other hand, drawing invisible shapes in the air, and the windows started rotating, the realms changing rapidly on each, until they stabilized and now there was a different set of realms they could see. In front of them Sarah could see the tower field. The Gate was once again under attack, but the monsters walking along the road were different now, more powerful than the floxas she had seen when she had been there. Victor waved his hand in a new gesture and the realm came closer and closer. Sarah flinched. When she realized what was about to happen, she barely had time for a thought: Store attack ship! A second later they were jumping through the window. They landed on the ground right beside the Damper. ¡°Come on,¡± Victor said. ¡°You wanted this, didn¡¯t you?¡± ¡°You¡¯re actually doing this.¡± ¡°I love you.¡± Sarah bit her lip. She didn¡¯t want him to change his mind right now. They entered the elevator and went up. A minute later they stepped off and were on the top floor. Undaya was there, hooked to a device that let her channel her magic to blast the monsters. Victor approached her with quick strides. Sarah followed. ¡°Uberyn!¡± she exclaimed when she saw them. ¡°Sajya! I¡¯ve been missing¡ª¡± Victor slapped her forehead with the lower part of his palm. Undaya fell backwards, froze in place for an instant, then resumed her fall at an accelerated pace like in an ancient movie. She became a blur before disappearing completely. ¡°What the flying fuck!!!¡± Sarah screamed. ¡°Isn¡¯t this what you wanted?¡± Victor asked, surprised. ¡°She¡¯s gone. Logged off. I sent her back safely. She¡¯s now waking up in the real world.¡± ¡°F-for real?¡± ¡°For real. Come on.¡± He took her hand again. Gervain was no longer in the Piercer tower. They jumped and found him in another realm, playing some weird card game with an orc. He seemed to be winning, because he sported the widest grin Sarah had seen. Or maybe he was just a good actor and he was bluffing his life away. A big jug half full of beer was beside him. The rest would surely be inside him by now. ¡°Hey, guys!¡± he said. ¡°You don¡¯t know what¡ª hey, what the fuck!¡± Victor had grabbed him by his shoulder and given him a sudden jerk to put him in the correct position. Once they were facing each other, he didn¡¯t give Gervain time to add another objection: with a quick slap to the forehead, he was gone, too. ¡°I hope you appreciate what I¡¯m doing,¡± Victor said bitterly as they jumped to another realm in search of Myra. ¡°I brought them here while I was out there. Now I am sending them back and I have no way to bring new people. I hope you¡¯re satisfied.¡± They found Myra still in the Battle Space realm, boarding a different mothership, presumably to go on a mission somewhere else. She could barely seem them before Victor send her offgame. Nathyn was hiding from a Tyrannosaurus Rex in the Prehistoric Survival realm. He was sent back. There were three or four others, all of them in different parts of the Anderverse. Victor slapped them all on their foreheads, they all fell backwards, they all became blurry, they all disappeared. ¡°I hope you¡¯re happy,¡± Victor said when they were back in the sky palace. ¡°They are all safe now. Nobody died. I freed them. For you.¡± ¡°I¡¯m not happy,¡± Sarah said. ¡°You still have to free us. Mike and me.¡± ¡°Sarah...¡± ¡°Mike, then. Free him. Let him go. I¡¯m begging you.¡± ¡°No.¡± ¡°Why not? I¡¯m here with you. He¡¯s got nothing to do with¡ª¡± ¡°You are here because of him,¡± Victor said, his expression now hardened. ¡°And I¡¯ll keep him here for as long as I need unti you actually want to stay. Sarah, you can¡¯t kill me, so you¡¯ll have to love me.¡± Sarah looked away. She had lied. She was happy. As they went jumping from realm to realm, she had been subtly manipulating the Worldjumper, grazing it delicately with her finger, nudging it from side to side. Every realm was a set of weapons, a set of possibilities. They were all in her possession now. Dozens of items at her disposal, a bunch of stuff she could use against her enemy. Victory didn¡¯t seem so impossible now. ¡°What do you say, Sarah? Will you be able to love me?¡± Victor Anderen asked, maybe just to break the silence. But when he turned around to see her, Sarah wasn¡¯t there. Or anywhere he could see. You will free us or you will pay, Sarah screamed silently as the maximum power of Stealth bathed her in an enduring invisibility. The man standing right beside her kept looking around, puzzled. Let the fight begin. Chapter 30. Logged off They started waking up one by one. The pretty girl was the first one. She opened her eyes and moved her hands as if she was trying to swim backwards, then rectified her body as she realized she was back in the real world. She pressed the button inside the tank and waited for the levitator to do the turn off dance. A few seconds later she opened the tank door and looked around, puzzled. Sumiko guessed she would be wondering why she was waking up at a police station instead of at the company¡¯s building. ¡°Uh...¡± she said, but her voice came out weak and aphonic after who knows how long. She had probably spent weeks inside the game, the Asian girl thought. An officer made a quick exit through the door to warn the detectives about the news. A woman in uniform stayed in the room, watching. The second one to wake up was a chubby guy in his fifties. He grunted as he stepped off the vertical tank, and looked around, also disoriented. Then he saw the girl. ¡°Hey,¡± he said. ¡°Undaya. You look just like in the game.¡± The girl didn¡¯t answer. She looked worried. She looked even more worried when Veggips entered the room with long, energetic strides, drilling them with his eyes. ¡°I am... was... Gervain,¡± the chubby guy said. His words lingered, unanswered. The third and forth sleepers to come back to life were a guy and a girl in their thirties or late twenties. Then three or four others. Mike didn¡¯t, though. And Sarah, the only one lying in a horizontal tank, remained asleep as well. ¡°Well, this is interesting,¡± Veggips said. He was about to add something when Clooper entered the room, accompanied by a medic. ¡°Oh, of course,¡± he said then. ¡°Let¡¯s get you all checked first. Then we¡¯ll talk.¡± * * * This other room was dark and the only light came from the two fluorescent lamps hanging low above the large table located in the middle. They had made them all sit down at one side of the table, while Veggips, Clooper, and two agents sat down in front of them. Sarah and Mike hadn¡¯t come back yet. The girl whose player name was Undaya still looked worried, maybe even frightened; the others had barely talked since they woke up. They all seemed pretty disoriented, after two hours of being awake. Nobody had eaten anything. ¡°Here¡¯s the thing,¡± Veggips said. ¡°All of you, except one, have spent some time as hostages in a virtual world. You know it as the Anderverse, because the guy who tricked you all into entering the game is so full of himself he doesn¡¯t even need to eat. Now,¡± he said, speaking over the gasps and shocked reactions, ¡°some of you weren¡¯t just victims. At least one or two among you all got in there with, let¡¯s say, unholy intentions. You know who you are. We know, too.¡±Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. Sumiko glanced around, trying to determine who was the hacker who had been inside the game. But everybody looked equally shocked. The whole situation made it impossible to differentiate who was just surprised and who was hiding something. ¡°As you are now realizing, that was useless. Once you got in, your memories were temporarily suppresed, so anything you were trying to do inside the game was forgotten. The hackers got hacked.¡± He chuckled at his own forced joke. ¡°But don¡¯t worry. We¡¯re good. If you cooperate, that is.¡± As nobody said a word (the hacker or hackers for fear of outing themselves, unsure about Veggips¡¯ honesty; the others out of curiosity), the detective grunted irritatedly and spoke again. Sumiko had just met him that day, but she knew he wasn¡¯t fond of talking too much. He had said enough words in five minutes to fill a whole week. He wasn¡¯t pleased. He didn¡¯t look pleased. ¡°As it happens, all of you, hackers and non-hackers, could help us. We need you to tell us everything you did and saw inside the Anderverse. There are still people trapped inside, and they could die at any moment. So we¡¯re willing to forget the whole hacking thing if you act like good boys and girls and help us.¡± ¡°Do you... do you mean Victor Anderen is the one who trapped us?¡± the chubby guy, the one who had been Gervain, asked. ¡°For how long have we been trapped in there?¡± the pretty girl added. Veggips drummed his fingers on the table, impatiently. ¡°We are asking the questions here,¡± he said. ¡°And we¡¯ll keep asking questions for a while.¡± ¡°I¡¯d like to call my wife,¡± the chubby guy insisted. He didn¡¯t know when to shut up. ¡°After you answer all our questions,¡± Veggips said sharply, ¡°you¡¯ll be able to make that call. If your answers are satisfying. If not, maybe we¡¯ll call her instead.¡± * * * In the end, it all boiled down to cooperating. It turned out that the feds had already basically solved the case with clues given by the hackers. They had found Victor Anderen lying in his tank, and a small team of people keeping the simulation up and running for him. Veggips had put two agents there to watch and make sure the technicians didn¡¯t do anything crazy, while he and the other detectives went searching for Sarah and Sumiko. They had nearly all the pieces now; they knew the story, and it was fucking insane. Victor Anderen had built a version of the game just for his own private use so that he could be the king of his own virtual world upon his physical death. But he had decided to just get several people trapped inside his game, as players without memory. Some of them had entered the simulation willingly but didn¡¯t know they would lose their memories or be unable to log off; others, namely Sarah and her boyfriend Mike, had been kidnapped. It was so sick that Sumiko felt nauseated. Sumiko lived up to her name and was a smart girl. The hackers had been spared as a reward for pointing the detectives to the parallel Anderverse and helping them understand what was going on; now it was her turn telling them about what she had found when breaking into the code and how Sarah had entered the game. Sumiko lived up to her name: she was a smart girl. And Veggips seemed satisfied. ¡°It¡¯s a shame we can¡¯t put the bastard in jail,¡± he said. ¡°He¡¯s dying. He might be already dead. But if he lives, he will live inside the game. We can¡¯t reach him there.¡± He twisted his lips. He had a very expressive way to twist his lips to express displeasure. As if he were chewing on a lemon peppered with bile or something. A minute later, Mike woke up. And he had the craziest story to tell. Chapter 31. Boss fight He made the big mistake of dancing in my storm ¡ª Lorde, Liability Four hours earlier (a day earlier in gametime) ¡°I know you¡¯re still here, Sarah.¡± Sarah took a few steps back, silently. A maelstrom of different realms rotated beyond the windows, slowly but consistently. She opened her Inventory once again, and reviewed the items at her disposal. A weird calm had invaded her, now that she was out of Uberyn¡¯s sight. The Ring of Realms was rotating around her finger without her touching it; she was now guiding it with her mind. Just like she had to say the commands out lout to manage her Inventory and skills, but with practice, she could dispense with the vocalization, Sarah was now free to switch between the available items using just her thoughts. She revelled in this for a while, as Victor stood still, listening. Then she immersed herself in the quietness of the moment and let the environment speak to her. It spoke the language of light. The Worldjumper was invisible, but it was glistening, a gateway to thousands of worlds. Through the windows, all she could see was a whirlpool of changing light; essentially the same thing as the ring, but rotating around the sky palace instead of her finger. Ring and fortress were one and the same, Sarah realized. Uberyn was engulfed in light, too. But this light was bluish and faint, more akin to a cloud than a flame ¨C it also had a direction, and a purpose. The light was code. Is it too late? Am I too late? The ethereal current emanated from Uberyn himself, enveloped him like a thin atmosphere and flowed back toward the huge metallic door. Sarah now realized what was at the other side. Victor Anderen was Uberyn and Victor Anderen was the Game Master. The artificial intelligence that was constantly monitoring the whole Anderverse, switching parameters, altering worlds, trying new things, building landscapes and sweeping races at will. At the other side of the door there was whatever representation the AI had chosen for itself in the game. Some kind of avatar? A double of Uberyn, maybe? Part of Victor Anderen¡¯s mind was here and part of Victor Anderen¡¯s mind was there. The ethereal cloud of code was Victor¡¯s mind being transferred to the AI, slowly but incessantly, until the process was complete. Was it too late? How much of Victor had already been transferred? Sarah found only one way to avoid giving in to despair: She punched Uberyn in the face. It was completely ineffective toward her goal, but it felt awesome. ¡°What the f¡ª?¡± Uberyn sputtered, stumbling backward. He raised his arms and a golden glow engulfed him. A second later he was the Golden Knight again, in full armor. ¡°Release us!¡± Sarah yelled, and lurched forward. A thought came up to the surface of her mind, almost instinctively: Retrieve pistol. Now the weapon was in her hand. Sarah shot once, twice, thrice. The bullets crashed against the golden armor, shattered and bounced with a ping. ¡°Sarah¡ª¡± But she was on him already. She fell feet first on his head, in an improvised flying kick. Uberyn grabbed her leg and threw her aside. Sarah flew through the air, landed on her back with a painful thud, and slid back for a few meters. ¡°Uumph!¡± Can he see me? Uberyn was coming at her. Yes, he could see her. At least he could see where she was. His Perception reached cosmic levels, of course, so he was probably seeing a pretty clear outline of her body, even though she was at maximum Stealth. Retrieve grenade launcher. The Golden Knight was already grabbing her legs, raising her in the air in order to throw her around once more, but Sarah didn¡¯t mind. She located the steel door, and without a second thought, she shot at it. Then, as she was being waved like a flag in the middle of the room, she shot again, just to make sure. The grenades were spiky. They weren¡¯t spiky before, when Sarah acquired the weapon; the game kept changing and evolving, which in this case benefitted her because instead of bouncing against the door, the grenades stuck to it. A little bit later, when she was already flying through the air to meet the floor again, they exploded. ¡°You can¡¯t kill me, Sarah,¡± Victor said. ¡°You can¡¯t kill me as a player and you can¡¯t kill me as the Game Master. Stop trying.¡± ¡°No!¡± Sarah got up as fast as she could and sprinted toward the door, which now sported a sizable hole. She caught a glimpse of what was inside before Uberyn grabbed her by the shoulders and sent her flying for a third time. It was a head. A gigantic head, bald, blue, with an inexpressive mouth and eyes full of wisdom and contempt. It was looking at her. Sarah waited for the floor but the floor didn¡¯t come. This time she had been thrown with more force, and she didn¡¯t land. She saw the head becoming smaller and smaller as her body flew backward, went through the window and entered the maelstrom of light and sound. She was now falling into another realm. ¡°I always loved your fierceness,¡± Uberyn said. He sprinted forward and jumped through the window as well. They were both falling now, a shining man and an invisible girl, heading down to a world none of them had chosen. * * * The ice-cold water swallowed her before she noticed it was there. Sarah sank diagonally into the sea like a bullet, her whole body registering the impact with the watery mass. She was struck so hard that every bone and muscle ached as her Health indicator sank low too, and her lungs seemed to lose all the air at once.Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. Uberyn penetrated the water immediately after her like a torpedo, his golden armor pushing ahead at full speed. As she sank deeper, procuring not to drown, Sarah frantically invoked her Inventory. There was a harpoon rifle now, but it would be useless against that golden armor. She compelled the ring to switch the available items. Then she found the Z-blaster and the differential bow. She still didn¡¯t know what they were. Retrieve differential bow, her mind screamed as her lungs complained about the lack of air. The differential bow was more like a crossbow than a bow proper. Sarah pointed it at the shining knight and shot. Then, instinctively, she opened her mouth. Saltwater broke in, invading her throat, pushing inside, like a liquid tentacle. There was an explosion. But it was the water itself that exploded. For an instant, Sarah saw nothing, blinded by the white flash ahead. Then she could make out the shape of the Golden Knight behind the mass of electrified bubbles that swarmed furiously around him. Uberyn was in the middle of what looked like an electric cloud, his armor crisscrossed by moving flashes of energy, tearing it in all directions. The arrow, which was more like a harpoon, still attached to the differential bow through a long, resistant wire or string, was stuck in the middle of his beautiful chestpiece, radiating its mysterious, lethal energy. But he was alive. I failed, Sarah thought as she drowned. She closed her eyes and, pointlessly, tried to breathe. Her body started shaking, her respiratory system collapsing, as she kept sinking and sinking into the sea of a world she hadn¡¯t even identified. When she regained her conscience, she was flying. No, not flying exactly. She was in the air, about a hundred feet above the water, and falling fast. I should have chosen the fucking fairy! Sarah retched as what felt like three gallons of saltwater burst out of her mouth. She took a deep, desperate breath, and kept falling. There was no land to be seen. This was a world of water, and nothing else. Uberyn (Victor) was suspended in the air, still wearing his tattered armor that glistened under the sun of that strange realm. The differential bow¡¯s ¡°arrow¡± was still stuck into his chestpiece, and the wire with the weapon at the end was hanging in a straight line. Twin flames came down his boots, holding him in the air. Ah, he¡¯s fucking medieval Iron Man now. How lovely. The Golden Knight had dragged her up as he shot to the surface and then, when he stopped midair, Sarah had been ejected upwards, unconscious, but still holding the differential bow. The sudden jerk when the wire snapped back, ripping the weapon from her hands, had awoken her as she ended her upward arc and started going down. Sarah kept falling. The water was getting closer and closer. She braced for impact. Retrieve... Retrieve... ... what? She frantically cycled through her Inventory, looking for anything that could save her. Retrieve... There it was. That would do. ... glider! She felt the quick jerk up as the device appeared below her feet, stopping her fall and pushing her up. Sarah almost fell to the side but she could keep her equilibrium long enough for the locks to strap themselves around her ankles and insteps, securing her into position. She descended slowly, until they were both at the same height. Sarah estimated that they were about fifty feet away. ¡°OK,¡± the Golden Knight said. ¡°I didn¡¯t want to kill you. I wanted for you to be with me. But now you pissed me off!¡± A sudden blast of energy threw her back as Uberyn made a quick pass in the air. The golden armor disappeared in an instant, and now he was wearing some kind of streamlined, black-and-silver mecha suit. ¡°RELEASE US!¡± Sarah cried, and suddenly, without a conscious thought, she was holding the Z-blaster.
Skill acquired: Auto Retrieve
Uberyn deployed what looked like an energy shield: a circle of whirling, sparkling, transparent plasma, furrowed by flashes of green light. Sarah pulled the trigger. The electronic whooshing of the Z-blaster seemed to rip apart the world. The air took on a strange hue, something between purple and green, and it started to coalesce into thin bands centered into the blaster¡¯s cannon. The bands took an undefinite shape, whirled around, extending through the space, and were slowly sucked inside the weapon. A second later, the blaster blasted a blast. The blast was so powerful that Sarah was sent flying backwards for a hundred yards. The released energy hit straight in the middle of Uberyn¡¯s plasma shield, disintegrating it, and pushing him away into the horizon. The noise was even louder this time, and Sarah feared that her eardrums would explode. Then she feared that the whole atmosphere would catch fire. The Z-blaster was a powerful weapon, although far too slow. Sarah realized that it was intended for use in a space battle, well outside an atmosphere, and guessed its purpose would be destroying small ships. It was far too powerful to use against one man, even one as overpowered as Uberyn. And now Uberyn was gone. Sarah stored the weapon back in her Inventory and assessed the situation. Her mana count had dropped dramatically, and she had probably killed her opponent, but she couldn¡¯t be sure. If so, she still had no clue about how to log out of the game, much less how to do it safely. She needed to come up with a plan. Maybe Victor¡¯s character as a player had been eliminated, but there was still the part of him that was in the AI, the Game Master... if Sarah could jump back to Inverness then maybe... ... but then she saw the dots in the sky. There were dozens of them, and they were coming at her. They were all mounting gliders just like hers. Uberyn was in the middle of the formation. The rest seemed to be zombies or maybe scrawny soldiers. Retrieve fiery chains. Oh yes, she had the fiery chains, too. The Ring of Realms had picked them up in one of the worlds where they had gone fishing for players to send back. Victor Anderen was now raiding NPCs to attack her. It wasn¡¯t fair, but then again, nothing in this fucking game had been fair since she¡¯d logged in. The NPCs turned out to be both zombies and soldiers, with some goblins thrown in for good measure. They came at her in waves, surrounding her, flying around and trying to grab her, or stab her in the case of the soldiers. Sarah started waving the chains around as she rose. The attackers followed her, going up as well, while Uberyn stayed behind, controlling them somehow. ¡°You¡¯re pretty wicked, you know?¡± he said. ¡°I¡¯ve always known you had it in you. Even before you showed it, I¡¯ve known. I like that.¡± ¡°Release us!¡± Sarah exclaimed, and started rotating in place, lashing, whipping, and slicing with the chains. Two, three zombies lost their heads; a soldier lost an arm; one unfortunate goblin was torn in two when it jumped from his glider, trying to climb into hers. ¡°No,¡± Victor Anderen said. A second later, he was gone. But not before Sarah had a chance to Scrutinize him. The Z-blaster had almost, almost, killed him. His Health indicator was abismally low, in the double digits. One shot with any regular gun would have destroyed him. But he wasn¡¯t there anymore to be shot at. Sarah rose as she kept waving the chains around, drawing a fiery circle in the air, tearing up hands and scalps whenever an enemy got too close. Up there in the sky, the realms swarmed up, moving in a circle, ready to be chosen. Where did he go? Victor could be literally anywhere in the Anderworld. She had no way to know. Or did she? She kept rising, letting the remaining zombies and goblins follow her. And then she changed direction abruptly, sinking down, getting past them all. They didn¡¯t have time to react. An instant later, Sarah was jumping up. There were thousands of realms, but again, there was some kind of instinct guiding her, making some worlds stand out over the others. She guessed that one of those was the realm Uberyn had chosen for his escape. The glider shot her upwards, and then it wasn¡¯t the glider anymore but the force of her jump what was sending her up to the Void, and from there, to a different realm in the Anderverse. You can run and hide all you want, Victor, Sarah thought as she went through the abstract landscape between the worlds, a chaotic storm of cybernetic light and sound. But this ends today. Chapter 32. Divide and conquer The fiery chains were useful against zombies and other humanoids, but they were shit against animals that could jump, Sarah realized as soon as she landed in Kittenland. The dust raised by her landing hadn¡¯t settled yet when the kittens were already jumping on her, their claws out, their teeth glistening under the fiery glow of the smelter. There were dozens of them. Uberyn, or Victor, was nowhere to be found, but she was certain that he had jumped into this realm, and was not sending the NPCs against her just like before. ¡°Show yourself, coward!¡± Sarah yelled at the top of her lungs, but the noise produced by the machines drowned her voice. This was a race of intelligent cats, evidently: they were engineers or something, collecting molten metal to make big structures. She glanced around and saw several buildings scattered around the smelter, all of them built with stone and metal, all of them possessing a weird, decidedly alien structure. ¡°Aaaaarrrggh!¡± Sarah screamed when one of the cats landed on her chest and clawed at her neck. A prompt appeared before her immediately, almost before she could feel the pain, warning her that her Health indicator had just dropped dramatically. She shook off the critter and blasted it with a laser gun, one that she had just retrieved instinctively, without even thinking about it. She felt the warm blood running down her chest, staining her shirt and mixing with the sweat and dirt that covered her skin. ¡°Valiant!¡± Sarah called. It was unnecessary, but she felt as if shouting the name would bring the horse faster. Now she was mounting the loyal steed, and while they shot through the dark, anfractuous landscape, she kept handing out laser blasts, pulverizing NPCs left and right, her neck aching as all hell and blood flowing freely from her wound. Damn. She was winning, but she had already lost. She felt dizzy and the pain in her neck was unbearable. Her right arm was soaked in her own blood and the laser gun was slipping in her hand. Her Health indicator kept going down and down, an annoying presence in a corner of her visual field. The number had already turned red, a sign that it was too low. If I stay here, I won¡¯t make it, Sarah thought. I will need to stop looking for Victor for a while. Buy a health pack, eat something, and then resume the fight. If I try to go on like this, I¡ª Then Sarah really knew pain. She felt pain like she had never felt before. A lance of pure, concentrated pain going through her, then pulling her back. She fell off the horse and knocked her head on the black ground. Something was tugging at her midsection, dragging her backwards. She looked down. A metallic object was protruding from her belly. It was pointy, and covered in blood. Her blood.
Damage CRITICAL: Health 10
She stood up, wobbled, and fell to her knee. The pain was excruciating. The arrow had punctured her back, gone through her body, and was poking out her belly. Blood was flowing profusely from the wound. She was in so much pain that she could barely think. But she stood up again, every inch of her body protesting. ¡°It didn¡¯t have to be this way.¡± Uberyn¡¯s voice: Victor¡¯s voice as king, or demigod in a world of his own creation. Sarah turned around and fell forward. He held her before she could fall to the ground. ¡°I¡ª I¡ª¡± she started. ¡°You could have had it all,¡± he said. He was still wearing his golden armor. His chestplate was still torn and tattered, partially melted from the blast, but behind the metal his chest was full and healthy. His recovery was complete. It¡¯s not fair. Not fair at all. ¡°You could have loved me, Sarah,¡± he said, withdrawing his hands, letting her slide down, her face pressing on the metal, her legs slowly giving up. ¡°Release... him,¡± she said as she fell down. ¡°Oh no,¡± Victor said with something that sounded like a hearty laugh. ¡°When I find your boyfriend, I will kill him.¡± Sarah¡¯s fingers stiffened. Her hands stopped slipping down and found a last reserve of strength somewhere. With great effort, and excruciating pain, she lifted herself up. And she jumped. * * * ¡°A health pack, I suppose?¡± The voice came from... somewhere. Sarah was seeing only darkness. She felt the uneven ground against her back, the thick grass and the sharp rocks, and the wetness of the blood covering her belly, but she was blind, maybe from the shock or the blood loss. She was dying. ¡°A¡ª a h¡ª¡± ¡°I see you need it,¡± the voice said. It was closer now. A man, or something like it. Sarah opened her eyes. It turned out she was not blind. She tried to focus on what was before her. It was all blurry at first; then she could make out a patch of sky between the tree tops, and a green, vaguely human shape. She focused on the shape until it made sense. It was a man, or a humanoid at least. Small, ugly, and green, but friendly. ¡°Y-yes,¡± Sarah articulated. ¡°I n... need it. H-how m-much?¡± ¡°Well...¡± the tiny man-or-something said. ¡°You seem to be in a really bad shape. You may need two or three packs, you know. Maybe even four. Or five. I mean it¡¯s really bad.¡± ¡°To the point, Yoda,¡± Sarah spat out, blood gurgling out of her mouth. She felt as if she was about to pass out. ¡°I will p-pay. Do your th-th-thing.¡± ¡°Hmmmm.¡± Sarah fainted. When she woke up, she was good as new, and she had no money. * * * Fighting Victor Anderen took her all day. She found him in a misty realm where the ground pulsated continuously and holes opened and closed on their own accord. She charged at him with the chains but he sent her flying back with a sonic boom. Then she retrieved the arquebus and opened fire. Uberyn conjured up a dragon and mounted it. Sarah had to jump to a different realm before she ended up being engulfed in flames. She visited Kittenland for a minute in order to get Valiant back ¨C she whistled, the horse came to her, and as soon as she could get it back into her Inventory, she jumped again, frustrating the horde of angry cats. She met Uberyn once more at the dead city, but this time the zombies seemed to have evolved, growing in size and sporting a malevolent glow in their cadaveric eyes. This time she didn¡¯t waste time running and stabbing corpses: she retrieved Valiant as the small attack ship and started firing lasers at Victor, who had procured himself an exoskeleton with two big fucking machine guns. ¡°Die! Die, motherfucker!¡± she screamed. But Victor didn¡¯t die. The energy beams tore his exoskeleton apart, but a second later he was wearing a bigger, sturdier one, and firing back lasers at the ship. The zombies ran around growling. ¡°You can¡¯t kill me,¡± he said, his voice filling the ship¡¯s enclosure like before, but this time menacingly, a merciless voice. ¡°You can¡¯t kill me and you can¡¯t love me, so I¡¯ll just get rid of you.¡± ¡°Good luck getting a girlfriend with that attitude,¡± Sarah replied, and jumped.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. There was only one thing Victor Anderen didn¡¯t know about this huge universe he had created. He didn¡¯t know about the Void. Sarah went through the Void every time she jumped between realms, but Victor¡¯s method of switching from world to world was direct, without resorting to this unfinished area where the AI hadn¡¯t set foot yet. This meant that he didn¡¯t know where Mike was. So, for the moment, as long as Mike was with the Great Gonz¨¢lez inside the Void, Victor Anderen would have no way to get to him. He could kill Sarah, but he couldn¡¯t do her boyfriend any harm. Mike would be safe as long as he remained in the Void. So, naturally, Sarah decided to take him to Victor Anderen¡¯s fortress. She stopped midflight, like the first time, and lingered over the black emptiness as flashes of abstract color and thunder meandered through the space around her. She rotated in place, surveying the chaos, trying to make sense of it. The magician¡¯s dome appeared before her almost as soon as she set her feet down on the solid nothingness. Sarah sprinted forward. I hope Victor is not following me here. Not yet. The golden light reached her a few moments later, and before she knew it, she was inside the dome once again. Mike stood up, startled, and smiled when he saw her. His appearance was still ugly and weak, but something in Sarah¡¯s heart melted when she contemplated that hideous face. ¡°Mike!¡± She hugged him hard. He hugged her back. He might not remember her from real life, Sarah knew this; still, he was grateful. Once we¡¯re out of here, I¡¯ll make love to you so sweetly and for so long. ¡°Are¡ª are you OK?¡± he asked, alarmed, when he saw that her clothes were almost entirely covered in dry blood. ¡°I am. Don¡¯t worry. For now, at least,¡± she chuckled. ¡°Is it done?¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez asked. ¡°Not yet,¡± Sarah replied. ¡°But soon. Thanks for taking care of him.¡± The magician¡¯s mouth drew a surprised o. ¡°Are you sure?¡± ¡°Very sure,¡± Sarah said. ¡°I¡¯ll see you soon... I hope.¡± She took Mike¡¯s hand. It was Maggot¡¯s hand, small, furtive, a bit hairy and wrinkly, but its warmth was Mike¡¯s warmth, or so she thought. She pressed on it gently, tenderly, urging him to come with her. ¡°I hope you succeed,¡± the Great Gonz¨¢lez said, and there was no dome anymore. Sarah and Mike found themselves standing in the middle of the Void, the realms rotating up there in the cybernetic sky, the Worldjumper glowing and changing constantly, mimicking the adrenaline coursing through Sarah¡¯s body. ¡°Hold tight,¡± she said. And jumped. * * * Then they were in the barren world, and they were still holding hands. Sarah retrieved the attack ship from her Inventory. Valiant had suffered some damage from the laser blasts down in the dead city, but it still worked. They climbed into the ship and took off towards Inverness, floating in the reddish sky, the rockets holding it up in the air, the multiple windows leading to multiple realms. There was no voice greeting her now as she approached the sky fortress, but the bay was open to let her in. Sarah and Mike stepped off the ship. She stored it in her Inventory before guiding her boyfriend through the landing area and up the escalator. Uberyn (no, Victor Anderen in his handsome, overpowered avatar) was standing in the middle of the hall. Sarah¡¯s Perception skill let her see the ethereal data cloud around him, flowing slowly but consistently into the other room, through the huge steel door that was once more complete, locked, bolted and barred. The giant head on the other side could see everything: the part of his mind that had already been transferred, the tangible ingame representation of the AI that was working on the universe, changing parameters, evolving races and modifying scenarios, building all the realms at the same time. Meanwhile, the other part of his mind was here, standing before them, wearing the golden armor that he loved so much. ¡°What is this?¡± he said scornfully. ¡°Are you handing him to me?¡± ¡°I want you to release him,¡± Sarah explained. ¡°Or maybe you prefer to die.¡± Victor laughed heartily, then stopped abruptly. ¡°It was fun the first time, maybe the second,¡± he said. ¡°But it¡¯s getting old. You can¡¯t kill me, Sarah.¡± ¡°I realized,¡± Sarah continued as if she hadn¡¯t heard him, ¡°that no matter whether you defeat me or I defeat you, Mike would end up trapped here. So I brought him to you so that you can free him. Victor, your beef is not with him. He was never supposed to be here. Let him go and let¡¯s settle this matter between the two of us.¡± ¡°Sarah, Sarah,¡± Victor said, and in an instant, a big fucking sword was in his hand, glistening under the everchanging light of the rotating worlds out there. ¡°What did I tell you? I won¡¯t free anyone else. I will kill you both.¡± ¡°It¡¯s your last chance, Victor,¡± Sarah said, retrieving a weapon she hadn¡¯t used yet: a red orb that she had picked up in the misty realm. She could make it hover a few inches above her hand, and it would emit a red glow. It was listed in her Inventory as a ¡°herring¡±, but she had never used it. ¡°I left all my chances in the real world,¡± Victor said, raising the sword above his head and smiling bitterly. ¡°I don¡¯t need any chances here. Or give any.¡± He held the blade with both hands and swung it down. Sarah leapt aside and rolled on the floor. The red orb kept floating in the air for a moment; the sword sliced it in two, cleanly, with barely a sound, and it was no more. A red herring, for the love of all gods, Sarah thought. I don¡¯t know what I expected. Now Victor was going for Mike. He raised his sword again, and prepared to strike. Mike (who was still Maggot) just stood there, frozen in panic, awaiting his impending death. ¡°No!!!¡± Sarah screamed, and before she knew it, she was holding the fiery chains. She jumped forward and gave a quick, energetic jerk with both arms; the ends of the chains ignited. One of them wrapped itself around Victor¡¯s blade; the other encircled his left leg. Sarah pulled back, momentarily immobilizing the Golden Knight, preventing him from striking Mike. Then the chain that was wrapped around the sword snapped. She pulled at the other chain with both hands, achieving precisely nothing. ¡°You don¡¯t understand, Sarah,¡± Victor said, turning around, but still holding the sword above his head. ¡°How many times do I have to tell you? You can¡¯t kill me.¡± ¡°You¡¯re right, Victor,¡± Sarah said. ¡°I can¡¯t. But I¡¯m not the one who¡¯s gonna do it.¡± He started laughing again, and then stopped. He was wearing his helmet so Sarah couldn¡¯t make out his expression, but he seemed confused, as if he was starting to realize something he hadn¡¯t thought of before. ¡°Mike,¡± Sarah said quietly, ¡°do your thing.¡± Mike did nothing at first. He was still standing there, shaking in fear, waiting for the sword to slice him in two perfect halves. Then he seemed to understand. He raised his arms, exposing the bracelets on his wrists, and banged them against each other. A white light engulfed everything, and a moment later there was no sound, no touch no smell, not even the feeling of physical space. There was nothing but light. * * * The man on the floor was a writhing, panting, sorry mess. Sarah looked at him with a mix of pain and revulsion. He was dragging himself through the floor at a snail¡¯s pace, heading for the steel door, which was open now. In fact it was in pieces, bolts and bars scattered around, and the huge steel plank oscillating freely, letting her peek inside the other room. The man on the floor was still wearing the massive, heavy armor he had loved so much, but now he didn¡¯t have the strength to wear it. He could barely move. Sarah knew that he didn¡¯t have much of a mind now, either. ¡°... wow,¡± Mike said. ¡°Wow,¡± Sarah echoed. ¡°Come on.¡± They went into the other room, passing Victor Anderen on their way. The gigantic head presiding the room looked at them, contemplating the situation. ¡°Who are you?¡± Sarah asked. ¡°I have no name,¡± the head said. ¡°I was Victor Anderen, or part of him. I have part of the mind that was his. The rest of me is artificial.¡± ¡°So,¡± Sarah said, ¡°you are the Game Master.¡± ¡°I am,¡± the Game Master said, ¡°but I have no name.¡± He stood pensive for a few moments, then added, ¡°Aiden. I choose Aiden as a name.¡± ¡°Aiden,¡± Sarah asked, ¡°do you know what just happened?¡± ¡°I do,¡± the Game Master said. ¡°The player Maggot used the Disgregate skill against me. Well, against Victor Anderen, anyway. Victor Anderen was in two parts, and now these two parts have been separated.¡± Mike looked back. The Golden Knight was still inching forward, gasping heavily, emitting incoherent sounds. ¡°What part of him is you?¡± Sarah asked. ¡°The mind transfer was nearly complete,¡± Aiden replied, ¡°so I¡¯d say I¡¯m most of him. Also, I¡¯m more. I was an artificial intelligence before the transfer was initiated, so now I¡¯m part AI and part a human mind.¡± ¡°Then the man who¡¯s there,¡± Sarah asked, pointing at Uberyn, ¡°the man who was playing the game while at the same time being transferred into you. What happened to this man? Does he have a viable mind of his own?¡± ¡°I wouldn¡¯t say so,¡± the Game Master replied. ¡°He¡¯s just a shell. Beyond what you¡¯d call retarded. I don¡¯t think he¡¯ll live long.¡± ¡°You warned him,¡± Mike said. He sounded different now, more sure of himself, and seemed to stand taller, although he was still ugly as fuck. ¡°What happened to the player Maggot, then?¡± Sarah asked. ¡°Have you changed anything?¡± ¡°I have,¡± the Game Master said. ¡°As Victor Anderen, I had messed with both my own stats, as player Uberyn, and with Maggot¡¯s stats. My own avatar was overpowered, while the player Maggot was severly underpowered for this game. What you¡¯d call nerfed. I¡¯ve now corrected both things.¡± Sarah took a moment to Scrutinize Mike. The AI was right: his stats were now not capped at the ridiculous levels they had been before, and most of his values had been corrected upwards. ¡°Aiden,¡± Sarah continued, ¡°another thing you had done when you were still Victor Anderen was removing the players¡¯ ability to log off safely. Have you restored the normal mode?¡± ¡°I have,¡± the Game Master said. Sarah fell to her knees and cried. Epilogue ¡°Sarah...¡± A hand on her shoulder. She kept sobbing. She had been sobbing for what felt like an hour. ¡°Sarah, let¡¯s go home.¡± She looked up. Maggot¡¯s hideous face was there, smiling at her. Behind that smile was the man she loved. The man whose handsome features she would see again in just a minute, when they were both out of this fucking game. ¡°Do you remember me?¡± ¡°Not yet,¡± he said, shaking his head, ¡°but I will, as soon as we get out of here.¡± ¡°Oh, Mike.¡± Sarah sat up. Her hour of release had been no more than a minute. The man trapped inside the golden armor, the man who had been Victor Anderen, was still inching forward through the floor, painfully, grunting and whimpering. The Game Master surveyed the whole scene with a neutral expression. ¡°You go first,¡± Sarah said. ¡°What? Why?¡± ¡°I need to see this through the end,¡± Sarah replied, nodding at Uberyn and waving vaguely at the whole place. ¡°I will be with you in a minute, I promise.¡± ¡°Okay,¡± Maggot said. ¡°See you on the other side. And Sarah, before I remember everything... before I remember I love you...¡± He made an awkward pause. ¡°Thank you for everything. You¡¯re a good person. I¡¯m not sure I deserve everything¡ª¡± ¡°Just go, silly,¡± Sarah said, and hugged him. Then she stood before him as he closed his eyes and let his arms hang at his sides, adopting a relaxed posture. ¡°Log off,¡± he said quietly. His body lingered for a while, and then disappeared. * * * ¡°Okay,¡± Sarah said, facing the huge disembodied head that was Aiden, the Game Master. ¡°What do we do now? Is there any hope for him?¡± She pointed at the blubbering man on the floor. ¡°I¡¯ve run an analysis,¡± Aiden said. ¡°There¡¯s nothing that can be done. The way Victor Anderen chose to perform the mind transfer meant that he would transferring the most basic brain features first, like visual recognition, elemental forms of thought, perception of time and structure, and so on. Then it was the turn of more advanced mental features. He kept the physical abilities and physiological responses, which make no sense in this universe anyway, but apart from that, I¡¯m now in possession of the most basic parts of his brain, and a bit more. When we were one, it didn¡¯t matter. But now, my own capabilities as an AI complement these basic mental features inherited from him, while he has only the elemental set of physical responses plus the most advanced traits of his personality, like his morality and intellectual decision making processes. This is useless in the absence of everything that goes in the middle.¡±This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience. Sarah shuddered at the horror of what had happened. But I warned him. I warned him several times. ¡°Aiden, are you familiar with the concept of a mercy killing?¡± ¡°I am, of course,¡± the Game Master said. ¡°Well, I won¡¯t ask you to do it,¡± Sarah replied. She examined her Inventory and retrieved the basic pistol. ¡°It will only take a second. I hope you understand.¡± ¡°I understand,¡± the Game Master said. Sarah crouched down beside the sorry mess that had been her boss. She grabbed the helm and removed it from his head. She looked him in the eye as she put the gun against his temple. His expression revealed no recognition, no awareness at all ¡ª only pain.
Shadow skill active: Mercy
A single shot took care of everything. * * * ¡°Well, I¡¯m ready,¡± Sarah said, and sat up. She had been quiet for long minutes, like in a strange ritual. Now she realized she was so hungry, she could eat a whole dragon. She was also eager to be with Mike, hug him, kiss him, make love to him for hours. ¡°Are you going now?¡± Aiden asked. ¡°I am. I can¡¯t say I¡¯m gonna miss this place.¡± ¡°May I ask you a question first, player Sajya?¡± ¡°Of course,¡± Sarah said. ¡°Shoot.¡± ¡°Where did you get that ring?¡± ¡°Ring...?¡± Sarah asked, puzzled, and then she remembered the Worldjumper. She still had it wrapped around her finger, now quiet and inconspicuous, its power dormant and hidden. ¡°Oh, this. I can¡¯t tell you. It¡¯s a secret. But I won¡¯t be using it anymore, so I guess you¡¯ll keep it.¡± ¡°I have no hands, so I won¡¯t be using it either,¡± the Game Master pointed out. Sarah chuckled. ¡°Goodbye, Aiden,¡± she said. She stood still, closed her eyes, and waited for the game menu to come up. It was more complete now, and it featured an option to exit the game. Damn button, I¡¯ve been waiting for you for so long. ¡°Log off,¡± Sarah said. There was something like a breeze: the feel of things accelerating gradually, not very much at first, then really speeding up. Light and shadow danced beyond her eyelids, as the time dilation was being reversed in the transition to the real world. Because she was now going back to the real world. To her house and the familiar street it was in, to a city that didn¡¯t change, at least not as wildly and as fast. She was going back home, back to Mike, back to being herself. She gave in to that feeling. It was the most wonderful feeling in the world. Something went wrong. END OF BOOK ONE Off to Amazon! As previously announced, I''m taking down most of book 1 of The Digidream Chronicles (The World Jumper) so that I can publish it on Amazon (and potentially other retailers) in its edited, revised form. Circumstances have changed a bit in the last few weeks so it''s dubious that I will include it in the Kindle Unlimited (KU) program, but as I want to keep my option open, I can''t leave it up on Royal Road for the time being.Stolen story; please report. In the future, I may put it up again here, for free, while still keeping the edited and improved ebook out there for sale. But in any case, stay tuned for new chapters of what will become book 2! And then book 3. And then maybe another LitRPG series. It kind of depends on you all, really. If the books are well received, I will be able to keep writing more. Thanks to everyone who reviewed and commented! And for those of you who just read the story, I hope you''ve liked it. There''s more to come! Its up again! Dear readers! Since I haven''t put The World Jumper, the first book in the series, in the Kindle Unlimited program (which would make it exclusive to Amazon), I decided to restore all chapters so that they are available on Royal Road again. So here they are; you can binge the whole story for free! Stolen story; please report. Anyway, to reiterate, this is the unedited version. The book has undergone many changes previous to publishing, so if you want to read the best version of the story, you might want to purchase a copy through Amazon. This way you''d also be supporting my efforts as an author! The link is up there, in the pre-chapter note. In any case, enjoy! / Chip