Re: A Night in Low Society
Posted: Fri Nov 27, 2009 4:44 am
The first thing that he noticed upon entering the Rai Sector was the smell. The whole place smelled like metal, rust, and ozone. It was like the inside of a machine shop, or the depths of a scrap yard. In fact, when he looked around, that was essentially what it was.
The road he walked on was paved with metal plates, most of which were rusted. Some of them were rusted through in places, showing a ground made of soft red dirt underneath. That dirt, he suspected, was rust from previous plates the current ones had replaced.
To either side, the buildings he saw were also made of metal. Either large plates or smaller woven steel, or even a few thick fences of woven cable. Some of them were gray, some matte black, others a buffed up silver. Every building as far as he could see was made out of metal. On top of that, many of them were covered in jagged spikes or torn chunks of metal. All in all it gave him the impression of something post-apocalyptic, a wasteland where everything was pieced together with cannibalized chunks of metal and bits of appliances.
The one difference between this and an apocalyptic wasteland was that they had electricity here. They had a lot of electricity here. Half the spikes he could see, from the small ones on the sides of doorframes to the largest peaks of the tallest towers, crackled and flickered with crawling arcs of lightning. That, combined with the fact that many of the pieces of metal that made of some of the buildings, fences, and other bits of scenery were made of old weapons, made him almost laugh at how over the top it was. He thought he even could see a tree made of metal with steel leaves and fruits made of balled up swords. Here and there, even, were pieces out of character for the game. The World didn’t have exhaust pipes, for example, that were used as some of the larger chimneys and a couple of doorframes.
When it came right down to it, Nighthand could take a picture or a screencap of any portion of this sector, from any angle, and it would make an amazing death metal album cover. That was what he decided. All he would have to do to make it perfect was add some blood, maybe some half-naked women, and here and there a few skulls. Nope, he checked that one off his list, as he passed a fence where each spiked post was topped by a steel skull.
Shifting his gaze away from the buildings, he looked over the people. They seemed to take two divergent paths through their character designs. One half of them wore metal, in the form of armor, only much spikier than could possibly be practical. These tended to arc with electricity themselves, the power displaying to anyone precisely what these players did with their time. These, almost always, were heavy physical classes. Though here and there he found some twin blades, who had customized their knives to flicker with power as well. The axes and the swords with forks and spikes were equally impressively covered in lightning, and equally as impractical looking to fight with.
The other half of the population allowed him to tick off another item on his list. They wore very little. The women found the chainmail bikini and plate armor bras to be in style. The men wore various forms of boxers made of metal, thankfully all of which left everything to the imagination. The last thing Nighthand wanted was to be confronted with a plate armor crotch bulge. He was almost afraid he would kill the offending player if he saw him, just on principle of the thing. Of course, if he did, that would give him the blood he needed to toss his list entirely.
Another thing he saw as relatively prevalent in the Rai Sector was piercings, of all sorts. Ears that dangled chains that sparked when they touched. Nose rings that flickered with their own light. Lip rings that connected via wires to rings in the cheeks.
Nighthand shook his head and continued. He didn’t really have a purposed to wandering the area, other than that he could get the feel of the place if he did. He found himself moving unusually silently; his boots didn’t make as much noise on the ground as the metal boots and clomping chain covered feet of many of the other players.
Nighthand walked into a back alley where he didn’t see anyone and took to the air. From high above, he could see the layout of the Sector in its detail. Unfortunately, it was no less confusing. Even from above the place was a chaos of metal and spikes jutting in all directions. One thing was certain however. One place surrounded by spikes had to be the castle. For sure. He flew in that direction, and noticed slowly something odd about it. All of the spikes were pointing in, not out. It was almost like they were angled to symbolically keep something inside the castle, not to keep intruders out.
When he flew closer he could tell that this was, in fact, the case. The large open area he had spotted from above was a deep metal-lined pit. Spikes covered the wall on all sides, forming what would have been an easy to climb lattice ladder, had the spikes themselves not been covered with spikes, that were in turn covered in needle sharp edges and razor bladed points.
Nighthand dropped out of the sky and hide behind the edge of the pit when he spotted what was in the bottom of the pit.
Raikiri.
Fucking Raikiri.
Nighthand crept forward until he could just barely see over the pit and into the edge.
Yes. As he looked into the pit, he could see it, the demonic beast sitting on a metal spike-covered throne in the center. The beast had huge wings and was covered in shaggy dark fur that, upon closer inspection, was actually made of metal. At the moment, he wielded a pair of gigantic axes, each easily the size of Nighthand’s torso. One was held in each hand. They crackled with electricity beyond the simple cosmetic power of the players of the Town. This power was dangerous and deadly. Yet… Nighthand didn’t recognize the weapon. He had thought he had seen every weapon that Raikiri had to wield.
He opened his eye, his elemental sight active as always, and examined the power of the monster down in the pit. It was powerful, yes, but not quite the same. Then again, he hadn’t really had time to study the first time they had fought the lightning-themed monster, back when Rugudorull had ambushed them in the hot springs so long ago. Even then, they had barely been able to defeat him, and only by enraging him so much that Sheena had been able to call in Royce. Something that Raikiri had been about to unleash, something known as Demonic Heart, was so powerful Royce didn’t want it even used in a normal server. She claimed it would crash the server itself.
“What’s up?” Came a voice from next to him. Nighthand’s heart skipped a beat, and he glanced over.
The player that was next to him seemed far too casual to be so close to a pit with such a monster inside. Nighthand wondered, at the same time, what the lack of urgency was, and also what purpose Rugudorull could have for sitting so calmly in his demonic form down in the bottom of a pit.
The player was a woman, one of the chainmail bikini types. Her skin was pale and marked with tribal and lightning-themed tattoos. She had pierced ears, up to seven rings in each, and a pierced lip. Her hair was blond and spiked, short as it was. She had a wand in one hand, something that looked like a cane with a spiked metal fist as a topper. When he didn’t answer, she looked over at him. She was laying on her back, staring at the sky prior to this move. He now saw her eyes, yellow irises and pupils shaped like lightning bolts.
“Gonna challenge him?” She asked.
“What, are you crazy?!” Nighthand said, shocked she would suggest it. Sure he was strong, and looked it, but to challenge Raikiri solo? Madness!
“You look pretty strong, and you’re studying him. I figured you wanted to usurp him.” She shrugged. “Pity. It’s pretty fun.”
“What do you mean?” He asked her. He really had no idea what she was talking about at this point. “Fun?”
“Yeah. I challenge him every few weeks. I’ve snagged a few nice prizes out of it, too.” She lifted her cane, showing him. “This thing is pretty sweet, I’ve used it for fifteen levels now.”
“You mean he doesn’t kill you?” Nighthand asked. Raikiri was a violent monster. He didn’t have restraint. If someone challenged him, they would die.
“No… wow. Okay. So you’re new here.” She pursed her lips and, Nighthand swore, had there been gum in The World she would have smacked hers.
“Relatively.” He said grudgingly.
“Okay so.” She said, rolling over onto her stomach to look out over the pit. “That guy down there is Rikirion. He’s the Master of this particular area.”
That explained a lot in Nighthand’s eyes. This guy, way too calm, wasn’t Raikiri. He was Rikirion. Similar names, similar powers, similar form…
“Any relation to Raikiri?” He asked her.
“Yup. Rikirion admires Old Rugu and his abilities, and is doing his best to take after them. Obviously without the power of an Elite he can’t quite match it, but he does well enough for himself.”
“So why the pit? Why the challenges?” Nighthand was curious now, looking down at the monster below.
“Oh, he gets bored. Whenever he’s sitting in the pit, anyone who wants to jump in and challenge him to a battle is free to do so. If the challengers win, he offers them items, or weapons, or armor, or power, or status in his army. If they lose, and he wins, he beats them to within an inch of their life and casts them out of the pit. Then he challenges them to come back later and fight him again, once they’ve healed and leveled up some.”
“Sounds like a right battle-minded guy. How often do people beat him?”
“Not too often. It’s rare enough, anyways. If you beat him once and challenge him again, he’ll win. He learns really fast. Quite a challenge, he is. I don’t know how he does it; he has some kind of perfect knowledge of the abilities of anyone who challenges him, as long as he’s seen it before. I beat him by fluke once or twice, but he’s always ready if I try the trick again.”
Nighthand thought a while. “Isn’t he worried someone would come in and not stop when they win, and kill him?”
She chuckled. “I’m sure he is. The few times it’s happened though, he disappears. Up there.” She pointed at the other side of the pit, where a large tower covered in spikes, with no obvious entrances or windows, could be seen. When Nighthand looked, he saw why; the entrance was actually in the pit.
“So if he gets near death, he teleports home and lives to fight another day. Well, that’s insurance for you.”
She nodded. “Yup. Once, a group followed him into the tower. They never came out, and Rikirion was in the pit the next day, just like usual.”
“Sounds like they didn’t make it.” Nighthand said.
“Yeah probably not. Who knows, maybe they’re just lost in the tower. It’s not open to the public like some of the other Castles, so who knows what’s inside it.” She made the gum-smacking face again, and stood. “Well, nice talking to you. I’m gonna fight now.” She vaulted into the pit with a back flip and twist, leaving her facing Rikirion.
“Hey Rikirion! Long time no see!” She shouted at the demon, who then took notice of her. It grinned a toothy smile, full of jagged metal teeth, and rose from his place on the central throne. He hefted the axes into the air and shook them, roaring. The roar, Nighthand noticed, carried farther than it should have. Some acoustic property of the pit, perhaps. He saw a few players stop what they were doing and come to the edge of the pit, to watch. Figuring he was safe enough as long as he didn’t fall in, Nighthand did the same, crouching on the edge and watching.
“Yasmay! Long time no see!” The demon cried, his voice graveling but happy.
“Hey big man, today’s the day I beat you again!” She called out, waving her cane around.
“Really? With that thing? I gave that to you, or did you forget?” He laughed, brandishing his axes. Nighthand could see that in their posturing they were moving slowly closer and closer to each other.
“Oh, I remember! I just made some improvements, to it and some other things.” She grinned, flashing her own metallic teeth. “Let’s do this!”
She half-skipped forward in a move as fluid as a dancer, scraping the tip of her cane, the spiked fist, against the grit on the floor of the pit. The wave of dust picked up speed as if on a wind, and obscured what the attack really was. A series of spikes of metal jutted out from the ground, stabbing in a wave at the demon.
The great winged beast flapped those great wings, blasting the dust back into the girl’s face. When it cleared, the spikes were straining against the hand-axes as he blocked with the sides of them. He swiped his axes to the side, shattering the spikes, upon which they melted into the ground and disappeared. He laughed. “You need a new opening move, girl!” He copied the move with his axes, and sent a lance of electricity at her.
She slammed her cane into the ground and one of those metal spikes rose up a few feet in front of her, catching the lightning and grounding it at her feet. “So do you, big guy!” She danced around the spike as it melted and ran with a speed greater than that of a Twin Blade, even though she was a wavemistress. At least, she looked like a wavemistress. The only weapon she carried was a cane and she hadn’t cast any spells yet, at least.
She ran up past the demon, and under an arm that swung with an axe to catch her. She ducked and slid in the grit, and Nighthand, watching closely, saw her stop abruptly when metal spikes shot out of her feet and into the ground. Those same spikes continued to extend, pushing her abruptly into the back of the demon. Rikirion stumbled forwards and dropped his axes. When they hit the ground, a pair of Rai Don spells of high level, probably three from the look of them, slammed down at Yasmay.
The wavemistress had already anticipated the reactive attack and two more spikes grounded those spells as well. She clung to the back of the big man, his fur giving her ample handhold. That is, until the fur spiked up, forcing her to let go. Nighthand squinted, but couldn’t see any blood on her. He on the other hand, had matted fur where she had held on.
“Ahha! Fun times, big man! Come and get me!” She taunted him from a dozen feet away, sticking her tongue out at the demon. Rikirion roared and laughed as well, his axes abandoned. He reached onto his back where a sword would be if he had one, and the axes burst into lightning. The lightning arced onto his back and, when he swung, a large flamberge was gripped in the hand. He gripped it with a second hand and leaped into the air, coming down where Yasmay taunted. The girl ran from that spot, quickly and easily avoiding the attacks. He slammed his sword into the ground, and the whole arena began to rumble. Spikes of steel, not quicksilver like Yasmay’s had been, began to shoot up randomly in the arena. Yasmay herself discovered she was the target of the attack, and went into evade mode. Twice she almost was speared, and once Nighthand could have sworn one grazed her side, only instead of flesh it clanged off a thin layer of quicksilver. When had she applied that? He didn’t know, and next time he looked, it was gone.
Finally in her dodging, she drew close enough to Rikirion to slash across his back with her cane. A spike extruded from it long enough to be called a dagger, and it dug well into his flesh before he spun and backhanded her away. She skidded, and again more of those spikes came from her feet, and some from her hands, to drag her to a halt before she tumbled into the spike-covered wall. No matter how good your defense was, that razor wall would shred you.
The demon left his sword in the ground and clapped his hands together. The sword exploded into lightning and formed a sphere in his hands, which he brought back like the charge for a fireball. “Ground this!” He shouted, and thrust his palms forward.
A great beam of plasma shot from his palms to her location on the ground. The spikes forced her out of the way and she tumbled, rolled, and came to her feet already in a dash. Displaying speed Nighthand could only follow because of his long experience with people like Nall, she delivered punches to the backs of both knees of the demon almost simultaneously. His legs gave out from under him and he started to fall, his beam of plasma lancing up and out of the arena. It caught the corner of a nearby building and Nighthand felt a tingle in the ground of discharged electricity making it’s way even through to him.
Yasmay stood over the fallen demon and laughed. “How’s about I ground you instead, big man?” She smacked him across the face with her cane, and he roared. His massive hand reached out and grabbed her before she could dart away, and he twisted to his feet.
“Got you now.” He growled, and started to squeeze. Then he howled in pain and dropped her, his hand dripping blood. Nighthand caught at the last moment spikes from all over her body retracting into her skin. That quicksilver defense of hers was damn good.
“Sure about that Rikirion?” She taunted and smacked him again with her cane. He backhanded her again, this time high enough that she almost landed on the spiked walls before she managed to stop herself. “Almost!” She called to him.
She started dashing in a circle around him, faster and faster, tighter and tighter, kicking up dust with every step. Soon the arena was impossible to see into. He heard the sound of lightning striking and electricity crackling. He heard several clashes of metal on metal. Electricity sparked through the cloud, made of rust and particles of metal, making it an incredibly light show, if not a battle.
When the dust cleared and drifted away, Rikirion was panting, bleeding from a dozen new wounds. Yasmay herself wasn’t dripping blood, but she was panting just as hard. Nighthand was beginning to wonder if she even had blood to drip. Her skin was beat up, slashed and torn like a thin layer of paper. Beneath it he could see a shimmer of the quicksilver that seemed to rest just below the skin.
Then, slowly, Rikirion sank to a knee. The crowd started to cheer, and Nighthand found himself smiling along with them. He didn’t cheer, however, just watched. Rikirion growled, then grinned, then roared. The beast climbed back to his feet and slowly approached Yasmay.
“You have bested me once again, girl.” He said. “And once more, I shall grant you a boon. We shall discuss it upon my recovery. You know the way.” She nodded, clasping a hand on his massive wrist. Nighthand marveled at just how small she was compared to the hulking demon. He hadn’t noticed it when she was next to him on the edge, but she was easily a foot shorter than he was.
“Got it. Good fight, big man.” She turned, scanning the crowd, and raised her arm. The cheer went up again, though the crowd was already beginning to disperse. Nighthand looked down on her, his eyebrow raised. She smirked at him and jerked her head to one side. He nodded and started wandering through the crowd in the direction she specified.
On the edges of the crowd he heard someone muttering. “Stupid woman, defeating him so early in the day… How am I supposed to challenge myself now?” He glanced into the pit, and noticed the demon was gone. Returned to his tower to rest, no doubt.
Another voice caught his ear, barely audible over the crowd. He only caught fragments, and wasn’t sure he even heard it at all. “Kill him… tower doors… gotta recruit… next week.”
He turned, but whoever had said it was long gone, lost in the flood of people suddenly remembering they had business to attend to.
Not knowing how deep into the city Yasmay wanted him to go, he just walked in the direction she had specified. To his lack of surprise, he saw her some time later, sitting on a metal barrel on the side of an alleyway. She looked up when he approached, hearing the sound of his footsteps, quiet as they were here.
“So what’cha think?” She looked up at him from her perch.
“You fight well. Though that trick at the end…” He shook his head. “Hiding from the crowd, or hiding from Rikirion?” He knew she could have done it without kicking up nearly so much dust; he had seen the extra effort she put into sending it into the air.
“The crowd.” She said, unsurprised he had seen through her ruse. “He can see just fine in the dust. The speed was what threw him off; I wasn’t this fast last time.”
“So what did you do?” He asked her. “Anything specific? Or are you just hiding your speed?”
“A lady never reveals her secrets on the first date.” She said with a smirk. He looked at her, and could see that her skin had healed over in nearly every place. Only one spot he could see, on her shoulder, still had metal showing through.
“You missed a spot.” He poked her shoulder on the metal part. The metal was hot as blood, and he burned his finger, though he didn’t show it.
“Oh, thanks.” She moved her hand over the spot and, when her hand dropped to her side, the skin was healed. “Can’t be wandering around like that all the time.”
“So that’s your ability then, is it?” He noticed her cane was gone, no doubt in her inventory somewhere. “Metal under your skin?”
“One of them. Like I said, first date.”
“I dunno if we could call this a date. You never even told me your name.” He smirked right back.
“It’s Yasmay.” She said.
“I know. I heard Rikirion shout it a few times.”
“Oh.” She actually seemed at a loss for words, for an instant. Then she hopped off her perch and headed deeper into the sector. “Come on this way.”
He followed her, through a few twists and turns, though nowhere near as complicated as Velvet had tried to run him through earlier that day. He could easily find his way back out. She stopped at a doorway and slid it open. It had no visible hinges, rather it slid on a rail like a Japanese style doorway. They entered and walked through a straw-mat covered floor and paper-hung walled room. The sound of their footsteps on straw mats instead of heavy metal was so different Nighthand did a double take. On the other side, another sliding door opened for them, and they passed into and through a stone-walled room covered with an elaborate array of hanging chains. The chains seemed quite dungeon-like, and Nighthand eyed them warily.
“Cozy place you’ve got here.” He said, keeping humor in his voice.
“Oh I never use this room any more. Too much fall out. I’d remove it, but I don’t have the ability to myself. I also haven’t gotten around to hiring anyone to do it for me. I just ignore it, really.” She seemed to ignore it as they passed through, at least, and that made Nighthand feel somewhat safer. That is until they reached the next room, which was also simple bare stone walls and floor and ceiling, with a single large metal vat in the center of the room. Glancing in as he neared it, the vat proved to be full to the brim with quicksilver. He reached to touch it, as it exuded no heat, but her hand on his arm stopped him.
“You don’t wanna touch that, guy.” She shook her head.
“Why not?” He pulled his hand back anyways.
“I’ll show you.” She turned slightly, and plunged her hand into the stuff. He could hear a slight hiss and see as it frothed around her arm. Perhaps it truly was hot, or maybe just acidic. Either way, Yasmay seemed to pause, a smile playing across her face. She seemed revived, more energetic, when she pulled her hand out. He thought at first that it was still covered in the quicksilver, but on closer examination, that was simply her real hand. The silver outside and the silver inside her had burned through the thin layer of skin so they could meet. She looked recharged, revived, and Nighthand grasped the concept.
“So you’ve got that silver inside you, and you recharge here. I got ya.” He smiled and stepped away, examining the room for other doors. There was one, which he assumed led to her living quarters. When he looked back at her, the skin over her hand had returned and she looked normal again.
“Sometimes I swim in it. I lose days that way.” She eyed the pool wistfully.
“I don’t have days to wait for you.” He pointed out.
“Yeah, I gotcha. So! Come on. This was only a pit stop basically.” She led the way back out of her room and, sliding the door closed behind her, they walked back the way they had come and soon were near the pit once again. Nighthand glanced in, but Rikirion wasn’t there. Of course not, he’d been beaten already. He’d be in his tower resting, perhaps.
It occurred to Nighthand as they walked that he did a lot of following in his career as a heavy blade in The World. It wasn’t a coincidence. From the very first day he had logged on he had been following Nall around. Now Nall was down for the count, it seemed, and while he was on the mend now, he wouldn’t be fit to lead them for a while. Nall had the power to lead, but he had need of the love of his people, to put it poorly. Nall may have had the bad habit of luring people into his group with the promises of rare items, but he was a rare item hunter, and he knew what it took to lure in his own kind. He gathered able warriors and he explained to them what was going on, and those that decided to carry on with him and continue fighting the good fight were given the powers and strengths they needed to survive over time.
On top of that, though, Nall had always relied on the respect and hope of his party members to succeed. If the party hadn’t trusted him, they would have all died long ago. He thought about the party in the sad state it was in now. So many leaders, too many. Sheena led only to get Nall safe. Raine was a leader in the sense that she sat back at home base and gave them information for their missions. Even he himself was a leader, in battle, but he didn’t do a very good job of it. The party, now, for lack of anyone better, had been following Demorian around simply because he had the largest body of knowledge of the Town and the surroundings, the Wastelands and the prison and the towers. He knew more than the rest of them combined, or at least than the rest of them cared to share. Sheena might know more, Raine wasn’t able to talk to them, and Nall was unconscious. Nighthand certainly didn’t know much about the town, though his body of knowledge for the hacker Elites was surprising. At least, surprising in the sense that he knew so little even after knowing so much.
He thought about it as they walked. He knew so much about the Elites, and yet he knew nothing about them. He didn’t know any of their real names. He didn’t know if they were even the same gender they were on the outside. He knew they were supposedly all the original coders of the game world, though how many other coders existed he didn’t know. Or maybe just Nall, Garaa, and whoever the Master was, were the original coders, and the rest of them were lackeys and hangers on. He didn’t know where any of them were from. He didn’t know if any of them had bodies on the outside that still lived, still functioned. He didn’t know if they wanted to return to their bodies as much as he and his party did to theirs. They would give up their massive power to do so, but did they yearn for it? He realized with a start that they would be just as unable to as the rest of them without the aid of their companions. Which of the Elites would consent to sending one of their number back to the real world? More likely they would deliver them into the hands of the Admins. Anyone who chose to leave such a position of power would more than likely be a traitor and be worth killing. Who knew if any of the elites they wished to kill simply wanted out themselves, but couldn’t escape?
He looked around. How many of these people were stuck in the Game and really wanted to get out, but had no way to do so? How many of them would be freedom fighters if given the chance? The need for secrecy, especially in the enemy home base, was too great to go recruiting. The risk of being seeded with a double-agent or a spy was too great. Being called out, being trapped, being sent to their deaths, these were all very valid concerns. He also wondered how many of these people could possibly be people. There were so many. So many souls wandering around Yamiyo. How many of them were regular players and script kiddies, just waiting to be stuck in the game? How many of them were legitimate hackers somehow having avoided the stuck fate? How many of them were actually stuck in the game, like Nighthand himself and his crew? How many of them were AIs or bots wandering around, acting like people? How many of them were stuck in the game, but had dead bodies they could never return to?
That last one was a possibility he didn’t really want to think about, and yet he did, all the time. He had no way of knowing between check ins with his father whether or not his body was still alive. Even if it was still alive, it was horribly atrophied by this point. Here, in the game, he could fly. He could jump dozens of feet. He could run faster than a player could even register seeing. He could swing around this massive plate of steel as if it was nothing.
Outside the game, he would spend months or years trying desperately to train his body to even be able to walk again. His leg muscles would barely be able to support his weight. His arms would barely lift anything. His mind wouldn’t even know how to control a body that didn’t have all these extra abilities. He didn’t need a controller to access his menus, to select and target people and monsters, to swap out items and activate hacks. This was all subconscious, was second nature. To be back in the real world and have to talk to people to find out their name. For them to not have classes, not be focused on battle. To not have to judge them immediately in the form of whether or not they would be a threat. It was all too much.
Then there was the fallout of having to care for a body. Injures wouldn’t be able to be healed by a simple expenditure of a few SP. He would have to wait and let it heal over time, and anything more dangerous than a couple hit points worth of damage from a paper cut would take a long time to heal, and potentially be life threatening. The injuries he routinely took in battle here in The World were more than life threatening outside the game. The proof was the fact he had died so many times. Any one of those times, the injures he had sustained would have killed him in real life. Not to mention the needs he didn’t have here. The need to eat, especially, though he could do that here if he wanted. It was simply the digital taste here, not the need for sustenance.
He was pulled from his reverie by Yasmay when she stopped, putting a hand on his chest when he almost walked past her. She knocked on a door nearby Rikirion’s tower. He could see it over the rooftops some distance away. The door swung open and she entered, her hand gripping his coat and pulling him forward and in before the door closed.
Inside it was dark and gloomy and cold, the metal all around holding no heat. The only vague light that lit the corridor came from what looked like glow sticks embedded in the wall.
The pair walked through similar corridors for quite some time, until they came upon a room at the end of the halls. It held only an altar with a single spike on it, and nothing else. “This is it.” She said. “Rikirion’s prize.” She walked up to the altar and, without a moment of hesitation, plunged her hand down on the spike. Nighthand moved to stop her but she jolted, her body suddenly arcing with electricity. He backed off, not touching her. Several minutes later the electricity died down and she collapsed, her hand sliding off the spike. There she lay on the ground, twitching occasionally, with a smile on her face. For several more minutes she lay, lost in a haze, and Nighthand watched over her. Once, experimentally, he touched the spike on the altar, but it did nothing. Either he would have to plunge it into himself, or its power was drained. When Yasmay opened her eyes and pulled out of her stupor, Nighthand looked down on her.
“You’re a power junkie.” He said simply.
“Sure.” She said dreamily, holding out a hand. He pulled her to her feet and she fell against him, wobbly on her feet. “Rikirion’s abilities are the best.”
“He’s a drug dealer you have to beat before you can buy.” He shook his head. “And who has no qualms about beating you.”
She shook her head. “No one wins as much as I do. He gives me a power and I take it and run with it, so I can use it in ways he doesn’t expect. It’s a game.”
Nighthand nodded. “I suppose. Are you done here?” She nodded as well. So he threw her arm over his shoulder and he helped her, as her legs could barely support her enough to walk, until they made it back to her small dungeon-like home. She bid him leave her in the antechamber, with its semi-comfortable straw pads, and so he did as she said. The Heavy Blade left her leaning against the wall. “I’ll be going now.” He said over his shoulder.
“Wait, a moment please.” She said, calling him back. He turned.
“What is it?” He asked.
“Just hear me out.” She smiled. “This thing I do.”
“Yes?”
“It’s not like you’re thinking. If anything, I’m addicted to the fight, not the reward. Too inconsistent.”
“You seemed rather able to beat him.”
“Got lucky this time, he was slow. I lose more often.” She shrugged. “You’d see the scars if I still had flesh that scarred.”
“I meant to ask you about that.” He said, suddenly more serious. “What precisely is it? Your power that is.”
She shook her head. “Metal blood? I hardly know any more. I’m more power than person.” She stared at the sky. “The things I’ve done in the name of power…”
Nighthand watched her for a moment longer, and she turned her gaze on him. “I just wanted to say that. You know? I’m not all bad. I’m not a junkie.” He shrugged.
“I know.” Then he turned and left, sliding the door closed behind her, leaving her in a dim straw-padded room. He didn’t look back.
The road he walked on was paved with metal plates, most of which were rusted. Some of them were rusted through in places, showing a ground made of soft red dirt underneath. That dirt, he suspected, was rust from previous plates the current ones had replaced.
To either side, the buildings he saw were also made of metal. Either large plates or smaller woven steel, or even a few thick fences of woven cable. Some of them were gray, some matte black, others a buffed up silver. Every building as far as he could see was made out of metal. On top of that, many of them were covered in jagged spikes or torn chunks of metal. All in all it gave him the impression of something post-apocalyptic, a wasteland where everything was pieced together with cannibalized chunks of metal and bits of appliances.
The one difference between this and an apocalyptic wasteland was that they had electricity here. They had a lot of electricity here. Half the spikes he could see, from the small ones on the sides of doorframes to the largest peaks of the tallest towers, crackled and flickered with crawling arcs of lightning. That, combined with the fact that many of the pieces of metal that made of some of the buildings, fences, and other bits of scenery were made of old weapons, made him almost laugh at how over the top it was. He thought he even could see a tree made of metal with steel leaves and fruits made of balled up swords. Here and there, even, were pieces out of character for the game. The World didn’t have exhaust pipes, for example, that were used as some of the larger chimneys and a couple of doorframes.
When it came right down to it, Nighthand could take a picture or a screencap of any portion of this sector, from any angle, and it would make an amazing death metal album cover. That was what he decided. All he would have to do to make it perfect was add some blood, maybe some half-naked women, and here and there a few skulls. Nope, he checked that one off his list, as he passed a fence where each spiked post was topped by a steel skull.
Shifting his gaze away from the buildings, he looked over the people. They seemed to take two divergent paths through their character designs. One half of them wore metal, in the form of armor, only much spikier than could possibly be practical. These tended to arc with electricity themselves, the power displaying to anyone precisely what these players did with their time. These, almost always, were heavy physical classes. Though here and there he found some twin blades, who had customized their knives to flicker with power as well. The axes and the swords with forks and spikes were equally impressively covered in lightning, and equally as impractical looking to fight with.
The other half of the population allowed him to tick off another item on his list. They wore very little. The women found the chainmail bikini and plate armor bras to be in style. The men wore various forms of boxers made of metal, thankfully all of which left everything to the imagination. The last thing Nighthand wanted was to be confronted with a plate armor crotch bulge. He was almost afraid he would kill the offending player if he saw him, just on principle of the thing. Of course, if he did, that would give him the blood he needed to toss his list entirely.
Another thing he saw as relatively prevalent in the Rai Sector was piercings, of all sorts. Ears that dangled chains that sparked when they touched. Nose rings that flickered with their own light. Lip rings that connected via wires to rings in the cheeks.
Nighthand shook his head and continued. He didn’t really have a purposed to wandering the area, other than that he could get the feel of the place if he did. He found himself moving unusually silently; his boots didn’t make as much noise on the ground as the metal boots and clomping chain covered feet of many of the other players.
Nighthand walked into a back alley where he didn’t see anyone and took to the air. From high above, he could see the layout of the Sector in its detail. Unfortunately, it was no less confusing. Even from above the place was a chaos of metal and spikes jutting in all directions. One thing was certain however. One place surrounded by spikes had to be the castle. For sure. He flew in that direction, and noticed slowly something odd about it. All of the spikes were pointing in, not out. It was almost like they were angled to symbolically keep something inside the castle, not to keep intruders out.
When he flew closer he could tell that this was, in fact, the case. The large open area he had spotted from above was a deep metal-lined pit. Spikes covered the wall on all sides, forming what would have been an easy to climb lattice ladder, had the spikes themselves not been covered with spikes, that were in turn covered in needle sharp edges and razor bladed points.
Nighthand dropped out of the sky and hide behind the edge of the pit when he spotted what was in the bottom of the pit.
Raikiri.
Fucking Raikiri.
Nighthand crept forward until he could just barely see over the pit and into the edge.
Yes. As he looked into the pit, he could see it, the demonic beast sitting on a metal spike-covered throne in the center. The beast had huge wings and was covered in shaggy dark fur that, upon closer inspection, was actually made of metal. At the moment, he wielded a pair of gigantic axes, each easily the size of Nighthand’s torso. One was held in each hand. They crackled with electricity beyond the simple cosmetic power of the players of the Town. This power was dangerous and deadly. Yet… Nighthand didn’t recognize the weapon. He had thought he had seen every weapon that Raikiri had to wield.
He opened his eye, his elemental sight active as always, and examined the power of the monster down in the pit. It was powerful, yes, but not quite the same. Then again, he hadn’t really had time to study the first time they had fought the lightning-themed monster, back when Rugudorull had ambushed them in the hot springs so long ago. Even then, they had barely been able to defeat him, and only by enraging him so much that Sheena had been able to call in Royce. Something that Raikiri had been about to unleash, something known as Demonic Heart, was so powerful Royce didn’t want it even used in a normal server. She claimed it would crash the server itself.
“What’s up?” Came a voice from next to him. Nighthand’s heart skipped a beat, and he glanced over.
The player that was next to him seemed far too casual to be so close to a pit with such a monster inside. Nighthand wondered, at the same time, what the lack of urgency was, and also what purpose Rugudorull could have for sitting so calmly in his demonic form down in the bottom of a pit.
The player was a woman, one of the chainmail bikini types. Her skin was pale and marked with tribal and lightning-themed tattoos. She had pierced ears, up to seven rings in each, and a pierced lip. Her hair was blond and spiked, short as it was. She had a wand in one hand, something that looked like a cane with a spiked metal fist as a topper. When he didn’t answer, she looked over at him. She was laying on her back, staring at the sky prior to this move. He now saw her eyes, yellow irises and pupils shaped like lightning bolts.
“Gonna challenge him?” She asked.
“What, are you crazy?!” Nighthand said, shocked she would suggest it. Sure he was strong, and looked it, but to challenge Raikiri solo? Madness!
“You look pretty strong, and you’re studying him. I figured you wanted to usurp him.” She shrugged. “Pity. It’s pretty fun.”
“What do you mean?” He asked her. He really had no idea what she was talking about at this point. “Fun?”
“Yeah. I challenge him every few weeks. I’ve snagged a few nice prizes out of it, too.” She lifted her cane, showing him. “This thing is pretty sweet, I’ve used it for fifteen levels now.”
“You mean he doesn’t kill you?” Nighthand asked. Raikiri was a violent monster. He didn’t have restraint. If someone challenged him, they would die.
“No… wow. Okay. So you’re new here.” She pursed her lips and, Nighthand swore, had there been gum in The World she would have smacked hers.
“Relatively.” He said grudgingly.
“Okay so.” She said, rolling over onto her stomach to look out over the pit. “That guy down there is Rikirion. He’s the Master of this particular area.”
That explained a lot in Nighthand’s eyes. This guy, way too calm, wasn’t Raikiri. He was Rikirion. Similar names, similar powers, similar form…
“Any relation to Raikiri?” He asked her.
“Yup. Rikirion admires Old Rugu and his abilities, and is doing his best to take after them. Obviously without the power of an Elite he can’t quite match it, but he does well enough for himself.”
“So why the pit? Why the challenges?” Nighthand was curious now, looking down at the monster below.
“Oh, he gets bored. Whenever he’s sitting in the pit, anyone who wants to jump in and challenge him to a battle is free to do so. If the challengers win, he offers them items, or weapons, or armor, or power, or status in his army. If they lose, and he wins, he beats them to within an inch of their life and casts them out of the pit. Then he challenges them to come back later and fight him again, once they’ve healed and leveled up some.”
“Sounds like a right battle-minded guy. How often do people beat him?”
“Not too often. It’s rare enough, anyways. If you beat him once and challenge him again, he’ll win. He learns really fast. Quite a challenge, he is. I don’t know how he does it; he has some kind of perfect knowledge of the abilities of anyone who challenges him, as long as he’s seen it before. I beat him by fluke once or twice, but he’s always ready if I try the trick again.”
Nighthand thought a while. “Isn’t he worried someone would come in and not stop when they win, and kill him?”
She chuckled. “I’m sure he is. The few times it’s happened though, he disappears. Up there.” She pointed at the other side of the pit, where a large tower covered in spikes, with no obvious entrances or windows, could be seen. When Nighthand looked, he saw why; the entrance was actually in the pit.
“So if he gets near death, he teleports home and lives to fight another day. Well, that’s insurance for you.”
She nodded. “Yup. Once, a group followed him into the tower. They never came out, and Rikirion was in the pit the next day, just like usual.”
“Sounds like they didn’t make it.” Nighthand said.
“Yeah probably not. Who knows, maybe they’re just lost in the tower. It’s not open to the public like some of the other Castles, so who knows what’s inside it.” She made the gum-smacking face again, and stood. “Well, nice talking to you. I’m gonna fight now.” She vaulted into the pit with a back flip and twist, leaving her facing Rikirion.
“Hey Rikirion! Long time no see!” She shouted at the demon, who then took notice of her. It grinned a toothy smile, full of jagged metal teeth, and rose from his place on the central throne. He hefted the axes into the air and shook them, roaring. The roar, Nighthand noticed, carried farther than it should have. Some acoustic property of the pit, perhaps. He saw a few players stop what they were doing and come to the edge of the pit, to watch. Figuring he was safe enough as long as he didn’t fall in, Nighthand did the same, crouching on the edge and watching.
“Yasmay! Long time no see!” The demon cried, his voice graveling but happy.
“Hey big man, today’s the day I beat you again!” She called out, waving her cane around.
“Really? With that thing? I gave that to you, or did you forget?” He laughed, brandishing his axes. Nighthand could see that in their posturing they were moving slowly closer and closer to each other.
“Oh, I remember! I just made some improvements, to it and some other things.” She grinned, flashing her own metallic teeth. “Let’s do this!”
She half-skipped forward in a move as fluid as a dancer, scraping the tip of her cane, the spiked fist, against the grit on the floor of the pit. The wave of dust picked up speed as if on a wind, and obscured what the attack really was. A series of spikes of metal jutted out from the ground, stabbing in a wave at the demon.
The great winged beast flapped those great wings, blasting the dust back into the girl’s face. When it cleared, the spikes were straining against the hand-axes as he blocked with the sides of them. He swiped his axes to the side, shattering the spikes, upon which they melted into the ground and disappeared. He laughed. “You need a new opening move, girl!” He copied the move with his axes, and sent a lance of electricity at her.
She slammed her cane into the ground and one of those metal spikes rose up a few feet in front of her, catching the lightning and grounding it at her feet. “So do you, big guy!” She danced around the spike as it melted and ran with a speed greater than that of a Twin Blade, even though she was a wavemistress. At least, she looked like a wavemistress. The only weapon she carried was a cane and she hadn’t cast any spells yet, at least.
She ran up past the demon, and under an arm that swung with an axe to catch her. She ducked and slid in the grit, and Nighthand, watching closely, saw her stop abruptly when metal spikes shot out of her feet and into the ground. Those same spikes continued to extend, pushing her abruptly into the back of the demon. Rikirion stumbled forwards and dropped his axes. When they hit the ground, a pair of Rai Don spells of high level, probably three from the look of them, slammed down at Yasmay.
The wavemistress had already anticipated the reactive attack and two more spikes grounded those spells as well. She clung to the back of the big man, his fur giving her ample handhold. That is, until the fur spiked up, forcing her to let go. Nighthand squinted, but couldn’t see any blood on her. He on the other hand, had matted fur where she had held on.
“Ahha! Fun times, big man! Come and get me!” She taunted him from a dozen feet away, sticking her tongue out at the demon. Rikirion roared and laughed as well, his axes abandoned. He reached onto his back where a sword would be if he had one, and the axes burst into lightning. The lightning arced onto his back and, when he swung, a large flamberge was gripped in the hand. He gripped it with a second hand and leaped into the air, coming down where Yasmay taunted. The girl ran from that spot, quickly and easily avoiding the attacks. He slammed his sword into the ground, and the whole arena began to rumble. Spikes of steel, not quicksilver like Yasmay’s had been, began to shoot up randomly in the arena. Yasmay herself discovered she was the target of the attack, and went into evade mode. Twice she almost was speared, and once Nighthand could have sworn one grazed her side, only instead of flesh it clanged off a thin layer of quicksilver. When had she applied that? He didn’t know, and next time he looked, it was gone.
Finally in her dodging, she drew close enough to Rikirion to slash across his back with her cane. A spike extruded from it long enough to be called a dagger, and it dug well into his flesh before he spun and backhanded her away. She skidded, and again more of those spikes came from her feet, and some from her hands, to drag her to a halt before she tumbled into the spike-covered wall. No matter how good your defense was, that razor wall would shred you.
The demon left his sword in the ground and clapped his hands together. The sword exploded into lightning and formed a sphere in his hands, which he brought back like the charge for a fireball. “Ground this!” He shouted, and thrust his palms forward.
A great beam of plasma shot from his palms to her location on the ground. The spikes forced her out of the way and she tumbled, rolled, and came to her feet already in a dash. Displaying speed Nighthand could only follow because of his long experience with people like Nall, she delivered punches to the backs of both knees of the demon almost simultaneously. His legs gave out from under him and he started to fall, his beam of plasma lancing up and out of the arena. It caught the corner of a nearby building and Nighthand felt a tingle in the ground of discharged electricity making it’s way even through to him.
Yasmay stood over the fallen demon and laughed. “How’s about I ground you instead, big man?” She smacked him across the face with her cane, and he roared. His massive hand reached out and grabbed her before she could dart away, and he twisted to his feet.
“Got you now.” He growled, and started to squeeze. Then he howled in pain and dropped her, his hand dripping blood. Nighthand caught at the last moment spikes from all over her body retracting into her skin. That quicksilver defense of hers was damn good.
“Sure about that Rikirion?” She taunted and smacked him again with her cane. He backhanded her again, this time high enough that she almost landed on the spiked walls before she managed to stop herself. “Almost!” She called to him.
She started dashing in a circle around him, faster and faster, tighter and tighter, kicking up dust with every step. Soon the arena was impossible to see into. He heard the sound of lightning striking and electricity crackling. He heard several clashes of metal on metal. Electricity sparked through the cloud, made of rust and particles of metal, making it an incredibly light show, if not a battle.
When the dust cleared and drifted away, Rikirion was panting, bleeding from a dozen new wounds. Yasmay herself wasn’t dripping blood, but she was panting just as hard. Nighthand was beginning to wonder if she even had blood to drip. Her skin was beat up, slashed and torn like a thin layer of paper. Beneath it he could see a shimmer of the quicksilver that seemed to rest just below the skin.
Then, slowly, Rikirion sank to a knee. The crowd started to cheer, and Nighthand found himself smiling along with them. He didn’t cheer, however, just watched. Rikirion growled, then grinned, then roared. The beast climbed back to his feet and slowly approached Yasmay.
“You have bested me once again, girl.” He said. “And once more, I shall grant you a boon. We shall discuss it upon my recovery. You know the way.” She nodded, clasping a hand on his massive wrist. Nighthand marveled at just how small she was compared to the hulking demon. He hadn’t noticed it when she was next to him on the edge, but she was easily a foot shorter than he was.
“Got it. Good fight, big man.” She turned, scanning the crowd, and raised her arm. The cheer went up again, though the crowd was already beginning to disperse. Nighthand looked down on her, his eyebrow raised. She smirked at him and jerked her head to one side. He nodded and started wandering through the crowd in the direction she specified.
On the edges of the crowd he heard someone muttering. “Stupid woman, defeating him so early in the day… How am I supposed to challenge myself now?” He glanced into the pit, and noticed the demon was gone. Returned to his tower to rest, no doubt.
Another voice caught his ear, barely audible over the crowd. He only caught fragments, and wasn’t sure he even heard it at all. “Kill him… tower doors… gotta recruit… next week.”
He turned, but whoever had said it was long gone, lost in the flood of people suddenly remembering they had business to attend to.
Not knowing how deep into the city Yasmay wanted him to go, he just walked in the direction she had specified. To his lack of surprise, he saw her some time later, sitting on a metal barrel on the side of an alleyway. She looked up when he approached, hearing the sound of his footsteps, quiet as they were here.
“So what’cha think?” She looked up at him from her perch.
“You fight well. Though that trick at the end…” He shook his head. “Hiding from the crowd, or hiding from Rikirion?” He knew she could have done it without kicking up nearly so much dust; he had seen the extra effort she put into sending it into the air.
“The crowd.” She said, unsurprised he had seen through her ruse. “He can see just fine in the dust. The speed was what threw him off; I wasn’t this fast last time.”
“So what did you do?” He asked her. “Anything specific? Or are you just hiding your speed?”
“A lady never reveals her secrets on the first date.” She said with a smirk. He looked at her, and could see that her skin had healed over in nearly every place. Only one spot he could see, on her shoulder, still had metal showing through.
“You missed a spot.” He poked her shoulder on the metal part. The metal was hot as blood, and he burned his finger, though he didn’t show it.
“Oh, thanks.” She moved her hand over the spot and, when her hand dropped to her side, the skin was healed. “Can’t be wandering around like that all the time.”
“So that’s your ability then, is it?” He noticed her cane was gone, no doubt in her inventory somewhere. “Metal under your skin?”
“One of them. Like I said, first date.”
“I dunno if we could call this a date. You never even told me your name.” He smirked right back.
“It’s Yasmay.” She said.
“I know. I heard Rikirion shout it a few times.”
“Oh.” She actually seemed at a loss for words, for an instant. Then she hopped off her perch and headed deeper into the sector. “Come on this way.”
He followed her, through a few twists and turns, though nowhere near as complicated as Velvet had tried to run him through earlier that day. He could easily find his way back out. She stopped at a doorway and slid it open. It had no visible hinges, rather it slid on a rail like a Japanese style doorway. They entered and walked through a straw-mat covered floor and paper-hung walled room. The sound of their footsteps on straw mats instead of heavy metal was so different Nighthand did a double take. On the other side, another sliding door opened for them, and they passed into and through a stone-walled room covered with an elaborate array of hanging chains. The chains seemed quite dungeon-like, and Nighthand eyed them warily.
“Cozy place you’ve got here.” He said, keeping humor in his voice.
“Oh I never use this room any more. Too much fall out. I’d remove it, but I don’t have the ability to myself. I also haven’t gotten around to hiring anyone to do it for me. I just ignore it, really.” She seemed to ignore it as they passed through, at least, and that made Nighthand feel somewhat safer. That is until they reached the next room, which was also simple bare stone walls and floor and ceiling, with a single large metal vat in the center of the room. Glancing in as he neared it, the vat proved to be full to the brim with quicksilver. He reached to touch it, as it exuded no heat, but her hand on his arm stopped him.
“You don’t wanna touch that, guy.” She shook her head.
“Why not?” He pulled his hand back anyways.
“I’ll show you.” She turned slightly, and plunged her hand into the stuff. He could hear a slight hiss and see as it frothed around her arm. Perhaps it truly was hot, or maybe just acidic. Either way, Yasmay seemed to pause, a smile playing across her face. She seemed revived, more energetic, when she pulled her hand out. He thought at first that it was still covered in the quicksilver, but on closer examination, that was simply her real hand. The silver outside and the silver inside her had burned through the thin layer of skin so they could meet. She looked recharged, revived, and Nighthand grasped the concept.
“So you’ve got that silver inside you, and you recharge here. I got ya.” He smiled and stepped away, examining the room for other doors. There was one, which he assumed led to her living quarters. When he looked back at her, the skin over her hand had returned and she looked normal again.
“Sometimes I swim in it. I lose days that way.” She eyed the pool wistfully.
“I don’t have days to wait for you.” He pointed out.
“Yeah, I gotcha. So! Come on. This was only a pit stop basically.” She led the way back out of her room and, sliding the door closed behind her, they walked back the way they had come and soon were near the pit once again. Nighthand glanced in, but Rikirion wasn’t there. Of course not, he’d been beaten already. He’d be in his tower resting, perhaps.
It occurred to Nighthand as they walked that he did a lot of following in his career as a heavy blade in The World. It wasn’t a coincidence. From the very first day he had logged on he had been following Nall around. Now Nall was down for the count, it seemed, and while he was on the mend now, he wouldn’t be fit to lead them for a while. Nall had the power to lead, but he had need of the love of his people, to put it poorly. Nall may have had the bad habit of luring people into his group with the promises of rare items, but he was a rare item hunter, and he knew what it took to lure in his own kind. He gathered able warriors and he explained to them what was going on, and those that decided to carry on with him and continue fighting the good fight were given the powers and strengths they needed to survive over time.
On top of that, though, Nall had always relied on the respect and hope of his party members to succeed. If the party hadn’t trusted him, they would have all died long ago. He thought about the party in the sad state it was in now. So many leaders, too many. Sheena led only to get Nall safe. Raine was a leader in the sense that she sat back at home base and gave them information for their missions. Even he himself was a leader, in battle, but he didn’t do a very good job of it. The party, now, for lack of anyone better, had been following Demorian around simply because he had the largest body of knowledge of the Town and the surroundings, the Wastelands and the prison and the towers. He knew more than the rest of them combined, or at least than the rest of them cared to share. Sheena might know more, Raine wasn’t able to talk to them, and Nall was unconscious. Nighthand certainly didn’t know much about the town, though his body of knowledge for the hacker Elites was surprising. At least, surprising in the sense that he knew so little even after knowing so much.
He thought about it as they walked. He knew so much about the Elites, and yet he knew nothing about them. He didn’t know any of their real names. He didn’t know if they were even the same gender they were on the outside. He knew they were supposedly all the original coders of the game world, though how many other coders existed he didn’t know. Or maybe just Nall, Garaa, and whoever the Master was, were the original coders, and the rest of them were lackeys and hangers on. He didn’t know where any of them were from. He didn’t know if any of them had bodies on the outside that still lived, still functioned. He didn’t know if they wanted to return to their bodies as much as he and his party did to theirs. They would give up their massive power to do so, but did they yearn for it? He realized with a start that they would be just as unable to as the rest of them without the aid of their companions. Which of the Elites would consent to sending one of their number back to the real world? More likely they would deliver them into the hands of the Admins. Anyone who chose to leave such a position of power would more than likely be a traitor and be worth killing. Who knew if any of the elites they wished to kill simply wanted out themselves, but couldn’t escape?
He looked around. How many of these people were stuck in the Game and really wanted to get out, but had no way to do so? How many of them would be freedom fighters if given the chance? The need for secrecy, especially in the enemy home base, was too great to go recruiting. The risk of being seeded with a double-agent or a spy was too great. Being called out, being trapped, being sent to their deaths, these were all very valid concerns. He also wondered how many of these people could possibly be people. There were so many. So many souls wandering around Yamiyo. How many of them were regular players and script kiddies, just waiting to be stuck in the game? How many of them were legitimate hackers somehow having avoided the stuck fate? How many of them were actually stuck in the game, like Nighthand himself and his crew? How many of them were AIs or bots wandering around, acting like people? How many of them were stuck in the game, but had dead bodies they could never return to?
That last one was a possibility he didn’t really want to think about, and yet he did, all the time. He had no way of knowing between check ins with his father whether or not his body was still alive. Even if it was still alive, it was horribly atrophied by this point. Here, in the game, he could fly. He could jump dozens of feet. He could run faster than a player could even register seeing. He could swing around this massive plate of steel as if it was nothing.
Outside the game, he would spend months or years trying desperately to train his body to even be able to walk again. His leg muscles would barely be able to support his weight. His arms would barely lift anything. His mind wouldn’t even know how to control a body that didn’t have all these extra abilities. He didn’t need a controller to access his menus, to select and target people and monsters, to swap out items and activate hacks. This was all subconscious, was second nature. To be back in the real world and have to talk to people to find out their name. For them to not have classes, not be focused on battle. To not have to judge them immediately in the form of whether or not they would be a threat. It was all too much.
Then there was the fallout of having to care for a body. Injures wouldn’t be able to be healed by a simple expenditure of a few SP. He would have to wait and let it heal over time, and anything more dangerous than a couple hit points worth of damage from a paper cut would take a long time to heal, and potentially be life threatening. The injuries he routinely took in battle here in The World were more than life threatening outside the game. The proof was the fact he had died so many times. Any one of those times, the injures he had sustained would have killed him in real life. Not to mention the needs he didn’t have here. The need to eat, especially, though he could do that here if he wanted. It was simply the digital taste here, not the need for sustenance.
He was pulled from his reverie by Yasmay when she stopped, putting a hand on his chest when he almost walked past her. She knocked on a door nearby Rikirion’s tower. He could see it over the rooftops some distance away. The door swung open and she entered, her hand gripping his coat and pulling him forward and in before the door closed.
Inside it was dark and gloomy and cold, the metal all around holding no heat. The only vague light that lit the corridor came from what looked like glow sticks embedded in the wall.
The pair walked through similar corridors for quite some time, until they came upon a room at the end of the halls. It held only an altar with a single spike on it, and nothing else. “This is it.” She said. “Rikirion’s prize.” She walked up to the altar and, without a moment of hesitation, plunged her hand down on the spike. Nighthand moved to stop her but she jolted, her body suddenly arcing with electricity. He backed off, not touching her. Several minutes later the electricity died down and she collapsed, her hand sliding off the spike. There she lay on the ground, twitching occasionally, with a smile on her face. For several more minutes she lay, lost in a haze, and Nighthand watched over her. Once, experimentally, he touched the spike on the altar, but it did nothing. Either he would have to plunge it into himself, or its power was drained. When Yasmay opened her eyes and pulled out of her stupor, Nighthand looked down on her.
“You’re a power junkie.” He said simply.
“Sure.” She said dreamily, holding out a hand. He pulled her to her feet and she fell against him, wobbly on her feet. “Rikirion’s abilities are the best.”
“He’s a drug dealer you have to beat before you can buy.” He shook his head. “And who has no qualms about beating you.”
She shook her head. “No one wins as much as I do. He gives me a power and I take it and run with it, so I can use it in ways he doesn’t expect. It’s a game.”
Nighthand nodded. “I suppose. Are you done here?” She nodded as well. So he threw her arm over his shoulder and he helped her, as her legs could barely support her enough to walk, until they made it back to her small dungeon-like home. She bid him leave her in the antechamber, with its semi-comfortable straw pads, and so he did as she said. The Heavy Blade left her leaning against the wall. “I’ll be going now.” He said over his shoulder.
“Wait, a moment please.” She said, calling him back. He turned.
“What is it?” He asked.
“Just hear me out.” She smiled. “This thing I do.”
“Yes?”
“It’s not like you’re thinking. If anything, I’m addicted to the fight, not the reward. Too inconsistent.”
“You seemed rather able to beat him.”
“Got lucky this time, he was slow. I lose more often.” She shrugged. “You’d see the scars if I still had flesh that scarred.”
“I meant to ask you about that.” He said, suddenly more serious. “What precisely is it? Your power that is.”
She shook her head. “Metal blood? I hardly know any more. I’m more power than person.” She stared at the sky. “The things I’ve done in the name of power…”
Nighthand watched her for a moment longer, and she turned her gaze on him. “I just wanted to say that. You know? I’m not all bad. I’m not a junkie.” He shrugged.
“I know.” Then he turned and left, sliding the door closed behind her, leaving her in a dim straw-padded room. He didn’t look back.