by Ros Per
My blood started to boil from all the anger I’d felt before since I hadn’t even had the chance to cool off after my talk with Andrew. Right now, these Shinkata were, to me, the embodiment of everything that I’d been trying to get rid of for so long. Somehow, all that crap had found me here, in what I’d thought of as the last refuge of my weary soul. I’d tried to forget the past and live the last years of my life in peace, just surrendering to any and all of my fleeting desires, without any regard for others. But no, they can’t even give me the chance to die peacefully.
- Well, kittens, let’s dance! -
I pressed the quick-release latch on the automatic belt and leaned the butt against my thigh. I ejected the spent magazine and was already slipping in a fresh one before the empty one hit the floor. The sound of it doing so was like a signal for us to start. Four cats took off, rushing toward me and, at the same time, I finished replacing the magazine, my lips stretching into a mad grin. There is no true death here, there is only temporary oblivion, after which you can come back and take revenge. Yes, there is some pain that’s even stronger than the real world equivalent, but that physical pain is nothing compared to the mental pain that I’ve endured. Because of a decision made by a man whom I’d considered my friend for many years, I lost the only ray of light in my otherwise dark, pointless life.
And now, without her, my life has lost all meaning. I’m not a man; I’m just a beast that has gone mad and is suffering from senility. A wretched creature that doesn’t have the courage to lie down and die, hoping to be reunited with his loved one. From what felt like the deepest, darkest pit in my soul came a deafening, animalistic roar that mixed with the sound of the machinegun fire. The ones in front fell almost instantly. I dodged to the left, avoiding a pouncing cat, filling it with lead as it flew by. Noticing another jumping toward me, I ducked, trying to make it miss me by going over, but didn’t make it in time. I felt something heavy land on my back. I grabbed the cat by one of its paws and, bending even further forward, I threw it over myself. The maneuver left me disoriented, the Shinkata’s struggles causing me to stumble.
I started firing blindly with my submachine gun. The recoil hit me, causing me to drop the gun a second after. But, during this long second, I managed to shove the barrel of the gun into its eye. My body jumps up and rolls forward, since the automated dodge had apparently activated. After looking around the street, I noticed four Shinkata corpses. The last one, which had been wounded at the beginning of the battle, turned around and began coming after me, emboldened by the fact I’d lost my gun. Slightly limping, it still only had to leap twice to get near me, leaving behind a bloody streak on the floor. Then it jumped, aiming its fangs at my throat.
Slightly lowering my head, I met its mouth with the front part of my helmet, and gripped its impressive claws tightly with both hands. With my hands preoccupied, I couldn’t grab a weapon, making the situation almost inevitably fatal for me. Without even thinking about it, I tried to sink my teeth into the neck of this creature. It had ended up right in front of me, so it wasn’t too difficult to just tear out chunks of its throat and spit them out to the side. Its struggles gradually weakened, but not before we ended up rolling around on the ground. I calmed down and stopped biting it only when the cat was dead. Rising to my feet and finding no more opponents around, I swiped my palm across my face. After spitting out the last remnants of bloody flesh, I proceeded to give the dead Shinkata a heartfelt eulogy:
- I should’ve put some salt on you first, and then eaten you, *****; you are not tasty! -
After checking my status, I realized that I had once again passed right in front of death’s door. The plate of the bulletproof vest that covered my abdomen was covered in scratches from the claws of the cat's hind legs, with only a couple of millimeters of armor left to protect my stomach. After reviewing the battle logs, gloating a bit, I noted that I’d done continuous critical hits with my teeth. It was kind of funny, of course, but the fact that I’d even allowed myself to end up in such a situation, bereft of weapons, relying on my teeth alone, was very regrettable. After collecting my weapon and making sure everything was in order, I looked at the map, trying to determine how far I had left to reach the meeting point. It turned out that I was only a couple of hundred meters away. I stood around for a while, my eyes riveted to the five corpses, thinking it over, and then typed a message to Tilorn, sending him my current coordinates and asking for the rest of them to meet me here.
In the meantime, I took out my flask of water and began cleaning up, washing away the blood stains. When the group appeared from around the corner of the building, I was simply amazed. Even if I have seen a lot over the course of my life, the sight of Tilorn accompanied by two pimply teens and a young girl — was still a shock to me. Okay, I don't look my age at all, so I won’t jump to any hasty conclusions.
I should first get to know them well and then decide what to do from there.
- Hello! - I said to them. - Sorry I summoned you here, but some unexpected corpses popped up and, unfortunately, I have no way to transport them properly. -
- “Dude, don’t worry, everything will be ready to go very quickly! Now, we will just collect all the goodies...” - one of the guys, the one with reddish hair, leapt forward eagerly, but, seeing Tilorn’s angry look, changed his approach: “Um... We’ll, uh, collect them now, we have everything we need.”
After that, the two guys started cutting up the cats, and in the meantime, after I received an invitation to join the group from Tilorn, I started to examine these people. The ginger haired guy was called Quartz, and he was a “Technician-operator,” a very unusual profession. He apparently didn’t wear a helmet, because his head was covered only by some round glasses with an elastic band serving as their frame. He had a simple, open body armor that protected only his chest and back, over a brown jumpsuit. He also had fingerless gloves and his legs were protected by high top shoes with plastic clasps.
He also had a lot of other pouches on his belt and body armor. He was armed with some kind of short-barreled gun, but most of it was hidden by a backpack, from which only the butt stuck out, therefore, it wasn’t possible to determine the type of his weapon. Turning his head, he bumped into the second boy. This one had a huge, almost overly full backpack and he kept taking out vacuum bags from it to pack the Shinkata organs into. This guy was more properly equipped: shoes that were reinforced along the toe and heel, shin guards, forearm guards, knee pads and elbow pads.
Aramid pads were fastened to the bottom of the vest along the sides, protecting the outer side of his thighs, while also having pouches hanging from them. Above the vest, he had shoulder pads and a gorget, also made of aramid. All this increased protection was topped off by a battle helmet with a raised face shield. I was surprised to find he had no gloves on. He was armed with two huge revolvers that had only five rounds in the drums, but were a rather large caliber.
- May I help you? - I asked.
In response, he just shook his head without even pausing. Well, God bless you, I guess you’ll be quite a great teammate. Tilorn, who had come up behind me, patted me on the shoulder, nodding his head as he suggested I move a little to one side. To my surprise, he turned out to be a field medic, or some sort of strange physician. He was wearing tight, heavy metal armor, which covered almost his entire body, except for the joints. No amplifiers of any kind were visible. On the back, or rather on the left side of it, there were three rows of fairly large spines, ending at the left shoulder, but the right side was absolutely smooth.
No backpack, no automatic weapons, only a large shield and a massive mechanical hammer were attached to his back. Wait… did they have a medic who was also the tank? In order to fully grasp the absurdity of this group, I cast a glance at the icon of the final member. Seeing the name of the profession, my eye began to twitch: why did they have a spy saboteur in this group?!
I tried to spot the final team member, but she wasn’t where I’d last seen her. Even looki
ng around intently, I wasn’t able to locate her. But how?! How had she been able to slip away without me even noticing it? Turning to Tilorn, I wanted to point out that a member of the team was missing, but then I met the eyes of the girl who was right behind me and gave me a slight bow.
Damn, that's really creepy, only Krill had been able to sneak up on me like that. Of course, with his level, it was understandable, but this girl was only level 18. By the way, everyone was level eighteen; I felt like a dumbass, being only level 16. She was dressed in a dark gray suit, with polymer seals protecting the most important organs, as well as her elbows and knees. She didn’t seem to have any weapons, only some very thick gloves on her hands. Seeing that I’d noticed her, she calmly turned to Tilorn and uttered just one word:
- “Acceptable.” After that, she retired to the nearest ruins.
Okay... And these guys will be the ones I go into battle with. Alright, well, let's see how they handle a combat situation. I get the feeling I might end up spending all of my time teaching them.
- Well? - I demanded, coming up to Tilorn.
- “Volper, look, I’ve decided to immediately clear up a couple of things.” Wow, he’s hesitating like a girl about to lose her virginity. “I think, because of our agreement, that this is quite important information for you to have.” And he was hesitating again, apparently choosing his words carefully. “I probably wouldn’t have said anything at all, but I need to ask you to be gentle and patient with everyone. I doubt you would agree to it, if I don’t explain why they’re acting the way they are. And, admittedly, the clause in the contract does prevent you from speaking about it…”
- Tilorn, stop beating around the bush, out with it! - I interrupted him.
- “You’re right, it’s better to get to the point straight away. Have you heard about the Ignatenko precedent?” My mind froze like someone had pressed the emergency shutoff button.
- Um ... the precedent where some patients got the opportunity to always be in the virtual world, without having to come back to reality?
- “Yes, that’s it. Our clinic decided to launch a pilot project, with several of our wards participating. I don’t have the right to disclose any further details, I’ll just inform you that these people are participants in the project, and I am looking out for them. I’d like to ask you to understand that they have a number of small psychological problems. Please, when working with them, have a bit more understanding and tolerance for their various antics and oddities.”
- Wait a second, if we take into account the contract that we signed, and everything else, like doctor-patient confidentiality, I don’t get why you’re telling me this. It’s not like you need to. -
- “Well, how can I explain this… You aren’t the first who’s tried to work with our group. As you can see, we have a very unusual team. The others, for the most part, reacted very negatively to our group and their words were harmful for the emotional state of my wards.”
- Well *****, what did you expect? This is a bloody, cruel world, where pain can even be more intense than the normal sensations! Even without the other people reacting poorly to them, surely you didn’t expect this to go well! – I almost began shouting at him, but I managed to refrain myself just in time. –Seriously, are you joking right now, or are you just so dense that you legitimately thought this would be a good idea? -
I felt pity as I looked at him: sagging lifelessly and hunched over, he turned his gaze to the floor. It was clear that his charges didn’t belong here. I wanted to hurl some more abuse at him, but I stopped myself in time, seeing his demeanor. It seemed like he himself understood all of this as well, which made all of this even more confusing. Well, even if the good doctor is a moron, he wouldn’t have thrust his patients into such a hardcore game. I was missing something here. After all, with such a precedent established, surely they could’ve found more favorable virtual worlds to immerse these poor people in.
- Why did you bring them here? - I asked after calming down, even using a fairly normal tone of voice.
- “The Ignatenko precedent is currently applicable only to Alfarome. There’s a legal battle going on right now to enable them to go into virtual reality without any restrictions.”
That took the wind right out of my sails. I couldn’t even muster up a response. Asking him to give me a couple of minutes to think about it, I stepped aside and sat down on a large piece of rubble. Would you look at that! I’ve created a legal precedent with my court case. Now it’s possible for quite a few people with limited functionality to feel whole again, at least in VR, and without having to return to their sick bodies.
But at the same time, Alfarome is the only world where they can live permanently, at least for now. The fuck is happening here? It's like a giving candy to a child, but after making sure to smear it in pepper. Where does that leave me? My actions have given them a chance. Still, I feel like it’s better to break the contract and pay the fine, rather than deal with the headache. When I was about to get up and go to talk to Tilorn, Castra suddenly sat down next to me, which almost made me flinch; that was the second time she’d managed to approach me without me noticing. She was some kind of mystic, for sure.
- “You’re strange,” she said, looking straight ahead. “I used to think that we are strange. But, in comparison to you, we’re still normal.”
- Why do you think that I’m strange? - I asked, caught off guard by her saying something like that.
- “Well, think about it. You appear very young, but the look in your eyes is far older. It makes me want to ask you for a bedtime story while you hold me in your arms, or that you buy me a gift for my birthday. Now look at Tilorn; he’s so tense, constantly looking around and trying to spot anything dangerous before it gets to us. The guys, on the contrary, are passionate about collecting all the loot, but are otherwise quite relaxed. Almost everyone I’ve seen so far behaves one of two ways: either they’re extremely serious, or they’re just like tourists. And yet, here you are, having a rest, seemingly completely relaxed… Except for your eyes, which give you away by never pausing, always scanning everything around you. You’re odd in other ways too, but I’ll focus on two more things. You seem like a good player, considering your gear, and yet, you’re level 16. All the good players have reached level 25 by now. And, last but not least, the way you look at us. Most people seemed disgusted or like they were condemning us. Sometimes, we’d even get sympathy or envy. But you are the first to look at us like we’re children, with a slight smile on your face. Like an old man watching his grandchildren playing in the sandbox. That’s why I say that you are strange.”
Without waiting for my reply, she got up and went over to the guys who were butchering the last body. Looking at her walking away, I finally realized how she’d been able to get close to me without me noticing her. She simply wasn’t perceived as a potential danger, and even my trained subconscious mind would simply disregard her movements as an insignificant detail. Even now, looking directly at her, it was hard to focus on where she was going, like following the path of a leaf falling from a tree. Even if you stare at it, you end up unable to remember how exactly it got down to the ground. Interesting… I wondered if this was an ability she had in the game, or maybe even one from real life? Enough distractions, I had to talk to Tilorn.
- Hey, Doc, - I began, walking up to Tilorn. – I won’t ask you for any confidential info, but I do have some questions. -
- “Ask away.”
- How old are they? How many of them are there? -
- “Three in total. Two are 18, the third one is 19.”
- Can they make it? In the real world. -
- “I doubt it,” he replied, after thinking on it for a couple of seconds. “They’ve been on life support for a long time, and, unfortunately, all of it was spent in a medically induced coma.” After his response, we both became quiet for a few minutes, lost in our thoughts.
- Why did you bring them here? – I finally asked.
-
“I don’t know,” he answered, sounding sad and defeated. “At first, I just wanted to give them a substitute for a full, proper life. I hoped this project could give them, and others like them, a chance at rehabilitation. Now, after seeing what this world is like… I don’t know what to do.”
- Well, fairy tales and birthday gifts are a good start - I muttered to myself.
- “What?”
- I said, come on, we still have tasks to do for the outpost, right? They need to get used to combat, as well. -
We rejoined the others. I was still thinking about their situation. If someone had asked me why I’d changed my mind so drastically, I wouldn’t have been able to give them an answer. Maybe I felt sorry for them, or I’d decided to help these children because I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t. Hell, it could’ve been temporary insanity. But I knew one thing for sure: for some reason, I was feeling good right now, and I was walking around smiling like an old fool, not even bothering to hide it.
CHAPTER XXVII: FURTHER INTO THE FOREST...
After we had reached the territory that we were meant to be clearing, we decided to get some rest. After that, we would proceed directly to eradicating the monsters.