Glitch Boxset

by Victor Deckard

  Another notification popped up.

  > Warning! The night will fall in 20 minutes!

  I was nervous. It was silent as the grave and that crept me out. Something was wrong. Even the wind ceased whistling. I was wandering in the darkness for quite a long time already but still didn’t encounter a single mob. All players completely disappeared without a trace as well. All that had me flipped out. Something was dangerously wrong. I could feel it in my gut.

  Suddenly, clouds got scattered. The moon showed up in the sky. Silver light flooded the streets, making the city seem ghostly and unreal. On the other hand, there was enough light to see by now. I didn’t have to concentrate so hard on careful walking and groping in the air with my hands so as not to either trip on or bump into something any longer, since all cracks, gaps in the sidewalk as well as streetlights and rusty bodyworks of vehicles, and other obstacles appearing in my way were well visible now.

  I walked to a crossroads filled with soft silver light. Came to a stop in the middle of it to get my bearings. No one around. No sound. No movement at all. Only half caving-in buildings, ruined roads, and long since abandoned and useless vehicles surrounded me. Nobody seemed to be around. What the heck was happening? Where had all the mobs and players gone to? I felt like a character in a horror flick. The surrounding area had me crept out. I was in a foul mood. I would’ve felt better off if there had been gunshots barking again somewhere. In that case, I would’ve ceased to feel like the last human on the planet.

  Something up ahead attracted my attention. Raising my head to look up, I saw something funny. Funny peculiar, not funny ha-ha. There was the moon in the sky, but it wasn’t the moon that drew my eyes but some object that stood out against the moon. Figured it was either a spaceship or space station. The thing was X-shaped, the middle part a small circular object with four long wings sticking out from it.

  As I was regarding the space base, or whatever it was, another message appeared.

  > Warning! The night will fall in 10 minutes!

  I knew something really nasty was going to happen once the night fell. I should’ve gone somewhere and found some safe place. Yet the space station kept my attention. A few tiny objects flew from the middle part of it. They were growing as they approached. Whatever they were, the objected advanced on the planet extremely fast. In just a few moments the flying objects were the size of a plate each. They resembled an egg in shape and emitted bright purple-colored light.

  The flying objects scattered in different directions. Yet one of them kept on descending coming down right at the city, growing even more. Then it hovered just above one of the skyscrapers. The object’s purple glow made its shape seem vague and unclear.

  Suddenly the object launched itself forward above the city’s building roofs, gradually descending. And it was advancing my way fast. It caused me to get frightened. I started retreated until my back bumped into a wall behind me. The glowing purple stain approached extremely rapidly. Yet from its high speed, I could tell that the object certainly wasn’t going to land at the crossroads.

  After some time it zipped past overhead, almost touching the roofs with its underside. The entire street got flooded with brilliant purple light for a second or so. I was even forced to squint. Then the object cleared the buildings surrounding me and whizzed away, quickly receding into the night. I stared after it. The object moved almost noiseless and incredibly fast. It disappeared from sight in under three seconds.

  Then something flashed and from where the object had just gone to a shaft of purple light shot up into the sky. I goggled at the strange, nevertheless spectacular eye-catching sight. Seemed as if somebody had turned on a huge spotlight and directed the beam upward.

  I felt like going over to the source of purple light to find out what was happening over there. Yet I had a gut feeling that other players would convene in that place like a swarm of moths drawn to a bright flame. And there would be trigger-happy, bloodthirsty PKs among them, all right. Confrontation with them would’ve gotten me killed once more. So for all desire to walk over to the shaft of purple light to investigate it, I decided not to. Walking all alone around the bleak dark streets was much better than being wasted at the hands of PKs again. So I turned around and walked in the direction opposite to the shaft of purple light.

  A message appeared.

  > Warning! The night has just fallen!

  I kept on walking forward, trying to find some proper place to hide myself. The moon sent a wash of silver light over the streets. Visibility was pretty good. Only narrow alleyways were enveloped in the darkness. While passing by, I looked into each for either mobs or players lurking inside. Yet I found neither thus far. It was all too quiet as well. Only my footsteps sounded in the otherwise silence.

  Nothing happened for a few moments. As I was to learn pretty soon it was just the calm before the storm. Almost simultaneously two things happened. The first was an inhuman shout muffled by distance. The yell was closely followed by a few more outraged screams. Some of them were dangerously close. And the second was loud footfalls. I looked around in panic, yet there was nobody nearby. But all the sounds were getting under my skin. Although I knew the submachine gun was of no use to me, I involuntarily unslung it, my fingers tightening around it hard. My head turning in various directions ceaselessly, I still saw no threat nearby but only heard savage yells and barks that made my blood run cold. What the heck was going down?

  Finally yielding to pressure, I broke into a run, turning around in the direction of the shaft of purple light. Even possible encounter with PKs couldn’t scare me now.

  After some time I got aware of someone’s heavy steps behind me. I looked back to cry out in surprise. No one or two or three but a freaking bunch of some big ugly creatures were on my tail. I could only speculate as to where all these mobs had come from.

  The monsters were gaining fast. I employed the Surge and Blow psi-powers at the same time. I had no idea as to how I had managed to employ two spells at once. Guessed all these rapidly escalating events had my thoughts jumbled.

  One hundred or so down the street, I realized I’d never make it to the purple shaft. Mobs were spawning all around me. The street was swarmed by mobs having blocked both ways. Where to go? Looking around, I spotted a building with its entrance door wide open. Probably I shouldn’t have taken refuge in the closed confines of the building, yet all these mobs having suddenly popped up seemed to frighten me out of my wits. A few monsters at the entrance door waited for me to get closer to them. I roughly shoved them aside with the Surge and burst in the building.

  It was pitch-dark inside. Moonlight couldn’t reach in here, what with boarded-up windows. Ferocious shouts came from the street. I couldn’t waste time waiting for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Dashed forward with my arms stretched forward. Three or four meters into the room, I tripped over something and got flattened on the floor. The submachine gun skidded away into the darkness. From the shouts, creatures were inside the house already. Utilizing the Shield, I got to my feet, raced forward, and stumbled again.

  I fell onto a set of stairs. The steps lead up. Cussing through my gnashing teeth, I quickly clambered upward on all fours. Somewhere behind my back were growling and clacking sounds as if mobs were trying to snap at me. Once on the second floor, I straightened up and looked around, squinting in the darkness. Yet I had no time for getting my bearings. I dashed in a randomly chosen direction. In a second I bumped into a closed door and kicked it open.

  Burst inside. Looked around. It was as dark in here as it was in the corridor. Still, at the far end of the room I managed to make out a boarded-up window with cracks between them through which sliver moonlight was seeping inside. I dashed for it, snatched at the rough wooden boards and pulled hard trying to wrench them free. The boards were reluctantly giving in under pressure.

  Suddenly, a vicious shout reached me across the room. Looking back over my shoulder, I saw two glowing bloodshot eyes
in one corner. There was some creature in the room that I had failed to notice on my having entered! I felt numb with horror. But not for long. Whirling around, I darted for the door. Once I reached the doorway, someone or something appeared in it. I tried to bring myself to a stop in time, yet my momentum carried me forward to bump into the black figure. I felt strong hands or paws grab and shove me roughly back in the room. Thrown off balance, I slumped to the floor.

  Husky barks and high-pitched screams reached me. Judging by loud and frequent stomping, no less than ten mobs barged into the room. I was pinned down before I could get up. Sharp pain shot through me as numerous pangs and claws penetrated my body.

  It was more than I could bear. I cried out in pain at the top of my lungs. Tried to apply the Surge, yet I had only fifty mana points left – not enough for the psi-power.

  Tried to break free hard but to no avail. Mobs firmly held me down on the floor and sunk either their sharp fangs or curved claws, or maybe both, deep into my flesh.

  Half a second before I had my health points reduced to nothing and the world went dark before my eyes, I caught a glimpse of a message popping up in the log.

  > The player Max Calm didn’t make it through the night! He got ripped to pieces!

  THE END OF THE BOOK ONE

  TO BE CONTINUED…

  Glitch Book Two

  Chapter one

  Once regained consciousness, I found out it was already broad daylight. Got out of the tumbledown building and gingerly looked around. There were no players around at the moment.

  Clouds had gotten scattered to reveal the morning sun shining brightly. Rays of light had my almost naked body warmed. With the pleasant sunshine, the ruined city didn’t seem to be so bleak and depressing as it had before.

  Before setting off, I looked at my UI. I’d maintained level 2. Still, the experience bar was nearly empty. My level had dropped to 1 were I to perish once more. I resolved not to die anymore. And with these encouraging and cheerful thoughts in mind, I started off.

  Less than one hundred yards into my travel, I came across a pile of assorted items. A player seemed to have died here. Yet there was nobody nearby, which meant the player had been whacked a long time prior. And it’d most likely been mobs that offed him or her rather than PKs, since the latter would’ve picked up the loot. Even a cursory examination of the loot revealed lots of useful items. No way PKs would’ve neglected it.

  So yeah, it stood to reason that the gamer had been murdered by the same monsters that’d ripped me to pieces in the night, as told in the message I’d caught a glimpse of just before dying.

  Looked around. It was still quiet and deserted. Still, the owner of the items could turn up to retrieve his or her belongings any minute now. With that in mind, I didn’t waste time examining the items’ stats. All clothes, fabric T-shirt, pants, and shoes, were lit up in white color. Just Common stuff. Still, it was better than nothing. I slipped them on.

  Then took a bag off the ground and delved inside. It held a few morsels of cooked roach, mosquito, and rat meat. Slinging the bag across my shoulders, I gave the street one more careful look.

  Nobody was around. Still, it didn’t necessarily mean that I wasn’t being watched through the scope of a sniper rifle by some nasty PK.

  It occurred to me that I’d better move it. I’d just picked all the necessary stuff so it was time to move on lest I put myself in the same awkward position as last time. Then another thought crossed my mind.

  The sharpshooter with the ardor for killing newbies would already have opened fire on me had he been still here. Why wait? I stood near the loot for a couple of minutes now, almost not moving at all. It was a perfect moment to shoot at me. So I guessed the sniper wasn’t around now, otherwise he or she would certainly have taken advantage of this situation already.

  More to the point, it was unknown if the sniper themselves had made it through last night. He or she might’ve been killed by mobs as well. They might be scavenging around the city for any useful items now, the way I did.

  In spite of my having come to a conclusion that I wasn’t being watched, I utilized the Shield just to be on the safe side. Sure enough, it did no good against the sniper’s bullet last time, but I nevertheless felt somewhat more confident and relaxed when under cover of the translucent, bluish power dome.

  Bending over at the waist, I picked up all the resources. There were stones, wood, chitin, and metal. That left only a heavy and clumsy machine gun and body armor lying on the ground now. The perished person apparently played the Soldier class. With my playing the Warlock, I could weigh myself down by carrying over heavy weapons, for example, so as to sell them; yet, I couldn’t use them. If I were to try and discharge the machine gun, the trigger wouldn’t budge, for all my efforts to pull it.

  But what about the body armor? It was most likely of no use to me as well but just to make sure of it I decided to try and don it.

  Crouching down, looked the body armor over. It consisted of two parts, of which the first was designed to protect the chest of a player and the second one the back. The body armor could be put on by pulling it over the head. Still, I had to undo two locks first off. But I didn’t seem to be able to pull it off. The locks just wouldn’t work. A “Use” line wouldn’t appear as well, for all my intent gazing at them. Well, it figures.

  I put the body armor back down on the ground and straightened up. Then just stood there regarding the heavy machine gun and body armor. Should I take the items so as to sell them later on? I could do with some money. Still, my character was too weak to carry both of these items. But I could take one of them. For instance, the machine gun. Since it had a sling, I could hang it on my shoulder so the weapon wouldn’t hinder me from walking and my hands wouldn’t be occupied.

  The issue was that I still didn’t know where a vending machine was. I found none thus far. It was unclear how long I would have to bear that awkward machine gun before finally discovering a vending machine. Besides, I didn’t have the faintest idea as to how much money I would be able to make out of it. The machine gun was common, “white”, so it sure didn’t cost much.

  In the end, I concluded it’d be better to leave the machine gun and body armor behind. Turning around, I set off. But didn’t get too far. Having turned around a corner, I happened to find another pile of items. A few items lighting up in blue color instantly caught my eye.

  > Name: Biker leather jacket

  > Armor type: Light

  > Rarity: Rare (blue)

  > The player’s required level: 7

  > State: 240/300

  > Physical resistance: 50

  > Fire resistance: 30

  > Frost resistance: 75

  > Corrosive resistance: 25

  > Electrocute resistance: 25

  > Special quality: Increasing firearm damage by 10 percent.

  A pair of pants lay beside the jacket.

  > Name: Biker leather pants

  > Armor type: Light

  > Rarity: Rare (blue)

  > The player’s required level: 7

  > State: 190/250

  > Physical resistance: 45

  > Fire resistance: 25

  > Frost resistance: 70

  > Corrosive resistance: 20

  > Electrocute resistance: 20

  > Special quality: Increasing all sorts of resistance by 5 percent.

  I then shifted my gaze toward another article of clothing.

  > Name: Biker leather boots

  > Armor type: Light

  > Rarity: Rare (blue)

  > The player’s required level: 7

  > State: 150/250

  > Physical resistance: 30

  > Fire resistance: 15

  > Frost resistance: 50

  > Corrosive resistance: 15

  > Electrocute resistance: 15

  > Special quality: Increasing the player’s movement speed by 10 percent.

  The la
st item lying on the ground was a black-colored matte paint helmet with a tinted mirrored visor face shield.

  > Name: Biker leather helmet

  > Armor type: Light

  > Rarity: Rare (blue)

  > The player’s required level: 7

  > State: 180/300

  > Physical resistance: 45

  > Fire resistance: 35

  > Frost resistance: 35

  > Corrosive resistance: 20

  > Electrocute resistance: 20

  > Special quality: Reducing all critical damage (headshots) received by 25 percent.

  Moreover, each of these items had the second special quality.

  > Full armor set bonus: All motorbikes have their movement speed and armor increased while fuel consumption reduced by 50 percent.

  I got excited. Sure I had no motorbike at the moment. Nor for that matter had I any other means of transport. Still, even if the leather biker armor hadn’t had the motorbike bonus, it would still have been exceptionally good. Such high stats and special qualities to boot! I’d gotten real lucky to get my hands on such terrific armor set!

  Yet there was a small snag. The level requirement was 7 while my character’s level was only 2. So the question was if I could put the armor on. At any rate, it wouldn’t do me any harm to try it out.

  I gave the street yet another once-over to make sure I was still alone. Then lifted the biker jacket off the ground. The zipper was undone. It raised my hopes. The metal body armor had had locks preventing me from donning the armor. But the biker armor was another matter altogether. It was unzipped so it seemingly wasn’t going to pose any difficulties.