by Dante Steel
Olivia shrieked and tumbled from her flight right onto the man. The spear was still red-hot, somehow back in their foe’s hand. The metal burned Olivia, maybe even punctured her, and she collapsed to the ground. Her hands shook as she tried to reach for a potion.
The man went in for the kill, but massive bats with human faces swooped around, also falling from the ceiling, their fangs like that of vampires, and they tried to bite and tear into him.
And only him.
Because of the Runed Ruby still clutched in his grubby paws?
Gary rushed over to Olivia and handed her a potion while glancing around. The ground was still shaking, and a massive two-headed bear had lumbered into the cave from the second entrance. Each step the bear took caused the earth to quake all the more.
This was the stuff of nightmares. All that was missing would be a dragon.
A burst of fire appeared high overhead. When the smoke dissipated, a fully sized dragon descended. With massive green-black wings and a golden underbelly, the dragon took up the vast majority of space above them. Considering how commodious the area was, that was saying something.
Thankfully, the dragon and most of the creatures seemed to be going after the man, which gave Gary enough time to find Nicoletta. Her face was covered in ashes and soot as she picked herself up off the ground. She was bleeding, her clothes torn, but she stalked toward the man as if she was ready to set him ablaze.
With a wild shrill, she tackled him, forcing him to the ground. The Runed Ruby fell out of his grasp, and one of the snakes from the ceiling snatched it. The man went to yank on the snake, but another one bit his hand.
The creatures were attacking the man.
The man wasn’t a supervillain, at least not in the sense of the game.
The man had to be another player.
He kicked Nicoletta straight in the face. She staggered back, right in Gary’s arms. He dragged her over to Olivia, and the three of them limped away, back the way they had come.
The cave tunnels had repopulated with more bears, snakes, and vultures. Gary had to handle most of them, and even though he had managed them relatively easy previously, now, his body was aching, and his reflexes were slower. Worse, he had left his sword behind, so he had to use his dagger. The close quarters meant that he was almost bitten several times, and one bear got a nasty sideswipe against his ribs.
Eventually, though, they tumbled outside and lumbered across the field back to the town. The girls drank potions and healed before his eyes.
Olivia wordlessly handed one to Gary. He accepted it but didn’t drink. She appeared too tired to say a word, hugged them both, and logged off.
Nicoletta handed Gary his sword. In the mad dash out of there, she must have picked it up. Gary wasn’t even sure when exactly he had lost it.
“That was intense,” she said slowly.
“That’s one word for it.”
“We all almost died.” She brushed some hair from his forehead and examined a cut near his temple.
“We’re survivors.”
“We can’t go back after that treasure.”
“We don’t have to,” he said, all the while thinking I have to.
“Not without a larger party,” she continued. “I don’t think Jorge will be much help.”
“I might know someone,” he said. His head was pounding, and he just wanted to sleep.
“You need to rest and recover. You sure…” She glanced at the potion and then away.
“I’ll be fine,” he said.
“I don’t… If you’re positive…”
“You don’t what?” he asked.
Don’t believe me? Don’t think I’m sane? Don’t want to deal with me and my issues? His last girlfriend had said that when she broke up with him. She claimed he had suffered long-term trauma because of all the loss he had suffered. Maybe that was true. He could always ask Olivia. She would know about that psychological stuff.
But for right now, the main issue he had wasn't the same ones that girlfriend had been talking about. Now, the problems were life and death in a game setting where some of the enemies had superpowers. How in the world was he going to continue to survive unless he could gain superpowers himself?
Chapter Nineteen
Nicoletta swallowed hard. “I don’t want to leave you,” she said softly.
Gary was moved. “Aw, is someone worried about me?”
“Yes, because you’re a bit touched in the head.” The yes was firm, but the rest of her words were teasing, and her fingers brushed so gently around his wound.
“I’m fine. I am. Go ahead. Log off. It’s got to be late, right?”
“It is. And I’m hungry. This game, it really takes a lot out of you. The jolts are one thing if you’re only hit here or there, but continuously? And the ground shaking? And the jolt from his wind blast… If that’s the kind of power we can work up to, that’s incredible.”
“Do you think he’s a mage like Jorge?” Gary asked.
"Or maybe he's an elemental, but I thought I read that so far, everyone could only use one element like I can only use fire."
“Maybe you’ll be able to add a second one if you’re a high enough level. I didn’t pay attention, but did you notice what level he was?”
She blinked a few times. “That was a player? I thought we might’ve stumbled onto a quest meant for characters at a much higher level.”
Gary shook his head. “He’s a gamer.”
“Wow. Do you think he survived all of that?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“Probably.” She bit her lower lip, clearly musing something over. “Wind and fire. Man, that’s crazy.”
“You used yours some.”
"I had to. You needed me to. Olivia also did. I-I had to try."
“You did more than try. Are you okay?”
She kissed his cheek. “My mom’s at the door. I hate when she stops by unannounced. She knows I’m home, so I can’t blow her off. I have to go.”
“I thought you were going to go regardless.”
Nicoletta gave him a look that suggested she would’ve stayed longer if she could’ve. “Please don’t do anything rash,” she said.
He took her hand and cupped it against his cheek, relishing her soft touch, wishing her hand was the one touching him.
“I can’t make that promise.”
She pulled her hand free. “I know.”
Gary went to pull her close, to kiss her, but she had already logged off.
Now that he was alone with no one and nothing to distract him, the pain came rushing in. As much as he wanted to get food, he didn’t have the energy to walk over there. He had to drag himself along to reach the stables, and he leaned against the wall as he slumped to the ground.
His eyes were just beginning to close when faint footsteps sounded. He cracked open his eyes to see Haru.
“Do you have any news for me?” Gary asked, not bothering to feel any sense of hope. All he could feel was extreme fatigue, body aches, and pain.
“Yes, unfortunately.” The Japanese man paused before him, feet shoulder-width apart, his hands clasped behind his back.
“Bad news, I take it.”
Haru nodded once, the movement direct and crisp. “I have come to warn you.”
Gary’s mind was swimming. Random thoughts came together in his mind, and he blurted out, “The other guy from the real world, he’s the one I was trying to steal the Runed Ruby from, wasn’t he?”
"Yes, just right. Gary, you must use any means necessary to acquire that artifact. We added it to the game so that you could become a superpower. If in the wrong hands, another will gain a second power, and that could have a devastating effect on the game at large."
Gary nodded numbly. How could he steal the game from someone already so powerful? From someone already willing to kill other gamers?
“As much as we would like to correct the glitch by just giving you a superpower, we cannot risk the other guy realizing. We do n
ot want him to learn about you. We fear he will target you and kill you.”
“Does he know that you know about him?” Gary asked. “Have you visited him like you have me?”
Haru shook his head. “He doesn’t know that the developers have caught onto him. As much as we can, we are attempting to discern how exactly it was that he came to be in the game. We also want to know about him and understand why he is so violent.”
“Violent is right,” Gary muttered. He licked his lips and winced when he tasted blood.
“If that man keeps the artifact, we will make it harder to be used so he won’t gain a second power, but realize that would mean it would be that much more difficult for you to use it too.”
“Not exactly what I want,” Gary said. He rubbed his temple and tried to concentrate. “Does this mean that he didn’t obtain that Runed Ruby after all?”
“No, he did not. We have it heavily guarded.”
“Yeah, I think I activated the animals and monsters and creatures that attacked,” Gary said ruefully.
“No, we have the game set up that if a person stepped within a certain distance of one of the exits with the Runed Ruby in their possession, that the person would be hit and hit hard. Again, we cannot allow just anyone to gain a second power.”
“So, what is he exactly?” Gary asked. “He was using both wind and fire. That’s two powers already!”
“Technically, he’s a wizard.”
“Not a mage then.”
“His level is one hundred. As such, he has been elevated in rank to wizard from mage.”
“Seriously?” Gary rubbed a hand down his face and winced at the fresh blood leaking from his bicep cut. It burned. “Why are there even mages in the game in the first place?”
“We wanted to be able to develop—that doesn’t matter now. There are mages, and we can’t go back and change that now.”
“Level one hundred.” Gary was only level twenty-two.
“He’s been playing nonstop and hardly sleeps. I don’t know how he’s managing.”
“That’s insane,” Gary blurted.
“Yes, it is. He’s obviously not thinking clearly. Who willingly enters a virtual reality game?”
Gary swallowed hard. If someone had no friends, no wife, no kids, no job or a crappy one, if someone had no reason for wanting to get out of bed every morning… Who wouldn’t want to jump at the chance of making things better?
“He’s the highest level of all of the gamers by twenty-seven,” Haru continued. “I don’t know how he found out about the Runed Ruby. We kept that tight to breast because we wanted to ensure you found it—”
“With all of those baddies, did you really think I would be able to handle all of that?” Gary snapped.
He couldn’t help being furious. His head was pounding. Every breath was labored. While he didn’t think anything was broken, how could he be sure? It wasn’t as if there was medicine or doctors here in this game. Just some hacks with potions that didn’t work on him. His body was rejecting all of the strain, and his injuries were severe enough that he knew he wouldn’t be able to go back out there again tomorrow, not to face that mountain. Mountain of Eternal Gloom wasn’t right. More like Mountain of a Thousand Deaths.
“Come morning, we will have ready a potion that should help you.”
“But—”
“Yes, you’re human and not an avatar, but you are in the game, and we can affect you. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be able to imbue you with a superpower. We’ll only make this potion available for those who lack a superpower, and by the time you have one, we should have worked out the code that you and you alone can purchase it.”
Gary nodded. His head felt as if it weighed a million pounds, and it lulled down heavy on his chest, his chin nearly touching his chest plate.
“I’m sorry things aren’t going easier for you, Gary, but you have to admit that we didn’t expect or ever intend for someone to enter the game! It’s fascinating, really.”
“Great. I’m a guinea pig, a science experiment.”
Haru opened his mouth and then shut it.
“That’s right. Don’t deny it,” Gary grumbled.
“We will fix this,” Haru promised.
“Are you sure about that?”
“We’re working on this as hard as you are at getting that Runed Ruby.”
“You have an enemy to face too?” Gary’s eyes were closing. He couldn’t open them again. He was fading and fast.
“You could say so,” Haru said, his voice seemingly coming from far away. The ringing had returned.
“What’s his name?”
“Whose?”
“The other human in the game.”
“Shh!”
“Sorry,” Gary mumbled. “Well?”
Haru hesitated so long Gary wondered if he was alone now or else had succumbed to sleep or even death. Then, the Japanese man cleared his throat. “He did not enter a real name.”
“So what name did he enter?”
“Smaug.”
Of course. The terrible dragon from the Hobbit. How fitting.
Chapter Twenty
Gary was dreaming. He had to be. Hands were all over his body, familiar hands, and lips. He was naked, and he wasn’t the only one. His hands were wandering, touching, caressing, so many breasts, so many holes… Nicoletta, Olivia, and Elena… all of them together, and he couldn’t handle it. He came, but they kept pumping him, sucking him, riding him, and he remained hard and came again and again…
When Gary woke, he groaned for several reasons. One, waking with a migraine when you were trapped in a game shouldn’t be allowed. Two, he was so hard that his balls ached more than the rest of his wounds. Three, the girls weren’t here with him.
His body felt wooden, his arms tingling, and he had to throw his arm to try to move forward to gain access to the ground so he could push up to standing. Instead, his hand brushed against his bulging erection. Great, just what he needed. Not at all.
Somehow, he managed to roll onto his back, get onto all fours, and stand up. He needed to get a potion and now. He should’ve done a better job of binding his wounds last night, but he had passed out. He wasn’t sure how he had managed to get back to town. There wasn’t a part of him that didn’t hurt, and he had more cuts and gashes and wounds then he had realized.
Walking out of the stable wasn’t easy, and he staggered like a drunk to be able to reach the alchemist who sold the potions. For a special, low, low price of only a single rupa was a new potion. Gary didn’t even pay attention to the name of it and just bought it.
The vial was shaped like a round-bottomed flask, the liquid inside purple with black specks. Gary drank it down chugging it. The taste resembled concord wine, and Gary couldn’t help thinking that a night of heavy drinking was in order. Maybe even day drinking. Early morning drinking.
A slow warmth washed over his body, starting at his toes and ankles and working its way up. As it climbed, his body healed, and when it reached his groined, he came immediately. Great. Another mess he would have to clean.
The potion's warmth worked even higher, and the cut on his bicep healed, and before the heat dissipated, the fog in his mind vanished. The drink had healed him completely and entirely.
Whistling, happy for one of the few times since he had entered the game as a human, Gary strolled over to the tavern and bought himself some grub. Once he ate his fill, he bought new clothes and then a ton more of the potions that were specifically for him.
That done, he rubbed his hand and surveyed the town. Now, what?
His earlier jubilee vanished, replaced by worry and fear. The other guy, the so-called Smaug, could not be allowed to gain a second power. He was already too powerful as it was.
“Howdy, stranger.”
Gary grinned and turned to face Elena. “Long time no see,” he said.
“Not really. I’ve been busy.”
“Oh.” He hesitated. “Busy doing what?”
“Pract
icing.”
“You’re going to turn me into a dentist,” he grumbled. “Making me pull teeth.”
She smiled bashfully. "You don't understand. It's… Well, I've always loved to bake. It's a passion of mine. And I wanted to start a bakery. A lifelong dream of mine. But because of an accident when I was a kid, my right hand lost a lot of control. Damage to the nerves. I used to be right-handed, but ever since I had to learn with my left, and it still never felt like it should."
“And your power is metal fists. That’s kinda freaky. Not your greatest fear.”
“Yes, it is.” Tears welled in her eyes. “Because in real life…”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” He felt terrible. How had the developers been able to determine everyone’s greatest fears through their stupid quiz? Was something else going on behind the scenes?
“But…” Her grin was breathtakingly beautiful. “I don’t know what it is, if it’s the game or if I have the confidence to try again or what, but… Okay. To be a baker, you have to decorate with icing, right?”
“The icing bags,” he said.
“Yes. You need two hands to squeeze. That’s what’s been holding me back. I lack the hand strength in my right hand to decorate properly. Yesterday was my youngest cousin’s birthday, and she wanted me to make cupcakes, and, Gary, it’s such a small thing, but I was able to ice them. Not just icing. I made each one a little flower garden. I was able to squeeze with both hands. Nothing’s changed outside of my using the game. It’s incredible.”
She was so giddy, so excited that Gary had to hug her, hold her. He rubbed her back. Deep inside, he wondered if the game had nothing to do with her hand strength aside of giving her the confidence to try. Then again, wasn’t that huge in and of itself? Trying? You couldn’t succeed if you didn’t try.
