The Player Plague

by Lucas Flint

  “Master Haru has his reasons for wanting the Z-Virus spread among the people,” said Kuwabara. He crouched lower onto the floor. “Reasons you cannot understand.”

  “I understand that Master Haru is an even bigger monster than I thought,” I said. “How did you even find me? I thought the Ninja Guild had you guys distracted.”

  Kuwabara grinned, which was when I noticed a gleaming sheen of blood on his lips. “The others might have fallen for your ruse, but I did not. Once I realized they were a distraction, I slaughtered all six of the puny ninja sent after me and came back in here as soon as I could. It looks like I was right.”

  My eyes widened. The Ninja Guild members who had been used as a distraction weren’t necessarily the most elite, but if he had slaughtered six of them in the span of a few minutes, then this guy was even tougher than I thought. I didn’t like the blood on his lips, either, which implied all sorts of things about this guy that I didn’t want to even think about.

  “I have sent a message to my brothers and sisters informing them of this ploy,” said Kuwabara. “I imagine they will be back soon enough to kill you and the other three people who are trying to destroy out Z-Virus supplies as well. If I were you, I would run.”

  Uh oh. The plan required the other Ninja Guild members keeping the Stalking Shadows distracted long enough for Aimi and Riku to finish setting the charges. But if Kuwabara was telling the truth, then we probably only had a few minutes before the guards returned and stopped us. I could only hope that Aimi and Riku were finishing up the charges because if they weren’t, this entire plan was just about to fall apart.

  “I’m not running,” I said. “I may not understand what Master Haru is trying to do, but I know enough that it can’t be any good.”

  “Believe what you want,” said Kuwabara. “I know you are working with the accursed Ninja Guild, but you don’t understand what is actually going on here. If you did, you wouldn’t be here tonight at all.”

  I eyed Kuwabara carefully. “Want to let me know what’s going on? Or are you just going to speak cryptically?”

  Kuwabara’s bloodstained lips formed a twisted smile. “Even better, I will offer you a mission.”

  Without warning, a mission notification appeared in my vision, which read thus:

  MISSION: The Truth about the Ninja Guild

  A member of the Stalking Shadows, Kuwabara, has cryptically claimed that there is more to the conflict between the Ninja Guild and Stalking Shadows than meets the eye. Although you know the Stalking Shadows are not to be trusted, you don’t exactly trust the Ninja Guild, either, an organization who you still aren’t on particularly good terms with.

  ALIGNMENT: Hero

  DIFFICULTY: Hard

  RARITY: Unusual

  SUCCESS: Find out the truth about the Ninja Guild

  FAILURE: Refuse to find out what the Ninja Guild is really up to

  REWARDS: Unknown

  ACCEPT? Y/N?

  What the heck? A Villain NPC was offering me a mission? I didn’t even know that was possible. I was so surprised by this turn of events that I didn’t know whether to accept or reject it.

  “Come now,” said Kuwabara in a savage tone. “What will it be? Yes or no?”

  Biting my lower lip, I considered my options. My first instinct was to reject it, because if a Villain like Kuwabara was offering me a mission, then it couldn’t be any good.

  But the fact was that I didn’t really trust the Ninja Guild that much more than the Stalking Shadows. The only reason I was even helping the Ninja Guild at all was because I wanted them to stop sending Assassins after me. And the fact was that I had only ever heard the Ninja Guild’s side of the story. I’d never heard a Stalking Shadow give their side of the story. There was probably more to their little conflict going on than I was aware and it seemed strange, if not irresponsible, to say no to Kuwabara’s quest without thought.

  But then I thought about the fact that the Stalking Shadows were deliberately distributing the Z-Virus—the deadliest virus in the game—to players and NPCs under the pretenses that it was a drug that could give them superpowers and I immediately hit ‘N.’

  Kuwabara must have been aware of my decision because he frowned and said, “Why did you refuse my mission? I thought you Heroes were all about accepting as many missions as possible.”

  “I’m not a fan of the Ninja Guild myself, but at least they’re not knowingly distributing the Z-Virus to innocent people,” I said, jerking a thumb over my shoulder at the crate of Z-Virus bottles behind me. “I don’t know everything that is going on here, but I do know that accepting a mission from you guys is a dumb move.”

  “I see,” said Kuwabara. “You have, of course, made a terrible mistake, but you are free to make your own choices. Unfortunately, that means you are also free to suffer the consequences of those choices.”

  Kuwabara suddenly lunged toward me with both knives thrust out. I Dodged his attacks easily enough and, as he passed by, grabbed his arm and activated Freezing Touch.

  Ice spread out from my hand and covered Kuwabara’s right arm. In the space of a breath, Kuwabara’s whole arm from shoulder to hand was frozen solid.

  With a yell, I brought my other fist down on Kuwabara’s right arm and smashed directly through it. Kuwabara did not scream in pain, but he did grunt in surprise and jumped away out of my reach. He clutched the frozen remains of his arm, glaring at me through the slit in his mask.

  “What’s the matter?” I said. “Feeling a little cold? Or did you realize I’m not as slow as I look?”

  Kuwabara suddenly smiled again, his eyes gleaming with madness. “A clever move, but it barely inconvenienced me. Observe.”

  With a grunt, Kuwabara smashed the remains of his frozen arm, totally shattering it and sending chunks of ice and frozen meat flying. My mouth fell open when I saw that, yet Kuwabara did not seem even remotely affected by smashing the rest of his arm. He just grinned even more savagely than ever, the blood on his lips making him resemble a lion after it had just finished feasting on a gazelle.

  “You destroyed your whole arm,” I said. “Why? Doesn’t that hurt you?”

  “Hurt me?” Kuwabara repeated. He ripped his mask off his head and tossed it to the side. “How can I feel pain when I am already dead?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  I nearly puked when I saw what Kuwabara’s face looked like after he removed his mask. At one point, he might have been a pretty handsome dude, but his face now looked absolutely awful. His skin was whiter than snow, while his nose was missing completely. His teeth were jagged and uneven and quite yellow, while his lips looked like they were about to fall off any minute now. The stench of blood and rotting human flesh rolled off him in waves, which would have made me throw up all by itself if I wasn’t already disgusted by his face. His hair was almost completely gone, with only a few wisps of white hair sticking out of his spotted, rotting scalp.

  “Holy crud,” I said, looking at Kuwabara in disgust. “What are you?”

  Kuwabara bared the rotting teeth displayed between his red lips. “I am an Undead Stalking Shadow. And do you know how I got this way? The clue is in your hand.”

  I looked at the Z-Virus I held with fear. “You mean the Z-Virus?”

  Kuwabara nodded. “Yes. Master Haru has injected every member of the Stalking Shadows with the Z-Virus.”

  “Why?” I said, looking up at Kuwabara again. “Does he want you all dead or something?”

  “Hardly,” said Kuwabara. “You have been told lies about the Z-Virus. It isn’t a virus at all, but a powerful serum which grants its users immortality and invincibility. It takes away all pain sensations. That is how I am able to destroy my useless arm without feeling any pain.”

  I gulped. “How far along is your Infection?”

  “Fifty percent,” Kuwabara replied, “but do not worry. Once my Infection is one hundred percent complete, I will be truly immortal and invincible, just like Master Haru. I shall live forever,
a life free of pain.”

  “You’re insane,” I said. “I saw what happens to people who get completely Infected. They lose their minds and become monsters.”

  “Only if they are weak,” Kuwabara said with a sneer. “The strong, however, are able to resist the drug’s negative side effects and become immortal and invincible masters over the dead. This is why we follow Master Haru, for he has promised to give us a world without pain.”

  I could barely believe what I was hearing. What sort of person would willingly Infect themselves with the Z-Virus? If I hadn’t just seen Kuwabara rip his own arm off like that or his ugly, zombie-like face, I wouldn’t have believed him. Yet I couldn’t deny the evidence standing right before my own eyes. I now wondered exactly what I had gotten myself into.

  “Master Haru lied to you,” I said as I put the Z-Virus bottle in my item inventory with the intent of properly disposing of it later. “You might think you will get to live in a world without pain, but in reality, you’re just going to lose your mind and become a shell of your former self. Seems to me your master is building an army of immortal soldiers who will mindlessly do whatever he says rather than a world free of pain.”

  “You do not understand Master Haru,” said Kuwabara with a growl. “Or what he promised us. Not that I am surprised, however. You have been fed lies by the Ninja Guild, lies which have poisoned your mind. Therefore, there is only one way to deal with you.”

  Kuwabara raised his remaining knife. “I will butcher you like a cow. And then, I will butcher the rest of your allies as well and present their bodies to Master Haru as an example of my loyalty to his cause.”

  Kuwabara jumped into the air and brought his butcher knife down on me. I Dodged at the last second, however, causing Kuwabara’s butcher knife to slam into the concrete floor of the warehouse. Skidding to a stop, I fired an Ice Beam at Kuwabara, but he did a back flip and easily avoided it. He landed on top of a nearby crate and, tossing his knife into the air, drew about six throwing stars from his pockets and hurled them at me.

  I Dodged nearly all of them except for one, which cut my left cheek and knocked a couple of points off my Health bar. I responded with another Ice Beam, but I didn’t aim it at him this time. Instead, I aimed it at the crate he stood upon.

  The crate exploded, sending chunks of wood flying everywhere. The explosion also sent Kuwabara flying through the air, but he reached out, grabbed a chain hanging from the ceiling, and swung in a circle a couple of times before letting go and flying toward at shocking speeds. His feet slammed into my chest and sent me staggering as Kuwabara backflipped off my chest and landed before me. Without missing a beat, Kuwabara drew another, slimmer knife from his belt and slashed at me.

  But I summoned an Ice Dagger at the last second and blocked his knife. The two of us exchanged blows, his knife attempting to stab me, while I blocked his attacks as much as I could. Although my Ice Dagger was thick enough to take the repeated blows, the fact was that it still chipped wherever the knife struck. It meant my weapon was getting weaker and weaker, but I had no time to think about that in the face of Kuwabara’s intense onslaught of attacks.

  Then Kuwabara suddenly lunged at me, his knife thrust out before him. I blocked his attack again, but this time Kuwabara pushed down on me with surprising strength, his eyes gleaming with bloodlust as he pushed against me.

  “Do you really think you can handle me?” asked Kuwabara. “As an Undead, I have limitless Stamina. And I can already tell you are starting to run out of yours.”

  Kuwabara wasn’t wrong. Although my Stamina was still about half full, it had definitely dropped quite a bit during the battle. I wasn’t sure why, but assumed it had to do with the Z-Virus infecting me. Perhaps one of the side effects was that it weakened my Stamina or something.

  In any case, I needed to end this fight quickly. Yet as long as Kuwabara pressed down on me, I couldn’t do much except try to hold him back. And, as we already established, I couldn’t hold him back forever. Soon my Stamina would run out and Kuwabara would be able to finish me off. Somehow, I needed to be able to hit him hard in a way he didn’t expect.

  I thrust my empty left hand out and activated Ice Dagger again. At first, I got an error message informing me I couldn’t use two Ice Daggers at once, but I ignored it and focused intensely on summoning another one. That was when I felt coldness began generating in my hand and a split second later, a second Ice Dagger, identical to the first, appeared in my free hand. A notification appeared at the same time, but I ignored it in order to focus on my current situation.

  With a yell, I stabbed the second Ice Dagger into and through Kuwabara’s remaining arm. Specifically, I aimed for his elbow, driving my weapon into his elbow as hard as I could. The Ice Dagger cut cleanly through Kuwabara’s elbow, neatly severing the forearm from the upper arm in one swift motion.

  Kuwabara cried out in surprise as his knife hand fell to the floor. Without any pressure forcing me down anymore, I lunged forward and stabbed Kuwabara not in the chest, but in the head, his Weak Point, with both Ice Daggers. The twin Ice Daggers slammed into Kuwabara’s eyes and I heard an ugly pop as his eyeballs exploded in his skull, followed by what sounded like a squelching sound in his head as my knives pierced his brain.

  I yanked my Ice Daggers out of Kuwabara’s head and took several steps backward. If Kuwabara’s face had looked ugly before, it was downright disgusting now, with the fluid from his popped eyeballs running down his cheeks like some grotesque type of tears. Considering I was using Kids Mode, I wondered how he must have looked uncensored.

  For a moment, I expected Kuwabara to keep fighting, but then he collapsed onto the floor in a pile of flesh and bones. A new notification popped up as soon as that happened:

  [Undead Stalking Shadow Kuwabara] has been defeated! +1,500 EXP!

  Level up! You are now Level 26. You have earned 4 Stat Points and 2 Power Points. Points can be distributed anytime by going to your character sheet in your main menu! EXP to next level: 15,983.

  I smiled at the notification. It was good to level up again, although I thought Kuwabara’s EXP was kind of low. Probably Kids Mode again. I couldn’t wait until it was lifted and my EXP gain was not halved anymore.

  At the same time, however, I noticed another notification that had popped up during the battle which I had ignored:

  New Skill unlocked: Dual-Wielding [Level 1]. You can now wield two weapons at once, although the damage inflicted by each individual weapon is half as strong as using one. Level up this Skill further to increase the power of both weapons and use weapons other than knives effectively.

  Before I could fully process that particular notification, a new one popped up which read:

  Power Ice Dagger upgraded to Dual-Wielding Ice Dagger. Now you can summon and wield two Ice Daggers at once, although individual Ice Daggers are less durable as a result. Cost: 1 Energy for 1 Ice Dagger, 2 Energy for 2 Ice Daggers.

  Wait a minute. Since when could I upgrade Powers? Cy certainly hadn’t mentioned that to me. Nor did Funky, for that matter. I didn’t even recall seeing it mentioned on the Forums, but maybe I just hadn’t been paying attention. It was something I’d have to look deeper into later.

  In any case, I had at least managed to kill Kuwabara. It was a disgusting way for a person to go, but I didn’t feel too sorry for him. He was deliberately spreading a dangerous virus to people for no purpose other than to make his organization richer. He reminded me of the drug cartels back in Texas, only the Z-Virus was far worse than even the most dangerous real-world drugs.

  My thoughts were interrupted by a loud, feminine scream coming from the center of the warehouse. It sounded like Aimi.

  Remembering what Kuwabara had said about his fellow guards returning, I immediately rushed back the way I came, hoping against hope I would get back to the center of the warehouse in time to save my allies from the Stalking Shadows.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Upon reaching the center of the warehouse
again, I found a full-on battle raging. On one side was Riku, who was fighting four Stalking Shadows at once. Although the Agility of the Stalking Shadows was amazing to behold, Riku somehow managed to keep up with their various attacks, doing all sorts of weird twists and tricks that looked incredibly unnatural but which helped him avoid their attacks neatly and easily.

  On the other side, however, was Aimi. She was surrounded by half a dozen Stalking Shadows, who surrounded her like a bunch of hyenas going in for the kill. Although Aimi was defending herself better than I expected her to, she had more nicks and wounds on her than Riku, which told me that she was being overwhelmed by the Stalking Shadows. I didn’t see Cy anywhere, which I thought was weird, but I pushed such thoughts out of my mind for now in order to focus on saving Aimi and Riku.

  “Hero Winter!” Riku suddenly called out in between dodges. “Save Miss Aimi! I am currently unable to aid her!”

  I nodded in response and rushed toward Aimi. The Stalking Shadows who were trying to kill her did not seem to have noticed my arrival yet, so when I stabbed one of them in the back with my Ice Daggers, his cry of surprise was real. But he immediately whirled around and tried to slash me, forcing me to Dodge the attack that surely would have opened up my chest.

  My arrival was finally noticed by the Stalking Shadows. Half of them broke off from the group surrounding Aimi to attack me, while the other half continued to surround and attack her. That wasn’t good, but I figured that three Stalking Shadows were easier to handle than six.

  In any case, I Scanned the guys who came after me and discovered that all six of them were Undead like Kuwabara, although unlike Kuwabara, their title was [Undead Stalking Shadow Guards]. That meant the outside guys had either failed to distract them or had been killed outright. Thinking about how Kuwabara’s lips had been red with the blood of the ninja he killed, I didn’t even want to think about what grisly fate the other Ninja Guild members had suffered at the hands of Kuwabara’s allies.