by Shawn Wyatt
I sat up and blinked as my eyes adjusted to the darkness inside the wagon. "Thanks for the update."
Evey slept against the side of the wagon, her body curled into a tight ball. Boris slumbered under her, his snores interrupted with a snort every so often. I reached over and set a hand on her shoulder.
She sprang into a crouch and drew her dagger, eyes wide with fright. "Hey, it's just me," I said. "We've stopped for a little while. Figured I'd wake you if you wanted to stretch."
Evey took a deep breath and sheathed her weapon. "Sorry. I don't wake well."
"Noted. Good thing it was me that woke you and not the driver." She glared at me. Through it all, Boris had not woken. He rolled onto his back, huffed, and swiped a paw at something in a dream. I watched in fascination. "I wish I could sleep as well as that bear."
"Not much bothers him, does it?"
"I'm not sure anything does." I jumped out of the wagon and stretched my legs, then looked for a tree out of instinct. At that moment, I became aware of something I had not yet realized: I had no biological urges. I looked to Evey. Her mouth twitched in something that resembled a smirk.
"You look confused," she said.
"Yeah, you could say that." I didn't know how to broach the subject. "Do you feel no need to use the bathroom?"
"No. Why should we?" She dropped to the ground. "No other full-dive game requires that level of realism."
"I know, but--"
"But this isn't like any other game, is it?" Evey sighed. "The CHIP can override almost everything in the brain except biological needs. If you need to use the bathroom in reality, you'll feel the urge in this world."
Elements began to fall into place. "Time moves at the same speed here. It's been a bit over a day since we were stuck here. Shouldn't we have felt something?"
"Not if someone inserted a catheter," Evey said. "I assume most players have been hospitalized by now."
"My family would have found me," I said. "What about you?"
She shook her head. "I live alone. But I don't feel ill. It's possible that once authorities realized what happened, they traced the CHIP connections and hospitalized anyone still logged in."
We sat in silence a moment. The idea sobered me.
The nap had helped settle me. Until that point, my mind had swung like a pendulum between the thrill of adventure and utter, abject terror at the situation. The real world seemed so far away. Maybe that was the point of all of this. If players accepted life in Perla Online as reality, how many would come to prefer it to the real thing?
If Evey was right and we had been hospitalized, our minds could remain stuck within this world for an indefinite amount of time. Our bodies would be kept alive by the hospital.
A strong gust of wind rustled the trees around us. The driver came around to the back of the wagon. "I think it's best we make camp now," he said. "There's rain on the wind. Storm's coming this way."
His words broke me from my reverie. "What do you need me to do?"
"Load up. There's a spot just ahead that I've camped at before. Tall trees, good shelter from the wind."
I leapt into the wagon, then turned and offered Evey a hand. "We'll get out of here," I whispered. "We just have to win."
She nodded.
The driver urged the elk-creatures forward and guided them from the road into a clearing. He then untethered them and led the first to a tree on one side of the clearing and the second to a tree opposite the first. "They serve as alerts," he said. "No mistaking their squeals when danger is around."
Boris woke and jumped from the wagon. He sniffed around the clearing and the tree line. The driver nodded in appreciation at his efforts, then drew a bundle of wood from the wagon and arranged it in the center of the clearing. "You any good with fire?"
"You need to start a fire?"
"Magical fire," he said. "I have a fire starter, but it has limited uses, and these are expensive for folk like me. I know that fancy flintlock of yours can shoot fire, so if you wouldn't mind?"
Hammond had supplied us with basic supplies before we left, but Caster Shells were not easy to come by. He had given me nine. I loaded one into the gun and fired. The flames hit the bundle of wood and grew three times as large. The light from the fire scattered shadows and cast a warm glow over the entire clearing.
The driver grinned. "These logs are issued to all travelers leaving Grenay. The flames emit a barrier like the one that protects Grenay. Keeps all sorts of baddies out of the campsite. We'll be able to sleep peacefully here without worry. Once we build a shelter for the flame, anyway."
"The barrier doesn't keep out the rain?"
The driver laughed. "No, the powers that be grow angry when we interfere with nature. While these flames are magical, they aren't magical enough to avoid being extinguished by rain."
I spent the next few minutes helping the driver build a makeshift shelter to stop the rain from dousing our campfire. The first few drops began to fall while we cinched the last piece of wood in place. Our group crawled up into the wagon, Boris included, and called it a night.
It didn't take long for sleep to claim me once more. The CHIP caused mental fatigue if used for an extended length of time, and it would take several days before my brain adjusted to constant, full immersion in a virtual world.
The storm passed during the night. I woke to dew-soaked grass and the sound of birds. The fire burned strong even though a part of the shelter had collapsed due to the wind. The flames licked at the wood, but did not ignite it. The driver had hitched the animals to the wagon before I woke, and now stood in front of the flames and warmed his hands.
He heard me approach. "The fire warms but doesn't burn. It's vulnerable to water, but won't spread in the wind." The driver turned and tore a chunk from the trail-bread he ate and offered it to me. "These logs are a blessing for couriers like myself."
I nibbled at the bread. Its texture resembled that of cinder blocks--and the flavor did too. "I've never seen anything like it," I said.
The driver laughed. "Not many people have, boy. That's what makes them so special. You won't find them anywhere except Toris. Come on, let's load up. The town's awaiting."
We set out once more for the cluster of villages. No more than a few hours' journey, said the driver. He was right.
It didn't take us long to find it.
The scent of burnt wood and scorched earth reached us before the smoke. The villages came into view, lit by ghostly blue flames. Everything lay in ruins. Even from the crest of the hill, I saw corpses scattered throughout the villages.
And in the blue flames, shadows began to move.
CHAPTER SEVEN: WITHERING
The driver pulled hard on the reigns. The elk-creatures neighed in distress and stopped short in the road. Their hooves kicked up clouds of dust that obscured the flames even more. The sound of the wagon attracted the attention of whatever creatures lurked in the shadows. Shapes that looked like heads--I couldn't tell through the haze--turned toward the group.
I leapt from the wagon. "Run!" I shouted. The driver didn't to be told twice. He turned the wagon around in impressive time and bolted up the road. Evey stood beside me. Boris took a protective stance in front of the two of us, head down, fangs out. He snarled at the creatures.
It didn't take them long to emerge from the flames. At the sight of them, a part of me wished they had stayed hidden. Rabbits the size of dogs lurched forward, their gait uneven. Chunks of skin and flesh sloughed from their bodies onto the ground and sizzled where it landed.
"What kind of creature is that?" Evey murmured, her bow already in hand.
"No idea." I focused on the beasts, but their name and HP gauge wavered. The name was clear, however: Withered Rabbits. A small icon next to their name displayed a status effect I had not seen before: Withering. I drew my pistol and loaded a Caster Shell. Freezing Shot would slow the rabbits down and give us more time to attack them before they reached us. "Hold Boris back," I said. "Don't let him bit
e them."
Evey looked surprised, then nodded. "I'd hate for him to turn into one of those things."
I fired. Instead of the usual belch of flame, a shard of ice burst from the barrel and buried itself in the ground. A ring of frost and icy tendrils spread from the impact point over the surface of the road. The rabbits paused, their glares focused on the road, and then advanced once more.
The creatures staggered over the ice, forced to pick their movements carefully lest they slip. Evey murmured something under her breath and let fly an arrow. It arced through the air and pierced one of the rabbits. The beast fell to the ground, still.
I fired another bullet, this time with no magical properties. Its impact all but disintegrated the target. Nothing more than the lower half of a torso and two feet remained.
Evey made a noise of disgust. "I understand the creators wanted realism, but this is a bit much." She peppered another rabbit with arrows and brought it down. The entire group of enemies only took a few minutes to defeat. Corpses littered the road, but the moment I approached the fallen creatures, their bodies vanished into dust. Not even blood remained.
"What just happened?" I asked.
"I don't know. Maybe it's that status ailment they had. Withering? I've never seen anything like that in a game before."
"Me either." The fight had been too easy. I looked ahead. Larger shadows still moved in the flames. "Let's go. Those rabbits didn't destroy the village."
We moved forward, every sense on high alert. I scanned the underbrush on either side of the road for any hint of danger. The crackle of the flames was the only sound I heard. The silence unsettled me. I heard no voices--not even screams or whimpers.
The monster came from nowhere. An ape, one arm reduced to nothing but bone, emerged from behind one of the huts. It bellowed a challenge and charged forward, shrugging off the bullets and arrows that hit its skin. I rolled to the side.
The beast's momentum carried it several yards past me until it turned and pounded its chest. The clack of its skeletal hand against exposed ribs set my teeth on edge.
Withered Ape, level 8. Its HP gauge sat at 75%. All of the attacks it had taken hurt, but not enough to slow it down.
An additional icon blinked beside its nameplate. "I think it has a Berserk state," I said. "Damage won't have any effect. We just have to kill it."
"Happily," Evey said. She raised her bow and drew the string back as far as her arm could reach before she released it. A thunderclap followed the arrow. It flew true and penetrated all the way through the ape and embedded itself in a tree on the other side. "Heavy Draw," she said. "Takes longer to use, but has a high critical hit chance."
The attack took the creature by surprise. It hooted and scrabbled at the hole in its chest before it charged again.
I lined up my shot. Another Caster Shell. This would be the third of the nine I had in stock. The bullet fired with a crackle of lightning as electricity writhed around the ape. Its body locked up and it tumbled to the ground.
Boris lunged at the beast and eliminated any HP that remained with vicious swipes of his claws.
Just as before, the Withered Ape vanished upon death. No trace of its body remained. Not even loot.
Evey knelt beside where the creature had fallen. "I need those claws and nails to make arrows," she said. "We have to find enemies that don't vanish on death."
"Yeah," I said. "I wonder if these monsters have something to do with that necromancer?"
Evey didn't answer. She had turned to face the flames behind us.
Little stood of the three villages. Most of the homes had burned to nothing. Bodies lay in the streets. Blood pooled around doorways. The bodies of the villagers had been mangled by the monsters. The rabbits had a taste for flesh. Soft tissue and been eaten away like something out of a zombie flick.
I fought down a wave of nausea and felt more grateful for a strong stomach than I ever had.
Evey leaned against a wall and retched. I handed her a canteen with water. "Thanks," she said. She wiped her mouth with the back of her sleeve. "This is too much. Too realistic."
"It is real," I said. "This is the world we're in. Until we get out of here, this is our reality. Although I do wonder if the game would have been this realistic before the changes were made to it."
We heard the child crying at the same time.
Evey and I glanced at each other and sprinted into the smoldering village. Monsters be damned, I thought. We found the girl in the crook of a house. She could have been no more than ten years old, if that. The soot on her face made it impossible to get a good read on her age.
The girl stared at us with wide eyes, fright heavy on her face. "It's okay," Evey said. "You're safe now. We'll protect you." The child looked over Evey' shoulder and her eyes grew wider. She made a terrified noise in her throat--and then fell unconscious. Boris leaned over Evey and sniffed at the girl. "Looks like you were too much for her, big guy. Don't worry. She'll come around to you once she gets to know you."
Boris huffed.
"She might have thought Boris was another Withered creature. Let's get her out of here," I said. "It doesn't look like there are any other survivors." Or any trace of the attackers, I thought. If the creatures all had the Withering debuff, they would vanish when killed. Maybe they vanished after a certain amount of time, anyway. Withered away.
Evey set the girl on Boris' back and led the way out of the village. I stayed back and guarded their retreat, but no more monsters appeared. At the gates of the village, I paused and looked back at the destruction. How could this happen? Game or not, this level of destruction belonged in a war zone, not in a peaceful cluster of villages.
The driver pulled the wagon forward when he saw the girl. He met my eyes, and his question was obvious in his gaze. His shoulders slumped at the shake of my head.
The journey back to Grenay passed with no further incident. We rode through the night, eager to return to the safety of the city and to leave behind that field of death.
No one spoke. No one wanted to. I shook my head and tried to scatter the gloom that hung over me, but what hope I had begun to feel had vanished, replaced by a sense of hopelessness.
Even if I knew this was a game and none of the people we had met so far were real, the NPCs all had personalities. Each and every one of them acted like their own person. In this world of blurred reality and false lives, who was I to say which lives mattered and which didn't?
Hammond met us at the gates. The man looked as though he had not slept since we left, and his eyes widened when he saw the girl. We had tried to clean her up a bit, but the grime and dirt had been more than we could remove with our limited water supplies. The poor girl had slept through the night and even now dozed, little disturbed by the voices around her. Who knew how long it had been since she had felt safe?
Hammond gestured to some of the men nearby. "Take her. See to it she gets a proper bath and someone to care for her."
He turned to us. It looked as though he had aged ten years in an instant.
"Thank you for your efforts," he said. The fatigue in his voice hit me like a punch to the gut. "I appreciate what you did, even if no one else could be saved. I'll take the girl in, give her a home. You have room and board waiting for you at the inn. I've covered your expenses for the week. Take the time. Rest. And let me know if there is anything you need."
"Thank you. And," my voice trailed off. "And I'm sorry."
He stared in the direction of the villages for a long moment, and then walked away without another word. I turned toward the wagon. Evey had given our driver some gold by way of thanks. She raised an eyebrow when I looked at her. "No more quests today," she said. "I'm going to find a very stiff drink and then sleep."
"Agreed," I said. Nothing could have sounded better in that moment.
CHAPTER EIGHT: BASTION
I lay in bed for a long time after waking. I didn't remember falling asleep the night before.
I didn't actually
remember going to bed at all.
After Evey and went to the inn to eat and rest. I stayed at the bar long after she had gone to upstairs to sleep.
The inn's sweet ale soothed a pain I couldn't place. I must have downed four tankards or more before I called it a night. I lay still, because I knew the moment I moved the hangover would strike with the force of an assassin's bullet.
The pillow struck the perfect balance between firm and soft under my head and the sheets slid like silk over my skin. I had not felt such an inviting bed in a long time.
Not even my bed in the real world felt this good.
Of course, the experience could have been enhanced by its comparison to the previous nights' sleep in a wagon and the night before that in a tree. Nights spent in discomfort made those passed in luxury all the better.
I roused myself and got out of bed. I swore it called out to me as I stood, but a more enticing mistress called my name. I ignored the ache that started at the base of my skull and wormed its way behind my eyes.
The smell of fresh bread wafted up from the floor below, and the painful clench of my stomach reminded me just how long ago dinner had been. Robust conversation and the clatter of plates told me the inn had quite a few people dining in it already. If I wanted any shot at breakfast, I needed to hurry.
I slipped on my clothing and made my way downstairs. The atmosphere felt lighter and less hopeless than it had the day before. I spied several players among the crowd, though most of the patrons were NPCs. Still, even a few players were a welcome sight. The more people that decided to embrace this world, the shorter we could make our stay here.
One of the players stood out from the rest. The man sat at the bar, his attention on the tankard of ale in front of him. I glanced at the candle on the wall. It had burned down only three marks. Since the candles were replaced every six hours, that put the time somewhere just after 9 AM.
A palpable cloud of anger hovered around the man. He wore the clothes and equipment of a Prophet of Truth, one of the healer classes, but he carried a broadsword. Flames danced around the blade. Although any class could, in theory, use any weapon, it didn't make sense for a caster to carry a sword that size. He should never be close enough to put it to use.
