Chapter 222: The Wrath of the Forgotten

  As daylight finally arrived and chased away what was, in all honesty, the worst stretch of night that Zach had ever known, he sat up in his sleeping bag, feeling groggy and unrested. His entire body felt rundown and exhausted. He was confused and in disarray. His morale, which had peaked yesterday afternoon, had now plummeted to near hopelessness. And with it all came the unavoidable question: Am I okay?

  His hands feeling clammy, he wiped them on his bare chest. Then he crawled on his knees over to where both of his bags were now situated, along with all of his personal belongings, including his extra toothbrush, extra bottles of water, canned food, and several carefully wrapped cartons of farm-fresh eggs, which could last more than three weeks uncooked even while unrefrigerated.

  Everything is still here, he thought. Both bags. Not one: both. I brought both. I knew I did.

  A sensation made of pure unease traveled through him, one that amplified his overall state of desperation and despair. The things he’d seen yesterday…he could not explain them. But they left him feeling sick and weak. And what made it all so much worse was this sense in the back of his mind that he wasn’t crazy despite knowing full well that he must be.

  Jascaila taught me to be honest with myself, he thought. So why do I feel like this…this one isn’t on me.

  There really were only two possibilities here: either Zach’s mind had made him see, hear, feel, and even smell things that weren’t real, or Zach had genuinely observed such inexplicably horrifying phenomena in reality. Clearly, it was the former. And while he may not have understood why or from what cause his mind had begun conjuring such delusions, it was only logical to assume that he’d had some kind of “episode” in the tower yesterday that had triggered all those nightmarish hallucinations that had completely ruined his day.

  But now I’m all right. Aren’t I?

  He looked around. The world was as it should be, though it was gloomier than desired. The island had at last descended below the clouds in Plains of Mist, and so aside from some fogginess, there was ample humidity in the air, creating a damp sensation over just about everything, including his skin and his belongings. Above, the sun was nothing more than a vague outline hidden mostly behind thick grey patches of rainclouds.

  Gods, he thought as he rubbed his face, his eyes, and his nose. What the hell was that? What is wrong with me and why?

  He thought back on what he’d experienced, hoping to remember it from a different perspective or to glean some kind of insight. Maybe he had actually seen something but had merely misunderstood what he’d been experiencing. Such things were not uncommon, after all.

  Three years ago, when Zach’s dad and Eldora had gone out drinking one night, Whispery Woods had experienced a brief, twenty-minute power outage. During this, Kalana had pounded on his apartment door, shouting for him. She’d been freaking out, claiming there was a ghost in her kitchen. Naturally, Zach had rolled his eyes at her, yet upon reluctantly following her back to her apartment, there had been just a very brief moment where he’d thought she might be right.

  “See?” she’d shouted, grabbing his shoulders and hiding behind him.

  “Wh-what the fuck?” he recalled exclaiming as he entered.

  In the middle of her kitchen was some kind of creature with a round head and a flowing body, and it had appeared to be floating into the living room.

  Yet, a moment before Zach fully joined in on Kalana’s terror, the power returned, and the lights came back on. Instantly, what had at first looked like a supernatural entity quickly revealed itself to be nothing more than a jacket on her father’s coat rack, which had been blown across the room due to a draft from a window Kalana had accidentally left open. The brake on the wheels had malfunctioned, causing the coat rack to roll around the apartment floor. In the dark, this had made it look like something it wasn’t.

  Maybe that was all that had happened to him yesterday.

  But I heard voices, too. I heard laughter. I saw blood flooding out of the walls. And that hand that grabbed me. And the maggots and the worms. It was too much to just be some optical illusion.

  Shaking his head, Zach reluctantly tossed aside the possibility that he had merely observed something incorrectly. That was just too far a stretch. It was also what he wanted to be true. No, his original two possibilities were really the only ones: he’d either seen and heard those things, or he’d suffered some kind of mental crisis.

  And only the latter option made sense.

  Thus, assuming that what he’d seen wasn’t real, it then became a question of why it had happened and what was wrong with him. And for this, Zach had no answer. At least none that made any sense.

  Maybe…maybe it was from all the damage I took in the last few days. Or maybe it’s trauma from getting burned to a crisp.

  Unable to come up with any plausible explanation, Zach became frustrated. Eventually, he settled on something unsatisfying but necessary—the fact that it probably didn’t matter. No, all that mattered was getting over it and moving on. He had work to do here, and he intended to do it. Hopefully, nothing like that would ever happen again, and in time, he’d forget it had ever happened at all. But for the moment, at least, he needed to simply accept it and move on.

  If it happens again, I’ll consider turning back. But for now, I pick myself up and keep going. I came here with a purpose, and I can’t forget that!

  Feeling a small, but very much needed return of his resolve, Zach got up into a standing position and turned to face the tower. Clad in nothing but his underwear and his recently looted boots, he picked his sword and scabbard up off the grass and secured it to his back with a strap that went over his shoulder, and then he raised his hand above his head and called upon Bank and Storage, which he used to retrieve the three healing stones he’d quickly stowed away yesterday; the remainder of them were in one of his bags. He also grabbed his new sword from out of the box, deciding to take a look at it before heading off.

  Appearing in his raised hand, he dismissed Bank and Storage and then gave the weapon a look-over. His mood elevated ever so slightly as his thoughts turned from yesterday’s horrors to appreciating this new weapon. It was a rapier with a looped, decorative grip, and the entirety of the weapon looked like it was made from ice. It also left behind a small, misty trail of a snowy, watery mix wherever the bladed edge of it moved through the air. In addition to the sword itself, the level-65, red-haired mob had also dropped an accompanying hip holster.

  Tapping his shoulder three times, Zach went to his inventory and inspected this new item.

  (Epic Rare): Frozen Blade of the Mystics: discovered by Zachys Calador

  Level-62 Spell Sword

  +100 physical attack damage

  +800 magical attack damage

  +11 dex

  +14 int

  +11% ice damage

  +11% ice resistance

  Enables Spell Cast

  (300 seconds): target takes 200% increased damage from magical, ice-based spells and abilities for 15 seconds (user only)

  200 range.

  Reading over the item’s description, Zach’s mood perked up just a tiny bit more, as he’d actually been wanting a staff, spell sword, or other weapon capable of using magic, and now, he’d gotten one. And even if he ended up finding no use for it in combat, it certainly didn’t hurt to merely have it equipped, for as long as it remained either in his hand or sheathed by his hip, he would get a free 11 points into dexterity and 14 points into intelligence.

  Actually…come to think of it, how come he’d never before bothered to equip a weapon or shield in his secondary weapon slot just to make use of the free stats? There really wasn’t any reason not to do so.

  From now on, I should always try to have every equipment slot filled, even if it’s a piece of equipment I don’t need.

  With the sword sheathed by his right hip, Zach took another look at his stats.

  Zachys Calador: Level 29

  (103577/1240000xp)

  Armor Bonus: 11

  197 strength

  198 dexterity

  160 constitution

  272 intelligence

  160 speed

  37 luck

  He couldn’t believe how high his intelligence stat had become. And now, for the first time, he actually had a way of casting magic, though he only had a single usable spell, and a fairly common one at that. He’d gotten it with the same level-up that had catapulted him forward so fast that his stats now exceeded what a typical adventurer might have when leveling into their 60s or maybe even 70s.

  (Inner Ability) Flame Arrow II (Spell)

  Requires Spell Cast. User summons two flaming arrows, which fly at high speeds towards the user’s target, dealing magical fire damage. Flame Arrow II is affected by both fire and piercing resistance but is unaffected by bonuses to armor or physical damage. Exertion Level: Moderate-low. 300 range.

  Zach whistled appreciatively. Although he’d seen the spell used numerous times in the adventuring world, he’d never realized it had such a long range: 300. That was like the end-to-end distance of an entire sports field. And the exertion level was only Moderate-Low, meaning it required less of his stamina than his Wave Slash did.

  I used to daydream in school about how cool it would be to use magic, he thought. And now, I actually can.

  Crouching down in front of his bags, Zach looked around for his six cards. Last night, he’d very quickly placed them on top of one of his bags, though he’d done so haphazardly, having been troubled and distracted. At some point during the night, either due to a breeze or for some other reason, the stack of them had gotten knocked over, and now he had to pick each one of them up off the grass.

  “All right. Time to get back at it,” he said with an exhale that transformed into a yawn halfway through.

  Having slept so poorly, he was tempted to take a day’s rest and try to get more sleep. But he knew that he needed to get back at it right away, especially now that there was an element of fear weighing down upon him.

  And so, with steps that felt heavier than usual, he walked around the deceased, decaying boss, up the now very familiar twenty stone steps, and into the rectangular entrance of the tower, where it was now noticeably darker than it typically was in the morning. Since the entire place was lit exclusively by the light that traveled in from the glass viewing dome all the way at the top of the structure, the gloomy, foggy day made for a gloomier, darker tower.

  And that made Zach a bit nervous. And those nerves made him angry.

  You’re an eighteen-year-old man now, he told himself. You’re not some idiot kid afraid of the dark.

  Forcing himself onwards, he stepped around the destroyed, broken clock, which left pieces of glass, nuts, and bolts scattered all over the central atrium, and then he proceeded to head towards the partition, beyond which awaited the same level-60 Legion Portal Guardian that could always be found on the first floor.

  At the moment, Zach was holding his cards in his right hand and his three rejuvenation stones in his left. Leaning over, he placed the cards in a neat pile on the floor, then set the rejuvenation stones down next to them. With that, he faced the elite mob, eager to test out his fire spell.

  Do I need to physically draw the rapier in order to cast spells with it? Or is having it equipped enough?

  To test this, he mentally activated Flame Arrow II—and absolutely nothing happened.

  That answers my question, I guess.

  Reaching across to his right hip with his left hand, he drew his new weapon, and merely the act of unsheathing it and holding it up at the ready caused a trail of icy vapor that led from his right side up to the front of his face, though it faded in less than a second. Now, with his opposite hand, he drew his Primordial Void Blade from the scabbard on his back.

  I’m dual-wielding, he realized, his stance wide with both swords raised parallel to one another. Feels weird.

  Once again, Zach activated Flame Arrow II while targeting the Legion Portal Guardian. As it did with certain abilities, his body moved all on its own. His left, rapier-wielding hand made two quick swipes back and forth across the air as he chanted aloud, “Val En Flamir Arr!”

  Two small rings of fire materialized in the air in front of his body at around chest height, and as though these rings served as portals, a reddish, arrow-shaped flame emerged from within each, firing out at great speed towards the elite Orcish mob; both rings then vanished the moment the arrows had exited, leaving behind not even so much as a puff of smoke. Now, Zach watched as the arrows made of flame struck the Orcish elite mob at the exact same time in the chest.

  The moment of impact, the arrows released a bright flare of orange light, then vanished, and in the same instant, the Orc opened its mouth as if to shout out its typical Orcish cry before charging. Yet it ended up saying nothing at all, as the force from the impact caused it to stumble a half-dozen steps in the opposite direction, with the first arrow striking for 151,200 damage, and the second hitting for an additional 139,207. They also left behind two dark-black scorch marks on the Orc’s exposed chest, along with dual trails of blood that ran down and over its tribal markings.

  Wow, that hits hard, Zach thought, smiling. The sight of the level-60 Orcish elite struggling to regain its footing made Zach feel powerful, and that feeling of power helped reduce the fear from yesterday. He was starting to feel a bit better.

  “Val En Flamir Arr!” he shouted again, letting the Orc have some more.

  Another two arrows made of pure fire struck the Orc, dealing somewhere around another 300k damage and knocking it flat onto its back. At the same time, Zach’s breathing increased, but only slightly. Going off feeling alone, the two Moderate-Low Exertion Costs sort of felt to him like one Moderate did—such as whenever he used a Wave Slash. Maybe slightly less. It was hard to tell for sure, as he’d definitely increased his stamina since coming here.

  It's strong and not overly taxing, Zach thought, becoming pleased. I’m definitely going to make good use of it in the future.

  As the Orc picked itself back up, Zach sheathed his two swords, then crouched down and grabbed his cards off the floor. Returning to an upright standing position, he began activating Card Summon one after the next, managing to get four of the six Legion Portal Guardians out just in the time it took the enemy elite Orc to scramble back to its feet and charge at him with both its axes raised.

  It never made it to him.

  “Krest zencht harganar!” his four cards shouted.

  “Krest zencht harganar!” his other two shouted a moment later, having been summoned right after.

  For good measure, Zach also summoned his Kralzek’s Beast, and then he simply stood back and let his small force of Orcs and his saber-toothed cat get to work. Observing them was difficult, however, as the seven of them crowded around and surrounded the enemy Orcish elite such that Zach could barely see what was happening. All he saw was flailing axes and a biting set of teeth along with the occasional spray of blood.

  It didn’t last long.

  The Orcish elite died moments later, his own mobs barely sustaining a scratch, earning Zach an easy, but extremely reduced +9000xp. And as it faded away into tiny grains of sand, the typical rumbling came from the walls around Zach on this side of the partition as the step-like, flattish slabs of stone began sliding out from the walls in a circle that wrapped around the tower twice before leading up to the second floor.

  Eager to keep things moving along, Zach bent down and grabbed his three healing stones, and then he began ascending up to the second floor, hopping from one stone platform to the next. But he stopped when he was halfway up, having forgotten that his cards had issues climbing these things. He remembered the way that they’d run around and around in a circle yesterday, requiring him to dismiss and resummon them one floor up.

  With a sigh, Zach turned around to recall them with Card Dismiss—but then he stopped, confused.

  All six, along with his war-mount, were easily making their way up with him. His Kralzek’s Beast, along with two of the Orcs, were on the platform right behind and closest to him, and the other four cards were bunched together on the one just below that.

  What in the hell? he wondered. These things weren’t able to climb yesterday. Or did I just imagine that, too?

  The feeling of uneasiness from before returned, driven by the painful realization that Zach was having trouble distinguishing what was and wasn’t real. It was…very disturbing. Yet with a shake of his head, Zach forced those troubling thoughts away and proceeded upwards to the second floor, where three elite enemies awaited him. Once there, he immediately gave the order to attack the two Legion Portal Guardians and the beautiful, red-haired female mob, which stood in front of the blocked-off exit.

  Zach sent two of his Orcs at Legion Portal Guardian A, two after Legion Portal Guardian B, and two at the as-of-yet unnamed, red-haired, and level-65 elite spellcaster. He also sent his Kralzek’s Beast to her as well.

  “Krest zencht harganar!” cried both friend and foe alike as six allied Orcs and two enemy Orcs lunged at one another.

  Just as it had done on their previous two encounters, the female mob acted first, and it once again managed to utilize crowd control while doling out serious damage to one of Zach’s cards, disabling it in the process and encasing it in ice while his Kralzek’s Beast and another of his cards charged at her. His other four cards reached their targets without issue, however, and immediately began trading blows.

  And so began the fight.

  As grunts and the sound of swinging axes filled the air, Zach hurried over to the red-haired, rapier-wielding mob in the hope of adding some extra damage. But he stopped himself before crossing half the distance. Abruptly, he recalled what had happened to him here yesterday; specifically, he remembered that it had been the act of moving in close to the red-haired elite mob and joining in on the attack that had set off whatever “event” his brain had triggered.

  What if it happens again? he thought nervously as he halted in place. Everything was going fine with me yesterday up until I tried slicing that beautiful mob’s head off with my sword. That was when all the weirdness and other shit started happening.

  For something that was almost certainly all in his head, he could remember the events with very vivid, lurid details. He had raised his sword high and had been about to bring it down on top of that mob, but just before he’d sliced her, he’d heard his own voice shouting about “Vim Alazar,” demanding to know the location of his guild-leader: words that Zach could actually remember shouting at a pleading, begging member of the Guild of Gentlemen.

  Those words I heard yesterday…they were my own words from my own memories.

  Right. He remembered now. Not that he’d ever really forgotten, but rather, he recalled in greater detail what he’d done and said that day. He remembered that there had been two soldiers: a girl and a guy. Zach had killed the girl, and then the guy had dropped his sword, surrendering. But Zach had killed him anyway despite his pleas for mercy, because Zach knew that, if he let the young man go, he’d alert his guild and compromise Zach’s mission.

  There had been no choice.

  So, this proves it’s all in my own head, right? he wondered. The voices I was hearing…they were my own and those of the people I killed. Was that whole thing yesterday just some kind of manifestation of my guilt?

  But if so, why now?

  Why all of a sudden?

  Was there something about that mob that had caused his “episode?” Was it possible it’d activated some latent trauma he wasn’t aware he had? Maybe she reminded him of someone he’d killed during the war: someone he couldn’t readily bring to mind but who he subconsciously remembered—or maybe it was just a total coincidence and had nothing to do with anything.

  He just didn’t know.

  Regardless, the last thing he wanted was a repeat of that. And so, deciding to hang back and do nothing, he instead backed away a bit and chose to simply watch as his two cards to his left and his two to his right double-teamed their lone opponent, killing them in around a minute while sustaining only moderate damage.

  +9000xp

  +9000xp

  As soon as their targets died, his four cards took off after the red-haired, rapier-wielding mob automatically and without Zach needing to command them. And so now, with five Orcish elites and a saber-toothed cat all crowding around and beating the female elite to death, Zach didn’t expect it to last very long. Especially since the ice encasing his sixth card finally cracked and shattered, freeing it and allowing it to join the others in their seven-versus-one beatdown.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  To her credit, the red-haired, level-65 elite mob managed to swing around her icy rapier and guard against a surprising number of axe strikes and even a few scratches and bites from the saber-toothed cat. But the sheer volume of attacks was far too much for her to overcome, and very rapidly, she was mauled and sliced until she resembled nothing more than a bloodied clump of flesh.

  As the female mob was savaged, Zach, relying on nothing more than luck, began mentally spamming Card Capture, hoping the red-haired human mob’s HP would be reduced to less than 5% without dying outright.

  Card Capture, he thought in his head, mentally activating the ability. Card Capture. Card Capture. Card Capture. Card Capture!

  She was getting closer and closer to death. Zach couldn’t imagine she had much HP remaining.

  As one of his six Orcish elites cracked the woman over the side of her face with its axe, the Orc standing closest to it made as if to bring its own, left-handed axe down on top of her skull as well.

  But she was saved.

  An instant before receiving what would surely have been a deathblow, the female mob collapsed into a white ball of light, which zipped across the open space to where Zach was already extending his hand, ready to grab his brand-new card as it flew into his waiting palm. And with that, the flat, but sturdy piece of stone blocking the exit began sliding out of the way all on its own, revealing a narrow passage into a stairway that almost certainly led up to the third floor.

  I got you this time, Zach thought victoriously to himself as he looked down at the card in his hand. Finally, he was able to learn the mob’s name.

  “Vixen Portal Commander,” the card stated at the top in white, bold lettering. Below these words was an illustration of the woman from the waist up, set amid a background of a crypt or some kind of tomb. The illustration seemed to prominently display her chest, which was framed by what Zach could still only think to call “boob armor.” The woman was making a sneaky grin and winking.

  Taking just a few seconds to appreciate the card's artwork, Zach activated Card Summon, sending forth his newly acquired “Vixen Portal Commander,” who appeared before him armed with the same icy rapier she’d dropped for him yesterday that he now had sheathed at his hip.

  As soon as he saw her, he took several steps closer then looked to his left and right nervously. Obviously, there was nothing to either side of him but stone walls. Still, he needed to be sure he was alone, so he looked back over his shoulder at the slab-like steps leading upwards, which remained vacant. Finally, he again faced forward.

  And then he did it. Because he was only human, Gods damn it.

  “I just…I just need to inspect your equipment, ma’am,” he said, reaching forward and removing her bronze, impractical chest armor in a disgusting but mentally necessary attempt to satisfy his curiosity.

  And yep. That confirmed it. She was fully “endowed” underneath. Everything was where it should be. And any guy all alone with no one around to judge him would have also looked, not just Zach. And anyone who said otherwise would be lying or just not into girls.

  Also—and let’s just be fair here—whatever Great One had made her this way had intentionally designed her to look and probably feel as real as a real human underneath the armor. That definitely wasn’t necessary. There was no reason they couldn’t have just made it so that there was nothing beneath. They chose to make her this way. So Zach definitely wasn’t the bad guy here.

  Still, if nothing else, Zach at least resisted the temptation to touch his non-sentient card, and so he put the boob armor back on the boobs. He also didn’t dare pull down her shiny black leather leggings to see what was beneath them, as that would clearly be going too far. Or…or maybe it wouldn’t if he just took a peek.

  “I am such a filthy animal,” he said with clear self-loathing as he pulled the front of her leggings forward and peeked inside. “Oh my Gods. It’s there. They gave her that, too.”

  His surprise faded quickly, however, and he frowned as a thought popped into his head, one that provided him with a great deal of clarity: enough so that he was able to immediately let go of her leggings and rid himself of any and all temptation to see or inquire further. And it was a simple thought, too—a basic one.

  What if the situation were reversed?

  Even though this was a non-sentient, non-biological entity, Zach imagined how he would feel if Kalana had the ability to capture mobs. How would he take it if she came across one that had a massive dong, and she started fawning over it? The very idea of it made him furious. He’d be so fucking angry with her. He wouldn’t care that it wasn’t “real” in that sense. So, yeah. Just that thought alone was enough for him to immediately lose every last hint of “curiosity” he had.

  Also, it was basically just an animated doll. How was this meaningfully any different than those lonely old creeps who ordered blowup dolls in the mail? Reminding himself of this, he realized his earlier views had been wrong. No, it wasn’t true that “any” guy would be curious. Only a guy like Zach in complete isolation with no one to talk to or socialize with.

  Riddled with self-disgust, Zach took his eyes off his newest card and instead put his attention on his six Orcish elites. He decided to quickly inspect each one to make a determination as to whether or not he should dismiss and resummon any of them for the purpose of restoring them to full HP.

  Since he couldn’t see HP at the moment, he would just have to estimate based on the visible, apparent level of damage. Thus, he mentally ordered each of his six Orcs to stand side by side in a line in front of him, and then he reveled in the feeling of power as all six high-level elites scrambled and then reformed in accordance with his bidding, their axes still dripping an endless supply of fake blood on the stone floor. Having complete and total control over these vicious mobs…it made his heart beat faster. There was something about it that filled him with a nervous energy.

  “Okay, let’s see what we’ve got,” he said aloud.

  He began with the leftmost Orc, but his attention did not linger on it long. The Orc had some scratches and scrapes and a missing piece of nose, but it didn’t look all that bad and probably wasn’t worth the exertion cost to heal. And so, content to leave it as it was, he set his gaze on the next Orc, finding that this one was in more or less the same condition as the previous.

  Yeah, it’s fine to keep going.

  Moving along, he regarded the third Legion Portal Guardian. This one was in a bit worse shape than the first two, but Zach wasn’t quite sure that it rose to a level where it needed to be dismissed and resummoned. And while it did have a deep, still-bleeding gash in its throat, it was very difficult to determine precisely how much missing HP that translated into.

  Zach looked upwards to inspect its forehead, which also had taken a deep hit. But as he did so, a feeling of wrongness and discomfort struck him, one that caused a nervous chill to travel down the back of his neck.

  What…the…?

  Something wasn’t right.

  He could feel it. He could feel it strongly.

  The mob…

  Was it staring at him?

  Zach shuddered as he looked directly into the Orc’s eyes. Something was very wrong with the way it was staring back. It wasn’t quite the look of sentience he’d learned to recognize, but it was something darker, more sinister, and alien in a sense.

  I’m losing my mind!

  Very quickly, he turned his head to the left, then right, glancing at his other cards to see if this was something they all did. But he quickly realized that, no, their eyes were vacant and empty. And technically, so too were the eyes of the Orc right in front of him. But there was just something different. Something in its pupils that made it seem deliberate in a way that he couldn’t really understand or explain.

  Ignore it, he thought. It’s all in your head. You’re imagining this!

  Yeah. He needed to ignore it.

  Zach proceeded to the next Orc, which looked back at him with its usual vacant, empty expression. This one was badly beaten. This had been the one the “Vixen Portal Commander” had encased in ice and then assaulted with sharp icicles. There were numerous holes all throughout its body, and it was missing an arm.

  Zach activated Card Dismiss, recalling the Orc and returning it to card form. The moment he did so, his heart began to race, and sweat glided down the sides of his face. He panted, feeling like he needed to sit down for a moment, though he forced himself to remain standing. For a few seconds, he closed his eyes and opened his mouth wider to take in more oxygen as he dealt with the worst of the exertion cost.

  “Whew,” he said with an exhale a bit later, reopening his eyes—to see the third Orc still staring directly at him in a way that felt all kinds of wrong. And was Zach imagining it, or was its head turning ever so slightly to look at him as he shifted down the row of Orcs?

  You’re imagining it! Ignore it! Pretend it’s not happening!

  Refusing to give in to whatever craziness was bouncing around his brain, he inspected the last Orc in the line, and very quickly, he determined that this one was also well enough off that it did not require healing. And so, with that, he activated Card Summon and sent out the one he’d just dismissed so that all six were out and ready to go. This, in addition to his Kralzek’s Beast and his Vixen Portal Commander, meant he had a fighting force now of eight NPCs.

  I want to keep going, he thought.

  Zach entered through the newly opened passageway ahead of him, which led to a more conventional stairwell rather than the platforms he’d had to hop his way up. A minute or so later, he emerged into a small, rounded room with only one exit that led to an extremely narrow hallway that cut across the entire length of the tower.

  At first, he had to duck to avoid hitting his head on the low ceiling, but then the ceiling gave way to openness as he passed beneath the central part of the tower, and for the moment, he could see the glass viewing dome all the way up above. But as he continued on, he was forced to duck low again.

  Carefully and cautiously, he traversed this narrow, enclosed pathway. Given the lack of space, if he ran into something dangerous, he wouldn’t be able to order his cards or his war-mount to attack, as they were in a single-file line behind him and would struggle to get around.

  Thankfully, the narrow passage widened considerably before letting out into a significantly larger, but also roundish room on the opposite side of the tower beneath an unlit chandelier. Stepping inside, he realized there was yet another exit being blocked off by another slab of stone, and just like on the previous floor, it would likely only grant him access once he killed everything here.

  “Seven of them this time,” he groaned. “This might be tough.”

  On this floor, there were three Legion Portal Guardians, two of the red-haired, rapier-wielding “Vixen Portal Commanders,” and now he saw that there were another two robed, staff-wielding, bald-headed human mobs, each being level-62 and whose names he did not know.

  Moving a bit farther inside, he ordered his seven cards and his Kralzek’s Beast to fan out to both sides of him, not wanting to aggro them just yet. He paused to consider whether or not this was a fight he could actually win. Although it would be eight versus seven—or nine if he got directly involved with the fighting—the Vixen Portal Commanders were more powerful than the Legion Portal Guardians, and he had no idea what the robed, staff-wielding mobs were or what they could do.

  Zach rubbed his chin as he thought on the best course of action. He could always just go back and make more cards.

  “Heh. Heh-heh-heh,” came the sound of a laugh from somewhere behind him.

  Zach felt his heart lurch in his chest. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. A moment of fear seized hold of him, and it momentarily brought him into a state of paralyzed shock.

  Was…was one of his cards laughing at him?

  “Heh. Heh-heh-heh.”

  Zach gritted his teeth. It wasn’t real. It wasn’t! He wasn’t going to acknowledge it. He was going to ignore it. The moment he treated it like it was real, it would surely become such. The absolute worst thing he could do right now would be to turn around and—

  Stop! he warned himself even as he looked over his shoulder.

  Then he felt the blood drain out of his face. His hands seemed to become cold. His heart began thumping mercilessly in his chest. That same Orc as before, the one with the forehead gash: it was smiling at him and staring right at him. Its eyes were definitely trained on Zach’s, meeting his deliberately.

  Not real. Not real. Not real! he screamed in his head, suddenly feeling sick. His knees became wobbly, and it was difficult for him to stand upright.

  Just carry on like nothing is happening. Ignore it! It’s in your head.

  “Heh. Heh-heh-heh.”

  Why was that one card and only that one card behaving this way? All of his other cards were acting as they should. It was just that one Orc with the forehead wound. Zach thought of dismissing it and resummoning it, but then he realized that, to do so, it would mean acknowledging what he was seeing and hearing, and that was the last thing he wanted to do.

  Actually, what he really wanted to do was go home.

  And that was not a positive thing to realize.

  I’m scared, he thought. Something is really fucked up here.

  *****

  A brief, but violent blast of light erupted in the middle of his office, yet Adamus was not surprised. No, he had expected this to happen. Of course he had. Of course she would come storming her way in here, demanding answers from him.

  “And here she comes,” Olandrin said with a sigh.

  The boyish, fun-loving Great One was standing upright and across from Adamus’s desk, but he quickly stepped to the side as the light faded; now, before them both, stood his beloved, Eilea Vayra. And she did not look pleased. Naturally, for her to actually teleport herself here, she must have been beside herself with fury.

  “Adamus!” she shouted at him in a half-shriek, half-hiss. “How are you allowing this? How!”

  Adamus wanted to urge his beloved towards calm, but he knew that it would be a fruitless endeavor, as once her passions became roused, there was little that could douse such a fire. Her brother must have known this as well, and yet, despite this, he nevertheless tried.

  “Sis, take it easy,” he said. “You’re hurting my ears.”

  “Brother, I shall not!” she thundered. “What is going on with you two? Surely you must be aware of what is happening?”

  “We are both well aware,” Adamus said, his tone stern but not hostile.

  Now that he had rejuvenated himself and returned his biological age to its peak form, he wasn’t quite so soft-spoken. Prila, who stood behind his chair with her hands on top and gripping the sides, no longer needed to lean in closer to hear what he had to say in the way she used to, though she did so anyway as if out of a desire to be closer to him.

  Right now, his dear Prila was trembling with fear and worry for her friend, and Adamus did not need to turn around to see that. He could feel it. The poor girl’s worry radiated off her like a radio transmission.

  “Eilea,” Prila began, “we’re well aware of what’s been going on, and actually, we’ve been talking about it since yesterday. Rest assured, we’ve been on this since the moment it—”

  “Who is we?” Eilea snapped at her. “You are just a dainty little pet my husband uses for his entertainment and his amusement. What right do you have to even speak up? You should not be in the room for this conversation!”

  Adamus frowned. He did not appreciate the way his beloved was speaking to Prila. Yet before he could say a word in protest, Olandrin beat him to it.

  “There’s no need for that, sis.” He gave Eilea a pat on the shoulder. “I get there’s friction between you and Prila, but there’s no need to be abusive about it.”

  Eilea’s mouth fell open as though she were aghast and enraged, and Adamus could clearly feel that she was indeed both of these things. “You…to tell me…when Adamus is…” She began to tremble with rage. Adamus dearly hoped she did not end up doing something foolish. If she attacked this space station, he would have no choice but to defend it and the people who worked tirelessly to uphold the system.

  “Look,” Olandrin said, now going so far as to take Eilea’s hands into his own and squeeze them. Somehow, it managed to calm her down a bit. “We’re aware of what’s going on, and we’re trying to figure out a way to fix it.”

  “And why don’t you, then?” she asked. “Deactivate him!”

  Even if Olandrin hadn’t averted his eyes, Adamus would still be able to spot the shame in his face. Truth be told, he felt a degree of it himself. Olandrin, wetting his lips, mouthed a few words but said nothing, so Adamus was forced to step in and explain the situation, as uncomfortable as it may have been.

  “We cannot deactivate it. And no, Eilea, it is not for lack of trying. The fact that the NPC has managed to break containment is, on its own, a testament to how serious a situation we find ourselves in.”

  Eilea whipped her head in his direction. “Are you saying you’re not powerful enough to destroy a single NPC? That both of you together cannot eliminate him?”

  “It,” Adamus corrected. “Not he.”

  “No, you’re wrong on that point,” Olandrin said, speaking defensively. “Landy is very much a living, sentient being. And it’s your refusal to accept it that has created this mess in the first place, Adamus.”

  Adamus did not feel like rehashing this debate, which had raged on for thousands of years. There were, incredibly, a great many fools who believed that merely having programmable sentience gave something the right to declare itself alive. But they were completely wrong. Life was nothing so cheap: it was a grand, beautiful, and complex biological process. Thus, system-created objects such as Angelica or Landy were not “alive” in any sense of the word. Such a notion was ridiculous.

  “Adamus,” Olandrin continued. “How many thousands of years has Landy been trapped in total solitude?”

  “Since its creation, I’d imagine,” he replied. “But alas, it is but an object meant to serve the system.”

  Eilea scowled. “And that’s why it’s rebelling! And now we’ve got a rogue, level-19,500 shopkeeper terrorizing Zach, and you won’t do anything to stop it! That’s it. I’m going down there, and I’m going to—”

  “You absolutely will not,” Adamus said firmly. “We are not going to take any action just yet.” Eilea opened her mouth as if to shout, but Adamus interjected. “And this is not based on my principle of non-interference. In this very specific case, if I believed interfering would help, I would have done so already, as the NPC is clearly acting in a way that is wayward and dangerous. But right now, the NPC seems content to toy with the boy. If we make a reckless move, it could easily decide to kill him.”

  “How is that even possible?” Eilea shouted, slamming her fists on his desk hard enough to create a loud snap and knock off an entire chunk of wood. “How is an NPC more powerful than you?”

  “It is not,” Adamus said.

  “That’s not what you just indicated to us.”

  “Then I suggest you listen more carefully, for what I have told you is that I cannot deactivate it. I never said I cannot destroy it.”

  “So destroy it!”

  “If I do that, I will risk far more than just the boy’s life. For the moment, it is prudent that we act wisely and calmly.”

  Eilea began pacing back and forth as Olandrin’s youthful expression turned sour. “I don’t wanna destroy or deactivate him,” Olandrin said, drawing his sister’s ire. She stopped pacing and glared at him, which caused him to shrug at her. “I’m just being honest. I think we should try to make amends somehow.”

  “Amends?” Adamus whispered. “With an NPC?”

  “You know what? You’re just a real mean guy, Adamus. You really are.”

  “Perhaps. But I’m right.”

  “No, you’re not.” Olandrin frowned at him. “You can’t give something the ability to think and feel and then be surprised when this happens. For someone who doesn’t believe in divinity, you sure do behave like a cruel, cold-hearted God.”

  “I have done no such thing,” Adamus replied. “Though you look like a young man, your mind is thousands of years old. Has it become so addled, Olandrin, that you have forgotten that I was always opposed to the creation of sentient objects? I merely tolerated the existence of such, but I have never actively supported it.”

  “Maybe not,” he said, “but it’s still your responsibility.” Olandrin looked on the verge of shouting, but then he took a deep breath and sighed. “We used to have this debate so many times a century, and we never agreed then, and we’re never gonna agree now. Even still, I’m gonna try to get through to that thick head of yours one last time.” Olandrin met his eyes. “Look, Adamus. You put this poor fucking guy in a cage for thousands of years. Do you understand what that means?”

  “Naturally.”

  “Do you really, though? Think about it, Adamus. In all of the thousands of years that he’s existed, he’s never once, in his entire life, had a conversation with anyone ever. Really think about that. He’s been alive for almost ten thousand years, and he’s never spoken to another person. He’s never…he’s never experienced happiness. He’s never had any of his needs fulfilled.”

  “Needs?” Adamus asked. “Olandrin, that is an absurd word to use when referring to an NPC.”

  “But I’m right,” he insisted. “You can’t just act like someone isn’t a real person just because they’re not a carbon-based lifeform. Who made you the arbiter of deciding what is or isn’t life?”

  “Science did,” he explained calmly. “Life is independent of sentience. A starfish is no less alive for its lack of thought. A tree is no less alive for its inability to feel. It is factually the case that NPCs cannot be ‘alive.’”

  “But do you deny that sentient NPCs can experience pain, love, regret, longing, and happiness?”

  “I do not, Olandrin. But in the context of our system, that does not grant something worthiness to be treated as life.”

  “How can you even say that?”

  Adamus did not know why he wasted his breath trying to reason with such unreasonable people. “Olandrin,” he began, “are you not aware that if we were to turn off the system, every NPC would cease to exist? They are powered projections. They exist only for so long as the system remains active. They cannot exist on their own because they are not actually real. If the nodes were to somehow lose power, they would be gone in an instant. They are not tangible or substantive.”

  “They don’t have to be,” Olandrin countered. “Existence itself is a subjective experience. And one that—”

  “Enough!” Eilea shouted, fury evident in the way her upper lip pulled back to bare her teeth. “I did not come to this wretched place to discuss philosophy. I want Zach protected!”

  Olandrin lowered his head. “There’s really nothing we can do right now, sis,” he whispered. “Landy is in an extremely volatile state. If we provoke him in any way, he will likely kill Zach out of spite. He is suffering from a level of madness and hatred that we can’t even fathom. Our own shit pales in comparison.”

  Eilea’s eyes dampened, and tears began to fall. She pointed an angry, shaking finger at Adamus. “You did this,” she said. “You put that NPC through nearly ten thousand years of isolation and torment, and now that he’s broken containment, he probably wants revenge because of what you did.”

  “Sis, try to calm down. You’re giving Landy exactly what he wants by getting emotional. He’s probably only going after Zach because he knows it’ll hurt you.”

  “Me? What did I ever do to Landy?”

  “Certainly nothing to help him, that’s for sure. None of us did. And we could have.”

  Eilea trembled. “He’s stalking Zach. I can see it. He’s torturing him! This is your fault, Adamus! Yours more than anyone!”

  Adamus said nothing because, on that point, his beloved was correct. He had clearly failed to anticipate this crisis. He never imagined that an NPC could break containment in the way that this one had. At first, he’d suspected it was Olandrin’s tampering with the permission structure in order to allow “Mushkie” to move about freely on weekends, something so silly that, at the time, he hadn’t even bothered to give it a second thought. Yet upon reviewing Olandrin’s changes late yesterday, Adamus confirmed for himself that Olandrin’s actions had been narrow and specific towards affecting only that one NPC.

  In other words, it had nothing to do with this situation.

  Thus far, neither Adamus nor any of his best technicians had a clue as to how Landy was able to break containment. The thing should still be confined to its item shop on Albion-4. Yet not only was it disobeying orders, but it had somehow gotten free. For such an NPC to be on the loose…one of such immense power…the threat to the system could not be understated.

  It has far too much power.

  Like all important NPCs throughout the system, it had been granted a disproportionate amount of power in order to protect itself and to maintain order within its domain. Otherwise, adventurers might feel tempted to simply kill it and steal from the item shop during the time it took to respawn. To ward off even the thought of such attacks, the most important NPCs were given comically high levels. But that had been done with the knowledge that they could simply be deactivated with the press of a button.

  Yet that button had been pressed, and Landy persisted.

  Adamus tapped his fingers on his desk as he thought. A moment later, he said, “My beloved, in order to bring this situation under control, we are going to have to—”

  Adamus’ words cut off. He tilted his head sideways. Eilea’s entire face had changed, hadn’t it? Yes, it had. It seemed the woman’s skin had decomposed, and now there were maggots and worms crawling out of her empty, widened eye sockets. Had she died in the past few moments? Hmm, obviously not. What he saw was most certainly not real. A telepathic attack, most likely. Directed at him.

  How childish.

  Adamus closed his eyes for a moment to purge his mind. When he reopened them, Eilea was back to her usual self, only now she was staring at him as though confused. “Why did you stop talking?” she asked. “What just happened?”

  “The NPC was briefly able to penetrate my mind, but I have removed it. I would suggest that you two put up barriers of your own. It appears it has been able to find out where we—”

  “WHAT IS THAT?” screamed a voice from somewhere outside the office. Gunshots followed this scream, and this in turn caused dozens more voices to shout in terror. Adamus frowned as even more gunshots followed along with shrill cries of immense pain. Suddenly, alarm systems began to blare, playing loudly enough that Adamus had to practically shout to be heard.

  “We’re under attack,” he said loudly. “It’s going after the OMP.”

  The lights above began flashing, an explosion resounded in the distance, and the entire station began to shake. At this, Adamus turned his attention towards protecting Prila. Because a moment after the explosion, the sound of the station’s generators cut off, and with it, the power cut out, submerging the entire space station in darkness and quiet, save for the cries of death occurring all around them. At the same time, gravity failed, oxygen levels began to plummet, and aside from the red emergency lights built into the flooring, it became difficult to see.

  “Ahhhhhh!” screamed a voice. Then came another sound: that of a chainsaw. It was as though the man who’d cried out was being cut in half.

  Olandrin snapped his head towards the office door, and so too did Eilea. “It’s in here with us?” she asked.

  “Only partially,” Adamus replied. Then his attention diverted to the viewing port in his office, where a bright, but soundless light filled his view. From the look of things, the nearest orbital monitoring platform, station 8, had just exploded: as in all of it. All eight hundred twenty-seven crew members were likely dead.

  Adamus returned to his feet. “Olandrin, please get Prila to safety. I must get the situation here under control before he destroys any more stations. It must not be allowed to target stations 1, 5, or 7.”

  Olandrin nodded. “Prila, come.”

  Fear evident in her expression, she floated over to him as the gravity shifted to 0G. “Are my friends here going to be okay?”

  Olandrin lowered his voice. “I don’t think anyone else is still alive here on Station 9 except for us. The only reason you’re still breathing at all is ‘cause I fabricated a small, oxygen-rich atmosphere around us. The crew on this station probably already died of asphyxiation. And those were the lucky ones. The rest seem to have been butchered by something.”

  Prila began to weep. Olandrin patted her arm, and with that, the two vanished into a portal that hopefully took her far away. Olandrin was wise not to tell Adamus where he’d taken her, as Landy would most certainly look to inflict pain upon him in any way that it could, and if his thoughts somehow betrayed her location, she would become a prime target.

  This was truly a historically awful situation.

  ******

  It’s not real, Zach continued to tell himself as the Orc’s smile broadened and blood began to drip out of its eyes. I’m having a mental-health crisis. It’s not real. It’s not real!

  Zach, in a confused, desperate, and probably misguided attempt to ward off his own madness, forced himself to turn back around and face away from the Orc even as fearful tears rained down his face.

  He was falling apart: worse than he ever had before. He was going crazy. He hadn’t healed at all, had he? His brain was fundamentally poisoned. His mind was poisoned. He was broken and unrepairable.

  I’m crazier than I’ve ever been, he thought. How can I save my friends when I can’t even save myself?

  He tried not to whimper, but it was becoming more difficult. Because now all of his cards, not just the one Orc, were chuckling. They were…they were chuckling. Actually chuckling. All of them.

  The red-haired, level-65 elite even pressed her fist to her mouth and lowered her head as she chuckled in an almost bashful way.

  “What’s so funny?” he asked.

  No! Don’t speak to the delusions! They might reply!

  But it was too late—and she did.

  “You’re what’s funny, Zach,” she said, causing terror and confusion to erupt within him. “Hey, you wanna see something cool?”

  She placed her left hand on top of her head and into her hair, and then she placed her right hand below her jaw. Then she squeezed and pulled in opposite directions. Zach cried out in horror as a tearing sound preceded a spray of blood as she tore her own face off. In perfect detail, he watched the way her mouth and lips were simply yanked apart from her forehead and scalp while her eyeballs fell out of their sockets and began rolling around on the stone floor. Afterwards, her left hand, which was gripping the top of her face by her hair, began waving it back and forth while her right hand remained clutching a clumped-up batch of flesh that included her disfigured mouth.

  Fuck it, Zach thought, a smile forming on his lips as he could actually feel himself breaking. I don’t even care anymore. I don’t care. I don’t care. I DON’T CARE!

  “Great trick,” he said, laughing and crying in unison. He actually laughed. And then he clapped. In spite of everything, he clapped, and he laughed. Then he laughed again. And this seemed to surprise her, as for a moment, she seemed genuinely taken aback. But then she too laughed. And they laughed together.

  And then things became even stranger as, despite all that was happening, Zach pressed on.