CHAPTER 4

  Raid Boss

  The three brutes flanked their leader, carving a path through fleeing villagers. A boy screamed as the cleaver swept down toward him. Bash’s vision erupted with lines of possibility. Too fast, too strong, no way to win head-on.

  But Bash didn’t have to win by brute force. Not if he trusted the whispers. “All right class,” Bash hissed, “show me how to kill a super boss with nothing but two cheeks and a prayer.”

  The guards around him began to waver, terror stark on their faces. The older guard who’d vouched for Bash earlier drove the butt of his spear into the ground and roared, the sound cutting through the chaos, raw and defiant.

  The Raid Boss replied to the challenge by raising his massive blade, embers pouring from its edge. On command, his lieutenants thundered forward, the distance closing fast.

  Bash sprinted forward to meet them, his enhanced dexterity vibrating up and down his limbs.

  The closest lieutenant swung his cleaver wide, a sloppy attack meant to take Bash’s head off. Bash saw an opening and shifted a single step left, slipping into the margin. He grabbed the brute's wrist and yanked, guiding the massive strike straight down and into the thigh of his companion. A roar tore loose, as blood sprayed out.

  Ripping the cleaver from his leg with a snarl, the injured raider lunged at Bash who was still struggling with the first. The older guard intercepted him mid-charge, driving his spear through the raider's throat. The brute gurgled and dropped, dragging the guard down with him.

  He had no time to check on the old man; the third one was already swinging.

  Bash's instinct was to go low, so he held on to the first and threw himself into a slide, jamming his shoulder into his knee at the perfect instant. The raider toppled, and the maul meant for Bash caved his own ally's skull with a sickening crunch.

  The dead weight pinned Bash to the ground. He shoved at the corpse, legs scrambling for purchase, as the third lieutenant stepped over his fallen brothers and brought the maul back for another killing blow.

  The other guards swarmed. Three, four, five of them, spears and swords finding gaps in the armor. The lieutenant roared, swatting one aside, but more piled in hits. He went down under the weight of them, still thrashing, until a blade found his neck and the fighting stopped.

  Bash shoved the corpse off and staggered to his feet. He straightened, as a cheer went up from the guards and renewed courage flashed in their eyes.

  The upgrades hit like a drug, giving him renewed strength. Between the blood, the dirt, and the new muscle tone, Bash imagined he looked more barbarian warrior than French guy at the beach.

  His power fantasy was interrupted as the ground shook under his feet. The raid boss was finally making his move.

  A giant blade, longer than Bash was tall, came down in a murderous arc, carving through stone as if the street were brittle slate. The shockwave flung two of the cheering guards aside, and heat rolled across Bash’s cheek.

  Bash’s stomach dropped. This was supposed to be a level one zone. “What is this, a raid tease? A cute little ‘die now, come back later’?” his voice came out dry.

  The raid boss crossed the square toward him, stepping over bodies like debris. He tilted his head, savoring the sight of Bash standing alone.

  Prediction lines wove across the burning square, the game practically begging him to flee.

  The raid boss roared and swung. Dodge left? Risky. Right? Slightly better. Bash moved before thought could catch up. He slid right, his foot catching on loose rubble and sending him tumbling. Not a mistake, a variable he had already seen. The war blade screamed past, red sparks exploding as it scraped stone, and the large raider’s own momentum dragged him off balance.

  Bash darted in, aiming a jab at the soft patch beneath the ribs. High chance to connect, but no way to hurt him. Unable to stop, Bash’s fist connected with the raider’s side.

  The impact was like punching a brick wall. Pain ricocheted up his arm, a sharp reminder that bones were still bones, even in a digital afterlife.

  The boss did not grunt or even acknowledge the strike. He turned his head slowly, almost curious, and Bash had just enough time to think oh, fuck before a gauntleted hand swatted him aside.

  Bash became airborne, tumbling through space, his vision strobing in static bursts as he smashed into a wall hard enough to taste blood. The world exploded into white. Fire raced across Bash’s face and neck. Most of the green had faded to red, except for one singular line. He tried to grin, but it came out as a grimace. “So you’re saying there’s a chance?”

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  Bash climbed back to his feet, trying to regain his senses. This body wasn’t real, he tried reminding himself, but the simulation didn’t care. It made him feel every tear in his skin, every loose tooth, every crushed nerve. Bash cursed as he forced his Investigator skill to dig deeper into the metadata bleeding around the giant raider.

  The Boss stalked forward, blade dragging a furrow through the ground behind him. Looming over Bash, he spoke, the voice hollow, practically rattling. "You stand no chance. Flee, or face certain death."

  Bash almost laughed, dizzy with pain. “Wow. The game's really trying to hold my hand, huh? Did somebody get paid to write that garbage?!”

  The boss ignored the taunt, pausing to drive his blade through a wounded guard. The man let out a small gasp before going still.

  Bile rose in his throat at the sight. "I'm over here, asshole!" Bash shouted, grabbing a chunk of rubble that he hurled. It struck dead center, but crumbled to dust.

  The boss turned back to him, unhurried, raising the flaming blade to strike. The next swing dragged wide, followed by another just as lazy.

  Bash backpedaled, studying the giant raider as they maintained the same mechanical rhythm, brutal but predictable. Overhead strike, sidestep, thrust, on repeat. And every single time, there was a half-second between. A tiny gap he could exploit if he was willing to pay the price.

  The cost made his stomach lurch, and he scanned for something else. Anything else. His mind cycled through options faster now. Retreat to the alley, red. Use the cart as cover, red. Every path collapsed into death. Every path except one green line that Bash kept refusing to look at.

  Holy shit, Bash thought as he desperately looked around. All of the ways out were suddenly gone. It was like he had just missed a quick time event without realizing it.

  "Little help?!" Bash shouted toward the remaining guards. A young one with blood streaming down his face charged in from the left, spear raised. The raider pivoted and caught him by the throat. One squeeze. The body dropped.

  The boss turned back to Bash like nothing had happened.

  Behind him, another scream went silent. Somewhere else, steel found flesh and another child became an orphan. The village was dying around him, and every second he spent looking for another way, someone else paid the price.

  The next swing came wide, and Bash barely ducked it. His legs were sluggish. Too slow. The one after that clipped his shoulder and sent him spinning, fresh pain exploding down his arm.

  He was out of time, out of options. Bash stopped retreating and waited for the pattern to repeat, preparing for what would come next.

  I better get a cool robot hand or a chainsaw for this. He thought, before realizing how fucking dumb this idea was.

  Too late for second guesses, the blade rose and came down. Bash thrust his left arm up, placing it exactly where it needed to catch the strike.

  Steel bit through his wrist and caught bone, deflecting before slicing clean out the other side.

  His severed hand hit the cobblestones, fingers still twitching. Blood poured from the stump, and cold flooded up his arm like he'd plunged it into ice water. Pins and needles where his hand used to be. The world compressed to a pinhole, and the only thing he could see was the green line Investigator drew through the fog. One path. Bright and certain.

  His body moved before his mind caught up. Bash grabbed his severed hand. The bone jutted from the torn flesh, slick and pale, jagged where it had snapped. He spun, following the line his skill painted, and drove the splintered edge up under the raider's helmet, into the soft gap beneath the jaw.

  The boss stood motionless, as if the game had forgotten to render a death animation. Blood seeped from beneath the helmet and ran down their chest in dark ribbons. A wet gurgle rattled behind the mask, and whatever held the body upright snapped. The raider's knees buckled, and the massive frame crumpled into a heap of armor and dead meat.

  The other raiders all froze, their war cries glitching into shrieks. Turning in unison, they fled, shoving each other and tripping over corpses in a mad dash for the tree line.

  Ragged disbelief filled the square, and a cheer tried to form, guards hammering broken shields in triumph. But it soon cracked apart as the devastation set in.

  Sure, the impossible had happened, and the village still stood. But standing wasn't the same as whole. Survivors came out from hiding, almost all of them clutching wounds. Injured screamed for help, and loved ones knelt over bodies that would never get back up. Nearby, a woman sobbed, holding something Bash couldn't and didn't want to see.

  Swaying on his feet, Bash waited for the pain. Nothing. Adrenaline? Shock? Game fuckery? Didn't matter. He forced himself to look down at what should have been a pulped ruin. Instead, his arm glowed verdant along jagged edges. The stump writhed as threads of light unspooled from the ragged cut, weaving through shredded nerves and splintered bone.

  His hand did not heal, so much as it rebuilt. Bones recompiled. Veins crawled outward, and tendons snapped tight with wet clicks. And finally, flesh yanked into place. Within seconds, his hand was whole again, pale and perfect, as though nothing had been lost. Bash gagged at the sight. This was not healing. This was save-scumming biology.

  “Guess I can keep my job as a hand model,” he joked weakly. His new fingers shook as he flexed them, watching them obey. He clung to the motion, to the proof of control, pretending that was courage.

  At the corner of his vision, more messages bounced.

  At first, he thought they were duplicates. A visual bug. Or simply crossed wires in his scrambled head. But he could feel the extra levels as they settled and locked in, the implication too complex for his broken mind to handle.

  In disbelief, Bash began to cackle, the sound bubbling up until it turned maniacal. His ears popped, and every sound collapsed into a single high whine that drowned out the cries and screams still echoing through the square.

  Someone stepped in front of him. The older guard. His mouth was moving. Words, probably. Questions. Bash watched his lips shape sounds that arrived from very far away, muffled and meaningless.

  He opened his mouth to speak, but the Shard tilted around him. His balance gone, Bash fell, and reality broke.