There was no need to waste effort reading the fine print. I knew the other rules already.

Accept.

I looked to see Gus’ eyes scanning the air in front of him. Alan had assumed a heroic pose. Meryl shot hearts at Dante.

More and more people went from focusing on the air to surveying those around them. It was like back in high school, people setting down their pencils after a test and being forced to remain sitting around.

It wasn’t the bell that dismissed us nor was it when everyone finished. It was when the suits above us finished gambling on our lives.

Uneventful minutes until one cocky voice ended the silence.

“Let the game… Begin.”

The lights in the room shut off. An invisible force rag-dolled my body around. Sounds of stone-on-stone grinding echoed.

The lights turned back on.

Forming a miniature square, congruent to the walls surrounding us, was me and three others. Two thugs and one pot-bellied middle-aged man.

“Hey guys.” I waved, trying to start on the right foot.

The thugs gave me nasty looks. One nodded to the other, and the larger of the two thugs charged at me.

Shit. They remembered what I said earlier.

Only one thing to do…

Good ol’ running away strategy. I was allowed to hit back this time, but his arms were twice mine in thickness.

Why is there never anywhere to run?

All I could run to was the stone wall behind me, so I did. Thug #1 was gaining ground as I neared my destination.

That’s not a door handle!

A steel doorway stood apart from the surrounding stone. On the door was a glowing outline of a hand.

His footsteps resonated right behind me. I slammed my hand on the door.

My hand cracked, killing my momentum.

Faster than I could blink, the door slid into the ground. In its gap, it left behind a blind pattern of nearly invisible wires.

[(Add-on Notify): Remove wires by opening another door in the room. If you open the door yourself, the scenario of that door won’t activate.]

In the next room were more people.

I snapped back from my observations. Coming directly at me was Thug #1’s arm. It was going to hit me dead in the chest.

Not into the wires. Not having time to dodge, I braced for impact.

The thug’s arm split apart, bisected by a wire. Only his blood reached me. By the time his instincts could halt his momentum, the fissure reached his bicep.

The left side of his arm was lost as his arm spasmed to the right. He stepped back in caution, only to lose his legs.

I held back throwing up as a gut-wrenching feeling hit my stomach. His screams were background noise to my heartbeat ringing in my ears. I wasn’t used to these sights.

Deep breathes.

First things first, survey the surroundings.

The room was filled with thin wires scattered about like lasers in a guarded room of a spy movie. Across the room, Thug #2 was in an awkward coughing and shoving match with the pot-bellied man.

Realizing I was momentarily safe, I stripped out of my bloodstained suit down to my heart underwear, used the clean parts to wipe myself off, and threw the clothes away. The wires sliced them into scraps. I only kept my pocket square, pinning it between two scales.

Thankfully, the ‘waxing’ on the goldfish shawl had some kind of waterproofing that caused the blood to slip off.

Noting the others' fight was still in progress, I turned to look through the doorway. The group within consisted of a thug, an average citizen, a man in tribal clothing, and Gus.

They were having a tense conversation too far away to hear. Gus nodded to me before turning back to his surrounding threats.

A sense of exhaustion overcame me. A wave of nausea had me covering my mouth.

Crap.

I turned around to the bleeding-out man. His screams had stopped. His eyes were dull.

I hastily ducked around the wires, nearly skinning myself on them, and I coughed in the dying man’s face.

The exhaustion in me instantly faded. The curse had left my body.

Like a virus, it took time until symptoms kicked in. Like some curse, it was transferable. Further investigation was needed to learn more.

The dying man was dying no longer as he let out his final breath.

Close.

I couldn’t be sure, but there was reason to believe there were rules on how the curse transferred. It’s not as if all his DNA left me when I wiped off the blood, yet I could still transfer it. And it wouldn’t make sense to enter an infinite loop where we infect each other by holding each other's DNA.

One likely rule is the curse only transfers between living people. Why? It’d be less interesting to watch for the event to devolve into just a death match. I had more faith in Carnival.

My relief was short-lived as a shrill cry rang out.

Across the room, Thug #2 turned into a disassembled Megazord. The pot-bellied man's hands were shaking, missing a couple fingers.

“Hey, Piggy. Want to work together?” He snapped out of his reverie and faced me. “Judging by your coughing match, I take it one of you was healthy. I’m not sick either.”

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

Okay, “Piggy” was a bit uncalled for. My bad. No, it was for the sake of psychological warfare.

He was sweating like a whore in church. It took him a minute to collect his breath.

“How can I be sure you’re not sick?”

“Okay, fine.” It was best not to work with a coward anyways. “We’ll stay on opposite ends of the room. If I open the door there will be no additional traps and the wires will go away.”

His body didn’t seem to be the type to work well with a wire maze. There was no additional risk for him if he agreed.

“How can I be sure you won’t attack me once the wires are gone, or you’re telling the truth?”

Ugh.

“You can’t. Fine. If you look closely there’re people in the room behind the wires.” I pointed behind me.

“I’m going to open another door. You go through that one, I will run for the room behind me. You’re healthy, so you’ll want to avoid people.”

“What if there are people in that room?”

“We’re probably not in the middle room or another door would’ve opened by now, so I give it 50-50 odds.”

He didn’t look reassured.

“Fine. I told you what I’m doing. Stop me if you can.”

Deep breathes. Getting annoyed wouldn’t help anything.

I made my way through the wire maze to the door to my right. I had to move cautiously, but the wires on their own weren’t bad. The room only became dangerous when others were involved or when your favorite food was lard.

The odds weren’t really 50-50. That was only if we did a random room. If I did the room opposite to me and closest to him, there’d be better odds of not running into people.

I didn’t want to go near him, so he would have to settle for worse than 50-50 odds. His job must’ve not used much math because he stayed quiet on that point while I made my way through.

Not only quiet, he also didn’t move. He just clutched his hand where his fingers were missing.

Perhaps I could’ve been more empathetic, but it was possible to reattach fingers, so he could suck it up and be rational.

I don’t think I’m going to heaven.

I placed my hand on the door. The door slid down, revealing an empty room.

Good for him.

I ran over to my original door, giving a final glance to the rotund man who was waddling to the empty room. I passed through where the wires once were.

“What happened here?”

Gus was the sole one standing, completely unscathed. The others lay motionless on the floor.

“An unnecessary fight.” His voice was cold. “Was anyone who died in your room uninfected?”

“No, the dead were all sick. You?” The more who died while healthy, the less that could escape alive.

“Everyone in this room was infected.” Including him.

“So why did everyone fight?”

None of the scenarios for the doors seemed activated. Unlike with me, there wouldn’t have been any personal vendettas. There was nothing to gain other than injuries if you chose to fight against other infected.

Plus, I saw them talking earlier.

“It was the man dressed in tribal garb. He lied saying he was uninfected, and that we should all work together. Then he pretended to leave his back open for a sneak attack. The other two acted on it, and he used that chance to kill them both.”

All three bodies had crushed necks.

“You didn’t chip a nail, did you?”

“No. I’m able to do more than run away in a fight.”

This confirmed for me Gus was level 2. Of course, it took more than being level 2 to defeat someone trained in combat without a scratch. Whatever training he went through, it probably played into how he was so casual after killing someone.

“I knew you didn’t get into Aster University based on academics.”

If one was level 2 by the end of high school, unless severe reasons disqualify them, they would be accepted to Aster University. Not to brag, but you had to be the top-ranked in your country, or one of the top few depending on the size of your country, for grades alone to qualify you.

“Bold words for someone I can easily take out.”

“You’re not going to kill me? It’s basically self-defense based on how dangerous the system deems what I may make you go to.”

There was nothing in the friendship contract that stated he had to take my side. It only required him to attend events with me.

Gus’ position prevented me from reaching any other door in this room. I couldn’t pull the same trick again, and he was fast enough to catch me if I ran for a door in my previous room.

I watched him as the silence stretched on.

“You’re too weak to survive anyway. No point wasting the effort. Just don’t expect any help.”

Curious.

“What happened to you?” He pointed at my underwear.

I updated Gus on what went down in my starting room. He gave knowing nods to some of the details I included, having watched it play out from afar.

“So this… Porky… guy… he’s uninfected?”

I may have embellished the story a bit saying the man introduced himself as Porky.

“Are you really going to hunt him down?” I couldn’t believe Gus. I went about my terrifying story, and that was all he had to say?

“It’s me or him.” He shrugged.

“That’s not kosher! Pinkerton is off limits.” I crossed my arms into an “X”.

“Would you prefer I hunt something closer?” Gus’ eyes turned scary-cold again.

“Fine.”

Only when pigs could fly would he be able to stay out of Gus’ reach. I did what I could for him.

“But first, we need to test the limits of the curse.”

Gus nodded in agreement. The key to survival in this event was understanding the limits of infection. Perhaps brute forcing coughs to the face would be enough, but it was better to have more cards at play and learn what could be used against us.

“Start by walking closer to me as you cough at my face.”

Gus made a face of disgust. Killing people was okay, but spreading germs was too far. With a sigh of resignation, Gus started coughing.

He began 10 feet away, alternating between small steps and a cough. By the time he reached arm’s length from me, he paused.

“I passed it on. Feel anything?”

“I’m counting.”

I counted in my head. On the sixtieth second, I clutched my mouth, feeling a familiar wave of nausea. The curse seemed more potent this time, increasing in effect as time passed since the start of the game.

“It takes a minute to transfer.”

I spit on Gus’ arm causing my nausea to vanish. In response, he reflexively raised his arm in disgust and to attack.

“Easy buddy. I passed it back to you. Try coughing on me again.”

“We’re not buddies.”

Gus wiped his arm and collected himself before coughing on me again. There was no change.

At the end of the minute, Gus flinched.

“Looks like I’m still infected and can’t spread it until I feel symptoms.”

He tried coughing on my arm, basic skin contact, then spitting on clothes to no avail. Only when the spit slid off the end of the shawl onto my barefoot did it transfer.

I attempted a few more out-there methods with no luck.

Throughout our attempts, I couldn’t help but glance at the dead bodies. Beyond the disgust and sadness seeing them caused me, there was something magnetic about them. Not due to the bodies themselves but death.

There was something real about it. Whatever thoughts and ambitions were running through my head felt inconsequential when compared to the death of someone I could see. Perhaps that’s why when I was completely aimless, that was the flame I was drawn towards.

Don’t get me wrong. Although death seemed real, and it drew my eyes, I disliked the feeling seeing the bodies gave me.

And I hated that I used their deaths for personal inspiration.

“That’s enough for the tests. Best we don’t waste any more time.”

“Who put you in charge?”

“Please, no need to still be mad Gussy. I’m sorry for spitting on you without a heads-up.”

I wiped the area I spit on Gus earlier with my pocket square. Instantaneously, I became healthy again.

Hmph. Gus knocked my hand away, making me drop my pocket square. A hungry look entered his eyes.

“Let’s go hunting.”