Loading…
Info #11: After exiting the game, your character does not disappear. He is in sleep mode in a tent, in a hotel, or in other similar places. If you exit the game leaving your character in the middle of the road or in the forest without any protection, there is a high chance that a monster will kill you or other players will rob your belongings.
Cities and fortresses give you a 99% guarantee that nothing will happen to your character when you exit the game.
Still loading…
Info #12: Any shooting is prohibited in all cities; an attempt on a player’s life or trespassing on private property for immoral purposes, such actions are punishable by an instant temporary ban, followed by a fine for death.
A little more…
Info #13: If you decide to quit the game in a dangerous place, the protective field of the camping tent will save you from weak monsters, hails, storms, etc. But a boss-level monster has enough strength to reduce the resistance of the protective field to zero. In this case, the system will notify you of the death of your character. Be careful! Choose your resting place wisely!
Loading completed.
It took Ronnie three days to repair the Barrett. After that, the workshop turned into a corner of chaos. The mess in one’s shelter is like a parasite in one’s brain, very disturbing. Sooner or later, one will have to get rid of it. Ronnie chose the first option and devoted the entire fourth day to cleaning. On the fifth, he took a break and read a few books, sitting on his loggia with SYL in his hands and AOC on the bedside table next to him. He memorized the silencer, found out about the required materials and returned to the game and went to the premium store, and selected the right parts. No matter how he looked at it, he could not do without help. Ronnie wrote to his friend, the blacksmith Doffersnoah, and asked him for help in creating the silencer.
In that case, you will help me.
With what?
I’m working on an SVDK for one of my clients, but the damn rifle is jamming and fucking my brain. I made a mistake somewhere.
First the silencer, then the SVDK.
Agreed.
We have seven days.
For the next couple of hours, a small and empty notebook that used to lie and gather dust in the corner finally came in handy. Paper still remembers better than a person, Ronnie reasoned. He filled the pages with information on the creation of a large-caliber Dragunov sniper rifle: starting from bolts and material, and ending with complex ballistic schemes. The handwriting was clumsy, just like his father’s. Ronnie remembered how he wrote his school essays for him when he was nine years old. A pleasant memory. In the last words, the ink in the fountain pen also ran out.
Ronnie picked up a backpack with tools from the floor, a couple of cans to restore energy, and the same number of scanners, also a resuscitating B rank syringe just in case (they often told on the forum how characters died from falling bricks at a construction site), he did not take additional cartridges. His hand touched two grenades lying in the special pockets of his waist bag. He decided not to put it out. Last time on a “fishing trip” they came in handy. He slung his Barrett over his shoulder, put the notebook in his side pocket, and went outside to Doffersnoah. In the HUD, the AI showed the shortest route. The journey would take half an hour.
While Ronnie was looking for something to listen to in the bestiary, a warning popped up on the whole screen:
A dangerous unknown monster appeared in Otron! Restrictions on shooting have been lifted.
Ronnie spat and went to the western part of the capital, to a place near the local landmark “AInarthan Lighthouse”. There, fifty yards away, overlooking the sea on Cape Carnil near the cliff, was a small shack, a smithy named Doffersnoah—a secluded place that had not yet been touched by the city bustle, light pollution, and a bunch of players coming with an interested look inside, distracting the crafter from the artistic process of creating weapons. There was only the owner, nature, and the sea. The blacksmith built a small wooden fence along the entire site and also bought two hectares of land around so that civilization would not get to him for sure and installed a protective field on the border of his possessions. On the forum, many complained about this act, but the rules are the rules. When the players asked Doffersnoah why he needed so much land, he replied: “I bought it because I can afford it, and when I can do something, I do it.” The man’s character was stronger than the metal with which he liked to work.
Ronnie looked up at the gray sky, filled with impenetrable clouds. Even the scorching star faded in this colorless metallic routine. He did not stop anymore. One intersection replaced another. Kerosene lamps hanging on chains from lampposts let out a dim yellow light, covering the surface of the road with circles of dying suns. In the dark alleys, the local fauna: MurrSadei, with big green eyes and dirty red fur, raced with a Jorolog, whose body resembled a rat, and a cyclopean face, ran from place to place, looked out from above and below in search of something to profit from, and then ran back into the darkness. There were more players in Otron than one might assume. The word “sleep” was alien to this city. Small muddy puddles on the road reflected the light from the windows of residential buildings. There, in small rooms, many friends gathered and played board games, and cards, and sang songs, as in reality, it takes too long and it was too expensive to get together.
Then, out of the blue, tracers of machine guns flew up from the side of the parallel street in a dotted stream. Ronnie became alert and turned into an alley in order to get away from the unnecessary clashes.
“AI.”
“At your service.”
“Is this some kind of new event with a monster in the city?”
“I’m afraid it’s not.”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
“What’s going on?”
“Two days ago, an unknown monster similar to a player killed several people in the western part of the Elgoreombdon forest. Based on the information available at the moment, they tried to start a conversation with him but received only silence in response. Apparently, he was waiting for them to leave. When they failed to meet his expectations, the monster’s face changed beyond recognition. He took out two swords from the scabbard and kicked everyone out of the game at once. Three victims with aliases Bynahal, Yvetter, Zayi complained to the support service that the system did not show who exactly killed them and why he did not receive a fine for the PK. Half an hour ago, a monster appeared in the capital, where it took the lives of three patrol NPCs. Central AI’s algorithms recognized it as a wild boss with transmutation ability. From that moment on, we announced the alarm.”
“Intelligent one…”
“That is correct.”
“What does it look like?”
“Screenshots are not available. There is no reliable information.”
“According to rumors?”
“Bynahal wrote the player was female with brown eyes and gray hair. He’s about six feet tall. The NPCs met a monster in the guise of Yvetter. Players who noticed the creature a few minutes ago identified it as Zayi.”
After a five-minute lull, more shots were fired. Tracer bullets flew over the roofs like liquid fire and landed in the ocean as shooting stars. Ronnie quickened his pace and was practically running. The quiet filled the streets with invisible tension. He realized what kind of feeling was stuck inside him; it was squeezing his chest, and the hallucinatory ticking of a clock appeared in his ears. Every step echoed in his head. This feeling was unmistakable—the minute before the fight, a timeless minute during which the past does not matter, and the future is darker than night. Ronnie heard the window shutters creak. They opened and closed to the rhythm of the wind. There was no confirmation of the monster’s death. Smelly garbage cans stood next to the houses’ walls, and DaenMads were swarming in them—small birds with raven black plumage, blue body, long necks and with a beak like an Andean condor. He slowed down, passed by stealthily, since he did not know what to expect from them. Not all creatures in the capital were harmless, a good deal of may well cause serious injury. When the road brought Ronnie to Third Street, the clouds parted, opening the doors to sunny gaps. He took out the Barrett, wrapped the belt around his arm and hid behind the un-discarded building material and waited.
The quiet and deserted atmosphere continued to press, releasing the inner paranoid from the cage of Ronnie’s subconscious. He could feel the blood pulsing in his veins, and how the body had put itself into a stressful mode. Everything was not in vain. Several bullets flew past his head. By the pop of the shot, he realized somebody had fired a pistol. Ronnie got up a little, bent forward, and ran without looking back to the first intersection. All this time, the fire on him did not stop. Around the corner of a small apartment building, he took out a small mirror from his bosom and looked back. Two level seven players were running there, aiming Browning’s muzzle in his direction. Ronnie opened the map of the city, oriented himself along the roads and rushed into the darkness of the alleys.
They fired two shots at random. The bullets hit the brick wall with a metallic, hideous scream. Ronnie was nowhere to be found. They ran forward, holding their index finger on the trigger, passed two T-shaped intersections and saw a suspicious shadow flash behind the house a hundred yards away. They smiled greedily, ran across the road to the opposite side and sneaked forward, checking the dark alley on the right along the way. It was empty. When they passed on, Ronnie got up from the open manhole and crawled in their direction. Less than two minutes later, the Barrett’s butt hit one player on the back of the head, and the second - when he turned around—in the nose, causing a slight stun.
Ronnie looked at the player’s nicknames; they were Onzaa and Camerc. He pointed the muzzle of the large-caliber rifle at them and asked:
“Did you decide to kill me under the guise and take the weapon?”
They raised their eyebrows, threw their pistols forward and turned around with their hands in the air and answered:
“Holy shit! It also speaks our language!”
“Don’t kill us! It’s better to take us as slaves.”
“We’ll serve you, O Dark Lord, in human form.”
“What are you talking about, fucktards? I’m not a monster.”
“Yes, sir.” Camerc nodded and fell on his face like a believer before his God.
Ronnie picked him up and slapped him heartily on the cheek with the back of his hand, grabbed and squeezed his face and looking straight into his eyes, said:
“Turn on the HUD and say the same thing again.”
Camerc’s eyes darted, his mouth opened wide, and Onzaa, on his knees, moved back.
“Did you scan yet?”
“Why was the ‘unknown monster’ announced then?"
“At least they didn’t make a mistake with ‘dangerous’."
“What’s your name in the bestiary?”
Ronnie rolled his eyes.
“You can see my stats and level. It’s because I’m a player. How can I be confused with a monster?”
“Damn it, you look just like him!”
“You’re inadequate. Both of you. The AI told me what it looks like.”
Ronnie threw Camerc to the ground and pulled the Barrett’s bolt and took off the safety and was ready to use his right to self-defense, as Onzaa said:
“Wait! Wait! Wait! If you are a player, then we can write to you in PM, right?”
“How will it save you?”
“I’ll send you a screenshot from the forum, taken a couple of minutes ago. You’ll see the image and believe us and let us go.”
Onzaa did just that. On the in-game forum, in the post “Monster of Otron”, players published photos of a creature called a doppelgänger. On one of the last was Ronnie, with hands like a werewolf. He ripped the guts out of one dead player’s body before it could crumble. The next one - taken from the window of an apartment building and updated just now - showed Ronnie’s face up close, and how he jumped to the height of the second floor.
“What the fuck? How the fuck is that even possible?”
“We didn’t even know that a player with the same appearance exists.”
Ronnie looked at their frightened faces for a couple more seconds and thought and swore and looked back and was horrified. In some residential buildings, windows were replaced by loopholes, inside of which nothing could be seen but thick darkness. Someone can make the same mistake as these two. One misstep and I’ll become the Top Secret guild’s eternal slave. Fuck! Ronnie looked at these ragamuffins waiting for him to use the right to defend himself and said:
“AI.”
“At your service.”
“Why does the monster look like me?”
“Because, as it was mentioned earlier, it has the ability to transmute.”
“From what you mentioned earlier, I can conclude that he turns only into those he has seen before. I don’t remember meeting anyone like that.”
“Apologies. I can’t answer your question.”
“As usual. Plot a route to the place where he was last seen.”
“Just a moment…”
Ronnie, along with Onzaa and Camerc, found themselves on the street number thirteen. There were bullet marks on the road, a bunch of shell casings and the dead players’ ashes. He noticed several holes twenty yards from the slaughterhouse. It looks like the place where it was photographed during the jump. Ronnie went over there, squatted down, and examined the hollows. They resembled the footprints of a ten feet tall giant. At this point, the Doppelgänger pushed off and jumped ... well, well, not only strong, but also heavy. Ronnie continued to inspect the site of the battle and after a couple of minutes, he found sand and small drops of black blood. That’s how it is…
“Why don’t you use ‘detection’?" Camerc asked.
“Because it has a range of only 600 yards, and the cooldown is 24 hours. If I’ll use the skill now and I won’t find anyone, then it’ll bite me in the ass when I’ll really need it.”
From the end of the street came the noise and hubbub of a small group of players, and then they opened fire. Camerc died on the spot from a stray bullet. Onzaa and Ronnie managed to hide behind a brick column of a bank building.