The Monster let out a bloodcurdling roar, the force of which was great enough to shake the branches of a few nearby trees.
Immediately the players knew something was wrong. Once they heard the roar they all felt their bodies seize up, joints locking and breath leaving their lungs as their hearts started racing.
Soze, being the only one to fully understand the situation, quickly opened his menu.
[PARALYSIS]
Remaining Duration: 2 Seconds
You cannot move.
[STUNNED]
Remaining Duration: 27 Seconds
Active Skills cannot be used.
[FEAR]
Remaining Duration: 2 Minutes, 57 Seconds
Reduce DEX by 50%.
You cannot willingly approach the source of [FEAR].
'T-too much,' Soze thought.
Immobile for five seconds, not being able to use Skills for thirty seconds, and you can't approach the target for a whole three minutes! It was quite possibly the most overpowered Skill Soze had seen not just in New Eden Online, but in any RPG he had ever played.
"It has a name now!" Soze shouted the moment he could move again. "Its roar causes debuffs!"
"What?!"
"That's bullshit!"
Soze had no time to explain further, as The Monster was currently charging at him, its speed reduced by its injuries but still incredibly quick.
'I can't escape it without using Sprint, I need to fight back somehow,' Soze thought as he raised his bow to fire at the bear.
Or at least, that's what he tried to do.
The moment he tried to look directly at The Monster he felt his knees go weak and his hands started to tremble. The [FEAR] debuff wasn't just affecting their movements, it was using the AetherGear to forcibly stimulate the parts of their brain responsible for feeling terror. This wasn't unique to New Eden Online, but very few games did this, and it would easily catch ordinary players off guard.
Even Soze, who had gone through plenty of near-death experiences was just barely able to keep his nerve in the face of this debuff, and several players from Bates' party were already tripping over themselves as they tried to get as far from The Monster as possible.
The problem is that this wasn't ordinary fear. Normal fear would begin to subside as time passed. Normal fear could be suppressed by logic or confidence.
This fear was a rule being enforced by the system. Any attempts to focus on the task at hand or suppress it with understanding would be met with a new wave of terror. This was why such systems were uncommon in the realm of gaming. It was the panic and anxiety of a jumpscare forcibly extended over several minutes. It was an unnatural state of being that could only be achieved by using advanced technology to turn your own biology against you.
And The Monster could force it on them just by opening its mouth.
Soze loosed the arrow and began leaping back, fighting the urge to just turn and run completely. The arrow landed in The Monster's shoulder but did no damage. He was about to fire another but froze as a thought ran through his mind.
'The Fear effect is also reducing our damage!'
With the Dexterity reduction in addition to the armor from [TOUGH HIDE] it was almost impossible to damage The Monster with ranged weapons. For a moment, Soze wondered if the bonuses from [DAMAGE BURST] would be enough to kill it.
'...Only one way to find out.'
Readying more arrows, Soze stopped running as The Monster closed in on him. It slashed at him the moment he was in range, and Soze ducked under the swing, one of its claws grazing the side of his head. With its side exposed, he leapt back and fired as many arrows as he could in that short time frame towards The Monster's broad body.
With no need to worry about accuracy, Soze managed to fire off six arrows into the beast's torso. The first few shots had no effect, and while the shots after the fourth were doing damage, The Monster's HP only went from 16% to 15%.
The Monster tried to swat him with a backhanded strike, but Soze used its arm as a springboard and launched himself dozens of feet backward. Even then, the force of the blow was strong enough to deal significant damage to Soze, and he felt his ankles throb as he kicked off the ground.
Maintaining his momentum, Soze moved backward and fired more arrows at The Monster. He thought the beast might be enraged enough to simply charge through his shots, but it knew exactly how injured it was and began to dodge side to side as it chased after him. They were only small movements, barely even enough to slow it down, but with the Dexterity reduction throwing off his accuracy it was enough for a few shots to miss, canceling the [DAMAGE BURST] bonus.
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'There's no way I can do this alone,' Soze thought bitterly. Even with the beast in such an injured state, he didn't have the accuracy or the arrows to finish it off. Furthermore, he was losing the momentum from The Monster's attack and it was steadily closing in on him.
Desperate to get back to the others, Soze jumped higher toward the branches of a Maple tree. Landing feet first, he moved to leap over The Monster but was filled with dread when he felt his legs lock up at the last moment, the [FEAR] debuff driving ice-cold terror through his chest.
Jumping over The Monster was too close to 'approaching' it, and so it was forbidden.
The Monster reared up onto its hind legs as it approached the tree, raising a paw to smash the branch he was standing on.
Terrified, Soze dodged to the side at the last moment, leaping out of the tree and rolling as he hit the ground. Soze took off running, trying to activate [SPRINT] out of instinct as The Monster lowered its massive body with a thud before chasing after him. Mercifully, the [SPRINT] finally activated as the [STUNNED] debuff wore off, allowing him to create some distance before the bear could get its body up to speed.
'I have to get back to the others,' he thought desperately as he ran for all he was worth. 'I need to-'
*ROOOOAAAARRR*
Suddenly, all thoughts were forced out of Soze's head as The Monster used [BURNING RAGE] again, letting out another [FEAR]-inducing roar.
Immediately, Soze was thrown to the ground as the [PARALYSIS] set in. He hit the dirt hard, taking significant damage as he was unable to cushion his fall in the slightest. Soze was too terrified to check the extent of his injuries, and he didn't need the [FEAR] debuff to make him afraid.
He was lying flat on the ground, with The Monster less than a dozen feet away, and unable to move for at least another three seconds. Even when the [PARALYSIS] wore off, he was too slow to get away without the use of [SPRINT].
He was dead.
The moment he was able to move again, he felt The Monster's claws dig into his side, not ripping him open, but roughly flipping him over.
The enormous bear was staring down at him, its face only a foot away from his own. It roared at him, splattering his face with saliva and showing off its glistening white teeth. It didn't use its Unique Skill, but it roared with enough fury that it left Soze paralyzed all the same.
Soze didn't move.
Didn't breathe.
Didn't think.
And surprisingly, he didn't die.
Before The Monster could attack him, an arrow landed directly in its eye, causing the beast to flinch in pain. Another arrow struck it in the shoulder, then the chest. It looked up to find its attacker, only for another arrow to strike it in the other eye.
The Monster reeled back, totally blinded, as more arrows continued to strike it.
As Soze's mind slowly caught up to reality and realized he wasn't dead yet, he began scrambling backward before turning completely and breaking out into a full sprint toward the player who had saved him.
It was Yin.
She continued to fire as Soze ran to her, The Monster roaring in pain behind him occasionally.
"Fuck!" He shouted as one of her arrows landed in his shoulder. 'She must be really focused on shooting fast for her accuracy to suffer this much.' Technically he was still between her and The Monster, but Yin had just managed to hit an inch-wide target from over a hundred feet away. He knew her aim was better than this.
"Th-thanks for the save," Soze said, panting as he came up next to her.
"Don't thank me yet, I need you to help me distract it."
Soze let out a nervous chuckle. "Don't be so tense, you already blinded it. We can take our ti-"
Soze flinched as The Monster let out another roar, and it was closer this time. Turning to look, Soze realized that the bear was able to tell where they were standing from the direction of Yin's arrows. It was slower than before, and occasionally bumped into trees, but it would close in on them soon enough.
"I need you to start circling around it. As long as we can hit it from multiple sides it won't know where to go anymore."
"Can't we just run and shoot? It's stumbling around enough that we can probably keep away from it."
"I can't."
"What do you mean you-" Soze finally got his first good look at Yin since the start of the battle, and what he saw made his heart drop into his stomach.
Fear.
Palpable waves of abject fear and terror were radiating off of her. Her arms and legs were trembling as she continued firing. Her face was calm even as thick tears poured from her eyes. She stared at The Monster, her eyes shaking as if it was difficult for her to even look at the beast.
After all the hunting, fighting, and surviving they had done over the last three months, Soze had forgotten that Yin was little more than a talented high school student. He was able to keep his nerve in the face of the [FEAR] debuff because he had past experiences with life or death situations, but Yin had nothing like that. Even the members of Bates' party had more experience with danger than she did because of their history as gamers, and even they had broken down and ran in the face of this debuff.
Yin was just barely holding herself together through pure discipline and was able to keep firing because this was the form that she had trained into her body and mind for years. In fact, SOze realized that she was firing too slowly to trigger [DAMAGE BOOST]. She had just managed to save him by aiming for its eyes, and was only able to keep her nerve through these practiced, meditative motions.
'If she tries to move right now her instincts will probably take over and make her run,' he realized.
For possibly the millionth time since they were first trapped in New Eden Online, Soze found himself cursing the unfairness of their situation. Yin, Yang, Alexx, and Loran may legally be adults, but to him they were still practically children, to say nothing of the actual children in the village or the hundreds of millions of other children throughout the rest of this accursed game.
"It's not fair," he muttered. Yin said something but he didn't hear it, his mind was spiraling as memories surfaced.
His first, and last, canyoneering trip.
'It's not fair...'
The rumbling of water and falling rocks, followed by intense pain.
'It's not fair...'
A hospital room, the surgeon looking apologetic.
'It's not fair...'
...His prosthetics.
"Get out of here," he said in a low voice.
"W-what? But you-"
"GO!" He barked.
His outburst finally broke Yin's paper-thin composure, and she ran.
He turned to look at The Monster. Without really thinking about it, he tried to take a step forward but was stopped by his debuffs. He kept trying as he pulled out his bow and started firing. He felt the [FEAR] surging through him again, but this time it was being suppressed by his anger. Hands that should have been shaking with either terror or fury were shockingly still as he fired shot after shot at The Monster, each shot landing. He didn't spare a glance at the [SIXTH SENSE] readout, he was too angry to care if it was taking damage or not.
The Monster was less than twenty feet away when he fired his last arrow. He finally looked up at the readout.
[HP] {5%}
Soze scowled as he tossed aside his bow. Reaching into his inventory he pulled out a gift Zed gave him from Ziege Basin. It was the blade of an Iron Ant Warrior, a little longer than he was used to and technically requiring more Strength than he had, but more than sharp enough to cut through The Monster's armor. He was hesitant to use it before because of the speed difference, but at this point, Soze was too angry to care about getting hit, or even killing The Monster.
He just wanted to hurt it.
*DING*
There was a notification that he didn't care about, and at the same time, blade in hand, he charged The Monster.