55TH AND 9TH, STREET SIDEWALK. HELL’S KITCHEN, NYC
NEIGHBORHOOD: UNCLAIMED.
CITY: CLAIMED BY SQUAD THE PARAGONS OF JUSTICE
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“You know, it ain’t really neighborly of you gentleman to be trying to rob this nice lady,” I called out, approaching the three men just as they began to surround the elderly woman. People in New York had a tendency to keep their heads down. If you weren’t involved, it was generally better to stay out of it, especially if you didn’t want to end up late for work… or… you know… crushed by a fucking dumpster.
“You’re never going to let that go are you?”
“SERIOUSLY?! What do you think?” I shot back, trying not to let my annoyance break the aura of confidence I was attempting to maintain as I stared the bikers down.
Some of this attitude had gotten worse when the Augments appeared. The idea of being a Good Samaritan was harder and harder because you just didn’t know if the problem you were trying to get in the middle of had an Augment involved. Because seriously, what the hell was a regular human going to do against someone who considered the laws of physics a mere suggestion? And while now I knew at least that Augments couldn’t just be in normal street clothes because of the game’s Secret Identity rule, that was far from common knowledge. That said, the Augments did prompt New Yorkers to at least look up, and almost always pull out their phones.
“Look at the fuckin’ orange over here trying to play hero,” the largest of the bikers, a Level 4 Brute named Chuck, called. I noticed a few people on the other side of the street were already stopping to look. The folks coming up the sidewalk on our side had also stopped, several guys extending their arms to keep others from getting in the middle of a problem that was clearly brewing. I was actually in the right outfit this time to play the part, looking more like an Augment than a bank robber this time around. I didn’t have super hearing, so I couldn’t hear what they were saying over the general ambient noise of New York, but I could see more than a few of them pointing.
It was getting easier and easier to play the part of a hero though, and I think it was finally setting in that I was in fact a hero.
“You should all get on the ground before this ends like my last fight with some of your friends,” I taunted. I couldn’t be sure that they would know about that, but if this was like other games, that information would have somehow found its way back to them. Sure enough, the old lady seemed to be forgotten about as the three men turned toward me. “I don’t want to hurt any of you, but if it’s between that and you hurting one of my neighbors? Well I’m gonna have to be the one doing the hurting.”
“Oh so you’re the reason Rattle’s crew got pinched? Guess that makes this easier,” Chuck huffed as he looked at the smaller men who flanked him. They all wore similar black leather vests with purple lines stitched into them. “Get him, but keep him alive, the boss is gonna want to make an example of this piss-poor hero wannabe.”
“Crime Alert Updated! The time limit on this crime has been removed. You will fail to complete this crime alert if any harm comes to poor Mrs. Rodriguez by those big scary bikers. Additionally, since you called her nice, she might make you a pie. I hope it’s apple!”
The bikers were cracking their knuckles as the older woman backed against the nearest wall and I waited, hoping they’d give her just a little bit more distance. I risked another look across the street and the crowd was continuing to gather, but more importantly, I could see more than a few phones already raised toward us.
“You know, getting on the ground?” I said as I looked back at the bikers. I could actually feel myself smiling as I really settled further into my role. Maybe there was just something about being in costume defending people that made you want to be just a little bit snarky. “It wasn’t a suggestion.”
Before they could react, I activated my Weighted Clothes ability and the two grunts were both crushed to the floor under the weight of their suddenly quarter ton shirts. In the same moment, I pushed off, rushing Chuck and activating the Venomous Strike ability from my bracers as I jumped. A sheen of green liquid flicked off the spikes, splashing against the brute’s chest and leaving a debuff spinning above his head. My momentum continued to carry me and my fist crushed into his sternum, sending him stumbling backwards.
I nearly stumbled myself, the momentum of my jump carrying me further than I expected and I had to scramble on the other side of the brute to stop myself from tripping. His health had only lowered by about 15% and while the Weighted Clothes had hurt his friends, it wasn’t the instant takedown it had been on the level 1 version of these guys in the bank. Both of them were down to 50% health and they sported matching Pinned debuffs above their heads, slowly ticking down from 25 seconds.
Unlike his friends who had gotten crushed by their heavy shirts, Chuck was only noticeably slower as he lumbered toward me. He only sported a Poisoned debuff from my bracer's ability and it was quickly counting down. The short timescale of the debuff would cause it to expire long before I could put him down for the count, so I knew that I just had to utilize his sluggishness for as long as I could.
“I am gonna crush you,” he growled and attempted to lunge at me. I was able to easily sidestep the slowed attack and I quickly jabbed at him. The increased strength coming from my equipment was certainly helping and his health chunked down another 15% from my basic strike. At the same time, his debuff finally wore off and he stumbled right into their parked bikes, knocking them over like dominoes. The bike he fell on actually seemed to crumple from the combined weight of the brute and the enhanced weight of his shirt.
I was about to chase him down when I noticed one of the grunts pushing his way to his feet, the vest he was wearing seemed to emanate a pale glimmer as he wiped a stray bit of blood from his lip. While I hadn’t expected the NPCs to be equipped with gear that had abilities attached to them, I shouldn’t have been surprised by it either.
“Am I able to loot their gear too or do I only get stuff out of loot boxes?”
“You can loot their gear but the gear that gets generated for these lower level NPCs tends to only be useful to give them a fighting chance against you all. Your jacket is far better than that thing anyway,” Angie explained.
“Okay, but I could sell it, right?”
“Well yeah but when you didn’t loot those guys back in the bank, I just assumed money wasn’t your primary motivation.”
“You’ve seen how broke I am, money is always a motivation, and no, before you suggest it, I’m not going to go Miscreant and rob a bank,” I shot as I watched the grunt closely.
His health had also gone up by 25% and before I could react, he rushed me. He covered the distance in a matter of seconds and swung a wide strike that collided with my side. Luckily, I had planted my feet, and even though my health bar dropped by a good chunk, the Steadyfoot feature of my boots activated, and I gained just a little bit of it back.
“My turn,” I said, grabbing the grunt’s wrist before throwing a punch as hard as I could right for his face. Just before my strike hit, I activated my Sting Like a Bee ability and a flash of red accompanied the sound of my fist hitting his flesh. With my luck stat sitting at a 17 after equipment, the ability gave me a 36% chance of striking something vital. While that might not have sounded high, luck still seemed to be on my side.
Had I not had a solid grip on his wrist, he might have fallen backwards as his health dropped deep into the red. I could have hit him again, and dropped him, but instead I turned on my heel, yanking the man as hard as I could and forcing him to go stumbling toward the brute who had only started to recover. He was clearly annoyed and I found myself coming to a halt as I watched him effortlessly lift one of the motorcycles.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
“You know, for what it’s worth, you’re far less boring than some of the Guardians I read about in my short initialization period. Maybe not as exciting as some Miscreants or anything, but still.”
“Cool thanks, let’s bond over that later,” I shot back, unsure why she was even bringing it up. Still, she might have had a point. If we hadn’t gotten people recording this already, a guy lifting a fucking Harley was sure to do it.
“I’m getting real fuckin’ tired of your bullshit!” Chuck snarled.
He actually swung the motorcycle at me like it was a club. I was lucky it was so slow and I easily dodged his first swing as I started to skip backwards. But I only made it a few steps backwards when I found a hand grasped around my ankle, holding me in place with an annoyingly iron grip. The brute was regrouping as he marched toward me, the Poisoned debuff gone as he lifted the motorcycle for another strike.
I had to move quickly and an idea struck me in a flash of inspiration. I spat the gum I had been chewing since leaving the diner at the ground in front of me, lifting my free foot and stomping down on the grunt who’s Pinned debuff was just about to expire. His health chipped down further, but more importantly, he let go of my ankle. The brute was nearly in range to strike at me again when I reached for my power.
“New Ability! Mirror Image. And this right here is why reading is important kids. Thanks to your pre-dinner, super-speed, study session, you figured out how to manipulate the air around you within your local area to create mirages! When activated, leave a mirage of yourself in place for 30 seconds, additionally, you vanish from sight for 10 seconds, allowing you to move out of the way and maybe get to a better vantage point! This ability has a 10 minute cooldown.”
“Please Note: This is the 8th activated ability that you have added to your hotbar. Upon creation of any additional abilities, you will be given the option to replace one of your current abilities. Abilities on Cooldown cannot be swapped out until combat has been completed. Additionally, you cannot change the abilities on your hotbar during combat unless it’s for the inclusion of a new ability.”
I was scrambling backwards as I tried not to gasp in shock of seeing a copy of myself left in place. I had been wondering if there was a limit on just how many abilities I could have access to and while it was a bit more annoying than I would have liked to only have eight available slots, it wasn’t currently the end of the world either. The brute stepped directly onto the piece of gum and I mentally crossed my fingers as I focused on his shoe.
“New Ability! Like Concrete! First you take an ordinary piece of gum and chew it on up, stretching and making the polymers niiiice and pliable. Then you put it in the way of your opponent. Now, you’ve stepped in gum before, you know just how sticky it can be right? Well now that gum is in your local area! And thanks to that, you can increase the Van Der Waals forces being applied by 10000%! In layman's terms, that’s stronger than even the strongest of super glues. This effect lasts as long as the item remains in your local area or you choose to deactivate it. This ability has a 30 minute cooldown. Warning: Your Activated Ability bar is full. Please select an unused ability to replace on your hotbar.”
I didn’t hesitate and dropped the new icon in place of Water Into Wine. I had to stifle a laugh as the brute tripped forward, dropping the motorcycle through my illusory doppelganger and onto his prone associate.
“I didn’t know you were an expert in gum stickiness.”
“I’m not,” I huffed as my invisibility ticked off. The brute was prone and one of the grunts was down, but the last one was still up and I could see him moving to use a health syringe.
Just before he could use it, I threw an enhanced punch for his head and felt a satisfying crunch under my fist as he crumpled to the floor with the KO symbol floating above his head.
“Well you must be if you were able to make that happen,” Angie mused, though I was positive I could hear an edge of uncertainty in her tone.
“You saw me at the diner, I looked it all up on Jon’s tablet, apparently a “general understanding” equates to a quick google search, it's kinda a loophole but hey, that’s good to know,” I couldn’t help but feel myself smiling as I turned to face the last of my opponents, the brute who was pushing his way to his feet. He still had about 30% of his health remaining, but the sole of his boot was still firmly attached to the ground and my confidence was quickly rising.
“Hmmm, I’m not sure that’s intended to work like that. I will have to confer with Axio, please wait,” Angie said. I was prepared to move in on the brute when she spoke back up only a few seconds later. “Okay, he is going to let it slide this time as the ability has already been generated and he’s actually impressed by the ingenuity to a degree. But moving forward, the requirement for a non-game generated understanding of a topic has been increased. For future clarification, a General Understanding for the game’s purposes can be acquired through the game generated tomes or by either reading a book on the subject that’s at a minimum 200 pages, or by actively watching teaching material equivalent to 6 hours of video.”
I wanted to complain, because why the hell wouldn’t I? But I supposed it was fair too, I had found an exploit and utilized it after all. It was a gamble when I looked up why gum was sticky in the first place but it had paid off. It just sucked that it was the only bit I could sneak through for an extra ability.
“New Achievement! Bug Finder! You’ve discovered a bug that Axio hadn’t accounted for when generating your powerset! It didn’t break anything that major, but it’s a good thing we can patch it now before you exploit it for something really important. This is a Gold Level achievement. Reward: You have received an A+:Tier loot box.”
“Is there a bookshop in the Guardian section of the Square? Like somewhere I can go to purchase more of those knowledge tomes?” I asked, watching as the brute tried in vain to pull his boot free from the pavement. I had put on a good show so far and even though I couldn’t just go shouting what my powers were, an obsessive eye would probably put together the newest of the abilities I had displayed. I had to hope that would be enough for the time being. I materialized a Stamina Injector into my hand and shoved it into my leg as the green Stamina Bar below my Health Bar filled back up.
“Yes there is, but as I’ve mentioned, you only get access if-”
“If I have claimed a territory for one of the sides, yeah I remember.” I said cutting her off.
“Plus you need a name if you’re going to do that,” she added.
“Yeah I know, but there’s one that’s been growing on me since dinner here,” I replied.
Before Angie could ask me what it was, I rushed the brute. He was practically bent over as he tried to yank at his leg with his hands. I honestly couldn’t believe just how solidly I had glued the boot to the ground. It really sucked that the ability was on such a long cooldown, but I could see just how broken it could be if I could be throwing it around every other minute. I burst through the dissolving mirage version of myself and planted my feet before I threw a hard uppercut right for the brute’s exposed jaw.
As my fist connected I mentally disabled Like Concrete and Chuck stumbled backwards, tripping and falling right onto his ass as my Sting Like A Bee ability went on cooldown. His health had dropped to critical and was flashing over his head as I cracked my knuckles.
“I want you and all of the assholes in your little biker gang to get something through your thick skulls. Hell’s Kitchen is my home, and I’m not going to let any of you fuckers hurt the people in my home,” I walked up to Chuck, towering over him as he reached up and felt at his jaw that was leaking blood. “Tell your boss… no… tell every one of the pathetic assholes you call friends that prey on the weak, that if they want to do it in Hell’s Kitchen, they have to go through Loophole first.”
I struck quickly, my fist bloodying against the side of his face as I sent the brute sprawling to the ground with a satisfying thud.
“Territory Update! The neighborhood of Hell’s Kitchen, NYC has been claimed by Guardian: Loophole. This claim is Contested. This claim is Tentative to the player registering their Player Name at the Sanctuary Square Registration Office. It’s a good thing those rubberneckers on the other side of the street caught your little speech, cause you just knocked the last of your enemies all the way the fuck out. I don’t think they’re going to be talking about you to anyone anytime soon.”