Chapter 7: Stealing

How do you steal something as big as a raid boss from under the nose of five people?

Perhaps only the sneakiest and bravest of adventurers would know!

It was all up to chance and opportunity.

Above the canteen in Area 57, was a full-blown storage house. Its size was unimaginable as the single building spanned the entirety of the area. Nearly everything that wasn’t related to food was stored in Area 57 before being processed and moved to other areas. It was the stomach of the entire corporation. Contained within was a large decontamination chamber as well. The raid boss spawns here once enough pollutants had gathered. Although it was augmented reality, it still followed the schedule of real life. Ironically, the day the raid boss spawns was also the day the cleaning drone perform their monthly cleanse of the storage zone.

This meant that very few employees stuck around during the cleaning. Thus, they could assume that any people they met would be one of the five adversaries they must face.

Amazingly, Gin still hasn’t been assigned any work from the company. Thus, he accompanied Rakia to Area 57 on the day of the raid.

After a few days of practice, Gin at least knew how to use a bow now. He didn’t have talent for it, but he could shoot an arrow or two. The auto-aim assist would help him correct his accuracy. This was just in case Gin was forced out of Exceed mode though. Zin had great mastery with the bow.

“Three types of raid boss spawns in Screw Town. The one that will spawn today is highly likely to be the contaminated type.”

Rakia explained as they hid in the storage area. The drones won’t attack them, but they will attempt to decontaminate them. It would lock them down in place and immobilize them with foam.

Gin nodded like a simpleton.

“Contaminated types come in many shapes and sizes, but they often have highly corrosive attributes. Avoid touching it with your skin at all cost. Our weapons should be able to handle the corrosion though.”

Rakia was wearing her work uniform. It looked different from Gin’s orange jumpsuit, gloves, shoes, and bubble helmet.

She wore a turquoise skintight suit. It was fully heatproof. Her navy-blue gloves were well padded and looked like modified oven mitts. Lastly, she wore black shoes that looked like regular boots but with large spikes protruding from the bottom. It elevated her height by a full inch.

In the past, butchers wore high heels to prevent stepping in the blood and gore on the floor of their butchery. Over time, they became more of a fashion statement.

With her boots, the flaming spear in her hands was now the perfect length for her height.

Her shoulder-length hair was hidden behind her helmet. It was in the shape of a cylinder and looked like a welder’s mask from the front.

Wearing their work uniforms helped them blend in. Many people with the same profession would wear the same uniform. If the five saw them in uniform, they couldn’t identify them. At best, they could only guess what department Gin and Rakia came from. Anonymity helped them avoid future conflicts as they were kill-stealing today.

Gin and Rakia wearing their strange outfits were moving around the various containers. Soon, they reached the refrigerated area. The temperature dropped sharply, and the moisture left a fine layer of frost on everything.

“Careful, it’s slippery.”

Rakia whispered to Gin as her spiked shoes stuck deep into the frost. Gin with his flat-bottomed shoes found it difficult to regain his balance. Thankfully, with all his training in the horse stance, he didn’t fall flat on his ass.

“Our first task is to find where the boss spawned. Secondly, we will need a vantage point that hides us from the other five. We will wait until both sides are fatigued, then we strike.”

“Got it!”

Mead and Zin were staying as quiet as possible. Their communication method could be detected by other AIs. Rakia and Gin whispering to each other was safer in the large storage container.

Suddenly, a drone rolled by from across the corner. It was spraying disinfecting foam on almost every surface.

Rakia swapped with Mead and she quickly jumped up above the containers. She dropped a rope down and Gin grabbed it tight before she reeled him up like a fish. Once both were on top of the container, they laid down on their backs and waited for the drone to pass by.

“Stay still kid,” Mead whispered.

Gin nodded in reply.

The land drone scanned around and found nothing out of the ordinary. It moved on from its zone and left the upper areas to the aerial drones. Even after it left, the two still stayed still for ten more minutes before finally moving again.

Several more drones were cleaning the refrigerated storage area. With Rakia’s quick movements, they managed to avoid all of them. Gin was in awe at how fast she swaps with Mead. He still had to slowly close his eyes and wait. It was not a cartoon where your enemy waited for your transformation scene to end.

The refrigerated part of the warehouse ended in a large metal door. On the side was a smaller door for personnel to enter and exit.

“It’s locked.”

Mead said as she tried to open the door.

“Manual or digital?”

“Digital, we aren’t going to get past this one.”

“Any other way in?”

“There are vents, but to get up there will require some climbing.”

“We can climb.”

“I can climb, I don’t know about your athletic skills kid.”

Gin sighed as Zin took over.

Gin’s face became more serious.

“I got this,” Zin said.

“Good. Come with me.”

Mead looked around before she threw her flaming spear into the wall. It penetrated cleanly and left the shaft sticking out. She leaped up and stood on top of the spear and started to move up and down. The elastic shaft gave her a boost as she leaped up towards a vent. As she got close, she kicked the wall, hard. The spikes on her boots stabbed into the wall as she gripped the vent and pry the grate opened. The grate landed with a loud sound.

Zin looked around and saw no one was approaching. He also leapt up and grabbed the shaft of the spear. Swinging around a few times, he used his momentum to fling himself up while pulling the spear out. Mead grabbed his hands and helped him into the vents.

“Thanks,” Zin said as he returned the spear.

“Let us hurry. As soon as we entered the vents, I could feel our surroundings digitize. The raid boss is nearby.”

Zin nodded. The zeros and ones were coming out of nowhere and lining the vent. They were entering the augmented reality zone.

______

After several twists and turns, they found their target.

In a well-lit room full of barrels filled to the brim with mysterious fluid, there was a large creature roaming about. It was covered in tentacles that dipped into the barrels and seemed to be drinking the fluids.

Zin and Mead stayed as quiet as possible without moving a muscle. They communicated through hand signals if needed.

Eventually, five costumed folks sneaked in from the other side. Two of them looked professional. They checked corners, scanned the area for escape paths, and found possible vantage points. The other three were looking around in wonder. It was obvious the large room with the tentacled beast shocked the newbies. Gin was also shocked but Zin took over, so his emotions were suppressed.

The two veterans used conventional weapons. One used a large hammer and the other used a large square shield with a short sword. They looked like paladins from the games of yore. One was a bulky man wearing thick rubbery padding while the other was a woman wearing several layers of metallic plates.

The three newbies wore their work uniform and carried common things one could find. A piece of rebar, a kitchen knife, and even a shovel.

“There it is,” The man said with a deep voice.

“Corrosive type A, is it drinking the radioactive fluids?” The woman scanned the beast.

“Crap, we need to stop it before it grows.”

The two veterans immediately leapt into action. The three newbies noticed the commotion and tried to run along them.

“Secure the perimeter, these raid bosses tend to call in or summon support units!”

The man yelled at the three newbies.

The woman reached the beast and slammed her shield into the creature’s side. She quickly stabbed her sword several times like a scorpion into the fleshy side and blocked an incoming tentacle with her shield.

The man leaped into the air and slammed the hammer down hard on the beast’s body. It left a deep dent but was quickly recovered as the creature drank more fluids from the barrels.

“It’s resistant to blunt damage, use piercing or slashing attacks!”

The man told the woman before turning his hammer around. The other side of the hammer was a sharp spike. He swung his hammer again and the spike smashed into the creature. It roared with pain.

Although the beast was large and mostly immobile, its recovery speed and resistance to physical damage made it tough to beat.

“We have to separate it from the barrels.”

“You three! Go get rid of the tentacles and move the barrels!”

The man and woman were keeping the main body of the monster busy while the three newbies were now running towards the various barrels the monster had stuck its tentacles in.

Zin and Mead watched as the three attempted to hack and slash at the tentacles. Of course, they failed to do any real damage, but they irritated it enough to leave the barrels alone for now.

While the monster was slowly being whittled down, time was passing by quickly.

Suddenly, drones came into the room.

“Crap, get out of the sight of the drones!”

The man bellowed as he quickly ran away. The woman followed but a stray tentacle managed to wrap around her ankles and tripped her.

“Shit!”

It seemed she activated Exceed mode as her physical ability skyrocketed. But the tentacle was too tenacious.

The drone immediately spotted her and began to spray disinfecting foam. It soon hardened and locked her in place. She would be stuck for the next half hour and thus was forcefully ejected from the AR system. At least she won’t suffocate as the foam was porous.

One of the newbies was also caught by the drone and turned into a snowman made of foam. Finally, after a quick sweep, the drone left.

With only three people left, the fight continued. Without the extra person keeping the tentacle busy, the monster took longer to kill. The man doubled his efforts to make up for the missing people as he activated Exceed mode as well.

No more drones would hinder the battle so the man could now put his full focus into killing the tentacle creature.

One of the newbies was incapacitated, but he managed to lop off one of the tentacles. He was forcefully ejected from the AR system as well.

Finally, the creature was now visibly shrinking in mass and ferocity. The man was also panting heavily, and his swings were getting weaker. Suddenly, the last newbie messed up and got caught by the last tentacle.

“Now!”

Mead and Zin appeared from the vents above and dove down onto the man and beast. Mead stabbed the creature with her burning spear while Zin shot several arrows at the man’s face.

He blocked a few arrows with his hammer, but one still managed to get through and blinded one of his eyes.

“You fucken scavengers!”

He roared with rage.

“Keep him busy,” Mead said as she started to deal heavy damage with her spear. The fire cauterized the wounds she inflicted and left black marks all over the creature. It was screaming with pain.

Zin nodded in silence and kept firing arrows at the man. The newbie was completely restricted by the tentacle and could no longer move. It was a lucky moment that they had to take advantage of.

The large hammer acted as a good shield, but some sneaky arrows still got past and struck the man in the arm. It slowed down his speed and started a cycle. He got slower and slower and began to get hit by more and more arrows.

Soon, he was a pincushion of artificial arrows. He knelt on the ground and dropped his hammer at his side.

“You bastards will pay!”

He roared before finally getting kicked out of the AR system for taking fatal damage. Not even Exceed mode would help him now.

Mead finished off the monster after a while. It left a large box and several puddles of goo. They were lucky the boss didn’t summon any supports, although the tentacles could be counted as such.

“Good stuff,” She said as she brought out several vials.

Carefully, she dipped them in the goo and corked them.

“This can be used in so many things.”

“What is it?”

“Concentrated corrosive fluids.”

Zin didn’t ask for one. They already got their part of the bargain; all the rest of the rewards went to Mead and Rakia.

They kicked the box and it opened up like a chest. Inside were several gold coins and some colorful jewels.

“This looks like a pirate’s chest.”

“Most raid chests look like this.”

“What uses does the gold coins have?”

“They can be directly converted into credit.”

Zin and Gin both got excited. As paupers, seeing such a large amount of possible credits made them both drool with greed.

“Hey now kid, don’t go breaking the deal now.”

Mead laughed at them as she pocketed the entire chest. She didn’t bother to explain what the jewels were, but Zin and Gin could only assume they were valuable as well.

“Now, let’s get out of here before those idiots come back for revenge.”

Mead and Zin leapt back into the vents and crawled away. As soon as they were far enough, they exited Exceed mode.

Gin limped on the ground. He could feel his muscles screaming at him.

“So, this is the true side effect of Exceed mode…,” he sighed.

He still followed Rakia back through the sophisticated route they took until they returned to Area 58. They covered their track as much as they could to prevent their five adversaries from finding them.

The rain dripped off their hydrophobic outfits as they ran back to Rakia’s shop. Every outfit provided by the company was top quality and waterproof.

Once inside, they quickly closed the doors and hid.

“We wait a while to see if anyone was following. Keep an eye open.”

“Got it.”

Gin peeked past the curtains of the window at the street outside. A few people were walking by on their commute to dinner. It was getting late in the day and the sun was setting. Gin had missed the last shuttle to return to his room. Thankfully, Rakia let him stay the night, just in case. Truthfully, Mead was just afraid that the kid would get kidnapped and interrogated. She couldn’t afford to move out and go into hiding now.

They both were hungry, so Rakia made something quick.

In her kitchen, there were various tubes of nutritional paste that actually looked appetizing. The 3D printed stuff couldn’t even share a spotlight. It’s like comparing pudding to mud. This type of cooking was less like chemistry and more like arts and crafts. She made a pie-shaped thing with the paste and shoved it beside her spear. Minutes later, it puffed up and became fully baked.

Taking a slice, she took the first bite.

“Not bad,” She said as she handed a slice to Gin.

Gin took a bite as well and was amazed at the taste. Just how did she turn something as basic as nutritional paste into something with such a complex combination of flavors.

“I make my own nutritional paste. They make for good quick and easy meals.”

Rakia said as she saw the confusion on Gin’s face.

Gin nodded delightfully as he ate his pie slice.

Time passed and nothing out of the usual happened. No one was watching the store from the outside and everything looked normal.

Night came and the streets quieted down. The moon rose but the countless amount of room pods in the sky made it look like it had a bad case of acne.

The endless rain played a rhythmic beat on the pavement. The neighbors were loudly chopping something, and the sound of oil frying echoed through the walls. It felt warm and homey compared to Gin’s lonely room pod.

It made him want a place of his own, amongst friends and neighbors. He grew tired of living alone.

But a place down on the planet was very expensive. The lowest price the company offers employees was 10,000 credits, and that’s for what basically was a broom closet. For a shop the size of Rakia’s, you would require nearly ten times that amount. It was amazing that Rakia had a place of her own down in Screw Town.

Gin knew she had some secrets, he was also envious of what she has, but he didn’t bother her about it. Instead, it motivated him.

Looking at the bow she lent him, Gin sighed and began to review the blueprints his boss sent him. Rakia sat by the window, enjoyed the rain, and kept an eye out for suspicious fellows. It was a calm and peaceful night after a big event.