Chapter 34: The Level Beneath

A fraction of a second later, Miguel had already tucked the vial of dusty lizard blood into his backpack and begun climbing down the ladder. However, he hadn’t gone far enough from the surface to avoid hearing further sounds of tearing and rending of flesh, as well as further yells, gasps and screams from the players above.

“That’s Chloe done for,” he murmured to himself. “I suppose I should be glad, but...”

He fell silent, fighting back feelings of regret and embarrassment about how things had ended in his last contest with Chloe. And at that moment, there came a further splattering noise from above, followed by something splashing into the hatch and spraying down over Miguel and Aluna below. As it hit his face he winced, gritting his teeth, and tried to focus on the ladder, rather than on the rich smell of the human blood that had just showered him.

Gonna need to be ready for a fight when we get to the bottom, he told himself, trying is best to focus. The other team will be ready. And let’s just hope it’s only one team we’re up against.

Aluna was already a fair bit further down than him now, having followed his instructions to get moving. As Miguel descended further, he saw the gleam of her dagger again before he saw her. And then, to his surprise he heard a voice from below, speaking out not in a warning but a note of concern:

“Are you all right up there? What... urgh! Damn, if it’s not a human hand!” It was a woman’s voice speaking. “Ricky, you’d better stay back, my friend.”

There then came a low growl – was someone reacting in horror? Or was it a warning?

Miguel clambered further. Must be ready to equip my crossbow the moment I get down, he told himself. Aluna will be there first with her daggers. She’ll need my help.

And then, just as Miguel pictured the scene, Aluna did leap down the last few rungs of the ladder and land cat-like on the floor, equipping her second dagger as she did so.

“Woah, there,” came the same woman’s voice. “We don’t mean you any harm.”

“Yeah.” It was a man’s voice this time, gruff and deep. “You’re welcome to shelter from those korapta lizards, though.”

“From the what? But...” apparently, Aluna was lost for words at the strange and unexpectedly peaceful approach.

Miguel hurried down to the floor after her, careful not to step on the severed hand, and moved close to Aluna’s side. He then took in the scene. It was lit by a pair of torches in sconces on the walls – it was unclear whether one of them was the same one he had previously left on the surface beside the hatch. The room was circular, and supplies were roughly stacked against its walls. Or at least there were several barrels, crates, and boxes. As yet, he couldn’t see the contents of any of these.

Near the centre of the room was a round wooden table, and both of the other two figures in the room were leaning on the far side of this, staring at them. They were indeed the brown-clad players that he had seen before. One of the spherical Demon Hunters drones hung in the air just above the table, reminding them all they were being observed by the publikum.

Surprisingly, though, he could now see that the pair weren’t wearing combat fatigues, as he had at first assumed. If anything, their clothing looked rustic – plain brown smocks with hoods. The sort of thing that some refugees wore when they arrived at the gates of New Baravia. Both players had longbows slung across their shoulders.

Miguel at first looked at the man – tall, hairy of face and arm, imposing, with glistening black eyes. He was perhaps forty years old, thought the lines on his face suggested that he had experienced a lot of woes, and perhaps some hard physical labor, too.

To the man’s left stood the woman whose voice he had heard. She was slim, no more than twenty years at Miguel’s best guess, and had medium brown skin. A lock of gray hair fell across her face, despite her youthful features, and her eyes were bright vivid green.

Then the woman pulled back her hood, and Miguel’s eyes widened. Her long hair was woven into an elaborate style around two long, pointed ears.

“You’re... are you...” he began. “Not human?” He was rapidly readjusting his assumptions. Perhaps the two weren’t a team within the competition, but a new kind of test.

“She’s an elf,” grunted the man, pointing towards her with his thumb. “And yeah, she’s not from around here. Neither of us are.” As he spoke, the man looked towards the severed arm that was lying on the ground near Miguel’s feet, and sniffed.

“Ricky...” warned the elven woman.

“Feeling hungry?” asked Aluna, raising one eyebrow. Miguel’s companion was still holding her daggers at the ready, but had made no move to attack.

“I, uh...” began the man, then stopped, running his tongue across his teeth and glancing sideways his companion for a moment. “I have a sensitivity to blood and suchlike.”

“He’s got the appetites of a wolf, he means,” said the elf, her eyes sparkling. “I’m Channia by the way.”

Aluna grunted. “Listen, this is all starting to sound very friendly, but I’m afraid the four of us can’t work together. This is a battle between the different teams. It’s got to be the last one standing. So I’m going to give you a choice. Get out there and face that razor-lizard before us, or fight us right here, right now.”

Channia regarded Aluna coolly for a moment, but showed no sign of drawing her bow in the response to the fighting talk. “Interesting. A team battle, really? Is this for the amusement of some kind of ruler or king of your realm?”

“Something like that,” Aluna replied.

“Well then.” The elf shrugged, eyes sparkling again. “You can relax. We’re not part of your competition.”

There was a moment of silence, and then Ricky spoke up. “Aluna, they may be telling the truth. They don’t look like players. It could be some other kind of test. Perhaps they are here to guard these supplies.”

Channia shrugged at this. “I don’t think we were put here for any such reason, human. We only just found this place a few minutes ago ourselves. And anyway, we entered this particular level of our own accord.”

“What do you mean?” asked Aluna. “What level?”

The man, Ricky, then spoke up: “You could say that we stumbled upon a doorway into this... realm, or whatever you call it. We don’t belong here. So while we are ready and able to defend ourselves, neither of us have any reason to fight you. We just want to get into the city.”

Aluna frowned. “What city?”

Ricky stared back at her, folding his powerful-looking arms. “I’m a refugee from outside New Baravia. I’m here because I’m trying to become a citizen.”

Miguel’s eyes widened again. “Wait – what?” He looked from Ricky to Channia and back again. “But you can’t actually walk the streets with us. You’re both simulations in a virtual contest.”

Ricky gave a wry chuckle, leaning forward over against the round table once again. “Ah, and there’s the rub,” he said. “It’s true – Channia’s not from around here. I met her in the simulation that refugees can access outside the gates, a thing called the Dark Framework. So, are the pair of you from New Baravia yourselves, then? If so, we could use your help.”

“We...” began Aluna.

But before either Aluna and Miguel could say more, the surroundings began to fade.

Miguel then found himself back in the same small room of Madam Kampion’s compound where he had found himself before. He opened his eyes, blinking and trying to get used to a different way of seeing his surroundings once again. And all the time, it felt like Demon Hunters was on the verge of making an announcement. A sound was playing at the back of his mind, like the first syllable of a sentence, repeating again and again on a loop.

“Damn thing’s broken,” murmured Miguel. He tried to rise, but could only wait as the service android laboriously removed the headset.

A few minutes later, Miguel found himself outside the compound again. Ahead, Aluna had already moved over to the edge of the lake, where Bratislav, Noah and Tarja Tuomi were standing. Miguel hurried over to join them.

“You did great,” Bratislav was saying, but despite the fact that you were obviously on track to win the thing, the system hasn’t treated it as a victory.”

“But all the other teams got killed, right?” said Aluna.

Bratislav shrugged. “I thought so too. The razor-lizard was making short work of what remained of Chloe Kralova’s team, and these two” – he briefly pointed towards Miguel and Aluna – “were sheltering. It should have been all over. But for some reason, the system glitched out.”

Miguel narrowed his eyes. “What about the brown team.”

His friend looked back at him, hesitating for a moment. “Huh?”

“Yeah, you know... The pair in brown clothing. They were on the beach, and then they made it into the same shelter we did.”

Bratislav exchanged a glance with Noah and Tarja, then looked back at Miguel. “Uh, we watched the whole thing, Miguel. I don’t know what you...”

Then, Tarja interrupted: “The bottom line is that you haven’t won yet, Schmoop. It’s been counted as a tie. And the boss is pissed, because she thinks you blew it.”

“I...” Miguel didn’t know which to feel more confused about – the mysterious team that nobody but him and Aluna seemed to have observed, or the fact that their efforts were being seen as a failure. “But if Chloe’s team didn’t die, what then? We were still first equal, no?”

Bratislav shrugged. “In a way, but you can also consider yourselves also last equal, I’m afraid. Nobody has been declared a winner, and that is not a great return for Dana Kampion’s investment, to be frank.”

Miguel exchanged a glance with Aluna, who was also frowning, clearly confused about the outcome.

“But there is a chance to make it right,” Bratislav added. “Demon Hunters have announced that there will be a tie-break contest with the teams who were in the lead near the end. This is your big chance to show that you can beat Chloe.”