Present day

Oh, so I need to take Maggot to the Sorceress. Easy peasy. Only I need to know first where Maggot is. And then I need to figure out how to use the Worldjumper to get to the Sorceress. Tiny details for someone trapped in the zombie apocalypse.

Sarah forced the steel curtain open and went out. In the pitch black darkness she would make an excellent target for both living and undead alike, considering the flashlight taped to the soldering mask she was using as helmet. The thought made her nervous but it couldn’t be helped: there was no way that she’d make all the way back climbing building after building with the flamethrower hanging from her back, so the bike was the best option.

The first zombies appeared when she was about to reach the corner. They were three, four, then six at most. Not worth wasting fuel yet. Sarah pedaled faster in an attempt to cross the street before they got to her, but the combined weight of her body, the flamethrower and the backpack slowed down her march. She had to retrieve the switchblade and start impaling the ones who got too close. She almost fell from the bike once, and a few seconds later she had to step off to fight the undead on foot. When the area was clear, she climbed on the bycicle again and pressed for speed.

Skill active: Mount

Yeah, I knew how to ride a bike before logging in here, but thanks I guess.

She had pedaled halfway through the next block when she found a larger gathering of zombies. There were at least thirty, maybe fifty, and they were coming at her. There was no way out but forward. This is why I needed you, she said with her mind, as if the flamethrower could receive and interpret her thoughts. Don’t fail me now.

She stopped the bike, examined the horde of zombies moving toward her, and pointed the hose to the center. Throught the narrow strip of the soldering mask and under the potent white bath of the flashlight, the zombies really looked like an army of ghosts, and a sense of dread filled Sarah’s heart despite herself.

“Die for once, motherfuckers!”

She pulled the trigger and a magnificent stream of light and heat rushed into the dark air. The night seemed to catch fire. Sarah was momentarily blinded, then caught a glimpse of zombie hell. The corpses were not walking anymore; they were writhing, shaking, trembling, falling to the ground as the fiery load embraced them like a deadly lover.

Skill acquired: Blast Attack

The Blast Attack skill could be useful if she ever got out of this depressing realm, Sarah thought. Both assets and skills seemed to be crossphasable from one realm to the other, so her learning to ride a horse in the medieval village had activated the skill she had acquired (Mount) here in this desolate city. Maybe Blast Attack would let her do some interesting things elsewhere, even without a flamethrower.

At this point Sarah realized something. The mechanics of the game had very little to do with acquiring particular abilities and items in the different realms; they were related to crossphasing and adapting between worlds. The way to play the game was to play the meta-game, trying to master the skill of crossphasing. This will be immensely useful once I learn how to use the Ring, she concluded.

A new notification popped up then:

+43 XP

There, an exact count.

Once all the zombies stopped moving, she had to maneuver around the flaming corpses so that the bike’s wheels wouldn’t melt. Then she changed her mind: she actually stepped off the bike, lifted it with some effort and crossed the barrier on foot. She realized she hadn’t brought anything to repair the bycicle if it ever got damaged, and she couldn’t afford the tires melting while she was outside wandering among the undead, so she had to be extra careful, or at least as careful as the circumstances allowed.

In my next incursion I’ll procure a bycicle repair kit.

Her next encounter with a group of zombies was right after passing beside the crashed bus. They were just six or seven this time, so she refrained from burning them and instead started stabbing them as they got close. Fortunately, they were not very fast. She pedaled away as fast as she could.

And then she got to the building where she had waken up hours ago.

Well, fuck.

The entrance to the building was completely inaccessible. It looked like all the zombies in the city had chosen that point to gather around, and half the block was swarming with animated corpses. Again, Sarah thought there must be at least a thousand of them.

Think fast.

Sarah assessed the situation. She was outside, without a cover, and even with the flamethrower and the mask, it wouldn’t be long until the zombies dispatched her. The best course of action seemed to be pedaling away and circling around two or three blocks as she waited for the undead to go elsewhere. If their number went down to—

“Mmmmgggrrh!”

Sarah turned around, startled. Two zombies were almost over her already. They had come at her from her left when she was distracted watching the swarm. She pushed one of them away, then withdrew her arm with a quick jerk when the other grabbed it and tried to bite it. The flamethrower made it difficult for her to move, so when she tried to stab them with the switchblade that she held in her right hand, she fell short.

No, no, no.

More zombies were coming at her now, alerted by the noise.

Store switchblade, Sarah commanded, then prepared her left hand to hold it. Retrieve switchblade.

Now she could stab the zombies that were attacking her. But there were so, so many more.

Oh, fuck.

She pointed the hose at the ones that were getting close and lit them up. The situation changed abruptly. The first line of undead fell, contorting and murmuring, but the others saw the flame and started walking towards her.

Oh, fuck, fuck.

Sarah abandoned the bike and the backpack. There would be time to go back for them if she managed to survive his, which was a big if. She opened fire again. Liquid death rained over the already dead, killing them again.

They are going to make me use all the fuel.

She stepped forward, pressing on. Zombies on fire were still trying to get to her, but they collapsed as they did so, turning to ashes. She took another shot. The heat was burning her arms and chest, and the felt ran down her face profusely, clouding her already limited vision through the soldering mask. She shot again. More fire, more heat, more death for the undead.

“Mmmggrh. Mmrmrm. Grrrrnnnrrr.”

Even though she incinerated every zombie that came to her, more kept appearing; she burned the ones in front of her and suddenly there were zombies at her sides and behind her. She started turning around as she pressed the trigger, embracing the undead in a wheel of fire.

When she got to the door, the bycicle and the backpack forgotten amidst the swarm of zombies, she took a look at her Inventory.

Fuel 0021 ($30/x)

Her reserves had dropped dramatically in just one trip. Of half a trip, more accurately. Then again, she had completed the mission, as a new notification informed her when she entered the apartment, all sweaty and exhaust.

Task complete: Retrieve the flamethrower

+300 XP

+30 Perceptiom

+30 Endurance

+30 Agility

- Skill acquired: Stealth

- New weapon: Flamethrower (crossphasable)

After a couple of minutes, a new prompt informed her that she had ascended to level 4. She had killed so many zombies that she had leveled up by sheer accumulation of XP, at one per head.

* * *

And then, nothing else happened.

For a long time.

In the following days, Sarah raided the rest of the apartments in the building for food and other useful stuff. She kept the barriers on the door and windows; even though the zombies were unable to come upstairs, there might still be other people in hiding, waiting for her to lower her guard to invade her place.

She cleaned the apartment and took the dead man outside before it started to rot; in a brief ceremony, she burned his body in the middle of the street with a shot of the flamethrower. The undead had come to feast on both her and the corpse but the fire kept them at bay. She didn’t know who the man had been but she thought this sign of respect was worth the spent unit of fuel/mana.

Every few days she went out with the bike, wearing the mask and carrying the flamethrower. She typically chose a store and raided it for more items. She piled up cans of food which she even cooked sometimes using little scoops of the flamethrower’s fuel. She also built a small arsenal of melee weapons: gardening scissors, axes, whatever could be used against a surprise attack. Since she hadn’t found any ammo for her firearms yet, she was limited taking on her enemies at close range or burning them as a last resort, spending valuable fuel. She killed so many zombies that she leveled up twice more, bringing her level to 6.

On the days she didn’t venture out on the streets she went to the roof and practiced several skills. She ran, jumped, climbed, and rolled until she was exhausted; she became proficient at throwing knives and perfected her kicks and punches. The game occasionally rewarded her by assigning her several combat skills.

She also kept her eye on the book, waiting for Sumiko to talk to her. A couple of weeks after she completed the task, a worrying message appeared on the page:

They raided your house.

Sarah gave in to despair for a while; she yelled and cried and unloaded her fury and frustration on the undead, shooting them with the sniper rifle until her ammo was dangerously low.

After a while she realized she had been foolish. Snapping won’t get me any closer to finding Mike, she told herself. If I can’t find the way to exit this dead world, at least I should stay alive for as long as it takes until a way out presents itself.

On another occasion she received an enigmatic message:

Jump from a great height.

She felt puzzled at that. I wish Sumiko would take more time to write her instructions, she thought. But maybe the time she was spending on this world was only equivalent to a few minutes outside; she didn’t really know how strong was time dilation at this point in the game.

Time.

Time kept running mercilessly. Her resolve only hardened. She left the flamethrower inside to avoid wasting more fuel and decided to improve her Stealth abilities. It worked like some kind of field she had to keep active by conscious effort, and at first it only lasted for one minute or two; after a while she could prolong the effect and keep it working without so much effort. She walked around without the zombies noticing her; when they were really close they could see her but it was already too late, because she had her knives ready. She went on this way, earning experience points one by one, killing the already dead, upgrading her cloaking skills bit by bit.

She had brought her Stealth points from the basic 10 to 30 when she saw the big-eyed girl.