Free The Leveller by Julia Durango Page A

“and you’re Goldilocks,” he added, while we were strategizing my attack. I laughed at the time and said I hoped they served a decent porridge, but it doesn’t seem nearly as funny now. Bears would be a welcome sight.
    Giant scorpions? Not so much.
    I see them now, right where they’re supposed to be. Papa is at four o’clock, shiny and black and the biggest of them, his stinger raised to a height about twice my own five feet ten inches. Mama’s at eight o’clock, copper-tinted and moving slowly, biding her sweet time. And Baby’s positioned directly at twelve o’clock, an iridescent greenish blue like a dragonfly and the smallest of the three, but also the fastest and coming right at me.
    â€œOkay, let’s get this done,” I say to myself. I run as fast as I can toward Baby, my sword high in the air. I move like a panther, my legs pumping at least twice their normal speed, and I feel like I’m about to go airborne. I’ve never used a speed potionbefore—performance enhancements have always been
way
out of my price range—and it almost feels like cheating.
    Baby sees me and raises his stinger even higher without losing speed. I can’t believe I’m playing a game of chicken with a giant scorpion, but here we are, running at each other like freight trains about to collide. “Wait for it . . . wait for it,” I mutter to myself as we get closer and closer, and then
SWISH
, down comes his stinger, straight at my heart.
    I whip up the oak shield just in time, and sink to my knees as the stinger plunges into the wood. It makes a loud
THUNK
, then Baby lets out an even louder high-pitched screech when he realizes he’s stuck. For a second I wonder if scorpions screech in real life, but then Baby lifts his tail with both me and my shield still attached, and my mind snaps back to the task at hand. I bring down the Gladius sword as hard as I can and slice Baby’s tail clean off.
    Baby lets out one last screech before he dissolves into thin air and I fall to the sand. There’s no time to brush myself off. If Papa and Mama were dangerous before, they’re in a murderous rage now. They come charging at me from opposite sides and it’s all I can do to hold my ground between them.
    They skitter around me, their black-and-copper stingers raining down in syncopated rhythm. Two Papa strikes for every Mama strike. As I tumble and dodge, flipping in between their tails like a Chinese acrobat on speed, I take note of theirmovements. Papa’s strikes are more forceful and rapid, but Mama’s got accuracy going for her.
    Just as Papa raises his tail to strike again, I roll myself between Mama’s coppery legs.
CRUNCH
. Papa’s stinger plunges itself into Mama’s back. Mama screeches and her body goes into defensive auto-pilot. I hear another
CRUNCH
as her stinger plunges into Papa.
    Papa doesn’t even complain, he just takes it like a boss and dissolves into the sand, locked in the fatal embrace of his wife.
    Whew.
    I sit down, shading myself with the oak shield until the desert turns back into the white room. I am exultant for a minute before a hideous realization descends on me like a school of poison jellyfish. If I weren’t virtual, I would shiver. The known portions of the maze are now complete. From here on out, I don’t know what to expect, how to equip myself, or what kind of monsters to watch for. It’s all guesswork. And if I fail, it’s back to the beginning. All of it—all over again.
    It’s enough to make a weaker person, a person who in no way resembles
me
, cry.
    I tap into my inventory and take a look around. I change my mind several times, then finally decide to arm myself with the rappelling gun and crossbow. Fight and flight, both covered. I can always trade weapons mid-challenge, though that’s often the best way to lose. In battle, every second is precious.
    I follow the