Free Game Slaves by Gard Skinner Page B

over a river. I was winning, though, and the fights were a blast. The Black Knight doesn’t just claim invincibility, he needs to back it up.
    Gamer after gamer attacked. I barely picked up a nick in my leggings. They shot arrows and swooped on flying beasts and one of them even tried some kind of magic spell he’d gotten from a mountain witch. It was weak. Sure, it turned my mace into a poisonous serpent and my horse into a rabbit. In response I fed the rabbit to the snake, then cut off its head and shook the bunny way down toward the tail end.
    There, I had my mace back.
    After I hacked up the gamer, I took
his
horse.
    But something happened, and I wished Dakota had been there to hear it. There was a pause in the game as we leveled up, and I was under the bridge, down in the shadows, when a pair of new victims tromped up.
    I could pick up their crosstalk.
    One said, “Hey, Todd, you get that factory slot?”
    â€œUh, yeah.”
    â€œLucky, man.”
    â€œIt’s a factory, brother, hot as a mother in there.”
    â€œYeah, but now you get the brand.”
    â€œI’m just workin’ for chits, same as you. After tax I barely clear rent.”
    â€œBro, no whining. You’re
in
now. On the good side of the wall for sure.”
    â€œI’m a corporate serf.”
    â€œYou’re
stoked
is what you are. Better days ahead. Nose to the stone. Plus, you got bennies, right? Meds. Protection. Store discounts?”
    Then there was a silence.
    â€œDo good in there. It’ll lead to more.”
    They both forgot their problems because I jumped out and took ’em by surprise. It wasn’t more than a few moves and I had them lanced, stood up, and planted in the ground like giant olives on a stick.
    In here, these guys’ problems were not better jobs or the cost of living or feeling like their lives only served the rich and powerful.
    No, they should’ve been a little more concerned with perimeter defense, squad integrity, and overlapping fields of fire.

Level 11
    DUNGEON OF DEATH XXV , the ongoing saga of a dungeon. Where there’s death. And the gamers must sneak in and free their comrades before my drones can replace their good spinal columns with my remote-controlled fiendish spinal columns.
    The tweak here is that I was playing the role of Boss, and while I really prefer to be a top general, the gig had its moments. As a general, I get to alter my troop and weapons placement and our defensive or offensive strategy. I can pace our engagements and watch for weaknesses in gamer tactics. The days when we villains rush blindly into a room or over a ridge one after another are long gone. No fun in that for either side.
    As Boss of the dungeon, I had a long string of attack vampires on chains, and I placed these in the outer chambers. That made it quite a sneak mission for gamers to get around them and still stay out of range of their tethers.
    I turned a bunch of gamers into werewolves with titanium skulls and spines and, using a catapult, launched them into a three-dimensional skirmish with those who’d survived the first levels. Toss in a few gladiator-style arena fights and that whittled things down to my favor.
    But even then, a pack of gamers worked their way through—serious ninja skills—and soon enough, they were surrounding me, stomping my horned feet. Shooting flaming arrows into my pressure points. Eventually, two of them survived, climbed onto my back, and got revenge by extracting
my
spinal column in a closing scene filled with more bloody pulp and amniotic goo than should have been allowed under any rating system.
    Nicely played. But again, I don’t like boss battles. The big cheese always seems to have certain weak points that are just too easy to identify. It’s the journey to the boss that’s more fun. Not the final scene.
    When I came out of Re-Sim, it started again. That burning over my right eye. It spread to the bridge of my