NeverWorld was not the only game available in this ghetto. There was Mission Flipp’n Ridiculous (a spy game), Samurai on Top (a samurai death match), Golden Age (a twenty-first-century war game), Grokstania (a social networking game), and several other less popular options. One would think that with so many people playing so many different games it would be chaos, but unless two spankers were in the same game, they were skinned as a “sideliner prop” to one another-just like the two ghosts appeared to D_Light.
Although spankers avoided running into sideliner props, they otherwise ignored them because the props typically had no real importance to the game they were in. D_Light now found himself in the unique position of caring about the props, at least the ones that represented Lyra and Djoser. How else would he coordinate with them on finding the demon? In response to this, Smorgeous verified that the old man was, in fact, Lyra, and the lumberjack accident was Djoser.
Returning his attention back to NeverWorld, D_Light breathed a sigh of regret as he watched the thicket- dense hairy back of the maltoc continue down the hall. It was uncommon to find one of these devils by itself, and D_Light had the advantage of full surprise. He felt a twinge of frustration as his opportunity for easy experience points disappeared around the corner, but he reminded himself that he was playing a much bigger and more important game this evening.
“Smorgeous, watch for doors that appear in the material world but not in the game. When you see one, go sit next to it,” D_Light stated out loud so that Lyra and Djoser could hear. Because D_Light was now playing a fantasy game in a quasi-medieval setting, he was supposed to role-play using fantaspeech, which included words like thee, thou, nay, and so on. However, he was not going to embarrass himself by speaking this way to the nobles. His score flashed red as NeverWorld exacted a minor penalty.
His familiar pinged confirmation of his master’s verbal command.
Although Smorgeous was not as intelligent as most humans or human-based products, he did have the advantage of being able to process multiple inputs at once. Smorgeous could monitor the game D_Light was jacked into while seeing the real world. However, D_Light had to be personally spanking in order to give Smorgeous access to the game. Spank games like NeverWorld did not allow familiars or other software to access it without a human sponsor being jacked in. Otherwise, spankers could use software to scout out the game before jacking in, which was cheating.
It was a while before they found a private door. D_Light watched the Lyra ghost knock on it. Just as D_Light had expected, the door upon which she was knocking appeared to him as a solid wall. There was some muffled talking, but D_Light could scarcely make out any of it, for real sounds were always somewhat muted while jacked in. Unable to hear much, he did manage to catch Lyra saying the phrases “interested in” and “thank you.” Her voice, husky but silky feminine, sounded surreal as it emanated from the old man’s ghostly mouth.
Additional doors were discovered as the night wore on, and the team soon dropped into an efficient routine. Fortunately, it was getting late and most residents had retired to their apartments. Unbeknownst to the residents, Lyra was having her familiar take images of them as they came to the door and then compare them to images in the demon database. After doing this for a while, Lyra even dropped the ruse of being a salesperson and simply told the often groggy-eyed occupant that she had the wrong apartment. Such a terse exchange was adequate, as it only took a second or two for PeePee to grok the suspect.
Meanwhile, D_Light spent most of his energy on avoiding being seen by the nasties. As his invisibility spell began to wear off, he had to renew it, and his spell manna was dwindling. Worse yet, some of the creatures lurking about could see him, despite the invisibility. He tried especially hard to avoid these, often doubling back down the hall, which confused Djoser and Lyra as they tried to stick with him.
Where the flip are you going? Lyra asked over a blink.
Uh, can’t talk. There’s a goo coming. D_Light sent his mental reply as he ran. The gelatinous mass of undulating slime that slithered after him was not fooled by D_Light’s invisibility, having no eyes anyway.
A what? Lyra’s thought signature was irritated. For Soul’s sake, this is stupid! I can’t believe I agreed to this…this…whatever it is we’re doing.
D_Light streamed as he ran. Look, I don’t want to get fragged. If I die, I get tossed out, and it’ll be a half hour before I can re-spawn.
What? returned Lyra. We didn’t take you along to do any spawning, okay? You want to do that, get a concubine and a room!
D_Light sprinted down a flight of stairs and out onto a grassy courtyard. He had lost the goo, but maltocs were now chasing him. Numbering at least four-more than a match for D_Light-they too could see through his invisibility. Perhaps something, maybe the goo, had cast a spell on the maltocs which enabled them to pierce through his invisibility illusion. Whatever the case, he could hear them storming down the stairs, and he had only a moment to hide. With one forceful leap, he hurled himself onto the ground and took cover behind some virtual rubble.
D_Light could have chosen a peaceful game like Grockstania where virtual death was not a problem; however, D_Light was not adept at social networking games. Other players would expect him to mingle with them. He would either have to waste his time chatting and flirting with these ghetto residents, or blow them off. Being antisocial in a social networking game would get you voted out quick, which would be no better than death in NeverWorld. Worse yet, bad manners tended to attract attention. Even if the demon wasn’t a player, he or she might have friends who were. The last thing D_Light wanted was for his plan to actually tip the demon off. He would never be invited to a MetaGame again.
Lyra followed, Djoser trailing behind her. She looked around furtively to confirm no one was watching and then glowered down at D_Light, who was lying motionless, all curled up like a possum playing dead. Lyra blinked D_Light, knowing he could not properly hear her audible voice. Are you insane? Why are you lying on the ground?
I’m hiding. I’m behind some rocks and stuff, D_Light blinked back. You’d understand if you were jacked in. D_Light’s blink was faint, as though he was trying to whisper with his mind.
Well, I understand you need to spank, but we feel like idiots following you around like this-not to mention it might look conspicuous to the demon if it were to observe us. From now on, Djoser and I will just chill somewhere while you ping us on the map where the private doors are, and we’ll follow up.
Djoser trotted up alongside Lyra. He was slightly winded. Yeah, why don’t you take care of the legwork? You know, you be the brawn and we’ll be the brains.
Sounds reasonable, D_Light pinged back. He wondered why they hadn’t done it that way from the start, them being the brains and all, but he was careful not to send the thought.
Having been left to his own devices, D_Light continued seeking out private doors. As soon as he and Smorgeous identified a door, Smorgeous forwarded the coordinates to Djoser and Lyra. And then, without waiting to see the results, D_Light moved on. So far he had not found many private doors, even fewer than he had expected-only thirty-six private doors, compared to over a thousand residences open to the public.
The small number of private doors made Djoser and Lyra’s job easy, but it did nothing for D_Light as he struggled to keep his bearings in the massive apartment mounds. The mounds went several stories above the ground, and the tunnels that connected them were like fat, mossy dikes with narrow paved roads on top. And worse than the scope of mounds was the unpredictability of the layout.
Because dro-vine dwellings had no real floor plans, no reliable maps existed. Indeed, even if they did, they would not remain accurate for long as existing walls and chambers shifted and new ones formed. Consequently, D_Light found it extremely challenging to find all the hidden hallways and chambers, many of which presented themselves awkwardly. Trapdoors in the floor, knotted rope ladders going upward, hidden crawl holes connecting adjoining chambers-it was anarchy. Spankers were usually too busy to put much energy into sweating the details of elegant interior design. Indeed, D_Light imagined they fancied their ad hoc architecture, believing it added variety and a tinge of surprise to the games played here.
Several hours passed before D_Light finally got fragged. He had wandered into an arch devil’s lair. Gold coins, jewelry, fine armor and weapons, books of lore, and magic items of various sorts gaudily adorned the walls and tables in the resplendent room. The devil prince was not in his lair, but his dog was. And it was not just a run-of-the-mill canine-it was a hellhound, and worse yet, it had been super buffed-up by some dark magic. D_Light barely got a look at the treasure before the hound came out of nowhere and ripped out his throat.
