So Serious

The building was immediately cooler than the outside, a relief from the late August sun. The lobby was spacious yet sparse, with little more than a row of powered off screens standing on the left and a circular desk in the center. A hologram stood inside the boundaries of the desk, and a computerized voice seemed to come from both it and the ceiling, “Applicants who have not yet submitted their data, please follow the directions of your instructors and take the elevator or the stairs to the second floor. Applicants who have submitted their data, please head to the training rooms in the basement.”

John noticed that a few people stood tall above most of the crowd, donned in various attires but each sporting a patch that had a single large brown stick on the shoulders of their clothes. Since this is based on tarot cards, I’m going to guess they’re the wands. I wonder how space is shared between the bounty hunters and the other divisions here.

He followed the majority of the crowd up a flight of stairs which poured out into another wide-open room. This one was less spartan and had a variety of couches and chairs. Likely for people to wait in, John realized, looking at the rows of desks that lined each wall except for the back wall, which was made entirely out of windows. The sun reflected off the pier below brilliantly. In terms of structure, it looked like a very fancy DMV. He didn’t have much time to consider it as he was pushed along toward the desks. He chose an open one and walked over to it, noticing that the woman behind it looked exactly the same as the one next to her… and the one next to her, and the one next to her. He cast Advanced Spy on her as she spoke, “Please slide your data-pad under the glass.”

John followed her instructions, giving her his data-pad. She jacked it into a port on the side of a touch-screen that made up the front of her desk, reading all the while. “Alright, John Newman! Let’s see what you have to do. High school graduate… college dropout… grades like that mean you can opt-out of the written test. Would you like to do that?”

“Will that impact me negatively in any way?” John asked, willing to sacrifice time if it meant looking better.

“Probably not. Unless you think you’d do better at a multi-subject test than the culmination of your grades from your first semester at… Ashcroft,” she answered, swiping through the data he had submitted. “Wow, you’ve got a lot of potential here. Let’s direct you to… sublevel two, room ten. Before you leave, I need to register your official pseudonym. While this can be changed at any time, in order to create a strong identity, I advise you pick something you’re going to stick with.”

Well, it can really only be one thing, John thought with a smile before answering, “The Gamer.”

The secretary’s eyebrows rose and she gave him a look as if to say, “Really? Didn’t you hear what I just said?” but registered him nonetheless. “Alright, your pseudonym has officially been registered as ‘The Gamer’. Your ID number is one-two-three-five-one. When you get to your directed room, you will find a bounty hunter who goes by the pseudonym ‘Sickle’. He will be testing your skills, so I suggest you prepare yourself. Have a nice day.” She handed his tablet to another clone that was passing by with a cart full of them, then handed him a plastic ID card that had his name and ID number on it which he pocketed. “That’ll last the day. If you become a permanent member, you’ll get one with your picture on it.”

John backed away, and the moment he was gone, his spot was replaced by a short, stout man with short brown hair. Tightening his belt, he made his way over to the elevators and got into a nearly-empty one just as it was closing.

Looking at the myriad of buttons inside, he noticed they were numbered as high as 99 and as low as G-50. Based on the fact that all the “G” buttons were below the lobby button, he guessed that they were the sublevels. Since G-2 was already pressed, he had nothing to worry about. Turning around, he discovered that with him in the elevator were Abigail and a man who looked eager to ignore both of them, intensely staring at his phone. His long, dark brown hair concealed most of his face.

“Hey John! Glad to see you made it!” Abigail beamed at him. “Who are you being tested by? Apparently I’m going up against somebody called ‘Crossfire’. If they’re a pyromancer, then fighting them might be hard. I lose control sometimes when things get really intense and I’ve always been better at punching than magic.”

“I’m getting tested by a guy called ‘Sickle’ which I’m going to guess is his weapon. These babies are going to make it a cakewalk,” John replied, patting Ebony and Ivory through his duster. “I can’t imagine someone using a sickle and chain is going to be all that hard to beat with two high-powered guns.”

“Maybe! I wouldn’t underestimate whoever they’re putting us up against though! We are the applicants after all,” Abigail reasoned, stepping out at G-2 into a well lit room made mostly out of concrete and steel, just as John did. “Oh you’re on this level too? Cool! I’m in room nine, what room are you in?”

“Ten,” John responded, noticing a sign on the wall indicated that the hallway in front of them and to the left had room numbers one through ten. “We’re supposed to go this way,” John said, following the signs into a sizeable hallway. It was big enough for an eighteen-wheeler to drive through comfortably. His room was at the end of the hall, and they agreed that the first one finished would wait for the other as she walked into her testing room. Walking into his, he only got a glimpse at it before being sucked into a trap barrier.

Warning! You have been pulled into a trap barrier by Sickle of the Rider-Waite Swords! When your HP hits zero, you will be ejected in the same state as you entered!

The message was cut off as John went into Reflex Mode and just barely dodged a blade on a chain that swept across the whole room from the man in the middle. “You’re the first applicant today that’s been able to do that. Color me impressed. I’m Sickle, but you probably already knew that. I’m going to be testing your combat skills. The moment you were pulled into this barrier, an enchantment was applied to you that’ll prevent you from really getting hurt. Get hit too much, and you’ll be ejected out. Who are you?”

“The Gamer,” John responded, taking Ebony and Ivory into his hands. Yellow bars overlapped his normal health and mana bars. I haven’t fired these yet. With everything going on, I probably should’ve just cut an hour of sleep to get used to these a little bit. Too late for that though. I’m guessing these yellow bars are what I can use in the barrier.

“That’s just the sort of name I’d expect a rookie to take,” Sickle responded, casually flicking his weapon back at John.

John shot it out of the air with Ebony but noticed that the **** power of the gun felt like it could’ve broken his wrist with the recoil. That’s not good. I better increase my Endurance or Strength next. John looked around the room to see if there was anything he could use to his advantage, but he discovered that, aside from fake windows which let in real sunlight, the spacious room was barren. “So, a barrier inside a barrier. Didn’t know that was possible,” John said, buying time while trying to think of a plan.

“That’s right, and getting easier to create every day thanks to our brothers and sisters in the Wand program,” Sickle responded, his eyes following John as the Gamer began to circle him. Sickle looked to be in his late twenties, wearing a long, blue overcoat with a plain white dress shirt under it. Oddly, he wore shorts beneath those. The sickle he held in his right hand had its chain coiled beneath him; from the looks of it, it could extend the whole room and then some. Oddly enough, the end of the chain was nowhere in sight. Instead, it extended into his sleeve. The bandana he wore on his head was the only reprieve from his blue and white color scheme, as it was red with a white X through it. Long, blond hair flowed out from under it.

David sat on John’s shoulder in his incorporeal form, and John motioned for the bird to disappear, This guy is way stronger than me. I don’t want you to get hurt. I’ll be fine, but the barrier said nothing about you. David didn’t completely understand, but the conviction John radiated was enough for him.

“You made fun of my name, but what kind of name is ‘Sickle’? You just named yourself after the weapon you use. That’d be like if I named myself ‘Gun’ or if a brawler named themselves ‘Fist’,” John joked, finger about to press down on the trigger of Ivory. He used Advanced Spy on the man in front of him to see what he could learn.

“Well, it’s not a name I picked so much as it is one I earned,” Sickle responded, unphased by his taunting. “You’re about to learn why they call me ‘Sickle’”

“Because you’re a communist?” John asked bluntly, which made his opponent get red in the face.

“No! It’s because I separate the wheat from the chaff!” Sickle responded, a duplicate of the weapon in his right hand falling out of his sleeve and into his left as John let loose with Ivory. Sickle had no problem deflecting each and every bullet, a whirlwind of blades surrounding him. It grew outward, and John worriedly backed away, firing with Ebony and Ivory at different angles in an attempt to make it through the bladed blockade. Green energy blades began to project out of his attacks, slicing through the solid rock of the trap barrier’s walls with ease. John Jumped out of the way just as one would have hit him, though he received a sizeable cut on his forearm nonetheless.

-350 HP

It was only due to the Duster that the pain wasn’t unbearable, and John bit his lip hard to stifle any noise as he continued to weave through Sickle’s attacks. Jesus Christ! I cannot let myself get hit by that. Also, I don’t think that’s what a sickle does, John thought, using Sip the Mana to disrupt the magic blades cascading throughout the room temporarily. Sickle stopped, momentarily disoriented. A side-effect of Sip the Mana that John had gotten used to over repeated uses. Sickle didn’t have that luxury. John fired dozens more bullets from Ivory, using Ebony sparingly but with greater precision. Even distracted, Sickle managed to block all but one of the bullets, which found its home in his left hand.

“Not bad, not bad. Still, I think you’re holding back. Where was that speed you had when you entered?” Sickle asked, resuming his attack rush. John began to fire upon the sickles instead of his opponent in order to block them whenever they got too close. All it took was one miss, and a sickle knocked Ivory from his hands, sending it across the room. He put both hands on Ebony, a plan forming in his head. He did his best to shoot away the sickles with the gun that had a much lower fire rate, but it was to no avail. Ebony was quickly knocked away, and John had to put up a wall with Mana Construct to prevent losing then and there.

“Well, well. That’s a new trick. Still, it’s not an offensive one. Let’s see how you deal with being disarmed!” Sickle began his attacks once again with renewed vigor, intentionally blocking off John’s paths to get his weapons. Little did he know, John didn’t need to get close to them. I better use Ebony for this. It’s more powerful.

“It’s clear that you’re helpless without your weapons! Go pick them up!” Sickle mocked as John tried to knock away as many attacks as possible, his hands covered with Mana Construct.

“What was that?” John asked, firing a burst of weak Mana Bolts at Sickle, who took them to face without concern. “It almost sounded like you told me to go pick up my weapons. Surely you didn’t say that, right? Why would I do that?”

John brought out the pistols he had been using previously and fired on Sickle while he was still partially blinded by the Mana Bolts. All the while, John used Move to ever so slightly position Ebony.

Even half blind, Sickle had no trouble deflecting the inferior guns’ bullets. With the slightest movement, John used Move to pull the trigger on Ebony, which was pointing at Sickle, directly in his blindspot.

The bullet went through Sickle cleanly, embedding itself in the wall above John’s shoulder.

“While you were attacking me, I carefully looked at where your sickles were going until I found the two places they never swept over. That was one!” John used Sip the Mana again and charged all but twenty of his mana into a Fist. Using the last of it, he Jumped in and blitzed him in the chest, sending him careening into the wall. “And that was two.”

Sickle sat in the rubble of the broken wall while John gloated, “If I can beat the person who’s supposed to be testing me, whatever they have next is going to be a-”

“I’ll admit, if I hadn’t brought my secondary sickle up in defense, you might have done some real damage to me there. As it is, I’m probably going to have to take it to Caroline to get it fixed. But if you hit that hard, I don’t know why you bother with guns. That aside, surely, if you’re that strong, I don’t need to hold back anymore, right?”

“Uh, what?” John asked, as in the blink of an eye a sickle went straight through him, ejecting him from the barrier. Sickle followed, leaving the barrier voluntarily.

“Not bad. You’re decently strong but not very durable. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders and some very interesting abilities. I’d say mid to high class C. Let’s fight again when you complete your tests. You can tell me about my blind spots,” Axel joked, patting John on the shoulder. “Head to the lobby for further instruction, you’ll probably have to wait a while for everyone else to finish their written and combat tests though.” With that, he reentered the barrier within the barrier before John had a chance to ask any questions, and a ridiculously fat man wearing a pig mask soon came down the hallway and was pulled into the trap barrier John had just exited. John leaned against the opposite wall, waiting for Abigail.