Vylt: The New Dawn

Chapter 1: Infected

That thing was bugged. It had to be. While aggressive bosses weren't a foreign concept in the game, none were supposed to attack the players as soon as they came into vision, much less one with such a high damage output. If it was intentional, then the developers had finally gone crazy. I was furious regardless of the reason. I had taken my best equipment to that raid.

In Danath Online players not only lost experience but also dropped everything they had on them whenever they died. It was annoying, yet it made the virtual reality game feel more realistic. We actually feared death because of it.

The bright side was that we could always recover our things. All the items remained on the corpse and had no time limit unless they were perishable already. Anyone could claim them, but since the dungeon was unknown to everyone else, the risk of someone stealing my stuff was low. We still needed to go back for them as soon as possible, though.

Mary, nicknamed Ryme inside the game, and I were lucky to die closer to the entrance, and chances were that she had already gone back to recover our things after I went to bed in frustration. She was better at keeping her cool. The biggest problem was that some of our friends, including our guild leader, had been less fortunate and died inside the boss room. Our only chance to recover their equipment was levelling up. We needed to, otherwise we wouldn't survive getting hit by that thing. That, however, was a concern for the future.

I woke up earlier than usual. It was a very special day, after all. It marked the end of an era, and the beginning of a much more exciting stage of my life. It was my last day of high school, and the thought of finally graduating was enough to make me forget about yesterday's fiasco.

The sun had yet to rise when I got to the bus stop. I always took the earliest rides to avoid dealing with the crowds that formed later on, and today wasn't the exception. I didn't consider myself antisocial. Not anymore, at least. I simply enjoyed those nice peaceful moments of solitude before school.

Sitting on the closest bench, I took out my phone and began reading the new issue of Mysterium while I waited. I never missed a single release of my favourite digital magazine.

While I particularly enjoyed reading horror stories and the legends of the Old Era, I also had a blast going through the fake news included at the end of each issue. It was mind-boggling that some people honestly thought many of those stories were real, no matter how far-fetched they got. People claiming aliens had abducted them and famous cryptid encounters were all too common.

I was just done reading an article on zombies and survival when I heard a scream nearby. Turning to look at the origin of the noise, I spotted a young man leaning on a tree at the other side of the stop. I approached him cautiously to see what was wrong. He only grunted when I asked. It was clear that he was in a tremendous amount of pain, so I dialled the emergency line.

<This is emergency services. What is your emergency?>

There was more screaming and groaning. He fell to his knees, as if the last of his strength had finally deserted him.

"There's a very sick person next to me. I think. He seems unable to stand up or talk from the pain, and I don't see any wounds." I winced as his suffering clearly increased.

<Thank you for your call. Please, do not hang up your phone as we're currently tracking your location to send help. While that's done, is there anything else you can tell us about this person's condition?>

"I think he's just a bit older than I am. Oh, sorry. Um, early to mid-twenties, maybe? He's kneeling and pressing his stomach with one hand. Wait... He's gagging now!"

What is that thing!?

Realising the words never left my mouth, I told the lady what I witnessed. "S-some black stuff just came out of his mouth!"