The Gray Tower (Being Rewritten as The Erstwhile Druid)

Chapter 22: A Pittance for Your Secrets

The gates of Vana loomed, moonlight bouncing off its twin towers. Tetsu breathed in the crisp air. A good night.  Briskly, Tetsu entered the forest, each stride filled with purpose.

Dried leaves and deadwood crunched underneath his feet. Tree limbs and foliage conspired to sabotage the Japanese man, obstructing both vision and movement.

Tetsu pressed on, determined to uncover the truth.

Soon the trees cleared, confirming his worst fears.

Both graves he'd dug were pillaged, dirt tossed asunder. Their inhabitants were gone. He noted blood splattered against trees, the smell of death drifting amongst the scent of pine. So they really were corpse eaters... But they were removed from the game after the closed alpha test. The patients complained that they were too visceral, too real. But how much have the monsters evolved?

Kneeling, he sifted through the crime scene. Metal shards glinted in the soil. Pieces of their armor. There was no doubt about it. Corpse eaters mashed their prey, consuming only flesh and bone. Their palate prevented them from eating any other material. Behavior and code remain relatively untouched. That's good news.

Tetsu sighed, tension draining. If he knew how the monsters worked, there wouldn't be any problems dealing with them. They were equivalent to shape-shifting zombies, slow and deliberate in their actions. Destroying them would be easy, but player morale was at risk of a downward spiral. No one wanted to slay monsters that bore the clothes and faces of their friends. Responding to the mental welfare of the adventurers would have to be a top priority. One out of many. Problems were piling into a huge mountain of to-do's, snowballing to disaster.

Three days and already the situation in Tralheim was dire. Players argued amongst themselves, and the NPCs... They were another story, but a solution had to be found quickly. The timer was already ticking, every second pushing the doomsday needle millimeters forward.

But who could've done this? He rubbed his beard. The timing is too meticulous. The mastermind must be one of us: someone related to Project T.O.W.E.R.

Tetsu mentally slogged through a list of possible suspects. The mastermind had to be located higher up the chain, on par with Tetsu. Two of the original developers were dead, leaving one obvious person. He frowned, repeating the same process thrice. The trail always led full circle to the same answer.

David.

"My, if it isn't Tetsu."

Speak of the devil. Tetsu stood, spinning in the voice's direction. "David."

"Tetsu, why so cold? There wouldn't be a me without you. After all, you were my mentor."

Tetsu stayed silent. His thoughts turned to Luke and Noelle. Be safe.

David droned on. "I tried to lock you out, but you just wouldn't take no for an answer. How'd you manage to get in?"

Fine. I'll play your game. "You forget that I'm the one who coded the game's infrastructure. Did you think I wouldn't build in backdoors?" Tetsu said.

David chuckled, smoothing his red suit. "You always were clever, Tetsu. And the most perverted of us. Oh you voyeur, you."

Tetsu squinted. Brown hair hugged David's scalp, cut shorter than Tetsu remembered. There was a glimmer of madness in the man's eyes — an ill omen. Tetsu's hand gripped Expander, feet shuffling into a fighting stance. "You're a fugitive, David. Where are you? Stop the madness. It's not too late to make things right. Turn yourself in."