Kiara’s four extra intelligence points made our croc battles easier. She could fire off four Magic Smacks now before her psy points ran out. Even if Ki didn’t score an instakill hit, the crocs were toast after two Magic Smacks and one of Trix’s Flame attacks. I rarely even had to pull out my switchblades.

  We found the second entrance to the dead-end rooms. This time I didn’t psyche myself up for some kind of horrible sewer battle against a fire breathing ten-foot-tall rat. I walked right in, not expecting to find anything. And nothing is what I found. Kiara and Trix stood in the doorway, similarly not surprised to find an empty room. I sat down and pulled the map back up.

  WILL: Maybe we’re missing something.

  TRIX: With each one of these rooms, there’s nothing behind it on the map. Just empty space.

  We all looked at the smooth concrete wall at the far side of the room.

  KIARA: You think there’s a boss in a hidden room on the other side of that wall?

  WILL: It doesn’t have to be a boss. What if it’s an exit out of this quadrant?

  TRIX: No use idly speculating. Let’s blow this thing open. Kiara. You’ve got the honors. Aim for the middle of the wall. Will, be ready to draw your hunting knife if something comes through.

  I nodded and stood beside Kiara.

  KIARA: Why the middle?

  TRIX: That’s how it usually works in video games.

  Her right arm outstretched, Kiara slammed a bolt of magic energy against the wall, and two things happened. First, a short, Legend of Zelda-like chime played. Second, an open door appeared in the middle of the wall. All three of us were too stunned to move at first, and as we stared at the door, we heard a hissing sound.

  KIARA: That better not be the sound of a gigantic snake.

  TRIX: Unless there’s a tractor trailer in there that just blew a tire, I think we’ve found ourselves a snakepit.

  It seemed like I never had enough time between fights that required pulling out my hunting knife. I felt too mentally tired to hear Keel again. He’d been nearly silent for a while, and I wished I could keep it that way. But I didn’t have any other options. My baseball bat looked like it had been discarded by Bo Jackson, and my only other weapons were the kind of switchblades you find at a flea market between a pile of romance novels and colored drinking glasses. As I pulled the hunting knife out of my inventory, Keel screamed in satisfaction.

  KEEL: We must hunt, Will. I want blood.

  I did my best to shut Keel out. I waited until the hissing stopped and then I strode through the secret door into a circular, blood-red chamber. A walkway went through the middle of the chamber and around its perimeter, raised over red, frothy water. I walked in, and an iron portcullis slammed down behind me. I spun around to see Trix and Kiara trying to lift the metal bars, but to no avail. Then I heard a splash as something broke through the water. I turned to see a giant, red snake rising out of the water, its body the thickness of a telephone pole, with an arrow-shaped head and rows of teeth like handsaws gliding in the air above me. Its green, reptilian eyes studied me with an evil intelligence. The world froze as what I was convinced could only be the guitar solo from the Power Rangers theme song kicked in and the word Zilch appeared across the room in red ASCII lettering.

  This goes without saying, but it’s Boss Battle time! Can you believe you did all that work of finding this place to die horribly? Anyway, I’ll keep this short to reflect the time you’ve got left before your proverbial bucket is melted by the noxious fire-breathing attack of Zilch the Legendary Firewyrm – level 17! Zilch usually feeds on crocs, but she has a thing for human flesh too. Did I yet mention that Zilch can metabolize bone? You may have noticed that you’re in here alone. That’s the way Zilch prefers her fights—unfair.

  As soon as the action paused and the system started chattering away about the stupid firewyrm, I hit Snoop and scanned Zilch’s info. The first thing I noticed was that she was actually level 19. It wasn’t clear if announcing it as level 17 was a system glitch or a way to give the firewyrm an added element of surprise, but it tracked with the unfairness theme. The second thing I noticed was that Zilch had some kind of attack resistance that triggered once she’d taken a specific degree of damage from one particular attack. My mind raced at that. My switchblades and hunting knives dealt the same kind of damage. After that, the only thing I had to fall back on were my broken baseball bat and my fists. I hoped those attacks weren’t classed the same, but it might not even matter. How much damage could I even do with a broken baseball bat? Right before the system message ended, I found a note that her principle attack was poison infused fire. The fire was going to be bad.

  I was still grabbing at strategies when the world unfroze. Zilch spewed poison fire at me, and it made the stench of the sewer system smell like a bed of roses in comparison. I was simultaneously gagging while on fire. Since, I was burning, I did what any sane person would do. I hurled myself into the red, frothy water. Once submerged, I stopped burning and my health meter stopped dropping. My health was still in the green, barely. At the same time, a poison check kept popping up and clearing on my interface with the words The Mother of All Belts resisted the poison! I was in a pool of deadly poison, but that belt was paying dividends. A drawback of being under the water was that I couldn’t hear the heavy metal fight song.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  KIARA: It’s not letting me heal you.

  TRIX: And there’s an energy barrier between us blocking ranged attacks.

  WILL: What about psychic attacks?

  TRIX: Nothing. I’m surprised we can still talk.

  KEEL: Stop stalling. Stab the snake!

  I swam next to Zilch and stabbed, hoping for a bingo. I wasn’t that lucky. Still, her health dropped by 33%, and mine topped off from Vamp. Then an alert popped up: Zilch is now resistant to piercing!

  KEEL: The wyrm cheats!

  WILL: That’s the truth. Putting you in reserve, Keel, but if that flag drops, I’ll bring you back out.

  I cut Keel’s screams off by dropping the knife into my inventory.

  I came back up to the surface for air, and Zilch belched another wave of fire. I dove back down, before taking much damage. I pulled my broken baseball bat out of my inventory and tried hitting the serpent with it, but it didn’t do anything. The water was pulling my punches. I was going to have to get on one of the platforms to hurt him with my bat.

  I swam behind Zilch and popped my head out of the water, grabbing the edge of the platform and pulling myself up. Zilch spun around and sprayed the room with fire again. I tried to slam on Turtle and then remembered thinking that a bunch of panicking drug dealers would be the most dangerous thing I fought today. Heat radiated across my skin and my health meter plunged. I leapt at Zilch’s head and connected with the half bat, dropping her health to 33% and then falling into the water again. My health was around 70%. I’d taken a lot of damage from the fire attack before getting a Vamp heal. More alerts popped up: Zilch is still resistant to piercing! Zilch is resistant to bludgeoning!

  I couldn’t stay under water much longer, but once up, I’d only have a few seconds before the invincible firewyrm moved to phase two of this fight: metabolizing my bones.

  WILL: I don’t have any weapons left that can hurt Zilch. Got any ideas?

  TRIX: Use your belt.

  WILL: My belt? That’s the only reason I’m not dead yet. This place is a poison pit.

  TRIX: Then be fast.

  WILL: But bludgeoning doesn’t hurt him now.

  TRIX: Choke him with it, Will! Right below his head.

  WILL: That’s a great idea.

  TRIX: I hope so.

  I wondered if by holding the belt it would still be considered as equipped, because I surely didn’t want to lose my poison resistance or its constitution and strength bonuses. I started to take the belt off while I was in the water, but stopped. If I lost my poison resistance, this caustic water might instantly eat through my skin and kill me.

  But I was out of thinking time. My chest was heaving from a lack of oxygen. My hand found purchase on the platform and I pulled myself up quickly. As soon as I was up, Zilch spotted me and lunged with her razor teeth. I kicked up at her, but she caught my foot in her mouth and latched on. I could feel her poison pumping into my leg, but with her head within reach, I couldn’t afford to miss my chance. I whipped my belt off and immediately felt light headed. My health took a nose dive into the red zone as I got the belt around Zilch’s head and tightened it for all I was worth. My foot felt like it was on fire and began to swell around my shoe and my health meter began to blink before Vamp kicked in.

  Zilch unclasped from my foot and tried to dive back in the water, but I held on with my belt, watching as the last sliver of her health disappeared.

  As Zilch’s body began to slide in the water, I raced to loosen the belt from her head. It was still around it when the head went under water and my hands and arms went in with her and sizzled from the poison. My health, which had gotten a final Vamp boost, dropped again before I got the belt off and pushed myself away from the poison water. My hands throbbing, I slipped the belt back on and felt relief from the burning on my hands and arms. At least in this moment, I was relieved that I didn’t have a lick of charisma.

  You really weren’t supposed to win that fight. People just made a lot of bets, and very, very few bet against Zilch. That means you just netted BioZone a big pile of cash. For that, your Dag pellet has been replaced with a token that will boost the piece of equipment of your choice.

  You hit Level 8! Too bad every time you level up you get uglier. Did you know that the Bruiser class gets to add 4 skill points with each level? Are you still glad you chased off your Game Guide?

  I was sitting on the platform, my bloodied and torn limbs shaking in shock when Kiara and Trix ran in the room.

  KIARA: Here!

  Kiara hit me with a heal potion. I was going to tell her to save it, but I was grateful for the flood of warmth that ran through me.

  WILL: Trix, your idea saved me.

  TRIX: It wasn’t my idea. Snoop listed choking as one of the ways Zilch could take damage.

  I closed my eyes and exhaled. I’d fallen into battle brain and hadn’t thought to keep looking through Zilch’s stat sheet for a solution.

  I also wondered about the betting angle that the system mentioned. Who would bet on a game that the system could manipulate? Had the system pulled any strings for me to ensure that BioZone didn’t lose money? If it had, I’d never know. That fight felt like it was going to be my last.

  TRIX: Woah, you looked at the loot yet?

  I checked it out.

  Key shard, 1 out of 4. This item can be combined to create a complete key.

  I dropped the key into my inventory

  Zilch’s Scales. This jacket was cut from the shedded skin of Zilch the Legendary Firewyrm. Its distinctive urine color and red chevrons will give anyone who sees you in this pause before they announce, “That’s one jacked-up looking jacket.” +3 Strength, +3 Constitution, -6 charisma. The wearer of this jacket is impenetrable from one attack type of their selection for two minutes a day.

  I was a hideous homeless man before I put on Zilch’s Scales. So, I didn’t feel any shame about wrapping myself in a snakeskin jacket that looked like it was retrieved from the back of a garbage truck.

  WILL: How do I look?

  KIARA: Truth?

  WILL: Sure.

  KIARA: You look like a hobo in a cheap Crocodile Dundee costume.

  In spite of everything, I grinned.