20

  LEVEL ONE: THE DRAGON STONES

  REMAINING CONTESTANTS: 9,169,475

  TIME UNTIL CULLING: 52 days

  NAME: JACK REN

  CURRENT RANK: 489,201

  The three of us stand around for a long moment and just look at each other. Earl is grinning like a madman. Aside from the hat and the crossbow, he’s also acquired himself a monstrous, two-handed sword, strapped across his back, and a suit of smooth, black armor. The stetson, contrasting with the armor, makes him look like a lunatic, and his manic smile isn’t helping matters.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Earl says. “Didn’t think I’d see you again, Jack.”

  “Likewise,” I say, voice shaky from the adrenaline. Blood is still pouring from my chest. The Aeln cut me bad, and it’s really starting to hurt now. I don’t even want to look at it, to see how severe it really is.

  “And who’s this?” Cole asks, eyes narrowed.

  “Name’s Earl,” says Earl, tipping his hat. His crossbow, I notice, is pointed at Cole, another bolt loaded and ready to go. It’s an odd looking device with a rotating barrel with at least half a dozen bolts. I’m pretty sure they didn’t have those things back in medieval times.

  “This is Cole,” I say. “He’s leading a group that Elizabeth and I met up with. We’ve been sticking with them. Thought we’d check this place out—we figured it was empty.” I wince down at the Aeln. He’s still alive, whimpering, clutching at the ground and trying to pull himself up. A pool of dark blood is spreading out around him.

  “Well,” Earl says, “suppose we ought to put our friend out of his misery before we talk any further. It’d be cruel not to. Jack, I’d like for you to do the honors.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “Are you sure? That’s…generous.” Particularly generous because I’m sure whoever kills the Aeln will level up. I can see the hunger in Cole’s eyes as he thinks that very thing.

  “Why not me?” Cole says. “We should at least, I don’t know, play scissors-paper-rock or something—”

  “Nah,” Earl says, shaking his head. “My friend gets it. Besides, he was doing all the work. You were just getting smashed. Now, step out of the way, pretty boy, and let Jack do the deed.”

  “Can I borrow that crossbow of yours?” I ask. “Don’t exactly have a weapon. So it’s either this or I’ll have to beat him to death with my fists.”

  Earl nods and hands me the crossbow. Cole stands dejectedly to the side, playing with that ring of his. I can tell he’s tempted to jump in and steal the kill, that’s he’s very much not happy with the present circumstances—but what can he do about it? Besides, it’s his fault we got ourselves into this mess in the first place.

  “Careful,” Earl says. “It has some bite to it.”

  I fire the crossbow—and Earl’s right, it does bite. The thing jerks violently in my arms, hammering a bolt through the Aeln’s skull and killing it instantly.

  The effect is immediate.

  You have leveled up!

  Name: Jack Ren

  Contestant level: Six

  Current rank: 315,001

  Reward: New item

  Choose from one of the following:

  Spider Bracelet

  Charm of Warding

  “Huh,” I say, mind racing. Once again, it’s the classic problem of me having no clue what the difference between the two is. It’s pure guesswork. “Earl, you know anything about either of these?” And then I read out the options.

  Earl shakes his head. “Afraid not. I think they’re, like, random, or maybe tailored, or dependent on classes and so forth…honestly, got no clue. Spider Bracelet, though—that sounds cool, right?”

  “Sure,” I murmur, and then say, “Spider Bracelet.”

  The golden words fade. A weight settles around my left wrist.

  It’s a bracelet—no surprise there—made out of a matte black metal. It boasts a shiny black spider with ruby eyes. There’s something about it—something powerful. I feel a difference I can’t quite explain.

  “What does it do?” Earl asks.

  “No clue,” I say. “Suppose we’ll see once I figure it out.”

  Cole is watching us quietly. Moping. Wishing that he was the one with the new bracelet. I grin at him, amused by the absurdity of the situation, and at the same time worried about what he might do to get the bracelet off of me.

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  “We can trade, if you want,” I say, looking at me. “If you give me the ring.”

  “How can I make that trade if I don’t know what thing does?”

  “That’s the fun of it. The risk. It’s like gambling. But I get the sense you’re not much of a gambler, Cole.”

  “No,” he says, eyes dark. “I prefer to calculate.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “Figured. Unlike Earl here.”

  “Oh, I love to gamble,” Earl says with a big grin. He gently takes his crossbow back from me and holds it casually against his shoulder, the veins in his forearms standing out against his tanned skin.

  “So, Earl, I think it’s about time you filled me in. What happened to you?” I look him over. “I thought for sure that David got you.”

  Earl’s eyes widen, just a tiny bit. “You know David?”

  I frown. “Do you know David?”

  Earl scratches his brow. “Well, that’s the funny thing. So, there I was, running alongside you and Elizabeth with that giant, armored bastard chasing us. And then I fuckin’ tripped. It was the stupidest goddamn thing. A root got me. A root. Can you believe it?” He shook his head. “I thought that was the end of me. Killed by a root. The giant—David, as you apparently know—stood over me. I didn’t bother fighting. When I know a fight can’t be won, I use my mouth instead. I’ve always prided myself on my ability to make friends. So, that’s what I did. I made a friend.”

  I stare at him. “You and David are…friends?”

  “Yep,” says Earl.

  Cole’s reaction is subtle, but I don’t miss it. He angles his body so that, if it comes to it, he can make a run for the door, and he tilts his hand and adjusts his ring so that it’s pointed at Earl, who doesn't seem to notice—but then, the thing about Earl is, I have a feeling he notices a lot more than he shows.

  “Interesting,” I say, confused, more than a little worried. Because David doesn’t seem like the sort of person you can make friends with. Assuming, of course, that everything Cole has told me about the man is true. Which it might not be. Maybe Cole’s been deceiving me the entire time.

  Unfortunately, I’ve never been particularly good at knowing when people are lying. I’m a trusting guy. I like to believe that people are good and honest. I know it’s naive. And I know it’s gotten me in more than my fair share of trouble, from cheating ex-girlfriends to shady managers. Suddenly, I feel that it may very well be something I have to change about myself if I want to survive the Reality Games.

  It’s just another way this whole fucked up situation is going to make me a worse person.

  “Cole has something to tell you,” I say. “Something about David. Something you ought to know.”

  Earl holds up a hand. “Sure, feel free to do that. But…” he lowers his voice. “Listen, between the three of us, I have a feeling I know roughly what you’re going to tell me. David isn’t a good person. I know that. I’ve seen him do some shit these last few days that’d turn your stomach inside-out. He can be a mean, mean bastard. But here’s the thing: he’s also winning. Ranked third currently. And currently hunting the bastard who’s number two. He’s…an interesting guy.” Earl takes a deep breath. “I figure, this really isn’t the time or the place to worry too much about morality. David is a man who can carry us through this fuckin’ thing.”

  “And then, at the end, when it’s just you and him…then what?”

  Earl grins. “Then, brother, we take him out together. Stab him in the back before he stabs us in the back.”

  “And when it’s just us?”

  “I don’t know—draw straws?”

  I laugh, the tension bleeding out of me. Draw straws indeed. It’s a nice idea. It’s not going to happen, as much as I hate to admit it. No way I’m letting Sarah’s future be dictated by which straw gets drawn. But right now, it’s a pleasant fantasy, and one I’m willing to indulge in until reality slaps me in the face—as it always, inevitably does.

  “Where is he now?” Cole asks quietly. “Where’s David?”

  Earl glances at the other man, frowning. “He’s below us.”

  “Below us?” I say. “What, exactly, does that actually mean?”

  “There’s a dungeon below the citadel,” says Earl. “The citadel, David told me, is really just a cover for the dungeon. It’s the whole point of this place. You go down there and…there are monsters. Or so he told me.” Earl shrugs. “Listen, man, David was going on and on about how dangerous it is down there. Suicidal, he described it, unless you really know what you’re doing, which he supposedly does. So he’s down there. Fighting monsters.”

  “To what end?”

  Earl offers us another one of his trademark grins. “Loot.”

  I grit my teeth. It’s an unsettling thought: that David is down there cutting his way through whatever’s lurking in the dark, acquiring more and more powerful items, separating himself from the rest of the herd by the second. At a certain point, I have to think he’ll be truly unstoppable. And this is a man I have to directly compete with.

  So, the question is—how do I beat him?

  “What if we went down there?” My voice emerges with far more confidence than I’m actually feeling.

  “Easy question to answer,” Earl says brightly. “We’d simply die.”

  “Where’s the entrance to the dungeon?” Cole asks.

  “Why do you want to know?”

  “Just answer the question.”

  “Listen, brother,” Earl shakes his head. “I’ll be honest with you. I don’t like you. I don’t like you at all. You make my skin crawl. I don’t feel inclined to tell you a single damned thing.”

  And then, in a quick torrent of words, Cole tells Earl everything he’d told Elizabeth and I—the story about what David had done to their group, the murders in the middle of the night.

  Earl listens silently, expression unreadable. When Cole finishes, the Texan says, “I already told you that I know he ain’t a good guy. This isn’t exactly news to me.”

  “The reason,” Cole says calmly, “that I’m asking you, right now, where the entrance is, is because maybe there’s a way to shut it. For good. To trap David down there. We could bury him. Think about it, Earl. The man’s the single greatest threat to any of us. Let’s eliminate him while we can.”

  I glance at Cole. It’s not a bad idea, and now that he’s voiced it, now that it’s out there and in my mind, I find myself tempted by the prospect. Because maybe we don’t even need to kill him directly. If we can collapse the entrance, imprison him in the dark with the monsters…wouldn’t that solve one of our biggest problems?

  Unless, of course, he gets out.

  Unless all we end up doing is piss him off.

  “I’d be betraying him,” Earl says quietly. “I pride myself on being a man of my word. If I was to agree to this…”

  “You'd quite possibly save your own life. There are certain things, Earl, that we need to put aside while we’re in this place. Our word is one of those things.”

  Earl removes his hat, holds it solemnly against his chest. “I admit, there’s some merit to what you’re saying. But you haven’t seen David in action. It’s hard to imagine we could do anything that he won’t be able to break his way through.”

  Cole’s expression is resolute. “Show us the entrance. We’ll see about that.”

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