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Clint and Rictrap didn't have to wait long in the arena before they heard banging from across the stadium. There was a large wooden door with a metal bar across it and covered in chains. Some giant suits of armor stood before them, the assumed opponents until they headed to open the gate. A voice boomed over the megaphone in a heavy asian accent. "This is what happens when people enter my system illegally!" He said.

"So, Rictrap was it? What do you think of the situation?" Rictrap replied. "I try not to, plus this golem's pretty well made. It'll stand up to whatever befalls us." Clint sighed and thought to himself as the giant armors took out long chains of keys and started unlocking various locks on the door. "It's most likely an unbeatable boss." Said Clint. "It'll defeat us as quickly and cheaply as possible and throw us out of the system." He tried to be stealthy and send out a few messages to Eevee asking for help. It was nightfall in the real world now so she was probably asleep or worse- out... In any case she wasn't there to help. Clint was on his own.

The guards finally lifted the iron bar, then lagged a bit as the framerate dropped substantially. "What is this thing we're up against." Said rictrap. Whatever it was, it was powerful. A file large enough to lag the system was surely overkill. What could the programmer have been thinking? The door opened. Darkness inside, silence throughout.

*ScrEEEEEEI!!!* It was heard by all, the sound of a buzz, layered with a lions roar and something like nails on a chalkboard. Out came a gruesomely deformed monster. Came is the only word to describe how he moved as well, as he had eight primary legs with a long tail that served also as an extended body having many centipede like legs of it's own, topped of even at the end with a scorpion stinger. The head rested on the torso center of the eight primary legs, elongated. He didn't just have a mouth either, but a mouth inside his mouth, which was comparable to a crocodile's but not much else. It was covered in a long, black, eyeless skull and a boneless lower jaw. It's teeth moved individually, all of them, like razor sharp fingers, clawing and biting at the same time.

It lunged at Clint. He dodged out of the way and clawed back with his arm of fire, then shot at him with his two real hands and a pair of revolvers. Rictrap aimed his hands at the Golem, manipulating it to move and attack like a raptor. The golem leapt onto the creature's back, latched on by it's teeth, screaming in agony as the scales ruffled to form spikes, tearing into the Golem's flesh. You wouldn't think a golem would feel pain like everything else until you hear it scream, but he kept latched on by his master's orders. Clint drew a lighter out of his pocket and extended the flame into a sabre, then separated the tail from the torso, only to reveal a second head hidden underneath, capable of controlling the second half. It seemed the creature had a preprogrammed set of "natural" defences for everything, hence the lagging chunk of dataspace.

Scorpion claws emerged from the pincers of the new head, disarming him of a single pistol and cutting his hand. The blood was greenish black, so either it had a paintball mod or poison. "Eevee! we really could use some help down here! Wake. Up!" He cried. Meanwhile Rictrap was fending off the top half, spider legs and snake striking jawless croc head and all. All he could do was keep up and dodge until the creature extended it's striking range by shooting out it's tounge. Rictrap's good hand was caught, dagger ready to strike. Without it, he was defenceless.

Clint pulled out the last gun in his arsenal of weaponry, a tactical 12-guage shotgun and filled it full of holes, but it just wouldn't die... the invincible boss thing seemed a likely scenario...

Rictrap dropped his dagger into his left hand and stabbed the beast's tounge, following by slicing it off the rest of the way. It had a spike ready that didn't seem possible with the elasticity of the tounge a miuet ago, ready, and fired it out of the new hole into rictrap's neck. Meanwhile the tounge grew legs of it's own and crawled up his leg, making it's way toward's the heart.

Flesh turned black on clint's right hand, as well starting on Rictrap's neck. They were both poisoned without a likely cure anywhere programmed. The only thing that could save them now was a character interface program reboot, which would start them both in the status they were when they first entered, but it could only be activated from the outside. Clint sliced away at the claws with his fire arm and lightsaber, both on the left side, hiding away his right, but it was no good. They only regrew and left morphing tripod creatures beginning to surround him on the ground. Slice left, slice right, left, right, right again. Clint sliced away creating another more unmanageable foe each time, making sure to fling them a distance with each slice. Maybe a stab would do it... right in the face! But clint himself recieved in turn a faceful of claws from the golem, which was now fully fused into the creature's back, followed by it's club-like tail. He lost the blade into the flesh of the beast, still seeing it glow underneath it's forehead, bending his only remaining arm into a sheild to repel and burn away the swarms, which now had evolved into flying insects as well, multiplying full well on thier own! Rictrap was defenceless without his necromancy, which required something to die.

Just then Clint remebered something. A secret word to bring up the command window he used earlier in the case of an emergency. He would be unable to move his character or log out unti lthe task was completed, but it could buy him time until Eevee was able to return to her post. He screamed it out at the top of his lungs, only hoping the computer was still responsive. "PAUSE!"

He didn't notice any time pass himself, strange... that would mean either Eevee came at that very moment, or the game could freeze his mind as well. She rebooted Clint and Rictrap, leaving the creature forever frozen in the arena. There was something wrong, or she would have just logged him out. For now, he had some questions needing answering, and even though the only explanation as to how they were saved was her, she was still unresponsive. Perhaps the danger here was real. Threatening all the other players as well. This wasn't a simple matter of playing and winning anymore, but figuring out how to stop.

seeing hs chance, while the crature was frozen in midair, rictrap began summoning a chronoza, which he knew, would multply itself until this thing was either too full, or chocked to death. suddenly remembering history, he realized this was the beast that hercules killed with fire! when the mostar restarted, he wold summon a fire elemental to sear shut its wounds!

(Clint's signiture is an arm of fire... if that was it's weakness he would have fallen a long time ago. Plus, he's as good as dead frozen anyways so the best option would be just to leave him alone as all further damage is futile.)

Rictraps new attacks aimed at killing the beast once and for all, not realizing the nature of the system had already removed the physics layer entirely as a half asses precautionary anti-glitch program. His summoned beasts simply phased through. There was nothing more to do here, so Clint simply left, realizing his reboot gave him all of the items he should have had starting as a normal user, such as gold. He'd spend it on a night at the inn and see if he could discuss his thoughts with the other players.

Not quite ready to retire to her own room, Grace took a seat at the bar and surveyed the game's version of a pub as she sipped on a glass of water. There wasn't much to look at. A bunch of preprogrammed drunks were lolling about, sometimes bursting into off key song from their back corner near the door, while a rather shabby looking string quartet played slightly out of tune jigs on the raised platform near the stairs. The place was good enough for a one night stay but she would be more than happy to move on come morning.

No longer interested in her surroundings, Grace turned back to the counter and continued to sip from her glass in silence, she never struck up a conversation unless it benefited herself in some way. That wasn't to say she wouldn't talke to you if you spoke first, however, she simply might ignore you until you do.

a few seconds later, rictrap found himself, being crushed by his golem! realizing whatever happened had severed the ties to his golem, he ordered his flame elemental to disperse, and had the new animations fight the golem, apparantly, this is my fight, nobody elses, he thought, while the flesh golem crushed his skelotons into a fine powder with his fists he began leaping forward, sending his gullitine onto the head, and pulled it back, decapitating the golem. IT STILL WONT DIE??? thinking back, he used a quick spell, that had always been prepared, to cause the Golem to become the beast he had killed to create it, and he used the gullitine again, thus slaying the beast. Damn, that was my best Golem he said quitely, where can I replace it???

"You..." Tazuya struggled to speak, due to the fact he was beaten up. "You're...Sarubachi...from the Tenyo Dojo in the real world. You're Sarubachi Tenyo." Tazuya finally got out his sentence and surprisingly the old man showed no reaction until... "Ha. It took you that long to figure out it was me. Wow." The serious and wise old man that Tazuya ran into has just been replaced by this happy-go-lucky, energetic person. "I mean, I definitely thought you would have figured out my serious attitude was just an act. Man, are you dense." Sarubachi was continuousely getting on Tazuya's nerves. "That's not the important thing right now. Why, and how, are you here?" Tazuya wanted an answer. The Sarubachi that he knew wasn't much of a tech freak, and yet here he is on an online game.

"Yeah, I tend to get a little dizzy off and on. You sure you're good? I'm a good fighter too!"