Risk versus reward.

  That was most Players’ unofficial creed. Step into a RIFT and gamble your life. Win and walk out rich. Become a celebrity. The world would adore you. Worship even. Lose? It meant you’re just another number. A pile of meat in the dirt.

  And meat was exactly what Old Man Sid was staring at.

  “Good grief. What a mess.”

  The craggy Cleaner tugged his cigarette loose on his lips with smoke curling as he squinted over the battlefield. A remnant of what used to be a village of sorts. The ground was a butcher’s floor – blood, bones, and a stink that clung to the lungs and skin like leeches. Behind him, a couple of rookies in the same green jumpsuit uniform heaved their guts into the dirt.

  Old Man Sid spat in equal disgust and horror. “Can’t blame the kids. Still… Oi, Ritchie! Get me the good doctor.”

  “You mean that doctor?” a ginger-haired rookie replied from afar. He too tried to stave off from vomiting his recently eaten breakfast.

  Old Man Sid jabbed his finger towards the pile of mushed bodies. “Aye. We mine crystals, strip hides, shovel gold. But this?” His lips curled. “This ain’t for sane men. Get Doctor Frankenstein down here.”

  Outside the RIFT, the air reeked of disinfectant and wet asphalt. Silence filled the park as the patter of rain brought a fragile calm to the chaos.

  A man in a dark-green jumpsuit crouched before a bald, broad-shouldered survivor whose scarred face was streaked with tears. His hair was cropped short; his hands still reeked faintly of alcohol wipes as he rolled a bandage over the bloodied stump.

  “You alright, big man?” he asked quietly.

  Ironshield didn’t answer. His remaining right hand trembled against his thigh.

  “It’s not easy losing people. Especially those you fought beside. But you kept some alive. That counts for something.”

  “B-B-But… because of me-”

  “Because of you, two of them are breathing.” The man in the dark-green jumpsuit nodded toward the paramedics loading stretchers into an ambulance – a young guy with a red mohawk and a girl swaddled in bandages. “Tell her I’m sorry. I had to amputate to save her.”

  Ironshield swallowed the lump down his throat, his voice shaking with every word he muttered. “Rhys… Minnie…”

  “I’ll take care of them,” the man said. “You have my word.”

  Just then, a shout carried over the hum of flashing ambulance sirens. “Dr Frankenstein?! You out here?”

  The man exhaled softly before turning toward the voice. “Guess break time’s over.”

  Sasaki Jin stood, brushing the dust from his knees, and patted Duane ‘Ironshield’ Johnson on the shoulder before handing a metal flask to him.

  “I-I don’t drink.”

  “Then don’t. But a little might help. Just don’t get drunk on regret.” Jin turned his back, but before he walked away, he continued where he left off. “Good work in there, big man. Rest up. You earned it.”

  ***

  Cleaners.

  The normal people. The unawakened – those who were forgotten by the System. Their claim to power denied. Yet, they were the ones who came after the heroes. Scavengers of glory and gore.

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  If Players – chosen few who were blessed by the System – risked their lives for rewards, pride and honour, Cleaners came in when the fighting was done. Their creed was simple: strip the dead, collect the loot, mine the stones, and pray that the RIFT didn’t close before payday.

  The battlefield still steamed with decay. Monsters' blood seeped into cracked soil, turning the ground black and sticky. A broken sword jutted from the earth like a gravestone. Etched up in the RIFT’s noon sky, the System Message was clear for all to see – forty-eight hours left before it collapsed.

  “Doctor Sir,” the rookie named Ritchie asked, “What will happen if we get stuck here when the RIFT eventually collapses?”

  “No idea,” came the reply before Jin pulled Ritchie away by his collar. “Careful where you step,” he muttered, lifting what was once a forearm from a puddle of blood. “We’ll need that.”

  The rookie gagged and turned away. “S-sir, I-I didn’t know it’d be this bad…”

  “Nobody ever does. RIFTs never warn you how bad people look when they die.”

  The kid retched again, and Jin almost smiled. The first time always left a mark. Some quit. Some hardened. A few, like the rookie, stayed because someone had to clean up the heroes’ mess.

  “Oi! If you’re gonna vomit, do it somewhere else!” a gravelly voice barked. “Don’t mix your guts with the clients!”

  Old Man Sid shuffled over with a cigarette butt still dangling from his lips, his dull eyes darting around. The veteran has been in this business longer than the RIFTs have had ranks.

  “And hello, Doctor Frankenstein,” he said with a smirk.

  “You know better than to call me that,” Jin replied, setting the forearm onto a green cloth spread beside a pile of torn flesh. “I’m no doctor.”

  “Yeah, yeah, sure. You just happen to stitch people back together for a living.”

  Old Man Sid crouched beside him, watching as Jin worked. He sorted through the carnage, picking out human remains from monster entrails with unnerving precision.

  A bone here. A hand there. An eyeball latched onto pulps of the monster’s entrails. Each piece was laid carefully on the cloth, like a grim puzzle. The others pretended not to watch, either through superstition that it was bad luck to stare at the dead for too long, or the scene was too traumatic to look at any further.

  “Two and a half years of this, huh?” Old Man Sid asked. “Tell me you still sleep at night.”

  “I sleep fine,” Jin replied, threading a needle as thick as his finger. “It’s good money. And someone’s got to do it.”

  “Money, my arse. From the way you look now, I reckon you’re rather enjoying this.”

  “Maybe.” Jin chuckled as he began sewing, the needle sliding through bloodied flesh with a wet sound. “Or maybe I believe in karma.”

  “Karma sharma,” Old Man Sid scoffed. “Ain’t no reincarnation in this business.”

  Jin shrugged. “Says the man who’s cheated death seven times. You’re what now? Sixty-five? Fifty years in the business?”

  The veteran Cleaner chuckled, puffing a smoke out of his nostrils. “When my time comes, I wanna go in the arms of a busty vixen with a bottle in each hand.”

  “Then you’ll die alone, broke, and piss-soaked,” Jin said dryly, searching for a matching skin to patch.

  “At least I’ll die happy. Unlike you, you crazy bastard. Pays good, sure, but you don’t look like you’re spending any of it.”

  Jin didn’t look up. “Eleana’s ten, you know.”

  “Damn! Already? So, all this gore money for her, huh?”

  “Every last cent. School, ballet, college.”

  “College? At ten?”

  “Got to plan ahead, old friend. This business will kill you sooner than you think.”

  Old Man Sid grinned. “What about marriage, then? That’ll cost you. Or grandkids while at it.”

  Jin froze mid-stitch and gave his friend a glare sharp enough to cut steel. “Over my dead body. No marriage. No boyfriend.”

  The veteran Cleaner barked a laugh that echoed across the ruined village. “Ain’t that what every father says before their girl brings home a lad. And you bloody know you can’t stop her one bit.”

  “Then I’ll bury that bastard myself,” Jin grumbled, tying off a stitch.

  He stepped back and wiped his hands. What had once been a pile of flesh now vaguely resembled two human shapes – a boy and a girl, young, perhaps nineteen at most.

  And to end his ‘work’, Jin then took rolls of bandages and wrapped the bodies mummy-like, leaving only the face, eyes, hair, or anything else that was still recognisable, visible. Besides it being tidy and all, wrapping up the bodies like this helped a lot. Especially to those who might have to deal with them later on, the mourning relatives included.

  “They can rest now,” Jin murmured. “At least their families will have something to bury. Or burn.”

  Old Man Sid exhaled a long stream of smoke before putting a hand to his chest, offering silent prayers. Jin followed suit.

  Once done, Old Man Sid excused himself to supervise the loot-collecting team. All the other Cleaners had already left the place, leaving crystal lanterns around that faintly lit the area. Now alone, Jin turned back toward another pile.

  There were more bodies to find – to be exact, from the record of missing Players, seven more bodies – and less time to do it. The RIFT’s sky continued to dim, and the air carried a faint, ghostly hum.

  “No rest for the wicked, huh?”

  Jin cracked a grim smile. The dead didn’t haunt him. They just kept him company.