I launched myself at the Skinstealer before it could go on the offensive, shooting across the air between us with tremendous speed. My fist connected with its head as I flew past.

  “You just used SPRING_HEEL!” Panda exclaimed.

  Not-Noah leapt after me, but I dodgerolled forward and moved through his body as though it was made of smoke.

  “That was your I-Frames passive!” Panda yelled. “What is going on!?”

  I sent a punch into the monstrosity’s stomach right as the delay from the first hit expired. A loud crunch echoed through the nest as its head was bent back at a spine-breaking angle. Unlike Candy, its body was not sent flying, though it was disabled for a moment which I exploited to its fullest potential. I rapidly drummed my fists into Not-Noah’s stomach and torso as fast as I was able.

  When the first hit registered the rest followed like the shots from a machine gun, each loud smack accompanied with a visible impact on its body.

  The monster suddenly swiped its clawed hand forward, catching me in the side of the cheek and carving across my face. It felt like thin scalpels as the claws sliced along my eyebrows, nose, and upper lip.

  I stumbled back as blood ran down my face, filling my mouth and covering my eyes. My punches were still raining into its stomach, and cracking was starting to become audible from within its body with every impact.

  I blinked and a sheet of text appeared in front of my eyes for a split-second. It was long enough for me to somehow register what it said though.

  [Appraisal x ]

  Level ?? — ‘Flayed Noble’ — Spawn of an Absolute

  THE FLAYED QUEEN

  SENDS HER REGARDS TO YOU,

  GAMBIT.

  YOU CANNOT ESCAPE HER WRATH

  WITH YOUR LITTLE TRICKS.

  *Yawn*

  Huh, what’s going on here? I thought we weren’t starting for another 18 hours…

  Alright, let’s see what we’ve got here…

  Wait, a Flayed One? What’s the Flayed Lady up to this time??

  Hold on a minute, how are you even seeing this??

  [Dave!?]

  [We need to get Glitch Hunters down to the Castleburg Region asap!]

  [What do you mean they’re not ready!? Are you seeing this shit!?]

  Hey, you reading this right now, yes you, don’t fucking go anywhere!

  We’re sending people as soon as I can kick them into gear!

  “What the hell?” I muttered.

  “Even your Appraising Eye passive works!?” Panda exclaimed in confusion.

  “Gambit, are you okay!?” Bee yelled from behind me.

  “Stay back!” I told her.

  “I think your skills are working!” Panda realized. “You’ve gotta use Pow Punch!”

  Before the Flayed Noble could rush me, I knelt down and launched myself at it again. I clenched my fist to trigger the Sea Urchin Ring and swung my spike-covered arm right into its center.

  “Pow!” I yelled.

  Brock squeaked excitedly.

  Nothing happened, but I was already running back towards Samantha, Camilla, and Bee.

  “Run!” I yelled at them.

  As though they’d been paralyzed until now, my words finally made the two businesswomen get a move on.

  The rain of punches had finally run their course, and the Flayed Noble was quick to pursue.

  “What the fuck is that!?” Samantha yelled as we barreled through the walls of the weird spiraling nest.

  Then there was a pulse across the IKEA store. All four of us were frozen in time and it took me a second to realize why.

  “The Pow Punch is doing its calculations!” Panda said, putting my realization to words. He was somehow not affected by the hitch in the stream of time, which was quite bizarre. I also wasn’t sure how I was able to perceive his words.

  The moment we were unfrozen, and time resumed its normal flow, a warm wind rushed past us. We were lifted off our feet, along with all the walls and remaining furniture. We were fortunately blown right through the open doorway to the store, since otherwise we’d have been crushed against the walls. The four of us tumbled across the floor of the mall, while a shockwave pulsed repeatedly from the heart of the IKEA.

  I looked back and saw a brilliant and continuous light. It was as though a miniature sun had been summoned by my ability. The Flayed Noble was completely gone. There were no signs of its nest, the piles of bones, nor Candy’s dismantled body.

  A moment later the light and heat dissipated.

  “Holy fuck,” Panda said in awe. “Breezy is going to be so pissed at us.”

  I got to my feet and rolled my right shoulder. I didn’t even feel any soreness from the fight.

  Before I could ask my friends if they were alright, Camilla came over to me and slapped a bunch of bandages around my head. I knew it wasn’t necessary, since I could already feel how the cuts were knitting themselves shut.

  The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “What just happened in there?” Samantha asked as she approached the front of the store.

  “You punched a hole out through the back of the mall!” Bee said excitedly. She was also standing next to Samantha and surveying the damage.

  I went up next to them and looked into the IKEA. Sure enough, there was a circular hole going through the back wall of the store and it continued through the outer wall of the mall itself.

  “What happened to the creepy thing that emerged from inside Noah?” Samantha asked.

  “I killed it,” I told her and went back inside the store.

  I looked about for any signs of the Flayed Noble. There were no remains. Not even any Leftovers.

  “Loot probably doesn’t show up until after the Great Game has begun,” Panda said.

  “That’s some bullshit,” I replied as I went deeper into the store.

  Where the nest had stood was just a circular groove eaten out of the floor. It extended all the way to the hole in the wall. From where I stood, I could also see the damage I’d inflicted outside the mall. Fortunately, the beam of energy had passed between two apartment blocks. It had continued up over the city, taking out the top of an old water tower, before striking the crest of a distant mountain and leaving a circular hole through it like a tunnel.

  “I hope you understand how lucky you got,” Panda said. “That could’ve killed a lot of innocent people.”

  “You were the one who told me to use it!” I shot back.

  Samantha came up to me and looked out through the hole in the wall, seeing what I saw.

  “How did you do that?” she asked.

  Camilla wrote something on the clipboard she still somehow held onto. They’d both lost their crossbows at some point.

  Outside the store a bunch of people were looking in and talking loudly.

  “All of this will make a lot more sense tomorrow when the Great Game begins,” I told them. “But basically, I’m very strong.”

  “You know, this all feels pretty anticlimactic,” Panda said. “You’ve already dealt with Liam and Noah before the Game even began. You’ve lost your raison d’être.”

  “Did anyone else feel time stop before the explosion?” Bee asked.

  Samantha and Camilla both nodded uneasily.

  “I thought it was just me,” Camilla said.

  “You’re gonna be in so much trouble,” Panda said with a sigh. “This kind of System subversion is miles beyond anything you were guilty of before… Anyway, we learnt something useful thanks to that random appraisal. The Great Game will start tomorrow at noon.”

  “Do either of you have a watch?” I asked them.

  Camilla immediately pulled out an old-timey pocket-watch. “It’s currently 6:12 PM,” she said.

  “According to Panda, we only have 18 hours before the Great Game begins,” I said.

  “Who’s Panda?” Samantha asked.

  “He’s Gambit’s invisible friend,” Bee explained.

  She sighed.

  “Today has been a weird day,” she said.

  “It is possible that the canned food we ate yesterday was expired and we are currently hallucinating,” Camilla commented, trying to give her boss a way to explain what they had witnessed.

  I reached over and pinched her cheek.

  “Ouch,” she complained. “What did you do that for!?”

  “It’s not a hallucination,” I told her.

  Then I took a step back and puffed up my chest.

  “Alright team,” I started, “we’ve got 18 hours to find Otto, Tina, and Chris! Let’s get going!”

  “What about Steve?” Panda asked.

  “Forget about Steve,” I told him. “That guy is not worth rescuing.”

  The two businesswomen looked at me.

  “I’ve had enough adventure and murder for today,” Samantha told me. Camilla nodded eagerly.

  “Alright, suit yourselves. Bee and I will go on without you!” I replied.

  “Ask them if they’re staying here,” Panda suggested.

  “Are you two staying at the mall?” I asked.

  Samantha looked at the crowd of people standing outside the IKEA. “I guess we’ll be able to do more good from here than Downtown.”

  “We should make an inventory of all the food available, as well as a list of all the residents,” Camilla suggested, immediately switching back into work mode.

  “Just don’t stay inside here when the clock hits noon tomorrow,” I told them. “Bee and I might not be back before then.”

  Camilla looked at me. Unlike Samantha, she did seem to take my warning a bit more seriously. “Where should we go?” she asked.

  I glanced at Panda.

  “Maybe the roof,” he suggested. “Serenity Park is not a great place to wait out the initialization, thanks to the Swan. Having some way to get back into the mall would be a good idea, although the monsters inside are going to be pretty tough.”

  I relayed his advice.

  Camilla nodded. “We will gather all our weapons and provisions and head for the roof around 10 AM.”

  “Anyone who stays inside the mall could potentially end up as a monster,” I said. “So make sure you don’t leave anyone behind. And stay away from the elevator.”

  Camilla wrote down notes on the clipboard while Samantha just looked at her in exasperation. Still, I felt confident they would heed my words, especially since they had seen the Skinstealers with their own eyes.

  Bee walked up to me and asked, “Before we go, can we get something to eat? I’m very hungry.”

  “Of course,” I said and strode towards the IKEA’s exit. The crowd parted at my approach and Bee quickly followed after me.

  “I think I saw a food storage on the second floor,” Panda said.

  The guy running the foodbank inside a jewelry store was not happy with me taking several of his canned goods, but he became a lot friendlier after I bent his crowbar into a V-shape.

  As we made our way to the exit, Bee loudly smacked her lips while eating the pineapple rings from one of the cans we’d looted. I swallowed the contents of a tin of refried beans, which was quite filling. Strangely though, I didn’t feel very hungry.

  “That’s because of your high Vitality,” Panda said.

  I pulled off the bandages Camilla had wrapped around my head and threw them in a nearby bin, then we took the escalator down to the first floor. Bee looked at my face in wonder.

  “How are you able to heal that fast?”

  “Oh, that’s simple! It’s because… Erm… Actually, I’m not sure to be honest.”

  “Don’t look at me,” Panda said. “I’ve got no idea either. You don’t have any passives that are supposed to do that.”

  “Panda says he also doesn’t know,” I added.

  “Will I be able to see Panda tomorrow when the Great Game begins?” Bee asked.

  “I think so,” I said.

  Brock squeaked on my hand.

  We all looked down at the balloon gauntlet. “I think he wants to be heard as well,” Panda said.

  After making our way outside the mall we passed through the park. Bee managed to snag us some hotdogs from an unattended grill, but when the owner noticed he chased after us with a machete.

  We easily outran him and left Serenity Park behind.

  Bee grinned while chomping down on her stolen food.

  “Been a while since I’ve had a hotdog,” I said. “This one’s pretty good.”

  “I wanna try,” Panda begged, and I gave him a piece of the sausage. Bee had even managed to get some mustard and relish on top.

  She looked at the sausage as it vanished into Panda’s mouth.

  “Woah,” she said, amazed.

  “Alright, I think our best bet for finding Otto and Tina will be visiting Madeville,” I decided. “Not sure where we’ll find Chris though. I didn’t really get to know him that well.”

  “I thought you said he was your best friend,” Panda remarked drily.

  “If we’re going to Madeville, we should take the metro,” Bee suggested. “I heard it’s still operating. But there are probably gangs who took over the station.”

  I shuddered at the thought of getting inside the train, but knew she was right.

  “Gangs won’t be a problem,” I said.

  She clapped the crossbow hanging from her side on a strap. “We can take on anyone,” she agreed.

  Panda sighed. “Poor girl, already warped into an evil henchman.”

  I finger-flicked Panda in the head. “Bee’s not a henchman. And we’re not evil, we’re vigilantes.”

  Bee nodded even though she hadn’t heard Panda’s comment.

  “Vigilantes are criminals,” Panda countered.

  “Since when did you care about the law?” I retorted.

  “Did he say that vigilantes are criminals?” Bee asked.

  I nodded. “He’s pretty predictable, right?”

  “He kind of seems like a stick in the mud,” she replied.

  Panda lowered his head shamefully.

  “How are we going to get to the metro?” Bee asked. “Will you carry me again?”

  “Actually, I might have something more exciting than that, but yes, I will probably have to carry you on my shoulders like earlier.”

  She grinned. “I’m ready.”

  I pointed in front of us with Brock dramatically and said, “Skater Boy!”

  A fleshy longboard appeared in front of me and Bee jumped back in surprise.

  “Do I get powers like this too!?” she asked excitedly.

  I nodded. “Of course you do.”

  I bent down and Bee climbed onto my shoulders. Then I got on the board and kicked off.

  We zoomed through Castleburg, while I chained trick-after-trick and further increased our speed. Bee squealed excitedly every time we took a sharp turn or jumped several feet into the air.

  “This is like a rollercoaster!” she yelled. “This really is the best day ever!”

  “Turn left!” Panda directed. If not for him, I would probably have been pretty lost. The piled-up cars everywhere made it really difficult to recognize the various streets and know where to go.

  “Straight through the intersection!” he shouted. I blazed past a massive pile-up by grinding along a fallen traffic light and jumping almost ten yards before landing on the sidewalk.

  We continued through Downtown at insane speeds until Panda yelled at me to slow down.

  I skidded half-way across a block before managing to stop completely. Then the longboard simply vanished.

  My skills weren’t working entirely like normal, which made them a bit unpredictable. If not for that, then I would’ve simply used Fuck Gravity from my Rules of Anarchy passive to fly all the way here.

  Bee hopped off my shoulders.

  “That was so much fun!” she exclaimed.

  “Pretty cool, right?” I asked.

  Nearby was the entrance to the metro station, but it was surrounded by improvised walls and there were people guarding it with bows and machetes.

  “Seriously, where are all these machetes coming from??” Panda muttered in confusion.

  There hadn’t been any fortifications like these when I’d gone to the metro with Chris, Steve, and Tina. The reason was pretty obvious though, since this was one of the streets the Metro Train monster had been patrolling above ground.

  “Alright, let’s get going,” I said. “We’ve got a train to catch.”

  Something pinched the skin on my stomach.

  “Ow.”

  Panda sighed. “I honestly don’t understand why Bad Catchphrase is still in effect.”

  I pushed in front of Bee, and she followed after me as we approached the barricades around the metro.

  The people guarding it had already noticed us, but for some reason they were abandoning their fortifications and running away. Then I realized that their group consisted of both the weird leather-wearing bikers we’d gotten ambushed by earlier and Pieter’s construction worker crew. No doubt word had spread, and they weren’t taking any chances with us.

  With the guards out of the way, I was able to topple one of the wood and concrete walls without any resistance. And just like that Bee and I were able to reach the escalator that led down into the train station.

  Hopefully it would be less chaotic than the last time I’d come here.

  “There’s no chance,” Panda said pessimistically.

  A loud tinny voice and the sound of whiny brakes announced that a train had just pulled into the station. A second later we could hear fighting.

  Panda sighed loudly.

  “Let’s just get it over with,” he said.