Surviving the Game: The Rat Assassin

The Seven Kingdoms

Abigail Jones had spent her short life so far becoming the best gamer in the virtual reality world. She was currently ranked 3rd overall, her ability to adapt to new games amazingly beneficial to her. She had just turned 12 years old when the game arrived in the mail for her, promising a completely immersive world created based on an old game called Dungeons and Dragons. This one however was augmented with VR, making it so the person actually took over the body of the character they created.

So, she decided that fateful afternoon, to play a relaxing game that she wasn’t competing in for the team she worked for on a near daily basis. The load screen impressed her as she put the helmet on that would intercept her nerve signals at the base of her brain stem so that her body wouldn’t move as she laid down on her bed. As soon as it launched I to the character selection, Abigail knew that whoever had made this game spared no expense in the realism matrix.

For several minutes none of the characters were calling out to her, the fighter not her specialty as it relied on strength and size to be the most effective. She of course could alter her character attribute to compensate for it, she however liked playing as close to her real abilities as possible. And in real life she was a short gymnast that could already do amazing things with her body. So she has eliminated the Paladin, Priest and the Sorceress Class, none of them seeming to be what she wanted either. Than she spotted the Rogue class, and knew that it was the perfect fit, especially as her natural statistics would give her additional bonuses in Dexterity, Agility and even the class skills of acrobatics and stealth seemed to match her perfectly.

The game however asked her to select from two backgrounds of how her character became that class. The first one described a person that essentially liked to hide in the shadows, stealing just for the thrill and testing their mettle by the biggest score they could steal. The second one however looked interesting, as it had a warning on it that the pathway was dangerous. It called it the Rat Assassin Path, the starting age literally a roll of the dice as it still uses them for a lot of things making it 2d6 as the result for the age. So she rolled the dice and got a result of 7, the system informing her that she was fortunate for the beginning quest chain.

As soon as it had the results, she found herself being thrown into an alley, both sides completely blocked by buildings that looked like they had seen better days.

“You RATS need to learn you place!” the little fat woman yelled at her holding a rolling pin. Abigail laughed as she saw the NPC, but knew it was just the game as it went back into the building.

“Getting caught by the guards sucks, how far did you get?” a little bit of probably 8 asked her as she shrugged noticing her name in the game was Liora Shadowblade.

“No idea, but I assure you it won’t happen again.” She said as she looked at the alley that she realized was supposed to be the border her character was supposed to be trapped in. It however had exactly what she needed to practice her acrobatics skills. In fact her game interface gave her a quest for doing exactly that, with the clear objective of finding a way out of the alley by making it to the roofs of the surrounding buildings.

It took her about 5 minutes to find the path she would take, running with the little boy by her side as they used some serious acrobatic skills using the poles protruding from the building to either jump from or swing off of, making their way up the 30 foot walls without stopping. As soon as she got to the top and looked down into the crowd on the outside below, her quest completed and rewarded her with a small dagger it called a Rats Tooth. The thin blade was 11 inches long, was perfectly balanced in her grip as it gave her the next quest.

Using the hide in shadows skill she was to pick the pockets of at least 3 subjects and gather at least 30 copper worth of goods or coins. She used her perception ability looking through the crowd in the market below as she found her first mark. The man was wearing fancy clothing that was far to flashy for most of the people, and she saw at least 3 money pouches. So, she followed him from above for nearly an hour when she saw her opportunity.

She slipped into the apothecary stall and slipped a sleeping draught from the shelf as the shopkeep was distracted by a customer, just as the rich mark sat down at a stall and ordered a plate of food and cup of ale. As she snuck past she dropped two of the tablets into his drink that dissolved quickly, grabbing the first of his money pouches as he never even saw her with his focus on the waitress that was dressed provocatively. Her NPC friend was shaking his head as they watched him eat his meal, her quest for targets one third complete with her total completed as this one money pouch has 30 silver pieces in it.

10 minutes after he finished his meal the sleeping pills worked as he began stumbling around as she grabbed him and slipped into a dark alley before she robbed him of everything he had. She pulled his dagger belt off, the rare and enchanted dagger being slipped into her bag just as quickly as his other money pouches, bringing her loot to 30 gold and 80 silver before she climbed back to the roofs looking for two more marks. This time she picked easier targets that were stumbling out of the whorehouses now, most of them drunk and easily pickpockets despite their coin purses being considerably lighter as she completed the quest with 35 gold, 86 Silver and 75 copper pieces.

“I wish I was as skillful as you Liora, it is good though you aren’t old enough for the Race tomorrow. Promise me you will use the next four years to get even better, promise me you will survive the Race when you are forced to.” Peter the NPC Orphan Rogue said as she nodded.

“I will.” She said making a new quest pop up. To witness the Race of the Rats the next day, part of the Festival of Mask. The reward was a set of armor that it called Rat’s Shadow which gave a bonus to her hide in shadows ability.

She had no idea what exactly she was supposed to do for that, as the sun went down in the game. She looked at the time however, realizing that she had only been in for 20 minutes as it was apparently operating under an accelerator. She however used the opportunity to continue pick pocketing the people coming out of the whorehouses that she quickly surmised made up the entire outer barrier of the alleyway all of the Orphan Rogue’s were ‘required’ to be.

As the sun came up in what felt like a few hours but was really only a few minutes, Liora found that there was activity on the roof as she slipped into the shadows on the customer side of the building. Everywhere she looked from the peak of the buildings along the alley had Rogue’s lining them, all of their attention on the roofline facing the alley. She managed to slip into a few crates on the alley side, 2 of the Rogues right in front of her with their daggers drawn as she looked down at the end of the alley where a master Rogue flashed into appearance right in front of about 80 of the Orphans over the age of 8. Peter the NPC that had been with her the day before at the front as each of the 80 has small daggers thrust into their hands.

“Let the Rat’s of Mask run the Race as is tradition in these great years. In a few minutes, the sun will wise over that building.” The man said pointing to the other end of the alleyway. “Your task is simple, make it from this end to that one by the time the sun no longer touches that building, and you will be allowed to live. Your blade might give you three chances, that is how many times the poison on them will be lethal. After that it will be entirely upon your skill to make it through the doors on the other end.” The man said before disappearing as the sun came over the edge of the roof, bathing the alley in light as all 80 of the Rats as the game now labeled them ran into the alley. All of them with the goal of making it to the other end.

It became apparent quickly however that there were other rogues on the ground hunting them as well, as they began being killed by hidden assassins I side the alley. Liora saw her chance and as soon as she had the thought she got the quest. ‘Pkck the pocket of an Assassin on the rooftop during the Race of the Rats.’

She smiled as she reached out and pulled a small pouch of the belt from the one right in front of her, he never even suspected it as the three of them watched the Rats run through the maze of pallets and trash in the alley as they were hunted. Some of them actually managed to kill a few of the assassins, the poison coating their blades deadly with just a scratch, all within seconds. She smiled as she looked at the other one, a throwing knife strapped to his boot that she managed to undo the belt to and slip into the crate with her before the two of them moved in to kill a Rat that had climbed to the roof right in front of them.

She used the opportunity to slip to the other side of the roof, no one seeing her as she did so, watching carefully the entire day as the assassins killed all 80 of the Rats. The last three as they made a mad dash for the doorway as the sun went down, bathing the alley in darkness and shadows before the older Rogue’s swarmed the alleyway, killing anything that moved inside of it.

She watched as they pulled the bodies in the center of the alley, all of the fallen burnt to ash as the 80 orphans had killed 20 of the assassins. The quest completed then, her new armor automatically equipping as she had none of it prior to that. So long as she was in the shadows, she essentially became invisible with the +50 to hide in shadows ability. She equipped the throwing dagger to her thigh, the blade a rare piece of equipment with an enchanted emerald that meant it didn’t need to have a poison continuously applied to have the effects of one. It was called the Rats Claw, the same poison in the vial she had obtained coating it’s blade and guaranteeing death within seconds.

She slept on the roof that night, hidden from the assassins below before the sun rose and the other Orphans reoccupied the alley. The system was kind enough to inform her that it would be 4 years of game time before the next one, which is when she would be in the race. Her new quest was to train for and survive the race, the system giving her two choices. The first would be a time lapse that would take several minutes, randomizing how many levels she gained before it began the race, called at a maximum of 6 levels.

The second choice was capped at 20 levels, but would take a full 2 hours of game time to cover the 4 years. It would be a lot of quests that she had two hours to complete to determine how many levels she could get. Knowing that the launch party was 3 hours away, she decided to give it a go to take the long route of getting to that Race.

So she followed a daily quest, each day lasting only 7 minutes, although it actually felt like the hours they purported to be. Her acrobatics training during the day and her stealing practice at night made her level quickly, especially as it seemed her body didn’t need to sleep as it was going off the actual time past. When she got to the first dungeon after finding a way to the City Sewer system, she was amazed to learn that it was one she could use every ‘day’ as well.

By the time the Festival of Mask began two hours later, she had actually gained 22 levels, all of her gear legendary level as she was taken into the building on the end of the alleyway. Her abilities were off the charts compared to the other ‘Rats’, despite her gear the same assistant from the last one stuffing a blade into her hands before the Master made the same speech.

This time when the door was thrust open there was 300 rushing into the alley, Liora slipped into the last of the shadows, using a shadow jump technique she had learned as the doorway and reappearing 50 feet into the alleyway as she slit the throat of an assassin that had been in the exact spot. She however had the advantage, her shadow strike tripling the damage she did when she stabbed him with the Rats Tooth Dagger that was a common one that had two doses of the poison left. She however looted his corpse, taking his uncommon copy of the same weapon that still had all three as well as the vial with three more applications.