The Tutorial Boss
2076 Words
Falling was a strange sensation when your inner ear no longer cared about gravity.
Kade hit the floor of the main lobby with a sound like a wet sack of flour hitting a pavement. The black, muscular vines that had buckled the floorboards above didn’t follow him down; they retracted into the ceiling like startled snakes, leaving him in a cavernous space filled with the flickering orange glow of burning parked cars outside the glass entrance.
“Five stars,” Kade wheezed, peeling his cheek off the cold marble. “Great service. Would definitely recommend the ‘Express Floor-to-Floor Drop’ to anyone tired of the stairs.”
He groaned, pushing himself up. His body felt heavy, not just dead-heavy, but dense. The bone-spikes had retracted, but the skin where they had burst through was now a mottled, leathery grey, crisscrossed with jagged silver scars that looked like lightning strikes.
[WARNING: TUTORIAL ZONE SEALED]
[OBJECTIVE: CLEAR THE LOBBY TO UNLOCK THE CITY GATE]
A massive, crimson digital barrier slammed down over the main revolving doors. It hummed with a low-frequency vibration that made Kade’s phantom lungs ache.
“Sealed? I’m the one being chased by a bone-mountain!” Kade shouted at the ceiling. “Let me out! I’ll go be an ‘Anomaly’ somewhere else! I’ll go live in the woods and start a podcast about being undead!”
The System did not care about his career pivot. Instead, a heavy, wet thump echoed from the direction of the cafeteria.
THUMP.
It wasn’t a footstep. It was a rhythmic expansion, the sound of a leather bellows being pumped too hard.
THUMP.
From the shadows of the “Get Well Soon” gift shop, something emerged that made the Sprinters from earlier look like Olympic athletes. It was nearly seven feet tall and five feet wide, a mountain of translucent, pale flesh that jiggled with every agonizing movement. Its skin was stretched so tight it looked like wet plastic, revealing a roadmap of blackened, swollen veins and pulsing organs that should have stayed on the inside.
[BOSS DETECTED: THE BLOATED ONE (LVL 5)]
[SUBTYPE: RUPTURE-TYPE INFECTED]
“Oh, come on,” Kade muttered, backing away until his heels hit a check-in desk. “That’s not a zombie. That’s a walking OSHA violation. Does the System just have a ‘Gross-Out’ slider that keeps turning to max?”
The Bloater stopped ten feet away. It didn’t have a face, not really. Its features had been swallowed by the swelling, leaving only a tiny, puckered mouth that hissed with a constant stream of yellow gas.
HUNGER. PRESSURE. BURST. MUST. RELEASE.
The Static coming from the creature was deafening. It wasn’t the frantic chattering of the Sprinters; it was a pressurized scream. The thing was a living bomb of necrotic gas and bile, and it was looking at Kade like he was a pin.
“Nice... big guy,” Kade said, raising his hands. “Look, we’re both on the same team, right? Patient Zero? The Crown? I’m practically your boss’s favorite nephew. How about we just”
The Bloater didn’t do diplomacy. It leaned back, its massive chest expanding to an impossible size, and then it belched.
A cloud of corrosive, neon-green bile sprayed across the lobby. Kade dived behind the marble check-in desk just as the liquid hit the wood. The sound was horrifying, a high-pitched sizzling followed by the acrid stench of melting plastic and scorched stone.
“Okay! No talking! Message received!”
Kade looked at his hands. They were trembling. Not with fear, his nerves didn’t really do fear anymore, but with weakness. Despite the “Undead Vigor,” his human frame was reaching its limit. His muscles were tearing under the strain of his own unnatural strength, and his HP was still stuck in the thirties after the Stitcher’s attack.
[NOTICE: PHYSICAL INTEGRITY AT 42%]
[HUMAN FRAME INSUFFICIENT FOR LEVEL 1 COMBAT]
[EVOLVE OR PERISH]
“Evolve or perish. My favorite Saturday morning cartoon,” Kade hissed.
He opened the [ZOMBIE TREE]. The screen flickered violet, showing three pulsing icons.
1. [CHITINOUS PLATING]: Develop a hardened dermal shell. Massive defense boost. -15% Humanity.
2. [ADAPTIVE MUSCULATURE]: Rewrite muscle fibers for explosive power. Speed and Strength boost. -10% Humanity.
3. [GASTRIC OVERLOAD]: Mimic the Bloater’s physiology. Projectile bile attacks. -20% Humanity.
“If I pick the third one, I’ll never be able to wear a slim-fit shirt again,” Kade whispered. He looked at the first option. A shell. He’d be a turtle. A dead, grey turtle.
The Bloater slammed its fist into the desk. The marble shattered like glass, sending shards flying into Kade’s back. He rolled away, but the creature was surprisingly fast for its size. It swung a massive, flabby arm, catching Kade in the ribs.
The sound was like a baseball bat hitting a bag of walnuts.
Kade was sent flying across the lobby, crashing into the wreckage of a coffee cart.
[HP: 12/100]
[CRITICAL DAMAGE: RIB CAGE COLLAPSED]
[SYSTEM WARNING: CONSCIOUSNESS FADING]
Kade lay in a pile of roasted coffee beans and broken glass. He tried to breathe, but his chest wouldn’t move. The pain was distant, muffled by the fog of his “Deceased” status, but the cold was coming back. The same cold he’d felt right before he “died” in the ICU.
He saw the Bloater waddling toward him, its body beginning to glow a faint, sickly green. It was preparing to detonate. It was going to take the whole lobby with it.
“Not... like this,” Kade wheezed. “I just... got... a second chance...”
His finger hovered over the [ADAPTIVE MUSCULATURE]. It was the middle ground. It wasn’t a shell, and it wasn’t a bomb. It was just... better.
Do it, the Hive whispered. Be more. Be us.
Kade pressed the icon.
The world vanished in a scream of violet light.
It didn’t feel like a choice. It felt like an invasion. Kade’s body arched off the floor as his DNA was forcibly rewritten by the glitched System. He felt his muscle fibers snap and reform into something denser, something threaded with silver data-strands. His tendons tightened like steel cables. His heart, the cold, silent organ in his chest gave a single, violent thud that shook his entire frame.
[EVOLUTION COMPLETE: STRIKER-ZERO (PROTOTYPE)]
[HUMANITY: 78.5%]
Kade stood up. The coffee beans crunching under his feet felt different. Every sense was dialed to eleven. He could see the dust motes dancing in the orange firelight. He could hear the Bloater’s bile sloshing inside its gut like a stormy sea.
He felt... incredible.
The Bloater reached him, its body swollen to the point of bursting. It opened its mouth to let out the final, lethal spray.
Kade moved.
He wasn’t a human running; he was a blur of violet-streaked shadow. He crossed the distance in a millisecond, his new muscles responding with a terrifying, effortless grace. He didn’t punch the Bloater. He *drove* his fist into the creature’s center.
His arm sank six inches into the flabby, putrid flesh.
“My turn,” Kade growled.
He twisted his fist, activating the second part of the evolution: [KINETIC DISCHARGE].
The impact sent a shockwave through the Bloater’s liquid interior. For a second, the monster froze. Then, its back erupted. A fountain of green slime and black organs sprayed across the lobby, but the force was directed away from Kade.
The Bloater deflated like a popped balloon, its massive frame collapsing into a heap of empty, grey skin.
[BOSS SLAIN: THE BLOATED ONE]
[XP GAINED: 500]
[LEVEL UP! LEVEL 1 -> LEVEL 3]
[TUTORIAL CLEARED]
Kade stood over the remains, his hand dripping with neon-green filth. He took a deep breath not for air, but to taste the victory. The “Static” in his head was singing. It was a beautiful, harmonized choir of triumph. He felt a rush of dopamine so intense it made his previous life feel like a black-and-white movie.
“I did it,” he whispered, looking at his arms. The silver veins were glowing brightly under his skin. “I’m... I’m powerful.”
He flexed his hand, watching the way the new muscles coiled and shifted. He felt like he could jump over a building. He felt like he could take on the Crown Zombie right now. He felt like a god.
Then, he saw his reflection in the glass of the revolving doors.
The glow was fading, but the changes stayed. His shoulders were broader, his neck thicker. But his face... his face was starting to look like a mask. His cheekbones were too sharp, his jaw too heavy. He looked less like Kade Miller and more like a statue of a predator.
He looked down at the Bloater’s corpse. A small, charred object lay in the pile of bile. It was a name tag.
Arthur Vance. Maintenance.
Kade’s stomach, the one that didn’t work, suddenly felt like it was full of lead. This “Boss” wasn’t a monster. It was Arthur. Arthur, who probably had a locker in the basement and a favorite lunch spot.
And Kade had just found it *fun* to explode him.
The rush of power vanished, replaced by a cold, oily shame. He had just traded 10% of his humanity for the ability to turn a janitor into a puddle of slime.
“Oh god,” Kade whispered, wiping the green slime onto his tattered gown. “What am I doing?”
[HUMANITY: 78.5%]
[STATUS: ASCENDANT MONSTER]
The crimson barrier over the doors flickered and died. The path to the city was open.
Kade walked toward the exit, his new, heavy footsteps echoing in the silent lobby. He reached the revolving doors and pushed.
The cool night air hit him, but he couldn’t feel the breeze. He could only feel the city.
The “Static” was everywhere now. It wasn’t just in the hospital; it was the wind. It was the rhythm of the burning buildings. Thousands of voices, all calling out in that wordless, predatory language.
And then, a new sound cut through the noise.
It was a siren. Not a police siren, but a deep, mechanical horn that vibrated through the pavement.
Kade looked down the street. A fleet of black armored vehicles was roaring toward the hospital, their headlights cutting through the smoke. On the side of the lead vehicle was a white symbol: a sword crossed with a syringe.
[NEW FACTION DETECTED: THE PURITY CORPS]
[THREAT LEVEL: EXTREME]
A voice boomed over a loudspeaker, amplified by a System skill.
“BY ORDER OF THE PURITY CORPS, THIS ZONE IS UNDER TOTAL QUARANTINE. ALL INFECTED BIOMASS ARE TO BE INCINERATED ON SIGHT. SURRENDER THE ANOMALY OR FACE IMMEDIATE TERMINATION.”
Kade looked at the armored trucks, then went back to the hospital. He was caught between a god of bone and a literal army of monster-hunters.
“Well,” Kade said, his voice cracking with a bit of his old, dry humor. “At least I don’t have to worry about my medical bills anymore.”
He turned and started to run, but he didn’t run like a human. He leaped, his new muscles propelling him thirty feet into the air, landing on the side of a fire escape with a metallic clang.
As he scaled the building, a red dot settled on his chest.
Foomp.
A canister of white phosphorus exploded against the brick inches from his head.
“Guess they aren’t fans of the ‘surrender’ option!” Kade yelled.
He reached the rooftop and looked out over the city. He saw the “Purity” soldiers jumping out of their trucks. They weren’t just humans. They were wearing power-armor, their helmets glowing with blue “Hero” light.
And at the head of the squad was a familiar figure.
It was Sarah. The combat medic. But she wasn’t wearing a medic’s cross. She was wearing a Captain’s insignia, and she was pointing a high-frequency pulse rifle directly at him.
“Target locked,” her voice crackled over the comms, echoing in Kade’s “Hive-Sight.” “Anomaly identified. Preparing for fire.”
Kade stared down at her. “Sarah? It’s... it’s Kade!”
But through his violet-tinted vision, he saw her name tag. It wasn’t blue. It was flashing a dark, systemic grey.
[SARAH HALL – LVL 15 MORKAI SLAYER]
[CONDITION: SYSTEM-BRAINWASHED]
Sarah pulled the trigger.
- Writer
