Chapter 35: Have you ever heard about the double-tap?

Fernando entered through the door with groceries in his hand and a cheerful smile.

“Estoy en casa!” he said, in a positive way. He was happy to finally get some quality time with his family. The last few days of chasing the boogeymen had been stressful.

He looked up and saw Howard with a gun in his hand.

Before he could say a word, Howard emptied the clip on him.

BANG BANG BANG BANG…

In the background, his wife and kids cried.

“Shit that’s loud. I hate guns,” Lucas said.

Eugene said nothing. He looked deeply ashamed.

Howard grabbed a machete and cut off Fernando’s head.

“Why the fuck did you do that? Isn’t this enough!” Eugene said.

“Fernando has way too many skills. I do not trust some simple bullets. Furthermore, this,” Howard said, and brought out a gasoline can.

“I’m gonna burn in hell,” Eugene said.

“Pun intended?” Brian said.

Eugene didn’t respond. He just gave Brian a dirty look.

…

Before they parted ways, Howard said: Doing summersaults 10 times in a row gives you the Acrobatics: Rank 1 skill. Hitting a monster with a thrown stone 10 times gives you the Throwing: Rank 1 skill. And he mentioned again the previous achievement in case they forgot it of the mental enhancement point from counting to 1000. Howard also said, as a parting note: “Stay out of the game for a few days. You need to wait for the aftereffects of Fernando’s death before you don’t have to worry about the hit on you. That hispanic gang will soon fold up like a tent.”

Lucas and Brian were now sitting in their motel room.

“So, what the fuck now?” Lucas said.

“We find out where the fuck Jack is,” Brian said.

“How, we go back in the game?”

“Yeah. But wait, lemme try something.”

Brian picked up his phone and called Jack.

“Hi, this is Jack’s phone, how may I help you?” Miranda said in a flirty voice.

“You’re such a great secretary, baby,” Jack said through the phone.

…

“Another bottle of champagne!” Lucas yelled.

All of the girls in the cabaret club cheered.

“And then the fucking snail monster looked at me with its predator eyes. It looked like it was having fun teasing me,” Jack said to Lucas and Brian and the other girls around.

“Oh my god, then what happened?” Miranda said.

“Well, I just looked right back at it. Told it I was not going to back down. I’m Jack fucking Stonewall.”

“That’s such a cool fantasy story. You should be a writer,” one of the cabaret girls said. Miranda shot her a dirty look.

“It’s not a fake story. It’s real,” Jack said.

“Haha, what?” the girl said. She was new to this bar and hadn’t heard about Jack and Lucas and Brian before.

“I can prove it,” Jack said.

“What do you mean?” Miranda said, with a very curious look on her face.

Brian and Lucas smiled.

“Here you go. Give me a little kiss on the cheek and crush this,” Jack said, while handing over a skill crystal to Miranda.

Miranda smiled jokingly.

“Okay,” she said, and kissed him on the cheek.

“Okay, now crush it between your fingers. You have to add a little force to it,” Jack said.

“Like this?” Miranda said. She crushed it and yellow energy flowed into her hand.

Botany: Rank 1

Miranda almost had a panic attack.

…

After blowing about 10.000 USD in the girls bar, everyone parted ways and Jack was now in a hotel room with Miranda on his lap.

“Are you for real? Is this really real, Jack?” Miranda said.

“Yes, baby. I love you. I’m gonna take you with me to great places.”

I will say anything to have sex with you right now.

“But this is so crazy. I feel like I did shrooms or something. This can’t be real? All of that information about plants feels so crazy, that it’s just in my head like that.” Miranda said.

“Hey, look at me. Miranda. I love you,” Jack said.

“Really?”

“Yeah, baby. I would do anything for you,” Jack said. He leaned in and kissed.

Maybe I could have used that botany skill for growing weed or shrooms. Why did I give it to her?

…

The next day, they all met up at a diner.

“So, what’s the gameplan?” Brian said.

“We wait a few days for all this to blow over like Howard said. I also say we get assault rifles and full body gear etc. Better equipment. Kevlar. And then when we get back in, get the achievements. But, I have the next move we have to do,” Jack said.

Lucas and Brian leaned in closer.

“And what’s that?” Lucas said.

Jack leaned back. Took a dramatic pause. Then said: “When I was on that weird ass mission, I realized something… we haven’t even unlocked the full extent to this gameworld. We didn’t even know about summons. Or how absolutely massive that world is. I have an idea about how we can use our free skill points to unlock new dimensions of the game. I want to buy the skill…”