Draven woke up with a banging headache and realized that he was in his room. He tried to remember what had happened the previous night but not much was going on. Sure, he’d made a lot of friends, but he couldn’t even remember them. He only knew Mikey, and that was because the guy was all over him. Groaning, Draven rolled out of bed and dragged himself to the kitchen. He felt heavy with his dead weight that seemed to drag him down every step of the way. By the time he reached the kitchen, he was breathing heavily. Draven turned the water in the sink on and bent his head under the running water. He stayed there for a few minutes until his eyes cleared. When his head became less heavy and he could breathe properly, Draven withdrew from the sink and turned it off.“Mommy, I don’t want to go to school!"Drawn cringed and reflexively turned towards the sound. He hated that their children made so much noise every morning before they went to school and evening when they were back. He had con
He started first by going to the route that he had gone with Leo yet no matter how Draven tried, he couldn’t find the place. He sneaked around the bar that they were indebted to and ended up in a completely different room. He tried too hard to remember the route too, but all he knew was that he and Leo were drunk and they had run around a bunch of places. They finally ended up on a street and then suddenly into the field. Now that he was searching for that field and not finding it, he tried to recall Leo’s last words. Nothing came to mind, except the silly words on the letter. Those words were engraved in his brain, partly because he had suffered a great deal and was very awake when he read them. That must have been the reason he couldn’t remember what Leo said last about the game. Draven stopped in the middle of nowhere. He looked around and tried to recall the environment and where he had come from. His mind was just so muddled by so many ideas and imaginations that he was unable t
It was his splitting headache that woke him up. It was torture to move his head even for a little bit. It pounded ferociously, like he had offended the thunder god or whatever he’s called and he’s using his hammer to pound the shit out of his brain. That was how he felt. For a long minute, all he could feel and think about was the pain in his head. Remembering what had caused that pain was not hard, but it was in itself a painful memory. Was the Indian man’s fist so heavy that it felt like he was fucking paralyzed?He started to move and then froze. He wasn’t sure where he was but he was certain that one shouldn’t move if kidnapped. That was exactly what happened to him—he was kidnapped off the streets and taken to god knows where. The next thing to do was stay really still and get to understand his environment. Draven stayed very still and opened his eyes slowly. It was dark, stuffy, and tight. He couldn’t move several parts of his body because they felt stiff and tight, especially h
Before Draven could even start laying out his problems, the man turned and left. He just made his statement and left, not even giving him one more glance of interest. Draven didn’t understand one bit what was going on and why these people were so hell bent that he was this person they were searching for. He expected that the leader would especially know his client but it looked like he too was kept in the dark. The big brute smiled down at him and brought a cold bucket of water, his intent bright in his eyes.“No… no… no…”His pleas were futile. The man poured water on him, stretching it out so it would become a painful point and not just cold water. Draven shivered violently afterwards. His clothes were soaked to his skin and the room was dark and cold. He was soon left alone, not given food or water for many hours.Draven didn’t even know if it was hours or days that had passed. He moved in and out of consciousness, waking only just so they poured him cold water just as his clothes
Draven had second thoughts by the time they started preparing him for dinner. It was crazy. He didn’t know what he did to deserve being dressed in a suit and shoes and led down the hall to the dinner place. Outside it was dark when they led him out. He didn’t know if it was midnight or mid-morning, since these people were crazy enough to let him believe anything. It felt like he’d been in there for days, and the worst part of it was that he still didn’t know.They took him inside a bigger room this time. It was a long hall full of food and goodies. It looked like he was in a castle full of thugs and criminals. There were several round tables in the room occupied by three or four persons. When Draven looked around for an exit, he saw the Schivoka waving at him to join them. He walked towards him with the realization that this might be the last time he would be alive. There was no saving himself. This place was just one room that had one fucking exit. He would die in here, not knowing
The guards leading him outside stayed far behind him. They were giving him privacy to cry about the last hours before his death, which was absurd. What was the next thing they would do now, cry on his grave after they had buried him? He didn’t understand their ethics and mode of conduct, which was why he found it weird. The handymen had tattoos and rough edges while the most respected leader was white and plain to the eye. He probably had a family outside. A wife, two children, maybe a girlfriend too, who knows? They would all be oblivious to his lifestyle because he had the humor of a gangster. He knew how to keep it under wraps, but for how long? That was the problem with shady business. It would always come out, no matter how long you held on to its secrecy.“He’s not my business,” Draven murmured to himself.They were still on the ground of the house, but he ached to go further. He was sure that this place was a big, big field that had two gates. One should be in the east and the
The further he ran, he could hear the dogs barking and howling in the distance. How many were there? He wondered. With how loud they were, they sounded like thousands of dogs. Of course he knew it wasn’t possible to have that many dogs in one vicinity with a hazard of health crises, but he was sure Schivoka did not care about things like that.He began to wonder how the man would have come about that kind of name. Did it mean ‘leader’ in some other language that wasn’t English? He looked and sounded literate, so could he have coined that name for himself?He brushed the thought off his mind and focused on getting to the game. None of those things was his business. He should instead be focusing on how to survive without being eaten to death by the dogs, which kept him in untold pressure. He was sure that no one had ever been under his kind of pressure when entering the game. Like Leo, they must have been happy and sure and probably drunk before entering. They might have even slept thei
Draven walked for a long time. He was getting used to it; having walked for hours in the outside world. At first, he thought things were smooth and easy. The system had provided him with a map to locate Leo and continue on his journey. The only difficult thing there was that he had three days to reach his destination, or the instructions on the map would disappear. It was just rough paper with directions on it. It already looked too thin, like something that would disappear in the blink of an eye. The first day was easy. He didn’t even make much effort. He walked for a short while, drank loads of water, and continued. And drank more water. In fact, he took a lot of water for no particular reason other than taste. Draven was unapologetically thirsty. At the end of the day, the water weighed him far down and made him give up easily. He woke up early the next day, hoping to accomplish more than the previous day. Draven soon realized that one element must always hit him hard just as he
Draven couldn’t believe it was over. Three months later he was still thinking if he was making the right decision. Assistant David sat in his living room with a bunch of documents in front of him. He paced up and down, not sure what he would do.“You can just sign here,” the man said for the umpteeth time. “It’s not really that hard. You sign that you’ve taken ownership of the game and you decide what you want to do with it.”“But I don’t want ownership of the game,” Draven said again. He had repeated this exact words countless times but the guy didn’t seem to be hearing him.“You should have known what you were getting yourself into when you challenged late game owner Timothy—” David paused and looked to the heavens. “May his soul not rest in peace. You should have known that killing him would automatically make you the owner of the game. Those were his rules.”Draven rolled his eyes. He was sure that Timothy had made that rule because he didn’t believe anyone would be able to defeat
Timothy laughed. His laughter was vivacious and full of life. This was what he wanted, after all. The very end of judgement day where he would punish all those who failed him; those who went against him and those who was party to his torture.Here was Draven, the strongest man to ever grace his game. Timothy knew he was going to be a lot of trouble in the future and so he had specifically looked into him. Now that Draven has waged war with his full chest over a woman, he was ecstatic. This was historic, and he was living a historic time in the present. How many men brought knives to fight for their loves, anyways?Smiling, he snapped his fingers. A single door opened and his assistant ran to him carrying a box.“You’re about to experience an historic moment with me,” He said to Draven. “Diane will be our goddess Diana, and we will be the lowly men who are fighting for her love.”Diane scoffed. “You don’t have to do it, Draven. The guy is nuts. Let’s just get out of here.”“But darling
Draven panicked for a minute. He thought for sure that the darkness and pressure meant he was losing his consciousness, but that wasn’t the case. One minutes there was stark darkness and the next minute they fell into an extremely white room with hard cardboard. They fell through the sky, hitting directly on the wood and groaning in pain. The stark white color of the room blinded them. It was brighter than a sky or white paint. It was so bright that Draven closed his eyes and tried to regain his or he r senses. He knew there was a betrayal in the group—which wasn’t surprising as their group was made of weird, diverse people, but he needed to see who exactly did it.He won’t even be surprised if to was Lara. She was the one who had led them to the cage, after all. She was the one who offered to test the waters and make sure the portal was okay. Who in their right senses tests water and portal to make a point of the portal not working? Unless he or she was working with Timothy and knew
No one said anything after Diane’s statement. They were so tired and hungry and unsure of what to do next. Draven’s goods felt heavy to him. His sword even felt heavier than normal. He didn’t believe he came back to this game to be ridiculed and placed in a very unstable condition because of a silly fight that was going on between two lovers. When he looked at Diane, he wondered if she was toying with them again. Was she afraid to meet Timothy or what? He knew that the portal might likely take them to Timothy as the owner can easily manipulate events, but at least he was ready for that stage. He could exactly tell what Diane was thinking when she was looking her nose down on the portal.“We cannot just stay here,” Lara said. “Do you want us to keep waiting for him to keep finding opportunities to kill us? We’re certainly going to die of hunger if we keep waiting!”“She’s right,” Draven concurred. “We can’t keep lying about in wait like lambs to a slaughter. We must make the first move
Everyone was super awkward after the kiss. Leo avoided for the rest of the morning. He didn’t want to talk about it but it was too late; Draven had seen them and announced to the whole pack in the morning that the kiss was probably the most hottest he’d seen.“Whoa,” Diane said excitedly. “You two kissed? That’s great. Are you like a couple now or something?”“It’s nothing like that, okay? It was just a kiss, and a mistake at that,” Leo piped up.Even though he didn’t want to talk about the kiss or look at Lara’s face, he was glad that Draven brought it up. At least he’d air his opioid publicly about it so he won’t have to be in an awkward space with Lara.“Ouch, Leo, you’re a player!” Diane said, laughing. “You can’t say those kind of things to someone when you’ve kissed them!”“I didn’t kiss her, okay? She’s the one who kissed me,” Leo defended hotly.“It’s still hurtful that you say it that way. Have some feelings, pal,” Diane said, her laugh increasing.It sounded mocking and cont
Leo could not sleep. Draven had been out for close to an hour, yet he wasn’t back yet. Lots of thoughts assaulted his brain, but the one that stayed the most was Diane.Diane. Diane. Diane.He bet she was here to true their life again, and that bet was true. If Leo was the one to handle this, he’d definitely not want to help her out the way Draven was. It was as if the guy didn’t want to learn any lessons about why it’s dangerous to just not help anyone for too long. Draven was lenient when it came to Diane and he didn’t like it one but.He turned his head to the side and saw her sleeping peacefully.“Yeah, like you didn’t just send someone to their death,” he murmured to himself.He wondered if Draven was still talking to the game creator or if he’s been killed. If he was truly killed, Leo won’t honestly know how to handle that. He tried not to think about it because it was depressing enough. He sat up now, still watching Diane. If she had been careful, they won’t be in this shit hol
Draven waited until everyone was comfortable with him being their security for the night before he left into the woods. Diane was surprisingly quiet and compliant. It was like she was into her head too much to care about what Draven wanted to do. Seeing that all odds were in his favor, Draven waited a bit before withdrawing to the forest. He walked deeper and deeper, wondering if he should just sit on a log and wait for Timothy to appear.“Hi Draven.”He yelped and fell to the ground, startled. His shouts of surprise startled the forest a bit, and so Draven waited it out to make sure no one was coming to check what the noise was before turning his head slowly to the side. There was Timothy, standing under the moonlight. He looked attractive and mysterious and just too handsome to be standing there. Draven sat up as he brushed away the small dirts on his body.“You scared me,” he hissed at Timothy. “You know you should learn not to sneak up on people like that.”“I didn’t sneak up on y
They camped inside a cave, just as Draven wanted. He’d taken his time and made sure they covered a 12 hour distance just so he could find the perfect place for them to camp. Finding a cave was not just the problem—and caves were pretty scarce. The problem was finding one that was deep and big enough to accommodate more than three persons. When he finally found it, it was nearing dark. The blanket of darkness that fell over them was just the right thing Draven needed to carry out his plans. He’d been thinking for hours how he would get away with talking to Timothy without anyone noticing and this was the best part.“A cave?” Lara asked in disbelief when they stood before the place. “Isn’t this kind of weird, Draven? Some crazy monsters might be in there!”Draven nodded in understanding. “Leo and I are going to check it out and see if it’s free of monsters; how about that?”“I thought you said we were getting to the end of the game,” Lara moaned.Draven gave her a confused look. “Lara,
They walked a long mile, Draven and Leo leading the way while Lara and Diane walked behind. Diane stayed at the far end so she won’t walk on the same lane with Lara. There was something suspicious about the young girl that she didn’t like. Diane wasn’t usually suspicious of people but when she does, her instinct was definitely right—just as it was right with Draven and Lara. Leo cleared his throat and glanced at Draven. “So… were you lying?”“Was I lying about what?” Draven mumbled.“You know… about what Diane said?”“Why would I be lying about that?”Leo cocked his brows at him. “Don’t forget that I know you all too well, Draven. I know when you lie out of necessity and when you lie out of leisure. I usually don’t catch the leisure one but the necessity one is very obvious.”Draven glanced at him with an amused expression. “Really?”“Yup. You get all tense and defensive and violet most times if you’re pressured about it. It’ll make you want to protect that little lie of yours quite