Distraktion Duel

The portal spat Sakuya out onto brimstone in the same way the Quadbarrel’s alt-fire spat out shells. The feeling of getting dropped into a duel on Hellcliff after bot carnage in the barebones testing map was exactly as jarring as it sounded, especially with the situation at hand. Kinzorn, time, the world itself. Everything was working against him.

The surroundings reeked of rust, dried blood, anguish and something unholy. Pieces of bone lined the rocky ground, half-caked with what may have once been flesh as the air shimmered with heat distortion. Pickups were scattered around as usual, some in skeletal palms as if the forsaken were offering them to players.

Of course he picked this crappy map. All the dueling tryhards did for cheap, fake skill checks.

Sakuya had enough reasons to dislike it: it was dark and difficult to see when the arena itself was an island of black bedrock atop glowing orange lava, all under a crimson sky. That, and the atmosphere was not exactly LAN party-appropriate with all the bones and skulls around, along with distant screams from the odd tortured soul making their way through the ambience of bubbling and crackling magma. Hellcliff was a fitting name. It was a cliff, somewhere in Hell. For some reason, it had three versions, all varying in size. Kinzorn had picked the smallest one.

Timer: 10:00
Health: 100 | Armor: 50 | Ammo: 16
Warning. Extreme heat. Energy weapons may overheat quicker.

Kinzorn was on the far edge of the cliff, casually juggling yellow ball lightning in his bony hands as if he were bored. The purple veins all over him glowed whenever he caught the arcing spheres.
“Going to stand there all day? First shot is yours, my third-rate friend.” He smugly tossed a glowing sphere up and down, smirking.

Sakuya grit his teeth under the helmet, stomping towards Kinzorn, wrath burning inside his chest.
“You set me up just so that mechanical freak friend of yours could nab Cassie, didn’t you!?”

He tried to keep his cool, but the weight of the situation was almost crushing. He was furious at the fact someone actually went for his friends, the first real friends he’d met ever since finding himself in the arena. But he was also terrified. Not only did he have to obliterate Kinzorn, who was a good few spots above him on the board, he had to do it quickly enough to get Cassie back.

Kinzorn raised an eyebrow and stopped tossing the sphere for a moment.
“Hm, either you’re smarter than I’d thought, or our plan was a little too obvious. No point in lying about it now. My employer wanted to talk to her, that’s all.” He sneered. “Don’t worry. Kauter said he’d keep her al—”

BOOM!

The Quadbarrel roared like thunder, sending torrid pellets and reddish-purple mist flying across the cliff. Kinzorn’s legs scattered into the lava below, discolored chunks of flesh sizzling into ash.

CH-CHK. Sakuya reloaded the weapon with a practiced ease. He took a breath and relaxed his shoulders, letting the memories of midnight duels behind the screen come back to him. B-7X fought the heat, activating its internal cooling systems. Sakuya snarled, already looking at the spawn point.

“Afraid I couldn’t give less of a shit about the why. You’re the reason Cassie and Ashlan are in danger. For that, I’ll make sure you get used to getting gibbed.”

Kinzorn respawned in the middle of the map, sprinting for an armor pickup behind a pile of bones. Sakuya followed him, mantling over the bones and firing.

BANG!

A cloud of dust flew up. Swing and a miss. The shot nicked Kinzorn’s side, but his armor had tanked most of the damage. Time felt slowed down. Sakuya was still mid-mantle. Kinzorn was on his back, stretching his palm toward him. Click. Click. [EMPTY]. The sorcerer’s mouth curled into a smirk, before—

ZZZZZAP!

Every single warning in the B-7X screeched only for a split second before Sakuya scattered into a pile of black dust, coating the heap of femurs. The announcer roared like a demonic sports commentator.

“KINZORN IS TIED FOR THE LEAD!”

If Sakuya were behind his keyboard right now, he’d probably smash his fist into the keys before slamming another energy drink. Unfortunately, he couldn’t do anything but await respawn and stare at the scoreboard in spectral form.

Timer: 9:41
Sakuya: 1 | Kinzorn: 1
SPECTATORS (7)

It wasn’t entirely clear if the spectators were from PN&P or not. The chat blipped with a few messages.
“damn, speedrunning the frags”

“yo i walked past this armor guy the other day lol”

“hes a noob kinzorn is the GOAT”

Sakuya gritted his teeth. The chat faded from his view as the HUD flickered back in. He gave himself three minutes to get six frags.

Default 1v1 rules were: small maps, five minute timer (ten here), and a limit of ten frags, unless one player got five over the other, to prevent unfair fragrolling. Strange design, to say the least. Most pros turned the last setting off for hyper-competitive games, but Kinzorn probably knew he couldn’t mess with the match too much, especially with Bonebags’ rigged duels being the talk of the lobby lately.

“All I need to do is waste your time, tin man.” The cursed mage taunted from the northern edge, launching a purple arc straight at Sakuya, who hadn’t even fully spawned in at the time.

Spawn-trapping loser.

Sakuya dropped hard onto the ground with a thud. His HUD glitched as the bolt flickered past right above him. Like a pangolin, he rolled toward a plasma rifle that one of the cadavers held. Kinzorn’s magical shockwaves showed no signs of stopping, so Sakuya let a burst of glowing plasma rays loose at the sorcerer, making him step away from the cliff’s edge. The suit of armor ran to close the distance between the two.

Kinzorn hid behind a catacomb-esque pillar of bone and skulls, unleashing a barrage of purple lightning bolts as he strafed side-to-side, pinning Sakuya down by the same bonepile that enveloped the armor pickup. It was impervious to all damage, but Sakuya knew he couldn’t stall. Every wasted second was Cassie’s.

He sprung into a mad dash, suppressing Kinzorn with a sustained spray of plasma. The blue projectiles mixed with the purple lightning, distorting the air even more than the lava surrounding the island had already been. Sakuya circle-strafed his way behind the pillar, still holding down the trigger. But right as Kinzorn entered his line of sight—Beepbeep. SCHHHHHH…

The gun’s barrel melted off, right in his hands. Should’ve heeded the heat warning. He threw the liquifying weapon at Kinzorn right as he charged up another bolt, throwing his aim off just enough for the blast to miss. Sakuya readied the Quadbarrel again, firing it straight from his gun belt like a cowboy.
KA-THOOM!
No luck? It looked like it had missed again, chipping bonemeal off the pillar. But then, Sakuya saw Kinzorn’s body slumping down, a pool of blood forming under it.

Where’s my point for—

ZZZZZZAP!!!! A sphere of ball lightning rolled towards Sakuya’s feet, completely frying him in the armor, leaving nothing but a charred skeleton rattling inside. Kinzorn stood up, tossing a bloodstained piece of sharp stone into the lava, running for a health pickup.

HE WAS PLAYING DEAD!?

“KINZORN HAS TAKEN THE LEAD!”

Timer: 9:00

Sakuya: 1 | Kinzorn: 2

SPECTATORS (20)

Chat messages scrolled.
“brutal, savage, rekt”
“cant believe dudes still fall for that trick”
“i hope armor guy wins”

Sakuya now needed six frags. Within two minutes. However he looked at it, it was impossible at this rate, especially the safe way. Playing it safe was not an option. Nothing about this was safe. That was the whole point of the arena. If he kept picking every path of least resistance with this match, not only would he fall way down on the board, not only would he be letting Kinzorn and Kauter win, he would also be doing it without having challenged himself. Without even a hint of fun. Without the satisfaction of revenge. Completely defeating the purpose of donning the B-7X.

Screw that.
Continuously worrying won’t help me at all.

It’s time to kick this guy’s ass.
…And chew bubble gum.

Timer: 8:55
“TEN SECONDS UNTIL HYPERSPEED!”

The moment he’d respawned, Sakuya dashed towards the northern edge, where the Hyperspeed powerup was about to spawn. Kinzorn was behind him, gunning for the powerup as well. Instead of his pinpoint-accurate purple bolts, he threw his hands forward. His purple veins flashed with yellow as he conjured homing spheres of ball lightning, each of them flying towards Sakuya. They were slow, but smart, looping around obstacles and splitting paths instead of clustering.

You’re kidding me! That’s way past OP!

The chase forced Sakuya to observe six paths at once: Kinzorn and the five spheres. His pro gamer-sense was certainly working overtime here, but he was focusing more on preventing Kinzorn from getting the powerup than from perfectly dodging the slow spheres. But their logic wasn’t completely rigid. The exact moment Hyperspeed spawned in, the spheres made an undodgeable beeline towards Sakuya. He dove forward, falling right on the powerup, ready to die again, but intending to throw himself off the cliff so Kinzorn wouldn’t get it.

Timer: 8:45
“SAKUYA HAS HYPERSPEED!”
Hyperspeed: 30
29…
28…
The timer ticked down on his HUD.

His dive ended right at the edge of the cliff. Right as the spheres were supposed to collide with him, they didn’t. Sakuya was still well and alive. He looked back to see them closing in on him and forming into a cluster, but at around half their usual speed.

That’s not how it worked in the game.

Indeed, it wasn’t. In Rezrektion Arena, Hyperspeed would simply make a player twice as fast as all the other players. It wasn’t optimal for getting frags—only for evasion and maneuvering—because to make up for the double movement speed, you’d need to have double reaction speed as well. Here, it felt like time had halved around him, his perception doubling. It was heavily in his favor.

He rolled out of the spheres’ way and responded with a pull of the Quadbarrel’s primary trigger. KA-THOOM! ZZZZPOP. They all popped like electric balloons, throwing yellow sparks around them in slow-motion.

Wasting no time, Sakuya zipped around to Kinzorn, who was in the process of turning toward him. BANG!! The sorcerer popped into purple gibs, all floating in slow motion.

“SAKUYA IS TIED FOR THE LEAD!”

“hooooly shit”
“sick hs pickup”
“armor guy is useless without powerups lol kinzorn will win”

While waiting for the mage to respawn, Sakuya ran around the map and stocked himself up on weapons, ammo and armor. He equipped his railgun and waited, his crosshairs trained right on the spawn pad.

Timer: 8:39
Hyperspeed: 24

Right after Kinzorn materialized on the center platform, he tried to reach for something in a pocket on his robes and—BWOOOOM!! The noise shook the entire map as the rail blasted a hole right through his chest.

Sakuya: 3 | Kinzorn: 2

“SAKUYA HAS TAKEN THE LEAD!”

Feel that? That’s me pwning you.
Hm, I might actually be able to win in time.

Sakuya wanted to obliterate Kinzorn completely and have fun doing it. He kept circling the center of the island, just counting down the seconds. On the mage’s next spawn, Sakuya flew right at him, tripping him up and grabbing him by the legs while he was mid-fall. Sakuya spun him around and threw him over the edge—straight into the lava—and watched him explode into a pile of flaming purple gibs.

“HUMILIATION!”

The chat went as wild as the announcer did.
“YOOOOO”
“ban hyperspeed smh”
“CLIPPING THIS”
Player: Sweetman has clipped your most recent frag.

Sakuya was hyped now, raring to do more fun frags for the chat. His pro gamer, showoff spirit took over. Maybe that was the best way to ease his anxiety at the moment. Awaiting the next respawn, he quickly primed five grenades, listening to the beeps as he internally counted down to Kinzorn’s respawn, b-hopping across the map and back. The exact millisecond Kinzorn spawned, Sakuya dropped all the grenades on the spawn platform. He b-hopped away as the sorcerer evaporated entirely in the blast. And Sakuya didn’t even turn back to see, because cool guys never looked at explosions.

“LUDICROUS KILL!” The announcer shrieked with the zeal of a true fanatic.

“SGKHJSDKGFHSGJKHDSFGS”
“LUDICROUS!!!”
“A wonderful display of tactics.”
Player: Thilrix has clipped your most recent frag.

I’ve heard that name before…

Sakuya took a deep breath.
Just two more and I win.
Just two more.
Stay cool, Sakuya.
You’re number one.

Timer: 8:28
Hyperspeed: 3

With his powerup almost out, Sakuya switched to a rocket launcher, ran towards the spawnpad to build momentum, jumped as high as he could and fired the rocket downward, the blast propelling him into the air. A classic rocket jump. From high up in the air, he fired another rocket at the pad right as Hyperspeed ended.

Kinzorn spawned and tried to dodge, but the rocket hit him directly.

Sakuya: 6 | Kinzorn: 2

“did not expect kinzorn to lose to a 4k”
“gg i guess”
“fun while it lasted”

I can do this.

I got him without HS once, so what’s one more?

This time, Sakuya played it safe and aimed his railgun at the spawnpad again.

Timer: 8:18

He fired it when Kinzorn popped up, but he hadn’t yet recovered from Hyperspeed, and so he’d entirely underestimated how fast the sorcerer would react. Kinzorn effortlessly sidestepped, the rail slug only burning the air beside him as he left behind an afterimage.

What the…?

FWOOOM! FWOOOM! FWOOOM! Shot after shot, Kinzorn just flickered aside in purple bursts, dodging everything. It seemed impossible, and Sakuya’s railgun spam eventually ended with the barrel glowing as it melted off. He threw the gun at the sorcerer and dashed away.

Damn it… There has got to be some way to damage him! I’ve gone too far to lose now!

Instead of striking back, Kinzorn tore the railgun apart with ease, ripping out a white-fuming, frost-coated cylinder. He launched it at Sakuya like a fastball. “Why don’t you cool off, metalhead?”

The coolant can? Heh, what’s that gonna do?

Sakuya didn’t even bother dodging. He spun the Quadbarrel from his belt into his hands and braced to fire again. It hit Kinzorn, no doubt taking off over half of his HP. The coolant can went straight into his chest, exploding into a white cloud of hissing—

∷##!@¼.12>>@>#<<X_X/segmentation fault/.s/><>@>${}{SD }A}A}}:D””D”””A???))#_!_D)_-__
bbr##R#BRNILBRBRBr3r#R##RRNILRr::!:!:!::!:RD::#:A(G(D__S+../>!$!@@@/////
!?#?$??CR>>ITICAL TEMPERAT>@$>>URE SHO:#:CK||||||

He immediately felt the bite of the cold, stumbling backwards as his HUD fractured and glitched out completely, the view of the arena disappearing, having been replaced with a flashing mess of code, strange symbols and garbage data as if some alien software had crashed. Instead of hearing the crackles of lava, wind and the whine of distant tortured souls, there was only a mess of warped beeps and whirs.

He switched to a machine gun and sprayed it blindly, unable to see a thing past crude system logs. Even if it couldn’t have hit Kinzorn, at least it might’ve been able to push him back somewhat. Sakuya lost his balance, falling down with a heavy impact, grunting as he did so. It hurt. Even if the armor itself was internally cushioned, he felt the shockwave go through his body. His entire body ached. The armor and gunbelt felt heavier than they should. The heat actually irritated his skin.

@>$>>$@>@>>!>SYS<<<TEM>>>FAILURE!#:::O
<@<>REB@OOTI@@Ng:::!['''
— AUDIOVISUAL: 96%
— TEMPERATURE: 35%
— DIAGNOSTICS: 32%
— PAIN INHIBITORS: 2%

When the audiovisual system turned back on, Sakuya’s eyes had to readjust to the glow of distant lava. He saw Kinzorn standing over him, holding up a piece of ball lightning, grinning devilishly, veins pulsing.
“I didn’t just pick this map for nothing. Tinheads like you normally hate it. You know why? Because temperature shocks disable pain inhibitors, making them feel every bit.”

Sakuya pulled the machine gun’s trigger again, but it only responded with a click. He tried to force himself off the ground, but Kinzorn stuck the sphere of electricity right into the chestplate, letting it phase through the armor.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WARNING: VOLTAGE

Health: -2147483648

His entire body convulsed. The visor flashed white, alerts screeching at max volume.

it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurtsithurtsithurtsithurts stopstopstopstopstopstopstopstopstop

He felt his skin get fried away. His nerves overloaded, every single muscle fiber tearing apart. His mind went blank, shock sending him into total mental shutdown.

A single white cursor blinked on a command line, floating in an endless void.

C:\>

The pain was, thankfully, gone. Sakuya had no idea if he was breathing, or if he had lungs to do it with. He didn’t know how to type anything here, but he knew he wanted to type “exit.”

A simple choice popped up.
forfeit? y / n

But right before Sakuya could mentally lock his choice in, voices and HUD alerts cut through the void.

Hyperchats scrolled on his helmet—voice messages from spectators, routed directly into his audio systems.
100BB from Sweetman > [“DON’T GIVE UP! STOP AFK’ING AND PWN HIM!]
50BB from xX_trigger_Xx > [“ARMOR GUYYYYYYYYY!! GET TF BACK UP”]
150BB from Ashlan > [“I’m still reading Cassie’s sig! Snap out of it! Hurry up and win, Sakuya!”]

The arena flickered back into Sakuya’s view, his mind readjusting itself. He was standing on the center spawnpad.
Sakuya: 6 | Kinzorn: 9
Kinzorn was sprinting toward him with a dagger, likely having been racking up humiliation bonuses the entire time Sakuya had spent in the dark.

“Not this time, bonelicker.”
Sakuya stood still right until Kinzorn’s dagger was about to pierce his chest, but pulled the Quadbarrel’s trigger at the very last moment, making the sorcerer fall backwards, half his face blown off along with the entire left shoulder. Sakuya ran forward, kicking the corpse in the air and firing again, purple gibs raining down all over him as he reloaded his gun, fueled by pure rage. This grudge match was going to end violently and triumphantly.

“HE’S BACKKKK”
“LETS FUCKING GOOOOOOOOO”
“WIN WIN WIN”

7-9.
Kinzorn juggled ball lightning, smirking. “Look who’s back. Enjoy your little break, tin man?”
He threw it at Sakuya, but the latter threw his weapon at the sphere, running towards Kinzorn and ramming him with his shoulder, sending the sorcerer into the lava below.

Enough.

8-9.
Sakuya was away to grab a plasma gun, which was an ample opportunity for Kinzorn to fire his accurate lightning bolts instead. Sakuya rolled out of the way, but still got grazed.
Health: 20
He sprayed plasma in a ring, melting the barrel on purpose. Once it melted, he scraped the liquified casing away on the stone to get to the superconducting spool. That in one hand and Quadbarrel in the other, he threw it at Kinzorn, who’d been on an ammo run (his magical attacks needed ammo too) and shot the overcharged spool in mid air. A colorful, light blue blast evaporated the mage, leaving only a pile of sand.

I know a secret or two as well.

9-9.
“MATCH POINT!”

Timer: 1:52
Kinzorn was desperate to win. He spammed not only ball lightning, but bolts as well. Sakuya rolled side-to-side, using the default machine gun to shoot the spheres, slowly trying to advance closer. The moment Kinzorn’s ammo ran out, Sakuya threw his weapon down and ran towards him for a melee finish.

Kinzorn retorted with his cursed dagger, trying to stab Sakuya through the heart. The latter did his best to dodge, but couldn’t avoid getting cut a few times due to how difficult it was to make such small-scale dodges. No. The B-7X wasn’t built for nimble dodging. It was built for fists, for crushing grip, and for the raw fury of its wearer.

Sakuya swatted Kinzorn’s stab attempt away, knocking the dagger out of his hand. Kinzorn looked to the left, intending to pick his weapon back up, but while he was turned away, Sakuya charged up with a powerful straight punch, aimed right at his chest.

SPLAAAASH! KSCH! TSCH!

The sorcerer’s upper half flew away, scattering gibs across the island, eventually sliding off the edge. His legs staggered a few steps before collapsing, the torso finally sliding off the edge into the lava below.

Sakuya stood in silence for a moment, listening to his own breath echoing in the helmet. He shook the blood and chips of bone off his fist, muttering a quiet and tired, but relieved “GG.”

The announcer roared. “SAKUYA WINS!”

The chat was ecstatic, spamming messages faster than Sakuya’s HUD could keep up.
“I KNEW HED WIN I KNEW IT”
“I BET GOOD BONEBITS ON HIM LFG LFG”
“hax”

The map flickered away.

Returning to lobby…
Warning: Portal not found. Using default.

What!?

Sakuya found himself standing in the lobby’s center, right by the massive leaderboard screen. It was already showcasing fragreels from his duel, most notably the lava throw. A few players noticed him, projecting thumbs up emojis and the odd “GG.” Still, the lobby was oddly empty, oddly quiet. Especially for daytime.

No time to stand around here. Sakuya sprinted through the districts. The atmosphere was all off. The sunny sky felt too bright. Once he got to PN&P, he couldn’t believe what he saw.

The bar was in complete disarray. Its sign hung by one ripped cable, flickering. Inside, sparks shot off from broken holoscreens and the overturned server rack tables. Nearly every light was shattered. The door to Cassie’s shop was open.