Another Challenge

October 10th 2018

Steve, Hanabi, and I were playing Starfight together. This group would never happen under normal circumstances, but Seiji and Sun had prior engagements. So, Hanabi suggested we do something different.

“At the Lost Plain, there’s a low chance for a rare monster to spawn. The rate is only like 2%, but there are other monsters we can fight. How about it?!”

Steve and I never heard of this, but it sounded interesting so we decided to go for it. Plus, Hanabi mentioned Seiji never wanted to try with the low spawn rate, calling it ‘a waste of time’. If I can beat a monster the great Hargrave has yet to, then I just had to try and one-up him.

Along with fighting small monsters, they’ve been talking to pass the time. Since the couples are rarely apart like this, there are plenty of topics to discuss that otherwise wouldn’t be brought up. For the most part, they still pertain to the game.

“I don’t understand how you didn’t reach max level yet. You play with Seiji all the time and with your personality and knowledge of the game, you’d surely be popular.” Ryuuji says.

“Yeah, aren’t you tired of being Hargrave’s sidekick?” Steve asks.

“I don’t mind that title, actually.” Hanabi practically sings from the praise, “I do have a list of dungeons I plan to solo to level up, but I’ve been too busy to start.”

Considering her ‘busy’ schedule may also include playing with friends this very night, Ryuuji is blunt in saying, “You could have just told us off to start your list tonight instead.”

“No way! Besides, I’ve always wanted to try this, but thought it would get boring by myself.”

“You’re really too nice.” Ryuuji says, also adding, “Way better than Hargrave. Right, Steve?”

“You are asking the wrong person to agree with that.” Steve stands strong as a member of team Hargrave.

Hanabi giggles until she notices something at the bottom left corner of her screen, all the way in the middle of the field. Her shock causes the boys to believe the rare monster appeared, excitement building, but after taking a look, they can’t believe what they see.

Walking through the field is a black shadow almost in the shape of a game character. With each step it takes, parts of the shadow become pixelated like it’s a program error. There’s no mistaking that this is-

“The wandering shadow.” Ryuuji says, amazed.

“Wait, that’s real? I thought it was a rumor.” Steve says.

“This is the first time I’ve seen it too.” Hanabi says.

The wandering shadow is something Ryuuji knows all too well due to his father’s complaints. This has existed since the game was released and when it originally attacked players, their characters would sometimes be erased. The company was able to recover the affected accounts and prevent that from happening again, but not remove the defect. In fact, they couldn’t find any trace of it, not even after following up on every sighting. It’s as if it’s a ghost that continues to haunt the game.

They consider leaving it alone, but then Ryuuji backtracks to Hanabi’s comment.

“You said you never saw this, then does that mean Seiji never did either?”

“Not that I know of.” Hanabi says.

She remains clueless, but Steve knows exactly where he’s going with this. If Hargrave never spotted the shadow, then he never fought it either. This is no different than if they happened upon the monster they’ve been waiting for. No matter what, he will be able to brag. Ryuuji’s excitement grows, but the other two aren’t fully convinced.

“Next time just lie to him.” Steve says.

“Sorry I should know by now.” Hanabi says with a sigh.

“Hey I have part of a plan at least. Instead of defeating it, let’s see if my defog spell will reveal if anything is under there.”

“Will that work?” Steve asks.

“No idea, but it’s worth a shot.” Ryuuji says.

Enjoying the challenge, Hanabi agrees to help. Since the shadow typically heads in one direction and attacks only when someone is within range, she recommends two people stand in the back while one person distracts in the front. Steve volunteers to ‘sacrifice himself for the greater good’ as he puts it, making him the distraction.

Once in position, Ryuuji and Hanabi slowly get closer to the shadow. After he takes a deep breath, Steve jumps in front. The shadow stops for a few seconds, and with it so do the two following from behind. Then all of a sudden, the shadow lunges toward Steve, causing him to panic.

“What do I do? What do I do??” He shouts repeatedly.

“Run back to us!” Ryuuji says.

Steve follows his advice and attempts to run around the shadow, but it swiftly follows.

“I thought you said it goes in one direction?!” Steve whines.

“Not when attacking!” Hanabi clarifies.

While the shadow continues to chase Steve, Ryuuji waits until it’s in range to use his defog spell ‘Cloud Less’. To their surprise, it works. The face isn’t fully clear, there are some pixels mixed in, but it’s enough to get an idea of what it may have once looked like. After a few seconds, the shadow covers it once more.

This had no effect on its attack, with it still pursuing the group. Steve quickly moves out of the way, hoping to leave its field of vision, but Ryuuji doesn’t move. His rogue stands frozen in place, distracted by his thoughts, That looked just like…

“Ryuuji!!” Steve shouts.

This successfully wakes him, but it’s too late. The wandering shadow slices right through RedShinobi with what appears to be a blade. That one strike almost immediately drains all of his health. Then all of a sudden, he’s fully healed. Ryuuji is confused at first, but realizes he’s alive thanks to Hanabi. She lets out a heavy breath, having saved him just in time.

However, the shadow realizes this as well and turns to Flora. It attacks her in a split second, and she disappears. After she’s gone, the shadow stands up straight and continues walking in the direction it was facing, completely ignoring the two that are left.

Worried, Ryuuji and Steve start shouting Hanabi’s name various times as if she’s on her deathbed. Despite being forcibly logged out, she can still hear them. She attempts to cut into their screams.

“I checked and Flora is here with everything intact. It just won’t let me log in, saying I need to wait an hour. Hopefully it’s just a bug.”

“One hour? That’s crazy.” Steve says.

“I read it was once going to take that long to revive for certain events, but that idea was scrapped.” Hanabi says.

Ryuuji keeps to himself, trying to process what he saw. He definitely recognized the character, and knows where he saw it before, but no matter how much he thinks about it, nothing makes sense.

“Well, I’ll try logging in again later. You guys can keep waiting or do whatever.”

“Sorry for what happened, Hanabi. I was distracted.” Ryuuji says.

“It’s fine, I’m alive after all. See you guys tomorrow~”

After they say their goodbyes, the two remain quiet. Steve is about to take this chance to ask Ryuuji what happened, but he doesn’t need to.

“Do you want an explanation?” Ryuuji asks.

“Oh? How did you know?”

“Because that’s how all you guys are.”

The only way he can explain this is with some old Komi Company files he has at home. He isn’t sure where they are and since it’s late, he opts to invite Steve over after school to look for them then. This also means something he’s been hiding will be revealed. Even with his involvement in the company, Steve has yet to know of his home situation.

“Are you inviting anyone else?” Steve inquires.

“Nope. You get a one-time, limited invite.”

“Limited?! Oh man I’ll come over for sure.”

Once that’s settled, Ryuuji places his headset on his desk. I’ve been able to accept how my dad has changed, but to show it to other people…I wonder how he’ll react.

October 11th 2018

After school, it’s just Steve, Sun, and Ryuuji. The following day is Hanabi’s birthday and since her family always takes them out for dinner the day of, the couple wants to spend this night together. That may explain why Seiji couldn’t play last night; he was probably busy planning something for her.

“I can’t wait for Sun’s birthday. It’s been so long since I’ve been able to say ‘happy birthday’ in person~” Steve is overjoyed just thinking about it.

“I’m looking forward to it too. So long as you don’t go overboard at school.” Sun adds.

“When’s your birthday?” Ryuuji asks.

“It’s April 24th.” Steve says, “Mine is April 27th by the way.”

“I didn’t ask you.” Ryuuji scowls.

When he thinks about that date, it strikes him as odd because it’s memorable for him too, but he can’t remember why. It then pops in his head as if a lightbulb went off.

“That’s when I transferred here.”

“Seriously?”

“Yep!” Sun says, “It was one of the worst birthdays I had in a while, having to listen to your rich boy bragging all day.”

After all that she’s done for him, surprising him on his own birthday even, Ryuuji can’t help feeling bad. Without a second thought, he pledges to make it up to her next year.

“I’ll do better next time. Therefore, Steve! Remind me about Sun’s birthday one week before it arrives.”

“Roger that!” Steve salutes.

Now that Steve is involved, Sun knows there’s no stopping them and has to accept this as is. She then looks around and notices Steve’s ride isn’t here yet.

“Is your driver running late?” She asks.

“Actually, Ryuuji invited me to his place! He wanted to show me something.”

Sun smirks at Ryuuji. He looks away, disgruntled, and starts walking home. Steve waves goodbye to Sun as he follows behind.

Sun would like to say ‘have fun’, but she knows what awaits them won’t be a pleasant sight.

In the hall on the way to the apartment, Ryuuji makes mention that his father may not be awake, but that puzzles Steve. Since it’s early in the day, it’s more likely he should be at work. Many normal parents would be if he held the same kind of office job, at least.

Ryuuji opens the door and as they enter, Steve is shocked by what he sees. To his left on the couch is a man, awake, with a scruffy beard and worn clothing. The TV illuminates the surrounding bottles and cans that are scattered about.

With this being the first time his son brought anyone home since they moved here, his father is astonished.

“So you are awake.” Ryuuji says. He then gestures to Steve, “This is my friend from school. We’re going to hang out for a bit. Let’s go.”

Once his shoes are removed, he starts heading to his room. Steve is quick to follow suit, taking one last look at the man with his widened eyes until he’s out of sight.

In his room, Ryuuji closes the door behind them and proceeds to rummage through his closet. He made sure to store some of the old files in his room so he’s at least confident of the location. Even though a lot of the paperwork involves his grandfather who is dearly missed, there was no telling what his father would do initially.

Meanwhile, Steve remains in disbelief at what he just witnessed. He tries to keep his emotions in check but can’t hide that it made him upset. The reason why Ryuuji works and randomly lashes out, it finally makes sense.

“How long has your dad…” Steve begins to ask but doesn’t know how to say it.

“Been a hopeless drunk? Ever since my hell began.” Ryuuji explains as he continues his search, “We moved here, he filled out the paperwork for me to transfer schools, then proceeded to drink his days away. He doesn’t give me money, food, nor the time of day.”

Having found the folder he wanted, Ryuuji steps away from the closet and looks at Steve, only to be met with a distressed, “I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing? If anything I’m surprised you didn’t ask about my dad sooner.”

“Believe me I wanted to ask, but Sun begged me not to!” Steve shouts, “She said you’d tell me when you’re ready. It bothered me because I could tell she knew, but I can see now that she was just protecting your secret like a good friend.”

Hearing that brings a smile to Ryuuji’s face. He did manage to thank her for the first time the other day, but the list of things she’s done to help only continues to grow.

“I don’t know how I can help my dad since he doesn’t listen to reason, so I’ve been keeping an eye on him instead. Either way, for now, I need to take care of this.” Ryuuji hands the folder to Steve.

“What is this?” he asks.

“You got a look at the wandering shadow’s face last night right? Well, look at the design on the first page. It was drawn by my grandfather before he disappeared.”

Curious, Steve opens the folder to see that it is indeed the same as the wandering shadow; long black hair, golden eyes, with an overall mature look.

“This is from over 20 years ago when they started getting ideas for the game. I think it was supposed to be the original design for the swordsman, but my dad couldn’t bring himself to use it. He saw it as a constant reminder of his own father who went missing.”

“You don’t think this has anything to do with his disappearance do you?”

“Not exactly, but the way that it’s a bug the company can’t trace, it’s almost like a ghost.” Ryuuji hesitates before continuing, “I have no idea if we can do anything, and I plan to mention this to the others, but wanted to ask you first; will you help me?”

Steve instantly feels a chill. He’s never been good with ghosts and the way he just described it is just how something would come to be haunted. In movies at least, but he can tell Ryuuji is serious and has no reason to laugh at him.

“This is really creepy and I don’t fully understand it, but I can never turn down a favor from you.”

“Is that because you pity me?”

“I can’t believe you’d even ask that.” Steve gives a big grin, “It’s because we’re friends of course. Plus you finally told me something without needing to force it out of you!”

“You didn’t have to go that far, but you’re right. I guess seeing your reaction to my dad gave me second thoughts.”

Steve’s smile fades, “I’m going to tell my father about yours.”

“I expected you to.”

Although I knew Steve wouldn’t keep my dad’s state to himself, I didn’t think it would be one of the last few days before everything changed again. I honestly did invite him over due to finding it more convenient to show him there rather than just explain the strange situation. I was still glad it unfolded how it did.

********************

Starfight tips;;

‘The Wandering Shadow’ is officially labeled as a defect by the company, but to players, it has become a famous myth. There are many stories such as it being a ghost of a lost player, or a new form of Calibash or a monster he created, and although there are few sightings each week, it’s widely discussed.