Second Genesis

Grey immediately started backing away, trying to keep an eye on Fitz. Half of him wanted to turn tail right this moment, but he had seen Fitz’s handiwork several times already.

Aside from one loop where he just barely nicked May’s throat and she bled out, all the others had fatal shots right to the head and neck where the arrow very clearly struck true.

The only people who would pick a bow and arrow entering a death match like this one were either idiots who thought too much of themselves, or people who were quite used to using one back on Earth.

Fitz was very obviously the latter.

That meant the only chance Grey had—

’Shit, dodge!’

Grey screamed at himself as though it would help. Luckily, it did.

He dove—not to the arrow flying into the skies—but instead timing it to the release of Fitz’s fingers.

Taking the opportunity, he rolled back up to his feet as the arrow clanged by, rebounding against a distant cobblestone.

Panic lit Fitz’s eyes as he realized he missed. He rushed to load another, but Grey had already vanished behind a building. Grey hadn’t come very far out from the line of them in the first place. He hadn’t had far to go in order to disappear from Fitz’s line of sight.

"Shit! Shit! Fuck!"

Fitz ran a hand through his hair in panic, taking one step toward Grey, then another back toward May. He couldn’t seem to decide who he should be going after or what he should be doing. In the end, he gritted his teeth and rushed back toward May.

He yanked the arrow from her eye socket. Then he ran the arrow’s blade tip across her neck. He was doing his best to make it look like anything but an arrow killed her.

During the last loops, he had left it be—half because he was in a panic that he had killed someone, and another half because of Ray and the fact they would be leaving a Tutorial Zone no one else should be able to return to anyway.

But now, it was clear to him that anyone that came to Zone 234 would be spawned right here, and the last thing he wanted was for a bunch of people to be judging him out of the corner of their eyes, or wondering why it was he killed her.

He scrambled to put the bloody arrow back in his quiver, and then pulled on something around May’s neck.

Greed lit his eyes when he suddenly heard a rush of footsteps behind him.

Fitz’s head whipped back to find Grey rushing him in an all-out sprint. His eyes couldn’t help but go wide. How insane did you have to be to rush into an open space against someone with the clear long-ranged advantage?

Almost anyone would have avoided Fitz for the foreseeable future, but Grey had actually decided to come back.

Fitz panicked and rushed to pull out a new arrow, but his palms were slick with blood and his dexterity was shot. Grey was already within ten meters by the time Fitz had finally managed to pull one out and was rushing to nock it.

He was so used to competition firing, when he got a chance to take a breath and loose his arrow. In fact, in competitions, compound bows were set on random timers to release when the archer wasn’t anticipating it so as to remove any chance of focusing on anything other than aiming.

This was a completely different situation, and this bow also wasn’t the same compound bow he was used to. It took far more strength to draw, and the nocks for the arrows were far less forgiving.

By the time he was finally firing, Grey was only three meters away—but it was enough.

Three meters might as well have been an ocean’s breadth. And now, Fitz didn’t have to worry about aiming perfectly. Grey was too close.

Ta.

The arrow was released with a twang, and it seemed to reach Grey’s chest instantly.

There was a wild look in Grey’s eyes. A tinge of red colored them, a madness flooding his blood as adrenaline pumped through his arms.

He knew he was insane. And inwardly, he was kicking himself for having chosen the more reliable longsword over the less durable double axes.

The sword might have been just a starter weapon, but it was sturdy and well-built. But because he had made that choice, he didn’t have anything he could reliably throw at Fitz.

But he needed to do this. He had to do this.

He could only bet on one thing, hope for one thing—

That for once... Fitz would aim for his chest.

Grey’s lips spread in a wild grin the moment he saw it.

Chi.

Ray’s Nexis Suit unfurled and formed a net between Grey’s arms. The arrow instantly ripped through the first layer, and then the second, piercing into Grey’s chest.

"Son of a bitch," Grey wheezed out—but not before he closed in the final distance with a last lunge, swinging Ray’s sword down in a wild arc.

Fitz’s head flew into the skies, his eyes wide with shock.

All his life, he had only been concerned with one thing: hitting the target. He never considered what happened after that because it would normally mean that things were already over—whether that be the competition he was participating in, or the lives of the game he hunted.

But what he didn’t realize in the heat of the moment was that by failing to target Grey’s head, even if he had hit something vital...

Grey’s sword would reach him no matter what.

Huffing for breath, Grey roared. Every time he did something that made his blood pump, he could never help himself. Whether he was snowboarding down a death slope or beating someone bloody in an MMA match—

It fueled him like no other.

"COME ON!"