Page 127 of Mud

They chose the street in the middle.

Lights and people, elves and orcs all around me. Players, too, plenty of them, all perfectly disoriented. All looking upward at the buildings that kept going higher and higher.

Then there was fire.

People screamed. Instinct took over and I raised my hands to protect myself when the roar filled my ears, and then another person screamed especially hard—andlong—as he fell from the edge of a four-story building.

He wason fire.

Iris help me, his entire body was burning as he screamed and fell for about two seconds, then slammed against the asphalt some fifteen feet away from me.

Another roar over our heads, and I looked up just in time to see huge wings on a dragon as it flew away and disappeared behind the buildings.

I was in shock, and maybe that’s why I went closer without really understanding what the hell I was doing, but nobody was screaming anymore at least. Not even the man on fire—because he was dead.

Seeing death in all its forms wasn’t anything new to me—I was an IDD agent. Or at least I had been one, and I’d seen my share of awful things, but this was different. This wasa game.This was not a rescue mission, and there were no bad guys to chase and capture here. No, this man hadbeen incinerated by a fucking dragon flying in the sky, and now he was dead.

“Get out of my way!”someone shouted as he shoved people away to get through because we’d all gathered to see. I didn’t think anyone could even help it—it was instinct, and when I saw the corpse still burning, perfectly still on the blackened asphalt, I felt like I might throw up. Despite all the corpses I’d witnessed on my missions, at the morgue, at the office, this hit me differently.

The Whitefire who’d been behind me was right next to me now. When our eyes locked, I almost leaned into him for some support—to hell with it all.

Then the guy who’d been calling for us to get out of his way kneeled in front of the still burning man, while we remained a couple feet away. He wore black leathers and had dark hair, and when he raised his hand toward the body, Blackfire magic engulfed the flames until they went out.

The body could have been a doll painted black, but the smell wouldn’t let you be fooled. I thought for sure the man had done this because he hadn’t wanted to see another player get burned, but then he started whispering a spell, fast, and more of his magic unleashed from the palms of his hands and stretched over the dead body.

Idiot,I thought, enraged. He wasn’t trying to help at all—he was trying to bring the guy back.

“Pretty sure that’snotnatural causes,” said someone from the crowd.

Someone else laughed. “Yeah, dude. He got incinerated by a dragon and fell to his death,” said a woman. “Fuck it, I’m outta here.”

“Guess this means we should stay away from rooftops, rookies,” said another man, while the Blackfire wasstill chanting his necromantic spell. It wasn’t going to work, and I was pretty sure he knew it, but he was trying anyway.

He was trying and turning the dead man’s body to ashes right there on the asphalt as his magic fought to bring back his soul but couldn’t.

Seconds later, he stood up, cursing out loud, dusting his hands off as if he were pissed that the body of the player was ruined, and he was still without his key.

I was sick to my stomach.

It took a lot to stop myself from going after him, or from pulling out my gun and emptying a magazine or two into his back—or even reaching for a throwing knife under my jacket. This was anythingbuta game, no matter how Iridians advertised it, and the whole world knew what happened in this playground, yet nobody did anything to stop it. On the contrary—they made twice the billions they spent to prepare for this lunacy.

Unlike the other players, I was forced into this mess, but I knew the one rule in the Roe all the same:kill or be killed.There was no other way about it. If someone was foolish enough to climb on the rooftops to search for the easiest way out, that was on him.

The sooner I accepted that, the sooner I could finish this challenge and leave Night City behind.

“Are you okay?”

The voice was hushed, barely a whisper, and I turned to the Whitefire guy, surprised he was still there beside me.

And he was talking to me.

No, I’m not okay—areyou?I wanted to say, but what the hell would be the point?

“I’m fine,” I lied because we were enemies no matter what. In here, every single player was an enemy to the other.

So, I walked away without waiting for a reply, ignoring the ashes of the player on the sidewalk.

The city was alive, and the deeper I went, the more lively it became, with a lot more people, louder music, and brighter lights. Elves and orcs were drinking and laughing and dancing. I stuck to the sidewalks, to the shadows, and watched the other players approach them, ask them for food, for drinks, for beds—yet they all saidno. I passed by grocery stores and bakeries and restaurants, a flower shop and a lady that sold perfumes on a stand in the middle of the street. There were no cars here, or any kind of vehicle that I saw. Everybody walked to wherever they were going, and a couple of hours in, the players no longer even tried to ask for food or drinks.

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