31 I Will Teach You How to Fight (yeah, right)

Lucas's fingers played over the screen. His usual smirk was now a genuine smile of pure fascination. 'I've only heard of Hermann's work…' he thought, 'But I have never seen it before.' He went through the complex code of the system. He could change most of the settings, but the code file however, was locked. 

'Oh man, it's locked. Otherwise I would have done countless other things,' nevertheless, he went back to the things he could alter. Their traits. There was a huge list of them for each boy.

'Calm during crisis, rational, pessimist, hates sweet things…' were the different titles listed under Ethan's name. 

"Woah…" Lucas said out loud, "They're actually like us humans, but in a code version! So cool!" Entire range of possibilities ran through his mind. The things he could do with this technology were endless! 

People didn't have to work anymore…these VR-IRL Translated Characters could do the work instead. Children without siblings wouldn't be lonely at home anymore, they could have their own baby friend. And Lucas…he wouldn't have to be there during the daily family fights at dinner. He would just have to create a VR-IRL version of him with his memories and traits and put that in his place while he went to chill with his friends.

At that moment, where his mind rushed with ideas, he wanted to steal it. Steal it all. He was a part of Evertech after all. And sadly, Evertech had a huge reputation of stealing. Not wanting to add fuel to that rumor was the only reason he held himself back.

"But I don't have to steal to have a little fun with this," he realized and the smirk came back to his face as he opened up the on-screen key board and typed up a new code to replace the old one.

The title of 'Calm during crisis' faded away and new letters replaced it.

'Reckless and hyperactive' 

The lights above him flickered slightly. Lucas looked up in surprise for a second before returning to his work. He moved on to the others and switched a little bit of everyone's traits one by one. But that wasn't all.

He discovered a new hidden category during the process.

'SKILL LEVELS' 

"Oh wow, these must be the skills they are supposed to have achieved in Breakfire Online," Lucas giggled and opened that up too.

'Super strength' 'Invisibility' 'Blood Sucker'

'Water Bender' 'Star Breaker' 'Dragon Scales' 

Not being able to help himself, he enabled them all, "You guys are just game characters anyway. This is the real world. While being invisible is possible for you, I doubt you can bend water and break stars...whatever that is. But if you guys do end up destroying everything," he laughed, thinking of how happy his mother, the founder of Evertech, will be. No dinner fights for a few weeks! Yay!

"The target will be Systema games," he shrugged, "Good for Evertech, good for mother, and good for me!"

The lights around him and of the entire building flickered again, more strongly. Some of the employees of the other departments started screaming in frustration. 

'My printer's jammed!"

"Oh, what happened?" another employee asked, walking forward to examine the printer. After a few minutes, he looked up and rubbed his chin, "Why…it's short circuited!"

Another man from the nearby office came out too, "Two of the printers in my office got short circuited too!"

Everyone fell into a slight shock before more employees started coming out of their offices in even more frustration.

"My computer crashed! I lost all the drafts for tomorrow!"

"You're not alone mate," another one said, his face sullen, "Mine crashed too. Just now." 

Lucas frowned at the commotion and tilted his head, "What's up with them?"

....

I tensed as I saw him wink. Why was my heart fluttering at a time like this? I frowned at him discreetly and he simply gave me an almost invisible, assuring smile.

Relief and warmth rushed through me as I saw that smile. He was back to normal. I wanted to hug him for coming back. But how had he come back to normal? That, I didn't know.

Kai was about to force the knife in Saye's hand into my stomach when I decided to smile. Kai frowned in confusion, "Why are you-"

My eyes flitted over to Adrien as he swiftly lifted his leg up in a roundhouse kick and hit the side of Kai's neck in one powerful blow, probably severing his jugular vein.

Kai let out a scream and almost fell on his knees. He got back up again and his eyes were filled with fire now. He grabbed the knife from Saye's hand and brandished it at Adrien. Seeing his tactics, Adrien turned back and slipped two kitchen knives out of its place on the racks and held it in front of him.

"Back off, Kai, I'm warning you," Adrien threatened to protect me. Kai lunged forward to stab him. Adrien dodged and grazed the blade of the knife on the side of Kai's face. 

Tiny drops of blood dripped from it. I saw it touch the ground…and glitch.

And disappear.

Now there was no doubt they weren't human. But they weren't complete robots either. This was proof, I opened my mouth to breath from all the things happening and looked back at Luca who was still holding me hostage. I met eyes with Saye who was also wondering how to escape. 

I heard a whimper and whipped my head to look at the floor. Kai lay on the kitchen floor, his hand twisted in an indescribable angle.

Adrien looked up at me. I couldn't meet his face. All I could see were the knives dripping blood. 

"You both. Run. I'll take care of them," Adrien said and dropped the knives before walking towards me and pushing Luca back with force and finally, I felt my hands go free. 

Saye was still under Jae-suk's hold. I looked around for anything to hit him with. Saye pointed at the cutting board with her eyes. I reached for it and tried to hit him on the head. But he ducked too quickly and smiled proudly. 

I tried again but he ducked that too. I was miserable. 

"Ashe…" Saye sighed. 

"I'm sorry, okay! I'm not used to fighting people!"

She rolled her eyes, "You still have a little hate left for me right?"

"Huh?"

"Hit me. Take it out on me," she said. 

"I-"

"Just do it, Ashe," she urged and I looked at the cutting board. Why was she telling me to take my anger out on her now? But then I feared if she would do something to me later if I didn't listen to her now.

I clutched the board tighter and lifted it, "It will hurt, Saye."

She shrugged, "I probably deserve it."

"Probably? More like definitely," I said and brought the cutting board down on her.

But to my disappointment, she ducked that like a pro. But my disappointment didn't last long. Jae-suk, who was standing behind her, didn't duck this time and he swayed a bit before falling down unconscious on the floor.

Saye and I both simply stood there for a second and stared at the seemingly lifeless body. She spoke first.

"Woah. Did you hate me that much?"

I punched her on the arm and dropped the cutting board before running out of the kitchen with her, leaving Adrien to deal with a raging Luca and Ethan. It was one on two…and I felt a deep worry in my heart. 

"Are you coming, Ashe?" Saye asked and I nodded and followed her to go out of the house and call the guards at the perimeter for help. 

"Why are they suddenly like this, Ashe? It can't be an act," Saye asked, not looking at me. 

"I swear I switched off their survival mode. Seems like it's somehow on again," I replied, confusion filling my voice. 

"Did somebody turn it back on again? How do you disable and enable that anyway?"

"There's a hidden latch at each one's necks. It opens up the few system controls, not the entire thing. You can change the mode there. But other than that, I don't think you can change it remotely," I told her truthfully. All this was chaos. My head was too muddled to think.

That's exactly why I had forgotten to look out for one more boy in the house.

Romeo grabbed Saye by her collar and pulled her towards him, "Where do you girls think you are going?"