1 Fear and Death

The lady's long untidied hair wavered as she ran. Her name was Honger. Jumping over the stairs and dashing through the hallway she almost went past the elevator she was desperately trying to reach. She punched the button and jumped into it. After exiting the elevator she clumsily put the key in and bursted the door open.

"Bold, BOLD" she yelled

"Why are you shouting, jeez"

A young adult with straight black hair and a round face turned his gaze away from the computer and stood up in discontent. He was 20 years old. A bit of a slacker in his studies at university.

"We need to go now"

"Huh? to where?"

"To America"

"Ahh, What? The hell are you talking about?"

"There is no time to explain. We need to be at the airport at 6. Move quickly, before they catch us".

Bold could not believe what his mother was saying. It was almost as if he was being dragged into an action movie all of a sudden.

"You gotta be kidding me. Did you jump on some big fishes for cash? Why are you always causing so much goddamn trouble ".

"Quit your whining. Listen Bold, I have the money. We have the money. If we just make it to America we'll live with no troubles in our life" said his mother while holding the credit card at her son's face.

Bold looked at her disgustingly.

"Y-you stole that from someone? Someone shady?"

"Shady people becoming broke is the will of the great sky. They reap what they sow, that's what has happened".

"Mom, you can't do this"

"Go, get dressed NOW"

Within twenty minutes they headed outside in the freezing cold of December and headed towards the road and called for a taxi. And within an hour's ride, they easily reached the airport. They took out their passport, ordered the tickets and ran across multiple checks. And at last, they were at the flight waiting section. Hongor's face was tight with tension.

She observed her surroundings carefully and every minute she jumped up to her feet with cold sweat and shock to see if someone else was spying on them. Of course, no one was there. Or so Bold thought. Despite the time he spent in front of the PC screen his eyes were working fine. And as far as he could tell everyone around him seemed normal. To him, his mother was acting a bit paranoid.

Even if ma did steal the money. And even if the money was huge. The people who are after us couldn't be THAT mad, could they? Yeah, if those folks surround us we could just give the card back, ask for forgiveness and there would be no problem.

While he was wrapped up in his thoughts an announcement was heard saying that the time for their flight has come.

"Let's go" said Hongor.

Bold stood up and trotted towards the section of the airport and her mother followed her. He looked at his surroundings carefully. Or at least tried to, with dozens of people going from here to there it was impossible to get a good vision of the area. But Bold was fairly calm. He was certain there was nothing to fear. Until he heard a sudden cry behind him.

He looked around to encounter a devastating scene. Her mother was on the floor with her face buried to the ground. Blood oozed from her back. Next to her was a man standing in black leather. And in his hand was a bloody katana. All the hair on Bold's back sprang up like needles and his body shivered in fear.

When he met the man's gaze his heart felt like it almost stopped. His eyes were cold as the winter's night and deadly as a poisonous snake. It almost felt like those two orbs penetrated into Bold's very being. It stripped him naked and witnessed all that he was. A scared little boy. Bold tried to look in a different direction but the effort was futile. His body and his brain were frozen solid.

"R-u-n"

He looked down at her mother whose body had become paralyzed but her eyes still had a fire.

"Run, Runaway. NOW"

Bold's body moved on its own and he sprinted across the crowd as fast as he could. He was mindless, he didn't know where he was going. But it did not matter he had to run. The direction was definitely the opposite of where that bastard was at so it was the right direction. That was the only logic he was left with. And miraculously he found the door that led to his plane just as he was about to run past it. He slipped and fell on the floor flat with his face when he tried to stop himself. The flight attendant seemed quite worried and walked towards him but he got up to his feet himself and raised his ticket from his pocket.

"I need to get on that plane, FAST. Please"

And by his request, the attendant helped him enter the plane. He looked back, again and again, to see if anyone suspicious was coming after him but no such person came. He sat on his chair, fiddled with his fingers and looked again. People came into the plane in swarms and spread towards their seats. Bold shivered with fear. His hand quickly reached the seat in front of him, pulled out a newspaper, opened it and raised it to his face.

He would dare not look. That monster wouldn't know he is here. He held both the tickets. There is no way he could find where he had run off to. But then, strangely, a hopeful feeling came. That his mother would come. His annoying, bossy but wise mother would come.

It was a stupid thought, he knew, even if his mother did show up he would think it was an illusion. But this feeling persisted. But just as he had expected, as the last person entered the plane the door was shut. And a voice came from a speaker indicating that the plane was about to move. Soon something wet trickled down along Bold's cheeks.

Tears?

Four years have passed since then. During this time Bold's way of living was simple. With the immense cash her mother had left upon him he had bought a flat with 1 bedroom and stayed there. And by staying there it had to be written with an exclamation point. He literally stayed there all the time. He would occasionally go for a walk to buy some groceries but that was it. Prancing around the city was dangerous, at least according to him. He had to stay put. Who knows, maybe those bastards who took his mother away were still on the search. They probably knew that he went to America. So, this small room was safe.

Not to mention America wasn't exactly the safest place. A report about at least one shooting would be written on websites every night. He had the money, there wasn't anywhere he needed to go. He was provided with everything he ever cared about. He had a computer, the internet aka THE GREATEST CREATION MANKIND HAS CREATED, and a VR set.

What else was even needed? Perhaps an exercising machine would do. Over the last few years, he had put up quite a weight. But if he were to walk along the streets he wouldn't be that out of the ordinary. There were quite a lot of people like him here anyway. And the people who weren't well… fat knew not to fat shame anyone.

While he was chatting and giggling to himself in front of the PC he suddenly remembered that he was planning on sleeping and looked across the window. The morning sun was slowly rising above the mountain. He sighed and pressed alt+F4 on his keyboard and saw at the corner of the PC that it was 6 AM. How many hours was he playing? It didn't matter. It's not like he had anything to do. If he felt tired he could just sleep and eat all day. It's not like there was any shortage of money. Time wasn't essentially a problem for him. For someone who didn't go to school or had a job and barely got out of his apartment, whether it was night or day didn't matter. But it was still annoying to him that he couldn't follow up on his plan to restrict his time on his PC.

His eyes had started being itchy and occasionally his heartbeat would become really weird. And just now he noticed that his eyes were twitching and his head ached. Farming and chatting with his teammates online had completely taken away his time. So, a few minutes later he turned off his PC, the lights and slowly dragged his heavy body to the bed and lied down. The room was slightly illuminated by the early ray of the sun. Bold was immensely tired yet he couldn't sleep.

What items should he purchase to synchronize with his teammates and what will happen in the next episode of his favorite show? Those thoughts swirled in his mind. After realizing that speculation about all that nonsense was pointless Bold sighed and looked at the calendar next to his bed.

Goddamn it. What day is today anyway?

Since he hasn't been involved in any activity whatsoever for the past few years it was easy to forget about something simple such as that. Even if it felt like a short span of time for Bold he had actually wasted months and years without doing anything of significance. Bold wasn't the hardworking type, that was clear. But looking back on it now his laziness over the past few years had surprised even himself. If it hadn't been for the money, the financial security his mother had left him with he would be a homeless man with a starving stomach. She had risked her life to get it and even lost it to save him.

After all that he was just doing bullshit day after day just to make himself feel less useless and less bored. God, how much he just hated being bored. Even if the content creators in the entire world had come together to make a game or a tv series he was sure that there wasn't a single entertainment that could rid his boredom for good. And if there is any feeling he hated more than boredom it was hunger…okay, constipation was the second one but right now he was hungry. In fact, he was starving.

Oh man, when was the last time I ate? 9 PM? Have I seriously been playing since then?!

He dragged his heavy lump of a body and slowly entered the kitchen while scratching his balloon-like belly. He then opened the refrigerator and collected the ration he wanted to eat. As he closed the door and turned around three men were standing in front of him.

"Woah!"

Shocked by their sudden appearance, Bold threw everything he was holding into the air and fell backward, hitting his head on the door of the fridge in the process. After recovering from the pain, he nervously inspected the unknown guests. The three men in front of him were wearing dark shades and black costumes. They all had huge builds, probably could pin down a lion. And their faces were just as stony as their bodies. It lacked expression of any kind.

"Wha- when- who are you people?"

But the men did not answer. Instead, one man quickly grabbed his arm, pulled him forward and pinned him to the ground.

"H-hey, Help!"

But before Bold could show any more resistance a cloth was wrapped around his mouth and nose. Bold's consciousness became drowsy and he fell into an irresistible slumber.

Bold opened his eyes. Despite his consciousness being fully awake he could not see anything but darkness.

Huh? Is this what death feels like? Well, if I died why do I have my thoughts with me? Am I in a dark room? Maybe I'm blindfolded. That's stupid. If I was I would have felt it.

He looked down and saw his hands, legs, the white trousers and brown T-shirt he was wearing. It took a few more moments for Bold to notice that he was actually floating in the air.

Is this a dream? Well, that seems to be the only possible explanation.

He moved his hands to his face and touched it. It felt…real. He moved his legs forward and backward. Again, the feeling was genuine.

They are functional, at the very least.

He also pinched his cheek and noticed that he could feel pain too. There wasn't any clue where he was or how he got here in the midst of the black void. Complete darkness surrounded Bold. Only his body illuminated in this void for some unspecific reason. And it wasn't long before he started to panic. No matter how hard he kicked and waved his hands he couldn't move from the position he was in.

At least he got identified with the thought that he wasn't moving. There was nothing to confirm whether he moved or not. But all of a sudden, he felt a strong force pulling him to the ground and he noticed that he was falling. There was nothing he could do to resist and a second later his head and back collided with a cold hard surface.

"Ouch, shit. Goddammit".

The pain he felt was extremely…real. The back of his head was relentlessly aching and he was sure he broke his spine from the fall. He rolled on the ground while holding his head and gritting his teeth. Bold fell from the stairs, was beaten by some mean bullies back in the day but none of that was comparable to how much he was in pain now. But it wasn't long before the pain faded away. How it vanished so quickly was out of this world. Such strange phenomena he had never felt before.

"H-hey you okay?" said a girl's shivering voice.