— A/N —

This story is inspired by Dahmiel's Players will be Dispatched and the gameplay of Katana Zero. And because of the latter being mentioned, this story will be action based and I will be describing scenes of violence with a little more detail than necessary, which is why I have this rated as M. For anyone squeamish, consider this a content warning.

It's also pretty much a gamer-fic but with less of an emphasis on stats. Take that as you will.


"SAVESCUM"

Chapter One


The door to the apartment opened as a young man tiredly walked in. The evening sun peeked through the window blinds of his unorganized apartment; a wonderfully golden hue filling in an otherwise dull and messy room. His heavy book-bag was tossed off to the side with little regard as he kept walking forward towards his bedroom, only to turn on the computer before leaving for the bathroom.

Teddy Holman rubbed cold water into every part of his face. Drying it off, he looked back up to see those same old dark-brown eyes, still slightly red from before, and the mess of his equally brown hair. He had little care to comb it down. Others, from what he's heard, would describe him as plain-looking. He had a regular face that wore rimmed glasses, and a build neither above nor below average, just mediocre, and he supposed that was fine.

When he returned to his bedroom, he entered the password to his computer and immediately double-clicked on the application of the game. As it loaded, a headset was pulled out from its protective case. It was akin to a motorcycle helmet, perfectly round and encompassing most of his head, with a large screen filling his view and just inches away from his nose.

Teddy clicked on the launch button and felt the soothing grasp of the headset. This feeling—which he could only describe as that state where a person is both awake and asleep as they dreamt—was always a comforting one. He'd felt it many times, yet he couldn't get enough of it.

Though his eyes were open and staring at a screen, and his body felt itself laying on his bed, his mind felt itself somewhere else.

Somewhere it could escape to.

Somewhere in Remnant: Grimmdark.

· · ·

He strolled in like he owned the place. It was a small two-story building with a cafe on the ground floor, and an office on the second floor. It acted as a business front by some gang, a place to launder money or whatever the lore reason was.

Young-faced and hair lazily combed back by hand, donning a light-grey peacoat over a white button-up tucked into brown trousers. Teddy's character—named Teddy Gainsboro—mimicked everything that Teddy thought about doing. His fingers shook with anticipation when they finally noticed him on the second floor. Low-skilled and low-leveled, they all had their auras unlocked, but there wasn't much. Each wore black suits with red button-ups, and matching red sunglasses. Tinted sunglasses indoors, in the middle of night? The thought amused him.

"This is a private area," one of them barked. "You can't be here!"

From what he could see, it was only four of them, likely just here to keep the place guarded. The only response he gave him was cracking his knuckles. Seeing this, all of them slowly reached their way towards their weapons—consisting of slender, red blades with a square tip, and regular handguns.

[Quicksave Complete…]

"Last warning. Get out of here and nobody gets–" Teddy didn't let him finish, throwing a right hook to the side of his face as he rushed him. When he fell onto the floor with a thud, the others were soon upon him.

Teddy kept his distance as two wildly swung their swords at him, the other one staying back and aiming his gun at him, and the one he knocked down getting back up. He ducked and dodged to the side until one of the grunts reeled his sword back for a hard swing. It only left him open for a quick uppercut. Teddy's fist was square against his jaw, and it satisfied Teddy that he launched him off his feet for that. His sword, similar to him, also went up spinning in an arc for him to catch.

Teddy would consider himself good with hand-to-hand combat; now that he had a sword, he considered himself unstoppable.

It was two of them charging in towards him that he easily traded blows with. They swung at Teddy, and he swung back, but he would always give a little extra gift, be it in the form of a low-kick to their legs, or perhaps a shove towards the others. Still, he always kept an eye on the one in the back. If he was about to shoot, he'd try to get another grunt to be in the way. As much as Teddy enjoyed fighting large groups of enemies, this was how he was going to manage them.

The first few minutes were rough as he tried to get a rhythm going, but then it clicked. Everything that was unnecessary was tuned out—his opponents' words, the sweat on his body, the sound of gunfire and metal clanging against metal. He found himself smiling. In this moment of pure bliss, this flow, all that mattered was this moment, to simply exist in a turbulent time and prevail.

That was what it meant to be alive.

Teddy cut down a grunt across his entire chest, shattering his aura and leaving him on the ground unconscious. Another, he pinned against the wall and ran the blade through him. This, too, shattered his aura, but left a slim keyhole in his body. With a twist of the blade, blood poured out from his wound before he slumped onto the floor, desperately trying his best to cover the wound.

All of a sudden a shot rang out, and with it, Teddy became aware of everything in his surroundings—it was enough to make him light-headed. The gang member who shot him looked satisfied.

Despite having taken a 'major bleeding debuff', it only felt like a numbing sensation in his leg neither good nor bad. But that wasn't what bothered him. These people had aura; his character did not. That meant that anything more than a scratch—no, even a minor scratch—would eventually kill his character. This alone was enough reason to never get hit in a fight.

[Loading Quicksave…]

"Last warning. Get out of here and nobody gets hurt." In a blink of an eye, everything was back in its place; a blank canvas just waiting for him to create something once more.

Take two. Teddy cheered as his heart rate began to rise once more. He found his flow much easier this time, being able to dodge their attacks with grace and attack with viciousness. A minute into the fight, he already got one of their swords. In four minutes, two of them were already out of the fight—much quicker than the first time.

And much like the first time, the gunman in the back shot him, this time in the chest. A numb sensation in Teddy's center rib cage enveloped his entire upper body as he watched through the eyes of his character collapsing onto the floor.

[Loading Quicksave…]

"Last warn–" Teddy ignored him, shoving the grunt out of the way as well as the other two that tried to stop him. His eyes were dead set on the gunman.

As he raised his gun up to him, Teddy ducked down to allow the shot to miss him, and delivered an uppercut straight to his chin. The brief sense of satisfaction ended when he felt a slash form across his back. That went as well as I expected. Maybe I shouldn't turn my back on the three gang members with swords.

[Loading Quicksave…]

And so, the fight went on. Victories were made and erased within seconds as Teddy continued to fight. But with every failure, every retry, he gained more control over the fight. His reflexes became more reactive to the slightest movement that these NPCs made to attack him.

At some point, everything became a massive blur of images and sensations connected only by the rush of adrenaline, and separated by the mention of reloading a save. How long had he been doing this for? He didn't know, and he couldn't care any less. He wanted to get as much enjoyment as he could from this.

[Loading Quicksave…]

He disarmed the grunt in front of him and took his sword; from there, the fight went like all the other times. Two minutes in, Teddy put two of them out of the fight. With most of the melee fighters out, he turned his attention to the gunman in the back. He quickly reached for any office supply he could get—staplers, paper weights, even a wireless keyboard—and threw them as hard as he could at him. It wasn't so that it could hurt, let alone kill him, but it was meant to throw off his aim, buying himself mere seconds to remain in the fight unharmed.

When the third and final melee fighter was nearing him, he kicked an office chair towards him to make him stumble a bit. Teddy took this moment to lock blades with him and push him all the way to the gunman, using him as a shield. He closed the distance fast and shoved the grunt off, the gunman catching the grunt into his arms. With the way he was positioned, it was a perfect slice across the grunt's neck.

"No! Y-You bastard!" The gunman, for a very good reason, looked horrified holding onto his colleague's body as he had his throat slit. Teddy could tell that through his red sunglasses, he was scared. The gunman let the grunt's body fall to the ground and drew his gun up, but Teddy was faster.

His sword knocked the gun out and away from his hand. From over the man's shoulder, Teddy saw the window behind him. His mind knew what it wanted to do. He continued his momentum to spin on one foot as the other foot shot out towards the man's center mass—a spinning back kick to send him flying out the window. He heard the thump as the gunman's body hit the street below.

Just like that, it was over. Teddy looked around and took in the scene before him. What could've passed as a decent office space was now torn apart, furniture knocked over, the floor stained red, and smoking bullet holes littered the wall. Whatever poor janitor that has to clean up this has their work cut out for them.

That's not including the combatant's bodies on the floor. Two of them were dead from receiving fatal injuries when Teddy shattered their auras. The third one was alive, for now at least. The grunt was desperately holding onto his wound trying to stop the bleeding. Teddy simply left him be.

He never went into these fights with the intention of killing an NPC, but anything can happen in a fight. It was a win as long as they didn't get back up. The fight was over, and unless he had a good reason to restart it after it was over, it would stay like that.

Needless to say, the whole place was a mess.

Throughout many retries he had made, his character had taken many injuries—lacerations, gunshot wounds—all of which he had felt, but those wounds weren't real, his heart pounding his chest was. Teddy was satisfied, exhilarated, much like one would feel after watching a classic action movie. The smile on his face was involuntary, likely a reflection of what his body was doing in the real world, but he welcomed it nonetheless.

"H-Hey! Are you okay? Who did this to you?" Teddy heard a rough voice from outside.

He went up to the broken window to see a group of men sharing the same attire as those he had fought. They all looked up to him when the one he sent out the window weakly pointed to him before his arm collapsed onto the street. Whether he was dead or just unconscious, Teddy wouldn't know.

[Quicksave Complete…]

By the time Teddy heard running footsteps from the floor below him, he turned around to see a small number of them at the stairway entrance. They all looked at what he's done before staring at him, all shocked.

Teddy raised both hands and made a motion for all to come at him, a cheeky grin plastered on his character's face.

· · ·

Yesterday was fruitless for the three members of Team RWBY. When Blake had dove out the window the moment she outed herself as a faunus, Ruby, Yang and reluctantly Weiss had gone out to look for her, calling out for her name and asking around if anyone had seen her. Today would mark the second day they would be looking for her. The three did the same thing they'd done prior, albeit that it was clear it was taking a toll on them.

"Honestly, do you know who else has the resources to conduct a search better than the three of us? The police." If it was a joke then Weiss certainly delivered it harshly. It was clear that she was tired too, but she did her best to walk prim and proper to keep up her appearance.

Yang, Ruby's half-sister, turned to her with clear annoyance. "Leave it, Weiss. She's our teammate."

"Is she? For all we know, she could still be working for the White Fang as a spy! Right under all of our noses!"

Ruby was glad that there weren't many people around early in the morning. "Weiss, please." It was enough to get her to stop, with her giving a hmph in response, something Ruby took slight solace over.

They continued to walk throughout the city in search of her, when they noticed a building cordoned off by police tape just ahead of them. Upon closer inspection, it was a cafe with windows smashed on the upper floor. She would have thought it was an act of vandalism until she saw just how damaged the interior was.

It looked like a skirmish had occurred. She saw the police inside taking photographs of the wrecked furniture and the weapons on the ground; one was counting how many bullet holes there were in the walls. Ruby winced when she saw the blood splattered on the floors and walls, but thankfully there were no bodies—possibly having been removed by the police. Though as a group of investigators came down from the stairs, she could only assume the worst on the second floor.

One of the detectives had walked up to them when he and his partner noticed them standing there. "Please back away from the scene."

"Excuse me. What happened here?" Weiss had stepped forward from the group towards the man.

"Another killing, just like the other ones," he bluntly stated. The detective stopped when his partner grabbed him by the shoulder.

"What are you doing?" He hissed out. "You can't disclose this to the public."

The detective huffed as he swatted his partner's hand away from his shoulder. "What does it matter? We don't get paid enough to deal with more killings and dust store robberies."

Weiss' expression shot up, shocked. "Has another dust store been robbed?"

"Hm? No, just the one near the docks a couple days ago." The one that they had seen, the same one that started this argument between Weiss and Blake. The two detectives were called over by someone else, and they went inside the cafe.

Weiss groaned as she turned to the two. "It's the fifth one in the past two weeks."

"The fifth one?" Yang asked.

"Have you paid no attention to the news? There's been someone going around attacking places that has connections to criminals—not that it makes them any different. It's either some vigilante who doesn't know how to hold back, or a serial killer who does his work under the guise of 'doing good'."

First, Blake went missing, now, a possible serial killer out on the loose. Ruby felt like everything was getting worse by the minute. "Do you think we'll ever come across them?" She didn't mean to ask them, the words had come out on their own.

Yang was the first to respond, hands placed on Ruby's shoulders to shake her a bit. "Nah, don't worry about it, Rubes. They'd have to be pretty confident if they do something in broad daylight. Besides, I doubt they can handle us."

She did have a point. With the amount of training needed to even apply to join Beacon put them in a different league from the normal person without aura. Yang was also pretty strong too. She'd never seen her lose to anyone but Taiyang, and maybe Qrow too if he actually was serious. By all accounts, she should feel secure.

Yet the thought of coming across someone truly dangerous was still in the back of her mind.

Yang rustled her hair a bit before letting her go. "Well, let's keep looking for Blake."

"I'm sure she can take care of herself. If anything, we should be searching for this killer."

Ruby only sighed.

· · ·

When the alarm rang, he wished that he had more time to keep playing. With a great deal of effort, Teddy made a permanent save and quit the game. As he took off his headset, his eyes burned whenever he blinked, and it took a lot more time for it to adjust to how dark his room had become. The evening sun was gone, leaving him to fumble around in the dark for the light switch.

Creaks came from his body after having not moved for three hours straight when he walked into the kitchen. He prepared a microwave dinner—he could eat just about anything right now, his nutrition be damned. When it was done, he left it there to cool down.

Cars sped by from some distant highway and a dog barked loudly across the street. Somewhere two rooms to the side, a couple was arguing loudly, just as they always did every night. They argued about stupid things, dumb things, but it was always about who's fault it was. Despite how unquiet the apartment life was, it was one of the few silent and boring places he'd ever been in; especially after what he's experienced.

Remnant: Grimmdark—an immersive, open-world, single-player RPG VR game developed by a small team. For an indie project, the game had interaction on par, if not better than most triple-A games that have in-depth NPC interactions, ones that live their own lives in a simulation.

As good as that was, the interaction only serves to help make the core gameplay stand out—the combat. Even though it was an RPG, Teddy never really cared about the whole leveling up one's skills, or doing quest-lines for minor characters. Fighting was its own reward. That rush of adrenaline was addictive. Every part of his body begged for him to put on that helmet again.

But of course, that would have to wait until after tomorrow.


— A/N —

Please let me know if there is anything I could do to improve, whether it be grammar or how I write.