Day 2
Ren awoke back at the scramble. A day had passed by already, but he was unaware. "Is she gone?" he asked himself as he looked around.
"Excuse me?" A voice boomed behind him, with an angry Mint towering over him.
"I meant, uh, the cashier," Ren tried to cover up.
"Oh I'm so certain you did," She said clenching her fist.
"I'm serious! Why would I complain about being trapped with a beautiful young women," Ren said trying to save his ass.
"Mmmhmm," Mint replied, cracking her knuckles. Thankfully for Ren, the two received a text message. Immediately, Ren pulled out his phone and read the message out loud.
"Roses are red, with leaves green as grass. Can you make it to the underpass? You have fifteen minutes, the weak will be uprooted."
The timers appeared and they both winced in pain.
"Ready?" Ren asked.
"This is going to be easy," Mint commented starring at the text.
"Something tells me that it won't be that easy," Ren said.
"Why? Yesterdays mission was pretty easy. Just took us awhile, which was totally your fault, not mine," She said.
"Uh huh, let's just go," Ren said, beginning to grow immune to her taunts.
"Ew, somebody is in a pissy mood," Mint said.
"Alright we need to move fast though. We only have fifteen minutes, and there maybe something waiting. I wanna be prepared," Ren said.
"Stop being so paranoid and let's go," She said.
Ren and Mint then began to make their way. The underpass was not very far from the Scramble Crossing and there were no obstacles that seemed to get in their way while running. Finally, after maybe a total of four minutes of running, they made it to the road that led to the underpass.
Thinking they were in the clear, Mint ran ahead of Ren. She got about 20 feet short of the underpass entrance when a rose soared through the sky and hit in front of them. The force behind the throw was so powerful that the rose pierced through the ground of the street, sticking the flower in it.
"You know that was unnecessary," Ren said as he looked around
"Bwhahahahahahahahahahahahaha!" A girlish voice exclaimed with an echoey background in the same manner of a certain brown haired female from a well known anime show about a club of handsome boys.
"She stole that laugh," Ren stated.
"Why is that the first thing that comes to your mind when we just got a fucking rose that could pierce through stone just got thrown at us!?" Mint asked, slightly annoyed.
The women jumped down and laughs again. She was wearing a fully black outfit with various flowers on the right side of her belt. The most notable aspect of her appearance, however, was the two black wings jutting from her back.
"Woah, where can I get wings like that?" Ren asked, staring at them.
"Oh you want a pair of these, huh? Well it's easy! Just kill her there and you can have a pair yourself," she answered.
"Uh, how about no," Ren replied.
"Aw, such a shame," she said. "You could've had a life like that you know? Instead of having to beat this game."
"Game?" Mint asked "I thought we were in hell?"
"Well, essentially it is a sort of hell. You mean to tell me you guys haven't figured it out? Oh, how fun new players can be!" the dark winged female laughed.
"What are you talking about? You know you're more annoying than her," Ren said.
"I know you're not talking about me!" Mint yelled at him, crossing her arms.
"Arguing will get us nowhere and we have an annoying bitch with wings, who might I add asked me to kill you. I say we kick her ass and keep moving," Ren said.
"Fine, you know. If you ever kill me, I'll kill you," She said.
"Yes, yes your ghost will haunt me forever," He said.
The girl smirked and shrugged, "First, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Rose.And I'm sorry to say, kiddies, but I'm not here to pick a fight. I'm just here to make you fail."
"Oh well, bye then," Ren said as he grabbed Mints arm and ran past the women. As they ran, Rose grabbed another rose and threw it. The flower pierced the ground in front of them again, but this time, it melted and turned into a red mark just like the ones ffrom the other day.
"I'm not here to pick a fight, but they are! Bwuahahaha!" she laughed.
"Bitch," Ren exclaimed a he let go of Mint and ran at the creature.
Thought it was obviously the same kind of animal as the monsters from the previous day, the monster that came from the marking looked not a thing like the frogs. The beast strongly resembled that of a giant bumble bee colored black with silver strips. Another notable difference was that it's wings were made out of green and thorny vines, but stayed in a shape similar to the tribal marking it had emerged from.
Ren was the first to attack. He charged an ice attack before running towards the bee-like enemy. Once he was close enough, he sent it as a wave of ice, hitting the bee. The successful attack resulted in the outter layer of it's wings being frozen and making the bee have to land, unable to fly.
Mint then pulled out her mp3 player and plugged the ear plugs into her ears. She searched through her playlist for awhile until finding a good song and began to play a classical number. From her ear plugs, a string of musical notes come out and wrapped themselves around the monster, making it unable to attack with the stinger.
Ren then jumped up and punched the beast in it's chest, freezing a small portion of it.
The bee tried to get out of it's trap, but to no avail. Ren sent three ice spikes at the creature, which stabbed into it, slicing a portion of it's wing off.
Finally the bee shacked it's wings free of the ice so it could an attack in. The thorns of the viney wings disconnected and went filing towards Ren. He held his arm up and encased it with ice, creating a flat shield just in time to protect himself.
Finally, the classical song ended and the binds were taken away. The bug was now completely free. Mint shuffled through her mp3 player quickly until she found a percussion song. Blasting it in her ears, multiple drums sticks poured from the sky and started to beat down on the bee.
While Ren and Mint continued fighting, two figures rushed onto the scene. The first and taller of the two was a boy around their age. He had short, white hair, wore a pair of sunglasses, and a purple outfit. Beside him was a shorter female with long and light brown hair. She was wearing a short, yellow sundress. Upon noticing the fighting occurring, the two looked at each other and nodded. After that, they both ran their own ways, the male pulling out a white gun and going towards Rose, while the yellow attired female ran towards the underpass.
"Damnit!" Shouted Rose as she looked at the two. "I thought Taichi was supposed to take care of you guys!"
The boy merely smirked and pointed his gun at her, watching over his shoulder to make sure his partner had made it into the underpass.
Ren jumped up and axe kicked the bee right in it's chest that he had previously frozen. Not only did the kick crack said ice, but it also sent streams of ice throughout it's body. With one final kick, the monster shattered then vanished.
"Take that flower bitch!" Ren said smiling.
Mint smiled at the victory and then glanced over and blinked confused when she saw the woman and the white haired boy. Suddenly, the timers on all there hands disappeared.
Rose glared at them and shouted in frustration. "Damn you all!" she exclaimed.
"Hey, you were the one who tried to stop us," Ren said.
"Don't you get it yet? 'Roses are red?' I was your obstacle, it was my job. But, then again I wouldn't expect you idiots to understand." She then jumped up and flew off.
The girl in the yellow dress came walking in with a happy face. "Mission accomplished," she said cheerfully and gave the male the victory sign.
"And you guys are?" Ren asked.
"Oh, I'm so sorry," The yellow dressed girl said, "My name is Naomi and this is Matsu."
"Ren and Mint," Ren said. "It's a pleasure to meet you."
The girl smiled and giggled, "It's nice to meet you too! We weren't sure if any other players were around."
"Players?"
"Uh huh," She said.
"I see," Ren said. "So, what is all this?"
"You don't know?" Matsu asked, staring at him like he was some sort of idiot.
"No, no one gave us any instruction," Ren said.
"I see," He replied, clearing his throat, and looking at Ren, "Well let me be the first to welcome you to the UG, also known as the Underground."
"Underground?" Ren asked. "What do you mean? Like a tunnel?"
Naomi laughed a bit and Matsu shooked his head, "Allow me to explain, if we have enough time. The world we are in right now and the world we all died from are the same and different. To the world you died from, also known as the real ground or RG, cannot see the UG. However, the UG can see the RG, obviously. In a way we are kind of like wandering spirits."
"What's with these ice powers? And her music?"
"Every person has psych abilities. You both have a player pin on you now, you just never checked. It allows you to use your psych in battle, which would be her music and your ice. Also it can allow you to scan peoples thoughts to help with the days missions. Psych is usually based off something you have on you that you like," Matsu explained.
"I get it I guess. But who gives us the missions? And what do we get at the end of this game?"
"I explain this part," piped up Naomi. "You see we are dead, but not fully dead. There is still a possibility that we can return to our old lives. The UG is also a game known as Reaper's Game. We are given a week to survive and follow out the missions given to us by what is called the Game Master. The Game Master, or GM, has many minions and workers, like the one we just saw. But, however, in order to be allowed to play we have to give up something that we cherish."
"I wonder, what I gave up. I remember being hit by a car, that's about the last thing," Ren said.
"That's pretty standard as your death is one of your prevalent memories. But anyways, keep in mind that, if you fail, you will not only die, but you will lose your entrance fee."
"Something that important to me? I don't think I want to lose it," Ren said.
"That's why you have to fight, as long as one player finishes the mission we survive the day. But, be cautious that women we just fought is a reaper named Rose, there are many like her who will send out enemies called noise to do anything it takes to make us fail. They are the workers Naomi mentioned."
"Assholes," Ren replied.
"But if you think about it, they are only doing there job. Perhaps they don't..." Matsu went on, but he voice faded and everything became black again.
END OF CHAPTER