Breaker of Iniquity

Chapter 5: Epitaph

Everything sucked.

Class sucked. The people sucked. School sucked. Breaker Online sucked. Edward sat fuming quietly at his desk in class. After the initial six deaths in BO the night that dickhead Raisin Oats put a damn bounty on his head, Edward caved and made another character just to play around on for a little while. When he left the starting area, he couldn't believe his eyes. Everyone on the server was looking for Planet Breaker.

Who wouldn't? A thousand gold could buy a new character all the gear they needed until they were raid ready. People who were okay with risking a ban could sell it for a solid ten bucks. Everyone seemed hell bent on finding him. Not for the gold, though. But because it would be funny.

Just what I need, Edward buried his face in his arms at his desk. Two worlds stomping me into the ground with their assholes. Something soft hit his puffy hair. Then something poked it. He looked up, nothing. The teacher droned on through a presentation on the giant touch screen. Edward buried his face again. Then there was another poke. He glanced and grabbed at it this time.

"Don't touch me!" Stephanie said to him.

Oh, it's her, great. He glared at her.

"Mr. Matterhorn, I don't like the way Edward's undressing me with his eyes."

The teacher stopped and sighed. "Edward, eyes forward."

"You wish," he said, ignoring the teacher and putting his face back in his arms. Something poked his other side now. Something sharp. He shot up and whirled to see who it was. The class snickered at him.

"He's such a fucking spaz," said a boy.

"Alright that's it," the teacher said. "Edward, office."

"What did I do?"

"You're being disruptive." The teacher scowled.

Edward couldn't believe the backstabbing son of a bitch. "But—"

"Keep it up and its detention. You. Office. Now."

Edward did as he was ordered and sat in the office, unattended and unnoticed until the period bell rang. He marched on to the class after Matterhorn's. The rest of the day, of course, sucked.

Three days had gone by and still there was the ever persistent drive for people to plant their balls on Planet Breaker's face. Breaker Online's combat system left little to the imagination. A player's character would die if their health bar reached zero, sure. But death also came with dismemberment, decapitation, crushed limbs, and more..

Small groups of people had taken to either disarming him or disabling his ability to move before killing, and of course, teabagging him. He managed to suicide his way out of one encounter, but that said nothing for the rest. Ed had lost count in the mid-seventies. He had changed his character's name to Jupiter Rising by the twentieth incident and dyed his armor set different colors in the mid thirties. But they still found and killed him over and over again.

Ascension's pockets ran deep. There was no shout to end the hunt, no message from anyone anywhere saying, "Stop." There were plenty who filled the general chat with, "That's messed up," and "That's not fair." But the grey area loving bastards usually followed up with, "He shouldn't have picked a fight."

Yeah, this is my fault. You stay classy, server, he thought.

Blacklisting them only prevented them from speaking to him. They could still harass him through their primary pursuit. He managed to escape on his alternate for a while but found himself logging out after a few minutes each time. He couldn't even remember his character's name.