Game Alive: A Science Fiction Adventure Novel by Trip Ellington Read Free Book Online

shoulder and a large, green -190 shimmered momentarily over the creature’s head. Jake pumped his left fist triumphantly and shouted, “Critical hit!”
    “Nice,” Des yelled back over the sharp humming of his sling releasing another rocky missile.
    “Yeah, why don’t you let us have a couple more?” Kari complained breathlessly, slinging a small ball of fire from her ruby-tipped staff. The fireball struck and enveloped one of the largest dread wolves, which had been just about to fling itself claws-first onto Jake’s back. He felt the heat through his heavy armor, and stepped hastily away from the howling wolf as it rolled in the dirt, fighting to extinguish the flames spreading through its filthy pelt.
    “Sorry,” said Kari, wincing. “Is there friendly fire?”
    “No, shoot away,” Jake told her. He could hurt himself if he wandered into the flames now, but Kari’s magical attacks would do no direct harm. He flashed her a thumbs up before turning back to the remaining wolves. Even as he raised his sword to chop at his next opponent, blue lightning bolts began hammering the earth all around him. The surging shafts of crackling, blue fire stabbed down again and again in rapid, thundering succession. The wolves shrieked in terror, their feral yellow eyes going wide with mindless fear. Electric bolts seemed to seek them out especially, tendrils of raw power wrapping around the dread wolves’bodies and constricting. A steady stream of green numbers superimposed themselves one over the next, flashing over the monsters’heads.
    “Oh, that’s a good one!” shouted Kari, laughing proudly. “Storm surge, ultra cool!”
    Jake joined her in the laughter as he blocked the renewed attacks of the three dread wolves still on their feet. They leapt at him as one, biting and clawing. Red numbers flashed above Jake’s head, and he spared a quick glance to the horizon. High above the furthest visible rim of the earth, three long green bars hung horizontally in the sky. They represented the life points Jake and his friends had remaining. His was still over three-quarters full, but dropping; Des’s and Kari’s were virtually untouched, he noticed with a spike of irritation.
    Behind him, he heard Des’s sling again. The wolf circling the thief and the sorcerer-princess let out a long, agonized how and dropped with a heavy thud. It did not get up this time, but lay in the earth and eventually began to fade out of existence as though it had never been there.
    “Got him,” crowed Des, really enjoying himself now. He looked around, searching for another target even as he packed another fist-sized stone into his sling’s cup. “Next!”
    A brilliant beam of purplish light shot past Jake’s ear, making him jerk involuntarily away from it even though he knew it couldn’t hurt him. The ray of power struck the wolf to Jake’s left, blasting it up and backwards. The smoking corpse fell fifteen feet away, shuddered once, and lay still where it had fallen in the tall grass. After a moment, it faded as the others had done.
    The final dread wolf was also the largest. Blood ran down its haunches from a dozen small cuts from Jake’s sword, but it showed no signs of defeat. It opened its massive jaws wide and roared its howling fury before lowering its huge head and charging straight for Jake.
    He chopped for the wolf’s neck, but the creature dodged his strike and bolted to one side as it tried to get around him. The wolf snapped and bit wickedly at Jake’s arms, but the knight turned away snap after snap with his sturdy buckler. Turning in place, he tried to keep his front to the beast so he could see its ferocious attacks coming. Spittle flung from the monster’s jowls as it snarled and hissed at him. Its eyes burned with a demonic hatred and hunger so real that Jake very nearly forgot this was all just VR.
    With a roar of his own, a ringing wordless battle cry, Jake plunged forward and struck the dread wolf repeatedly with