004 Raven's Dark Little Secret

“Rose, don’t be so mean,” The leader of the group smiles, walking toward Raven, “She looks like a girl with a brave soul. I myself have not seen a newbie who didn’t get hurt by the wall.”

He called the fog “the wall”. Raven noticed. If she had touched the fog, her hand would be like the man on the ground now--

Cut and bleeding.

The leader of the group held out a hand to Raven for a handshake, his smile friendly and warm, “Call me James. I have been through 3 worlds now -- ohh, that’s what we call the game module.” He gestured around with his chin, “The game, don’t you find it too realistic for a game? Almost like...”

...like it was cut out of the real world.

“Apophis,” Raven shook James’s hand, forming a cute but polite smile like meeting a fan, “You might have heard of me, hopefully? I’m a gamer on Twitch.”

Raven hated exchanging names. After all, in real life, names were linked with one’s criminal record.

James let out a short laugh: “Using a false identity is smart. After all, you don’t know who the players are in real life.”

Raven returned a smile. This man tried to trick Raven for his real name with his self introduction, only to turn and give the tip of “don’t give anyone your real identity” as if he cared for Raven, AFTER Raven saw through his trick.

Smiling face, scheming head.

Raven filed “James” away under “do not trust.” Not someone Raven could trust in a game played with one’s life, nor someone a newbie like Raven should mess with -- if James was telling the truth about going through 3 worlds.

Who was it, that said “Hell is other people”? How true, Jean-Paul Sartre.

This was why Raven hated multiplayer games -- A few selfish, lying brains mixed in, and the difficulty multiplies. A simple money-making game -- until people showed up. Then came the trading, the robbing, the using, the killing.

“Why did you bother helping the newbies?” Raven asked James, tipping her chin at the man on the ground.

James paused a second--

He didn’t warn the man about the fog to help. The game world was filled with dangerous rules like fog that cuts you, and he would rather keep the newbies around to test the rules out for him.

For example, Raven would have touched the fog and gotten herself hurt, but with the man on the ground testing out the consequences, Raven didn’t.

But of course, James wouldn’t tell Raven his real thoughts.

The issue was, Raven’s question made it impossible for James to leave the man on the ground like this to die -- if he did that, the other two newbies him and Rose just recruited would see through their real intention.

The question that James really cared about now was--

Did Raven ask that question to force him to help the man on the ground on purpose, or it was just an unfortunate line at the wrong timing?

“I have seen too many deaths in the game...” James let out a heavy sigh, a genuine sorrow look on his face, “I’m not strong enough to carry, but at least I could offer help when I can. You know? Humanity is the easiest item to lose in the game.”

Like Darren and Emily.

“That’s very noble. I’ll help you,” Raven nodded at James, looking surprised but admiring just the right amount as she reached out a hand to the man on the ground to help him up, “Can’t let such kindness fight on alone.”

James frowned subconsciously, starting to feel like Raven might be more trouble than the sharp tool he wanted Raven to be.

The man on the ground clung to Raven's shoulder like a drowning man clutching a straw. He was already terrified, and with his body covered in knife wounds—shallow, but too many of them -- he'd lost too much blood. By now he was shuddering so hard he could barely stand.

“I-I’m Aaron,” The man held Raven’s hand tightly, mumbling with trembling lips, “Thank you, thank you a lot!”

“No problem,” Raven smiled at Aaron.

If any fan of “Apophis” was here, they would be too shocked to recognize Raven as the horror streamer they had been following.

Raven wasn’t the kindest soul as a gamer. After all, she did choose her own player name.

Apophis was literally the god of chaos. His whole existence was to wreck Order. To bring darkness and destruction to the world. He was the only god in Egypt that had no disciple. He was “nonexistence”, the waste before the existence of the universe.

In short, he didn’t belong. Not to anything.

No fan of hers would link the infamous god to a girl with cute smiles and warm eyes. Just the kind of disguise Raven wanted.

In her games, Raven existed to extinguish. NPCs, players, or anyone and anything. That was why she was the only horror gamer on the top 10 list -- people enjoyed watching her destroying everything in that cold, cruel way.

Her best score was not how many monsters or players she slayed in Resident Evil. She found a bug that time and triggered the nuclear bomb set under Raccoon City. That was a short piece of hidden code that was abandoned when the game was still being designed, and was never meant to be triggered.

Raven was a sociopath. A well hidden one.

That, was the dark little secret she hid from Darren.