Swordsman of the Rift Read online

  Swordsman of the Rift

  Brandon Varnell

  Illustrated by

  Lonwa A

  Kitsune Inc.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Swordsman of the Rift

  Copyright © 2019 Brandon Varnell

  Illustration Copyright © 2019 Lonwa_A

  All rights reserved.

  Brandon Varnell and Kitsune Incorporated supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce creative works that enrich our culture.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use the material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact the publisher. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  To see Brandon Varnell’s other works, or to ask for permission to use his works, visit him at www.varnell-brandon.com, facebook at www.facebook.com/AmericanKitsune, twitter at www.twitter.com/BrandonbVarnell, Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/BrandonVarnell, and instagram at www.instagram.com/brandonbvarnell.

  ISBN: 978-0-9989942-8-4

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  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Afterword

  Hey, did you know?

  Brandon’s LNs

  American Kitsune

  A Most Unlikely Hero

  Arcadia’s Knight

  Journey of a Betrayed Hero

  Executioner

  Follow me!

  Chapter 1

  Blood stained my body. Screams of terror echoed in my ears. A world of fire and death and flying body parts filled my vision. I saw people dying left and right, mowed down by gunfire, soaring through the air as they were hit with explosions. Heat seared my skin and shockwaves rattled my brain and bones.

  “CHRIS!!!”

  A shout erupted from my mouth as my best friend’s lifeless corpse hit the ground beside me, his body half burnt to a crisp, eyelids melted off, revealing glazed-over eye sockets, and a pool of blood spreading out beneath him. Pain ripped through me as I opened my mouth again to scream…

  And then I opened my eyes and found a ceiling above me. I blinked once, twice, and then relaxed as the softness of the bed and the warm, very feminine body resting against me, made me realize where I was. This was not the battlefield. There was no war. There was just me, the woman beside me, and this bed.

  I still felt a little sick.

  Climbing to my feet as I removed the woman’s limbs from around my body, I stumbled around the completely unfamiliar bedroom. Soft carpet stretched out beneath my feet. I glanced at the large dresser to one side, sitting next to a sliding door that probably led to a closet space. When I turned around, I noticed the massive window dominating one side of the room. From the view I could, I could tell this was a penthouse.

  I found a door several yards to my left and walked through it. A relieved sigh escaped my lips when I realized this was a restroom. Tiled floor. Marble countertop. Sink. Toilet. The whole shebang. I noticed there was no shower, but I spotted a door at the other end, so I assumed the shower and the toilet were separated.

  Walking up to the sink, I placed my hand over the sensor bar, which turned on the hot water. I splashed the water on my face, then placed my hands against the counter and took several deep breaths.

  Another dream. Another nightmare.

  I wondered when they would end, but it had been two years since my military service ended, and I was still having nightmares of the things I’d seen.

  Looking up, I stared at my reflection in the mirror. My pale skin was marked by a cross-shaped scar on my left cheek. Pale blue eyes gazed at me from beneath my eyebrows. My eyes were a little sunken in, my face a little hollow, but I was clean shaven at least. A head of messy light-brown hair sat on my head. Someone once told me I looked like Ryan Reynolds with my current haircut. It was such a great compliment I decided to keep my hair like this.

  I also hadn’t lost my physique, which I’d earned from my time in the military. Broad chest and shoulders, powerful abs and legs, the V-shaped cut a lot of bodybuilders tried to attain. If nothing else, I should probably be proud of myself for keeping up my exercise regimen even though I was no longer in the military.

  As I stood there, a loud beeping went off in the bedroom. It took me a second to recognize the ringing of my phone. Walking back into the bedroom, I saw the blonde woman shifted in bed.

  “What is that… noise?” she asked.

  “Just my phone, babe. Don’t mind it. You can go back to sleep,” I said.

  The woman shifted against the covers again, burying her head into the pillow as I grabbed my phone and went through a door that led into an expensively furnished living room. I didn’t pay attention to the furnishings much as I looked at the Caller ID.

  Elric Fuller.

  I frowned, but then shook my head and accepted the call.

  “Elric?” I said.

  “Hey, Bryan. It’s been awhile, hasn’t it?” a familiar voice came from the other end.

  “It has been a long time since we last talked. About a year, if I’m not mistaken.” I paused. “What do you want?”

  “What’s this? Why do you suspect I want something? Can’t a man call his friend every so often to see how he’s doing?”

  “There’s nothing wrong with that, but we both know you never call someone just to ‘see how they’re doing.’ You only ever call when you want something.” I wandered over to the wall and leaned against it. The coolness of the wall felt great against my back. “So spill. What’s so important that you’d call me up? What do you want?”

  “Okay. You got me. I do have something I want.” Elric paused for effect, but I just sighed. “So, I know this guy who has a job lined up for me. A huge gig that pays good money. He’s getting together a team. Says he wants people with combat experience, so I forwarded your name to him. I was thinking you could do this as a distraction. You haven’t been doing well since your service ended, right? He’s interested and wants to know if you’d like the job.”

  I frowned. I wasn’t really looking for a job, and Elric knew that, but he also knew I probably needed something to distract myself. He was right. I hadn’t been doing well since my service ended—no, I’d probably been in this state since before my service ended, if I was being honest.

  I took in the room as I thought. It really was a nice room. Spacious, with an entertainment area embedded a few feet below that could be accessed via a short staircase. The furnishings were all nice, beautifully hand-crafted items made from leather and natural wood. I didn’t want to know how much this furniture and that brand new holographic projector cost.

  “Tell him… I’m interested,” I said at last.

  “You can tell him yourself. We’re meeting tonight. I’ll forward you the address.”

  “Yeah. Sure. That’s fine.”

  Once he had confirmation that I was in, Elric hung up. I received an email seconds later. A glance at my inbox said I had one new message from Elric Fuller. When I opened it, I saw that he’d uploaded a detailed
map of where I was supposed to meet. As if gravity was affecting my mouth, my lips turned into a frown when I noticed the meeting was to take place in an abandoned warehouse. That seemed pretty shady. However, Elric knew I’d never do something that was illegal, so this gig should be on the up and up.

  I glanced back into the bedroom. The woman still lay sleeping on the bed. I didn’t know her name, what she did for a living, or anything about her. We’d met in a bar last night. She complained about her ex-husband, the struggles of her divorce, and I merely listened because I didn’t have anything better to do at the time. Then she asked me to come over.

  I didn’t have a reason to say no.

  After spending another moment looking at her, I wandered into the kitchen and decided to make the woman breakfast. It was the least I could do for showing me a good time last night. She’d want something nice and greasy anyway. Given how much she drank, she was bound to have a hangover.

  There were a lot of abandoned warehouses on the south side of the city. These large buildings, no longer working or running, looked like they might be haunted.

  I found Elric standing outside the warehouse on my map. He was a tall man at about two heads taller than myself, putting him at a good 6’7” or so. His blond hair was immaculately combed to one side. Bright blue eyes, a trimmed beard, and a physique similar to my own gave him the look of a standard pretty boy, the kind who could make their entire living by seducing women. He was wearing black pants, a black shirt, and an overcoat. White breath steamed from his mouth as he broke out in a smile.

  “Bryan, good of you to make it,” he said, clasping my hand in a firm shake.

  It was a cold night. My body was covered in goosebumps as I wore the same thing I’d been wearing at the bar last night. I wasn’t dressed for the cold like Elric was. However, the cold was never something that bothered me.

  “What’s this job your friend has lined up?” I asked.

  “All in good time, my man,” Elric said as he slung an arm around my shoulder and led me toward a door located just beside the warehouse’s main entrance. “For now, let me introduce you to the team we’re working with.”

  We walked through a hall before entering another door, which led into the warehouse itself. This place was mostly empty. Aside from the girders, stairs, and unused power equipment, the only other thing inside were a group of people and several objects that looked like incredibly high-tech and sophisticated recliners.

  As we walked forward, the people turned to study us, and I in turn studied them. There were three others aside from Elric and me. Two women and one man.

  The man was another one of those pretty boys. His dark hair was meticulously combed. He was in good physical shape, though I could tell it was the kind you got from going to the gym.

  The two women looked like they were also in good shape. One of them actually had bigger muscles than the man. She was tall, had dark skin and broad shoulders. She wore an outfit that vaguely resembled army fatigues, which went nicely with her short hair. Meanwhile, the other girl was far more petite, but she had slender shoulders, a thin waist, and skinny arms and legs. Actually, now that I was looking at her, I could tell that she was just skinny and not in good physical shape. Her physique made me think of people who sat behind a desk all day. She had light skin that was almost porcelain, dark hair that seemed black, and even darker eyes. Judging from the shape of her face, I could tell she was Asian or of Asian descent.

  “Bryan, that guy right there is Brad. He’s the one putting all this together. The dark-skinned gal over there is Vyra, and the little Chinese lady is Ju Chen.” He introduced each person in turn, then unslung his arm from around my shoulder and pointed at me. “Everyone, this is Bryan Jenson.”

  “I’ve heard of you,” the dark-skinned woman, Vyra, said. Her eyes narrowed. “You’re the one they called Invincible back when I was in the Marines. Rumor has it you’re the youngest member to ever join the Special Forces, and you’ve completed more missions than any Marine alive today.”

  I grimaced when I heard the words. So this woman was ex-military too? That might make things unpleasant for me, as I’d been doing my best to avoid anything that had to do with the military. Even so, I tried not to let my reticence show on my face.

  “I’m surprised people still talk about me,” I said, shrugging.

  “They might not anymore. I got out of the Marines about a year ago.” Vyra shrugged, then looked me over once more, from my head to my toes. “Somehow, I expected you to be… I don’t know, a bit more dangerous-looking, I guess.”

  “Sorry to disappoint.” I shrugged. It didn’t matter to me what preconceived notions about myself I shattered. “So, can I know what we’re going now?” I turned to the one called Brad, even as I hooked a thumb at Elric. “This guy wouldn’t tell me a single thing.”

  “Don’t look at me.” Elric held his hands up in a helpless gesture. “I don’t know anymore than I already told you.”

  Brad nodded and smiled. “Now that we’re all here, I’ll be more than happy to let you know what we’re doing.”

  He walked over to the recliners, which I now realized had what appeared to be an advanced vitals monitoring system attached to each one. A holographic monitoring function hovered over them. It was currently blank. What caught my attention even more were the objects sitting on each recliner. It looked like a black full-bodysuit and a sleek helmet.

  “I’m sure all of you have heard about VR technology these days,” Brad began as he patted one of the recliners. “It’s pretty much everywhere these days. Shops, bars, brothels, hospitals… you can pretty much find it being used all over the place. How many of you have heard the term VRMMO?”

  Pretty much everyone raised their hands. Even I raised my hand.

  “I think all of us know what a VRMMO is,” Elric laughed.

  “You never know,” Brad said with a chuckle. “Some people have never heard the term before. I figured I’d make sure we were all on the same page before I go further.” He paused to scratch his chin. “Well, anyway, what we’re about to do is something very similar to a VRMMO. All of us are going to put on these suits, use a backlink to log into a place called the Rift Plains, and travel through a portal that will take us to a world currently being controlled by enemy forces.”

  “Hold on,” Vyra said, suddenly scowling. “You mean to tell me we’re… playing a video game? That’s the big gig?”

  I shared her sentiment, but I didn’t say anything.

  Brad looked at the woman with a smile, shook his head, and explained further. “What we’re doing is only similar to a game, but at the same time, it’s very different. The place we’re traveling to is very much real. In fact, it’s so real that if you die while playing this ‘game,’ you will die in our world. You people need to understand this fact going in. It could save your life.”

  I could see the skepticism written on everyone’s face, and I was sure my own face looked just like theirs. Brad also seemed to realize this because he shrugged. It was like he was saying we’d find out sooner or later.

  “We’re using some pretty high-tech gear here,” he continued. “This gear I got is all stuff that can’t be found without connections. It will allow you to create an avatar that you can use for this mission. Your avatar is automatically at level 50, so you’ll be able to gain some damn powerful abilities, which you’re going to need thanks to where we’re going. Anything less than someone at level 50 at least would be nothing but a liability. To be honest, I’m even a little worried that level 50 won’t be enough, but there was nothing on the market that could give us a higher level avatar. Now, does anyone have any questions?”

  “I’ve got one,” Vyra said suddenly. “You mentioned this was a paying job, but you haven’t said how much you’re paying. So, how much?”

  “Each of you will earn no less than 50,000, but you might make more if you do a great job. I’ll be handing out bonuses to people based on their performance.”

  V
yra didn’t say anything else as she stepped back. I could tell from the look on her face that she was satisfied. I was honestly shocked myself. We’d make 50,000 just to play a video game with this guy? No one I knew would throw that kind of money around for something so banal.

  Brad must have been loaded.

  “Anyone else have a question?” asked Brad. No one said anything. “Does anyone want out? If you do, now is the only chance you’ll get.” Again, no one said anything and no one left. Brad nodded. “In that case, let’s suit up. You can put these over your clothes, but I personally recommend wearing nothing when you change.”

  Ju Chen and Vyra grabbed their suits and wandered off for some privacy. I didn’t bother. Stripping down to my underwear, I grabbed the suit and stepped into it, pulling it over my body.

  This suit appeared to be made from some kind of rubber-like fabric, but I could tell from the sensation that it wasn’t rubber. It was incredibly stretchy and durable like it. However, the texture made it feel like synthetic clothes, such as polyester. After zipping the suit up, I put on gloves, boots, and grabbed the helmet, though I didn’t put it on yet.

  “You ready for this?” asked Elric.

  I glanced at the man who was also suited up, then shrugged. “I guess.”

  I’d never played a VRMMO, which stood for Virtual Reality Massive Multiplayer Online. It was basically a video game you played online with hundreds of thousands or even millions of people using virtual reality technology. While I had used VR technology before to try and escape from my past, video games were not something I was into. However, that wasn’t to say I’d never heard of or played them before. In my youth, I’d been damn good at Call of Duty: Space Warfare.