I stepped out of the convenience store holding my breath. The automatic doors had stopped working, forcing me to push them open slowly so the hinges wouldn't squeak. In this city, even the smallest sound could mean a long night.
The shelves were still fully stocked, the lights buzzing without end, but there was no cashier. There never was. This city was like a stage set abandoned right after the final rehearsal.
I looked down, making sure the card was still pressed against my side, hidden beneath a layer of duct tape that had started to itch. Its thin presence was a bitter reminder: I was no longer an ordinary person. I was a target.
I moved quickly toward the underground drainage channel. We'd pried open the iron cover long ago. The damp, metallic smell greeted me like the front door of my own home.
Our basecamp.
Four people. Four cards. We were four players who had chosen to survive as long as possible, rather than risk our lives hunting for cards like the Hunters did.
Neo and Rey were already there, sitting on old wooden crates with a chessboard between them. I had no idea where Neo had gotten it—maybe from a toy store, or a house whose owner would never return.
There was no signal down here. Phones were nothing but dead objects repurposed as flashlights, digital clocks, or a final entertainment if you were lucky enough to have a built-in game.
"Where's Gaia? Not back yet?" I asked, setting down the shopping bag—which was more accurately a stolen bag. Not that it mattered; the city was empty. The soda cans clinked softly as I arranged them.
Neo didn't look up. "She's back. Said her stomach hurt. She won't be long."
Rey nodded in agreement, brow furrowed at the chessboard. I sat down and opened a soda can. The hiss it made sounded far too loud in a space this small.
"Full moon tonight," I muttered.
Those words instantly made the air feel suffocating.
Neo moved his piece calmly. "As long as the Hunters aren't moving in groups, we're safe. Besides, what Hunter would ever cooperate with another? They'd rather beat each other up over cards." He chuckled.
Rey smiled faintly without looking up, one hand resting against his chin. "And if we ever have to flee this tunnel, we're the ones who know its routes best."
"Not to mention, they'd be stupid to approach a team with the threat potential of four cards," Neo added.
"There's always an anomaly among the players, man," I replied, giving voice to the pessimism creeping through my chest.
Water dripped from the concrete ceiling. The smell of damp earth mixed with rust stung my senses. I hugged my knees, staring blankly at the chessboard. One full moon had passed since we woke up in a city that appeared on no map. Tonight would be the second.
A city with its lights on and no inhabitants. A city too clean to be called dead. Sometimes I wished this were just a nightmare, but nightmares don't usually come with a calendar.
Tonight, the sky would be perfectly round again. The moment when all cards would glow as bright as stars. Every player would sense each other's presence, as though some magnetic force were pulling them to slaughter one another.
Before long, there were footsteps. Gaia emerged from the darkness of the tunnel without any light source.
We had agreed without words not to show each other our card abilities. But Gaia's casual indifference to the darkness suggested she didn't care if we guessed her power.
I looked at her face, with its faint smile. Her jet-black hair fell beautifully down to her back. She was dressed entirely in black, perhaps to blend perfectly into the darkness. She was as beautiful as always. Ugh, what was I thinking?
I turned my gaze back to the chessboard. A woman as beautiful as her deserved only my admiration, not my desire. If anyone in this three-man team deserved to be her partner, it certainly wasn't me.
Gaia sat down near us and grabbed a snack, watching the intense battle on the board. Neo and Rey didn't even glance at her. Neo was beginning to frown while Rey kept stealing looks at his face. I wasn't sure what that meant. I wasn't paying much attention to the game anyway—my mind was drifting through worst-case scenarios for the night.
Entertainment was scarce here. Every day felt like terror. I had once seen a player's corpse while searching for supplies, and the sight had made my legs give out on the spot. Since then, I'd been paranoid. Afraid that a Hunter might suddenly appear and take my card and my life.
Neo finally won after nearly two hours. Good grief—a single move could take more than ten minutes. But since there was nothing pressing, we had no reason to hurry.
I didn't know how much longer we could last. It would be wonderful to live in peace until death came for us from old age rather than from a blade. I'd had the thought that maybe I would wake up if I died. Unfortunately, I wasn't brave enough to find out. Even in a nightmare, I always fought with everything I had to stay alive.
And the real nightmare had only just begun.
*Gup!*
The sensation hit all at once. We all felt it—the presence of the cards. The full moon had officially arrived, even if we couldn't see it from underground.
Neo shot away in an instant, putting distance between himself and Gaia while pulling me and Rey along with him. Without wasting a moment, he spread a Barrier in front of Gaia. At the same time, Rey entered Full Armor mode, standing upright before us with a great sword drawn.
It was the first time I had seen them use their card abilities.
I could sense that Rey carried two cards—one more than me and Neo. But the most terrifying of all was Gaia. Five cards were housed within her.
She had been the last to join, and we had accepted her because I said she wasn't dangerous. At least, at the time, my ability had detected no threat from her. And honestly, even now, I still didn't sense any killing intent.
Yet Neo and Rey weren't willing to take chances. They had shifted straight into defensive mode.
Gaia giggled in amusement, looking at us. "What's wrong? Scared?" She flashed a smile that might have been cute but felt deeply out of place in this moment.
"Five cards, and you chose to join our little team of your own accord... you really are someone to watch out for," Rey said with an aggression that was a far cry from his usual easy-going nature.
Neo's Barrier wrapped around Rey, who was already encased in armor. Neo, who was usually so talkative, had gone silent, his eyes sharp and watchful on Gaia's every move. And me—with no combat ability to speak of—I could only shelter behind their backs.
Even though my instincts weren't sounding any alarm, my logic and my instincts were now locked in fierce battle. Five cards were five cards. How could someone who held that many possibly be someone truly good? Could it really be that so many people had willingly handed over their cards to the same person?
I swallowed. The air froze with thick tension, while Gaia looked on with perfect calm, not a flicker of emotion crossing her face.