He sat down next to the blue lake in the shade of a palm tree and began to reason to himself what torments he had found himself by doing such an act. When Ronnie pulled the trigger, the consequences seemed too vague, rather he imagined himself a hero, and now he is forbidden to enter settlements, transport, and the cherry on the top, half of the server will chase after him. And the only weapon that could give him a decisive advantage was the Barrett, which lied in his backpack, cut into two halves by the wild-boss. But worst of all, he needs to get to the twenty-fifth level before he dies, otherwise he will lose all progress he got in the last two months. With a Mosin rifle in his hands, it was beyond human strength. The only hope was to murder another such poor fellow, but based on the information on the map there were no such people within a radius of five hundred kilometers. I've come too far, he thought, too far.

Nika sat down next to him, put her hand on his shoulder and said:

"Thank you, really. I'll write on the forum about your action, maybe you'll be excused."

Ronnie looked at her with a disappointed look, full of regret, stood up and stared at the undulating sand hills. Nika stared at his back for a couple of minutes, took the Colt Anaconda out of the holster, hesitated a little, grabbed the handle of the revolver with her right hand, held it from below with her left, and pointed the barrel at Ronnie's back, when she cocked the trigger, she saw him twitch, he rested the rifle’s butt on his right shoulder, aimed - kept his eyes open - and fired into a small sand dune in front of him. A dead swordsman flew out of the sand, holding a scimitar burning with blue flames in his hands, a 7.62 caliber bullet pierced his neck, the skin shone through in some places, and long dreadlocks snaked out of his head. The thin fabric of a white shirt with long sleeves fit snugly to the body, trousers on the legs, dotted with holes and cuts. The aggressive monster did a front flip and almost cut off Ronnie's head, but he managed to bend his body back and dodged at the last second. Nika grinded her teeth and adjusted the aim of her .45 colt, and hit the monster in the eye, he flew a couple of meters back and did not move anymore.

"Twenty percent!" She screamed and dropped the gun and grabbed her ears and swore and saw Ronnie say something, but heard nothing but an incessant squeak. Her level has risen to the seventh.

While Nika was trying to get back to normal, Ronnie received an alert. He opened it in the HUD and read: according to meteorological data, a weather anomaly will occur in this place in a few minutes.

"The most important thing is the timely notice, right AI?"

"It is as you say."

Ronnie looked up and saw dark clouds gathering. They were sailing at an insane speed, about 60 m/s from the west, from the boundless waters. Several lightning bolts burst out of a low cumulus cloud and hit the ground. The sand flew up like a turban. A strong storm was beginning. Nika saw several small blades of unknown origin cut into the surface of the lake with a hiss. The spray rose up in a small geyser. Ronnie immediately dropped his backpack, pulled out the tent, put up a protective field and said:

"A glass-rain is coming, hurry up and get in!"

The light of the sun disappeared. Darkness overshadowed the entire space. A red-hot cyclone seized the desert with its predatory claws. Nika took things in her arms and ran into the tent, Ronnie was looking at the two PPSh-41s on the ground and could not resist and rushed after them. The horizon disappeared behind an impenetrable impending mass consisting of red sand and gray dust. One cloud transformed into an airy white tornado. Ronnie took the first and second weapon under his arm and ran to the tent and felt one shard cut his arm and the second one cut his back, but he managed to hide behind the protective field.

"You're a complete nut," she said, "but I like it."

Ronnie looked at her, and said:

"Weapons will be useful to us."

The tent vibrated and shook because of strong gusts of wind it constantly seemed as if someone was running past. Lightning flashed here and there, and a second later there was a deafening roar. Sand, glass fragments, drops of molten mercury, and it is unclear what else was beating against the protective field.

"Will it hold?" Nika asked and slightly raised her pupils up and synchronously nodded her head in the same direction.

"I hope so."

"You're not verbose."

Ronnie disassembled both PPSh, checked the magazines for ammo, cleaned the barrels from sand and put them back together.

"AI."

"At your service."

"Check the serial number of its history, who it belongs to, and so on."

"Following orders... information found. It was bought two days ago in the virtual arsenal of the avant-garde. Belongs to the Onstof player."

"Nothing suspicious?"

"No."

Ronnie looked askance at Nika and crawled up to the mosquito net, opened it and then half unzipped the outer tent. The storm intensified. Outside, the shadows of the bushes trembled, and a single tree bent to the ground as if in a prayer pose. All-consuming darkness engulfed everything. An infinite number of portals seemed to open in the huge black clouds. They shone with fleeting bright light, yellow and pink colors. In these otherworldly lights, the outlines of a ridge of clouds were exposed, endless and majestic, as if they were soaring mountains. In addition, the glass precipitation struck every centimeter of the earth with a countless volley of arrows.

Nika huddled in a corner of the tent, wrapped herself in a sleeping bag and shivered. Ronnie watched the storm without stepping up. The strength of the protective field has decreased to 95%. There he saw the black silhouettes of sand soldiers rising from the sand opposite to the tent, as if rising from the dead. In this oppressive, darkened hell, their eyes flashed blood-red. The army was growing in size, all the soldiers were on alert, and in their hands spears, swords and bows were burning with blue flames. Ronnie could feel how they wanted to kill, how they wanted to get his accumulated experience, but he could not explain even to himself how this feeling came to be. Maybe because they were somewhat similar?

A hundred yards away, the bulky bodies of two titans flashed by in the flash of a blinding lightning, with stone lifeless eyes without pupils, a white beard, a naked torso and a single loincloth. From above, a humanoid skeleton in red and yellow imperial outfits with a velvet long collar on a flying carpet flew past the tent. Ronnie jumped up in fright and closed the zipper back.

"What did you see?" Nika asked.

"What you'd expect."

"I don't understand," she whispered in a nervous voice.

Nika lowered her head, buried in her half-bent knees and shuddered after each thunderclap. Her hands and left eyebrow were shaking with such force that she could not stop trembling, but she did not show her weakness. Ronnie, in turn, did not care about that. He did not know what to do with himself and decided to disassemble Mosin's rifle. It is unlikely that it will be useful in the near future.