Chapter 10: Natural User.

*Ba-ba-bang*

'Does he thinks that by just running in circles he will recover his weapon? In his dreams!' Crimson Crisis is a lot confident. I am just fleeing and he is pursuing me tightly without letting me approach the carbine.

*Swish*

*Creeack!*

'That sound again? What's that?' Each time I take cover Crimson Crisis could hear a strange noise and suddenly I would run towards another tree. Since he has to keep watch over his distance and look towards the Carbine too he can’t check what I am doing, the moment he does I can easily go and recover my weapon.

'He has a plasma saber... Could it be... Is he just playing with my curiosity?' Crimson Crisis tries to guess but can’t find a logical explanation.

*Thud.*

*THUD.*

Crimson Crisis hears two loud noises coming from the direction where I am currently hiding. "Stop wasting time and... F..." He couldn't finish the sentence when suddenly the tree I kicked an instant ago falls towards him.

*Crash...*

He rolls and retreats several steps trying to avoid the falling tree and its branches. 'Don't even think I can be distracted so easily!' He is confident on his abilities and immediately stands up looking for me while checking in the direction where the Carbine is dropped.

*Boom, thud, THUD, crash.*

"So, that was what you were doing!" Crimson Crisis watches as several trees crash against other trees causing a domino effect. While dodging his relentless pursuit I weakened several trees with deep cuts, it is now just matter of a heavy push in order make a tree to collapse.

*Ba-ba-bang.*

Even with the treepocalypse in the densely packed forest Crimson Crisis still is pursuing me while dodging the falling trees without giving me an opening to recover my weapon.

However, moments later in the midst of the pursuit Crimson Crisis steps in a thick branch which snaps under his weight, causing him to stumble.

'This is my only chance.' I see him stumble and kick another tree. After that I quickly change my direction and charge towards my Light Plasma Carbine at top speed.

Crimson Crisis after recovering from the stumble sees another tree falling towards him. He has to roll twice to his left in order to evade a direct hit from the trunk, then he quickly stands up. As his body rise behind the tree that almost crushes moments ago, he meets my line of sight.

*Pew, pew.*

Two plasma shots fly towards Crimson Crisis impacting in his shoulder and he immediately ducks behind the same fallen tree trunk to avoid the rest of the incoming shots. Seeing that I successfully recovered my weapon, he began to be less savage and a lot more cautious. He starts to fire at me only from safe spots and I decide to do the same.

♫ ♪ ♫

"Does he think that every game can be won by using landscape tactics?" Alfred comments while seeing the screen in which Crimson Crisis and I are battling, "Unfortunately for him Crimson Crisis is quite skilled."

'Landscape tactics?' Mr. Smith watches attentively with a strange smile on his face, 'Indeed, he used the landscape, but why do I have the feeling that it wasn't to trap the opponent nor to recover the weapon? There must be something else...’ Mr. Smith eyes narrow, ‘It’s like… Is he at such level that he can study his opponent movements?' Mr. Smith's eyes are shinning while focusing all of his attention in the screens.

♫ ♪ ♫

"Taking down almost fifty trees to recover you weapon? What was that for?" Ana whispers me with a soft voice.

"Recovering my weapon was just a sub product, I was studying his movements and the bad news became worse." I quickly answer Ana while taking cover behind a thick tree.

"Worse news? What do you mean?" Ana says a bit worried noticing that I am being serious.

*Pew-pew.*

*Ba-ba-bang!*

After recovering my Light Plasma Carbine I have landed a pair of burst dealing 18% of damage to Crimson Crisis's energy shields. On the other side, I have received more than 200% of damage to my shields, right now my remaining shields are only 247%. If we follow to exchange fire at this rate it’s clear who would emerge victorious.

"He has a very deep understanding of all the system-made movements, if it not were for the Battle Boots Boosters and me slightly changing my movement patterns in the middle of the pursuit, I'd be dead before having the chance of kicking the first tree." I explain Ana what I was doing with a calm tone.

After seeing that Crimson Crisis is a Specter Hybrid I knew that he is the perfect counter for me, but from watching him dodging and pursuing me also I learnt that he is a very experienced and talented player. The fact that I was found so quickly in the beginning of the match, and that during the pursuit the only real chance to recover my weapon was when he stumbled because otherwise I was cornered all the time, confirms to me that Crimson Crisis is not an ordinary player.

I came up with the improvised plan of running in circles feigning to be trying to recover the Light Plasma Carbine while weakening several trees to provoke later a chain reaction. It would be silly if the player that had me pinned down would fall for such a simple trap because with the speed of the characters inside Shooting Range evading a falling tree was very easy, but by being chased and seeing him evading the trees with such easiness without losing me from the focus, I got to the conclusion that he has a deep understanding of the system-made movements.

In other words, he has thousands of hours of playing against difficult AI’s and is applying that knowledge to have a huge advantage against regular players.

To his misfortune, I’m not a good player, but I’m not a regular player either.

"However..." I am continuing with my explanation to Ana but I have to pause because I am under heavy fire while running to another position.

"However? What? I know you can talk while firing!" Ana pouts and replies angrily at me sensing that I am just being mysterious.

"Listen up Ana, there's little time, I'm going to shut down completely the system guide and go full dive mode." I try to explain quickly my plan to Ana.

"What? But that's hard and you haven't done it in..." Ana’s voice sounds shocked when she heards what I am planning to do.

"There's no other way," I interrupt Ana, "I will be full focused and I need you to deploy the weapons and distribute the energy shields accordingly, if you hesitate I lose, do you understand?"

"Understood!" Ana decides to just follow my command. She has a deep trust in my reasoning, if I think that using the full dive mode is the only solution, she would trust me and do as I say.

Full dive mode consist in the ultimate player experience: controlling fully your avatar without the system help. Usually if you want to do a back flip or a side roll, even if you don't know how to do it in the real life, you can just think the movement and the system will help you do it. However, the system has limited options or to be more precise, the system is still a computer program and will only choose the optimal route.

If you tell ten karate masters to perform a roundhouse kick, every master will do it slightly different from each other. Inside the game, if ten Mutants perform a high jump with the system help, all of them will have exactly the same force, speed, angle, and height, all of the jumps will be identical.

Using full dive mode allows a player to use natural movements, movements that comes from his own imagination. It allows a player to use non-scripted movements. But everything that has benefits will have drawbacks and full dive mode is no exception: If the player doesn't know how to perform a movement he will not be able to do such movement.

You are not as restricted as to only use movements you can perform in real life, if you don't know how to do a back flip in real life you could do it in the Virtual Reality if you can imagine the motions in your mind and transmit them to the virtual reality. However, the reverse situation is true too, if you know how to do a back flip in real life and you go into full dive mode but you can't imagine the motions you will not be able to do the back flip. Although this second case is extremely rare, it happens sometimes.

"System command: Full Dive mode!" I command while ducking behind a fallen tree.

♫ ♪ ♫

In the lobby there is a tiny crowd watching the final wave of duels. Currently there are only 6 ongoing duels, one of them is naturally the duel between Kortef (me) and Crimson Crisis which Mr. Smith, Mr. Ackerman, and his son Alfred Ackerman are watching.

Suddenly in my point of view there are two red M flashing in the upper right corner indicating that I am adopting Manual Mode.

Watching the "MM" flashing Mr. Smith and Mr. Ackerman stand up from their seats almost at the same time, both with surprise all over their faces. "Is he a natural user?" Mr. Smith asks in a low voice. Those who can play without the system guide are often called natural users.

Some people in the crowd seeing as I activate the Full Dive Mode but still am crouching just think that I went nuts and I want to lose with style. Others who saw me in the first and second rounds are eager to see me in action again.

♫ ♪ ♫

"Go!" I roar with my robotic-like voice.

I start running clockwise trying to get near Crimson Crisis. My movements are now completely different from what they were moments ago, I am using more steps but I am being slower, this gives me the option to change my direction faster.

Crimson Crisis tries to aim where he thinks I will be based on my footing, but this time he is missing the mark horribly. He watches as I shot at him too but for some strange reason to him I am missing the mark for more than 5 meters. The reason for me missing him is that I’m not used to the controls of the weapon, in full dive I have to aim manually too.

Crimson Crisis watches as I dodge his bullets with strange ease and as I duck behind a tree. This change of events surprises him but it is just for an instant as he soon hears the sound of crunching leaves and snapping branches approaching to him quickly. He starts to retreat backwards while focusing his aim following the sounds behind the tree, but in the backwards motion he involuntarily looks down as he steps in a piece of what was the trunk of a tree.

As if I was watching him, the instant Crimson Crisis looks down, I immediately stand up and fire 4 twin bursts with my Light Plasma Carbine while running behind the tree which gives me half cover. Crimson Crisis could only sidestep and roll to avoid being hit without having the chance to fire back. He sees as each of my shots is more precise than the previous.

This time he feels a sense of danger: Now he is being pinned down by me.

END OF CHAPTER 10