Facing Fear | ✓ ONC 2023 Honorable Mention

17 | All Bite, No Bark

"It's a house," Tsuna said in disbelief.

Ren swung the white picket gate open, before looking back to the group. "You guys coming?"

Mori lingered in the garden, breathing in the fragrance of blooming lilies. Ivy crept up the stone walls of the picturesque cottage at the heart of the valley, the center of Valor. Unlike the rest of the virtual world, with larger than life landscapes and creatures, this place...it felt like home.

The sun somehow broke through here, a circle of light even with night all around. Butterflies flitted through the air. Bees nuzzled the flowers, gathering little clumps of pollen on their legs.

She looked at Ronin to find him solemnly plucking a flower and crushing it to pixels in his hand. He caught her glance and shook his head. "It looks beautiful, doesn't it? But it's not real. They're not real."

"Who's they...?" Mori began to ask.

"Demi?" Yuta whispered from behind her.

A woman skipped out of the cottage door, her black hair pinned up beneath a straw hat and a white sundress flowing from her shoulders to her knees. "Yuta!" she exclaimed, face lighting up. She ran and threw herself at him. "I knew you'd come to see me. Ren, Tsuna, you're here too!" Demi waved, a basket swinging on her arm. "We can all go pick wild strawberries together!"

"What is this?" Mori murmured, backing away from Demi until she bumped into Ronin behind her. "Demi died in a dungeon. That can't be her."

"Some of it's her," Ronin answered. "Some of it's FEAR. The memories are there, most of the personality is too, but the motives will all be FEAR's. When we die here" —his throat bobbed— "FEAR must download our consciousness somehow, and in the process, it dissects it from the body and kills the real person."

Mori shook her head, watching her friends interact with Demi. They laughed at something she said, a relief present in their eyes. In another corner of the garden, Wei sat on a bench swing with two other of FEAR's clones. All three of the people who'd died looked as Mori guessed they would appear in the real world, instead of their avatar personas.

Without a second thought, Mori grabbed Ronin's hand and pulled him after her, past the fence and out of the garden. They plunged back into the darkness and immediately the laughter stopped like it had been swallowed up.

"Ronin, tell me. Am I going to see Shiori in that house?"

"Yes."

Mori found herself shaking, with what emotion she didn't know, but she couldn't stop. "Isn't there another way? What if a player hasn't lost anyone in the game?"

Ronin paused, his dark eyes glinting in the night as her vision adjusted to make out the lines of his face. "I don't think they can find the house. Even if they could, the only way to reach the clearing point is to ask your person to lead you to it. They'll do it, but reluctantly. Because to them, you're leaving them behind."

"I can't do this." Mori bit down on her fist, teeth leaving marks on her hand. Tears threatened to spill over. "I was ready to fight a dragon, some kind of huge boss...not this."

"Me too. Mori, I—I couldn't clear the game by myself, not if it meant leaving my sister behind, but I think I can this time. I need help though." Ronin's jaw clenched and he forced the words out between his teeth. "I'm not strong enough to do this alone."

Mori slipped her hand into his. "We'll face this together then."

Ronin squeezed it in answer.

When they entered the garden again, Cynthia had joined the group. She zeroed in on Ronin and Mori, moving to block their path to the door. "Guess I beat you two here, huh?" she said with a smirk.