MADMAN APOCALYPSE

Level 0

‘Gambit’

System Glitch x

---RED BAR---

STATS

Health: Not Bad

Stamina: まあまあ

Armor: Tinfoil Suit

Carry Weight: 1000 Pandas

Top Speed: Carriage

Mana: Literally Zero

ATTRIBUTES

Strength: 2300 lbs.

Dexterity: Wombat

Intelligence: TBD

Vitality: Sirloin

Athleticism: 栗鼠

Perception: ‘Yes?’

Wisdom: N/A

Defense: Tinfoil

ABILITIES

PASSIVES

‘Glitch’

‘Insanity’

‘Inanimate Voices’

I looked at the nonsensical information that’d appeared before my eyes. “This makes no sense whatsoever… also, what does it mean that my Intelligence is ‘TBD’, that’s just rude!”

“Hm, it looks to me as though this is the fault of your class, this System Glitch. All the information is jumbled.”

“I have three Passives at least,” I said, trying to look on the bright side. They were listed as ‘Glitch’, ‘Insanity’ which was a given, and ‘Inanimate Voices’.

“No abilities, huh?” Panda remarked. “Also, the only thing I can tell is that you can either carry a thousand copies of me at once or a thousand actual pandas.”

I looked at the Strength, which was the only other thing with a numerical value attached, though I wasn’t sure what it referred to exactly. “Maybe Strength is how much I can bench press?”

“That’d put you far above the world champion,” Panda explained, somehow knowledgeable about the sport.

“Can you read those strange symbols?” I wondered.

“I think they’re Japanese,” the plushie said, “But no.”

“How fast do you think a Carriage goes?”

“No faster than thirteen miles per hour,” he replied with certainty.

“What do you think that red bar is for?” I wondered, tapping the display in front of my eyes.

As though prompted by my gesture, a new window popped up, overlaying the Status Screen.

Congratulations! You have unlocked an achievement! x

‘Insane in the Membrane’

Max out your Insanity Gauge at 100%.

Enjoy your new life of speaking in tongues and hugging your paralysis demons, while having the insects below your skin sing you soothing lullabies when it rains upside-down.

Normally, reaching 100% on your Insanity Gauge is supposed to turn you into a mindless monstrosity and remove you as a contestant in the GREAT GAME, but you are somehow still human-ish in appearance. How peculiar.

Please remain where you are while we send another agent to investigate this mystery.

Reward: ‘Insanity’ Passive

“How many agents are they gonna send to investigate me?”

“A lot, from the sounds of it. Seems like you weren’t supposed to survive going completely insane.”

“It’s kind of their fault for expecting people in an asylum to succumb to their insanity.”

“Seemed to work on your friends,” Panda remarked darkly.

“Posers,” I scoffed.

Before I could close the Achievement screen, another window popped up, overlaying it. It was starting to feel like I’d ‘accidentally’ visited the wrong kind of website or something…

Congratulations! You have leveled up! x

You have reached Level -1!

+1 new Attribute Point available to invest!

Kills required for Level -2

0/5

“Why is it counting my levels backwards?”

“How am I supposed to know how this works?”

I clicked away the Level Up and Achievement windows, but yet another Achievement popped up immediately after:

Congratulations! You have unlocked an achievement! x

‘¿Level Up?’

Reached Level -1

I’m not sure what’s happening here to be honest, but, eh… best you probably just remain where you are while we send a squad of agents to investigate this mystery.

Reward: ‘Punch.harder( )’ Ability

“Ugh, it’s non-stop!” I complained.

“You got an Ability though,” Panda remarked.

“I didn’t even get to pick it!”

“Don’t be a choosing beggar,” he scolded me.

I clicked the X to close the pop-up, then took in my Status again and poked the Intelligence attribute, to, hopefully, invest my available point.

ERROR!

Unable to invest point in chosen attribute!

Please pick another.

I poked the Wisdom attribute, only to be met with the same message.

ERROR!

Unable to invest point in chosen attribute!

Please pick another.

“Ugh,” I groaned. “Why isn’t it working?”

I poked the Vitality attribute and this time something happened. I sighed as I saw what it changed into. Interestingly, the Health and Stamina stats changed alongside it, but, again, the result was dumb.

Level -1

‘Gambit’

System Glitch x

---RED BAR---

STATS

Health: Not ‘Bad’

Stamina: まあねー

Armor: Tinfoil Suit

Carry Weight: 1000 Pandas

Top Speed: Carriage

Mana: Literally Zero

ATTRIBUTES

Strength: 2300 lbs.

Dexterity: Wombat

Intelligence: TBD

Vitality: Beef Medallion

Athleticism: 栗鼠

Perception: ‘Yes?’

Wisdom: N/A

Defense: Tinfoil

ABILITIES

PASSIVES

‘Punch.harder( )’

‘Glitch’

‘Insanity’

‘Inanimate Voices’

“This isn’t so much insane as it’s just downright frustrating.”

“I wonder why the ‘bad’ part of your Health stat is in quotations now, but I guess we can at least say that your Vitality is based on types of meat dishes.”

“I’m not sure there’s any logic behind this…”

I clicked the Status window away and got to my feet. “Alright, enough of this. I’m gonna find a way to get out of here,” I decided. My right fist was still bleeding, though scabs had already formed. Panda, who had crawled down to sit in my lap, quickly climbed up the legs of my pajama’s pants, then up my back and up onto my shoulder.

“What do you think your ability does?” he wondered.

“Doesn’t seem that hard to figure out,” I replied, as I made my way down the hallway, trying not to look too closely at the screaming tapestry of faces through the hole I’d made. The warbling screams from the patients behind me were entirely gone. Only the sounds of the wailing hole in the dungeon wall and the hum of the lights in the ceiling accompanied me, as I followed the path that seemed to curl around, before another door was in my way.

As soon as I pushed open the door, a long-limbed woman in a pajama set like mine leapt into me, sending me back out into the hallway, where my head bounced off the rubbery linoleum floor. I pushed the screaming figure off me, before she could sink her buck teeth into my face or stab me with her Edward-Scissorhands-looking fingers.

I scrambled backwards on my ass, while trying to get back up, though the lack of friction from my woolen socks made it a difficult maneuver. The woman swung for me with her scissor fingers and nicked my shins, before I was able to pull my legs out of the way.

Finally, I got back to my feet, just in time for her to swipe at my face, cutting me shallowly across the bridge of my nose.

“You motherfucker,” I cursed.

“Wouldn’t it be fatherfucker?” Panda corrected unhelpfully.

I pulled my bleeding fist back then hit her with a haymaker, right in the forehead. The punch produced a loud slap that echoed through the hallway and sent her slamming back into the floor with such force that it splattered the back of her head on impact.

It was clear she wasn’t getting back up.

“You’re already bleeding quite a lot,” Panda remarked.

“It’s fine,” I said, stepping over the dead patient.

When I returned to the door, I opened it cautiously and peered inside the waiting room that greeted me. There weren’t any of the ripoff Spy Kids thumb-faced orderlies in sight, but two more of the twisted patients were seated in plastic chairs up against the wall in the back, and there was a potted plant that’d clearly come to life next to them. The normally-calming picture-frames on the walls were full of grisly torture scenes and leaked actual blood down the off-white plastic walls, and a set of reinforced metallic doors stood against the wall on my right, though there was no obvious way to open them.

“Charming,” Panda remarked.

I double-checked to be sure, but it was clear that it was just those two enemies in the room. Then I made a quick decision, and pulled the round handle off the door, before running towards the two monsters. I settled into a slide across the floor on my socks as I wound back my arm and flung the metal knob right into the chest of one of the two, a man, perhaps, crushing his sternum with the impact. It produced a sound like crackers being stomped on. The other got up with a warbling scream, seconds before I slammed my palm into its chin with enough force to snap its spine.

As the distended and twisted patient collapsed to the floor, I finished off the other, which was gasping for air, with a downward punch that cracked its head against the floor.

“Yeah, I’ve definitely gotten stronger,” I said as I tried to wipe my bloodied fist on my grey shirt.

The intercom in the ceiling suddenly buzzed to life with a scream of TV static.

[THE PSYCHIATRIST WILL NOW SEE YOU!] it yelled.

The reinforced doors in front of me swung open.