Kaiju: BattleField Surgeon

Mural artist ISO blank wall.
No wall too big or too small!
Degree in art, experienced muralist will turn your dreary wall into a hand-painted masterpiece for the ages!
I am quick, talented, versatile, and I do not use AI. All art is 100% human-created. Interior or exterior. Please see attached portfolio for a few samples. Low prices. Willing to travel all over the Puget Sound. Email Duke for more info.
Do NOT contact me with unsolicited services or offers.
Duke,
Hello. I have a loft space in Capital Hill. I am seeking an artist to make a mural. It is a large, brick wall. Do you have a phone number so we can discuss this further?
A.E.
Part one: Bast.
Chapter 1.
I should have known there was something wrong with the dude.
He’d been too eager to get me up into his apartment. He had a way about him, you know? Twitchy, nervous. He didn’t look you in the eye. He wore one of those fancy watches, an old-school, gold Rolex I think. Looking back, I think that’s why I followed him to his place. He had money, and I did not.
We’d met at a Starbucks just outside his building. I’d ordered an Americano, black, extra hot. He’d dithered, looking over the menu, like this was his first time. He settled on an iced coffee. It was the first week of February, and it’d been slush raining for two weeks straight. An iced coffee. I should have known right then and there to stay away.
“Hey, good to meet you. My name is Anatoly.”
“You too, I’m Duke.”
“I really dig your stuff. I was particularly interested in the revenant mural from your ad.You’re a good artist. It was really bloody and realistic. ”
“Thanks. I did it for a haunted house thing last year.”
“So…Is that what you’re looking for? Something undead?”
“No, well, er, not exactly. Are you familiar with Kaiju: Battlefield Surgeon?”
“The VR? I’ve never played it, but I’ve seen some of the gameplay. It’s survival horror, right? Like, you’re a dude running around the feet of giant monsters while they fight other monsters.”
“Exactly. Anyway, I was hoping to paint a scene from my home base on the wall. I want to make my apartment look a little more like what I have in the game.”
“Sure. Do you have a screenshot I can look at?”
“No. A screenshot won’t really work. It’s kinda hard to explain. It’s better if I just show you. I have a rig in my apartment. It’s in Bast. My home base, I mean. You’ll have to jack in to get a look.”
“The game will let me log in as your character? Is that because it’s single player?”
The man sighed. “No, unfortunately, uh, you’ll have to roll a new player. Don’t worry. I’ll get you in and get you there to my base so you can eyeball it. We can walk to the portal and teleport right there. The whole thing will take about 10 or 15 minutes the first time, but once you’re there, I’ll get you a brand, and you’ll be able to log in and out at will to get a look.”
“Err, okay, I guess.”
“Also, the game is single-player, but there’s also a co-op mode. You can have up to 22 players. I run a private server, and there are a few other players who regularly log into it. We each have our own base of operations.”
This guy. This fuckin’ guy. Anatoly. The whole time he didn’t look up from the table. He put his coffee down and started furiously itching at the back of his left hand like a damn maniac.
Run, every instinct told me. This guy is bad news.