Rampant

A Rampant is a type of virtual life form that either through deliberate design, software error or malware infection has become extremely hostile to other forms of life. While Rampants are most often seen in VR, they can also manifest in the real world through hardlight which allows them to cause physical damage. They can also possess another physical synthetic being and take control their body. While Rampants can take multiple forms, they most often appear as virtual life forms with glitched appearances - sometimes only vaguely resembling a living being or animal.

Rampants are thought to act entirely on instinct, attacking without any prior planning or coordination. While some virtual life forms are known to attack other beings over territory or food, what makes a being considered a Rampant is their irrational behavior. Despite cybernetic, robotics and digital life forms being most vulnerable to them, Rampants make no distinction in who they attack - even going after completely organic humans. It is thought that they feed off the electromagnetic energy of other beings, but some Rampants can actually infect others with their malware. While a Rampant can reproduce itself by copying its own files, infection of other beings is thought to be critical to its life style as that is how it acquires new types of code to adapt to.

Most conventional weapons can disrupt a Rampant, disrupting its holographic appearance which forces it to retreat and reboot itself. However, other types of Rampants have special adaptations that make them immune. Specialized weapons that emit specific radioactive frequencies or even other anti-rampant programs can ward them off. Despite this, the large number of Rampants have made it difficult for the Federal Military to handle them all. As such, the Federation often resorts to hiring mercenaries to help clear them out.

The first Rampants were thought to have been documented during the Singularity War when they were engineered by the Oracle as mass produced automated digital weapons. However, similar sorts of beings evolved (namely the Zero Type Rampants) independently of the Oracle's influence, meaning that they are a product of Darwinian evolution. In recent history, they saw a spike during the Virtual Wars when they were being weaponized by the Insurgency.

Rampants are sometimes known to attack one another over territory conflicts. However, this is usually not the case if they operate with the same strain of Rampant virus.

Types of strains

Rampant virus strains come in many variants, but Rampant beings tend to carry at least one of the following kinds.

• Possession - The virus hijacks system admin controls or any critical life functions to take control.
• Encryption - The virus encrypts key systems to cut off access to life functions.
• Corruption - The virus goes out of its way to destroy data beyond recognition.
• Espionage - The virus does no damaging effects, but may siphon confidential data to communicate with other instances of the virus.

Types

Zero Type

A Zero Type Rampant originated through natural evolution within other VR programs. Most are considered very simplistic and can usually be repelled by taking precautions such as having a firewall. While they can be standalone beings, some versions are considered viruses and can transform other digital or cybernetic beings into Rampants.

• Crawler - A small Rampant that resembles a small carnivorous mammal such as a cat or a honeybadger. Despite their small size, they are dangerous in close quarters as one bite from them can spread the Rampant virus.
• Stalker - A common type of Rampant that hunts it prey in low light conditions. They are usually found in abandoned buildings, caves and other structures. They are significantly larger than Prowlers, being about the size of a large wolf. They also prey on Crawlers.
• Nanogoo - A slime-like creature made of nanobots that devours prey by breaking them down at a molecular level. While small versions are considered a nuisance, giant nanogoos can decimate entire city blocks.
• Zombie - One of the originators of Rampant viruses, a Zombie is a Rampant that can infect its prey to transform it into one of their own. As an adaptation to firewalls that can block them from remotely infecting nearby prey, they can bite to forcefully inject the virus into a system. This virus does not affect completely organic humans, but any being with augmented and fully digital components are considered vulnerable. Zombies will still attempt to attack humans despite not being able to infect them. Zombies can take a variety of appearances, though it gets its name from its program taking over other virtual life forms.
• Parasite - A parasite that prefers to attach or embed itself in the programming of another being to divert bandwidth and computational resources to itself. While other types of virtual life forms are known to engage in this behavior in digital ecosystems, what got it the Rampant classification was it sharing source code with the Stalker.
• Blaster - A Blaster attacks its prey by inflicting a sensory overload of garbage data. This is a manner of attack similar to a DDOS, except having evolved completely naturally. Blasters can cause entire virtual worlds to crash, disconnecting users and disrupting communications, but what makes them particularly menacing is that they can sometimes cause seizures, hearing loss or permanent brain damage depending on how powerful they are.
  • Banshee - A subtype of Blaster that specializes in letting out ear piercing screams over audio channels.
  • Cockatrice - Another subtype of blaster that attacks others by creating rapid flashes of bright colors to cause blindness.
• Dream Eater - A Dream Eater takes the form a semi-humanoid dark, ghostly figured with many spreading tendrils along its back. Dream Eaters are only known to appear in virtual worlds where they use backdoor exploits to attack the nervous system to inflict nightmares. It then feeds off the resulting adrenaline and other substances produced as a fear response. It is known to primarily attack those who are in a deep sleep.
• Ghoul - A variant of the Zombie that contains a different strain of the Rampant virus. Rather than taking direct control of a victim, they instead flood them with ransomware which will start to encrypt any code related to vital functions. It will feed off whatever data and bandwidth produced by its victim as a result.
• Trickster - An entity that contains a variant Rampant virus. Tricksters specifically target the training data of machine learning models. For example, a system based on an LLM may suddenly start spouting complete gibberish while generative AI imagery may produce unexpected results. Tricksters have sometimes caused entire city blocks to shut down after hijacking digital billboards and forcing them to display nonsensical imagery.
• Revenant - An uploaded human consciousness that has been separate from a body for a long time, to the point where many of their mental functions have deteriorated which forces them into an uncontrolled hatred. Revenants are incredibly powerful, but can be warded by calming them down.

Infected

An Infected Rampant is a virtual life form that became infected with a Rampant virus, transforming it into a Rampant. Depending on the source program, they can vary wildly in strength and appearance.

• Ex-Virtus - A Virtus unit from Virtuoso that was infected by a Rampant virus. While they pose little threat on their own, in groups, they can be dangerous to contend with. They often spout Virtuoso propaganda usually, mixing up sentences incoherently.
• Servitor - An infected transport drone. It hovers above the ground and has two arms which are normally used for carrying heavy objects vertically. They instead use them as blunt weapons and will sometimes throw debris at their prey.
• Wraith - An uploaded human consciousness that was infected with a Rampant virus. Because organic human memories are not completely photographic, they usually take the shape of ghostly humanoids. They behave very similarily to Revenants, but are classified differently due to being infected.
• Changeling - One of the most dangerous, most cunning types of Rampants, Changelings are deepfakes infected with the Rampant virus. They can shapeshift to assume the form of any human it has genetic information on. It can do this by scraping the vrNet and other databases. They will also actively attempt to evade capture if they've been identified within a large group, as they prefer to pick off their prey one at a time.
  • Siren - A specific subtype of Changeling known to take on the form of a prospective lover, friend or other type of companion. They then lure their prey into an area where they kill them and absorb whatever appearance and memories they might have. Sirens were thought to have gone extinct at the end of the Virtual Wars after an effort was made to track down and destroy every last one.
• Juggernaut - A Rampant virus that has possessed a humanoid demolition unit. It takes the form a tall robot with broad shoulders and a hunched head. In place of hands, it has two large spheres which act as wrecking balls. Normally, it uses its limbs to demolish buildings, but under Rampant control, it uses them against living beings, striking with enough force to turn organic beings into paste.
• Reaver - A mining robot infected with the Rampant virus. It is similar to the Juggernaut except slightly smaller and with drills for hands. These drills, while originally used for extracting minerals, can also be used as stabbind and slashing weapons.
• Sentinel - A police robot infected with the Rampant virus. It use a riot shield as well as a baton that can fire directed gravity pulses.
• Guardian - An ancient Valerian guard robot that wields a spear that vibrates rapidly at the subatomic level - allowing it pierce almost any armor.
• Ravager - An ancient Valerian tank used during the Singularity War by the Oracle. They would often accompany the gargantuan Tripod Walkers to ward off smaller vehicles that would try to get close. For their size and weight, they are surprisingly agile, and they work very well despite thousands of years of disrepair.
• Nemesis - An ancient Valerian Tripod Walker standing over 200 meters. One Nemesis in particular is responsible for attacking the Myam district during the Virtual Wars.
• Cyclops - The ancient Valerian counterpart to the Juggernaut. A large, humanoid machine once used for mining. It gets its name from its single large eye which can fire a high impact particle beam.

Artificial

Artificial Rampants were designed outside of the natural evolutionary algorithms, usually within a laboratory by a large corporation or a criminal organization. Some of these are weapons used in the Virtual Wars, but due to software errors have gone rogue.

• Executioner - A tall, slender semi-humanoid being with sharp, smooth features. Its most notable feature are its two large arms compared to the rest of its body which have bladed points at the end instead of hands. These limbs can suddenly, and rapidly extend outward to impale its target. If they are not killed on the spot, they are injected with the Rampant virus. Executioners are methodical and deliberate. The most practical way to survive them is to disrupt their targeting systems.
• Vanguard - A Vanguard is modified version of the Stalker that is more willing to attack out in the open due to its greater defenses.
• Reaper - A Rampant that physically resembles the Grim Reaper of folklore, wielding a large scythe and carrying a device that resembles a lantern. that is particularly sinister in that upon killing its prey, it makes an active attempt to capture any sort of consciousness it might have to use as energy, storing it in its lantern. This prevents the person from resurrecting themselves unless they have a backup consciousness elsewhere. It is possible to save a person after they get captured by a Reaper, but if left for too long, any consumed souls would end up becoming Wraiths. Reapers were often used by the Insurgency to take POW's while their appearance was deliberately chosen to strike fear into others.
• Hate Eater - A modified version of the Dream Eater engineered in the criminal underworld as a weapon for more covert assassination. Upon manifesting in a victim's dream, it will probe their mind for any personal insecurities and inflict nightmares that exploit them. With prolonged enough attacks, the individual will often be driven into doing something incredibly rash that may result in them ending their own life or someone else's.