Chapter 1: Get Over it.

It is said that the rise and fall of a nation could depend on a single word. Perhaps it was true, as Tobi’s life seemed had fallen thanks to nothing more than a simple, trivial game. If a game can impact a life, why couldn’t a word do just as much to a nation?

“Tobi, we’re ordering takeaway. Do you want anything?” Lucy called up the stairs, his younger sister by three years.

“I’m good, ta!” Tobi shouted back, barely raising his head from the pillow. The effort to shout seemed more taxing than it should, forcing Tobi to sigh and lament over his depressive mood. Everyone seemed to be getting on with life except himself. A single setback in life and he already felt like giving up.

Hearing the door to his bedroom knock, Tobi flipped himself over and looked toward it. There was no point asking who was there, his family had the annoying habit of thinking a knock didn’t require an answer; he’d find out who was knocking regardless…

“Tobe?” Lucy whispered, opening the door a crack.

“I’m good Luce, I’m not hungry. I’m still tired from the trip home.”—He wasn’t, but he wasn’t in the mood for company. Normally his sister might be the exception, but it seemed that even she wasn’t able to coax him out of the bad mood.

“It’s not that,” Lucy said, edging into the room and closing the door behind her, “it’s about that girl.”

“Niamh?” Tobi asked, sitting up properly before cursing himself for the interest he still had in her. Considering how things ended between them, he shouldn’t care about her any longer; yet he couldn’t put her out of his mind no matter how much he tried.

“You said her name in Aevitas was Senna, right?”

‘Aevitas’ Tobi cursed mentally at the game that—in his mind—cost him everything. How a simple game could grip half the known world, Tobi would never know. He’d never been into computers or gaming. Computers to Tobi were for typing up his homework, online research, social networking and the like. Games were just a pastime that he couldn’t care for. Well, with the exception of online chess; maybe.

“Yes,” Tobi answered darkly, “her name is Senna.”

“Did she tell you the name of the guy she’s dating in the game?”

Pausing to think about it a second, Tobi tried to recall what his name was, “I don’t know his character name, but his real name is Liam, I think. Why?”

Lucy shrugged as she sat on the end of the bed, “Some of my guild members were paid to help clear a high level dungeon near Deniya. At the end of the dungeon, when the boss was down to about a quarter of its life left, they were kicked from the party and ended up dying. When I asked who they did the job for, they listed a group of 12 people. One of them was a level 67 mage called Senna.”

Tobi didn’t really understand the game mechanics, but after all the times he heard Niamh talk about the game, he at least knew a few bits and pieces. What Lucy had just described was something that happened to Niamh shortly after she started playing. It was called a ‘Boss-PK’ and was considered the worst kind of player-killing in the game. When a dungeon boss killed someone, the person would drop everything they were carrying: Food, potions, armor, weapons...everything. If killed in a normal PK, they would only lose a single item of gear and their inventory. The difference didn’t seem like much, but to players, it was the difference between losing a car compared to losing their home.

“How much did your guys lose?” Tobi asked, pretending to understand more than he did about what happened.

Knowing how little Tobi really knew about the game, she decided to put it into words that Tobi could understand, “In total, they lost about £2,000 worth of gear and loot between them.”

‘£2,000 for game items? What the hell?’ No matter how Tobi thought about it, there was no way some random fake items in a game could cost so much money!

Guessing what Tobi was thinking, Lucy gave a sad smile and shook her head, “The Paladin is called ‘TheRockisCooking’, but we just call him Rocky. His ‘Tower Shield’ is a rare drop-item that is really hard to get. The drop rate is less than 0.1% and it’s the most overpowered shield that we know of. We will probably find better ones at higher levels, but the highest levelled person in the game is only level 91. The shield is for people level 80 and up so it’s considered the best one at the minute. On the official website Auction House people are already offering as much as £800 for it...”

“And now your Paladin friend has lost it thanks to Niamh’s party?”

Lucy nodded, “I don’t know why I am telling you. I just felt like I should. Especially because I am going to kill her, and everyone else that was in that party.”

Tobi lay back down and closing his eyes, quietly asking himself if he was bothered by any of it. He wasn’t, “It has nothing to do with me.”

Feeling the bottom-end of the bed rise as Lucy got up and left, Tobi opened his eyes and frowned. He didn’t really care about what happened in the game, but he did still care about Niamh. As much as he loathed to admit it, he was still in love with her. He hadn’t told his family, but before he and Niamh broke up, he’d actually proposed to her. If that was all, it might not be much, but she’d said yes. He thought they were going to be together forever. Just two-months later and everything was over.

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‘I should have just played the game when she asked me to,’ Tobi mused silently, ‘then we would still be together. ...Always stubbornly refusing to play; for what?’

Slowly sitting back up, Tobi considered all of his reasons for not playing computer games; or at least tried to think of his reasons. He couldn’t think of anything specific though. The simple fact of the matter was, he simply had no interest in computer games. Pacman had entertained him for all of five minutes in some arcades at the beach as a kid, but even that was a rare moment of fancy. The longest game he’d played was a car racing game, but only because he had nothing better to do at the time. He’d been babysitting for one of the neighbours and the game proved to be a good way to pass the time. The moment the neighbours returned home though, he turned the game off without hesitation and never thought about it again. Until now.

Other than having no interest in games, and no game ever managing to get his attention; had there ever been a reason for him to avoid playing computer games?  

Opening his laptop and navigating his way to the Aevitas website, Tobi decided to see if the game had anything he could find interest in. If there was at least one thing to grab his attention, he would give it a try. If he couldn’t find anything though, he would kick his ass out of bed and go look for a job. Anything was better than another day spent in his bed…

Skimming the introduction to Aevitas and information about the company that developed it, Tobi quickly covered what he already knew about the game. Aevitas was a Virtual Reality based world, literally. The world had an approximate size of Earth and could only be accessed by using the specialized ‘Dive Unit’ software created by the company; Skea Tech.

The so-called Dive-Unit was an item Tobi was all too familiar with. Despite its name, it had the appearance of a human-sized incubation capsule, and that’s pretty much what it was too; something that could be found in many a sci-fi film—used by people who would be sleeping during countless years of spaceflight.

Tobi continued to read on, his eyes skimming the text and absorbing only the information he wanted. The ‘Dive Unit’ allowed a person to experience a world that was not unlike the real one. There were discrepancies and differences, but for the most part, it was a believable experience. Or so the company claimed; Tobi didn’t take their word for it and doubted to the truth of it.

While the actual technology behind the Dive Unit was not explained, what the machine was capable of was known to all. The user simply had to lie within the capsule, close the lid, attach two pads to their temples and wait. The user would slowly, through the help of the capsule, enter a sleep-state known as REM-State Four.

Not sure what REM-Sleep was, Tobi paid a little more attention to what he was reading and cross-checked a few of their claims on other websites. According to the Official Website of Aevitas, the technology only made use of what the user’s body was already capable of. During REM-Sleep, the body would enter a paralyzed condition known as REM atonia, immobilizing the body so that it doesn’t act out the dreams while sleeping.

The Dive Unit did the same thing. Without explaining how they did it, the company described the effects: The machine would guide the user into entering a sleep-like state and project images to the subconscious. This caused the user to enter a state of sleep identical to REM-Sleep; and the brain—not the machine—would automatically enter REM Atonia and paralyze the body for the duration of their time inside the Virtual World.

Thanks to the combination of the technology and the natural processes of the human body, the company was able to create a full immersement experience into the virtual world. The limit of realism was down to the user, not the company. Just as some dreams were incredibly real during the time a person was sleeping, so was the virtual world of Aevitas. At the same time, some dreams could be recognized as dreams and would not have the same level of realism. Aevitas was no different. The more the user could make themselves believe the world was real, the more real it became.

At the end of the section on REM-sleep, Skea-Tech offered a comment of their own; claiming that people playing Aevitas through use of the Dive Unit could actively learn new things. REM-sleep was known to improve learning capabilities, but how and why was still up for debate. Skea-Tech didn’t give any comment on the how or why, only that their players could learn skills in the game and continue to use them in real life.

Following the claim of learning skills while in the game was a list of user comments describing their own experiences. Tobi skipped most of them without much care. He doubted the comments were real. If he were the owner of the company, he’d just have his own staff post some comments. If there were really comments by the users, he would only select the good ones, not the bad ones. As a result, Tobi was not inclined to read the comments posted on the official website.

Just as Tobi was about to navigate his way to the next page, the final comment on the list was by a member of Aevitas staff. The title caught Tobi’s eye and he stopped just long enough to read it.

Prior to playing Aevitas, I had never cooked a thing in my life. Microwave meals, bowls of cereal and toast made up the bulk of my menu. The cook in my family was my mother, and later, my wife. Perhaps I am old fashioned, but I always viewed the ability to cook as a woman’s skill. To a smaller extent, I may have even been under the belief that it was part of a woman’s duty to cook.

Since learning to cook inside Aevitas, I have found that the process is incredibly enjoyable. I now make all the meals at home. I bake bread and cakes, cook family meals and experiment with complicated dessert menu’s. My relationship with the wife is better than ever. My son has also taken an interest in cooking thanks to my influence. My home life, thanks to learning this skill in Aevitas, has improved greatly.

My family has never been happier or more united. It is amazing how something as simple as cooking can change the entire dynamic of a single household.

Tobi wasn’t sure why that particular post was able to stand out above the others and attract his attention, but something about it had gripped him. After re-reading it a second time, Tobi gained a slight understanding into what was different about it compared to the other posts.

Instead of claiming; ‘I learned Masonry in Aevitas and was able to build a Garage on the side of my house’, as one particular comment claimed, the story shown—on a more personal level—how the skill he learned managed to change his life.

Sitting back in his chair and thinking about everything he’d read, Tobi considered the potential of learning skills in Aevitas. He already knew how to cook well enough, so he wasn’t really interested in that; but maybe there was something else within the game that he could learn.

Navigating his way over to the Website Forums, Tobi signed up with the name ‘Inq.Mind’ and opened a thread of his own:

The Official Website claims we can learn skills in Aevitas and continue to use them in real life.

Can anyone give a list of skills that have been learned in the game and used in reality?

Leaving the message forums open and going down to make himself a coffee, Tobi tried to think of what skills would be of interest to himself. There would definitely be something, of that he was sure. He just didn’t know what that ‘something’ would be. He wanted to have an idea for what he wanted to learn before he started to play the game. By this point, it was already a definite that he was going to give Aevitas a try.