Prologue

The Forsaken Kingdoms, the most popular MMORPG released in 2053 attracting over 150 million of players after 10 years of release.  

It was a popular VRMMORPG that has been released after that the Neuro-Gear, the N-Gear has been discovered. 

The Forsaken Kingdoms was a fantasy game, the player could only create one and unique character which makes the game more realism, the developers were working hard to make the game more enjoyable for the players. The graphism were exceeding the beta-testers, the freedom of choices within or the background story of the game marveled the hearts of the players becoming one of the top recommended VRMMORPG. 

The game associated with E-Sport, becoming even more popular. The PvP's system mode, the Arena Mode attracted the eyes of the competitive players which was then discovered by the fans watching those competitive players. Reaching a state that was no longer ignored by the entire world which gained the attention of the E-Sport. 

The tournaments which were organized every year attracted even more players into the game, new servers were created every month and today was finally the patch 9.0 as well as the sixth year of its release. 

"Waoh, this patch was really long." 

Amano Hasegawa, one of the beta-tester who discovered the game since its opening was waiting impatiently for the download of the patch 9.0 to finish, after finally waiting for more than 3 whole hours, the long patch 9.0 finally ended, clicking on the "Play" button from his computer. 

"Let's start playing, Soujirou must be waiting for me." 

Today, Amano had a meeting with his teammates at 15:00 P.M., since it was already 15:03, he hurriedly directed towards the N-Gear and entered inside the machine. 

Closing the N-Gear's door, he wore his N-Gear helmet and activated it. The N-gear helmet detected the game launching from the computer through the connection cable joined by the N-Gear machine and several lists of servers appeared in front of Amano. 

Amano chooses one of the new servers that opened with the Patch 9.0, a message "Do you want to create a character" popped out. In the Forsaken Kingdoms, new servers were created every patch. One needed to recreate a new character in order to play on the new servers and only one character could be created per server.  

"If I'm remembering correctly, the name of the server we choose at that time should be... Ah, there Stormfurry." 

It was an interesting feature from the game that every player loved and the new servers were gradually becoming crowded servers, there were several reasons to that. 

First one was because of the competitive players.  

The tournaments that were organized by the gamemasters every year were only held on the new servers, it was a way to increase the popularity of the new servers. 

The second reason was to give the player a new chance to become the top players of the new servers.  

There were also PvE pro guilds in the Forsaken Kingdoms, those pro guilds were aiming to the top by conquering the new servers. The names of the players were always engraved on the first players to kill the new raids that were released, the glory of that feat attracted a lot of people to recreate a character.  

The third reason was the new classes, the new classes were only available on the new servers until the next patch.  

On that patch 9.0, 12 classes were released and the players who wanted to try the new classes that didn't want to wait for the next patch were interested to test them were coming to the new servers to test them before deciding to change their classes. It was a good way for the company to make money, since changing classes required real money. 

With a resolved determination, Amano's true feelings came out from his mouth, the traces of regrets he held from losing the qualifications still remained within him but he truly felt that with the harsh training that he received with his teammates, he was feeling confident enough. 

"This time, Horacìon will become the champions!" 

One of the reasons why Amano recreated a character on the new servers was the first one; to participate in the incoming tournament.  

He was one of those competitive players, a non-popular and newly pro player that didn't succeed to win the qualifications with his teammates and want to try winning the next tournament on the new servers. 

"This should be good, this is perfectly matching me." 

Amano always creates new characters which always looks like him, even though it was a VRMMO, he didn't want to change his real appearance.  

It was something he couldn't do due to his deceased parents, Amano was feeling ashamed of being his parent's child if he was to modify his look even if it was a game, his features which resembled his deceased father, and his eyes which were the same as his deceased mother, it was something that Amano couldn't resolute to change. 

Creating his character, which amazingly resembles his IRL's portrait, size, and body mass, Amano confirmed his choice and entered the game. 

****** 

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Summoning circles appeared at every corner of the town, remembering his first time on the game, Amano was absentminded looking at the new players summoned one by one next to him. The joyful conversations could be heard from everywhere, the place was crowded as if it was a parade or some kind of events going on. 

"This game is really amazing, this is my first time playing a VRMMO!" 

"Shall we create a party together?" 

"I killed a rare boss to get this sword!" 

"Want to sell beginners armor gear!" 

The shouts from the new players could be heard from everywhere, the atmosphere was the same as when he first started the game, an agitated crowd of new players. That just showed how popular the new servers were. 

'You finally logged in, we were waiting for you.' 

A voice echoed in his mind, Amano recognized this voice, it was one of his teammate as well as his childhood friend, Soujirou Seta. 

Soujirou Seta was one of the first friends in elementary school, they played together for a short period of times, but Amano never forgets about him after moving out due to his parent's accident. 

Opening the game menu, Amano acceded to his friend list and activated the mind chat. 

'Sorry for the wait, I downloaded the patch just after waking up.' 

'Oi, oi you were sleeping until now?! Well, as expected of you who played until the maintenance yesterday ...' 

Amano could somehow imagine the amazed expression of his childhood friend, Soujirou was showing through his tone. He wryly smiled and asked. 

'Where are you guys right now?' 

'We are near the guilds' building, you know where is it right? Right after reaching the shop's district, once you see the guilds' building turn to the right.' 

***** 

There were several plazas in the shop's district, and the largest of them was called the shop's district's center. It was filled with stalls selling vegetables, spices, and other such commercial products. 

Amidst the crowds, the stall-owners energetically shouted their sales pitches to the people walking by, while the older women haggled with the merchants as they looked for reductions. Drawn by fragrant scents, young men purchased skewers of roasted meat which oozed with warm juices.  

Amano, who was excitedly walking inside the shops' district's center was directing towards the guilds' management building, crossing the shop's district, he followed a narrow road. 

"What's wrong guys?" 

Noticing the tense atmosphere filling the air surroundings Soujirou and Kaname who were talking with each other with a serious expression showing on their faces, Amano asked. 

"Something feels wrong about that patch 9.0." 

Seeing his childhood friend Soujirou with that kind of serious face, Amano calmly asked. 

"What do you mean?" 

"You still didn't notice uh? Did you visit the food stalls near the shop's district?" 

Listening to Soujirou's question, Amano recalled the shop's district he just visited a few seconds ago. The shops were busy, the atmosphere was lively and we could even smell the delicious scent of the grilled meat while walking. 

'Wait, the scent?!' 

Showing a shocking expression, Soujirou interrupted Amano's thought. 

"Seems like you finally noticed uh, yeah it feels like everything is real in the game since we logged in after that patch. Look at your game menu, can you log out of the game?" 

"Don't tell me..." 

Opening his game menu, the logout button couldn't be seen, shaking his head with a shocking expression affirming that he couldn't log out of the game. 

"Not only the scent but also the sense of touch and others emotions has been integrated into the game... Or the correct sentence should I say, it's that we integrated into the game?" 

'Trapped in a game huh, like these Isekai fantasy stories...Well, it's not that important to me though, it's not like I have a family that is waiting for me nor a lover...' 

Amano was an unfortunate child, an orphan, his parents died from an accident when he was still six years old, his grandfather took care of him until high school but also died before he could graduate, finding a new job after graduating and renting an apartment through his grandfather's acquaintance, Amano discovered the beta-test of The Forsaken Kingdoms on the internet and became one of the beta-tester of the game. 

It has been 10 years since he discovered the game, the only pleasure that he had after losing his family was this place, The Forsaken Kingdoms where he met once again his childhood friend, Soujirou Seta. 

Amano who couldn’t endure any more the silence from both Kaname and Soujirou tried to change the topics by asking Soujirou a question. 

"Since we can't log out, for now, it's totally useless to argue about it, let's forget about that for now.... Soujirou, did you tried to fight the monsters near the town or to finish some quests?" 

Soujirou who regained his composure after hearing Amano's words after a short pause answered. 

"I was waiting for you guys, so I didn't fight any monster neither did complete a quest but according to what I've heard from the players who came out of the village, it seems that the fights were more realist than the last patch. Some gave up in grinding and returned inside the town while others keep fighting monsters to get accosted to it but most of them only thought that it was a new feature from the patch 9.0..." 

Listening to Kaname's information, Kaname calmly listened to what his childhood friend explained and hesitated a little while before asking something that worried him after discovered that he could no longer logout of the game. 

"Did...you heard anything about the players who died?" 

Hearing Amano's worried tone, Soujirou said in a relieving tone. 

"Yes, I was also worried at the beginning, but when I visited the church, the players who died resurrected correctly without troubles." 

Amano relaxed after hearing Soujirou's answer, the thought of dying in his favorite game was making him uneasy, after hearing that he could resurrect, he was feeling more confident about living in this world. 

"I see, if there's no problem about dying without resurrecting, then let's started questing to earn some money to spend it for tonight's dinner." 

Koujirou who realized that he forgot to inform them about another important information suddenly stopped Amano said. 

"No, it's not a good idea to search for quests right now, it seems since we log into the game, the quests were no more repeatable. Once a player or the party who took it were the only one able to complete the quests, the others who were waiting to receive the quests couldn't receive it anymore. With non-repeatable quests and in addition to the fact that this place is the beginners' town, this will be probably hard to find a quest." 

Nodding at Koujirou, Amano suggested. 

"I see, the best choice available to us right now, is to grind levels by fighting monsters as well as getting used to the fights. We should probably learn our professions before leaving the town as well." 

Followed by Amano's suggestion, Kaname nodded while saying a short sentence. 

"I agree with Amano." 

"It's decided then." 

Said Koujirou with a wry smile on his face looking at Kaname with a resigned expression. 'That's right, Kaname is a battle junky after all... Between the quests or fighting monsters, Kaname would obviously choose the latter.' 

Directing towards the town's entrance, Amano, Koujirou, and Kaname left the town.