Prologue

It was another day of school for high school junior Hiro. He entered his room as the kids were talking quietly. He took his seat and waited for his teacher to begin the day’s lesson. As the minutes went on in another one of his math teacher's long boring lectures, Hiro slowly began to drift off into one of his many daydreams. He found himself in a fantasy world where, alongside his companions, he was fighting a dragon who breathed fire hot enough to melt steel. He raised his shield to protect those around him while others blasted the dragon with a plethora of magic spells. The evil dragon fought tooth and nail but Hiro and his companions fought even harder. Finally, the dragon's fiery breath stopped and Hiro lunged at the beast sinking his blade deep into its chest. The dragon bucked wildly but Hiro hung on and continued to sink his blade deeper and deeper until he finally pierced the creature's heart. Hiro stood atop the beast laid motionless as the others cheered in their victory. They had slain the dragon and saved the kingdom.

He longed for his life to mean something. As he dreamed a smile came over his face but suddenly he heard his teacher’s voice.

“Hiro! What is the answer to the problem?”

Hiro, who was startled by her question, looked at the board and replied, “4^3is 64.”

The teacher glared at Hiro and replied to him, “Hiro, keep your mind focused. Stay here in class with us. No daydreaming”.

Hiro was an army brat who moved around a lot. His father was a black man who was a naval combat instructor. His mother was a Japanese immigrant who followed her husband from base to base around the world. Hiro had lived in 5 different countries including Korea, Japan, Germany, France, and now in the United States.

The boredom and daydreams in class, these were just a few of the normal occurrences in day in the life of Hiro. He excelled at academics but was very poor at sports. Because of his father's job, Hiro was enthralled with combat sports. He wanted so badly to be like his father who had mastered several different fighting disciplines. Unfortunately, Hiro had some problems he had not been able to overcome. He had a poor constitution due to his chronic asthma and a severe lack of coordination. With these deficiencies, his training never really amounted to much. He was also very shy and introverted so he had no real friends which further alienated him from the other students.

Lunch time came and Hiro decided to sit outside because it was such a nice day. He got his lunch and began to eat. Just then a group of kids who picked on him every day came up.

The leader spoke saying, “That looks good. I think I’ll have some!” Immediately he took Hiro’s sandwich.

Before Hiro could say anything, the leader of the bullies bit into his sandwich.

“This is awful” the bully said and he spit it out.

Then he took the rest and smashed it on Hiro’s head. Hiro was completely embarrassed as everyone in lunch seemed to be watching him get humiliated. He clenched his fist and wanted to fight back but the fear of the beating he would receive from the bullies paralyzed him. After they left him alone, Hiro went to the bathroom to clean up. While he was in the bathroom the bell rang. He ran as fast as he could but he was still late for class.

His teacher greeted him at the door with a smug look on his face."Hiro to go to the principal’s office for tardiness to class."

"But I...", he started

"No buts Hiro. Go to the dean of student's office now."

Hiro turned around sullenly and walked away. He quickly did as he was told and went to the principal’s office. He opened the door and saw his principal sitting behind a large desk with his computer open.

"Dean Barnes, I was told to come see you because I was late to class."

The dean said, “Why were you late for class?”

Hiro replied, “I’m sorry. I was in the bathroom cleaning myself up."

"Why were you cleaning yourself up? Did something happen?"

"It was because someone was picking on me at lunch. They took my food and smashed it in my hair.”

“Who did this?”, the dean sternly asked.

“It was Chu. He has been picking on me for a while now.”

“Thank you Hiro. I will take of this matter immediately. Now go back to class.”

Hiro went to class relieved that he wasn’t in any trouble. Once he got back to class. Chu was called over the loud speaker to come to the dean's office.

Chu got up from his seat and said, “If you told on me, I’m gonna make your life a living hell.”

Then it would be just like it is now. So it won't make any difference.

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The class ended and everyone got their things to go home from school. Hiro walked out of the school campus and turned the corner to walk home. As he walked down the street Chu was standing there. He had a mean look on his face. Chu was already intimidating. He was black belt in karate and he was about 190cm tall and weighed about 80 kilos primarily muscle.

Not good. He looks pissed. I’ve got to get out of here.

Hiro turned to run. Chu and his goons quickly gave chase. Hiro saw a fence ahead of him and tried to jump and climb over it. Once again his physical weakness came into play. He jumped onto the fence and began climbing but Chu caught up to him easily and pulled him off of the fence. Hiro fell flat on his back hitting his head on the hard concrete. Chu immediately jumped on Hiro in full mount position and began to rain down blows upon Hiro's face. All Hiro could do was use his arms to cover himself up.

Why won’t anyone help me?

Tears began to run down his face. Everyone around stared and started to laugh. When Chu finally stopped Hiro got himself up and he was somewhere between rage and terror.

I want to hurt him the way he hurt me.

With blood running down from his mouth and right eye, Hiro lost his judgment and threw single punch that struck Chu on the back of his head. Chu bent over from the impact but It did very little damage to Chu who had been fighting in martial arts competitions for years. The effect it did have was that it enraged Chu. Chu returned Hiro’s punch with his own directly to Hiro’s solar plexus. Hiro doubled over and gasped for air. Chu followed up with a vicious knee to Hiro’s face. He fell back on the ground and hit his head on the concrete again. When his head hit their was a sick thud like someone dropped a book on the floor. Hiro lay there in a heap with blood now flowing from his nose, mouth, and eye. His vision was hazy and he heard a ringing sound in his head.

“Stay down or next time I’ll kill you” said Chu with a darkness Hiro had never seen in his eyes.

Hiro could barely move and the punch that he received to his abdomen had him ready to vomit. Chu walked away and after a few minutes Hiro stood up holding his bloody nose. He felt dizzy and his vision was still blurry. The sun was beginning to set so he walked home as quickly as he could manage given the pain he was in.

Feeling very sore and bruised up from the beating he took from Chu Hiro decided he better take a bath to soothe his body. Once he got out of the bath he cleaned himself up and looked at his face in the mirror. He faced looked bad. His lip was starting swell both his eyes were blackened and he had a cut on the side of his eye. "

He really did a number on me. I don't even want to imagine what this will look like tomorrow. I will have to avoid him for a while.

Hiro decided to play his newest game for a while to take his mind off of what happened early. He enjoyed games because there he could be the kind of person he wanted to be. He was an excellent player. He had played all sorts of games from shooting and sports games to his favorite the RPG, or roleplaying game. So he opened up his computer and there was a strange e-mail waiting for him. He clicked the icon and the e-mail opened up. In bright blinking letters it said become a beta tester for the newest most realistic RPG ever created. It said something about being a virtual reality game but Hiro ignored it thinking it was some sort of spam mail. Then he went on playing his game. Hours passed as he slayed dragons, wizards, and skeletons with his magical swords, spells, and fearless companions. Finally Hiro was ready for bed. The e-mail about the newest RPG came up again. Hiro decided this time to click and open the game. He filled in his information and then went to bed.

As Hiro laid in his bed he felt a sharp pain in his head. He tossed and turned for a while as the pain in his head raged on. He got out of bed and took some pain meds from the medicine cabinet in the hallway bathroom and then returned to bed. After about 30 minutes the pain subsided enough for him to relax a bit. Soon he began sleeping soundly.

Suddenly he heard a sound “ding!” The sound startled him and he awoke. He was sort of groggy and his eyes had not adjusted to the darkness. He heard the “ding” sound again and as he opened his eyes he saw only darkness in front of him.

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Thank you for reading all the way through the prologue of the story. I hope you enjoyed it and maybe it resonated with the experiences some of us have had to endure growing up. Fear not the story gets much better from here on.

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