Chapter 1 -The beginning-
Shara went to the hospital with her mother.
Once there she walked to the information desk.
"Hello, can you tell me which ward Mr. Andre is in."
"One moment miss. Mr. Andre is located on floor 5 room 5.36.
Take the elevator on the left. When you’re on the fifth floor, turn right, and walk straight down the hall. The room is to your left."
"Thank you."
She went inside the opened elevator and waited for her mother to get in.
She pressed number 5 on the control panel multiple times until the door closed.
The elevator stopped on floor 2 and 4 for people to get on.
Finally at the 5th floor she got out of the elevator, went right and rushed to the end of the hall while looking at the room numbers.
Almost at the end of the hall, was room 5.36.
Tensely she opened the door and as she walked in, the sun blinded her for a moment. Looking at the bed, she saw Andre lying down, connected to some machine to monitor his condition.
She walked to the chair next to him and sat down, took his hand and started praying for him in her mind .
At that moment Shara's mother walked in the room. She was looking at Shara holding Andre's hand. It was the same as 15 years ago when she had lost her husband. He was brain dead for 6 years and after 10 years, they finally decided to pull the plug. She was once again reminded of that painful time. It took her almost 2 years to overcome the grief of losing her husband. Not wanting her daughter to experience the same pain as she did, she decided to support her daughter's relationship with Andre, instead of canceling their family agreement. She walked to the statistic machine and looked at it for 5 minutes, then took out her phone and walked outside.
Shara was thinking about how happy he was on their date yesterday.
The good time she had. The smile on his face was now gone, laying almost lifeless on the bed. She got even more sad and then she noticed her mother returning to the room.
"Shara, there is a way you can talk to him."
"What...! Really? How? "
"You have heard of the game Royal Road right? "
"Yes! "
"The Unicorn Corporation wants to try out a dual capsule.
Although Andre is in a coma, his brain is more active than normal coma patients, so the Unicorn Corporation capsule should have no problem connecting him to the game. That could maybe help him get out of his coma. "
"Are there any risks? "
"Theoretically there is no risk but it will be the first time they use it on a person that's in a coma. In the tests on animals they did not have any problems or side effects. "
"Very well I'll do it. "
[2 weeks later]
Royal Road is now the most popular VRMMORPG in the world.
The first day 50 million people registered and in 2 weeks 1/5 of the world population was registered.
(Shara's home)
Todays the day Andre was brought from the hospital to Shara's house.
There was a special room prepared for Andre, and in that room was a machine for Andre to be placed in. The machine would feed him and move his body for his muscles. The machine was a modified capsule for him to connect to his local network and Royal Road. Once activated he could see what was happening in his surroundings thanks to the cameras that were placed around the room. He could also search the internet because his brain was linked to the computer.
Shara woke up and checked here phone for messages. As she was popular at her University she had a lot of messages, asking how she was doing. She was hopeful because today at 2 o'clock Andre would be here to be connected to the machine. She went to the kitchen to make herself some food, sat down on the couch and watched TV for news about Royal Road.
*Ting Dong *Ting Dong
Shara walked to the door and opened it.
Her mother was there with 4 people from the hospital and 2 from the unicorn corporation.
"Do you need any help mother? "
"No dear you can just wait in the living room".
2 men from the Unicorn Corporation went inside. Shara's mother guided them to Andre room. Once in Andre room, they looked at the machines and placed Andre in it. As they were preparing the machines to start they also ran a few diagnostic programs. Once it was done they re-booted the computer, installed the correct software and updated the software. This was a process that took a few hours.
Shara was waiting impatiently. The moment she heard the work was done she rushed to Andre's room. She saw Andre laying in a glass capsule that was connected to a lot of computers.
"I wonder what kind of specifications the computer has".
But at the moment she was not interested in asking the Unicorn Corporation Employees. All she wanted was to jump into her own capsule so she could talk to Andre again. She got inside the capsule, closed the door, and the capsule turned on.
Her screen went black and after a few seconds she materialized in a white empty void. Andre also appeared in the white void. She ran to him and hugged him and they both fell on the ground. Andre was surprised when Shara ran to him not noticing the white void, but after a few seconds he noticed a white void.
"Shara, where am I? What is this place? And why is this place so white? "
"You have been in a coma for the last three weeks. My mother was asked to try out a new dual capsule from the Unicorn Corporation and as that was my only way to be with you, I accepted it. "
"Okay, but where are we then. "
"At the moment we are in our local network. You can monitor the camera’s and watch us in your room. You can also design this place to your personal preference like adding a chair or couch or computer to surf the Internet."
"But I'm awake now. Can’t I get out of the capsule and be with you in real life?"
"I don't know but my mother said you will wake up when your body feels like it. As we don't know how long that will take we were given the opportunity to play Royal Road, on the condition that we had to give them the test results of the dual capsule. So do you want to try Royal road out?"
"It's not like I've got anything better to do. "
Connect to Royal Road
Yes / No
"Yes."
Scanning.
The scan on your iris and vein has determined -Error-.
Recalibrating software, updating, loading, 10%, 60%, 100%.
Loading special AI. 100%
System update complete.
Verifying system updates, complete.
Rescanning.
Scanning has determined two persons in capsule.
The scan on your irises and veins has determined that you're an unregistered user. Do you want to create your accounts?
"Of course we want to."
Starting player one avatar creation.
-Please choose a name for your avatar.-
"Xandit. "
-Select your gender up from male to female or neutral-
"Male. "
-Royal Road has 49 races. You may select your race from the primary 29 races.-
"Human. "
-You may alter your appearance.-
"Keep it the way I am. "
-Please wait for player two to start creating avatar.
-Starting player two creation-
-Please choose a name for your avatar.-
"Sanni. "
-Select your gender up from male to female or neutral-
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
"Female. "
-Royal Road has 49 races. You may select your race from the primary 29 races.-
"Human. "
-You may alter your appearance.-
"Keep it the way I am. "
-Loading two player starting places.-
-Only one starting place available.-
-Before starting in the game do you want to start the tutorial.-
"No thank you. "
With a FLASH of white light, they materialized in a small dark room. After a few seconds, they saw tiny little crystals on the wall lighting up.
Xandit started to look around, and the first thing he saw was a table in the middle of the room. Looking further he saw some more objects. A bed, some chairs, a fireplace and a whole lot more. But the one thing he didn't see was an exit of this room.
Sanni, also looked around. Looking around her eyes were drawn to a book on the table in the middle of the room. It had a yellow glow to it and she knew from when she had researched Royal Road that books with a yellow glow were rare. She went to the table, took the book and started reading. After a few seconds of reading the first page she called Xandit.
Xandit walked to Sanni and asked her what there was. Sanni showed him the book and he started reading it.
* Reading.
Introduction book part one.
Welcome to part one of 12 stops between the exit of this dungeon.
As you might have noticed there is no exit in this room; that's because there isn't one. The only way to get out of here is by teleporting. So you need to acquire the skill teleporting, and the only way to do that is by finding two rings in this room. The rings will link your characters together and you will learn the skill “Teleport”. Once your characters are linked you can no longer separate the soul link, but if you don't want to soul link your characters then you're out of luck because without soul link, you won’t get out. Read this book again when the rings are found. Then the hidden part of this book will appear.
*Ting.
> Quote:Finding a soul link
>
> Find the two rings within this room to become one.
>
> Quest Difficulty: E
> Quest requirements: Need a male and a female.
> Quest reward soul link and ???.
> Time limit 24 hours.
> If Quest fails you’re disconnected for 48 hours.
> When you log on you can try again.
Xandit and Sanni started searching the room, from left to right, up and down but with no luck. After four hours they took a break.
"We need to look a lot harder, let's try and divide the room up in sectors and then go from one sector to another to be sure we haven't missed anything. "
“Where could the rings be hiding?”
After three hours of searching they were only done for 40% of the room.
*Ting.
> Quote:For searching in an organized manner for a long time.
> Hidden paths will now be visible
> you learned the skill Scan
>
> Scan skill level 0.01%
> level 0 cool down of skill 60 sec
As the skill scan helped, Xandit and Sanni searched the room faster. In one hour they had already cleared 70% of the room.
"Pfffff...... I never had to search this much in my life, what about you Sanni?"
"Sometimes when I don't know where I put my phone. "
"Well let's take another short break."
Xandit let himself fall on the floor. He hit the floor too hard and got the message
-7 HP. "Dammit this game is too realistic, system show stats."
http%3a%2f%2fimg20.imageshack.us%2fimg20%2f9859%2fstats1p.png [http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/9859/stats1p.png]
Looking at his stats screen he noticed his health went down by 7 points.
Lock HP, MP, Hunger and stamina on iris field on the left corner at the top and always show these stats.
He also recommended Sanni do the same.
She did what Xandit recommended.
System show stats.
http%3a%2f%2fimg716.imageshack.us%2fimg716%2f148%2fstats2s.png [http://img716.imageshack.us/img716/148/stats2s.png]
Lock HP, MP, Hunger and stamina on iris field on the left corner at the top and always show these stats.
As they both noticed, the hunger bar was almost empty.
System open inventory.
They saw they had a canteen and 10 pieces of rye bread. They both ate one bread. As Xandit was looking around in the room he saw something shiny in the wall. He walked up to it and used the skill scan.
*Scanning
> Quote:You found your first soul link ring!
"Sanni, look..! look....! I found one! "
Sanni went over to Xandit to watch the ring. But when she was walking towards him she fell over a stone on the floor. The whole stone came out of the floor.
Again Xandit saw something shiny by the stone.
"I think we found another one."
*Scanning
> Quote:You found a second soul link ring!
*Ting
> Quote:Scan skill level 1.07%
> Skill level up.
> You can now scan below level 30 enemies/NPC/Players.
> +1 luck.
"At least I didn't fall for nothing, we found the rings. Let's go to the book and see the hidden part."
*Reading
> Quote:Introduction book part one (hidden)
>
> Congratulations on finding the rings, you now have to soul link the rings.
> To do this you have to place both rings in your hands, and say Link!
> Give the rings to your soul partner and say Link again.
> When that is done both take one ring and place them at the same time around your finger. At that moment you will be soul linked
> and you will learn the skill Teleport.
"Well let's do it," Xandit and Sanni followed the instructions of the hidden part from the book. The moment they put on the ring.
*Ting
> Quote:Quest complete.
>
> Level up.
>
> Soul linked.
>
> NEW Class: Soul-Link
> Class bonus effects:
> -5% Exp rate gain, will increase when leveling up.
> You can learn all skills, but you can only select 10 primary skills, you will be able to select more skill when leveling up. All other skills will be 1/6 as effectively will increase when leveling up.
> Increase drop rate 1%, will increase when leveling up.
> Increase drop rate rarity 1%, will increase when leveling up.
> You learned the skill teleport.
> Cooldown 4 hours
> Teleport skill level 0.01%.
> You can now teleport to your HQ.
> All stats, skills and inventory except hunger are now shared with each other.
> Loading new stats.
>
> http%3a%2f%2fimg853.imageshack.us%2fimg853%2f8380%2fstats3t.png [http://img853.imageshack.us/img853/8380/stats3t.png]
At the moment's they closed their stats window they were teleported.
-END- V1CH1