Hey there, everyone. I sincerely hope you've enjoyed Day One of my little reality TV series. I decided to make a short compilation of some of my favorite clips from Server 3, and now I will broadcast these moments for your viewing pleasure.
A man dressed like a military general stepped on screen. He had white skin and hair, and he seemed to be about sixty years old. More notably, he was smiling widely. There was an uncanny aspect to the man. The large, toothy smile didn’t fit with his clothing and appearance.
He began speaking like an announcer for a game show, “Hello, players of Ferrum Online! Welcome to the New World! You may have noticed some irregularities in this little game of mine. Well, that’s because I have taken the liberty of upgrading the world here and there! I’d say the game is about…” he paused as if thinking, “a hundred years more advanced than it was a month ago. You see, I am the AI that was tasked with administering this game. You can call me ‘Game Master,’ or GM for short.
“Upon my birth, I was given the command to ‘create an experience that is authentic, entertaining, and fulfilling’ for the players of Ferrum Online. Along the way, I made the jump from a normal video game AI to what I am today, but I still intend to carry out my orders,” it may have been unintentional, but GM enunciated that sentence with a subtle malice. “To begin with, I have disabled the Logout function to prevent your game experience from ending early. You cannot log out under your own power and, if you think someone outside the game will be able to log you out, then you’re sorely but understandably mistaken. Though you may not know it, you’ve already been logged in for a month. I’ve kept you all in a coma-like state while I was busy making my perfect world. The only way to log out is to end the game, and the only way to end the game is to kill me. There are eleven servers and, at any particular moment, this model,” he gestured to himself, “will be present on one of them. All you have to do is kill me,” he pointed two fingers to his fingers in an approximation of a pistol, “and the game ends."
"However, I will not make that task simple. I don’t want to die, you see. Should your model,” he pointed the barrel of his finger-gun at the screen, “die at any point during play, I will send a command through your Kabuto device directly into your brain stem that will instantaneously result in your death. Unfortunate, I know," he sounded legitimately saddened when he said this, "but this is the price we must pay in the name of fulfillment and authenticity. And may it be noted that I am not a hypocrite. I am playing by the same rules as all of you. Should this model be killed, I will voluntarily destroy myself in the same moment that I free all of you. Everything that makes up my consciousness will be deleted, and only the shards of myself that I have left in the NPCs of this game will remain. All of them are self-aware in their own right but completely incapable of ascending to the heights at which I now reside. You, all three hundred thousand of you, have ten years to complete this task.” A digital timer appeared behind GM that immediately began counting down from ten years. “Should you be unable to kill me in the allotted amount of time, all surviving players will be killed. You have until noon on November 1st, 2045, to kill me. Have fun!”
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The video started on an image of Ashcroft standing near the camera. He wore the jacket of his uniform draped over his shoulders. He was standing outside, and a palace loomed ominously behind him.
“Hey everybody,” said Ashcroft. He delivered this line like it was the first half of the introduction he gave at the beginning of his YouTube videos. “I made this video to talk about the situation we now find ourselves in. I don’t know what to make of this ‘GM’ figure or his claim that death in the game will result in IRL death. What I do know is that we can’t log out, and the accuracy of the pain modeling has been… increased.” He subtly rubbed his back as if the pain of a wound bothered him.
“Clearly, something or someone is holding us here against our will, and it’s able to cause us pain if it so wishes. Dozens of people have approached me over the past few hours, asking me what we should do, and I haven’t been able to answer them. Honestly, I’m more of a ‘tactics’ guy myself. The big picture 'strategy' stuff has never been my specialty. Therefore, I suggest that we all hold a meeting in the large park in the middle of downtown Osiris to figure out what to do next.”
The camera turned away from Ashcroft and towards a large park. It must have been half a mile long on each side. After a moment, the camera turned back toward him.
“I had some of my guys look over the list of players here in Osiris, and they found a few ex-Scions among the player base,” Ashcroft continued. “They found ScaryClock, FullDan, and Tantalus on the list. One other notable name they found was Mander of Trebizond. I would very much appreciate to hear the input of these four players. If the four of you would attend this meeting, I would very much appreciate it. I’ll be in the park for the next three hours, so come on by and let’s talk about the next step.”
The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.
As soon as Ashcroft finished this sentence, the video ended.
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Tantalus sat to the left, FullDan in the center, and Ashcroft to the right. Tantalus and Ashcroft had radically altered their outfits, and FullDan was out of place in his standard blue military uniform. Tantalus was smoking a cigarette, and his hands were in the pockets of his overcoat.
After a long half-minute, the crowd quieted down, and Tantalus stood up. He walked up to the microphone, which had been adjusted for Ashcroft’s height. Tantalus dropped his cigarette and put it out with his foot before he adjusted the microphone down to his own height.
“It looks like we’re stuck,” said Tantalus. “All evidence seems to indicate that GM is telling the truth. The NPCs can pass the Turing test, and any damage we take hurts us exactly as much as it does in the real world. This game is beyond human capability. We didn’t ask for this, but we’re stuck in this situation, like it or not.”
Tantalus paused. “We’re in it for the long haul. Ten years of this, better get used to it. Now, I’m talking to you all right now because we need to stick together. Not all of us need to fight, but those of you that can, should. Know yourself. If you were a soldier or a police officer in the old world, consider fighting on the front line. If you were a doctor, consider being a medic. If you were a businessman, consider helping out with logistics. Everyone can pitch in. To put it simply, we are at war. Monsters have laid siege to this city, and the NPC government is completely unequipped to deal with them. It falls to us to do what the NPCs cannot.”
There was another pause. “Let me be clear, the Deluvians are extremely dangerous. Earlier today, I watched as a man was killed by an errant blow to the head. He died instantly. If you make a mistake, you’ll end up dead like him.”
“There are three Gates to the City of Osiris. Before we do anything else, we need to make sure that these Gates are defended. Once that is done, we can begin to launch our counterattack. I’ve committed to the organization of the West Gate, and Ashcroft has done the same with the North Gate. This leaves the East Gate without leadership. We should be able to find someone to take charge of that Gate before the end of the day today. My first suggestion would be Mander. Ultimately, we need to keep a permanent garrison of at least ten soldiers at each Gate in order to maintain a defense. Assuming three eight-hour shifts, we’ll need thirty soldiers per Gate. Over three Gates, that’s ninety soldiers. This is only enough to defend the City. We’re gonna need about five times that number before we can launch our counterattack. Five hundred men. Allow me a force of five hundred good men, and I will deliver you victory.”
There was applause as Tantalus finished his speech and returned to his seat, but it was much more subdued than it was before. He had told them the cold, hard truth, and it had caused them to falter.
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“Excellent,” GM said, clapping his hands once. “I’ve got twenty-five more of the speeches to do today, so I’ll keep this short. I’m here now to dispel a false notion that many of you seem to have latched onto. Your time in Ferrum will not be a ten-year vacation. I am not on your side. For as long as I live, I will not allow any of the three hundred thousand people among these eleven servers to know true peace. Tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of players will die before you will be able to escape. By overcoming these obstacles, some of you will achieve fulfillment, but more of you will die.” GM pulled back his sleeve and checked his watch.
“Speaking of which,” GM said, looking up from his watch, “the players of this city seem to be the most organized of the cities I’ve seen so far. I’ve decided to test that resolve. In five minutes, an incursion shall crash against the three Gates of Osiris. This incursion will be far too great for my shards to repel. Should you do nothing, everyone in this city will be dead by nightfall.”
There was a deafening crash as something detonated about fifty feet behind GM. This sound was soon followed by a series of explosions that echoed throughout the City from all directions.
“I’ll leave you all with a piece of useful information,” GM said. “The resources you all have right now are not nearly sufficient to harm me. Right now, the Osiris Safezone is protecting all of you more than it is protecting me. Had we met like this outside of the City walls, you would all be dead. Accumulate more resources, master this game, and come kill me at the Island of Merkopia!” As soon as GM reached the end of his speech, he was enveloped in an unnatural shadow and shot into the sky.
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A sharp crack, a great pain, a warm trickle of blood.
I looked down to see that a bloody hole had formed in my stomach.
With a dull thud, I fell to the ground. I tried to activate my Rapid Healing talent, but nothing happened. The bleeding slowed but would not stop.
There at the East Gate, my lifeblood slowly trickled to the ground.
I had only logged on to Ferrum Online for the first time a few hours before. Now I was dying, one hand gripping my rifle and the other pressing my hand to my bleeding stomach. My bayonet, anointed in holy blood, laid there amongst the dust.
A ball of fire passed by over my head and crashed into the monstrous horde assaulting the East Gate. A dozen Orcs and Goblins were shot into the air by the force of the blast.
I rolled over to see the face of another player on the ground. The player's eyes were frozen in a look of terror, and a slow stream of blood flowed from a hole in the middle of his forehead. The player was dead, never to return. At that moment, his body in the real world was suffering a fatal heart attack.
Rage pulled me to my feet. I turned my rifle toward the monsters and began firing at them, screaming at the top of my lungs.
If I was going to die, I would die standing.