“My name is Mara Sato and I write LitRPG books. I hope you enjoy the first chapter of my upcoming book”

VIRTUAL FURY, GAMER'S REDEMPTION

CHAPTER 1

Fallen From Grace

MARCH 25, 3010

The sound of Coach Douglas' whistle pierced through the air, momentarily deafening the teenagers on the court and anyone else within earshot. When he wasn't there, some students called him Doug as they made jokes and mimicked his janky walk. Coach Doug had gotten his limp from his earlier career playing professional dodgeball overseas.

He was dressed in a black tracksuit. This was a special day, and the excitement in the auditorium, which sometimes doubled as the assembly ground, was palpable. He was grading the tests that would significantly affect their performance assessment scores.

It was mid-day, and their peers had gathered to observe the entertaining destruction of the final dodgeball match, which was sworn to be equally entertaining and destructive. They were incredibly excited to watch Myron Hawkins obliterate the red team.

This was Facton High School, a public school. This meant that the air conditioning vents were just there for decoration, and only four of the ten weirdly long ceiling fans were working. The court had the markings of the basketball court, but the rim and basket were absent.

None of the boys wanted to lose the game. Losing this game would have varying consequences for each of them. The rules were simple: Hit and eliminate the four players on the opposition’s team and eliminate them.

The boys rushed for the eight balls in the middle of the court. The teams were separated into two teams of four, both wearing old blue and red shirts to distinguish their teams. Everyone picked up a ball and hauled it at the other team, determined to knock them off with the most devastating and precise hits they could muster. Myron had not moved an inch; he did not bother about how his teammates were proceeding. His teammates dodged, threw, and fumed under their breaths at how much help Myron provided to the team.

Coach Doug considered blowing a cautionary sanction against him, but this was Myron, even though he knew to expect something irregular from him. Moreover, he didn’t see any worth putting in additional effort for such a low- paying job. The balls flew around intensely, gathering sweat and bouncing off heads, bodies, and legs. The boys scattered around, and Coach Doug's eyes darted to follow who was being eliminated and who stayed, all while mildly distracted by Myron.

Myron was a member of the Celestial family. He was just a branch member but knew he didn't have to be so zealous at such a low-reward activity. He already knew, just as they were convinced, how the game would end, and he expected that there would be no surprises. He was inevitable; they knew it, but they had to do their best.

The red team went straight for blood. They had huddled before the whistle and came up with their game plan. “Myron doesn’t look like he’s in the game today, but we need to take him out first,” Franklin mentioned as they all frantically chucked their dodgeballs at the unresponsive Myron, hoping to eliminate him before he found them worthy to target.

Myron didn’t see them as a threat, as he barely moved to avoid their weakly thrown shots. He could hear the whistle of the rubber balls as they whisked past his ear. Some of the balls that were quick enough and on target intensified the hot harmattan breeze that plagued the entire auditorium.

Myron glanced at Coach Doug for a second and was only mildly missed by Franklin’s shot. “That was pretty close,” he thought to himself. He didn’t care for most teenagers in the gym, but Franklin seemed slightly different. Unlike the rest of the class, Franklin was tall; everyone looked tall to Myron, but he was tall. He had an unusual physique, bulky but not muscular. He was a big boy; contrary to how menacing he may have looked, he was pretty chill and could be found most of the time minding his own business.

Franklin scoffed in annoyance at being unable to smack the high and mighty smirk that covered Myron’s face. Myron caught the ball in his right hand in front of his face. He didn’t imagine anyone getting that close, let alone it being the easiest target on the court. The impressive shot reminded Myron of a core memory from his childhood with his elder sister, Sheila, who had knocked him out with a dodgeball.

Myron could see the excitement on his teammate’s faces as he caught the ball. They knew they had the best player on their team, but he was known to not carry the team spirit on his back. The blue team hoped he would finally move a muscle and maybe hit someone. Myron eyed Franklin for what seemed like an eternity and dropped the ball on the floor. Franklin quickly took the opportunity to shoot a second ball at Myron’s stomach, swiftly and with kind of a spin; he thought that if Myron were busy dealing with the first one, he wouldn’t be able to stop the second one. Myron quickly dodges the shot, just in time. His teammates dared not complain; they hated what Myron was doing but wouldn’t say anything about it. They needed him more than he needed them, and they knew it.

Franklin and the red team could not hide their shock as Myron effortlessly dodged their advances and put their tactics in shambles.

“They’re confused; attack them,” Jason said under his breath as he and the remaining blue team took advantage of the opportunity to try and eliminate the red team; unfortunately, they had the hand-to-eye coordination of a panda. The red team braced themselves for elimination. “They missed,” someone shouted from the crowd, a chant followed by a small segment of laughter and a roaring cheer from their peers.

In disgust, Coach Doug squeezed his face as their horrible shots missed everything but the wall behind the red team. Franklin’s size had placed him as the De Facto leader of the red, and he changed his strategy, and aimed for the players who missed everything. The spectators were having a good time as Franklin took out the third player on the blue team. The game lasted for five minutes, and Myron just stood there. He wondered if Coach Doug would do anything to him if he walked off the court. Jason’s yelp brought him back to reality. He was the last person from the blue team to be eliminated.

But everyone knew who was on the blue team. Franklin and the crowd knew Myron was a formidable opponent even when he wasn't in the game.

All eyes were on Myron, and he had a ball in his hand. It seemed to almost appear in his hand, but he had caught it when it bounced off the floor from Jason’s just a second ago. The Auditorium went silent. This was the first thing Myron had done all game. Myron could feel the held breaths of his opponents and the other students watching from the stands. There was an increase in the difficulty level, and the competition was becoming challenging.

Myron bounced the ball again; you could feel the crowd tense up in anticipation of his next move. No one knew what he was going to do. The only thing everyone could be sure of was that he did not care whether his team won or lost this game. Myron could hear his shoes squeak as he quickly inched towards the half-field line. Myron was quick; everyone knew he was, but he moved noticeably slower, like a snake stalking his prey.

With each step he took towards the half-court line, more crowd members stood on their feet.

“Stay sharp! He's coming!” Franklin called out to his teammates, a moment too late, as he saw the ball flying fast in motion; he had been prepared to catch the ball, even though his teammates hadn’t been; he had, or so he thought. The ball moved precisely coordinated; a flawless spike had set the ball in motion, desperation right on his tongue as he stretched his hands, trying to stop the impending doom, but as always, skills were never enough, even sometimes strength wasn't, and now was one of those times, he watched as the ball moved past him heading fast towards his teammate. This cheeky boy couldn’t move fast enough. It bounced off his chest with a BAM sound, acknowledging the teenager's body fat.

Franklin gritted his teeth in anger; he turned in time to find another ball in Myron’s hands. Myron had tasted blood; He was active now. The crowd cheered in excitement as he moved swiftly around the court. “Spread out,” Franklin called to his team, anticipating the onslaught he was expecting from Myron’s hands. He figured that would make the team a more challenging target for him to knock all out.

Myron whisked around the court with an unreal quickness. His black eyes darted around as the red team spread out. He kept moving, whisking past their shots with ease and calmly calculating his next course of action.

Franklin took his second shot, but it missed everything. All power and no precision, Franklin thought. Perhaps he needed to be moving faster and lost the target. The ball flew straight toward the wall where an unlucky chap was heading. It bounced off the wall, finding space on his face. The ball had enough force to hone in on Franklin. Reacting quickly, Franklin dodged the ball, bending backward, re-enacting the move he had seen in The Matrix, a movie his mum had forced him to watch a few days ago. Unfortunately, the movie never taught them how to get back up; he fell flatly on the floor. The ball found solace at the back of a skinny kid’s head, and the deflection redirected the ball back to the fallen Franklin.

Coach Doug was on his feet. It had promised just as much entertainment as he thought. Celebrations were in order. If not for the excellent grades that would be handed to the members of the blue team, it was the sheer excitement of eliminating their competition in such spectacular fashion. The audience cheered in admiration, and the blue team members punched their hands in the air with joy as they rushed to hug the proud teammate.

Myron Hawkins was 167 cm in height with jet black hair and a unique shape of eyes that’s been termed “hunter's eyes”; he was known for his sharp observation skill. He didn't find his targets because he was stronger and could throw the ball faster than them; it was because his first throw found the red team member, not because it was too fast. Myron didn’t have high physical specs, which was surprising since he was a member of a celestial family. Even if it was a branch, he had observed and thrown the ball promptly into the teammate's blind spot.

Coach Doug played for the Coldshark team in his younger years, and even in his professional career, he thought Myron’s hands were the most ridiculous hands he had ever seen; everything the boy threw at, he knew how to find its mark. His accuracy was off the charts; whether it be a moving object or a tiny one, he always knew how to find his target. His archery skills? Bonkers! Dart throwing? Bullseye! Despite his height, throwing an object or an item, even shooting a basketball into the net, wasn’t too strenuous for him. All he needed was the strength to stay on the court and bump bodies with the rest of the team. Myron had only failed in one Throwing-oriented sport, which was the javelin. He always thought it was too heavy for him and wished the javelin was smaller or at least lighter. He was the man for the job as long as it wasn’t heavy like a javelin or a hammer in a hammer throw.

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His talent was the primary reason it was complicated to deal with him since everyone thought he was a self-centered, selfish, proud, and spoilt brat, and all he cared about was the spotlight being on him. He would never work with his teammates, and even though he would net them many points, it usually cost them a lot. He thought he was just strong-willed, trying to understand why anyone would want him to change how he played or his approach to his craft. The rest of the students thought he was simply arrogant and unwilling to change or listen to correction; Coach felt a vein pop up in his head remembering the various moments he had tried to make him work with his teammates,

“Coach!” “Coach!”

A student called out to him; he turned his head in time to spot Myron calling for help. His blue team members were beating him up, apparently when they had rushed to cheer with him for winning them the points. He had pushed them off in high aloofness. Their joy had immediately switched into rage as they had pounced on him.

“Oww!” Myron screamed as the nurse placed ointment on his wounds

He wasn’t used to injuries. He usually attacked his problems from afar, and they usually ran from him, too.

“Not so arrogant now, boy,” the nurse teased. She had delicate hands for such a muscular person. She was pretty, too, but the scars on her hand indicated that she had seen at least a few battles. She chucked a little and had a lively smile on her face. She had seen worse injuries.

“Maybe if you did your work properly, you wouldn’t be a lonely woman,” he retorted

“Why don’t you shut up, gremlin?” the nurse replied as she added a little force with the ointment to his wounds, earning him another series of screams. The smile on her face had faded but had a resurgence when she heard him scream.

After some minutes of care, she gave him an ice pack for his swollen head.

“Now, what do you say after being helped?” she asked.

“Fuck you?”

“Might as well add to your injuries,” she said as she drew out a cudgel from her drawers.

“Thank you. I’m sorry,” he quickly added.

“Tone your stupid ego down; you wouldn’t last long in the real world with that behavior, even if you’re a celestial family member, there’s always a high before the fall, and your shitty luck would definitely make that happen fast, now get out of my sight before I give you a real reason to need to visit the hospital,” she said.

Tyla was the Facton High nurse. Many of the students had a mix of admiration and fear for her. She was rumored to have once been extraordinary and a member of a celestial family but was now marked as fallen from grace. This was the term given to someone banned/ exiled from a celestial family. Nobody knew why she was banished, but there were rumors.

Tyla’s words carried a little more weight than everyone else who usually said something to or about him because of the rumors. It didn’t matter to him, though; He discarded the thought just as it came to his mind and deemed it the ramblings of a disgraced old witch. By the time he left the infirmary, the school had closed for the day. It was now time to go home.

The world has evolved slowly over the years; ever since the creation of the virtual reality game “Eternium '' the world has refused to be the same. The game was controlled by a powerful AI known as Prometheus-0. It was a game that could keep updating and processing by itself without needing a physical company the moment it went live.

The technology of AI was so groundbreaking that various powerhouse governments of the world, realizing they couldn’t take it, tried to destroy it but failed. The technology could understand humanity and reason like them frighteningly while also being a powerful computational device. Yet it was used to power a game.

Over the years, Eternium had evolved from a basic casual game to a second reality that affects the world, serving as a source of income and replacing many things, like jobs around the world. Over the years, the government battled against the game and finally surrendered when they realized that an individual could die in real life but could continue to exist; death in real life was not death in the game.

After reaching a certain level in the game, the AI properly registered your consciousness and personality. If one died in real life, they continued to exist in the game. Later, their consciousness could be transferred to a real-life body with technology to bring them back to the real world. At this point, they knew it is too late to stop the game.

Eternium as a second reality didn’t just signify the end of the idea of the current world. Instead, it served as the beginning of a vast new world. Humans also evolved in technology in the real world, even slowly establishing themselves on other planets due to the increase in world population. Wars were no longer fought in reality, but in Eternium, various procedures and punishments were implemented to reduce crime. However, the end of the old government was the world's most significant change.

During the early days of Eternium, the elite players had quickly jumped on the game, being the very first to access this new technology; they established themselves in the game at first as casuals, but as the actual value of the game came to light and various government politics and powers came into the game. It changed overall; the players who could stand through and consolidate their forces through skills and cunning in the game, despite the various challenges, were then recognized as superpowers.

When each player, with their following force, solidified their status and kept evolving in line with the game, Prometheus-0 had to accord them a last name as a family name for their standing through the ages. The ten most powerful of all families were called a celestial family. A celestial family had to consist of various members with god-level abilities per the game terms. Their status in the game was reflected in reality as the different world governments crumbled, slowly allying and solidifying the status of the families.

The celestial family, the peak of powers, was regarded as the new rulers/governments of both the virtual and real worlds. Being termed fallen from grace was regarded as a curse in Eternium and seen as a mark of shame in the real world.

Myron lived in Hawkins's villa for as long as he could remember; it has always been alive inside his home. He stayed with his sister, Sheila, and three maids. They had guards at the villa who ensured they were never in danger. Sheila was older and taller than him. He called her Shey. Her voice was as soft as her skin. She had a close relationship with Myron. She cared for him for most of his younger years, and he couldn't imagine a world without her.

When they were younger, and Myron could not yet read, she would read the Eternium guidebook to him and explain the rules and archetypes. Myron was always excited to see her after school, even though she was not always home most of the time. Today was her arrival date from one of her expeditions. Finally, he thought, away from that place and back with my sister.

She had been physically absent when she got old enough to create an Eternium account. Being just a branch member of a celestial family had many benefits but also its downsides, and he dreamt of one day being in the main branch, providing for his eldest sister, the only one he cared about.

He didn’t know much about what she did for the main family, nor did he even know the name of the main family he was a branch of. There was a rule that this knowledge wouldn't be available until he was eighteen. He had read the manuals over and over again. They made him feel more connected with his sister, even when she wasn’t around. Eighteen was the legal age for one to enter Eternium; he was fifteen, three more years, and he could work with or even provide for his sister.

When Myron got to his villa, he noticed it was abandoned. The guards usually opened the doors for him. At this point, he had a routine. They would see him walk towards the door, he would signal to them by raising his left hand, and they would swing the doors open for him to stroll in while they held their salute.

But it was different today. Nobody was at the door to watch him lift his right hand. The large doors required the muscular men to be explicitly trained to open them.

Two doors opened down the middle. He had never taken the time to look at their composition. They seemed extra shiny today, but their gold paint had faded a little, and they screeched when he pushed them. He had tired of waiting and decided to open the door himself.

He didn’t usually have a lot of company in the house, but it felt strange today. But he was home, and that was all that mattered to him.

He stepped in, making for his room. “That's weird; who turned the light off?” He quizzed as he walked some steps into his hall. The lights were never off. The guards usually signaled the serfs to switch the lights on whenever he was on the way. He wanted to call out one of his serfs but didn’t know their names.

He thought it was a waste of time and resources to remember the serf’s names when they constantly changed and cycled with those from the other branches. The lights came on as he touched all of them. It was brighter than he had been used to; he felt blind, unable to tell what was behind the light. He quickly covered his eyes and waited for them to adjust.

He saw everyone, his serfs and guards, bowing before a young man sitting on a throne-like chair with a cloak and a silver eye band covering his eyes. In the middle of the eye-band was an image of a golden-rimmed mirror with an opened eye in the middle of the mirror; he had a tippet on his shoulder with a bishop chess piece on it and a miter on his head carrying the eye in the mirror image.

“What is happening?”

The gold colors of his dressing and his light skin, alongside the bright yellow chandelier lights in the hall of the villa, formed a holy matrimony that gave the man before him a domineering aura like he was something to be worshipped - like it was an honor for Myron to even stand before him and set his eyes on him. He suddenly felt dirty by being in his presence and was too stunned for some time.

He recognized the symbol belonging to one of the celestial families but didn’t know which one. Information about celestial families was not necessarily banned from being posted online, but it was not available to the public, yet they were the only ones granted a symbol.

“Welcome, Myron Hawkins,” the words rolled off the individual’s tongue so smoothly, almost as if he had practiced calling Myron’s name for some time.

The mention of his name sent chills down his spine. He could feel the pasta he had eaten crawling back to his throat. He tried to control the gulp he could feel coming while remaining frozen on his feet.

His skin crawled, and he felt goosebumps rise with every second in his presence. This was his home. Where did that throne even come from? Why did nobody tell him? Why is he here? The Celestials never visited this branch, and he wondered what the special occasion must have been to bring this person to the villa.

“Why do you still stand before me?” He asked, slowly tilting his head, his eyebrows conveying all the emotion that they needed to

“I’m sorry, your lordship.” he fell to his knees immediately.

“Bring forth the infidel,” the man ordered

Infidel?

Myron wondered; as some of the serfs brought a bleeding lady down the stairs, they forced her to her knees. Myron recognized her instantly. He had not seen her in at least eight months, but her features were unmistakable. It was his sister. Sheila looked tired. The fear quickly turned to anger, just as intense as he had just felt before the stranger. Before he could say anything, one serf carried him and dropped him beside her.

He couldn’t struggle. His body trembled with a mix of fear and anger. He hated that he could not do anything about it. The room was cold. The white walls felt smaller than they ever seemed before. His hall was large by hall standards—the Hawkins villa was even bigger. Every room was about 15 feet high, with walls to match the massive aura. Myron always felt a little small whenever he was around. The walls were white; they reflected the light at him.

He hadn't been this close to his sister in a long time. He rushed towards her, and she opened her arms and received him. She rubbed his head just like she used to when they were younger. She dragged him closer for comfort. Her embrace felt like feathered pillows; they were his real home, where he had truly felt peace. “Begin,” his voice pierced through the quiet room as the figure rose and directed the serfs to form a circle around Myron and Sheila.

“Sheila, wha-what’s going on?” He asked his sister

The lights went off immediately; the only illumination came from the linked hands of the guards and serfs, who, looking more closely, didn't seem familiar to Myron. The circle glowed a dark green. Myron’s legs felt like jelly, and all the energy to fight back seemed to leave his body.

The circle opened up, and the mysterious branch member was now dressed in a robe so white it could be seen despite the darkness in the room. He held a book open in his hands and, along with the serfs, chanted. The glow turned orange as he approached, and the chants got louder. The man spoke the same tone as the other serfs, but Myron could understand him clearly. Everyone else now said in the same tongue:

In hallowed halls, where vows were made. An infidel kneels, his promise betrayed and embraced by shadows, a sinful phase. God's light extinguished, a chilling trace. Your deeds laid bare, a fearsome sight. For ye have fallen from grace’s light.

“Nurse Tyla was right; I’ve got bad luck.”