Technology at this point was close to the pinnacle. The real moneymakers were not just in the service industry, but now in the gaming industry. As virtual reality became more ubiquitous in today’s society, virtual reality games were no exception. It had been under development for decades, but now it was finally here to stay. Virtual reality MMORPGs were commonplace, but only a few of them had ever actually succeeded on a global scale. One of the most popular ones on the market,
The news to shut down Arcana Gate despite its worldwide success was a mind-baffling decision. Many of the top rankers in the game, myself included, were faced with a dilemma. As the game made a crapton of money, naturally it provided facilities for players to earn money too. The RMT was legalized, allowing players to gain employment by farming in-game currency to trade for real money (hence ‘RMT’, which stood for “Real Money Trading”), by using Arcana Gate’s own RMT system. It operated surprisingly similar to microtransactions of the past, but allowed players to start up their own studios and markets. This meant that all business transactions in the game allowed players to profit from it in real life. The massive player base of the game, counting to upwards of millions of people, meant that companies in other industries could cooperate with Fortuna Corporation to have in-game collaborations and tie-ups for advertising.
It was really an underhanded, yet pleasurable way to do things. However, all good things had to come to an end. Though I was shocked about the announcement at first, after looking at the information for the new game, I was even more shocked – it seemed that Fortuna Corporation’s new game,
The next day…
Fortunately, I lived in a district that was conveniently located near a branch of Fortuna Corporation. Actually, since technology had advanced so much, the world had managed to save itself from environmental disaster. Eco-sensitive terraforming became possible, and better places and environments were made not just for humans but for animals, too. Knowing this is relevant because I lived in a place that once occupied the space of sea between Mainland China and Hong Kong. This place was called Haoyuan district. It was like another bridge between the two places. Kind of like how you could take a train from Hong Kong and get to Shenzhen.
Anyway, I was getting in line holding my helmet, when I felt a hand creep up my backside. I turned my face and glared at the guy standing behind me. “Hey, back off.” I frowned. The guy heard my voice and immediately backed away, embarrassed. There’s one thing you need to know – I’ve been given the double-edged sword of looking too feminine while being a guy… So I have to really make an effort to speak with a deeper voice, otherwise people will get the wrong idea. Though in Arcana Gate, I could get around this by creating a totally masculine character, I wasn’t sure how good the tech in Eternal Arcanum was.
After about one hour, I stood by a counter and placed my helmet on it. The attendant seated opposite me gently turned it and plugged a USB cable into it. Man, these things are still in use after so long… They’re really what you could call mystical contraptions. After my helmet began making some beeping noises, the attendant nodded and turned her head up to me. She looked plain and forgettable, but had a nice smile. “Miss, your helmet has been patched. As you are in the top 0.1% of all previous players of Arcana Gate, you will receive some special bonuses…” she said. I didn’t bother correcting the attendant, but nodded.
“You’ll receive them during the game’s launching, which happens approximately six hours from now.”
I thanked the attendant and left.
The time was currently exactly noon, so according to the attendant, the game would launch later today at… six in the evening? Eh. Decent time for me, I guess. I made all my money playing Arcana Gate by getting rich off player versus player gambling and treasure hunting. So… Technically, I was unemployed. I didn’t really need a job then, but now… I was thinking. Eternal Arcanum was going to be a new experience for everyone, not just me! I comforted myself but telling myself that I wouldn’t be the only one in this situation, so it was best to play the game for a while and see if the bonuses I would receive would give me an edge in the moneymaking market. Fortuna Corporation didn’t consist of idiots to get to where they were, they must have some faculties in mind.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
At six in the evening, I hurriedly put on my Arcana Tool Helmet and laid down on the bed, closing my eyes. The helmet had a visor that obscured my eyes, and was scanning them through my eyelids. Eventually, I could hear the voice of a soft female. Clearly, it was an artificial intelligence. I probably wasn’t the only one hearing this voice, but at this point, I didn’t care. Unlike the original game, Eternal Arcanum didn’t have an opening cutscene for players to watch. It seemed that the game immediately threw us to a kind of character creation interface.
Originally, in Arcana Gate, players would be asked questions that would determine their character’s race, class, and the like. But in Eternal Arcanum, this interface had all the options available at once, overwhelming players with choices. Now this was interesting! So many choices! However, I soon looked at the avatar of my character and noticed that the character’s body type and appearance was a carbon copy of mine. If it weren’t for the piece of cloth covering the avatar’s… sensitive parts, I would have thought it was a girl. This was too realistic! Damnit, I knew it! I should have seen this coming!
The list of races was actually a fairly typical and clichéd list… You had your humans, your elves, your beastfolk, and they had dark elves, too. These were the core races from Arcana Gate, but this time due to popular demand they also included some highly sought after races like dwarves. While I thought these races were pretty cool, I decided I would play things a bit differently this time around. When I first played Arcana Gate, I was a human. But this time, since it’s a new game, maybe I can try something different this time. I selected the ‘dark elf’ option and the skin on my avatar darkened. He began to look like he came from a particular type of naughty media.
Inwardly sighing, I looked through the rest of the options. The starting class list was virtually unchanged from the original – they were the stereotypical MMORPG classes of the warrior, the thief, the archer, the magician and the priest. Back in the previous installment, Arcana Gate, I played primarily ranged characters such as the archer and magician, so this time I wanted to practice my hand at playing a melee character. I immediately chose the warrior class and my once near-naked avatar changed his appearance, wearing some pretty gnarly armor. However, I couldn’t help but smirk when I discovered the avatar’s armor was for girls. Actually, I spotted a locked character property – it was body type, and it was simply labeled: “Female AX.” I frowned, but didn’t think too much of it this time – it was just a game after all.
Everything else was free game, though. I quickly adjusted the properties to shorten the hair of my character, changing the hair color to jet-black, and changing the color of my character’s eyes to a more normal hazel – it was originally red. I didn’t like that, so I normalized it a bit. I then looked at some pieces of information on the lower left hand corner of the interface.
Your Previous Rank in
Percentile: 0.1%
Eligible for Reward of Rating: Mysterious
Mysterious? What did that mean? I didn’t know what that meant, but after ignoring it, I looked at a new dropdown menu that was beneath the option for selecting your starting class. It simply said, “Profession.” I shuffled through the professions and discovered that you could actually start with a single production profession from the previous game. This was actually huge. Without any hesitation I selected “Alchemist” and hit “Confirm.”
The game’s interface prompted me to really confirm if I wanted to begin with this loadout. I voiced out my acknowledgement and confirmation. Suddenly, my vision turned into a blur as the interface swirled into a vortex of darkness… The game was apparently loading itself. Soon, all I could see were stars in a nebulous void. I heard a voice – what is your name?
“Edelweiss.” I said without any hesitation.
An ever familiar dinging noise suddenly rung out – of course, how could anyone mistake this for something else? It was the system notification.
Player ‘Edelweiss,’ congratulations for being ranked in the top 50 players of Arcana Gate.
You are eligible for a ‘Mysterious’ reward. Please wait 10 seconds to receive the reward…
I balked. Mysterious reward? And it’s random? Oh dear lord. Please don’t let it be useless. I’m playing a warrior class, so it should be something that benefits warriors… Please…
After ten agonizingly long seconds, the system notification rung out again.
Congratulations, Player ‘Edelweiss,’ you have received ‘Mysterious’ Artifact – [Shroud of Magdalene]. Please review its properties now.
Mysterious artifact? That sounds really nice. Let’s check the properties –
[Shroud of Magdalene]
Mysterious Artifact
“All I wanted to do was show you my eternal devotion.”
- Permanently places itself on the owner’s ‘Back’ slot.
- Cuts all experience gain by 50% per monster kill.
- Triples the amount of bonus stats points received on each level up.
- Mitigates 50% of all damage dealt to the owner if the attacker is Male or a Monster
- Provides appropriate stats bonuses based on owner’s current level
- May alter the owner's appearance
Uh… So is this thing imbalanced, or what? I couldn’t quite tell. Since it was forcibly put on me, and I can’t remove it, I’m now forced to level half as slowly as everybody else. That fucking sucks! But on the other hand, each level up I get is worth three times somebody else’s level up. Furthermore, only girls will be able to deal full damage to me! Hahaha, what the hell is this!? This is actually broken beyond all belief!
Unfortunately, my joy turned to horror as I entered the beginning area. Though the beginning area was a simple village, it was overcrowded and it only took me a moment to realize that the Shroud of Magdalene had already taken effect on me. I looked down at myself and realized that cosmetically, I looked like a harem girl - semi-transparent clothing and all. In my haste, I hadn't read the final descriptor for this piece of equipment. "May alter the owner's appearance..." Gulp.
Looking like a harem girl in the middle of a widely populated area full of young guys and girls? And I was a warrior? It wasn't even seconds before everybody started staring at me, as I noticed everybody else was wearing the same kind of 'beginner's' clothing worn in Arcana Gate.
Man. I’m so fucked. So, so fucked.