April 2, 2100
Kristine woke up from the smell of brewed coffee, toasted bread and fried eggs. She got out of bed without fixing it or her appearance and drowsily left the bedroom.
As she entered the living room, the first thing that she saw was Vincent sitting on the floor by the coffee table, with a cup of coffee in one hand and a news magazine on the other. Standing by the coffee table was Lawrence, setting food on the table while wearing a frilly pink apron.
It was a bizarre sight to say the least.
“Oh, good morning!”
Lawrence greeted her with a bright smile that seemed to shine like the sun. Vincent turned his head and nodded at her then went back to reading the magazine.
Kristine remembered the events of last night. After Lawrence’s announcement, she had a sudden headache. Trying to push the two out of her apartment, they knelt on the ground and begged to allow them to stay for the night. Vincent didn’t want to walk back home (riding wasn’t an option). Lawrence had nowhere to go. In the end, she let the two sleep in the living room.
Now, the two acted as if they own the place.
Exhausted by the turn of events, she ignored the two and walked into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator to grab a glass of milk. She noticed that she was almost out of eggs and took note of it. There was an upcoming sale tomorrow night in the nearby market.
As she returned to the living room she sat by the coffee table, in front of Vincent. He raised his eyes to look at her, then went back to reading. What the hell? Kristine didn’t know what he was thinking.
Soon, a set of plate and utensils had been placed in front of her. It was slightly cramped in the table. She had bought this coffee table instead of a normal one as she never thought of having other people to share it with.
Lawrence sat down, and they started to eat. The room was silent except for the sound of utensils hitting the plate’s surface. The fried egg was delicious, and it reminded Kristine that she had not eaten anything last night. A last piece was at the center and as she moved to take it, Vincent’s fork blocked her. They had a silent battle with forks until Lawrence sliced the fried egg into two equal parts for them to share.
“So, have you made a decision?”
Lawrence asked as soon as they finished eating.
“I’m fine with it. I’ve already been fired from my job, anyway.”
Vincent gave a quick answer. The two males looked at Kristine as if to devour her. This reminded her of their days in high school. She had always been the voice of reason among the trio, but the two would always team up and force her to join in their antics.
“Explain it again to me.”
Lawrence had given a short description of his idea last night, but she didn’t pay too much attention to it as she was already having a headache. It was still only nine in the morning, and her work shift starts at twelve. The cafe was just a ten minutes walk from her apartment, so she still had plenty of time to hear him out.
“Heaven Conquerors Online is a new VRMMO to be released next week. It’s the current hype right now, and many gamers are waiting for it like there’s no tomorrow. It has many new features unseen in other VRMMOs before, which I won’t go into detail. The most important part is that it supports real money trading. Combine that with the game’s most advertised feature, the Heaven's Domain, we could strike it rich!”
“Heaven’s Domain?”
As she asked about the unfamiliar term, Vincent handed her the news magazine. It was opened to a page discussing about the upcoming features of the game that Lawrence mentioned.
Heaven’s Domain was a dungeon that can only be accessed by players who reached the level cap of 100. The dungeon had thousands of floors, each floor changing every time. In this dungeon, the monsters were very strong and intelligent. Only by defeating a floor’s boss can the next floor be accessed and challenged. This dungeon was also filled with many hidden treasures which were rare and expensive, and could only be taken from Heaven’s Domain.
“If we make it to Heaven’s Domain and obtain those treasures, we can sell them to other players for a high price, and they would be willing to buy it using real money!”
Kristine shook her head and rejected this idea.
“Even if we can reach the Heaven’s Domain, there’s no way that we can just enter it and easily obtain anything of worth. It said that the monsters there are much stronger and smarter than those outside.”
“That’s a piece of cake!”
She was dumbfounded with Lawrence’s confidence. Vincent on the other hand was nodding his head in agreement to his words.
“I know you are a very talented individual… but your skills must have a limit…”
As she tried to deny Lawrence, he suddenly stood up and pointed at himself with his thumb.
“I am the son of Cain Lopez, the owner and president of VRI, the leading VR hardware company! I have graduated top of the entire student body in middle school and high school! I am talented in many physical sports, and I am a black belt in many forms of martial arts! Surely, I still have many more skills and talents to discover!”
Kristine’s mouth hung open. He had always been this way since their middle school years, filled with unbounded confidence. This was also the reason why he didn’t have many friends. Also, seeing him this way while wearing a frilly apron didn’t seem to match his words.
“You’ve been disowned, though.”
Vincent’s words caused a strange smile to appear on Lawrence’s face. He hid his face with his hand and made a creepy laughter.
“Kuhuhuhu… It was all part of the plan.”
Kristine sighed then stood up.
“I’ll think about it.”
She then kicked the two out of her apartment.
There was a wide river near Kristine’s apartment, and two-lane two-way road bridge crossed over it. By the grassy riverbank beneath the bridge, two figures were looking for suitable rocks to skip over the river’s calm waters. They quickly found a bunch of smooth flat rocks which they then threw with practice motion, taking turns.
“Eh… it’s a tie.”
Lawrence said after throwing the last rock. All the rocks that they made skip over the river reached the other side.
“What do we do now? This is boring.”
“Let’s fight.”
Vincent suggested as he threw a light jab at Lawrence, who dodged effortlessly.
If an outsider saw the two, they would be quite shocked at the current scene. Two people were facing off under the bridge. One was a rugged-looking young man. The other was an apron-wearing smiling youth.
Kristine forgot to retrieve her apron when she kicked the two out.
“Haha, that’s fine. I also missed exchanging blows with you.”
Back in high school, whenever Vincent and Lawrence were bored or had something they couldn’t agree with, they would resort to having a brawl.
"Take this!”
Lawrence closed the distance between him and Vincent, then raised his right leg to do a quick front kick. Seeing this, Vincent immediately entered a defensive stance, but the kick was a feint. As soon as Lawrence’s foot lifted the ground, it quickly stomped down. He twisted his body to the left. His back now facing Vincent, his left leg shot out to perform a beautiful back kick.
Vincent wasn’t slow to react. He stepped to the side, then parried the kick with his left arm. With the right arm that supported his left, he reached out to grab Lawrence’s ankle. The latter quickly retracted his foot and stepped forward with it. Lawrence turned around to see Vincent dashing forward, his arms raised.
With a burst of speed, Vincent appeared in front of Lawrence and tried to tackle him down. Lawrence didn’t let Vincent do as he planned. Before Vincent could grab his waist, Lawrence placed his arms in between them and leaned forward, catching him beneath his arms.
The two were in a deadlock for a while. After a few minutes of struggling, they separated at the same time.
“You’re still as good as ever.”
Lawrence complimented Vincent. Their brawls since high school had never been simple fights. Sometimes it would last for hours, and the first person to get tired would lose. As if remembering this, Vincent made a proposition.
“I don’t want this to be another war of attrition. Let’s settle this with our strongest blow.”
“You sound like a cheap ripoff from some eastern cartoon… but I like the idea.”
The two relaxed their breathing and focused their attention on each other. They were standing withing reach of each other, and throwing a light punch could easily hit the other one. It was like the final battle between two rivals who had competed for a long time. The stare off lasted for almost ten minutes.
The two moved at the same time, or that was how it appeared to outsiders.
The first to actually move was Vincent. He got a little impatient and decided to attack first. An attack almost without any precursory movements came from the right arm that had hung loosely on his side earlier.
Lawrence knew that Vincent would grow impatient. He saw the sudden fierceness in the latter’s eyes and expected an attack to come within the moment. Lawrence used his left arm to throw a punch, with motion similar to Vincent. He was ambidextrous, so the force would just be similar as if he was using his right. His right leg very slightly shifted to the side. This simple action determined victory or defeat.
With his body slightly shifted to the right, his left arm in the inside blocked Vincent’s punch which was now on the outside.
A smile had formed on Lawrence’s face, his fist had stopped a centimeter away from Vincent’s face.
“I won this time.”
Vincent smiled then stepped back while taking out a cigarette from his pocket. Although, he acted cool and calm, the fact was that he was agitated and frustrated inside.
Before meeting Lawrence and Kristine, Vincent had roamed the streets and acted like any other hoodlum, mugging people and taking their things just for fun. He thought that he was the strongest, and no once could ever make him step down.
One day, on some small neighborhood group fight, he almost got stabbed by a hidden knife. His ‘friends’ left him behind in fear of the guy with the knife. At that time, Lawrence and Kristine were passing by, and Lawrence acted to help him. Vincent felt frustrated that he needed someone to help him and challenged him to a fight, which he easily lost.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Since then, he would challenge Lawrence to a fight whenever they met. After the tenth fight, Lawrence invited him to hang out with them. That was how they became friends.
This thoughts filled his head as he puffed out smoke into the air.
“You should quit that.”
Lawrence reprimanded him. Seeing him with a serious look and wearing an apron, Vincent couldn’t help but laugh.
It was now afternoon. Kristine had let the two back in her apartment when they returned. She then left them as she went to work.
In the cafe, she couldn’t do her job properly as her mind was adrift, thinking about Lawrence’s proposal. She had been weighing the pros and cons non-stop since earlier, but still couldn’t come to a final decision.
“What’s wrong, Krissy?”
One of her co-workers asked, the same person who pointed out Lawrence in his strange getup last night.
“Remember that man from last night?”
“The one who tried to ask you out? He was pretty cute.”
She was referring to one of the customers.
“Not that. The one with the suspicious appearance standing outside the store.”
“Oh! Don’t tell me he did something to you last night!”
“Well, sort of.”
Her co-worker suddenly pulled her to the side, to a spot not easily seen within the store.
“Tell me what happened!”
She had a strange glimmer in her eyes. Kristine remembered that this co-worker had a hobby of reading novels where the main heroine always got forced down at first, then falls in love with the man who pushed her down through the rest of the story.
“It’s nothing like that. He happened to be an old friend back in middle school and high school.”
“A reunion! Work of fate!”
“Enough with your delusions!”
Kristine hand-chopped her head to wake her up from her daydreams.
“He invited me along with another friend to play a game called Heaven Conquerors Online.”
“Isn’t that great?”
“Well, the plan was to earn money through that game, so I have to quit this job and focus on it.”
“Oh, is he planning to start a gaming studio? If I were you, I’d go ahead with it without a second thought!”
“Why?”
“Playing a game with you old friends together. Wouldn’t that be fun?”
Fun. Kristine can’t remember when she last had fun, maybe back in high school when they still hanged out together.
“And besides, I’m sure you’d be able to earn more by playing that game instead of this cafe’s paltry salary. I’ve read a bit about that game on a magazine, and I think it’s an excellent one.”
Kristine once again tried weighing the pros and cons. In the end, her co-workers words resounded in her ears. Wouldn’t that be fun?
“Thanks for the advice.”
“Sure, no problem!”
Kristine left her co-worker behind and quickly walked toward the owner’s office. Before her boss could ask why she came, she declared her intent loud and clear.
“Boss, I’m quitting!”
A week quickly passed by. It was now the 9th. Kristine and Vincent were standing in a line outside a store that sells VR games. Today was the day of release of the game Heaven Conquerors Online.
The line outside of the store was long. There were more than two hundred people waiting in line based on Kristine’s estimate, and there were still more coming. Yesterday, the VR equipment they ordered had just arrived. Lawrence, still wearing that frilly apron handed the two of them lunch boxes and told them to go to the store to buy the game while he sets up the equipment.
At first, she was confused. She knew that the release was on the 9th, so why had Lawrence told them to go and buy it a day before? She thought that he was too excited and mistook the date.
When they arrived at the store, she was shocked to see that there was already a line of almost 50 people. She asked if the game was released early and they explained to her that the line would just keep on increasing, so it was better to line up now than to come tomorrow. It was part of the marketing strategy to sell the game just a few hours before the servers go online. This was to increase the sales as quickly as possible in a short span of time.
As they waited for the store to open, Kristine remembered the events of the past week. She had quit her job. Vincent left his apartment and brought his stuff over at Kristine’s. With the place now packed, they looked for a bigger place to stay that would suit their needs. They easily found a vacant single bedroom apartment with a wide living room near her place. The bedroom was for her to stay, while the two guys would use the living room.
The cost of rent, the VR hardwares, and their initial living expenses were all handled by Lawrence. He still had a bank account with enough money to let an average single man live a comfortable life for two years. For the three of them, it was only enough for three months. Lawrence had also made another account which they would use for any transactions they will make in the game.
The plan was to log in the game as soon as the servers go live, level up and strengthen their characters as quickly as possible. They didn’t have to compete against other players nor were they aiming for prestige and glory. They were playing the game to earn money.
And have fun at the same time, Kristine added in her thoughts.
A bright smile appeared on her face as she imagined the days of adventuring with the other two slowly approaching.
“We will only use a single VRI wireless system server unit and router. It uses parallel processing over five processors to boost system performance even if multiple headgears were connected.”
There was a big black box as big as a refrigerator with blink lights in the apartment’s living room. On the floor beside it were three helmet-like objects, presumably the VR headgears.
“The initial design and prototype of this was made by me, then improved by VRI’s finest engineers, so you don’t have to worry about its capabilities.”
Kristine and Vincent had successfully bought a copy of Heavens Conquerors Online. When they arrived at the apartment two hours ago, Lawrence quickly installed the game and started explaining(boasting) about the VR hardwares that they would use while still in the frilly apron which seemed to have become his trademark outfit.
“What’s the plan for the game?”
Vincent interrupted Lawrence’s nonstop narration which Kristine was truly thankful for.
“For the party, you will be the vanguard. You will stay in front and be our main tank and melee DPS. For Kristine, you should chose a ranged class, since you were excellent in archery. As for the genius me, I will play be the support, although I may shift to other roles depending on what the situation needs.”
Kristine chuckled when she heard that he would play support. The apron truly suited him now.
“As soon as we log in the game, our starting zones will be random, so we need to level up to ten as quickly as possible and meet up on a main city. For now, we need to decide on which names to use!”
The three sat around the coffee table (which Kristine brought over, unwilling to sell it) in silence as they tried to think of names for their characters. They also ate instant noodles for lunch as they did so.
“Can’t we just use our names or something based on it?”
Vincent didn’t know why they have to think up of a name they could use other than their own.
“That’s too boring.”
Lawrence rejected the idea.
“How about the names of the three musketeers?”
Kristine thought her idea was brilliant.
“Boring!”
Rejected easily.
“Earth, Sun, Moon.”
“Boring! We need something with more impact!”
“We, Want, Money.”
“Vincent, can’t you be a bit more creative? Rejected!”
“Fatso, Stinky, Stretch.”
“We’re not ghosts, no!”
“Robin, Maurice, Barry.”
“We’re not gonna sing, no!”
“Moe, Curly, Larry?”
“We’re not comedians!”
After spending thirty minutes over it, they finally agreed to just go with any name they could think of during character creation.
It was now five minutes before the game goes live. The three had already positioned themselves with Kristine in the bedroom, Vincent on the couch, and Lawrence on a sleeping mat on the floor right beside the VR system unit after saying that being that close would increase the connection efficiency of the wireless headgear by a fraction of a millisecond.
Lawrence knew inside information about the game which he didn’t tell anyone else, like how the first person to enter the game world would receive an unknown reward. Furthermore, he also knew that the servers would actually go live five seconds before the appointed time.
In the login screen, he was all ready to enter while watching the countdown timer. As soon as the timer hit 5 seconds, he pressed enter, and true to the inside information, he was now in the character creation screen. He didn’t change the appearance of his character, which looked just like him, and instead entered the name that first entered his head.
* * * Welcome to Heaven Conquerors Online * * *
Congratulations!
You are the very first player to enter the game!
You have received a hidden class, Novice+, as a reward!
After a few seconds, more players started appearing all over the beginner zones of the game.
The name of the very first player to enter the game and obtain a hidden class was Majestic Conqueror. By coincidence or by fate's design, two other players in two different zones appeared with the names Elegant Conqueror and Formidable Conqueror.