“Ladies and Gentlemen!” the announcer’s deep voice echoed in the vast arena. “This is what you’ve all been waiting for!”
Cheers and applause resounded.
“The main event for the night!”
The cheers gradually grew stronger. It was easy to see the excitement in all the audience’s expressions.
“The final battle to find out who will rightfully claim the title of the strongest!” The announcer was purposely drawing out the length of his words in order to increase the tension and the suspense.
“Everyone! Grab on to your seats for this is…” he paused for a few seconds. It suddenly grew quiet, then a drum-roll began.
“Last Light Online Battle Arena Championships!” As the announcer finished his words, the arena shook with the cheers that reached the peak of excitement.
“Let us begin! From the North gate, the defending champion, MightyShield!”
“MightyShield! MightyShield! MightyShield!” the audience chanted his name.
In the circular arena, there were four gates. One of the gates opened and out came a huge man wearing a golden full heavy armor set. The armor was filled with intricate designs and blue flames would burst out every now and then. On his right arm was a black tower shield with an image of a red dragon. He held a heavy-looking silver hammer with his left hand. Snakes of lightning would dance around the hammerhead.
“Oh! Looks like MightyShield had finally completed his Burning Gold Armor Set! Will he be able to keep the championship title today?”
The people were awestruck. The Burning Gold Armor Set was one of the hardest to complete item set in the game. It can only be looted from the final boss of one of the most difficult dungeons, with a drop rate of less than one percent for each set piece!
Although the set does not have a very high defense compared to other sets, it boasts its bonus to attack damage and the retaliation damage for melee attacks with its Immolation buff.
“Now, from the East Gate, a veteran of this arena who for so many times had failed to grab the title of champion, TheQueen!”
“TheQueen! TheQueen!” Although the chanting wasn’t as loud as the previous one, it could be seen that most of the audience that were cheering for her were females.
From one of the gates came out a slender figure dressed in a glamorous purple robe. The left side of the robe was wreathed with a cold, freezing aura, while on the right was emitting a fiery, burning flare. On her head was a golden crown embedded with multi-colored gems. A white wooden staff was held in her hands. As she raised the staff, it transformed into a white snake that spitted a beam of black light.
“It’s the legendary Cursed White Boa! A legendary item in the hands of TheQueen!”
With a smug look, TheQueen’s eyes met with MightyShield’s, and she smiled confidently. The Cursed White Boa was a legendary item, and there is only one of it that exists in the game. Its special characteristic aside from amplifying magical damage was its ability to transform into a snake and shoot out a beam of light that gives a random debuff to any target that was hit. It was the perfect counter to MightyShield’s defense.
“Just from their items, I am already filled with intense excitement and envy. They truly live to their names as veterans of the game! Now, let’s proceed to the third contender! He was the very first champion of this arena, but had not participated in a long time. Let us again welcome, Math!”
As the figure came out of the gate, there were only very few cheers. His in-game name produced dread in the hearts of many players. MATH! A lot of people fear MATH!
The figure that came out was indeed a representation of their fears. Clad completely in black, he moved so quietly it was impossible to sense he was there. Equipped in his hands were a pair of pure black sickles coated in a green sheen. When he moved, half his body seems to fade into the dark.
“A warrior, a mage, and an assassin! This arena is getting interesting and interesting! And what do I see? That’s the Fade Walker Set!”
The Fade Walker Set was a rare item set that allows the user to easily blend with their surroundings when moving. If used with a skill for invisibility, it makes the wearer very hard to detect. It was also a very hard to obtain item similar to the Burning Gold Armor Set.
“Last, not the least, we have a new face who rose quickly in the ranks among veteran players. This is his first time ever participating in this event! Let us welcome, IAMWILL!”
As the gates opened, the last contender appeared. If the previous reaction from the audience was called below average, then this time it could be said to be completely silent. Even the announcer could only stare at his appearance.
What came out was figure whose appearance was completely without uniformity. On his limbs were silver heavy boots and gauntlets covered with small circular figures. Beneath the open black robe was shabby looking leather armor and leggings. On his head was a golden circlet.
He raised his hands up with confidence as he entered the stage.
“What the hell is that!?” the audience screamed in confusion. His attire was very bizarre. There was no sense of uniformity nor purpose. Robes and circlets were used to amplify magic. Leather armor were worn by physical damage dealers. Heavy armor were used by tanks. What the man was wearing was a mix of it all, and he even lacked a weapon.
Based on the name that appeared above his head, IAMWILL, there were no doubts that he was indeed the final contender.
“Uh… even I’m at a loss for words,” the announcer said weakly. He truly does not know what to comment. “I guess we can only look forward to the battle to know the truth behind his… attire. He did make it to the finals after all.”
The audience seat were abuzz with discussion. Some were mocking him while others were contemplating on what the items he wore was and if they had a purpose for being mixed like that.
“Oh, well!” The announcer gave up on making any sense with the situation. “The final battle starts in 3… 2… 1… Start!!!”
Boom!
All the contenders in the arena started to move. MightyShield left behind a deep groove in the ground from the force of his initial step. TheQueen used a spell to fly up into the air. Math dashed and faded into nothingness. IAMWILL only stood and bumped his fists together.
Seeing his defenseless posture, MightyShield dashed towards him. He raised his tower shield right in front of him. When he was halfway there, he stopped and dug the shield into the ground. The dragon design on the shield’s front came alive and turned into a real crimson dragon wreathed in red flames. It flew straight toward IAMWILL!
TheQueen, who was floating high in the air, also thought of the same idea as MightyShield. She cast one of her strongest small area spells, Phoenix Dive. With the special effect of her robe, all her fire type spells have their cast time reduced by 80%, and 50% of the fire element damage is converted into ice element damage. Within a short amount of time, a Phoenix made of ice and fire appeared and dived toward IAMWILL!
TheQueen wanted to eliminate the other two first so she could have a one on one battle against MightyShield and claim his title of champion.
Seeing that he was targeted by the two as soon as the round started, a smirk formed in his face. IAMWILL was not afraid of them. Two of the circular designs on his gauntlets glowed. They were singe-use spells called spell formations. He had engraved them into his gauntlets.
As the spell formations took effect, his body was surrounded by a faint green glow, and his feet and fists were covered by a layer of enchantments. The green glow increased his speed by a tremendous amount and reduces the weight effects of any armor equipped over five minutes, while the layer of enchantments gave his attacks a hundred percent armor penetration for five attacks within five minutes.
He easily dodged the flaming dragon and the dual element phoenix. He then dashed toward MightyShield.
With a kick on the shield, he dealt a bit of damage to the heavy armored warrior’s health and broke his stance. With the body exposed behind the shield, he threw a heavy punch on the chest easily knocking away a third of the warrior’s health. MightyShield tried to retaliate with his hammer, but the attack was too slow and was nimbly dodged and countered by IAMWILL. A second kick hit him on the head, dealing a critical blow.
Just like that, MightyShield’s health points were reduced to zero.
The audience went crazy. The development was totally unexpected. A lot of them were yelling that he was cheating. Only few of the veteran players realized what had happened and had figured out how it was possible.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
With the appearance of high grade weapons, the combat style of warrior type players were to rely on heavy armor to increase their defense, then equip a strong weapon to be able to deal out damage. With this gameplay, many people had forgotten the existence of unarmed combat skills. One of the properties of unarmed combat was that the weight of armor equipped on the fists and feet also increases the damage done. The downside of this was that wearing heavy armor slows down movement and attack speed.
IAMWILL tried to solve that problem by equipping only heavy armor on his limbs, then using a spell to remove the weight effects so that he it would not decrease his speed. It was a brilliant idea, and was not hard to think of. Players just did not took the time to think too much about it because they would prefer to equip themselves with stronger weapons rather than fighting barehanded.
Her mouth wide open and face filled with shock, TheQueen was at a loss. Her mind was confused on the events that had happened right before her eyes. Before she knew it, IAMWILL had jumped and easily covered their distance in the air. The reduced weight effect, his speed boost, and kicking against the floor with the attack boost allowed him to do so.
As soon as he reached her height, with no time to cast a spell or evade, a heavy kick landed on her and she fell right on the floor. The pitiful amount of health points she had left after receiving the kick was completely drained when she impacted the ground.
Landing on the ground, IAMWILL just stood there. The invisible opponent was surely lurking and waiting for the perfect chance to kill him in one strike. The audience held their breath in anticipation.
Suddenly, the space behind him quivered and a man clad in black appeared. Using both sickles, Math cut his neck! It was an assassin’s strongest skill, Decapitation! It was a skill that can only be used from behind the opponent after using a stealth skill. It was sure-kill technique. Once used, the target’s health will surely drop to zero. Math was confident of his win…
But his eyes widened in shock at the impossible sight in front of him. The person who was supposed to be dead suddenly turned around, the remaining circular figure on his right gauntlet glowing brightly. His right fist was covered with a bright red light. Math tried to dodge but it was too light. His reaction was dulled from the thought that his opponent was already dead.
The punch hit his stomach with full force. A shock wave appeared behind him and his health was drained to zero! Before his vision darkened, he saw that IAMWILL’s health was stuck on 1 HP. He must be cheating, he thought.
IAMWILL smirked at the corpse. He had investigated his opponents and had chosen the right spell formations and items to use to counter them. He didn’t die from decapitation because of the circlet on his head. It was now cracked. It was a one-time use item that let’s the wearer survive one fatal damage with one health point remaining. The last spell formation used was called Sacrifice. It converts any damage from the last attack received by the caster into attack damage for one attack.
He smiled as it all went as expected. Raising his hands, the audience cheered for him without knowing whether what they saw with their own eyes were real or not.
“This… this… this is truly amazing! Unpredictable! I am truly awed! IAMWILL had presented a battle we have never seen before! The new champion of Last Light Online Battle Arena is… IAMWILL!!!”
William Lee took off the gaming helmet and quickly went to the computer to access a chat room. Inside, there were more than ten people including him. All of them were discussing about the championship results in the VRMMO game Last Light Online.
A few weeks ago, using an anonymous account, William had discovered this chat room. The members all used anonymous accounts and made bets for many VRMMO games. Their latest bet was for Last Light Online Championship. There were no rules on the betting, and so William made a bet for his own game account, IAMWILL. The other chat members didn’t know of this account, so they took him for someone who did not know what he was talking about. They all made bets on either of the two favorites, which were TheQueen and MightyShield.
“With this, I’ve made a killing,” William whispered to himself as he reminded the chat members about the bet. After saying his thanks, he left the chat and quickly checked his bank account. He earned more than 800,000 Php.
‘Easy money,’ he thought. With all that done, he quickly prepared to leave for school.
It was the era of Virtual Reality Massively Multiplayer Online, or VRMMO, games. The boom started more than five decades ago, when the very first successful virtual reality hardware were released in the market. Gaming companies quickly shifted to developing games for the new hardware, and that’s how it all started.
The gaming community quickly adapted to the changes, and now, more than 80% of the world’s population is familiar with virtual reality. It’s not just used for games after all. It could also be used for simulation purposes like practice driving, surgery, military drills, and many others.
Virtual Reality have become a part of almost everyone’s lives.
“Hey, check this out!” Kevin said excitedly as he shoved his tablet phone in William’s face. They were in the classroom, and lunch break had just started. They were sophomore students, one more year before they start preparing for university, but they still don’t feel the pressure.
“What is it?” William asked groggily. He had been sleeping in third period, the class before. He had just woken up when the bell rang when Kevin, his seatmate, started making a commotion.
“This was the championship battle in LLO last night. I managed to get in the front seats and recorded the battle!”
“Ugh… sure, that’s great,” William answered disinterested. He slowly stood up and left the room. Kevin followed him and continued on blabbering on how awesome the battle was. He didn’t know that the champion was right in front of him.
“Fine, man! Be like that!” Kevin finally noticed that William was not the slightest bit interested. He left and returned to the room to show the video to the others.
William went to the bathroom to wash his face. In front of the mirror was a brown-eyed, black-haired youth. His eyes were slightly surrounded by dark circles from lack of sleep. Although the latest VRMMO hardwares support sleep mode, the lack of pain sensors and motion sensitivity in sleep mode was not something that he liked.
On the way home, the sky quickly darkened as huge gray clouds blocked the sun. William was walking along an alley as a shortcut to his home when heavy rain fell. He tried to run, but it wouldn’t take long before he was drenched. Giving up, he took shelter under the frame of a building’s back door.
After about ten minutes, the rain turned into a light drizzle. As William was about to leave, the door behind him slightly opened.
“Are you here for the package?” a weak female voice asked.
“I—”
“Don’t talk! Don’t turn around… Just take it!” The voice seemed like it was scared. A small box appeared at the foot of the doorway, then the door was shut followed by the clicking sounds of multiple locks.
‘What the hell was that?’ William was confused. Still, he picked up the box. It was wrapped in packing tape. There was no way to tell what was inside aside from ripping it open.
He was undecided whether to take it or not. In the end, curiosity won and he took it with him home.
As soon as he arrived, he quickly locked the door and went to his room. He unpacked the box and took out the items inside.
The first item was a helmet similar to the VR head gear hardware. The only difference was the lack of a cord to connect it to the network, and instead of fully covering the face, it had a translucent visor instead. It was also very light compared to the VR hardware.
The other item was a small box with a USB cord. Quickly, William attached it to the computer. It started an installation program which he ran without hesitation.
On the computer screen, it gave instructions to wear the head gear. As soon as he did, the soft material inside the head gear suddenly expanded and tightened around his head. Panicking her tried to take it off, but it was too tight. Then, a stinging pain pierced through his nape. His vision blurred and darkened for a moment. He felt like the world was spinning all around him.
As everything started to settle down, in front of him, words appeared in thin air.
[ Calibrating… ]
[ Calibration Complete ]
[ Augmented Reality Head Gear ready for use ]