John quickly brings out his laptop and starts to laugh at whatever he is looking at; Jack knows that John has essentially checked out now. Jack starts to think about the whole situation going on.

He was given an envelope at some point while he was in the game but one of his roommates was the one to receive the envelope and pass it on later. Jack thinks about how the roommates that he was living with are now dead, he can honestly say that he doesn’t feel much regarding their death.

He will never see them again but they never would have been considered friends, just roommates that often annoyed each other. He does feel sorry that things have progressed like this and he’s somewhat to blame, but he feels his mind has changed over the past couple of days. As though, life and death are now a common part of his life. It’s a new sensation but when he considers his loved ones going through this experience, he can feel that heart wrenching pain.

He has never known his parents as he was given up before he can remember anything, his younger sister is the only family who he has left but she was adopted out and lived a rather happy life. They keep in touch on each other’s birthday and Christmas but that’s about it. Their parents are completely unknown and strangers to both Jack and his sister, if they’re even still alive.

Jack feels like he should get in touch with his sister to make sure that she’s safe, he brings out his phone and notices that it’s activated. He hasn’t had a working phone for several days and has several hundred text messages and a couple of phone calls. 80% of the messages appear to be from John, some from work regarding schedules, lots of spam and a couple from his other friends.

He responds to the messages from his friends, letting them know that he hasn’t had a phone for a while. He considers it and also lets them know that he has a new job, he won’t say that it’s actually playing ‘The Secret World Online’ but that’s not important. Ignoring all of the other messages, Jack proceeds to check his emails, mostly just receipts from automatic payments and updates from social messaging.

John is still laughing away; Tom and the other guy haven’t re-entered the room and the TV is off. Jack walks over to turn the TV on, it’s still on the morning news and he watches for a while.

“’The Secret World Online’ the game that everyone has been patiently waiting for has finally announced they’re opening orders for the game from the general public and for the first week, they will waive all fees” the anchor states.

“We’re told that governments around the world welcome this move as many corporations are starting to pay a lot of attention on this front. We have acquired information that several large multinational corporations will be offering money transfer services buying up in-game currency for cash” the other anchor talks with the first.

“That’s right, it’s only rumours at this stage but many people are excited by this as the rate of currency transfer is going to be 1:1 meaning $1 is 1 gold coin within the game. We’re told that even the lowest levels of quests in the game offer rewards in the thousands and there are even some that offer rewards in the billions”

“Previously governments have shut these sorts of operations down as it’s often a predatory practise with game operators also stamping it out quickly, this is a major shift from previous opinions where many were anticipating no major changes”

“This sounds like nothing but good news for people that got into the Beta Test”

“It certainly does, many people in the beta test are reported to have already become millionaires. I believe there is even a report of someone becoming a billionaire in China but there has been no confirmation”

“Sounds like I should get the game and join them” the anchor finishes the news segment and moves onto the next one.

Jack stops paying attention to the TV and uses his phone to check out various social media websites to see if he can see anymore information about this. Essentially, it’s all the same information shared on the news and nothing new. Frustrated he tries to remember the login details to the private forums but is unable to remember the information.

He jumps onto the chatrooms but it has devolved even further;

‘BUYING GOLD BEST RATES PM ME’

‘SWAPPING MY HOUSE AND WIFE FOR 5 MILLION GOLD COINS’

‘LOOKING FOR HUSBAND, WILL TAKE BEST OFFER, PM ME’

‘The son of heaven is here now! You must offer him your loyalty or suffer his wrath!’

‘That star was the sign of the beginning of the end, first it was the red sky event and then a star suddenly appears’

……

The chatrooms are proving to be essentially useless at this point, it has gone from under 10,000 people to over 200,000 making it a cluster fuck of people with little to no moderation. Jack can feel a headache and lays down on the bed putting his phone away.

He feels like he can quit his job, if he can make some money quickly in game then he will be able to transfer it. Currently he has no money in game because all the currency in game comes from system cities.

Once he upgrades his village into a city, he will be able to set a taxation rate which can provide a passive income but beyond that, he will need to go to a system city and participate there. They have quests offered by the system, quests offered by NPCs, they have shops that you can sell gear to, auctions and land that people can buy to setup their own player run store. There are many options there but the first problem is, Jack needs to get to a system city.

He knows the location of the closest system city but it’ll take quite some time to ride a horse to arrive there. There are teleportation crystals but Jack wouldn’t know how to find those nor where to start.

*BZZT*

Jack’s phone vibrates as he receives a message on the chatroom. It’s one of his friends he previously played MMORPGs with.

‘Hey Jack, how’s it going? Have you been able to get into ‘The Secret World Online’?’

‘Yeah, I scored a beta invite and have played for a couple of days, what about you xXx360NoScope420xXx?’

‘Nice Yeah uh call me David I got in, in fact it’s only my second day I got in on the last day of the beta program apparently. Even went into some place called the Hall of Trials, that was a fucked-up experience.’

Jack laughs to himself and says inwardly ‘fuckin newbs’, always leaking their secrets because they’re excited. He doesn’t recognise the irony in his thoughts as he was in that very same position only a few days ago with Tom.

‘Be careful when sharing that around, I’ve heard that people like to steal what you acquire from the Hall of Trials’

‘Thanks for the warning but I’ve already shared it everywhere so too late haha’

‘Damn, well hope it all goes well for you with that do you know where you’re located?’ Jack wants to redirect the conversation so he doesn’t have to lie about obtaining something too.

‘Yeah it seems like everyone in my country spawn on the southern continent along with all the other central and south America countries, a bit of an asshole move by the game because it’s fucking freezing there luckily my inheritance is armour that negates it all XD’

‘Lucky about that then, I’m somewhere in the central continent somewhere it will take a lot of effort to get to you’

‘No need for that just don’t be a stranger in the future’

The two of them chat and compare notes on the world, Jack is interested to hear about the cold areas. He needs to find places of extreme element as it’s likely to have a divine beast there which will progress his Myriad Arts.

David hasn’t heard of anything specific but did hear that a lot of NPCs warn that when the region barriers dissipate to not head to the eastern continent as there is a region of extreme cold that no one has ever returned from. They finish up chatting after promising to keep in touch.

Jack sends a few messages to his other MMORPG friends, including a special Russian girl that he played quite a bit with but she isn’t online. He sends a message just letting her know what’s going on in his life and to send a message if she needs anything.

This takes a period of time after which the door swings open, Tom is walking in with lofty airs around him, the tough guy is hanging back as though his life is hanging on the line.

“Alright, Bobby here will look after you in the future, you need to stay here until all the drama surrounding the leak dies down but it’s not really up to me. I’m calling in a lot of favours already to keep you safe, don’t blow it again” Tom states as he stands before Jack and John whom are both laying on beds.

“Now I’ll explain a few things that you might not know. ‘The Secret World Online’ is much, much more than a game. We’re not really sure what it is, ‘we’ being the US and AUS governments, but we do know that it has a special entity surrounding it that….. is an existence we have never seen before. It’s certainly not human”

“After two years, the earth will undergo a massive transformation and anyone who hasn’t played ‘The Secret World Online’ or is actively playing it. We’re not sure what exactly will happen but we’ve been told that their consciousness and spiritual intelligence will be corroded away possibly turning their bodies into……. mindless husks” Tom explains slowly maintaining a serious expression on his face looking directly into Jacks eyes. Jack’s eyes go wide as he’s listening with rapt attention.

“The world will under go a lot of changes leading into those two years so if you have anyone that you want to get ‘saved’ make you tell them to play the game, but don’t tell them anymore than that!” Tom finishes his explanation while almost shouting the ending.

Jack has cold sweat on his forehead and running down his back, John looks like he doesn’t care and takes another hit. Tom sighs while looking at John and throws him a crystal.

“Get into the game and get started, stop wasting your time smoking that shit” Tom says.

John catches the crystal with a smile, he has wanted to try the game out for awhile and hearing that he’s trapped in this warehouse for the immediate future was wondering about how he’ll sneak out and get a copy of the game.

John quickly sticks the crystal on his head and his body goes limp as though he’s sleeping, it’s the first time Jack has seen another person playing the game and is confused because his body has seemingly disappeared each time he has played the game.

“I have to get back to work, let Bobby here know if you need me and don’t spread shit online” Tom says and leaves the room.

Bobby, the tough guy is looking at Jack rather menacingly.

“What?” Jack asks, Bobby’s knuckles crack.

“I got into a lot of shit due to you today and now we’re here alone with no one to stop me from doing what I’m about to….” Bobby says as he rushes over to Jack’s bed.

Jack is shocked by this sudden change and brings up his arms to defend himself.

Bobby grabs Jack and flings him off the bed, Jack crashes on the ground hard but his body doesn’t hurt from it. Jack quickly stands up and gets himself into a fighting pose, a pose similar to one that he used to train with Drakon.

Jack subconsciously starts to rotate his qi, it’s incredibly weak due to a low amount of qi in the natural environment but it’s there, Bobby rushes over to Jack and lets out a punch.

Jack dodges it by ducking causing Bobby’s punch to hit nothing but air, Jack lets out one punch into Bobby’s stomach and quickly lets out a second and jumps away. Bobby is keeled over, almost frothing at the mouth struggling to breathe.

Jack is surprised at this and looks at his fist, he can feel a faint trace of qi within his fist. He has a feeling it’s related to his interacts with the old monk. He then ignores Bobby on the ground, places the game crystal on his head and disappears into the game world.

His body for some reason disappears and he’s finally using that to his advantage so Bobby is unable to take revenge on him, which is true as when Bobby recovers and is unable to find Jack he’s pissed off thinking he ran off and starts to lay into John but is given no reaction and no satisfaction. He leaves the warehouse incredibly pissed off.

Jack’s vision reappears in the boring crystal room, the NPC is there with its rainbow coloured eyes smiling at Jack. He walks up to it asking it a question, “Why are you here?”

“I am your personal assistance program, you may call me White, user. I am here to assist you with any special quests the system hands out to beta participants and particularly ones that pass the Hall of Trials” the NPC explains.

“The system has decided to give you a special quest, would you like to accept it?” the NPC asks and a prompt appears in front of his eyes.

‘QUEST PROMPT – You have been tasked with collecting various metals and minerals from ‘The Secret World Online’ upon completion you will be specially rewarded, upon commencement of this quest you will be given 1 x Teleportation Crystal’

Jack smiles inwardly, he was just thinking about how he will obtain a teleportation crystal and now the system is just giving him one for nothing. He quickly accepts the quest, the NPC smiles but before Jack can ask anymore questions, he hears, “Goodbye” as he is forced to leave the room.

His vision returns to his body where he left it within the game world, laying on the ground near the City Heart, Drakon is close by as still as a mountain and walks over, “Your Majesty, we have found a goblin village close and it seems like a good training opportunity, what do you want to do?”