"Hikaru!" his mother calls him by his name. His mother's voice was loud and clear, and he can hear her from inside the digital world.
Hikaru is an average high school student in his senior year. He likes to spend every day on the computer playing inside a virtual world known as "Shinkai" It is a world made for the dead to continue living.
Inside Shinkai; it is like being inside a virtual reality game. The living can interact with their family and friends who had passed away. Thanks to the new "Human Consciousness" chip technology. People's consciousness can be recorded, save, and stored away in a server computer once that person had passed away.
Hikaru's grandfather was like that too. His grandfather had passed away due to old age last year. However, in Shinkai, his grandfather seems to be doing well, happy and alive but, Hikaru knows that it is just his grandfather's conscious he is interacting with and not the real person.
"Grandpa, mom is calling me for breakfast. I'll come back in to see you again after school today okay?" The time inside the game is the same as the real world. Hikaru looks at the time, and it was already 8:00 AM. He should be getting ready for school.
"What? You're leaving me already?" Grandpa was feeling a bit sad to hear that his favourite grandson is leaving him. Hikaru loves to play video games, and in Shinkai, it is just like another video game for him to play. However, for his grandfather. It is his home, and he wanted to spend more time with his family members.
"Grandpa, I stayed here with you all night last night." Hikaru looked at grandpa and couldn't help but felt sad in a way. It was hard to explain to because he knew that his grandpa is not his actual grandpa, but only a consciousness. Aren't they just NPC (non-playing characters), aren't they?
However, the way his grandfather acts and treat him is so much like how he was when he was alive. Hikaru felt a heart-wrenching ache inside of him as he waved farewell to him.
"Wait! Don't Go!" Grandfather tried to stop him. "You can tell your mom you're sick and sleep in all day!" Grandfather tried, but he knew it was impossible to keep the living from staying with him for that long.
"Sorry, can't! I have exams coming soon! I'll see you later tonight!" Then Hikaru pushed a button on his setting. 'Log-off.'
The moment when Hikaru wakes up, he removed his VR headset. The VR headset is the ones that allow him to enter Shinkai: The world of the dead. The headset works when you are sleeping, so it doesn't interfere with people's everyday life. It is like having a dream where everything felt so real inside Shinkai.
Last night Hikaru when on a quest and completed some mission to help build his Grandfather a new bed. Although they could buy a new one, however currency inside the game is like the currency outside the real world.
The people inside called it, Digital Money (DM) and we called it Dead Money (DM). Real world money can be transferred into Shinkai. However, the money from inside Shinkai is useless for the Real World because it is non-transferrable.
However, there are still many people in the real world who would invest most of their savings into Shinkai, after all this is the place where they will be after they passed away.
After Hikaru removed the headset, his mother came inside his bedroom. "Did Grandpa need anything from inside Shinkai that he wants me to get for him?" his mother asked.
"He said it's all good there, and he just wanted to have us visit him more."
"Well, tell him I need to make us enough money for our future there together, I'm too busy with work I can't see him. I'll visit him once my work has calm down. So you visit him as much as you can for me, okay?"
Hikaru got up from the bed and went into the washroom to brush up and take a quick shower for school. He is fast, and he was ready in under ten minutes. When Hikaru went downstairs, his mother had gone to work already. He had his simple toast, eggs and slices of bacon. Then head to school.
The entire day was boring for Hikaru. Hikaru is a bit of a loner at school. He's not popular and never tries in class. Hikaru gets average grades, an ordinary life. That's all Hikaru cares about; a simple life, making money so that he can place all his savings inside Shinkai.
Hikaru and his family are not the only ones that do that. People all depends on the Shinkai's system. Where in the real world they grind hard to earn money, and when they pass away, they can live life in the digital world.
It was an average day for Hikaru as he was walking home from school one day, thinking about what he should major in when he gets to college. Just who could have imagined that life in the real world would end too soon for Hikaru?
Bam! A street sign falls on top of his head.
It was sudden, and the only thing that Hikaru heard was the ambulance's siren. That was all he could remember.
It was dark, and somehow he could feel a coldness that he couldn't describe, his entire body felt frozen. "Where am I?" As Hikaru slowly opens up his eyes, he heard a voice, coming from a small light.
"Oh good, you have woken up! For a moment there we thought something was wrong with your HCN." Said a man's voice, which was what he could hear, but not see. "Can you hear us?"
"Yes, I can hear yo-" Hikaru paused for a second as he realised. "Why can't I speak?"
"Well, that's because you are dead. It was a tragic accident… But don't worry the insurance company has paid a lump sum of amount for your death. You will be transported into Shinkai very soon."
"Oh… I dead…" Hikaru knows now that he is just a conscious left from a database that the HCN recorded while he was still alive. He couldn't believe just how much of his awareness was still… Alive?
"So what do I do now?" Hikaru asked as he seems to be nothing more than just data.
"Well, for us to process your transfer, your parents need to sign some paperwork. It was placed on hold until you can talk to them first, it took us a while to finally be able to load all the data in your HCN, anyway! I will give your parents the microphone so you can have some words with them."
Hikaru's mother was crying her eyes out, and so is his father. His father was out on a business trip and had to rush home as soon as he heard about Hikaru's accident. They both felt pain in their hearts.
Talking to Hikaru through the microphone as he is just on the computer now. His data still is in a process and it's all blank. They could only hear his voice and cried about his death.
Hikaru talked to them to reassure them that he is just going to be with grandfather and wait for them to come, "Please live a happy life until you die of old age okay, mom… Dad. I love you both. Make lots of money so we can have a better life in Shinkai."
Then, his parents pressed the enter button. It was just like how his grandfather was, a ceremony and they push a button to bring his grandfather into Shinkai. Like a funeral, yet, it was more like a celebration.
The bright light grew big the moment his parents hit enter. I was a bright and white light that blinded Hikaru's eyes. And then, slowly his readjusted his sights.
The scenery was a beautiful garden. A beauty like you can see only in the movies. "Woah, everything looks so wonderful here-!" Hikaru stopped, as he felt like something is wrong with his voice. Then he places his right hand on his neck. "My Adam's apple is gone! What the heck is going on?"
"Hello, there miss. Welcome to Shinkai, the world where the dead is now alive again." Said a man as he approached him. The man was dress in a knight's costume.
"Wait… Miss? I'm a guy, who the heck are you calling a miss!?" he shouted at him. Hikaru's voice suddenly changes from something substantial to a cute loli voice.
"Um… You're a very pretty and cute girl. Miss." The guy said as he looked at Hikaru, up and down. Then he blushes, as he had never met such a cute girl before in his life. "You are a very, very cute girl."
"Why am I a girl!" Hikaru screams as he places his hands on his chest. "I'm-" Then he felt his breast. With his eyes popped out of his socket. "Why the heck am I a girl!?"