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/Half a day later/
Dale could be seen sleeping in a car together with his mother and father.
As the dad looked at the sleeping Dale, he let out a sigh of relief.
"Thankfully, in the end, it was just decompression sickness from logging out from a high time dilation too quickly."
The mother agreed before she asked as she held a piece of paper in her hand.
"What do we do about this?"
"They offered to pay for it, so be it."
"But their product…"
"It wasn't their fault, besides, it only happens in 1 out of 10000, they only asked for a few pieces of data and that was it, they didn't even ask us to keep silent, and as an apology, they will pay us for the damages and even give us a discount on that machine of theirs… He will be very happy."
"Our son has just passed through a minor calamity and you are already thinking of buying a new machine?"
The father shook his head.
"You are a bit too tense, the doctor himself said that such problems are common and serious after-effects are rare, besides, Dale is already fine, a week or two without gaming should be enough and we can bring him to the doctor again in the meantime free of charge if we accept this apology of theirs… 2 weeks of free good healthcare is more than enough."
The mother stayed silent and said:
"Fine, when you put it that way I can't complain."
What they didn't know is that Dale was very much awake, thinking deeply about many things…
…
/A few minutes later/
They eventually arrived at their home and Dale went to his room and lay on his bed. But he did not sleep as he raised his hand and touched the green square in the corner of his vision.
{Initiating}
{Dale Houston (18-year-old)
Body condition: Healthy-7; Stressed-1; Tired-1; Confused-2
Lineology: Mixed race -> North America, South America, European.
Physical Data (Numeric display has been chosen)
-Body: 4.7
-Cognitive: 8.4
-Not named: 0
#Data has been processed by analyzing the average of your species with 3.35 being the average for body and cognitive functions.
Meaningful Abilities: Gaming-3; Close quarters Combat-2; Maintain Emotions-2; Analysis-1; Study-1; Exercise-0.
Overall, comprehensive Analysis: Young, above-average Human male that needs to focus more time on exercising in order to remove his extra body fat and stop playing in Virtual Reality and instead, use it to sharpen his skills.
Score: 2 out of 10, not 0 since there is still hope for improvement.
#Score is not calculated by current society's values.
}
Dale opened and closed the green square multiple times, but it did not disappear.
From the first time he saw it when he woke up in the hospital to now, Dale was still confused as to what this panel was and what it said…
He thought it was some sort of side effect and he even contacted the doctor, being a bit discreet with his explanation, but he informed him he was seeing words from his game panel, and the doctor said that was an unusual effect, but not unseen.
So he told him that if it kept reappearing, then he should go back and tell him more.
However, Dale was sure this wasn't a mere fluke. And that was because of his lineology. He had no idea he had European and South American ancestors, but when he checked it was true.
Still, this wasn't enough to make him any less skeptical of this situation…
But there was nothing he could do, he eventually learned how to live with that green box at the very corner of his vision. It was annoying at first but he soon became used to it.
Dale tried to log into the game again a few days before the Beta closed but it was unavailable.
Confused, he tried to contact Jelly and he said the game server just crashed a few days ago and that he had been forced out of his machine.
"So it wasn't just with me…"
He wanted to ask Jelly something, but he decided against it.
Dale found the email from the company and confirmed that it was indeed real, however, only the first part of the email was there, and the second part that he didn't read wasn't there.
This made him suspect things, but since there was no way to recover those, and he was too scared to ask the developers, he just went straight to Jelly.
"I see… A shame, I wanted to know what would happen after you hit Level 100, but for now, I'm probably going to have to find out on my own."
"I'm sorry man…"
"Nah, it's okay. It's not your fault if you did something way out of line… Besides, we'll see that soon enough anyway."
They talked for a bit more in the virtual chat before the two logged out.
Dale went on to continue his day-to-day life…
And soon, he learned of its true value.
…
/Back to the present…/
Dale could be seen inside a room next to another person.
This person was relatively smaller than him but he looked similar to him in a sense.
"Done, it's installed, now we need to wait for it to boot and reset and you'll be ready to game." Said Dale as he looked at his brother
"Thanks, I still need to know how to do this but last time…"
Dale interrupted him saying:
"You were too violent with the pieces and you scratched the container, spilling the solution inside the machine and breaking it… Yeah, I remember that fucking day."
His brother cringed as he remembered that.
"Don't make me remember that… Dad already beat me enough…"
Dale got up and opened the door out of the room.
"Once it's done, check the system to see if everything is fine, I'll get ready in the meantime so if something happens just ask me."
"Sure."
Dale's brother smiled, he seemed pretty excited to play this game.
/Clack/
Dale closed the door with a thin smile.
(Not all brothers need to completely hate each other, right?)
…
/Click!/
Dale locked the door to his room and checked the time.
"Hum… I still have 20 minutes."
'I already have my plan memorized… But in any case, I scanned it and have it on my machine in case I need it while playing.'
'I love that they allowed these small features in this game, most games don't allow these in order to not break immersion… Or whatever the company's reasons are.'
"Everything is in order… So I guess I can just relax… As fucking if!"
'I've been waiting for a year! I need something to do…'
{Initiating}
{Dale Houston (19-year-old)
Body condition: Very Healthy-2; Excited-5; Confident-1
Lineology: Mixed race -> North America, South America, European.
Physical Data
-Body: 50 (Maximum Gene Chain)
-Cognitive: 25 (Maximum Gene Chain)
-Fucking 0: 0 (Temporary name)
Meaningful Abilities: Exercise-8; Spear Technique-7; Close quarters Combat-6; Gaming-5; Maintain Emotions-5; Analysis-4; Study-4; Spacial Awareness-3; Willpower-2; Knife Technique-1.
Overall, comprehensive Analysis: A young Human male with an overwhelming presence strong enough to make kids cry just by having them look at his back if this can be considered Human.
This young adult doesn't understand the meaning of 'stop, this is enough and instead opted to achieve the limits of a Human by training every day until his arms bled.
He may have more muscles than brains, but he has shown intelligence by trying his best to make the most of his muscle's power, with decent success.
Score: 6.8 out of 10, you have achieved power but at what cost? Your masculinity is big enough to bend straight guys. But at least you still have your hair.
}
"... I evolved so much… Wait, did the score change?"
'What… My what?! Fuck you too!'
As he cursed this evaluation inside his mind, he got ready by putting on the special clothing necessary to play in these pods.
It was a type of skin-tight suit similar to diver suits, you didn't expect people to enter inside a pod and get submerged in a liquid naked or with their clothes on right?
…
/13:40… 13:50… 14:00/
"It's time." Said Dale as he entered the pod
'The game servers will open at 14:30, and at that time players will be allowed to enter the Tutorial lobbies, but I have 10 minutes of a head start!'
Dale closed the pod and started to put on his things. He strapped a metal tube to his protective clothing.
/Shush!/
The air inside his clothing was sucked, making it stick to his body.
"Haaa… I really hate this part."
Dale put on a helmet and connected the neck of his suit with the helmet before pressing a green circle on his pod's glass wall.
[System: Operational]
[Checking user integrity… All systems nominal]
[Elden Throne thanks you for choosing its products!]
[Would you like to QuickStart or…]
"QuickStart, I hate seeing the liquid slowly rising… It gives me…"
But before he could finish, his body went limp.
[Initiating…]
Only the machine sounds were left in the room…
…
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Notes