Blade Battle Online, a fully immersed conscious game has been the most played game for the last several years. Fully immersed conscious is exactly as it sounds. The headset envelopes your mind, conjuring a dream that the system projects. Games like Blade Battle Online are the closest thing we have to living in a fantasy world.
For the past 2 weeks, I've been BBO's top player. Every day, the interface greets me with a leaderboard flashing my username, "Midas," at the very top. That wasn't my real name of course, my name is Silas. A fancy name, if nothing else.
I returned to my dorm after work: a boring office job where I have nothing to do all day. I sat down on my cushioned bed and placed the headset over my eyes, and took a deep breath as I prepared to be whisked into the fantasy world I was so fond of. The familiar digital hum enveloped me, and within seconds, the vibrant sprawl of Blade Battle Online unfurled before my eyes. Within seconds, I was greeted by members of my guild.
"Midas! Are you joining the raid today?"
"Hey man, do you think you could help me practice later today?"
"Are you free later Midas?"
Greeted was a soft way to put it, more like harassed.
"Sorry, I've already got plans today"
That was only a half truth. I had plenty of free time at work today to browse the forums. I really only looked for patch notes or any upcoming content to prepare for, it was the only way to really stay ahead of everyone else, that and a good set of gear, a good stat build, and just good mechanics.
BBO was different from any other game I had played. It required real skill, if you had a sword and any other weapon in the real world, you could practice in your backyard and then notice the difference in-game. That same unique trait also brought the game mass criticism, as many people think BBO is built to train soldiers for real world combat, which is a stupid sentiment for a fantasy game. That was truly the aspect that set players apart. Even if you had the worst set of equipment and no stat points allotted, you could still beat a high level player with pure skill alone. I would know, I've done it.
I found something strange on the forum today, it seemed like a rumor about some broken code that had been forgotten to be removed. I went to look at the discussion on the post, but no one was saying anything about it, I don't even think anyone had saw it yet. I went to look at it again once I got to my dorm but I couldn't find even a trace of it. Luckily I still remember the location in the post, underneath a patch of dirt in a boss room in the third realm.
I passed by the other players and made my way to the hub. Vibrant colors and shops flooded my vision as I made my way through. Each realm had its own fully explorable environment, with all the normal stuff: dungeons, important crafting resources and even a housing area. I went to the third realm and passed by all the dungeons, at my current level I didn't even have to bother fighting any of the enemies. I reached the boss room and made my way to the corner. The room was empty, so someone must've just cleared the room. I lowered myself and plunged my hands into the dirt. Despite not having many stat points into strength, the soil shifted easily between my hands. I kept digging until an information box disturbed my view.
「Demon's Nail」
It was a dagger I've never seen before. Not only that, the stats on it were absurd.
「+999,999 ATK」
My best dagger alone only had ten thousand bonus attack, and that took months of trying just for the perfect dagger, and this completely outclassed it. I could completely dominate the game with this, but there's also no way the developer would just let me have this. I attempted to store the dagger in my inventory for now.
「Are you sure you want to pick up 'Demon's Nail'?」
Another new pop up. Is the system trying to warn me about the dagger? The worst that could happen is my account gets banned, but even starting over wouldn't be that terrible, it would give me something to do at least. I decided the reward outweighed the risk.
「Yes」
「Are you prepared to handle the responsibility?」
I hesitated. This wasn't a phrase I'd seen before in the game. If the system wasn't trying to warm me before, it is now.
「Yes」
「You have equipped 'Demon's Nail'」
Equipped? I only put it in my inventory. Frantically, I opened my inventory and my eyes widened. My level, which had previously been sixty, the max level, is now sixty-two. My inventory size had been doubled, and the Demon's Nail had been equipped. I tried to remove the dagger - replacing it with my old one - but I kept getting met with an undisclosed error. For what felt like hours, I tried to get this dagger off of me, but no matter what I did, it never left.