Chapter 2: Prologue 2: Past Experience
After playing this game, Dragona Online, for almost five years, clearing the mobs of the dungeon was an easy feat for their party. And as they arrive outside the boss room, they took their time to prepare and recuperate their strength so that they would be able to fight the 'Dungeon Boss' at their hundred percent capability.
"Everyone ready?" Pedro asked.
Everyone nodded towards him with confidence in response. With his lead, they carefully entered the Boss Room. However, instead of a Dungeon Boss who would immediately launch an attack, they were welcomed by a Black Dragon who seemed to have just woken up from its sleep.
"Humans..." The black dragon yawned as it simply lifted its head and watched them advance forward. Then, the dragon asked, "You dare wake me up from my sleep?"
Underestimating the Dragon, A male player with a bow mocked it and said, "Man... Is this even a dungeon?"
This made everyone else, except Pedro, laugh as if agreeing with the man.
On the contrary, Pedro felt that something was off with the Dragon. He knew that the dragon was either far stronger or way weaker than them to act less hostile to an enemy.
"Be on your guard! Ready your teleportation crystals! Something feels weird with this boss!" Pedro ordered as he held his teleportation crystal in his left hand.
Because of his authority, Everyone followed his order without complaining and took out teleportation crystals.
This was a common safety method done by the players who play VR games. This is due to one of the Laws made by the government on VR games like "Death penalties should result in true death of the player's character".
This Law was based on the study of a psychologist to help develop different skills like social or survival skills of the people, especially the young ones who play games most of the time. At the same time, it may lessen the chance of people becoming addicted to VR games.
However, VR games have some cases into which this law was not applicable. Some exemptions may include deaths due to losing on Duels or valid PvP battles, tutorials, and the like.
The risks they face were very high since the hard work that they invested in their characters in those past 5 years would be lost if they die.
Since the 'Dungeon Boss' seemed like it was just about to take action, Pedro wanted to seize the initiative to strike first. Hence, he hurriedly gave their tank the go signal to attack.
"Vex! Charge now!"
Vex, the party's tank, simply smirked in response. Then, he grasped his shield and sword, tightly, and activated a skill that made him ram straight to the dragon.
As everyone was following the charge of Vex, the dragon turned its head towards the party in a lazy manner.
"Humans! You are brave... BUT NOT STRONG ENOUGH!"
At this moment, Vex slammed towards the dragon's hand.
For some reason, their mouths went agape as the dragon retained its calm and cold look while still being able to 'lazily' move its head.
Vex could only take a step back in fear. The skill he used to 'charge' towards the dragon is a skill that had the highest 'stun rate' in that game.
"Not good!" Pedro said as the monster's information appeared.
~~~~~~~~~~
[Atlas, The World Dragon]
Rating: God
Description: [unknown]
Skills:
[unknown]
[unknown]
~~~~~~~~~~
Monster details or information do not appear unless it was attacked. This was one of the 'Laws' implemented on VR games. Hence, only when the players were able to land a hit to their targets should the information about it appear.
Everyone wore a grim look upon seeing the dragon's name and information. It is at that moment that they realized that the dragon isn't something they should mess with.
As quick-witted as everyone was, they immediately activated the teleportation crystal in their hands.
"TELEPORT! NOW!" Pedro was anxious as his teleportation countdown of 5 seconds starts.
The teleportation crystals activated and the countdown started. To the five players, this moment seemed to be the longest five seconds in their life.
Suddenly, the dragon showed a faint smile and exhaled a blue flame out of its mouth.
Fwaaaaaaah!
"You think you can escape me, humans?" The dragon chuckled as everyone had a grayed vision and received a system notification.
[You Died! Character deletion and automatic logout will commence in 3!]
2!
1!
...
"Nooooooo!" Pedro screamed very loud as he regained consciousness in the real world.
'What was that? A god? Ain't those types of NPCs only appeared on Main Story Quests? Why would there be a dungeon boss of that level?'
While questions bombard into his head, someone slapped him hard at the back of his head. He glanced in that direction and saw his enraged father standing near the door of his room.
"You useless piece of @@@@!" His dad scolded while pointing his hand to Pedro, "Can't you see that we are already sleeping? It's 2:00 AM PEDRO! 2:00 AM! I even thought that something bad happened to you! Only to learn that you--!"
"Calm down, Honey... Calm down!" His mother entered the room and stopped his father with a hug.
His father shrugged his mother's arms and said, "This is the last time you'll do this young man! Do it one more time and you'll see what I would to your game!"
Afterward, his parents left him in his room. Then, He simply laid back to his bed and placed a pillow above his face.
'Could anything go worst than this?' He thought.
The next morning, Pedro was woken up by his phone. He was receiving messages from his guildmates. He lifelessly reached for his phone and saw that he had more than forty unread messages.
All of the messages that he received were similar. It was from his guildmates telling him that they would leave their guild after learning the unfortunate event that they experienced last night.
Out of anger, he threw his phone as strong as he could and said, "I know that something was fishy! Only five were online last night? And now this? Fvck them!"
With his character deleted and his guildmates leaving, the guild that he built for five years has disbanded after just one night.
Inside the Armaz Energy Corporation, Pedro's father has just arrived and he was about to enter his office. His secretary followed behind him with a black folder in her hand.
"Were you able to get information about the VR Box?"
"Yes, President Jon!"
"Let me hear it."
"Yes, sir... Since last year, the developers of the VR Box had a major problem. It was their electricity consumption rate. Since then, the developers searched for possible solutions to the extent of even finding an Energy Company to collaborate with the research and design. Unfortunately, no Energy company displayed their interest to collaborate with them. The cost was high and the solution they wanna make is for something that would be used in a game. Which--"
"Was opposed by governments all over the world." Mr. Jon Armaz interrupted.
"Yes, President!"
"Then... How did they succeed?"
"Joe Energy Corporation International."
"I see... Check if Atomic Energy Crystal III can lower the energy consumption of the VR Box. If the RnD Department sends its approval, Try to contact the Manufacturer of the VR Box. We must get a deal with them no matter what!"
"Yes, President!"
The secretary left Mr. Jon Armaz, who was looking down from the windows of his office.
"Games, huh?"