Arcane Kingdom Online: The Chosen (A LitRPG Adventure, Book 1) Read online

  “Happy?”

  The guard grunted and spoke into a radio walkie-talkie. “All clear. Please open first door. Over.”

  The door slid open and we exited back onto the tarmac. The machine gun turrets aimed right where I stood.

  “Good to see you again too,” I muttered.

  I followed the guard towards the parking gate. As we got closer something different came into view. A man in a tailored black suit and tie leaned against a silver BMW, taking a drag of a cigarette. His brown hair was combed back and he wore black sunglasses despite the fact it was a) night time and b) it made him look like a total douchebag. It was none other than my older brother William Hopewell.

  He threw the cigarette on the floor and stubbed it out with his black leather brogues. He nodded at the guards and said, “Leave him with me. Thank you.”

  Next my older brother opened the door to his car and said, “C’mon Clay. We don’t have anytime to waste.”

  BLACK ASPHALT ROLLED past as Will sped down the highway. He weaved in and out of traffic, cars honking as we passed them. He kept his eyes on the road, fixated on the city’s glowing towers of neon in the far distance. The engine rumbled. The speedometer kept going up. I gripped the door handle for balance and peace of mind.

  Will jerked the steering wheel to the right, cutting across the road, towards an exit lane.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Right now,” said Will, hands gripped on the wheel, “We’re taking a shortcut.”

  We drove off the highway and entered a part of the city I’d never been to. A neighborhood on the outskirts. Half the streetlamps didn’t work and the others flickered on and off soon to be broken themselves. The road was littered with the broken glass of smashed storefront windows. The only items not stolen from these places were their “For Sale” signs. Graffiti adorned the walls of buildings. In deep red letters were the words: “THE END IS NOW.”

  Smoke billowed from a trashcan. A raccoon rushed across the street and I nearly jumped. I’d be a lot happier once we were out of this dilapidated neighborhood. Shadows moved behind the second story windows of nearby buildings.

  “Are you sure this is a safe area to be in?” I asked.

  Will stroked his hair and gritted his teeth. “We’re fine.”

  We continued down the street, passing more fiery trashcans. Smoke enveloped the car, concealing the road ahead. Out of the clouds, figures appeared. Shadowy lumps. Hunched silhouettes. They stood in our way, blocking our passage. They moved towards us. They were scraggly homeless people, men and women, passing around a bottle of whisky. Their eyes were drooping and bloodshot. Most of them were missing teeth. One held a baseball bat. Another held a piece of wood with a rusty nail.

  Will blasted the car horn.

  They ignored him and gathered around the car. More figures joined the original gang, appearing out of the smoke and shadows. They pushed the car back and forth. Then a baseball bat came swinging at the window closest to me. I recoiled at the loud thump. The glass cracked. One more hit and it would disintegrate into tiny shards.

  Will honked the horn.

  “Fuck this.”

  He pulled the car into reverse and slammed on the gas. He knocked a whole crowd of people to the ground. He changed gears and drove at the scraggly rioters in front of us. They dove out of the way and we zoomed down the street.

  A man in a ripped jean jacket ran after us with a green bottle, a flaming cloth dwindling at the neck of it.

  “Step on it Will,” I yelled.

  The rioter screamed and threw the bottle in our direction. The bottle twirled in the air, flying towards the back trunk of the car. Will swerved and the bottle smashed inches away from us, erupting into a blast of flames.

  Will kept his foot on the engine and we shot our way down the street. The wall of flames shrank behind us as we drove away. We turned onto a main road. One with working street lamps and other cars.

  “Holy shit,” I gasped. “Will—what the hell is going on? Where are you taking me?”

  Will shook his head and wiped his eyes. “You know I would do everything in my power to help you. You know that, right?”

  I sighed and asked, “Are you telling me there’s a secret cure for ZERO that only corporate big shots know about?”

  Will shook his head and glanced down at his watch. “We’re running out of time. There is no cure Clay. But there is a preventative measure. You may have already heard of it. Do you know the video game Arcane Kingdom?”

  My eyebrows furrowed. I was surprised on multiple levels. Firstly, Will and I had spent entire holidays in our basement in the glow of the early Arcane Kingdom games. How had he forgotten? Our parents were very anti-video games, so we had to pool our allowances and cumulative birthday money to buy an out of date console older than we were and a copy of Arcane Kingdom 6. We only had enough for one controller, so I sat beside Will as he played the game. Even just watching, it had been mesmerizing.

  The second reason for my surprise was my brother’s current rescue plan was bat shit insane. Back in the day, the Arcane Kingdom franchise rivaled its competitors Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest. The series had been the hot new franchise until—thirty years ago—the creator and founder of TriCorp, Konrad Takashimi, announced the development of Arcane Kingdom Online. The new game promised to take the storytelling, adventure, and wondrousness of the classic single player series and connect people around the globe in a hyper-immersive virtual reality experience. The announcement came with much fanfare, but after a few years with no new developments, the game quickly disappeared from the public consciousness. A couple of decades later, it had been all but forgotten. The earlier titles in the series were spoken of with a quiet awe and fervor, but A.K.O. was now more of a myth than an actual game. People said the production had bankrupted the company while others believed Konrad Takashimi had secretly died. No one had seen the creator or his daughter Betina in years.

  Everything changed last week when the company issued a press release stating those suffering from the ZERO virus were invited to upload their mind to A.K.O. and live a digitally reincarnated life online. All the retail VR capsule pods had sold out in minutes and the waiting list had already grown well into the millions.

  “How did you even get your hands on the equipment?”

  “Let’s just say my company saw a great opportunity in investing in the TriCorp hardware. That’s all I’m at liberty to say.”

  The BMW screeched to a halt outside the city’s hospital. The parking lot was a mess of cars and shanty tents. EMTs weaved patients on stretchers through the crowd of vehicles and homeless refugees. Police managed the crowd, keeping the hysteria to a minimum.

  The homeless campers gawked at me and my white quarantine suit. One woman ran up to us.

  “Please… Help me… I’m dying out here…”

  We quickened our pace and the woman gave up on us, running over to someone else to beg.

  The inside of the hospital was as chaotic as outside. Nurses and doctors ran frantically in either direction. The phone rang and showed no signs of stopping. Will grabbed hold of a nurse by the arm.

  “Excuse me,” she said. “I don’t know if you notice but I got a hospital to run.”

  “Sorry,” said Will. “We’re looking for the ZERO-TriCorp emergency wing.”

  The nurse sighed and said, “The TriCorp wing is in subbasement 2. Take the elevator over there.”

  We hurried over to the elevator. It was empty, offering us a brief respite from the hysteria of the rest of the hospital. Will scratched the back of his head and looked at his watch again. The way he was acting you’d think he was the one on the verge of death.

  The doors slid open, revealing a quiet hallway, empty except for one woman sitting on a bench. My mother. She was her typical professorial self: hair tied tightly in a bun, thick black glasses, tweed suit with a matching skirt. Her heels clanged against the hospital floor as she came to hug me.

  I embraced h
er and said, “I didn’t know you were coming.”

  Her eyes were sad and melancholic. “Clay—it’s good to see you. It’s been—” She paused. “Too long.”

  “Where’s dad?”

  “He had a lecture,” she said quickly and looked away.

  I mustered a smile. Of course he did.

  The three of us stood there in silence, basking in our awkward family reunion. As always, I was the odd one out. Between my brother dressed in his banker’s business suit and my mother in her academic attire, I was clearly the one who didn’t belong. Some things never changed.

  A woman in a lab coat appeared from down the hall and walked towards us. She had red hair that fell past her shoulders and brown hazel eyes.

  “Good evening,” she said. “I assume you are the Hopewells.” She turned to me in my quarantine suit. “And you must be Clay.”

  I nodded.

  “Before we continue: I need you to sign a form agreeing to the operation we’re about to do. So you understand how it works: the TriCorp headset connects nano-sized neural-cerebral transmitters to and from the user’s brain, creating a simulation wave that adapts and envelops one’s central nervous system and consciousness within the servers and data algorithms of Arcane Kingdom Online. You will do this from inside a glass containment pod full of psi-sensory liquid gel. This helps create deep immersion for the user. It also allows us to monitor your physical health from here in the hospital. The hope is we’ll be able to keep your body alive long enough to complete the cognitive upload process which takes roughly forty-eight hours. I’m legally obligated to tell you twenty percent of user’s who undergo this process do not survive. If you still wish to continue, please sign here.”

  She lifted up a holopad and showed me a long legal contract and a place to sign.

  This was it. My one and only chance at survival. Will gave me a reassuring glance. Mom did the same. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to them. Or to this life. Or to this world. But what other choice was there? Shivering, I leaned in closely to the holopad and squiggled my finger across the air, committing myself to the process.

  The doctor headed towards the swinging doors of the operation room. Before she left, she turned around and said, “Please step through here when you’re ready.”

  Will hugged me tight. “Good luck little bro.” He let go and wiped a tear from his eye. “It’s your turn now. I hope you were paying attention in our basement.”

  I grinned. “I thought you had forgotten.”

  “Never. I was worried you had.”

  I shook my head. “No way. I’m still bitter at how much of the game you hogged to yourself.”

  Will and I hugged one last time and then I turned to mom. She was as stoic as she’d always been. Her eyes were clear.

  “Mom,” I said. “I know you and dad didn’t always agree with my life choices. Dropping out of college and—”

  “It’s fine,” she said.

  “Well I want you to know, even though we’ve spent all this time apart, I still—”

  “I know. You don’t have to say anything.”

  I sucked in air.

  “Goodbye mom.”

  She nodded her head and I went down the hallway. As I pushed through the doors, my mother called out.

  “Clay!”

  I turned around. Tears filled her eyes and her lips quivered and all the words she wanted to say stumbled and disintegrated at the shivering border of her mouth.

  The doctor placed her hands on my shoulder, urging me to come forward.

  “Wait,” my mother yelled, an exasperated croak echoing across the hospital hallway.

  “Good luck,” she said and swallowed a lump in her throat. She scratched her neck, clawing at where the words she struggled to express lay trapped. She wanted to say more—tell me all the things she and my father had never said to me growing up, like they believed in me and were proud of me and loved me—and maybe she was going to but right as she opened her mouth I was swept into the next room, never to see her again.

  “We’re running out of time Clay,” said the doctor.

  A sleek black containment pod with the TriCorp logo etched on it stood in the center of the room.

  “If you will please unzip your suit and enter the chamber.”

  “But isn’t it dangerous for you if I take off—”

  She tilted her head in confusion. The doctor was an android. She didn’t care.

  I undid my suit.

  “You’ll have to take all your clothes off,” the woman said. “Once naked please enter the pod.”

  I took off my clothes, shivering more and more with every layer I took off. Butt naked I walked over to the capsule and climbed into it. The doctor followed behind and placed the neuro-VR headset overtop my head. Next she closed the glass roof of the capsule.

  “The procedure will begin shortly,” said the doctor, clicking buttons on her holo-pad in the air.

  A gelatinous purple liquid oozed into the capsule. This must be the sensory gel. After a few moments a voice spoke from the headset.

  “Hello Clay Hopewell. You are attempting a COMPLETE COGNITIVE UPLOAD into Arcane Kingdom Online. Before proceeding you must verbally accept the TriCorp terms and agreements as well as a legal waiver stating you are fully aware of the risks and consequences with COMPLETE IMMERSION uploading. Do you accept and agree?”

  I gulped. There was no turning back now. “Yes.”

  “Are you ready to log-in to Arcane Kingdom Online?”

  I took a deep breath, nodded my head, and answered the prompt: “I’m ready to log-in.”

  3

  The capsule vibrated and shook. The sensory gel filled the pod. The voice prompt in the headset said, “Entering Arcane Kingdom Online.”

  A powerful drowsiness overtook me; my eyes weighed with a great heaviness until I closed them shut and I fell into a deep sea of nothing. Then, like a snap of fingers, I was up above, lost in a gorgeous cerulean sky. I floated in the clouds without arms or legs or even a body. I was an ethereal being. Then I plunged, shooting through the clouds. Out of the puffs of air emerged a large continent floating in the sky. The land went on and on in every direction: mountains, forests, valleys. Water from streams fell from the continent and into the airy depths below.

  Illyria once existed as a single landmass floating above the endless sea, said a scholarly and feminine voice in my head. But thousands of years ago all of that changed…

  I flew closer to the landmass, zooming through snowy mountain peaks. The tall natural spires rumbled. Avalanches crashed down like wintry tidal waves. One mountain erupted with volcanic lava. The ground below cracked and separated. The land ripped apart from its very foundations. A family of elk were separated by the shifting landmasses. Towns and cities tore in two. Hundreds of people fell through the cracks and into the ocean of sky below.

  The Great Rupture split the world into five continents, said the prompt as I floated through new scenes: I was on the edge of a landmass watching magical pirate airships be built by tiny fox-like creatures; next I was running through the forest with a group of rangers; then I was in a market square watching exotic goods be traded and exchanged for glimmering gold coins; rushing through the air I approached this incredible tower shooting upward into the sky like the needle of a rapier. The floating world of Illyria would never be the same. Old alliances shattered and new ones emerged. What role will you take in the future of Illyria?

  I rode up the side of the tower and flew back into the beautiful blue sky. I went higher and higher, heading for the stars, the galaxy of this other world. I travelled through the cosmos: past shooting stars, meteors, and gorgeous nebulae until eventually I arrived at a black sea of nothing. The darkness dissolved and I was standing in a sandy desert under a misty sky. I was back in my body, clad in a light cloth shirt and shorts, no longer an invisible ethereal puff floating through the shifting historical landscape of Illyria. It was such an abrupt transition I fell to my knees, sinking into the
desert sand.

  I gasped at the twilight sky above me. I dug my hands into the sand and let it pour through my fingers. This wasn’t like a video game at all. I stood up and ran over to a nearby oasis and kicked the water. It rippled and flew through the air before splashing back into the small pond. I bent down and splashed water on my face. It felt cool and refreshing on my skin. This was far beyond anything I expected. I lifted the palms of my hands: the detail and texture was amazing. Every crisscrossing line and wrinkle was there. A breeze ruffled my hair. A dry humid odor tickled my nostrils. I felt every single sensation. Wherever I was—Arcane Kingdom Online, Illyria, or digital purgatory—it was indistinguishable from the reality in which I had just come from.

  The clear pool of water caught my reflection. It was enough to make me jump back in surprise. I cautiously stepped back and peered into the pond: my reflection hovered between the surface and the rocky sand below. It wasn’t quite me. The image was partially myself: scruffy brown hair, green eyes, pale white skin from spending too much time inside reading comics and playing video games. There was even a brown dot, a birthmark I’d always had, lying underneath my right ear. Even that had survived the initial upload process to the game. But somehow I looked better, more in-shape, a handsomer, more idealized version of myself.

  A window display appeared in front of me. The screen showed a full body image of myself with loads of customization prompts for changing my face, gender, race, and name.

  So this was the character creation zone.

  I examined the window display. Under the race tab I was currently classed as: “Haeren (Arethkarian).” Ah yes, the Haeren. All the previous Arcane Kingdom games had used that name to refer to the human equivalent race. I clicked on the button “Haeren (Arethkarian)” and a new window popped up.

  Haeren

  The Haeren are Illyria’s youngest and most populous race. Their friendly nature and desire for travel—be it by foot, carriage, or airship—has led them to creating towns and cities across the five continents. [All Haeren, except for Orensparon, have access to all professions and classes and start with a neutral to friendly stance with all other races].