"Should I just start murdering random people?" Lucius laughed as he thought about the sanity of what he had just asked himself. "But there is nothing I feel wrong…"
He looked down at his hands and there was nothing. No black marks that usually corrupted beings have, not even voices speaking to him, nothing that screamed that he was darkness itself… like how Miu said it.
He just felt normal, but not for too long.
"Hey you!" A sudden, deep voice came from in front of him. "Throw your hands up, kid!"
His first encounter in Eldoria, a human, or well, he can't truly be categorized as a human.
A bandit… which means I am in the slums… what a great spawn area. Lucius thought as he finally stood up from the ground, feeling the weight of his body, feeling that he was truly alive, feeling the reality of it all and getting a bit emotional.
He spent so much time in the hospital bed that a tear almost rolled from his eyes when he stood up on his own, though the bandit was still there.
"Do it, kid!"
Bandit... should I kill him—
[System: Kill him and harvest his soul. You can also cut his neck artery and drink his blood for the "Blood Ritual" Achievement.]
What the fuck…?
[System: I am your assistant and personal System.]
Okay… but—
"I said throw your hands up!" The bandit shouted again, but this time his voice was stronger, and he moved toward Lucius and he noticed it.
It was only for a split second, but he saw it.
The fucking typical dagger that all the bandits had in the game, and now that Lucius was in the game himself, was a completely different experience. Back on Earth, he could wipe out a bandit with one click of the mouse, but now it was something else entirely, to say the least.
Adrenaline surged through him immediately, his heart started racing, his eyes and his entire being locked on the dagger and the threat.
Fear.
He felt it as goosebumps ran all over his body and he knew it was fear because the same fucking thing that had happened on Earth, though that was a homeless man threatening him with a knife for money, but it was the same feeling.
The fear for your life, but this time it was different, so much different that even Lucius questioned it.
"Why do I fear…?" He asked himself, looking down once again at his shaking hands. It didn't make sense that he was still trembling, not after what Miu had explained to him.
[System: Fool of Death, do not fear. The Fool of Death is fear itself. You are excited for your first kill, so do it slowly and enjoy every single drop of blood.]
For a moment, he paused, because what the System said was straight-up absurd, a psychopathic serial killer behavior, but it was right.
Lucius wasn't shaking because of fear, nor did he feel threatened by the dagger.
What Lucius felt was excitement, pure and raw excitement that took over him.
Yeah, I need to test it… now… it's the perfect time and he is just a bandit. He thought, as it truly was the perfect time.
A bandit like this in front of him, a low-level one, had no meaning in the world of Eldoria… he had to test it with him, rather than with something more powerful.
So Lucius did what he never would have thought and started walking straight toward the man, who was everything and nothing all at once. He seemed… fragile, scared, like he just wanted to rob Lucius and nothing more.
"Hey! Stop!" He shouted, pointing the dagger at Lucius. "I said stop!"
But he didn't stop, he kept walking.
"Stop! I said stop!" He shouted, swinging the dagger to scare Lucius away, but nothing, no something happened that was absurd.
Lucius reached out, grabbed the bandit hand that held the dagger and walked into it.
He felt the blade going against his skin, cutting it and sliding into his stomach, and then felt the warmth of his blood but Lucius did not flinch. He did not scream. His eyes were wide, bright with something dark and terrible.
Something that should not exist in a human being.
"W-What… are you…?" The bandit voice came, staring deep into Lucius's eyes… eyes that were nothing but a dark void, while the sound of blood dripping no, it wasn't dripping, it was pouring onto the ground, yet there wasn't a single trace of emotion on Lucius's face, just that smile.
"Haaa…" He exhaled, still staring into the man's eyes as he grabbed his hand and slowly pulled the knife out, then, without hesitation, he stabbed himself with it again… and again… and again… and again.
The sound of it, the sound as the blade drove into the same spot, the sound that the blood made as it gushed out with each stab was terrifying. But what was more terrifying was that he felt all of it, felt the dagger go into his organs, felt all of it and didn't look away.
He stared straight into the bandit's eyes.
"I'm truly invincible huh…?"
[Quest completed: The Rise of the Fool of Death]
An hour before.
"No way…" Lucius' mouth was wide open just like his eyes, as he was looking all around and immediately recognized the place, it was the same palace that stuck with everybody who ever played the Eldoria.
The spawn location of every beginner that starts the game, the palace where the storyline starts with basic tutorials, up in the clouds next to the Forgotten Gods' realm, which is a foreshadowing for the most ridiculous final boss fight in the main quest.
I gotta be hallucinating, yeah why the fuck would I be in a game that is just purely impossible… maybe I fall into a coma… yeah those machines keeping me alive… I am just a potato in real life… He thought as he still stared at the gates of the Forgotten Gods realm.
"Mom! Unplug me! I'm not going to live in a false reality, do it, Ma! You promised me!" He shouted from the top of his lungs but his words didn't reach anybody, only the vast skies and clouds… yeah their promise was heard by no one…
A promise that his parents and he had made, a promise no family should ever make. It was simple, if Lucius ever fell into a coma or became fully paralyzed, they would unplug him from the machine keeping him alive. They would let him go… let him slip into the afterlife in peace.
That was their promise.
"Mother! Father! Plug me—"
"Why are you shouting?" A sudden voice came from behind his back, and for a moment he completely froze him and the reason for it was simple. He had heard the same sweet voice thousands of times, and when he finally slowly turned around to see… she was truly there.
Her purple dress, the golden braided hair, the pale skin with the golden cane in her hand and the most unforgettable part were the emeralds that replaced her two eyes.
"Miu…?"
She was really there as a real being looking exactly like she looked in the game. Her big boobs, her gorgeous face and those emerald eyes… all of it was real as well as the sharp sound of the cane as she started to walk toward him.
"It's me, Lucius. Nice to see you again… no… " She giggled. "It's nice to see the real you." She smiled as she slowly reached out her pale hand toward Lucius's face… it was warm… not just that but the smell of her was exactly like how the game described it.
Mirelda Isenwyn Urathis, known simply as Miu, the Goddess of Wanderers.
In the game, she was essentially the tutorial guide, as according to the game's lore, all players begin as wanderers and only later choose their classes.
"T-this can't be real…" Lucius whispered as he stared at her, well, more like stared at her big boobs.
That too was just like in the game. Those horny ass developers knew exactly how to grab the male player's attention. Her dress only covered her nipples and it was kind of see-through… yeah those nipples seemed too real as did her whole being.
"It is real, Lucius!" she shouted, her voice filled with joy as she spun around. Once again, Lucius' attention was caught very much as she saw under her skirt. "This is Eldoria, the palace where you belong, the palace where the journey starts!"
Silence. Her enjoyment was followed by complete silence.
No way… I can't be this down bad… this can't be real… he thought staring at her nipples. Why the fuck am I imagining a game character this way… I had never even thought about having sex with her. Fuck, I was never even horny for a game character.
"Can you stop it?" She asked, but now her sweet voice kind of faded away. "Just accept it, why do you act like this? And stop staring at my boobs, you freak." She said as she covered herself.
"What…?" Lucius asked, looking up at her face in disbelief. He could see emotions there, see that disgusted look, even though her eyes were fucking emeralds.
"Yeah, you died, you freak. Just accept it. Why do you need to do this? "Oh, I'm hallucinating." She mimicked him. "You died. A painful and terrible death. You are not plugged into a machine, you are not even in the hospital anymore. Your body was cremated, and you are in an urn.
Now, this was something else, something truly confusing to him, not even confusing, just… something he couldn't name. Like hearing that his body had already fucking turned to ash… what the fuck, but there was one more thing that was more stange then that.
"Y-You went off script."
"Because this is not a game, not a dream, not an imagination… but your reality now." She said as she stepped once again toward him and pointed her finger to his forehead. "This… is… not… a… game." She poked him and he felt her sharp golden nails.
Yeah, he felt it, the pain as her nail dug into his forehead. He even felt her breath and the smell, the smell that the game described as very rosary-like.
How much fentanyl did they give me…? This has got to be an overdose… a trip? I'm tripping about Miu in a sexual way… about a game character.
"I can hear your thoughts." She said but now her facial expression changed too, she looked fed up with his bullshit. "You are not on fentanyl, Lucius, you are not on the machine and you definitely are not going to have any sexual act with me. You're dead, you got cremated, your body is in an urn and now you are in Eldoria."
"Wait…" Lucius said, staring at her harder now, realizing that something was truly wrong. She knew something she shouldn't. "You can't know about my death… or what happened to my body."
It wasn't just about that Miu went off script, talking about modern medicine and machines, but that she knew that his body was already in an urn. It was something totally different now, like it wasn't just impossible anymore, but absurd to even think about it.
"Oh, I know everything." She smiled. "A month has already passed since you died." She laughed for some reason. "Your parents are grieving for you, your friends too, but something greater than death happened…" She suddenly went silent, as if adding dramatic effect, then stretched her arms wide. "You were invited into the game you conquered, the game that was your obsession, the game that is no longer just a game, but your life!" She clapped her hands together. "You are in Eldoria!"