In one of the apartments of a suburb, a young man, resembling a younger facial image of Maximus Grant, was currently having a nightmare in his bed.
The lower legs of the bed were crippled—to balance it, a severed brick was placed.
As he flipped his body from side to side, the crippled legs of the bed and a piece of brick's friction was slowly making the latter detach from the former.
Eventually, the bed suddenly dropped by an inch, causing Max to be startled awake.
He sat up straight away as he broke into sweats and was gasping for breath.
He fell into daze and has yet to be conscious enough of his surroundings.
The apartment was illuminated by sunlight gleaming through the broken window. It was currently in the afternoon, and his young brother had yet to return from school.
Suddenly, a knock echoed from the door, grabbing Max's attention.
It was a simple and soft knock at first, but eventually, it got so intense that the door was abruptly broken.
Max gazed at the three people entering the apartment with fierce gazes with steel bats on their grasp.
A bald middle-age man glared at Max, who stared at him in a daze, and shouted, "You motherfucker! Are you deaf? Or you're just pretending to ignore us? Don't blame me for breaking your door!"
He pointed his steel bat at Max, who had just finally regained his consciousness.
He stared at him, then to his lackeys, and to his surroundings.
W-Where am I?
This place…
When realization finally struck him, a tear crawled out of his eyelids.
"Oi! Oi! Oi! You fucker! Stop being a crying-baby and pay your parents' monthly loan!"
When Max heard what he had just said, his assumption was spot on.
I have returned back in time! Seven years!
It was currently February 28, 2028. It was just in the late months last year that the gaming pod was released. It took the gaming industry by storm. Countless games were introduced the moment the gaming pod has sold ten million units in the span of three days.
Currently, at least 100 million have bought a gaming pod and there are a variety of gaming pods depending on their quality.
Aethernova Industries, a leading organization in producing gaming pods, were able to produce a limited-edition, high-end gaming pod by next year. It was capable of automated waste infiltration and extraction, which was feces and urine processing, IV-based micronutrient and caloric injection system, muscle stimulation to prevent atrophy, real-time vitals monitoring and neural feedback balancing, and sleep-cycle compression technology compatibility.
However, only a limited number were released, marketed as "Elite Competitive Equipment" for top-tier players and sponsored guild leaders.
Furthermore, after discovering how the players invested most of their time playing, they introduced the sleep compression injection, which condenses REM cycles, allowing 4 hours of sleep to functionally equal to 8-10 hours of sleep.
Nevertheless, in a few year's time, those who invested themselves in playing, even when they had a limited-edition gaming pod, would suffer from physical consequences—worst, they would become mentally ill.
And that was then, the exercises from Apocalypse Online were brought to the real world and became one of the most effective cures.
It was also the beginning of the foreshadowing that what had happened in the Apocalypse Online would occur in the real world.
And that was when everything would make sense why even the pentagon couldn't crack down the culprit, who deleted every VMMORPG game and was replaced by a single game, Apocalypse Online.
Max only has five years left before the apocalypse descended on earth—space rifts began to tear every part of the country, causing the demons and monsters to invade and take seventy percent of the landmass.
Thankfully, as soon as the apocalypse descended, the status of every player down to their equipment and inventory was brought to the real world, enabling them to fight back and eventually stabilizing the human's safety after covering forty percent of the landmass.
Afterwards, it would be difficult to obtain class advancement. The system, to which allowed them to keep their inventory, items, and their tier, class, and level wouldn't just reward them without a proper and logical reason.
They have to earn the class advancement by fighting and killing a demon or monster above them multiple times or clear a dungeon with a difficulty higher than their tier.
In fact, for the next two years after the apocalypse descended, those who earned a class advancement and ascended to the next tier could be counted by hand.
That was why Max tried to ask the Lewis Guild in exchange for the hidden legacy class he obtained.
He asked for money because that was the only way to recruit members to help him clear dungeons to finally gain a class advancement.
In return, he was betrayed, instead.
He was utterly infuriated, causing him to grit his teeth and veins began to pop up on his jaw. His bloodshot eyes were staring into nothingness.
However, the loan sharks interpreted his reaction in a negative way, offending them.
Hence, the bald middle-age man didn't hesitate to swing his steel bat at Max's cheeks.
The moment his body moved, Max's gaze turned sharp. He evaded the attack by leaning on his back timely, causing the bald middle-age man to lose his footing but was saved from falling to the floor with his lackeys just in time.
Enraged, he hastily stood up and about to attack Max again when the latter raised his hands and said in a horrified tone, "I-I'm sorry, I'll pay now. I was just reminded of someone offending me."
The bald middle-age man gritted his teeth with a flushed face. He was embarrassed that his lackeys witnessed a humiliating sight of missing his attack and losing his balance.
He growled at Max, "You better pay your parent's monthly loan with 30% interest this time."
Max was taken aback. He asked, "Why 30%? Wasn't it 20%?"
The bald middle-age man yelled. "What else? The ten percent is for me. The rest is for my boss!"
Max nodded. "Aright. I'll give it to you."