The Game

Wars, hunger, aliens, diseases, extinction, climate change. For ages, people used to picture that Earth would face these problems in the not-so-far future. But do you know what the main human problem is in 3026? Yes, it is plain boredom.

After drugs to stop aging at 26 were invented and AI took over nearly all the work needed to support humanity, boredom became a real issue.

That is how and why the Game was invented, after all. Full VR immersion of your mind while your body is kept in stasis, giving you new life without the need to return to the real world. Exploring a world ten times bigger than Earth, where you could do almost everything. No limits, very few rules. Your experience always unique and altered by AI engine to spice things up. Sounds like a good cure for boredom, at least for some time.

Nick was happy to finish his last day as an AI support technician. Five years of shifts granted him one hundred years in the game. Which is a good start, because everyone knows that time is essential, it’s the main currency in Pangea. Nick heard the rumors that over the last five hundred years of the game’s existence, some players in factions of angels and demons gained millions of years. Which must be really sweet, because time means experience, and the more time you have, the richer the experience, full of pleasure. Besides that, there were rumors that some factions and classes were erased from the game forever, and all players were zeroed because they had become extremely powerful.

After finishing his shift, Nick headed straight to one of the Game’s stasis centers. One hundred wonderful years of new adventures awaited him.

He entered the Game full of excitement. The first thing he saw was a user agreement. There were only three simple rules:

Rule 1. Your class and stats are defined by your genetic code and are not subject to change.
Rule 2. To play the game, you need time. In order to return to the real world, you need to die or run out of time.
Rule 3. There are no moral or legal rules or consequences in the game. You are free to do whatever you want.

Nick agreed to the rules with lightning speed, and the fun had started.
The game determined Nick’s class as necromancer, which was weird enough because Nick had never heard of this class. Given a choice of where to start the game, he selected Abadon, the capital city of the demon faction, hoping to meet his family there.
Nick spawned right in the center of Abadon. The time was just past midday. Right away, he was mesmerized by the neo-gothic city architecture. High towers reaching the skies, with all possible demonic creatures all around him. Just the city design was worth exploring for days.

First thing, Nick headed to the city family center to find his sister, who had spent the last few decades in the game and was, to his knowledge, a wealthy demon.
On his way, he was observing the weirdest sculptures he had ever seen. The family reunion center was right in front of him when he noticed something shiny on the road. It was a golden coin. Nick picked it up, and the coin depicted the devil on both sides.
The next thing he heard was, “Get out of the way,” and then there was total darkness.

Nick was hit by the train. Death was instant.
 

Nick woke up in a strange old castle. Realization of what just happened, slowly came to him. He had just died in a stupid accident. But something was extremely wrong. He was still in the game, not the real world. He checked his clock, and it showed that he had minus one hundred years of playtime.