Acquired: Copper Ore [Quality: 1%]

Acquired: Copper Ore [Quality: 0%]

Acquired: Copper Ore [Quality: 1%]

Acquired: Copper Ore [Quality: 2%]

Acquired: Copper Ore [Quality: 1%]

“All of this copper is low quality.” Winter sighed with disappointment.

“What did you expect, we don’t have a mining skill yet. You’ll need to level it up if you want to get higher quality stuff. Without a skill of the appropriate level, you can’t get a quality above 3%.” Davoth commented, watching his friend sweat as he mined.

“So there’s no point mining until we get this quest done?”

“Eh, the experience is retroactive, so it’s not a waste. Once you get the skill, all the mining experience you accumulated beforehand will be added to your mining at once.” Davoth looked around the surroundings to double check for Rockjaws.

“Perfect. Walking back and forth seems pretty inefficient.” Winter said between pickaxe swings. He looked to see his stamina dropping with each swing, and his hunger had dropped below 50%. “Any secret to getting my stamina back fast?” Winter asked.

“It regens slowly whenever you relax for a few minutes. The regen rate is based on your hunger level and your stats.” Davoth replied as he continued to look out for Rockjaws to hunt.

“Gotcha.” Winter pulled out one of the buns from his inventory, biting into it. He wasn’t sure what to expect from it flavor wise, but it tasted like freshly baked warm bread, surprisingly delicious. Before he knew it, he had finished eating and watched his hunger bar fill back up by 10 points, and after a few minutes of resting he was able to refill his stamina completely.

“Not bad.” Winter stood up and stretched, then went back to mining the copper ore. He continued this for a good hour, getting a notification from the Sim Box that he’d been playing a long time without a break, but ignored it. Once he’d cleaned out all the ore out of one area he climbed to a high vantage point on the hills to find a new spot, and continued mining.

“Hey Davoth!” Winter called for him after about four hours of mining, climbing to the top of a hill.

“Yeah!” He shouted back a few rocky hills away, running to reach his friend. “You finally get our 20 copper?”

“20? I’ve got closer to 200.” Winter bragged.

“Seriously? We coulda headed back to turn in the quest hours ago?” He groaned.

“Yeah but you said experience is retroactive right? Going back and forth is inefficient. I need your pickaxe.” Winter held his hand out expectantly.

“What? Why?”

“Mine hit 0 durability, can’t mine with it anymore.”

“Dude, you’re seriously going to keep mining? I’m already level 2. Check it out, I got a few copper ore to drop from the Rockjaws as well.” He took out 6 copper ore chunks from his inventory. “Hunting’s where the fun is at, this is an MMORPG!”

“6 ore from hunting for 4 hours? Incredibly inefficient. Hand it over.” Winter wiggled the fingers of his outstretched hands at his friend.

“You’re unbelievable.” Davoth sighed as he took out his pickaxe. “I finally get you to play and all you want to do is mine ore.”

“I’m making money.” Winter proudly declared as he took the pickaxe and headed back down to another cluster of ore.

“Well yeah, but I’m level two.” Davoth retorted as he headed off to find more Rockjaws. More time went by and the sun began to set in the simulated world. During the next stretch of his mining endeavor he got some benefits towards his stats.

Attribute Up!: You’ve gained +1 Strength

Attribute Up!: You’ve gained +1 Constitution

Both increases helped raise his maximum stamina and make it easier to swing the pickaxe. After another few hours Davoth made his way back to check on Winter.

“You’re still going at it? How much ore did you get?” Davoth asked.

“Almost 600, my inventory’s getting full.”

“We should head back, you’ll get a decent level in mining from all this that’ll up the quality of the ore you’re getting.”

“Yep, that’s the plan. The pickaxe will be done in about an hour. I-”

“Eli, I made dinner.” He heard his mom's voice, she was speaking to him using the microphone outside the Sim Box.

“I’ll be out in a minute. Sorry Davoth, gotta step out to eat. You head back and I’ll meet you in town.”

“You gonna be alright heading back on your own? Monsters get tougher at night.” Davoth replied.

“Yeah I’ll be fine.”

“Alright cool, I’ll probably head off home too once I get back. But this was cool right? I mean, all you did was mine, but you down to play more tomorrow?” Davoth asked excitedly.

“If this stuff really makes money, then sure why not. Beats a part time job and more scholarship interviews.” Winter shrugged.

“Sweet! Catch you later.” Davoth grinned ear to ear. That was the last thing Winter saw before he hit the exit simulation button. His vision blanked for a moment. Once it came back to him he was looking at the top screen of the Sim Box, letting him know he’d been in simulation for just over 7 hours. He looked to his mom as the top of the Sim Box opened.

“I saw you were playing it too, huh?” She grinned deviously. “What’d you think?”

“Derrick talked me into it, says there’s a way to use it to make some money so I figured I’d try it out.”

“He finally got his own Sim Box?”

“Nah they upgraded the Sim Box’s downtown, he’s using those. What’s for dinner?”

“Your favorite! Spaghetti..” She lead him down the stairs and the scent hit his nose once he reached the bottom step. He didn’t realize how hungry he had gotten but when he saw the plates prepared he dove right into eating with his mom.

“So will you be playing more?” She watched him curiously.

“Yeah, I guess. Trying not to let the fact that David plays it get to me. You’re right about it being pretty damn incredible.”

“What island did you start in?”

“Kalmoore.”

“Aw, that’s way far from the one I picked. If you end up liking it we’ll have to get another Sim Box to play together.” She smiled.

“You plan on playing more too?”

“Yup, had a lot of fun. My co-workers said they’d like to show off to me the houses they got in the game world.”

“I always thought you hated playing video games, you never played with David.”

“Nah, I used to love them. That’s how we met. I just didn’t have much time and, honestly, it was tough playing with him after a while. He always took the games way too seriously for me, so I could never relax and enjoy them.”

“If that’s the case, you should use the Sim Box. I’m not that into it.” Eli shrugged.

“No, no it’s fine. I’m in no rush. Once we get you that tuition money to Equinor we can save up and get another. You have fun with your friends, you’ve been so focused on studying I was worried you forgot how.”

“Oh c’mon it’s not that bad.”

“Really? You’re reading books on rare diseases in your free time.” She motioned to his backpack and book that she’d already brought downstairs for him.

“I find that stuff interesting.” Eli defended himself. His mother just raised a single brow in his direction to express her doubt.

“Once you finish your exams next week you’ll be home free. I don’t want you to spend the summer break worrying about me or money, so promise me you’ll try to enjoy your summer and have some fun.”

“Yeah yeah, I’ll go drink alcohol, do drugs and have some one night stands with the other seniors. I promise.” He said with heavy sarcasm. His mother rolled her eyes at him. Once they finished eating he made his way back up to his dad's old office and stood in front of the Sim Box, waiting to choose a simulation to load.

He thought about going into the Surgery Simulation to get some practice in, but the curiosity of how much money he’d make with all that copper got the best of him, and before he knew it he was back inside the game world, sitting atop a mound of stone in the Kalop hills.

While he had spent 45 minutes eating in realtime, that’d meant it had been 3 hours in the game world. Davoth was long gone from the hills. Winter saw his party had been disbanded and his friend was logged out.

He took the chance to spend the last 5 points of durability on the copper pickaxe, clanging the stone under moonlight. He could hear the echoes of a few other late night miners at work, so he didn’t feel alone.

Once the durability broke, he stretched his back and arms and checked his inventory to see his haul. In total he managed to collect 683 copper ore, the highest quality piece he’d gotten was 3% and not many of them at that.

The next step was to take it back to the village and turn in the quest to see what mining level he’d gotten from all his hard work. He began the trek back in the dead of night, the sounds of owls hooting and crickets chirping all around him. Alone, he wasn’t particularly in the mood to fight anything so he did his best to avoid any rustling sounds in the brush of the forest.

After about an hour and a half of walking he broke the treeline into the open fields around the village of Orm where he saw a strange gathering of 5 players, they had many small bright yellow lights floating all around them, illuminating their surroundings making it easy to spot them from far away.

Winter didn’t think much of it as he walked towards the village, until he recognized one of them to be Swiftstar, the level 36. Swiftstar noticed Winter approaching and began pointing in Winter’s direction furiously.

“There, that’s him! That’s Makarath’s son!” Swiftstar shouted out, causing the other 4 players to look at him. They walked over to him hurriedly and surrounded him. Winter knew something was up, but he wasn’t sure what his options were. He saw their names and levels, all of the other 4 were above level 50. Keldan, Shira, Rothrax, Medelon. They had high level armor and various types of weapons and equipment that looked well beyond what Winter was wearing. More importantly, he noticed a camera icon floating above Keldan’s head. He could only assume it had something to do with the live streaming feature the game had.

“You’re Winter, right? Son of the player Makarath?” Keldan spoke. He was a tall male human with wavy blonde hair that went around his ears, wielding a large white staff on his back. He wore very colorful decorative robes.

“Who are these guys, Swiftstar?” Winter ignored Keldan and looked at the person he knew. Swiftstar didn’t reply to Winter, instead to Keldan. “It’s him. He said so earlier.”

“Good enough for me.” Keldan shrugged, waving his staff at Winter. Winter suddenly felt his body freeze up in place, paralyzed and unable to move. His body went numb, he could blink, see, and hear, but that was it. “Listen up, my fellow adventurers. Today, Justice will be served for those who have been trampled on by the Sages of Destiny guild. Here before us is the son of Makarath, the leader of the guild.” Keldan spoke as he began circling Winter, the others watched with smiles on their faces.

“For all of you who were killed and pushed out of grind spots by those high level players, or had loot stolen from them, this is for you! Makarath, if you’re watching this, you should work harder to protect your poor weak little boy.” Keldan spoke with pride. Winter had a good idea of what was coming next. A giant fireball formed from Keldan’s staff and shot at Winter. For an instant, the pain was unbearable, until his screen went black.

You have died.

Login Restriction: 1h

(Reduced Login penalty due to player level)

The simulation ended and the Sim Box opened up, he sat in the chair annoyed for a bit as he looked at the screen. A bunch of high level idiots using him to get back at his dad. Whatever, he thought. Paying the price for not changing his appearance, he didn’t particularly care. He’d just find something else to do for an hour and then go back and check the copper prices.

He got up and headed to his bedroom. He had a small screen built into the wall beside his bed and pressed a few buttons on it to turn on music, then walked over to his exercise equipment and did a few stretches. He spent the next hour working out his muscles to make sure he stayed in shape, lifting weights and doing push ups until he worked up a sweat. Once he finished, he hopped in the shower, dried himself off, and headed to the Sim Box.

The time restriction was lifted, he could now log back in. Eli sat back into the Sim Box and started the simulation. Once it initialized and he’d gotten through the login screen, he awoke in front of a large white statue with angel wings. He was in a graveyard, it was still dark out but in the distance he could see the familiar buildings of Orm illuminated by lanterns lining the streets.

He stretched his arms and legs to get used to his body again, double checking his status and inventory. Everything was exactly as before, no penalty for dying at level one. He strutted casually through the graveyard, noting the many high level Kalmoore guards present. He presumed they were to deter any would be corpse-campers.

When he arrived back at the village square he headed straight for the Craftsman Guildhall, stepped inside and saw that Hoggan was behind the desk, half asleep.