Gabriel borrowed his Dad's white Ford sedan, it was equipped with accelerator and brake buttons behind the steering wheel to allow Kristof to drive. Although one of the newer self driving cars would have made things easier for Kristof, Gabriel's parents couldn't afford something so expensive. Gabriel got in the driver seat and pressed a button on the touch pad above the audio player to enable the foot accelerators and brakes. His sister Jane helped Max buckle into the booster seat in the back.

Max was old enough not to have to sit in one but he was small for his age so he still needed the booster. Jane jumped in the front and Gabriel drove out the driveway. He first headed to drop off Jane at her Junior High and then took Max to his primary school. He walked Max in himself and made sure he got to class. He had tendency to hide at the sand pit and play with his toys in the morning, arriving late to class.

Gabriel then drove for another hour to inner city New-York and went to West Point College main campus. It was one of the new, cutting-edge colleges, with predominantly upper-class students. The massive needle-like building rising up in the middle of campus, which housed the Technology and Robotics department, was the first thing one noticed upon approaching West Point. A massive steel structure that looked as if a giant had driven a stake into the ground. The amount of money needed to enter the department was enormous, and scholarships were in high demand. Gabriel was fortunate enough to receive a West Point scholarship, although it only funded his economics major with a minor in history. Gabriel finished his first year in the top five of his class. He fell into a deep hole after sucking on the forbidden fruit of woman during a College party, and spent the next two years chasing girls.

Before he knew it, Gabriel wound up going steady with Melissa. She took up much of Gabriel's time from then on out. He spent most of his daily life doing errands for her. The love struck fool also spent most nights, driving Melissa and her friends around instead of studying. Gabriel acted more like a chauffeur then a boyfriend.

"God, don't let me run into that bitch." Gabriel muttered under his breath.

Speak of the Devil and they shall appear. Gabriel just entered through the front gates after parking the car and was headed toward the central courtyard where the graduation was taking place. When he managed to walk straight into Melissa and her friend Lucy, coming out of the Auditorium in front of the courtyard. Gabriel bumped into Lucy and quickly reached out to stabilize her. Melissa was the first to realize it was Gabriel and threw down one of her classic snide remarks straight off the bat.

"Wow Gab. I didn't think that merely a day after we break up, you would already be trying to get your hands on my friends." Melissa's snarky voice commented.

Lucy looked at Gabriel's hand, which was holding onto her arm after he bumped into her. She started to blush and threw Melissa a frown. Gabriel's brow wrinkled at the comment as he gazed at Melissa. He forgot how much of bit*h Melissa use to be. Gabriel merely ignored Melissa and helped steady Lucy. Once done he replied like he was talking to thin air.

"Well Melissa after you dumped me over text last night, the hazy fog that covered my eyes has now cleared and thank Jesus for I have seen the light!" Gabriel put his hands up like he was a tent-revival preacher.

"Lord I have seen the Devil! She wears trashy lip stick and sucks the souls out of a man like a Dementor. May god strike her down!" Gabriel preached, he finished with eyes close, one hand in the sky and the other pointing at Melissa's head.

Gabriel waited a couple of breaths before he opened one eye to look at the sky and muttered loud enough for everyone to hear.

"Must be his day off" He continued while looking at Lucy. "You look lovely today by the way Lucy. I might never have said this before... maybe because of some Devil's shadow keeping you in the dark. Now you've finished your degree I recommend you make some human friends. Okay, that's all I have now from the Gospel of Gabriel. Byeeeee!"

Gabriel then continued to walk on, not bothering to even look at Melissa again. Gabriel remembered that last time this moment happened, Melissa ruined his whole day after her malicious comments and made him leave early. Recalling that Melissa even made a comment about finally not needing a chauffeur driving her around in a beat up old car, as her new boyfriend had a self driving one. He now felt absolutely nothing for Melissa. His previous memories had started to already shape him anew. Gabriel felt the things that he used to think were important becoming nothing but dust in the wind, especially in comparison to his future plans. Melissa was a person who liked to twist the knife after she had stabbed someone. A real sadistic one but overall not much of a threat, Gabriel decided to put her entirely out of his mind from then on.

There was only one reason that Gabriel came to West Point and that was to find his best friend Tom Bullen. Tom was Gabriel's one true friend from high school to college. They both joined economics together. Unlike Gabriel though, Tom took University seriously and was always one of the top performers in class. In the last year they slowly fell out of touch mainly due to Gabriel dodging his phone calls to hang out with Melissa instead.

Gabriel planned to find Tom today and rope him into Deliverance with him. He knew that in one year's time, Tom would faint one day at work and find out that he had a brain tumour, due to catching it so late it caused severe brain damage. Much like Gabriel's step-dad, the operation to remove it and repair the damaged tissue was too expensive for Tom's family. Tom's father owned a minor robotics factory, which he had to put up as collateral for a loan but only managed to acquire half the amount needed for the operation.

In desperation Tom's father took out a hefty loan from some loan sharks to get Tom the operation. The high interest rates ended up putting the family in the red and before they knew it. The loan sharks forced his father to sell his business. It still wasn't enough though and one day the loan shark's goons turned up to Tom's parents' house. His parents weren't home but Tom was. He ended up trading harsh words with the goons and got into a scuffle with them. One of the goons in a panic managed to slug Tom in the back of the head with a baton. Due to having a recent operation on his skull, it was very fragile. Tom ended up passing away, on his own front step. Gabriel's heart broke when he found out and it was one of the main reasons, he fell into Deliverance Online to take his mind off the guilt.

One of the major wrongs Gabriel wanted to right this time around, was to help Tom. He finally spotted him standing by himself. Tom was scrolling through his phone, using his holographic glasses and not talking to anyone. Tom never made many friends, he had what you would call a 'quiet but big personality'. Gabriel marched over, making his presence known/ Tom looked up and spotted Gabriel approaching him, looking slightly excited.

Tom was a large lad, he looked like a human shaped dumpling. Cheeks so chubby that when Tom smiled, his eyes were forced to close. He had light brown medium length hair that was slicked back. Gabriel knew that it was his mum who did his hair for him every morning like he was a preppy. Tom's mom was almost as over bearing as his was.

"Gab you tool! I have tried calling you a bunch of times over the last couple of weeks. What gives? I thought you wouldn't even rock up today."

Tom started questioning Gabriel immediately, he played it off like it was nothing but Gabriel could tell Tom was hurt by his best friend's cold shoulder lately. Gabriel didn't reply to Tom's question and just went up and bear hugged him.

"Gab what the hell are you doing! There are girls here man, you are ruining my prestige" Tom shouted, as he squeezed out of the tight hug from Gabriel. He shot a quick look around at people who might have noticed their 'loving' behaviour. Gabriel let Tom go and took a step back.

"Sorry my friend that was an apology hug for being such a d#$k over the last couple of months. I am sorry. Apparently all the blood in my head had flowed down below feeding the dragon and I wasn't thinking clearly" Gabriel apologized.

"Haha Dragon? More like skink. There is only one dragon here and we all know that's me." Tom declared arrogantly while sticking out his large belly.

Gabriel smirked at his friend's quick change of the topic after his apology, he knew Tom had put it behind him and nothing more need to be said between each other. That was all bros needed. Gabriel raised his fist for a bump and Tom quickly reciprocated.

"So, Tom what's your plans after graduation?" Gabriel asked. He wanted to get the ball rolling and get Tom to talk about joining Deliverance Online when it first launches.

"I'm going to work for my dad for a while, his factory is doing well and I think with the stuff I learnt here I am going help him out with his books and maybe open a stock portfolio. What about you Gab?". Tom Replied.

"I am actually planning to train with my Dad and help out around the house, I will keep working as a night guard on the weekends for my dad's friend and then I plan on being a professional gamer once Deliverance Online launches." Gabriel declared; his tone was laced with unbridled confidence".

"Seriously dude!? But the chances of you making money doing that are so slim, unless you have insane skills, join one of the big guilds or are sponsored by a large company, it would be very hard to make a livable income". Tom queried, he raised his eyebrow at Gabriel before he continued. "I have played with you many times in VR games dude and you're not bad but I wouldn't say you have the skills as one of the pros. Sorry. I am just curious what gives you so much confidence?" Tom finished, he looked at Gabriel like he lost his mind.

"You don't understand Tom, this is actual 100% immersion. The reason I was only so-so at previous VR games was because of the delays between commands from you and your character due to lag. You know better than anyone how good my reflexes and control are." Gabriel retorted.

He wasn't boasting either. Ever since Gabriel was a small child, he had weirdly great control of his body and reflexes. Gabriel liked to refer to them more like instincts then actual skills as he never trained them.

All that was going to change though. he was going to get his Dad to train him for the next four months until Deliverance is released. He was going to get his Dad to train him just like he was trained in the Russian forces, he knew it was going to be hard but Gabriel also knew it was going to be so worth it in the end.

Tom slowly nodded after thinking about it, 'Gab does have raw talent that if trained, could make him quite the athlete. Too bad he was always too lazy for that'. Tom thought. He also noticed that Gabriel appeared somewhat different today. This was the most motivated Tom had seen Gabriel since the day he lost his cherry to Melissa.

Gabriel continued. "Anyways.... none of that matters right now piggy. You will just have to wait and see. What I want is for you to also join me. I am not telling you to quit your dad's business but we won't get much time to hang out once you start working and I start gaming full time. It will be a chance for us to hang out and stay close. Plus, with the time dilation. You only need a couple of hours a day and its half a day's worth in the game world. You down?"

Tom weighed the pros and cons for a couple of minutes before he finally said. "It's pretty expensive but at the same time I should have enough money saved to buy one of the capsules straight off when they get released. Hmmm... Yeah bugger it why not. I'll play with ya. Probably end up having to carry your lazy ass, HA!".

A sense of relief washed over Gabriel after he heard the confirmation from Tom. The two friends continued to catch up, talking about Melissa and all the recent news they have missed from each other. They both pretty much ignored the whole graduation festival. Gabriel ended leaving early to get Max from School before he returned home and started to truly get ready for his future plans.

Gabriel planned to build a roadmap to power once he got home. He also needed to convince Kristof to train him. Spend time with his family. Do research on various topics. Just thinking about how much to do, Gabriel’s head started to spin. He had so much to do, in a short number of months but instead of feeling truly pressured he was nothing but excited. Unknown to Gabriel, his eyes started shining a deep purple as he made his way back to the car.