The implications of the blue status boxes shot through my mind like lightning as I struggled to move my body. My crippled being in real life had been replicated in the Great Game. Not only could I not learn any special skills, if I died I really bloody died! Even worse the likelyhood of my death had been greatly accelerated by the fact i was forever locked at level 1.

My reactions were sluggish as it felt like I was moving through water, but all I could think about was that if the log in points were always the same then I had just potentially logged into my death as Victor could predict my entry point into the game.

I felt panic rise up and seize my heart before I ruthlessly suppressed it. I forced myself to breath slower as a bright haze slowly cleared in front me. Completely circling me were over 20 people, dressed black uniforms and armed with various bladed weapons. Interestingly, no one had a gun. I took all this in with a simple sweep of my eyes as I calculated the probability of fight or flight.

Only half a second had passed when I made my conclusion. I didn’t bother dropping into a defensive stance or attempt to flee. This world was unknown to me, as were my physical capabilities. So instead I waited to see what would unfold. Many people made the mistake of thinking of weapons as only knives or guns or bombs. But the deadliest weapons remained the ability to influence, the power of words and even the subtle pressure that could be exerted by silence.

I straightened my back and adopted a strong confident pose. My face was completely blank and expressionless, it was a look I had long cultivated under the instruction of Uncle. Of course in the real world it was easy to artificially control all the muscles in the face which created expression, but I had learned the hard way to do it manually.

That skill carried over now as I imitated one my Uncles most deadpan, in control blank stares. My eyes gazing over those around me with indifference as if they were beneath me.

If they knew who I was, and I theorized they must, then they would surely feel some fear. The only murderer in 100 years was a reputation that created an emotional reaction I could prey upon. Fear would make them hesitant and potentially create opportunity.

The men shifted uncomfortable as I stared them down. Eventually, one moved forward and opened his mouth to speak. Just a he opened his mouth I cut him off and seized the iniative, talking while I walked towards him.

“You know who I am. You all know who I am.” I said softly and my voice broke the silence and carried easily to the men surrounding me. I took one more step to get closer to the man who had been about to talk. I invaded his space ever so slightly to make him more nervous and uncomfortable.

“Say my name.” I whispered as his eyes widened slightly in surprise. “You all know it.” I said more loudly.

“Say. My Name.”

I heard my name begin to be whispered amongst the surrounding men before the man in front of me choked the words out.

“You’re Braizo Nakamura.” He said hoarsely.

“You’re god damn right I am.” I said casting my gaze across my audience one last time.

“Now take me to your boss as you have been instructed to do.” I finished and looked at the man like he was wasting my time.

“Yes sir. Please this way.” The man said as he turned around and wiped sweat of his forehead.

As I followed the man my mind raced. Whether it was Victor or some other handler for him or a neutral agent it was easy to presuppose that these men’s orders were to take me to a person in charge. By taking the inaitive I had stolen their power and made it my own and they had already begun to act like my subordinates without even realizing it.

From their reactions I guessed they did not work for Victor directly, either a handler he had engaged or a neutral third party. As we walked I looked around and saw I was in what appeared to be the ruins of a city that almost looked ancient Roman in design.

I massaged my hands slightly as I walked testing out the tactile feel for the VR. I could feel no difference between real life and the game. My sense, the feel of my body, everything was identical to reality. The only difference was I felt so weak, my body was heavy and unresponsive and I was starting to get out of breath simply walking a few blocks.

Eventually we weaved through a few more streets before entering a large building. This was the first time I saw other people scurrying about engaging in various tasks.

Soon I was walked into a large room where a woman sat at the end behind an enormous mahogany desk. On either side of her stood two incredibly large men, they looked like twins and were around 6ft 5 and wide as a door-frame with thick muscles.

Without waiting to be invited it casually strode into the room causing the two large men at the back to twitch slightly. Instantly I knew these two would not be impressed by my reputation and would kill me on the spot if they thought I posed a threat to the woman.

I sat down in a chair opposite the desk and raised my eyes to the woman.

“You can leave now. Thank you for the escort.” I said to the man behind me without so much as looking back. I saw the woman’s lips twitch and my presumption as her eyes gazed behind me and she nodded her head slightly confirming the order. I heard a slight noise as the door behind me closed.

Silence.

We both sat there comfortably for some time without a word being said. I could tell she was well schooled in the art of negotiation. Her body language was neutral, neither hostile nor servile, expecting nothing and giving nothing away.

My posture was identical. Though my mind continued to calculate. Brown hair, brown eyes, early 20s unless she was a second generation rejuv participant. Pale white skin. I couldn’t place her exactly but definitely a legacy, the daughter of someone with power and influence. She had been raised in it, lived and breathed the discipline and the privilege.

“Braizo Nakamura.” She said finally breaking the silence. “I must admit you are not what I expected.”

“You mean I don’t look like a murderer?” I replied with a slight smile.

“No, you do not. You look weak.” She said flatly. “I can easily see past the aura of strength your are projecting with the simple force of your personality. Your character must have lower starting stats that any I have ever seen, its quite pathetic. How many hitpoints do you have?”

I thought the question aloud in my head as she asked and a status screen popped up. I was excited to view my stats as I figured after all the years of training I had done they must be unusually high. Also, because I had developed them naturally and not through tech I might have completely over powered strength even as a beginner.

User StatusName:Braizo NakamuraSkills:*Unable to acquireLevel:1Class:*Unable to acquireRace:Earth HumanHealth:10-Strenght:1Speed:1Intelligence:1Endurance:1Vitality:1Luck:80

UNIQUE STATUSWhat does not kill me, makes me stronger*All damage and status debuffs that do not kill the user strengthen the user in various ways

*User cannot learn any special skills, obtain any class or utilise any technopathy or implants

*Unable to learn alternate resource abilities such as mana, Qi or artifical powerHe who fights with monsters*Stat increases from actions increased by 100%

*Likelyhood of increasing stats increased by 100%

*Luck increased

*Genetic Ceiling removed

*User cannot exceed level 1

*Due to the unique 100% sync rate with the Great Game if you die in the game it is highly likely you will die in reality

“I have 10 hit points.” I said in shock. “And all my stats are on 1.”

It looked like I wasn’t the only one in shock as I saw her jaw hang open.

“It looks like Victor won’t have any difficulty killing you after all. An average user starts with 100 HP and 20 in each stat.” She muttered. “Perhaps when you accept a class your stats will balance out.”

I didn’t reveal that I couldn’t ever take a class, or learn a skill for that matter. Knowledge was power.

“Do you plan to hand me over to him.” I asked, getting straight to the point.

“No I do not, and you can thank your Uncle for that. You have no idea how lucky you are do you? There are 60 spawn points in game for people on earth. The Wolf Corporation controls 30 of those, another 20 are controlled by a mix of alliances eight are controlled by the Rand Corporation which is headed by myself in game and 1 by earth’s most powerful mafia organization the Red Sun. You would be dead or sold to Victor if you had spawned in any other location but this one.”

“So what do you plan to do with me?”

“I plan to do nothing to you.” She snapped in irritation then sighed. “Not giving you to Victor will cost the Rand Corporation dearly. In due course he will discover you spawned here and that we did not hand you over. He will make us suffer for that, a fact which we have prepared for.”

“Your Uncle and my grandfather were once great friends before the incident back then. He still owed him one last great favor and he called it in for you.”

A look of confusion must have shown on my face. As far as I know Uncle had no ties with a company as large as the Rand Corporation.

Seeing my confused look she burst out laughing. “oh my, you don’t know who your Uncle really is do you?”

I wanted to ask, I desperately wanted to know more, but I controlled myself and resumed a flat expression. If Uncle wanted me to know something he would tell me.

“Not going to ask?” the woman teased.

“What was the favor?” I said, asking a question she did not expect instead. Thrown off by the question she lost her train of thought momentarily.

“The favor was simple. Should you spawn in our territory we are to provide you with information, provisions and safe passage to a neutral zone so you can have a chance to survive. Nothing more, nothing less. The information will be provided by me, here in this room, after which we will provide you with provisions and send you through a teleporter to an unexplored location.”

“Tell me about the game mechanics then.” I said prioritizing the information I would need.

“The first thing you need to know is to not think of this as a game. It is virtual reality in the literal sense. Everything feels exactly like it does in reality. If someone blows your arm off it feels exactly as it would in real life. This is not a game made by company for enjoyment by users. It is an alien VR that mimics life perfectly. That is why when you die you are logged out for 48 hours as the only penalty. When you die, it feels like you really died. Trust me, you will do anything to avoid that trauma. Wounds do not instantly heal unless magic or tech is used and if you lose a limb it can only be regenerated by dying or usage of rare advanced tech or magic.”

Little did she know that for me, death would likely be permanent. This also meant if someone chopped off my arm I was unlikely to ever get it back.

“You can log out of the game, but only at night and it takes an hour to log out. As to what exists in the game, this planet is our starting point as humans from earth. Other users from other galaxies can only interact with at some limited points currently as part of our protection from the Warden to allows us to develop. This planet was created from the collective minds of all the humans on earth.”

“This means it has ancient Roman cities like this one from the far distant past as well as modern cities and suburbs as well as things like dinosaurs. So far barely .05% of the planet has been explored.”

“What about classes and skills.” I asked.

“ahh this is where it gets interesting. Classes are virtually limitless, while some can be trained others just emerge spontaneously for some individuals. Generally speaking though so far the vast majority of the population falls into one of three areas. Technomancy, which is no different to pursuing the kind of tech advancement commonplace in reality. Magic, which draws on the mana stat, a large number of classes will fall into this, mages, druids, shaman all the bed time stories they used to read children seem to have been given form. Lastly, martial artist that most resemble Xianxia type stories. They utilize Qi and are capable of some fairly outlandish feats at higher levels.”

“You may have noticed a lack of guns here. The Rand Corporation has chosen to specialize all recruits and members into the magic arts and martial arts. Wolf Corporation and most of the other big firms tend to pursue technomancy.”

“Classes are basically specialized categories that give you specific bonuses, skills are things you can active to create a range of effects, like a warriors Sonic Slash is a skill that attacks with sound. You have to activate it. Then stats are just stats, they are the users foundation.”

“And with that your time is up and we will send you on your way.” She finished.

“Wait! Let me ask one more thing.” I quickly interjected. “This place you are sending me – the unknown location I need to know more.”

“Well it is quite simple all the starting spawn zones are located in a city like this. Within these cities there are hundreds of teleportation formations. These formations are one way teleports, you can teleport out, but not back. Where they go we do not know as no one has ever returned. We assume they take you to further cities on the planet, possibly even ones that are close to where we are currently, be do not know for certain. By putting you through an unexplored teleporter you will be temporarily safe from the Wolf Corporation as no one, including us, will have any idea where you are.”

“I want to designate my provisions.” I said immediately.

“That is acceptable.” She replied. Then her face began frown as I provided her with a long list of measurements and materials that needed to be manufactured. In my mind I had already formed the seeds of plan.

A short time later I was escorted to a teleportation formation.

“Mr Nakamura this is where we part ways. I highly doubt we will ever see each other again, as it highly likely you will die. But I wish you well and Victor is no friend of mine. Should we ever meet again, my name is Misiki.”

With that she handed me over a bag filled with provisions and what i assumed was a single sword as i could see the hilt sticking out.

"The other provisions you requested will take some time to manufacture we will build them and sent them through the teleporter. If you remain alive on the other end you may make use of them.”

“Thank your grandfather for me.” I said, knowing in my heart that had it not being for the favor owed my Uncle this Misiki would have had no qualms delivering me directly to Victor for the right price.

I stepped on the teleportation Formation and in a blink I was gone.

--------------------------------------------------

Misiki

As the body of Braizo Nakamura faded away I turned to my bodyguards.

“Transmit the coordinates of the Kalachi ruins to Victor with the subject heading ‘Braizo Nakamura’.”

“You think he can survive?” one bodyguard asked.

“Unlikely, we are talking about Victor after all. And from what I can see despite his significant will and intellect, Mr Nakamura’s user seems crippled somehow." Not only was he crippled but his only weapon was the one she had just given him, a useless sword with the worse stats she had ever seen. She almost felt guilty giving it to me and would have swapped for a higher quality item if it was not for the specific request from the Uncle that he was given that specific sword. Seems like a lot of powerful people want him to suffer.

"It will take at least month maybe more for Victor’s team to reach those coordinates. If he is still in those ruins in a month then he will wish he was dead.” She shuddered as she remembered her meeting with Victor when he demonstrated his experiments.

He claimed he would torture Braizo just like Zeus punished the Titan Prometheus for stealing fire from the gods. He had trained a great eagle as a pet and he planned to string Braizo to a great tree and have his eagle eat his liver every day before killing him. After 48 hours Braizo would be forced to log back in and would respawn at the same spot only to have this torture carry out again.

“Run Mr Nakamura.” Misiki whispered. “Don’t stop running.”