AN: Here is the first chapter of this second side project of mine. Enjoy... Maybe...

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A young man was in an armored vehicule, looking at the pulsating setting sun. The vehicule was all-ground, a little longer than a humvee. The vehicule was tracting behind it another one, bigger, the size of a bus. This second vehicule was also lightly armored. They were at the edge of a high plateau, with hills and a river visible below. The land was almost barren, turning into a deeper shade of crimson under the light of setting sun.

The young man looked at the sun with sadness, regret and longing. After all, the end was near. He traveled around most of the places of this world, fighting, studying, saving, killing, supporting, stealing, building and destroying. For nearly 15 years he roamed on the differents lands of this world, he loved this world very much, but it was on the brink of death, he wouldn't be able to stay there anymore.

He was sitting on the passenger seat, next to him on the driver seat was a robust young man with a sharp, handsome face, with a kind of calm, bestial charm. At the back were 2 women, one was a short pretty woman with black hair and blue eyes, and a beautiful figure, the other was also pretty, of average height, with golden hair and eyes, and big breasts. Those other 3 people were also looking at the pulsating setting sun. But unlike the first person, their faces were lacking emotions.

If one looked closely, one would be able to see imperfections on their skin and their clothes. In fact, those imperfections were present on anything and everything in this world. Understandable, since this world was, at its very core, made of 0s and 1s. This world was a virtual world for a game, the first VR game boasting 90% of realism, a science-fiction online role-playing game. This game, after a little more than 10 years of success, had reached its final stage.

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It all started when the young french man, Francis Damas, reached the age of 16. A rising game company, after the success of its previous VR game, developped a new one, which reached a new level of realism. The young man was selected as one of the beta testers, under the username Tonyorobsky. The 3 months of the beta were enough to completely steal the heart of the young man. He always felt that he was born during the wrong era, and this game offered him wat he was yearning for.

VR technology appeared 30 years prior to this moment. The visual quality of the games wasn't different from what people could see during the 2020s. As for the emulated senses, there was only sight, earing and touch, and then again it was just the bare minimum in the range of feelings. Slowly, the quality of the games increased with time, until Cataclysm Online was developped 11 years ago.

The premise of the game was that a cosmic anomaly crossed the solar system, causing many changes in its wake. It caused tears in the space releasing copious amount of unknown radiations and energies. The wildlife of earth suffered serious mutations, as for the humans, a fourth of the population died while some gained esper-like abilities. The cosmic anomaly also caused the apparition of new materials and a new form of energy. But most importantly, it caused the Sun to be unstable and age at an incredible rate. It was predicted that it would turn into a nova in the near future.

People were trying to save the human species, but that wasn't going to be easy with the collapse of governments and the mutations of plants and animals. The wildlife became more deadly than before, and many areas became unhinabitables. With the collapse of governments and the appearnace of espers, chaos spread through the cities of the world. The goal of the game was to help develop the means to save humanity before the Sun destroyed the solar system or before humanity destroyed itself.

Thankfully, the after effects of the cosmic anomaly were the appearance of a new material called etherium, and a new form of energy called etheris. Along with the study of the after effects of the anomaly, it brough great advancement to the human technology. Many new materials were created, discoveries were made in physics, and a new form of clean energy was available for mankind to use in any fields. Projects were underway to leave the solar system before the end.

There were 3 races available in the game, the humans, the mutants, and the cyborgs. Nothing to say about the humans, the mutants were physically weaker, but could use telekinesis or telepathy, and were generally more beautifull. As for the cyborgs, they were humans that augmented themselves with cybernetic parts to either boos their physical abilities or allow them to interact with electronic devices or have hidden weapons within them.

The level of the characters was the sum of the levels of their differents skills. The maximum level of a skill was 15, and the maximum level of a character was 200, so in theory it was possible to have up to 13 skills at max level. Though reaching max level in a skill is almost impossible. Some skills can merge, some can be absorbed in an other. Each skill level grant bonus points to the differents attributes. During the beta, when Tonyorobsky discovered the merging of skills, he focused on learning all the small skills that could later merge into a single one.

There were also several classes in the game. Those classes would grant a bonus to the growth speed of the skills related to them. For the unrelated skills there was a 40% malus in growth speed. Each character could get a primary class at level 20 and a secondary class at level 90. Of course, to select the class it was necessary to have a minimal number of skills related to the said class at a certain level. Primary classes give 20% bonus in growth speed for related skills while secondary classes give 10% bonus.

Every 40 levels, a player is given a special quest, and if the player complete the quest he can create his own NPC. All created NPCs start at level 1, but they have an accelerated growth speed until their level reach 85% of the level of their creator. After that, their growth is the same as that of the other players. Noone managed to complete all 5 quests. Only 13 people managed to complete 4 of them, and less than 8000 managed to get 3 NPCs. Still, around 2/3 of the other players could get 2 NPCs.

After the beta, Francis invested almost all of his free time to the game, carefully nuturing his character to later become one of the strongest player of the game. He used his knowledge and experience as a beta tester to make the most of what the game had to offer according to his tastes. He already didn't spend much time with his family or friends in the real world, they knew he felt foreign to the world. They weren't really surprised to see him play the game so much, they were even relieved he found something he really liked. He spend almost all of his time between working and playing the game.

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However, as he was working on his character, skills, possessions and NPCs, and enjoying himself in exploration, the others players were working on the game's primary objective. Before he could reach his peak, the other players advanced in the story line of the game, and cleared all the conditions to launch the last phase of the game. Tonyorobsky participed in the final event with good achievements, then left for the wilderness to admire the scenery for the last time. Within a few minutes, Cataclysm Online would end.

The people had started to evacuate Earth, some on massive spaceships with revolutionary FTL (Faster Than Light) propulsion, but the majority in smaller spaceships scheduled to escape the solar system through a stargate. Because it was not possible to save everyone, when those 2 projects were completed, the installations were swarmed by people trying to escape the dying world, and the final quest of the players were to protect those installations until the critical devices could be succesfully launched.

Of course other players got the quest to stop the launch or take controle of the sites for themselves. The young man had participed in the defensive side, and they managed to repel the attacks. At that time the Sun started showing signs of nearing its end, the game would end with its death. So, for the remaining time, the young man came to a spot where he could see the setting sun of this world one last time.

He was in one of the 2 vehicules he made, with his 3 created NPCs. The sun was pulsating more and more as it was reaching the horizon. Before disappering, it suddenly expanded while seemingly tearing from the inside, its color going from yellow to a dazzling bluish white, quickly covering the entirety of the sky. All of this happened within 3 seconds, and the blast reached the Earth...

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AN: Isn't that a nice way to end a game? With a fucking nova!!!

As you can probably tell, this fiction was inspired from Overlord for a few things (custom npcs, staying in the game until the end, transported to another world with the “base” when the game ended, and the npc becoming alive).