What Alpha Eye had divulged during the somewhat intense questioning did not leave them any less confused than when they started off. The conversation had gone somehow like this. After what Alpha Eye had performed on Ned which turned out to be scanning it started the explanation with Robbie’s question.

“Mr. Edward Caesar, player number 1 of the current team and also the current team’s progenitor-,” Alpha Eye had started but before he launched into the explanation he was interrupted by Ned.

“Excuse me, what do you mean by the progenitor?” asked Ned.

“The progenitors are of course those who add other players into the game, you added Mr. Garfield Hurst, Mr. Rookfield Jonathan and Mr. Clinton Lockwheeler into this game through the request you sent them,” said Alpha Eye and Ned looked meekly at Rook and Clinton, whilst Rook gave him the death stare Clinton nonchalantly nodded at him.

“How the hell did I turn into a progenitor?” asked Ned but then a bad feeling arose in him as he though to the time he had been jabbed in the neck by the syringe.

His fears were confirmed true through the next answer. “You were injected with the serum commonly referred to as the ‘firstborn’, through this you gained access to Future World and you sent out requests which they accepted.”

Ned however felt partly relieved. It hadn’t entirely been his fault in sending the requests, they had accepted it as well. He gave a meek stare at Rook who suddenly looked furious, Ned didn’t if that was at him or Rook himself.

“Now to continue Future World as you should know is an FPS an Multiplayer Augmented Reality First Person Shooter, you will encounter other players who have this game, what you must know is that if you die in this game you will lose your AR Matrix and your memories from the point which this game installed onto your devices so if you wish to keep playing take great care and if you don’t then the job simply is to die and you will not remember anything, your memories will instead be replaced by a seamless placebo.”

“You can tamper with our brains?” asked Gars horrified even Clinton seemed a little pale at this.

“Of course, but there are rules for that of course which I’ve just explained and we cannot do anything other than erase your memories, if you are thinking of mind control then you are overthinking.”

“Are we?” asked Clinton. “Overthinking I mean.”

“Yes,” answered Alpha Eye. “The AR Matrix installed at the tip where your skull meets your spine is of more use to the players in this game than us, it cannot retain enough power to perform a hold on your mind.”

“Holy fuck,” shouted Gars his hand snapping to back of his neck as did Ned’s, Rook’s and Clinton’s.

“How was it put in us?” asked Clinton his face paler now.

“Nanites, the size of germs,” said Alpha Eye. “When Future World is installed, using complex technology we stream nanobots through the connection assembling it inside you to make a AR Matrix, which will allow your body to perform the superhuman feats necessary for this game.”

“That’s it,” said Gars. “I’m done.”

He turned to leave but this time Ned blocked him.

“Are you crazy, if you terminate the tutorial you could lose your memories,” said Ned.

“Yes Garfield, this decision you are about to make is stupid,” said Clinton vouching for Ned. “Though this Alpha Eye says seamless placebo, there could always be aftereffects with implanted memories.”

“So, what, we’re just trapped here?” asked Rook in rage.

“Certainly not Mr. Rookfield Jonathan,” said Alpha Eye. “You may terminate this tutorial and as I said your memories will be erased and a seamless set of memories will be implanted, there will be little to no aftereffects.”

“Sorry, I don’t like anyone messing with my head,” said Rook balling up his fists.

“Then you may need to continue this,” said Alpha Eye, his emotionless face looking a lot more frightening now to the four people.

“That’s not a damned option either.”

Rook roared and rushed forward as he took a big swing at Alpha Eye and as everyone thought the fist was going to pass through Alpha Eye effortlessly caught it.

“Attacking an administrator is against the rules, please keep your control Mr. Rookfield Jonathan, you have been warned,” said Alpha Eye. “You have two strikes left.”

Saying that Alpha Eye gently pushed Rook back who stumbled and fell onto his butt.

“So, do you all wish to continue the tutorial?” asked Alpha Eye.

Ned looked at Gars and Clinton who after a brief moment nodded with somewhat frightened glances shared between the three of them. Ned moved towards Rook to help him up.

“Get off me!” shouted Rook and turned on Ned. “This fucking crazy, this is all on you.”

Suddenly Ned grew angry as well, “All one me, you’ve got to be kidding me, you accepted the request.”

“You shouldn’t have sent it in the first place,” said Rook getting up in Ned’s face.

“That was an accident, I didn’t even know what I was doing,” said Ned. “But you could’ve just left it and it would’ve been fine, why would you accept a request from me anyhow.”

“Because-!” roared Rook and suddenly stopped as he turned red with anger or embarrassment Ned couldn’t tell. “Well it’s none of your business!”

Rook turned away with a huff leaving Ned out of sorts. The anger that had been building up inside had somehow been released like steam being let off without exploding. Tired he turned towards Gars and Clinton. Gars seemed to be in position to move forward to stop them from fighting. Clinton however had a look of disapproval on his chubby face which somehow seemed to suit it well.

“Well seeing as you have finished your argument, we shall all accept the tutorial,” said Clinton. “That is our decision correct!”

“Yes,” sighed Ned and Gars nodded as well.

The other three turned towards Rook who was turned away from them.

“What about you Rook?” asked Gars meekly.

“It’s a yes from me as well I suppose, I’ve already come this far, might as well do the rest.”

“Uh let’s start the tutorial then,” said Ned turning towards Alpha Eye.

“Excellent,” said Alpha Eye. “I will now activate your AR Matrixes.”

Alpha Eye floated up a little further and a holographic keyboard and screen appeared in front of him. Number scrolled across the screen as Alpha Eye began tapping away under the curious gazes of Ned, Gars, Rook and Clinton. Suddenly Ned’s nape felt hot and in panic he reached his hand back and felt it heating up. He looked at the others who seemed to be experiencing the same thing and from the others he saw blue light radiating off in the form of a square from their nape which he supposed was what was happening to him as well. The heat slowly died down and so did the light and suddenly Ned felt a burst of strength as if his heart had pumped a high dose of adrenaline into his body and with a flash in front of him appeared a virtual screen akin in appearance to what was in front of Alpha Eye.

“Please enter your display name,” said Alpha Eye as the four stared blankly at the box in front of them.

Soon after a keyboard appeared in front of them. They looked at each other before Ned sighed and tapped randomly down on the virtual keyboard and surprisingly his hand felt as if he had touched something. He looked over and saw Clinton leaning to side examining the keyboard closely.

“It managed to trick our visual and somatosensory systems, I suppose this is the brilliance of the AR Matrix,” said Clinton with a wondrous look on his face.

“Tomato what system?” asked Gars turning to Clinton.

“Not tomato, somatosensory system,” said Clinton with a roll of his eyes.

“What does that even mean?” asked Rook.

“Our sense of touch,” replied Clinton as he moved to enter whatever he was thinking of to be his display name.

“Why didn’t you just say that?” asked Gars shaking his head.

Clinton ignored them and Gars and Rook too turned to typing in their display name. Ned thought for a moment but then proceeded to use a name he had been using for nearly all his gaming accounts. He typed down ‘Thunderbird’, it was a name he found amazing back when he was around ten years old and watching an old tv show, he had made several different variations of it all for games that required to him come up with a new name, not one already in the system. He didn’t know how this game’s naming system worked but he decided to type it in whole without butchering it. He pressed enter and the virtual screen in front of him changed. He looked up at Alpha Eye who after five seconds proceeded to the next explanation.

“As you have already completed your names, you will now move onto class selection, again please choose wisely, switching classes will not be an option once you start.”

Ned looked at Gars curiously. “What name did you write.”

“I’ll tell you later,” said Gars as he excitedly looked down at his screen for class selection.

Ned too looked down and saw several icons. A cloud with wings and a tail, a flaming torch that seemed to have some weird as flames on top of it, a reverse G with a dot at the center and several others, all in all there seemed to be seven of these symbols. Ned tapped the one at the top, the one that had the winged cloud with a tail and its information appeared.

Sky Razer: A class that has been born to dominate the skies. Firing down volleys of bullets from above, dodging with infinite precision, no one can stop your advance.

It seemed cool to Ned and so he proceeded when he realized his blunder, he hadn’t looked at the other classes. He bit his bottom lip cursing himself an idiot repeatedly in his head as he looked over to the others who seemed to be seriously combing through the class list. He tentatively looked at Alpha Eye who seemed sitting aloof, above everything. No chance for a second choice then, he thought in his head as he sighed. Then he looked down at this screen which had proceeded onto the next screen which seemed to have a smaller figure much like Alpha Eye on screen with surrounding boxes which Ned guessed would be for equipping armor and weapons, the likes. To the right side in an expanded box was his attributes and name and other information.

Name: Edward Matthew Caesar

Displayed Name: Thunderbird

Status: Progenitor/Alive

Class: Sky Razer

Rank: Gun Novice (0/150)

Skills:

Weightless (Active)

Cooldown Time: 15 seconds

An ability to make the body weightless for a short duration of five seconds. During this period the player’s agility is increased by four points. This is added as a buff. The points return to normal once the skill ends.

Buffs:

The Firstborn (Permanent)

As a player that has received the status of progenitor, the player gets a permanent +1 to all their status points. This increase once your rank upgrades by +1 for each rank upgrade.

Stats:

Strength (STR): 12 (+1)

Agility (AGI): 16 (+1)

Dexterity (DEX): 15 (+1)

Intelligence (INT): 14 (+1)

Stat Points: 0

Interestedly Ned looked through his stats. This was just like how one played online games. His excitement was slowly increasing as the fear was displaced. He looked at others amongst whom Gars was smiling like an idiot as he looked down at his profile window, Rook too had a small smile on his face. Clinton however looked down seriously and Ned noticed he was still running through the class selection. He turned back to examining his profile once again and after a short while Clinton finished. Alpha Eye moved towards them standing in front of them once again with the virtual screen and keyboard in front of him removed. Ned blinked once as his eyes somehow adjusted and then he saw something astonishing above Alpha Eye’s head, a white cursor along with the name ‘Alpha Eye’ and ‘Administrator AI’ under it in small italic letters. He turned to look next to him and saw Gars and above him was a green cursor with a strange name R1ipper above his head. Next it was Rook who had Hellhound and Clinton who had chosen Clocker.

“I can see you display names,” said Ned.

“Me too,” chimed in Gars and he turned to Ned. “You have Progenitor underneath your name.”

“Don’t tell me our eyes always going to be this?” said Rook turning towards Alpha Eye.

“Yes,” said Alpha Eye. “You are officially part of Future World, from now on you can see everyone’s display names, NPCs however will have their real name registered above their head, the cursor will change color depending enemy or friendly, enemy being red, friendly being green, administrators are generally white.”

“Who are the NPCs?” asked Ned turning questioning glances towards the other three who seemed just as interested in it as he is.

“NPCs are of course those who are not players, the normal humans,” said Alpha Eye.

“So, we can see every NPCs’ names?” asked Gars a little more excited than he should have been.

“That is so,” answered Alpha Eye.

“Feels strange,” said Clinton. “Like we know a secret of theirs, if we know everyone’s names without even asking them.”

“Yeah, it’s sort of like reading minds,” said Gars.

“You have created your profile, it is time for you creation gift,” said Alpha Eye and four blue lights shot out of his finger entering their virtual screens.

“The interface opening and closings and its related items are voice operated,” said Alpha Eye. “You may say open to open the interface and close to close the interface, if you wish to open other functions you must first activate it on your cellular phone and only then will it become available on your virtual interface, right now you may open the profile window and inventory, the shop window and the league window will only be opened once you rank up. Progenitors are the only ones that can own and operate a league, the members the progenitor added to the game are automatically part of the league he/she creates.”

Trying to imprint all this into his memory Ned proceeded according to what the interface showed him with an arrow. He swiped right and once again the cool feeling of touching the interface intricately weaved itself into his fingers and he slid into the inventory. There were a lot of square boxes, thirty-two by count and at the top was the gift box that Ned guessed to be the creation gift. He tapped the box and a larger version of it appeared, playing a shaking animation and the box popped open gifting him an assortment of equipment. Gloves, an assault rifle, a pistol and a holster. He tapped on the gloves first and options popped up. He equipped it and it appeared on his hands in a flash of blue light. He turned towards Gars who appeared to be a holding a large grey flamethrower.

“Oh my god,” said Gars. “I take everything back, you can mind control me all you want, I am so into this game right now.”

“Is that real?” asked Ned taken aback.

“It feels real,” said Clinton. “But as I said, this AR Matrix is technology far beyond what humans have been capable of till now, it could be real, it could be fake but it feels real to us now, which makes me question if we get hit by it, will it hurt?”

“Fighting in Future World is much like real combat, it will assuredly hurt but after combat is over the players will heal to normal unless the player dies in which case the player’s memories are wiped as I have explained before,” said Alpha Eye.

Rook suddenly took out a pistol an aimed it at Ned’s forehead. Ned scrambled back in alarm.

“Hey what are you doing!?” asked Ned in panic.

“Just testing it out,” said Rook chuckling.

“Don’t even try it,” said Ned. “He just said it’ll hurt.”

“Best to know firsthand,” said Rook.

“Then shoot your own hand,” said Gars stepping in.

“Why don’t I test it out on you,” said Rook pointing it suddenly at Gars.

“Try it,” said Gars stepping forward. “You might be slightly large but a gun works same on all people, if you shoot me Ned and Clinton will probably have you down.”

“He’s right, I’ll shoot you if you fire at Gars,” said Ned equipping himself with the assault rifle and he trained it on Rook.

“I will shoot you too Rookfield, if you intend to fire your gun at Gars,” agreed Clinton.

Rook spiraled the gun on his fingers, “You guys are no fun.”

“He should be locked up in a mental facility,” muttered Gars as he returned back Ned’s side.

“Well the fun is out of the way I expect,” said Alpha Eye and his expressionless face made a smile. “The tutorial will start in…”

Another cold robotic voice took over from Alpha Eye as the count initiated from ten. Alpha Eye floated there with a smile as the countdown ran out and then behind him appeared several barrels and large timer that sat atop it.

“Your tutorial mission,” said Alpha Eye forming an interface and sending it to the four of them.

Mission: Escape the Building and the Blast Radius in 30 minutes.

Optional Mission: Kill 15 Enemy Soldiers with you weapons.

Number Killed: 0/15

Brief: Infiltrating the enemy headquarters you have planted a bomb at the center of it for maximum casualties. The enemies have however converged on your point. You must successfully escape the enemy soldiers and make it out of the blast radius in thirty minutes. Failure to do so will risk in death.

Rewards: 75 Rank Points, Tutorial Gift Pack

Failure: Mission will restart. Fail it three times and your AR Matrix will be removed.

“Bomb?” asked Gars nervously as he closed in on the barrels. “These are bombs?”

“I suspect so,” said Clinton. “From the mission briefing and the timer which yet to start ticking.”

Alpha Eye disappeared and the same robotic voice that initiated the countdown said, “The tutorial mission starts now!”

The timer on the bomb started ticking down as they heard noises of many footsteps downstairs.

“It also said enemies are converging on our point, right?” said Ned.

“That is what the mission brief says,” said Clinton.

Ned and the other three closed the interfaces. Ned ran to the windows and looked down, his heart jumped through his mouth at what he saw. There were many men in black storming the building all holding guns.

“We have company,” said Ned. “Major company.”