Hunched over my keyboard, I stared at the screen with dry eyes.

My fingers rapidly clicked and typed and my voice cracked as I talked to the other members.

I was part of a raid, and controlling two characters.

The first character was of the melee type, he dealt out massive damage and had a large health pool.

But by himself, he would eventually fall. So my second character was a ranged healer.

Someone in the raid was assigned to draw aggro away from my healer as to leave him free to cast spells.

With a bellow and a shout, the giant finally toppled and the way lay clear.

Ignoring the loot, we healed up and stood before the final entrance.

Inside was a boss monster. The purple Hydra. It was the final boss of the game.

We've killed every other monster in the game, the bosses falling before us. Toppled as if they were trees.

Don't get me wrong. We weren't all powerful or strong. We were actually one of the weaker groups.

There was a total of 5 people in our group, and 12 characters. Half the size of a normal raid group.

Because of having several accounts, we couldn't spend all our time on one character and had to spend most of our time strategizing and planning out our moves.

You are permitted to use macros in the game, the problem was that those macros often fail to predict something a human can see coming a mile away.

Destroying the entire time you spent to get to that point.

To counter this, one of our members created a point and click macro. Put simply, they would keep auto casting spells, and they would move towards points we continuously choose.

It wasn't perfect, and tons of other teams had something similar or better.

But the one advantage we did have, was the leader of the raid. NuckleBeard.

He was awe inspiring.

Within seconds of playing against a new monster, he already has a strategy to deal with it.

The Orc King likes to pick up his mace and slam it down unpredictably, his damage dealing almost a KO? Organise healers to chant a massive healing spell each.

Those spells took 30 seconds to cast, and were able to be held in reserve for 3 seconds each before expiring. So we had them casting the spells at time individuals.

You were never more than a few seconds away from a full heal.

During that time, if one of our argo takers took damage. It was used on them.

Coupling this with hit and run tactics as to have only one man effected by the attack at any time.

We practically slaughtered the Orc King.

Basic tactics you may say, but you have no idea how hard it is to control a single character.

Controlling 4 at once, one of our raid members was practically a legend.

But granted. We did use macro's to help us.

So standing before the entrance, the lair of the final boss.

We knew what we were facing. A purple hydra.

The red hydra breathes fire and the green hydra has a strong regeneration with 9 heads.

Landing a attack on one of the green hydra's heads would increase its regeneration by 500% for a minute.

Thanks to that, we were unable to use ranged attacks for fear of hitting the heads.

The red hydra in comparison was easier. If you notice it take a breath, you simply have to stay out of the way.

The damage was severe and dealt a huge debuff to defence.

The purple hydra however, countless teams had challenged it and lost. Shortly after you organise a new attack, it learned and countered it.

Its had a abominably large health pool, poison breath that covered half of the cave and a giant crystal behind it.

Any attempts to attack the crystal would have the hydra defend it and send it into a murderous rage which tripled its power.

However only a few people have ever tried to destroy the crystal. After all, the goal of this dungeon was to claim the crystal.

It was rather exciting.

You see.

There was three special things that made this game exciting.

The website of the game was simple enough, it had a giant glowing crystal with the purple hydra guarding it set as the background.

A yellow box was set with one simple word. "Install".

Another row of text under it states simply. "Only the last 1000 users to join may play"

The site itself was hard to find. As a result, only a small group of people knew about this game.

The computer power needed to process the graphics were well beyond our computer specs. The amount of lore, spells and monsters you could find was not even half discovered.

And yet. It ran with no problems.

And lastly, we could have our access cut off.

That's right. Only the last thousand users to sign up can play it. Not accounts. Users. It knew somehow who was behind each account.

The game hinted at something magical, something powerful. Something for the victor. And we wanted in.

When it was first found, the guy who found it couldn't find any information on it. So curious, he installed it. And he was amazed.

Posting it in a private community, a few of us came to check it out. We were amazed as well.

He quickly removed the post soon after, he wanted only a few to play.

A rough estimate would put the total number of people who tried it at 900.

Really strange if you think about it. You'd expect someone to leak the game and the world to pounce on it.

But the truth was even simpler.

We didn't want to share it.

For to share it, we would lose our access. None of us wanted that.

The original guy who found the game started a guild, Green Vines.

A lame name to be sure, but there were only five guilds created.

My group wasn't in a guild. We preferred to stick together.

We first teamed up when we started playing. People came and left our group.

They didn't fit in. We eventually found our perfect number with 5 users and 12 accounts.

5 healers and 7 attackers.

We previously challenged the purple hydra before.

But the issue with it was that unlike the rest of the game.

Its attacks would destroy your account.

The last time we attacked, we lost 4 accounts before being forced to retreat.

Its why people did not challenge it very often. They were scared of losing.

We stood before the entrance of the final boss, the hydra lying on the ground, head resting on claws. Golden gaze fixed on us.

Our palms grew sweaty on our keyboards and mouse. Our leader then cleared his throat.

Speaking earnestly, he started talking.

"We've known each other for five years. Played together from the start. I've always been the leader, you were the army that charged into victory."

His voice grew solemn.

"We've challenged this guy before. Four accounts were wiped before we retreated. But will that stop us?"

We roared as one "NO!"

"Our accounts will be wiped!" he yelled at us.

"WHO CARES!" We yelled back at him.

"I DONT WANT TO DIE!" he yelled.

"WHO CARES!" we howled.

He then roared into the mic. "WHO ARE WE!"

"DUNNO!" we roared back.

I loved our group name.

Hyped and our adrenaline roaring, the leader outlined the plan.

Fingers sweating, we charged in. Speakers chattering with the countless typing from keyboards.

The hydra roared, standing and challenging us it lead with a wave of poison.

Splitting into two our group stepped into position.

The poison stopped and the hydra's defence lessened momentarily as it took a breath.

We took that chance to make the first strike.

At the crystal.

You'd think this has been done before, and it has.

But no one has the amount of coordination we did.

The hydra frantically used its body to cover as much of the crystal as it could.

Its body was hit by the archers and the spells crashed into its body.

But unknowing of our tactics, co-ordination and skill.

A single arrow slipped by.

The hydra frantically raised its head and tried to snap at the arrow as it flew past.

But our melee attackers hit then, knocking the hydra as it was distracted by the arrow.

With a fearsome howl, the hydra rammed the arrow with its head and lost its balance.

Taking full control over my melee character, I slipped past the fallen hydra. Seconds in which to strike a blow.

The hydra noticed the movement and attempted to swipe me, however the other 2 melee'rs took the blow. Saving me from being swept away.

Raising my sword, I crashed it down on the glowing crystal.

I saw the crystal crack, shatter and explode.

With a earsplitting crack, my speakers blew.

My screen fried and smoke came from the casing of my PC.

Rolling off my chair, I lay on the ground covering my ears groaning and crying in pain.

My mother ran in, scared by the sudden noises and smoke from my bedroom.

My hearing was gone, I couldn't hear her voice.

Some prize this was.

My hearing gradually came back and I comforted my crying mother. She was distraught and afraid something happened to me.

I heard the phone dimly ringing, but I couldn't muster the sense to answer it.

My heart was heavy. We should have slain the hydra instead.

My computer was history.

Minutes later, my mother had calmed down and I lay on my bed, gazing upwards at the ceiling.

Slowly my hearing recovered and my fear died down.

Standing up on shaking legs, I walked to the phone and called my friend. Eventually after a few rings, he picked up.

I opened up with "Did your computer blow?"

"What are you talking about?"

"My speakers blew. My computer fried"

"Wow.." He didn't say anything for a few seconds.

He had been talking to the other members of our group.

None of them mentioned anything like this. It seemed I was the odd one out.

Was it because it was my attack?

He told me what happened after the crystal exploded.

The hydra just fell limp.

When attacking it, it didn't fight back. It just lay on the ground.

Upon killing it, they received a massive amount of exp. But nothing happened. The crystal prize was gone.

Teleporting back to the town, the NPC's were limp. Not moving.

After ten minutes. The game grew slower and slower. It took longer to move around, longer to turn the screen view around.

It effected everyone.

The small forums created for players of the game grew crowded. The game was disappearing.

Files were corrupting.

The site's install button was grayed out.

The background of the site was of a dead hydra and a cracked gray crystal.

Did this spell the end?

Why did the crystal have this effect?

Should we have even tried to smash it?

I spoke with him for several hours more as he kept me up to date.

Finally, he had no more to tell me and we said our goodbyes.

Lying on my bed. I looked upwards. Grief heavy in my heart.

Would we ever play on Balizen again?

Closing my eyes. I drifted to sleep.

But my sleep was restless, nightmares raging with the crystal exploding and repeatedly I saw the distraught expression the hydra had.

We shouldn't have done it. We really shouldn't have done it. The thought that kept pounding through my mind as I slept.

Then I heard a sound.

*Tring*

Blearily opening my eyes from my restless sleep. In front of me floated a silver blue text box.

For crushing the source of Balizen's power

- You have gained the title Gamer

- You have learnt the skill Gamer

Reaching out for the box, it felt solid under my hands. And yet my fingers easily slipped through. It was a weird feeling.

Sleepily, I pressed 'OK' upon which it disappeared.

I fell back asleep, but instead of the nightmares of before, I now dreamt of fights fought and won.