March, 2XXX.

It was a sunny day.

It was already evening by the time Rain Villaflores walked out of the school with his backpack.

Arriving safely at his house, Rain excitedly threw his backpack on the top of his bed. Four years of high school finally came to an end.

Smiling ear to ear, he could not hide the excitement he was feeling. However, graduating wasn’t the real reason he was that overly excited but because of the upcoming launch of the first ever VRMMO game in history which would be held in the Philippines.

The holographic virtual network era, once considered a mere fantasy, or something only seen in novels had finally and suddenly descended under inconceivable circumstances.

Holographic virtual networks, which would soon replace traditional networks.

A historical event that might change the whole world; with Philippines as its center.

As a Filipino … why could he not be excited about it?

The world was stunned at the same time excited by its appearance.

Excitement come after shock, and doubt come after excitement.

America, Japan, Korea and even China became crazy upon hearing the sudden news. A sci-fi like event; a goal for most of the scientist and engineers in the whole wide world.

[ Philippine Lore ]

Holographic Virtual Game!

These countries send people to investigate but came out with nothing.

[ Abyss ] the company who made [ Philippine Lore ] was a very secretive and mysterious company. No one knows where this company came from or its core members. They just popped out from thin air and suddenly declared the existence of the Game.

However, one thing was for sure. The owner of the company; [ Abyss ] was a Filipino.

Julio Flores.

Julio Flores appeared in every television to advertise the game and explained its mechanics. Thus, every people in the world know of him. But that is all. Apart from his appearance and name, nothing was known of him.

Julio Flores guaranteed that the Game was safe and sound. There won’t be any mishaps such as things out of fantasy novels where players were trapped in the game would happen as he boost of its ‘Security with no loopholes’ and ‘Absolute Stability’.

Though most of the people seemed to be overjoyed by the declaration but it seemed like there were still some that were disappointed by it as they voice out their thoughts in Facebo*k and Twitte*.

What a bunch of idiots. Rain couldn’t help but cursed inwardly.

Is it because they wouldn’t be able to experience something that was out of fantasy novels? That’s just mere stupidity. Reality and Fiction might have a narrow gap but it was still not something that was easily to break.

Besides, why would they risk their lives for such stupidity~

Scattered beams of light peeked into the house through the open window, giving it light. The beams of light revealed not piled up things such as furniture’s and scattered things as one would expect from a normal boy’s room, but cables and cables of red and green, attached to several radiators and large-screen displays.

Inside was a boy carefully stroking a metal helmet as if it was his own son.

“This holographic virtual helmet… is wholly seamless! It’s obviously made of metal but its weight is less than that of plastic. How the hell was this made? This must be some black sorcery born of technology.”

Rain looked at the glowing helmet in his hands. It had a faint metallic luster. It’s practically a work of art! A sigh escaped his lips.

Beep!

At this moment, a sound rang out inside the room. Rain raised his head and looked at the screen but as soon as he saw the message reflected in his eyes, he couldn’t help but frowned in annoyance.

‘Find anything about the [ Abyss ]. I will give you a good compensation.’

A very short but precise message.

That’s right; Rain was a programmer and at the same time … a hacker.

By hacking at a specified network he can find out something from it. However, [ Abyss ] was like an Impregnable Fortress. He once tried out of curiosity but unexpectedly he could only breach two to three doors but more than that is impossible.

As expected from the one who made the first ever Holographic Virtual Game, their firewalls was no half-assed.

Rain had lost count of how many requests he had gotten at this moment but this was of no concern to him. He had no thoughts of accepting this kind of requests. Aside from the reason that it was near impossible to do it, Rain was also looking forward to this game.

Why would he do something that would trouble it? It might even be the reason that will make the Game launching cancelled, and that was something he couldn’t allow.

Besides, with the advent of the era of holographic virtual networks, the people rejoiced, jumped for joy and buzzed in excitement.

Why would he be the one to become the demon to destroy it?

“Anyway, I still have some time before the game officially starts. I should buy some necessities first to prepare~”

-----

[ Philippine Lore ]’s official launch is at 5pm tonight. Rain looked at the time and saw that there was still an hour before the opening.

At this time, there would definitely be hundred millions of game crazed people who would be wearing the game helmet to watch the opening. There would also those people who wished to become legendary player, were probably

twiddling their thumbs together waiting to enter the virtual world.

Entering a certain address, Rain opened his Facebo*k account and as expected, it was filled with activities.

And the sole topic was; [ Philippine Lore ].

Logging out, he then opened official website instead.

There were more than 500 million people online on the website. With so many people online on the night before it officially opened, this game could be the most anticipated game ever!

Having spent almost an hour reading some information regarding the game, Rain’s head began to spin.

With his astonishing concentration, he forced himself to remember everything. But rather than analyzing them individually, he memorized bits and pieces of the important information.

After reading, he turned off the computer, took the helmet, and looked at the game’s slogan——

An unpredictable country as your very own stage! Stand up and rise!

Stand up and rise? This is really interesting!

[ Philippine Lore ] has a magical fantasy background based on Philippine Mythology, however, there were still some cultures of various other countries mixed in to livened up the game.

There are also many hidden quests with concealed conditions needed to be met in order to activate them.

With a faint smile, Rain looked at the time while playing around the helmet for a while, and then finally lying on the couch. Holding the metallic helmet, he closed his eyes and put on the helmet.

Instantly, the metallic helmet briefly flashed a bright light as his irises were scanned by the helmet’s visor. At this moment, his identity was checked!

In front of Rain became a white space, his mind dazed for an instant and then suddenly brightened. A new scene started to appear as he entered the game’s registration interface.

Scene of a desolate and blood drenched land, suffering from countless wars and endless battles appeared in front of

his eyes. Forests had withered and human civilization had fallen into ruins.

---Then the camera panned in the sky and a big sun shined viciously down upon him. However, this wasn’t all. In the

sky, there were some people fighting.

“Sitan! What are you doing?!” A man with a long beard cried out.

“How could you open the three doors of Kasamaan!?”

“Amang Bathala” The man smiled as he pointed his sword at Bathala. “The mortal had lived too long in prosperity. And because of this they had forgotten who their real master was…”

“Savage? Animals? Men are more than that. You should have already seen it, Amang Bathala! Men became too full of themselves, thinking that they had the rights to be superior. And now …”

“As a guardian of Kasamaan, now is my time to reap my rewards~”

At this moment, in the foot of the mountain, neighs of horses could be heard. However, these horses had a human body, standing in two legs as they neigh towards the heavens as if agreeing Sitan’s claim.

“Sitan! You!” Bathala couldn’t do anything but glared hatefully at Sitan.

Looking at the foot of the mountain, Bathala gritted his teeth and then shout; “Fight!”

This as a signal, countless human soldiers charged ahead, swinging their swords.

There were also those who seemed like mages which hid in the dark and cast complicated spells, unleashing balls of flames towards the enemies.

The battlefield only became more ferocious with time as war cries shook the mountain. The air was filled with a thick smell of pungent blood.

Roar!

In the midst of the roar, a huge body towered over the humans, casting a shadow down on them.

Giants.

One eyed giants, long bearded giants that were smoking and humongous monsters appeared one after another.

Fresh blood dyed the ground as the warriors turned into cold corpses one by one.

Then in the sky, both Bathala and Sitan charged towards each other, their unleashed ultimate attacks collided together and produced an explosion that shook the heaven and earth!

‘Bang!’

The sound of swords clashing reverberate in Rain’s ears, and then the scene slowly shrank and turned blurry as two big words appeared in the sky – [ Philippine Lore ]!

This game’s art was truly breath-taking!

Supposedly, this was the opening scene.