Bare with me for this chapter and the next! I can understand that it might be confusing but I will try my best! As a reward I’m giving you a double release! It should be up around the same time as this one but if it isn’t just wait a little while I suppose!

***Start of Chapter***

Laying in bed, I roll around and snuggle myself in the warmth of my blankets. I had been in this perpetual state for what felt like hours. To tell you the truth, it had probably only been a few minutes.

Rolling to the side for what can only be the umpteenth time I open my eyes shocked. Something wasn’t right at all. It felt like I had just stumbled upon a deep and dark secret, like i had betrayed my closest friend. I was back in my dormitory at University. I swear to god I had been working at the store with Charlotte and had gotten home and went to sleep! Had I been forcibly logged out? No, no. It’s not that. I’m just not sure what it is that feels so wrong.

I got out of bed, I had a really bad feeling about this, retrieving my CNS Cortex Linker, I log in. I’m greeted by a frightening sight, the apartment where I had been staying with Leaf and Charlotte appeared different. The colors appeared more vivid than usual and objects weren’t were I remember them being. Looking around I see that I’m on the couch. This was odd, why am I on the couch? I then noticed Charlotte wasn’t around. It suddenly hit me, the only night I was on the couch was the first night of tutorial.

“This is really odd,” I had spoke to myself before getting up, noticing Leaf watching television half zoned out seemingly not noticing my awakening.

I head into my room to confirm something, I was honestly not to excited if this was going to go how I thought it would. Opening the door slowly, my changed - or rather, unchanged - room was exactly how it was after I had set it up after just starting the tutorial.

“I’ve been waiting for you to log back in, I thought you wanted me to wake you up, so that you could continue your job hunting. Surprised me when I found you logged out. Anyway, we need to get ready soon.” Leaf had called out to me and explained that he had been waiting. I was no longer confused.

“Oh, right. Sorry man.”

I now had a relatively good idea about what had happened and why everything was so odd. I had been dreaming. I had literally dreamed the last few days up in my mind, creating everything in an oddly fulfilling way. I didn’t like this at all. I wasn’t too sure where Charlotte was but I had a few ways to figure out when I had actually fell to sleep and started this whole delusional dream reality.

“Where’s Charlotte, Leaf?” If he knew about Charlotte than it would mean that I had introduced them earlier this morning and then fell to sleep. If he didn’t know who she was than it would mean that I must’ve logged out a fell to sleep on the first night of the tutorial, which would lead to Charlotte probably leaving in the night after I logged out.

“Who’s Charlotte? Did you get a girlfriend?” He has a smug look on his face like he knew I didn’t and is just taunting me. In other words, I started dreaming after I got back and woke up with Charlotte in my bed and moved to the couch. She must’ve went back to her office or something after I logged out by accident

.

I think of anything that I could physically tie back to Charlotte to backup my thoughts. I can feel my head actually starting to hurt because it felt like it had been so long ago when I suddenly remembered the candy bar I had bought her. I headed towards the fridge opening it in a rather normal fashion.

“The candy bar, it’s still here.” I had been slightly surprised that my thoughts had been on track. Charlotte had definitely slept in my bed and I had definitely moved to the couch, logged out and begun dreaming in the real world. After all, today Charlotte was supposed to have eaten the candy bar. It’s existence proves that I wasn’t insane.

“Woah, relax Charlie. I didn’t touch your sacred goddamn chocolate snack,” he began, “you’re really starting to scare me.” I didn’t care at this point. I had physical proof that she had been with me shopping and I now had no time to waste.

“I’ll be back later, something came up.” with a slight spring to my step I headed towards the door.

“Heyy, Leaf. Get back here, we need t-” I shut the door, cutting off his voice and headed down a few streets before getting to where the Shopping Mall is where I had started my lemonade business. Or at least, it was supposed to be here. Okay, I don’t have anything from my dream, this is all within expectations. All I saw was an office building towering up into the sky. I look around the street and notice all the building are different than what I remembered them to be. I had even created parts of the city in my head.

The mall doesn’t exist. My business doesn’t exist. Charlotte isn’t around, and I have a second chance at my tutorial, in a weird kind of way.

******

I was finally coming properly to terms with things. After returning to the apartment I quickly said goodbye to Leaf and started making plans for today, the second day of the tutorial. Yesterday I had went around applying for several jobs, to be denied spectacularly. I had also met up with Charlotte and went shopping with Crystal and Elizabeth too.

According to my own memories I stayed in game overnight. The only thing that I can really deduce from all this is that I got so excited and exhausted after spending a day in Economicalopoly that when I finally went to sleep I dreamed about it overnight in the real world, convincing myself that I had already started. An incredibly long and realistic dream wasn’t as fun as it sounded when it actually happens and you wake up realise everything was in vain.

If I was to be so blunt, I must have been out of it because I made some really stupid choices over the few days in the dream. I had started a business in a speciality I knew little to nothing about. I had abused a bug for my own personal gain which could have resulted in losing my account and Charlotte being deleted. I could not imagine myself under any circumstances making choices as stupid as those. Maybe aliens had had some involvement in this? I chuckle a bit at this stupid though, who knows. If it’s important I’m sure the answer will reveal itself in time.

Thinking even longer about the events leading up to this who delusional fantasy business, I felt stupid having only protected my money after having it stolen. I mean, it was better than nothing but I wish that I had dreamed about the kid stealing from me so I could fix that all now. I guess I can’t get everything I want. I could’ve sworn that I would never let something like that happen to me so easily. What was I thinking at the time, to hug some crying kid just because I felt bad.

I call up the system menu to check the time, it was 7:53. I hadn’t even been awake for an hour and so much had already happened.

As much as it sucked to have to restart, in a way, it was for the better. I can right some of my wrongs now and have much better results in the long run.

I knew that Leaf was meeting-up with Crystal and Elizabeth to head to work because they had talked about it yesterday. I decided to spend the day actually attempting to get a job related to my hobbies and area of expertise. Technology.

***Crystal, Leaf, Elizabeth***

(A/N. I’m putting all the events that weren’t physically/abstractly involving Charlie into the chronological place they were in the last few chapters because otherwise you’d be left with Charlie only chapters until I caught up. Only Charlie’s/Charlotte’s parts were a dream meaning that everything else happened. FEEL FREE TO SKIP OVER IT, ONLY MINOR CHANGES IN NON-CHARLIE SCENES.)

My thoughts had rolled back to yesterday when Charlotte had appeared out of thin air, I was wondering how Charlie was going to be able to deal with her. I then glimpsed over towards Leaf and wondered how he reacted when he met Charlotte. Wait, has he even met her yet? Hasn’t mentioned anything… Anyway, I didn’t think Charlie would be able to control her so easily. I stumble slightly on the pavement while my head was in the clouds.

"Crystal, stop losing focus otherwise you’ll also trip and hurt yourself and we’ll be late!"

"I'm really sorry I get distracted easily by small things..."

"It must suck living in an Asian country then!" What does Leaf mean? I really didn't understand.

*slap counter 4*

"I dare you to say that again." Elizabeth suddenly attacked Leaf without warning.

"It must suck liv-"

*slap counter 5*

Abruptly, before Leaf could finish his sentence he had received yet another slap. It was not Elizabeth's most flattering angle but I felt like she did it for me and I came to respect her even more.

"You had your warning." Leaf was currently on the ground with a red face. The smirk having left his face. Elizabeth really could be scary sometimes.

"Elizabeth, where will we be working anyway?" I really didn't know much about this job. Elizabeth had told me that we'd be cleaning for a large company that was in urgent need of 5 new janitors. Luckily for them, they hired us three in such a short time. It was highly likely that the two spare positions were already gone. I was hoping that I’d be able to finish up this small contract quickly so I could move on to bigger and better things.

"Ahh, we’re going to be working at Paleria Corp." I wasn't familiar with the name but it did sound big. I mean, it had 'Corporation' on the end of it.

"So we're just cleaning, right?"

"Well, yeah. That and apparently cleaning toilets, I believe."

It didn't sound the best but after this month was up I could do anything I wanted. I wonder how the rest of the group was doing.

***Marcus, Howard***

"Howard, we're not getting anywhere." I was getting tired from this repetitive job hunt.

"Marcus, don't give up. Have hope!"

"Why should I? Do I propose that I should also have had hope with the physical examination? We all know how good that turned out." I respond sarcastically in every possible way, making sure to clearly portray my annoyance.

"We'll find something eventually. You just need to believe."

The majority of the red team had joined together after we had failed miserably against the salients. Combining all our money was enough to purchase a decent sized place for all of us to stay in.

Rex and Max had somehow managed to secure jobs at a construction site. It suited them in a way because they had a really high strength stat. Most of us were around 40-55 while they were both in the high 70's.

Howard and I had went through building after building trying to get a job while the others like Ethan, April and Scott had also been looking. It really wasn't going too well.

A few of the others had to log off at night in the game and still hadn't logged back in. They had stuff to do apparently. I didn't delve deeper into any of it. Our offline lives weren't anyone's business.

It was still early in the day and we were looking for work. I did not want to run out of time on the tutorial because I had a late start. Approaching another large building, Howard and I had read the name on the outside of the building.

"McJohnald's"

What the hell is this? That's a blatant rip-off, clearly

"Are you seeing this, Howard?"

"Of course I am, and it's our last resort so shut up." Howard had suddenly become bitter which was unusual because I hadn't seen him like this since the physical examination.

"I'm going to have to work at a damn fast food chain?" This was really going to be horrible.

******

"You two have got the job. It's always good to see hard working individuals such as yourselves trying your best. I'll call you both with all the details by tomorrow, alright?"

It was the interviewer. We had managed to land ourselves a job at McJohnald's.

Important Notice!

You have managed to obtain a job through legitimate means!

With a legitimate job you can earn a steady pay!

Good-luck with burgers though, ehhh.

Despite what we had first thought, it didn't seem like a job with them would be all too bad.

"Thanks sir. We really appreciate it!" Howard had shown the man our gratitude. Finally, we were done.

Friends Online:

Howard Ypres

April May

Ethan Hall

Max Power

Rex Chester

Annalise Kurtis

Contacts Online:

McJohnald's Interviewer(Adrian Fisher)

All of the sudden the man popped up as a contact. It was convenient. Everyone had decided on not changing their first name in an attempt to prevent confusion. It was a good idea really, why would you want to change your first name anyway?

Howard and I finally leave the interview room with a skip in our step. We were going to bring good news back to everyone after all!

***Perspective Change Leaf, Elizabeth, Crystal***

Sweeping the tiles bit by bit I slowly edged my way over the entire bathroom. It was horrible. Crystal and Elizabeth had gotten incredibly lucky and were simply vacuuming offices.

Because I was getting bored I decide to skim over my stat page. My name was still 'Leaf' and I my stats were still the same as yesterday. I didn't expect them to change at all but it still felt odd. The only thing that had actually changed was that my stat page had changed to show I now had a job at Paleria Corporation as a janitor.

It turned out that Paleria Corporation was an insurance agency. NPCs and Players could apply and pay a set fee to receive some form of support.

The main difference was that NPCs would get insurance for their health and personal belongings, while players would get insurance on their money and belongings.

When an NPC died, they really died. They may have a stats page and an inventory but in the end, this was still real life for them. Players on the other hand, when they died they would receive many penalties and would also have to wait a day in real time before reconnecting. 8 days would pass while you were gone! It was really outrageous.

The many penalties that a player would face would be all cash on hand and 2% of all money stored in bank accounts. Additionally, a player would also lose many things in their inventory. The only thing that was never affected was one's stats.

Although it wasn't like conventional games, in Economicalopoly stats wouldn't be lost from death simply because stats were a representation of the real you. It wouldn't make any sense for a player to suddenly lose stats that the system had spent so long calculating. Besides, your real body didn't change from dying in-game.

Enough of that, currently I was mopping the floors in the men's bathroom. Almost being finished, I felt freedom coming as I can finally leave the bathroom! Wait... Dammit! I still need to wipe down the mirrors, refill the soap dispensers and change the toilet paper...

Today was going to be a long day. I could feel it.

******

"Ehhhh...." I could feel my body melting into a pile of sludge. Being a janitor wasn't easy. After I had finished with the bathroom, I was instructed to clean windows with Crystal and Elizabeth. Afterwards we were finally allowed to go out for lunch.

We had moved to the company's cafeteria and had started eating our lunch, this is where we were now. We were talking about VR and I had asked if this was everyone's first.

Surprisingly Elizabeth had explained that she had played Death's Bridge before Economicalopoly but she didn't like that the majority of the game was simply fighting. It wasn't fun at all, according to her.

On the other hand, this was mine and Crystal's first time in VR. Eventually the conversation led to me asking about Charlotte, the woman that Charlie had mentioned briefly in the morning.

Crystal had begun talking about Charlotte, my eyes half shocked. Since when did that bastard get his own goddamn loli! This is a serious injustice towards myself and all mankind! Suddenly Elizabeth interrupted.

"Crystal, what's going on between you and Charlie?" Crystal suddenly jumped back at the attack on her. Slowly her cheeks took on a pink shade. It was funny so I inadvertently let out a short laugh. That goddamn bastard has two girls swimming in the palm of his hand.

"I-I don't know what you're talking about..." Crystal response got quieter and quieter as she neared the end of it.

"Leaf, help me out here!" Suddenly being dragged into the new conversation wasn't pleasant so I just pretended not to hear Elizabeth.

***End of Chapter!***

(SPOILERS FROM THE CHAPTER ABOVE)

Hai! If you are confused then it means I haven’t done my job as a writer properly and I have failed you. To put it simply, in the above chapter, Charlie had actually been dreaming for the last few chapters (Literally the start of chapter 10, read from chapter 10 straight to this one and it SHOULD flow properly.) about the events that had occurred to himself. In other words, almost everything else in the last few chapters happened because Charlie can not dream about people he doesn’t know! April and Marcus met up, Leaf, Crystal and Elizabeth still have their job, etc! He can’t dream about something that he honestly has no idea about. If you have any questions, just put them in the comments below and I will attempt to answer you and place it into the chapter so it becomes a whole lot better. This whole chapter was honestly a gamble. Thanks!

(END OF SPOILERS FROM CHAPTER)

Thanks for reading everyone and I’ll see you on the other side of the double release! C: