1 The Best Birthday Present pt. 1

I tossed my backpack down in the corner of my tiny entryway and sighed in relief as I hooked the backs of my shoes, pulling them off with the toes of my opposite foot. I only had one wish. Glory.

My birthday fell on Glory's anniversary every year. Glory was the best video game ever created, and even though it was released before I was born, it was still going strong while all other games fell to the sidelines. At midnight, I'll turn 19, and Glory will turn twenty-five. I had the best birthday of anyone.

Since I shared such an important day with Glory, my friends called me "little Ye Xiu," as a joke and play on my name. Maybe because I'd started playing when I turned eight and never stopped. Perhaps because I could spout facts about all the items, gear, quests, dungeons, and bosses of Glory, without mistake.

My friends were the opposite, They could describe all the current Pro players down to the type of shoes they liked to wear, but they couldn't describe the characters the pro's used. My friends played around in the game for fun, but for me, Glory was more than just fun. It was life. It was adventure. It was home.

I clutched the new server card tightly and walked the ten paces to my living room, where I had my computer set up. I pressed the on button and waited for it to boot, nothing happened. I tried again; still, nothing happened. No, no, no, no, nonononoNO! This couldn't be happening. I checked the power cord, and all it's connecting parts, nothing was out of place. Why was this happening?!

I rushed to my door and jerkily threw my shoes back on, grabbed my backpack, and dashed out the door. There were only thirty minutes until the new server opened and I was going to miss it! I quickly scanned my phone for the nearest internet cafes, there were three. The first was fifteen minutes away on foot. I ran, I don't think I've ever run that fast before!

The first cafe was full. I ran to the second. Ten minutes left, but that cafe was full too! There was one more chance five minutes away. I ran and ran until I was gasping for breath. I dashed in the door of the last cafe in the area. "Excuse me, are there any more seats?" I asked the lady at the front desk.

She held out her hand for my ID and smiled, "You're in luck, we have one more seat in the very back corner."

I tried to control my gasping and wiped my brow as I waited for her to return my ID, "Thank the Glory Gods," I praised, and she laughed. The woman was probably twice my age, but she was beautiful and friendly.

"Everyone is here with friends since it's a new server," she handed my ID card back and pointed in the right direction, giving me an aisle and seat number. "You should hurry, there's only one minute left until the server launches."

I yelped and ran to the back of the internet cafe. The seat was in the smoking section, but I didn't care, all I cared about was being in the game. I found my place and quickly logged into the game right as the clock hit midnight.

"Interesting," the guy next to me said, a cigarette hanging out of the side of his mouth as he used his hands to deftly join the new server.

I didn't know if he was speaking to me or not, but it seemed impolite not to reply, "What's interesting?"

"Your hand speed. Haha," the man said as he chose a character and entered the game.

I started to choose my own character when he spoke again, "What are you going to play as?"

"Um, I was thinking a cleric," I hadn't played one since I was ten, so I figured I'd give it another try.

"Pity," he said and blew a giant plume of smoke. "Instead of a healer, why don't you play something else."

"Oh? Why?" I tilted my head and bit my lip as I tried to understand.

"Because if you play as something else, you could join my group," he said and gave a small smile around his cigarette, "How about playing a Ninja?"

"Weird. How did you know that was my favorite class to play?" This guy was impressive!

"Ha ha! I didn't know until you told me, I just knew no one else on the team would be playing that," the man laughed.

I blushed and mumbled, "Oh." I still picked a Ninja, though.

Things had changed in Glory since the beginning. The most significant change they were releasing this year was that you could choose your class from the moment you logged in. You no longer had to wait for twenty levels. This restricted some of the moves you could use at level one, but at the same time, they gave you more class skills from the beginning too. I was excited to give it a try.

The starting village was flooded, as expected. It was total chaos as characters tried to force their way towards the quest givers. I groaned and started towards the first one.

"Wait, don't go there, tell me your name," the man said.

"Oh, I'm Ye Yanxiu," I blurted out.

"Haha, I meant your in-game name," the man coughed out a laugh, "But I like your name, little Ye."

I about died from embarrassment, and mumbled, "Behind the Moon." Ah, could I be more of a noob? Thinking that this guy wanted my real name. Ugh.

A notification popped up on my screen. Lord Happy would like to be friends. Yes or No? I clicked, Yes. Another notification popped up. Lord Happy would like to invite you to a group. Yes or No? Again I clicked Yes.

From the look of it, I was the last one to join. I looked at the group composition as everyone typed a hello to me. It consisted of Lord Happy, a male whose class was Unspecialized, Laughter in the Wind, a female Launcher, Ultimate Trash Talk, a male Blade Master, Unrivaled Pain, a female Battle Mage, and me, a male Ninja.

"What about a healer?" I asked, feeling nervous.

"We don't need one," Lord Happy said nonchalantly, making me even more nervous.

"Aren't we going to start with the quests?" I asked as the group decidedly went in the opposite direction of the quest givers.

"No need," the man said.

"Child, listen to your seniors, we'll teach you how to level quickly on launch day. Just follow me and Lord... Happy. Lord Happy? Really? That's the best you could come up with? Why not tell the entire server who you are. You're horrible at picking names, Look at Unrivaled Pain, no one will figure out who she is. Speaking of, how did you come up with that name?" Ultimate Trash Talk said all of this in the blink of an eye, it was almost faster than I could comprehend.

"It was the name that populated as a suggestion when I logged in," Unrivaled Pain said with a soft feminine voice.

"Oh," was his somewhat deflated reply.

"You picked Ultimate Trash Talk, can you really call that name any better? Why not just call yourself Swordmaster?" Lord Happy said with a huff.

"I couldn't," Ultimate Trash Talk sniffed then continued, "it was already taken on this server."

"Can we get started?" Unrivaled Pain asked with boredom.

"I agree with Rou Rou, let's go!" Laughter in the Wind's gentle voice exclaimed.

"What do you mean, get started? Aren't we heading in the right direction? What else would you have us do?" Lord Happy chided. These people obviously knew each other well, it seemed I was the only stranger in their midst.

I was beginning to wonder about the sanity of the group, but this is what happened when your friends weren't as interested in Glory as you were. You ended up in a pick-up group full of strange people. It could have been worse, I supposed. I could have ended up with a bunch of noobs, leaving me struggling to pass the first level.

Within the first five levels, I could tell this group wasn't normal. They were all high experts with high mechanical speed and a depth of knowledge of their classes that went deeper than someone who simply played for fun. After killing a monster, I turned to Lord Happy, who still had a cigarette dangling from his lips, "Are the four of you Pros?"

Ultimate Trash Talk laughed, hearing my question through the voice on the game, "Us? Pros? What are you talking about little Behind the Moon? How could we be Pros? You're keeping up with us, aren't you? How silly! How preposterous!"

"I'm barely keeping up with you, and most people can barely keep up with me! I usually have to slow down to their pace. Your pace is so fast!" I was bewildered, how could they not be pros?!

"Let's just say we've all been fans of Glory for a long time," Lord Happy said evasively, "Let's continue, we're almost level ten, we can try out the new starting dungeon."

"Yes, let's do that! It sounds fun!" Laughter in the Wind said happily.

"We're level eight!" I gasped at the idea. We were going to run a dungeon while we were still under-leveled?!

"I know," Lord Happy sighed, "we should have tried it at level six, but I wanted to test everyone's ability first."

It didn't take a genius to figure out that Lord Happy really only wanted to test my ability.

To combat the tough time people had leveling in the starting areas, Glory launched a new level ten, five-man dungeon, called Spirit Cave. All of the NPC's were lead by a dragon named Hated Spine. He was supposed to be a ferocious beast covered in sharp spines that, should you touch one, would immediately give you a bleed effect that ticked away at your health for fifteen seconds.

At the proper level, and with a healer, this wouldn't be an issue. But we had no healer, and we were two levels less than the monsters we were going to fight! I felt sweat accumulate at the edges of my face and swiped it away. Could we do it? Glory still had the same "die and get kicked out of the dungeon to a rez point" rule. It felt like a giant gamble to me, but we still entered the dungeon.