Game Start

It was a Sunday evening and Yu Jinhai was sitting on the couch in his small apartment, repeatedly glancing at his front door. His purchase was supposed to arrive at 5:00pm on the dot and it was 4:58pm, it would be delivered at any moment now.

His purchase was the newest VR pod made by Assault, the game company that created the biggest RPG in the world, Utopia Online.

Utopia Online was created 5 years before and was played by over a billion people worldwide. The main reason for this was because it was extremely easy to make real money by playing the game. There was an auction where in game currency was sold with 1 gold coin being worth $10. There were 100 silver coins in 1 gold coin and 100 bronze coins in 1 silver coin.

Jinhai had worked overtime and saved all of his money for a year to buy the $40,000 pod. It would allow the player to play 22 hours a day compared to the 8 hours the headset allowed, as long as the player had the needed nutrient blocks in the pod.

The doorbell rang.

Jinhai jerked and bolted to the door, yanking it open quickly. A young man stood with a box larger than he was in the doorway.

"Are you Yu Jinhai?" The man questioned, looking down at the tablet in his hand.

"Yes! That's me," Jinhai responded excitedly moving out of the way to allow the delivery man in.

"Great I am here to install your pod for you and get it set up for your use," the man said while quickly wheeling the box inside.

Jinhai led the man into his bedroom where he wanted the pod placed and then left the delivery man too it.

Jinhai took a seat on the couch and turned on the small tv while he waited. Before he knew it the man came back out.

"Your pod is all good to go and I placed your free 6 month supply of nutrient blocks next to it," the man said.

Jinhai stood up quickly and walked the man to the door, thanking him as he left.

As soon as the door was shut Jinhai turned around quickly and walked to his bedroom. The pod was placed in the corner and the boxes of nutrient blocks were on the floor next to it just as the delivery man had said. Jinhai walked to the pod and after looking at it for a moment decided that it was worth the money.

He quickly pushed the power button and placed a few nutrient blocks into their slots before getting in the pod.

The pod came on and the system spoke.

[What name would you like to register this pod under?]

"Yu Jinhai."

[Which game would you like to open?]

"Utopia Online"

There were a series of beeps and then Jinhai's world went black.

When he was able to see again there was a young female NPC sitting in front of him. She had long, white hair and her eyes were silver and had no pupils. Jinhai looked around, they were in a dark room and he couldn't make anything else out.

He looked back at the girl and then she spoke.

"Hello I am the gatekeeper of Utopia and I will be helping you create your character. Please state what you would like to be called."

Jinhai had already made his choice weeks before so he did not need any time to decide.

"You can call me Fallen Snow," he said calmly.

"Okay, from now on you will be known as Fallen Snow is this correct?" The gatekeeper said.

"Yes"