"Didn't I tell you? I still have four hours before the three-day stream ends, and I am already on the last boss!"
- You still haven't beaten the Archangel.
- Honestly, even though you are one of the best players, no one has passed this stage before.
- Just have faith in him! He is going to show us the promised land of Stage 5!
"Haha! My viewers are the best! Now watch!"
- He is fighting the freaking Archangel, but he didn't lose any health yet!
- You are the best, Nova! The Archangel only has half its health now!
"Guys, are you ready? The Archangel can only take one more hit. I will show you the fifth stage!"
[Your profile has been banned because of potentialcheating!]
"Huh?"
- What? What is the meaning of this?
- Hmm? Why does it say so?
- Nova, explain yourself. Did you cheat?
"Are you crazy? Didn't you watch me fight now? I didn't get damaged because ı dodged well. This shit!"
- Man, I was really curious about the next stage. Look at the stream stats, the viewers are leaving!
"Hey, wait. Don't leave yet. Don't worry, I have a spare VR set. I don't know what happened, but I will prove to you all that I am not cheating. Watch me beat the fourth stage now!"
- Nova, let it go. You haven't slept for three days. We believe you. You can try it later.
- Yeah, man. Don't force it now. You need to sleep.
"No! I already connected the new device. I will show those developers I didn't cheat by beating it much faster. Also, this time, I won't take any damage throughout the game!"
Nova, the streamer with lots of records on his name, put on the new VR set, and the stream started again. Looking at the number of viewers, he sighed.
Almost fifty million were watching me... Now it is a mere ten million.
What went wrong to cause this? I didn't cheat. Is it really because I didn't get damaged? Sigh... I am really sleepy.
Let's try it one more time.
But before even the game was loaded, Nova was sleeping. Or was he?
- Huh? Where did Nova go?
- He was here right now. Where did he vanish?
- I told you he really cheated! Stop playing games with us, Nova! Get back in front of your camera!
---
Godfall: Ascension Protocol, or GAP in short, was a half-immersive game played by most gamers for the last decade.
Thanks to the modern VR goggles, it was possible to enjoy the game like the user were inside it.
But, since it was only half-immersive, the players didn't feel like they were leaving this world. They needed to stop frequently to meet their body's needs.
Still, it was the most played game in the world because of how realistic it was. Even the time passed at the same speed as the real world.
While creating their characters, the players could choose their age, class, and appearance. It was possible to start as a baby or as an 80-year-old.
Of course, both had their advantages and disadvantages. Starting as a baby, the player could raise their character however they wanted.
Since they would start training early, the character would also be much stronger. But there was an issue.
Since time passed at the same speed as real life, the ones who started as babies are only 10 years old now, since the game was released only a decade ago.
Coincidentally, some liked to play this game as a slice of life instead of an RPG, so it was even fun to raise a child character.
On the other hand, if one chose to start playing a character at the age of 35, while the character's body was at its peak, they didn't need to train much.
However, the character would come with preset stats, meaning they wouldn't be as strong as the characters that were raised manually.
The best players in the game had their own preferences for age since there were no checkpoints in this game.
If one died, that was it. They needed to start again, making this one of the hardest games. That was why no one had ever passed the fourth stage, the invasion of angels.
While most players chose the age of nineteen, for Nova, this age was fifteen. He started every new game with a fifteen-year-old character. The reason? Because he knew a shortcut.
Yes, the time flowed at the same speed as the real world, but there were exceptions. For example, after creating a new character, Nova would enter the academy.
When he did that, time would fast forward for four years, making his character 19. And the game, or the real story of the game, started when the character reached 20, or instantly if the character was older than 20.
"Huh? Where am I?"
Nova slowly opened his eyes. When he looked around, he saw that he was in a blue room with grids.
"Sh*t! Did I fall asleep at the character screen? I hope I don't get banned for sleeping while streaming!"
He looked to his right and sighed. Since there wasn't a stream chat there, it could only mean that he closed the stream before sleeping.
"I wonder how much I slept... Wait, I shouldn't choose a character when I am not streaming. Those b*stards will say I am cheating again!"
But when he looked at where the characters should have been, he didn't see the different profiles he could choose from.
Instead, there was only one character. But he was black like a locked character.
"Am I still sleeping?" he wondered. There were no locked characters in this game. Even though he would start a new game, it wasn't like he would need to unlock characters.
He approached the blackened profile and tried touching it, only to be buzzed by something like static electricity.
Sh*t! That scared me.
After looking at the character for a while, Nova decided to log out. Again, he didn't want to be accused of cheating. He needed to start the game from the beginning after he started streaming again.
Now that I think about it, I must be hungry. Let's eat first.
He turned his back, but he stopped. His curiosity wouldn't be gone if he didn't check this.
What if this thing isn't here the next time I come?
He could always start again, but this character might not be here all the time.
"Sigh... Let's try it." With that, Nova chose the character. First, he entered the character's age. Of course, it was fifteen.
Then, he was supposed to change their appearance, but... There wasn't anything to change. So, the game started as he closed his eyes, waiting for the scene to change.
But, things didn't go like how he thought they would.
He felt the wind. Wind?
There shouldn't have been any wind in the character selection screen.
He opened his eyes again.
"Aaaaaaaaah!"
He was falling from the sky.