Chapter 2: Cornius


Ryder’s first impression of Cornius was nothing less than incredulous. He landed right in the midst of a bustling city yet it was busier than he expected. Races of all kinds hustled through the streets to get on with their quests and whatnot; even more races than he’d seen in his own world. Being a more advanced world than the medieval world of Azure, buildings and signs were standing tall on every corner of every street. Hovercrafts that looked like slabs of metal with exhaust nozzles on the bottoms floated over him. They resembled small rockets flying through the air and he was amazed at how fast they traveled.
“Strange mounts…” he mumbled to himself and looked around some more. The sky of Cornius wasn’t the beautiful blue, cloudy atmosphere that he was used to. Instead, the sky was dark and colorful like a galaxy. Stars, nebulas, other galaxies, and bright suns and moons lit up the world with their light; casting rainbow shadows on the ground everywhere one turned. Where there was no asphalt covering the ground, the blue hue of the planet replaced what would normally be dirt on his. It was like the real world’s moon’s surface only colorful. Ryder walked through the town with his hood up over his head, watching creatures push past him in a hurry. ‘Is it always this crazy?’ he thought to himself. After awhile of walking and looking at the outside of strange shops and Guild homes, he finally made it to the end of the town’s street and looked out beyond at the vast world in front of him. The surface was almost plain besides the many ponds, marshes, and bodies of water that were placed almost everywhere. He saw Floatorians swimming in some of them, taking on creatures that looked like giant frogs and fish with armor. That wasn’t just it though; they weren’t just fighting the creatures. Some were fighting each other. As he looked around, he spotted a small group of the race, all taking turns casting spells and swinging axes at yet another small group. One of the Floatorians, a young girl, was getting most of the attention. Several of the opposite group kept trying to attack her but her group was defending her with their all. He didn’t know if it was the protective instinct in him or the need to stop this madness, but he took off in their direction. Scrambling over the rough surface of the planet and trying to maneuver his way around some of the small yet deep lakes, he caught up to them within a few moments. Immediately he drew his swords off his back and held them out while getting into a fighting position.
“What the hell’s going on?! You’re going to kill each other!” He shouted and gritted his teeth. One of the Floatorians, a buff blue male with heavy steel armor, instantly turned around from the green male he’d just taken out with his broadsword. Ryder swore under his breath as the male charged at him with the sword held over his head. Holding up his swords in an ‘x’ formation above his head to block the attack, he felt the sword come crashing down upon them. His boots sunk down into the blue dirt and dust with the force of the blow. The male’s gills flared and his oval-shaped eyes stared down at him with a look that could only be described as pure hatred. Ryder pushed his swords against the broadsword with all of his might and jumped back out of the dirt so that he was a few feet away from the male. Narrowing his eyes, he held one of his swords out in the distance that separated the two.
“Answer my question!” He yelled and kept an eye on the others to make sure they weren’t to the girl yet. They were still attacking the Floatorians that were guarding her so he had some time. The Floatorian in front of him laughed and stepped forward so that the tip of Ryder’s blade touched the metal on his chest.
“We’re of the thief class. What do you think we’re doing? The kid has gold and we want it, capicé?” His voice was a bit high for his stature, indicating he was about Ryder’s age. He even looked about the same age thanks to the Oculus Rift’s accurate scanning of the user’s face and build when the game started. Ryder narrowed his eyes angrily.
“That’s no reason to kill somebody! This isn’t just a game anymore! If you kill her here, she dies out there!” He shouted and pointed his free sword at the sky above. The male backed away from Ryder’s blade and held up his own for another strike. Ryder moved just in time to avoid the attack but stumbled and fell down into the dirt below. “I’m warning you…” He said and used his swords like canes to help him up. He looked at the male with growing hatred of his own in his eyes. “Tell your lackeys to back off or you’ll all pay for it. I promise you that.” Laughing, the male walked towards him and lifted a big blue hand. He patted his hand down on Ryder’s head mockingly, his slimy skin sticking to his black tendrils. Ryder frowned.
“And what do you propose to do if we don’t, midget?” The male asked and ruffled his hair hard. He didn’t even see it coming when one of Ryder’s swords cut straight through his armor like a warm knife through butter. “W-what…?” The male managed to get out, a trail of green ooze dripping out of his mouth and from the hole around which the blade had entered in his chest.
“I warned you.” seethed Ryder. Ripping his sword out of the male’s chest, he pulled it back along with his other sword and watched as the Floatorian fell to the ground. The others had noticed by now and started running towards them. Ryder got down on one knee so he could speak to the male on the ground who was gasping for air. “I don’t want anybody to die. I’ve never killed another player and I’m not about to start now. Call your minions off and I’ll spare you.” He said, his voice softer now. The male gulped in a mouthful of air and squinted his eyes up at Ryder. Once he got a good look at him, his squinted eyes widened in a mix of fear and wonder.

“You’re the Dark Rider… aren’t you?” He asked and watched Ryder nod.

“It’s just Ryder.” He replied.
After a few moments when his group finally reached them, the male raised his hand into the air.“Stop! We’ve no business here today unless we want an early retirement from thieving.” The group protested but the male whom Ryder now knew was their leader on the ground growled and threatened an early grave to them. “Enough! You all have sworn allegiance to our Guild and I; the Guild Master. I say what goes and that is enough arguing.” He then turned his gaze back to Ryder. “I am sorry. We have never killed anybody either. I know it is surprising but in this world it is impossible to kill another player just like in your world. It’s against the rules. There are only a few worlds that allow that kind of playing. If we defeated the girl in battle we would get a share of her gold. That is the truth of why we are here.” Ryder looked beyond them to the girl they’d been attacking. Her group was healing and the perished members were respawning nearby. He looked down to the male with a confused look on his face.

“Then why were you afraid of me killing you?” He asked. The male arched a brow in disbelief.

“You get my gold if you finish me off of course.” He said simply and Ryder gave an exasperated sigh.

“It’s always about gold, isn’t it?” He asked nobody in particular rhetorically. Standing back up, he spoke softly, “Inventory Open.” He then selected an item called ‘Full Health Elixir’ and looked down to the male. “What is your name?” He asked and waited for a response.

“Orion.” He said and sat up, cradling the wound on his chest. With his free hand, he motioned to the three others in his group that were standing around him protectively. “And this is Corvus, Lupus, and Carina.” The two men he’d identified, Corvus and Lupus, were the same blue tint as Orion but were less muscular and wore light long-sleeved tops and black bottoms with daggers aligning their waists. Their emblem on both of their shirts was the constellation Ursa Minor. They looked like twins and their clothes reminded him of Star Trek uniforms. The girl on the other hand was a dark shade of purple with splotches of pink forming what looked like tribal tattoos wrapping around her forehead and cheekbones. She wore almost the same as the others only she wore a metallic skirt that was long in the back and short in the front. She was the first to speak while Ryder was gifting Orion the elixir.

“The Dark Rider? I expected you to be…taller.” She said without mockery surprisingly. Ryder shrugged off her comment, not feeling like answering to it. When he was done gifting Orion, he sat down across from the bigger male while he healed. He noticed that the girl and group from before had vanished, leaving them all to themselves in the vast area.

“Alright. Now that you’re healed I need some information.” He said and set his swords down on the ground beside him, keeping his hands on the hilts though just in case. Orion motioned for the rest of his group to sit down next to him and they did as they were told.



“Information? What kind of information do you speak of?’ asked Orion curiously.
“I need to know where to find Moon Dust.” Ryder replied and was surprised when they all suddenly started to laugh. Orion raised his brow and waved his hand over the blue dust and dirt under them.
“Moon Dust is everywhere. Whenever you defeat a creature you automatically receive some. While it is supposedly hard to get in other worlds, it’s incredibly abundant here.” Spoke Lupus. Ryder automatically felt stupid and cleared his throat.
“Oh, uh, alright. Do any of you have any spare Moon Dust then that you could give me?” he asked a bit nervously.
“Of course we do, we-“started Orion but he cut off in mid-sentence, his eyes going wide. Orion quickly lifted an arm and pointed towards the sky. “What the hell is that?!” He yelled and quickly got to his feet. Ryder looked over his shoulder at what Orion had pointed at and his jaw dropped. The once colorful canvas of sky now was a dark shade of red as if it had turned to blood. Hovering over the planet in the midst of the reddened sky was what appeared to be a huge spaceship firing down on the city he had just been in not long ago. He heard screams and the all-too-familiar sound of health points dropping below 0. The sound was like a loud pop when somebody died and their bodies would disappear as if they’d never been there, leaving no trace. Ryder and the others got to their feet and watched in horror as fleeing Floatorians, Elves, humans, and Lizaars were obliterated on the spot. Ryder turned away from the scene of the burning city and dying players, yelling at the other four.
“Move it!” He yelled and started to run across the planet’s surface, hoping they would follow. They did as they were told and ran behind him, paying no mind to the spaceship that was now heading their way. Ryder kept running but took a peek over his shoulder and felt the fear course through him. Several ships were in the sky now, firing what looked like bright lasers at the ground that destroyed everything in their path whether it be buildings, creatures, or players. The city was toppling down on itself and the death toll had to be huge by now. A cry in the distance is what made Ryder turn his gaze back in front of him. Yet he didn’t see anything in front of him. He turned his head back around and stopped in his tracks, almost causing Orion and the others to crash into him. The same girl that Orion had been attacking yelled to them from a few yards away. The rest of her Guild was no longer anywhere to be seen. A ship started hovering her way just as Ryder turned on his heel and made a dash towards her. He called out to her loudly in hopes she would hear over the chaos going on around them. “Run! It’s coming!” he yelled frantically and watched her turn her head towards the ship. Her eyes widened into orbs but they soon narrowed as if she was angry. The girl reached over her shoulder and a something started to form on her back, pixels making their way to where her hand was. When they all came together a huge gun rested in her hands and she pulled it forward, having to hold it low to the ground with all of her strength. The body and muzzle of it were huge and cylindrical, taller than her and about two times wider. The muzzle of the weapon started to light up and Ryder stopped running towards her, staring at what was happening right in front of him. A loud mechanical ‘whooshing’ sound was coming from the weapon and he noticed that something was spinning inside the muzzle, creating a giant fiery ball of light. The girl said something but he couldn’t hear over the sudden explosive sound that made his ears ring. All he could remember from that point was the weapon firing and the sound of more explosions. The sky turned a bright white before everything went black.

Chapter 3: Chaos


When Ryder awoke he heard people talking around him. He didn’t dare open his eyes, afraid of where he may have ended up. Instead, he listened to the voices around him. The first voice he heard was a girl’s. She sounded stern and maybe even a little angry.
“You disobeyed my one rule, Vela. You brought an outsider into our midst. What if he’s dangerous?” The girl asked. Another girl spoke who Ryder assumed was the ‘Vela’ the other girl was scolding.
“They were going to die if they stayed on Cornius. I had to help them. I couldn’t just leave them there to die.” Vela said defiantly. “I won’t watch another player die if there’s something I can do to prevent it.” The voice that spoke after was on Ryder recognized.
“With all due respect, ma’am, she saved us and I’m not prepared to betray somebody like that.” Orion spoke up.
“You dare say that after you tried stealing her gold, thief?” Orion was quiet after the accusation from the stern girl. “And what about the other survivor over there? The elf is quite far from home. What was he doing on Cornius?” Ryder felt the presence of the girl standing over him and he tried to manipulate his breathing to still seem as if he were sleeping.
“That’s the Dark Rider, Mars.” Vela spoke up in her high, childish voice. Ryder heard a scoff come from who he now knew was Mars and he clenched his jaw, feeling a bit irritated now.
“Oh how very impressive. Am I supposed to drop to my knees and revere this child?
Mars asked sarcastically. It was the last straw. Ryder’s eyes opened and he sat up quickly, all heads turning on him when he spoke in an angry tone.
“I’m not a child!” He shouted, getting to his feet on the thick metal flooring below. He finally got to see where he was being held: a large steel chamber with a few bunks on the sides of the walls. In the center of the room was a bunch of monitors and screens with buttons and strange-looking devices.
“Only children act so rash.” Mars replied in monotone, reminding Ryder of what Alasse said. That shut him up.
“Where am I?” He asked after a few moments of awkward silence. The little girl from before, Vela he know knew she was named, was the first to speak.
“We are on Vessel 87432-A: Codenamed Aspirus on route to Azure.” She said in a cheery voice.

“A spaceship?” Ryder asked, feeling a bit woozy from all of the questions swarming in his head. “What happened to all of those people? Are they… are they dead?” he asked, a knot forming in his throat.
“No.” Said Mars as she stepped forward so that she was now face-to-face with Ryder. Ryder furrowed his brow, confused. “The players on Cornius are not dead, they are,” Mars was cut off by Vela, who jumped in front of her.
“They’re not real players!” Vela exclaimed. “The players you saw on Cornius were all AI’s put there by Yoshida, the developer of the game. Apparently he was staging it to get the real world in a panic.” Ryder didn’t exactly know what to say to that.
“How would you know all of this?” Ryder asked and heard Orion’s voice from across the room where he was seated on a metal box.
“They know because they’re AI’s too.” Orion said in a bit of a grim voice.
“Not exactly.” Contradicted Mars, who had been silence ever since Vela interrupted her. “It is true we are artificial but unlike the AI’s on Cornius, our existence was not meant to be. We were created somehow but not by the game developers. We have our own thoughts and actions unlike the NPC AI’s. We are free of the system.” It was the first time Ryder really noticed Mars and he realized she was being truthful. Normal NPC’s had an unearthly feel to them when even just near them. He didn’t know how to put it but they just didn’t seem real. Mars had pale grey skin and wavy black hair. Her face was outlined in silver patterns and lines that twined together and her eyes were a piercing green. Almost like Alasse’s. Alasse. Ryder wondered if she was okay.
“Alright then…last question. Why are we going to Azure?” Ryder asked and Vela answered.
“Azure is the main world and is where the battle tower is. If we can beat the final boss, the madness will finally end!” She said in a shout. Ryder happened to see Orion’s face when she said this. It seemed sad and still grim.
“What’s wrong, Orion?” Asked Mars, stealing the words from Ryder’s mouth.
“What you’re saying can’t be true…” Orion responded in a troubled voice. “Lupus, Corvus, and Carina… where are they? They were real people, not NPC’s or AI’s. Yet they’re not here.”
Ryder thought about it and realized it made sense. If he, Orion, and the others were able to be on Cornius, there had to be more real players in the world during the time Cornius erupted into chaos. Mars seemed to have all of the right answers.
“We assume that any players caught in the façade were subjected to PVP rules.” She said without a hint of emotion behind her words. It was the first time Ryder thought of her as just an AI; A fake human without remorse or emotion.
“So they’re…” Orion trailed off, despair in his voice.
“Dead. Yes.” Mars finished for him. Ryder could see the pain in Orion’s eyes.
“Did you know them I.R.L?” Ryder asked carefully.
“Yeah,” Orion started, “They were my best friends in the real world. We all got the email to join and we formed our own guild once we realized this was our life now. There’s just, there’s no way they can be dead!” Orion’s voice caught in his throat. Ryder could tell Orion was holding back sobs at this point. Walking past the girls, Ryder approached him and placed a hand on his shoulder.
“We’ll get the bastard developer who did this.” He said softly before turning back to Mars and Vela. “Let’s get to Azure.” Mars narrowed her eyes.
“I’m the captain of this ship. We leave when I say we do. First we have other things to attend to though and jobs to assign.” She chastised.
“Jobs? What do you mean?” Ryder asked.
“This ship cannot fly itself,” Mars started, folding her arms behind her back and walking towards the middle of the room where the monitors were. “Each of you will receive a schedule with things that need done on the ship.”
“Don’t they fly themselves?” Ryder asked. “This is a video game, why would we have to manually fly a ship?”
Mars turned her head back towards them and Ryder could have sworn he saw her smile for just a second.
“There’s one thing I forgot to tell you,” Mars paused in the middle of her sentence and sighed. “The game is turning into reality.”

Chapter 4: Reality


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6:00 AM- Wake Up.
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6:10- Morning debriefing.
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6:30- Breakfast
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7:00- Maintenance check on deck.
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9:00- Maintenance check in crew quarters.
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12:00 PM- Free
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3:00- Lunch.
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3:50- Navigation
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5:00- Free
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9:00- Lights out.

Ryder looked over the short schedule he was given the morning after he arrived on Aspirus. Yawning, he tossed the paper onto the floor below his bunk and sat up. He stretched and looked up above him to Orion’s bunk; wondering if he was okay. The night before had been terrible. All Orion wanted to do was stay in bed and sleep away tragedy. Ryder understood how Orion had felt but he didn’t know what to do. When he had lost people in the game, nobody had been there for him; he simply took out his anger and pain on creatures and bosses around Azure. Orion was much different, Ryder thought. He was a brute but when he was sad he wasn’t the fighting type it seemed. Either that or it was the lack of creatures on the ship that stopped him from being hostile.
“You awake?” Ryder called up to Orion who lay in a heap on his bunk. Orion didn’t respond. Sighing, Ryder got to his feet and was about to change into something else other than his pajamas until he remembered something. There was no more virtual inventory. This he discovered the night before when he boarded the ship. The game was starting to change into reality. He didn’t know how much of it had changed yet but after the attack on Cornius, inventories were disabled along with automatic ship traveling and who knows what else. Ryder was thankful when he saw his robe, pants, boots, and swords sitting in a pile next to the door. All of the items he had out of his inventory last.

Pulling on his clothes and boots and sheathing his swords behind his back, Ryder walked out of the crew quarters and down the long hallway to the mess hall. Vela was sitting down at one of the few round tables in the small room, tugging at a piece of crispy bacon with her teeth. Ryder walked over and sat down next to her with a friendly smile.
“Heya!” Vela shouted before he could greet her himself. She seemed just as hyper active as usual, he noted. “Want some bacon?” She asked and waved a piece in front of Ryder’s face. He practically salivated over the smell.
“Where in the world did you get that?” He asked, “I haven’t seen bacon or any normal food once in this game.”
“It’s no longer a game, remember?” She stated and dropped the last of her piece into her tiny mouth. “And food like this is easy to find if you know where to look and buy.” She dropped the other piece of bacon into his hand with a smile.
Ryder took a bite of the meat and could hardly believe how good it was. Just like the real world, he thought and felt an ache in his heard. Home. He could hardly remember it for some reason. Disturbed, he dropped the bacon and tried to think again of what home was like. All he could see was Alasse and her shop, his house in Azure, his friends on the planet, and other familiar aspects of the game world. He couldn’t remember anything from home though.
“What’s wrong, Mr. Ryyyyyyder?” Vela asked, leaning in really close to him with a worried look on her face.
“N-nothing. I think I’m just tired or something.” Ryder replied, leaning back away from her. Vela still looked worried so patted the top of her head with an awkward smile on his face. “Don’t worry; I’m just not used to flying. I’ll be okay.”
“Mmkay!” Vela said and downed a glass of chocolate milk from her breakfast tray. Ryder picked his bacon back up and started to eat the rest of it, silently trying to remember something.

About half an hour later Ryder found himself on the ‘deck’ of the spaceship. It was a huge room with controls on the side, a captain’s chamber in the front, and in the middle sat a giant holographic image of the spaceship. Ryder made his was towards the captain’s chamber and was greeted by Mars who was hard at work on entering coordinates into a machine resembling a giant laptop.
“Is the Floatorian awake?” She asked. Ryder shook his head.
“No. Well, at least I don’t think so. He won’t answer me.” He responded sadly.
“I need him awake and ready by tomorrow. We will head to Azure then.” She said and waved a hand for him to go away. “You have work to do.”
Ryder couldn’t help but feel angry. “He just lost his friends and this is the kind of sympathy you give him?!” Ryder shouted. Mars turned her chair around and stared at him with disappointment.
“And I’m just supposed to let him sleep all day every day? Is that what you propose? To let him waste what little of his life he may still have left on mourning by himself on a cold bunk?” She asked rhetorically. Ryder was speechless and feeling stupid. “Whether you humans believe them to be real or not, I was programmed with emotions and thoughts. I’m not so cold and heartless as to force a man to work without purpose, Mr. Dark Rider.” Mars’ voice wasn’t loud like Ryder’s had been but it held twice the sternness and sting.
“I…I’m sorry, Mars. It’s just that so much has happened in the past two days.” Ryder said quietly.
“No, Ryder. So much has happened in the past two years” She responded with a shake of her head.