Dungeon Core Online

Chapter 3

The first thing James was greeted with, as he immersed himself, was an empty white room. This room was a generic loading area, allowing individuals a moment to orient themselves before entering the actual virtual world. From this area, people could tweak their appearance, catch up on private messages, or simply relax in the peace and quiet.

James would normally jump right from this room to the Warcraft Universe, becoming the legendary warlock Glyax. He was one of the highest leveled players in WU, and had many friends and followers. Very different from the real world. However, he resisted the urge to jump in, knowing that today, he would hang up his WU mantle, to begin his next adventure.

With a swipe of his hand, he pulled up his games list, flicking his wrist to the left until he found what he was looking for, Dungeon Core Online. A timer was counting down, showing that the game was live for character creation and lore, but wouldn't be fully playable for 24 hours in game time. That was standard practice for most games now. The first hour in the real world allowed players to wrap up whatever they needed to before immersing, and ensured players already logged in couldn't gain an unfair advantage.

For most games, unique instances were created based on time zones, allowing mass amounts of people to all play in the exact same world, at the exact same time. This allowed for meaningful continuity and relationships to be formed, that otherwise wouldn't have been possible if people were all playing at different times.

Dungeon Core Online, had taken a somewhat different approach. According to the developers, DCO was going to offer a completely new opportunity for the world. Dungeon Core Online was meant to bring communities together. Instances were geolocked, with each instance encompassing only a single city. This meant that every player that would be in James's instance of DCO, would be from his city. Every player therefore, would have a vested interest to work together against the dungeon, because the better they did, the better the economic gain for their own city.

In the game itself, players were able to become whatever they wanted. James was planning on becoming a summoner, a class that served well for solo players, and that had caught his eye during the demo. Who didn't want to have a pet dragon, after all?

The classes though, were endless, and players didn't even need to become adventurers to profit. Dungeon Core Online sought to create a massive community outside of the dungeon, meaning there was going to be a demand for countless skills and trades, so people were likely going to open up their own shops, forges, bakeries, and whatever other service they could think of, to profit.

One of the unique sides to immersion, was that because it was all digital, the government seemed to have very little care what went on. Obviously, there were certain taboos from the real world that couldn't be carried over in the virtual world either, but for the most part, anything went. Usually, that meant players set up gambling halls, taverns, and brothels in any game within an hour of launch. No matter how futuristic mankind became, there were a few constants that remained the same.

With a grin, James selected DCO, and pressed launch. Immediately, the room around him disappeared, and he found himself floating in darkness. A single prompt appeared before him.

ENTER YOUR NAME

Without a second of thought, James entered his chosen name. Glyax. It was the only username he had ever used, and it is what his in game friends knew him as. He already had a few friends he was planning to form a guild within DCO, so he figured using his same name would help them all find each other easily.

Welcome Dungeon Core

James stared at the white text for a moment, his eyes blinking. He assumed it meant to say "Welcome to Dungeon Core Online", and he couldn't believe there was already an error this early on in the game. For a game that had so much work put into it, he felt that such an early glitch cheapened the experience.

"Seriously, a glitch already?" He whispered to himself, glancing around at the darkness that surrounded him. He was sure his character creation screen should be loading any time now.

"Actually, it's not a glitch James." A strange voice echoed through the darkness around him.

"Who's there??" James spun around in a complete circle, but couldn't see the origin of the voice. "What's going on?"

"Currently? One of the largest social experiments ever conducted by the government." The voice seemed bored. "However, I cannot further elaborate on that for you."

"Then, what's going on?" James tried to pull up his menu screen, and nothing happened. His mind began panicking. He had read some litrpg's about people getting trapped in games. It usually didn't end well.

"I am here to ensure you understand the rules, and sign a nondisclosure agreement, before you begin the game." A piece of paper appeared before James, along with a pen.

"Go on." He grabbed the paper and pen, his eyes scanning the document.

"You have been selected to become the Dungeon Core for your city's instance. By agreeing to this task, and signing the NDA, you will begin your role as the Dungeon Core. You will be solely responsible for growing the Dungeon that players will interact with, and you will individually shape the world of your players. In agreeing to this role, you will be unable to communicate with other players in the game, and no one will be aware that you, as the dungeon, are sentient. By signing this agreement, you swear to never share this information with anyone, in or out of game. Failure to follow this agreement will result in your immediate expulsion from the game, the destruction of your city's instance, and your incarceration. Do you agree to these terms?"

James stared hard at the document for a moment. The idea of being the dungeon core was fascinating, especially after the stories he had just read. However, the downside, the fact that he could singlehandedly lead to the destruction of the instance for his city, as well as his imprisonment, made him hesitate. Did he really want to do this?

"What happens if I don't agree?"

"Then, we will wipe this conversation from your memory, and load you back into character creation. From there, you will get to live out your days in DCO as just another one of the players, nothing more, nothing less."

James paused for a moment. Immersion pods weren't supposed to be able to alter a person's memory. The government had strict laws against such a thing, safeties were put in place to make immersion pods as safe as possible. However, the way the voice said it, so matter of fact, James was worried the threat held some substance. Even more so though, was the second part of the voice's statement. If there was one thing James did not want to be, it was just another one of the players. He was nobody in real life. He wasn't going to be nobody in DCO.

"I agree." He said as he signed his name on the paper. The moment he removed the pen from the paper, it disappeared in a bright flash, causing James to close his eyes. When he opened his eyes, he found himself face to face with a female pixie. Needless to say, he screamed.