Free Web NovelChapter 3: The Irregular Player
--Chapter 3–
Title: The Irregular Player
[Neural Link Established]
The darkness that shrouded his vision persisted as Xavier found his body, or what felt like it, floating in nothingness, dangling between the real and the illusory.
He’d expected the familiar and serene hum that always introduced the interface of Arillion Online.
But right now, the only sound he was aware of was his own heavy and ragged breathing. The sharp and uneven bursts of air were as though he’d just surfaced from deep water.
Slowly but surely, Xavier felt his hands move first, even though his mind was still all over the place.
The rustiness in his joints slowly peeled away and he no longer felt like he was simply dangling.
Just then, a rush of air filled his lungs so suddenly that he almost choked on it. His eyes felt like they were about to burst, but Xavier remained still because he genuinely couldn’t understand what else to feel.
After a second or two, his feet touched grass as the wind brushed across his face, carrying with it the smell of damp earth and musky leaves.
These were sensations that should have been impossible inside a game.
Every virtual reality system ever created preached about being able to imitate reality, but most were flukes.
Yet the tingling sensation he felt in his fingertips was more convincing than anything he’d experienced in his twenty-five years of life.
Slowly but surely, he opened his eyes and looked upward. The blue sky above stretched into the distance as clouds drifted across it.
It was serene to watch, but something weighed heavily inside Xavier’s chest.
It didn’t take long for reality to break his immersion in the virtual world.
"Grace..."
Xavier took a step forward, his eyes darting left and right as he took in his surroundings.
The unfamiliar landscape was a swamp filled with thick trees, dark almost-soggy water, and a blanket of fog.
With nobody in sight, Xavier instinctively called out again.
"Grace..."
But just as he gave the world his voice, it returned it with a reverberation.
"Grace."
And that snapped Xavier back completely. His heartbeat quickened as he remembered the announcement, the red glow on Grace’s pod, and V’s message.
Everything came back to him in a rush.
How he had thrown himself into the pod without thinking.
Because if Grace was trapped inside this world, there was no reality where he would willingly remain outside it.
He looked around again, trying to reorient himself when a purple translucent screen interrupted his thoughts.
[Player Login Confirmed]
[Verifying Identity...]
Xavier narrowed his eyes with a frown as the text continued processing... and processing.
Then, after a few more seconds, it stopped and flickered.
[Identity Verification Failed...]
Xavier scowled. This was unprecedented.
Before he could complain, another message appeared.
[Searching For Records...]
Another notification appeared immediately afterward.
[Status Conflict Detected]
Before Xavier could even begin to process the notification, another emerged.
And then another.
They changed faster than he could keep up.
[Unauthorized Entry]
[Login Threshold Exceeded]
[Late Login Detected]
[Review Pending...]
Xavier’s expression darkened. The series of notifications made one thing clear.
The system knew he wasn’t supposed to be here.
And right now... he was like an intruder. A virus that had bugged the whole thing. The feeling of being expelled sat heavily in his chest.
After a few more seconds of the interface glitching back and forth, the translucent screen finally went blank before a single message appeared.
[Player Identified]
[Welcome Hunter X]
[Record: Three Complete Conquests]
[Legacy Recognition Confirmed]
A sigh of relief finally left Xavier’s lips at the sight of the new notifications.
At least the game could finally recognize him and he wouldn’t be kicked out.
But before he could celebrate this small victory and turn his attention to his immediate circumstances, another notification appeared.
[Player Has Been Assigned Irregular Status]
"What the fu--?"
Xavier cursed under his breath.
There wasn’t much description attached to it, only another vague message.
[Irregular Players Exist Outside Normal Protocols]
For the first time in nearly five years of playing this game, Xavier found himself in a situation he couldn’t fully wrap his head around.
He was genuinely uncertain about what was happening.
But instead of standing around waiting, he reached for the menu interface and was relieved to find that this function still worked normally.
[Character Sheet]
[Map]
[Party]
[Friends List]
[Inventory]
[Mail]
Xavier’s eyes skimmed through the options in relief. Without bothering with the rest, he immediately tapped Party.
But instead of the interface opening, a warning appeared.
[Function Unavailable]
"C’mon," he muttered before tapping the next option.
Friends List
[Function Unavailable]
He didn’t stop there.
He quickly tapped Mail and then Player Search, but everything led to the same notification.
It was safe to assume at this point that the system had locked him out of interacting with other players.
"Grace," he said out of habit. Or was it fear?
She was out there somewhere, maybe even oblivious to the fact that Arillion Online had been corrupted.
But since all else had failed, Xavier decided to find her the traditional way.
The map.
Tapping on the option, a brown parchment-like image floated before his eyes and quickly unfurled.
At first glance, most of the map was blank, with only a small remote section visible.
Luckily, his current location was blinking on the visible portion of the map.
Right at the center.
The Scar Swamp.
’Damn it.’
His tongue clicked in realization.
Of all locations, it had to be this one.
’Wait. Why did I spawn here?’
Confused, he looked around as though trying to confirm the map wasn’t being diabolical.
It wasn’t.
Xavier had spawned in a location that was by no means a beginner zone.
On the contrary, this was an area players typically reached after the first dozen levels, somewhere around Level Ten to Twenty.
’Bloody hell... bloody hell.’
Panic slowly began to set in.
He didn’t know what would happen if he died here.
Would he respawn?
Or would he simply disappear?
Before Xavier could descend into full-blown panic, a thought crossed his mind.
This was still the early game.
And that meant...
’I won’t d--’
The thought hadn’t fully formed before another notification appeared.
[Irregular Status Applied]
[Beginner Protection Status: Inactive]
"Yeah... I’m dead."
---
Lamenting wasn’t really his thing.
But in this situation?
Yeah... he wasn’t exactly in the best position.
Luckily, the game wasn’t openly trying to kill him.
Not yet, at least.
But all the safety mechanisms designed to prevent new players from being wiped out before understanding the game, including death protection and spawn protection, had clearly not been assigned to him.
In the end, this was the price he paid for slipping into the game when the servers were supposed to be closed.
Splash!
Xavier’s head turned east as his eyes darted through the fog.
A distant sound echoed from somewhere beyond it.
Snapping him back to the immediate danger.
The question now was how a Level One player was supposed to survive inside the Scar Swamp.
Halfway through his contemplation and his decision to push forward despite the difficulty, the interface flickered into his vision again.
This time, the notification looked different.
The borders were gold. The text was sharper. And more stable.
[Legacy Recognition acknowledged]
Xavier stopped in his tracks.
For the first time since arriving, his eyes brightened.
Finally! Some good news.
[Reward Eligibility Confirmed]
[Three-Time Completion Reward Available]
[Global Ranking Reward Available]
[Unique Achievement Rewards Available]
The corner of Xavier’s lips twitched upward.
It seemed that even while Arillion Online had been hijacked, certain things within the system remained unchanged.
And the only thing he could hope for now was that the rewards weren’t complete bullshit after all the hype surrounding the launch.
’Let’s see what you’ve got.’
A golden chest materialized right before his eyes.
The light radiating from it pulsed steadily through the fog.
Without hesitation, Xavier tapped it.
He wanted to see what completing three full playthroughs of the greatest game he’d ever played would earn him.
The chest vibrated before the lid slowly opened.
A brilliant golden light flooded outward, illuminating the fog as a notification appeared before him.
[Absolute Drop Authority]
[Rank: EX]
[Description:]
Xavier’s eyes moved downward. Then stopped.
The silence stretched...
He reread the description again and again, making sure he wasn’t imagining things.
Then slowly, a smile spread across his face.
"Beautiful."
–End Of Chapter–
A/N: If you like the story... Add to Library. T for Thanks.
