I entered the home. Their home always smelled of chocolates. Dev was spread out on a sofa, his eyes fixed on the TV. The news reporter was enthusiastically saying something.
“Hey,” Dev said to me with a forlorn smile, the reason behind which I knew a bit too well.
“So you play Prithvi Online now?” Shalini asked.
“Yes,” I replied. “It’s the best thing I have ever done.”
Dev shot me a look when I said this.
“Dev wanted to play too. But unfortunately I couldn’t allow him. What would I do alone at home?” Shalini said. “But look at him. He has been rarely talking to me since the past few days. He has this grumpy look all the time.”
Dev grimaced at these words.
“Dev gave you that card, didn’t he?” Shalini asked me.
“Yes," I said. "I am very thankful to him. I would have never been able to afford the game capsule otherwise.”
“Well, I am glad that you could play. Dev said they pay you ten grands just for playing the game?”
“Yup. Just received twenty five hundred gibs today,” I said.
At these words, even Dev’s wife let out a small gasp.
“That’s cool,” she then said. “That’s good money. Too bad I couldn’t allow Dev to play.”
I slumped next to Dev on the couch.
Dev grinned at me for the first time after I had come.
“She will regret she didn’t allow me to play,” he said. “Twenty five hundred bucks for six days is good. That’s more than the one month salaries of both me and my wife combined.” Dev said this in a very small voice so that Shalini wouldn’t hear. Even I barely heard his words.
“You two care to go out with me in the evening?” I said to Dev and Shalini. “I’ll pay for everything.”
“I had some work to do,” Shalini said, “but…”
“Oh, come on,” Dev broke in, “it’s Sunday for god’s sake. You have changed so much, Shalini. I wonder if all women change so much after marriage.”
“Fine, we’ll go out,” Shalini snapped.
I focussed my attention on the television. The news reporter was talking about some people who had died in an earthquake. Didn’t news channels always speak about people dying and all the things going wrong? You’d start believing that only bad things happened in the world. I began to think about all the people who had died because of the earthquake. In Prithvi they would have just respawned. Yes, they would have gone down to level one. But they wouldn’t have been deprived of the chance to walk and talk and live.
“You know, in the game world nobody dies,” I found myself saying.
“Don’t be so sure of that,” Dev said darkly.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Don’t you know?” Dev said, and all of a sudden he seemed to become someone who possessed much more knowledge than me. “The game developers of Prithvi were asked by the governments of the world to install Death into the game.”
“What are you saying? Why would the governments ask something like that?”
“Well, because it’ll be weird if people kept living for all eternity, simple as that,” Dev replied. “The governments feared that due to the absence of death people would lose the motivation to live. I mean, come on, we do most of the things thinking that if we don’t do them now we won’t be able to do them after death, right?”
Dev said this all in a tone that announced, ‘I am going to eventually die, and so will you.’
But his words made sense. Humans did things keeping the end in mind. If I already knew that I would never die, I would become too carefree. So carefree in fact that I might stop doing things that contribute to society. Regardless of whether the society was a game world society or a real world one.
Dev looked at me as I thought this.
“I am surprised really that you didn’t know about it,” Dev said. “It was all over the news particularly about two month ago when the game first launched--Oh, wait,” Dev slapped his forehead, “when the game first launched, you told me not to tell you anything about it. Even when the other employees were discussing about the cool new game you would stay away from us.”
When the game had first launched, I had done my best to avoid getting to know it. With my brother’s photo hanging on my bedroom wall, I would have felt like a criminal had I tried to acquire any knowledge regarding the game. I had eventually come to know a few facts about the game though, despite everything, mostly from overhearing people conversing about the game. But I had never heard about the 'installing death' part until now.
“So, what happened?” I asked Dev. “Did they install Death?”
“They said they would, but I don’t think they have installed it so far. But be assured that they eventually will.”
I nodded. I wasn’t afraid of Death. If I died I would meet my brother, simple as that.
I had lunch at Dev’s home. Shalini was a good cook, whose cooking could easily challenge that of Nanda’s. Plus, I was eating real food, and the knowledge somehow made the food even tastier.
I stayed at Dev’s home till the evening. And then the three of us went out. It was a pleasant experience. It would be six days before I got to see either Dev or Shalini, so I enjoyed their company.
I returned home at about seven. Immediately I plunged myself into a fantasy paperback. I made a mental note to find a bookstore in Prithvi.
I powered through the standalone novel in just four hours being the fast reader that I was. Normally I read series books, since I was more able to get into the world of the books, and it was always fun to revisit characters from previous instalments. But the standalone was good too. The hero died in the end. There was no other way that the plot could have been otherwise resolved. I saw the end coming. It was sad, really. The hero gave us his life to save the fantasy world, and he was forever remembered. I sighed as I kept the book away. I wondered what if I was in the game world, and somehow total destruction threatened it.
There were always hackers and such people around who could get into the system of the game and pose threat. Perhaps someone might install a virus into the game world that turned all the NPCs into monsters that couldn’t be killed. All sorts of terrifying situations were possible.
Nah, I would never give up my life, I decided. It was sometimes best not to be a hero. I’d rather not be remembered.
Chapter 8
The next day, I went to the blacksmith’s shop and then entered the underground hall through the trapdoor. Serena was present there. She gave me the gooey liquid with the terrible taste. Soon I found myself lying inside the capsule. My hold on consciousness slowly slipping, I recalled my last day with my brother in vivid detail and felt like I was transported to the past.
I had been gaming and my brother had brought me tea.
“I couldn’t kill that mob the last time I tried,” my brother had said, while my eyes were fixed on the computer screen as I battled and finally killed a one-eyed monster.
“Really? That was easy for me,” I said.
My brother sighed.
“I wish I could play like you, Dev,” he said. He patted me on the shoulder and left the room. Moments later I heard a big sound coming from downstairs but I didn’t go to investigate. I was in the middle of another fight, and if I left the computer for even a minute I would lose.
It was forty minutes later that I actually went to see what had caused the big sound.
My brother lay at the bottom of the stairs, dead. There was a big wound on his head. He had tripped on the stairs apparently. Had I rushed him immediately to the hospital he might have survived. But I would never know because I had been too busy gaming.
There was a tear in my eye as I materialized in my room in the Ravana’s Inn. My heart drummed fast as my mind replayed the painful scene with my brother's head a bloody mess. I had cried so much that day. I was sure my brother had yelled as he had fallen, but I being too engrossed in the game had entirely missed his yell. I sighed and walke
d to the window and opened it, ushering in the sunlight. For a few moments I found myself staring at the people and the buildings. I suddenly realised that I wasn’t offending my brother in anyway by playing Prithvi Online. Prithvi Online was much more than a game that people played for past time. This was an alternate world, among the greatest inventions of Man, the next step in our evolution.
With this thought, I felt significantly better. I didn’t know how much of it was true and how much of it was a lie. But it provided me solace and so I hung on to it.
I went to Grimguy’s room but found that he had gone somewhere, his door locked. I decided to get in touch with my other friends. I messaged Rajahard, Ladyjane and Lovebird, inviting them to my room and telling them that I had something to show to them. Rajahard and Ladyjane came quickly. I asked them how the past couple of days had been for them and they said that they had progressed by two levels. I showed them my sword and they were quite impressed with it. Rajahard said that he now had a new spell. One that made Raks burst like meat bombs.
“Your spells rarely come to any use,” Ladyjane taunted him playfully.
After sometime Lovebird came and I introduced her to Rajahard and Ladyjane since they hadn’t met before. Then I summoned Danav and Danavma.
“Wow,” Rajahard exclaimed. “Not one but two pets!”
I introduced the three to Danav and Danavma.
“When in the midst of a fight, be sure to protect them too, not just me,” I told the pets.
“Hey, listen,” Rajahard said, “I came to know of this Rak village where there is a really powerful giant. Want to go kill it?”
“Doesn’t every village have a giant Rak?” I asked.
“This one is different,” Rajahard said. “This one is not a warrior, but a priest. He can cast spells. There is more risk involved, but the reward I guess would also be greater.”
I messaged Grimguy where he was and if he would like to join us on the hunt. But he replied he was busy with a different quest and wouldn’t be able to go with us. Danav and Danavma disappeared and then the four of us went to the river in the horse carts. We crossed the river.
“The village is a little deeper in Rakshasha land,” Rajahard said once we reached the opposite bank. “About six kilometres in. I hope that doesn’t concern you?”
The rest of us were fine with it. In the real world it would take quite some time to go six kilometres, just by running. But here it was different. Whenever we felt tired we just drank a health vial. All of us had health vials in plenty. Quite a few of the Raks dropped health vials.
“I tried to contact you yesterday,” Lovebird said to me along the way, as we ran through the flora. “But you were offline.”
“Yes,” I said, “yesterday was the first time that I left Prithvi in six days. I’ll be here for another six though.”
“You are so lucky,” Lovebird said, looking into my eyes. I felt my cheeks go hot and looked away.
“Why don’t you stay for longer periods?” I asked Lovebird. “Your job is too demanding?”
It took a while for her to reply.
“Sort of,” she said with a forced smile. I wondered why the colour disappeared from her face every time I asked anything about her real life. It wasn’t like I was extremely curious to know about her real life, but still most of the other players I had met were more open. Grimguy had even told me he had come to the game world because he had been chronically ill in the real world.
“Prithvi is a good place, eh?” I said to Lovebird. “No worries of the real world. We can spend the entire day hunting Raks.”
Lovebird smiled meekly.
“Yes, this is so much better than the real world,” she said, “nobody here dies for real.”
At these words of her I wondered if someone close to her had died in the real world. The real world really did suck. No respawning. Though I wasn’t sure how long people would still be able to respawn after death was installed into Prithvi.
“I am afraid that won’t stay so for long,” Ladyjane said, who was running ahead of us.
“Yeah,” Rajahard chimed in, “you know, it’s the Year of Death in Prithvi.”
“Year of Death?” I asked, confused.
“Yup,” Rajahard said. “There are ancient myths that say that this year is the one when Death would strike.”
“But these aren’t ancient myths, are they?” Lovebird said and from her voice it sounded like she was trying really hard to be optimistic. “I mean, the game developers created these said myths. Prithvi didn’t even exist just a few months ago.”
“It did actually,” Rajahard said. “They started to make this game world about five years back. But I get your point. It’s not like these myths existed for hundreds of years. The history of this world was written by the game developers after all.”
“Didn’t they originally plan to never let the perma players die?” I asked.
“Yes, they did. Which is why it is confusing. If you ask an NPC about Death they would say that death would strike this year. But then I haven’t played this game since the beginning. I guess players who went perma in the beginning would best know about this. I wonder how Death striking would really affect us. I mean, if we die during a battle, we will respawn right? Otherwise who in their right mind would play the game?”
I made a mental note to ask Grimguy about this. He had gone perma during the first days of the game.
I let out a dramatic sigh. We were getting way too serious, I felt.
“I just wish to find a girl,” I said, stealing a glance at Lovebird. “In my real life I am a balding guy in my thirties who never approached a girl in his life. In the game world I wish I could live my fantasies!”
Ladyjane let out a laugh.
“That’s almost what Rajahard told me when he first proposed me,” she said.
“Really?” I asked. I noticed that Lovebird was doing her best to avoid eye contact with me. “I mean, did you guys meet in the game?”
“Yes,” Ladyjane said.
“You don’t know each other in real life?” I asked, quite surprised. Even Lovebird gasped.
“Nope,” Rajahard said. “All we know is that the lives of both of us suck in the real world. We promised we would never ask or tell each other about our real lives. Perhaps in the distant future we would go perma and then our real lives wouldn’t matter in the first place.”
That was something to think about. A virtual relationship. I wondered if this was what Lovebird was thinking about. I had a small hope she was.
We reached the village of the sleeping Rak after sometime. From a short distance we observed the guards. A quest pop-up appeared.
New Quest!
Kill the Sleeping Priest
Reward: Unknown
“Simple plan,” Rajahard said. “I and Ladyjane will stay here in the distance and the two of you go and kill those guards.”
Ladyjane coughed.
“I am not sure that is fair,” she said, looking at me and Lovebird with some doubt.
“It won’t be hard,” Lovebird said quickly. There was an assurance in her voice that put me at ease.
“Okay, then that’s that,” Rajahard said. “I am pathetic with a sword anyway, so it’s best that I stay away and throw my spells. Ladyjane will heal you two if they harm you. And Rohan, you have that splendid sword. Wait a minute, why haven’t you summoned your pets?”
“Right,” I said. I had almost forgotten about them. I summoned them and soon Danav and Danavma appeared.
“Help us kill those Raks,” I told them.
“As you say,” the mother and the son said together.
They ran towards the Raks to kill them, and so did I and Lovebird. I tried to use my electric effect on one Rak, but the electricity was hard to control. It leapt from my sword tip and hit a tree instead, which burst into flames. The Rak meanwhile hit me with his sword, draining me of 75 health. I decided it was best not to use the electricity for close quarter combat.
�
��You dare hit me?” I cried. It took me only three hits to down the Rak. Lovebird meanwhile killed two. Danavma and Danav killed one each. The sixth one was killed by Rajahard. His spell literally made the Rak burst like some kind of a meat bomb. A piece even fell on me, but it soon disappeared. The loot dropped where the Rak had last stood as a whole.
We picked up the loot.
Just then through the gaps between trees, I saw a man sneak into the village of the Raks. He might have missed us completely, or perhaps he was using us to his advantage. With us killing the Raks he could easily go into the village.
I pointed this out to the others.
“He’s a fool,” Rajahard said. “He’ll be killed by the Raks.”
I recalled that I had not seen any name or other details on the man, so it was yet another perma player.
We entered the village. There were Rak children running around. They didn’t bother us, so we didn’t bother them. But they did run to their huts and told their parents about us. Adult Raks began to pour out of the huts.
The parents were mostly farmers and workers, though there were also a few warriors. It was easy to kill the farmers and the workers, while it took some time to kill the warriors. Rajahard kept performing his new spell. It was a pretty gory spell, truth be told. Sometimes bits and pieces of bones and intestines would fall on me, making me want to vomit. The Raks were super ugly but they had many similarities with humans and so bits and pieces of their bodies made me very disgusted. But thankfully the bits and pieces would disappear shortly after the Rak blasted. The spell also struck fear into the hearts of the other Raks apparently, and some of the workers tried to flee instead of coming for us. We didn’t spare them. We pursued them and killed them without mercy.
By the time we were done, there were no more adults remaining in the village. But they were also sure to respawn in a few minutes so we had to be fast. The question was: where was the giant?
We looked around the small village or camp whatever you called it. There were not more than ten huts. Also, where was the man who had sneaked into the village?
“Where is the giant you said about?” Lovebird echoed my thoughts to Rajahard.
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