Class Information

After flying for a while, Hades lowered his altitude. After searching aimlessly for something he could interact with, he finally spotted a place lit up in the distance. Though the light was faint, he knew that in the dead of night, only intelligent beings could make something like that.

He began to descend slowly. As he did, the cold wind howled through his body. It wasn't enough to make him want to find somewhere warm, but could a nanotech virtual device really simulate sensations this realistic?

Hades couldn't help wondering. His device had a realistic-experience feature for medical use, but it reduced the sensations by seventy percent, retaining only thirty percent of the original feeling. For safety reasons, the feature was available only to a select few authorized programs.

So was this lifelike sensation the result of a device malfunction? Could a feature that reproduced only thirty percent of a sensation really make it feel this real?

For some reason, Hades suddenly had a bold thought: could it be that he was actually in the real world?

The idea sent a shiver through him. Perhaps his guess was right—he had entered the real world as his YGGDRASIL character.

But a moment later, he dismissed the idea. People in the real world couldn't fly without some kind of aircraft.

And the real world didn't have scenery like this. Even in an Arcology, the natural landscape in view was far too varied. There were endless grasslands, as well as forests and mountains. Even the most advanced Arcologies couldn't create anything on this scale.

As for the land beyond the Arcologies, if there were still unpolluted, undamaged natural landscapes out there, the government wouldn't have spent so much time and money building Arcologies.

In the early twenty-second century, the environment had been devastated and the agricultural industry had collapsed. The sky was often shrouded in black smog, and the sun was almost never visible. Streets were blanketed in thick, toxic fog, making it impossible to go outside without a gas mask.

Of course, none of that had much to do with Hades. He had lived in an Arcology for as long as he could remember. He couldn't go wherever he wanted and often couldn't see his parents, but at least he had a comfortable life and could get anything he wanted. What he disliked was the constant stream of people trying to make him study tedious, boring subjects.

After living in an Arcology for more than twenty years, he had grown used to being confined there. His life had long since lost its excitement. If he could, he would rather leave the Arcology and see the vast skies beyond. Even if he had to wear a gas mask, he still wanted to see what the wider world looked like. Maybe there were still places on Earth untouched by pollution.

If this was the real world, Hades decided, then it wasn't so bad. But he was worried that in the end, he might just be an early-access player for YGGDRASIL's second installment.

It wouldn't have been the first time something like that had happened. A famous game publisher had once done the same thing. It had ended up in court and led the government to restrict the use of nanotech virtual devices, but the stunt had still generated a fair amount of publicity.

Hades didn't know which was true: the real world or the virtual one. As the possibilities clashed fiercely in his mind, he reached the ground. The sensation of his feet touching solid earth, of his soles bearing his weight, shifted his feelings one notch toward the real world.

Scattered across the plain before him were houses built of thatch and wood. The light came from one of them.

"Is this a village?" Hades muttered to himself as he walked toward the lit house.

When he reached the door, he could faintly hear indistinct voices from the other side. He couldn't tell what language they were speaking. It didn't sound like his everyday language, yet he had the feeling that if he could hear them clearly, he would understand what they meant.

Hades raised a hand and gently knocked twice on the wooden door. The muffled sound rang like a death knell. The voices on the other side fell silent, and at the same time, the whole village seemed to grow quiet with the knock.

Hades tensed without meaning to. He couldn't be sure whether he was in the real world or a virtual one. For all he knew, some indescribable monster might appear when the door opened.

He regretted making such a rash decision. He should at least have listened in first to find out what they were saying. But when he heard footsteps thumping on the other side of the door, he could only steel himself and remain where he was, ready for anything.

At the same time, he instinctively tried to call up a panel and check his character's stats, only to remember that YGGDRASIL's control panel had disappeared.

But to Hades's surprise, a stream of information suddenly flooded into his mind, deep in his consciousness. It was the very character information he had tried to call up.

Character Name: Hahaha Hades

Race: Human

Gender: Male

Karma: 200

Alignment: Good

Class Role: Warrior (Monk · Combat Specialist)

Classes: Monk 10, Ki Monk 10, Ex-Ki Monk 10, Ki Master 10, Dragon Breath Walker 5, Eternal Death 5, Duelist 10, Duel Master 10, Peak Martial Artist 10, Champion 10, Invincible Warrior 5, Transcendent 5.

Hades's mind was reeling, but he had no time to think about it. With a creak, the wooden door swung open.

Every muscle in Hades's body tensed, and cold sweat trickled down his forehead. At last, the weight lifted from his heart: there was no indescribable, bizarre creature behind the open door. There was a human—a gray-haired man.

The man had a mixed Asian and European appearance. The weathered look on his face showed that he was no longer young, and Hades had never seen hands as rough as his, with such thick calluses.

It was a relief that the person before him was another human man, just like him. It would have been even better if that man weren't pointing a pitchfork at him.

"Who are you?" Emmet gripped the pitchfork tightly in both hands as he looked at the handsome young man outside, who seemed as if a gust of wind could knock him over.

In this village, far from the cities, strangers almost never came by. Everyone in the village knew one another, young and old, men and women alike. After nightfall, the villagers went home to rest. Even when they needed to knock on someone's door, they would announce who they were as they knocked. Their voices were the best way to identify them.

It was practically an unwritten rule in the village. So if someone knocked at this hour without identifying himself, something might be wrong. No matter who it was, picking up a pitchfork was essential.

Because inside the house behind Emmet were his wife and two daughters. If the stranger was a thief, at least Emmet could strike first, and the noise of a struggle would alert the rest of the village.