CHAPTER 1

08-01-2514

Nara suspiciously stared at the device. She ran her fingers over its flawless glassy finish. It looked much like bangle, an inch wide. It was smoothly curved into a perfect hoop, allowing it to be easily slipped around one’s wrist.

Nara had mysteriously found the device in their postal portal earlier. Mail was rare since it was deemed inconvenient with all the customs items had to go through so she was shocked when the portal chimed in the morning. The device came encased in an odd fabric, soft yet thick, and with a note—an invitation to ‘Paradox Online.’

Nara had never heard of such a place, if it even was a place.

“Online?” she whispered to herself. The note had introduced the device as a ‘band.’

Nara flipped the band in her hands. It almost felt like it was pulsing under her fingertips, beckoning her to try it on.  The moment she squeezed her hand into the item’s grasp it suddenly tightened around her wrist. She collapsed.

Nara felt her consciousness leave her body, as if her soul had been out. Her body was left falling into an eternal abyss. Wind howled past her ears and her stomach felt like it was rising up into . The falling sensation came to a sudden halt and Nara could feel her soul return.

Nara opened her eyes, though she was unsure whether she had actually opened them. She felt her chest tighten as she was enveloped into the blackness. Her lip was trembling as fear took a firm grip of her.

Nara wanted to look around and find a way out but as soon as the darkness crept into her eyes she would squeeze them back shut. After a good five minutes she slowly opened her eyes. She could see her forearms after she had tucked herself away.

It was odd, despite the surroundings being jet black she could clearly see her fingers as she wiggled them in front of her.

 The girl was expecting to have woken up from a dream but was quickly shocked to still find herself floating in empty space.

Nara shrieked and panicked as she waved her arms. She swung her limbs to and fro until it seemed like she was upright, it was difficult to tell since there was nothing to indicate which way was up and which way was down.

She was breathing rapidly, her heart thumped loudly behind her ears. She held her breath to slow it down. Nara squinted, lifting her hand over her eyes as a bright light ignited in front of her. Still holding her breath, Nara lifted her head to find two plain words hovering in thin air.

USERNAME:

PASSWORD:

Nara pressed her lips together and let out a puff of air.

“Username… and…” she read aloud, pausing before finishing dubiously, “Password?”

The two words were written one underneath the other respectively.

Nara had no idea what was going on. She felt terribly lost and motion sick from floating in the nothingness.

“I want to go home,” she whimpered in a mouse voice. Nara was fretfully fidgeting with her hands, unsure what to make of the situation.

The space was silent except for the light buzzing coming from the dangling text.

‘This must be a dream’ she assured herself, ‘but…’

The girl then glanced at the band cosily wrapped around her wrist. She attempted to pull it off.

“That’s odd,” Nara murmured to herself, “I don’t remember it being so tight.”

She sighed and turned back to the ominous hovering text.

She narrowed her eyes at the two words. ‘Username…’

“Nara?” she said timidly, somehow uncertain about her name. Four small circles obediently appeared one after the other.

USERNAME: •  •  •  •

PASSWORD:

Nara blinked. She was caught slightly dumbfounded. Without filling the password, she was suddenly zapped back into unconsciousness. 

‘Welcome to Paradox Online,’ chimed a charming female voice in Nara’s head. The voice sounded like an echo, similar to the voice of an android. ‘Your password has been assigned to you,’

Nara hesitantly opened her eyes. Her stomach felt even worse than it had earlier. This time the room was brightly lit to the point of almost being blinding.

“Password?” Nara repeated hazily.

‘Paradox Online uses the latest technology. Brainwaves are scanned to create your password. This procedure will be done automatically upon logging on,’ the voice explained.

Nara nodded her head. It wasn’t anything surprising, it sounded convincing given the recent development in the technological sciences.

‘What an odd dream,’ she thought. The situation started to sink in and feel, bit by bit, more real. As her head spun she assured herself it was anything but real. She stopped to think for a moment then asked, "What's 'Paradox Online?"

'Paradox Online is a virtual reality massive multi-player online role playing game, or VRMMORPG. The game syncs with your senses using the band, allowing up to 99.8% realness.'

Nara blinked, shocked by the explaination. 'Game?' she pondered. She glimpsed down at the band, 'Is that even possible?'

‘Please choose a race.’  The voice chimed indifferently.

There was a ring and several images of Nara appeared before her.

The girl almost fell back in shock. Standing before her were several versions of herself, all staring blankly ahead of them. To each copy, several features were added or changed. Despite them being copies of her, some of them hardly looked like the girl. Several had an extra few feet added to them and prominent muscles bulging out of the arms and chest.  Others were even shorter than Nara’s petite height and stood up to her knees.

“What is this?” Nara questioned as she analysed one of the copies. It looked like a prettier version of herself. The copy had a pointed chin and jutting cheek bones with just the right amount of peachiness to complement its dewy white complexion. It had a smoothly defined jaw line that brought attention to its perky ears and large round eyes.

‘Elf,’ said the anonymous female voice. ‘Is this your chosen race?’

“Huh? Um,” Nara took another look around then shook her head. She was often picked on by other girls because of her looks, though she didn’t think of her reflection as anything special, she decided it was safer to go with something somewhat uglier.

Nara glanced at the other copies. Several were covered in fur, resembling various animals such as tigers, bears and wolves. Nara walked across the group of clones, examining all their faces and unique aspects.

She stopped in front of a copy that would catch anyone's attention. Its face was repulsive and its teeth were protruding out of its mouth. It had a crooked nose and warts erupting from its murky skin.  Nara flinched and cowered back slightly.

“Can I just go as I am?” she asked, still rather unsure.

‘You have chosen race: human. Would you like to confirm?’

Nara nodded. “Yes.” She had no idea what was going on. It was unlike her to ‘go with the flow’ since there usually wasn’t a current for her to go with. She never had friends at school that stayed very long.

Nara pursed her lips at the numbness building in her chest. ‘I didn’t mean to…’

‘Please choose your class.’

Nara lifted her head at the sound of the female’s voice. The copies had vanished and several items took their place in front of her. The items were floating above their designated podium. Most of the items were weapons such as spears, swords, daggers and the bow and arrow. Nara walked over to a floating staff. It was a supple blue with intricate embellishments engraved onto one end. It radiated a calming aura, pure and timid.

Nara hesitantly reached out for the staff. A bright flash flooded the room, erupting from Nara’s fingertips as she touched the staff.

‘You have chosen class: cleric. Welcome Nara, beta tester 03, to Paradox Online.’

***

27-01-2514

Technological advancements and the rise in population were evident throughout the globe since the Third World War. Due to these factors, South Korea’s economy had been greedily piling upon itself, keeping many people struggling to keep up.

It was on the afternoon of the 27^th of January 2514, that people’s attention were temporarily drawn away from the penny-pinching Government. Though never officially advertised, the issue had been greatly spread around the world through word of mouth.

‘Paradox Online’—if you hadn’t heard of it, you were deaf.

Nara winced at the thought of the game, ever since that day a few weeks ago she had been more fretful than usual. She had never purposely logged on since creating an account but somehow found herself in the game whenever she went to bed. She recalled the first time she got up after playing and immediately puked on her lap.

Nara felt queasy at the thought of logging on again that night. She had tried to stay awake for several nights to avoid the game but gave up in the end.

Nara rubbed her eyes warily. ‘I thought it was a reoccurring dream until I heard classmates talking about it.’

The classroom was quickly filling up. Nara could hear cuts of people’s conversations.  

“Have you heard about Paradox Online?”

“Are you going to get it?”

“I heard it’s getting released at twelve o’clock this afternoon.”

Nara bit her lip. They didn’t know all the hardships she had gone through the past few weeks. ‘If I just hadn’t put on the band…’ She looked down at the white bracelet still locked around her wrist from under her desk. It strangled her thin wrists, a curse that’ll drag her back into the imaginary world upon unconsciousness.

“Are you planning to play it too?” one of the girls asked Nara. The girl’s bright eyes were looking at Nara intently. Nara suddenly felt nervous. She must have caught her staring as she listened into their conversation.

Nara unconsciously brought her arms to her chest in defence. She pursed her lips. “No, I’m a—”

It felt as if her jaw suddenly clamped. She felt click into place and a sharp pain strike from up to the side of her face. Nara attempted to shut it but gaped open unable to utter a word. Her breathing quickened and panic took over.

“Hey are you okay—”

Nara abruptly got up from her seat and ran out of the classroom.

Once she had left, the group of students discussing the game looked at each other oddly.

“What’s up with her?” one of them said in disgust. “What a weirdo.”

***

Nara stopped in the hallways. Her jaw had unlatched itself but still felt numb. She massaged it uncomfortably. She could feel the veins popping out from the side of her neck, defined like guitar strings under her fingers. She began to open and shut robotically, catching weird glance as people walked by.

The pain slowly began to subside. Nara dabbed the sweat on her forehead as she stood back upright. Her face felt awkward and twitchy. She recalled a similar incident when she had attempted to discuss the game with her childhood friend Youngjae as he drove her to school.

Nara felt an electric chill run through her veins, the sensation left a tingle across the side of her neck. She suddenly felt ill. ‘A warning?’ she thought. Her stomach dropped. If that was the case, would she have to endure the suffering alone?

Nara bit her lip and clutched at her elbows. She knitted her brows as she attempted to reassure herself. “You’ve been enduring the bullying alone,” she said under her breath, “How’s this any different?”

She winced in dismay as she dropped her head and prodded back to class. She was finally given a chance to be involved in a conversation but ended up making a fool of herself.

***

Nara made it just in time before the bell signalled the start of class. Attendance was recorded and latecomers were identified when they walked through the door, the student would be promptly scanned and their arrival recorded.

Obediently after the bell, all the desks’ surfaces’ emitted a green light. The page of their current textbook appeared on the screen of their desk.

Nara awkwardly made her way to her desk. She was greeted by the judgemental gazes of her peers. She felt her chest plunge into her stomach as she took her seat. Her head was blunted by their glares and her own self-contempt.

Almost half way into the lesson a student came in from the front door. Nara raised her head, a tall tousled, fawn-haired boy made his way across the room. He was approaching Nara. She felt the weight of gravity pull down on her as she recognized him to be the boy from that morning who had given her the cold shoulder.

She immediately ducked her head. They made short eye contact before he turned to the empty seat beside her. He plugged his USB into the side of the desk and, after a few taps on the desk’s surface, swiftly took his device out.

Nara watched him get back up to leave. She didn’t feel any hate towards him, just emptiness. She had long been hollowed out of hope and happiness that she could no longer tell apart negativity from neutrality. Judging by his uniform he was in his last year of school, but that wasn’t what surprised her—she was shocked to catch a glimpse of a white bangle strapped around his wrist, much like the band.

***

Junhong silently left the classroom after retrieving an assignment from his desk. He felt uncomfortable from the girl’s stare, he assumed she had recognized him when he walked pass her when she was in need. ‘Couldn’t help it,’ he told himself.

He made a turn and found his way to one of the school’s computer rooms. He took a seat and commanded the computer to turn on. The screen flashed before him welcomingly.

Junhong slipped the USB into the slot located on the side of the desk. Its window almost immediately popped up. He proceeded to enter the assignment into the system.

Nowadays no teachers were required for classes other than those with students from the ages four to eight. The only adults around were for supervision and to keep misbehaving students in order. Students had their assignments and notes given to them electronically, they would then finish them and feed them to the system where they were scanned, checked and marked. Their results would be given after a few minutes.

Junhong waited for the computer to spit out his results. A message window appeared and he swiped the air to open it. Mistakes were replaced with red markings. He frowned at every little red cross. He scrolled down to the bottom to find his results.

Choi Junhong

Social Studies Issues Assignment Rank: 5 403/15 094

Students left to submit: 4 906/20 000

Current Overall Rank: 6 431/76 500

The rank was determined by the other students’ grades who had currently submitted the assignment. Junhong nodded. His rank could possibly drop if students who had not yet submitted the assignment got better marks than him. Despite the fact his year level alone contained 76 500 students, the school was considered to be of average size.

Now that Junhong had finished and sent his assignment there was nothing left to do but wait. He watched the screen for a while as his rank began to flicker, he became nervous as other students submitted their assignments. He was finishing school after this year and if his overall rank dropped into the bottom fifty percent it would be almost guaranteed he’d be unable to attend university.

“I just want to get out of this hellhole,” Junhong muttered to himself. He could feel several eyes glimpse his way as he mumbled to himself. More than anything, he wanted to move out of his father’s house.

Junhong sighed as he leant back in his chair. It was currently half past ten. It was a public holiday so to honour the fallen soldiers of the Third World War, they would be finishing early.

Suddenly the date beside the time caught his eye.

‘January 27^th 2514.’

The date rang a bell, an awfully loud bell that resonated in his ears. He felt electricity zap past his ears and an unwelcomed chill enter his body. Something was going to happen.

“The release,” Junhong murmured.

He quickly pushed back up in his chair and pulled himself towards the computer. In a rush he began to search through the news, though it didn’t require any searching at all—scrolling down any news feed or internet forum, all you could find was about the release.

 “Twelve o’clock,” Junhong read aloud. He felt something was coming, but he wasn’t sure what to expect since the game was truly unpredictable.

“I never knew you were interested in Paradox Online too.” said a male voice behind him.

Junhong jolted back slightly before turning around to see who it was. It was just the boy that sat next to him during one of their classes.

“No, not really,” he replied frankly.

The boy gave him a confused look. “Well, I just thought you were since you were searching it and all.” He shrugged. “Pretty much everyone’s going to go download it after school,” he scrunched his pig-like face and adjusted his glasses on top of his snout-of-a-nose, “not really sure how since I haven’t seen any download sites with it.”

“You’d have to buy it.”

The boy looked taken aback at Junhong’s rapid response then became a bit more confused. He was sure he had been keeping up to date with all the news on the game. He readjusted his glasses. “What do you mean we’ll have to buy it?”

Junhong looked taken aback, as if the previous statement just slipped out accidentally.

“You play a lot of games, right?” he continued. He had heard the boy’s endless chatter about various battles, quests and items for sale that he could probably recite his whole inventory and gaming history.

“Yeah but what—”

“I suggest you don’t play this one.” Junhong said firmly as he unplugged his USB and rose from his chair. He towered above the other student. It would have made him more intimidating if not for his lanky structure and pale complexion. “Shut down,” he commanded into the boy’s face as the computer screen disappeared into thin air.

***

Many students were excited to hurry home after a rumour had spread about the game being sold.

“Purchase? As in we’ll have to pay?”

“Can’t we just download it?”

“I still want it! It’s my parent’s money anyway!”

“Let’s go to the game store afterschool!”

There were many doubts, but despite this everyone hurried to various game stores for the release of Paradox Online—all except one.

***

Jaehee had heard all the ruckus about a game releasing soon but cared for none of it. She had no intention on playing and even if she did, she had no time to leave her brother’s side.

Jaehee stood by her brother tending to his every need. She hated letting Eve nurture him when she wasn’t even capable of caring, all she did was follow orders. But an incident a few weeks ago rose Jaehee’s suspicions.

She had been counting the days. It was on the eighth, nineteen days ago, a mysterious white bangle had appeared around her brother’s wrist. At first she had assumed it was something their parent’s had given him but when she asked if they had purchased anything lately they denied.

“No, we haven’t bought anything. Is something wrong?” their parents had replied ambiguously.

Jaehee had attempted to take the band off on several occasions to no avail. She would have asked for help but feared that outsiders would accuse her for something crazy like attempting to make Yuhan into a robot.

With no one else left to blame, Jaehee had become wary of their family android, Eve. Her pretentious caring eyes made of plastic and glass, put Jaehee off. She would fall for none of it.

Jaehee pursed her lips as she took hold of her brother’s hand. His heartbeat had been changing lately during his sleep and it worried her enough to use the machine that traced his heartbeat.

Yuhan’s heartbeat pulsated around the room, beating soothingly into Jaehee’s ears. She wasn’t sure if she was over-speculating or not, but her stress was fixed on the empty white device locked around Yuhan’s wrist.

“What is it?” she muttered to herself.

It was then, at the strike of twelve o’clock, Yuhan’s heart beat stopped and the room fell into an eerie flat note.

Author's Note: things have finally started. The chapters will probably be around this length I think. I have 2 weeks of this school term, 2 weeks of holiday, then another 2 weeks of school before I graduate... so I'll be taking a hiatus. I'll probably still jot things down for the next chapter of two but yeah... no promises. Please anticipate the next chapter and wait a bit more ♥

I'm debating whether or not I should get a proof reader... since the story's quite complicated I sometimes forget that you guys don't know everything that I do and miss out explaining things. Is it fine so far? Do you have anyone to recommend?

Oh! and please do my survey! (It's only 2 questions long!) ♥ ♥