XV

Chapter 15: Boom Not Boon For Humanity

"Is there any way to tell who is and who isn't?" I ask.

"…Hmm." She seems to be in thought. "At the moment, we can only check through the system, which is taking some time to check all the servers but as for regular players? I'm not sure you can differentiate them unless they have their memories. Some of them usually suffer amnesia. And those with their memories are usually freaking out. Some weird ones were slightly happy though. Anyway, all the ones we have found so far have been moved to a separate server."

"…" My heart is pounding crazily at the moment. Elise may most likely be a player who has amnesia. Wait. The admin said she was an NPC. "Can the admin tell if a player was sucked in? Is it possible for it to mistake players as NPCs that have gained sentience?"

"This…I don't think so. The admins should have records of the NPCs that were generated before the players logged in. So, it should be easy to compare."

I sigh in relief.

"But, with the crazy function that was added, we never know if there are other bugs."

We talk a little longer before disconnecting the call. At first, I thought the Harvesting function was a blessing for humanity, but it has brought problems instead. Besides towards the end of the call, mom mentioned another of her worries.

If the function can bring loot to real life, what if NPCs could be brought too? Elves, dragons, orcs, demons, and so on. That would be…I don't know what to say. It may be catastrophic. Human military is super advanced, but humans are focusing more on resource production recently. Suddenly going to war with mythical creatures if the function gets bugged and is triggered without any player paying U coins for it, is a daunting possibility.

I plop on the gaming chair, staring into open space lost in thought about it.

Elise. If I can bring living things to the real world, I can bring Elise. And as for the other players trapped in the game, they may also be brought back to the real world albeit in the body of their avatars. Ha-ha. If they choses something they'd regret actually being, that would be classic.

I'm picturing some girl who wanted to be a tomboy in-game and chose to be an orc or something. Or players that chose to have different gender for their avatars. They're going to go gender-bent.

"Here we go. No risk. No reward." I steel my resolve. I may get trapped in-game. I may not.

*** ***

"Elise." I didn't see Elise at home, her bakery, or any other places we normally hung out in-game.

I asked the admin and she said she knows about those who were loaded into the game after the Harvest Function appeared and Elise isn't one of them. She couldn't give me her location, but she said she was fine and still in this server.

What do I do? Hmmm.

I decide to wait until night and head towards the west (the floating castle). There should be bigger prey beyond the castle. At least I hope so.

I had levelled up after killing a couple more beasts as I searched for Elise today. I shouldn't be too worried about her. If my guess is right, her stats should be at a level between 15 and 17 so she should be mostly safe.

"Status."

LEVEL: 20→21

FORM 2: HUMAN-LOOKING

HEIGHT: 5'9

HAIR COLOR: RED

HAIR STYLE: LONG

EYE COLOR: BLUE

BODY TYPE: RECTANGULAR

UTOPIA COINS: 0

[STATS]

STRENGHT: 24→25

AGILITY : 29→230

STAMINA: 27/27→28/28

DEXTERITY: 39→40

DURABILITY: 23→24

INT: 29→39

IQ: 128 [STATS CANNOT BE ASSIGNED TO THIS]

HP: 105/105→110/110 

MP: 100/100→105/105

SKILL POINTS: 6→7

UTOPIA COINS: 1

"Admin."

"Yes, Dexter Bloom."

"Tier Rankings. How does that work?"

She begun to explain. There is a mode called RANKED that involves players competing in the arena. There are arenas at the core of every city. Players go there to earn Rank Points. Bets can also be made during Ranked Matches by only those who are participating in the match. Spectators, party members included (party members that won't be in the ring) can't bet. U coins, Material Points, Artifacts, Potions, Monster Parts and so on must be used as a bet. As long as both sides agree, it doesn't matter if the two sides bet things of unequal value. There are different modes. Such as, 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, and 5v5. There are also different Competition Modes, such as Sumo Mode where a player that falls off the stage (out of the ring) is eliminated/loses.  As for the rest of the rules and more detailed information, I'll have to go to an arena to learn about them.

"There is an arena in this little city, but this is just a small city." In fact, it's the lowest.

Why is that a problem? Well, my opponent must belong to the same tier as me. And in this place, the number of people that have reached level 20, if any, is minute or zero.

Forget it. Let's rest first. There is a long journey ahead of me tomorrow.

*** *** ***

Elise didn't come home last night. I checked her bakery as well and came up with nothing. The admin says she's still fine.

"What do I do now? The monsters here are small fry and not worth much experience points. Although the game will regenerate mor of them over time, I'll still be slowing the growth of other players' growth when it gains me nothing but M Points."

I ponder for nearly half a minute before deciding to go to the arena. I'll go check it out. It might be entertaining. After that, I'll begin my journey to the west.