Mocked at Level 1, I Became the Spear God

July in the city baked like an oven someone had forgotten to turn off. Nate Cole walked out of his third failed interview in two days with sweat running down the inside of his collar and the distinct feeling that life had him pinned against a wall and was taking its sweet time finishing him off.

Two years out of college. Two years. And he was still hovering around thirty grand a year, which in this town meant he was statistically dragging the average down. He'd been a clerk at a small import outfit, selling industrial widgets to people who didn't want industrial widgets, and his people skills had always been the kind of thing you wrote about in euphemisms.

Three days ago, everything had gone to hell.

He'd been passing Director Hewitt's office on the way to the break room when he'd heard it. A woman's voice, tight, half-protesting. A man's voice, oily as used motor oil.

"Miss Ellis, don't be like that. You want your start date moved up, don't you?" Hewitt had wheezed it through a laugh that ended somewhere disgusting. "A supervisor looking out for a new girl. What's so wrong with that?"

"I want to—but... we can't."

Nate had caught it through the gap in the door. Hewitt had about twelve hairs on his whole scalp and both of them were greased down, and his hand was already on Sam Ellis's shoulder, drifting. She was red-faced, cornered, too scared of losing the only job offer she had to actually shove him off.

Nate would later tell himself a lot of things about why he pushed that door open. The truth was simpler. He just couldn't not.

The two of them had jumped apart like he'd thrown a bucket of ice water. Sam ran before he could say a word. Hewitt had gone purple, but he couldn't yell—not with an audience forming in the hall—so he'd squeezed the words out through his teeth.

"What do you want."

"I came to file my travel-expense report," Nate had said, because his brain had abandoned him entirely about two seconds ago.

"Expenses go to accounting. Not me." The door had slammed hard enough to rattle the nameplate.

He'd been fired the next morning. The charge: inappropriate harassment of a female coworker. The witness: Sam Ellis.

Life, Nate thought, had a real sense of humor if you looked at it from far enough away.

By noon he'd struck out at two more firms. Both interviewers had that tight, polite smile that meant "don't call us, we'll call you," and they both knew he knew.

He had one more appointment on the books. A game studio. They'd told him on the phone the pay was around thirty-six thousand plus commission.

Back in college he'd been good at this stuff—good enough to take the campus gaming championship. But "good at video games" and "having a career" had never overlapped for him, not until the balance in his bank account shrank to three digits and the argument became academic.

Forty bucks in checking. He wasn't exactly in a position to be picky.

Red Dragon Studios, Suite 3001. The door stood open. He walked in and told the girl at the front desk he was there for the interview.

She looked up. Up close she was maybe twenty-two, pretty in a way that made the office feel less like a dentist's waiting room, with big eyes and just a little softness in her cheeks.

"Right this way," she said, and her voice was unfairly nice.

In the meeting room she set a bottle of water in front of him. "It's a hundred degrees out. Drink."

"Thanks." That was when he noticed the rest of her. Professional skirt, heels that made her legs go on forever, the whole deal. He realized he was staring and fumbled his resume across the table like a man who'd never held paper before.

She read it in silence. Then: "We're a new outfit. We're staffing up for a launch called The Vigil. You took the campus championship? That's exactly the profile we want. If the numbers work for you, you're hired."

Numbers had been hashed out on the phone. Base salary, monthly targets, bonuses for over-performing, four days off a month. "What's the actual job?"

"We set monthly targets in-game—levels, materials, gold, monster intel, boss clears, guild fights. You deliver materials and gold back to the house. Beat the target, you eat a bonus. We furnish the gear." She smiled. "Any questions?"

"Nope." Thirty-six grand, a roof, and a boss who didn't try to cop a feel. Compared to the alternative, it was a palace.

"Great. Come in at eight tomorrow morning. The Vigil goes live sharp." She held out her hand. "I'm Cassie. I run logistics and admin. Anything you don't know, you come ask me."

He left the office with her laugh still ringing in his ears and a stupid grin on his face that he couldn't shake all the way to the bus stop. Somewhere between the firing and the hire, his life had done a 180, and he was too broke to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Back in his cramped rented room, he booted up his beat-up laptop and started digging. The Vigil was a full-dive VRMMO, and it wasn't the usual scrappy startup project—half a dozen rival mega-corporations had somehow stopped trying to kill each other long enough to build it together. Worldwide simultaneous launch. Full immersion. The forums were a zoo.

Five classes: Warrior, Archer, Mage, Assassin, Apothecary. Warriors were the odd ones—each picked a weapon specialty, and your stats shifted depending on whether you went blade, sword, shield, or spear. The other classes got one weapon and that was that.

Nate had always liked the in-your-face fights. He liked feeling the impact. If nobody told him otherwise, he was going melee.

The other thing everyone was screaming about was the talent system. One random roll per character at creation, ranked Common up through Rare. What you got was pure luck of the draw.

He clicked away from the forums as the afternoon died. The official site had nothing else. Everything waited for launch.

He was in his seat in Suite 3001 by seven the next morning.

The room was half a floor of open plan, and forty or fifty people were already milling around wearing badges. Cassie stood near the front with a headset microphone, pink-cheeked and clearly not used to herding cats.

"Good morning, everyone! Your badge has your station number on the back. Please find your seat."

Nate flipped his over. Number fifty. He walked all the way to the back.

His station was clean. A mug. A dive helmet. Someone had actually thought about the little stuff.

"Ten minutes to launch. Test your gear, settle in."

The room hummed. Forty-odd strangers, all of them dreaming the same dumb dream—that they'd be the one to climb out of the pack.

Nate strapped on the helmet.

The countdown ran in his head.

Ten. Nine.

Three. Two. One.

*Ding.*

"Welcome to The Vigil."