Bored and fatigued, Eric Burke lounged in the hall by the kitchen’s metallic double-door entrance ever since his shift had started thirty minutes prior. His fortune hadn’t been great since he’d taken a guard post at Osborne High-Security Hospital and its connected psychiatric facility. The hours were long, it was lonely as heck, and rarely he was required to act as a guard. For a week now, his primary task as the new guy was to deliver food to the offices upstairs. He’d hoped to catch a whiff of the delicious savory smells within, but unfortunately, the kitchen was behind an airlock for hygiene purposes. At least his superiors were polite, and his weekly pay was good—for a guard.

Eric was already regretting this; he’d rather play Aeon Chronicles Online in the comfort of his apartment right now like he’d done so all day every day for the past year. It was too bad that universal basic income had taken hefty cuts, and his crafting business hadn’t been performing well either. If Synaptic had not let the beta become stale in recent months, high level players would play more often, and his gear-crafting professions would be more in demand. Everything was in a sad state, his life most of all.

And as if the gods of Aeon heard his plight, his phone vibrated in his pocket and played a tune which signaled it was an email from inside the game. He snatched out the phone and swiped the archaic touch-screen with his thumb.

Blaze Runner: Yo, shit just went down at that Water Mages’ Spire in Draconia. There’s two player World Bosses now! Check out the thread linked.

With a surge of endorphins, Eric nearly jumped to his feet and fist-pumped at the news. Players could become World Bosses now! He couldn’t begin to fathom how something like that could possibly work in a game with over a hundred thousand players. It was so new and creative, yet bizarre—and possibly imbalanced to an outrageous extent. How could a tiny few be allowed to possess such power? Unless all players could become World Bosses… but how would that work? If everyone was a boss then no one was.

The archaic phone sure took its time to authenticate his forum credentials and load the animation-filled page. The cheap connection plan wasn’t helping either. It was all he could afford with his UBI credits—scraps. This touch-screen computer technology was over a century old, and it wasn’t even a mediocre version of what they had back then. It was far worse. Though now with this guard job, he could save up for a Holo-Phone soon enough.

The blurry page finally sharpened. Load complete.

The Water Mage Spire Has Fallen. Posted by Hadrian Miser…

Eric gobbled up the opening post, his hands warming with slippery sweat as his eyes took in point after point. Tingling excitement swept his skin for the prospect that he might also become a World Boss one day. But his excitement was overshadowed with frigid dread putting a death-grip on his throat and balls. Both World Bosses were darkies. LeMort, the most powerful of the five, and a new darkie more powerful than her. He was a Necromancer. And the Dracos’ faction leader had been captured. Fortunately, LeMort and Black were only tier sixes—not too powerful.

“My god,” Eric whispered as he scrolled through the thread. It was total pandemonium in there. People cried foul, yelled in all-caps, and some threatened to quit the game. As expected, the most common complaint was how unfair it was. Albeit, a few were excited about mass-scale world PvP, and some lapsed players whom he recognized were already returning. Others reasoned that it was still beta and this simply was a temporary experimental feature.

As Eric flipped through page after page, the chaos began to subside, and in its place was renewed confidence and surprising optimism. A significant share of the posts near the thread’s latter half were by players who hoped they’d be the next World Boss leading the light side to glorious victory against the darkies. Only gamers could be so fickle and bold.

Still, many complaints trickled into the thread at a steady rate. A few hundred had lost their houses, and even more worried similar might take place throughout the continent. Many were already planning to elope to one of the other factions. Eric imagined the housing prices for Draconia right now and couldn’t stop himself from chuckling into the empty, silent hall. It was most likely in free-fall—a perfect opportunity to buy while everyone else was panic-selling. The human capital was likely safe. The Dwarves’ capital as well. The Draconian capital would likely never fall. Those were prime areas to snap up some cheap real estate.

As his cruddy phone loaded the marketplace website, the pager at his waist beeped. He checked it in a heartbeat. It could be something serious.

But it was just another food order ready for pick-up and delivery in the airlock. For a visiting neurologist and his patient this time.

Standing, Eric sighed and pocketed his phone. If he prided himself on anything, it was his work ethic. He wasn’t going to slack while doing something he was paid for. He carried that attitude everywhere from his crafting business in-game to these occasional low-skill jobs in real life.

The journey to the offices upstairs passed tediously while Eric made his way through the maze of corridors, stairs, and security doors. A fellow guard nodded as he strode past. Another was strolling to the west-wing psyche ward. You needed to be a nurse-guard to work in there. Their pay was substantially higher, understandably. Eric couldn’t guess what kind of crazies they had to put up with.

Door B-13 was where it should be. Eric knocked with three not-too-loud taps with his index finger knuckle. “Food’s arrived.”

No answer.

He knocked again and said with a harsher voice, “Food’s here!”

Over twenty seconds passed. Nothing happened. Was this the right door? Eric checked the ticket stuck to the covered tray, and indeed it was for room B-13. Perhaps it was a mistake? Or a prank?

Eric quietly groaned as he turned. He’d walked all the way up here for nothing, and it was a very long walk. He’d slogged his way across the entire facility with a searing-hot tray in his grasp, and now he was to return to his post still with it in hand. He wasn’t paid enough for such nonsense.

Eric squirmed as he double backed for room B-13. Damn it to all hell. He was a guard, not a freaking delivery boy.

My access card better work.

Flashing the plastic in front of the scanner, he found the door was already unlocked—which meant there was someone in the room! It was protocol to never leave offices unlocked. No doctor would make a mistake like that.

Eric growled loudly and barged into the room. “Your snack is getting col—”

A whiff of that tangy, iron, rusty smell of blood rushed up his nose. He knew it all too well after working in a hospital for a week. Heart thumping, his guard-training and experience in Aeon Chronicles as a support kicked in as his eyes snapped to a body laying on the carpet. Tossing the tray onto the table, he grabbed the pager from his hip and slammed the emergency button. “Code blue! Room B thirteen! Repeat! Code Blue! Room B thirteen!”

The reply was instant, the operator’s voice calm and professional. “Response unit on the way.”

Out of instinct and not protocol, Eric leaped to the body, then crouched and thumbed for a pulse at the neck. A timid beat pushed against his fingers after too many seconds. The teen was alive—barely. But blood was still leaking from the ears and nose, and by the looks of it, he’d lost at least a liter or two or three depending on how much the carpet absorbed. He was minutes if not seconds away from death.

A door slammed open down the hall, and Eric jolted straight as the first EMT rushed in from the opposite direction a second after. He stepped aside to let the white-coat attend to the guy.

“What happened?” the woman asked as she did doctor things, starting with a pulse-check as Eric had done.

“I don’t know. I was delivering food, and the door was unlocked.”

She nodded without another word.

The guy from the room down the hall entered. One of the hospital’s directors, Dr. Winston, paled at the sight, and his hands visibly shook as he took retrieved a Holo-Phone from his coat pocket. Sweat ran down his flabby neck, and his bushy mustache quivered as the phone dialed. He was breathing heavily, enough for his airways to make a wheezing noise.

Why was he so nervous? Surely, an old doctor like himself had experienced stuff like this a million times before. Eric wasn’t as panicked, and he was just a security guard, but maybe that was due to Aeon Chronicle’s desensitizing effect it had on one’s psyche. He’d seen much worse than this in countless dungeons and raids. Melted faces, exploding torsos, and horrid screams winked before his senses. The gore was somewhat tuned down but not much. The realism of the game was astounding.

As two more doctors ran in, Dr. Winston connected to whomever he dialed. He said in a shaky voice, “It about Mr. Black. Yes, Rowan. He’s unconscious and injured, bleeding from…” He eyed the body. “The ears and nose.”

Immediately recognizing the name, Eric frowned. Rowan Black? It couldn’t be the same Rowan no matter how uncommon that name was. And players usually chose in-game names different from their real names. It had to be just a coincidence.

Dr. Winston left the room, nervously chatting on the phone in hushed tones, and the trio of white-coats lifted the guy as another doctor entered. Eric stepped back to make space. As a guard, it was protocol in this high-security facility to stand by during events like these. For all everyone knew, it could’ve been foul play, and whoever was responsible could be lurking nearby.

While the response team carried away Rowan with great care through the door, Eric’s hand brushed against a matte surface he felt before a billion times before. He spun around.

In the corner sat Synaptic Entertainment’s new FIVR pod. Rowan’s blood trailed from beneath the lid.

Adrenaline pumped through his limbs. A cold sweat broke out across his skin, dripping from his armpits. What the hell was happening here? Was that the same Rowan Black from the thread? And were the pods unsafe? It couldn’t be. Seconds turned into minutes while he stared dumbfounded at the scene.

Behind him chuckled a smooth voice.

Eric flinched and twisted back around, meeting the gaze of an old man behind rimmed spectacles. The circular glasses gleamed in the sunlight, hiding his eyes. His white coat was slightly different. Eric’s cheeks heated. He was more than breaking protocol here. He was supposed to follow the response team until another guard took over. “Sorry, I was a bit shocked at the scene. I’ll head back to my post immediately.”

The doctor smiled creepily. “See that you do, with haste.”

“Yes, doctor.” He backed away from the blood and mumbled another sorry.

“Do be mindful of patient confidentiality,” the doctor lightly said. “And good work. You might’ve saved a young man’s life.”

“Yes, of course. And I’m just doing my job.”

A trillion thoughts raging under his scalp, Eric ate a massive breath of hallway air and shook his head as he turned down a corner. He couldn’t make wild speculations here or cause a mass panic by claiming the pods were unsafe. Yeah, that probably wasn’t Rowan Black. The neurologist was just using the FIVR tech for some other medical purpose. It was all just a coincidence.