The monster staggered back, blood dripping down its legs to mingle with the rain pooling on the floor. High-pitched chittering rose above the drizzle of rain, sounding tinny and crackly over their cheap speakers. The shadows that lingered at the edges of his vision looked swollen with minions waiting to jump back into the fray. Rain slid down his visor and thunder cracked overhead.

He spared a glance for their health bars. His was a hair’s breath away from empty and hers was practically there. He reached into a pocket and cracked open a healing jewel to release a soft glow that surrounded them both, giving them much needed health.

“Sera, you done being stunned?” he tried to whisper.

But the roar from the big boss, a balrog-like beast, drowned out his words.

It wasn’t over yet.

The monster reared back, blasting energy from its mouth into the sky in a roar that rattled the nearby buildings and shattered their glass windows. The beam lit the heavens, then lowered as the monster swept its head down. The light sliced through the landscape like a laser, cutting down everything in its path and setting it alight. A nearby high-rise collapsed to the ground in a thunder of dust and flames. Pixel lines zapped over the landscape, distracting Gilbert for just a second. Damn, their shitty monitor was going to cost them the game!

The beam swung towards them.

There was no way to fight that kind of power but there was a crater nearby. Gilbert jumped and rolled into it, barely managing to drag Sera’s limp body along with his. He’d gotten to her just in time, and the ray of death passed over them.

“Together,” she whispered back. “It’s the only way we can do it.”

He nodded and set her down. They had about five minutes before the monster recharged itself, if it or they survived till then. They walked out into the open, took their stances and got ready.

The monster’s stomping footsteps shook the ground and sent circular ripples through the puddles as it charged at them.

Gilbert shot forward first, lifting his sword in time to clash metal against claws. The beast must have outweighed him by several tons, and it showed. It loomed over him, pushing him back so hard, his boots squealed against the ground. His health took a hit every time he parried, but he kept at it. A flash of light from the corner of his eyes and loud clanging told him that Sera had just saved his back from the monster’s dagger-sharp tail. He spared a glance at the boss’s health bar. There was a sizeable chunk left, but they’d gotten it lower than they ever had this time around!

Then, in a sneak attack they hadn’t yet seen, it opened its jaws wide and an internal head snapped out from the depths of its throat, between it’s ragged teeth. He felt it swooping at him, could almost taste its hunger for his flesh. He ducked to avoid it but the teeth were already closing in on the back of his neck. Another second more and it would snap his spinal cord in two!

“Down!”

Just before its fangs fully dug into his neck, he released his swords, dropping low. The head descended with him, its grip dragging it along and its neck extending further out the monster’s jaws. He felt rather than saw Sera dart in to chop the mutant head off.

The monster’s cry was ear-shattering. Its health dropped a few more bars, but he didn’t wait to watch it. He picked his swords up again, slid between the monster leg’s and released a flurry of strikes against its back even as it flung Sera aside like a rag doll.

“Aaaargh!” Gilbert yelled, using Flashstrike to stab and slash the monster as fast as he could. He activated aggro and made the monster turn to focus on him. A short distance away behind it, Sera began chanting. She healed both of them just a fraction more, then the tone of her incantation changed and he joined in, struggling to hit the right words while he danced with the monster, parrying its tail, fangs and claws, and the occasional drip of acid blood with Sera occasionally darting in to get a critical strike. They whirled like dervishes, in sync, so used to fighting together, it was as if they could read each other’s minds.

The inky shadows were closer now. Things began to reach for them, shadows with fangs that laughed and whispered. Every intangible touch sucked stamina and health from them, but they kept moving and chanting, focusing their attack solely on the big boss. As soon as the magic began to swirl around both their swords, they quickened their pace.

Gold filaments stretched from each sword like spun sugar as they used up the last of their stamina to slash, stab, hack and slice in sync with each other, still chanting.

“—fellar, ervesto, bralderon,morghast!”

At the last word, the threads gleamed with a brilliant light, then tightened like a net. The monster froze as the spell took hold. Every hit they’d scored during the spell was amplified by their matching swords and the effect of each was quadrupled.

Ichor and gore spurted from the countless wounds all over the monster. The shadows froze and the beast bellowed its last cry.

Gilbert darted back with Sera and waited, jaws clenched. The monster swayed for a second or two. Its health bar seemed fully depleted, yet…

“Is it really over?” Sera whispered into the pregnant pause. She staggered against him and he put his arms cautiously around her.

Finally, the beast fell with a ground-shaking thump that knocked them off their feet.

A storm of ash and brimstone began to funnel down from the heavy gray sky, the whistling sound of the wind drowning everything else out. The tornado reached lower and lower until it touched the fallen boss’s body, then flames erupted and Sera and Gilbert were flung head over heels by a fiery explosion.

They would have been blown off the plateau if not for the fact that Gilbert had enough presence of mind to stab both his swords into the cracked earth, using them as an anchor. He took both hilts in one hand then reached the other out and grabbed Sera’s arm just in time, holding on to her with straining muscles until she could anchor one of her own swords and grasp it. After a minute, the last of the ashy remnants of the boss spiraled upwards through the funnel and the sky cleared.

The heavy gray clouds dissolved, allowing shafts of sunlight to break through. Wherever the sun touched, blades of grass sprang out from the burnt earth, growing so fast, it appeared as if they were watching a time-lapse of a world being birthed. Flowers burst into bloom from buds and trees sprang up to twine their branches and roots around broken cars and fallen buildings. Soft, peaceful music began to drift on a fresh wind.

Sera and Gilbert climbed to their feet, health, stamina and mana fully restored. They blinked around, in awe of the sudden beauty surrounding them.

Then, something bright broke through the clouds and descended to the spot where the monster had stood. It was an angel with six wings and a scepter. It was more beautiful than anything they could have ever imagined, and its voice when it spoke, was dulcet and bell-like in tone.

“Children of Man, you are the chosen ones. You have proved your worth to be the first to enter the hallowed halls of Creation. Come now and live among us, help us herald a new era into the world. We welcome you to… Elysia!”

The angel threw up its hands and spread its wings. The light that emanated from it filled their vision, leaving behind a wall of text that scrolled up the screen.

‘Congratulations! You are officially the first players to conquer the final level of Earthania! We would like to extend an invitation to you, and to join us at Elysium as consultants to help us develop our full immersion, virtual reality based MMORPG game, Elysia. This offer of full-time employment will include a salary, accommodation, and benefits for a year, with the opportunity for extension, subject to satisfactory performance. Please report to our headquarters in Einsovereign as soon as possible to begin your contract.

Terms and conditions: Job offer(s) is contingent upon completion of a satisfactory identity, health and background check, and accompanying relocation passes to the precinct of Einsovereign are only valid for verified winners of Earthania and their dependents. Minors are required to possess either parental approval, or in the case of unavailable parents, be placed under custody of the Einsovereign state before accepting.’

Gilbert slowly pulled off his headset and turned to Sera, meeting her excited eyes with his own. Her headset was on her forehead and she had already peeled her threadbare haptic gloves off.

“Oh. My. God,” Sera whispered. “We did it! We won! We’ve got into Elysium! We’re going to live in the city! We can get out of this hellhole!”

He gazed at her with dazed eyes. “I can’t believe it…”

She leapt up and released a shriek of laughter, and he automatically moved out of her range while she threw her gloves up into the air and did a mad victory dance. Gilbert reached his hand out to touch the tiny words he could see on his headset screen in his lap. “I just can’t believe it. Pairing the Divine Twin Swords actually worked and… after three whole years… we’re really the first who cleared the final level?”

“Look at it!” Sera stopped her gleeful screaming to point at the tiny screen. “It’s right there! I told you! I told you the forum posts were fake! Everyone was just trying to keep it on the down low until they could get there, and we beat them to it! We won! We did it!”

Gilbert shook his head, still unable to find the proper words… the proper feelings… he just felt numb. The game was over.

“Take your time, buddy,” Sera said. She planted a big wet kiss on his lips, then jumped over the castle of blankets, pillows, empty packets of food, and drinks that they’d built up over the past 36 hours and ran towards the driver’s seat of the RV, her bare feet nearly skidding on the worn floor.

They’d been talking about leaving the ancient vehicle and finding a new hideout for the past few months, but between the time they spent in the virtual world of Earthania and in scavenging for food and fuel in real life, they hadn’t yet managed to do it. Instead, whenever they drove the RV, they had taken care not to push it too hard, just in case it broke down and marooned them in the middle of nowhere.

But this time, Sera threw caution to the wind.

She cranked the gears and floored the gas, then jerked out of their camouflaged parking spot, blaring the horn like a crazy old lady.

“We did it!” she screamed at a flock of wild geese by the side of the road. “We did it!”

And finally, as he heard the glee in her voice and watched the broken landscape whizz by, Gilbert’s lips curled up into a crazed grin, and he finally managed to believe it.

***

“It’s this one?” Gilbert asked. He kept one eye on the road and the other on Sera as she turned the map upside down. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I told you, turn here.”

He carefully steered the wheel, guiding the RV around the bend before trying to accelerate. The potholes in the cracked tar road rattled the whole vehicle and the engine sputtered and groaned, but they managed to keep going. “We have to reach it real soon, otherwise—”

“There, look!” Sera leaned over his lap and jabbed her finger at the window beside him. Gilbert spared a glance, then did a double take.

Tall spires scraped the air, wound through by elegant, long, multi-tiered highways. Greenery and colour dripped from every balcony and shining glass sparkled in the harsh sunlight. It was a huge contrast compared to the broken, desolate landscape they had passed through in the last week, which resembled a scene out of Earthania more than anything else.

Gilbert drove as if he were in a dream. Every mile the RV ate was bringing them closer to a new life, a new beginning. Who could have imagined that two rats from the eastside could find their way into the city of kings?

The guards at the Wall stopped them to check their papers. They scrutinised the RV with suspicious eyes, looking at Sera and Gilbert’s scrawny figures as if they expected them to each pull a tank out of their baggy trousers. But there was nothing wrong with their residential passes, sent directly from Elysium to their ID accounts. And there was no question that they were the sixteen year olds on record.

With a bored look, the guards waved them in.

“I’m going to be so good,” Sera said tearfully, turning to Gilbert. “As good as an angel. No more piracy. No more stealing. No more breaking the rules. No matter what it takes, let’s not screw this up, ok?”

He had to stifle a laugh. Sera would not be Sera if she tried to be angelic. He had never met a more bloodthirsty or savage girl in his life—virtual or not—and he wouldn’t have it any other way. She was a survivor and he loved her for it. But he bit his tongue and said the right thing he knew he should say in this situation. “Of course we won’t. And when we’re stable, let’s bring our families in.”

“I don’t know if we’ll find mine,” Sera said, her eyes filled with sorrow. “Or if they’re…”

“They’re still alive. And we’ll find them all,” Gilbert insisted. “I promise you.”

She smiled at him, her eyes full of love and affection.

Gilbert smiled back a split second before a car rammed head-on into them, and Sera, whose seatbelt had gotten broken months earlier, crashed through the windscreen and out onto the road.

Chapter 1

Ten years later.

The funeral was supposed to be a family affair.

She had not wanted to invite so many people, most of them strangers to her, to be there at the moment she said goodbye. Yet, she was not the only person who had a right to his last moments above the earth, it seemed. Everyone, from the family who knew nothing of the anguish he had suffered for the past ten years, to the colleagues who saw him every day but hadn’t actually seen him, to the long-lost friends and passing acquaintances who were surprised to find that he was married, let alone dead, wanted to have a last chance to gaze upon him in his open coffin and say goodbye.

Sera stayed seated at the front most pew where she had the best view of all the people who walked past. Some, she saw, stared intently at the face of the man she had lived with for most of her life, yet known for only a third of that, as if they could somehow read his last thoughts from when he’d drawn the knife down his arms. Others, like his best friend, gazed once, then twice, then turned away, as if unable to look at him for fear of catching whatever it was that had made him end his life in such a pointless, cruel way. Or perhaps it was the guilt that made them do that.

It was certainly guilt that kept her glued to her seat, until the very last of the gathering had made their way past his coffin. She ignored the pleading look her mother-in-law gave her, as if she thought that if her daughter-in-law would only look at him just one more time, her son would come back to life.

But she had looked all she wanted.

Sera had gazed at Gilbert’s pale, slack face for what seemed like hours before calling the police and the ambulance. In those short, everlasting seconds, she had immediately understood all she needed to know about the reasons why he’d done it, all without exchanging a single word with him. He hadn’t even left a note, that’s how obvious the reason was between the two of them.

“Some can’t separate themselves from what’s real and what’s not,” said one woman to the other as they passed. She held a delicate black lace handkerchief to her nose, and the other wore a black veil that revealed as much as it concealed, allowing glimpses of blood red lipstick on shapely lips to be seen. “You should keep an eye on your son.”

“It’s a pity… but this is what comes from diving in too deep,” someone else said a few rows behind with a soft click of their tongue. “Someone should have stopped him before it was too late.”

Sera closed her eyes slowly, holding her breath to listen to her heartbeat. It helped her keep calm and tune the harpies out. When she opened them, she gazed up at the ceiling, tracing the high, arcing beams that came together in a beautiful golden rosette. The church her mother-in-law had chosen for her departed son’s service was an old one, with timber walls, huge, multi-paneled stained-glass windows and enough gold gild that put together, could probably rival the weight of the Charging Bull on Wall Street.

So much for being humble and remembering their beginnings. Not that Sera herself deserved to preach.

If she recalled what Gilbert had said correctly, this very church was the one that had been used as a template for the Church of Lost Souls, the regeneration site that all players who ventured into Elysia eventually ended up visiting.

It was a little fitting, she had to admit, that this was also where she had to say goodbye to her husband. He probably would have wanted it that way, if he had thought about it at any point.

By the time the service ended and the coffin was carried out and lowered into the ground, she was numb to it all. She had done everything she was supposed to: accepted the condolences, assured those concerned for her wellbeing, and promised to call if she needed any help.

The only thing she did not do was attend the post-funeral reception.

Because if there was one thing she was not going to do, it was to be present while everyone else wallowed in their grief for her husband. They were only just catching up to Gilbert’s loss and pain now, and she had no wish to stay behind and be a part of it.

At least, not here, not in the real world where he had ceased to live so very long ago.

***

Someone kind had dropped off his belongings from the office on one of the days following his funeral. There was not much since his work had been mostly digital. In fact, there was so little that it all fit into a single cardboard box.

When Sera gave up the apartment, took a leave of absence from Elysium and moved out of the city, the box had simply been bundled up with all the other boxes that the movers had packed and transported for her. For one long month, it lay untouched in the spare room of the apartment she had moved to until she stumbled across it again on a day that seemed bright and sunny and full of potential.

The box was such a generic one, she thought at first that it simply contained more paraphernalia she had yet to unpack. She dug into it without caution, wondering which long-lost moth-eaten sweater might surface this time, or whether this was where her lost baking tin had disappeared. The last thing she expected to find was Gilbert’s neuronode, wrapped in the dark green fleece jacket he had absconded to his office when she’d threatened to throw it out on account of it being the sort of green that reminded one of alfalfa laden horse poop. After all, she’d already assigned his things to a storage facility, in an effort to ‘move on’.

So when she unwrapped the neuronode, the first thing that occurred to her was the bitter memory of herself holding an earlier prototype and shouting at Gilbert that she never wanted to see something like it again, just before she threw it to the ground and smashed it into pieces.

The second thing was more of a reaction than a conscious thought.

The signal light on it was blinking.

Sera stared at it for several confused moments. Then, after a slight hesitation, she picked it up and put it on, making sure to lift her hair away so that the node at the back touched the bottom of her head at the top of her neck, right where her brainstem was. The black opalescent interior of the helmet-like covering glimmered momentarily before she closed her eyes.

A rush of cold like the swiping of antiseptic swept across the nanopatch on her skin, then brilliant colours bled into her mind and she found herself standing in a circular room with a screen spanning its multicoloured walls, displaying a login page. It was requesting a key to match her biometric data.

As she stared at it, the colours slowly morphed into swirling gray monotone motes that drizzled in the background like snow and a note scrolling at the bottom of her vision informed her that her neural nanite levels were low or nonexistent and that she needed to top them up before beginning the game.

She ignored it and strolled around the room until she found what she was looking for.

In the lower right hand corner was Gilbert’s profile, shown as a little figure with his name beside it and a lock symbol. She touched it and a picture of an envelope popped up, along with several notifications and the sentence, ‘Please login to view content of messages’ above them.

She read the notifications.

‘***** replied to your message (5.34 a.m. June 15).’

‘New message from ***** (5.39 a.m. June 15).’

She scrolled down, seeing similar notifications, hundreds of them, until the most recent one appeared at the top, highlighted in blue:

‘***** replied to your message (12.15 p.m, July 7).

That was just half an hour ago!

As she stared at it, the message turned gray, signifying that it had been read.

Sera’s jaw dropped.

The only way someone could access Gilbert’s Elysium account in real time was if they had access to his biometric data in real time, or if he had designated someone as his legacy caretaker, to wrap up his virtual accounts.

But that was impossible! Gilbert had not designated anyone to take care of his legacy, not even Sera. After the funeral, she had had to remind herself that she had a right to ask—and force herself to dredge up the courage to follow through with it—but when she’d finally inquired about it from their lawyer, the answer had been straightforward: Gilbert had left everything in perfect order. He had prepared for this years ago and there was nothing for Sera to do.

Sera yanked the neuronode off and dropped it into the sweater. She stared unseeing at the walls around her until a beep sounded.

“Sera, is there a task you wish me to perform? If you are unable to speak, nod once for medical assistance, or shake your head to indicate everything is as normal.”

It was Perry, her home butler. Since she had decided to live at home away from the city, she had set it on the highest alert level. Who knew what kind of riffraff were roaming these parts of the country, so close to the Wall.

“Perry, please call Monica,” Sera said after shaking her head.

“As you wish, Sera.”

The dial tone sounded for a few short rings before the phone was answered.

“Hi Sera! How are you doing? I was just about to call actually, I think I’m not going to be able to make it to the gymnasium today, it’s a long drive out and—”

“Never mind that, Mon,” Sera interrupted, “I want to ask you something. What happens to unclaimed legacy accounts on Elysia?”

There was a short silence. “Uhm, I think it depends. If there was a designated caretaker, then it would be transferred to their account, this would allow them to maintain it without making any big changes, or to close it down entirely—”

“Would they be able to read messages? Personal messages?” It was always possible that Gilbert had not told the lawyer about a legacy assignment or made any note of it anywhere.

“No, definitely not. You can’t assume someone’s identity even if you have control over their legacy account,” Monica said, sounding very sure of herself.

“Then… is there any way that personal messages might be sent or received from someone’s account after it’s been marked as a legacy account?”

“Sera… what is this about?” Monica’s voice sounded sympathetic and soft and for a moment, Sera wanted to just hang up on her.

“Nothing, I just… wanted to know, out of curiosity. Please, just humour me?”

“Well, I don’t know what you want me to say. It’s impossible so to speak. No one should have access. If someone had the password it wouldn’t be enough. They’d need biometric data that was at least an 85% to 90% match. They’d need to be a very close relative… like a twin, or a sibling who by amazing coincidence, has a high genetic similarity.”

“Or a clone,” Sera said thoughtfully.

“You do know those are banned. They can’t be made to have the same lifespan as us, and it’s not ethical to make them. Plus, if someone wanted to make a clone of Gilbert, they’d have had to start decades ago—”

There was a pause.

“I’m sorry Sera, is this… about Gilbert?” Monica sounded even more tentative than before, and Sera could feel her temper starting to get away from her.

“Yes, but it’s not what you think. I’m not trying to read his messages,” Sera said plainly.

“Oh, good, because… the easiest way would be to ask admin to unlock his account and… I really can’t do that,” Monica said, her voice lowering. “Not without a court order.”

“I’m not asking you to, Mon.” Sera sighed heavily. She swiped a hand through her hair. “Someone dropped his neuronode off with me before I left the city. I just put it on because it was flashing and there’s so many notifications from his account, just piling up on the login screen… I can’t read them of course. It’s just annoying.”

“Oh, Sera,” Monica said in a tone like a gushing waterfall of sympathy that made Sera want to cringe. Monica was the most well-meaning, sweet-tempered friend a girl could ever want, but the depth of her sorrow for Sera’s loss made Sera want to either run to her and soak her through with tears or turn away and dig hard elbows into her every time she offered her condolences. “I’m so sorry. It will get better with time. Just chuck that neuronode away. It’s probably some friends who don’t realise he’s… gone.”

“Yeah,” Sera said. “Listen, don’t worry about the gym, I was going to be late anyway.”

“Oh… okay, then how about coffee tomorrow?” Monica said. She was trying to make up for missing gym. For Sera living alone out there. For everything. Sera just didn’t want to fight anymore. If Monica wanted to meet up and do her good deed of the day by making sure Sera hadn’t killed herself yet and by making her cheer up even though she had just had to bury her husband, how could Sera say no? Her friend was a force of nature and Sera had long ago found that it was just simpler and easier to go along with what she wanted when she got an idea into her head.

“All right, what time?”

“How about four o’clock? I’ll get off work early.”

“Okay, I’ll see you then. Take care.”

“You too, Sera!”

The click notified her of the end of the call. “Thanks, Perry.”

“No problem, Sera. Anything else I can do for you? How about lunch? There’s a ramen store down the road whose Butler has been sending me some very interesting catalogues….” Pictures of mouth-watering ramen began to bounce about the walls with their twirly naruto fishcakes and springy ramen noodles. Then an image of a very handsome man dressed in a blue sweater with his mouth open and a chopstick-ful of ramen airplane-ing its way into his mouth flashed across the wall. Sera rolled her eyes at her Butler. He had no human empathy, and she was so thankful for it.

“Shut that off, Perry, I’ll get something on the way back from my run. Can you please trace me and try to look for other restaurants in the area? Send the suggestions to me when I turn back.”

“Will do, Sera.”