Demon’s Cage

Chapter 1: Loading

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Volume 1 – My War!

Chapter 1: Loading

It was July. The sunlight was scorching, and even the thick curtains couldn’t completely block the burning sunlight. It poured in through the curtains and formed a rectangular beam of light, acting as the only light source in the room.

Ring!

The telephone sounded again. After three consecutive rings, the phone automatically switched to the recording.

“Is this Qin Ran? I’m Dr. w.a.n.g. You only have a year left until you turn eighteen and if you don’t begin your gene therapy, then you’ll completely lose this opportunity!”

The doctor repeated his usual comments and gave his recommendations.

Qin Ran was indifferent and disregarded it. He looked down and concentrated on the game card in his hands. It was bright red and the size of a thumbnail.

After confirming, Qin Ran slid the game card which cost him all of his savings into the slot inside his virtual helmet.

Beep!

The lights on the virtual helmet turned from red to green.

“Beep, beep, beep!” Game manufacturer not detected. Security unknown. Please proceed with caution!

The virtual helmet speaker gave a warning, but Qin Ran didn’t care. An underground game obviously wouldn’t have registered manufacturers and security.

A year ago, this legendary 100% virtual reality (VR) game came onto the market.

Logically speaking, a 100% VR game should’ve been far more popular than the 30%-40% VR games that were on the market.

However, reality was the opposite; before it came on the market, it had been prohibited. All because the game was too real! If you died in the game, you’d die in real life.

Less than 1/10 of the 3000 private players were currently alive and had left the game.

With the deaths of thousands of people, it was obvious that the game would never be allowed on the market. However, Qin Ran had later on heard that real money was added to the game in order to provide players an incentive to play the game. Because of this, the game thrived and became an ‘underground game’ in a true sense – only a few people had access to it.

Looking past the secretive purchasing channels and the large amounts of money one could obtain, the prospect of death in both the game and real life stopped most people from playing.

However, Qin Ran didn’t care.

If he couldn’t raise three million for the cost of his treatment within a year, he would undoubtedly die because he suffered from a viral-gene disease.

For the rich, three million was nothing, but for Qin Ran it was an astronomical figure.

Since three years ago when he was diagnosed with the disease, Qin Ran tried to save money.

However …… money was like a drop in the bucket!

Three years ago, Qin Ran was an ordinary 14 year old junior high school student who had no qualifications or expertise, nor could he even do physical labor. Because of his age, he was completely unqualified.

He could only do odd jobs.

But no matter what kind of odd jobs he did, he wouldn’t have been able to afford the three million treatment. Even with only five hours of sleep a day and three part-time jobs, Qin had only managed to save up thirty thousand.

That amounted to just one percent of his medical expenses. Qin Ran felt despair! He had a lot of expectations and fantasies in his life. As a result …… he didn’t want to die.

But reality had left him with death!

It was around this time that he heard a rumor at the goldsmith studio. It was about the ‘underground game’. There was a rumor saying that a random ultimate equipment could be sold for millions of dollars!

After confirming the authenticity of the claim, Qin decided to take a chance.

He used all his savings from the past three years and bought a game card for this underground game and decided to fight for his life.

“Conquer or die!” Qin Ran silently thought.

Wearing the helmet, Qin Ran lay on the bed. Everything went black, and then a piece of text along with the voice began –

(Hint: a new instance for players is a rare opportunity!)

When all the text appeared, it paused for about three minutes to allow Qin Ran enough time to read it. Suddenly, a dazzling bright light shined in front of him. Even when he closed his eyes, he still felt extremely uncomfortable. Hence, he had to cover his eyes with his hands. Then, he went into a state of weightlessness and accelerated downwards.

The whole process lasted about one or two seconds.

When Qin Ran felt everything go back to normal, he put down his hands and opened his eyes.

Suddenly, Qin widened his eyes.

Less than a meter away in front of him was an eviscerated corpse leaning against a wall, with its head slightly tilted upwards. Its cloudy eyes were looking at Qin Ran as if they were staring at each other.

Qin Ran immediately felt short of breath. Since he was young, Qin Ran never seen a human corpse. At most, he’d seen some b.l.o.o.d.y fights.

At this time, the dead body appearing in front of him immediately made Qin fall into panic and fear. He almost instinctively retreated back until he hit stopped at the wall behind.

Bang!

Colliding with the wall gave him a lot of pain. However, the pain allowed Qin Ran to slightly recover from his panic and regain a bit of rationality.

“This is a game! This is a game! Even if it’s one hundred percent real, it’s still a game!”

This reasoning made Qin Ran think about his experience in this environment.

He didn’t really encounter a dead body. He just entered the game world.

But in front of him, the b.l.o.o.d.y and rotten corpse made Qin Ran need to find more concrete evidence to convince himself.

“Status!”

Qin said.

Because Qin Ran once worked at the goldsmith studio, some virtual controls of the game weren’t new to him. Fortunately, some of the game rules were generic. The ‘underground game’ was no exception.

After Qin Ran said that, the attribute fields visible only to himself appeared in front of his eyes.

The properties were divided into three pages –

Qin Ran looked through it: the first page showed his basic stats while the second page showed his character’s attributes.

The third page displayed his skills, equipment and inventory, but right now it was empty.

(Rating: an absolute rookie even worse than cannon fodder!)

That final evolution was a joke, causing Qin Ran to smile.

The system bar undoubtedly proved that all the things in front of him were part of a game!

Even with one hundred percent authenticity!

Woo!

Qin Ran took deep breaths as he put aside the horror earlier and calmed himself down completely.

After he calmed down, he subconsciously looked at the gutted corpse!

In real life, a corpse would cause fear and panic, but in a game, it represented another meaning: gold coins and equipment!

Qin Ran certainly didn’t forget his purpose in joining the game: to get enough money to treat his viral-gene disease.

To do this, he needed enough strength in the game.

Only with power could he get more coins and good enough equipment that he could exchange for real-world money.

But with his current negligible properties, skills, equipment, empty backpack, and even the “worse than cannon fodder” evaluation, he naturally didn’t have such strength.

Therefore, he needed time to make himself stronger.

However, he didn’t that much time!

One year had pa.s.sed in real life!

As for the game?

Qin Ran wasn’t sure, but based on other virtual games, the time in the game shouldn’t have been much longer than real time.

Therefore, he needed to seize all the opportunities to make himself stronger.

Right now in front of Qin, there was such an opportunity.

Fighting the discomfort in his heart, Qin Ran slowly approached the body.

Even if he knew that it was just a game, the one hundred percent reality made it so flipping the body was no different from flipping a real body for Qin Ran.

Even worse, the b.l.o.o.d.y stench coming off the corpse was so disgusting that Qin Ran puked over and over.

Qin Ran subconsciously avoided eye contact with the corpse’s cloudy eyes and his disembowelling wound. He just searched the body.

After a while, Qin Ran’s eyes suddenly brightened.

He looked at the straps in his left hand and slightly pulled on it, causing a backpack to fall down from the body.

This backpack was hidden very well. Moreover, from the body’s posture, if Qin Ran wasn’t careful enough, it would be hard to find.

Being so carefully hidden, there would naturally be some good stuff in it.

Subconsciously, Qin Ran started starring at the backpack in his hands.

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