Chapter 8- Logout

Chapter 8- Logout

I stopped walking upon my realization. It only just now dawned on me that I'd been playing for at least a few hours. I started playing after I arrived home from school, giving me at most four hours before dinner time. By focusing on the topic I'm able to bring up a clock that shows me the real time for my irl location. According to this display, which is only visible to me, 4 hours and 10 minutes have passed since I started playing.

"Is everything alright?" Julie asked.

I was leading the wall and I did stop in my tracks. It was a natural thing for her to say in this situation.

"I'm fine. I just didn't realize how late it got."

I turn to face her.

"I'm sorry about this, but I need to log off."

"It's alright. No problem. We can pick back up tomorrow if you're interested."

She's so nice! I thought the worst and assumed she'd find a new partner or go it alone. I'm glad that she still wants to play the game with me.

"Do you want to register as friends?"

Her suggestion caught me off guard. I almost take a step back in reflex. No, this is no longer joy even if it's a good thing she asked. Instead I feel the onset of panic.

"Why… yeah. Let's do… that."

I have no good reason to refuse her, unfortunately. Having her in my friend's list would be nice, that's not the problem. It's what she'd be able to see once we became friends. I haven't changed my system settings so she'd see all my travel history.

If she had the Teleportation skill she'd be able to go anywhere I've been, including my Sky Fortress and The Dark Lich's Castle. Neither of those locations are good to know about.

Map sharing was designed by the developers to allow a player to easily get around. They assumed Teleportation would be a skill everyone would pick up eventually. The developers also realized a player may want to hide their travel history so a system setting was created to turn off the map sharing function.

All players start with the function turned on. It was a rookie mistake for me not to turn it off as soon as I logged in. I never assumed I'd add someone to my friend's list on the very first day.

Now, I see the system notification in front of me to accept or deny her request. Instead of selecting an option I open my system settings and scroll to where I can change my map sharing preferences. I turned off the function, accepting her request afterward.

I'm sure she has her map sharing turned off as well. After all she should have a base and I doubt she wants anyone knowing where it is. I'm also glad we are unable to see another player's system settings screen when they open it otherwise she would've seen me turn that function off. I doubt she'd make a big deal about it, but it would feel embarrassing.

"What time do you plan on logging in tomorrow?" I ask.

"I'd say about 2 hours earlier than now."

It's better she said it that way. We could be living in different time zones, but at least this way there is no confusion.

"Okay. I'll see you at the dungeon entrance around that time tomorrow. If there are any problems we can message each other."

She nodded. "That sounds good."

I started to walk out of the dungeon, teleporting away after a few steps.

I teleported back to my Sky Fortress, on the throne. Teleporting always seems to make my stomach a little sick afterward. It's an odd feeling. It feels like you blink and the world completely changes around you. My body instinctively knows that it doesn't feel right and it reacts by making my stomach sick. I hope this feeling doesn't carry over to when I log off.

Before logging off I deactivate my Humanification skill. My wings, tail, and horns return. It's another odd feeling. When I lost these limbs from activating the skill it felt like phantom pains, like my body knew they should be there. Now regaining these limbs my body feels itchy and I can't seem to lose this feeling of unrest.

I wonder if these are bugs in the game or if it was designed this way on purpose. Regardless, I need to log off. I take one last look at my throne room, devoid of the maids who worked in here earlier.

I open my system setting and hit the logout button. I confirm my action and the world of World Calamity fades away.

I reach up with my hands and remove my VR headset. I'm back in my room, sitting in my gaming chair. This is the real world.

My body more or less feels the same as before I started playing. That's good, no ill side effects. I don't know if I was expecting something different. Not only was that my first VR Game, but today was my first experience with VR in general. I think it went pretty well.

I get up from my chair and head out of my room. I had shut the door, but left it unlocked. I doubt anyone entered my room.

I head down my home's hallway into the living room. It's quiet tonight, the TV is off. Heading into the dining room I see someone sitting at the dining table, a box of pizza in front of her. They were already eating.

She was no stranger. At 2 years younger than me she was my little sister. She wore a black jacket, jeans, and blue shirt.

"You should really use a plate." I scold her.

I walk into the kitchen and pull two plates out of the cabinets. I grab a napkin for each of us and return to her. She takes the plate and napkin without saying a word.

I sit down across from her and grab a slice of pizza. I had placed the order for pizza before logging into the game. Seeing as how I wouldn't be able to prepare dinner tonight this was the best I could do.

"You should've woke me."

"Why?"

"I would've paid the delivery man."

I had placed my order to arrive at a specific time. I thought I'd be able to finish playing the game before then, but I was wrong.

"I can pay the delivery man."

"That's not what I mean. It's my job as the older sister to take care of this stuff."

"Just drop it, okay? You're so annoying."

I hope her attitude improves. I wish she'd smile again. My cute younger sister has been gloomy far too long now. I don't remember the last time I've seen her express joy.

"Listen, mom and dad wouldn't want us to argue. Let's drop it."

"You're the one who started it."

I'm looking out for you, that's my job.

"So I used up most of what I had in my savings. If you don't mind, I'd like to transfer a little more into my account." I figured changing the subject was for the best, but now that I think about it this topic I'd even worse.

"You're just wasting the money on games. This is why I said we should go live with auntie."

"No, I can take care of us. Look, it's not that much. We'd have plenty left over. You'd still have a fair amount if you wanted to attend a university and we'd be able to pay the bills until I graduate and find a job."

"Do what you want."

I think my little sister gave up on me. That's a bit sad. After all, nearly everything I do is for her sake. I've given up on trying to make a life for myself. The game is all I have left.

I want to give my little sister the best future possible, but first I want to indulge myself in the game. Even after saving money away for her future and bills I should have plenty to spend on my hobby. I think she understands where I'm coming from.

Times are tough on the both of us orphans. The money our parents left us manages to keep us going month to month, but if I'm not wise about how I handle it we could find ourselves in deep trouble.

For now everything should be fine. One of the things I want the most is to see my little sister smile, but I have no idea how to make that happen.

"Do you want to hear about the game?" It's a random thought I have, but maybe hearing about it will inspire her in some way.

"You're going to tell me anyway."

She knows me so well. No one knows me as well as she does.

"It's great there. Everything looks and feels so real. I've already made a friend… oh and I've got a nickname. Can you guess what they call me? It's Dragon Princess."

Saying those words immediately makes me feel embarrassed. It sounds so chunibyo when I say it outside of the game.

Regardless of how it made me feel I'm seeing results. My sister tries to hide her mouth under a hand as she giggles a bit. I caught a quick glimpse of a smile.

"What are you, a middle schooler?"

"Hey, I didn't give myself that name."

I feel like a great pressure has been lifted from my body. It's nice to see her smile again, if only for a moment. This pizza tastes way better now.

Author's Note

This is maybe my second or third longest chapter. I don't try to do it intentionally, but most chapters come out to 1500 words. This one is over 1600 words and I know at least one chapter so far reached 1700 words.

I didn't give our MC a name in her real life yet or her little sister because at this point I'm not sure if they're Japanese or American. The fact they live alone together would imply them being Japanese, but the big problem with that is I forgot honorific up until this point and now it feels odd to randomly start using them and I haven't had a chance to update previous chapters with honorifics. I was tempted for the little sister to call her big sis Onee-san, but I still haven't figured out their nationality.

The next chapter truly starts the dungeon arc. We will spend a lot of time in that dungeon going forward.

A reader wrote to me asking how MC was able to afford the game. I haven't stated how expensive the game us, but let's high ball the ultimate edition to a few thousand and standard edition to around a few hundred. These are not the Canon prices of the games, nothing is Canon unless it is written in a chapter or guide. Anyway we now know that our MC is an orphan, both parents are dead. Say on average that's $150000 USD per parent she'd have plenty to afford the game. Grief is a great motivator for spending thousands to try and get over your grief, I know what I'm talking about from personal experience. You'd have to use the context clues or read this author's note to understand she used some of the life insurance money on the game as I didn't spell it out directly in the chapter.