I took the same route home every day from work. A busy freeway that had heavy traffic. It was the fastest way.
It was raining. The rain hit my windshield hard, making loud sounds. The heavy water washed away the dried dirt stuck to my windshield.
No one knew how to drive in the rain, and everyone was just as reckless as they were when the ground was dry. Even so, I still drove with little to no care in the world. I wouldn't drive unsafely; I would just get lost in driving. You start driving home and it takes you 15 minutes. You pull into your driveway and garage, and suddenly you snap back to consciousness and wonder how you got home.
I always drove like that. It's just today I snapped back to consciousness when a semi-truck's lights blinded me. The truck was plowing straight toward me, and suddenly it smashed into the front end of my car. I felt absolutely nothing. My life just turned to black. Everything around me was completely pitch black. I could see nothing, and I could hear nothing but my own thoughts. It was like this for a while. It felt like I was in some type of waiting room after getting flattened by the semi-truck.
Maybe I was waiting to enter heaven? Or maybe hell? I really hoped it wasn't hell.
After what felt like hours of stirring through my own thoughts, something weird popped up in my vision.
[SYSTEM MESSAGE]
Restarting tutorial instance
Tutorial instance? As I tried to figure out what the message meant, it seemed my eyes began to open slowly. The brightness of the sun hurt my eyes initially. It wasn't raining anymore, which meant some time must've passed if I was still alive.
A green screen popped in front of my face:
[SYSTEM MESSAGE]
Tutorial instance starting.
{New Objective}
Lose to starting adventurers
I attempted to move my hands and head. Nothing worked. It didn't matter how much I tried to strain my own muscles or body; I was stuck as if I were a statue, looking forward through the dense forest in front of me. My consciousness was the same as it was in the black void, except now I was able to see things around me.
Suddenly, as I was lost in thought, a group of six people appeared in front of me. They appeared in a digital green light, clad in leather and small metal armor. They were all equipped with different weapons such as knives, swords, and a staff.
I felt like I was in a damn video game, looking at the people dressed in such out-of-world clothes. Somehow I was trapped in some type of LARPing scenario. I had to be dreaming.
My body suddenly started to shift. My right arm began to move with no thought of my own, and as it did, I saw a hand and arm covered in dull, silver, rusty armor. My arm moved to reach toward my back, grabbing something from it. The body I was seeing through quickly drew a long broadsword stained with blood and assumed a ready position. I did none of this. I didn't grab this sword, hell, I didn't put this armor on myself, and I don't even remember getting here.
Suddenly, the six LARPing-looking people began to attack. The guy dressed as a mage stood in the back and launched fire toward me.
Holy shit, I thought, as the body I was in quickly dodged the fire.
Two of the people, a girl and a guy dressed in similar leather armor and equipped with daggers, lunged toward my body on the left and the right. I noticed the fireballs but not them until their daggers sank into my skin through the cracks of my armor. I couldn't move any part of my body, but I sure could feel pain. It was tremendous as the dagger wielders stabbed my sides another time before my body finally moved. The sword my body had drawn slashed toward the one on the left side, missing the person completely. Whatever was controlling me seemed to have no skill whatsoever. Whatever was controlling me seemed like it wanted me to lose this fight.
The other three people in the group carried generic swords and shields. Their gear didn't seem to be fancy and looked similar to starting gear in an MMO. I started to realize fast that this wasn't LARPing anymore. They started stabbing my body as it barely fought back. I felt the blood oozing out of my body, and my thoughts started to jumble. My vision started to blur.
It made no sense, I thought. What was happening to me? Why couldn't I fight back? Am I going to die again?
[SYSTEM MESSAGE]
{INSTANCE COMPLETE}
INSTANCE WILL RESET IN 30 MINUTES
The instances did not end after that. What seemed like low-level adventurers were able to continuously come fight me, and every time my body moved sluggishly and I had no control. I watched as I was stabbed, shot with lightning, and hit with fireballs over and over again, always leading to my death. Trapped in a black void for 30 minutes until I eventually reset in the same place.
An open area surrounded by lush forest, where a group of six to four beings would appear in front of me. I say beings because eventually it wasn't just humans in the groups. Dragon-like people and orcish people began joining these groups. Sometimes small goblins or gnome-like creatures.
The creatures, the magic, and the system. I was in what felt like a video game.
346 times now, if I had been keeping track right. I have died 346 times, and each time the same message popped up the exact same way:
[SYSTEM MESSAGE]
{INSTANCE COMPLETE}
INSTANCE WILL RESET IN 30 MINUTES
Instance number 347. The forest was so lush and green. The breeze made the trees dance, and for a second I felt a little bit of peace until the group finally arrived.
An orc, three humans, and one of the dragon humanoids showed up, ready to take me out. I used the time to study their different abilities. I had noticed human mages could use either lightning, fire, or ice magic. It seemed pretty common. The other races had mages, but not as many. The dragon-like creatures used ice, fire, and lightning magic, but they also used wind magic. They were the only race that had used it against me, I noticed.
The orcs had magic users, but most of the time they were brutes. Large wooden clubs or metal maces used to clobber their enemies. I had been hit by a mace 127 times. Not every time did an orc use the weapon, but each hit from an orc was ten times more powerful than a human's.
The adventurers that used daggers seemed to act as rogues. They were sneaky, and this sluggish body was never able to outpace them. There were so many races and so many uses of powers.
I tried to remember all of them to the best of my ability while also dying to those same abilities. It wasn't the easiest thing to do. Each encounter lasted about fifteen minutes, and in between those instances I waited thirty minutes for another one.
I was about to die again. I felt each stab. Each magic attack. It hurt.
I lay there dying as the system said:
[SYSTEM MESSAGE]
{INSTANCE COMPLETE}
INSTANCE WILL RESET IN 30 MINUTES
15,630 minutes. That is about ten days straight of dying.
15,660 minutes. Thirty minutes later, the new instance was starting. I stood there waiting for the group, looking at my surroundings, when I felt the weirdest sensation since I got here.
My finger moved slightly.
I slightly moved my finger.
As the new group teleported directly in front of me, I knew my death was imminent, but I moved my finger just a little bit.
Just enough hope to keep me going.