Pandora of Fantasy And Reality Chapter 38

Prologue

Four o’clock at the morning.

The boy, [Naruse Akito] woke up with the sound of the alarm clock. He  yawned while getting up on the bed and stretching his back.

He looked over his familiar room with his mind still in a daze. He  could see the outside that was still dark from the crack of the curtain.

The light of the room automatically turned on and the air conditioner started working. He felt a pleasant breeze.

He touched his sweaty body and then his disheveled black hair.

The season was summer.

「I’ve gotten used waking up at this time.」

It was too early to wake up and go to school at this time.

Akito got out of the bed, and headed to the washroom to wash his face.

He was wearing a t-shirt and a trunk. His body had grown a lot taller and his build a lot firmer during these several months.

He washed his face and rinsed his mouth before returning to his room.  He turned on the large monitor that was embedded into the wall.

The screen was displaying today’s weather and a list of news.

He selected a program that was playing a news with a topic that tickled his curiosity.

『The next news is the ambassadors of the moon’s residents――the  Lunarians has come down on earth. There has been an active exchange of  technology between two sides until now, but this is the first time that   Lunarians actually come to earth.』

In the past there was a time when humans couldn’t live on the surface.

There were two paths available for the people.

The path of migrating to the moon to survive.

Or the path of remaining on earth and entered cold sleep underground.

Time passed for the earthlings without any change of generation until  not long ago, but in contrast the Lunarians were living on the moon.

The Lunarians who were showed in the news were all tall and slim.

The Lunarians somewhat felt more like artificial doll than human.

Even a tall male white person needed to look up to see the Lunarian’s face. The Lunarian was waving his hand with a smile.

The commentator was talking about the Lunarian’s objective.

『The Lunarian’s main objective is to observe the plan of recycling of the remaining colony on earth as power plant.』

The female announcer controlled the image to display the illustration of the colony.

The colony was a huge facility that was created underground. It was  the place where mankind slept in the past. Akito heard that even now  there were various things still sleeping there.

「Come to think of it, there was a plan to tour the colony as our field trip huh.」

He took out a ration for breakfast from the refrigerator and warmed it using the microwave oven.

While he was looking at the monitor, his eyes met the Lunarian who was looking at the camera.

Akito fell dizzy and pressed his hand on his head. To him it felt  like the Lunarian was making an ugly smile. It was as though the  Lunarian’s expressionless face was overlapping with an ugly smile.

「What’s that just now?」

He shook his head and looked again at the screen, but he only saw the  Lunarian male’s expressionless face there. Akito rethought what he had  just seen. There was no way anyone would smile like that when in front  of a camera.

The Lunarian group looked eerie with how tall they were and how they were all wearing the same white outfit.

That was what Akito felt.

The commentator was speaking with a smile in the monitor.

『Our livelihood is dramatically improving due to Lunarian’s  technology. This too is thanks to them who are living on the moon. The  important part of the power plant this time too came from the engineers  that the Lunarians are brin――』

Akito watched the Lunarians while trying to ponder about the  hallucination that he had just seen. But the microwave oven was beeping  so he stopped thinking.

「Haa……I guess it doesn’t matter.」

It didn’t matter. Akito who thought that turned his gaze toward the large box that was placed at the corner of the room.

It was the business-use VR machine. He purchased it from his friend  to enjoy playing a popular online game. Now that was Akito’s daily  routine.

He could only login two hours per day.

But, the time inside the game was stretched to make it possible for player to experience two whole days of playing.

「I need to prepare before five o’clock.」

He said that and took out his meal from the oven. Akito took off his gaze from the monitor.

『Everyone on earth, good afternoon.』

The Lunarian’s smile as he gave his greeting looked somewhat forced.

.

.

.

At a girl’s dormitory.

This was a type of dormitory where the residents shared room. A red haired girl was brushing her teeth in a bit of hurry.

The girl’s junior at school passed behind her.

「Eh? Senpai, why are you in such a hurry like that?」

[Shikata Yakumo] rinsed her mouth and spewed out the water. She then brushed her short bob haircut while replying to her junior.

「I overslept. I login at five o’clock every day, so I need to finish preparing before that.」

The reason she was rushing was because there was only a little time left before she had to login.

The junior looked at Yakumo with exasperation.

「Senpai, you’re logging in every day? It’s no problem even if you login late you know? You can have fun there even by yourself.」

Yakumo waved her hand while shaking her head to show her disagreement.

「I’ll feel bad for my acquaintances there. Besides, today is going to be the last day.」

It was 10 July…….

The exam period had finished and the summer holiday for school was also approaching.

It was announced during such time that the famous VRMMORPG [Pandora’s  Box Garden] would temporarily stopped its service because there would  be a large scale update.

The junior sighed.

「We’ll have a lot of free time until they resume service. What are you going to do senpai?」

Yakumo kept glancing at the clock while tidying up her appearance.

This was a space where there were only girls. She was wearing an outfit that exposed a bit more skin while facing a mirror.

「Part-time work and getting qualifications I guess.」

The junior girl was astonished.

「Senpai, you’re a beauty, so you should find a boyfriend.」

Yakumo looked at the mirror while thinking of her friend inside the game――[Ponsuke] who was using orc avatar.

「……There isn’t my ideal type here.」

The junior girl laughed hearing what Yakumo said.

「You play game too much that your ideal become too high senpai. Let’s  go to a mixer next time. In the past that was how men and women met――」

Certainly there were a lot of good looking avatars inside the game. A  lot of players used idol or actor as base for their avatar. Good  looking men and women were all over the places.

But, Yakumo wasn’t interested with that. What she was interested with was――.

「I’m alright.」

Yakumo hurriedly returned to her room because it was almost time.

「Sorry, there’s no more time. I’m going now.」

「Ah, senpai!」

Yakumo returned to her room in a rush. Her junior watched her back while puffing up her cheeks.

「Geez, senpai run away immediately when this topic came up. But, senpai’s ideal type, I wonder what kind of person he is?」

◇

Inside the game.

A lot of players started logging in to the plaza of the Capital of Temperance when the time came.

Among those players, a silver haired orc with conspicuously large body appeared with a flash of light.

He had thick limbs. His look was like a monster. It overwhelmed those who caught sight of him.

His equipments were also styled like a savage. A player who appeared beside him was shocked.

A player hugged this player who was using orc race as his avatar.

「Ponsukeee!」

Someone tackled and hugged him from behind. The orc――Ponsuke pitched forward.

The person behind him was a blonde haired and blue eyed woman with short bob hair style――[Alfie].

Her red and shiny dress was a paid item that had excessive amount of decorations applied on it.

Her other equipments were also all paid items. That was Alfie.

Her outer appearance was of a teenage beautiful girl. Her body style  was also feminine. Ponsuke felt the soft texture of her body, but he was  calm because he knew that an avatar’s gender didn’t exactly guarantee  that the player’s actual gender would be the same.

「Ponsuke! We appeared near each other.」

「……Alfie, you’re heavy.」

Ponsuke faced the delighted Alfie and told her straight that she was heavy.

Alfie kept smiling as she slapped his face.

.

.

.

Alfie was puffing up her cheeks angrily.

Ponsuke apologized to Alfie with his swelling cheek.

But he was also dissatisfied.

「What’s with you. I just said the truth. It wasn’t like I was saying  that your weight is heavy. I meant that your paid equipments are heavy.」

While Ponsuke was muttering complaints like that, a female elf with  red hair that was tied into ponytail hugged his stomach and laughed.

She was wearing equipments that showed off her body line and a large bow on her back.

Her name was [Mariela].

These three were usually enjoying this game together.

To be more accurate, they were unable to recruit one more person into  their party even though the maximum number for a party was four people.  That was their current situation.

They just couldn’t find one more person no matter what they did.

Alfie was showing her anger through her attitude.

She folded her arms which pushed up her breasts.

She was looking away from Ponsuke, but she was sending glances at him.

「Then, let’s head to the Capital of Hope’s tourist area today. I’ll forgive you if we have fun for the whole day there.」

The laughing Mariela argued against Alfie’s demand.

「Why? Didn’t we already talk about gathering money and leveling up  before the update? Ponsuke, let’s go to the plain or the forest.」

Mariela apparently wanted to level up immediately.

This was because the Capital of Temperance――it had the setting as the hometown of the elves. Many of the NPCs here were elf.

The gigantic tree at the center of the city was like a roof of the  city with the way its branches and leaves were spreading out above.

Moss grew on the crumbling building around them. The ground was soft from the grass all over it.

This elf capital was abundant with nature.

Because of that this place had a lot of important events for elf players.

「I want to get the two-swords style for short sword. I need to level up for that.」

Mariela who was an elf apparently preferred to focus on leveling up rather than playing around.

Ponsuke watched the two girls who were glaring at each other while sighing.

「Then we’re going to level up at the first day. Then we’ll return to the Capital of Hope at the second day.」

Ponsuke offered that compromise. Mariela who was starting to grapple with Alfie turned toward him.

「Are you alright with that? You yourself need to do the event of offering the fire dragon’s horn to the altar.」

Fire dragon’s horn.

It was a rare item that Ponsuke obtained after defeating the fire dragon boss when leaving from the Capital of Hope.

Unlike normal avatar, orc had a lot of disadvantageous limitations  that were placed on them, so they needed to rely on events to strengthen  themselves.

The other players could go to the shrine where they could customize  themselves. They could choose to increase their power or increase their  speed for example.

But only orc was incapable of doing that.

Orc had extremely excellent status but, it was treated as a [joke  race] because of the many disadvantageous settings that accompanied it.  The was the situation of the orc race.

There was a strengthening event for that orc race, which was done by offering item to an altar.

Ponsuke shook his head.

「Aa~, impossible. My level isn’t enough right now, and we also lack  manpower……look, there is also the orc group. They will come later, so  I’m thinking to take the quest together with them at that time.」

The orc group.

Orc was treated as a joke by most players, but there were still people who chose orc as their avatar.

The group was a bit……no, very strange, but they weren’t bad people.

Alfie made a sour look.

「So we’re waiting for those guys.」

Ponsuke looked around.

The players that gathered in the plaza, some were in group where they  chatted with each other, while some immediately headed to the  adventurer guild as soon as they were all gathered.

But, most of the logged in players were leaving the plaza.

「We should go too.」

Then Mariela and Alfie who had stopped fighting each other tidied up their messy hair and equipments.

「Well, if Ponsuke say that then I’ll go along. To be honest I want to play for two whole days though.」

Mariela glared at Alfie.

「You’re annoying. We here need to go out and defeat monster to  upgrade our equipments and thelike. Stop using paid equipments already.  It’s a waste that you only used paid equipments and not using any from  the game.」

Paid items were becoming commonplace in online game.

In Pandora, player could purchase powerful equipments using real  money, which cost only several hundred yens. But, the endurance of those  paid equipments would decrease with each login and became unusable  after several logins.

They also couldn’t be repaired, unlike the equipments that the players gathered on their own.

Alfie brushed up her hair.

「There’s no problem with that. Besides, I have no choice because there’s no equipment here that fit my standard.」

Alfie’s principle was to not use equipment that was cheap and didn’t suit to her liking.

「Well, it’s each to their own, but keep it in moderation okay?」

Ponsuke said that and started walking.

Then, an NPC――Non Player Character――a female elf passed in front of him.

When she saw Mariela who was a fellow elf, she greeted her with a smile.

「Hello. Nice weather today isn’t it?」

That NPC was wearing a subdued outfit that exposed little skin. Her expression was peaceful.

Mariela and Alfie were taken aback by the greeting.

When the NPC saw Alfie standing beside Mariela, her attitude became  condescending to hold Alfie in contempt because she was human.

She was still smiling, but that smile was clearly different than the smile for Mariela.

「The air smell bad when there’s a vulgar lower life-form around. It smell like human.」

And then at last the NPC looked at Ponsuke.

The smile that she directed to Mariela and Alfie gradually darkened, and then her expression twisted into hatred.

Ponsuke recalled.

(Ah, is she the famous NPC Clara? Come to think of it, this NPC was really harsh.)

This NPC harbored extreme dislike toward other races. This NPC that  Ponsuke met for the second time suddenly punched his stomach.

「Ofuuh!」

It was a punch with the whole weight of the person’s body behind it. Ponsuke fell on his knee.

「……W-why? You didn’t go this far before.」

Ponsuke looked at Clara in pain. She looked down on him and spat. The saliva landed on his face.

Mariela grabbed Clara.

「You bitch, again! You did it again! Why did you punch Ponsuke!?」

Then Clara smiled only at Mariela and said.

「Welcome adventurers. This is the Capital of Temperance.」

「Don’t suddenly speak with that standard RPG line! You overdid it  just now! There must be someone there! There’s absolutely a person  inside you!」

The NPC averted her gaze and smiled meaningfully. Mariela kept shaking her.

Alfie ran toward Ponsuke and helped him stand.

「Are you okay, Ponsuke?」

The reason why orc race was treated as a joke……one of the reasons was because they were very hated by NPC.

「……It seriously hurt.」

The sharp and heavy blow put another pile of grudge toward the management inside Ponsuke.

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