Pandora of Fantasy And Reality Chapter 1

Prologue

Author’s Note:

※Warnings

I’ll accept comments, but I’ll reply to them usually at the activity report.

I’m planning to write this story mostly with third person perspective.

The story will include convenient harem element.

I will erase the afterword each time I updated.

I’m planning to use the activity report to announce the important things.

At a grassland where a large fortress city could be seen nearby.

There an orc with long and spiky silver hair and ashen skin was carrying a large sword in his right hand.

His body was more than two meter tall. He had thick arms and legs,  and his upper body was slightly larger than his lower body. He was  making a grim expression, but there was no fang growing from his lower  jaw.

He had black eyes with yellow pupils that he was using to glare at the adventurer before him.

「You aren’t going to attack?」

The opponent who said that was a young man with white skin, blonde  hair, and blue eyes. His hair was styled to be pointy. He had slender  build but his body was clearly looked trained. His black outfit was  clearly light equipment even compared to the monster――the orc that he  was facing.

The outfit intentionally didn’t have sleeve at the right side. The  young man’s right arm was mostly exposed. The other parts of his outfit  were made up from cloth or leather.

In contrast the orc was holding a sword that was even larger than the  great sword the young man was carrying with just one hand. His limbs  were protected with leather-made protector.

The orc even had a chest protector equipped.

「UOOOOOOOO!!」

The orc stepped forward with his large foot. The young man didn’t  panic even when looking at that huge body moving. He readied his great  sword with his hands.

「Sheesh……you’re too predictable.」

He said that and stepped forward as he deflected the orc’s great sword.

The orc became unbalanced, in contrast the young man stepped forward  again and hit the orc’s stomach with the flat of his blade from the  side.

「Kahah!」

The orc opened his large mouth. And then the young man swung down his great sword while the orc was writhing in pain.

「It’s over.」

The orc closed his eyes.

But, he opened his eye fearfully after a while. The young man placed  his great sword on his shoulder while speaking in exasperation.

「Your movement is predictable. Also don’t hesitate when attacking. I  had told you that many times. It’ll still take a while until you can put  it into practice like this.」

The young man offered his hand and the orc……Ponsuke took it and stood up.

The two meter tall orc scratched his head with an apologetic look.

「Even if you say that Ri――」

Then the young man, Rook made a stern expression.

「Oi, don’t use my real name. That’s a breach of manner.」

「S-sorry」

Rook sheathed his great sword on his back before starting his lecture at Ponsuke.

「You shouldn’t lose that easily mo matter how much longer I’ve played  than you. If it’s just about specs than orc should have more advantage  in close quarter combat than high human.」

Ponsuke also put away his weapon and then he shrunk into himself.

From outside it would look like a young man was scolding a scary looking monster.

「Of course I’ll hesitate when you suddenly told me to fight like  that. Besides, shouldn’t I normally fight monster first to level up  before getting into PvP?」

Rook shrugged.

「Stupid. I’m giving you a bit of practice first before you go teaming  up with other people. Or rather, it’s easy to level up until level 30,  so just a bit of difference won’t mean much. More importantly, it’ll be  better if you polish your player skill more.」

The orc Ponsuke dropped his shoulders dejectedly.

「I thought this is just a VR game, but to think that it’ll be this  troublesome to play……from what I gathered in the internet, the threshold  entry to play this game is high.」

VRMMO――the title that could be said as representative of that field  even in Japan was this [Pandora’s Box]. It was gaining popularity so  great that other titles couldn’t even catch up to it.

But in Ponsuke’s opinion, accompanying that popularity was the fact  that it made an environment where it was difficult for new player to  come in.

Rook hurriedly correct him.

「It will be fun later after you get used to it! Besides, it’s not  like the battle is the only highlight of this game. As long as you clear  the early stages, you will find a lot of fun places like sea, mountain,  and a lot more.」

Inside the game there wasn’t just battle against monster. There was  also a lot of sight-seeing area――places to have fun prepared inside the  game. Rook explained how it increased the range of the player type  because of that.

「You can just your own way to enjoy this game. Well, the increase of  people also made the entry threshold feel somewhat higher though. But  you got to clear the early stages at least!」

There was a reason why Rook was recommending the game to Ponsuke this desperately.

(He’s so desperate just because he wants to get his hand on the reward item for the newcomer invitation campaign.)

Originally Rook was a high level player inside the game even just based on his level.

But such advanced player was helping out a beginner like Ponsuke because he was the one inviting him to play this game.

Furthermore, the reward item wouldn’t be given until the invited player had cleared the event quest.

Ponsuke looked at Rook with a doubting gaze.

「Ahaha……」 Rook laughed awkwardly and pointed to the fortress city with his thumb to signal that they should go back.

「Yosh! Well, I had taught you the basic, so let’s go back now and  find you a party to join. You won’t be able to accept the quest unless  you do that. We need two more people including me.」

Ponsuke looked at Rook with puzzlement.

「Is it okay to clear it by teaming up with high level player? If I’m  not mistaken……your level is over a hundred already isn’t it?」

Rook nodded.

「Yeah, I’m already level 128. But, it’s fine this time because I got  restriction on my level. My level is set up to be ten right now.」

Ponsuke thought after hearing that.

(A veteran level 10 player beat up a level 1 like me……no, let’s just  think of it as him teaching me about this player skill thing.)

Ponsuke and Rook started walking. They headed toward the large  fortress city――the Capital of Hope which was the starting location of  the game.

Wind blew through the grassland.

Ponsuke felt it with his skin and looked over the surrounding.

(Even so, this is pretty realistic.)

*

It all began inside the classroom.

Ponsuke――Naruse Akito could be briefly described as a very plain high  school student. He graduated from the middle school and enrolled into a  private academy where he started living alone and worked part-time.

He didn’t have any talent that made him felt like joining any club,  and he also had no motivation to join a sports club just for fun.

The academy immediately introduced him to a part-time job right after  he enrolled――it was decided that he would work in a small supermarket  located in a complex that had a lot of apartment buildings and  condominiums lined up.

The supermarket was somewhat bigger than a convenience store. He was in charge of the chores and the register in there.

It was called a supermarket, but the place looked more like a convenience store.

The one who came to talk to such Akito in the classroom was his friend, Aoba Riku.

His hair was dyed blonde. He looked like a player but apparently he  was a sportsman during his middle school. Although after graduating he  felt like he had no talent and gave up on entering a club.

Right now he was the same like Akito, a high school student who chose to live alone while having part-time job.

Akito was sitting while facing that Riku with a single table between them as he tilted his head in puzzlement.

「VR machine for business use? Why are you selling something like that?」

The place where Riku worked part-time was at a VR cafe.

A lot of people wanted to enjoy virtual world, but they felt that  buying the device for it was too troublesome. However recently it had  become easier for individual to purchase it thanks to its  miniaturization and advancement in function.

Riku joined his hands together in front of Akito and begged him.

「My workplace just switched to the newest model but we got some  leftover. It will be a waste to just scrap them so the manager asked me  to sell them. He said that he will give me half if I can sell them for  20000.」

Akito was also interested with VR machine.

Even ordinary people had a lot of chance to use the machine through  hospital. Akito too had received VR education for several weeks in  hospital before enrolling to school.

The lessons that students usually learned for three years in school could be stuffed into them in several weeks.

That was the norm in the present time.

But, even though everyone went through the same thing, there would  still be difference in the result of the education, perhaps because of  the difference in talent.

VR machine had been greatly developed for other things than game  industry, like for education, medical care――and even things like  military.

The game industry started making use of it since some ten-odd years ago.

「Even if I buy it, it will be pointless if I can’t play it.」

Akito showed his reluctance. But Riku explained to him as though he had been waiting for it.

「This is the old model but it’s for business use, so  functionality-wise it’s actually better. Can you understand me if I said  that this thing is too overspecced that it has a lot of unnecessary  part? But what’s important is that it can play Pandora’s Box without any  problem.」

In Japan when it came to VR game, the Pandora’s Box that Riku mentioned was undoubtedly the number one.

There were other titles, but Pandora’s Box was the first VRMMO that managed to be realized.

The other titles were also doing their best, but VR game  fundamentally required time, fund, and manpower to a degree that was  incomparable to other games in the past.

Even just a simple VRMMO game would need years of development until it was ready.

A complex one would need more than ten years of development. The  development cost would be massive and a lot of talented manpower would  have to be gathered for it.

Furthermore the maintenance after the game was completed also required massive resources.

Because of that, other titles than the successful Pandora’s Box would  immediately vanish or operating while only barely scraping along.

At present Pandora’s Box held the monopoly in the industry.

A girl approached while Akito was still deciding whether to buy or not.

She was the class president Ichinose Maya. She had a long brown hair  with half-up hairstyle. She was radiating the aura of a lady.

In fact she was the daughter of the school director, so she was a real lady.

She was a smart girl who originally could go to a higher ranked  school, and combined with her status as class president, it caused the  surrounding to keep her at distance.

「It’s fine to talk about game, but have you two submitted the  documents that the teacher asked? Teacher complained to me that you two  still haven’t submitted it yet.」

Both Akito and Riku smiled wryly when facing her slightly upturned stern gaze.

「N-not yet. I’ll hand it today.」

「M-me too……」

Maya sighed.

「Don’t dawdle. It’s me who’ll get complained by the teacher because of you two.」

Akito took out his smartphone and checked his mail. He found the one  that was sent to him from the teacher and opened the electronic data.

The content was about the visit that would be done soon by the school’s staff to the place of the student who lived alone.

The email said that the student needed to choose the time where they  were available, then inputted the time and mailed it back right away.

Riku immediately inputted the time and mailed it back.

But Akito was troubled.

「Crap, I need to check my work shift first.」

Riku looked at Akiot.

「Does your workplace often changed the shift time?」

Akito nodded.

「The other part-timers there are a bit problematic. They sometimes  suddenly ask for shift change. I wish they will stop because it irritate  my senior there.」

Riku laughed.

「You got it hard at your place. My workplace doesn’t have that kind  of problem at all. More importantly, are you going to buy it? I’ll also  add the software as bonus if you buy it now.」

Akito shrugged.

(Well, I’ve been interested anyway, so it’s fine I guess. I also have enough money right now.)

「I’ll buy it. Come to think of it, how much the monthly fee is? It also need card registration isn’t it?」

Riku immediately mailed his workplace as soon as Akito said that he would buy.

「I think it was free of charge for two weeks after you registered. If  I remember it right, you can also use game’s point card to play, so  you’ll be able to buy it even at your workplace. Now then, I’ll prepare  the machine and the software for you……how about tomorrow? I’ll  bring  the thing to your apartment.」

Riku looked really pleased. Akito could only smile wryly seeing him like that.

*

At Akito’s workplace.

There were two high school part-timers inside the supermarket [Mild].  There was one permanent employee in the back office, but he never went  outside to the front.

「Thank you for your business~」

Akito saw off the customer who left. And then he stretched his body while looking at the clock.

It would be 9 PM soon.

The one who was putting items into the shelves was Shikata Yakumo, a  second year student from other high school. Her distinctive trait was  her short bob red hair that didn’t reach her shoulder. She was also tall  and slender.

Even so her body was well-developed where it mattered. She was also  good looking. The male customers who came here often stared at Yakumo  when they went to the cashier.

Akito who was wearing a green apron looked across the inside of the store.

「Finally no more customer is coming.」

Yakumo’s respond was curt.

「Seems so. Leaving that side, I wonder if they will be late too today.」

The part-timers for the next shift hadn’t arrived yet. The next  part-timers would be a duo of university students, but there was no sign  of them coming.

「Yeah. Well, we’re going to need to stay behind to pass the baton to  them anyway……ah, that’s right. Let’s take care of this too while I’m  here.」

Akito did the procedure of purchasing using electronic money at the  cash register. Yakumo also finished lining up products on the shelves,  put back the cardboard box at the back, then she headed to the register.

What Akito was purchasing was the point card for Pandora’s Box.

「The base cost for just one month is ten thousand yen, that’s expensive.」

The management wouldn’t be able to maintain the game unless they  charged that much money. When he thought about that, Akito accepted his  own reasoning and purchased ten thousand yen worth of point.

(Riku said that he also spent tens of thousands more to buy various things, like paid items……I can’t believe it.)

Yakumo was glancing at what he was doing from the side.

「Is something the matter senpai?」

Akito noticed her gaze and addressed her. Yakumo shook her head.

「It’s nothing. More importantly, it looks like those two finally arrived.」

Then two university students entered inside.

「Sorry for coming late.」

「It should be fine right? You two still need to remain here for passing the baton anyway. Ah, Yakumo-chan, how’re you doing?」

The university student nonchalantly talked to Yakumo, but she treated  him coldly while passing the baton to them for the next shift.

But the two university students paid it no mind at all.

「You’re being hated there.」

「Ee~, shocking. Even though we worked in the same shift before.」

With her slightly gentle expression and atmosphere, Yakumo originally  should look like a kind big sister. But Akito who was working in the  same shift with her got the impression that she was really cold.

「I’ll go ahead.」

One of the university students talked to Akito.

「You also have it hard huh.」

「Ahaha……」

Akito could think of how to react except laughing wryly in respond.

*

――Capital of Hope.

A lot of players were checking the posters that were pinned on the huge notice board at the central plaza.

The two who just returned from outside――Ponsuke and Rook were also making use of the notice board like the other players.

「Hmm~, looking for two more members for a beginner party, and done.」

Rook wrote on a paper that he then pinned on the board.

Ponsuke checked the writing.

「You aren’t adding anything else there, like race or job? The other notices have far more detail than this.」

There were other papers that listed various requirements like job, race, or even play style.

However Rook sat down on a nearby bench while looking disinterested.

「It’s fine like that. We’re just going to clear the beginner quest,  so even player with joke character or joke class is welcome.」

「Joke class?」

Then Rook showed a slightly surprised look.

「You……don’t tell me, you chose to be orc on your own? No, there are a  lot of other players who chose it but, most of them chose it just  because they want to screw around or don’t care about efficiency you  know?」

Ponsuke was shocked. He never imagined that the orc race that he chose on his own was being treated as a joke race.

「No way!」

Rook grinned.

「Yes way. Well, you can just change it later, so it should be fine if  you play around like that for a while. Well, you’ll be beneath the  notice of the top level players though.」

Ponsuke felt dejected.

「No way……even though I spent hours to create this avatar」

Then someone called out to the dejected Ponsuke.

「I saw the notice on the board. Are you still recruiting?」

It was a player with a female avatar. She was wearing a red dress with a sword hanging on her waist.

The avatar had blonde hair and blue eyes. It was very well made and beautiful.

Rook whistled.

「Those are paid items. Really enthusiastic aren’t you. Also yeah, we’re still recruiting.」

Rook told Ponsuke to add her into the party while he went to the  board to revise the notice that they only needed one more person.

The blonde haired and blue eyed woman looked at Ponsuke and smiled.

「I’m Alfie. Please take care of me.」

「Y-yes.」

Ponsuke rejoiced, but then he saw an elf running out of the crowd and turned his gaze there.

「Are you still recruiting? I’m an elf and a hunter.」

The energetic woman’s straight and long red hair fluttered behind  her. She was wearing an outfit that looked easy to move in but exposed a  lot of skin.

A short bow was hanging on her back. The pointy long ears that pointed out from her hair also looked distinctive.

Rook erased the notice on the board.

「We got four people with this. Then let’s take the quest. This  party’s balance is a bit bad but, we’ll manage somehow by leveling up  you guys.」

The red haired elf Mariela patted her chest. It made her large breasts jiggled.

「Thank god. Everyone keep refusing me since some time ago. They said that wizard would be better to be the rear guard.」

Rook laughed.

「You can just take magic related class later on, so there’s no need  to mind that. Then, let’s go to the guild to accept the quest and then  we’ll do the quest right away. It will take a bit of time but I want to  finish it in one go. Is that fine with all of you?」

Rook talked to the two about how he was going to accompany Ponsuke until the quest was cleared and they nodded in understanding.

Alfie looked happy.

「I’m grateful to have a veteran player guiding us.」

Mariela also felt the same.

「I planned to look for party member on my own or head out by myself if no one accepted me but, this is a big help for me.」

Rook shook his head.

「It’s possible for hunter to go solo but……that will be hard to do  unless you have good player skill. Well, you can also learn by dying  over and over though.」

Then the four of them started moving. Rook saw Ponsuke looking nervous and talked to him with a small voice.

「Why are you nervous?」

「No, because……two pretty women suddenly joined our party.」

Ponsuke said that while feeling curious.

(It felt like I had seen them somewhere before.)

Rook elbowed Ponsuke’s side from an angle outside of the two’s eyes.

「Listen well stupid……even though they looked like pretty young woman,  there are a lot of stories around about how the inside of this kind of  avatar might be greasy middle-aged man you know?」

「……Eh? Eh!? B-but, the manual said that using avatar of different gender in virtual world isn’t recommended!」

Ponsuke’s mind fell into chaos. Rook looked at him with a sad smile.

「A guy like you’ll definitely get tricked by a woman avatar  controlled by some fat uncle until you got nothing left in your pocket.  Well, cheer up man.」

Ponsuke looked back at the two female avatars who were currently having fun talking to each other.

The scene of two pretty girls chatting cheerfully……but, that was just  an illusion. In his eyes it became just a scene of fellow uncles  talking to each other.

「……This is absurd.」

Rook patted Ponsuke’s shoulder. And then he made a gentle expression.

「That’s just how the world works. Be thankful that you realize the truth right from the start.」

The handsome young man consoled the dejected orc……it was a very odd  scene but, it was an ordinary sight in this world. That was the world of  Pandora’s Box.

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