Zantar - Clash of Worlds

One Year Later

James

Beep.
Beep.
Beeeep.

The third twang of the alarm clock sounded longer and more annoying than the rest. I swung my arm over faster than you can say "fuck mondays" and slammed the top of the alarm clock once, twice, three times before I was fianlly able to silence the barking. It would have been easy if I wasn't totally concentrated on the computer monitor in front of me. At that moment, the only things that existed in the world were myself, the computer monitor and the game - Zantar.

The loud, abrupt alarm clock ruined that very sense of immersion and reminded me that I was still a person sulking over lazily in his computer chair, and not an actual a being within the game. It was easy to get in this trance while playing Zantar. It was by several magnitudes the most in-depth and complex massively multiplayer online (MMO) game that was currently on the market. Admittedly, after almost a full year of the game being live, most other MMO's simply shut down due to a lack of playerbase. It seemed, quite literally, that everyone and their mother was playing the game. Even after a full year and more in-game hours than I cared to admit, I was still not at maximum level and hadn't explored even five percent of the total game's landmass.

Five. Percent.

It was practically, for lack of a better description, an entire world within a game.

Hell even my bitch-of-an-ex-girlfriend played the game. I think she was more upset about losing her guild-spot than me after it was all said and done. I was, as it stands, one of the top ranking members of the most prestigious guilds in the world. The other ranking members of this guild, many of whom were my closest friends, and myself were now attempting for the fifth time, one of the most challenging battles within the entirety of the game. No one else had beaten this boss yet. It had taken almost six hours of harsh grinding overnight to get here, and I'll be damned if the alarm clock would break my concentration. Getting ready for work could wait, as I was working from home today anyways.

"Darren switch from "Happy" to "Sad" once the rage bar gets too high or his health gets too low, we cannot make the same mistake as last time." I barked into the mic to the side of my keyboard.

"Got it. Should I keep stacking my Rend or cool it for a while?"

"Keep stacking until he gets to fifteen-percent then stop."

"Okay sounds good."

The five of us were completely concentrated on the task before us. "Happy" and "Sad" were nicknames for the two menacing guards that we were required to defeat before taking on the actual boss, who was currently sitting in a large spiked throne in the back of the room, giving our group a stare so serious it was like he had just finished grinding up orphan child's bones for his pre-workout shake. He donned a set of thick red armor that was blackened all over as if it had been badly burnt. I was fairly certain I'd read in a book somewhere that he had intentionally bathed in dragon-flame to acquire the look, unaffected by even the most destructive mythical power in the game. His eyes were red and demonic, like the eyes of a creepy nun you'd see in an awful horror movie. A red nameplate over his head said "Drakkyn".

One thing was for certain - he was one hard-looking mother fucker.

The two guards were no easy task, either. Each wore jet black armor that resembled the boss, and a helmet that covered their face completely. It was as if "Scream" had two older brothers that grew up in the "Mad Max" dimension. They each looked exactly identical, besides one helmet having a terrifying grin carved into it, while the other had a menacing frown. Hence the nicknames, "Happy" and "Sad" for easy communication mid-fight.