Blade Skill Online

Prologue to chapter 2

Prologue

"Oh, it's finally arrived! So, this is 'Blade Skill Online'!"

Holding a game package with a fantasy-esque cover in my hands, I jumped for joy. Now, I may finally be able to say goodbye to my bad luck for good!

Ah... I'd always been unlucky since I was born.

Birds shit on me every day on my way to school; my umbrella always got stolen when I left it at the convenience store; sudden diarrhea as I was taking the entrance exam for high school, causing me to almost bomb the exam.

I had tried various stuff like visiting shrines to get rid of my bad luck, but no matter how many times I prayed to the gods, my prayers were never answered, not even once. By the time I advanced to the second year of high school, I was about to give up and live out the rest of my life as an unlucky guy.

...But then, an idea struck me. Bad luck does not matter in VR games!

VR games. They were games that used the latest technology to allow players to enter a virtual world. No matter how unlucky I was, it wouldn't affect me if I lived in cyberspace which was ruled by probability and calculation.

And 'Blade Skill Online', which would start its service today, had a stat called 'Luck'! It was written on the strategy guide site that summarized information about the game from the beta test phase, so there was no doubt about it. If I tweaked my stats distribution well, I was sure I'd be lucky!

Okay, it was almost time for the service to start. After inserting the game disc into my PC, I put on the wired VR helmet. You'd be able to enter the game world by wearing this. It was quite pricey, costing 100,000 yen, but I'd somehow managed to get my hands on it after taking numerous part-time jobs like my life depended on it.

"I've gone to the bathroom and I've fully rehydrated myself! Okay, here I go... dive on!"

The moment I shouted the activation keywords, my consciousness fell into darkness...

Chapter 1

"Welcome! This is the character creation space!"

...When I opened my eyes, I found myself in a pure white space. And a fairy was fluttering in the air before me.

"Uh, who are you?"

"I'm Navi, a Player Navigation Fairy! I'm created to support the players in their adventures!"

Ohh, she can communicate?! That reminded me, it was mentioned on the strategy guide site. This game used the latest AI technology, which made it possible to have small talks with NPCs.

Wait, this wasn't the time to be impressed by the power of science. Now that I'd started the game, it was time to apply what I'd learned from the strategy guide site. And if I was going to have a head start, I had to quickly make my character!

"Okay Navi, let's get the character creation started right away."

"Understood! Well then, first please enter your user name!"

After the little fairy said so, a translucent keyboard appeared in front of me.

User name, huh? Well~, since my real name was Yuri[裕理(ゆうり)]...

"Let's go with Yuri [ユーリ] in katakana!"

"Yuri-sama, is it! Then, next please select your job, weapon type, and skills!"

This time, three windows appeared in front of me. The job window listed all sorts of jobs such as 'Swordsman', 'Magician', and so on, whereas the weapon window contained descriptions of weapon types such as 'One-Handed Sword', 'Staff', and 'Kusarigama'... There were 'Scissors' as well, but who'd use them? A hairdresser or something?