The Latest Game Is Too Amazing

The capital of Castal Kingdom, Mouct, is a city so huge that it even outshines Maeldia. At the heart of the city is a castle, the symbol of royal capitals, and the rest of the city is spread out all around it.

Just how many people live here? I don’t think it’s quite big enough to be a million, but the roads lined with street vendors are so lively and packed with people that it’s making me a little dizzy.

Just how much time would it take to make a city as large-scale as this? I don’t know much about programming, so I can only vaguely imagine how ridiculously time-consuming it must have been. It reminds me of an interview with the producer from the game developer company where he confidently declared, “Players won’t get bored of this for decades. We really created a whole other world.”

He wasn’t exaggerating. The developers really did make another world inside the game. This game isn’t amazing because it’s the world’s first immersive VR game, it’s amazing because the developer staff are amazing.

It’s actually surprisingly common for MMORPGs to have a short lifespan, too. It’s very rare for games to be popular long enough for them to stay in service for decades. They can be shut down within a year after launch if they can’t get enough people interested. There are even cases where games get announced in magazines or internet articles as currently in development and then fade out of existence when they can’t cover development costs.

Considering all of that, they must have really been planning on making Another World a big hit for them to have a budget big enough to make a world as massive as this. I have no doubt that it would be just as popular even without the title of the first immersive VR game.

In fact, it’s very highly praised online. It gets rave reviews like “It’s like taking a trip to a real fantasy world”, “The level of player freedom is way too high. There are so many things I want to do that I don’t have enough time for all of them”, “The game devs put way too much effort into this, lmao”, and “Lately, I feel like I’ve been leaving reality instead of returning to it”. Because of this, there are a lot of people begging for the official launch.

Currently, there’s a restriction on the number of players since it’s in closed beta, but that ends in a week. As long as there’s no big bugs, the closed beta won’t be extended. After that, it’ll switch to open beta testing with no player limits, and then when that’s over, the official launch will happen. The launch date hasn’t been announced yet, but it’s probably not too far off.

That aside…

There are a lot of narrow streets here in Mouct, and it’s so complicated that I’d definitely get lost. Thanks to the map window, I can figure out my location, but without it, I’d get swallowed up in the sea of people and completely lose track of where I am. While I was wandering around sightseeing, I discovered that the city is divided into districts: the region near the castle, where there are stately mansions that seem to be where the nobles live; the district lined with ordinary houses like the ones I saw in Maeldia; and the slums, full of men with nasty looks in their eyes and women who look like prostitutes.

Although, since the region with all the mansions has a wall surrounding it and guards stationed at the entrance, I could look in from outside, but I couldn’t enter without permission. Naturally, I can’t enter the castle inside the walls that easily, either. Well, this sure isn’t one of those friendly kings that casually lets anyone in the castle like in some RPGs. If you think about it realistically, those kinds of kings are more unusual, or more like impossible. You probably can’t go inside without accepting some sort of quest. For now, it’ll have to wait until later.

And now, I’ll get straight to doing what I came to this city to do. First, I head to the tools shop. There are no elixirs or highest level potions and mana potions for sale, but they do sell the other potions. On my way here, I used up all but two lowest level potions, but thankfully, I can stock up on mid-level potions and mana potions here. They’re one silver each, and I currently have two gold and 15 silver. Buying 20 of each takes a big hit to my savings. I hope I have enough to get equipment.

I was too naive. When I take a look in the weapons shop and the armor shop, their merchandise is much better quality than in Maeldia, but the stronger stuff is too expensive, so there’s a lot of things I can’t get. Looks like I have no choice but to stay in the capital for a while and earn money. I buy only a copper bangle and leather boots, raising my defense just a bit, and then head to the Adventurer’s Guild to take a quest.

There are about ten young men and women lined up at the entrance to the Adventurer’s Guild. I wonder if this is the line for the receptionist. It looks like the capital is so big that the Adventurer’s Guild is overflowing with people. Looks like I have no choice but to wait in line. I stand at the end of the line.

Come to think of it, Japanese people are seen by foreigners as people who tend to form lines with astonishing levels of coordination. I’ve heard that we’re lauded internationally for maintaining order even during disasters and lining up to shop or receive rations without rioting.

Since Japanese people value order, it’s common for people to form lines even in MMORPGs. For example, when there are quests to hunt monsters that are limited in number, we form lines, complete the quest efficiently, and prevent other players from cutting in line. And if someone does cut in line, they get called out online for being rude.

Apparently, it’s rare for people to do stuff like this in foreign MMOs, so it seems bizarre to them. They say stuff like, “Japanese people are weird, they’ll wait in line even in video games.” “It’s like they’re robots.” The rest of the world is probably a society of first come, first serve where cutting in line is allowed. Maintaining order even in places like this truly is Japan’s nature, there’s no other way to describe it.

Well, it’s true that it’s strange to see a bunch of people armed with swords and armor all lining up in an orderly manner. From a monster’s standpoint, seeing a bunch of players lined up waiting to kill them the moment they appear would probably be sickening.

“It’s almost time. So, there are eleven people here right now? Then, please come this way,” says a woman who I’m guessing is a guild staff member. Finally, the receptionist line is moving.

They all start following the woman’s lead and walking away from the guild. Wait, we’re leaving? Is it so crowded that the receptionist has to do her job somewhere else?

The woman then heads towards the residential area and enters a building made of stone. I see, so this is where we’re supposed to accept quests.

All that’s inside the building is a staircase leading underground that was guarded by an iron gate. There’s no sign of any guild staff. The woman takes out a key, unlocks the gate, and leads us inside.

“Alright, please meet up back here in two hours.”

Huh, this isn’t the guild receptionist desk? Wait, so that wasn’t the line for the receptionist, it was a different line?! Oh no, what do I do?

While I’m figuring that out, the door slams shut and the woman quickly starts walking away. …There’s nothing I can do about it now. I have to wait two hours? Though, since she counted the number of people, I might have to complete a quest, too. I check the event window, and a new quest has been added. Now, there’s no way out of it.

…From now on, whenever I get in line, I’ll make sure to check what the line is for.

The Adventurer’s Guild of Mouct, the capital of Castal Kingdom, is famous for being one of the highest-paying workplaces in the whole kingdom. However, while the work is high-paying, it’s also well-known to be exhaustingly difficult.

Since the capital contains 30% of the kingdom’s total population, there are many poor people and villagers from the surrounding area who become adventurers in the capital in order to move up in the world. Inevitably, both the number of quests it handles and adventurers who gather there are proportionally high. The excellent staff members of the Adventurer’s Guild deal with these things promptly, so the work proceeds smoothly and without issue.

However, within this workplace that’s meant to consist entirely of excellent staff members, there is a single problem child: Nina, the new girl.

“Sir, I’ve finished guiding the adventurers!” Nina says. She has short, chestnut brown hair and an appearance as bright and cheerful as her personality, an irreplaceable quality that’s sure to give others a good impression of her. However, her clumsiness is her fatal flaw.

“Oh, good work. And you did your job right?” asks Morris, who was given the job of being her mentor. He was worried that she would mess something up again, but since they were busy, he left her in charge of guiding the adventurers who accepted the sewer quest.

“Yes, I made sure to guide all eleven of them to the sewer!”

As soon as he hears her say “eleven of them”, Morris’s face becomes stern.

“You idiot! What do you think you’re doing?!”

“Ow!” Nina says after Morris’s fist barrels into her, squinting as she holds her head in pain. Morris subsequently shoves the quest application towards her.

“Only ten people accepted the quest! Someone got mixed in with them at some point.”

“What, really?!” In a panic, she looks over the paperwork and finds that it only proves that Morris is telling the truth.

“Before you brought them there, did you do a roll call or do anything at all to confirm their identities?”

“…Ah!”

Morris sighs. “Run over and check now. It’s only the sewer, so I doubt anything will happen.”

“Urk… Understood.”

“And once you get back, you’re getting another lecture.”

Grimacing at having to go down into the sewers, Nina slumps her shoulders dejectedly.

Low class monsters like wererats show up in the capital’s underground sewers regularly. Generally, they’re all incredibly weak and rarely pose any sort of threat, but adventurers rarely go out of their way to go into the sewers, and they can’t just let the sewers get overrun with monsters. Therefore, they have new recruits take a quest to hunt wererats in the sewers to test them.

With a lantern in hand, Nina searches for the adventurers she brought here earlier. After checking the five people near the entrance, she confirms that all of them went through the receptionist. It seems that the person she’s looking for isn’t near the entrance. She prepares herself and quickly advances further in.

Even using a handkerchief as a mask doesn’t help much with the rotten sewage smell. The sound of someone’s heavy footsteps echoes, causing her anxiety to intensify as the smell makes her eyes water. While passing by the occasional wererat, she proceeds deeper and deeper in.

After walking for a while, she doesn’t find anyone at all. In this dark, cramped space, she gradually loses her sense of time. She starts to consider that perhaps turning around and waiting at the entrance would be a better idea.

She can faintly see a light from ahead. Finally, she found another adventurer. All at once, her mood recovers from her previous faintheartedness, and she starts running towards the light. Although she knows it may be irrational, she wants to complain to somebody at least a little bit.

As she gets closer to the source of the light, they become more visible. Just as she’s about to call out to them, she can finally see them clearly.

It’s a girl wearing ratty clothes and several men punching her.

Her train of thought grinds to a halt. What the heck is going on here? The only thing that’s clear to her is that staying here is dangerous. She has to call someone and–

Thud.

She takes a sudden hit to the back of her head and subsequently loses consciousness.