.hackGODDESS
by SmkViper
Proof readers/editors: Sehet Xaui, Greybolt, Gen, Eponine, Cholene
Copyright
.hackGODDESS © 2003 SmkViper
Oh My Goddess! © Kosuke Fujishima
Japanese Language Version © Kodansha Ltd.
English Language Version © AnimEigo, Pioneer, Dark Horse
Project Dot Hack © Project Hack, Bandai, TV Tokyo, Comptiq
.hackGODDESS is a fan fiction work based off the
Oh My Goddess! and Project Dot Hack universes. It
is not affiliated with Kosuke Fukishima, Kodansha Ltd.,
or Project Hack. And resemblance to any person, living
or dead, is purely coincidental.
Author's notes:
Text in are a character's thoughts.
Chapter 2: The World
"AAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGHHHHH! WHY WON'T YOU DIE?!" Urd yelled as she slashed at the monster they were fighting. Urd, Keiichi, and Belldandy had been fighting this monster for almost 10 minutes so far and it still showed no signs of dropping. In fact, the only reason they hadn't all been killed already was Belldandy using her healing magic to keep them all alive.
"How are you doing back there Bell?" asked Keiichi, "You need any mage souls?"
"I'm fine Keiichi! Just keep attacking it!"
Suddenly, the monster took a swipe at Keiichi and hit him back a few feet into the wall while he was distracted.
"Ow! Now you're going to get it!" he shouted as he rushed back into the fight.
"Maybe we shouldn't have picked such a high level area K!" yelled Urd as she dodged another attack from the monster.
"No, really? Who was it that said they could take it and we would get lots of experience!"
"Stop arguing you two, we're almost done with this dungeon, you can't quit now!" insisted Belldandy. She suddenly noticed Keiichi's low health and cast a quick healing spell to replenish it.
Keiichi dodged another attack from the monster and saw an opening. He quickly lunged in, cutting a deep gash in the side of the monster. It roared in pain and Urd quickly swung at it while it was vulnerable, but it recovered quickly and blocked the attack with its shield. The monster then quickly kicked its foot out and tripped Urd up.
"Urd!" Belldandy yelled as the monster raised its sword to attack Urd while she was on the ground. Belldandy quickly ran in and blocked the attack with her staff, straining under the force from the blow. Suddenly the monster hit her with his shield, knocking her over and inflicting some damage. By this time Urd had gotten to her feet and was facing the monster again.
"Hey you! Your momma was so ugly even one of my potions couldn't get her a date!" shouted Urd.
The monster, now enraged, swung wildly at Urd but missed by several inches. Now that its back was to Keiichi he ran in close and delivered two quick cuts to its back. He then looked over to see if Belldandy was out of the way yet, but she was out cold on the floor.
"Belldandy! Get up!" yelled Keiichi. He could tell by the health bar at the bottom of his view that her hit points (HP) were almost spent. "Urd! Belldandy's down! Do you have any more health drinks? I'm all out!"
"I didn't pick up any extras because she was supposed to do the healing, not me!"
"Damn, we're going to have to take this guy out by ourselves! Hopefully Bell will snap out of it soon," thought Keiichi. He then felt a sharp pain in his back as the monster took advantage of his distraction and beat him to the ground and his HP bar started flashing, indicating that he was almost dead. The monster, convinced that he was down for the count, turned its attention back to Urd, the only party member still standing.
Suddenly, they heard the door to the room open behind them.
"Oh great, just what we need, another monster!" thought Keiichi, looking towards the door. But instead of a monster, a girl wearing the same style of armor as Urd and carrying a large sword was standing there.
"You guys need any help?" she asked.
"What gave you that idea?" yelled back Urd as she dodged another attack and quickly hit back with one of her own, "we're having a bit of trouble here!" She quickly dodged out of range of the monster and sent a party invitation to the newcomer.
A second later, another set of stats appeared at the bottom of Keiichi's field of view, revealing that the girl's name was Mimiru, and from the amount of HP she had, she was probably a level or two above them. She then tossed a health drink to both Keiichi and Belldandy, healing their HP back to the point where they could stand again and rushed into battle, delivering a painful-looking hit to the monster they had been fighting. Belldandy slowly got up, still a little injured and cast a healing spell on herself and Keiichi to heal them back to full strength. She then quickly cast an attack and armor boosting spell on Mimiru to help out before quickly healing Urd who had also fallen rather low on HP.
With Mimiru now fighting with them the battle slowly started turning in their favor as the monster was beaten back against the wall. A final blow from Urd finished off the monster and it faded from the room.
"Whew…thanks for your help there," said Keiichi.
"No problem, I'm Mimiru!"
"I'm Keiichi, the heavy blade is Urd, and the wave master is Belldandy," he replied, pointing to each of them in turn. Belldandy smiled and Urd gave a little wave back. "We've been playing for about 3 weeks now."
"You guys were pretty lucky that I happened to come along when I did. You almost got killed, what were you thinking coming to such a high-level place so early?"
Keiichi started to say that it was Urd's idea but quickly shut up as Urd gave him a withering look.
Noticing the little exchange, Mimiru decided to change the subject. "Well, shall we go pick up our reward?" she asked, running through the door ahead of them. Keiichi, Urd and Belldandy didn't follow immediately.
"What happened Bell? Why didn't you get up?" asked Keiichi, a little worried.
"I don't know Keiichi, I fell over because of the force of the blow, but then there was a sudden pain in my chest that lasted for a few seconds. It felt like…I don't really know what it felt like…"
"I'm going to have Skuld look over this computer as soon as we finish here. I don't want any of us actually getting hurt playing. Well, we better go after Mimiru before she takes all the treasure."
While they were talking, Mimiru had walked through the doorway towards the lone treasure chest in the room, when she spotted a lone wave master in grey robes looking rather confused.
"Oh, hello there, I didn't know I had company. Hi there, I'm Mimiru."
The wave master looked at her with a distant expression.
"Is something wrong? Are you OK?" asked Mimiru, a note of concern in her voice.
He flinched slightly, then turned to face her as she walked closer.
"I hardly ever see a wave master working alone. You must be powerful! Are you?"
The wave master glared at her and pulled a small device out of his robes. He activated it, and teleported out of the room.
"Well that's a fine way to say hello! Hehe…oh well, at least he left the treasure chest." Mimiru said, pointing her sword at the chest.
"Hey Mimiru? Who were you talking to? I thought I heard voices," asked Urd.
"Hmm? Oh, I saw a wave master in here just kinda staring at the treasure chest, when I tried to talk to him, he warped out. Some people just have no manners!"
"So what's in the chest?" asked Keiichi, "you look yet?"
"Nope," replied Mimiru, "you guys walked in just as I was about to check."
They walked through the open door and to the treasure chest in the last room of the dungeon. Keiichi opened the chest and pulled out a staff, along with two rainbow cards, which would bring a nice price back in town.
"Hey Bell, think you can use this staff?" asked Keiichi, handing it too her.
Belldandy inspected the staff, and replaced her current one with the new one. "Thanks K," she replied with a smile.
"Here, this is for helping us with that monster back there," said Keiichi, handing a rainbow card to Mimiru.
"Hey, what about me?" asked Urd. "What do I get?"
"You got part of the treasure last time Urd, don't you remember? You'll get something from the next dungeon we beat together, OK?"
"Fine," replied Urd, pouting.
"Well, shall we return to town?" asked Belldandy.
They all agreed and warped back to the root town.
"Hey, I have to log off for a bit, here's my member address if you guys want to party again some time. See ya!" said Mimiru, logging out just after.
"Well, I say we hit the shops and then log out and eat, I'm starving!" Keiichi said.
"Oh, no! I forgot to get lunch going!" moaned Belldandy.
"Don't worry about it, I'm sure Skuld made something up, you know how Shinobu gets at meal times," Keiichi replied, with a grin.
The three of them visited the various shops in the area to restock on supplies and see if any new weapons or scrolls were worth getting. They then logged out of the game to eat.
"Hey Skuld? You're not suppose to really get hurt playing this game right?" asked Keiichi.
"Of course not! It's just a game, why, what happened?"
"Well, Belldandy said she felt a pain in her chest after getting hit by a monster, would you mind double checking your programming for me?"
Skuld glared at him for a second before replying. "Fine! I'll check it, but I'm doing it because Belldandy was hurt, not because you asked!" She then hooked up a portable screen and started examining the program.
"Well, I guess I better fix some lunch," said Belldandy as she headed off to the kitchen."
"Oh, Belldandy? Kami-sama called you while you were playing and wants you to call back," said Skuld.
"Really? I wonder what he could want…" Belldandy walked over to the phone and dialed his office number.
"It is I," said a voice at the other end of the line.
"Kami-sama, you wanted to talk to me?" asked Belldandy.
"Yes, did you feel anything unusual about 5 to 10 minutes ago?" he asked.
"Well…I did feel a pain in my chest, but I thought that was from the game. Is something wrong?"
"Possibly, at about that time, a young person fell into a coma while playing the game. They were rushed to a nearby hospital but are still unresponsive. After reviewing the information gathered from Yggdrasil by Peorth, it looks like the mortal's soul was transferred from their body, and into the internet. I want you, and your sisters to investigate this matter with the utmost caution. I will be sending some help in a day or two."
"Yes, Kami-sama," replied Belldandy, her voice shaking slightly.
"Oh, and put Skuld on the phone, I need her to do something for me."
"Skuld? Kami-sama would like to talk to you," called Belldandy.
Skuld walked over to the phone, a worried expression on her face. Her eyes grew wide as she listened.
"Y…yes sir, I will," she said. She was shaking as she hung up the phone and went back to work on her computer.
Belldandy went to the kitchen and started lunch. Skuld started typing on her computer.
connect Yggdrasil
Attempting to establish connection to Yggdrasil…
Connection established
You are connected to Yggdrasil at access point 154.145.875.876.235
Username: Skuld
Password:
You have successfully connected as Skuld, Goddess 1st Class, Norn of the Future
download comaantivirus
Download starting…………………………………download complete
install comaantivirus
Installing Anti-Virus software, please wait…
Installation successful
Thank you for installing Peorth Anti-Virus, registration will allow Peorth to continually send you annoying e-mail accompanied by large amounts of rose petals, would you like to register now?
No
How long until you want to be reminded to register?
NEVER
That's Peorth for you, always trying to find an excuse to annoy people! You'd think she would eventually learn… thought Skuld as she closed the connection to Yggdrasil.
"Skuld? Are you going to join us for lunch?" asked Belldandy.
"Be right there," she replied, quickly shutting down the computer and joining the rest of the family in the dining room.
Belldandy brought out lunch and they all started eating, well, all except for Shinobu, who was playing with her food again.
"So, Belldandy, what did Kami-sama want?" asked Keiichi.
"He…there is a problem. That pain I felt in the game did not have anything to do with the game itself, but was me feeling the pain of a soul being torn out of its body and pushed onto the internet while playing that game."
"But…how is that possible?"
"I don't know, but Kami-sama wanted us to investigate the incident, He mentioned that He would send help in a day or two."
"But, we'll have to get into the game to get some clues! How can we be sure that the same thing doesn't happen to one of us?"
"That's what Kami-sama wanted to talk to me about," replied Skuld. "Peorth was able to construct an anti-virus program that prevents that from happening, based on the information Yggdrasil gathered from the incident. I installed it on our computer before coming to lunch."
"But can't you just put that program on the internet for everyone to use?" asked Keiichi.
"Well…no. It only works on computers based on Yggdrasilian technology, in other words, our computer. A normal computer wouldn't know what to do with it."
"Alright then, I guess we'll have to start investigating after lunch," said Urd.
"You mean, we'll begin investigating, it's your turn to watch Shinobu," replied Skuld with a smirk on her face.
"You wanna bet, brat?" Urd replied, lighting cracking around her fist.
"Stop it now!" said Belldandy. "Urd, you know it's your turn you watch her."
"Alright, alright," Urd replied. "C'mon kid, lets go find you something to do," she said as she picked Shinobu up. Shinobu giggled happily and waved her hands at the attention she was getting. And then Keiichi's tea froze.
After the dishes were cleaned up, Keiichi, Belldandy, and Skuld went back out into the living room where the computer was set up.
"So, how shall we start looking?" asked Keiichi.
"Obviously, we just keep playing the game, but we keep an eye out for anything suspicious and ask various people we meet if they know anything," replied Skuld.
They put the helmets on and then found themselves near the chaos gate in the root town.
"I'll page Mimiru, she might know something," said Keiichi. He waited for a few minutes, but did not get a response. "Hmm…guess we'll have to try something else for now."
"Hey! You three by the chaos gate, want to party for experience points (XP)?"
Keiichi looked up and saw a guy with short brown hair and the top half of his face painted with a blue design next to a woman with long blonde hair and a gold headband waving at them. The man looked to be a heavy blade while the woman was a wave master.
"I'm Bear and this is my friend BT. We were looking for a few extra people to go to an area with us, you guys up for it?" he asked.
"Sure," replied Keiichi after getting nods from Skuld and Belldandy. This would be a good opportunity to see if they know anything, he thought to himself.
He, Skuld, and Belldandy received invitations to Bear's party, which they accepted. A few minutes later they were standing in an area, looking for some monsters to kill.
"Over here!" said Bear, pointing at a spinning yellow disc that indicated a monster spawn point.
They all joined him and approached the disc. As they got near, it dissolved, revealing a large crab-shaped monster. Belldandy quickly cast buffing spells on each of the party members, while BT sent a few lightning bolts at the monster, most of which hit, but did little damage. Keiichi, Bear, and Skuld surrounded the monster by positioning themselves in a triangle with the monster in the middle. Bear and Keiichi attacked first, hoping to draw its attention since they had the most HP in the group. Skuld quickly sneaked up behind it while it was distracted and embedded her dagger in its back. The monster reared up and quickly swung around, throwing Skuld to the ground and causing her damage. Belldandy quickly fixed the damage with a healing spell. BT stayed back and pounded away at the monster's armor with her lighting and fireball spells.
After a few minutes, Bear stepped back and watched the rest of his party battle the monster. Seeing that they would be fine without him, he left the group to go to the spring of mist he saw nearby. The rest of the party failed to notice his departure.
Bear found the spring he was looking for and sat down to rest. A wave master in grey robes suddenly teleported in next to the spring, and after staring at it for a minute, tossed a small dagger into the pool. A large water drop with eyes and a mouth appeared above the pool where he had thrown the dagger.
"Hey, did something just fall in here?" asked the oversized drop of water. "Did you drop this golden axe? Well, did you? Or maybe it was the silver axe?"
The wave master took a swing at the drop with his staff, but it dodged the attack.
"Oh no!" it said before fading from view. Bear started laughing.
"You having fun?" Bear asked. The wave master looked over his shoulder with an annoyed look before turning to face him.
"Greetings, I'm Bear. You know I like to do that too whenever I happen to be feeling down. I can lend you a hand if you need any help, I'm always supporting newbies here and…"
The wave master warped out without a word.
"Well, he's certainly a shy one," said Bear to himself.
BT walked up behind him.
"Hey there! What's a swordsman doing abandoning our fight," she asked indignantly.
"You were victorious I assume?"
"Well, I'm worn out though."
"Shall I help you recover?" Bear asked with a smirk.
"I took care of that myself."
"Well, then there's no problem. That's how everyone gains strength around here."
"You're not being a gentleman."
"Oh, I am gentle, but not a pushover."
"There you guys are!" said Skuld, running up with Keiichi and Belldandy in tow. "What's the big idea leaving us to fight that monster alone?"
"He thought he was doing us a favor by leaving," replied BT.
"How was that supposed to be a favor?" asked Keiichi.
"You gain more experience by fighting a monster with fewer people," answered Bear.
"Well you still shouldn't have left us. Oh, by the way have you or BT ever heard of someone going into a coma because of playing this game?" asked Keiichi.
"No, I haven't," replied BT. Bear shook his head.
"Oh, well thanks anyway, shall we finish this area?"
"Wait a sec," said Bear, "what kind of question is that? There is no way someone could be hurt physically while playing a computer game!"
Keiichi, Skuld, and Belldandy glanced at each other.
"Um…we read a rumor on the BBS about someone who was admitted to the hospital while playing the game. It said they were in a coma, and we were…a little worried it might happen to us or someone we know," said Skuld Thank Kami-sama I looked at the message board yesterday!
"Oh…" replied Bear, with a skeptical look, "I guess I'll have to look at that once we're doing here."
Skuld breathed a sigh of relief.
Keiichi, Belldandy, Skuld, BT, and Bear fought several more monsters in the area and completed the dungeon over the course of a few hours before returning to the root town.
"Well thanks for the good time," said Bear. "Here's my member address if you want to meet up again."
"And here is mine, I'll see you guys later," said BT before logging out. Bear logged out soon after.
"Well, I think we should call it a night," said Belldandy. "It's too bad we didn't find out anything, but there's always tomorrow."
The three of them logged out of the game. Belldandy went to the kitchen to prepare dinner, Skuld started working on the computer, and Keiichi went to his room to work on some paperwork.
That night as they were lying in bed, Belldandy felt that same pain in her chest. Keiichi, noticing her tense up asked her what was wrong.
"I felt it again, that same pain, but not nearly as strong. I hope it didn't happen again," she replied. She and Keiichi fell into a fitful sleep.
Elsewhere in Japan, a man screams while playing a computer game and tears off his visor before falling off the chair, unconscious.
by SmkViper
Proof readers/editors: Sehet Xaui, Greybolt, Gen, Eponine, Cholene
Copyright
.hackGODDESS © 2003 SmkViper
Oh My Goddess! © Kosuke Fujishima
Japanese Language Version © Kodansha Ltd.
English Language Version © AnimEigo, Pioneer, Dark Horse
Project Dot Hack © Project Hack, Bandai, TV Tokyo, Comptiq
.hackGODDESS is a fan fiction work based off the
Oh My Goddess! and Project Dot Hack universes. It
is not affiliated with Kosuke Fukishima, Kodansha Ltd.,
or Project Hack. And resemblance to any person, living
or dead, is purely coincidental.
Author's notes:
Text in are a character's thoughts.
Chapter 2: The World
"AAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGHHHHH! WHY WON'T YOU DIE?!" Urd yelled as she slashed at the monster they were fighting. Urd, Keiichi, and Belldandy had been fighting this monster for almost 10 minutes so far and it still showed no signs of dropping. In fact, the only reason they hadn't all been killed already was Belldandy using her healing magic to keep them all alive.
"How are you doing back there Bell?" asked Keiichi, "You need any mage souls?"
"I'm fine Keiichi! Just keep attacking it!"
Suddenly, the monster took a swipe at Keiichi and hit him back a few feet into the wall while he was distracted.
"Ow! Now you're going to get it!" he shouted as he rushed back into the fight.
"Maybe we shouldn't have picked such a high level area K!" yelled Urd as she dodged another attack from the monster.
"No, really? Who was it that said they could take it and we would get lots of experience!"
"Stop arguing you two, we're almost done with this dungeon, you can't quit now!" insisted Belldandy. She suddenly noticed Keiichi's low health and cast a quick healing spell to replenish it.
Keiichi dodged another attack from the monster and saw an opening. He quickly lunged in, cutting a deep gash in the side of the monster. It roared in pain and Urd quickly swung at it while it was vulnerable, but it recovered quickly and blocked the attack with its shield. The monster then quickly kicked its foot out and tripped Urd up.
"Urd!" Belldandy yelled as the monster raised its sword to attack Urd while she was on the ground. Belldandy quickly ran in and blocked the attack with her staff, straining under the force from the blow. Suddenly the monster hit her with his shield, knocking her over and inflicting some damage. By this time Urd had gotten to her feet and was facing the monster again.
"Hey you! Your momma was so ugly even one of my potions couldn't get her a date!" shouted Urd.
The monster, now enraged, swung wildly at Urd but missed by several inches. Now that its back was to Keiichi he ran in close and delivered two quick cuts to its back. He then looked over to see if Belldandy was out of the way yet, but she was out cold on the floor.
"Belldandy! Get up!" yelled Keiichi. He could tell by the health bar at the bottom of his view that her hit points (HP) were almost spent. "Urd! Belldandy's down! Do you have any more health drinks? I'm all out!"
"I didn't pick up any extras because she was supposed to do the healing, not me!"
"Damn, we're going to have to take this guy out by ourselves! Hopefully Bell will snap out of it soon," thought Keiichi. He then felt a sharp pain in his back as the monster took advantage of his distraction and beat him to the ground and his HP bar started flashing, indicating that he was almost dead. The monster, convinced that he was down for the count, turned its attention back to Urd, the only party member still standing.
Suddenly, they heard the door to the room open behind them.
"Oh great, just what we need, another monster!" thought Keiichi, looking towards the door. But instead of a monster, a girl wearing the same style of armor as Urd and carrying a large sword was standing there.
"You guys need any help?" she asked.
"What gave you that idea?" yelled back Urd as she dodged another attack and quickly hit back with one of her own, "we're having a bit of trouble here!" She quickly dodged out of range of the monster and sent a party invitation to the newcomer.
A second later, another set of stats appeared at the bottom of Keiichi's field of view, revealing that the girl's name was Mimiru, and from the amount of HP she had, she was probably a level or two above them. She then tossed a health drink to both Keiichi and Belldandy, healing their HP back to the point where they could stand again and rushed into battle, delivering a painful-looking hit to the monster they had been fighting. Belldandy slowly got up, still a little injured and cast a healing spell on herself and Keiichi to heal them back to full strength. She then quickly cast an attack and armor boosting spell on Mimiru to help out before quickly healing Urd who had also fallen rather low on HP.
With Mimiru now fighting with them the battle slowly started turning in their favor as the monster was beaten back against the wall. A final blow from Urd finished off the monster and it faded from the room.
"Whew…thanks for your help there," said Keiichi.
"No problem, I'm Mimiru!"
"I'm Keiichi, the heavy blade is Urd, and the wave master is Belldandy," he replied, pointing to each of them in turn. Belldandy smiled and Urd gave a little wave back. "We've been playing for about 3 weeks now."
"You guys were pretty lucky that I happened to come along when I did. You almost got killed, what were you thinking coming to such a high-level place so early?"
Keiichi started to say that it was Urd's idea but quickly shut up as Urd gave him a withering look.
Noticing the little exchange, Mimiru decided to change the subject. "Well, shall we go pick up our reward?" she asked, running through the door ahead of them. Keiichi, Urd and Belldandy didn't follow immediately.
"What happened Bell? Why didn't you get up?" asked Keiichi, a little worried.
"I don't know Keiichi, I fell over because of the force of the blow, but then there was a sudden pain in my chest that lasted for a few seconds. It felt like…I don't really know what it felt like…"
"I'm going to have Skuld look over this computer as soon as we finish here. I don't want any of us actually getting hurt playing. Well, we better go after Mimiru before she takes all the treasure."
While they were talking, Mimiru had walked through the doorway towards the lone treasure chest in the room, when she spotted a lone wave master in grey robes looking rather confused.
"Oh, hello there, I didn't know I had company. Hi there, I'm Mimiru."
The wave master looked at her with a distant expression.
"Is something wrong? Are you OK?" asked Mimiru, a note of concern in her voice.
He flinched slightly, then turned to face her as she walked closer.
"I hardly ever see a wave master working alone. You must be powerful! Are you?"
The wave master glared at her and pulled a small device out of his robes. He activated it, and teleported out of the room.
"Well that's a fine way to say hello! Hehe…oh well, at least he left the treasure chest." Mimiru said, pointing her sword at the chest.
"Hey Mimiru? Who were you talking to? I thought I heard voices," asked Urd.
"Hmm? Oh, I saw a wave master in here just kinda staring at the treasure chest, when I tried to talk to him, he warped out. Some people just have no manners!"
"So what's in the chest?" asked Keiichi, "you look yet?"
"Nope," replied Mimiru, "you guys walked in just as I was about to check."
They walked through the open door and to the treasure chest in the last room of the dungeon. Keiichi opened the chest and pulled out a staff, along with two rainbow cards, which would bring a nice price back in town.
"Hey Bell, think you can use this staff?" asked Keiichi, handing it too her.
Belldandy inspected the staff, and replaced her current one with the new one. "Thanks K," she replied with a smile.
"Here, this is for helping us with that monster back there," said Keiichi, handing a rainbow card to Mimiru.
"Hey, what about me?" asked Urd. "What do I get?"
"You got part of the treasure last time Urd, don't you remember? You'll get something from the next dungeon we beat together, OK?"
"Fine," replied Urd, pouting.
"Well, shall we return to town?" asked Belldandy.
They all agreed and warped back to the root town.
"Hey, I have to log off for a bit, here's my member address if you guys want to party again some time. See ya!" said Mimiru, logging out just after.
"Well, I say we hit the shops and then log out and eat, I'm starving!" Keiichi said.
"Oh, no! I forgot to get lunch going!" moaned Belldandy.
"Don't worry about it, I'm sure Skuld made something up, you know how Shinobu gets at meal times," Keiichi replied, with a grin.
The three of them visited the various shops in the area to restock on supplies and see if any new weapons or scrolls were worth getting. They then logged out of the game to eat.
"Hey Skuld? You're not suppose to really get hurt playing this game right?" asked Keiichi.
"Of course not! It's just a game, why, what happened?"
"Well, Belldandy said she felt a pain in her chest after getting hit by a monster, would you mind double checking your programming for me?"
Skuld glared at him for a second before replying. "Fine! I'll check it, but I'm doing it because Belldandy was hurt, not because you asked!" She then hooked up a portable screen and started examining the program.
"Well, I guess I better fix some lunch," said Belldandy as she headed off to the kitchen."
"Oh, Belldandy? Kami-sama called you while you were playing and wants you to call back," said Skuld.
"Really? I wonder what he could want…" Belldandy walked over to the phone and dialed his office number.
"It is I," said a voice at the other end of the line.
"Kami-sama, you wanted to talk to me?" asked Belldandy.
"Yes, did you feel anything unusual about 5 to 10 minutes ago?" he asked.
"Well…I did feel a pain in my chest, but I thought that was from the game. Is something wrong?"
"Possibly, at about that time, a young person fell into a coma while playing the game. They were rushed to a nearby hospital but are still unresponsive. After reviewing the information gathered from Yggdrasil by Peorth, it looks like the mortal's soul was transferred from their body, and into the internet. I want you, and your sisters to investigate this matter with the utmost caution. I will be sending some help in a day or two."
"Yes, Kami-sama," replied Belldandy, her voice shaking slightly.
"Oh, and put Skuld on the phone, I need her to do something for me."
"Skuld? Kami-sama would like to talk to you," called Belldandy.
Skuld walked over to the phone, a worried expression on her face. Her eyes grew wide as she listened.
"Y…yes sir, I will," she said. She was shaking as she hung up the phone and went back to work on her computer.
Belldandy went to the kitchen and started lunch. Skuld started typing on her computer.
connect Yggdrasil
Attempting to establish connection to Yggdrasil…
Connection established
You are connected to Yggdrasil at access point 154.145.875.876.235
Username: Skuld
Password:
You have successfully connected as Skuld, Goddess 1st Class, Norn of the Future
download comaantivirus
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That's Peorth for you, always trying to find an excuse to annoy people! You'd think she would eventually learn… thought Skuld as she closed the connection to Yggdrasil.
"Skuld? Are you going to join us for lunch?" asked Belldandy.
"Be right there," she replied, quickly shutting down the computer and joining the rest of the family in the dining room.
Belldandy brought out lunch and they all started eating, well, all except for Shinobu, who was playing with her food again.
"So, Belldandy, what did Kami-sama want?" asked Keiichi.
"He…there is a problem. That pain I felt in the game did not have anything to do with the game itself, but was me feeling the pain of a soul being torn out of its body and pushed onto the internet while playing that game."
"But…how is that possible?"
"I don't know, but Kami-sama wanted us to investigate the incident, He mentioned that He would send help in a day or two."
"But, we'll have to get into the game to get some clues! How can we be sure that the same thing doesn't happen to one of us?"
"That's what Kami-sama wanted to talk to me about," replied Skuld. "Peorth was able to construct an anti-virus program that prevents that from happening, based on the information Yggdrasil gathered from the incident. I installed it on our computer before coming to lunch."
"But can't you just put that program on the internet for everyone to use?" asked Keiichi.
"Well…no. It only works on computers based on Yggdrasilian technology, in other words, our computer. A normal computer wouldn't know what to do with it."
"Alright then, I guess we'll have to start investigating after lunch," said Urd.
"You mean, we'll begin investigating, it's your turn to watch Shinobu," replied Skuld with a smirk on her face.
"You wanna bet, brat?" Urd replied, lighting cracking around her fist.
"Stop it now!" said Belldandy. "Urd, you know it's your turn you watch her."
"Alright, alright," Urd replied. "C'mon kid, lets go find you something to do," she said as she picked Shinobu up. Shinobu giggled happily and waved her hands at the attention she was getting. And then Keiichi's tea froze.
After the dishes were cleaned up, Keiichi, Belldandy, and Skuld went back out into the living room where the computer was set up.
"So, how shall we start looking?" asked Keiichi.
"Obviously, we just keep playing the game, but we keep an eye out for anything suspicious and ask various people we meet if they know anything," replied Skuld.
They put the helmets on and then found themselves near the chaos gate in the root town.
"I'll page Mimiru, she might know something," said Keiichi. He waited for a few minutes, but did not get a response. "Hmm…guess we'll have to try something else for now."
"Hey! You three by the chaos gate, want to party for experience points (XP)?"
Keiichi looked up and saw a guy with short brown hair and the top half of his face painted with a blue design next to a woman with long blonde hair and a gold headband waving at them. The man looked to be a heavy blade while the woman was a wave master.
"I'm Bear and this is my friend BT. We were looking for a few extra people to go to an area with us, you guys up for it?" he asked.
"Sure," replied Keiichi after getting nods from Skuld and Belldandy. This would be a good opportunity to see if they know anything, he thought to himself.
He, Skuld, and Belldandy received invitations to Bear's party, which they accepted. A few minutes later they were standing in an area, looking for some monsters to kill.
"Over here!" said Bear, pointing at a spinning yellow disc that indicated a monster spawn point.
They all joined him and approached the disc. As they got near, it dissolved, revealing a large crab-shaped monster. Belldandy quickly cast buffing spells on each of the party members, while BT sent a few lightning bolts at the monster, most of which hit, but did little damage. Keiichi, Bear, and Skuld surrounded the monster by positioning themselves in a triangle with the monster in the middle. Bear and Keiichi attacked first, hoping to draw its attention since they had the most HP in the group. Skuld quickly sneaked up behind it while it was distracted and embedded her dagger in its back. The monster reared up and quickly swung around, throwing Skuld to the ground and causing her damage. Belldandy quickly fixed the damage with a healing spell. BT stayed back and pounded away at the monster's armor with her lighting and fireball spells.
After a few minutes, Bear stepped back and watched the rest of his party battle the monster. Seeing that they would be fine without him, he left the group to go to the spring of mist he saw nearby. The rest of the party failed to notice his departure.
Bear found the spring he was looking for and sat down to rest. A wave master in grey robes suddenly teleported in next to the spring, and after staring at it for a minute, tossed a small dagger into the pool. A large water drop with eyes and a mouth appeared above the pool where he had thrown the dagger.
"Hey, did something just fall in here?" asked the oversized drop of water. "Did you drop this golden axe? Well, did you? Or maybe it was the silver axe?"
The wave master took a swing at the drop with his staff, but it dodged the attack.
"Oh no!" it said before fading from view. Bear started laughing.
"You having fun?" Bear asked. The wave master looked over his shoulder with an annoyed look before turning to face him.
"Greetings, I'm Bear. You know I like to do that too whenever I happen to be feeling down. I can lend you a hand if you need any help, I'm always supporting newbies here and…"
The wave master warped out without a word.
"Well, he's certainly a shy one," said Bear to himself.
BT walked up behind him.
"Hey there! What's a swordsman doing abandoning our fight," she asked indignantly.
"You were victorious I assume?"
"Well, I'm worn out though."
"Shall I help you recover?" Bear asked with a smirk.
"I took care of that myself."
"Well, then there's no problem. That's how everyone gains strength around here."
"You're not being a gentleman."
"Oh, I am gentle, but not a pushover."
"There you guys are!" said Skuld, running up with Keiichi and Belldandy in tow. "What's the big idea leaving us to fight that monster alone?"
"He thought he was doing us a favor by leaving," replied BT.
"How was that supposed to be a favor?" asked Keiichi.
"You gain more experience by fighting a monster with fewer people," answered Bear.
"Well you still shouldn't have left us. Oh, by the way have you or BT ever heard of someone going into a coma because of playing this game?" asked Keiichi.
"No, I haven't," replied BT. Bear shook his head.
"Oh, well thanks anyway, shall we finish this area?"
"Wait a sec," said Bear, "what kind of question is that? There is no way someone could be hurt physically while playing a computer game!"
Keiichi, Skuld, and Belldandy glanced at each other.
"Um…we read a rumor on the BBS about someone who was admitted to the hospital while playing the game. It said they were in a coma, and we were…a little worried it might happen to us or someone we know," said Skuld Thank Kami-sama I looked at the message board yesterday!
"Oh…" replied Bear, with a skeptical look, "I guess I'll have to look at that once we're doing here."
Skuld breathed a sigh of relief.
Keiichi, Belldandy, Skuld, BT, and Bear fought several more monsters in the area and completed the dungeon over the course of a few hours before returning to the root town.
"Well thanks for the good time," said Bear. "Here's my member address if you want to meet up again."
"And here is mine, I'll see you guys later," said BT before logging out. Bear logged out soon after.
"Well, I think we should call it a night," said Belldandy. "It's too bad we didn't find out anything, but there's always tomorrow."
The three of them logged out of the game. Belldandy went to the kitchen to prepare dinner, Skuld started working on the computer, and Keiichi went to his room to work on some paperwork.
That night as they were lying in bed, Belldandy felt that same pain in her chest. Keiichi, noticing her tense up asked her what was wrong.
"I felt it again, that same pain, but not nearly as strong. I hope it didn't happen again," she replied. She and Keiichi fell into a fitful sleep.
Elsewhere in Japan, a man screams while playing a computer game and tears off his visor before falling off the chair, unconscious.