Parking her motorcycle in one of North Ambassador School's designated zones, Aiko took a deep breath, steeling herself for the onsught of fake smiles and hollow greetings she knew awaited her inside. As she walked through the front doors, the familiar cacophony of voices bombarded her, each one vying for her attention and favour.

  "Good morning, Miss Aiko. How have you been?" A girl said, trying to curry favour by pretending to be her friend.

  "Have you eaten yet? Would you like me to buy some breakfast for you?" A boy said, pushing to the front of the crowd, trying to get Aiko indebted to him.

  More students tried various methods of favour currying as Aiko moved past. Moving past her fellow students, she imagined sticking a gun into the mouth of every one of them. Pulling the trigger, she could vividly imagine the spilling of blood and brains, before suppressing a smirk that was about to creep onto her face. Taking a moment to stop her racing heartbeat, she focused her thoughts on something less brutal.

  'Snap out of it Aiko. You promised to stop thinking like this.' Aiko thought as she remembered her New Year resolution. 'First lesson was maths wasn't it?'

  Pulling her timetable out of her inner pocket, she examined today's lessons.

  'Maths, geography, double PE, computer science, history.' Aiko read. ' What a pain.'

  In her geography css, for whatever reason, some students were still struggling with basic geography, so the teacher, Mr Smite, went through elementary school knowledge.

  "Teacher! What is this pnet called? Where are we?" One of the three musketeers of idiocy asked.

  'These idiots. They don't know shit.' Aiko thought as she zoned out. 'This is the 6th time they asked about this now. They better not do this in History as well.'

  "This pnet is called Terra. There are a total of 5 countries. North America, South America, Europe, Asia and Oceania. This country is Europe." Mr Smite expined without patience, "There used to be 195 countries, but they united and became 5 giant countries. If you want to know why, ask your history teacher."

  Feeling drowsy, Aiko id her head on the table. Her eyelids felt heavy as her vision slowly decreased before it disappeared completely as she fell asleep.

  'Fucking stupid idiots. The entire lesson was wasted expining the elementary stuff.' Aiko thought in anger. Directing her attention forward, she spotted the three idiots from before. 'Fucking bitches think they're all tough when they're all bark and no bite.'

  "Hey pretty." One of the students approached Aiko, obviously high on some Fre, a highly addictive drug that made the brain release inhuman levels of dopamine, and started hitting on her. "Wanna go out with me, beautiful?"

  "Hey dude, that's the rich girl, Jude might as well have won the jackpot if she says yes." One of Jude's friends, who is also high, whispered to another.

  "Jude, you don't wanna mess with her." Jude's only sober friend walked up to him and warned him. "She's fucked up in the head. You really don't wanna mess with her. I heard that she beat up 5 guys with her bare fists."

  "Bah. That was only once." Jude replied before turning his attention back to Aiko, only to be met by her fist.

  Using the moment of shock of having been punched in the face, Aiko grabbed one of Jude's outstretched arms and pushed it behind his back. Restrained, Aiko kicked the back of his knee and forced him to the ground. Flexing her wrist, a paper cutter shot out of her bzer sleeve and into her hand. Stabbing it to the ground right in front of Jude's face, she carved out "NO" before retrieving the paper cutter and leaving for break.

  'That better have been a good enough warning for everyone to leave me alone.' Aiko thought as she walked away, 'But my god was that fun. Gotta do this again sometime.'

  'THESE FUCKING IDIOTS AGAIN!' Aiko gnashed her teeth in anger. 'CLEARLY THEY HAVEN'T LEARNT FROM BEFORE.'

  In History css, the three horsemen of stupidity from before, once again, asked the History teacher, Ms Kennedy, about basic elementary school knowledge.

  "Why did all 195 countries decide to unite into 5 big countries? What is NCD?" Jude asked.

  "These guys again." Ms Kennedy muttered. Taking a deep breath, Ms Kennedy expined, "NCD is the currency that took over the USD, the currency with the biggest value in 1995. The countries decided to unite because there was a global riot about unity being better than separation. The higher-ups of all the countries, begrudgingly, agreed to join with each other to create the 5 great countries today: North America, South America, Asia, Europe and Oceania."

  Bored to death, Aiko decided to sleep again.

  'Not like anyone will care about my education anyway.' Aiko thought as her consciousness slipped.

  Riding her motorcycle home, Aiko plugged in some earphones and pyed the Kill Zone trailer.

  "Welcome to the Kill Zone. The New and Upcoming Virtual Reality FPS Game. Are you ready to survive the harsh weather on Vulcanis, or the aquatic surface of Aquaera? What about the icy surface of Gcia? Fight for the Refulgence in an organised army, or the Eventide freedom fighters. Who will you fight for? " The short trailer broadcasted to her earphones as she kept half her attention on the road. Stopping at a red light, Aiko took a quick peek at her phone. On her phone was the end screen of the trailer, which said that the game's server would officially open on 20.8.2026.

  'Tonight then.' Aiko thought. 'Tonight the servers open.'

  Arriving home, Aiko pced her backpack beside the wall and her helmet on her desk. Opening her wardrobe, she wore yesterday's white blouse and bck pants. Cracking the lock on her chest, Aiko lifted the VR headset, Kill Zone copy and Glock 17 out of the sea of gun replicas. Pcing the three items, a notepad and pen into a bck duffle bag, taking extra care in hiding her Glock, she donned a bck fabric face mask and grabbed her helmet before leaving the house.

  Riding her bike, she arrived at a poorer side of Westfield City, the slums. Walking down a byrinth of alleyways, Aiko arrived in front of a nightclub, called Kick Out. Walking in, Aiko took out her notepad and greeted the bouncer. The bouncer was a male with bck hair styled in an afro and green eyes. Wearing a bck shirt and white tie with a P250 holstered on his right hip.

  #Hi James.#

  "Long time no see, Ms Ataraxia." James greeted her back, calling her Ataraxia because she introduced herself with a fake name to everyone. "Please hand over your bag for a security check."

  Handing over her bag, Aiko wrote down #I have a loaded Glock 17 in the bag for self-defence.#

  "Alright," James said. "Considering how long you have been coming here, I will permit you to bring it with you."

  #Thanks James.# Aiko wrote before she walked in and greeted the bartender, who worked as this establishment's receptionist on the side as well. A woman with blue hair and eyes wearing a solid bck, long-sleeved top, bck trousers and non-slip shoes was tending to customers from behind the bar.

  #Hi Sydney.#

  "Oh hello, Ataraxia. It's been a while since I st saw you." Aiko's usually empty eyes regained a glimmer of light as her best friend greeted her.

  #Do you have a private room?#

  "What for?" Sydney replied as she cleaned some cups.

  #Immersive VR gaming.#

  "Is it the new Kill Zone?" Sydney asked, with lightbulbs going off in her eyes.

  #Yes.#

  "Send me your user info when you finish setting it up." Sydney said, "We have got to py together."

  #Sure, now about that room.#

  "Ah right. Go to room 10." Sydney said.

  As Aiko walked past, Sydney leaned forward and asked in a whisper, "Is this to hide from your parents, Aiko?"

  Doing a slight nod in response, Aiko continued her journey to room 10, not noticing Sydney's face grimacing with slight anger.

  *CREAK*

  Opening the door to room 10, a pin bed greeted Aiko. Sitting on the bed, Aiko pced her duffle bag and biker helmet at the foot of the bed. Opening it, she brought out her VR headset, still in its box, the copy of Kill Zone and her pistol. Pcing her pistol in her pocket, Aiko opened the box of the VR headset. The VR headset was a matte bck, with traces of blue that glowed, like electricity was flowing throughout the crevices. Two straps went around her head to secure it in pce, with another strap going on top to secure the headset tightly. At the top of the visor, a slot where the disc of a game could be inserted id in wait. Cracking open the Copy of Kill Zone, Aiko gently grabbed the disc of the game and inserted it into the headset before pcing it on.

  "Please acknowledge that you are ready to py." The VR headset said in a monotone AI voice.

  Seeing no button or prompt other than, 'Please say some variation of "Yes" to start your immersive dive', popped up to show her acknowledgement, Aiko assumed the worse.

  'Vocally? Well fuck.' Aiko thought in despair and frustration at her ck of voicebox, and, therefore, ck of voice.