Chapter 3: The same things, but different day.

After taking the same route back home from work, Ace drops into his bed feeling tired from a long day at work. He checks the time on his phone, looking at it; at 4:37 pm, thinking about what he should do for dinner.

As he gets up and checks the freezer on what to cook, he texts his sister Isla with a suggestion for dinner, but that suggestion was useless because all she texted was.

“Whatever you want to make, I am too tired to think after the gym.”

Knowing that he thought might happen he decided just to make fried rice with seafood.

After taking care of the dishes and making dinner, Isla finally arrives home with her Zane.

“Oh hi, I finished making dinner, both of you can eat anytime.”

Both replied with the same tone of “Oh hi.”

“Okay, we will both eat later, after we rested up a bit.”

As Isla said that looking tired, Ace teased her by pinching her cheeks. But she doesn’t like for her cheeks to be pinched. Looking at him annoyed.

“Stop, not my face, I still get pimples when you do those kinds of things.”

“Sure, Sure” Ace walks back to his room, before getting stopped by Isla’s attention.

“Also, just to let you know, Mom and Dad are coming back to visit for the weekend next week.” Reminding him about it.

“Yeah, I know they told me that yesterday.” Slightly annoyed about it that they are coming to visit next week. But there was nothing he could do about it considering they decide to visit whenever they want.

Finally, into his room, feeling slightly irritated about the fact they are visiting, looking at the time again seeing it is 6:45 pm. Changing his mindset puts him into his computer and turns on to go back into Sword X Hearts made him think.

It is crazy it has been a year since this game came out, I never thought I would play this game so much since Monster H.

Logging in to where he was last place was at, had him checked his login rewards for the anniversary event. Noticing that his friend list shows that his friend Axel known as ArcAngel is online, personally messaging him.

AceYuki: “Yo, how’s your anniversary quest going? It is the last day for it.”

ArcAngel: “Almost done heading to the last dungeon for the quest, want to party up”

AceYuki: “Sure, it can be a nice warm-up for me”

ArcAngel: “You say that you probably completed the quest already, but here is your invite.”

ArcAngel invited you to party up.

AceYuki: “Yes, I did but I completed it on hard difficulty because I want the bonus rewards. I bet you are doing it on normal.”

ArcAngel: “Shut up, I am not as hardcore on this game as you.”

As Ace accepted the invite from Axel, they continue their talk as normal as it can be considering they have been childhood friends for a long time. Share each other a bit of their work, new games and events coming out in the next month, and any discussion of animes we watched.

Considering that Axel is the only one left of the many friends that Ace had in the past that get along well. Thinking about it, Ace had talked and hung out with a lot of people but as he grew older that kind of friendship, fazed out for both him and others. He wished that he would have continued to stay friends with them but life goes on.

Nearly into the final boss of the dungeon, a player online notification pops up in his friend’s feed.

Hikari is online

AceYuki: “One second, let me make a quick message to someone before we fight the boss.”

ArcAngel: “Sure, I’ll buff myself and recover a bit.”

Ace opens a private message with his player friend, Hikari.

AceYuki: “Ohayo, Hikari, thanks for your message this morning, it pushed me into finishing the boss.”

Hikari: “No problem 😊 glad to be an encouragement of your fight, btw congrats on the hard-fought battle, it was close, at least you didn’t choke like you always do lmao.”

AceYuki: “Yeah, thanks, hey, I don’t choke on fights that often, only when it counts lmao. I am heading to a boss fight with my friend talk to you in a bit.”

Hikari: “Sure you do, glhf.”

Ace minimizes Hikari’s chat window and resumes his chat with Axel.

ArcAngel: “Took you long enough, let’s get this done. There are some other grinding I want to get done before logging off.”

AceYuki: “Sure, I somewhat remember its attack patterns so it’s not too bad of a fight.”

Ace and Axel open up to the boss’s room and began their conquest of defeating the boss, it took some time to overcome the first couple of bars because Axel learning the boss’s attack patterns but in the last half of the fight, it was smooth sailing despite the buff the boss gets when more than one players are facing against the boss.

Once they completed Axel’s quest, they returned to the town and claim the rewards for their completion, despite Ace helping with the quest his rewards were only just gold currency and weapon enhancement materials, but he didn’t mind it because all he was interested in was fighting.

In the private chat window with Axel:

ArcAngel: “Thanks for the help, I got to prep for work tomorrow then I am going to grind out a bit before sleeping “

AceYuki: “You’re welcome, okay, let me know if you get extra monster material drops for my sword, and I’ll trade you for something.”

ArcAngel: “Really…? I’ll hold on to you for that. Also are we good to hang out for the Ani celebration event in Victoria this weekend?”

AceYuki: “Sure, I already book my days off for it, We’ll sort out the details the day before the event.”

ArcAngel: “Ok, see you later then.”

AceYuki: “Talk to you later.”

Axel’s character went AFK, and Ace walked around the main town to see what shops are refreshed for their items. As he went around all the usual stops, he gets greeted by other players and gestured a wave back considering Ace’s character is one of the highest-ranked swordsmen in the server granted he is only 95th but other players respect their ability,

A private message pop up from Hikari,

Hikari: “Oi, look behind you!”

AceYuki: “Hm?”

Ace turns around and looks at the player character Hikari, a cute character design with white and violet combination with her light body armor and skirt for fast movements.

Hikari punches AceYuki, prompting a duel notification for Ace to decide. Ace smiled and realized Hikari wants to have a duel again.

Hikari: “Want to have a go? I think I have gotten a bit stronger.”

AceYuki: “Sure, but I have upgraded a bit since our last one.”

Ace accepted the duel and the two were teleported into an arena for dueling, having that occurred other players showed up to watch. Seeing in public chat, that they were saying,

“They are at it again.”

“Who do you think is going to win?”

“It has been 2 weeks since their last one.”

Ace and Hikari looked around the arena, amazes them how people show up to watch their duels.

Hikari: “Why do we always draw a crowd to watch us?”

AceYuki: “I don’t know maybe we have been dueling for a while that people started to notice.”

Hikari: “I guess, but that doesn’t change, maybe you’ll choke under pressure. LMAO”

AceYuki: “Sure, sure. Like you are one to talk you haven’t beat me once.”

A silence in the chat made Hikari ready for the fight and the same goes for Ace. A countdown timer starts counting down from 5 seconds. Ace looks at Hikari who is wielding a lance that looks like it was from a boss drop. Analyzing their armor, weapons, and stance.

Once it hit zero, they charge towards each other.