Demon Legacy

Right as they were about to enter the Mecha Battle building, Damien noticed an announcement on the door.

"It's shutting down?" Damien blinked, not sure if he was seeing correctly.

"What? Really?" Chet and Kaden both went to take a look.

The announcement detailed how the game was shutting down in five days. The game company couldn't afford to pay for most of the locations anymore, and while some locations were still profitable, they had decided to shut the game down.

Finally they thanked the players for sticking with them and told them to look forward to their next game.

Actually it was impressive it had managed to last so long in the first place. Since the

virtual world had been created, mecha games had always been unpopular. The game had even been forced to adapt a free-to-play model to sustain itself.

Initially mecha had been a key asset to mankind's journey into space. Once the human race began expanding and fought each other in wars over planets, mecha were present in every battle. But that was millions of years ago, considered to be ancient history.

Until now, mecha games had been able to survive off of the prestigious history of the mecha and the people who didn't awaken. But over time the player base for these games had only dwindled more and more. Mecha Battle was the final game left and now it was about to shut down too.

"Maybe this is for the best. If it shuts down you can't waste so much time on it." Chet gave Damien a pat on the back.

"What do you mean? You play it too." Damien was a bit bummed. He'd been playing the game for the past few months and had gotten pretty good at it. Now it truly felt like all the time he'd spent was a waste.

"Yeah but not as much as you. I still make sure to spend time on training." Chet chuckled, "How did your father respond when you came home and told him your ranking?"

"Uhhh…" Damien chose not to answer Chet's question, instead turning to Kaden, "Anyway you have to try it now. This is pretty much your last chance."

"Mhm." Kaden nodded his head in agreement. The news that the game would be shutting down actually made him more interested instead. Before he didn't really care, but now that it would be gone soon, he wanted to see it while he could.

The boys entered through the buildings door, as they stepped inside, the building functioned as a Teleportation Hub and they were immediately transported to another location.

…

Kaden found himself alone in the middle of a huge garage. A generic looking blue humanoid mecha stood in the middle, towering over him.

So tall and imposing, the mecha was certainly impressive looking. But the reality of it was that as long as someone awakened, they would be able to defeat a standard mecha like this easily.

Looking around, Kaden noticed an interface screen in his peripheral vision. Reaching out he touched one of the buttons with his hand. As a response to his action, a store page swiftly took up his view.

In front of him was a big selection of various mecha for sale. They could be bought with either real currency or the in-game currency. That was how the game had been able to keep it self afloat after switching to a free-to-play model.

Primarily the game's store targeted mecha history buffs who were willing to spend large amounts of real money on collecting the game's mecha.

The kids who couldn't awaken didn't spend nearly as much, just buying one or two mecha to practice their piloting skills with. They were also much more willing to grind for the mecha instead of outright purchasing them with real money.

This was the game's downfall. As time passed and people became less interested in mecha, fewer collectors would appear.

Kaden browsed the store for a bit, taking a look at these machines from history. While he could certainly afford to buy a few, he wasn't interested in spending money on a game that would soon be shutting down.

Shortly after closing the store, he recieved a party invitation from Damien. Clicking accept he was added to the party.

"Hey Kaden did you complete the tutorial?" Damien asked over voice chat.

"Not yet, I was taking a look at the store." Kaden figured out how to use the voice chat and replied.

"Do it real quick. After you complete it we can do some 3v3's."

"Alright." Kaden climbed into the cockpit of his mecha.

Looking around inside the cockpit, Kaden was overwhelmed by the amount of keys and buttons.

"It's really not as bad as it seems. Just focus on the two joysticks connected to your armrests." Chet tried to help him.

This was also a reason why Mecha Battle had a rough time getting more players. The control scheme was hard to master, and since most people weren't going to make a career out of mecha piloting, they didn't want to waste time on learning it.

Kaden put his hand on the left joystick and pushed it forward slowly, making the mecha take a small step.

"Good. Just do a little bit of moving around first, the tutorial won't give you any time to get ready." Chet gave him a few pointers and explained how to unsheath his weapon.

Kaden took Chet's advice and moved around the garage a bit, sheathing and unsheathing his sword a few times. It was hard to control the mecha's limbs with two joysticks, but luckily the starter mecha featured a button that the beginners could press to pull out their weapon.

He played around with the sword a bit, hacking and slashing at the air before him. It was two handed which made it easier to control than a one handed sword.

Watching Kaden get used to the control scheme, Chet was satisfied, "I think you're ready now. The tutorial's not super hard, besides, we'll be spectating in case you need help."

Since they were in a party together, Chet and Damien could spectate while Kaden completed the tutorial.

Clicking the button to start the tutorial, Kaden suddenly found himself standing in the middle of a field. Not far away from him stood a mecha who was clearly supposed to be an enemy.

Without giving him any time to breathe, the mecha sprinted towards him, striking at him with a blade.

It was only by a thin margin that Kaden was able to unsheathe his sword and parry the strike. He felt the cockpit shaking as the force of the attack bore down on him.

"Hey you blocked it, that's better than Chet's first time. He just got cut in half." Damien's laugh was transmitted over the voice chat.

"You didn't block it either." Chet coldly shut Damien down without mercy.

Kaden couldn't help but smile a bit, but he didn't have time to play around. The enemy mecha was already preparing another attack.

This time he was ready for it, swinging his two handed sword to meet the enemy's half way.

Once again the cockpit began shaking, albeit to a lesser degree than the first time.

He parried a few more attacks before he started to get used to the combat. Slowly but surely he was turning the tide into his favor.

As the enemy mecha was pushed back, it began to lose it's balance and it's parries grew weak.

Finally it stumbled and almost lost its footing, Kaden saw the opportunity and delivered a nice clean slash, severing one of the enemy mecha's arms.

With only one arm, it wasn't able to defend for long. After another few attacks, Kaden was able to deliver the finishing blow.

Upon completing the tutorial, a congratulatory message appeared in front of him and he was promptly teleported back inside the garage.

"Not bad Kaden." Chet praised. Neither him nor Damien had performed as well when they had first started playing.

"Yeah that was good. But let's play some 3v3's now, that'll be the real test." Seeing Kaden fight had pumped Damien up.

"I'm ready, let's do it." Kaden answered confidently, which he soon came to regret.

From the tutorial he had thought it would've been easy, but it was very different against real players.

The first match Kaden was cleanly hacked in two less than 10 seconds after the battle had started. Chet and Damien tried to hold on, but in a 3v2 they were ultimately defeated.

Despite the low popularity of the game, the queue times were low. The matchmaking wasn't planet specific and you could be playing against opponents from any planet within the Federation.

Thanks to this they didn't have to wait long before they found their second match. This time Kaden was able to hold on for a whole minute before he suffered the same fate. Luckily the other team had an inexperienced player too so Damien and Chet were able to clinch the win.

It took until the sixth match before he was able to get a kill for himself. With Kaden stepping up they easily got the win. At this point the teams record was 2 wins and 4 losses.

They played a few more matches before agreeing to stop, ending the day at 4 wins and 6 losses.

"I think I'm done with Mecha Battle now, it was fun while it lasted." Damien spoke as they appeared outside the Mecha Battle's building on the game street.

"You're not going to play the remaining days?" Chet was surprised, he had thought Damien would spend every hour possible on the game during it's remaining days.

Damien shook his head, "There's no point. Even if I get the mecha I was saving up for, I won't be able to use it for long anyway. Better spend my time doing something more productive."

"Maybe you can make it into the Elite class if you train for the midterms." Chet said.

"You better be careful he doesn't take your spot then Chet." Kaden joked. Chet had only barely made it into the class, if two people overtook him on the rankings, he would be pushed out of the Elite class.

"That's true." Chet laughed, not taking it too serious.

"I'm more interested in what to play tomorrow." To Damien getting into the Elite class wasn't too important, it was his father who hoped for him to achieve it. However, he would rather spend his time playing games.

"How about Combat Arena? I like that one." Kaden suggested. Of the few games he had tried so far, Combat Arena was by far his favorite. It was also a good tool for training, allowing one to practice martial arts against various types of opponents.

"Good idea." Chet said, "Perhaps that could help Damien with his training too."

Damien agreed and they all logged off to do other things.

Kaden still had to do some physical training on his own. Just because he was attending the academy now, didn't mean that he could slack off. Burcham would only be training him during the weekends now, but Kaden was still expected to push himself when he had time.

After all, virtual games couldn't replace training. They were more for combat experience and to discover flaws in your martial arts.

Kaden went downstairs to eat dinner with his family, after which he went alone to the practice room and trained for a while. He ended the day with a nice medicinal bath to replenish himself for tomorrow.