Demon Legacy

At lunch they had decided that they would meet at one of the other cafés located on the Central Plaza. After meeting up they relaxed at the café for a while before heading to game street, getting ready to play.

Unlike yesterday when they played Mecha Battle, they had to stand in line to use Combat Arena's teleportation hub.

In that way the virtual world's game system was somewhat dumb, but the Federation had no intention of changing the way it worked.

They were able to make a higher profit by limiting the access to games. If a game company wanted to make their game more accessible, all they had to do was rent another teleportation hub. All that extra money would go straight into the Federation's pockets.

…

After finally getting to the front and using the teleportation hub, Kaden stood in the middle of a busy street.

In Combat Arena the players didn't get their own private room, mainly because there was no need for one.

To play the game, all you needed was your own virtual body. A subscription was only necessary if you wanted to use the matchmaking system.

However Kaden already had a year long subscription that he bought the first time he played. The price was only 200 Federation units, a tiny sum for him to pay.

He considered the investment to be well worth it. Combat Arena had become a useful training tool to him. In real life he was levels ahead of his peers, if he used his full power he could easily overpower them without techniques.

But in the virtual world, everyone was suppressed to the same level. No matter your attainments, you only had the strength of the 9th level of the Body Tempering realm.

Without his demon physique, Kaden was just as fragile as everyone else. To beat people the same age or even older, he couldn't get by without improving his martial arts.

After today, he had a few more moves to add to his collection, he couldn't wait to test them out against some strong opponents.

Opening his interface, he sent a message in the group chat he had with Chet and Damien.

"I think I'm going to do some solos first."

He wanted to train a bit on his own before heading into the more chaotic group battles.

"I'll do some too then, let us know when you're ready for 3's" Chet's reply came quickly and Damien followed up with a thumbs up.

Having told Chet and Damien his intentions, Kaden entered matchmaking and started searching for an opponent.

He hadn't been playing for long so his rank was only bronze. Luckily that was also the rank with the biggest population of players, the game found him a match in less than 30 seconds.

As soon as he found a match, his body disappeared from the middle of the street, instead reappearing on top of a square battle stage.

A formless restriction froze his body in place, preventing him from moving from his spot.

In front of him stood the opponent the system had selected, equally frozen in place.

Like Kaden he was dressed in the game's default clothing. To Kaden that meant that he was probably a beginner like himself, making it an easy battle.

"H-Hi." The opponent stammered and bowed. From the way he behaved, it was quite likely that it was his first battle in the game.

Without bothering to reply, Kaden bowed and put his attention elsewhere. Out of the corner of his eye, he was watching the countdown timer on his interface.

3…

2…

1…

As soon as the timer hit zero, the formless restriction disappeared and freed his body.

In that same instant, Kaden set off by pushing hard against the ground, sending him flying straight towards the nervous enemy.

Before the opponent could even react, Kaden was in front of him, a fist quickly growing in size as it closed in on it's target.

Desperately he brought up his hands to try and defend against the attack. But because of his hesitation and nervousness he was already too late.

The fist landed true to it's mark, easily shattering the fragile skull with 800 kg's worth of force.

On Kaden's interface a message popped up, declaring him the winner of the battle and teleporting him back onto the busy street.

In truth the battle shouldn't have been so easy, but Kaden took advantage of the opponent's lack of experience.

No one would wait for you in a battle, but most of the beginners in the bronze rank weren't aware of that.

Without wasting time, Kaden started searching for his next match.

For several matches he kept using the same tactic. None of the bronze rankers were ready for the immediate onslaught coming from him as soon as the battle began.

It was only in his sixth match that he met someone who could defend against his first attack. But Kaden kept the upper hand easily, defeating that person in only a few more moves.

He was happy to win, but also let down because he hadn't found any capable opponents to practice against.

However he was feeling warmed up now, so he sent a message in the group chat to see if the others were ready.

Both of their replies came immediately and they grouped up, using the game's party system.

"What's your record Kaden?" Chet's voice came over the party chat. He was curious how many battles Kaden would've fought in the short time frame.

"6 wins 0 losses, you?" Kaden replied.

"I'm only at 2 wins, 1 loss. I'm surprised you managed to fight so many battles so quickly. How many did you get Damien?" Chet wanted to find out if he was the only one who was so slow.

"I'm 1-1. Seems like Kaden just ended all his matches instantly." Damien was like Chet, only managing a few fights.

"Well it's easy. If you just attack as soon as the timer runs out, people are too slow to react." Only one of Kaden's fights had taken more than a few seconds. It was only because of the matchmaking time that it had taken him so long to get 6 wins.

"Easy for you maybe." Chet mumbled to himself. After being shattered by Kaden when they sparred, he had hoped that he would be able to keep up when they were both under the virtual world's suppression.

However the reality was that even with the suppression, he was still unable to keep up. Right now he couldn't even tell how big the gap between them was.

Of course Chet wasn't angry because of that. In the first place he was someone who wouldn't get upset if he was overtaken on the rankings. He was just disappointed in himself for being so far behind.