Last Man On Earth When There Is No Earth ?

Sector eighteen, Planet Imar nine, Astragali city, Seven

After our encounter with the two dark skinned Zesioniens we tried resuming our walk. The news about a gorgeous Zesionien lady violently rejecting a gentleman asking her out spread all over Astragali that eyes followed us wherever we went.

This was no different from Rooster but unlike that time people were wary of Lilia instead of admiring her beauty.

We happened upon a giant fountain surrounded by underground entrances. Alley explained that those were transportation stations. Basically bullet trains that transport people and goods to and from Astragali. The area was crowded, it reminded me of places were couples wait for each other when meeting for a date. There were malls built all around the area. The billboards showed advertis.e.m.e.nts for products I can't really comprehend. What caught my attention were several ship ads with the label "Stoneheart enterprise" on them, that reminded me that Lilia's family was running businesses all over the place and they just happen to own a top tier space ship trade mark.

We went to a restaurant nearby on Aley's recommendation. There we got to experience the magnificent taste of the shabboot meat, a type of sea creature caught on Imar two. Yes, the second planet from the Imar sun, and one of the planets made almost entirely of water yet is constantly burning for some reason.

It was delicious, been sometime since I last ate fish. Twelve thousand years at the least. It had a slight bitterness but tasted perfect. As for the preparation it looked well done, nothing too strange for me to want it away from the table.

I wondered why Aley knew about this restaurant or the food it serves. When I asked he said he once gathered the information for a guide he wrote specifically for human tourists. Every considerate of him.

Next I wanted to play around, something I didn't have much time to do in the past few months. My attention was drawn to a particular building that was quite large. When we went in I discovered it was a shooting range. This place allowed people to try every gun made in the known universe, target practice and some tournaments.

I did the search put what they meant by every gun in the known universe didn't include anything that was made by humans before the Aljus invasion. That unforced ehat Aley told me about nothing from the human contact and culture that thrived on earth had survived.

Funny enough they had several types of bows and arrows. While I was totally hyped by this institution since it's the closest thing to an arcade I've seen since I was a kid I was shocked to learn we have something similar on Tiga one.

Apparently Lilia trained there sometimes when I was busy with work. I remember Iris telling me about something similar before but a lot of things happened and I ended up forgetting she ever mentioned it.

Even though it's not my favorite genre I did play my fair share of FPS titles. The establishment had rooms equipped with hologram generators that give life to the targets. As for the guns you don't actually get to try a real one or replica of the gun itself, instead you are given a controller that adjusts itself to simulate the trigger and way the gun of your choice is held then as well as its weight, the design of the gun would then get pasted on it just like in AR.

After a few attempts I started to get accustomed to it. I also developed a sort of affection for some of the guns I tried and listed them down so I could order the real thing later on. Starting a collection of sci-fi weapons instead of magic swords and armor does hurt a bit but a collection is a collection. I just hope that one day I would get to add that one golden glove with all its colorful stones to my shelf.

As it appears I'm way better than Lilia at handling guns. Iris was the long range expert in their team back in school. She was the Hawkeye with the talent that made up for her lack of physical abilities.

After two to three hours Logan joined us together with Blue. We spent a few hours trying to break records in various challenges, we got to know a few people there who enjoyed the competition and only left when sun was setting.

Logan told me about another place that specializes in ship simulators. Everything from space crafts to normal air and ground vehicles with tracks from various locations all around the universe.

We decided that would be the next place we visit but for now we went back to the restaurant we had lunch in and ate dinner there after which we went back to the hotel and called it a day.

…..

The second day, this one was the second best thing that happened to me ever since waking up -Lilia is the first-.

I know I s.u.c.k.e.d at racing games but damn it was a fun ride. Instead of racing I just liked to calmly fly around and observe the track, then there are the few times I had this idea about smashing right into the ground at full speed recreating the feeling of a rollercoaster ride gone wrong.

Those simulators were an epic development. According to Logan most of them were created as tools to train soldiers, but like everything else someone saw the money that could be made with them and the idea spread all over the place.

Sadly though all of them could only simulate real experiences. Meaning there were no fictional stories or scenarios, they only have things that are based in reality, which is also fine since anything they put forward would never look real for a human from my time.

Anyways, the technology is available so all I have to do is throw some green here and there, gather the right staff and start working on my own franchises.

There is another detail when it comes to this technology. Since AR has reached this level I was wondering if VR is the same. However I was hit with the reality that anything of the sort is banned by the intergalactic union, receiving the same treatment as cybernetic implants. From what I heard anything that directly effected the brain or the body is strictly prohibited except in some cases like medical uses.

One of those exceptions is the translation chip essential for outer space travel.

Although I have my own planet and those rules don't really apply to me I can just make all the FDVRMMOs I want and not fear the consequences, but let's not risk getting trapped in Aincrad at any point in the future.

Lilia joined us later together with Blue and Aley.

Just when we started to wonder where to go next I noticed a blast of applause coming from the east. I checked the map and found out that place was a Coliseum.

Just like it sounds this is a place were people fight to the death -not really- as a test of strength in tournaments. I don't know if I should be surprised by it or not but this place was entirely built by the Stoneheart enterprise.

This type of establishment was the equivalent of horse racing back on Zesion. A lot of gambling goes on and participation in the tournaments is open for the masses, it was a good way for people to make some quick money.

As much as I wanted to take a look Lilia was against the idea. Beside being a direct relative of the owners her warrior status could grant us free entry. However, being a warrior graduate would make a really big fuss and she would probably get forced to supervise the entire event as a guest of honor, and that's when putting aside all the challenges she would receive the following day.

The sun was still up but we agreed on getting some dinner then return to the hotel. Later that night we planed to visit that one casino the manager recommended to us.