C
HRONICLE:
F
IRST
L
OGIN
Kevin Murphy
Cover Illustration © 2017, Kim Sokol
C
HAPTER 1:
S
PECIAL
D
ELIVERY
Sitting in the center of a great stone hall—lit aglow by an abundance of torches—an old man leans back, worn and decrepit, on an upraised throne. He’s draped in elegant robes of aged purple cloth, finely embroidered with an odd, but matching, pointed cap. Cobwebs cling to him where he sits, unperturbed, and camouflage his thin white hair and beard. His sedentary posture suggests that he has not moved in a very long time. He seems more dead than alive.
The old man stirs and wheezes, producing dry sounds not far from the rattles of death. After a moment, the harsh rasping of parched, unused vocal chords settles into a hoarse voice.
“What if…”
While the old one slowly speaks, he centers himself in his seat and pulls himself up to stand through great effort. The creaking of old bones and ancient wood echo through the hall. The wispily-bearded man’s hunched back straightens as he meets the challenge of the stairs downward. Each step he takes seems to invigorate him. His withered body begins to grow fuller and his hair darkens by shades as he moves toward the viewer.
At the bottom of the stairs, his body is now that of a powerful forty-something. A new glint in his eyes accompanies his mischievously upturned lips.
“What if, at your leisure,” the man exclaims while raising his left arm with measured slowness, “you could transport yourself to another world as real as your own? A world where landscapes are breathtaking, wilds are untamed, and nothing is beyond your reach?”
The man closes his fingers in front of him, as if grasping the very world of which he speaks. His arm is revivified—his form young and imposing. His voice is loud and bold.
“…A world filled with mystery and adventure? A world where you can tailor your own adventure and forge your own destiny? A world where you can leave behind an old, frail body and any malady that curtails you?”
The man casts up both of his hands and the scene of him standing in the hall erupts in a torrent of light which fades into several short glimpses of adventurous life. The man’s shadowy form, backlit by an enormous moon, stands atop a great cliffside overlooking the world beneath. Next, he is shown reading in a great library surrounded by stacks, piles, and shelves filled with hundreds of thousands of books. Then, at a celebration of insane scale, he’s drinking outside at a table of honor amid a massive feast. Finally, the man arcs electricity from his upturned left hand while hurling a ball of flame towards a crowd of charging, bloodthirsty adversaries.
The man’s visage fills the screen again. With a wide smile he asks, “What if simply being there could give you extra time?” The vivid recording then fades starkly to black where the frosty text ‘Chronicle’ appears in an operational link.
The link in that advertisement would bring you to a website selling Chronicle pods. The advertisement quickly circulated through news outlets and social media networks. Within three months, everyone in the world had seen it. That advertising wildfire was thanks in no small part to heavy media attention focused on showing off the brand-new technology that hundreds of famous online personalities simultaneously beta tested for a full, 168-hour, week. One full week. All contained within the span of only 21 hours.
Reporters, critics, streamers, and their ilk sang nothing save praises of the experience they had undertaken. Editorials, blogs, vlogs, and live streamed chats boasted of how they had stepped into a funny little pod, sat through a few diagnostics, tweaked a few character settings, and then found themselves standing in a complete and beautiful new world. The testers could do whatever they wanted. Some simply relaxed, found the spare time to read a book or two, and watched a few movies. Some drank wildly, fought vigorously, and partied continuously. Some heroically protected innocents from fiends and felons, while others robbed them and fled. The testers could act entirely without inhibitions. The one thing every tester did without fail, however, was log out after hours of playtime to discover that they had only been in the pod for minutes. That was the haymaker that would leave the testers floored and the world reeling.
The game that would change the world was released in 2062. At the time, there was nothing particularly groundbreaking about an immersive virtual reality world or even fully fledged artificial intelligence, but what Chronicle brought to the table was technology that felt significantly more advanced and incredibly more polished. When playing in a Chron pod you felt and sensed everything. Pain was limited to certain thresholds and filters could eliminate some undesired effects—but overall, sensations seemed real and, often, better. The crippled could walk, the deaf could hear, the blind could see, and those unable to smell could experience the scent of limburger cheese, to their own boon or folly.
A Non-Player Character, an artificially intelligent game denizen of Chronicle, was found to be indistinguishable from another player in a pod, except for a lack of name hovering above their head within a city and a complete lack of knowledge relating to the real world. NPCs had it alclass="underline" ambitions, insecurities, and lineages that could be traced back generations. Alone, that was already an incredible feat for a virtual world, but Chronicle’s second biggest trick was that the world would evolve naturally on its own. The hierarchical AI of Chronicle created new content, quests, and narratives as the game was played. Content was created almost instantly and checked by a command chain of separate AI entities, just as quickly, to ensure that the additions were thematic and were not entirely game breaking.
\\\\\\
“Today is the day! I’m getting my very own Chron pod!”
Corbin Landrick, an exhilarated 24-year-old mischief-prone man, couldn’t have slept the night before even if he had given it a real try. He hopped out of bed and thought about his recent reversal of fortune. The best game in the world—if one could truly call it a game—was going to be delivered to and made playable for him within the next hour.
Chronicle had been released nearly half a year ago and Corbin, living dollar-to-dollar despite an age of government-provided allowances, couldn’t dream of affording a gaming pod without taking out a loan that would ruin him. Corbin wasn’t dull, nor was he a bad judge of the state of things and, despite the state of his finances, some might even call Corbin good with money. His problem was a terrible run of misfortune.
Corbin was ambitious within his means. He had many ideas which were certainly clever if not profitable. He worked hard, chased his ambitions when he had accumulated any sum of extra money, and played games or reread a book when he was completely exhausted of resources. For the last half year, he’d put his projects aside in order to save up enough money for a Chron pod. He was still a considerable way off from his target goal when a rare offer for a refurbished pod awoke him from a post-work nap the day before—thanks to an alert from a program he had set up to monitor second-hand retailers. The purchase had nearly drained his funds dry, but he was so happy about it that he had been jittering in anticipation through the night. Now with a brand-new toy, he’d have to dine with utmost frugality if he wanted to pay his rent on time.