Solo Cultivation in The Apocalypse

On a December morning, Hitori, who was standing on a bridge, took a glance at the babbling river below.

Standing near the iron railings, Hitori stared at a black, eleven inches wand that had a thick bottom and a pointed, slim end.

Then, Hitori turned around. "Thanks." he lifted his arm and threw his wand over the bridge with all of his strength.

His hood slid down, revealing his dark black hair. His bangs, that were covering his eyes, bounced; revealing his deep blue eyes.

Hitori's wand made an arc and reached its peak before it fell into the river, then drowned away.

Hitori stood there, staring at the horizon. He then walked down the bridge.

Hitori was surrounded by different shops, Tokyo's people, and a few houses on his way down the street.

He finally reached his destination after a few minutes of a slow walk. He took a deep breath and entered the city Vr-cade.

"Welcome." He looked at his side, a morning fairy welcomed him by bowing her tiny little head. Hitori nodded, he walked to the counter.

The lady at the counter welcomed Hitori with a smile. "Welcome, Hitori-san," she bowed her head, "the game: Monogatari, I guess?"

Hitori pulled out his card and gave her a nod. "Please." She accepted his card and asked:

"For six hours, I presume?" Hitori stared at the beautiful smile for a while. She knew Hitori would ask for the regular six hours because that was the duration of his school hours.

Hitori replied, "No, make it four for today." His unusual reply stunned the woman.

A slight frown appeared on her face and the smile faded. "Oh… sure."

The lady started checking out Hitori's game card. "Skipping school for only four hours today, sir?" she asked in a teasing tone.

The lady lifted her eyes to look at Hitori while doing her work, but Hitori looked beyond her.

He lowered his eyes and fixed on her, without saying anything. She smiled once again and processed Hitori's order.

"That will be six-hundred yen, Hitori-san." She stretched out her hand to hand Hitori his card back.

Hitori took out six hundred yen. "I do not know what you are talking about," he turned halfway after he paid his charge and grabbed his card, "I never skip the school."

Hitori turned around, took a glance at his card to check the console station's number that was marked on his card, and walked up to the console station allotted to him.

The counter lady's mouth dropped open, she was left stunned by the young man's reply. Still, her smile made its way back to her face. 'Hitori-san…' she shook her head.

Hitori sat on his chair and inserted his gaming card into a magic circle slot that had appeared on the console station.

While Hitori made himself comfortable in his seat, a magic circle appeared above his head, then a faint magic circle formed above Hitori's head.

When the logging process was done and the game's menu screen appeared, a message flashed on the magic screen.

[Inbox +100 messages]

His eye twitched. He opened his inbox with more than a hundred messages even when it had not been even a single day since he last logged in and checked his inbox.

He started going through the messages, most of them were: 'I will kill you!' or, 'fuck you, you little cheater!' or, 'he is a beta tester! I am sure of it!' or, 'damn you! Give my loot back!' or, 'You dared to kill me, hand me my equipment back.' You shitty fucker, I want my items back immediately or else I will kill you in your own house.'

Yes, most of them were death threats. Almost more than half of the messages were filled with death threats.

Hitori had won the items legally in fair and square battles. You can not blame him for being better than them at gaming.

He let out a deep sigh. He ignored all of the messages and searched for a specific someone's message.

He swiped up and swiped till his eyes fell on a message by 'Daichi the Assassin' he moved his hands quickly to the screen and opened the chat.

"Yo, my friend, ping me when you are online," the message read, "let us finish the remaining quests!"

Hitori had to log out early yesterday because the new quest, yesterday, would have taken more than an hour to complete, but he had no more than thirty minutes, so he had decided to stop for the day.

Hitori opened the keyboard and it appeared on the table's corner. He typed his message. "I am back, let us go." he waited for his friend's reply.

Daichi the Assassin was online so Hitori did not have to wait for more than a minute. "Ah, I was waiting for you, Ryu!"

"I will meet you in my room." Hitori texted.

"Sure."

Hitori closed the chat window, leaned back into his chair, closed his eyes, and clicked on the 'log-in' option.

'Monogatari: The Kingdom's Myth' game's logo appeared in Hitori's mind.

The logo represented the game's name written in bold Kanji letters with castles and soldiers in the background.

The game loaded, and soon, he was transmigrated to the game.