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I copied the last news bit and forwarded it to Eric. Let him give it some thought. Doubtlessly, the powers that be had long been in the know. They must have already stripped down and reassembled hundreds of virtual guinea-pig worlds, improving living conditions in our overpopulated prisons in the process. I'd love to know what had happened to those half-baked worlds floating in the middle of virtual nowhere with their digitized jailbird inhabitants. A terrible thing, come to think of it. You create a virtual version of hell, fill it with undesirables, then pull the plug on the server. Would it mean eternal hell? Or did an unplugged virtual world gradually decompose? One day we might know all the answers...

Not good. That called for some quality comfort eating. I topped a slice of toast with generous layers of butter and jam. How's that for a calorie bomb? As I crunched on it, I opened the gaming newsfeed.

Top European clan the Prophets have successfully completed their three-day raid on the Fear Plane. The total value of the auctioned loot exceeds one million gold.

Nagafen slain! For the fifth time in the history of the virtual world, this powerful dragon was killed by players of the United Asian Alliance. They then proceeded to discover Nagafen's precious egg in the dragon's nest. The raid's main question remains, which one of the Allied castles will be marked by the Black Guard's winged presence?

Many of our readers expressed their surprise when the Golden B Amero clan had their patrimonial Gold Bastion listed for sale the other day. Bidding completed yesterday at the record price of seven million gold. The same day, the clan leader explained their reasons for selling the place in an open forum. According to him, guild rangers had discovered a new Colossus-class castle in the frontier lands. The proceeds from selling Gold Bastion will go on the new castle activation, as well as paying virtual property taxes and buying up the adjacent lands.

This is Russian cluster news. It's been eight days since the Fathers began holding the entrance to the Valley of Gloom. The notorious dark clan block other players' passage to the location. The analysts suggest the discovery of a new dungeon behind the clan's actions. As you probably know, every newly discovered location acquires a unique 50% bonus to experience and loot for the whole of two weeks.

The legendary Pain Blade has been seen in possession of Les Miserables clan leader. This is the second known specimen of its kind in our sector. It's not quite clear how Les Miserables came by the artifact considering that the Blood Lord's Dungeon has never been completed once in the last month, and the vampire boss himself has never been slain.

We congratulate Yanir, combat leader of the Dark Side clan, on reaching level 240. Way to go, Yanir!

On a lighter note. A level 1 newbie has been sighted in the tutorial zone of the Korean sector. Apparently, the beginning player has spent the last three weeks assaulting a training dummy with a bokken sword. Someone needs to tell him that his feats won't affect his characteristics until he leaves the T-zone.

Whew. That was me done newswise. Just by reading it, my new world had expanded from the size of a small medieval town to the more customary size of a planet. Time to move it, anyway. As a friend of mine used to say, the smaller the distance between your ass and the couch, the less money will fit through it. So up with my ass and off we go.

First thing I popped in at Gunnar's, the vendor of all things brutal, and made him happy by finally purchasing the long-desired
 
Staff of Dark Flame. Much to my chagrin, he didn't happen to have any more yummies. That is, he had loads of cool stuff but all of it was quite commonplace—and not at all cheap.

I also visited the tailor recommended by the innkeeper. Thank God I didn't need to explain to him my need for new underpants, a T-shirt and a pair of socks. Game developers seemed to understand that wearing a steel cuirass or mithril boots on one's bare body in full immersion was not a gamer's idea of fun. So they came up with this interesting feature when you could wear two or three items per each clothing slot, but only one of them would bring bonuses and the others, marked as optional, would serve purely utilitarian functions.

Having finished with the undies, I also bought quite cheaply a few pairs of decent pants plus a couple of shirts and a lightweight suede jacket. Just for those days when I didn't feel like walking around like an armored wardrobe. I changed straight away and immediately felt a different person, way up the social ladder: not a bum any more but a noble adventurer. All I needed now was a new pair of shoes which didn't take much time in acquiring, either.

Closer to lunchtime, I popped in at the jeweler's on my way back to my room. He wanted twelve gold for the rings I had in mind: those with +5 to either Strength, Intellect or Stamina. The jeweler wasn't too forthcoming with discounts. Either he was a stingy old sort or he was paying me back for my neutral stance in the city.             

After a hearty lunch, I took a strategic position in the recliner and laid out my trophies on the table. They started to take the shape of a nice raid kit. The Staff of Dark Flame and the shield ruled it. I decided to decorate the shield with the Sky Stone—the Admins' gift—for the extra +10 to Intellect.

Now I finally had time to inspect the Gnoll King loot. I reached to the bottom of my bag:

Gnoll King Charm

Item class: Rare

Effect 1: +3% to magic resistance

Effect 2: Pain Mirror. Gives a 3 to 100 probability of reflecting the damage dealt to you toward the attacker.

Effect
 
3: Servitude Mirror. Gives a 3 to 100 probability of reflecting the damage dealt to you toward your summoned creature.

Class Restrictions: Only Death Knight

I especially liked the charm's dual purpose, in both raid and PK kits.

As for jewelry, I still needed eight rings. Yes, eight, as AlterWorld's inhabitants didn't wear rings on their thumbs. There was another cool thing about it, too. You could replace earrings with a second charm: good news for most male inhabitants who weren't looking forward to sporting some fancy palm-size half-pounders like Dragon Earrings and the like. We had none of those medieval sailors among us who used to stick a gold earring in their ear hoping for a decent burial.

Finally, bracelets. I had to admit I'd overgrown the +1 to Strength ones I'd farmed from the gnolls.

Having said that, why hadn't I thought about the auctions? They should have a massive choice—granted, it was limited to only City of Light players, but they counted tens of thousands. Now. Where's that search panel?

I opened the sales interface.

Items available: 141.901

Oops. A bit over the top. I limited my search to "
Buy Now
!" items. I had no time for bidding gamble.

Items available: 103.811

That's better. I limited my search to items between 10 and 2000 gold.

Items available: 28.514             

Right. This was something I could work with. Any other way I could trim it down further? After a thought, I limited the search to Death Knight items.

Items available: 354

That was it. I decided to weed it down even further. Show objects: gauntlets.

Items available: 16

Good. Now I could examine each lot personally. No hurry.

They had some interesting stuff there. Nothing too uber: most of the unique, rare and epic items were soulbound by definition. Those that weren't, cost a fortune and even then you had to put your name on a waiting list. This world had far more millionaires than available epics.

My problem was also in my particular leveling pattern. Most of the stuff here was meant for a classic semi-tank. Finally, I found something worth my while:

Gauntlets of the Soul Catcher

Item class: Rare

Effect
 
1: +34 to Armor, +11 to Intellect, +11 to Spirit, +11 to Constitution

Effect 2: Increases chances of dropping Soul Stones 7%.

Class restrictions: Death Knight

Price: 650 gold

That was just too good. And too expensive. I had to decide how much I could afford to splurge. I had, in total, just under 2700 in gold. I had to set aside five hundred at least as a reserve fund, to pay the rent and for emergencies. Ideally, I'd have to aim for ten times as much, twenty even. Just in case my grave somehow decayed with all my stuff in it: what was I supposed to do at level 100 in my underpants? I had to set aside another thousand for any unmissables—plenty of them around when you needed to have available cash there and then. Okay. I had twelve hundred to play with.

Having decided on the tactics, I still had to consider my strategy. Was it better to invest into mid-range items like that King loot? It sure would last me another thirty levels. Or should I aim for some choice top items like those gauntlets that would serve me indefinitely?

Finally, I decided not to bother with the mid-range. It was better to buy a few top things I really liked. For the rest, I'd have to make do with inexpensive gear, replacing it gradually with rare and unique items.

I pressed
 
Buy
. Immediately, messages started popping up, confirming the bank transfer. I ignored them and opened my bag, impatient. Oh, the beauty of teleporting. I couldn't take my eyes off the opalescent black armor. On one hand, sixty-five bucks for a collectable is nothing to sniff at. But on the other... If any of these things—like these gauntlets, for instance, with their intellect and spirit bonuses, damage absorption and rare items search—if any of them were available in real life, how many hundreds of millions would they cost? And in any case, was this world any different for me from the real one? The quick answer was: no, it wasn't.

I decided to look for some shoes.

Items available: 22

I looked through them. Nothing I really liked. How about a helmet?

Items available: 26

The first one definitely was meant for some tank, not for me. But the next one... was I having delusions of grandeur?

Crown of the Overlord

Item class: Unique

Effect
 
1: no extra characteristics

Effect
 
2: When worn, adds +3 to a summoned creature's level

Effect
 
3: Renders all the undead such as skeletons, zombies, spirits, etc. neutral and unable to attack first. Halves their aggro radius in case of the wearer's attack.

Class restrictions: Death Knight, Necromancer

Price: 1450 gold

Now that was the closest thing to a cheat. The item had been listed thirty minutes ago. It would be gone any moment. Every fiber of my gaming addict's being could sense the crown's concealed potential. I could only explain its moderate price by its class restriction, especially here in the heart of the Lands of Light. Dammit. This buy could crush all my financial schedule. Or could I maybe write it off under Emergencies? My inner greedy pig nodded enthusiastically. Could it be that
 
my portable mini vermin was prepared to part with gold? Well, then I simply had to have it.

The next moment, the crown took pride of place on the table. It looked the part. With something like this, I could rule the world. Joke.

I had six hundred left on my balance. Time to switch to economy mode and check out jewelry. Should I look at craft items first? Why not. It couldn't be that expensive.

I sorted the items by price and parameters. This looked like a curiously interesting object:

Distraction Ring

Item class: Craft, Uncommon

Effect 1: +1 to Armor, +1 to Strength, +1 to Agility, +1 to Intellect, +1 to Spirit, +1 to Constitution

Effect
 
2: +1% to all types of magic resistance

Class restrictions: none

Price: 14 gold

The offer had a note from the owner.

My wholesale leveling of jewelry allows me to sell most items at cost price. PM me if you're looking for something in particular.

That was pretty logical. Those players who leveled craft skills were obliged to produce hundreds and thousands of items. What were they supposed to do with them if the market was oversaturated and you didn't have a hope in hell of getting a fair price from a shop? So everyone was trying to at least get their money back.

After some thought, I ordered eight of them. For that money, a very decent offer indeed. Then I opened the vendor's selling list. There they were, just as I thought: Distraction Bracelets, identical to the rings, only belonging in a different slot. They cost a gold more. I picked up a couple, then started looking for a charm. Having said that, the vendor had had enough from me. I opened other people's lists and stopped my choice at an unimpressive Knowledge Charm: +3 to both Spirit and Intellect. Cheap and cheerful.

I filled the rest of the slots with inexpensive and unimpressive items. I'd have to replace them all gradually at a later date. At the moment, I was dangerously close to a financial collapse.

Having said that, the idea of choosing myself a profession had lingered. It was no good throwing punches around for a living. I needed something more pacifist, something that would bring in money as well as self-enlightenment. I gave it a minute's thought and remembered a few recent scenes: the exorbitant potion prices and the shop owner's transfixed stare when I'd offered him some magic dust. I looked it up in the Wiki. So, I was right—the dust made the basic magic ingredient in most elixirs. And I was basically a walking factory of the above which made my offers very interesting. Naturally, I couldn't dream of competing with clan crafters with their hundreds of hired workers. But their produce hit the open market but rarely: crafters mainly only catered to their own clan's consumption. I dreaded to even contemplate the costs of a top clan's one-day raid.