Morgana and I immediately slammed ourselves back to back, mom and dad being absolutely quiet was always bad… like ambush on the highway bad. Kès immediately put himself on the defensive too, he’d seen too many of these surprises to be caught unaware. Morgana and I did a quick, silent game of rock-paper-scissors to see who would have to make the first move. I lost, so I stepped forward just a bit and called out.

“Mom? Dad? We’re home.”

There was no response. So we moved forward as a group slowly, making our way into the living room, we checked corners and cleared rooms as best we could. It was like an improvised SWAT team. We picked up Kès’ backpack and made our way toward our room, no surprises yet…

We closed the door to our room and broke out the homework since we figured there would be school tomorrow. That was, until my phone went off telling me I had a new email. Looking at the sender address, I saw it was the school. I opened it up to see what was going on, and…

“School’s closed for a few days guys, somebody blew up the gym and toilets today. Do you guys think it was the same guy who burned the computer lab down?” I called over to Kès and Morgana who were working through Morgana’s geometry homework.

They both poked their heads up at that. “A few days? That’s quick work if they really damaged everything… unless they’re skimping again.” Morgana said.

“Oh, they are most certainly skimping.” Kès responded, pointing his pencil at Morgana.

We all had a quick laugh, and then I heard… well I think it was our dad having come out of his study. I made eye contact with Morgana, she nodded and got up to go to the door. As luck would have it, just as she was about to open the door, there came a knock from the other side.

As Morgana opened the door, our dad stuck his head in. Artemis Pendris, our father, was a very willowy figure. Standing about six foot even, and weighing just about 140 pounds, he was the epitome of “skinny geek.” From his shaggy, sandy blonde hair and wire-rim glasses to his faded band tee and ragged jeans, he looked like a nerd from the nineties who had just discovered grunge music. Anyone who met him though remarked about his intellect and natural charm.

“Hey kids, I forgot to say happy birthday this morning before you left. My bad. But to make it up to you, I’ve gotten you advanced access to this game I helped do graphics for. Some fancy school asked me to do a few web seminars for the game design crew and when they heard I had teens, they threw in a bonus redemption code and access to their dedicated server to prep for a tournament they’re holding. Kès, I know it’s not your birthday, but I got you an access code too… but yours doesn’t come with a gear voucher like Arthur and Morgana’s does. Sorry big guy.” Dad said, his voice sounding as carefree and nonchalant as ever.

“What’s the game called?” I asked, getting a minor sense of déjà vu.

“Dad paused for a moment, “I think it’s like castle legion or something like that. It was named after the school, and it had kind of a fantasy motif. Maybe the name was actually in Latin, and I’m not your mom, so languages go a little over my head.”

“Was it Castrum Legio?” Kès asked, referring back to the game we tried earlier today.

“That was it! Yeah, that’s the game. Wait, how’d you hear about that?” Dad looked confused.

“We got to try it out this morning, actually. Norm had gotten a machine that was designed for the tournament this coming weekend.” Morgana piped up.

“Huh. Ok.” Dad said and fished out three scraps of paper from his pocket.

On each paper was a QR code, a name, and a logo for the game. I popped out my phone again and opened the QR reader. A quick picture and I was directed to a website. I hit the option to send the link to my laptop and put the phone away.

“Oh, hey, have you seen mom?” I asked, dawning on me that I hadn’t seen her yet.

“Yeah, she’s in her study. Her agent called while you were out, something about moving up the timetables on her new novel. She’s finishing up her writing so her editor can take care of his part.” Dad said, tapping his finger on his face while looking ponderously up at the ceiling.

That actually made sense. I remember mom mentioning her new novel a few times last month, but if they had to move up her deadlines enough that she’d lock herself away, it had to be serious. She normally spaced her books a year and six months apart, kind of a safety net thing. It kept her from needing to lock herself away and beat out a chapter a week… so this must me one hell of a moving up.

“Well, I’ve gone ahead and scheduled a pizza delivery this evening since your mom is swamped and I’m not much of a cook,” dad said, “and I got an email saying you kids are off for the week, so I have to ask. Was this a decent birthday?”

Morgana and I said yes, it had been a decent day all things considered.

“Cool, then I’m going to head over to my gaming group for a few hours. I know you two don’t wanna hang with your old man too much, might get nerd on you or something. Pizza’s paid for, just save one for your mom and I for when she comes out of her cavern. Love ya kids.” Dad said, slapping the door frame and turning to go.

We all echoed his sentiment and thanked him. For being a huge nerd, he was really good about knowing what was going on around him. He honestly was a really cool guy, for a dad.

We decided to know out our homework anyway, and when we managed to get everything done there came a ring from the doorbell. I got up and headed down the stairs to get the door, I figured there was no harm in getting the pizza myself. Except, there were two pizza guys… and four bags. I held up my finger and moved to the stairs.

“Guys, I kind of need some help down here. Dad went overboard.” I called up.

Kès and Morgana came down in a hurry and helped me carry everything in and set it on the table. The delivery guys laughed a bit and told us they had never had such a huge delivery, but that they had fun trying to figure out what crazy person would order so much food. We made sure to tip them a decent chunk of change and thanked them for their services.

Once they left, Kès and Morgana brought down all of our laptops and chargers. We figured we would dive in on the early access we had been granted. I cleared enough room at the table for all of us to sit at. As we got plugged in and set up, I remembered we also had those disks from Norm. So I fished mine out and started installing them on my laptop, why not have that running in the background while we test out this new thing?

“Hey, so… is this technically cheating? I mean we’re getting bonus items AND some free time to get experience points before anybody else… I can’t help but feel that we’re kind of cheating our opponents.” Kès said, ever the voice of reason.

“Look Kès, I get where you’re coming from, but let’s be real.” Morgana started, “We may have a few extra hours, but there are people out there who stay up for days at a time ploughing through games, and who knows, there may be bonuses made for those willing to drop coin. Pay-to-win kind of stuff, like in big MMOs. If we swear not to make any in-game purchases, and use only the items we get from these codes as our gear for the tournament, we’ll likely be on even footing.”

I couldn’t really disagree with Morgana’s analysis, but at the same time, I could also see Kès’ point. If dad were here, he’d be able to tell us if Morgana was right or wrong. Too many variables, not enough information. Might as well get on with it anyway.

“Look, we’re probably not the only ones with this kind of an edge. Plus, isn’t it smartest to take advantage of any boons you’ve been given? Something about gift horses and eating people’s faces?” I asked, momentarily forgetting the old idiom.

Kès nodded at that and shrugged. We all opened the link from our respective QR codes and opened the install file. It took a little to download, but eventually we received a little notice that said the client installer was finished and we could open it up.

The splash page for logging in simply asked us to insert our character sheets, we assumed that meant the flash drives, so we plugged them in and the screen changed to start rendering a location. We all appeared in a small village area, like you would see in just about every MMO out there. Then a prompt appeared above the characters.

Welcome to Castrum Legio, the first game of its kind. In this world you’ll strengthen your avatars for the fights ahead. While your avatar may get better, this doesn’t mean you’ll be able to beat any opponent if you can’t make yourself better. Becoming the greatest you that you can be is our goal, and this game aims to achieve that.

You’ll face countless hardships as we continue to push out new versions and updates, and for that reason we invite you to push yourselves. Every stride, every level, every new vista and valley, you will become greater. For the at home and on campus portion of this game, you’ll be using the WASD keys and your mouse or touchpad. Skills will be mapped to the number pad or the bottom row of letter keys based on your keyboard.

Strive for greatness, overcome your enemies, and most of all, enjoy your time with Castrum Legio. E legionibus lecti profligate vitae.

It read like a basic tutorial message, which was nice I guess, but something felt off. What did it mean that a strong avatar didn’t mean you’d be able to beat an opponent? Isn’t the whole point of raising your level meant to be a measure of your strength?

Another box popped up asking me to confirm my phone number and… it wants me to snap a photo of the logo on the paper. Apparently, the logo was the extra item code for my gear, and when scanned I got a notice that I had new gear in my inventory. And just before I could open the inventory, I got another pop up.

Thanks for playing the test version of Castrum Legio. As a token of our thanks for helping your local game shop, please accept these items!

As we can see, your win/loss record also shows you won your test match! Take this item too!

And my inventory flashed open. Inside were four item boxes, each one needed to be opened in order to claim the reward. As I opened the first one, it popped a new blade into my equipped weapon slot. The next two outfitted my character with new armor. The last one gave me an option: a second sword that would grant my PC the ability to learn twin-blade skills and allow a second weapon equipped, or an accessory that quintupled my spell damage based on my HP going below half. I couldn’t decide, so I clicked to save the item for a later time.

“Hey guys, let’s form up a team. It shows we can have 4 members total, but for now the three of us should be fine.” Morgana said, her eagerness to get going showing through.

For someone so eager to hate on the fantasy genre, why is she so eager to play this game?