.HACK//Sandbox [Semi-DM'd, Explanation Inside]

[Red Glacier]

he stared at the code and looked it over carefully, He swore he remembered it from somewhere but it seemed so absurd. Where could he have possibly seen it? he seemed to be starring off into space as he thought  

[Kerrigan_dragon]

Gabrielle looked at the pieces fitting together with glee. "Oooo, that's so cool. I wonder what would happen if all the pieces came together. Something really good, or really bad, I imagine." She glanced over at Roc. "Are you... ok?"  

[Roland Karloseth]

" I dunno. The only thing I can say would be to find the pieces. Though this code..." Suddenly Eric had an idea. "I'm gonna try to filter this code... maybe some of this thing is irrelevant." He set to work, fingers flying on an invisible keyboard that didn't exist. Eventually he saw it.

J(*)#&$HUIH)DF@*(NDL:SW

F&(^()* #Y*&)(*&uI&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uN&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uD&(^()*#Y*&)(* &uT&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uH&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uE&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uB&(^()*#Y*&) (*&uR&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uA&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uC&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uE&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uL&(^()* #Y*&)(*&uE&(^()*#Y*&)(*&uT&(^()*#Y*&)(*&u

"Hrm..." Eric said, eyeing the message. "Find the bracelet... looks like we're already doing that."  

[Erverain]

Alex awoke with a start. He'd been working later than he had thought. The half-finished document glared at him almost accusingly. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he saved his current progress and checked the recent boards of The World. So far nothing was new, but the level of hackers and viruses, as well as new glitches kept rising up.
Alex sighed as he went to fix something for himself to eat. No sense worrying about things beyond his control. The execs at CC Corp. would get their people on it eventually. Have to keep customers happy, after all.
Eating a small meal of reheated canned goods, Alex wandered back over to his desk. That weird message still bothered him, though he thought it must just be a glitch in the mail servers.
After finishing his meal, he prepared to once again dive into The World.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Reentering the Shattered Stone Fields, Lynx double-checked his map's progress.
"Hmm, just under 50% complete, huh? Another few hours and I'll have this area scouted in its entirety."
Lynx smiled at the thought. Exploring the World was the best part of the game, at least according to him.
"All right, back to work~♫"
Setting off to the north this time, Lynx traveled for roughly fifteen minutes before he encountered a monster that he had never seen before. It looked like it had fur, but it had way too many legs, and some of them didn't look like they even belonged to that body. There were two heads, one of them like a bear but the other looked like it was borrowed from a lizard of some kind. And there was something else. The image kept fuzzing up and skipping frames. Deciding to screencap the thing and ship it off to CC Corp. later, Lynx focused on the creature. A short clicking noise and a second later, the oddity was stored in the picture bank.
Weirdly enough, now it was aware of him. Screencapping had never done that before. The thing charges. Firing off a quick message to Chaos, a player had met recently who shared his passion for the game, was all he had time for before the thing was on him.
Shifting to combat mode, Lynx engages the bugged monster.

Status: Online--Delta, Shattered Stone Field  

[Sentama Lin]

"I am not a player killer..." Heilig said the second he logged into "The World" . He realised, however, that now everyone looked at him with the most queer look. Retracting back to the Chaos Gate he shuffled his feet, laughed awkwardly, clicked the "Random Field" button on the Chaos Gate, and was transported to 'Shattered Stone Field' .

"...Well... this is nice..." He said, looking up at the scenery. It looked barren, but interesting. Walking around, he found it nice that there weren't too many monsters around, and the monsters he needed to take care of were easily disposed by a Wood spell (for, Earth and Wood were opposites). His screen began to flash static, however, and he got alarmed. Even the enemies seemed to move sporadically now once that flash happened.

From the distance he saw a weird aberration and another player, obviously seasoned, or at least he thought that because of the player's equipment. Thinking nothing of the static and the skipping of frames he dashed over to the player.  

[Erverain]

This thing was tough. Standard Wood-based skills were doing next to nothing, and the Defense of the thing was monstrous. And it hurt, too. It's Attack stat was way too high, and he still couldn't get an accurate read of the thing's level.
Quickly downing a health potion, Lynx decided to try something different.
"Okay, since Wood doesn't work, let's try some Fire! Here we go, Vak Smash!"
The sword bursts into flames as it descends, sparking off the thing's hide and catching some of the fur on fire.
"Dammit! What is this thing made of?!"

Status: Online--Delta, Shattered Stone Field  

[Sentama Lin]

Heilig saw the monster and the other attacking it with various elements. "Oh... oh... oh! Let me help!" He said as he prepared a spell of his own. "Juk Dom!" He yelled, then watched as a mass of wood and leaves and wind converged on the monster. It slowed him down, but seemed to do nothing.

Reiyaku looked at the monster's health bar and couldn't believe his eyes. "T... those aren't even numbers!" He yelled into his microphone, which, of course, the other player, Lynx, would have heard.

"Yo... uh, Lynx was it? Yeah, that's what's next to your health bar... Check out the health of this beast..." He said inbetween casting another spell. "What's up with this, this must be some crazy event... It better have a good item!"

Currently: Online -- Delta Shattered Stone Field.  

[Erverain]

Casting a quick glance at the health bar, Lynx saw the letters. Then he did a double take.
"That's ridiculous! The hell kinda glitch is this!?"
Skittering out of the attack range of the thing, Lynx prepped the next skill.
"Let's try this this time. Gan Smash!"
The health bar flickered. A tiny sliver had finally been knocked off.
"Oh God Dammit! So it's immune to Fire and Wood, and Earth does only that much!? I hope you've got some elements I don't, Wavemaster over there!"

Status: Online--Delta, Shattered Stone Field  

[Sentama Lin]

"Uh, uh, uh...!" Heilig responded, frantically searching around for his other wand. He put Wellgunde and Amor back and took out the wand he planned to sell before.

"Um, um, oh! Right... Cygnus Ex!" He cried while a summoning circle surrounded the monster. Out of thin air Cygnus, avatar of Water, coalesced in the center of the summoning circle, and with it a cyclone of hail, converging into the monster. It only managed to nick a little more from it, but not that much more.

"Tch... I think we need to run...!" He said as he prepared to summon Cygnus again.

Currently: Online -- Delta, Shattered Stone Field.  

[Erverain]

Narrowly avoiding being drenched, Lynx had an idea.
"Hold on just a sec! It's covered in water right? So let's see if this can't work! Rai Divider!"
The lightning playing on the sword nearly flew to the critter on it's own accord. Crashing against the deformed thing, the Thunder-based attack had so far proven the most effective, knocking a good 15% of the remaining health off.
"Hey, it looks like it worked! Let's keep it up!"

Status: Online--Delta, Shattered Stone Field  

[Sentama Lin]

Heilig nodded and raised his staff once more, shouting "Lanceor!" in the process. A spark of light appeared above the target, which eventually changed into Lanceor of Thunder. With one mighty boom the avatar pointed directly at the enemy and zapped it with energy. He watched the health go down even more, almost to half his health. "Gah... Yeah... this is working better!" He yelled, feeling his person for a Spirit Potion to regain his magic energy.

Status: Online -- Delta, Shattered Stone Field  

[Roland Karloseth]

Eric looked at the time. "Damn, it's getting a bit late. I'm gonna head home and probably game for a bit, Later Gabrielle. Nice to meet you Roc, hope to see you in the game sometime. My screenname is Chaos, look for me if you get the chance." He said, and excused himself.

Once he got home, he logged onto 'The World' and checked his messages. he got something from Lynx, someone he had met a while back. "Hrm, lets pay him a visit, shall we?"

Chaos walked to the Chaos gate and said "Shattered Stone field" and jumped through the gate. He then wandered around for a bit, looking around for Lynx. Eventually he found him and Heilig battling a creature he had never seen before. "My my, I seem to have an uncanny ability for running into you. Or perhaps your stalking me? And what the HELL is that thing?"  

[Erverain]

This Wavemaster must be pretty high level to solo out here. And the spells he's using aren't newbie stuff, either. Well, whatever. Lynx heard a small ding. looking out of the corner of his eye, he noticed that Chaos had logged in. Good, now we'll get a hand with this.
"Okay, that worked pretty good. Let's keep it going. Rai Drive!"
Keeping up the pace, the thing's health steadily decreased. Soon, only it was under 5%.
"Alright, time to finish this. Take this! Raio Maxima!"
Bashing the thing one last time, the blast of lightning finally dropped the sucker. But it didn't fade out like a normal monster. The drops were weird too.
"What is this? A bracelet? No, it's broken. And why is the screen bugging out whenever this is in the frame?"

Status: Online--Delta, Shattered Stone Fields  

[Roland Karloseth]

"Yet another bracelet piece huh?" Chaos said, and pulled his out to show Lynx. "Someone I know in real life also has one. I wonder how much of these things there are. In any case, no one seems to know what they do, other than glitch things."  

[Sentama Lin]

Heilig walked over to the drops and shook his head, looking at them with disinterest. A sword, a stave, some statue, some weird odds and ends; essentially the drops looked like legitimate drops, but none of the items were actually usable. He picked up the sword and the statue but found the items located not in the equipment part of his inventory but in the potions part of his inventory.

"This is really weird..." He said to himself, then he saw the bracelet, causing his eyes to grow wider. "Ah... this is really weird... I swear I keep seeing that everywhere." He said to Lynx. "This is like... um, um, oh! The third bracelet piece I've seen here.

"Personally, whatever this event is, it's probably very big if monsters are becoming this crazy..." He pondered out loud, then looked at the items. "Well... I'll just keep this sword and statue. It doesn't even look like it has any spells or anything... I hope you don't mind."

Heilig turned around and saw Chaos with them. "Huh... were you here the whole time?"

Status: Online -- Delta, Shattered Stone Fields.