It was that part that they did not know had truly sealed their fates. If Virtual Reality can fully mimic reality, then how can one tell the difference between the two after a point? What if the VR world they were transported to was not attempting to be a clear fake or generated world? What if it was actually trying to mimic reality itself, but with certain things missing? The fact that everything about The Decagon was player driven, down to even the choice to play it or not, was what set many people off. Why were they still allowed to be here if they were not even playing the game in the first place? The answer was one that none of them were expecting at all.
At 00:00, or midnight, on the day when we were 'awake' at the same time, it happened.
The reveal happened.
All ten thousand and nine players were within the game, in the last place they were logged into, all at once. This included all players, even those who have given up on the game entirely. They were within the game as well, what seemed to be against their will, as whatever they were outside the game was halted. They just instantly found themselves inside The Decagon once again, as their character now. It was then that they were all addressed by the developer directly, and for the first, and possibly only time, they got told something by them within the game itself. It was not something good, as it was instead confirming what many already had a sinking feeling was true, and others were completely blindsided by the reveal.
The Decagon was not what they thought it was. It was truly a fully Virtual Reality game, where everything was player choice, even the decision to play or not. However, why was that an important choice? As it turned out, the Decagon was not just the game that they thought it claimed to be, as the true game was both online and offline as well. What they thought was reality was also just a VR replica of it, and they were never logging out of the game, merely logging out of the game aspect of it. They were inside of a game that had a gaming aspect to it the whole time, as their true avatar were not the player characters within the game portion of The Decagon, but their true player character were the ones that had entered into the world of The Decagon itself instead. They were playing a game where their player character had to literally play the game themselves.
It was a game within a game.
Game Inception.
However, that was not the only thing they were told, as they were informed of the original point of this game once again. They were dropped into the world of The Decagon game without any guidance or direction. However, they were given a goal, as that goal was they had to complete the game to end the game, yet they were never told how that would be achieved. That is at least what they thought was the case, as they were actually told they would be playing a character that was playing a character within a game called the Decagon from the start. They were also informed of the full purpose of the game as well, in the contract they signed before as well. Not reading it fully was their choice, thus they did not read the part about why there were ten thousand and nine players. Leading to what was the purpose of this seemingly random number of players? Turns out it was never a random number that was just chosen on a whim, but a purposefully chosen one that was picked and detailed as to why as well. The choice not to read that part and/or not take it seriously was now on them. It was their choice to do so, thus they were now seeing the result of that choice coming full circle now.
Nine players.
Chosen at random.
Were now certain demons.
The very Demons that they were required to beat to finish the game.
However, there was a catch here, as the nine Demons were maxed out. They had maxed levels, status, skills, passive, and everything else was as well. If it was something that could be maxed out, it was to the highest degree. No one but the player who was chosen to be one of the nine demons was made aware of their status as one. Then, everything went dark for a moment, and when it stopped, there were now nine massive kaiju size demon roaming the world, as this too was one of their abilities as demons. It was now their true form as a demon, as every player was informed during the creation of their character to create a demon as well. They were not told why or what for, however, and even those who were aware of the demon aspect of this game. Did not put two and two together that being made to pick a demon form meant there was a chance they would become it.
This selection was truly random, as they could not find out who was now one of the demons they needed to defeat to finish the game. This demoralized some players, as they learned that nine players must be defeated in order for them to finish this game. Not only that, they were all maxed in everything, while the majority of them were still, even after all this time, just barely getting out of the single digits when it came to levels.
However, that was where many of them were left unaware of the truth, as two things happened that only the nine demons were aware of. Things that they would both be very wary of and take for granted, given what those two things were. One seemed like an impossible task that was hard for the sake of being hard. The other, however, that was a balancer that they figured was put in by the developers, as they gave both the remaining ten thousand players and the nine demon players things that were unique to them. There were benefits and downsides to being one or the other, as neither was all good nor all bad. For every positive, there was a negative side to things.