As I waited for the instance to pop, I looked around the crowded town center. LoW was a well-known tourist game world which means that most of the players around me were tourists like me. We buy a pa.s.s for a week or a month to join in the action and then leave for other game worlds. Then I heard a loud explosion above me. Everyone looked up and I saw numerous players flying in the air attacking the large airs.h.i.+p. Cheers erupted around me and I asked one of the nearby players what was going on.

He told me it was a public raid and the large airs.h.i.+p was the public raid boss. One of the regular players even 'helpfully' mentioned that the attackers were probably doing the main game world quest line which was about a group of small rebel groups taking down a conspiracy to rule over the world. As I was hearing the explanation, two players in the town center took to the air to join in the fun. One was wearing a steam jetpack and armed with a steam-powered rifle while the other was riding a metal horse with thrusters on its' hoofs. The flying horseman was dressed like a colonial officer with sword and pistol. I wasn't optimistic about their chances of survival as the airs.h.i.+p was fighting back. Machine guns on the airs.h.i.+p began firing and small explosive-laden clockwork drones flew out of the airs.h.i.+p to hara.s.s the attackers. Several players in steam-powered gliders and rotors backpacks immediately swerved to meet the mobs while the heavy hitters in their steam-powered fighter planes and clockwork birds continued their attacks on the airs.h.i.+p. I quickly reconsidered my opinion as bullets, steam bombs and even lasers flew through the air. Some of the players were even armed with ray guns! I knew there were a numbers of hardcore lovers of the game of course but I always thought these are mostly historical actors and cosplayers. It was as if the players above me were determined to prove me wrong.

It was one of those moments when being wrong was a good thing as I cheered along with everyone in the town center when a ma.s.sive explosion erupted on the airs.h.i.+p. More players in the town center flew up to join the fight. More explosions erupted on the airs.h.i.+p and then the airs.h.i.+p began to change. Even without the commentary from the regular LoW players, I knew that the boss must have changed to its second form.

More drones were released but these were flying rotors and they were clearly quicker than the earlier explosive drones. The airs.h.i.+p also began shooting steam-powered cannonb.a.l.l.s that had some sort of limited heat-seeking sensors on them. In a show of how prepared the raid party was, some of the players began releasing fireworks to mess with the cannonb.a.l.l.s and the sky began to light up with colors. It was like watching the annual fireworks display of SEAL Foundation Day. As beautiful as it was to watch, the action above me was getting serious. The players were still doing damage but now it wasn't a one-sided fight as several players were being shot down and the airs.h.i.+p began releasing even more rotor drones to defend itself.

I stood there riveted to the battle for five whole minutes when the PvP instance popped. The see-saw battle above me was still going on and as much as I wanted to see the end of the raid, work comes before play. Taking a last look at the battle above, I accepted the instance and everything went black.