Chapter 1: New DLC
The sounds of screams and erupting spells travelled through the air, spanning the distance of the battlefield. Metal drew blood and fire devoured flesh. No strategy could be seen in the movements of any soldier, only rampant chaos and bloodthirsty beasts had survived in this war.
The once flowery field she stood on could only be described as having become a barren wasteland. Aura blades ripped through the ground like nails tearing flesh, and fireballs singed humans and flora alike, fusing charred flesh and molten soil into one.
Wendy thought back to just half a year ago when this war was nothing but a far-off possibility, only whispers of political tension barely reaching her ears, nothing a commoner like her had any business discussing. She travelled here with Damian, wanting to show him a childhood memory of hers, a beautiful field of flowers her father frequently brought her to. They had walked hand in hand, playfully picking off the petals of the flowers and gossiping about those in the academy.
Her fervent memories were cut short by a stray arrow entering her abdomen. She stared dully towards her fresh wound, Wendy was too tired to either scream in pain or find and kill her assailant. Her life was ending soon nonetheless, and she believed she had killed far too many already.
Moving down her line of sight, Wendy's eyes met Damian's. He had already passed, his beautiful scarlet eyes now dull. Clenching her hand which held his, Wendy thought about how ironic life could be, the man who was her main motivation for living one day had become the deepest source of pain for her in the next.
She closed her eyes, wiping the feverish war out of her vision. Hoping that once she opens them once more, she will once again be met by Damian's warm embrace...
---
"Another bad ending huh..."
I stretched my back with a yawn as the credits rolled down the screen, of my last 10 playthroughs of "New Dawn Academy", this was the 10th bad ending I'd been met with. Though, in terms of tragedy, I could only rank it 8th.
'At least it's better than any of Williams's endings' I chuckled.
I pulled up a forum for the game I frequented and dotted down my party's composition, classes and item loadout.
'While the Divine Swordman class works for Wendy, it's definitely a waste. Just grab Samantha and add her to the party, who cares if her quest is boring af...'
"New Dawn Academy" was without a single doubt, my favourite game. With 2000 hours recorded and 1000 more on modded playthroughs, I could be considered the no-lifer of all no-lifers when it came to the game. I would even advertise the game to my friends frequently and even to randoms I'd meet on forums of separate games.
But no matter what, I'd always hear the same response.
"Doesn't that game have 30% overwhelmingly negative reviews?"
It was a wall that was impossible to overcome, no matter how interesting the setting of the game was, or how fun the combat system seemed. The second a person saw that red review text on Steam, their opinion was set and they would never give the game a shot.
"Argh! Just remove the old reviews!!! They haven't even beaten the game once!!!"
Why did "New Dawn Academy" have overwhelmingly negative reviews? Well, there were multiple reasons but if I were forced to name one, It would be bad marketing.
"New Dawn Academy" was advertised as an otome game, there was even a large amount of hype for the game before it came out.
'A young girl named Wendy Heartseeker enters the academy and has many fateful encounters with beautiful and handsome men. A calming game where you experience a young lady's eventful youth~' was the tagline of the adverts.
With gorgeous, soft, shojo anime-esk art and realistic voice acting it garnered a lot of attention.
But what people received was not what they expected, the first 5 or so hours did match the trailers but after...
Tragic character death after tragic character death.
A sudden war erupts and the main cast is enlisted.
A sharp difficulty increase that left casual players and game critics unable to progress with the game.
The final straw was broken when a famous streamer played the game and stumbled on one of the most horrific endings, where her favourite character William was **** and ******.
Afterwards, the game was completely review-bombed, with multiple people trash-talking the game on all platforms.
I had even been apprehensive about trying the game myself at first, I had never even been a fan of the genre. I only gave the game a try because my little sister preordered the game but didn't want to play it after seeing all the reviews, being slightly shrewd, I decided to do a playthrough not to waste any money.
But what I had discovered was that the game should have never been marketed as an Otome game, it was really a Strategy RPG game in disguise.
Hundreds of different classes, a unique progression system and a deep yet tragic story, didn't that scream masterpiece Strategy RPG?
The next thing I knew I had played the game 100s of times, even found a "good" ending and was writing down party composition reviews on the forum.
I finished typing down my review and got ready to start a new playthrough, perhaps it was finally time for me to complete a playthrough with the Trinity class.
As I deleted my most recent save, I was shocked to see that I already got a response to my post. Usually, with only 3 other fans of the game, I'd have to wait a full 24 hours before seeing any activity on the forum.
Expecting to see one of the few usernames I was used to seeing by now, I blinked upon seeing the suffix "Game Dev" on the reply.
Luxium Games: Hey there "RetiredFFfan"! We've seen you post a lot about our game and wanted to reach out to you. New Dawn Academy is getting a new DLC soon and we were looking for some playtesters. As one of our most devoted fans, we thought you would be the perfect choice to give out a play code! We think you'll certainly be shocked by its content.
"Holy shit! Holy SHIT!"
Quickly checking their account to make sure they were the real deal, I jumped in excitement when I found out that they were the office account for "New Dawn Academy". With light speed, I Dmed them and received a playtest.
After inputting the code within the game, squatting on my chair, I eagerly stared at the screen as the game was being downloaded.
[...5% downloaded]
"C'mon, C'mon!"
[...15% downloaded]
"I wonder what they added? A new character? More classes? New regions?"
[...40% downloaded]
Waiting for the download, I went to message the game dev, hoping to ask what content they added to the game. My face was flush with excitement.
[...74% downloaded]
Luxium Games: New content? Well, a lot is being added. Do you have anything specific you want to know?
[...82% downloaded]
Anything specific? I wanted to discover the new classes myself, so I guess I was mostly curious about any new characters.
[..95% downloaded]
Luxium Games: There are a lot of new characters, but we think you'd be most interested in the new love interest. His name is Lucas.
[...97% downloaded]
He has the same name as me? Huh? Wait, how do they know my name? It's not on my account information.
[...99% downloaded]
Luxium Games: How we know your name isn't important. What is important is that Lucas is a transmigrator.
"...What?"
[100% downloaded]
As the soft melody of the opening credits of the game began to play, I felt my vision turn black.
---
Once my vision finally returned and I opened my eyes, I discovered an unfamiliar ceiling. I looked around the room to find furniture and decorations that didn't belong to me. When a bedside mirror entered my sight, the person I saw did not match the sight I was used to.
My hair was no longer brown but black, my eyes had turned from a light blue to a dark abyss. My angular face spotted with freckles was replaced with smooth pale skin and soft features.
All I could think of was the last message I received from Luxium Games.
"I... really transmigrated?"
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Brumlol
Brumlol My 2nd ever novel! This time I hope I can make it past 24 chapters, but since the characters in this one are older it should be easier for me to write it.
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