Multiple Settings PaRaopen: Cybernet MMO [Postcyberpunk]

[TanteRegenbogen]

In a future world that banned advanced AI and cracked down on careless corporate goons there is still desire to escape the boring reality and play video games. Recently, a virtual fantasy MMO with lifelike NPCs named PaRaopen had been release. The NPCs are engineered well enough to seem almost like real people, almost pushing what is legally allowed, yet not self-aware. Additionally, there are multiple servers including some where assisting cybernetic hardware is allowed in turn for higher difficulty.

Plot of the roleplay:

In a not too distant future, people still seek escape into virtual worlds. This future takes place in a city named Fujioka. Most people have some form of cybernetic enhancement, especially after advanced AI had been banned after a few close calls. So some occupation related cybernetics may be available in people.

You are one of the residents of Fujioka seeking escape in the newly released virtual fantasy MMO Pa'Raopen. You find party members quickly and eventually create a guild with them. The game is impressive, but it might be a little too realistic in terms of features with the ability to sense exhaustion and pain in-game and NPCs with real personalities and sharp tongues.

Eventually, you find out the party members live in the same city as you and you meet some in real life.

Fujioka: Fujioka is a large city with a bustling, multilevel city core. The city has plenty of opportunities for free time outside of the apartment and an excellent public transportation system. It is however not perfect as it is ruled by military semi-dictatorship, where while the citystate has an elected parliament, it is strictly overseen by the military leadership and bribeable politicians are severely punished. In worst cases, hits are put out on politicians found to be corrupt.

Population is around five million. Included in the citystate is about 25 km of farmland and forest around the city until you get to the border. In total, the citystate is around 3000 sqkm in size.

Plot of the game world:

You are thrown into a dangerous world full of magical creatures like slimes and dragons. You are however penniless, clothed in rags and no one seems interested in helping you. But you come across a hermit who tells you that you should craft your own weapon and learn how to make clothing from plant fibers. You immediately get to experience the death-resurrection system of the game as you are blindsided by a goblin who bonks you on the head. You reawaken inside the hermit's home. Since you don't know where you are, the hermit assumes you have amnesia and explains you are in the land of Pa'Raopen and that the land had been in turmoil for years, even before the hermit left civilization. Ultimately, he gives you a little tutorial on how to defend yourself and gives you some food for your travels to the next town. You are just sent in a general direction along a faint path through the forest. The town's name is supposedly Haruoka.

Game system:

-The game requires you to craft a lot, everything from food to weapons to personal homes.

-At the beginning the locations on the map are unknown to players but they can charter their own maps or buy map pieces in towns. Map pieces usually only show the main settlements and landmarks of the local area. Additional landmarks, player-made settlements, guild houses and dungeons can be marked on maps.

-Skills: There are various skills that can be levelled up. But there is an exception: Communication. Due to the nature of NPCs, players need to be polite to most NPCs. NPCs will demand higher prices for items from rude and aggressive players. And if players are belligerent enough, NPCs can outright refuse service to them.

Skill types:

-Food related: Cooking, Butchering, Brewing, Drink-Making, Food conservation, Vintnering (Wine making), Farming, Fishing, Confectionary making

-General: Collecting, Athletics (walking/running), Swimming, Climbing, Riding

-Crafting: Masonry, Carpentry, Roofing, Armorsmithing, Weaponsmithing, Blacksmithing (non-weapon/armor smithing), Stonecarving, Coal burning, Skinning, Leatherworking, Tailoring, Jewelmaking, Paving

-Magic: Enchaning, Fire magic, Water magic, Earth magic, Wind magic, (Earth+Water=Plant, Earth+Fire=Metal, Water+Wind=Ice), Light/Healing magic, Dark magic/necromancy, Summoning, Illusion magic, Enhancement magic (self-buffing)

Combat: Swordfighting, Martial arts, Axes, Thrown weapons, Marksmanship (bows, crossbows, gunblades, arcane rifles), Longarms (spears, pikes), Scythes (warscythes, chain scythes), shortblades (knives, short swords), large weapons (greatswords, greathammers), exotic weaponry, unarmored defense, armored defense, heavy armored defense

Bodily enhancements:
Due to cybernetics being so commonplace in the real world, players expect enhancements in game. These aren't cybernetic, but are presented as arcane enhancements in-game. The arcane enhancements are buyable magical contraptions and jewels that enhance the abilities of players.

Attributes:
Players have multiple attributes in-game. Strength, Hardness, Endurance, Speed, Intelligence, Stealth and Luck,

Strength determines damage of long blades, heavy weapons and can influence defense values and base inventory size.

Hardness determines damage that can be taken and how much damage being taken can be decreased. Also influences defense values.

Endurance influences actual in-game endurance and exhaustion and mild pain can be experienced by players in game.

Speed influences running and swimming speeds, but also influences damage values of short blades, thrown weapons and shot weapons.

Intelligence influence magical ability as well as some crafting skills. Higher intelligence can mean better quality crafts and better enchanting.

Stealth influences masking presences during sneaking and also influences silent weapons such as thrown weapons.

Luck influences loot drops. Better luck means a higher chance of finding better items and equipment.

Guilds:
Guilds can be founded if there are at least three founding members and if a fee of 50 silver is paid. Each guild is entitled to a guild house, but only one at a time. For small guilds without owned land, guild quarters can be rented. But with owned land, a guild house is the start of a guild town in which guild members can build personal homes around the guild house. Guild upgrades can be made to include merchants at the guild house, give members daily buffs, increase guild house features (such as a pub and an event hall) and increase the guild member limit. Maximum guild size is 500.

Money:
The money is divided into copper, silver, gold and platinum. 100 copper is one silver, 100 silver is one gold, 1000 gold is one platinum. So that means it takes ten million copper to gain one platinum coin.

 

[TanteRegenbogen]

Somewhere in Fujioka

For the past hour, Midori had kept her mind on the time widget projected into her mind by her cybernetic body. She had recently bought a new MMO and today was the starting date of the PaRaopen servers. Midori couldn't take the day off since many colleagues had taken the day off before she had the chance to. So basically she was missing the start by two hours. She was carrying girders up a site as if they were made of foam. As soon as the clock struck 15:30, she hurried to unload the girders and get on her way home. She would have to run to the train station, board a train, ride it for twenty minutes, get off and run home.

After seeing off her colleagues, the tall, heavy cyborg in purple coveralls sprinted down the road towards the train station. She tried her best not to damage anything on her way as with her body, she could easily total a car if she ran into one or crack the pavement. Her cybernetic feet appeared almost like shoes and featured a rubber like layer on the botter for grip. Soon, she arrived at the station, checked through a ticket gate and made her way up to the track. She still had three minutes until the next train. A number of people stared at her, turning away when she noticed them. One guy near her, mumbled a comment she didn't like to hear: "Fricken tanks." Midori responded: "Why don't you speak up for everyone else to hear? Or was that meant for my sensors only?" The man turned away. Midori then said: "So I thought."

The train then arrived. Midori had to crouch a little to fit through the door. The carriage shook slightly as she boarded. Someday I will get better mods so I can just run all the way home. Midori thought. Her size made a number of things less convenient, but other things easier.

Soon she arrived at her stop. She left the train and as soon as she got through the ticket gate, she ran again. The area was rural enough that her having accidents on her way were unlikely. It wasn't far home. She soon arrived on a small property with a home made from repurposed shipping containers. The containers were slightly higher than her, so she had plenty of room to move through them.

First thing she did was "eat". It wasn't really food, but a metal pill that featured a programmed flavor and a nutrient delivery system for her brain. Sure she could eat normal food for pure enjoyment, but it wasn't necessary. She stuck the pill in her mouth which an automatic procedure took up the nutrients while simulating the flavor of a pea and pork pot pie. "Hmmm, pot pie. Seems like they improved the simulated flavor." Midori mumbled.

She undressed and got into the chemical shower to clean off any possible dirt from work and give her a fresh smell. The shower was something for cyborgs of her type only and seemed almost like a car wash than a normal shower as it featured many automated cleaning utensils. Some of the chemicals would be dangerous for normal human skin. The shower featured cleaning programs for artificial skin but also for the days that bare metal was exposed.

Once she was cleaned and dried off, she put on leggings and a kneelength longsleeve black turtleneck dress. Midori sat down somewhere comfortable. Her left ear popped out a little revealing an analogue port. She pulled out a cable from a box near she was sitting and plugged it into the port. Her eyes then went dim and she was plugged into her local cybernet network. Midori navigated it and started PaRaopen.

She stood in front of a screen that wrote "PaRaopen for Cymiltec Rhino 4.1" with Cymiltec Rhino 4.1 being the custom operating system for her body. Non cyborgs usually had something like Smallsoft Gate 10 or a Fenix based OS for a PC and a virtual headset with neural stimulation. And one of the more common cyborg OS's was CMS Friendship or a Fenix based OS for cyborgs. Midori's OS was an uncommon one usually restricted to military and retired military models with hers being of the latter.

Midori was hyped. She of course wanted to make a character that didn't appear like her tall, brown haired, green eyed self. Touching the "start" button, she immediately appeared at the character creation menu, quickly making herself an avatar with pink hair and bright green eyes. She took the name "Midomeya" which was just the first two syllables of her given name and the first syllable of each of her last names. Her avatar was also about 80 cm shorter than her real world height, being a more average height for a woman. Midori continued to play around with the settings for some time...

 

[Megilagor]

Name: Kathan "Kat" Cheshire
Location: Somewhere in Fujioka
Interactions: none
Family & tales unfold
Today was a hectic day for Kat to say the least. He needed to get Alice to the hospital for her monthly checkup, some shopping and other stuff and he only had a few hours to do all that if he wanted to access PaRaopen on time. The biggest hurdle was getting Alice there but at the same time he couldn't get mad at his own little sister who came to live with him to get away from their family members.

Having organized his thoughts and plans for the rest of the day, he changed his clothes into more presentable ones took some essentials with him, and walked to his lil sis room.
He gently knocked a few times on the door, before opening it and entering, there he saw his little sister Alice younger than him by ten years lying there in her bed, as he came closer Kat spoke.
"Alice wake up sleepy head, you have a checkup today."
It was wishful thinking though as Alice did not wake up, it seems she had another attack of temporal paralysis, at least this time she changed clothes fully before the attack so there is that.
Seeing this Kat walked up to a nearby drawer picked up a carry harness and put it first on Alice before putting her on his back and fastening the harness around himself, then he stood up and walked out first from her room and soon after from their house.

"Hang in there Alice."
Said Kat as he put his pair of headphones on her head so she can at least listen to some music while they walk to the hospital. The road was long and uneventful unless you count a group of elderly ladies throwing all kinds of compliments at the two of them for being such a sweet pair of siblings as something eventful either way, it did manage to put a bit of a blush on both of them.

When they arrived at the hospital they were greeted by their usual doctor who brought them to the examination room. There he laid Alice on the bed, took back his headphones and turned to the doc.
"I will leave her to you for an hour or so, I need to go around and buy a few things. Also, when do you expect that this stops happening, especially considering the injury should have healed by now."
"Well looking at her previous results, while the wound has healed the nerves and the mind still have a hard time realizing it. But with her meds and your help, she should have the frequency of those situations reduced heavily. Although whatever it stops altogether is a mystery."
"Thanks, Doc."
After his little conversation, he turned to Alice took her hand onto his and looked her in the eyes before speaking.
"I'm going to get our groceries now, and after I get them home I will come to pick you up, and maybe we will get some ice cream on the way ok."
Kat then let go of her hand stood up and walked out of the room and onto the shopping spree, which did take him around an hour and a half to do including going home and leaving them there.

Then he came back for Alice this time with assistance from the doc getting Alice on his back wasn't as hard so he walked back home on a scenic route that of course, included an ice cream shop on the way. With a bit of good luck and timing, Alice began to be able to move somewhat although not at the level where she could walk yet.
When they arrived at the ice cream shop they bought their favourite ice cream and began to eat them on their way back while talking.
"I'm sorry for being a burden to you Kat!"
"Shut it Alice, your not a burden your my little sis, and a great one at that, hell you are the one who is the main cook of our house cause you do know that if you left it to me I would just order takeout all the time."
"Yeah that's true you can't cook anything other than noodles or scrambled eggs, or you will end up burning the pot."
"Ok stop bullying me ok, and anyways we already arrived."

Their discussion made their time pass faster and soon they arrived at their house, there he laid Alice on the couch so she can watch the TV while he sorts the groceries.
"I already ate and from what I felt as I carried you they probably fastened you up in the hospital, so don't worry and lay there, watch some TV or play on the console if you want. And when you can feel your legs again then go ahead and do your own thing. But do know that I'm gonna play that new vrmmo soon so yeah."

When Kat ended his work with the groceries he turned around and began walking to his room, and within the corner of his eye he saw Alice happily playing some game on one of his older consoles, so he formed a slight smirk on his face before walking into his room.
There he turned on his Fenix os PC, readied his chair to be comfy, picked up his headset and sat down wearing it, then he only plugged it in and waited for the game to launch.

Kat didn't wait long for the game to boot up, there he quickly manoeuvred his way onto the character creation menu where he created Chessur.
Chessur is his in-game avatar, for starters he picked up an elven race mainly because of his love for character like Link, then he increased his age up a bit to appear more dignified, before moving on to being more detailed in his looks.
For starters, he increased his height by seven centimetres just to make himself a bit taller but not too tall as to feel a disconnect from himself and his character, and then he went off and fiddled with the various sliders and settings for some time, to make himself his perfect elf....

 

[Spoiled Bread]

Iruna Rintarou
Location: Happy Smile apartment, room 901

Thud

Thud

Thud

"Mama, are you okay? Hitting your head on the desk like that is not good for your health." A virtual avatar in the form of a black cat inside a propped up tablet device stared in concern at a figure currently banging her head on her own desk. Her hand was clutching a virtual pen designed for digital art and in front of her was a three-monitor computer setup displaying three different things. The monitor in the middle currently displayed a base sketch of what seemed to be panels of several figures in obscence positions.

"Vore, furry, commision." The girl finally stopped hitting her head, but her head was still slumped on the desk.

"I can take over the job if you want." The AI offered, but the girl immediatey rejected the proposal.

"there's no way I would let you work on this kind of task! I will not let you tainted by such degeneracy!"

Gritting her teeth and wrapped her 'good luck' headband around her forehead, the girl braced herself and continued the job that had been commisioned just this morning. She didn't actually need to finish it this early but there's a game she wanted to play today and she wanted to finish all the work before its release.

"Why should people with the deepest pocket also have the strangest taste??" Her hands moved quickly as she finished the 'arts' while sobbing. "and why the hell can I make these things????"

"I'm cheering on you, mama!" The cat now had a pair of pom-poms on both of his paws and wiggled it slowly.

Finally, after 5 grueling hours Iruna managed to finish her detailed short cursed doujin. She compressed all of it into one file and sent it to her client. Once they satisfied with the result the platform would send the money to her account. Simple and convenient, just as she likes it.

"Conratulations, mama."

"Thank you, Pocoa. Now I can focus on gaming."

Iruna laid down on the bed and strapped the virtual gear on her head. Her device was what people would call a chimeraware, a term for high-end virtual devices that was modified beyond recognition. Hers looks like a bunch of cables that were connected to a virtual headgear on one end and a large box of processors on the other one, which then connect to a small monitor for UI. Too unsightly and clunky for commercial use, but can runs any game smoothly to the point this kind of model is oftenly used by griefers to perform server crash. Definitely not why she use this device though, she just needs the beefiest machine she could find as she's also occasionally hired as game developer.

Character creation was a breeze for her as Iruna used the same character in almost every games she plays.

"KireiNeko is here!" She said when she finally finished the tutorial and plopped down into the main plaza. She skipped most of the dialogues though and made the tutorial NPC angry at her because she kept saying 'skip' at him. She found it quite interesting as that means she can be an absolute troll even to NPCs here.

 

[Spiderverse]

Somewhere in Fujioka
Interactions: N/A

Isah laid back in his ergonomic office chair, the automatic adjustments leaning back with the motion of his body to create a uniform sense of comfort as he looked up at the ceiling of his shop. Asakura Cybernetics had a pretty hit-or-miss crowd today, with a lot of the morning crowd being some old salarymen and women looking for lightning quick repair jobs; while the afternoon crowd was mostly window shoppers and other interested people who were their to snoop, never usually willing to buy unless it was some cheap new SIM link. Either way, they were all greeted with the same glowing energy and hearty wave as the bells jangled from the Age-Restricted Door.

But his absolute favorite customers? The Enthusiasts. They would usually roll in around the afternoon, with their tech either pushed to the near limit or just needing a quick referral for upgrades or alternative options. At least they were talkers. Today there was no such luck, as all of his regulars had bought that new MMO that dropped, PaRaopen. Their servers were supposed to have launched today, but Isah was stuck manning the clinic until close before he could even think about touching his VR gear. The temptation was definitely there, he had been one of the many fans that had been following the development of this game for years, and even threw a party when the release date was officially announced. But he had to stay strong; running a Cybernetics clinic meant no off days, and certainly no early closers.

Soon enough though, the bells jangled their jingle. A small group of people strolled into the clinic, and Isah shot out of his chair with excitement. "Welcome to Asakura Cybernetics, bringing you all the best mods with your safety guaranteed!" The small group consisted of two men and women, with one of the women walking with an odd limp. She made her way slowly to the counter, with the others looking like they wanted to help her but were choosing not to. "Can you check my leg? It spazzed out at work and I've been limping around all day.."

"Oh no problem!" The young man guided the woman over to the workstation, a large chair in the corner with lots of lighting and screens almost hovering above it, with an apparatus to slide your right arm through. "Have you been to a clinic before?" The woman shook her head, looking a bit nervous. He chuckled, offering his hand to help her into the chair. "Don't worry about it. The stuff looks scary but trust me, it'll be okay. I'll let you know if I have to do anything invasive, just in case you want to come back another day when you're more mentally prepared. Could you slide your right arm through here?" The woman carefully followed his instructions, the anxiety clear as day on her face, with glances being shared by her friends. Isah was experienced, and something like a spazzing prosthetic was a walk in the park, just a firmware check usually. He sat down on the stool next to her, his eyes beginning to turn and adjust like the lens of a high-tech camera as he propped her leg up for closer inspection. Raising his hands, his right forearm seemed to pull apart as an array of tools unfolded from within while the fingers on his left hand began to glow. With his left hand, he grasped the prosthetic, initiating maintenance mode so that it wouldn't flail about while he was trying to fix the damn thing. From his reading, it was a decent model; slight delay in movement like most civi-grade prosthetics but the haptic feedback was a near ten. "I'm gonna run a quick firmware check just to see if there's anything that throwing silent error messages. Otherwise, it may just be a simple factory reset."

A pop-up appeared on his eyes, the firmware check coming back with an orange. Apparently, some of the wiring within the neural response receiver had been torn, causing the prosthetic to not properly recognize what the woman wanted to do. Walk forward, and it could either do that or step backward. "I see... that's pretty simple." The screen disappeared from view as Isah turned to the woman once again. "All I gotta do is replace some wiring within your leg, should just be a minute." The woman sighed with relief, happy that it wasn't anything major that would've required a replacement. After a couple of minutes in the chair, her and her friends were sent away with happy faces and a new clinic to drop by whenever they needed anything. For Isah though, it was just enough time that allowed him to close up shop.


After running through all the normal procedures, the young man rushed upstairs and into his room. Throwing on his VR gear and jumping into PaRaopen. "FINALLY!" Isah exclaimed, a huge grin on his face as he began looking through the character creator. "I know exactly what I'm gonna do with this..."

 

[Steve Jobs]

HIGA KOBAYASHI

Tags: None

Lock: Rollerbiking tonight?
Shock: Oh you know it!
Me: Can't. Family's staying home tonight.
Lock: Can't you just get a body double or...something?
Barrel: Ohh what about a blow up doll?

Me: How am I going to get a blow up doll up to my room?

Lock: Hey there are no bad ideas when you're brainstorming!

"Ugh this is so stupid!"

Higa groaned as he dropped back onto his bed and closed his eyes. It had been three weeks since his house arrest (read: grounding) and he was already going stir crazy. No after school sports, no skateboarding, he couldn't even bring his friends over (not that he would want them to). It was just school, home, and the occasional outing if one of his parents or older siblings couldn't keep watch over him. Upon hearing a ping, he brought his phone back up to his face and swiped over to the group chat where "Lock" (who was really Reol) messaged him privately.

Lock: It could be worse
Lock: At least your parents didn't chip you

Were it not for his parents' aversion to cybernetic augments he was positive that his parents would have turned him into an android (complete with the inability to talk back to its creator). They wanted a someone who was a triple threat (athletics, academics, art) but not a son. In a way, his arrest was a blessing in disguise; it was a way of finally breaking the pedestal his parents put him on. Turning on his side, Higa eyed the VR headset that sat by his laptop along with a controller. His brother had been kind enough to loan him his gaming equipment and even alerted him to the release of a new MMORPG by the name of PaRaopen.

Before being grounded, he didn't understand the obsession people had with virtual reality. While he could see the appeal of escaping the real world on an intellectual level, he couldn't wrap his head around the idea of pouring hours into something that would never amount to anything in real life. For that matter, the fact that it was a live service game meant that there was no true ending in sight. Where most games could at least give you a sense of accomplishment in the same way that finishing a book or movie could, that didn't seem to apply here.

So why do you keep staring at it?

The answer was as simple as why any functioning adult might play this game.

Because I'm bored.

Standing up, he walked over to his desk and booted it up. He'd preinstalled the game on the off chance he finished all of his homework, but senioritis was in full force. All Higa had to do was pass the entrance exams and he would be a shoe-in.

Once the game loaded he popped on his headset and went straight to character creation. He might not have known exactly what he wanted, but the name "Blue" resonated with him enough deeply enough to get started. Blue eyes, blue hair (in a bob since he didn't feel like going through all the options), fair skin, a soft face... Should he give her some type of gradient to prevent her from being a big block of blue?

It felt as though Higa was putting too much thought into her, but if this was the image he planned on projecting in the game he thought to at least try to make something pretty. It was certainly better than getting clowned on for a dumb looking avatar.

After thirty more minutes of tweaking his character he finally loaded into the world of PaRaopen, ready to explore.

FUJIOKA SUBURBS

 

[TanteRegenbogen]

Midori had finally made a character, selected the normal difficulty server and did the entire tutorial without skipping. After one death from the tutorial and learning the combat and crafting systems, Midori set out into the direction the hermit NPC sent her. Being her in-game height felt weird as she was used to towering over other people, but here, the first NPC was taller than her.

Eventually, she arrived in a town. It was brimming with new players, though with the hype, she expected it to be fuller. "Maybe not all players start in the same place. Infos on the game said the world is supposed to be huge." Midori said. She noticed one player already starting trouble with a NPC, eventually going for a punch, but disappearing before even landing the punch. A message popped up "Usage of assisting cyberware is prohibited on this server. Player has been migrated to higher difficulty server." Midori chuckled at the prospect of griefers getting banned from the server for using assistance from cybernetics. Good thing any targeting cyberware and combat relevant cyberware in her was usually off as she rarely needed them.

She had so far fought with a selfmade stone sword that she crafted in the tutorial, but she felt that the weapon was too small for her tastes. Looking into her bag, she had already gathered a considerable amount of materials to the point that it should suffice for a larger weapon. The hermit NPC also gave her a recipe book with a couple of starter recipes for creating items and food. A stone hammer would be a decent sized weapon, however it wasn't necessarily a flexible weapon, so Midori opted for a greatsword instead.

On the spot, in what seemed to be a town plaza, Midori began crafting a stone greatsword. She took her time and concentrated on her work. Since weaponsmithing wasn't a main skill, the sword would need longer to craft and would have suboptimal stats. However, Midori made sure to put in extra effort to counter the downsides of a low skill level. After a while, she was finally done.

[Sharp Stone Greatsword crafted!]

[Weaponsmithing level up]

The greatsword was quite heavy, however it felt right. The sensation of feeling something being heavy exhilerated Midori as in real life most things felt like nothing when picking them up. While girders were heavy, they felt nothing like this greatsword she had just crafted. The game already made Midori happy. Here she already felt more human than in real life as she could feel things, smell things and such better than as a brain in a decommissioned military cyborg body.

Midori finally decided to go to the adventurer's guild to find some companions or even a freshly created guild to take part in. She wondered what would be in store for her. As she burst through the doors of the adventurer's guild, she called out "Hello everybody!", garnering attention from some of the few people in the room. It wasn't as full as she had expected, but there were still two or three dozen players there.

 

[Spiderverse]

Isah was excited to see what this game had to offer, and following the development for so long had made the moments where he was just opening up the menu and vibing to the music all the more sweeter. Being a Cybernetic Engineer, the young man had a lot of experience with hardware, and in preparation for games like PaRaopen, he had modified his equipment, not with mods to give him an advantage in combat like targeting systems or loot rollers, but audio and nerve enhancements. He really wanted to make sure that he was truly immersed in the experience. For his character, he decided to go with a blonde human, one with more unassuming features to counterract his aggressive off-tank playstyle. It was Isah's absolute favorite in all MMOs, to combine the speed and precision of a DPS with the responsibility and leadership of a tank. Since this was his first character and he doubted he had time for any others, Isah decided to join the normal difficulty server and go through all of the tutorials, taking notes along the way about the menus and the processes, especially when there were things that he was interested in.

Following the directions of the hermit NPC like everyone else seemed to do, he eventually made it to town with his arcane pistol and heater shield, which sported a weirdly dry brown and black look. I wonder when the color shaders come in? Probably an NPC shop in a bigger town. Looking down at himself, it was plainly obvious now that the equipment that he had selected in the tutorial was noob gear, with some pretty pathetic base stats. If Isah was going to get started on his off-tank build, he needed to quickly get some better equipment. Rather than stay in the small beginner town, he rushed passed another player who was crafting next to the fountain and went into the next danger zone to gather materials. Using the hermit NPCs recipe book, he crafted a basic pickaxe to get himself some ore. Though it took a while, he had gathered enough ore to craft himself some decent (for his level) torso armor.

[Title Acquired: Ore Rush!]

[Endurance increased!]

"Aww sweet! Who knew just gathering materials would reap some awesome benefits! I should craft this later though. Better get back to the town before I get ambushed by mobs.." Making good use of his increased Endurance, Isah ran as far as he could toward the town, though about halfway through he had to opt into a light jog in order to let his stamina recover. "Right right... gotta... watch out for that." Just as he reached the door for the adventurer's guild, he heard a voice call out in the proximity chat. Surprisingly enough, it was the same player as before that was crafting at the fountain. Though he swore she had a smalller sword on her before. Stepping next to her, Isah pointed toward the large greatsword that rested on her back. "I'm guessing that's what you were crafting on the fountain right? Nice work."

Tags: TanteRegenbogen

 

[Megilagor]

Name: Chessur
Location: Starter town
Interactions: TanteRegenbogen , Spiderverse
Bloody beginning
Kat after a bit of a while finished making Chessur look like he wanted him to, after that he selected the normal difficulty server and went on his merry way through the tutorial.
His first death was a sombre one and an awkward one at that cause probably he was the only one who died after being bit in the but by a wolf, even though he knew it was needed for the tutorial to progress it left a bitter feeling in him, carrying that within his heart he continued the tutorial, learning about the combat and crafting system, after finishing it he still lingered in the surrounding area gathering materials, and crafting his first tools and a provisional weapon namely a knife.

[Flint skinning knife acquired!]

When he finished making his equipment Chessur ventured out from the tutorial area but not towards the town, his target was one of the nearby danger areas namely a forest.
There Chessur climbed onto a tree and laid in wait for a bit for a lone mob to stumble in his way.
Some time passed as he sat there getting familiar with his knife when he saw from a corner of his vision a lone wolf approaching his spot.
Chessur readied his knife, and when his target came closer he lunged at it from the tree barely missing his target.
While he aimed to pierce the wolf's skull all he did was pierce his paw, upon seeing this the wolf howled and began to attack Chessur.

To a bystander, it might have looked like Chessur and the wolf were dancing and not fighting but the damage accumulated on both of them slowly, for now, both of them were bloodied.
With a quick spur of a moment, the wolf jumped at Chessur but he plunged the knife into the wolf's throat.
After the wolf fell down dead Chessur began skinning it messing up a few times by cutting something wrong making it so he was covered in blood.
Now with his new trophy and a bit of his honour restored he began on his journey to the beginner town, on the way cutting a bit of a vine off for later use.

[Unarmored Defense level up!]

On his way there both NPC's and other players had quite a sight to behold, a pretty elf fully covered in blood that wrapped himself with wolf fur on his waist walking down the dirt trodden road towards town. While he walked there he decided to clean himself a bit or at least his face since it was getting hard to see with all that blood on him, so he stopped at a small creak and began cleaning himself a bit, while also admiring his work.

"Damn I look good all bloody like that, hell if I don't get a monicker like 'Blood Elf' or something I might get sad or something."
After saying that he came within the city walls, he ventured to the nearest npc and sold most of the loot from the wolf, and bought a sewing kit, then he came onto the town plaza sat down near the fountain and began working on his first proper piece of equipment.
From the wolf fur, a piece of vine and some fancy stone he found on the side of the road he began making a cloak for himself.
It wasn't the easiest way to make by hand even though he had a leatherworking skill here, and a knack for tailoring in real life it still came as a hard task to him, but when he finished making it Chessur couldn't say he was disappointed, he was even able to make a hood for it from the remaining skin from the head.
Now with his new cloak in hand, he threw it over himself and put it on. It felt good on him, especially since it didn't count as armour but still gave him a bit more defence.

So he threw his hood up to cover his face, with the area where the wolf once had eyes being pierced by Chessurs scarlet eyes, with that done and said he went to the adventurer's guild.
Whether it was for gathering companions or joining a newly formed guild or maybe even exchanging information with others about things. He could only ponder what will await him there.
Upon arriving at its entrance he saw two players interacting with each other one being a lady with a greatsword, and the other being a man with what looked like magic guns.
"All is good people but it would be better if we don't stand at the entrance so others can come in or out. And yes I do have to say your sword looks nice. If you two aren't busy let's just go sit at one of the tables here, there we can introduce ourselves and such."

 

[Steve Jobs]

BLUE

Tags: TanteRegenbogen Megilagor Spiderverse

Running in heels had been harder than he expected. Though Higa had tried on Reol's shoes before they were nowhere near as high as his characters and he certainly didn't expect them to feel so real. They had him stumbling through the tutorial like a newly born giraffe (so much so that her athleticism leveled up). It made Higa wonder if going with a female model was the right choice, but supposed that it wasn't worth changing something he'd spent so long customizing. Instead, he committed to walking (then running) circles around the starting area until he felt confident he wouldn't topple over. For that matter, nobody asked him to prioritize aesthetics over functionality.

Seriously, what type of degenerate would place a mole so precisely on his character's right breast or abuse the slider until he got the perfect waist to hip ratio?

Still, Higa--"Blue" managed to make it to Haruoka with minimal damage and even snagged a bit of loot along the way. As it turned out, the very presence of a girl was enough motivation for players to throw themselves at her. Even without using voice chat they were convinced that he and Blue were one in the same.

Wolf pelts gold, friend requests, Higa would have been more than happy to let them salivate over Blue were it not for the fact that these were all low level items. He was far from shallow, but if he was going to be bogged down by orbiters, they needed to be made of richer stuff.

"Aw, thanks guys,"

"Blue" chirped in a raspy falsetto,

"I would really love to join you buuuut..."

All of a sudden her pitch dropped, a laugh barely suppressed behind Higa's words,

"I play alone."

Ignoring the mixture of groans, boos, and "tch figures", he headed towards the nearest forge where he sold everything but his potions and the clothes on his back. If this worked like other games then he would be getting new gear soon enough, thus voiding any emanate) advantage he might get from upgrading his equipment. The only downside to that however, was that until he found something better he'd have to stick with this.

Far from the swath of outfits on the PaRaopen's splash page, Blue's clothes were raggedy beyond belief. He didn't understand why this game couldn't just give them the clothing they wanted from the beginning, but supposed that it would defeat the purpose of grinding your skills (and god forbid you don't grind in an MMORPG). That left him with only two options: brave the wilderness or find someone who could buy or tailor her something.

Higa approached the front of the adventurer's guild where it looked like parties were already forming. Near the left were the no-lifers adorned in shiny gear and on the right, clusters of real life friends chatting about how this will be the game they all play together. In the doorway, a pink-haired woman greeted everyone and two men approached her shortly after, further blocking his path inside.

"Hey, yeah,"

he said, tapping on the cloaked player's shoulder,

"I'm trying to get through here."

HARUOKA

 

[Spoiled Bread]

KireiNeko
Location: Plain Meadow

"good day, adventurer! Are you interested in helping this old shepherd? I need 5 boar skins to make a new coat for my son. I will of course reward you handsomely." As her first course of action after the tutorial ends, Kirei decided to head straight into one of the available starting area for newbies, a place called the plain meadow. There she met an NPC standing beneath the shade of a lone tree, he claimed to be a shepherd and threw a quest for Kirei to fulfill. Though rather than simply accepting it like a normal person Kirei decided to interview the NPC for a bit.

"Who is your son anyway?"

"My son is Darius Oakenfell, he is working as a guard in Tontanny city."

"and the coat from this would be given to him?"

"Correct."

"Huh... interesting." Kirei put her hand beneath her chin as she contemplate the shepherd's answer. The fact that the NPC can reply to her off-script question with little to no hiccup was interesting, this made roleplaying in this game much better as they now can just roleplay with these kind of dynamic NPCs instead of relying on another players, which half of them were usually just trolls.

"Are you going to accept my request, adventurer?" The shepherd once again ask her, though she didn't seems to have any intention of answering it yet.

"Do you know who your creator is?"

"P-pardon?" The shepherd looks surprised at Kirei's sudden topic shift.

"Oh, nice expression. Do you know that you are not actually real but is simply a virtual data rendered inside my machine?"

"You are not making any sense, adventurer."

"I see, so this is the limit huh." Kirei sounded disappointed at the confused NPC. Back before the game's launch she heard this game would have really good AI that the cybersecurity agents constantly sniffed around their office, and while this responsive NPC was indeed a really good thing, Kirei expected something a bit more... controversial.

"Corporate gotta be corporate, I guess." She raised her tutorial staff and started hitting the shepherd, he raised his arms to block Kirei's assault.

"Adventurer, stop this. You're out of your mind!"

"No, I'm not." between Kirei's attacks, the shepherd decided to raises his own staff and hit Kirei in the head once. It looks like a simple smack but Kirei immediately collapsed onto the ground. She could only watched in silence as her HP bar quickly dropped to zero and she blacked out, two words made out of red ominous font appeared in the darkness.

YOU DIED

"Are you kidding me? Did I just got one tapped by an NPC??"

[Title acquired: the pwned one]

"I don't need that!"

Normally getting one hit by an NPC would discourage a player from attacking that same NPC again, but Kirei wouldn't let the damn shepherd go just like that, especially since he gave her this weird title which now couldn't be removed from her profile screen. Time for revenge!

Running back into the plain, Kirei knew that she needs to outlevel the shepherd in order to defeathm. That or she could look for something else to exploit, and since he was just standing there in the middle of enemy-infested area Kirei immediately knew what she must do. Looking around, she spotted several wild boars in the distance. It's one of the very early type of enemy for newbies to farm EXP, they're slow and clumsy but had relatively decent HP and small knockback on their attack.

"Summon: Smiling slime." The first summoned monster that she choose for her spell. The smiling slime was a small blue slime with a permanent goofy smiling face plastered on its body. Its attributes were all around abysmal except for its decent speed. Now for the next part, she commanded the slime to runs around and taking the aggro of nearby boars. She was actually surprised that the slime can execute her instructions this well. Anyway, the slime managed to provoke 8 wild boars and was currently running for its life as the boars chase the slime.

"Now, slime. Go there!" Kirei pointed at the shepherd and the slime hopped desperately towards his direction, bringing along the boars with it. Once the slime reached the shepherd it ran out of stamina and did nothing as one of the boar pounced it to death. There goes her artner, but now the stage was set. The shepherd brandished his staff against the boars and while the boar individually can't deal significant damage to the NPC, the fact that there's eight of them each with some mini-CC means the shepherd ends up getting shoved left and right by the boars and had his HP gradually chipped away. Meanwhile Kirei was watching in amusement as the shepherd was tortured by the boars, she found it interesting that the shepherd was letting out different screams each time the boar hit him. Finally, when the shepherd seemed to be battered enough and in the brink of dying Kirei approached the scene to get herself within the range and casted a spell.

"Smog bomb!" She lobbed a black sphere into the crowd and it exploded into pitch black smoke that engulfed the shepherd along with the boars. It's a spell that optimally should be used in tandem with one of her other spell but she didn't have enough mana after summoning that slime.

[Character level up!]

[Title acquired: Murderer]

"Kyahahaha, you can't guilt trip me, game. I'm feeling powerful now!" She got two titles now, both were weird ones but she didn't care. She opened her profile to check on her progress but was surprised when she found out that she only got to level 3. That shepherd one hit her, he should be at the very least somewhere around level 10 right? Kirei got her answer when the smoke dissipated, revealing the boars looking stronger than before, and have their sight on her.

"It can't be, this is rudiculous!!!" Kirei was once again sent into the hermit's respawn point after three boars headbutt her to death. The boars decided to stay together and went around killing several other unsuspecting newbies with their raw attributes and numbers. They snowballed their progress and thus the game got their first unofficial mini-boss the community would later dub as 'Boar Stampede', a bunch of normal enemies that were simply overleveled for their area.

"I-I need to look for frontliners." Meanwhile Kirei decided that she had enough going solo.

 

[TanteRegenbogen]

Shortly after Midori/Midomeya had greeted the room, she was joined buy a fellow who complimented her greatsword that she had made earlier within a public area. Midori smiled and said: "Thanks. I just thought a larger sword would suit me better. Plus it seems more fitting in my hands to be honest. Your weapons look nice too." Another player came to the conversation as well to compliment their weapons, but also suggested that they maybe not block the entrance and rather go to one of the available tables for introductions and banter. "I agree with your suggestion. We can relax at a table and get to know each other."

Another player was already trying to get through. Midori apologized: "Oh sorry, we were just about to go to a table. I am open to meeting new people, so if you aren't already invited by someone else, you can join us too." Midori went to a table and waved everyone over to join. As soon as everyone was within the vicinity of the table, she spoke up: "Hello. I am Midomeya, but you may call me Midori. I just started the game not long ago and came here to look for a party and maybe even people to create a guild. I read the guild system is supposed to be great. Did you know we can basically build a town around a guild house? Like, we get our own space. Build and upgrade a guild house and can have our own personalized homes around the guild house. They say we can even purchase services for the town such as merchants and gardens!"

Midori probably appeared like the typically enthusiastic green player. She didn't play virtual games much up until now and often would just surf the cybernet, sometimes finding remnants of rogue AI in the deepest parts of the cybernet. "You know, the last massively multiplayer game I played was Pogupogu Quest! This is significantly different to it!" Midori said. Pogupogu Quest of course highlighted that she wasn't a regular gamer as it was a pretty ancient MMO and one of the first virtual MMOs that utilized the cybernet. It was probably almost as old as Midori herself and still had cartoonish graphics and "dumb AI".

 

[Megilagor]

Name: Chessur
Location: Starter town - Adventurer's guild
Interactions: TanteRegenbogen , Spiderverse Steve Jobs
Introductions & negotiations
As Chessur stood there he felt a light tap on his shoulder so he turned around and saw a pretty lass, who shortly after spoke in a male voice, go figures.
"Yeah, we are clearing the way now. And if you care to join us then go on."
As soon as the two people in front of him moved ahead unblocking the entrance he stepped into the guild and strode towards the table chosen by the two people he had just met.
There he picked up and rotated the chair and sat down with his arms and torso resting on the back of the chair which now was at his front, he slumped down.

Sitting there he listened quietly and attentively to every word Midori said and watched her every gesture, for one can learn many things about the person.
And from what Chessur saw he and Midori won't have such a problem at least from his side.

"The name's Chessur. And I do dare say, Id love to get my hands on a guild of decent people and make a town with them. But before that I would rather party up with ya, to see how it goes first. So what have you say gents and lass about creating a little place we can call home for ourselves?"

As he heard Midori speak of Pogupogu Quest he chuckled a bit under his breath, he remembered playing it with Alice since she is a fan of old games, and all he could say about it is that it was so bad it was somehow good.
"Yeah, that old game is so different to this one, but don't worry. We can learn this one together. So what do you say about partying up?"
Spoke Chessur while handing an open hand towards Midori for a handshake as if they were making a deal.

 

[Spiderverse]

Isah was happy to have so many people coming around to the adventurer's guild, though it was a bit of a given with the fact that this was an MMO, and they had been blocking the doorway. But that didn't matter! Social interaction was social interaction, and while Isah was a pro, Silva was most definitely more laid back with it. He pointed toward the girl with the greatsword, waving his finger with a nod of agreement at her affirmation. "You can never go without a weapon that suits you. As soon as I saw the option for arcane rifles I just couldn't help myself. But... my playstyle requires this shield, but I'm hoping to switch to some more heavy artillery later." To be honest, he could have gone on and on about the plans for his build, the one he had in mind since seeing some of the leaked weapons types that existed in the game, and the kinds of cool playstyles that were possible. But two more players appeared, an elf and a woman covered head to toe in blue. "Ah my bad my bad. Didn't know we were blocking the way that much."

At Greatsword Girl's (GG) suggestion, Silva followed her to the table, plopping down next to her. He listened intently to her whole intro, along with the idea of starting up a guild. Before he would have a chance to jump at the opportunity and agree, the elf player spoke up, bringing up a valid point of partying up prior to setting up a guild. It was a good idea, definitely something that would help weed out the possibility of any weird vibes that would be harder to get rid of when they were a tried and true guild. Silva most definitely didn't want to jump the gun with people he just met, but having fun was all over his gameplan. But he had to play it cool, keep the excitement in. He chuckled a bit, leaning forward in his chair and pointing at Chessur. "Name's Silva. I don't wanna butt in here but I'm definitely down to party up with you all. I know we're all a bit green to this game, but it'd be best if we got the right party comp too. So to be totally up front with you..." He leaned back in his chair, the front legs lifting slightly off the ground with one of his legs holding onto the table for a bit of extra support. "I'm an off tank. I heard that there was a Heavy Cannon that can be used as a shield. So I set my starting stats with that in mind."

Tags: TanteRegenbogen Megilagor

 

[Steve Jobs]

BLUE

Tags: TanteRegenbogen Spiderverse Megilagor

Higa turned his head towards the spiky blonde before giving a deadpan response.

"People tend not to."

He didn't bother responding to the man's invitation and instead, he made his way to the counter to see if they're was a quick match option.

No luck.

Maybe he wasn't familiar enough with the game controls, but it seemed like the developers wanted to encourage organic socialization.

Gross.

Far be it for him to be that guy, but something about dealing with random people online didn't appeal to him in the same way that meeting people in real life did. Sure people's avatars mimicked their expressions well enough, but it didn't feel quite as simple.

Vaguely he wondered if he should have stuck it out with those simps.

Once more he scanned the room before finally landing back on the trio he had pushed past. Somehow he had not noticed the cloak the elf made nor the great sword the taller woman had crafted. It was a great oversight caused by his tunnel vision and sad to say, none of the other tables seemed to have any notable articles of clothing.

Higa rubbed the back of his neck as he finally walked over to the three. If there was one thing he hated more than admitting error it was backtracking. It was embarrassing at times and inefficient at others, but ultimately it was better to be wrong than kept waiting.

"Name's Blue. If you still looking for members we can party up."

ADVENTURER'S GUILD

 

[Spoiled Bread]

KireiNeko
Location: Plain Meadow -> Adventurer's guild

"No player, check. No boar, check."

Kirei's head peeked out of a bush. Her eyes scanned her surrounding to make sure there's no danger nearby. After making sure everything was safe, Kirei approached the exact place she was killed before and was happy when she found a sack just lay there untouched. Thankfully the boar didn't bother picking up the shepherd's drops so she could retrieve it easily.

"Now let's see what would be my first loots." Eagerly opened the sack, Kirei poured all of its contents into the ground. First was a wooden staff that the shepherd used to one hit her, the item's name was crooked staff. It had decent attributes for her current level but other than that there's nothing interesting about it, at least it's better than her tutorial weapon. The second one was a clothes armor called shepherd's garb, again it's not that impressive but definitely better than what she have now so she equipped both the garb and the staff.

"Now, I'm just Kirei Oakenfield." She lets out a chuckle as she realized that she's now becoming the shepherd. The last item she got was a clay gourd. She could fill it with water or potion for later, nice. Now that she got her loots Kirei immediately ran away before the boars come back.

Entering the starting town, the calming flute music inside her head slowly faded away and changed into some generic tavern music. Kirei took a bit of time to lower the volume of her background music as she though the trumphet was a bit too loud for her liking before entering the guild's building. This is the place ones would visit if they want to socialize and it sure was crowded considering this was the release day, everyone wants to form their own group before they ended up as PKers food. Kirei looked around searching for group with not too much people and decent team composition. A particular group piqued her interest as they checked both of her list. A great sword, a long sword, rifle and a bow. Perfect slots for her to fit in.

"Hello, people. Heard you guys want to make a party?" Kirei casually strolled into the conversation, if this is real life there's no way she would do something like this.

"Let me join, please. I'm using intelluck build."

TanteRegenbogen Megilagor Spiderverse Steve Jobs

 

[TanteRegenbogen]

The others joined Midori at the table and introduced themselves. Soon two others joined of which one introduced him/herself and the other only asked if they intended to make a party. Midori reintroduced herself to the other two who came to the table and nodded, saying: "Yes, it seems we all intend in finding or making a party." Back to what Chessur had said, Midori continued: "I think Chessur is right though, it may be wiser to first make a party and if we get along well, we can consider establishing a guild. We should maybe go over our skills, because so far we only know the weapons everyone wields but not the other possibly useful skills we chose to specialize in. I chose aside from the tank skills of large weapons and heavy armored defense the skills of cooking, fishing, healing magic and masonry. Though I probably intend to also train my armorsmithing and weaponsmithing too, but the others are more important."

Midori looked around the table and it seems this could become a decent group if the interpersonal chemistry works out. The game so far seemed to be amazing and would decent getaway from real life that tended to suck or be rather uneventful nowadays. Going around outside, people would just give Midori an off-feeling or Midori would accidentally break chairs due to her weight as most chairs in cafes or so were only meant to withstand up to 150 kg. Here in game, she was only slightly taller than average size and couldn't break chairs.

Anyways, she snapped back to the moment and looked over to the last person to arrive. "Anyways, you are?" Midori said to the last person who showed up.

 

[Megilagor]

Name: Chessur
Location: Starter town - Adventurer's guild

Chessur sat there quietly after saying his whole spiel, carefully listening to what others had to say, with a simple reason in mind how could he be a good teammate if he could not even listen to his soon-to-be teammates?
After they finished speaking he butted in before the new arrival could answer Midori's question.
"Well then as our dear new friend seems to be a bit shy, I will tell ya what I know. From combat skills, I obviously have sword fighting, along with it unarmored defence, from my other skills I have mining, weaponsmithing, skinning and leatherworking. As some of you can probably guess my build will depend on endurance and speed."

He stopped speaking for a moment to catch a breath whatever it was irl or ing then he resumed speaking.
"Essentially a basic dps but I will try to stagger the enemies as much as I can, for now with some cheap tactics, but later on who knows, maybe I will make myself some hidden weapons or such. My starting stats are spread pretty evenly so handling things in any role now in the early game will be easy for me, later on, though we will see. I'm not a person to use magic very much, so you could expect me to use enchanting and enhancement only, maybe alchemy if they add it.... Or maybe it's in already just locked away behind a quest??? Dunno, but we will probably find out."
As he finished speaking Chessur bend backwards a bit leaning off the chair and grabbed another chair from a nearby table for the new arrival, and he put it near her before saying.
"Here ya go' Sit down will ya' And welcome to the family!"
When he finished speaking he let out a small chuckle at his own words finding them funny for some reason.

 

[Steve Jobs]

BLUE

Tags: TanteRegenbogen Spiderverse Megilagor Spoiled Bread

Family? That was an odd say to say band of friendless newbies. His assessment did, of course, include himself given that everyone in his crew were off doing their own thing. Aside from arcade games, none of his friends really had an interest in video games (much less MMOROGs) so a lot of what the other players were talking about went over his head.

Higa knew about stats and the different weapon classes that the game offered but jargon like Intelleluck, DPS, off tank, and stagger made as much sense as sports terms probably made to these people. He just wanted to move fast and do damage.

As everyone finished introducing themselves, he pulled up a menu of his character before reciting his skills.

"I use bows, water magic, self-enhancement, athletics and...armor and weapon smithing."

Blue's eyes moved towards Chessur's cloak, the cloth looking more appealing by the second.

"But I'm looking into tailoring next."

ADVENTURER'S GUILD

 

[Spiderverse]

There was a sigh of joy that left Silva whilst the group of players gathered together, sharing their builds and their hopes for later items and rewards within the game. It reminded him of the old days of highschool when he would rush to PC lounges with his friends to play whatever the latest MMOs were or mess around with the fighting games. Even with all of the serious time and effort that games like these take to get good at, there was still a poignant sense of relaxation that came to him when he played. He chuckled to himself a bit as the girl in all blue finished talking, feeling a little funny that this was all it took to bring a bit of joy to him.

"Jeez it seems like most of us are going for armorsmithing in some way shape or form, I was really hoping to be like the sole-specialist! I even took the option of forsaking an extra proficiency in another type of magic to take Metal magic! I heard from some leaks that were talking about the game that when crafting the type of magic you're proficient in can influence how good the results are so I jumped on it! Though in hindsight it was probably jumping the gun a bit." Silva raised his arcane pistol just at the end, hoping the pun would land. "To be real though, I took Large Weapons, Armored Defense, and Marksmanship. But I'm hoping to play more a flex frontline tank role if that makes things make more sense for you guys. Or... to put it even simpler. Gun go boom. Hit me instead of you!"

Silva proudly crossed his arms with a somewhat cocky grin, proud of the way he just broke it down for those around him. Safe to say, he was pretty excited just to be there.

Mentions: All!

 

[Spoiled Bread]

KireiNeko
Location: Adventurer's guild

"Myahahaha. Don't worry too much about overlapping role. That kind of stuff only matter when you go speedrunning or aiming for #1 in PvP." Kirei let out a chuckle while replying to Silva, she then took the chair Chessur offered and sat on it. Her right hand fiddled with her menu briefly before she brought out her profile window for everyone to see.

"Here you go, name's KireiNeko. Just call me Kirei. Please add me to your friend list." Kirei's profile was quite full of things beside just stats, titles and skills. Since Kirei was an internet persona she slready use since she was in college, she had no problem stuffing the bio with several paragraphs worth of backstories, comprehensive list of like and dislike, link to mood board and playlist, and the most important thing, links to her freelance accounts. KireiNeko was not only an internet persona, she's also a walking advertisement.

"My current setup is for a summoner/enchanter character but I'm the type to chase whatever looks interesting the most to me so I would likely end up with something entirely different much later." She explained a it about her current build.

TanteRegenbogen Megilagor Steve Jobs Spiderverse

 

[TanteRegenbogen]

"Pleased to meet you, Kirei." Midori said and listened to what skills everyone had to offer. She added everybody to her friend's list and then said: "Well looks like we have a diverse group and all of the basics in regards to what a party needs even though we don't have the classic healer, but rather a heal/DPS and a heal/tank. Anyways, I sent you all friend requests. If we are going to make a party, are we going to name it or leave it nameless? Cuz if we name it, maybe we could use a name that stands out."

"Honestly, it is amazing how easy people talk to you ingame. In real life, people usually aren't as chatty and end up either ignoring me or just straight up stare at me. It's not as if I am some smelly dude in real life. I am also female in real life. But maybe it isn't a good idea to reveal things about oneself to strangers on the cybernet." Midori said and laughed nervously.

 

[Steve Jobs]

BLUE

Tags: TanteRegenbogen Spoiled Bread Megilagor Spiderverse

"It's not as if I am some smelly dude in real life."

"Hm."

Higa cast a pointed look towards Midori before accepting her friend request. There didn't seem to be much on her profile but the cat girl on the other hand.

Good god she was online. Backstories, playlists, and a mood board? How long had it taken her to throw all of that together? It baffled him that someone would go through all of that trouble for a video game when everything could have been summarized by a handful of links. He didn't need all of that. Nobody did.

All that really mattered was that the group was short on a name and a healer.

"I don't really care what we name ourselves as long as it isn't some dumb meme,"

he shrugged,

"it's not like we can't change it once we're all better acquainted."

ADVENTURER'S GUILD

 

[Spoiled Bread]

KireiNeko
Location: Adventurer's guild

"That's true, sharing real information should be done really carefully here. Getting hacked in regular internet means the hacker can open your emails, getting hacked in cybernet means the hacker knows the size of your left pinkies and more." Kirei said with a bit more serious tone than before. As much as she didn't want to admit it she knew that accessing cybernet was actually riskier than regular internet since it requires direct input from the user's nerves, opening possibilities for malicious people to get informations that would be otherwise unavailable for them.

"That's a shame, I have loads of dumb memes stored for potential names. Guess we can leave it blank for now." Kirei looked at Blue with a white grin and threw a peace sign at her.

"Let's go do some grinds. I heard the devs prepared some surprises for the first few people who managed to defeat certain challenges."

TanteRegenbogen Steve Jobs Megilagor Spiderverse

 

[Spiderverse]

Silva's eyes continued to dart around the table as he kept up with the conversation, his head shifting constantly as to maintain some kind of eye contact with whoever was speaking. Especially in an online space such as this, its easy to be ignored so giving everyone here the feeling that they were definitely being listened to was one of his top priorities. As the others began to say their names, Silva quickly opened the menu and sent out the friend requests to all of those that announced their usernames thus far, sending little personalized notes along with each one so that they weren't boring. "Alright so so far I've sent requests to... Kirei, Midori, Chessur, and Blue. Ah wait... is that everybody?" Silva took a quick glance around the table just to make sure he wasn't missing anyone, surprising himself that he had so quickly sent out friend requests.

His face turned to Midori, wagging his finger with a bit of a dissapointed look. "Always practice safety on the cybernet.. Don't wanna have your biometrics leaked ya know." At the mention of the party name and grinds, Silva's attention quickly turned toward Kirei, eyes almost aglow with enthusiasm. "Oh they have server firsts? We definitely need to do that! Gotta have something permanent etched into the game. Maybe even set some clear speed records?"

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