The light slowly returned, a soft glow that teased my eyelids. I rolled slightly, inhaling a fresh, earthy scent as the rough ground pressed against me from below.
My eyes cracked open. But my thoughts were in a fog. An impossible level of detail greeted me, dusty earth and green grass. Green wasn’t a strong enough word though. My neck craned as I pushed myself up with some difficulty.
The world around me was vibrant, verdant even. A forest. I was in a forest, rendered in such incredible detail. The texture of the bark, and the swaying of the leaves. From my prone position I could somehow make out even the cracks in the trunks in which moss began to grow.
Sunlight pooled across the forest floor as l looked to the canopy above. Small birds danced and chittered, chasing insects.
This could not be the world of Convergence. I saw no ‘heads up display’, I could feel the rough fabric of my shirt as the breeze softly carried the forest’s scents to me. I felt hungry and very thirsty. Everything screamed that I was in reality. But that wasn’t possible. I had remained logged in, the last thing I remembered was a sense of fear.
Had I ‘disappeared’ too? Was I dead? Could this be what had happened to everyone?
I moved my arms(?) below me and placed my feet(?) on the ground as I tried to push up. I felt wrapped in some sort of heavy shawl, dragging my arms and restricting my movement.
I was... covered in feathers? My hands disappeared beneath the flat press of my limbs. And my legs felt as if they had been bent the wrong way.
More proof I wasn’t in the real world. My mind churned, there was one solution to my confusion of course. And yet I was nearly faced with panic. For, I tried to move my fingers and dig into the soil beneath me and it was only those feathers that responded.
A white rachis and a black vane, held stiff by the others surrounding it. I held one arm aloft, sitting up. I could feel them. The soft breeze was pressing against ‘my’ feathers. No fingers as such, no wrist. Nothing about it felt natural.
I pulled my wing up, feeling the long tendon bring what would have been a forearm on a man (now an ulna) close to my new humerus. The feathers slid together cleanly as I flexed slowly every joint I could feel. It was strange, having such sensations, such an inhuman feeling. No game could create this, it was too real to be a dream.
Both of my arms were the same, long wings. Each one (assuming my sense of scale remained the same) was over 6 ft in length, or, almost as long as I was tall.
I had never been around too many birds before, but the words to describe each section came naturally to me. The primary feathers stretched out, creating a loose fan of ten feathers. Behind those were my secondaries, of which there appeared to be twenty. There were five other layers of feathers, each one covering part of the wing and shining in the sun with faint iridescence. I had a sort of ‘thumb’ called an alula, however, no other fingers, just one opposable digit with limited motion covered in feathers.
The rest of my body was likewise changed. A rough and baggy tunic covered me from my neck down with large slits in the side allowing my wings a -small- measure of mobility. But below that, more was different still. My legs were undressed, save a short pair of half shorts, leaving the pale skin visible. Hairless human thighs met the knees, where a more rough scale-like texture covered all the way down until the feet. The fused bone under the knee gave way into a third joint, the ankle which was far from where it was on the human form. Four digits extended off the bone below that joint, Three forward and one to the rear. Each one capped with a wicked talon.
The legs themselves, large, and all parts of them were powerful, thick with muscle. Much longer than I had seen on humans, even tall ones; they extended down from my hips and, from what I could judge by my own sense, were likely over one and a half times as long as my torso.
As for my torso, I tried to use my wings to move around my tunic, finding something that was very distressing.
I couldn’t believe it. My mind raced, struggling to come up with answers and explanations.
But, somehow, this was proving much more distressing than becoming some sort of bird-man hybrid.
A shock of fear and memory, disgust mixing with shame. Once I had worn long hair, but a swift intervention from my father silenced that. This was so much worse. I knew rationally I wouldn’t be hurt because of this. But if anyone found out, they would judge me, thinking me disgusting, or worse, predatory.
I buried my worries, forcing a calm mind to prevail. Regardless of the situation, I would need to find food and shelter. I looked around me, seeing the calm blue sky peeking through the trees. I first tried the motion commands for seeing the game menu, it was clear that something about this was related to the game. But no HUD or info box appeared. No inventory, no skills or status windows, and of course no settings.
I stood up, it was much easier now that I had seen my body in full, although, the height and the first few steps felt as if I was walking on stilts. I was tall now, in my human body (and my previous avatar for that matter) I stood a couple of inches shy of 6 feet. But now, I was easily over 7, legs making up the majority of the height and wingtips trailing on the ground if I let them extend. Rather than letting them collect dust, I folded them surprisingly comfortably at my sides, reaching one of them up to scratch at my hair.
My feet bit into the ground as I began to walk through the trees. Despite everything, I felt good. Full of energy and as if I weighed nothing. So I continued, getting used to the loping stride that my legs seemed to favor. Although, my mind caught on a strange question, 'if I had wings, could I fly?’.
A part of me knew that taking off from standing would be impossible, and the forest around me prevented my full wingspan, which as of measuring now, was massive, over 14 feet. I flapped one experimentally, feeling the incredible muscles across my chest and back heave as the air resisted me. Dust and grass blew forward and away as wind was created by the simple act. I put those thoughts from my mind as I walked, I could hear the flowing of a river and smell the dampness of the air.
I came up to the shallow banks of the stream as it burbled onwards. A crisp and cool, yet steady flowing affair. Civilisation, be that the world I’m in possessed such, would lie down river, or near to the sea.
Having a plan, I knelt down to the water, which was moving too fast for me to make out a reflection. I thought for a moment to cup the water in my wings, but instantly realized that would not work out. With a sigh I dipped my face into the stream, I took mouthfuls at a time, drinking the cold and sweet water down. Water spilled across my chest and face, even the top of my head. The day was warm however, so I had a hard time minding.
[][][]
Eventually I came across a well constructed trail, something easily beyond the normal animal paths.I had to hop across the stream to reach it, but a downward flap of my wings allowed me to make the jump easily.
The path took me through the woods towards a cleared section, and around the bend I heard a pair of jabbering voices seemingly arguing about something.
It was an almost familiar sight, monsters. Short green skinned humanoids, obviously goblins. Their crooked faces and red beady eyes matched how they were designed in the game, but they stood and jumped in a much more natural way, rags and scraps of leather covered their bodies and short, yet sharp metal tools were either clutched in their hooked hands, or discarded off to the side.
Three goblins. In the game, with my old character and gear, they would hardly be considered a speedbump, something to defeat and move past. And yet, I felt something like nervousness, a fear that spread across my wings causing my feathers to lift.
I couldn’t tell what they were arguing about, their words were foriegn to me.
But they quickly put aside their differences, pointing at me and making strange jeering sounds, as they scrambled to collect their tools.
I knew, intellectually, rationally, that they wanted to kill me, and that I should kill them. But before me wasn’t a collection of data, they were in all likelihood, living beings that either were placed here like me, or grew up here.
And on the other hand after all, could I kill them? Not psychologically, but rather, was I strong enough?
My thinking cost me precious seconds, and within the moment they were diving towards me. Killing tools, knives and shivs were being brought to bear, one even had a club.
My hands -My wings tried to go to where my hands could have grabbed a blade, but I remembered myself, and took a step back.
The first of three was at my feet, it didn’t even stand high enough to reach my hips and still it stabbed with its surprisingly sharp looking weapon.
An obvious strike, so I stepped aside to swing my leg past the blow, when with a sudden change of angle, the goblin’s knife struck home.
A feint?! It was unheard of, monsters didn’t change, they had one or two attacks, and they couldn't adapt on the fly and yet, the shallow cut on me burned with pain.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
My momentum wasn’t stopped however, and almost instinctively I swung my foot up and towards the goblin’s head, grabbing it in my wide grasped talons. With a twist I slammed it down and felt a sickening snap beneath the force and my weight.
Time seemed to slow as the two remaining goblins hesitated, allowing me time, with my still blood flecked talon to kick the closer of the two solidly in the chest. The lack of mass meant that the goblin was sent lurching and rolling backwards, instead of dying like his companion.
I watched, standing with one leg raised as he scrambled to his feet and began to scream and run, being followed by the last, uninjured goblin. I let them go and they scrambled into the woods.
I stared down at the corpse at my feet. I could hardly grasp my feelings about it. And almost, upsettingly, it wasn’t the killing that stood out, but rather the physical sensations. There was a stinging pain in my leg as blood slowly oozed from the red line left behind by the dead goblin’s knife. My foot below that was warm and slightly wet from where dark blood still stained it.
The oddest thing though, was the lack of system assistance in the kick, normally when playing the game, there was an animation for most types of attacks, a sort of rigid assistance to help you perform the moves. Here though, it was all me, no computer helped me kill that being. My will impelled my muscles, which resulted in the death of, not just a collection of data, but something alive.
I stood still for a minute, staring down, I had to avert my eyes from it. The corpse, it’s eyes were glazed over and blood leaked from its mouth. I had to step away. I had to put space between it and I.
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I was an hour out from where I had encountered the goblins. And the forest had begun to thin out into hillish plains. With the bright sun beating down on me. And in the distance, along the river there was a town.
My leg was beginning to throb, although the bleeding had stopped. And I was excited to meet people who may have a better explanation for all this than I could come up with.
The buildings in the distance were quaint single story affairs for the most part, large swaths of arable land, slowly growing this year’s crops. For all the strangeness I had observed thus far, seeing grain crops was somehow reassuring. A symbol of human advancement.
I still dared not to attempt flight, but there was certainly a spring in my step as I neared the village. I could see people now, -my eyes were clearly quite a bit better than my old eyes- and they looked rather plain, ‘peasant’ would have been the word I used to describe them if I had encountered them in a game as NPCs.
Each one was performing some task, I saw men feeding livestock and women washing clothes. More people milled about speaking with one another or moving heavy loads in light arms. Curiously, I also saw someone wearing what I could only call a wizard’s robe as they tended to devices that looked awfully like modern (or at least Victorian) street lamps.
The day was still young as I slowly made my way past the fields and into the town proper. The people looked at me as if sensing a dangerous outsider, certainly I looked different from all of them. While they were not all ‘human’ specifically, they were all much more human.
I could make out some elves and even a could of beastkin. Now I suppose would be a good time to explain what I knew of the world built by the MMO.
There were 10 playable races in the game. Humanlike: Human, Elf, Orc, Dwarf and Hafling. There were also the beast races: Cougar, Wolf, Elk, Bison and Bear.
Clearly, the race I was now, was not part of that list, but the people of this town seemed to follow at least the trend, excepting no orcs, and only a few beast kin.
I almost approached someone to ask questions, but a sudden bout of nervousness made my legs carry me deeper into the population center. There was clearly some sort of hygiene in place here, as my understanding of medieval towns was that they were quite dirty, but some of the people casually casting small spells seemed to imply that magic had solved this problem, which I was grateful for.
I got near to the center of the town, a great square with a fountain and a few large sized buildings.
Everywhere I went I craned my neck to look for someone like me, or at least someone who stood out. I needed to find a ‘player’.
I was drawing attention now, I could feel people staring at me, was it possible I was that obvious? I tried to hide my discomfort by walking away, when I was stopped by a voice.
“Eh you! Big Bird Lady!” I pivoted towards the sound, it was a short man, no he wasn’t short, but I got to feel just how tall I was.
“Yeah, you! You come from the game?” He was close to me now, a short 6 feet away.
He was dressed in a heavy dark leather apron, with a green shirt. His blue eyes looked up at me. He must have been 6 feet tall, and yet I was nearly two heads taller.
I only then realised I was starring,
“Yes.” I replied simply, trying to find my voice. My voice was smooth for a woman, and I was surprised when I heard it. At least my tongue worked the same.
I felt a strange anxiousness, I had never been one to shy away from talking to strangers in game, but this was different. No longer was I behind an avatar, or over some voice chat.
"How could you tell?" I broached probing for more information.
"Simple as," he looked at me and pointed at my chest. "you're wearin' the starter gear."
I immediately felt stupid, such an obvious mistake, I should have changed. And yet he kept on talking.
"Doesn't help that you look scared of yer own shadow."
I took a step back, was he making fun of me?
"No need to be shy of me, I was the same way," he continued "all the new people have that kind of look."
"And judging by that," he gestured to the blood that had stained my leg, "you've already done the hardest part"
I felt exposed here, as if I had erred in approaching the town. As I was contemplating my retreat, a cold voice bubbled in the back of my mind, ‘Take whatever aid you can, you need to figure out everything’
“I'm sorry…” I spoke softly. “Can you explain what happened?”
The man looked a bit confused by my sudden change in topic. He shrugged his broad shoulders.
“Well, before I get into the hard stuff, I’m Nelson, although my game character was named Pankratios.” He scratched his hair with his left hand. “You’ll find that many people take a new name, or use their in-game-name while here though.”
“And aside from that there’s not much I can tell you if I’m bein honest.” He gestured to himself, then to me. “I’m sure yer aware, but some people who played the game long enough got taken here.” He met my eyes with an intensity I had yet to see from his jovial personality. “Things are real here. It may seem like more of the game, but you can risk yer life and die.”
I got the feeling he was speaking from experience. “How long have you been here?” I asked.
“Oh, nearly 2 months now. I’ve met nearly a hundred other players since then though.”
Two months is a long time. I opened my mouth to speak again when I was interrupted by him.
“You should start by forgettin the game world. Stats won’t help you here, but levels are important. The temple in town should be yer next stop, they can give you a run down. Take yer mind to remember that most here aren’t players,” He gestured to the people in town “These folk are born here and they grow up here but they’re real people just like you or I.”
He looked over me once again. “You drew an interestin straw. '' He gestured at my wings. “Yer the first Harpy I’ve seen, but I heard from a couple of friends that there are more like you.” I looked at my wounded leg, “Mind if I heal you? I’ve been learning some healin magic. And yes before you ask, everyone can learn magic, it's not limited to class.”
At this point I was overwhelmed by the surge of information and had a hard time responding, so I simply nodded.
A warm yellow light spread from his hand, just like spells in the game as I felt my stamina recover and the wound on my leg close.
As I was maravling at seeing and experiencing magic for the first time in my mortal life (real magic!), he began to speak again, reaching into his pocket and holding something.
“Here, I’ll give you some money to buy some food and to rent a room around here. Don’t worry about paying me back, I’ve got a real job and other players stop by and drop off stuff for me sometimes.”
He held out a few coins as if expecting me to take them. They were small things, but larger than earth currency. In standard fantasy fashion there were three colours, Gold, Silver and Bronze. I almost tried to grab them when I realised I had nowhere to put them, or even to pick them up with.
“It’s no worry really!” He continued, before realising my situation “Wew lass, you did get the short end of someone’s stick. How about this?” He pulled out a pouch and a piece of long leather cord. With a motion I could barely track he had sewn the cord through the other and tied off the end, tools appearing to flash and then disappear.
He held the long loop up. I lifted a wing at first, then thinking on it again, I stepped towards him and lowered my head, ducking through the loop.
“Thank you.” I said, almost in reaction. I was not used to being offered, or accepting charity, but the situation I was in made me glad that I had met someone kind. “I intend to pay you back.”
“Take yer time!” He smiled at me, his face betrayed his age, despite the rough growth of his beard, I could tell he was young.
“After yer done at the temple you can meet me at my forge,” He pointed to a short building about 100 feet down the road. “or you can take some time for yerself, I know how disorrienting is waking up here, but you must have it worse, getting used to all that.” He gestured at my wings and legs.
I couldn’t speak so I just nodded as he turned his back on me and began walking to the building he had said was his.
[][][]
The sky was a deep blue as I strode past the people of the town. Their eyes seemed to possess a strange power that burned my skin as they glared at me. I was the outsider here.
My mind turned to the state of the town itself and the world I was in. I had to take things at face value or I would be overwhelmed by the scale.
This town was near a forest. The forest contained -at least some- monsters that were hostile to human habitation. People in this world faced danger, they fought and killed as a matter of necessity. The people around me would be on guard, their soldiers, militias and hunters must be ready at all times. They lived here, harvesting resources and creating societies. Surely there would be kings and nobility, people entrusted with the management of war, or at least warriors.
The logic of a video game would not help me. Treating the world around me as if it was my old world would be a folly. There were already others who came before me, I was not some hero who would introduce technology. Sure, I could reason how to help them advance, how to make steel of higher quality. But, had people already pushed them to the next level, were there guns or bombs? Were those weapons of war made obsolete by magic?
Nelson had helped me, but he left me with more questions than answers. Somewhere in the range of 20,000 people has disappeared. Were they all here? Nelson had claimed that he had personally met one hundred, which given an even distribution across a planet the size of earth is actually fairly impressive. But perhaps they were scattered on one continent or even in one country. On the other hand, maybe they landed in different worlds all together. For if there were two, perhaps there were many more.
That was an assumption that I was not willing to make however. So from that moment I chose to walk forward, drinking in the world and its new experiences.