“Give me no weird nicknames,” Agravain grunted, trying to get up, but immediately fell back heavily on the creaky bed with a loud groan. The stiffness was not just sleepiness, his body appeared terribly ill.

“Easy now,” said the woman as she tapped away without a care on the strange slate, “This is because you overspent your Rage bar, you know. Typical amateur blunder, really.”

“And who the hell are you?” Agravain glared sideways, “Did you do this to me?”

“Are you daft? Weren’t you listening? I had just done telling you it was all your fault. As for me, of course,” she grinned, as though expecting him to already have guessed something so obvious, “I’m Jophiel, your designated Player, one of the Seven Archangels of the Quest, patroness saint of all Knowledge and Hidden Records, the reigning champion, and all time keeper of the most titles in the current rendition of the Quest.”

An angel.

An odd thing to identify oneself as.

This woman struck Agravain as nothing but. She looked the furthest thing from what comes to mind when one thinks of an angel. The tracksuit aside, she was leaning back on the table in a terrible posture that made one worry for her back, her legs spreading apart unladylike to brace her lower half. And while her face was perfectly sculptured as one would expect in an angel, she had swept her bang quite carelessly aside with a V-shaped pin, leaving only a few terse forelocks drenched with sweat draped across her forehead. And whereas the images of angelic beings you see in old paintings typically come with gorgeous golden hair, this self-proclaimed one instead sported a crude short bob cut of raven black.

“An angel, huh,” he said after a bit of musing over the supposed angel’s appearance, “were it you who gave me these physical powers, then?”

“Me? Hmm, it’s a bit more complicated than that actually. I suppose you can say that I’m partly responsible for that? In a philosophical way, I mean. If entities like me didn’t exist you wouldn’t be here. In fact, you would still be in your original world raging ineffectively away. But say, Agravain, you seem like an uptight, no-fun-allowed sort of guy, so I feel like I have to ask you this first. Do you know anything at all about video games?”

“I do actually,” Agravain narrowed his eyes. That decidedly did not sound like something an angel would ask. “My sisters used to play games a lot, and she made me play with her.”

“Phew, that’s a relief!” Jophiel wiped her brow, “It would sure as shit drive me crazy trying to explain video games to a guy like you. Most people in the modern world play games, you know? Would in fact be stranger if you haven’t played one before. Old people, young people, even toddlers play with their parents’ phones these days. So you would be weird not to. Sports simulations, FPS, fighting, racing, farming, card games, there’s something for everyone. Which is why our interfaces resembled them, it boosts user experience and ease of learning, yadda, so says Michael’s leaflet. But that aside. Have you played a role-playing game before?”

“You could say so,” he shrugged noncommittally, “That useless sloth of a sister made me grind stuff in such games, only to then drop them soon afterward. So yeah, I have got more experience with them than I care to.”

“Then you’re aware of the main draws, yes? Things like levels, attributes, skills, and such? Customization, that is.”

“I guess?” Again he shrugged, “According to my sister, though, all of those you mentioned are just fluffs to sell games to casuals who don’t grind. In the end, she said, most if not all role-playing games are the same under the hood: a massive grinding simulation. You can beat just about anything with enough grinding.”

“A cynical little one, eh? I almost want to pity her, but she is dead anyway, so there would be no point in that.” At this point, the angel laughed gruesomely. Not that it sounded like she was relishing a brother’s misfortune, more that she thought it was an actually funny joke.

Go figures.

“Anyhow,” the angel continued, “it works to my advantage that you are both aware of that genre and also not too keen on it. It’s always a problem when the Player Character disagrees too much with my directions to follow their stupid preferences.”

“You keep calling me Player Character, what the hell is that? Use my name.”

“You’re who you are, no one can change what they were born as. You’ve been designated as Player Character #5 for this Quest, so that’s what you are now. You are an adult so don’t sweat over small details. It’s lame. You know about those characters you control in video games right? Like that. You’re one. Congrats, you were demoted from a human being! Except not really. You still have your freedom of action, since this is the real world and not a game, for the most part. And though my title is technically that of a Player, I suppose I’m more like a manager than someone who directly controls your every action. Or like an agent? Nah, that doesn’t sound right.”

“That’s one hell of a lot to take in. So this world...is like a game? What happened to my world? Why am I here?”

“Are you daft? Are you not listening? I’ve just done telling you this was a real world, if a peculiar one! And you are of course a real person. But the gist of it is this: we, you and I that is, may navigate this world in the manner of someone interacting with a game. It’s still the same thing underneath, you know what I mean, only the interface is different. Like a UI skin, if you will. That is to say, technically, whatever you can do, the average person in this world only can, you and I just interface with it differently. And as for your own world, or why you and the others were chosen, who knows, that’s not in my purview. I can direct you to the people in charge of that backroom stuff if you’re desperate to know. But be prepared to wait three hundred to five hundred business days for an answer.”

“None of what you’re saying is making a lick of sense.”

Jophiel sighed, shaking her head. “Of course, of course, my bad. I forgot. That’s the sort of character you are, isn’t it?” Her finger was now swiping swiftly across the rectangular device.

It appeared whatever she had done with the device had caused the now somewhat familiar voice to ring in Agravain’s head.

Player Character #5, Agravain

Class: Barbarian

Focus Attributes: Strength, Endurance

Traits: Novice Fighter, Dump Stat Intelligence

Feats:

Modifiers:

Skills: Rage

Rage bar: 100%

Attributes:

Str 44 | En 28 | Dex 14 | Int 0 (-∞) | Wis 8 | Cha 11 | Luck 15

“You Int stat was dumped, eh? Or rather, that’s thanks to a unique trait that comes hard-coded in your class. It’s quite amusing to witness in person, truly. In fact, I didn’t even know there was even one like that in this system! Like, who does that? Is this trolling? Or rather, hazing? There’s useless and then there’s deliberately bad. It was so funny I almost cried when the Operator told me you picked it.”

“Oh yeah,” Agravain nodded, somewhat aggravated by the angel’s manner. “I did hear some talk about classes and whatnot. So what? Am I actually dumb now?”

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

“It’s not that easy to get rid of an ingrained part in yourself, you know. I’m sure you will still have your smart-aleck moments. More than anyone should like, even. You just won’t be able to solve difficult problems as easily, or even inclined to. Anyways...”

Anyways.

Having said this word with gravity, the woman got out of her seat, flashing an intensity in her eyes.

In half a step she was next to the bed, the room was that small. A blanket had been laid across Agravain’s ill body, which the woman now yanked unceremoniously aside. For the next few moments, she poked at his body muscles.

He let her do as she pleased, not like there was any point in being ashamed in front of an angel. Supposedly they were invisible and roamed freely in the material world, then none of him had ever been a secret in the first place.

“Well, those seem like real muscles,” she concluded after the intense study. “This is the first time I have seen such a drastic change after profile assimilation. Which is just as well, I would hate to work with a twink playing pretend a muscular warrior. The aesthetics would clash too much for my taste.”

Presently, she picked up the tablet again, switching her attention to whatever was written in there.

“Your class is the Barbarian,” she began, “focus attributes: Strength and Endurance; Unique skill: Rage. A class of all brawl and no brain, in short. But of course, all classes have their subclasses to spec into later, as well as several viable builds to suit one’s style. Training regiments, feats, skills, traits, modifiers, equipment,... will also contribute to any given build. Hmmm, this is going to be a tricky case, but if my calculation is right...”

Abruptly, she stopped speaking to scan the room, landing on the articles hanging on the wall, Agravain’s tattered dress shirt and Iranon’s old cloak.

The barbarian wasn’t paying attention to her abrupt turn to quietness, he was thinking of his classification.

A strange name, to be sure, and a sweeping term, Agravain thought.

Barbarian: a word either to indicate an uncivilized person or merely foreigner to a state.

In the latter sense he was an alien to this world, and because of that, didn’t say much.

“I sure felt invincible yesterday,” Agravain said, “I don’t think there will be much of a problem, when it comes to fighting at least.”

“Oh? That is what you think.” Jophiel clicked her tongue, turning back to him, “You haven’t come across any real challenge yet, so don’t get uppity. I pointed to that trait earlier. Dump Stat Intelligence. Hard-coded trait. You hear me? No-nonsense. What it means is that you are forever crippled from any sort of magic casting, or any potential subclassing to magical using classes. No amount of tinkering on my part would ever fix that. None. Zero. You know what else is swell? The current meta, as a matter of fact, is strictly about magic, for magic, and by magic! The undisputed powerhouses are classes with Intelligence and Wisdom focus, so much so that all else is just noise. Prior to yesterday, the concept of class not using magic in any manner was more a silly theory than something to be considered in a serious conversation. I’m sure you will soon learn why. But I’m telling you now and you better believe it. Another fact: with your Intelligence attribute so low, your magic defense is abysmal also, thus yours is a class hard-countered by the most widely-used classes in this system. To put it simply, you are screwed and then double screwed.”

Agravain frowned, his eyes fraught with doubt. It was not that he didn’t believe the woman. She seemed to know far more about what was going on than him. But then again...

“I will just punch my way through things, regardless. How hard could it possibly be?”

“How hard could it be?” She repeated, then laughed, shaking her head. “Oh, you have absolutely no idea. Not at all, nope. Think of it like this, someone with an ordinarily low score in the Intelligence attribute could have half of their health evaporated by a magical attack at the opening of a fight. Yours? Yours is far from even ordinarily low, in fact, the value of the modifier is -∞. Even a juiced-up cantrip can come close to evaporating you. It also means any gains you make to this attribute through items or training will be completely nulled. That’s how hard-coded your class is against anything magic. You are compensated with absurd physical stats in return, sure, but that just makes you a glass cannon in the current meta. A glass cannon for a class with above-average mobility and no reach! It’s so bad it really makes one cry.”

“Well, sorry you are stuck with me then,” Agravain was a bit hurt. Most of what the woman had said still didn’t make a whole lot of sense, but the gist of it seemed to be that he was in a bad situation. “Sounds like you were assigned as my Player against your will.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” the woman asked, tossing the tablet unceremoniously on the table. The thing made not even a sound on impact, betraying its immaterial nature. “It’s true that we would have to draw lots if two or more of us had picked the same character, that’s why it’s called assignment after all. But who else in the right mind do you think would pick someone like you for their Player Character? None! Zero! I was the only one who signed up for you. That was so freakin obvious it isn’t funny!”

Of course it was not.

But the woman was now looking at him with expectant eyes.

Having shot to the middle of the room and standing with her hands on her hips during the passionate speech, she was now hinting shamelessly for him to ask the inevitable question.

How annoying.

“Well, why did you pick me then?” Agravain made a concession.

“Why, I’m glad you did ask,” she said, huffing her nose proudly, annoyingly. “Because if I didn't take such a massive handicap, this thing they call a war would just end up being another thrashing for those casuals who call themselves my rivals!” She then commenced a savage laugh. Which was truly savage--high pitch and irritating. “By doing this--by taking you as my PC, you get me, those filthy casuals are given false hopes that maybe, just maybe, they will have the slimmest of chance to win the Quest and claim the Egg this time around, and that I won’t once more completely trounce them like the noobs they--”

She was cut short.

The door to the room suddenly swung wide open, startling both Agravain and the angel.

A certain familiar youth came barge in.

The following instant, Jophiel was gone, even her tablet had disappeared from the table.

“Oh, are you awake?” Iranon said, eyes wide as he entered, seemingly more astonished that the barbarian was alive rather than just awake.

Meanwhile, Agravain could move again. So that self-proclaimed angel did do something to him after all. Though his limbs were still heavy, he got up. “Is this your place?” he asked, slowly stretching his muscles.

“Mine? This dump? Not quite, after yesterday Karvash men are probably hunting for us so it’s not wise to return to my usual place. This place is abandoned though, so no one’s coming here.”

Presently, the bard went over to his cloak and took it down. “I only came back for this. To be honest I didn’t think you would survive last night, what with so many wounds and so much blood, I reckoned no physician would answer the call for an enemy of the Brotherhood either.” As he got his cloak on, the bard peered at Agravain’s scowl curiously. “So what are you going to do now? Your idea to charge into the Karvash Brotherhood’s place is probably gone now that your head’s sober after a night’s sleep, eh?”

“Yeah,” the barbarian said tiredly.

What was he thinking really, trying to beat up people who had nothing to do with him for no reason? What a waste of energy and time.

But then again, what was the reason to do anything in this world? The point of all these classes and players and all the things?

Suddenly, he realized something so vital and yet Jophiel hadn’t mentioned it.

“Jophiel!” he cried out, caring not for the startled Iranon.

“Geez,” Jophiel clicked her tongue. “Can’t you be a bit more discreet? People will think you’re crazy, you know.” She was again sitting at the table by the window, but seemingly invisible to Iranon. The bard looked at him warily then about the room, right through Jophiel yet seeing nothing.

“Don’t mind him,” Agravain said, looking squarely at her. “What is the point of it? The way you talked about it made it sound like there was a competition among you angels, some quest. But what competition? What game are you the Player of? And why should I compete in it instead of going my way?”

“Didn’t I say you will know soon enough?” The woman carelessly examined her fingernails under sunlight, which were an uneven and rough affair, bearing evidence of being frequently chewed on. “As I said, I’m not in charge of all that tedious stuff. But there was a reason for the time and place you were sent here. Your own unique story event, so to speak, your own hook, though I know not what. Not something I particularly care about, unfortunately. A development that can convince you to desire a place in this competition. Fate arranges it. That’s how it usually goes at least.”

What in the world could possibly make him want to entertain the whim of a sloppy angel? Much less this rude one?

What in the world could possibly make him do anything at all, now that he was free to pursue an unattached life in this world?

He couldn’t think of anything.

Try as he might, Agravain couldn’t think of anything that was real, tangible, reasonable.

In truth, something did come to mind, but it was wrong, delusional, and unreasonable.

“Iranon,” suddenly he said, “tell me something.”

“What is it?” the bard regarded him with still wary eyes after his brief conversation with thin air.

“Do you know about a disabled girl near this place?”

If Agravain remembered correctly, that girl who had looked like Estella, his sister, had been referred to as the princess.

So of course even this lowly bard should know.

And yet the answer stunned him.

“Oh, that’s strange,” Iranon raised his brows, “you got wind of it already? Haven’t you been sleeping all the while? But yeah, word around is that the Karvash kidnapped one like that off the street last night. Weird as hell he’s into that type, but who cares, this is the opportunity for us to get out of this city while he’s distracted with that bounty!”

Agravain immediately got up, his body protesting all the while. But he didn't have time to rest. He didn’t even think about it.

“You’re going with me, bard. Or I will snap your harp in half once I find it.”