Corey set the sleek black box containing his new N-Cog unit down on his desk. His hands trembled with excitement. The box had Ultra-Soft Arts written in white on its center.

"Let's see if it was worth all the money I saved up," Corey said, grinning and carefully opening it.

Inside was a styrofoam encased helmet. It had a visor permanently attached, and after wrestling it from the styrofoam, he found it also had a long cord coming out the back of the helmet. The cord led to a large flat block, which had a long power cable coming out the other end. Corey's desk was against the wall next to his bed, doubling as a nightstand.

He set the helmet on the bed and the flat console on the desk beside it. After plugging the power cable into his surge protector, he was finally in business.

"Here goes," Corey said. He laid down on the bed, putting on the Neural-Cognition Reality helmet. He'd searched all day to find one, as the supplies were running low in stores with the game's release in mere hours. The same stores that had them a week ago were all out with one exception. It had taken him almost too long to save enough money, but he'd lucked out with his final stop at an old game studio, Hal's Games and More.

He'd almost forgotten that the place even sold stuff. He'd only gone there a couple times to play a game he didn't have yet. Playing it first made it easy to see if it was good or not, so it was worth the small fee to potentially save yourself from buying something lame.

But, at the last minute, and out of other options, he thought he could at least book some time on a headset at Hal's. Hal, however, had ordered some extra consoles to sell, and as luck would have it Corey managed to buy the last one.

Corey heard the heavy footsteps approaching down the hallway moments before his bedroom door flew open.

"Corey, did you seriously buy that game system?" his father demanded. "We talked about this. I don't want you wasting time playing video games all day. Have you even applied for a real job yet?"

"I applied to a place just before I came home," Corey said as he sat up, which was true. He'd applied to Hal's, where he'd found the N-Cog since they'd had a help wanted sign up. It didn't pay much, but he thought he might like working there until he could launch his gaming career.

"How much did you spend on that thing anyway?" his dad asked, crossing his arms.

"I spent most of my savings," Corey said. “But—”

"I don't want to hear it," his father said, cutting him off. "That was very irresponsible of you. When your mother and I get back from taking Beth to her doctor's appointment, we're going to talk about what's expected of you. You're the one who insisted on taking extra online classes and graduating early. You might only be 16, but if you're old enough to be done with high school, your old enough for a full time job."

"But, dad—“Corey said.

"I don't want to hear it, we are going to be late to the appointment. We'll finish this later," his dad said, turning and walking out of the room and leaving the door wide open.

Corey waited until his dad was down the hall and around the corner, then muttered in a mocking tone,"I don't want to hear it." He was so sick of that phrase. His dad used it more times than he could count, especially lately.

Corey removed the helmet and carefully set it down on the bed. Standing up, he went over to close the door. He clenched his fists and took a few deep breaths to calm himself, then walked back over to lie down on the bed to put the N-Cog back on.

"I'm not going to let him ruin this," Corey said in a whisper to himself. He pressed the single button on the side of the unit, causing the visor to light up, revealing a welcome screen.

[Welcome, user. Please sign in or create a new user profile.]

[New User]     [Log In]

After he'd read the entire thing, he mentally focused on the log in option, and the N-Cog visor opened to a new page.

A username and password dialogue box were centered on the page. He focused on the boxes, and what he wanted entered, and it did so. It was strange using the interface, which was more of a mental command closer to voice to text, only with the mind, but luckily, he'd already done this once before.

He finished logging in to the account he'd created back when his friend Leroy had let him check it out. Leroy's dad was loaded and had connections, so he'd managed to get an N-Cog right off the production line. So, Corey had naturally gone over to his mansion of a house to check it out.

[Welcome Corey!] a prompt said, and he was pulled to somewhere else. He lost sight of the visor and his bedroom. He had activated the neural cognitive virtual reality of the N-Cog, so he couldn't even feel his body anymore. It was more than a little freaky. Within the grey space he now found himself in, there were a few floating prompts.

[Log Out]

[Dungeons and Destiny]

[Store]

[Virtual Meeting]

[Settings]

He selected Dungeons and Destiny, transporting him to a new space that was a light blue void rather than the grey. It was a nice touch, and he looked over the options.

[Log Out]

[Play]

[Friends]

[Options]

He tried selecting Play immediately, barely realizing what he was doing. It didn't open the game like he'd hoped, instead, offering another prompt.

[Dungeons and Destiny is not yet live. Time until launch: 0 days, 0 Hours, 8 Minutes, 18 Seconds. You may select your avatar while waiting for the launch. Would you like to select it now?]

[Yes]  or  [No]

The timer continued to tick down, second by second.

"Yes! I made it in time for the launch!" Corey said in a strange disembodied voice.

The option to create an avatar was new. He'd only been able to create a user name before, so apparently they had released the feature just before the launch. Naturally, he selected yes, and to his surprise, he was looking at a blank rendition of a grey naked humanoid with no features at all. 

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

[Please select a race.]

[Human]     [Elven]     [Dwarven]

He selected human, since from the research he'd done they would be best suited for his adventuring play style. The Dwarves received crafting bonuses, along with boosts to strength and stamina with each level. The Elves had weapon proficiency bonuses, but received boosts to agility and intelligence with each level up. The humans, however, were able to get bonus stats in all four of the stat categories. It was supposed to be difficult to maximize gains, but even so, it would let him go in any direction he wanted.

[Would you like to auto generate your Avatar from your N-Cog profile?]

[Yes]  or  [No]

He selected yes again.

[Please hold the mental image of any features you would like changed.]

Corey briefly thought of making his nose super long to resemble a beak or something, but dismissed the idea, instead focusing his mind on how he saw himself. A long nose would probably get in the way and be super annoying.

The avatar morphed in front of him, and he could have sworn he was looking at himself in the mirror. It was complete with his reddish brown hair, freckles, slim chin, and tall lanky frame.

The avatar was uncanny, only it was wearing what looked like crude linen clothes and had a small knife sheathed on a leather belt at his waist.

Neat, he thought. He knew the unit could pull how you saw yourself from the neural connection, as that was what it did for your N-Cog virtual meetings, but it was still a little freaky. There was an option to customize, change race, or approve the avatar as it was.

From what he'd heard though, the beta players said the game was so life like that it was almost scary. You could feel, smell, and hear things inside the game as though it were real. Corey wasn't sure how far that would go with his avatar, but he didn't want to have to get used to a new body. However, he didn't want to be exactly the same.

He focused on his hair and changed it from the reddish brown to more of a fire engine red with lowlights of pitch black. It was so freaking cool. He mentally focused on approve.

The default avatar for virtual meetings couldn't be changed from what you actually looked like, so this would keep his profiles mostly the same, which would probably help avoid confusion if he made online friends and had a virtual meeting with them.

[Congratulations, Corey, all requirements to play the game have been completed. You will be able to play as soon as the game goes live.]

He still couldn't select the play option, as its timer was still counting down, but the friends menu option was blinking, so he selected it. A new notification popped up.

[Leroythegreat has invited you to be friends on Dungeons and Destiny. Would you like to accept the friend request?]

[Yes]  or  [No]

Corey accepted it.

[Leroythegreat has invited you to a Virtual Meeting. Would you like to join?]

[Yes]  or  [No]

Corey selected yes, and was transported to another space. This time, however, rather than a strange void, he found himself in a fancy room with large cushy leather chairs and an ornate rug. There were also bookshelves, and pictures on the walls. It looked like a fancy study. Leroy was already in one of the chairs.

"Corey!" Leroy said. "You made it! I was wondering if you'd get on before the game started."

"Hey Leroy," Corey said as he walked over and sat down in the chair across from him. "What is this place?"

"It's the default meeting room," Leroy said. "But, I think you can change it in the settings."

"Cool," Corey said. "You might want to change it later. It's a bit fancy for you."

"I can be fancy," Leroy said.

"Fancy like a fart," Corey said with a grin, "and a rank one at that."

"At least I'm a rank above," Leroy said with a laugh. "But yeah, I suppose this isn't really me. It reminds me of my dad's study. I'll fiddle with it later.”

"Ain't nobody got time for that right now," Corey said, opening his menu to see how much time was left until launch. There were four minutes to go. "Where are you going to start?" Corey asked. "Are you still playing a dwarf?"

"Yeah," Leroy said. "You still planning on playing as a boring old human?"

"Yep," Corey said. "It's all about them stat gains."

Leroy laughed. "I hope it works out for you. I know the dwarven starting area is pretty far from the human zone, but the dwarven racial bonus for the crafting professions is more my jam. You know how much I love crafting in games. This one is supposed to be insanely intuitive with countless options! I'll need any edge I can get if I'm going to try and win the prizes."

Corey knew that Leeroy shared his dream of being a professional gamer, so it was to be expected. He just hoped that he could meet up with him sooner rather than later in game. It was always easier with friends in these kinds of games.

"Yeah, I know you gotta go for it," Corey admitted. "But, I'm telling you. The human racial bonuses might be wacky, but I think stats are going to be super important, and having the ability to maximize all of them with extra effort is going to pay off, just watch and see."

"Sure you can max them," Leroy said, "but I heard that humans don't get any guaranteed bonus stat points each level. What if you finish a secret quest or something that levels you up and you miss out because you didn't train them? The dwarfs gain an extra two strength and stamina per level no matter what. And it's the same with the elves, only for dexterity and intelligence."

"Sure," Corey said. "I get that. Humans would be a lot harder to max, but the potential is there if I can figure it out. Humans can gain bonus stats in all of the five stat groups, even spirit, depending on how they trained them while leveling."

Leroy shook his head. "But, that means you will have to do a bunch of training. I could do the same thing and have lots of trained stats too from what they said. It's just going to make it harder on you. Do you really want to grind for stat points? If you went with an elf you could be a rogue, ranger, mage, priest, or whatever else uses dexterity or intelligence for the primary stat. There are supposed to be awesome items that improve your stats anyway, so you could probably still be an elven tank and be a dodge tank to boot. Besides, if you can't find any gear, I plan of crafting the best stuff anyway and I could hook you up."

"Why are you trying to convince me to be an elf?" Corey said with a laugh.

"Because, if you go human, we are on opposite sides of the continent. If you choose elf, which are in the north, you would share a border with the dwarves, so we could meet up a lot quicker."

"That's true, but I've already made up my mind," Corey said with a shrug. "It probably won't be that bad to travel anyway. I'll meet up with you soon. Then we'll be unstoppable."

Leroy shrugged and leaned back in his chair. "We don't even know all the details of what the stats do in game. I doubt you'll be able to be that much more powerful than other people, but who knows, maybe you're right. We'll figure it out in game, and if it sucks you can always re-roll your character."

Corey nodded. "I'm sure the stats help you in killing monsters and doing adventuring type stuff though. If I can figure out how to max all my stats, everyone will want to watch my videos and livestreams."

Leeroy was right about them being on opposite sides of the continent though. According to the map they had released, the humans started in the east of the continent, the dwarves on the west, the elves on the north, and the furlings, the only non-playable race, were in the south. The furlings looked like a yeti or bigfoot, depending on the hair color, but were supposed to be friendly to the other playable races.

 The entire game was one continent, at least for now. the center of the continent had a large ring of mountains surrounding the area, and a massive cluster of mountains in the middle. No confirmed information had been released for what was inside the center of the continent yet.

There had been supposed leaks, with people saying monsters would be trying to escape and destroy the outer world, or that there was a secret dragon race inside the central mountains, or that it was a demon stronghold, but there had been nothing official.

Leroy tapped at the air, messing with his own menu. "Looks like it's almost time," he said. "Best to just jump in and we'll figure out all the details later." 

Corey mentally brought up the menu which appeared as a glass panel in front of him.

[Dungeons and Destiny: Time until launch: 0 days, 0 Hours, 1 Minutes, 43 Seconds.]

"Have you talked Stacy into joining you yet?" Corey asked.

"I'm working on it." Leroy said. "She gave me a maybe, but I think I can persuade her. I'd really like to get us all in a group for any group quests though, so we'll have to see if there is teleportation or portals or what not."

"I'm sure they put something in," Corey said. "Everyone hates traveling for days in games, so there's no way that's the only way to get around."

"It will work out one way or another," Leroy said. "Does your dad know yet?"

Corey smiled. "About buying the game and headset? Yeah. He wasn't too happy. I guess we're going to have a talk about it later."

"If he kicks you out you can always crash on my couch until you're on your feet," Leroy said.

"It will be fine," Corey said. "I think it's illegal for him to kick me out until I'm eighteen anyway, and my dad prides himself on being an upstanding citizen. Thanks for the offer though."

"Cool," Leroy said. "Keep in touch with me in game."

The timer had just hit zero, so Corey nodded and tapped the Dungeons and Destiny option was now displayed in the same white text as the rest. Selecting it, the world changed.