Welcome to the world of Paxton

A bright white light shone in the distance, like a tunnel of light surrounded by darkness. Without any thought or action on my part I felt myself moving forward towards the bright light, kind of like walking in the beam of a flashlight, towards the light. I instinctively knew when fifteen minutes would be up. I was prepared in advance and kind knew what direction I wanted. I was an Engineer, and my strengths were attention to detail, work ethic, and creativity.

The world of Plaxon was a creation of Gaia, she was the AI who ran the world and was the server. Although in this case it was a very, very, private and selective server. Due to my profession, I knew that Gaia was at the cutting edge of the current technology, she was running a fully immersive world, while creating a world situation which would ensure a clear winner emerges at the end. However, she also had to give the contestants time to acclimate and fit in. Gaia in this sense was not unique, there were many so called “fully immersive world” for a long time now, since before the Union. Gaia was special, not because of her fully immersive ability, rather Gaia was the strongest AI in terms of cyber security. In order to ensure that there was no cheating or “bugs” Gaia was impenetrable, like absolutely.

I was shocked back to awareness by the sudden words flashing in front of my eyes.

Race selection:

Well here starts the fun part, character creation was and is until today the best part of role playing games. For me it really came down to Human or Dwarf. I mentally thought Human and a quick description pop up in my mind.

Human: the most populated race in the world, humans are capable of being anything and excelling at almost any profession. While they lack the specialization of other races, their determination and ambition helped them go far.

Sounds interesting, lets now check out the Dwarven race.

Dwarf: sturdy and resilient, dwarves are best suited as tanks, explorers, and craftsmen. Dwarfs are renowned for their smithing and jewelry making.

Interesting, it did not say much about anything. The idea of being an explorer did sound nice, not sure that was the right way to go. I was feeling the pressure, my “internal” clock was ticking and very soon I would not have any time. On some feeling, a hunch or maybe even nostalgia, I decided I was going with the Dwarf, or I should say Dwarven race. Having made my decision, I immediately received another pop up.

Sub Race Selection:

Hill dwarves- aloof, confident, and sometimes proud to a fault. They are known to be particularly stalwart warriors and shrewd traders.

Mountain Dwarves- strong, sturdy, and resourceful, the dwarves of the mountains are powerful warriors as well as excellent hunters and trappers. Their distrust of men is well known.

Plain Dwarves- clever and smart; having grown accustomed to life under the sun, Plain Dwarves have become the goldsmiths of most western kingdoms, as well as expert crafters of all forms.

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Deep Dwarves- living in the dark has had a strong effect on the dwarfs of the deep, with the partial ability to see in the dark, Deep Dwarves are always delving deeper after riches.

Badlands Dwarves- living around Orcs has over the centuries created a new subrace out of Plain Dwarves emerged Badlands Dwarves, sneaky, quiet, and survivalist to the core.

Royal Dwarves- Royal Dwarves come from the bloodline of Thragnar the Great. Their lives are hard for they are mercilessly hunted by all. Proud and stubborn they are slow learners; however, their potential is truly unique.

Interesting, so I picked my race, but I still had to pick a subrace, that was pretty cool and different. I liked it, I quickly reviewed the subrace again, I had decided I was going with the Plain Dwarves sub race, when my mind was suddenly attracted to the Royal Dwarves. I reread the description, the part about the persecution from all, which I assume meant all races, was hard. Well, persecution by all races kind of made sense because no leaders wanted other royal bloodlines running around with their own ambitions. The slow learners also looked kind of ominous. The unique potential part sounded really nice; I was usually a run of the mill type of guy. I worked well with my coworkers and did have my creative moments here and there, but too be harshly honest I was not unique in any shape or form.

I cannot describe what was going on in my mind, my very essence was rebelling. How can you not take the opportunity to be unique? My ego screamed and hollered uncontrollably. The problem was that I was a very honest guy to myself, I could not lie to myself and say I am unique or royal. How will you know if you never try? Maybe you have? Your mom always claimed you were special. I mentally took a deep breath and tried to calm myself, the conflict in me was real. I did not want to set myself up for failure by overreaching. That was a quick way to end my life. The line “you never know if you don’t try” kept coming back into my head, I could not shake the feeling that I should take the plunge.

I mentally closed my eyes and counted to thirty, steeled myself and took the plunge. Royal Dwarf it is.

My body started moving again, I felt my height shrink from a meter seventy-three to one forty-eight. My shoulders felt considerably broader and sturdy, my entire body felt like I added twenty kilograms of pure muscle to my frame. My steps turned heavy, into the heavy steps of a Dwarf. I received a pop up:

[WARNING: Royal Dwarves incur a -50% experience gain, as well as 50% increased learning time. Royal Dwarves receive +1 to primary skill allocation. Royal Dwarves receive -10% Development Shift timer]

Well, the experience was self-explanatory, that was a brutal debuff if I was understanding it correctly, the other modifiers I had no clue what they were, although at a second glance the plus one to primary skills probably meant that there were only a certain number of primary skills you could choose. Having an extra primary skill already seemed well worth the choice. But again who really knew what this world had in store for me.

Confirm Selection: Y or N

I hesitated for a moment before selecting yes, a mental sigh escaped my virtual lips or non-existing lips. There was nothing as hard as uncertainty for the human mind. Tell a person he is going to die charging an enemy fortification he will charge it happily and gloriously. Tell him that he may survive, and his courage will weaver as he tries to find a way to survive his predicament.

I felt myself keep moving forward slowly, intuitively I knew that it was time to pick my facial features. I tried to choose my own face, the AI allowed my request, I felt my eyes turn into a deep blue color, while my skin tone turned into slight olive. My features were modified to fit more into the dwarven mold, for example my skin looked a bit rougher or drier then actual skin, my forehead was much more pronounced. My wavy black hair fell about my shoulders and the beginnings of a beard was growing.

Name:

Thorin, was my immediate response. I hesitated a second and I think it was the correct thing to do to hesitate, I don’t think it was too smart to pick a name that was obviously a player picked name. I decided that the best idea was to request a randomly generated name. I didn’t think for more than a second when the AI supplied a name.

Gudrak Blackhorn

I liked it. This is who I would be now. As I felt the fifteen-minute timer reach the end, I finally reached the light, and everything went dark.