I didn't know when or how it happened. It just happened. One moment I was just casually walking across the road reading on my phone. Next, I look up to see myself in the middle of a forest with a freaking game screen announcement in my face.

[Welcome to your new life for the foreseeable future human. We here up above within the Collective have decided that all of you were just being a waste of space, not really doing anything on your Earth except slowly destroying it while only focusing on yourselves. That's not to say that all of you were like that, but the vast majority of you were, and we got tired of it. 

So, we have all come to the decision to drop you all on a planet about 20 times the size of your Earth, and have you all face waves of enemies that will be ever changing overtime. Of course you are free to explore the world as well, but know that you can never escape the endless waves. 

In order to give you all a chance to survive, we have given each of you random abilities based on your personalities and things you have interacted with. Each wave will have a timer in between to show when the next one starts. Good luck, The Collective hopes that you can prove to be somewhat useful.]

With the passive aggressive encouragement that was within that announcement, I had no idea how to feel. I walked over to a nearby pond and confirmed that I didn't physically change. I still had black, wavy hair, tan skin, hazel eyes, my glasses, a decent physical build, black joggers, a gray hoodie, and I was still six foot two. Soon after I confirmed all of that, another screen popped up. 

[Congratulations Mr. Day, your base ability has been chosen. You have been given the F-Ranked skill: *Golem Creation*. This skill allows you to make golems of any kind, however, their growth potential depends on what type of soul is imbued into them. 

You however can only choose one type of soul to summon when creating golems, and are stuck with that type, so choose wisely. Depending on which soul type is chosen, additional abilities may be given. You will also be given a few basic resources to start with, specifically a small amount of wood, and stone. Figure Out the rest from there.]

I looked again at my skill description on a separate screen to see if there were any finer details that I could glean from the ability. Outside of what was said, it's asking me to choose what type of soul I will be using for my golems. Apparently the type of soul dictated almost everything for the golem, from what it could become in the future, and even what it looked like at the start. 

I stood in place and thought to myself for 20 minutes before I looked at the wave timer. I had a total of three days to prepare for the first wave. I didn’t know what it consisted of, but I needed to start preparing now if I wanted to survive. It was then that a crazy idea hit me, I wasn't sure if it was going to work, but if it did, that would tip the scale in my favor.

"I want the type of souls I use to be that of Gamers."

[Processing Request…

Error…No available gamers from Users Earth, all are challenging the Collective's waves.

Proceeding to ping souls from different planets…

Complete. Discovered alternate Earth reality with VR technology. 

Creating Game website and engine for User. 

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Naming the game 'The Collective's Challenge'

Creating a preview video…

Marking User Day as Main 'NPC' and GM…

Creating an RPG system for Gamers…

Error… The RPG system is limited, max level for Gamers is level 20. Inventory is limited to 4 slots, mini-map cannot be deployed, Basic crafting implemented, only a few recipes recorded, any others must be discovered by players. 

Classes Mage, Warrior, Healer and Rouge available, no class upgrades or hidden classes available at this time. Please upgrade your skill to access more features and abilities.

Player slot max is currently set to 50. Please create the golems that the players will inhibit. Respawn is limited, the body must be recreated or fixed for players to 'respawn' at this time.]

I know it said that additional abilities would be created, but this is insane. However, this doesn't make me personally stronger. But it allows the gamers that I summon to get stronger by leveling up, acquiring skills, items, and more. First things first though, I had to follow the instructions of my skill in order to make them bodies. 

For now they will have to be pretty crude, and I can only make five with the materials I have at the moment. Three out of wood, and two out of stone, thankfully though they get pieced together by my skill and I don't have to do it manually, it just takes time. First thing I did was hover my hand over the small pile of wooden logs, and watched as a stream of purple mana flowed out of my hand and went towards the wood.

When the mana interacted with the wood, it started breaking it down into pieces, then reconstructing it into feet, then legs, then the belly and torso, to the arms, the neck, and finally the head. There weren't any details on the body itself, it looked like one of those dummies you would hit, except it had a full-sized body. From what I could tell, this base would get adjusted further when I put a soul into it. The process repeated itself four more times for the other golems, before finalizing. Now I just had to wait for the players to join the game.

[Alternate Earth]

My name is Dave, although I go by 'Valefor' in the online games I play. I recently saw an ad online for an upcoming VR game that would supposedly blow all others out of the water. It came with its own full body VR pod instead of a headset, and stated that it was able to simulate the five senses perfectly. They are currently running a small closed beta that would expand overtime until they reached an open beta. 

The game is called 'The Collective's Challenge' and it's made by a new game company called The Collective. Interesting that they named the game after themselves. The trailer for the game itself looked gorgeous and blew my mind when I saw in the bottom right it said *Actual Gameplay Footage*. It's supposed to encompass this fantasy world where we help the main character Day survive endless, ever-changing waves of enemies. We are also to build up and fortify for the waves. 

It's like an extremely advanced tower defense game, except you could throw in town building in there, and rpg aspects as well since there were your basic starting classes of warrior, mage, healer, and rogue, with more to come in the future. A huge difference is that the starting race that you played as were golems. 

Never have I seen a game that allowed you to play as them, let alone have you play as them starting out. The benefit of it was that we could apparently become whatever we chose to in the future as long as we worked for it.

I scrolled down their website after finishing going over the description and trailer. Then I signed up for the closed beta. Hopefully I'm able to get a spot.

[Back to Day's POV]

After around two hours of pacing back and forth, I was able to get some responses, and the first five players were chosen. I walked up to each golem and placed a soul within their chest. Soon after they started to dimly glow, and their details were being updated in real-time. One of them gained long black hair, red eyes, and got shorter, to around five foot and five inches, it looked more feminine as well. Another one of them grew to six feet, got short brown hair and black eyes. and It gained a more masculine look. 

Each of the golems also gained a set of 'beginner's clothes' which was just a white t-shirt, and white pair of pants, with undergarments. Each player had their name over their head, they were: Valefor, Gummies, Eat Dirt, Monkey Steals Peaches, and Old Swordsman. One of those names put a disgusted expression on my face, but I just moved on from there and prepared my speech.

[Valefor POV]

When I got into the pod it was more comfortable than my own bed. As I logged into the game, I was presented with a short cutscene, showing Day grasping what would be my 'Soul' and inserting it into my body. Afterwards I was able to adjust my character. I was given a warning that the looks would be purely ascetic until I got stronger since my character was made out of wood. 

I decided to do something different with this game, look wise since it wasn't all that limited. I gave myself long silver hair in a ponytail, blue eyes, and a light beard. I also chose the mage class since I always loved to fling around magic in mmos. 

When I finished up on the character creation, I was temporarily blinded by a light, and when I opened my eyes, I saw the NPC Day sitting on a wooden stump looking at me and four other players.