A weight settled on my feet. I'm on my feet! Years of confinement to a white room with nothing but a monitor are over. I am free. Looking around, the trees I saw from above before now towered over me. I had expected the woods to be filled with brush and fallen leaves, but it was completely clear with the canopy allowing only momentary shafts of sunlight to reach the lush moss floor. The light shining through the canopy’s leaves cast everything in a vibrant green.
Energy I hadn't felt in years surge through me and I took off running. I ran as fast as I could, pushing my legs as hard as possible, cherishing the burn that started to radiate from my legs and lungs, feeling like I was truly alive for the first time in years. Rushing through a forest of trees with diameters as massive as 15 meters. It was the most awe-inspiring moment of my life. Then someone cut my stings. I collapsed to the ground racked with pain. Panic rushed through me. I had just regained my body and its already failed. Slowly I felt the pain reduce and my body was able to move again. That's when it hit me, I ran out of stamina, this is a game world!
This was supposed to be a fantasy RPG but there were no prompts, skills, interface. nothing. I tried to call up a character sheet but nothing happened. I searched my pockets but found nothing. This felt just like the world I came from. I tried to reach out like I did with the voice but there was no response. I was about to start yelling to get the attention of something but thought better of calling whatever was in these woods to me. I was told that the game would be created by the thoughts of the players, so maybe the game systems have not been generated yet. Whatever the answer is I need to figure out where I am and how I’m going to survive.
Being Lost and alone in an ancient forest would be bad in the old world but now it seemed like a death sentence. Nobody said anything about what happens when you die in this world, so I should just avoid that at all costs. If this world is anything like sword and sorcery games, I know I need to find a weapon. You would think that an ancient forest would be full of fallen wood or something I could use as a weapon but no. whoever imagined this place must have hated sticks because there wasn't even a twig on the ground. In fact, all I could see was trees and moss. there was no sign of any animals at all, which is strange because I saw how many creatures were places in the world.
As I continued to walk through the sheer perfection that was this forest, I realized that it was literally brand new. Ether this area was not created during world creation or this isn't the world I watched being created. However, the hivemind people said this world is generated by thoughts of the players inhabiting it. So, if I am truly alone that means my thoughts should have the most impact on this place. With that in mind, I went in search of a place to hide in order to devote as much time to trying to influence the development of this area.
After a few more minutes of walking, I stumbled upon what looked to be three trees that grew and twisted into each other. At the base of the trees there looked to be a cave mouth. On closer inspection, it appeared that one tree grew at an angle that forced the root system of the second tree out of the ground. The roots of the two trees created the ceiling and floor of a tunnel that lead to a clearing in the center. Entering the clearing and looking up I was able to see that the trees seemed to be fused at the base but grew apart higher leaving a clear view of the sky through the canopy. I sat down in the shaft of sunlight coming down from that hole and thought back to the view I had during my creation. Hoping to imitate the experience of world creation, I started meditating on the contents of a forest. Animals, plants, rock, ore, magic, monsters. I thought about every forest I had ever explored whether it be real or imagined and as the day faded, I drifted off to sleep.
I woke up in the morning to the feel of a drizzle on my face. Opening my eyes all I could see were the anticipated notification windows of an RPG. It seemed that the system had generated the interface for the game as I slept.
The first prompts were about my character creation.
Congratulations on entering the world of Autrael This may be the day of your birth but you have experiences from your past life. Those experiences will be reflected in Autrael.
Dismissing the first notification a character sheet popped up.
Name: Bobby Perry Race: Human Age: 21
Level: 0 Exp to next level: 100
Health: 200 Mana: 240 Stamina: 200
Strength: 13
Constitution: 10
Agility: 5
Dexterity: 17
Intellect: 12
Wisdom: 11
Endurance: 10
Free stat points: 0
Looking at the character sheet I was slightly confused because the base stats seemed to be 10 but my agility was only at 5. They told us that all our stats would be set to the average of all users if the actual state was lower. As I swiped away the character screen an explanation of the stats came into view.
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Through years of construction labor, you have developed strength much higher than average (6) and receive an additional +7 to strength (13).
You don't seem to like to run or jump or throw or sneak or do anything but walk and pick stuff up. You have average agility (5).
You can't fix stupid, well now you can, but luckily you have above average intellect (9) and receive an additional +3 to intellect (12).
You are more durable than average (4) and receive +4 to constitution (8)
Typing, writing, building, carving, drawing. You have spent the majority of your life using your hands to do detailed work. You are far above average (8) and receive an additional +9 to dexterity (17).
Wisdom comes with age and experience and yours is just above average (8) and receive an additional +1 to wisdom (9).
Years of consistent physical labor have greatly benefited your endurance. You have above average endurance (7) and receive an additional +3 endurance (10)
As I finished reading my stat gains the window closed. Looking over the average attribute values it was clear that physical stats are relatively low. I don't know if that's a result of the players being physically disabled, but I do know that my lack of agility is probably going to be a problem.
The descriptions give a little insight into how to increase some of the stats. Strength, agility, and endurance seem to be able to increase with exercise, wisdom by doing new things, and dexterity by doing detailed or precise work. intellect and constitution have no obvious ways to increase but there is most likely a way to do it. Checking my character sheet again I saw that my stats were higher than they should be. Moving to the next notification I found out why.
Congratulations you have reached 10 strength and will now receive a bonus of +1 constitution for every 5 levels of strength you have. +2 to constitution
Congratulations you have reached 10 Intellect and will now receive a bonus of +1 wisdom for every 5 Intellect you have. +2 to wisdom
So, it looks like at 10 in any main attribute you get a bonus in a secondary. which probably means that stats points will be hard to come by, so I will have to learn how each stat affects my abilities before committing to anything. For instance, I was able to lift a little over 200 pounds before my accident so that gives me a gauge for the value of a point in strength. If the stat points represent a linear increase then a point in strength would equate to the ability to pick up about 15 pounds. As for the other stats, I have no clue but knowing the actual benefit of a stat point is important. In The next notification, I found the results of my choices during character creation.
Unlike in your last life, you have been given the ability to choose your starting point. Still, you must live with what you are given in this world as you did in the last.
You have gained 3 traits,
Jack of all trades: You are able to learn or gain any skill, ability, trait, or magic. Experience from leveling any of the four is reduced by up to 100%.
Master of none: Skill, ability, and magic leveling speeds are doubled. Leveling speed lowers as level increases.
Crafter: crafting skills are leveled 50% faster and items you create are 10% better. All skills require up to 100% more stamina or mana during combat.
I guess I got what I wanted and it seems that I will be relatively powerful at early stages. Though as time goes by others will be able to achieve both more powerful abilities and higher skill levels. Also depending on how combat works I might be seriously hindered in battle, especially since I'm alone.
The last notification was quite the surprise and started to show the possible diversity of character builds in this world.
Attention the secondary Attribute dexterity has exceeded its primary attribute agility by over 200%. Would You like to make dexterity the primary attribute?
Thinking about it, I was extremely lucky to find this out so early. The chances that someone has such skewed stats in associated attributes were probably low. Especially given the small pool of players.
Having very little information about the importance of primary and secondary attributes I don’t think it is worth the risk to make the switch now. All I know for certain is that I will receive +3 to agility, but with no real gauge of the value of each stat, I wasn't going to take the risk.
After closing the last window, I was left with four small bars at the top right of my vision. Red, blue, green, and silver. Focusing on the bars triggered a prompt.
Heath: 200/200
Mana: 240/240
Stamina 200/200
Exp: 0/100
Dismissing the prompt with a thought I focused on the bars and willed them to minimize unless they change and they faded away until they were almost completely transparent.
Then thinking character screen, a window opened that showed an image of me with a grid for my equipped items. Along the side of the window, there were tabs labeled Attributes, Details, Quests, and Inventory. The stats tab contained the character sheet as well as areas for equipment bonuses and other buffs. The Details tab contained fields for displaying skills, abilities, and traits. The inventory tab contained a simple grid that contained all the items on my person, as well as a single empty cell labeled soul storage. Focusing on soul storage resulted in a whole lot of nothing so I decided to figure that out later.
Now having an interface and an idea of my stats, I need to make a plan for the immediate future. First things first I need to get a weapon, all I have now is the canvas cloths I spawned in. to do that I need to find some materials to craft with. Without other players or knowing where a city is the only way I can do that is to go search the forest. However, from what I saw yesterday there wasn't any obvious crafting material other than trees and there's no way I was going to be able to chop one down. Unless the changes made to the game while I slept were more extensive than just the interface, I am going to have a bad time in these woods. Also, I’ll need to see if stats can be trained. the fastest way to do that would probably through trying to train agility. It's my lowest stat and from the notification before running may contribute to agility so if I just run as much as possible while collecting crafting materials, I should be able to increase the stat. With a general goal in mind, I stood up and left the grove.