5
A Name, A Mask
Rian’s consciousness reemerged as if from sleep. For a moment he feared he was in a coma again, but here his sense of self returned in an instant, and he could vaguely feel the presence of his body.
The game’s title rose out of the dark in sprawling letters, just as it had looked on the selection screen.
PROJECT MIRAGE ONLINE
The sounds of violins, cellos, brass, and piano began to swell as an orchestra kicked off into triumphant fanfare. The background lightened to reveal a sky flecked with clouds and a sprawling landscape below—distant mountains, rivers like gold against the sun as they flowed through the forests and plains.
It transitioned into an opening cinematic, the typical trailer for an MMO: players of all different classes exploring treacherous lands, killing monsters, teaming up and working together, opening treasure chests in dungeons, and generally looking like they were having as much fun as humanly possible. A voice-over narration began to play, and subtitles appeared below the center of Rian’s vision.
The land of Miracia, a continent once torn apart by endless strife, has begun to recover. The four gods who ruled over the world have fallen, marking the end of the Hundred-Year War. In their wake lies a rift, spilling countless souls into the realm. You are a Vessel—they who harness the remnant powers of the Four.
Was there any way to skip this, he wondered? He was sure the lore and the storyline were great and all, but he could always watch this another time. He was already looking around for hidden options to fast-forward it, but nothing was turning up. Not even his body was visible yet.
The cinematic shifted to a group of people in dark robes giving off a villainous aura: demonic knights and mages wielding gnarled staffs and barbaric swords and axes.
But there exist those who survived the Undoing and retain their loyalty to the Four. These Loyalists seek to halt those who would desecrate the memory of the gods. Drive them back, and take Miracia for your own!
Meer-ah-shi-a? Kind of an on-the-nose name for the place, considering the name of the game, but whatever. At least it seemed that was the end of the cinematic narration. MMOs and their walls of exposition.
A server menu emerged as everything else faded to black again.
Three towering stone monoliths appeared. The first, surrounded by ruby light, held a drawing of a stout and muscular man wrapped in a cloak, with a mountain etched in the distance. Upon the second, bathed in deep blue, was a drawing of a tall, lithe, robed man holding a book. The third, drenched in luminous green, was a smiling woman wearing a shawl and extending her hands. Overlay text hovered in front of the monoliths, which were the servers to choose from: Goam, the PVE server; Ezre, the PVP server; and Altir, the social/trade server.
Only three servers. He would’ve expected to see at least twenty for how popular Mirage had been, leading up to release, but maybe it was how these kinds of servers worked with their fancy new technology.
As for the choice, it was obvious which one his mom would’ve picked. If there was one thing she loved more than video games, it was competitive video games.
He focused on the center monolith—the PVP server, Ezre—and waited for the loading circle to complete.
The orchestra returned, harps plucking a pleasant arpeggio as his floating perspective descended from the void and into a forest. Off in the distance among the plains was a gigantic, white-walled city with spires nearly blinding in the sunlight.
Rian landed in a glade where the grasses flowed with the wind. Ahead, showing a view of the forest was an ornate mirror bordered in gold and standing at an angle. It was a mirror for the character creation process, obviously. He supposed he could approach it when he was ready.
When he glanced down, he could see his body, dressed in a plain gray t-shirt and pants. About as generic looking as possible. But when he flexed his hands, he held out his palms in awe. The fidelity was incredible, way more lifelike than any other game he’d played. He could feel his virtual body as if it were his own—the breeze against his skin, the warm sunlight embracing him.
It always helped to dispel the illusion sooner than later, so he took a moment to convince himself that it was, indeed, virtual. When he pinched his cheek, there was no pain but a sense of pressure in its place. He was actually breathing the air, or at least he seemed to be. The low, persistent ringing that he could always hear in silence was gone, too. And when he gazed off at the distant, white-walled city standing among the plains, things were blurry the farther he looked.
A huge step forward over ElmSaga. Reflect Systems had outdone themselves. If he hadn’t known where to look for the seams of the virtual experience, it would’ve fooled him at a glance.
A text box appeared in front of him.
[!] Sensory Limitations
In Project Mirage Online, most sensory information is translated from reality. However, negative sensations are either removed or heavily dulled to maintain a pleasant gaming experience. For example, players will retain their sense of taste, but can only experience pleasant tastes. Certain sensations—such as hunger and thirst—will arise from your physical body while in the game; please remember to utilize half-sync appropriately to address your needs.
Huh. So the game could tell he was testing things out, probably from reading his gestures. It was surprisingly adept. When he dismissed the text box, another appeared.
[!] Negative Sensory Experience
Players will not feel pain while in the game, but the anticipation of pain may provide some discomfort. Injuries cannot be inflicted upon players in any form outside of game-designated status effects; players cannot be de-limbed, blinded, deafened, or bruised. However, some blood may appear to signify damage taken. Other negative sensations such as dizziness and vertigo will arise as normal.
To unlock expanded sensory options such as the Intimacy Content Pack and Increased Pain Sensitivity Content Pack, please consult the DLC catalog.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Really? The game was already lobbing downloadable content options at him? That figured.
He hesitated, realizing he couldn’t feel anything between his legs.
Well, that was a bit disturbing.
He appreciated the heads-up about the level of pain and abstraction of violence in the game, though. It wasn’t something many people considered, but as games attained more lifelike realism, it became harder to distance oneself from the effects of gruesome experiences. The last thing any major company wanted was their game literally traumatizing players for life because someone stabbed and disemboweled them with realistic pain in a virtual setting. Talk about a lawsuit waiting to happen.
Rian made a shoo-ing motion and the text box disappeared. When he looked at the bottom of his field of view, nothing was there. Not even a heads-up display. Nor could he access the friends list yet, which would likely let him search for Azure.
Fine, he guessed. He’d play along for now.
When he approached the mirror waiting for him in the glade, his reflection was staring back at him—exactly how he looked in real life.
Please adjust your appearance as desired.
He was expecting some kind of slider system to appear, but nothing happened. When he looked closer at his reflection, it began to shift in subtle ways. It looked overall similar to how he looked but better, as if he were staring at an image of how he imagined himself to look, with all the imperfections smoothed out. There was a bit of delay with each change, which kept his look consistent and seemed to prevent his mind from letting his appearance go too wild.
When he tried to imagine himself extra buff, nothing changed. Bummer. But he could change almost everything else when he focused on individual attributes—hair length and color, his eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. He could give himself a mega-chin. The possibilities would’ve kept him occupied for hours, but for now, he’d keep things simple so he could move along. He reset everything to the default appearance: something similar to his real-life self.
When he stopped adjusting things, the game noticed.
Save changes? (Yes / No)
Please note that your appearance cannot be changed except cosmetically.
Rian nodded in understanding at that last bit. There were probably a bunch of cash shop items to fine-tune things later on.
Are you sure?
He hadn’t meant to trip the gesture system with that nod, even though he was done. But he appreciated the second chance.
“Yes,” he said, and the text faded.
His menu options finally appeared along the bottom of his vision—character, inventory, friends list, guild, system options, and so on—but they were all grayed out. Instead, his character page automatically opened.
Level 1 Beginner
HP: 106/106
MP: 94/94
STR (Strength): 4
DEX (Dexterity): 4
INT (Intelligence): 4
SPR (Spirit): 4
Please provide your character name. Note that it cannot be changed.
At any other time, this would’ve been the hardest decision—a name he’d be stuck with forever. But after years of streaming and gaming, his tag had kind of solidified itself, and that combined with his appearance meant that maybe someone would even recognize him. All he hoped was that someone hadn’t taken the name already.
“Cobalt,” he said.
The game spelled out the name in front of him as he spoke it, followed by a list of people who had already claimed it. He frowned, then realized what it meant: multiple people were using the same name. There was a number next to them, starting at #000. As he was added to the list, #003 appeared next to it.
The name Cobalt appended itself to the top of his character page. He closed it and finally opened his friends list by tapping the floating smiley-face icon on his menu.
“Add Azure,” he said, and again a list of players with that name appeared—nearly a hundred people. He sighed. People loved that damned word.
He sorted the list by identifier. His mom had been among the first in the game if that note she’d left was true, so she’d likely be the original “Azure” if not one of the lowest-numbered ones.
He glanced at the top of the list.
Azure #000 (Level 40 Grappler)
Last seen: 119 days ago.
...
The number hit him like a punch to the stomach. 119 days? That long ago?
When he considered the players directly below, all of them were either online or had logged in just a few days before him. But none of them aside from the first was a Grappler—the same archetype his mom had played in Comrade Clash.
He calmed down. There was a chance it wasn’t her, or that she’d just moved on to an alternate character. But when he asked the system to check for him, it wouldn’t let him see other characters on a person’s account. If she were online right now, he’d have no way of knowing until she logged into Azure again.
When he scrolled down, there was only one other Grappler with that name, and they were online. It was worth a shot.
“How do I message players?” he asked, looking to the sky, hoping the game would answer.
[!] The Whisper System
To privately message other players, whisper that character’s name and identifier while not facing any other player; or use the /whisper command through your virtual keyboard. If their name is unique among your friends list, stating the identifier will not be necessary. Other players will not be able to see or hear your conversation.
Simple enough. He whispered, “Azure zero zero five,” and a translucent box flickered into existence. When he spoke again, the game translated his speech into text, and it appeared inside the box, shortly followed by a response.
Letting his shoulders drop, he swept the box aside and it vanished.
He wondered what his next step was—maybe contact a GM to see if he could get information on the other Azures. He doubted a GM would give away info like that, but he was running out of options. If his mom were on an alt character, he could do something like send out a global message for her. But he didn’t see anything mentioning global messages in his system options, and there wasn’t any text about it popping up.
Maybe looking outside of the game for his mom’s whereabouts was a better choice after all, despite what the note had said.
Foliage rustled behind Rian and he turned. Stepping through the grass was a burly man dressed in brown work clothes. Chewing on a barley stem, he smiled through his mustache and beard.
Ugh, here we go, Rian thought. The tutorial NPC.
“Greetings, newcomer!” the man said, dusting his hands. “I’d like to welcome you to—”
The NPC’s eyes went wide as he gagged, his entire body tensing. Collapsing to the ground, he landed on his face with a terrible thud. A dagger with golden cross-guards and an amethyst in its pommel protruded from his spine. Blood welled across his back and soaked through his shirt.
Behind him stood a small man in a black and purple suit, four stubby horns atop his head. The slit pupils of his eyes flexed against the sunlight. With a fanged smile, he spread his arms.
“Welcome,” Corvis said, “to Miriad.”