Chapter 1
Running down the street with heavy steps in the pouring summer rain, is Chamak, on his way home to escape the rain. He is rushing home because he and his friends finally acquired a copy of " Minions of the Gods ", an immersive virtual reality game, released by Damacorp. , the Company which released the first immersive VR game 15 years ago and since then released nothing. The Game "Minions of the Gods" was released a year ago and sold like a hot potato. The game was released in batches due to in-game reasons. Finally, Chamak and his friends got a copy of the game and cannot wait to play it, well, they need to until Chamak is home. He just came from an interview at a university, and it was mediocre at best.
"Ah damn, I need to lose some weight. "
Arriving at the last pair of stairs in an old building right beneath the roof was Chamak trying to catch his breath. The first thing he did stepping into his small but barely affordable apartment, which has all the right temperatures at all the wrong seasons, was to grab his VRheadband and putting it on while running to the toilet.
"Before you say anything, I was running home for you guys.", said Chamak.
"no one said anything, now hurry up and come on, we are waiting for you.", said chrÃs, Chamaks oldest friend and longtime gamer.
"we already created our characters, we are only missing a supporter. Could you play one, if you don't mind?", said Panu, another one of Chamaks close friends.
"Hey Chamak, how was the interview?", asked bejay, the last of the close-friends-quartet.
"it was okay, I guess. It isn't the worst university, but it isn't the best either. It will work out somehow." Said Chamak. While he isn't the best student, he somehow glided through life, barely making the cut but passing everything. "I don't really know how the game works, but as long as playing a supporter is fun, I don't mind playing one. But what about Classes and Races?"
"We play as Humans. Humans are easy to learn and you can play almost all classes and occupations, where dwarves and the likes are handicapped. ", said Chris. "We can begin right away if you pick your real life optics and [Traveler] as your background. Our Tutorial will be in the same random city, but we can only play with others after the tutorial, we are still in a group though "
Chamak did as Chris told him, used his real name as his username, and as soon as he finished his vision went black.
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As Chamaks visions starts to blur he sees that he is riding a wagon with 4 other people. Three are looking normal but the last one at the end was hooded. Once Chamak began looking around he notices that they are passing the gates of a huge City. There is a castle visible in the distance, but there is no end to the buildings and streets nor is there an end to the city walls. As the group of travelers entered began the wagon to slow down.
They were greeted with ten guards of which on introduced himself:" Hello Travelers, I am Headguard Siegrid, and we need to see your faces as there are a lot of shady figures out there", Said the tallest guard in his shiny armor, while focusing on the hooded person. But now Chamak could see a white nametag, [headguard Siegrid], above the guard. And even more, he could see a green nametag above the hooded person saying [Panucles]. "What? This isn't really Panu is it?", thought Chamak as he was trying hard to hold back his laughter about the ridiculous name of his friend.
"But isn't this a Cutscene? And an Intro on top of that?"
This question was answered as soon as the headguard was in front of Panucles. A Lady in a nearby dark alley screamed horrendously and got the attention of all the guards. In the next moment, as the guards looked away, did Panucles run away into another alley. All guards were too shocked to realize that they had been fooled, except for Siegrid, who sprinted after Panucles.
As the guards came back to their senses, they saw the dumbfounded 4 travelers standing in front of them. They allowed Chamak and the other to go their way, but as he distanced himself from the guards did he hear one of them yell: „welcome to Styk!"
The first thing Chamak did was testing the interface and his movements. "All movements seem fine, lets check the Interface. Hmmm only a Healthbar without numbers and a greyed-out bar beneath it. Oh, and a tutorial guide, but no map or other directions. I should check the menu." And as Chamak said menu did the same open. He has three pages to look at. "The first is showing him his status and items. The items are an empty list and the Status is showing himself wearing his clothes, but everything looks empty and rather dull. "Well, probably because I didn't finish the tutorial. Let's move on to the second one.", thought Chamak. This one shows his Skills and occupation but is as empty and dull as the first one.
Even though Chamak doesn't know much, he saw some gameplays when the game was released. There are no skill trees and skill points. Players learn skills for the classes they want to play to gain a pseudo-class, and when one uses the right skills enough or do enough actions, they gain the class. It is the same with leveling. There are no experience points in Minions of the Gods, your stats and power come from gaining objectives, influence and doing quests, which differs from class to class. For example, a Priest needs to pray and heal a certain amount the gain stats and to improve his skills. Quests and other opportunities allow him to learn new skills.
On the last page, Chamak sees his questlog and his allies and special enemies, as well as his influence on a blank map. "huch, I see something on this page.
Let's see, Tutorial: talk to noobila, next to the gate."