Muraya walked to her left and letters started to seep out of the ground. The dark empty space slowly lit up with glowing white letters that melted together, spiraling around her to form words. Names of all her previous games started to fill the room, dancing around her with information about characters from every Cerebral game she had ever played. The further she walked, the more words appeared around her triggering old memories of when she played with her siblings. Such joyous memories brought a smile to her face as she reminisced.
Slowly the words started to dim and blew away into the wind as though they were made of ash.
A voice resounded in her head that said "Welcome to the world of Accrued Online Your character information had been uploaded. What is your name...?"
'Hmm,' Muraya thought to herself, 'who do I want to be in this world?'
She thought about how her sister would draw mermaids and name them after Muraya by altering the spelling.
After some deliberation, she made up her mind and said "Murmayd."
"Murmayd, "the voice said, "You have an affinity for battle."
"A what?" Murmayd asked, but the voice did not respond. Instead the floor under her opened like a trap door, and she was falling from the sky!
"Ah! What is going in!? This game is insane! Am I going to die on my first day?!" She was reminded of how she almost did die in this same manner just hours before. She shook her head and pushed that thought from her mind.
As she fell from the sky, she frantically looked around to see if there was anything that she could grab onto on her way down, or possibly a menu that could pop up to help her figure out what was going on. She panicked and started shouting commands.
"Menu, pop up, inventory!" Finally a window opened that showed her inventory. She looked over the starting items as the floor quickly approached.
- Water (30 thirst, low quality)
- Breakfast (30 hunger, low quality)
- Novice Mount (low quality, tamed)
- Cotton Shirt (low quality)
- Cotton Pants (low quality)
- Leather shoes (low quality)
- Wallet containing 10 silver (low quality)
Again, she started yelling random words trying to slow her descent. "Walk, floor, fly, activate mount!" The next second she was on the floor sitting on a small cow. "Ugh," she sighed "I knew I wouldn't like any games about fighting. This is already so weird." She looked down at the fat cow she was sitting on with her heart still racing and caught a glimpse of her body.
"I'M NAKED!" she shouted. "WHY WOULD THEY ADD THIS AS A FEATURE?! Activate shirt, activate pants, activate shoes." Again nothing happened. She decided at that point this game was truly nothing like any other game and she would no longer be surprised by the absurdities of this world. 'I think I get it now,' she thought inwardly 'this game is obviously designed to throw you into some crazy scenarios and just expects you to figure everything out on your own. How ridiculous.' She kept trying different combinations of words until something finally worked. She said "Equip shirt," and the shirt appeared on her body. "Finally! Equip pants, equip shoes." The pants and shoes also appeared and she was finally dressed. She looked around to make sure no one saw her naked body sitting on that fat cow in the middle of nowhere. She kicked the cow gently in it's sides and it started to move. She saw no reins and no obvious way to steer it. "Why am I not surprised," she said out loud. She grabbed its ears and softly tugged on one to make the cow turn. It was very slow and she wondered if it would be faster to simply walk on her own. She decided to let the cow do the work while she tried to figure out where she was and how to play.
Looking around, she noticed a sign up ahead pointing down a road that read 'Starter town.'
"Ha, she laughed as she spoke to her mount "the creators didn't put much effort into names, did they my little cow?"
The cow replied with a short and simple "Moo."
"Well said, my fat little friend," she responded. "Hmm, you need a name. Name mount!" A window popped up in her vision and she felt like she was finally starting to get the hang of the controls. She looked down at her cow and immediately knew the best name for her mount. She focused her attention on the pop-up and started to spell out the cow's new name. "W, A, L, K, E, R."
The pop-up disappeared and Murmayd laughed as she rode her fat cow in the direction of the sign. "Sorry my little cow, I know you are female, but I just think it's hilarious riding around on a fat cow named Walker. You're much cuter than 'The almighty Overlord Mr.Walker,' but you're just as slow and just as fat," she told her mount.
She looked around and the land was practically empty. She was in a dessert that didn't have any creatures and only a few green prickly cacti. 'How boring, I hope the rest of the map isn't as barren. Oh!' she thought as an idea popped into her head. "Map," she said out loud and in the corner of her eyes she could see a small map with the words 'Desolate Dessert.' The map didn't show the world but started populating as she walked. "It shows where I am, and where I have been. That's not so bad. At least now I know the name of this place. Let's keep trying some commands and see what else we can find out."
She started saying random words to see which ones worked and started discovering different menus that gave her more information on who she was in this world. So far, she had figured out that saying words like 'skills, status, inventory, equip, activate, and information' would show different pop-ups in her vision that she could view and scroll through by looking around and using her thoughts. At least this one feature was just like any other full-dive game.
As they reached the sign that was pointing right, she tugged on the cow's right ear and it turned. It continued to walk down the road in the direction of the 'Starter Town'.
She took advantage of this time and started looking through her characters information.
- Health: 100%
- Mana: 100%
- Hunger: 100%
- Thirst: 99% (Desolate Dessert drain)
'I guess this dry, sunny dessert is affecting my thirst. I hope we won't be here too long and I can make it to the town before I die of thirst,' she thought to herself. 'Hmm, it doesn't say what my maximum health and mana are but I guess I'll find out once I start fighting. Yet another mystery.'
Next she looked at her skills. She was excited to see her starting skills since she knew this game would use old information to create Murmayd, unlike other games where everyone starts at zero for all their skills.
- Melee: 5
- One-handed weapons: 4
- Two handed weapons: 2
- Ranged: 260
- Spellcasting: 280
- Creation- 8560
-
"Hmm, what do you think Walker? Are any of my skills amazing or is everyone else about the same?" She asked her cow who always replied with a short but wise "Moo."
"Yeah, I think so too little buddy " she agreed and continued, "they really are very general, but I guess that's because they had to combine so many skills from other games that they just lumped them into broad categories. I guess I'll find out more once people start posting in the forums."
She leaned back and looked at the clear sky as she wondered how much further till she met up with Yanet in the starter town. Several minutes passed and she could see some trees in the distance. After what seemed like an eternity, her hot dessert ride was finally coming to an end. A few minutes later, she was in a forest and could hear little creatures scampering across the ground. Walker continued her slow pace towards a large building in the middle of this forest. She could finally start hearing the chatter of other players and was excited to see what everyone else looked like. As she approached the mob of humans who were all walking into the starter town, she saw a wild variety of mounts and clothes. Some were riding faster mounts like horses or strange creatures and wearing poor quality leather armor, while others were wearing simple cotton clothes similar to hers and riding other low-level slower animals. She laughed out loud when she noticed a large bearded man riding a small chicken-like creature whose eyes bulged from its head. Suddenly she felt thankful for her cow and she gratefully patted its side. Her cow might be slower, but it was significantly less silly than the man on his strange chicken.
'It looks like players with higher fighting skills start with better gear. This game really only recognizes strength and battle experience over everything else. I'm going to have a tough time catching up to their status,' she thought. She kept walking around reading the signs on the wooden buildings. She knew Yanet was waiting for her in the weapons shop and she didn't want to keep her waiting any longer, so she didn't have time to really explore yet. She looked at her map but none of the buildings were marked. After asking around for the location of the weapon shop, she finally found her way and put away her mount back in her inventory before walking inside.