"Is this on?" a voice says in the darkness.
"You know what, even if it's not, you'll figure it out sooner or later. Not sure why my Lord is even wasting his time on this anyway..." The voice trails off followed by a "CRACK!"
"Oooouchy! Okay, okay! I'll stay on script. No reason to get violent all I'm saying --"
"STICK TO THE SCRIPT." A deep booming voice cuts off the rambling voice.
"Yes sir! Ahem, as I was saying, welcome candidates to the opportunity most would die for and quite a few of you will die for. Hehehe--"
"LAST WARNING NEOTHAK," the booming voice intercedes again.
'What an interesting beginning to the game. I guess this is one way to introduce the big bad.' Nathan thinks to himself.
"Ah yes, candidates welcome to the chance of a lifetime. The real reason for this "game" you all are taking part in."
Neothak then whispers, "Must I really call this a game? It's not really a game."
"YES"
"All right, Sanctuary Annihilation was created by my Lord to find himself a champion. Most of you have been selected because you have um, let's say "special characteristics" my Lord finds interesting."
"Your goal is to defeat his legion commanders in the different planes and ascend to the number one position. How you get there is part of the fun and remember that he will be watching." Neothak starts to explain.
"Each plane will host my Lord's legions and their goal is to kill each and every single one of you trash humans. Only the most brutal, cunning, bloodthirsty amongst you will survive."
"My Lord also finds your despair and terror most appetizing, so I'm obligated to inform you all that this game has very real consequences for losing. If you lose your life while in this what you idiots call "a dive," you will die."
"Beep, bop, boop, you'll become poop," Neothak says in a sing-song voice.
"However, rejoice! For the Lord of Terror wishes for you to feel true terror and each of you will be given one [Phoenix Down]. A mythical item of the planes that will grant you one rebirth to you if you accidentally extinguish your silly little life."
"Before some of you get excited and decide to start stealing or killing others for their [Phoenix Down], this is a mythical item we are talking about gifted to you by my Lord. It is soul-bound to you and cannot be transferred in any way so try not to find a runaround. Or do? I'm just the messenger."
"One last thing, build your strength quickly because humans are the weakest creatures in the planes, and the faster you rectify that problem, the better a chance you have at surviving.
La dee da, is there anything else? Oh yes! Be a lamb and don't say anything to the people of the planes your purpose is to ultimately serve the Lord of Terror, or this is some trick of the Lord of Terror or blah blah blah. You are considered a Planeswalker to the people in the Bastions and as a Planeswalker, you are some type of hero to the people. So, play the part or you may find yourself with no place to call home at all." Neothak drifts off into silence.
"I'm saying they'll kill you! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha…" Neothak screams and laughs maniacally.
With Neothak's laughter reverberating inside his mind, Nathan starts to see color swirl again until finally, he finds himself lying flat on the ground looking up at a cold gray sky with two suns and a moon in the sky.
Extreme nausea hits Nathan and he rolls over and starts to puke. After emptying what was in his stomach, Nathan spits and wipes his mouth while standing up to get his bearings. He pats himself off while scanning a 360-degree view of his surroundings.
'I didn't think diving was going to affect me so hard. I never heard of anyone puking when starting a dive. Maybe the streaming companies never show it. Where exactly am I?'
He is currently in a dry field with bare patches around him. The air is acrid and smells of smoke. In the distance, he can see a walled settlement with towers spaced along the battlements. At the end of the field, he sees a wooded area. Beyond that, he can start to see a mountainous region.
'That must be the main town, I thought I would be spawned in the middle of town.' Nathan ponders to himself.
The moment Nathan thinks about having a map, a mini-map appears in the top right corner of his field of vision. As he thinks more about the map it expands and takes up a bigger portion of his field of vision and starts to expand out.
'That's pretty sweet. It also lets me know the name of the field I'm in and what the settlement over there is called.'
Nathan continues to expand the map until it shows the entire plane.
'God damn, this plane is fucking huge!'
The map shows an extremely small area in detail which when zoomed out, only shows a dot with the settlement's name.
The remaining map is covered in white smoke blocking out any of the details. Land shapes, rivers, mountains, or even oceans. Nothing can be made out through the white smoke blocking the map.
'So much for trying to guess where different cities or places are with this map.'
The only information Nathan can see is the name of the Plane which is Edenfell.
'I can't get distracted by the map, I'll head to Hammers Rise and figure out the rest. This isn't the same-named city that was shown in all the beta tests. I hope Zach and James are okay and in this town. I haven't seen a single player yet.'
As Nathan looks at how far Hammers Rise is he starts to feel anxious. It is quite a distance to cross with no gear or stats.
'I'll check my gear, stats, and distribute my stats now, I can't follow our initial plan.'
Nathan thinks "inventory" and it appears in the right field of his vision. The only item in his inventory is the [Phoenix Down] that Neothak told him about. Besides that, he has 100 gold pieces and the clothes on his back.
'Plopped in the middle of a field and not even a starter set of weapons? What type of hard mode shit is this?' Nathan shakes his head in disgust.
'I'll check my status, hopefully, we all still get the 85 stats to assign or I'm screwed.'
The moment Nathan thought about his status, a window popped up in his left field of vision.
[Character: Nathan Emblem]
[Race: Human]
[Level 1]
[Life: 15/15]
[Mind: 5/5]
[Stamina: 60]
[Strength: 1]
[Dexterity: 1]
[Vitality: 1]
[Energy: 1]
[Skills: N/a]
[Defense: 1]
[Fire Resistance: 0]
[Cold Resistance: 0]
[Lightning Resistance: 0]
[Poison Resistance: 0]
Currently, he has 1 stat in every attribute with 81 other stats to place.
'I don't know what type of requirements are needed for the weapon I want to use so I won't use all 81 stats. I'll round everything out to 15.' Nathan says to himself as he starts assigning attributes.
As he increases his vitality, he can feel his blood surge through his body, and it feels like he just woke up from the best night's sleep.
As he increases his dexterity, his vision becomes sharper. His body feels like he just got done experiencing a round of stretches and had a professional massage.
'My God, this feeling. This is incredible! I haven't even put anything in strength or energy yet.' Nathan thinks blissfully.
Nathan quickly brings his strength to fifteen. The feeling of being able to punch through anything comes over him and he releases a roar of pure feeling without meaning.
'I've never weight lifted before. Right now, I feel like I could lift Zach over my head.' Nathan laughs to himself imagining Zach's face if he picked him up and shoulder pressed him.
The last attribute energy was brought up to fifteen too. With each point added into energy, Nathan could feel a cooling sensation start on his scalp and sink further into his mind.
His confidence in his decision-making increased with each point and he felt like his cognitive power was growing.
The oddest change was particles in the air sparkling and floating around becoming more noticeable. It was like seeing a haze in the air on a hot sunny day except the temperature hadn't changed at all.
'These particles must be magic!' Nathan is lost in awe at being able to see magic in physical form.
Nathan loses himself in the awe of magic and tries to grab the particles like a child experiencing snowfall for the first time.
A few minutes go by, and Nathan is still laughing in awe and trying to see if he can touch the particles.
"Are we having fun yet?"
Nathan's heart drops as he is caught completely unaware and off guard.