A person lay hunched back in their chair, slowly scrolling through various game forums, when an advertisement covered his entire screen. He grumbled, annoyed that an ad managed to get through his Adblock. Just before clicking off, a particular sentence caught his eye. He read it aloud, "Are you bored with your current life?" Intrigued, he read further on. "If so, sign up to be a beta-tester for the world of Kosmos Online!" Without a care in the world, as if hypnotized, he signed up. If only he knew that this decision would turn his life upside down.
After filling out some basic information, such as their email address, the screen asked him to select his name and age. After giving it a moment's thought, he entered his real name: Harlan. Age: 43. Once the form was filled out, he received a confirmation email from the website. It contained further instructions about how to proceed. He glanced at the clock; it was 8:30 PM. He had time to play this game first, then go to bed. What could possibly happen?
He logged into the game and found himself with two options. Either place a marker upon where you want to spawn or select one of the eight major kingdoms. The eight kingdoms were The Augend Empire, The Kingdom of Asteron, The Republic of Phal Igus, The Kingdom of Finnean, The Kingdom of Salvation, The Port Town of Allakan, the Iron Keep, and the Eleum Keep. He chose to spawn in the kingdom called Asteron, which was located near the western edge of the map.
A new text box appeared asking him to select his race. The options were Human (default), Elf, Dwarf, Demi-Human, or Demon. After a moment's hesitation, he picked Human because that was what they always played. Upon clicking, a drop-down menu appeared with an option between Human, and High Human. He selected High Human, not really knowing exactly why, it just was more alluring. A new screen popped up asking for his character name and age. He once again put his real name, and age, because why not? The next question asked him to pick a class. There were five classes available, Warrior, Mage, Rogue, and Cleric. As he mulled over his choices, he reluctantly chose Rogue, as it most fits his type of playstyle. A window opened showing his stats, Health, Mana, Strength, Agility, Endurance, Dexterity, Intelligence, and Charisma. He noticed that he had a pretty high base amount of all stats except Mana and Charisma, His stats were respectively 15 in everything, but Mana and Charisma were 10. But that didn't matter much, as the game gave him 100 points to allocate into his stats. He decided to put 30 in dexterity, 40 in agility, 20 in health, and 10 in strength.
After making sure that everything looked good, he closed the window and moved on to character customization. This is where the true fun began. He spent the next 15 minutes customizing his character to be as creepy as possible. He made his skin charcoal black, his eyes hollowed out, and his body scrawny and long. Finally satisfied, he clicked the Create button. The screen changed, and he was greeted by another confirmation screen. It read as follows, "Everything selected so far is final, and can not be changed later on. Do you still wish to create your character?" He wholeheartedly thought it over and selected yes. But, nothing happened.
"What do I do now?" he wondered, holding his head in frustration. He searched around his screen for any way to progress forward. He realized that there was no longer a text box, but instead, a large blank space. Strangely enough, his PC started to progressively get louder and louder. Peering through his acrylic side panel, he saw a spark. "Oh, Shit!" he screamed, as the computer exploded taking him with it.