Virtual Reality

“Welcome new player,” a feminine voice seemed to echo in my head. I looked around me, I was standing in a field of grass overlooking the sea. I could feel the wind on my cheeks, brushing through my hair and the scenery was so realistic but I could hear no sound except for my own breathing.

“Are you ready to step out into the world of Quest Seeker?” the disembodied voice of the woman asked. Her voice was machine like, cold and emotionless.

“Yes?” I ventured.

“The first step is to create your character before you can enter the game.”

“Please choose your species,” the woman said, her white hair drifting with the breeze. “There are humans, elves, categorised into moon elves and night elves, “Tugres, the half animal beings of Quest Seeker, Elementals, Fey, Orcs, Nightwalkers and finally Unknown.”

“What are Unknown?” I asked curious.

“It’s a random mix of two species.” It could either turn out horrific or not too bad. And besides, elves were the obvious choice but they were just so clichéd.

“I choose Unknown,” I said trying to look like I knew what I was doing.

“Unknown it is.”

A duplicate of me appeared floating in the air before me. It slowly underwent changes; such as growing a black fluffy tail, and growing large elfish ears thrown off by obviously yellow cat eyes. I shuddered. I did not want to look like a mutation.

I gulped. “Can I rather choose a Nightwalker?” They sounded quite cool.

“Nightwalkers,” she said and I lost my cattiness, grew slightly taller and more willowy. My eyes became a pale almost white grey and my skin adopted a pale silver tone to it. My light blonde hair became silver that caught the light and flickered. I made her change my hair so that it was long in front and short in the back with a fringe that nearly fell into my eyes.
I look more serious now, less like a joke. But Nightwalker? Why did it sound like such a cool looking species would have a catch? “Hmm…What are the special abilities of the Nightwalkers?” I hadn’t read through the manual very far, in fact I had only thumbed through it gleaning more technical facts.

“Please consult your manual for that,” the woman said, her eyes dead, robot-like. I breathed out heavily and walked around the new me. It still looked like me, but was more intimidating and…otherly.

I’ll read through the manual later, I told myself. This form looks good and maybe this form has a few tricks the other species don’t have.

“Ok, moving on to clothing?” I said.

“Are you satisfied with your species choice?”

“Yes, yes…” I flapped my hand at wherever her voice was coming from. “Clothes now please.”

I picked through a wardrobe of clothes and was told I could buy new ones when out in the world of Quest Seeker. I picked out black pants and black leather boots, a white tunic and
silver arm bracelets that twined and twisted around my biceps.

I went a bit crazy and gave myself glass droplets for earrings but drew the line at a choker. Maybe I can get one later? Don’t you just love character designing?

Why am I so obsessed with my image? The plainer the better, besides, Tanya would play
this after tonight and not me. But it was so addictive and I was still blown away by the graphics and…realness.

“What will you name yourself in this new world?”
I was really bad at names so I said simply, “Star.”

“Well done new player. You have successfully created your virtual self. You cannot come back here to make changes after you leave. You can access your skills’ files, weapons, possessions, money and maps just by saying Menu. Now, would you like to step into the wonderful world of Quest Seeker?”