I waited for a beat, then two, folding my arms. I was on the verge of saying something else, maybe telling these guys to get a move on it, when music exploded around me like a thunderclap. An epic score, with pounding drums, clanging cymbals, and a host of stringed instruments, conjured images of noble kings and fierce battles, clashing armies, and world-shaking magic—

“The year is 1095 A.I.C.—Anno Imperium Conditae,” the disembodied announcer bellowed over the music. “Dark power and the stirrings of war ride upon the winds of Eldgard, the provincial outpost of the Great Viridian Empire.”

Something streaked across the sky, a burst of fire that reminded me all too much of the meteor and the world I was leaving behind. The streak of light disappeared, blocked from sight by a thicket of pines, then exploded back into view a hundred feet away. A massive scale-covered body with huge, pumping wings flashed across the field of view, trailing fire from crushing jaws as large as a T. rex’s. A golden eye, big as a dinner plate and slit down the middle with a slash of black, regarded me coolly for a second. Then the creature ascended into the clouds above. Gone.

The breath caught in my lungs. A dragon. A prehistoric monster of scale and fangs and flame.

“Imperial legions,” said the announcer, “allied with the forces of light, march from the east, bringing the natives of Eldgard to their knees through flame, magic, and steel. Bringing progress. Building roads. Cities. A kingdom. Civilizing the dark-natured Wodes, the swamp dwelling Dokkalfar, and the Accipiter of the far-western deserts, enlightening them in the ways of the ever-victorious empire.” On the stretching plains below, I watched in awe as a sprawling force of humans, elves, and Risi—men and women—all clad in gleaming metal and oiled leather, swarmed across the ground like a plague of locusts. Banners rippled in a far-away breeze while foot soldiers hauled towering catapults and other savage siege engines.

“But the natives of Eldgard are not so quick to give up the old ways—to heel for foreign masters. Though the rebellion is yet small, they fight on. Hour by hour, day by day …”

Suddenly, I was floating, drifting high above like an eagle. The encroaching army vanished in a swirl of black smoke, and I found myself overlooking a marshy swamp filled with twisted trees and murky water. Dusky-skinned Murk Elves clad in dark leathers and crudely stitched robes fashioned swords and fletched arrows …

The scene exploded in a shower of light as a flock of the birdlike Accipiters cut through the air, banking hard right on outstretched wings before unleashing a volley of arrow fire on the invaders below …

Then, the scene faded, shimmered, resolved: blond-haired Wodes forged armor, battle-axes, and heavy maces in a roaring furnace, the sound of steel hitting steel ringing out like a battle cry …

“But, in the far flung North, another threat looms,” came the announcer’s voice as the Wode encampment vanished, giving way to a domineering peak capped with icy white. “The reclusive, mountain-dwelling Svartalfar have unwittingly burrowed into the prison of a dusty and long forgotten god. A monstrous being of true dark, eager to return to the land of mortals once more. The breach is small, but large enough for Serth-Rog, Daemon Prince of Morsheim, to call acolytes to his cause… Imperial. Rebel. Light. Dark. Living. Dead. Which side will you choose?”

The towering mountain erupted in a swirl of opalescent light and violent motion, wind beating against me with gale-force fury as I fell. Tumbled, end over end, arms wheeling, legs kicking, stomach rising into my throat. This shouldn’t be happening, I told myself. I shouldn’t feel this way. But the logic didn’t do much to ease the fluttering in my belly. I flipped once more and caught a set of burning eyes, green and deeply malevolent, watching my meteoric descent with amusement —

I smacked against cold stone with a thud, pain shooting from my back, elbows, and skull. Man, the Devs had taken this whole realism angle very seriously. Maybe a little too seriously. My head began to pound with a dull throb, and I restlessly ran my hands over my stomach, impulsively searching for broken ribs. When I was finally satisfied that nothing was irreparably damaged, I pushed myself up and leaned back onto my elbows. I blinked sporadically, squinting against the dark, trying to figure out where exactly I was. What had happened.

The lighting was terrible—gloomy and provided by sparse, sooty firelight—but after a few minutes, everything took on a ghostly blue tinge.

Racial Ability Unlocked: Night Eye

Night Eye allows you to see even in the poorest of lighting conditions, casting the world into a blue haze. Hvitalfar (Dawn Elves), Dokkalfar (Murk Elves), and Svartalfar (Dwarves) automatically use Night Eye in dark environments.

Ability Type/Level: Racial, Passive / Level 1

Effect: 8% vision improvement at night or in poor lighting.

I read over the gained skill and smiled. That was a nice little bonus they hadn’t mentioned during character creation. I dismissed the alert with a nod, and resumed my scan. The ground was gritty stone, and I immediately noticed thick steel bars around me—I was in a cage. A shoddy prison cell. I gained my feet, dropped into a crouch, and stole forward, searching for the door. It didn’t take me long to find the exit, but it also didn’t take long to find the thick iron lock, which refused to budge an inch when I yanked at it.

Well, this didn’t seem like a good way to start things off.

I let the lock go and pressed my face against the bars, searching for an NPC—non-player character—or any sign of what I was supposed to do. I was in a rectangular chamber in some sort of underground cavern; formidable stalactites and stalagmites jutted from the ceiling and floor like the wicked teeth of a monstrous, slumbering beast. In the center of the room was a grisly scene that made me immediately rethink the wisdom in choosing Viridian Gate Online as my emergency life raft.

A rudimentary wooden table dominated the space, and strapped to that table were bodies. Pieces of bodies, in most cases. As an EMT, I’d seen a lot of awful scenes—high speed car wrecks were frequently stomach churning—but I still wasn’t prepared for the graphic display. Amputated limbs. Strings of gray intestine. A glassy-eyed head, devoid of a body. There were also other tables littered with cruel-looking tools, hooks, pliers, knives, and clamps, plus a variety of machines and contraptions that didn’t look friendly.

An open metal sarcophagus, outfitted with foot-long metal spikes, was particularly gruesome.

I swiped the back of my hand across my forehead, wiping away the cold sweat dotting my brow. I didn’t know what they had planned for me here, but it couldn’t be good. I immediately turned my attention back to the lock, holding it up and giving it a thorough examination. I thought about slamming it against the bars in hopes of breaking the thing, but quickly dismissed the notion. That wouldn’t work, plus there was a good chance it would alert whoever was running this nightmare dungeon, and I wasn’t keen to meet them.

Not as a newb, stuck in a cage, with no weapons, no armor, and no skills.

I turned back to my cramped cell, scurried over to a simple pallet of furs in the corner, and began to frantically search for a key or lockpick. The Devs wouldn’t start you out in a cell if there wasn’t a way out. There had to be something. I pulled aside a rough blanket and tossed the furs. Something metallic clinked against the floor. A glint of light revealed a piece of bent black metal. A makeshift prison shiv, maybe. Or a lockpick. Certainly not an elegant lockpick, but that had to be its purpose. I headed back over to the lock and slipped the thin length of metal into the keyhole.

I jiggled it around for a bit, pushing, prodding, rattling it this way and that. In most MMORPGs there was an auto-assist mechanism to help with the lock picking aspects of game play. I didn’t get any kind of notification, however—no prompt telling me how the system worked—and I certainly didn’t get an assist. After a few minutes of fruitless struggle, I pulled out the pick and slammed it against the ground in frustration. Then, I froze. The soft rustle of moving fabric caught my ear. I wasn’t alone.

Someone, or something, was in the room with me.