The third pedestal had the same hand-shaped indentation as the previous one and Chris apprehensively raised her hand to start her character creation. Even knowing what to expect, the second pedestal had taken her by surprise, making her hesitant in entering the next task. She brought her hand down which caused the room to brighten slowly. Chris watched as the broad expanse of the space around her was revealed at the same time as the pedestals, with the exception of the one under her hand, dissolved into sand like particles before blowing away into nothingness.

Seconds later she found herself in an empty, brightly lit white space with no walls or ceiling to speak of. Although she couldn’t distinguish the floor from its surrounding of blank whiteness either, she knew it was there merely because of the solid surface she felt under her feet. After the surroundings stabilized around her, she had to wait a bit before the indent started glowing blue underneath the palm of her hand. The glow became so strong it made her hand above it seem translucent. When she tried pulling her hand free she realized it was stuck to the pedestal.

Chris watched as the glow spread until the whole pedestal was lit up—from the inside—in blue light. She continued to watch as straight, little fracture lines spread along the pedestal, outlining dozens of slim rectangles along the surface of the pedestal’s stone. As the fracture lines darkened, Chris grew slightly apprehensive and tried to extract her hand again. When it still didn’t budge, she tried using more force as the lines grew more and more pronounced.

Her suspicions were confirmed when a second later the entire pedestal started vibrating slightly under her fingertips. It was going to blow up. Chris didn’t know how virtual death by explosion would feel, but if her previous experience of virtual death by arrows was anything to go by, it was going to hurt like hell. Growing more frustrated by the second, she lifted one foot against the pedestal, trying to gain some leverage and push herself away from it.

The vibrations were growing stronger as her attempts were growing more frantic. Her hand felt like it was stretching, ready to pop off her wrist at any second. But the erupting pedestal was quite alarming so she continued to pull with all her might. When that still didn’t work, she lifted up her second foot to get an even greater leverage. With each leg secured to one side of her hand, she was able to throw her full body weight against the grip of the pedestal. When she couldn’t separate herself even with the help of the other leg, she was about to give up and just wait for the system to do whatever it was that it was going to do, when the pedestal really did blow up.

Instead of a large bang that flung her across the room as the pedestal went up in explosive shards, Chris watched as the pedestal dismantled itself along the rectangular lines spanning its whole surface. Each piece shot out to different locations around her. She fell onto her butt as the surface she had been propping herself against disintegrated, but she didn’t feel the impact as she landed, she was too focused on the pedestal fragments. Each piece looked like a slim rectangular slab that first morphed into what looked like lines upon lines of blue code, which quickly changed and grew in appearance until it became a large translucent screen displaying some sort of creature.

The dozens of other fragments underwent the same procedure until Chris found herself sprawled on the floor, surrounded by dozens of screens, each displaying a potential race choice. These ranged from races she could recognize like elves, dwarves, humans and most recently minotaurs to things she had never seen before. Creatures that looked part cat or snake or even fish and others that she had no simple way to describe. One of the ones that drew Chris’s eye had what looked like tentacles for hair, and when she got up to have a closer look approaching the screen, the tentacles suddenly started wiggling in her direction.

Chris shuddered and immediately closed the window by waving her hand in front of her in a gesture of dismissal. She already knew she wanted to be an elf, with their strong litheness, but took a minute to look at the options anyway. When she was about to go with her initial choice though, a window suddenly appeared before her.

Nova Era currently has 39 available races.

You have the option of choosing one now or conducting a series of system assisted tests that will help you determine which race is most suited to you.

Accept | Decline

Until that moment Chris had completely forgotten the option even existed. It had such a small segment in the instruction manual and none of the forums seemed to think it worth the time it took. Chris wanted to ignore the suggestion for the sake of time. She had already wasted too much in the introductory immersion of the game, it was time she actually went into the game to prove herself.

She was about to decline the suggestion when the perfectionist side of her took over and decided to accept the help. If she didn’t go through with it now, she would always wonder and if she could regulate and optimize her character to help her in the future. It was bound to be a worthwhile investment.

‘Wasn’t it?’

Chris just hoped she hadn’t made or signed up to make a huge mistake or waste of time.

[Accept]

Her surroundings changed once again. Each pixel of her environment dissolving into grains of sand, giving the illusion that Chris was surrounded by a dust cloud which was swept away by an unfelt wind to reveal an arena. Although she had just been in an undefined infinite space, the sheer size of the arena astounded her. She was standing on the ground, in the middle of an oval, sand covered area. The arena itself was surrounded by tall walls which led to rows upon rows of stands. Thankfully they were vacant but the whooshing wind through the colosseum made it seem like there was a roaring crowd just meters away.

This time Chris felt the wind skim her body with its warm moisture and the the grains of sand as they scraped at her ankles and calves. Even the air she breathed in felt and taste different. The sun glared down upon her shoulders, making her realize, for the first time, that her clothes had been replaced. Instead of the prison gear she had been wearing in the darkened pedestal room, she was wearing a simple threadbare and sleeveless tunic that reached down to her lower thighs. Her shoes and prison slacks had simply disappeared. Chris lifted her tunic out of curiosity to check if she had any undergarments on. Something she absolutely would not have done if there had been an audience in the stands.

‘... Friggin bastards gave me a diaper.’ Chris thought as she saw the cloth that was tied around her waist and legs. ‘All that’s missing is a safety pin.’

Your trial is now beginning.

Perform to the best of your abilities to ensure an accurate assessment of your attributes.

A screeching sound of metal on metal roamed across the arena, making Chris’s spine tense. She looked around, searching for the origin of the sound until her eyes fell on a large metal gate that was slowly opening as the gears fell into place, notch by notch. Each clacking sound made Chris more and more tense, so much so that she was eventually curling her toes around the sand on the ground with her fists tightened and cold shivers advanced down her spine.

As the gate rose, Chris suddenly realized what was behind it. She was in a gladiator arena, her trial was ‘beginning’ and a gate was opening, that was enough for her to work out that the game wasn’t about to let out a kitten to test her. As if on cue, a loud roar reverberated across the whole arena. It was, unfortunately, of unmistakably feline nature.

‘Or maybe it will…’

Chris looked around quickly, looking for a way out. She was quite certain the game didn’t want to test her affinity with cats, so she doubted it would play nice. Unfortunately, the walls surrounding her were all over ten meters high and all of the gates, excepting one, were locked shut and she wasn’t about to approach that one. The clanking seemed to grow louder by the second as she unthinkingly fell back a step at a time.

Instinct: 1 Credit

A notification suddenly popped up at the same time as Chris spotted a bright blue flash from the corner of her eye. Looking toward it she saw that there was now a person in the stands. A man with a graying beard in a simple robe who stood there, watching her with his arms crossed, obviously unpleased with the scene before him. Before Chris could give him another thought the gate lifted enough for the lion behind it to reach a paw underneath the iron gate to scratch at the sand before it.

Forgetting her unwanted audience for now, Chris immediately turned around and began running toward the wall opposite the lion’s gate. The sand was hot under her feet but she didn’t let them touch the ground long enough for it to be a painful problem. She kicked up sand as she ran and pumped her arms to help propel her forward. The clanking sounds were still continuous but Chris couldn’t help looking backward to see how much time she still had and immediately regretted it when she saw that the lion had already managed to exit the gate. He was standing there, mane blowing in the wind, as he assessed the contents of the arena, his gaze inevitably landed on her. She never stopped running, not even when she saw the lion start his slow advance on her. The lion’s graceful movement across the sand did not go unnoticed by her as his shoulders rolled in their joints to ensure a seamless advance.

Chris gulped and redirected her attention to her escape route, trying to work out a plan. There was no point to wait out the enemy with the current conditions. With claws and fangs up against fingers and pretty lips, she knew putting up a fight wasn’t an option. She needed to find a way out. The walls were still a good twenty meters ahead of her. She scanned them, trying to find the best place to climb out of the hell hole the game had thrown her in.

Ten meters out, she still hadn’t spotted anything that would serve as a foothold. Part of her wanted to look back at the encroaching lion, but the reasonable part knew it would only slow her down and mess with her concentration. Scanning the walls more closely, she finally found what she was looking for, an anomaly in the otherwise uniform wall. She didn’t want to head toward any of the gates in case the game decided to release another lion, she feared that was a distinct possibility. Chris didn’t slow down as she reached the wall, slamming into it, using her arms to absorb her speed.

Once again notifications popped up and once again the audience flashed with blue lights as new spectators appeared.

Speed: 10 Credits

Stamina: 2 Credits

Endurance: 1 Credits

Strength: 1 Credit

There were now over a dozen people in the stands and Chris realized that all of her actions were being measured by some unknown formula. Looking up, she saw little crevices between the stacked rocks that made up the wall. She could display her climbing skills and they would probably give her some strength credits and whatever other credits the system decided were involved in the act of climbing. But the lion, which hadn’t immediately ran after her like she had expected, was walking toward her like she was some sure and easy prey.

‘Fuck that.’ She thought in annoyance. ‘It’s just a game right?!’ She reminded herself. ‘I might as well prove my skills by bringing this little shit down.’

The lion looked back at her with a steady gaze as if reading her thoughts.

‘Well, maybe not so little.’ She thought, remembering it was a lion she was up against.

Looking around for some kind of weapon, Chris remembered the anomaly in the wall. Turning around to face it again she scanned the rock above her and spotted what she had seen, a torch holder. It was about a meter above her head, and looking back at the lion she figured she still had another twenty seconds or so before he reached her.

Chris didn’t even bother jumping for it, with her height, it just wasn’t going to happen. She quickly fit her toes into the cracks in the wall, being thankful for the bare state of her feet. Three footholds later she was able to hold onto the torch holder, using it to keep her balance as her toes were pinched in the wall fissures. Upon a closer inspection she was able to see that the torch it held. It was made of iron. Counting her lucky stars, she instantly grabbed it before jumping back to the ground. More notifications popped up, but Chris ignored them completely, focusing on the opponent before her.

Strength: 2 Credits

Dexterity: 3 Credits

Not wanting to be backed into a corner, she immediately ran away from the wall again. The lion was less than fifteen meters away and still maintained his slow and measured pace. The burned out torch in her hand was basically a metal rod she could wrap her hands around in a firm grip. It wasn’t exactly what she’d wish for when facing a lion. Chris thought a gun would have been more appropriate, or even the sword she had so easily discarded in the previous battle, but she would have to do with what she was given.

Having put twenty meters between her and the wall, Chris turned to face the lion. She had hoped to put more distance between them, but she was already a little out of breath and did not want to face the lion with a side stitch and gasping for air. The lion also came to a halt, five meters before Chris who spread her feet apart and raised her arms before her, readying for a fight. She had no idea how she was going to take on the creature which was at least three times as big as she, but she prepared herself nonetheless.

Chris had expected the lion to attack her immediately, but once again it surprised her and instead just circled around her menacingly, appraising her. Instead of feeling like she was being evaluated in terms of fighting potential though, Chris felt like the lion was seizing up her palatableness. It circled her once, twice, three times before she finally lost her patience and decided to go on the offensive herself. She waited, watching the beast’s eyes for a moment when it let it’s guard down, and immediately lunged toward it when she saw it’s eyes dart downward to her eyes.

The creature was caught off guard, and stood stock still while Chris brought the rod down on it’s head. She was worried it was going to immediately attack and kill her in return, but instead it dissolved into a cloud of white smoke the moment she made contact. She faltered in surprise as she watched a small slimy creature bounce away. It had no distinguishable shape. It was merely a blob and it couldn’t move very far in each bounce. As she watched its slow escape it dawned on her why the lion had approached her in such seeming leisure.

Her hands dropped down in relief, but she didn’t let go of the iron rod. Instead, this time it was her walking steadily toward the creature. She almost felt bad for it, knowing there was nothing it could do to hurt her. Probably like what a real lion would have felt when looking at her in a threadbare tunic, with a rusty metal rod in hand. Watching it, she wanted to just let it bounce away to safety, but somehow she knew that to progress to the next stage in her test she would need to finish it off for good. Gripping the rough surface of the rod tightly, she brought it above her head before swinging it down with force. It splattered all over the place, but mainly all over her. Chris scrunched her nose. It smelled like old fish mixed with flour.

Chris didn’t have time to check on the new credits that had shown up, but going from the cheers that were coming from the growing crowd, she had received a couple more during the ‘battle’. Seconds later, two more gates opened. This time releasing one lion and a rabid bull. For a moment she was just as apprehensive as she had been about the first lion, but when their progress seemed to be slow just like the one before them, she smiled and approached them at a jog.

She swung her rod once, ready to swing it again after destroying the mirage. After the puff of smoke dissolved she noticed that this slime seemed to be more aggressive and wasn’t immediately running away from her, but she splattered him across the arena floor nonetheless. Turning to repeat the same with the rabid bull slime, she noticed that it had managed to close in on her faster than she had expected. Much faster than the first slime’s lethargic pace. Before it could get any closer though, she repeated the same process and was splattered with even more foul smelling slime.

Chris noticed more flashes of light in the stands as the audience continued to increase at what seemed to be like a quickening pace. When another two gates opened, releasing two great wolves each, she realized she was already breathing heavily. The adrenaline was pumping in her body and a grin was stamped across her face. She didn’t know if it was the excitement of crowd that was driving her, the adrenaline of overcoming what seemed to be like a tough situation or even the mere freedom she was experiencing by being in a game world. Although the results would transfer over to the real world, she was winning and she was liking it.

Growing excited, she turned to face the pack of wolves with her own feline smile. This time she held her ground. Going by her experience that far, the game would give her more and more adversaries who knew for how long. She would need to preserve her stamina as much as she could. Chris didn’t have to wait long since the wolves’s speed was much faster than the bull’s. Part of her was worried about the increasing abilities of her foes, part of her was excited the fight was finally becoming challenging and a part of her was concerned about that growing excitement.

She smashed down on the first wolf’s head expecting it to puff into a cloud of smoke, instead it growled and tried biting her arm. Caught off guard, her arm almost landed in it’s mouth but instinct took over and smashed him over the head again. Chris was beginning to think she was fighting an actual wolf when it also puffed into smoke revealing a slightly bigger slime with a fanged mouth. As she watched the other three wolves she still had to kill, she couldn’t help feeling relieved they were still just slimes. She brought down her makeshift weapon again and killed it with one swing.

Readying herself for the onslaught that was to follow, Chris spread her legs like she had seen people do in countless movies and TV shows before. She took a deep breath, and raised her weapon before her. She wished the wolves would attack individually like the first one had but, of course, that wasn’t what happened. As if by telepathy, they all attacked at the same time. One went for her arm, the other for her leg and the last one went directly for her throat. She ducked to avoid the most vital one and then shrieked as the other two hit their marks. Thankfully the wolf had aimed for her left hand and she was able to vehemently beat him off with her rod. After turning him into a slime, she immediately turned and did the same for the other one before the third one could come back for her neck again.

As the second wolf turned back into slime form, she felt a sudden flaring pain on her right shoulder as the third wolf's fangs sank into her flesh. The pain shot across her body making her want to scream out in pain and forget what she was doing. She gritted her teeth together, trying to ignore the loud growling wolf on her right ear as it continued to maul her. She transferred her rod to her left hand and violently smashed it into the last wolf’s head until it also turned into a slime.

The moment she did so, three more gates started to open at the same time as the fanged slimes jumped onto her torso and started biting into her chest and abdomen. Shoving the pain aside for later, she immediately smacked them to death with the rod in her right hand. It pained her recently injured shoulder, but she knew it was still much stronger and accurate than her left.

Having disposed of the slimes completely, she looked around to find her new opponents. A larger pack of even larger wolves. Rolling her shoulder Chris readied herself again with the chorus of the cheering crowd encouraging her to continue. It was going to be a tough fight. Chris counted at least eight as her feet curled into the sand and sweat slid down her back. She was panting slightly, but her smile never faltered. Especially not after the rod in her hand slowly liquefied itself before morphing into a sword.

It was much heavier than the rod, taking a toll on her injured shoulder, but Chris’s grin turned into a smirk nonetheless. She watched as the pack approached her at a decent pace. Each one of them was eyeing her closely.

“BRING IT!” She yelled.

The crowd responded by shouting and jumping in the stands. Their voices were amplified by the colosseum’s design, but the crowd itself had already grown considerably. Knowing that her actions had brought them into existence gave her a sort of confidence she had never felt in real life. Knowing that she couldn’t die for real gave her a recklessness she had never experienced before.

Jumping into the fray, Chris disposed of her new foes much faster than before. The use of the sword was a game changer. At first wielding it felt very awkward and she swung it around like a hammer more than a knife. That changed after one of her downward swings cut her own leg. She became very conscious in the direction she was swinging her weapon so no further self-mutilation took place. It was a lesson painfully learned.

The gates kept opening, the crowd kept growing and she kept killing slimes. Every time she faced more, and more difficult, opponents. Every time she enjoyed it more. By the tenth pair off her body was already riddled with injuries ranging from bruises to a quite nasty gash. She barely felt them.

The slimes continued to grow in difficulty, slowly evolving beyond the existence as a slime. They gained fangs, then arms, then claws that became increasingly large and powerful. Their body composition was also slowly changing to become more solid than gel like.

Her sword was eventually replaced by an axe, then a hammer, then a scythe and many other weapons she didn’t even know the name of. By the time she was so bloody and sweaty her grip was slipping, she was barely able to breathe in enough air. Her weapon had already morphed more than a dozen times. Time piled up on top of itself as hours upon hours went by. Chris fought opponent after opponent. None of her kills were pretty and she often ended up surviving by a miracle or a stroke of sheer luck.

She knew that a couple of fights would not immediately turn her into an incredible fighter, but she had hoped for some kind of noticeable improvement. Instead she felt like she was actually getting worse with each weapon change. After one of her more successful bouts, she gained a small reprieve to take stock of the situation. It turned out not to be such a good thing since it gave her time to actually feel her injuries, particularly an especially nasty gash a goblin had given her side.

Hundreds of spectators filled the stands by the time Chris faced what was to be her final opponent. The game had equipped her with two swords a couple rounds back. She ended up mostly using her right, only putting her left up for defense whenever a hit was about to land from that side. It was completely uncoordinated on her part and she felt over-equipped. Two swords were actually worsening the situation but she continued to use both of them for the purposes of the test. The game was gathering data and all that she would manage by fighting with less than she was given was skewing that data.

The final gates screeched open as a dragon-like creature came out. It towered over her by a good five meters and Chris already knew she wasn’t going to make it by the time it approached her. She was breathing heavily with sweat dripping off her face, arms and even fingers. Wanting to go out with a bang, she raised her heavy arms intending to give him a good dozen gashes before he tore out her throat, impaled her or gave her an equally horrifying death.

Unfortunately she was wrong.

Before she could even prepare for it, a large lance of fire came shooting out of its mouth. It engulfed her in an inferno of heat and pain. The flames roared in her ears, but they weren’t loud enough to disguise the loud cheers of the crowd.

Everything went black before she even decided on how to attack. It looked like it would be a while before she could go out with a bang. So far her deaths had been quite uninspiring.

You have completed your trial.

You have amassed a total of 679 credits.

Your diagnostics are now available for examination.

Recommended Races: Darkling, Elf, Halfling, Gnome, Dwarf