When I open my eyes, I'm inside a church, also known as the spawn point for when you die or start the game.

I look around and I see four other people, one female nightingale. She is beautiful has long black hair with a stunning body and a pair of black wings on her back.

Two male elves each one with blond hair the taller one has a mohawk and the shorter one has a buzzcut. They both look slightly girly but in the end, they are guys.

The last one is a hulking black demon who's muscles look like they could crush cars. He doesn't have any hair on his head, only horns... Two massive ones extending from his forehead.

Each one of us is wearing the same thing green t-shirts with brown trousers.

I get up from the floor and walk out the door. I have no interest in grouping up with these people for no other reason then I don't have to.

Welcome to Beginner Village.

I see the town it's straight from a fantasy novel street vendors of all different races.

I find a bench and seat down.Open up my status.

Name: NeonRace: Lesser HomunculusEvolve points 0/500Level: 1Title:Element: ???[/tr]Health(HP): 150Energy(EN): 150Money:1,100[/tr]Strength: 5Speed: 5Luck: 5[/tr]Intelligence: 5Wisdom: 5Vitality: 5Attribute Points: 0

[Skills]

Identify

What? Why is my Element a series of question mark? Could it have something to do with the flaming figure? No, that's not possible... That was just some kind cinematic entrance to the game or something like that.

Shit, what do I do now? Element is everything, it gives you power in the game without an element I can't use any skills besides identity... I'm powerless.

No, I can't think like that, I still have some options. I'm not someone who just gives up because something is difficult. I open my inventory.

[Inventory]

Basic Sword

Basic healing potion x2

Alright, so I have all the basic equipment... Now, how do I progress without an element? So far, only one idea comes to mind: levels and stats. They are the other side of how you progress in this game.

"System: equip basic sword."

Basic sword equipped

A short silver sword appears in my hand.

“Identify”

Basic Sword

Damage 1-5

So not totally useless.

I begin walking towards the city gates north of the city.

"Wait!"

A feminine voice calls me from behind.

I turn around and it's the female Nightingale.

"Yes?"

"I was wondering if you would group up with me because I have never played one of these games before. The only reason I even started was because, I am behind on my rent since my ex-boyfriend stole most of my money... So please form a party with me!"

I'll give her credit... She was very convincing, even pushed her breasts together with her arms and any other day, I would have taken her up on her offer but I can't... Because if we party up, she'll see what my element is as part of the party system. And I can't let anyone know I have no element, if that happens then only bad news will come my way.

"Sorry, but I plan on soloing for a little while so maybe see ya around."

"Oh, okay... Well then, yeah... See ya around!"

I walk off leaving her there.

I reached the stone gateway, no guards or anything only a blue veil separating me and the monsters. Let's do this!

I stepped through the gate.

You are leaving safe zone Beginner Village and entering Metal tree forest. Do you wish to continue?

YES/NO

I press the yes button then the world swirls around me and then I'm standing inside a forest where the trunk and branches of the trees are made of metal but the leaves are green.

Welcome to Metal tree forest Level 1-5. Beware this is not a safe zone players can attack other players.

I look behind myself and there's the stone gate a walked through. Now, I have to hunt something.

"System: closest monsters."

Closest monster near player level is the White fur gorilla.

A red arrow appears out of thin air pointing in the direction of the gorillas.

What I just did was a simple function for when you are hunting. You can ask the system to help point you in the direction of a monster that’s the same level as you but it does not work on boss level monsters or rare monsters. This is a function only used for hunting so using this to find items will not work.

I followed the arrow until I hear the sound of snoring the arrow disappears. I crouch down and try to blend in as much as possible to my surroundings.

When I get close enough, I see what caused the snoring a band of giant white gorillas... They were all asleep.

"... Identify."

White Fur Gorilla level 2

HP: 25

Alright... So only one level above me that means if I fight all of them at once, they will kill me. And a one on one fight, I would lose unless I ambushed one. Great... So, kinda hopeless but I do have a form of a plan.

I grab a handful of pebbles off the ground. I take a deep breath and aim carefully and throw one at the closest gorilla. The pebble hits the gorilla lightly. It rubs its nose with its huge paw.

I throw another pebble, this time, it wakes the gorilla. It stands up and looks around for where the pebble came from when he is facing away from me, I throw another pebble. It hits the back of its head and it turns around not angry, it's just sleepy... All the better for me.

It strolls over to me, it walks on its back legs with its arms at its side. I'm hiding in the bushes in the springboard position ready to cut is down.

It walks past me then stops and looks around. Before it can move, I leap from my hiding position so fast the gorilla didn't even notice anything before I lodged my sword into its head.

Fatal Blow.

The Gorilla disappears into little balls of light.

White Fur Gorilla tooth acquired.

I look over at the rest of gorillas. Afraid, that since one of them died, the rest might wake up. They don't... They all just continue to sleep.

I move back to my hiding place so I can begin the farming.

“I want the fifth sector checked in the next three minutes!”

The boss of this place continues to shout out orders, never giving us a second to think or take a break.

I, like the rest of the people in here, have been searching through the source code of Elemental Online since the incident twenty minutes ago when some unknown code entered and did something to the system.

“Hey Satoshi, don’t you think this is just a little weird?”

I turn to my best friend and by best I mean only friend, Jack.

“No, I don’t think it’s strange that the head of the coding department came to each of our lower level departments and took us here, to a large underground dark room full of high-tech neural computers to sort through mounds of code, to look for some ghost code that broke through twenty randomly password generated firewalls.”

“You don’t have to be sarcastic...”

“I’m not being sarcastic, we work for the creators of the only world superpower left: Invision Corp, the inventors of full dive tech and Elemental Online so really it’s not that suspicious if they have underground workplaces.”

“I can see your point but still they should have at least put something about this in the contract we all signed when we started working here.”

This time, he has a point. This is weird but when you take into account who we work for it’s not that weird.

“Jack, stop talking and maybe you will find the code we’re all looking for.”

“Fine, but I still think this is all weird.”

Good... Now that he’s stopped talking in my ear like always, I can focus on my work...

“I found it!!”

Someone shouts out from the other side of the badly lit room.

“... Bring it up on the main monitor!”

The hologram screen at the front of the room buzzes to life. I can see the code now, it’s clearly a worm virus so this was the work of a hacker but what kind of hacker could have done this?

“Alright everyone, access the code using your neural cords.”

What? Is this guy insane? Using the neural cord to send our minds into the source code of Elemental Online just for some simple worm virus!?

“That’s suicide! Using the neural cords to send our minds into the source code of something so big as Elemental Online could kill us!!!”

“And why do we even have to do it it’s just some simple worm virus?”

I’m glad someone brought it up.

“Not true... Everyone in here was chosen because they can handle the neural link and if you do die, you're next of kin will be paid enough to not worry about it...”

Great... Now, I feel so good about it.

“And if you still don’t feel like complying then you can walk out the doors of this facility and be fired from Invision Corp. You all know what happens when you get fired from Invision Corp, you get banned from Elemental Online and it will be a permanent black mark on your work card so I doubt you will ever be hired by anyone else. So any more questions can be taken up with someone who gives a damn.”

He didn’t even mention anything about the worm virus. Great... So either jump through a ring of fire or walk through a shooting gallery as a target, not much choice now, is there?

I grab the two silver cables from the console, each cable has short blue tentacles at the end of them. I plug them into my ears and feel myself be absorbed by the neural cables.

Author:HazeyKnight

Editor:Senizal Fi Chrora