The faint smells of a suburban American household wafted through the small open window of a young man’s room. Facing it was a large desk with a computer, two monitors, and various gaming accessories tossed around it. On shelves nearby were a fair few figurines, plushies and games, and posters covered the otherwise clear walls of the room. A door stood on both far corners of the room, away from the queen sized bed tucked in the opposite side. That’s the image John Miller got of his surroundings as he opened his eyes after rubbing them thoroughly. Somehow shocked at the familiar environment.

‘That had to be a dream. No way something like that could happen,’ he shook his head in disbelief at the events of the prior few minutes, ‘I must have just woken up,’ accepting that fact immediately, he started crawling out of bed slowly.

Instead of his normal morning thoughts of school for the day or the games he would play when he returned, John’s mind continuously drifted back to that dream. Which he refused to acknowledge was anything more than the figment of his wildest fantasies and brain chemicals interacting.

“Wake up!” a female voice called out, with a tone that was urgent yet kind. Still mostly asleep, John barely heard it, and only after a soft hit on his shoulder did the presence grab his attention and he opened his eyes.

Looking around, he seemed to be in an entirely dark room. His bed had disappeared but somehow laying on the floor was just as comfortable. Confused, he almost jumped to his feet. His foot barely left the ground before hitting a wall he couldn't see.

“Fuck!” he yelped, though the pain he felt went away almost as soon as he exclaimed.

“Good, now we can finally talk. I have a lot to tell you John Miller,” slightly regaining his composure, he looked around to find the speaker but found no one had appeared.

“Who are you? And where are you?” he frantically asked, his mind racing to figure out the situation he was in.

’How can I hear her if she’s not here? And what even is this room, where am I?’ grasping onto the few solid thoughts in his head.

“You might call me god, or the truth, or the world, or you,” she chuckled, “nah, that’s just a joke. I’m Gaia, and you can’t see me because I’m not really there. But I’ve come to offer you a little game, if you will. And I’m sure that you’ll be an entertaining player. For now, though, this will be the last you hear of me, so good luck!” he could almost feel the smile coming through her voice, but something about her words sounded more creepy than kind.

Concerned and intending to ask the myriad of questions that came even from that short speech, John opened his mouth to speak. Before he could say anything, however, a small screen appeared in front of him. Like an application window floating in the air. As he moved his head to see what was causing it, it moved with him, almost like the type of interface he would see in VR.

Strangely, it was simple. No explanation of this bizarre situation or the game she had mentioned, just some text and a question.

Quest: Start the Game

Objective: Hit the yes button!

Reward: The title of The Gamer and all powers associated with

Play?

Yes! No, are you fucking crazy?

Design-wise, it was like a generic screen in an MMO RPG, with the two options highlighted along with the question, and the text above in normal font. The colors were not particularly special either, with white text and gray borders around it.

Eyes open wide and brain frozen in utter shock, it took a slap to his own wrist to snap John back into thought.

“FUCK! There’s no way this is real, but this can’t be a dream if I didn’t wake up, I definitely felt that,” he rubbed the slightly reddened skin mindlessly as he tried to wrap his head around it. His feet searching with their movements for the borders of the walls around him and finding that he was almost encased in invisible barriers. They didn’t budge even when he pressed against them with his entire body, so they were probably too solid to bend and too high to climb over. Not that he even knew where to go if he managed to leave. A completely dark space didn’t offer many opportunities to escape.

’Did this person kidnap me? Are they planning on using me for some kind of game like they were saying? What the fuck is this interface infront of me?’ in his mind he continued to ask questions but his intuition told him he probably wouldn’t get any answers before he interacted with that screen.

He pressed it, almost absentmindedly, too confused to care which option he chose. Yet at the same time, he knew exactly which one it was only a moment later. As he briefly saw a screen before a wave of relaxation rolled over his body and he felt himself black out.

John Miller! You have been given the position and title of The Gamer.

His eyes were locked on what had appeared in front of him once more, a screen. As he thought back to the dream, John found himself blankly staring at one of his own figures. Particularly, a Link figure he had owned for years now.

John Miller’s Link figure:

Bought on May 28th 2015, four years and one day ago.

It is a figurine of the character Link from the Legend of Zelda series portrayed as he is presented in the Skyward Sword cover art, with him holding the Master Sword up high. On the right leg of the figure there is a factory defect where a tinge of blue entered Link’s brown pants, along with a slight scratch next to it from a fall that occurred roughly two years after the purchase

’Why is there so much detail about my figure on this thing, and where the hell did this come from!’ John refused to accept that anything about the dream could be recurring now, and more than that the text of the screen was utterly insane, ’Nobody but me knows where that scratch came from, and I only told mom that there was that slight bit of color off… Was somebody in my room?'

“Is someone there?” he half shouted, half asked, both suspicious and scared of what he was seeing. Somehow, he knew it was neither. A voice inside him screamed that dream was real, but it was easy to kick that feeling down. It was simply impossible, unthinkable. Games aren’t real, and gamers don’t have special powers.

New Skill: Observe

’Observe? Is that what gave me that info before? And what the hell is that timing… Am I supposed to understand that they do? That’s just bullshit,’ John was still sure of that, but he was at least curious, and so clicked the name of the skill.

Observe, Lvl 0→1:

Look carefully at someone or something to learn details about them or it.

’I suppose that makes sense, given what it’s already done,’ this was clearly some sort of fantasy, but it was still an interesting one. If he had gone insane, he should at least know what the rules of that insanity are. And with that thought noticed what looked like his own character sheet.

John Miller, Lvl 3, The Gamer.

XP: 242/600

HP: 45/45

MP: 60/60

Strength: 8

Agility: 15

Endurance: 7

Intellect: 25

Wisdom: 10

Charisma: 5

Libido: 19

Skills:

Observe, Lvl 1

Gamer’s Spirit, Max

Gamer’s Body, Max

Curious, John clicked on the other two skills. Somehow now just a little less sure that it was actually inside his head.

Gamer’s Spirit, Max:

Turn your goals, skills and knowledge into the relevant quests, abilities and sheets.

’I suppose that makes sense… At least it’s consistent with that Observe sheet showing my own knowledge primarily,’ John thought, before slapping himself on the hand again, ’fuck, I almost forget this isn’t real.’

Gamer’s Body, Max:

Translates your body’s capabilities and personal abilities into a series of stats.

Your HP represents how much health you have, as well as any wounds or injuries you might have sustained. MP represents your Mana, or the amount of magic you can cast at a time using your body’s capacity.

Strength refers to how much you can lift and push, as well as how hard you can hit. Agility simply represents your ability to do things in an agile or dexterous manner, such as fine motor skills or similar. Endurance is how many hits you can take, or how much of a poison or harmful substance is required to take you down. Intellect measures how easily you can solve problems as well as acquire information. Wisdom is the other side of that coin, being how you understand the logic behind reasoning and is used to apply information. Charisma affects how you are perceived by others, positively or negatively depending on their inclination, and helps you to understand how to act in social situations. Finally, Libido shows how quickly you would be aroused, as well as sexual stamina, etc.

’That seems almost like D&D stats, apart from Libido… Strange that that’s even there. Guess my mind is more perverted than I thought,’ John thinks, before finally snapping out of his curiosity, ’why the hell was I reading all of that?’ looking at the clock, he noticed he didn’t have the time he had just wasted, ’I need to get dressed, fuck!’

Quest: Get ready for school

Objective: Shower, dress, and go to school like a normal person.

Side Objective: Don’t overthink this, please.

Reward: 50 XP for each objective

The first thing John did was heavily overthink it.