“You’re such a sweet boy Ash,” a young woman in her late 70s beamed with a smile “I really appreciate you checking on me and helping with whatever you can.”

“It isn’t a problem Mrs. Walsh,” a ruggedly handsome man in his mid 20s looked up after pulling out a rather stubborn weed from the mulch he’d laid down a week prior in the woman’s garden. “I need to get to my job,” Asher got up and began making his way out the gate “But feel free to call me if you need me!” he blurted out as he broke into a light jog.

Asher made his way down the street passing the various stalls and booths he works at during the week. For all intents and purposes, Asher is the word “Temp” made flesh and blood. He enjoyed the process of learning no matter what the subject was, it was always satisfying. He waved at the manager of the florist shop, nodded in acknowledgement to the owner of the pub he bartended, and finally he made it to his final destination. Today he was selling ramen out of his friend’s food truck, the “Miso Horny”. Asher had tried talking his friend out of the name, but to no avail. His friend Todd had thought the name was clever, catchy, and most importantly...funny. The day was the same as any other when he worked the food truck, the breakfast rush, followed by lunch. Todd and Asher would alternate between taking orders, cooking, and serving. Tips were split roughly 55/45 in favor of Asher, they’d argued over this split before, but Todd waved it away with a simple - “Look man, you’re the face here. You work with all these people, which means they trust you and by proxy they trust the food truck. Just consider it a finder’s fee, because I wouldn’t get this type of business around here without you.” he had said without even a second thought.

“You can head out today man, I’ll knock out the rest of the cleanup no problem.” Todd said.

“You sure,” Asher questioned “I don’t mind helping you out, it’ll be faster.”

“Yeah man get out of here, don’t you have that thing today? What was it..” Todd pondered briefly before exclaiming “Tabletop RPGs! Anyways, get out of here and go enjoy yourself, you’re always working and helping people.”

His shift for the day was done and he began to make the routine walk back home. It was on his way back that he had heard a noise coming from one of the alleys on his street, it was two men. One with a knife in his hand, the other with his hands in the air, quaking with fear.

“Please, please don’t hurt me...I’ll give you whatever you want,” the one man said in a hushed voice.

“Then shut up and just give me everyth--” the other man began to say but was immediately cut off by a fist being slammed into his jaw. He looked up through watery eyes to see the outline of a person standing over him. He put both his hands in the air and tried speaking with his broken jaw. “W-weht I’ll leaf hem alo-” another fist slammed into his face and things went dark.

After a few more punches and a kick to the motionless man’s ribs, Asher seemed satisfied and mumbled “People like you disgust me..”

The other man looked horrified from the sight and began shaking with fear.

“P-p-please don’t hurt me,” he stammered out.

“Hurt you? Why would I do that? Just get out of here and be safe on your way back home,” Asher said as he beamed a friendly smile, “It can get dangerous out here.”

The man nodded quickly and they both went their separate ways, leaving the man on the ground breathing deep, heavy breaths. “He should be fine,” Asher thought as he gave the man one final look before making his way back home.

Facing the familiar door to his 2 bedroom apartment he inserted the key and twisted counter-clockwise, he jiggled the key towards the end, it was one of the quirks of his door that he’d gotten used to in the last few years since moving in the area after graduating from college. Now it was time for him to enjoy his favorite hobby, role-playing. He sat down at his desk and jiggled the mouse for the screen to turn on. He opened up a new web tab and typed in…

www.TTRPGOnlineWorld.com

The familiar webpage came up and he began scrolling through new games he could potentially join. Ten minutes passed before one game caught his eye. The ad read: “LF FOR PLAYER FOR MY WORLD SOLARIS” - 1 of 1 spots available.

“One spot?” Asher mused. “I wonder if it's one of those one-on-one games. I heard they get super in-depth and are pretty fun if you’re open to it. Screw it, worst case scenario I can just politely back out if it isn’t for me.”

Asher clicks on the green icon that reads “JOIN GAME”.

Magical looking text began appearing on the screen. “Welcome to the world of Solaris. You have joined the game and are currently in character creation. Please fill out the mandatory fields in order to continue.

*Character Name: Asher

*Race: Human (Variant)

-Notice: As a Human (Variant) you may select a feat of your choice.

*Class: Rogue

*Sex: Male

Age: Not Necessary

“The GM requires you to randomly roll your stats with the dice generator added into this specific sheet. Results are saved and there will be NO rerolls.”

“Well that seems a little harsh, hopefully my guy isn’t one massive dump stat,” Asher mumbled to himself anxiously “This is kind of a cool feature though, might really make someone commit to their character.”

Asher clicked on the button that read “ROLL STATS”.

Numbers began cycling through each stat looking like some kind of slot machine.

STR: 18

DEX: 18

CON: 18

INT: 18

WIS: 18

CHA: 18

Confetti animation appeared on the screen as the last number settled into its place and Asher’s eyes grew big. “No fucking way, I’ve NEVER rolled a character this good. This dude is definitely going to think I cheated my rolls somehow...”

More text appeared on screen breaking up Asher’s thoughts “ ALL NECESSARY INFORMATION HAS BEEN ENTERED AND STATS HAVE BEEN ROLLED, DO YOU WISH TO COMPLETE YOU CHARACTER AND ENTER SOLARIS?” ( Y/N )

Asher pressed the “yes” option and his computer suddenly turned off. “What the fu-...,” Asher said as he tried to turn his computer on again, with no success. He began pressing the power button furiously to no avail. Everything else in the apartment worked except his computer, hell even the surge protector that the computer was plugged into still worked. “Maybe that sign-up process gave my computer some kind of virus or malware?” he said to himself as he made his way to bed.

“10:00 PM” his clock displayed in a hazy purple neon light.

“Whatever, I have an early day tomorrow and I need to get my computer looked at. Maybe the electronics store I temp at will give me an employee discount?” Asher mumbled as he laid down and proceeded to go to sleep.

Asher felt like he was falling through an abyss. An absolute void of pure nothingness. The feeling was strange because his “falling” felt like it had a texture to it, as if he was being sucked into the darkness and descending further and further. He’d never experienced this kind of dream before, but he didn’t panic. While the experience was foreign, it felt comforting at the same time. Finally after what felt like infinity, his falling came to an end and he broke through a layer of this nothingness only for everything to feel like it re-oriented itself and suddenly he was facing a humanoid figure wearing a mask.

“Who are you?” Asher asked.

The disorienting feeling of omnipresent sound entered into Asher’s mind and seemed to creep into his thoughts like poison ivy. “You can call me Dolos,” the entity said from behind the mask. “It is a pleasure to meet you Asher.”

“How do you know my name and where am I? This doesn’t really feel like a dream” Asher said with a nervous chuckle.

“You….well I guess you’re technically dead right now.” Dolos said, pondering if they chose the right words or not. “Yeah I’d say you’re dea-”

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN I’M DEAD?!” Asher interrupted the mysterious figure. “I exercise daily, I go to sleep early, I live an all-around healthy lifestyle. People like that don’t just die out of nowhere, how did I die?”

“Well the whole thing is very simple, you died because you didn’t place the blood of a sacrificed lamb above your door.” Dolos said matter-of-factly.

“WHAT?!” Asher groaned as he ran his hands through his medium-length brown hair. “What kind of bullshit...hold on why am I even entertaining this? I’m just going to wake myself up cause this is crazy.”

“Okay, okay the joke didn’t land how I wanted,” Dolos said in a calm tone, “But you’re definitely dead. And by dead, I mean your body no longer exists on the planet from where I took you. As far as YOU are concerned,” Dolos pointed at Asher “Dead. Finito. Done-so. Dearly Departed. The door most definitely hit you where the good Lord split you.” With each synonym of his death being accompanied by another mocking point of Dolos’ finger.

“Alright, alright I get it,” Asher said, annoyed. “Why did you kill me Dolos? And what now?”

“Well because you signed up. I can’t really blame you for that, because I knew you’d sign up, but you did it, so it is what it is.” Dolos put their hand on Asher’s shoulder reassuringly. “Don’t worry you’re gonna love Solaris. What was your line of work in your previous world?”

Asher pondered the answer for a brief pause, “Well I kind of did everything a normal person can do, I also graduated college with a degree in Military Science, but never really got around to using it for anything. I kind of just thought it was fun to learn about.”

“Hmmm interesting, well I see you didn’t pick a Feat, so I will assign one to you now. I’ll also be giving you a background” Dolos said.

With a nod from the masked figure, a window appeared in front of Asher’s eyes and it read:

BACKGROUND: Far Traveler

-All Eyes on You-

You are a foreign entity to this world. Curious glances are directed your way wherever you go, these experiences can be positive, negative, or neutral.

You can leverage this attention to gain access to people and places you might not otherwise have, for you and your traveling companions. Noble lords, scholars, and merchant princes, to name a few, might be interested in hearing about your distant homeland and people.

FEAT: Jack of Everything

-Lifelong Student

You have spent your life trying to learn from people of all skills and all walks of life.Your thirst for knowledge has turned you into a lifelong student. Bypass restrictions on learning new skills and abilities. Learn skills and abilities at an increased rate.

“You’ll have some other perks but those will make themselves known to you very soon. Also here,” Dolos reached into their pocket, pulled out a scroll and tossed it to Asher. “This one is on me, you know...for killing you and everything, consider this a get-out-of-jail-free card if you get into serious trouble.”

“Wait, I still don’t really know what exactly is going on here. Can you-” Asher was promptly cut off.

“We don’t have much more time, you’re smart. You can do whatever you want in Solaris, we WILL meet again, but for now, I must send you down to the world that is waiting for you.” said the masked figure as they began to point downwards. The falling/sinking feeling took over Asher’s body and suddenly things went black. Asher began to feel heat relentlessly beating down on his back and neck and as he looked around all he saw was the bright colors and dense foliage of the jungle engulfing his surroundings. Confusion still overtaking his senses he looked down and saw his arms. They looked thinner than before, and smaller.

“What is going on here?” he mumbled to himself. He stood up and his legs felt shorter and looked thinner. Asher’s stomach sank. He heard loud reverberating thuds in the distance and he ran towards what he guessed was the sound of water. He found its source and looked into the water and to his horror he saw his reflection, the reflection of a child around 8 years old.

“AHHHHHH!” Asher yelled at his own face. The thuds grew louder, the flying creatures could be seen leaving the canopies, and the creatures of the jungle all seemed to be running towards his direction. That was when he saw it. Through the trees shifting, he saw the massive, sleek body of a black dragon enter into his line of sight. The beast crushed everything in its path with ease and then it happened...Asher and the black dragon made eye contact.

“AHHHHHH!” Asher yelled as he turned tail and began sprinting as fast as he could.