Chapter 1: Log In

The VRMMO, Aurion, is a brand new fantasy MMO with some sci fi elements. Featuring a new one of a kind AI operated assist and development system to allow for a flexible, adaptable, and entertaining world, it featured a simple yet detailed LSS, or Level, Stat, and Skill system, balanced to ensure getting higher levels, skills, stats, and gear was rewarding, while also doing its best to ensure the game is not totally dominated by high ranked players. It featured a state of the art total Character Creation system, that allowed one to modify not just hair color or eye color, but height, weight, age, race, and more.

It featured various iconic races such as humans and elves, but also a race known as the Elari, akin to a fairy race in that they all appeared like children and had deep roots in magic and mysticism. New races are added all the time, as the game continued to evolve. In some cases, race specific quests could even allow one to evolve their race into a higher variant later on, and there were plenty of options in terms of specialty and craft. The zones were immersive as the lore.

It featured a planet that had at one point had a pinnacle magical civilization, until a group rose to power to try and take over, to lord over all as superiors and gods. The resulting war nearly killed the entire population, with the only ones who supposedly survived at that time were Elari. As such, the world was torn apart and changed, and even the moon was torn apart and became two moons. The current civilization and setting was made from that, with the races that rose after along with those that survived. To list a few:

Humans: The current dominant race. Their ability to populate faster then other races has allowed them spread across the land and establish a large amount of civilizations. Many currently are vying to become the strongest, or to survive and keep their independence. Due to the shifting changes, recently they have given more rights and been more accepting of other races to survive, although some areas are still quite racist. In addition, there are large conflicts between them and the Elari, which all of humanity tried to enslave at one time. They appear as humans normally do, and some are gifted in magic. Due to being the most populated of races, their own kind and other kinds cant afford to turn them down as easily in trades, giving them better prices in markets and increased charisma stats. Since they managed to become the dominant race, they are also lucky, so their luck stat is higher as well.

Elves: A race that evolved from the magical pollution into the wilds as a result of the Great War, they have strong ties with nature. They are far longer living then humans, and possess the ability to tap into the natural mana of the world for increased magical regeneration as well as more efficient physical enhancements. They can be noticed by their pointed ears and slender physiques. As such, Elves gain bonuses to dexterity and wisdom, but the option to become muscular is negated on the character creation menu. They also have exceptional night vision, and can sense enemy attacks easier.

Elari: An ancient race, shortly after the Great War and the rise of humanity, humans often enslaved Elari wherever they were, forcing them to be slaves and build tools for them. The Elari are natural magical inventors and mages, having large boosts to the intelligence and dexterity stats, and starting out with a skill that allows for Magical Tool Creation. The Elari are generally happy, playful, and easygoing on the surface, but due to bad blood with humanity, they can be slow to trust. Elari have a near perfect memory, and due to their ties to the ancient civilization, can provide more lore and rewards from Ancient Civilization Technology, and quests and things based on it.

Draconi: Genetically modified beings that were created before the Great War, they ended up escaping their containment cells during the Great War and began to reproduce. As they were meant to be cannon fodder, they have high strength and endurance boosts, as well as having scales that help reduce damage inflicted. They are also resistant to poison and are capable of breathing underwater without any special skills, devices, or enchantments.

Symbiotes: A mechanical race, these robots have highly advanced processors that allow them to have emotions and feelings like real people. In addition, due to their mechanical nature, they are immune to poison and several other status effects, though long term full submersion still harms them over time. In addition, they can absorb potions and healing magic to repair themselves, but they can also more easily upgrade the equipment they use, getting cost reductions to production, repair, and upgrade based actions.

Halderi: Also known as Beastpeople, there are various types scattered across the continent. Although there only seems to be mammal types such as Cats, Dogs, Lions, Wolves, and such, it is believed they evolved from the magical and soul influx that resulted from the Great War and mutated that way, originally coming from beasts. Other records suggest they might have been another supersoldier project. Either way, the Halderi are known for expert physical abilities, having great strength and dexterity. They also possess rapid health regeneration abilities, and keen senses.

Yes, there were various races to choose from, each one containing sub-races, Evolved Races, and further. As for stats, there were Eight: Strength, Dexterity, Charisma, Wisdom, Endurance, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck. Furthermore, it was designed so that each stat could be of use to each of the various playstles. Whether one focused on Magic or Swords, intelligence could be useful. Agility as well. It all depended on what the user wanted.

"Oh wow, this is so cool!" a black haired boy said as he took off his socks and lay down on the bed in just a T shirt and shorts. He had already gone to the bathroom, and he ate plenty of food. He had lots of snacks nearby as well, if he needed them. The news feed on his computer was lighting up with various notifications, news warnings, stuff like tension increases between countries and deep space stuff. Normally, he might be interested in that, but today was the day that Aurios, a massive VRMMO, had released and opened from beta into being fully open. A surprise update notification was released today as well, letting everyone know that there would be special prizes for those who were on in the first hour. Because of that, lots of people were logging in at this exact moment and starting the brand new game. The boy put on his helmet. He only just got the game today, but surely, those special prizes would be his as well.

He turned on the spare VR gear he got from his brother's room. His older brother was already inside, and this was meant to be a surprise. The boy giggled at the idea, as he finished putting everything on and laying in bed, booting up the device fully.

For a moment, he felt a bit of a shock, but soon after, he found himself standing in a big white room.

"Welcome, New Player, to the Coccoon! You are currently in the middle of being revived! This emergency medical device will help you. As we are restoring your body, please allow us to know what you look like so we can properly reconstruct it!"

At this point, a large white blank figure appeared. It then changed to match the boy's physical appearance, although it was totally naked. The first option was Race Selection.

"Hmmm...I really want that Lore Bonus...so lets go with Elari!"

At that point, the height modifier became extremely restricted, as the figure was permenantly set to child.

"Hmm...lets go with...white hair, and red eyes! Ah, but that is super common in anime...lots of people might do it. Should

I go red hair and red eyes then? Yeah, lets do that! Oh, and lets give me a star birthmark on my right hand and right cheek, red for both".

The changes formed. Notably, his own body changed to match the figure in front of him, as he became less of a white blob until he became that appearance.

"Lets see...how about we also give me a birthmark..." he said, moving around his body. "There, on the back of the neck. Third red star".

With that, he looked around some more, and then he wondered. He grabbed his own body and squeezed it.

"Huh, that actually felt kinda nice" he said, pulling away. Normally, he might feel a bit awkward, hugging a naked body while naked, but, both of them were his body, and this was cyberspace. After that, he looked around. The red stars were small enough to not be overly obnoxious, but also big enough to be notable. However, the one on his cheek then started to feel a bit off, so he decided to move it to the right shoulder instead. However, then that bothered him, so he decided to remove it.

Height was set to 133cm, and weight was set to 90 lbs. Apparently sizes could possibly affect stat development, but if he did not like being short, he could just change it. It was his base height in real life, so he didn't want to be disoriented while enjoying the start of the game. He looked around while thinking that, and thought it looked good like this, so he proceeded to the next step, choosing a class.

Suddenly, a lot of different icons appeared to choose from. Every class got a weapon, but otherwise they all started in the same starting gear. A simple one piece tunic, and boots. Along with the weapon, that was three pieces of starting gear, as well as 1000 coins.

Although the body felt rather real, it was a virtual world. SInce it isn't his original body, he didn't feel all that embarrassed about not wearing pants, even if it seemed like it was his body due to VR. Although, he had to say, they really went all out in the detail. Everything was made brilliantly. Of course, there was a pants equipment slot, but everyone started with just a sleeveless tunic, tied around the waist in the center, that then went down halfway to the knees. He thought it might be some sort of roman design.

"Hmmm..." he said, reflecting on the classes. He watched a lot of anime, and one thing that always annoyed him was that for some reason they only ever gave the girl characters magic, proper magic, while boys always got warrior roles. He was a big magic fan himself, and so he decided to go and play a mage. After all, he had chosen an Elari anyways, which had a boosted intelligence stat.

Either way, next was the Stat system. In front of him, the starter status before any points were distributed was up. There was also something where he could enter a name, and he put in Ryuu. After all, putting in his real name was too dangerous and risky.

So then the status showed up like this:

Ryuu

Race: Elari

Class: Mage

HP: 20/20

MP: 20/20

Str: 5

Dex: 25

Int: 25

Wsd: 5

Chr: 5

Agi: 5

End: 5

Lck: 0

Skills:

Magic Tool Creation

Passive Skills:

Elari Lore Bonus

In addition, there were descriptions for what each stat did. HP and MP were obvious, so he just read for the others.

Strength boosted melee weapon and some ranged weapon damage, carrying capacity, overall physical ability, and your ability to carry things.

Dexterity boosted one's ability to do detailed and fine work, such as crafting, lockpicking, and provided increased aim assist and some ranged damage. It also seemed to provide some minor bonuses for sneaking around, and being agile, though not as much as agility.

Intelligence boosted the power of magic casted, the ability to learn and understand details from sources in the world, provided minor boosts to learning ability, and so on.

Wisdom boosted ones ability to observe and anticipate things, allowing one to know more about enemies as well the ability to learn secrets. It also provides +5MP Max for every 20 points.

CHarisma boosted the ability to modify prices, gain information from various people in the world, increases the ability to turn neutral forces into allies, and enemy forces to neutral. Also allows for the increased cooperative abilities.

Agility boosted one's speed, ability to dodge, attack speed, and jump height. Additionally, it also affects how stealthy one can be.

Endurance boosted one's ability to endure damage and mitigate it, as well as resist or even negate status effects. It also provides health bonuses, +5HP Max for every 20 points.

Luck boosted how lucky one was. Can effect a large amount of things.

And at the start, one was given one hundred points to put into their stats, as well as a choice of skills based on their class. Ryuu had chosen mage, so it seemed like he might like Wisdom and Intelligence, however he also wanted to get into crafting. From the commercials and ads, Aurios was going to feature a really advanced and complex crafting system. Now, crafting was not a vital thing, but it would allow people to make truly customized gear, including the ability to imbue them with all sorts of effects, and depending on what they use, create new and unique ones.

He had 100 points to spend. First, he decided to put a good 10 into luck, since it was the only stat at 0. This left him 90 points remaining. Since it seemed like bonuses were given for stats at incliments of 20, he decided to boost Dexterity and Intelligence by 15 each. This left him 60. He decided to put another 15 into Wisdom, raising it to 20 and getting him a 5 MP bonus. Between his Wisdom and Intelligence stat, this left him pretty good on magic. So, he decided to put a whole 40 points into dexterity, and put 5 points into MP.

As such, his stats changed to this:

Ryuu

Race: Elari

Class: Mage

HP: 20/20

MP: 30/30

Str: 5

Dex: 80

Int: 40

Wsd: 20

Chr: 5

Agi: 5

End: 5

Lck: 10

Skills:

Magic Tool Creation

Passive Skills:

Elari Lore Bonus

After that, was skills, but that was fairly simple. A large amount of magical and crafting skills became available.

"Alright...lets get this so Magic Tool Creation is at Level 2. ANd lets go lightning magic, ice magic, wind magic. Lets also get Smithing, Brewing, Enchanting, that gives me all the Crafting skills I think. Is there any more..."

He searched through the menu in front of him, looking around. That was when he noticed an interesting skill at the bottom of the list. Choosing it would take two Skill Slots, the Magical Assembly Skill. It seemed to be listed as both a magical skill and a crafting skill, and its requirements was to pick a magic based class but have your highest stat be Dex, with it being 50 or above.

He thought there was a chance not many people would have this, so he chose it. He was allowed to choose ten skills in all to start out with, so since that took two, he had one more. He decided to go Support Magic, in hopes of combining it with his crafting. And so, he finished up.

"Congratulations! For being one of the people to log in during the first hours of the game's release, you will be getting an exclusive Passive Skill that will not be made available to others in the game for at least two months! Make sure to fully take advantage of it!"

And thus, he received the Passive Skill "Creation Genius", which further gave bonuses to his crafting skills.

"Hmm...well, if I was going to get this, maybe I should have put more points into magic? Ah, well, when I level up I can do that. At the very least, I will be able to make a lot of really cool things as well!"

And then, another announcement.

"Please remember, in this VR game, time is accelerated so that one hour in the real world will feel like twelve hours in game. As you have programmed, your smartphone's data has been uploaded into your secure account so that messages can be gotten in game, along with Apps and news reports. Also, for the release of the game, Time Acceleration will be multiplied times eight for the first real world week, so do go and get this world started!"

And like that, the system notifications ended. However, as his character fully changed to what it appeared, giving him a basic wooden staff, suddenly the white room began to flash red.

"Alert! Alert! Unknown Entity is attacking the Cocoon!"

As that happened, a large magic circle appeared under him.

"Emergency Ejection! Warping to random coordinates now!"

And in that flash, his mind just seemed to vacate.

When Ryuu woke up, he found himself lying on his belly in the middle of a grassy field. It was a bit windy, and some of it went up his tunic, feeling a bit weird. He wondered why he had fallen asleep in a place like this, not wearing any pants or underwear but just a tunic, but then he remembered. The attack on the Coccoon. The danger approaching the entire world. There was a great danger approaching...

Ryuu panicked for a moment, before he remembered. That it was a game. He had gotten so immersed, he forgot.

He didn't expect everything to feel so real. It was as if he was really, physically in this world.

As he stood up, he noticed there did not appear to be anyone else around him. The sun was up, and heat was pouring down, so he was glad all he was wearing was a tunic and boots. Since it was a digital body, he thought he would not mind it, but...he now wanted some shorts as well.

And that was when, as he looked around, he noticed a pillar of smoke rising from the north. At that point, the interface popped up with a message.

"Quest Received: Investigate Smoke!"

"I see...maybe I can find something there to equip...ah, now I get it".

He understood immediately. The lore probably was that they were supposed to get more equipment from the Cocoon, but because it got prematurely attacked and they got ejected early, they lacked all the equipment. In which case, this was likely the tutorial where he would fill up other equipment slots, such as the missing legs, wrists, rings, and pendent slots. There were also other slots, such as forehead, ankles, thighs...it really went all out.

Either way, Ryuu decided to follow through with the tutorial, and headed towards the smoke. It didn't take him too long to climb the hill, although he got tired really quickly. Not as quickly as he would in the real world, but it was tough.

"...should have put some points into strength or endurance" Ryuu mentioned, as he made it to the top and look down on it. It was the wreckage of an airship. Thankfully, going downhill was easily. He made his way down, sliding down for some of it, though it felt rather rough on his bottom. Once he made it down he walked into the wreckage. There were a lot of burning crates, likely everything in them was destroyed and unsalvageable. However...there was one crate that looked okay. He opened it up, and found that there were a pair of bracelets, as well as a pair of shorts. He put them on.

The first bracelet was Ring of Brawn, and tightened around his wrist once he put it on, so it would stay on, but it was not too tight. It gave him minor bonuses to Strength and endurance. The other one was Ring of Brain, which gave bonuses to Intelligence and Wisdom. Both were small, a ten point bonus at most for each.

As for the shorts, they were comfortable, and considered light armor. This was good, because his Strength stat was far too low to equip anything but the lightest of light armor. In fact, the shorts themselves required five strength for one reason or another. But their pockets increased his inventory size. In addition, he found a basic Magic Bag, which would allow him to store things in a pocket dimension. It seemed like his shorts pockets provided quick access though, while magic bag stuff had to be taken out from a menu that popped up.

"Alright, I guess that makes sense" Ryuu mentioned, feeling a bit more comfortable now. That was when he found a map as well as he kept searching. "Oh, if I keep going north, there is a city! I guess this is the tutorial's way of leading me to the first player city".

However, he noticed a lot of the airship seemed real and physical. So, he thought of something. He utilized his wind magic, focusing all of his MP into a super dense wind blade, and cut off some metal from the airship's frame. And, it was possible to collect it!

"So I can salvage this whole thing...maybe? Alright then, lets see what it can do!"

With this, Ryuu began his massive harvesting session of an airship.

By the time he was done, he was heading out north towards the city. He had totally maxed out his inventory space with some metal called Angelsteel, as well as other things like Hydraleather which was used for the airship as well. He went on a serious salvaging session, so much that he had leveled up and put even more points into dexterity, magic, and wisdom. He was now level 5, that was how much work he put into salvaging the airship. It was enough experience to level up four times.

Either way, now that it was done, and he was on his way, he came into sight of the city walls. They were great and magnificent. He started to go into a run as he approached them, though he began to slow down again as he reached the guardpost. It appeared the city was multi-racial, as the four guards watching the gate were a human, an elf, and Elari, and another human.

"Hold it. Please provide some form of identification or tax before you can proceed" the human guard said to him.

Ryuu showed him his Status Card, which was something everyone started out with.

"Hmmm...not in a guild, huh..." he mentioned. Ryuu did remember hearing that one's status page changed into something new when they joined a guild. In fact, he also heard pets and NPCs could be created and registered in a guild, though their actions would be more limited as they were NPCs.

Either way, since he had an ID, he let Ryuu pass. The small red haired boy walked through into the town, and that was when the quest was registered as complete. He got another level up, going to six, since apparently the first quest would give you a level up outright, giving you the amount of experience to reach the next level if you started from zero. With that, he was able to put a few more points into dex, since it seemed like one would get ten points per level.

However, almost as soon as the quest was completed did he get knocked to the ground by someone older.

"Stay out of the way, pipsqueak!"

Ryuu furrowed his brows a bit as he heard that man insult him. He looked like a player too, not an NPC. Either way,

Ryuu checked and he didn't pickpocket him, so it was all fine. For now, he would go to the market and sell some of his inventory.

At first, he went to a metal shop. Since most of it was Angelsteel, which seemed fairly high quality, he went to a good looking shop. To be fair, if it wasn't for the fact it had already taken some damage from the crash, he probably would not have been able to harvest so much.

"Hey there, kiddo" the store owner said. "You look rather young and low level to be here..."

Ryuu then took out two chunks of Angelsteel, and the merchant went wide eyed.

"I am looking to sell this. And if you try to pull one over on me due to my age, I can easily just go to a competitor. So lets save some time and skip that" he said. He could tell thanks to his Wisdom and Intelligence stat this guy might try something if he did not mention it in advance.

"I see, I see! A great customer indeed! And, how much are you willing to sell by chance?"

Ryuu then brought out half of his stock, which made the merchant go wide eyed. There was so much there, the thought of deception rapidly left his mind because he could not risk losing this much of a load. Because of that, Ryuu's profits were...very generous.

Rather, he ended up making around ten million coins. He felt like he might have exploited a bug.

Is one not supposed to harvest the airship? Well...its probably fine! In any case, its already done, so it should be good!

Incidentally, the airship would despawn the moment the quest was complete, and as most people completed it rapidly and way before Ryuu did, it was not worth spreading. In the first place, no players appeared until after Ryuu entered the city, indicating that was indeed the tutorial for equipping equipment and using the map.

However, ten million coins was a lot. One started with one thousand, but they also did not get much gear at the start, and no potions. Ryuu also did not encounter a single enemy so far...although he noticed a follow up quest, to report to the Adventurer's Guild.

That said, he was still lugging around all the materials in his magic bag. Apparently Angelsteel was quite valuable, so he wanted to make it work for him. Still, this would let him buy a nice place, he was sure. Well, what he mainly wanted was a workshop to work on his crafting skills. He needed a forge, a fletching area, an enchanting area, a brewing area, a storage area, a second storage area, maybe a meeting room, a break room for sure, and he should probably add a bed.

After all, they could still fall asleep if they got tired.

So, Ryuu started looking at the various buildings. That said...

"Wow, a lot of these are pricier then expected..."

Although a good number were within his budget of ten million, as expected, he did not want to burn through all the money on the building and furnishing. Eventually though, he found one, although...

"Hmmm...I have to make a Guild, huh? Well, sure...but what about a name? Champions...no, that's too common. Magecoast? No, seems exclusive to non-magic users. Hmmm...oh, Silvercrest!"

As he decided that, he quickly founded a guild using the menu. The reason for this was so that he could buy a guildhall he found, and then furnish it as his workshop. That was basically it. So after registering Silvercrest as a Guild, he went and bought the Guildhall he would use, securing permissions and what not. The building was squeezed in between two others on a road shooting off from Market Square, but it was nice and tall and plenty wide. He quickly locked the door, and began to purchase furnishings from a menu. The first room would be an opening hall, where people could take off their shoes, sit on a couch, play cards, or watch videos using a monitor.

In the basement, he put the forge equipment. He figured since heat rises, it would save money on heating the house. He put the enchanting room on the second floor, along with a library full of books. To be exact, he downloaded a ton of novels from the internet, and put them on the shelves. He also uploaded a massive amount of anime, movies, and other things to the monitor, so he could relax easily.

The first floor also had a toilet, though no bath. It seemed he would have to use a bathhouse...but that was something he could deal with later. The brewing station for potions was on the third floor, while also on the second floor was a room with four beds in it. The first floor had a kitchen, and each floor had a storage room.

There were a few other rooms with crafting like stuff in them, but there was also a room that he would make into a game room. Below the forge was the training hall, in the second basement level. Meanwhile, back on the third floor, there was another toilet, as well as an additional workshop space.

And of course, there was also a break room on the first floor as well.

"...I probably should have organized it from floor to floor, but whatever. Its fine" Ryuu said as he leaned on a railing on the interior second floor balcony, and watched everything fully materialize. It appeared to be the work of some sort of magic, so it was like a magical moving company? Either way, he had set up his workshop now.

Which meant, he could try out his new skills, and craft something. And so, he quickly got to work, forging and reforging the Angel Steel Metal, pouring it into some base casts he got. He also bought some magic stones to put into them to make them magic tools. THe first thing he made was a pendent, simple and easy. Even though he was a mage with a staff though, he thought having a knife would be good. Then there was the anklets. He also took some of the leather he had, as well as some cloth he bought from the market, and made a sort of beret like hat that he saw in anime once, it was a bit...poofy...but it looked cool.

And then, he made a new staff using Angelsteel. He noticed that Angelsteel was lightweight despite the large durability, which probably explained why it was used in airships. As expected, they did not miss a beat when on lore stuff. He was happy he chose Elari for bonus lore. Either way, with the magic stones combined in the forging, it was now time for enchantment and programming, to make them proper magic tools. Enchantment and Magic Tool creation were a bit different. Enchantment could be said to be a simple form, while Magic Tools were more costly but far more complex. Incidentally, Elari were good crafters anyways in the lore.

Then he fashioned a hooded mage robe with short sleeves. He added the hood on reflex, before realizing he might not need it if he had a hat. Well, I can always double layer...

With this, he had quite a bit left over. Thankfully, he had storage rooms, though he made sure to not only use Ownership Commands, but he went ahead and put magic locks on everything. Rather, he was not feeling all that much from ownership, so it made him feel a bit safer. Maybe he would get some sentries or traps put in later.

He also had a bit left over, so he made some spare sets of clothing. That said, he had to be careful not to make it too dense and heavy to exceed his strength stat. He really didn't feel like putting a lot of points into strength, and would prefer to focus more on Dexterity, Wisdom, and Intelligence. Though, getting more MP and HP also crossed his mind, especially given his great battle against Hillagedon, but...it would probably be fine.

Either way, he was starting to feel a bit tired, so he crawled into one of the beds and went to sleep.

Meanwhile, inside the Central Admin Tower in the game.

Error: Invalid Output Detected.

Error...

Error...

Error...

Admin Server Unavailable.

Error. Connection Issue.

Error. Connection Failed.

Error: No Internet Connection Detected

Error. User Identity Unknown.

All of these Errors kept appearing across the various screens, the code going wild from false data inputs and bugs. Then again, given the uniqueness of the situation, it probably could not be helped. Sitting in a chair, watching the monitors, a white haired red eyed boy who couldn't be older then eleven watched helplessly as the data stream was having issues.

"Well...I knew there would be some sort of weird side effects or such probably with this plan...but to think it would be this extreme" the boy said.

He had no ability to do anything, except to wait.

"Now then, players...or should I say, Adventurers...who will realize what has happened and reach me first?"

He said that, as the first in game day came to a close.