Author’s corner: HELLO HELLO! Welcome to the third and last chapter(of today) of Insania! Today, we introduce our adorable main character’s eternal rival! Prepare for a battle to death(or not). As aways: Critiques welcome, some errors, etc.

ANYWAY! I kind of grew attached to Cygnas a lot more than what I would have though… And Fear not my friends, For Window-ball is not dead, and it shall return!

Also, I’ve been wondering… I have this other story I’ve been working on, but not about VRMMO… But would it be a good idea to post it together with Insania at the same time?

Hmm…

Anyway! Enjoy the read!

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A wide grin appeared on my face as I looked the scene before me. I could feel my hands sweating with excitement as I prepared myself to the dreaded challenge before me, one I had challenged many and many times before, and always barely managed to overcome each time. And still, the pleasure of overcoming this hurdle is one that always gave me a huge amount of accomplishment.

“So we meet again, my oldest nemesis that hunts me in almost every game I play...” I gulped loudly, only adding to the tension. “Character creation screen!”

“Dramatic, aren’t we?” Cygnas said mockingly at my side.

“You fool!” I turned back to her with my eyes burning with passion and my inner chuu-nii raging free. This seemed to shock her, as she jumped in surprise. “Sit down you foolish, ignorant mortal, for I shall teach you the true meaning of the character creation!” Caught in my pace, she sat on her knees and looked surprised in my direction, listening attentively in my direction. To tell the truth I didn’t expect her to do that, but when she did I decided that it was too much of a good chance to let go.

“If you think that character creation is but the process of making a cute or cool avatar, they you are thoroughly wrong. This isn’t a process as simple as picking a hair, a face and a body!” I said while clenching my fist in front of my chest in a dramatic pose. “When you are creating a character, you are creating a new person, a new ego, a new life! You can’t do this kind of thing with a half assed disposition! This body will have its own soul, its own story! Even its very creation can determine what kind of being this character will be! Its personality, its relationships, its nature! A small change like the hair length of a man can change whether he will be a noble knight or a filthy thief! The color of a dwarf’s tattoo can change the destiny of a whole country! From poor and decrepit to a huge industrial metropolis! Small details of your character can change the story of a whole world!” I turned back to her and stared right in the middle of her amazed eyes. “Do you understand now how much of an importance is the character creation screen?”

She hastily nodded in agreement of my words, her face a mixture of understanding, surprise and regret.

“I… I never knew that creating a character had that much of an impact… And yet I let so many people simply go and do it half-hearted… I… I am a failure as a character creator assistant!” She looked extremely depressed with herself, holding her head with her hands in what seemed pure grief. Beautiful, intelligent, powerful… I guess I can add gullible to her description now, can’t I? She looked back to me, her eyes now full with eagerness. “I decided! I will from now on help any of the new players to my utmost when creating a new…” I couldn’t bring myself to look her straight in the eyes while holding my laughter. “You… Were toying with me… right?” She asked as her expression changed to a deadpan. I could only nod slowly, my attention strangely focused on the character creation before me.

She sighed loudly before looking away with a pouting face, a small smirk appeared on my face before I once again looked back at the characters in front of me, I was slightly surprised when I saw the character smirking right back at me, and took half a step back. And just like that, the character put one of its feet back and changed its expression to one of surprise.

Actually, all the other characters did the same. Do they copy every movement I do? I was too focused on teasing Cygnas earlier that I didn’t notice at all. In test, I lifted my right arm and soon all the other characters copied me.

An idiotic idea appeared on my mind after a few tests, so I quickly stole a glance at the self-proclaimed goddess who was still looking away. Noticing I wouldn’t have a better time to do it, I quickly executed my idea.

Let me tell you this, having near a hundred different humanoids, going from large orcs to miniature fairies, from ugly goblins to the beautiful elves, all excitedly dancing a half-assed Macarena for no reason whatsoever, doesn’t look silly enough for you, then not many things will.

Quickly finishing my dance and confirming that Cygnas saw nothing at all, I went back to seriously analyzing the character in front of me. He was a human and actually was pretty similar to me, same face, same hair, same height. There were small differences, but nothing too much. Actually, now that I looked to the sides, all of them kind of looked like the me version of each race. Wanting to take a look at all the races I looked for a way to scroll around, but couldn’t find anything of the sort.

“Cygnas, how do I change the characters?” I asked after some deliberation.

“Oh! Just slide your hand from one side to the other.” She said while getting up and coming to my side.

I extended my arm and slowly slid it to the side, and sure enough, the characters seemed to slide in accordance to my hand, as I started to absentmindedly scroll through the races available, a sudden thought came to my mind.

“Say… You said that you are usually bored in here, right?” I asked, receiving a surprised reaction.

“Well, yes… But why do you ask?”

“I mean, since you can keep a good hundred of bodies working at the same time with no problem… Couldn’t you also create a character for yourself and play the game as a normal player?”

She widened her eyes at my idea, and seemed to ponder about it for a moment, a small smile forming on her lips, then a sudden frown followed by a sudden depression. It was amusing to say the least.

“I could probably do it, but… It isn’t a good idea.” She said in a slightly sad tone, I looked at her in wonder, and she gives a small embarrassed smile. “I mean… I don’t think I could hold myself in using my management powers if I get in a tight spot…”

I laughed loudly at her confession as she was surprisingly honest.

“Then I guess making a monster’s body would also be out of question?” She nodded embarrassedly once again. Feeling bad about her I started to think of a solution, and a strange one did come to mind. “Say… Are there player pets in this game?”

“Yes… But wh…” She stopped for a moment and her eyes lit up and looked at me in surprise. “That… Could actually work! I could control a non-combat pet and that way I wouldn’t need to worry about getting in combat!” Her eyes were beaming for a while, then she had a worried look that she directed to me. “Well… I’ll probably need a player to be associated to… So… if it wouldn’t trouble you… Would you…” Her voice was slowly getting lower and lower until I could barely hear the last part, but seeing her fidgeting around and deducing from her previous words, I could guess what she was about to say, so I sighed and nodded.

“Sure, after all, the idea was mine, I guess…”I answered with a wry smile and she started to bounce around happily while squealing with happiness… But… Non-combat pets? Does that mean that there also are combative pets? What kind of class would I need to get one of those? Not that it matters, after all I already know what I’m doing with this character.

When I finally focused my attention back to the character, I finally noticed something. This entire time I was changing the race without taking notice, so I had skipped twenty something different choices without even looking at them. I mentally facepalmed myself. Better late than never, I guess?

So, starting with the one in front of me, I decided that I would pay a bit more attention to what I was doing.

…

Actually, isn’t this one really interesting?

It had the body shape of a human, but all of its skin was covered in rock… Rather, all of its skin was made of rock. In contrast to its rocky texture, some glowing lines ran through its body and gathered in the center forming a kind of nucleus, the same glow came from the place where the eye-socket would be. Overall, it gave an exotic feeling to this species.

With curiosity, I looked upwards and saw the name of the race floating there. Golem.

“Hey… If I choose golem, what kind of status bonus do I get?”

Strangely, Cygnas giggled slightly, so I looked at her inquisitively.

“In Insania, there isn’t really a race status bonus.” My eyes probably opened wide with surprise, that is something very unusual for games like these. “You see, all races start with the same status distributed in the same way, the developers sacrificed a bit of realism… as far as realism in a fantasy setting goes… In exchange to give players more customization options, this was made so that players don’t think things like: if I want a tank then I have to be a dwarf, or if I want a mage then I have to be an elf.” I stopped and thought for a moment. That actually did make enough sense. “But it’s not like all the races are the same. Every race receives four unique skills. Two practical skills and two cosmetic skills.

For example, the golem’s practical skill are: Rock Eater, which allows you to eat ores and raw mana crystals to fill your satiety and mana respectively, and Nature’s bastion, an active skill that reduces 75% of physical damage taken and have a five seconds cool down.”

“Isn’t that like… Really OP?” I may not know much about the game right now, but in whichever other game I have played or heard about, a 75% reduction on a five seconds cool down just sounded a broken skill.

“Actually, not at all.” She calmly shook her head. “The skill’s duration is but a fraction of a second, and the area covered is relatively small, so it’s actually a really hard skill to master.”

I nodded once again, truly, if it was like that then it may not be as cheaty as it sounds. Basically, it was a high-risk high-gain like skill. If I manage to time it right I can pretty much ignore the damage, but if I fail, I will take a full on blow that I could probably have dodged in another way.

By now I was already certain I was going to make this race. By the way, yes, sudden impulse. But still, to at least keep a pretense of normalness, I made sure to check all the other races, taking a whole ten minutes to see each and every one. And there were some really interesting ones, like one that was a kind of half-dragon half-humans, there was this alien looking thing, also one that I was pretty sure was a robot.

In the end I chose the golems, and all the other races disappeared in a flash of light.

“So… How do you want to customize your character? Do you just want to describe it to me or would you rather have the old slider menu?”

“I’ll go with the slider menu. Never was good at describing things.” And with a flash a familiar menu appeared in front of me.

I won’t really go in details here about me customizing my character, but will make a special note about a peculiar slider: Anthropomorphism. Fancy name, but a really interesting function. Basically, when you set it to minimum your character looks no different from a bunch of large rocks somehow stuck together in a vaguely human shape. I’m pretty sure that if I were to lay down and hug what would be my legs, I would be indifferent to a normal rock formation. When you maxed it out, you would get a perfectly normal human, except for glowing eyes and a few glowing tattoos.

The final appearance of my character about three quarters to the maximum. Enough for it to have all the humans’ features, but still low enough so all my body looked like it was made of rock. Body wise, I did not adjust much, taking a body of same build as mine, albeit a bit slimmer. My face I left the same. The “hair” of this race was some kind opaque, crystal like substance that was surprisingly soft to the touch and could easily be molded with my hands, but would soon revert back to its original shape as soon as you let it go. I set it to look like a long hair tied in a pony-tail. For my skin-tone, or skin texture, I could choose from a variety of different rocks, so in the end I picked a vivid brown rock, and set the glow from my markings to a light green, just like my hair. I considered setting it to blue, but it just didn’t seem to fit. Cygnas said that I could change the glow’s color and the hair in-game without needing to pay with real cash, so I felt slightly relieved.

In the end, after I accepted the options, a flash of light covered my vision and I felt a ticklish sensation all around my body that died together with the flash. When I looked at myself, I could see that my body had become the one I was editing earlier. Probably, since I mostly kept it similar to mine I didn’t feel all that awkward as I expected. In fact, this body could move surprisingly smoothly. In curiosity I rubbed my right hand over my left arm, and it felt like I was touching a stone, even if it was actually much softer than a real one.

Finally, I arrived at the class selection… Not. Actually came an choice I truly didn’t expect the need to make this way.

“Now, please choose your resource!” As she said that, three floating words appeared in front of me. One was red and flaming, one was blue and looked liquid, and the last one was yellow, seemingly made with electricity. They were respectively: Rage, Mana and Energy.

I’ve played more than enough games for me to know the difference between each one. With mana, you have a huge pool of resource to spend on your attacks, but the regeneration isn’t all that good. For rage, the more you hit or take hits, the more resources you receive to spend on your skills, some skills even generate rage. Energy usually is a much smaller resource pool, but it comes with a fairly high regeneration, making it excellent to spend on many small skills.

The only problem was, this kind of choice was something that went along with your class, and you couldn’t really choose it independently like this.

Seeing me with a doubtful expression, Cygnas explained with a smile.

“You see, the developers also thought that adding the chance to choose your resource bar could make for some very interesting combination, but there’s also no need for worry much, after level 10 you can pay a fee to change your resource pool at one of my churches. It isn’t exactly expensive, but it still isn’t a choice to make it hapzardly.

Also, for mention’s sake, in-game there is a ‘resource improvement’ status that can be divided between primary and secondary, and they affect each resource differently. For mana, primary means an increase in the mana pool, and secondary increases the regeneration. For rage, It’s a reduce in resource costs and increase in maximum pool, respectively. Energy goes with regeneration and reduce the skills costs.

Finally, for mages and healers, there will be some zero rage spells used for the buildup of the resource.”

“Wait… Rage healers? That… could actually be interesting…” I said while thinking for a moment. Even if this whole resource thing was really interesting, this was a fairly easy choice for me to make, as Monster Hunter had an energy bar as resource.

So I put my hand atop the electric looking words and soon these words disappeared, but at the same time a small HUD appeared in my field of vision. A green HP bar with a yellow energy bar were on the upper left corner of my vision, there was a small radar map on the lower right, a small clock on the upper right with a strange icon. I judged it to be the menu icon. The lower left had an empty bar written 0%, probably my experience bar. It was surprisingly unobtrusive.

“I guess it’s class next then?” I asked, almost certain of the answer, but she shook her head.

“You stay as a wanderer all the way to level 10, and from there you can choose your class from one of the basics one, or you can search for a more unique class. Also, you are able to change your class in-game, but unless the class you change to is a subclass from yours, like Knight to Templars, you will lose all your levels up to level ten! Still, the classes mostly give bonuses and penalties, but they don’t really restrict you, so even if you choose a mage, you can still walk around in full plate armor and wielding a two handed sword, although it won’t be exactly ideal.”

“Isn’t there already a ridiculous amount of customization already to this game? What’s next? I can change the race in game or something? Or choose another world to play on?” I said that half-jokingly in a fake annoyed tone, but when she sheepishly looked away I face palmed myself. Did I just discover the theme of the not even announced expansion in a joke? “Alright then… What’s next?”

She cleared her throat and waved her hand once again, and this time, before me stood a line of assorted weapons followed by a line of five basic-looking armor-sets.

I didn’t need an explanation to understand that this was for me to choose my initial equipment, I already knew what would be my initial equipment, but just for curiosity’s sake I looked at all the weapons. They were all fairly basic, but there was one thing that caught my attention.

Plain Wooden StaffMagic damage:5-7Element:FireQuality:CommonA basic wooden staff made for magicians in training. Can be bought easily in any weapon store.

I looked back at Cygnas.

“Say, what’s the reason for you to give an element for the staff?”

“It’s so for the beginners to be able to use magic right from the start, instead of having to buy a skill book. But having an element in a staff or something the like restricts all your magic to one of that element, so you have to disable it at the enchanter if you want to use other spells.”

That made sense, I guess. Any way, in the end my weapon was a simple iron sword and shield set with a whopping 8-9 physical attack. Obligatory starting equipment for me. For armor, I could choose between, cloth armor, leather, chain-mail, scale-mail and plate. From lightest to heaviest. The heavier the armor, the less movement and magic resistance, but the better physical damage resistance and better resistance to knock-backs and knock-ups.

I was in doubt between the chain-mail and the scale-mail, but when she said that I could mix equipment from the sets, I set on keeping the scale-mail chest, but the legs, arms and boots from the chain-mail. It gave a nice overall defense of twenty two armor points, seven magic resistance points and didn’t feel too heavy. For reference, the full plate armor is a round forty, and the cloth meager five armor points.

With that, I was almost done, and the only thing left was…

“So, what will you name your character?” Yup, the hardest part of every game. As I began to think of my choices, she also added. “By the way, I’m going to need a name, surname and a nickname.” Wait, what? I get the name and surname, but why the nickname? As if reading my mind she smiled proudly and said. “The name and surname are for when you are relating to NPCs, the nickname is what the other players see when they look at you. But be warned that I have permission to, in case the name and surname sounds ridiculous, to change at my leisure. For the nickname, as long as it’s not offensive it’s okay.”

Fair enough, this way I would only need to worry about the nickname, or so I thought until an idea came to my mind.

“For the name, can it be Gondorrer?”

She blinked surprised for a moment before tilting her head.

“Well, yes but…” She started poking her head with her eyes closed, as if thinking hard about it for a moment. “It doesn’t really sound a random name… But… Hmm… I can’t seem to find where you took it from…” She looked at me with a questioning gaze not unlike that of a puppy.

“That’s… Uh… I’m kind of a hobbyst writer… And…” I actually feel really embarrassed when telling people I don’t know very well about this hobby of mine, so my words kind of died by the end.

“Ehh? You write?” She asked with her eyes shining in anticipation

No, I’m telling this story through transcript telepathy. Of course I said no such thing.

“Well… I’m not really that good… And most of my stories actually don’t get too far…” Thank god for rock-skin, or else I would have become a tomato by now. “Anyway! The thing is… In one of my stories I wrote about a golem that had this name… So I just kind of stuck with it.”

She looked at me with a strange look of admiration. Please, stop that! It’s really embarrassing!

“Can you show it to me later? Can you? Can you? Can you?” She started jumping excitedly with her hands holding mine, unable to keep up with the pressure, I ended up nodding weakly, and was rewarded by a beaming smile. God! The expectation! It hurts! Finally calming herself, she once again straightened herself and asked a bit more seriously. “Ok, the name is set, what about the surname?”

I blinked in surprise, but didn’t really think much and made something on the spot.

“I don’t know… Gravelheart? I’m not really good with names…”

“Seems fine to me.” She said after pondering for a while. “Lastly your nickname.”

For this, I decided to go with my go-to over-used nickname. But stopped myself at the last moment. Warhawx… The hawx part doesn’t really fit a golem… so I lazily changed the name in my head and went with:

“Wargon!”

Ok, let’s make a breakdown of this name… It’s the prefix of my character’s name following the word war. Argon is a noble gas from the periodic table, and it also sounds like wagon… kind of ridiculous, but I like it.

Cygnas looked bleakly at me for a moment, before shrugging it off. I still had to choose my starting village, but I didn’t really pay much attention and simply picked one that was close to a forest. For now I knew nothing about the game world, so no use losing my mind about it.

And with that, after more than half an hour in this blank area and two chapters, I had finally created my character! By now the servers were already opened and I would start my adventure, albeit a bit late.

Not.

“You see, time here is three times faster than in the real world, so you still have a whole hour in here before the game starts.”

Way to put an end to my happiness…