Another seamless transition took Raid into Authority Fought For’s introduction, which was only the game’s main advertisement but built in a virtual world so that he could walk through it. Being within the advertisement meant little to him, however, since he couldn’t interact with anything. Raid promptly skipped it and all the legal stuff like lists of sponsors, trademarks, the age-rating, and logos that came after.

Soon, he was prompted with his first task, and virtual shivers coursed through his virtual body as he smiled excitedly. Mere moments separated him from playing his first VR game!

[Create your username.]

No hesitation. Raid used his willpower alone--a peculiar sensation--to input the username “Raidishier”, which he’d used for years as his gamer tag. He’d been gifted with an unusual, but still pleasant, name, so adapted that into everything he did. Plus, “Raidishier” just sounded so fantasy-like, which was cool!

After the system accepted his username--he thanked the gods that nobody had taken it before him--a figure appeared from smoke in the formless void before his eyes...himself. Raidishier stared at what was a perfect reflection of his body, but motionless.

“Yeah, this is freaky.”

The teen agreed wholeheartedly with the YouTubers who’d spoken of the Race and features selection menu--only spoken because recording could only be done within the game. Despite Human being the only Race to choose, the developers left a segment of the character selection menu for it, causing this awkward situation where the player creating their character had to look at a motionless copy of themselves. It wasn’t pointless, however. The general consensus among the Aff community was that it was a huge clue as to the fact that more Races would be unlocked, somehow.

As to what that meant for Aff’s gameplay, many people had hypotheses, but no one knew, yet.

Raidishier selected Human without bothering to change his appearance and moved on to the last, and most thought-provoking, menu. Class selection.

“Here we go,” he found himself mumbling as he was met with the sight of six sets of armor and weapons facing him in a semi-circle, all ownerless as though worn and held by ghosts. This was the core reason he and his friends chose Aff: the six Classes represented before him were the only Class options in the game, as they were the bases for just about all possible Class combinations from other games, according to the advertisements. The developers promised that instead of sifting through tens to hundreds of pages of Class information to find one combination that would take the player down a specific direction, all one needed to do for Aff was to lightly consider one of six options in the beginning. That way the player could decide on what direction to take while they played through their early Levels and experienced what the game had to offer, giving them a lot of flexibility.

For example, if one wanted to become a Berserker-type that stacked melee damage output by forgoing defense, the player would select the heavy armor holding a sword to the far left--Warrior. The Warrior Class held the potential for just about every melee fighter variation, so that Class would be the starting point for anyone who wanted to bash skulls in or slash their enemies apart.

For those with a magic-wielder Class in mind, like Pyromancer, they would start with the light armor and staff to the far right--Sorcerer, as that Class was the beginning to almost everything magical. Almost, because the Sorcerer option’s magical potential didn’t encompass life, death, and taming. Beside that option was the Celestial Mage, with the same equipment, but styled differently. Celestial Mage handled healing and necromancy, as life and death were two sides of the same coin.

The third magic-type option was Monster Tamer, which focused heavily on a playstyle that relied on monsters one tamed, obviously.

Most intriguing to Raidishier was the Bard Class, because in his youth he learned to play some flutes, the drums, and a little of the acoustic guitar. Additionally, the developers commented on the Bard playstyle by saying this: “Bard is a magic Class that can accomplish what the other Classes do, except Monster Tamer, with musical instruments instead of weapons or chants. It was designed for those who don’t like the traditional brawling and spell-slinging of the fantasy genre. Bards don’t have special magic; they have their own medium for channeling magic.” To Raidishier--who didn’t necessarily care for whether he swung a sword or chanted spells--the novelty of the Bard Class alone was almost enough to sway his opinion toward it… Almost.

Tinkerer was the sixth, and probably most popular, Class, even if not the most selected. It was designed for all the players who wanted the item-production playstyle, but with a little something extra. Heard directly from the developers: Tinkerers, if using equipment they made, could do almost everything the other Classes could. That news caused a storm of interest in the Aff community because it represented an implicit challenge for anyone who considered themselves a hardcore player--to trample over everyone else by using an unorthodox crafter Class.

And though trying exactly that with Tinkerer sounded amazing to Raidishier, he wasn’t going to become one. It was already spoken for by Michael, whose interest in creating items way overshadowed Raid’s own. Speaking of, he also couldn’t be a Warrior. Besides running an in-game store, Angela wanted to become famous as “the cute girl wielding an oversized sword”. It was something she loved seeing in anime and dearly wanted to replicate.

“That leaves me with Sorcerer, Bard, Monster Tamer, and Celestial Mage.”

However, Sorcerer was immediately out of the running because it just didn’t pop out as anything special, leaving him with three choices.

“As a Bard I can experience a special playstyle, and it comes with two perks: it would be hella funny if a guy playing a flute was the one mowing down enemies, and I could play my own boss music.”

He looked toward the Celestial Mage, chin in hand.

“We’ll undoubtedly need a healer, and Celestial Mage wouldn’t solely relegate me to that one task. I could also spec into the undead side of things and summon some cool subordinates or deal wicked debuffs.”

Then, Raidishier slowly turned to the last option, gulping. In truth, the entire time within the Class selection menu he’d been trying to talk himself out of this decision...and failing.

He made his selection.