Beta Life
Contents
Dedication
Chapter One: Real World or Real World?
Chapter Two: Tutorial
Chapter Three: The Wilds of Irune
Chapter Four: The City of Elves
Chapter Five: Preperations
Chapter Six: Departure
Chapter Seven: Into the Deadlands
Chapter Eight: Jailbreak
Chapter Nine: Flight or Fight
Chapter Ten: To the Black Gate
Chapter Eleven: Into the Dark
Chapter Twelve: The Kobolds' Lair
Chapter Thirteen: The Kobolds' Trap
Chapter Fourteen: The Road Under the Mountains
Chapter Fifteen: Maleuhur
Chapter Sixteen: Finding Turin
Chapter Seventeen: Turin and Viltria
Chapter Eighteen: Blind Escape
Chapter Nineteen: Dark Elves and Gray Brothers
Chapter Twenty: Return to Ithielthiel
Final Thoughts
Links
For my wife who supported a husband working two jobs in order to pursue a dream.
Chapter One: Real World or Real World?
Getting old sucks. Let me repeat--getting old sucks. We celebrate birthdays all while feeling like we have just ticked off another number on our countdown timer. The first time I felt this was thirty. My metabolism slowed and I put on weight. I was halfway to sixty, which was the age my dad died. There is this sinking feeling in your stomach as if your best days are behind you.
Fifty is even worse. Your hair is going full-on gray, if you even have hair left, and you start looking back at your life wondering what the fuck you've done with it. The answer I came to was even more depressing. Nothing. Sure, I had kids and a family and I loved them but was that really enough to give my life meaning? Is procreation enough to make my life meaningful? Maybe one day one of my descendants will do something significant enough to make my life worthwhile simply because I passed on my genes.
By seventy, I laughed at my thinking at thirty. I wish my only issue was putting on a little weight. My strength left me and doing simple things took me twice the amount of time it used to.
God in his infinite wisdom leaves your brain operating at full capacity, but your body cannot function the way it used to. A frustrating struggle ensues because of the disconnect between the two.
Now, at ninety-one, I sit in a wheelchair and no longer walk. I can't go to the bathroom by myself or enjoy most of the things I used to. My mind is slowing down, too, finally. I don't think as fast as I used to. My wife and most of my friends are dead. Most days I just hope I pass away in my sleep. Actually, that last part is not true. I am not ready to die, I don't know if I ever will be.
It's funny, every generation looks at medical advancements and says something along the lines of "With the advancements they are making in medicine, by the time I'm old, they'll be able to keep me living hundreds of years." Then, inevitably, they get old and die, usually before hitting one hundred. I said the same thing too, and here I am with a failing body.
Even with the advancements in medicine, our bodies simply cannot stem the tide of time, and while lifespans have gotten longer, humans still live relatively short lives. I know I am dying. Sure, maybe I'll last another year or two but I know my end is coming.
A couple weeks ago, my plans changed. I say that as if I had more plans than sitting around and occasionally being visited by my kids and grandkids, but that's all that my life has amounted to at this point. As I was saying, a couple weeks ago, my plans changed when they announced the digitization beta for Everlast Online.
Everlast Online is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game or MMORPG. The actual game has been out for around a year, but that was insignificant to me as I haven't been able to play video games in over a decade. I just don't have the coordination or motor skills.
This one became significant because of the underlying concept of the beta. The beta came with the promise of eternal youth and life. They achieve this by transferring the consciousness of people into digital avatars in the game. "Digitization" as they call it, was exactly the escape from death that I'd been praying medicine would bring me. I never imagined it would come from a video game, but I'll take what I can get.
One slight problem with my plan of everlasting life was that I had a very limited time to apply to be selected for this, literally, life-changing process. Nothing like this has ever been attempted before in history so there was a lot that could go wrong and little-to-no knowledge on the subject.
After thinking on it and speaking with my family, I signed up for the beta program. I just wasn't ready to die. The Everlast Corporations was looking for subjects to test out the digitization process that had been promised. The sticking point was once you transferred your consciousness, you were stuck in the game permanently. That sounded scary, but for me, it wasn't really an issue--I was going to die soon anyway.
After a stressful evaluation process, I was selected to be one of the beta testers. Basically, I fit their criteria pretty well. I'm old, frail, a drain on the economy, and won't be missed too much. If I die, and there is a real chance of death according to the legal documentation I've signed, it won't change much. While they are reasonably certain of success, and they have tested the system as much as they are able, until they try to transfer a human consciousness, they won't know for sure.
This is how I found myself sitting in orientation at Everlast Corporation among one hundred other living corpses. I thought I was on death's door, but some of these folks are literally kicking the door down.
"Hello, Hello!" a young business woman said up on a stage next to a large projector screen. "Welcome to the Everlast Corporation! I want to extend to you our heartfelt thanks for participating in this beta and taking the digital leap with us! We have a brief presentation to show you before we get started. It goes over some of the finer details and concerns you may have. Remember, you can opt-out at any time before going digital, but once your consciousness is transferred, there is no way back."
All this I knew of course, from the selection process. They made the fact that this was a one-way trip quite clear. I had no reason to want to come back though. My life on earth was nearing its natural conclusion.
The screen came to life, and the presentation started with a pleasant male voice.
Welcome to the Everlast Online Digitization Beta Program. On the surface, Everlast Online seems like any other deep integration MMORPG; however, this is only just the beginning of the game. Everlast Online was born out of an idea to help humans live indefinitely. Humans have long looked to medicine to solve the problem of their short lifespans, and medicine has always fallen short in this quest.
We here at the Everlast Corporation, had a revolutionary new solution to this problem. What if we transported people into a virtual reality forever? What if this reality allowed people to grow and live a better life than they lived prior? This is how Everlast Online was born.
Though the science is complicated, the process is quite simple. We create an in-game avatar with you choosing your gender, race, class, and various other starting statistics. Once this is done, you are placed in a machine we call "the OTD." It looks a bit like an MRI machine, but the science is dramatically different.
We will begin the transfer of your consciousness to your avatar once you are safely inside. This process will take roughly twelve hours, during which time you will lose cognizance. When you regain awareness, you will be in your in-game avatar and at the starting tutorial point based on your origin choices.
Now you may be asking, "if I'm going to spend an eternity in a game won't I get bored of the game or run out of things to do?" Our answer to this question is a resounding no! You won't get bored, we pr
omise. How can we be so confident about this? Because Everlast Online was built with state-of-the-art AI that is constantly developing and creating new content.
Meet Axis, the AI creator and mastermind of Everlast Online. To put it simply, this game is a living, breathing world that is constantly changing and expanding. Besides Axis, each NPC inhabiting the world of Alderoth is an AI with unique personality traits and quirks.
These NPCs are fully aware of everything the player is aware of, like stats, quests, and other mechanics. In fact, about the only difference you will notice between yourselves and our NPCs is that you know you are in a digital game world, and the NPCs will not. We believe this level of realism will go a long way in helping you feel at home in your new world.
The world of Alderoth is constantly expanding under the careful and creative guidance of Axis. You will never run out of areas to explore or things to do because Axis will create more places and things than an individual can possibly explore, no matter how long they live, and you should plan on living a really, really long time.
How are we safeguarding your digital selves and the world of Alderoth? We set up Everlast Online on state-of-the-art redundant server farms which are geographically dispersed around the globe. As new technology becomes available, Everlast Online will continue to be updated. You can live easy knowing that we will be keeping you and your world protected.
What is expected of me as a beta tester? Nothing once you are in the game. We can monitor you using our systems without you needing to do anything more on your part. You should feel free to quest, laze around, run a business, or engage in any sort of activity without needing to worry about checking in with us.
What will we be doing with your bodies? Your bodies will be handled with the utmost respect by us here at the Everlast Corporation. Once the transfer is complete, we will donate them to medical science or bury them in the location of your choosing. You should have received this with the paperwork you filled out. If you elected for us to bury your body we asked that you attached the payment method for this.
What should I do if I want to reach out to the real world? You can contact the real world support team my mailing beta support from your in game mailbox and if you wish to contact someone in the real world such as friends or family please message hello world from your in game mailbox with the person you wish to connect to and our team will do its best to relay your message. In addition if we get any messages for you from the outside world we will forward them on to you from our hello world team.
Once again welcome to Everlast Online, and thank you for helping us create the next stage of human evolution!
The presentation finished, and the lights came back on with the same woman walking back up on the stage.
"We hope you are as excited as we are to get started," she stated. "Please stay in your seats. We will come to you and take you down the hall individually."
Individual nurses came and slowly took about two-thirds of the people out of the room until I heard, "Christopher Ryland?".
This was spoken by an attractive nurse who looked to be in her mid-thirties as she walked up to where I was parked.
"That would be me," I responded.
"Excellent. Let's get you over to avatar creation and on to the rest of your life," she said as she moved around behind my wheelchair and began pushing me out of the auditorium and into the hallway.
She made small talk as she wheeled me through the expansive Everlast Corporation building. The building looked like a brand new creative office building with large open spaces, computers, and games everywhere. Eventually I was parked in front of a computer that was part of a large line of computers that looked like they were set up specifically for this purpose.
On the screen was the Everlast Online logo and the words "Character Creation" were below this. There was a large blue button at the bottom that said "Begin."
"If you would just click begin we can go through the character creation together, so I can help you with any questions or issues you may have," my nurse stated to me gesturing at the blue begin button.
"Sure thing," I responded, clicking on the begin button.
Welcome to the Everlast Online Character Creation, Would you like to start with a template?
Yes or No?
"A template?" I asked hovering my mouse in between the two buttons on the screen.
"A template is a starting point for you if you don't simply want to start from scratch," she answered. "They are basically premade avatars we created for you to use. You can edit any of these avatars to suit your liking. For example, we have taken the liberty of creating a template based off of you as a young man if you prefer your in-game body to be a little more familiar."
"Look like me as a young man? I've gotta see this," I replied clicking on the yes button.
Please choose a template.
The screen loaded various portraits, including several that definitely weren't human and one in the top left that was unmistakably me around the age of twenty to twenty-five. I clicked on the portrait of myself, and it loaded up a larger, full-bodied, three-dimensional display of myself.
It was incredible in its realism and its likeness to me at that age. He had the same spiky brown hair, the same blue eyes, the same messy eyebrows, and the same freckles on his left cheek. The rest of his body looked muscular and athletic which was a not an unpleasant departure from how I was back then. I was never really good at keeping myself in shape, let alone looking that toned.
I think I will accept this template to start with. Who wouldn't want to be themselves back at twenty again?
Please confirm your gender. Right now you have selected male. Do you wish to confirm?
Yes or No?
"Hang on, you mean even though I'm a man right now I could become a woman in the game? I asked the nurse.
"Yes, we at the Everlast Corporation believe in giving people the choice of how they want to play the game and live their afterlife," The nurse stated. "This includes choosing your gender. I must point out that this choice is irreversible once you have transferred your consciousness into the game."
While I was extremely curious at what running around as a woman would be like, I ultimately decided that getting stuck as a woman was too big of a risk to take. Besides, I really couldn't see myself living as a woman anyway. I selected yes and confirmed my gender as male.
Please select your race.
Human: The most prominent and populous race of Alderoth. Their Kingdoms and Empires have swelled and consumed many other races' traditional territories who must now live alongside humans. Humans start with no bonuses or penalties to stats.
Elf: Said to be the oldest humanoid race on Alderoth, elves are renowned for their beauty, crafting, and goodness. Most Elves live deep in wooded areas, preferring isolation and harmony among themselves. A few Elves do venture out into human society and can be found trading and adventuring. Elves have proficiency in the skill perception and can level this skill up faster than other races. +2 to Wisdom and -2 to Constitution.
Dwarf: The Mountain and Hill Dwellers. Dwarves are great craftsmen and warriors. Most prefer to spend their time drinking and fighting. Dwarves have proficiency in the skill blacksmithing and can level this skill up faster than other races. +2 to Constitution, + 2 to Strength, -2 to Dexterity, and -2 to Charisma.
Halfling: The little people. Small in stature and often mistaken for human children. Halflings live in and around human society and out of all the races of Alderoth have had the easiest time dealing with humans, perhaps because halfling society isn't all that different from human society. Halflings have proficiency in the skill stealth and can level this up faster than other races. +2 to Dexterity and -2 to Strength.
Half-Orc: A rarity among the races, they are the offspring of Orc and Human parentage. More often than not, they are the product of rape. As they are neither fully human or fully orc, but reminiscent of both races they are shunned and often lead difficult, lonely lives. +2 to Streng
th, +2 to Constitution, -2 to Intelligence, and -2 to Charisma.
Half-Elf: An Offspring of a Human and Elf parents. They often grow up in human society mostly accepted. Traditional Elves see them as impure and tend to shun them. They are quick to adapt having lived in part of two worlds. +2 to Charisma and -2 to Strength.
Dark Elf: The antithesis of the Elf and their hated enemies. The Dark Elves prefer dark and isolated places often living deep underground or in dark forests. Human Society has had little contact with them. Dark Elves have the inherent ability Darkvision and can see in the dark naturally. -1 to Constitution.
Gnome: The Exuberant Tinkerer. Though small in stature, gnomes live bigger than all other races. Gnomes throw everything they have into their passions and are often the creators of some of Alderoth's greatest inventions. +2 Intelligence and -2 to Strength.
We highly advise new players to choose one of the core races above as the advanced races on the next page can be much more challenging to play as. If you are an experienced player and would like an opportunity to play as an advanced race, please proceed to advanced races.
Well, there it is, the typical fantasy races. This is pretty much what I expected from this game as fantasy races haven't really changed much since the days of Tolkien. Hey, when something is good why mess with it? The advanced races may have offered more variety, but since I was going to be spending the rest of my existence in this game, I figured I'd want to stick with something I was comfortable with. It would be truly awful to get stuck as a lizardman forever. I selected human and confirmed my choice.
Please verify and confirm your physical appearance.
This page showed my character again on screen, and it looked just as it had before, like a twenty to twenty-five year old version of me. It also had various options for changing facial features and other physical attributes. I decided to change one thing about my appearance, and that was simply my eye color. While I was fond of my blue eyes, I thought a more exotic and interesting eye color might be fun, and since it wasn't such a big change overall, I would still probably feel comfortable.