21 Alone

Daniel stared at the notification in front of him for an unknown time. It could have been seconds or hours. When he was finally out of his stupor the notification was long since gone. He opened up his friends list and the only name on the list appeared before him. [Engi] (online).

He tried to send a message, and to his surprise it went through! The message he sent was simple, all it said was "hey". But it was enough. He did. ot recieve a reply right away, but that was to be expected. There were some areas of the game where messages would not appear until they left that area. He was probably in one of those now.

With His friend miraculously being alive on his mind, he could not really focus on much else. He forced himself to look at the area around him. The ruins of a once prosperous starter village. The area had been completely destroyed. The tall walls that had kept the monsters out of the village had huge holes in them. The houses were reduced to rubble. There were not any signs of life.

Daniel looked up into the sky, the once tranquil blue skies of the training village were now filled with black smoke. In the distance he could vaguely see the shape of a retreating floating warship. His mind began racing, why would a beginners village be under attack? Who had the humans made enemies with?

He slowly made his way out of the training yard. He could only move slowly in the shadows, he did not have any sort of weapon. Even if the place seemed to be deserted he would not trust it. His vast experience with gaming told him that this situation was not so simple. Inside he cursed at himself for not rolling a rogue or assassin type character. Heck even a mage or warrior would be ok. How exactly was he supposed to do anything with only basic skills in swordsmanship? He did not even pass the class! He knew enough to not accidentally cut off his own foot, and that was about it.

Keeping to the shadows he crept through the ruins of his starter village. His level was only one, and his stats were a mess. Unlike the other classes he did not have a major or minor stat. all of his stats were at 3. He was an all rounder, not an expert in one area. Which was his true weakness. With no area of expertise and a complete lack of combat skills he was basically useless.

But the beauty of this game was that it did not matter. Right now he was useless, but he could learn anything. Every single person that played this game could. If a person rolled a tank type character but wanted to play a mage? They could. They could learn all the skills a mage could learn, their stats that controlled magic would just be lower. This meant that every single person who played would have a unique experience and a unique character. The subsequent evolutions there character would go through were all based on the choices they made, the skills they chose, and their fighting style.

If a person started off as a tank but wanted to be play a mage? So what? All they had to do was play like a mage and their class would evolve when they reached level 100. Granted the evolution would be different than if a mage just pursued mage abilities, but who is to say what would be stronger? Every Player, every character had a unique design. This was the beauty of Infinite Universe. You could truly be whatever you wanted. And your starter class? It was always what you were deep down inside.

A person who valued their friends lives more than their own? bam you're a tank class. You don't wanna tank? Fine. learn magic skills or sword skills. Your character would evolve with you. It was truly beautiful.

Daniel sighed as he thought about this. Getting stronger was something that would have to wait. As a unique class his character would not evolve, this character was already at the apex for him. His stat progression would always stay the same. He would always just be average at everything.

He thought as he walked, soon he found himself at the center of the small starter village. Once there had been a proud statue that existed in all of G.A.T.E.S games. A large arch like structure. This is where new characters spawned from. Instead of the statue however, there was only a massive crater. Blood and body parts could be seen around the crater, most of the blood had already drained into the massive hole. This starter town was done for, there would be no more new players. Those that had spawned here and died would have been sent elsewhere. He was alone.