every story written is


    marks upon a page


    The same marks,


    repeated, only


    differently arranged”


    - Max Barry -


    The rest of the room met this with radio silence which, to be fair, was probably the right response, considering the fact that some of us were still picking brains off our denim.


    Felix looked the most scared out of the group, for completely understandable reasons.


    Fair enough big guy, no one does.


    Crazy, right? Let me give a wee bit of backstory, because it gets all the better.


    Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.


    Enter: Me.


    ait, that''s Aladdin.


    Snap back to reality. So what, I liked 8 Mile.


    “


    This somehow seemed to placate the quiet giant, which surprised even me, but I take small wins wherever I can get them.


    Renna looked quiet and withdrawn, and opened her mouth to speak for a second when Felix rumbled over and gave her a big bear hug. She started sobbing almost immediately.


    Not much fazes her either so it was a pretty clear indication of how surreal the whole situation was. Felix the Bear to the rescue, at least temporarily.


    I tried to gather my thoughts before speaking since the last thing I wanted to do was create even more panic. But Renna shrugged off Sir Bear and withdrew a bit into herself, quietly muttering:


    I briefly contemplated the depth of that statement, realizing that even though I had, a life blinking out in front of you is something that will stay with you forever, regardless of whether you knew them or not. We''re always a second away from returning to dust.


    But let''s focus on living.


    “There''s a glitch in the matrix” I said, immediately regretting the cringe factor but honestly not knowing a better way to explain it.


    The collective groans said enough in response, but I was determined to push forward.


    Her eyes said Why but the response was “Three, parents'' have an office desktop and a laptop, and my laptop.”


    I took a deep breath and scanned the room to draw eye contact, since I knew this would sound insane but I had a feeling that somehow, it was the only thing that made sense.


    “I need you guys to make TantaMount accounts, and we need to find Sarai there”.


    I''ve never seen the word dumbfounded so literally encapsulated within three faces before, and they stared at me for some time before I realized some kind of explanation was probably needed.


    “


    Dono chimed in helpfully as usual: “Cool, but I ain''t playin'' no cleric”.


    Thanks bud.


    So, thusly, Sabriel (Class: Warrior, irl handle Renna), Blank (Class: Rogue, irl handle Dono), and Ender (Class: Priest, irl handle Felix), were born, and three recently traumatized idiots joined the virtual world that I''d come to know and love.


    We were tired, scared, and uncertain, but what was coming for us, and what it would do to us down the road?


    At that point, we had no idea.