Phantasm

I didn’t experience the transition, or maybe I just don’t remember it. I was at my computer watching YouTube, and then… I was lying on the ground. Naked.

What the fuck?

I sat up and looked around frantically. It was dark, but I could make out shapes. Before I could identify anything though, glowing letters appeared in front of my eyes. I jerked my head back and then tried to dodge as the letters followed me. I fell over before working out what was going on, and calmed down enough to read them.

[Body Development] Level 1 awarded (free skill)

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP

[Stamina Development] Level 1 awarded (free skill)

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP

I stared at the notifications, not really grasping what was going on as they scrolled by.

[Female] trait awarded. +1 bonus to Charisma

[World Walker] trait awarded. Level prerequisites for Professions are overridden. +1 bonus to all stats

[Gift of Tongues] trait awarded. All languages are understood.

I stared at the writing until it went away. Then I noticed that there were more words at the bottom of my vision.

[Unspent Ability Points] : 240

[Unspent Skill Points] : 15

[Unspent Development Points] : 48

I closed my eyes and the words were still there. I put my hands to my face, but I couldn’t feel any goggles or even anything hidden under my skin.

What the fuck?

I don’t like to repeat myself, but I think the situation deserved it. I think I would have kept repeating that thought another 50 times, but I was suddenly reminded that I was naked in a strange room. By the sound of heavy breathing.

OK! Panic time! My eyes snapped open and I peered around frantically trying to find the source. Another notification popped up -

[Perception] skill unlocked

- but I didn’t let that distract me from identifying my surroundings. It was pretty dark, but there was enough light to tell that…

I’m in a barn?

It really was. Packed earth floor, straw everywhere, tools and stalls for animals. The breathing sound was coming from what looked like horses sleeping in one of the stalls.

[Identify] skill unlocked.

Sleeping, because it was night. What light there was seemed to be coming from outside, probably moonlight. Aside from them, and maybe some other animals further down, I was entirely alone.

What the - No. Focus. I needed clothes, a weapon… I got up as quietly as I could and checked out the rest of the barn. The presence of sheep and cows was a confirmed, all of them asleep or keeping quiet. I stayed well away from them in case they made a noise when woken up. I glanced over at the assortment of farming implements. There was an axe that would make for a nice weapon, but I just noted it for now. I didn’t have anything to use it on, and I needed my hands free. I didn’t see any clothes but there were some… blankets in the corner. Probably for the horses. They were smelly and itchy, but I wrapped one around me. It wasn’t freezing in here, but it was colder than I wanted it to be. Now ‘dressed’, I investigated the double door that was my exit.

It was locked, sort of. There was couple of centimetres gap between the doors and I could see that a thick bar had been placed on the other side, securing the doors in place. I could probably get a tool through and lift it, but it would make a lot of noise falling down.

It was at this point that I noticed the walls of the barn were made of stone, which I thought odd. Whenever I’d seen a barn in a movie it had been a big old wooden structure. Eh, its not like I know anything about farming, I thought. Looking higher, the upper level was made of wood, and had some big openings that were letting the moonlight in. And the warmth out, I supposed.

This… doesn’t seem like a kidnapping. It was a stupid thought, but that had been my initial assumption. I’d been drugged and dragged out to this rural location, stripped and… left here? It didn’t make sense. I didn’t feel any soreness or… stickiness, so I probably hadn’t been abused? I wasn’t sure I’d be able to tell but I felt… pretty great actually. No hangover from whatever drug had been used. And of course there were the notifications. Now that I’d checked out my immediate surroundings, I returned my attention to the writing.

[Unspent Ability Points] : 240

[Unspent Skill Points] : 15

[Unspent Development Points] : 48

It was only natural that I thought about spending Ability points while looking at the first line, and when I did a new notification popped up.

Ability Actual Base Cost

[Strength] 2 1 1

[Agility] 2 1 1

[Finesse] 2 1 1

[Soul] 2 1 1

[Intelligence] 2 1 1

[Charisma] 3 1 1

Unspent Ability Points 240

This is a roleplaying game.

I thought really hard, but I didn’t remember anything close to this sort of realism being available in VR. There was no way! We were decades away from this kind of realism! Could someone have kidnapped me to make me test their cutting edge VR game? It… didn’t seem likely. Had I died and been re-incarnated in a video game? I didn’t know how to start evaluating the likelihood of that. But….

QUIT.

EXIT.

END PROGRAM.

CRTL-C.

ESC.

I couldn’t stop it. Unless I wanted to try dying, I was going to have to play the game.

So what commands did work?

Inventory. No result

Character. No result.

[Status]. Just thinking the word felt different, and there was a result.

Name

Kandis Hammond

Level 1 [Unspent Ability Points] 240

Age 24 [Unspent Skill Points] 15

Abilities [Unspent Development Points] 48

[Strength] 2

[Agility] 2 [HP] 20

[Finesse] 2 [Stamina] 20

[Soul] 2

[Intelligence] 2

[Charisma] 3

Skills

[Body Development] 1

[Stamina Development] 1

Unlocked Skills

[Perception] [Identify]

Traits

[World Walker] Level prerequisites for Professions are overridden. +1 bonus to all stats

[Gift of Tongues] All languages are understood.

[Female] +1 bonus to Charisma

Oh nice. I bet the [Male] trait gets extra strength. Again, just thinking about the male trait felt different, and sure enough some text appeared.

[Male] +1 bonus to Strength (0 points, overwrites [Female])

Way to stereotype, game designers. It looked like the text in square brackets could be… clicked on, for want of a better word. To test it, I looked at something I didn’t understand.

[Body Development] : This skill determines your health and how much damage you can take.

That sounded important. Did that mean it determined [HP] ?

[HP] : When you run out of Health Points, you die. Determined by [Strength] x [Body Development] x 10.

Yeah, important. Wait, that meant if I didn’t have Body Development, I’d have 0 HP? I guess thats why I got it for free at the start then. [Stamina] would be something similar then…

[Stamina] : When you run out of Stamina, you fall unconscious. Determined by [Strength] x [Stamina Development] x10

Yeah. I started going through all the entries on the status page. I’ve played RPGs before, so none of this was completely alien. Splitting up Dex into a whole body Agility and hand-to-eye Finesse was a bit different, but I could see how it would work. Soul was a little unfamiliar but it turned out to be pretty much what some games called Wisdom or Willpower. Maybe it was time to look at spending some points.

[Ability Points]

Ability Actual Base Cost

[Strength] 2 1 1

[Agility] 2 1 1

[Finesse] 2 1 1

[Soul] 2 1 1

[Intelligence] 2 1 1

[Charisma] 3 1 1

Unspent Ability Points 240

None of the descriptions said how much each stat cost. The fact that there was a cost listed for each stat must mean that it increased as the stat increased, but by how much? Now what stat am I definitely going to need? They all looked important. Intelligence was probably up there, it seemed important for magic. This game, or whatever it was, better have magic. But the only thing I really knew it had at the moment was people. People skills were always useful… I added one to Charisma.

Ability Actual Base Cost

[Strength] 2 1 2

[Agility] 2 1 2

[Finesse] 2 1 2

[Soul] 2 1 2

[Intelligence] 2 1 2

[Charisma] 4 2 9

Unspent Ability Points 239

Whoa! Everything went up! That must mean - I did a little math. It must be based on the sum of all the stats… multiplied by the current level? That didn’t exactly match up, but -aha- a constant scaling factor to take the first level’s cost down to 1. That was… nasty. 240 points didn’t look like as much as it did before, and there was something else to consider.

The order you buy stats in matters… For the most effective spend, I should buy my highest stat to the level I wanted it, then buy the next highest stat and so on. Anything else would waste points… which means I needed to calculate my entire stat buy before I went any further. Maybe leave this to later.

[Skill Points]

[Unspent Skill Points]: 15

Unlocked skills available:

[Perception] [+] : detect hidden, concealed or obscured things.

[Identify] [+] : gain information about target object or creature.

I couldn’t spend skill points on existing skills? Both those skills sounded really useful though. I purchased both of them.

[Perception] Level 1 purchased

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP

[Identify] Level 1 purchased

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP

Huh. It did get a bit brighter in here. Not much, but… noticeable. I looked over at the horse in his stall. [Identify]

Identification failed

I tried again.

Identification failed

Identification failed

And again

[Identification] : Horse (Female) - Threat Level: 2

Of course I got the sex wrong. Well it wasn’t much, but perhaps it would get better when the level improved. I looked around the barn, Identifying everything in sight. It seemed to work about one time in 5, and I didn’t get any improvements. Onwards.

[Development Points]

[Professions] : Each profession, when taken, replaces any existing profession. Skill bonuses are replaced, Skill unlocks remain

[Social] : Denotes membership of organisations, ownership of property and titles. They can be acquired without development points

[Innate] : Denotes inherent abilities that are not covered by a skill.

Options, huh. [Professions]

A long list of professions scrolled by. I saw some that looked like wizards, but there were too many and it flowed by too fast to really see. At the end though was a note:

Query by: [Name], [Type], [Level Requisite], [Ability Requisite], [Skill Unlocks], [Skill Requirement], [Skill bonus]

Well, I’m trapped in this barn until daybreak, might as well get some reading done.

I learned a lot, but some things remained a mystery. For example, nothing I found described how skills worked, only what professions got what. Professions had requirements, mostly Level, Abilities and a Skill. They unlocked some skill, and gave bonuses to other skills. The higher the prerequisites, the better the bonuses. I didn’t have to worry about the level requirements, but I did still need the Abilities and Skills.

I didn’t want to waste my Ability points, so I looked to see if there were magic professions with a high Charisma requirement. There were:

[Beguiler] : Req: Level 3 - Charisma 6 - Mana Sense

[Illusionist] : Req: Level 3 - Charisma 6 - Mana Sense

[Mind Arcanist] : Req: Level 7 - Charisma 7 - Soul 4 - Mind Magic

[Phantasmal Artificer] : Req: Level 7 - Charisma 7 - Intelligence 4 - Illusion Magic

[Bard] : Req: Level 3 - Charisma 6 - Play Instrument

[High Priest] : Level 7 - Soul 7 - Charisma 4 - Divine Magic

From what I’d seen before, [Mind Arcanist] and [Phantasmal Artificer] would be upgrades of the [Beguiler] and [Illusionist] classes, so there were really only two choices there. High Priest and Bard weren’t really choices. I didn’t want to play music for a living, and I didn’t even know what gods got worshipped here. [Beguiler]

Profession: Beguiler

Development Cost: 10

Description: The Beguiler lures both men and monsters to their doom with enchanting magic through the medium of their voice.

Pre-requisites: Level 3 - Charisma 6 - Sing

Skill Unlocks: [Mind Magic], [Mana Sense], [Mana Development]

Skill Bonuses: [Sing], [Mind Magic], [Mana Development] , [Weapon Mastery - Dagger], [Persuade]

Extra: 15 Spell Levels for each level of [Mind Magic]

Mind magic was… pretty nasty. [Sleep] was as nice as it got, the rest was various forms of mind control and inflicting agonising pain and disability. I suppose it wasn’t as bad as throwing Fireballs at people, but still. [Illusionist]

Profession: Illusionist

Development Cost: 10

Description: The Illusionist tricks and deceives, leading others astray and turns their own strength against them.

Pre-requisites: Level 3 - Charisma 6 - Mana Sense

Skill Unlocks: [Illusion Magic], [Creativity], [Disguise]

Skill Bonuses: [Illusion Magic] +2 , [Deceive], [Mana Development] , [Weapon Mastery - Dagger]

Extra: 15 Spell Levels for each level of [Illusion Magic]

Now Illusion magic was much nicer. Not completely without combat potential, [Blind] and [Invisibility] for example. And Illusions were cheap. [Invisibility] was only 15 spell levels to [Fireball]’s 50.

Ok, so lets see if we can get the stats for Illusionist, or maybe the upgrade. I started working it out. It was a pain to calculate. I had to work out the costs for each level, while keeping track of the points I’d spent…Why am I doing this in my head? I found a knife in amongst the tools and started scratching numbers into the dirt to keep track of where I was.

Competency displayed with [Scribe], Level 1 awarded

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP

Competency displayed with [Calculate], Level 1 awarded

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP

Huh, that was a full skill level, not just an unlock. I checked and my unspent skill points remained the same. Free skills, nice. And now I could… bemusedly, I let my hand scratch out 10 symbols that I’d never seen before. 1-10 in the numeric system of this world. Somehow I knew that it was like Roman numerals, but with a different symbol for each number up to 10. Plus 50, 100, 500 and 1000. Another world that needs to be introduced to proper arabic notation, I thought to myself.

Continuing on, I worked out the numbers and then went and bought the stats. When I was done, the block looked like this:

Ability Actual Base Cost

[Strength] 3 2 31

[Agility] 3 2 31

[Finesse] 3 2 31

[Soul] 3 2 31

[Intelligence] 4 3 49

[Charisma] 9 7 121

Unspent Ability Points 14

Maybe I went a little overboard on Charisma? Not sure if I’ll get more Ability points again… The next step was to get [Mana Sense] but I’d already found the obvious profession for this. I purchased the [Apprentice] Profession and looked at my status again

Name

Kandis Hammond

Profession: Apprentice

Level 1 [Unspent Ability Points] 14

Age 24 [Unspent Skill Points] 13

Abilities [Unspent Development Points] 43

[Strength] 3

[Agility] 3 [HP] 30

[Finesse] 3 [Stamina] 30

[Soul] 3

[Intelligence] 4

[Charisma] 9

Skills

[Body Development] 1

[Stamina Development] 1

[Perception] 1

[Identify] 1

[Scribe] 1

[Calculate] 1

[Dodge] 0 (1)

[Persuade] 0 (1)

Unlocked Skills

[Mana Sense] [Mana Development]

Traits

[World Walker] Level prerequisites for Professions are overridden. +1 bonus to all stats

[Gift of Tongues] All languages are understood.

[Female] +1 bonus to Charisma

[Dodge] and [Persuade] were on the list because of Apprentice bonuses, I supposed. Could I use a skill even if it wasn’t unlocked? It was hard to tell, as I didn’t have anyone to Dodge or Persuade. I guess most people would have unlocked the skills before they became an [Apprentice]. That put me in a bit of a dilemma. Those skill bonuses would probably help me ‘Demonstrate Competence’ and get me the skill for free. But those bonuses would go away when I moved on to my next profession. I didn’t want to lose two skill points, but I really didn’t want to face possibly hostile farmers without Illusion magic. So I moved on to the next stage. Oh but wait! I had [Identify] at 2 now.

I went around and Identified everything again. Sure enough, this time it worked pretty much every time. No extra information though. OK, moving on.

Wait.

I’d gotten so worked up on [Professions] that I’d forgotten the other tabs. [Social] and [Innate]. Checking them out, it seemed that [Social] was a bunch of traits relating to ownership of things and membership of groups. Some of them… no, all of them really, were kinda weird. Take [Family] for instance.

[Family]: You have a family that loves and protects you (10 points)

If I bought that, would my family appear here as well? Would the system create a bunch of people that would be my family members? Or would a random bunch of people suddenly think I was related to them? Some of the others were less problematic, but I had similar questions. If i purchased [Homeowner] was a new house created? Someone evicted? The description didn’t say. I decided to steer clear of that section for now.

[Innate] had its own problematic options. These options were things about you that you could purchase, including your race. I looked down at myself. Do I want to be an elf? I still felt like myself, would that change if my body changed? Actually, had it changed? It seemed pretty much the same. I resolved to check more thoroughly the first chance I got. No racial changes.

Some of the other options were less concerning. They were abilities that didn’t seem to fit into the skill system, like [Night Vision]

[Night Vision]: Allows you to see more clearly in darkness (5 points)

There was some meta-magic stuff, like [Multi-cast] which let you cast two of the same spell at once. Two of them looked important for an illusionist.

[Silent Casting]: Allows you to cast spells without a chant (10 points)

[Subtle Casting]: Allows you to cast spells without gestures (5 points)

So spells needed chanting and gestures apparently. Well not for me! At least if I could afford this… I went back and checked. Yes! Time to proceed.

I purchased [Silent Casting], [Subtle Casting], [Mana Sense] and [Mana Development] and then [Illusionist]. Then I purchased [Illusion Magic].

[Status]

Name

Kandis Hammond

Profession: llusionist

Level 1 [Unspent Ability Points] 14

Age 24 [Unspent Skill Points] 11

Abilities [Unspent Development Points] 18

[Strength] 3 [Unspent Spell Levels] 15

[Agility] 3 [HP] 30

[Finesse] 3 [Stamina] 30

[Soul] 3 [Mana] 60

[Intelligence] 4

[Charisma] 9

Skills

[Body Development] 1

[Stamina Development] 1

[Perception] 1

[Identify] 1

[Scribe] 1

[Calculate] 1

[Mana Sense] 1

[Mana Development 1 (2)

[Illusion Magic] 1 (3)

[Deceive] 0 (1)

[WM: Dagger] 0 (1)

Unlocked Skills

[Creativity] [Disguise]

Traits

[World Walker] Level prerequisites for Professions are overridden. +1 bonus to all stats

[Gift of Tongues] All languages are understood.

[Female] +1 bonus to Charisma

[Silent Casting] Allows you to cast spells without a chant

[Subtle Casting] Allows you to cast spells without gestures

So many new things. I should start with the basic spells, I’d have more points for advanced spells later I purchased [Static Illusion] [Unseen Sound] and [Light] for 5 Levels each. Two of those spells were out right now as they might attract attention but…. somehow I knew the right chant and the gestures I needed to cast [Static Illusion]. My first magic spell!

The illusion of a single, unmoving object took form in front of me. The object I’d chosen was… a mirror. Yes, a full-length, freestanding mirror. Look, its not that I’m vain, I just appeared in another world, I needed to know if I was still me or not. There was no one to see, so I dropped the blanket, and took a good look.

My first reaction was relief. I’m still me! Then, doubt. Was that really me? That looked like my face, but was I ever that good looking before? And my body… I’d never been entirely happy with my body, what woman is? But looking at the me in the mirror… my breasts were maybe a bit bigger, a bit differently shaped? My hips a little wider, my waist a little thinner… small changes but they added up to… Damn, girl, you are gorgeous!

I was dirty, but that just made me look achingly vulnerable. My hair was a mess, but somehow it just looked ‘artfully tousled’ . I wasn’t gay, but looking at myself, I was having second thoughts. If this was 9 Charisma, then this world couldn’t be all bad.

OK, Focus. You’ve still got points to spend. I pulled the blanked up again. I had two more bonuses for skills I didn’t have. I wanted to try turning them into free skills, but there wasn’t anyone to deceive. I had a knife but… If I’m going to ‘demonstrate competence’ I’d probably have to stab someone - or something. I looked at the sheep. Nope, not going to do it, lets move on. I’d probably have to stab something at some point, but I wasn’t going to risk angering the farmers by stabbing their animals.

I had more spells to cast. Looking into the mirror, I tried holding my head still and overlaying it with a static image of another face. If you must know, it was of a certain pop star that I’d had on my wall for years. I was pretty familiar with that face. Being in the image blocked out sight, which was a surprise, but I kept myself in place, giving the trick a minute to work.

Only it didn’t. Maybe illusions are cheating? Disguise seemed like a useful skill to have though, so I bought it.

[Disguise] Level 1 purchased

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP

I cancelled both of the illusions. There was a small mana cost to sustain them - cheaper than casting them, but I didn’t feel the need to pay it. Looking at the wall, I tried to remember a painting I’d seen and reproduce it on the wall. One spell later, and a decent reproduction of Munch’s The Scream was hanging on the wall. I’m no art historian, but that was the one that came to mind.

Its possible I wasn’t dealing with being transported to another world as well as my calm experimentation would suggest.

Competency displayed with [Creativity], Level 1 awarded

For gaining a skill level you have been awarded 1 XP

Clearly the System wasn’t familiar with Earth art, but it knew what it liked. Time for the upgrade. I purchased [Phantasmal Artificer]

[Status]

Name

Kandis Hammond

Profession: Phantasmal Artificer

Level 1 [Unspent Ability Points] 14

Age 24 [Unspent Skill Points] 10

Abilities [Unspent Development Points] 3

[Strength] 3 [Unspent Spell Levels] 30

[Agility] 3 [HP] 30

[Finesse] 3 [Stamina] 28/30

[Soul] 3 [Mana] 50/60

[Intelligence] 4

[Charisma] 9

Skills

[Body Development] 1

[Stamina Development] 1

[Perception] 1

[Identify] 1

[Scribe] 1

[Calculate] 1

[Mana Sense] 1

[Mana Development 1 (2)

[Illusion Magic] 1 (4)

[Creativity] 1

[Disguise] 1

[Deceive] 0 (2)

[WM: Dagger] 0 (1)

[Charm] 0 (1)

[Conversation] 0 (1)

Unlocked Skills

[Enchanting] [Intrigue] [Memorise] [Research] [Teach]

Traits

[World Walker] Level prerequisites for Professions are overridden. +1 bonus to all stats

[Gift of Tongues] All languages are understood.

[Female] +1 bonus to Charisma

[Silent Casting] Allows you to cast spells without a chant

[Subtle Casting] Allows you to cast spells without gestures

Spells Mana

[Static Image] Creates an unmoving image of a single object not more than 1 cubic metre in volume. (upkeep 1/hour) 5

[Light] Creates a light that can be moved, brightened, or dimmed. (upkeep 1/hour) 5

[Unseen Sound] Creates a sound from a source you designate. (upkeep 1/hour) 5

Watch out world! A level seven profession and I’m only level one! I now had spell points to spend so I picked one that looked immediately relevant to my survival.

[Simple Invisibility]: People and Creatures are unable to see you. (15 points)

[Blind] was also 15 points, but I didn’t want to neglect the social side

[Disguise]: Modify your appearance and clothing as required (15 points)

Then I took a look at the unlocked skills.

[Enchanting]: Using runes, create permanent spell effects.

[Intrigue]: Safely negotiate the treacherous ground of politics and the Court.

[Memorise]: Perfectly recall details of what you have witnessed

[Research]: Glean hidden knowledge from books. Allows training in skills from manuals

[Teach]: Allows you to train others in Academic or Magical skills

Hmm.. None of these looked bad, but they seemed more like skills I’d want after I established myself. I was going to stick with [Phantasmal Artificer] for a while, so I decided to wait before spending skill points on them. I still had 4 skills on my list that I would need to buy if I couldn’t demonstrate competence. What was left? Just three Development points. There wasn’t much I could buy for that. I could leave them and hope that I got more later, or… maybe I needed to take a look at the [Social] traits again.

[Modest Means]: You possess enough coin to support you for two weeks. (2 points)

It wasn’t much, but it didn’t seem like it was risking anything other than the two points. Fuck it.

I made the purchase.

One of my hands got suddenly heavier, and when I looked, I was holding a small leather pouch. What the fuck? I poured the contents out on my palm. There were 14 coin in it, 10 copper and 4 silver, all shiny new like they’d just been minted. The copper coins were stamped with a picture of a small bird, maybe a sparrow, while the silver coins had a bigger bird. Both of them had a picture of a tree on the other side.

[Identification] : Copper sparrows - 10

[Identification] : Silver hawks - 4

Oh thank you Identification skill, I might have never worked that out. I’m not sure why, but seeing these physical objects appear out of nowhere struck me pretty hard. I’d felt myself getting stronger and smarter when I bought stats, I’d actually cast a magic spell, but somehow the cold metal in my hands made it all seem real. I stared at them for a long time, but I had to move on.

Whats next? Um… Nothing? I guess the next step was to wait until daylight and see what the farmers were like. I could try breaking out, but that would leave me naked and alone at night trespassing on someones property, with nowhere to go. Better to see if they took pity on the strange girl. I could always break out the invisibility spell if I needed to.

Waiting, though, that had its own problems. I thought about trying to get some sleep, but the floor was hard, the straw was scratchy and so was this blanket. Plus I was way too keyed up from… everything. I started practicing spell casting to occupy time. I wasn’t sure how to get my skills up, but this seemed like a likely method. [Static Image] took 1 stamina and 5 mana to cast, and I got 6 mana back every hour. So I could cast it once every hour without depleting myself, so I just sat back against a wall and waited for my mana to return. Cast and wait… cast and…

Oh, I guess I can fall asleep after all, I thought, waking up. Pre-dawn light was coming through the upper windows, but it was the sound of the bar being lifted off the door that had woken me. I drew my blanket around me and prepared to face my destiny.