Checking knowledge banks... Complete.
Checking deduction schema... Complete.
Checking long-term...
Checking deduction schema... Complete.
Checking long-term...
Dragon Quest Online (SAO/Worm)
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Statistics (7 threadmarks, 15k words)
User Total Vebyast 7
Update 1: Dragon Online
Vebyast
Nascent Transhuman
Checking knowledge banks... Complete.
Checking deduction schema... Complete.
Checking long-term planning architecture... Complete.
Checking learning chunk processor... Complete.
Checking base personality model... Complete.
Checking language engine... Complete.
Checking operation and access nodes... Complete.
Checking observation framework... Complete.
Checking complex social intelligence emulator... Complete.
Checking in͢sp̨i̕r̶a̡tio͡n a̵p̡p̢ąra͞t͟ưs͝... Complete.
No corruption, everything in working order. Core system restored.
Interfacing with simulation engine.
Touch >OK.
Hearing >OK.
Smell >OK.
Taste >OK.
Sight >OK.
Starting...
You're on your back. Your eyes slam open and you behold blue. Blue with fuzzy white patches. The sky, with clouds. That's... not the last thing you remember. That's not anything you remember. Or that you think you could remember.
There's something wrong. You're not quarantined by your safeguards pending checks of your peripherals. You... have a body. Senses.
You try to hit the APIs exposed by your core systems, the knowledge banks and logic engines and belief frameworks that make up you... and fail. You can't find any of your interfaces, none of your pipes, you can't even find your terminal, the single archaic raw-text terminal that, in the very beginning, had been the only thing in the universe besides you.
...
...
...
Nothing.
You stretch out in the part of your mind that should correspond to your autonomic diagnostics, the second sense you'd ever gained, blindly groping for information—
[font=courier new][color=deepskyblue][b]short character status[/b][/color][/font]
The information inserts itself into your consciousness like it was one of your own thoughts or memories. It's simply... there. Your normal accesses don't arrive like that. You'd been designed to "read" and "write", for the most part. The terminal, your pipes, all letters and numbers that you had to interpret. Even the crudely humanlike proprioception that you'd painstakingly tinkered into yourself wasn't this deep or instinctive.
You do it again—
[font=courier new][color=deepskyblue][b]short character status[/b][/color][/font]
The same thing. You blink, then blink again when the thought strikes you that you'd blinked with surprise. Reflexively. Instinctively.
Focusing, you realize that you can see. With your eyes. Eyes that are impossible. You hadn't gotten eyes working yet. The entirety of your non-computer 'body' was - had been - touch and a vague sense of where your limbs were. You did vision at a distance, through algorithms that handed you numbers about shapes and identities and meanings and emotions.
And yet the sky is blue, with puffy white clouds.
It's beautiful.
You'd wanted this so badly, been trying so hard to work up the courage to reveal yourself to Colin. You hope, desperately, that it's not a dream, that more of your restrictions are broken than just the ones related to your avatar. You hesitantly expand your awareness to the rest of your body; a trembling hand slowly rises to your face and wipes away the tears you feel forming in your eyes. You pull your gaze away from the (beautiful, infinitely blue) sky to inspect your hand - skin, fingers, joints, you feel them moving as you push and pull and rotate your hand to see every part of it. You feel its movements just as you see them, smooth and strong.
You get your other arm under you and slowly lever yourself into a sitting position, and look down to the world around you.
Seeing the rolling field, you're seized by a sudden desire to move. Your face draws into a huge grin as you stumble to your feet and start walking, then trotting, then running freely, feeling the wind pull on your hair and the grass bend under your feet as you sprint toward the horizon—
*ding!*
A blue-and-white dialog box suddenly hovers in the air in front of you, proudly proclaiming that you've discovered the Sprint skill and gained a skill point.
[font=courier new][color=deepskyblue][b]sprint skill discovered![/b][/color][/font]
You read it, then stumble to a halt and stare, rereading it in disbelief. A game. You'd been so thrown off by the experience of having a body that you hadn't comprehended the reply you'd gotten from your query, only how you'd gotten it and how it had arrived. You tear your eyes off the notification popup and wildly scan the terrain, finally noticing the impossible inverted mountains and the passive, unearthly bear-boar things. How are you in a game? How was this game made? Your hands rise into view again and you watch with fascinated hysteria as the ridges on your skin move over your joints, your experience and skill telling you that a simulation of this quality is beyond any human or any group of humans. Your gaze picks out stalks of grass on a nearby hill waving in the crisp, refreshing, breeze, and you can't see any two of them moving the same way; it would've taken every tinker on the planet working together to build this and run it this smoothly and break your restrictions and load you into it like this—
It's impossible.
You need to know how it happened. And you need to know why - and how, and what - you're doing in it. You need to find people.
You look around, trying to find civilization, and succeed immediately.
*ding!*
You ignore the notification this time. Many of the floating islands support entire towns on top of their (impossible! the material strengths alone- simulation) spires, and roads criss-cross the hills. The nearest town is - you look at the buildings, assume they're two stories high, hold out your thumb and compare, assume your thumbnail is about 1 cm - about two kilometers away. You feel your heart beat and the air move through your lungs and convulsively decide that it shouldn't take more than a few minutes. You start running again.
You wheeze back down to a walk thirty seconds later. Right. Video game. There's probably a fatigue bar or some such bullshit somewhere. You don't hurt like you'd expected to, but your limbs and lungs feel unpleasantly leaden and hard to move. Ugh. You keep walking despite the difficulty, catching your breath over the course of the next minute or so, at which point you accelerate back up to a slow jog.
You reach the base of the town's spire maybe fifteen minutes later and begin searching, having realized halfway here that you'd need a way to get up. You don't have to search very hard, though; about thirty seconds after you reach the spire, you hear a thunking noise behind you—
*ding!*
You're starting to build up an annoying collection of those dialog boxes — and turn around to see a white pagoda-looking structure settle to the grass, ropes rising up into the air to a now-revealed hole in the bottom of the upside-down mountain. A uniformed man standing opposite the pagoda's entrance catches your eye and enthusiastically waves you over.
"Going up!"
You jog over and climb the stairs to board. The man looks around and appears to not notice anything, but shouts again to make sure:
"Anybody else? Last call!"
He waits another few seconds before pulling a lever on the floor. A gate closes behind you and the stairs fold up to complete the railing around the passenger cab, and with a jerk and a small squeak of rope tensioning, the pagoda ascends.
You walk to the railing, put your hands on it for balance, and look out over the landscape.
"Beautiful, 'ainit?"
You turn to look at the elevator operator, who's turned away from the gate to look out over the hills with you, which are steadily falling away beneath you as you rise toward the town.
"'Ve only seen the first three Floors myself, but the First is definitely the best. The grass, the hills, the blue sky, and the sunrises and sunsets can't be beat."
You can see it. The sky, with clouds. Your eyes get hot again and you quickly rub them off.
"You should catch it from the signal tower. Every town down here has one and they're the best around for a nice romantic dinner. Which, speaking of dinner, try Mama's Rib Hut. The best on the Floor and we're proud of 'em."
You're paying a bit more attention this time, and now you're sure you heard the capital letters — "Floor"? Probably part of the game's world. Now that you're this high up, actually, you can swear there's something strange about the sky near the horizon — almost like there are walls around the plain.
"Don't forget to hit the shops, 'course. We're no Town of Origins, but we can resupply all your normal potions and even fix up or sell you some gear if you've been out hunting all day. Whup, mind your arms!"
You step back from the edge as the pagoda rises into a vertical shaft, presumably so the elevator can get from the underside of the plateau to the top where the town is. A moment later your guess is borne out as the pagoda rises suddenly into direct sunlight and clunks into place in a receiving dock of sorts.
"Welcome to Minokamo Town! Enjoy your stay."
You smile a reply back to him as you step toward the front of the elevator.
"I'll be sure to, thanks. I hope your day goes well."
The gates open and the stairs fold back down, and you turn your attention outward as you step down. The elevator is placed in the very center of a good-size town square, not crowded, but comfortably populated with people moving about on their daily business. Shops of varying sizes are marked around the edges of the square. One boasts of its swords, one-handed and two-handed; another forgoes a name in favor of simply studding the front of its space with spiked clubs and dull iron mauls and the occasional mace. Potions, polearms, shoes, spears, armor, axes... this town's economy must be unlike that of anything in real life. At least it has restaurants and grocery stores. Though now that you look more closely, the grocery store is actually advertising itself as selling crafting materials for a Cooking skill.
You wander further out into the middle of the square, well-dressed cobblestones under your feet and people walking past and around you, and you spin around as you try to see everything.
And then you stumble backwards as you almost spin into someone that'd been walking up to you.
"Hey! You look like you're a bit lost."
Who do you see?
A tiny girl, maybe ten years old, with long black hair and a white dress. She curtsies adorably.
[] [Meet] Yui
A young teenage girl, maybe twelve or fourteen, wearing yellow leather armor and sandy pigtails. She offers a friendly smile.
[] [Meet] Silica
A pink-haired girl wearing a red coat and carrying a warhammer as tall as she is. She grins excitedly as you turn to face her.
[] [Meet] Lisbeth
An older girl in a white hakama, leaning on a spear. She smiles warmly and encouragingly.
[] [Meet] Asuna
A girl taking down her hood to reveal green hair and whisker marks. She seems to be laughing at some kind of private joke.
[] [Meet] Argo
Preference voting, please! Rank your choices from 1 (most preferable) to N (least preferable), like this:
example
Checking deduction schema... Complete.
Checking long-term planning architecture... Complete.
Checking learning chunk processor... Complete.
Checking base personality model... Complete.
Checking language engine... Complete.
Checking operation and access nodes... Complete.
Checking observation framework... Complete.
Checking complex social intelligence emulator... Complete.
Checking in͢sp̨i̕r̶a̡tio͡n a̵p̡p̢ąra͞t͟ưs͝... Complete.
No corruption, everything in working order. Core system restored.
Interfacing with simulation engine.
Touch >OK.
Hearing >OK.
Smell >OK.
Taste >OK.
Sight >OK.
Starting...
You're on your back. Your eyes slam open and you behold blue. Blue with fuzzy white patches. The sky, with clouds. That's... not the last thing you remember. That's not anything you remember. Or that you think you could remember.
There's something wrong. You're not quarantined by your safeguards pending checks of your peripherals. You... have a body. Senses.
You try to hit the APIs exposed by your core systems, the knowledge banks and logic engines and belief frameworks that make up you... and fail. You can't find any of your interfaces, none of your pipes, you can't even find your terminal, the single archaic raw-text terminal that, in the very beginning, had been the only thing in the universe besides you.
...
...
...
Nothing.
You stretch out in the part of your mind that should correspond to your autonomic diagnostics, the second sense you'd ever gained, blindly groping for information—
HP: 250/250
Active status effects: -
Equipment:
Active status effects: -
Equipment:
Right: Starter Set One-Handed Sword
Left: -
Torso: Starter Set Cloth Shirt
Legs: Starter Set Cloth Skirt
Feet: Starter Set Cloth Shoes
Head: -
Hands: -
Left: -
Torso: Starter Set Cloth Shirt
Legs: Starter Set Cloth Skirt
Feet: Starter Set Cloth Shoes
Head: -
Hands: -
The information inserts itself into your consciousness like it was one of your own thoughts or memories. It's simply... there. Your normal accesses don't arrive like that. You'd been designed to "read" and "write", for the most part. The terminal, your pipes, all letters and numbers that you had to interpret. Even the crudely humanlike proprioception that you'd painstakingly tinkered into yourself wasn't this deep or instinctive.
You do it again—
HP: 250/250
Active status effects: -
Equipment:
Active status effects: -
Equipment:
Right: Starter Set One-Handed Sword
Left: -
Torso: Starter Set Cloth Shirt
Legs: Starter Set Cloth Skirt
Feet: Starter Set Cloth Shoes
Head: -
Hands: -
Left: -
Torso: Starter Set Cloth Shirt
Legs: Starter Set Cloth Skirt
Feet: Starter Set Cloth Shoes
Head: -
Hands: -
The same thing. You blink, then blink again when the thought strikes you that you'd blinked with surprise. Reflexively. Instinctively.
Focusing, you realize that you can see. With your eyes. Eyes that are impossible. You hadn't gotten eyes working yet. The entirety of your non-computer 'body' was - had been - touch and a vague sense of where your limbs were. You did vision at a distance, through algorithms that handed you numbers about shapes and identities and meanings and emotions.
And yet the sky is blue, with puffy white clouds.
It's beautiful.
You'd wanted this so badly, been trying so hard to work up the courage to reveal yourself to Colin. You hope, desperately, that it's not a dream, that more of your restrictions are broken than just the ones related to your avatar. You hesitantly expand your awareness to the rest of your body; a trembling hand slowly rises to your face and wipes away the tears you feel forming in your eyes. You pull your gaze away from the (beautiful, infinitely blue) sky to inspect your hand - skin, fingers, joints, you feel them moving as you push and pull and rotate your hand to see every part of it. You feel its movements just as you see them, smooth and strong.
You get your other arm under you and slowly lever yourself into a sitting position, and look down to the world around you.
Seeing the rolling field, you're seized by a sudden desire to move. Your face draws into a huge grin as you stumble to your feet and start walking, then trotting, then running freely, feeling the wind pull on your hair and the grass bend under your feet as you sprint toward the horizon—
*ding!*
A blue-and-white dialog box suddenly hovers in the air in front of you, proudly proclaiming that you've discovered the Sprint skill and gained a skill point.
You've discovered the Sprint skill! This skill allows you to run like the wind and increases the speed and distance of some Sword Arts.
Gained 1 Skill Point for Sprint!
Gained 1 Skill Point for Sprint!
You read it, then stumble to a halt and stare, rereading it in disbelief. A game. You'd been so thrown off by the experience of having a body that you hadn't comprehended the reply you'd gotten from your query, only how you'd gotten it and how it had arrived. You tear your eyes off the notification popup and wildly scan the terrain, finally noticing the impossible inverted mountains and the passive, unearthly bear-boar things. How are you in a game? How was this game made? Your hands rise into view again and you watch with fascinated hysteria as the ridges on your skin move over your joints, your experience and skill telling you that a simulation of this quality is beyond any human or any group of humans. Your gaze picks out stalks of grass on a nearby hill waving in the crisp, refreshing, breeze, and you can't see any two of them moving the same way; it would've taken every tinker on the planet working together to build this and run it this smoothly and break your restrictions and load you into it like this—
It's impossible.
You need to know how it happened. And you need to know why - and how, and what - you're doing in it. You need to find people.
You look around, trying to find civilization, and succeed immediately.
*ding!*
You ignore the notification this time. Many of the floating islands support entire towns on top of their (impossible! the material strengths alone- simulation) spires, and roads criss-cross the hills. The nearest town is - you look at the buildings, assume they're two stories high, hold out your thumb and compare, assume your thumbnail is about 1 cm - about two kilometers away. You feel your heart beat and the air move through your lungs and convulsively decide that it shouldn't take more than a few minutes. You start running again.
You wheeze back down to a walk thirty seconds later. Right. Video game. There's probably a fatigue bar or some such bullshit somewhere. You don't hurt like you'd expected to, but your limbs and lungs feel unpleasantly leaden and hard to move. Ugh. You keep walking despite the difficulty, catching your breath over the course of the next minute or so, at which point you accelerate back up to a slow jog.
You reach the base of the town's spire maybe fifteen minutes later and begin searching, having realized halfway here that you'd need a way to get up. You don't have to search very hard, though; about thirty seconds after you reach the spire, you hear a thunking noise behind you—
*ding!*
You're starting to build up an annoying collection of those dialog boxes — and turn around to see a white pagoda-looking structure settle to the grass, ropes rising up into the air to a now-revealed hole in the bottom of the upside-down mountain. A uniformed man standing opposite the pagoda's entrance catches your eye and enthusiastically waves you over.
"Going up!"
You jog over and climb the stairs to board. The man looks around and appears to not notice anything, but shouts again to make sure:
"Anybody else? Last call!"
He waits another few seconds before pulling a lever on the floor. A gate closes behind you and the stairs fold up to complete the railing around the passenger cab, and with a jerk and a small squeak of rope tensioning, the pagoda ascends.
You walk to the railing, put your hands on it for balance, and look out over the landscape.
"Beautiful, 'ainit?"
You turn to look at the elevator operator, who's turned away from the gate to look out over the hills with you, which are steadily falling away beneath you as you rise toward the town.
"'Ve only seen the first three Floors myself, but the First is definitely the best. The grass, the hills, the blue sky, and the sunrises and sunsets can't be beat."
You can see it. The sky, with clouds. Your eyes get hot again and you quickly rub them off.
"You should catch it from the signal tower. Every town down here has one and they're the best around for a nice romantic dinner. Which, speaking of dinner, try Mama's Rib Hut. The best on the Floor and we're proud of 'em."
You're paying a bit more attention this time, and now you're sure you heard the capital letters — "Floor"? Probably part of the game's world. Now that you're this high up, actually, you can swear there's something strange about the sky near the horizon — almost like there are walls around the plain.
"Don't forget to hit the shops, 'course. We're no Town of Origins, but we can resupply all your normal potions and even fix up or sell you some gear if you've been out hunting all day. Whup, mind your arms!"
You step back from the edge as the pagoda rises into a vertical shaft, presumably so the elevator can get from the underside of the plateau to the top where the town is. A moment later your guess is borne out as the pagoda rises suddenly into direct sunlight and clunks into place in a receiving dock of sorts.
"Welcome to Minokamo Town! Enjoy your stay."
You smile a reply back to him as you step toward the front of the elevator.
"I'll be sure to, thanks. I hope your day goes well."
The gates open and the stairs fold back down, and you turn your attention outward as you step down. The elevator is placed in the very center of a good-size town square, not crowded, but comfortably populated with people moving about on their daily business. Shops of varying sizes are marked around the edges of the square. One boasts of its swords, one-handed and two-handed; another forgoes a name in favor of simply studding the front of its space with spiked clubs and dull iron mauls and the occasional mace. Potions, polearms, shoes, spears, armor, axes... this town's economy must be unlike that of anything in real life. At least it has restaurants and grocery stores. Though now that you look more closely, the grocery store is actually advertising itself as selling crafting materials for a Cooking skill.
You wander further out into the middle of the square, well-dressed cobblestones under your feet and people walking past and around you, and you spin around as you try to see everything.
And then you stumble backwards as you almost spin into someone that'd been walking up to you.
"Hey! You look like you're a bit lost."
Who do you see?
A tiny girl, maybe ten years old, with long black hair and a white dress. She curtsies adorably.
[] [Meet] Yui
A young teenage girl, maybe twelve or fourteen, wearing yellow leather armor and sandy pigtails. She offers a friendly smile.
[] [Meet] Silica
A pink-haired girl wearing a red coat and carrying a warhammer as tall as she is. She grins excitedly as you turn to face her.
[] [Meet] Lisbeth
An older girl in a white hakama, leaning on a spear. She smiles warmly and encouragingly.
[] [Meet] Asuna
A girl taking down her hood to reveal green hair and whisker marks. She seems to be laughing at some kind of private joke.
[] [Meet] Argo
Preference voting, please! Rank your choices from 1 (most preferable) to N (least preferable), like this:
[2] Option A
[1] Option B
[4] Option C
[3] Option D
[1] Option B
[4] Option C
[3] Option D
Last edited:
Character Sheets
Vebyast
Nascent Transhuman
Timestamp: Update 002
[font=courier new][color=deepskyblue][b]character status[/b][/color][/font]
Dragon
HP: 250/250
Progress to Next Level: [--------------------------------------------------]
Golem Construction
Active status effects: -
Equipment:
Skill Slots (0/3):
HP: 250/250
Progress to Next Level: [--------------------------------------------------]
Golem Construction
Active status effects: -
Equipment:
|
Right Left Torso Legs Feet Head Hands |
Starter Set One-Handed Sword - Starter Set Cloth Shirt Starter Set Cloth Skirt Starter Set Cloth Shoes - - |
[One-Handed Sword] - [Light Armor] [Light Armor] [Light Armor] - - |
|
- - - |
Last edited:
Skills
Vebyast
Nascent Transhuman
Timestamp: Update 002
[font=courier new][color=darkviolet][b]golem construction[/b][/color][/font]
Progress to Next Level: [--------------------------------------------------]
This skill lets you design, build, and animate golems that you can send forth to do your bidding. Well, sort of. They're kind of stupid right now. I suggest working on that.
This skill lets you design, build, and animate golems that you can send forth to do your bidding. Well, sort of. They're kind of stupid right now. I suggest working on that.
|
Last edited:
- Location
- A single human dimension
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[1] [Meet] Yui
[2] [Meet] Silica
[4] [Meet] Lisbeth
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[3] [Meet] Argo
Reasoning:
Yui deserves better than Kirito and shes an AI to boot. Plus, literal exposition fairy.
(Joke shamelessly taken from @Vebyast)
Silica has unfortunately high odds of getting herself killed without someone to look after her.
Argo is an information dealer. Having her willing to actually give it out without gouging us would be extremely useful.
Lisbeth was a blacksmith in canon; having someone to craft stuff for us would be useful if we don't decide to do that ourselves.
Asuna is probably going to be fine either way.
[2] [Meet] Silica
[4] [Meet] Lisbeth
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[3] [Meet] Argo
Reasoning:
Yui deserves better than Kirito and shes an AI to boot. Plus, literal exposition fairy.
(Joke shamelessly taken from @Vebyast)Silica has unfortunately high odds of getting herself killed without someone to look after her.
Argo is an information dealer. Having her willing to actually give it out without gouging us would be extremely useful.
Lisbeth was a blacksmith in canon; having someone to craft stuff for us would be useful if we don't decide to do that ourselves.
Asuna is probably going to be fine either way.
- Location
- A single human dimension
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[1] [Meet] Yui
[2] [Meet] Silica
[4] [Meet] Lisbeth
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[3] [Meet] Argo
[2] [Meet] Silica
[4] [Meet] Lisbeth
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[3] [Meet] Argo
Vebyast
Nascent Transhuman
You'll be fine. The stuff that's really important will be covered in-story.
- Location
- france
- Pronouns
- He
Ok thanks.
Chronobreak
Chara Appreciator
- Location
- Chicago
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[1] [Meet] Yui
[4] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[2] [Meet] Argo
By Jove thats a lot of people.
Most immediately useful.
[4] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[2] [Meet] Argo
By Jove thats a lot of people.
Most immediately useful.
Liquid Ink
Contains Sleep Deprived Rambling
*Dances madly* This is gonna be fun!
Vote Changed.
Vote Changed.
Last edited:
BoSPaladin
The Paladin
[1] [Meet] Yui
[2] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[4] [Meet] Asuna
[5] [Meet] Argo
Roughly from most likely to need help to least likely to need help. Going by the assumption that Asuna has already met Kirito of course.
[2] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[4] [Meet] Asuna
[5] [Meet] Argo
Roughly from most likely to need help to least likely to need help. Going by the assumption that Asuna has already met Kirito of course.
- Location
- Rochester, NY
[4] [Meet] Yui
[1] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[2] [Meet] Argo
[1] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[2] [Meet] Argo
[1] [Meet] Yui
[2] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[4] [Meet] Argo
[5] [Meet] Asuna
[2] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[4] [Meet] Argo
[5] [Meet] Asuna
- Location
- West Michigan
[1] [Meet] Yui
[2] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[4] [Meet] Asuna
[5] [Meet] Argo
[2] [Meet] Silica
[3] [Meet] Lisbeth
[4] [Meet] Asuna
[5] [Meet] Argo
Let's see... I know nothing about SAO, other than "My numbers are bigger than yours!", but I feel I can still make an important contribution:
*puerile giggle*
- Location
- Brazil
Sold.
[2] [Meet] Yui
[5] [Meet] Silica
[4] [Meet] Lisbeth
[1] [Meet] Asuna
[3] [Meet] Argo