Ranger

You had always enjoyed playing as a stealthy archer. High damage, low risk, and you didn't have to get your hands dirty. That seemed ideal now that the game had suddenly become so real. Clicking the option with a thought brought up the same stats list as before, with the numbers now changed to reflect your selection. Strength was still the same, constitution was down a little, but your dexterity and perception were both up. There were myriad other alterations that didn't seem worth the time to read.

From your gamer's intuition, it seemed like the class would be a glass cannon, which was what you'd been hoping for. Ideally, you'd never get hit whilst dealing plenty of damage of your own.

Next to the stats list now were three bullet points.

Class traits

• Heightened senses: Your keenly honed rangers senses will allow you to see and hear what others would miss.
• Wild knowledge: It is important for a ranger to know their environment, you will have innate knowledge of most plants, animals, and monsters in Drotatha.
• Light footed: Oftentimes for a ranger, to be detected is to die. A light tread is a necessity that will reduce your odds of being detected or triggering traps

That all seemed good, and was about in line with what you'd been expecting. Locking in the class selection and accepting the default ranger stats, you were moved to the next step of character creation.
Race

Again, you were presented with a list of options, starting with human and with other possibilities stretching away below it. For a moment, you considered making a change, but ultimately you decided against it. As a human being, you knew what you were, you knew what you could eat, you knew what your tolerances for hot and cold were, what your sleep schedule should be like, how you could bear injury. If you switched to be an orc or an elf or a half-troll, you would have no idea about any of those. You were about to be thrown into a new and confusing world, there was no need to make it more complicated.

Besides, you were hoping to meet Miranda, Sarah and Tom once you were done with this. If you came out with green skin or 7 foot tall they might not have recognised you. There was even the possibility that a different race would speak a different language, one they couldn't understand. No, it was wiser to stay human.

With that, character creation came to an end.

{letter}

Are you happy with this class, stats, and race selection?

You will not be able to alter them again.

No

Confirm and exit

{endletter}

With no thoughts about what else to do but a lot of second guesses, you chose the bottom option. Again, the world was overcame with light, as the swirling clouds your mind had floated through closed in around you.