The story of Mezuku begins

I'll tell you now, I am not writing smut.
Sex is fine, this story will not revolve around it.

I stare at my reflection in the tinted window, a bored young man staring back at me, his light brown hair whipping about in the wind coming through the cracked window to my other side.

I've been sitting in the back of this black van for nearly an hour now, and we're only halfway through what would usually be a fifteen minute drive. I'm not quite sure what the rush is, but everyone seems to be in the streets right now.

I just want to get home. Teyn probably regrets offering to drive me home now, and I feel for him. It's tempting to just get out and walk at this point. I probably would if I wasn't stuck with two lanes of traffic to either side of me.

Sadly, though, I am. I sigh, looking through my reflection at the city beyond. Of course, I can't see much past the store fronts set on the other side of the sidewalk.

Teyn echoes my sigh just a few seconds later, muttering something about 'kicking that damned celebrity off the bridge'. So some famous guy did something and now everybody is rushing to see? Must be something big if they can't just watch from home. Maybe he asked people to come.

I get bored of that train of thought quickly, never having been a fan of fawning over random strangers who did something special. There's just no point really.

Regardless, I'm still stuck here. My dull blue eyes glance down at my phone, checking the time before I notice a message from Kian.

Nine before noon and Kian wants to know if I've seen the news about Forgone Skies Online yet.

No. What happened? I send back after a quick thought about what he could mean.

The games launching in 3 hours man.

The devs just put up the count down a few minutes ago.

I blink at that, typing back a response just to confirm.

FSO Is ready to play in 3 hours?

I wait for a tense moment, before seeing his response.

YES!! IM ALREADY SITTING BY MY POD WAITING FOR THE LAUNCHER TO OPEN.

Oops

I snort at his failure to pay attention to his words before sending.

Kian is an old friend of mine. We've been playing games together since we were nine. huh, that was nine years ago now. Feels like so much longer.

Anyway, me and Kian played all sorts of games, finally getting VR pods three years ago now and we've been playing in virtual reality ever since. This new game that's coming out is supposed to blow others like it out of the water, and I fully expect it to with that trailer they made. It would be a real tragedy if all the hype was for nothing though. Really hope it's as good as they claim.

I'll be home soon. I send a final message, setting my phone back down as I return to staring out the window.

This ride just got so, so much longer.

Another fifty or so minutes later, I'm climbing out of Teyn's van with a mumbled thanks as I make my way into the large apartment complex before me. He drives off as I enter, the streets around here not quite so packed, and I make my way to the elevator and get it started on its way to the third floor. Five minutes later, I'm finally home, and the first thing I do is check my dive pod for the status of Forgone Skies Online. As expected, I'm unable to open it, but there is a timer counting down from just under two hours there.

I spend those two hours making dinner and checking the forums. Not much is to be found there though, just people talking about how excited they are to start the game.

I'm excited too, but I've never been one to go plastering my emotions all over the internet. So, instead I climb into my pod, letting myself sink into my virtual lobby. Just a flat grey ground that extends in every direction until it's indistinguishable from the grey sky, along with everything I have downloaded into the pod floating around as little icons.

It's not much other than games, but I don't really do much other than games. Forgone Skies Online is still there, blocked behind a slowly ticking timer. I make sure that the game is set to start the moment it can, before closing my eyes to wait.

This wait feels even longer than the car ride, but at least it passes. The grey plane around me fades to black as the words 'Welcome to Forgone Skies Online.' appear before me.

They are followed by a prompt to choose my race.

Bellow the prompt is a list of mundane races. Things such as human, elf, dwarf, gnome, orc, and the such. I also see goblin and a few more of the less common ones from fantasy. Then there or these human like things called servlei. The only difference I see in the small avatar beside the name is that they can have any color of hair.

Selecting the race brings up more information, and I learn that their heart is on the right side of their chest with this race, along with a bit of background info.

It seems boring, so I skip over it after that, along with every other humanoid race. I eventually get to a section with things like centaur and lamia. Satyr, minotaur, harpy, this thing called an uaga which looks like a skin colored stick figure with a watermelon sized head and a fanged mouth that stretches all the way to where the ears would normally be.

Still, none of it interests me. I'm always looking for things that are different in virtual reality, why be human when you already are? Sadly, you never find anything more unique than these, and they never actually become your body, more like a robot that translates your movement into the proper movement for the body you're piloting.

The games are fun, but the experience dull, that's why I'm so excited for this supposedly amazing game.

I keep scrolling, before I eventually hit an advanced races button at the bottom. That's odd.

Clicking it, I'm presented with a warning.

All of the following bodies are designated as incredibly stressful for the human brain to link to. You are only being given the opportunity to view them due to mental scans stating that your brain is much more flexible than most.
Select at your own risk.

Oh? Wait, does that mean...

Well, there's only one way to find out.

I continue on to the list of advanced races, being shown a small list of only thirty options. Of the ones here, half I immediately dismiss simply because I know I wouldn't like them. The others I give a cursory glance to, before stopping on one in particular.

It's quadrupedal, resembling a cat in the general posture and litheness of its form. Covered in short, but thick fur, and its tail is easily as long as its body, and only as thick as it's spine along its entire length. The tail is waving through the air idly, and looks to be incredibly flexible and dexterous. At the end of the tail is a cluster of spikes, more like thick quills, which surround the tail's tip. One spike extends straight from the tip, with the next six placed an inch below it on six different sides of the tail. They continue down like that, stopping when there are about thirty spikes in total, and they form a small pod.

It sort of looks like a pineapple. If pineapples were made of slightly flattened kunai blades. And if they were longer and thinner.

Yeah, it doesn't really look like a pineapple.

It does however look like it could be incredibly painful to touch if those spikes were spread out just a little bit more. As they are now though, the quills sit together in just the right way that you could run your hand over the cluster and come off without a scratch.

This is what drew me here. That, and the four tentacle like things extending from the back of its head to curl back around and rest on either side of its head. Each tentacle looks like its tail, but doesn't have any fur or spikes, just bare skin, and is only about half as long. The one coming from the upper right portion of the back of its head sways idly a foot away from it, held above its head and to the right. The one attached to the lower right side of its head does the same, but instead rests below, rather than above, and this is mirrored by the left side.

This leaves it looking like its head is boxed in by them when you look at it from the front and they're not moving. Of course, I have no doubt that they can be held in any position the creature feels like, this is just their natural position.

Then there's the creature's head itself.

Its head appears to be a skull at first glance, the kind you'd expect to find on a feline-ish creature such as this one, though the snout is longer and the nose is two small slits. But looking closer, I see that this skull is actually just a layer of white material. I'm not sure if it's bone or some form of chitin or shell, but it is entirely covering the upper half of the creature's head, leaving just its lower jaw, neck, and the area where the four tentacles come from exposed. Also, it has six eyes.

Three eyes on each side of its head, one solid shade of red and seemingly compound eyes like an insect's. These eyes are set into indents in the not skull, and based on their positioning, this thing can probably look in any direction it wants with just a tilt of its head. Not sure how good its vision is though.

So, long flexible tail with probably at least somewhat controllable spikes attached, four tentacle things at the front of the body which are probably good for manipulation of objects, six eyes with hopefully good vision. Then there's the claws and teeth, which are sharp, but not so sharp as to shear my tongue off because I licked them.

All in all, it looks fun.

Now, I should probably actually look at its information and not just make assumptions based of the model.

Taedreno
The Taedreno are a rare and elusive species, preferring to live far away from civilization. They roam the wilds in solitude, content to live as beast rather than man. This is partly due to their beastly appearance, as most people of the known sapient races would react poorly to seeing one, freezing in terror being one of the better outcomes.
Not much is known about the Taedreno, but one thing is certain. They have the natural ability to manipulate a vast number of energies, though the extent of this is as vague as the existence of gods. That is to say, every person you meet will tell you something different.
This race comes with incredibly heavy downsides, and as such, incredibly potent perks.
-Beastly body: Taedreno are not humanoid. They have no thumbs, nor the proper vocal chords to speak most languages.
-Beastly visage: Taedreno look like monsters. Any person who does not know either what they are or how to recognize them will assume them to be nothing but a vicious, unintelligent beast. Those who do know of their sapience tend to be uncomfortable in their presence, subconsciously fearing them for their appearance.
-Technology forsaken: The Taedreno are much too uncommon to be thought about by manufacturers of anything really, and they see no need for technology as a whole. As such, nothing is made to accommodate them, be it weapons, furniture, building layouts, or public transportation.
-Rumor shroud: The Taedreno race has so little known about it that people's beliefs about their temperament, history, culture, abilities, or very existence can change from village to village, town to town.
-Nature's fittest: Taedreno have naturally powerful bodies, to the point that even their newborn can casually kill the average man.
-Natural weapons: Nearly every part of a Taedreno is a weapon. They have claws for each paw, a mouth full of fangs, a clump of spines at the end of their tail, which the individual can choose to inject venom through, detach from their body(generally used along with a tail lash to create projectiles), or both. The four limbs extending from the base of a Taedreno's head have a number of uses, including excreting the same venom as in their tails.
-Energetic nature: The Taedreno ability to manipulate various types of energy with the same ease they might move a limb has stumped researchers for centuries. Partly due to how hard it is to find one, let alone get them to agree to being experimented on, and partly due to the advanced biology of the Taedreno bloodline.
-Glyel: A compound unique to the Taedreno is used to make a form of mask or helmet to protect them. This substance is pure white, and can easily be mistaken for bone, especially as it grows into the shape of a skull. Upon closer inspection it also seems to resemble chitin. The first human to come across this material jokingly called it "Chi-bone", but the first known word to actually refer to the material is the commonly accepted name for it, Glyel. Glyel has the unique ability to completely absorb any energy to touch it, transferring the energy to the individual.
Many trials await those who choose this race, and not all can be learned here. Proceed at your own risk.

So you're saying that if I choose this Taedreno race then I'll have to live in the wild, won't get to use conventional weapons, will have to act carefully around or just flat out avoid other people, will start out stronger than the normal races at my level and will have access to much magic?

There's the challenge I've been looking for.

I select the race without a second thought, it's incredibly interesting in just appearance, but the backstory makes it so much better.

Next it gives me appearance customization. I go through all the settings quickly, soon finding out that the race itself is limited to a single color scheme per individual. A brown and grey Taedreno doesn't and can't exist, and if I ever see one I'll know it's fake.

After a minute of playing with the colors, I decide on a dark silver for my main color, turning the fur of the Taedreno model before me into silver, along with making the skin a matching grey. The tentacle things are the only visible skin, and the paw pads have turned black. The claws take on the same silver hue as the fur, while the spines on the end of the tail match the skin tone. I also increase the tail length to be one and a half times the length of the body, and scale the head tentacles to stay in proportion. I expected it to look metallic, but it really doesn't. The beast before me looks regal. Maybe it's the posture, or the glyel skull thing with the six large eyes appearing as rubies in a crown.

Either way, the end result is beautiful, powerful, but also calm, and serene.

I have not a fuckin clue how the devs managed to create such a race, but I like it. And I'm supposed to be this now?

Nice. I'll have to fit the part though, but that shouldn't be too hard seeing as just looking at it makes me feel like watching the world pass by. I have a feeling my mindset in this game is going to be overall more relaxed than it generally is in the real world.

I finalize the appearance after admiring the lithe figure for a while.

After that, it just gives me another screen asking for my user name.

What, no class selection or something? Meh, whatever. This really is an odd game.

Now, I enter the name I have always used in every game I've ever played.

Welcome, Mezuku.

And then everything turns black.