Everlast Online

Liz could barely stand, her legs felt like jelly as she slowly accepted each of the messages.

She became a necromancer.

She accepted the world quest.

She accepted the world announcement.

A whirlwind of emotions swept through her head, she just made a shit ton of money, right at the beginning of the game where gold has an almost 1:1 conversion ratio. But, now everyone in the game, and considering ELO's influence, soon in the world, knew about her.

Liz was no stranger to envy, she had experienced torment at the hands of her classmates for exceeding them despite being poor, at the hands of her coworkers who took advantage of her status to force the worst jobs onto her. Before she started suffering from a lack of food, many upper-class women had gone out of their way to discourage Liz as she was quite attractive and mature looking.

And now, in one of the most important places in the world, Liz had just gotten her hands on not only a world quest, but a mythic ranked one. The second highest rarity in the game! She could already tell people had haughty and arrogant attitudes from the world announcement that came before hers, she had thought at the time that 'Golden Monarch' was as stupid and arrogant name, and now she was expecting people like him to start attacking her; both in game and IRL.

"Haah." She sighed, deciding there was nothing she could do about it, instead opening her inventory to see the item she had gotten. The [Spooky Witch Set].

At first Liz was slightly disappointed to find the items could not be traded, but at the very least they were very good, as D-rank equipment should be.

[Spook Witch Hat/Cloak/Skirt/Boots/Gloves (D)] (A/N: They all give the same bonus, it just stacks) (A/N: Also decided to lower rank to D as getting B ranked equipment this early was a bit too much. Will change in earlier chapters too)

[Clothes worn by a very spooky witch. Grants +5 INT]

"That's pretty good." Liz said to herself, all together she gained 25 bonus stat points, putting her at 40 INT, which she was sure was quite above most other players at the time.

[Spooky Witch Broom (D)]

[Broom used by a very spooky witch. +10% damage when casting spells. +20% damage when casting dark element spells]

That was pretty considerable, it was a good damage increase across all boards really. Though she didn't have any dark element spells to use it with, she would probably get some soon.

She quickly equipped the items, finally seeing first hand what her [Dress-Up Doll] attribute did. Her body quite literally changed, the rough, potato sack-like skin she had before was replaced with a much softer fabric feeling. It also more closely resembled skin, very pale skin, but skin nonetheless.

She looked in the image and found that the outfit had literally become her, her body now looked like it was designed as a witch doll in the first place, besides some parts that stuck out. 

Like the hat, the skirt and the overcoat part of the chest equip. But even then, they were still sewn to her. 

"I look... Cute." Liz muttered, looking at the outfit she was wearing, she in no way looked scary as it seemed the name and description were jokes that were added in for the players to find. While some things did change, the button eyes and stitched mouth still stayed the same, showing everyone she was a doll; also the hair, but it felt a little less stringy now.

Instead it looked more like she was wearing a halloween costume. The hat was pretty much as you would expect it, a tall, black, pointed hat with a large rim; thankfully, the tip of the hat wasn't erect and it flopped over as a normal hat would. Around it, like a pilgrim's hat, was a brown belt with a cartoonish pumpkin for a buckle.

For her chest equipment, her body was now, white with the design of a collared shirt, the overcoat extended down to the back of her knees and had baggy ends at her sleeves that covered her, now more refined, puppet hands. It had a set of pockets Liz doubted she would use and on the inside were little bits of fabric that looked like she could hang potions from.

For the legs section, her up until the middle of her thighs looked like they were made from striped cloth. Like a pair of black and orange stockings, that stopped around the end of a black skirt, that Liz felt was a tad too short.

Finally, her boots. They looked like simple boots that went past her shins, if anything they were the most normal part besides they didn't look like real leather. She was just glad she now had actual feet instead of the ends of her legs just bending slightly.

Liz really liked her new outfit and felt it was well matched with the old wooden broom she was now carrying in her hand, she really looked like a witch archetype. As she went to close the menu, she noticed a new part of the equipment tab:

[Set Effect: <Spooky Witch (D)>]

[<+5 CHA>, <+[Enchant:Float] skill (only works on broom)>, <+25% MP regen when cackling>]

"What are these set effects!?" Liz was initially shocked that this feature existed, but then felt a little annoyed about how they were mostly just jokes.

The <+5 CHA> meant +5 charisma, a secret stat and one of 2 discovered in the beta. The other being luck. 

Liz felt glad she had managed to raise that as it, along with reputation, improved how NPCs treated you in Galdrash. With 5 more CHA, she would probably be treated much better.

The other 2 were not really that useful. [Enchant: Float] was a skill that was used to make objects float, obviously, but those same objects wouldn't move that fast. So, despite the implication being Liz fly on her broom it would probably be impractical.

The last effect was purely a joke, there was no way Liz was going to do that, she plainly refused.

She had finished going over the rewards when she looked at her new class. She had no idea what a necromancer was, thankfully though, the system understood this and offered players a brief description of their class.

[Necromancer]

[Highly advanced mage-type class, rooted in dark and subordination-type magics. Beware the forces of a necromancer, as they command legions of the dead to fight in their place. Raise a tireless dark army and conquer the land]

"Isn't this exactly what I was looking for?" Liz said, reading over the class description. With her [Voodooist] skill, a subordinate-type class would gain exceedingly more power than it would in another's hands, and now one had been dropped right into her cloth hands.

Although she had wanted to summon cute spirits, this was also okay for her.

Who knows, maybe some undead are cute. I mean, look at me. Liz thought, not knowing she was deluding herself as most undead are not cute.

The next course of action was to look at her new skill. Each class granted a new skill, and then one more every 10 levels; based on the class requirements to normally get this class you would need to have 2 class advancements from mage, to [Dark Mage], then to [Necrotic Summoner] and after that get 10 necrotic-type skills. That was not an easy hurdle to cross.

[Summon Skeleton Warrior (1) (F): Expend mana to summon a skeleton warrior to fight for you (0/10)]

Liz was shocked looking at the skill, not for what it said as it was a pretty standard summoning-type skill, based off of the 2 she had seen on the forums, but because of the capacity.

Having the ability to summon 10 warriors straight away was insane, most classes like this started with an upper limit of 1 summon.

"How will I upgrade them if I have to do it for ten?" She mumbled, before getting up and activating the skill. It took a fair amount of her mana, but less than she expected and a black magic circle appeared on the floor and began glowing slightly.

When the show was over, all that was left was Liz and an almost 2 metre tall skeleton with a crude, metal sword in its hand.

Liz marvelled at the sight, despite being almost 6ft tall IRL, her doll body was barely taller than a metre. As such she had to greatly crane her neck to look at her summon, as the skeleton was almost twice her height.

"AH! Shit!" Liz began panicking as for summoning jobs the player needed to subordinate the summon. She was worried the monster would attack her but it just looked at her until she calmed down. It didn't move, so Liz tried something, "Step to the left."

As she said that it took a step to the left, and Liz realised she already had control over it. There was no extra ritual needed to control her summon.

Were all the other summoners wrong? Liz began to wonder, until she realised her class was just that much more advanced, Perhaps only the beginning summoner classes need to do that.

She also noticed that there was no system page for her summon, which mean no way to increase his strength, even when she inspected it all that appeared was:

[Skeleton Warrior]

Liz once again looked at the system's description of the class and focused on the use of the words 'Legion' and 'Army'.

Maybe necromancers simply focus on numbers, She reasoned, inspecting the skeleton, Based on the description, I might be able to command monsters I kill later.

She closely inspected her summon as she wondered about her class, it looked quite domineering, nothing like the skeletons she had fought already. They were much smaller and mostly bare handed, this one also had a green glow behind its empty eye sockets. It was a little creepy.

She had long noticed a purple glowing circle appear in the room she was in, but ignored it as she knew that it would teleport her out of the dungeon. Now, she had finished her inspections and there was nothing left to take from this place, beyond killing enemies to raise her level, but to do that she would have to get past the big undead and the tile room. It made more sense to just teleport back to the entrance, despite how deep she had gone into the dungeon.

However, as she, and her summon, stepped into the magic circle she didn't find herself at the top of the stairs, but instead at the edge of a foggy forest with a new system message.

[Warning: Summon <Skeleton Warrior> has been destroyed]

"It was, destroyed?" She mumbled looking around, "Was it the teleport?"

She decided that made the most sense as there was definitely nothing in that room that could harm them, now she was more confused about the forest, until another message appeared.

[Spooky Forest: F-rank]

"It sent me all the way out of the forest?" She exclaimed, turning around and seeing a road nearby.

She made her way to that dirt road and discovered a sign not 10 metres away where the path diverged into 4 paths, each with their own designation.

[SpringHill →] [Gahsten ←] [Clearstone ↓] and [Spooky Forest ↑]

Liz was familiar with Springhill, it was one of the starting towns and Liz didn't really want to go to any of them. With the announcement anyone who inspected her, hell, anyone who looked at her witch outfit, would be able to tell exactly who she is.

So, she decided to head to [Gahsten], assuming it was one of the secondary towns where there would be less people. Even though she had taken a large break in order to read the journal she found, she doubted she was so far behind that the entire player base had reached the second towns. I mean, it hadn't even been a full day since the game released, so her level was pretty damn good, really her status was phenomenal:

====

Name: [Smokey]

Race: [Abandoned Doll] (Attributes)↓

Class: [Necromancer (7)]

Title: <None>

[Reputation: 1000] [Gold: 10000]

Stats: [STR: 3] [END: 5] [AGI: 20] [INT: 15 (+25)]

Skills: [Voodooist (S)] [Mana Bolt (2) (F)] [Summon Skeleton Warrior (1) (F)]

[Inventory]↓ [Equipment Menu]↓

[Player Auction]↓ [Currency Conversion]↓

====

"I'll look into converting my money on the way." She mumbled, summoning one of her skeletons as a guard in case of monster attacks, and headed off to Gahsten.

---

"IT HASN'T BEEN A FULL DAY YET!" 

In a different part of the world an office full of people has erupted into chaos, many of them will have to work overtime to deal with this and a lot of influential people have stormed into an important room in order to get an understanding of the full scene.

In the room there were 5 people on one side of a table and 10 on the other side, along with an assortment of assistants.

In regards to the 5 they were the owners and creators of Everlast Online, the one who created and monitored GAIA.

The 2 with the most power were the siblings Arthur and Alaina Pendra, who did most of the necessary work to make the AI functional. They were quite attractive and even a fool would be able to tell they are siblings as they were strikingly similar with the same dirty blond hair and striking hazel eyes, though similarities were to be expected from twins.

Despite being twins they were polar opposites; Arthur was extremely open and friendly, he would often be smiling and hanging around his subordinates without any awkwardness. Alaina however, was much more strict and reserved. Though this all changed when under pressure, Alaina's strict disposition was simply because she was quite socially anxious, so unlike her brother who would often blow up over conflicts, she would try and resolve it.

The other 3 members were their close friends: Lars, Percy and Gally.

Lars was a large, muscular and hair man who always sported a wide grin and never shied away from a drink. He was always there when needed and wholly reliable, his only fault was that he was a bit of a womaniser, though not any less respectful.

Percy was a tall lanky man, with wire-frame glasses that held up incredibly thick lenses. He looked very much like a stereotypical nerd, only grown up. He mostly managed the financial aspect of the company, but also assisted in the production of GAIA.

Finally, Gally, the only other woman in the group. She was most similar to Lars and Arthur in her extrovert nature, she often loved to party and have fun, but was quite frightening when serious.

This group of 5 had been friends had known one another since they were kids growing up in the lower city, and as adults with a penchant for business and videogames they formed the Camelot Company, named after the legend of the old King Arthur since their names sounded quite similar to some of his knights, the company later produced ELO; and the recent ripple, created by the player known only as [Smokey] is the topic of today's meeting.

"Mr Pendra." One of the shareholders spoke first, barely hiding his disdainful glare, "I thought we had an agreement."

"Oh and what agreement was that?" Arthur asked provocatively, causing the other four to chuckle slightly. 

The shareholder's collectively turned a deeper shade of red, but managed to maintain their composure.

"In exchange for our generous donations towards your company, those players whom we selected will be given all the best opportunities at the start of the game." The same man spoke and the other bigwigs nodded approvingly. Arthur smirked condescendingly as they were twisting the agreement.

"I think you'll find the agreement we reach was: 'In return for extra funding, we at Camelot shall allow the players, chosen by the funding party, to spawn in the most optimal locations.' That was the deal." Alaina read of the agreement they had made in order to finish the production of GAIA on time.

"HOW IS SOME RANDOM PLAYER GETTING A WORLD QUEST THE MOST OPTIMAL!?" One of the less controlled shareholders yelled, losing his composure entirely.

Lars and Gally gave him a glare before Percy decided to answer.

"All we did was put them in the most optimal spawns, if they don't have the ability then others will snatch up the opportunities." He said, making the faces of the shareholder's scrunch up in annoyance and hate. Some of those players were their own family, so it felt like an attack on them personally as he said it. Percy of course meant it like that as well.

"But-" One person began speaking but was quickly interrupted by Arthur.

"But nothing. There is nothing to talk about." He said, losing his temper, "We fulfilled our end of the deal, and that's that."

Nothing could be said after this, so all 10 of the shareholders left but not without grumbling to one another about 'disrespect from peasants' and 'Knowing a person's place'

Arthur was being calmed down by his sister, he had never once liked the deal they made, but there was little choice and he knew that. Really, none of them wanted to make that deal but it was necessary to ensure GAIA was done when the deadline hit.

The five friends began talking after a while, taking out drinks after the first successful day of ELO. After a while they were interrupted by a holoscreen rising from the table.

[Looks like you're all having fun] a beautifully feminine voice spoke seductively.

"Haha! How could we not, ELO is a success." Arthur said, all of them turning to the screen, "All thanks to you of course Gaia."

[I am merely doing my job, and worry not the issue is resolved]

"Oh yeah, what happened there." Lars asked in his booming voice, "I thought the eternal whatevers quest was level locked."

[You are almost correct Lars] Gaia said, [The items needed to activate the quest are hidden behind a level 150 Ancient Guard, but the player unintentionally found an exploit]

"Haha. Is that it? What happened?" Gally, who previously hadn't cared about the world announcement, became intrigued.

[Yes, the player <Smokey> used ranged attacks to knock the key off of the Ancient Guard's belt. The Guard didn't react to this until she touched the door and since the Ancient guard has an abysmal speed stat it could not catch her in time. But this has been fixed, now if players target the key the Ancient Guard will immediately enter its enraged state]

Mixtures of laughter and groans echoed through the room as they realised the entire mess had been created because they were lazy with designing the bosses main focus.

"Say what's this smokey player like, Gaia?" Arthur asked as the laughter came to an end.

[As you know I can say very little to protect their safety. But, I can say she has been exceedingly lucky up until this point, she has quite literally defied the algorithm. I really like her]

More laughter as the 5 childhood friends continued drinking, now with another guest who had generated her own alcohol to enjoy the time it had with them.

---

Around 20 minutes ago in a hunting field near the starting village Shroudhill.

A man was fighting against the coyote-like monsters that spawned here. He was dressed, head to toe in flashy, gaudy armour made from pure gold. Carved into the metal were the images of leaves and branches, as if to accentuate the value of the suit, large red rubies were embedded into the suit of armour.

The only part of his body, unobscured by this horrendously flashy item set, was his face. Where one could see the face of an attractive man with shiny golden hair and sky blue eyes. He wore a serious, yet smug expression as he cut through mobs with his sword, one that did not at all match the armour set he fought with.

This man was Golden Monarch, the party leader who cleared the first dungeon. Many people were looking at him with envy but other players surrounded him in such a way that no one could approach; thankfully, the armour was purely cosmetic, the result of him being a beta tester.

The Beta testers were allowed to maintain certain things on full release, most importantly their base character models. That way, beta testers who received rare races through random creation could keep playing and keep the racial skill they got during that.

The Golden Monarch, a powerful upper class man by the name of Godwyn, was one of those beta testers with a special race. On the outside he may look like any ordinary human, but in reality he is a member of the [Dragonewt] race, one of the higher species. It starts with bonuses in every stat and is one of the most powerful and rare races available for the players.

Although he had not yet achieved it in the beta, nor would he have been permitted to use it in the real game, Godwyn discovered how to upgrade this specific race to its next level.

He never once revealed the race skill or any other aspect of the race, so no one knows what the dragonewts were capable of and very few even knew the player races could evolve.

The other benefit of being a beta tester, besides the extra knowledge, was being allowed to create a single custom vanity set for yourself; Godwyn's being his suit of armour.

Nothing else would be fitting for someone like me. He thought, remembering the shame of having to wear 'peasant' clothes when beginning the beta of the game.

Godwyn Kim was an incredibly egotistical and arrogant man, he often beat on his servants for the fun of it and abused his position to get ahead in life. That is not to say he is inept as he was far from it; Godwyn excelled in everything he attempted as a child, but this only fuelled his ego further.

When VR gaming became popularised he capitalised on it. Every game he played he dominated and it was incredibly uncommon to not see [Golden Radiance] as one of the top guilds in any game you played. And now he would dominate Everlast Online.

Even now, as he hunted weak monsters to raise his level before heading to the next town, he felt confident having been the first person to get a world announcement.

No one has exceeded me, though I doubt any could. He thought, looking over the filthy whelps who gathered around him, I'm simply better than they are.

Godwyn understood many great feats didn't receive a world announcement for achieving, so others may have done some significant action, but he doubted it and remained confident; right until a world announcement began displaying in front of everyone:

The great Golden Monarch stood shocked for a moment, not breaking from his stupor until he was hit by a coyote. This was unacceptable.

He took the anger he felt out on the monster, attacking it with an enraged slash, using much more force than he needed, before regaining his composure.

One of his subordinates approached.

"Is this okay, sir? How should we proceed?" 

"Everything is fine." Godwyn replied, "It's a simple matter really. Just find this player and recruit them."

"And if they refuse sir?"

"Get rid of them." Godwyn spoke with no emotion, but inside he was seething in rage. But he had the mind not to show it in front of the peasants who adored him.

That bastard! He raged, How dare that piece of shit upstage me! I'll make sure he pays!

---

All over Galdrash, the ELO forums and even parts of the real world people were reacting to what Elizabeth had achieved.

A previously unknown player just began a MYTHIC-rank quest, and a world quest at that!

All this before the game had been released for a full day. It was done in less than half a day!

And while the world blew up over [Smokey], the player herself had no idea.

She understood the ramifications of this action, but not the true scope of it.

How could someone who hasn't played a video game for almost 10 years understand the influence they now held within society.

Blissfully unaware she walked along the road to Gahsten, checking out all of her summons as she did.