"Allan! You made it!" Trevor called out to me while running toward me.

I pretended not to notice him and continued immersing myself in the world around me. The sun rays gave off faint heat, like real life. The wind blew past me and I could feel chills, like real life. Based off of the weather, I'd say it's spring.

I tried walking and I found problems already. The clothes I was wearing, wasn't preferable for a stroll. Maybe a small skirmish with someone on the street, but not a nice relaxing stroll.

I checked myself out. I had a metal chestplate attatched to my, well, chest. The chestplate was strapped to me by a few more straps, which were connected to some metal shoulder pads. I wore a tight belt with a sheath that had a knife in it. As I took out the knife I had gloves without the fingers on. I looked further down at my legs where I was wearing leather knee pads and some leather boots. And under it all I was wearing some what looked to be cargo pants and a long sleeved blue shirt. As Trevor got closer to me, I looked up at him. He had the same get up, but with a black shirt on.

"Allan, glad to see you!" He said gasping for air.

"Oh, didn't see you there." I said.

"Alright, from the looks of it, you literally just started?" He asked, still trying to breath.

"Yes." I confirmed. "How did you find me as soon as I appeared here?"

"I was waiting for you." He looked at me like I was expecting something else.

"How long were you waiting? Are the girls with you?" I asked.

"One question at a time man, I had to run a bit just to get to you." He breathed in one more time. "I've only been waiting for thirty minutes. Nia showed up actually, but she went shopping in the shopping district." He pointed behind him where there were larger buildings.

"There's a shopping district?" I asked.

"Well yeah, oh wait, I should probably explain this all to you. I am experienced after all." He pampered himself.

"Yeah sure, whatever."

"Okay, first things first. Welcome to Eindorf! Eindorf is the central city and capital of all of Einsland, the first island. What you stepped off of is the 'Teleportation Pad' which allows you to travel in between dungeons and other islands. Granted, you have to beat this island first and then slowly make your way through the Divine Isles." He explained.

"You seem to know a lot."

"Well yes I do, I look at the wiki." He said looking all proud.

"Oh, I see."

"Anyway," He held up three fingers. "Eindorf has three main districts. There's the 'Shopping District' as mentioned before. There, they sell goods to the adventurers. It's not all bad though, it's where you buy equipment for quests and such. You can also buy costumes, which are, well kinda useless. Though they're kinda cosmetic only, they do have stat buffs, only slight ones though."

"Uh huh."

"Next up is the 'Adventurer's District'. This is where normal MMO things happen. Like guilds, quests, etc. I saw a guild rally for a raid here a few days ago."

"Keep going."

"Finally, there's the 'Residential District'. There's not much importance to it, but you could buy a house if you feel like it."

"Buy a house?!"

"Yeah, some prime real estate here. They go from raggedy old shacks to straight up Manors! Ah, we should save up to buy one."

"Yes, the one thing you said that I agree with." I said as I rub my hands together.

"W-what's that supposed to mean?" Trevor asked in shock.

"Ah! What's that stalker doing here?!." I looked over and saw Nia standing there with a drink in her hand. She looked a little disturbed.

"Oi, what's that?" I pointed at her drink.

"Huh? Oh it's eggnog from the bar." She said and sipped from the straw. "They said I was too young for beer."

"...okay" Trevor was just as amazed as I was at her ignorance

"What's it to you?" Nia asked with an attitude.

"Nothing." I said.

"Have you seen Bridget yet?" Nia asked.

"No, not yet. I'm messaging her but she doesn't seem to get them." Trevor scratched his head.

"You think she's alright?" Nia asked.

"Yeah she's fine as she always is, maybe she's scrambling to finish all of her homework. She does that when she wants to play games and has no time." He said while looking up at the sky.

Me and Nia looked up at the sky too. "It sure is realistic." Nia said.

"Too realistic." I look back down. "My eyes burn from the sun."

"Well, we might as well go without her. If she shows up she'll message me, probably." Trevor said.

"Where are we going?" Nia asked.

"Well, we're heading into 'Eindorf Woodlands'!" Trevor had a spark in his eye.

"Eindorf Woodlands?" Nia asked.

"The first stage in the game, where new players go to grind levels. Deep in the forest, there's a large tower that holds the key to unlocking the even bigger tower." He pointed at the center of the city and there stood a large tower that essentially touched the sky.

"My god, how do you get through there?" I asked.

"Well, we'll be pretty beefed up by the time we even get to the tower. Recommended level minimum is at least level 40." Trevor said.

"You've got to be kidding me." I say, still in shock.

"There are three dungeons on this island. Eindorf Caverns, and Mt. Zweistaht. We need the three keys in order to unlock the door to the final dungeon of this island." Trevor said.

"Quite a task." I said.

"Mhmm." Nia said, then went back to sipping on the straw.

"Well, we can worry about those things later, let's go explore shall we? Eternal spring on this island is pretty nice~" Trevor said.

"Yeah, let's go! I bought all this new equipment." She was wearing different armor than me and Trevor. Her armor looked more protective; and on top of that she was wearing a mantel.

"Hmm, before we go actually, me and Allan should go shopping." Trevor said.

"Are you kidding me? You're saying this now? Especially after you made all the big talk about exploring?" I asked, quite disappointed.

"Well, I've been saving up gold. I guess I'll buy you your equipment for compensation." He said.

"Haha, fine." I said.

We made our way through the crowds of people walking around and found a weapon shop.

"You're definitely gonna wanna replace that knife. What type of sword would you prefer?" Trevor asked while window shopping.

"I'll take a Rapier." I said in almost no time.

"Rapier? You know what those are?" He asked in surprise.

"Yes, I took fencing."

"Hmm, interesting. Okay, I'll buy it."

We entered the small shop and we're greeted by a big man with a long beard behind the counter.

"Hallo, how can I help you today?" The man said in a German accent.

"Ah yes, we're looking for the stronger base level swords." Trevor said.

"Oh, ya ve got many gut swords in our arsenal." He showed the rack of weapons behind him. "Vich von do you vant?"

"I'll take the Rapier." Trevor pointed at the longer skinnier sword.

"Oh ya, very gut choice." He took the sword from the rack and gave it to Trevor, ever so carefully.

"Thank you kind sir, how many Crystallias will that be?" Trevor asked.

"Vat will be about, one hundred Crystallias."

"Alright, here." Instead of paying with physical money, I watched as Trevor was interacting with menus. A message popped up saying 'confirm purchase?' and he pressed okay. I saw his balance shrink as he pressed the button.

"Thank you." Trevor said as we walked out of the shop.

"Danke." I heard the man say.

"He's very nice." Nia said, still sipping on that eggnog.

"Yes, very. They programmed him well." Trevor said.

"Ugh, I forgot these weren't real people." I said.

"Well Allan, I mean, they're programmed to be people." Trevor said. He gave me the new Rapier.

"How does that work?" Nia asked.

"Well, it's just like programming any other A.I. but the difference is that the programming is very complex. Beta testers claimed that the NPCs were very smart. They also claimed they learn from the players and that they have their own personalities. One beta tester data mined his copy of the game and found code that would create an NPC with random traits for it's personality on top of a generic NPC base. Computer programming is very interesting isn't it?" Trevor said.

"Huh? Oh, yeah sure." Nia sipped on the eggnog, looking down. She probably got lost in what he was talking about.

"Something tells me you know a little too much Trevor." I mentioned.

"Well, yes I do know a lot. My brother was a beta tester." He said with a grin.

"Brother?" Nia asked.

"Yeah, he was doing a part-time job of 'game tester' before he graduated and went to college. He tested this game for about two years before it was fully finished." Trevor looked up at the sky again.

I looked up and saw a hawk flying in the sky.

"You're brother must have been cool if you're gonna be all emotional about it." Nia said.

"Emotional? Ah, anyway, yeah he was pretty fun to be around. Too bad he's never home now that he's in college." Trevor said. "But, whatever, let's go on that exploration I said we would."

"Sure." Nia said. Then, she looked a little disturbed.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"My.. eggnog.. is finished.." She said, with a saddened expression.

"Well good, we don't need any distractions while we go into the woods." I said.

"Yeah.. but it was so good." Nia sniffled.

"You really are like a child huh?" I said.

"Call me that again!" She swooped over to me and then kicked my leg.

"Agh!" I knelt on the floor. I was gripping my shin when-

"I, uh, I'm sorry for kicking you." Nia said while looking down at me.

I looked up at her. "I uh, yeah, whatever, it's fine."

"Allan you okay?" Trevor finally asked.

"Yeah, just a bruise. Let's get going." I said and stood up.

"Here, drink this." He passed me a bottle with a blue liquid in it.

"What is this?" I asked.

"Light Potion, supposed to heal up bruises and small cuts." He said.

I drank it and I felt relief as my leg pain went away.

"Great, you're in shape and now we can go!" Nia said with a happy voice.

"Alright, let me explain how this works. Eindorf Woodlands is a dungeon sector, there are monsters here, so beware! We should also try to look for secret passages to find some hidden treasures. Got it?" Trevor asked.

"Got it." We both said.

"Oh that's right, let me invite you guys to my party." Trevor did some air swiping and opened up menus.

"Party?" I asked.

"Oh yeah, a party is basically a group of players that travel around together." Trevor said. "There, accept the request."

A menu appeared in front of me and Nia. It read "TrevorHandson has sent you a party request." With two options being 'Yes' and 'No'. I pressed yes and then two green bars appeared on top of Trevor and Nia's heads.

"Only party members can see each other's health bars. But that's not all, they can see your injuries, which glow red on the body. They can see your status ailment, which is if your poisoned, stunned, etc. And they can see your stamina bar, which by the way we should be weary of. If the stamina bar is empty, we won't be able to use abilities; and on top of that, we we'll get a little tired." Trevor explained.

"Yeah, yeah cheif, let's go shall we?" I said as I began walking forward.

"Allan, we're going this way." Trevor said as he points in the opposite direction of where I'm going.

"Oh, yeah of course." I turn around swiftly and walk forward.

Nia laughed. "Allan you're such an idiot."

"Uh huh, I bet you didn't know that." I said.

"Hey! I totally did! Don't underestimate me, I did get you in the leg didn't I?" She looked at me with one eye open and her arms crossed. She grinned at started fake laughing.

"I can use self defense against my stalker and he won't even defend himself!"

Well, I guess she isn't that bad when she's in a good mood.