[All players have completed character creation]

[World has been loaded. Spawning players in to randomized locations]

[Quest: Find the remaining members of your party. 0/3]

Garett saw these messages on the screen after he had been waiting for about 20 minutes for the other players to finish their character creations.

After around 5 minutes, it had gone from [Waiting on 3 players] to [Waiting on 2 players]. After a short while, it has reduced to 1 and finally...

He was being loaded into the game.

Unsure of what the RPG would be like, Garett was a bit scared, but he was slightly thrilled.

His gamblers spirit in him produced a curiosity for the unknown.

Garett opened his eyes and looked around.

And what he saw was...

A dark room.

There was virtually no light, and the floor and walls were made of stone.

There were iron bars that made the room appear to be a jail cell.

Garett got up to look around to see if there was anyone or anything down the hallway, and so he peeked his head through the bars of the jail door.

Clang!

When he tried to squeeze his head through, a vibration was sent through his brain, as if he had hit a metal pot with a ladle.

Garett regained his composure before realizing....

something felt off.

His hands, his skin, his mouth, his head...

Everything felt different from how it was in the previous world.

There was a different weight to his body, and his head felt like it was being dragged down jut a bit.

He looked at his hands to see a rough maroon colored scaly skin, and sharp nails- almost like claws but not quite.

He felt his mouth, and realized that his canine teeth had grown twice as long, and his overbite caused them to naturally seep out.

He then felt the top of his head to discover 2 short, thin twisted horns.

[Due to your alignment, lawful evil, you have been assigned the race: High Demon]

"Eh?"

A screen flashed in front of Garett, Displaying his status and a picture of what he looked like.

He looked like a normal human, aside from his reddish skin, long teeth, sharper nails, and the horns on his head.

"This is what I look like?"

Garett was slightly depressed at first, however upon second look- he was more human than he originally thought. At the very least, he wasn't some horrifying creature.

"This could make social interaction with others... quite interesting."

Garett smiled, thinking about the different risks and rewards that could be associated with his new appearance.

But wait.

He was alone right now.

Stuck in a jail cell.

And he had a quest to find the remaining party members....

As he thought this, time stopped.

[Welcome to the world of Yolenos. As a player in this game, it is up to you to decide what you do from this point on. This is an open world, which allows players to freely choose whatever actions they wish to take. Will you become a wealthy noble? A great hero? A dominating tyrant? Only time will tell as you and your fellow party members establish yourself in the world of Yolenos!]

[You are currently in a jail cell. What do you wish to do?]

There it was.

The typical "choose your own adventure" playstyle, where an RPG would ask a series of questions to the players regarding their actions, and depending on their choices generate resulting scenarios.

But Garett knew that this was more than a mere game.

This was his new life.

Meaning, everything he did wasn't merely part of a script of choices. There wasn't a single "Good ending" or a "Bad ending". It was more like real life, where your choices had rippling effects, that could be much more complex than going down a single determined path as per a script.

Garett then tried to move- and to his surprise...

He exited his body.

"..."

As if he were a ghost, he exited his body. He took a look at himself, standing in the dark room.

"This is..."

"Time has stopped for me to make this decision!"

It was as if this was a turn based game where time stopped to allow the player to decide what to do next.

Garett felt a feeling of euphoria as he imagined all the possibilities that came with this.

He would have as long as he wanted to ponder every decision and every outcome. However, when he tried to move away from his body to search down the hallway...

[Error. Please do not separate from within 1 meter of your character.]

There was a limitation.

He couldn't simply explore down the hallway in a ghost form as time was stopped. He had to make decisions and then carry them out in his own body.

Accepting this, Garett decided to look around the room.

[Skill used. [Analyze]. Because you are not in combat, this did not use up any action points. AP: 5/5]

Time then resumed, and Garett was flung back into his body.

He then got up to look around, and a glowing beam radiated from his eyes. A wave of light spread out from him like a sonar.

When he looked around, there was a key in the corner of the room with a yellow ring of light around it.

As Garett got closer, a description popped up over the key.

[Prison Key]

[Used to unlock the doors of the prison in the current dungeon. Not usable elsewhere.]

[Would you like to pick it up?]

Garett selected the yes option, and proceeded to pick up the key.

Everything in this world was like a turn based RPG. He even had an inventory and was able to use items accordingly.

He approached the door, and when he was prompted for his next action, he decided to use the key.

[You have used Item, [Prison Key] on the [Prison Door]. It has unlocked].

[Would you like to exit?]

Once again he selected yes. This time however, something strange happened.

[Rolling for dexterity to determine if door opens. D6 is to be used. Minimum required dexterity is 3. This action can be repeated].

Garett saw the image on the screen of a dice being rolled, and alas...

It came up with a 1.

[You have rolled a 1. Adding dexterity to roll. 1+0=1.]

Time resumed, and Garett attempted to exit into the hallway. For some reason, he felt compelled to do so, despite the fact that he had not rolled high enough to succeed. It was almost as if his actions were already predetermined. However...

Garett tripped on his own foot, and his head slammed into the door.

"OOF!"

Garett let out a large cry of pain as the clanging between his horns and the metal bars once again racked his brain

He held his head and crawled up into a ball, throbbing with pain.

"AGH!"

[2 Damage taken]

[HP: 11/13]

"What the hell..."

When Garett realized what had occurred, he smiled with glee.

"So in this world, the success of my actions are determined by the roll of a dice?!"

A smile crept across his face, making him look like a true demon. He wiped off some blood from his nose, and began to run his mouth with the eyes of one who had lost all reason- and yet managed to stay completely sane.

"This is interesting... this is truly interesting! A life where every action is determined by discrete probability!"

Once more, he decided to open the door. The dice was rolled, and this time came up with a 5.

When he opened the door this time, his hand hit a hidden button near the handle. All of a sudden, a compartment opened up underneath the door.

A small wooden box lay in the compartment.

Garett used his [Analyze] skill on the compartment, and a description popped up for the chest.

[Small chest. Contains: 5 Gold, 1 small healing potion. Heals 6 HP. 1 blueprint.]

[Health potion composition has been analyzed]

[Glass container. Can be produced by bringing sand to temperatures of over 800 K, and then shaped. Potion can be created at an alchemy stand using 2 Razorpin grass, and by adding 10 mL of concentrated liquid mana.]

[Concentrated liquid mana can be produced through the compression of extracted mage blood]

[Knowledge for blueprint design has increased]

Garett selected to take all the items, and they appeared in his inventory.

[If you obtain the item, pen, you may design an item using your blueprint, should you have the knowledge to create an item.]

Garett smiled at this, and then began to walk down the hallway.

It was time to see if he could discover these other members of his party.

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