Steve was 20, and a total nerd. D&D, video games, anime, he loved it all. So, come summer break from college, he wasn't the most popular guy and didn't have a ton of friends to hang out with. But fortunately, because he was a bright guy, he'd managed to pull together some cash when he came across a brochure for the Parallel Worlds Travel Agency.
He decided to book himself in for a vacation, looking on their website for their current packages. He booked himself into one that sounded interesting:
THE PEN AND PAPER PARALLEL PACKAGE
'For a low, low price, we can offer you what'll feel like a week here, but will be a full adventure there. Take a trip to a world that miraculously runs on the rules of an RPG. Vacation in fantasy taverns, quest in ancient tombs, in the comparative blink of an eye, you'll live the life of an adventurer!'
Two prices were listed. One was a discounted rate that brought the price down due to 'limited features chosen by algorithm'. Steve figured, hey, it was a great sounding holiday even if he had limited options. He guessed that meant you didn't get the full choice of content like races and quests, and hey, he could only do so much, right?
He felt nervous as he arrived. A gorgeous middle aged blonde with straining breasts almost bursting out of her pink blouse, Kelly, lead him to a room in the back filled with large brass egg shaped pods. Kelly turned to him, smiling, "Now, if you'll just hop on in, your consciousness will be projected over into the other reality. Unlike most of our vacations, you won't already exist there, you'll have to create who you'll be, just like in a game!" She sounded as if she'd given the spiel a hundred times, and it rolled off her tongue in a practiced manner.
Steve gulped. He already felt intimidated next to her, a scrawny nerd with a mess of brown hair, slightly greasy skin, and glasses. "And it'll all feel real?"
Kelly chuckled. "Well, it will be! But at the end, you'll be back here, in this body!" She helped him into the pod and he lay back in it, feeling everything fade to black, his awareness of his body drifting into nothingness until he found himself before a glowing sheet of parchment, hovering in a black void. He didn't have a body.
The parchment suddenly had text appear upon it, one second absent, the next appearing in a flash of golden light, curling letters of metallic ink inscribing on the paper. WELCOME TO ILLYRIAR. HERE, YOU WILL CREATE YOUR CHARACTER AND EXPLORE OUR WORLD. FIRST YOU MUST DECIDE UPON...