Chapter 2 - Enter the game

"Which is better? Cash in hand or ...Heck, why the comparison? Money trumps everything."

- Theodore 'Ted' Moore

The launch date for the game Boundless was set on Friday night. Allowing people to soak in the atmosphere and play to their content through out the weekend.

"In lieu of launch, the drop rate will be tripled for 60 hours, through out the weekend. Let yourself go and expand your horizons. Be Boundless."

The unexpected bonus for those fanatics who wanted to start the game on launch date itself rather than waiting for reviews and then buying it to play.

As soon as Ted saw the news, he stocked up all the emergency snacks, reconditioned his gaming pod for continuous work. He even went to hospital to talk to his dad, had a chat with Max and became ready to be without any contact with any living being for sixty hours straight. He would rush and play through out this platinum period to shore up his game coins and stocks.

The game developers had advised players to enter the game fifteen to thirty minutes before launch to create their gaming avatars. Ted thought entering game before fifteen minutes was enough. But his twist in the guts made him enter thirty minutes before.

A Verdant valley with impossible coloured flowers welcomed him when he entered. A pixie zoomed out from the gazebo. Ted wondered if the game character creators were all young men, looking at the pixie. She was enough to restrict the game from underaged. Her body curves were exaggerated and sheer guazy clothes left nothing to imagination. She was going to cause lots of nose bleeds, he mused.

"Welcome, lost soul!" She said, jumping up and down. He really wanted to hold the pixie down. The jingle of those curves made concentration a lot difficult.

" I have been given power to give you shape you desire. Let me know if you want any changes to be done!" The pixie said and out of nowhere an ornate full length mirror materialized.

Ted was not going to worry about his default setting. It was enough that it did not resemble him even a bit.

Then he had to chose his IGN.

He had searched high and low for it before. The regular names were all used up though and he did not want to use some special characters or numbers in the name. Honestly, he had no idea choosing a name would take so much time. Finally, finally IGN Sampath was available and he snapped it. He had started choosing his IGN which meant same as his real name from the time he was blamed and banned from eSports arena, though that had not helped him even a bit to earn wealth. Still... This time he got the free chance to play this game. Maybe his luck will change and he will earn money from this game.

After choosing IGN, it was time to decide his play style.

Boundless gave two options to play - get AI assist while playing or go free style. As a gamer, Ted had to choose free style though that meant he would have to struggle while killing monsters.

Then came different jobs. Boundless touted itself as truly boundless, allowing maximum options for the players. The primary job options included over hundreds of choices.

Basically, they were of two streams - based on magic or not. If based on magic, you could choose anything from different variety of mages, healer classes, spell casters, witches and warlocks and more.

In the non magic stream, you could be a tank, a guardian, beserker, swordsman, thief, ninja, assassin, hunter, ranger and more.

Or you could go for hybrid version later on but you had to start as magic stream or the other.

The guide for the game had explained majority of these classes with pros and cons listed. And the big disclaimer - all the classes are equal, it is the player who makes that class special.

The magic class had big drawback that it needed lots of potions to survive and progress. They were paper tigers when it came down to their own survival though they were excellent damage dealers. In non magic stream, the armour and weapons got worn down easily and had to be replaced or repaired frequently.

Sampath (Ted) chose to be a lightning mage. Just because there was a certain chance of inducing paralysis to monsters when hit by lightning. Fire mages and lightning mages had explosive power but fire mages thrived in hot climates. Lightning mages needed heavy rains or heavily loaded sky to enjoy same benefits. And let's be honest, which player would play when the vision is heavily restricted due to rains?

Yet Sampath chose it. The reason, he would be able to buy the needed weapons cheaply if there is no demand.

Then he had to choose and allot the attribute points.

Before entering the game, the players were given whopping 20 points to spread across various attributes based on their fighting style.

The attributes were- constitution (needed for vitality and stamina, passive physical defence), strength ( needed for physical damage), agility ( for movement and attack speed), spirit (for magical strength and magical defence) and wisdom ( for magical damage).

So tanks would focus on constitution, theifs on agility, weapon masters in strength, healing class on spirit, mages and alike on wisdom.

This was generally accepted trend. If you wanted to be jack of all, master of none, you could distribute the points equally among 5 attributes. But if you want to excel, you choose your own formula rather than following whatever the trend was.

As Sampath was a lightning mage, he invested more on wisdom and spirit, other three got same points.

Then, it was time to check for spells and skills. Unlike other games, there was actually no limit to number of skills one could learn. The actual limiter was the profiency in the said skill. So as a lightning mage, he could still learn fireball or water ball or even a prayer to increase his health along with his level zero skill - lightning strike.

Skill -

Lightning strike. Level zero. (0/100)

Hit your opponent with a lightning strike to cause 50% magical damage. Has a certain chance to induce paralysis. Cost 10 MP(mana points).

Cool down - 30 seconds.

He also chose two more skills.

Skill-

Lesser heal. Level zero (0/100)

Generate 50 HP(health points) over 10 seconds on using the skill. Can be used in combat. Cost 10 MP. Cool down - 1 minute.

Skill -

Lesser prayer. Level zero (0/100)

Generate 50 MP(mana points) over 10 seconds on using this skill. Can be used in combat. Cost 20 MP. Cool down - 2 minutes.

As he was not of healing class, though he acquired the skills, they were not optimised, thus costing more MP and needed long cooldowns. But atleast he had a chance to survive in his own in an emergency due to these skills.

There were even more skills he could learn, all level zero skills which did not need any monetary compensation, the only saving grace.

"Errr! Is there a need to choose the skills now? Can it be done later?"

The fiesty pixie was getting angry. This was a thankless job and she had to do it still many more times and this lost soul was taking forever to get going.

"No need. You can access all the free skills in your status window. All the free materials and gifts for the lost soul will be mentioned in the tab labelled 'Freebies'. Do you need to know more?" Her smile was definitely carnivorous, not at all like a peace loving pixie. Sampath shook his head.So the pixie went onto explain few rules.

"You are blessed by the diety to be immortal but you will lose power each time you die and you need to sacrifice some item to be born back each time. So, please try not to die."

He had heard of this before. The loss in EXP for each death would begin with 20%, but as levels increased the loss would increase and one could potentially lose a whole level on dying once. Not just that, one would lose a weapon or armour or some item in inventory space on dying each time. If there was only trash items on the player, no coins or items in inventory space, attributes and skill/spell profiency would decrease. This was to prevent overwhelm monsters with zerg technique.

"You get a basic starter package once you enter the village. But before choosing the village, you can try your luck for the blessings of the diety."

The so called blessings were talents. Something extra to distinguish players. The talent could be trashy F grade or uber superior - SSS grade. Better the grade, better the benefits. The guilds had already spread the news. If you had A grade talent, you would be accepted into the guild, no questions asked. Such was the power of the talents.

Why this talent was tested after choosing the job could be explained in this way- if the talent is for physical or non magical class and the player wanted to be a summoner, the game was trying to coerce the player to choose a non magical job. So, the talent pool would weed out talents unrelated to the job player chose and then the talent pool would be opened.

When they said it was a talent pool, they literally meant it.

The tiny pixie just pulled him up and dropped into the pool next to the gazebo.

The perception and sensations were undoubtedly excellent in this game. Which meant the player would feel like sinking and if he had fear for water or did not know swimming instinctly, he would know how it feels to drown.

The details regarding the talent pool was really merger. He did not know he if was to swim up or find something in the pool or just stay in the pool for long time.