Reincarnation is a strange phenomena that usually preludes the beginning of a story. Carrow wasn't a believer until he'd actually been reincarnated, and he briefly considered converting to Buddhism, but decided that he rather liked not hurting his brain too much.
Carrow as an avid reader and media watcher was somewhat genre savvy. Being reincarnated was a story hook that forced the main character into another world to adapt and explore. Often running into some of the more extreme beings of the world to further spice up the plot.
Carrow wasn't reborn in the typical Isekai situation. In fact, after his third year of life he stopped referring to himself as a 'main character', and instead decided to just take life as what it is. This stopped when on his fourth birthday, his parents were killed by a pair of illegal deportees.
To explain the situation, Carrow was born on a future Earth in the year 2342. Earth had expanded to the solar system and had human activity in Alpha Centari, Sol's nearest star. Along with the ever ongoing terraforming project on Mars, the exploitation of Saturn's Ice rings and resource rich moons, and of course Luna's space ports.
Earth had united into the United Earth Systems, a Frankenstine's monster of a governmental system that made the UN look competent. Regardless, the World Government was here to stay, and with colonies in space and manpower always needed in the stars, the governments of Earth saw it as the perfect time to get rid of their unwanted.
People were deported up to space, told to work in extreme conditions, and often died due to equipment failure. This continued until the first Mars base was made, and then terraforming started. Now days Mars and Earth had a very tense relationship, what with Earth still sending people over to Mars in the name of keeping the population down, and thus ecological damage down.
Certain people managed to escape that fate, and became wretches of society. Living in any area that they could to avoid the ever vigilant and practically omniscient government. One of these people killed his father, raped his mother, before eating her. That man was found and sent to the far reaches of Pluto.
No one wants to be sent to Pluto.
Carrow would have been subjected to a similar if different fate, as Orphans were seen as unwanted by many people. Thankfully his aunt saved his life, sacrificing her ability to have children in the future to save her sister's son.
Carrow grew up in a rather empty household. A concrete box in the ever busy city of Neo York. Carrow wondered if he'd be abused or be pushed to become some kind of main character. After all, he'd just had his parents killed, a tale tale sign of protagonist syndrome. Instead, all Carrow received were painful looks and strained conversations with his Aunt. She provided for him, but never really went out of her way to really care for him as a parent or loved one.
Not that he minded. He already had a family, and he saw his Aunt as less a parent, and more a relative who he knew and saw a lot, but never really talked to that much.
At five years old, Carrow knew that the 'plot' wasn't going to come to him. He might have been reincarnated, but that was no reason to start thinking life was a novel.
It was with this revelation that Carrow decided he needed a goal or ambition to chase after. Something that he could work towards even as a child and use in the future for his benefit.
With some research regarding future jobs on his Aunt's tablet, Carrow decided that he wanted to become a 3D Model Designer.
In the world of 2300 VR tech had come a long ways. With the advent of FTL Communications and Transmission certain roadblocks to many technologies could be rendered viable now. There were likely hundreds of other advances in tech that he was blowing over, but that one was major as it was the bane of Download Times, Lag, Ping, and Connection Issues.
Regardless, Carrow located a career path and started down it. Downloading various beginner software tools to get started.
At the age of eight he completed several of the more basic projects, but was roadblocked toward more professional pathways by his need for various neural implants for VR related testing.
While 3D Designers weren't involved with coding, they did need to get the animation skeleton, skin meshes, guts, blood, eyes, and other ultra realistic details down. This obviously depended on the model, but creating a humanoid or animal creature in God LABS was a graduation from a basic 3D modeler to a pro. In order for a single person to comprehend all that detail, one needed very expensive implants. An eight year old couldn't have those installed even if they had the money.
Still, Carrow wouldn't let this roadblock stifle him, as he simply took smaller jobs that didn't require such advanced tools.
When Carrow wasn't working on his Design skills, he was studying for school, or researching about VR Games. If Carrow had any goal in life, it was to be a pro gamer in a popular VR Game. Still, to play the game Carrow wanted; he needed to become of age and obtain the necessary implants to actually play.
With these goals and wants set, life moved on, and at 14 he started selling some of his modeling services. He focused on the smaller projects that get left behind when compared to say, a Boss Monster. These projects were weapons, loot, gear, cosmetics, accessories, and ability animations.
Very quickly the name 'Old World Blues' made its way around the modeling community. This name was soon synonymous with detail, texture, and effort. The community regarded Old World Blues' work as that of a master getting some practice on small projects using a false name.
Unknown to Carrow, he was already being compared with some of the leading experts in his 3D Modeling. Mind, these were people who have had decades of experience along with a technological advantage what with Data Accelerators, Memory Sinks, and Thought Relapse Nodes.
Carrow's email account was suddenly blasted with contracts and commissions. Carrow noticing this simply thought that these projects were low rank and assigned to him by various AI in hopes to get another slave working away at the chaff.
Carrow didn't mind, and while at school he'd get out his tablet and start blasting through requests. Then he'd get home, nod to his Aunt, eat dinner, finish homework in fifteen to thirty minutes, then get to work again. Carrow had taken great lengths in getting outstanding grades, 4.0s, but beyond applying for advanced placement classes, Carrow didn't excel beyond that.
When he turned sixteen, the modeling community practically worshiped 'Old World Blues' in just how efficient and god tier his work was. This was also the time when Carrow applied to an Art College. He was planning for a four year stay, getting a Bachelor's degree in 3D Design.
It was also there that he learned that his name was seen as a messiah for many design students and professors. Talk about embarrassing.
He knew he was good, but to be so good to out preform experts with superhuman abilities? That was a stretch.
Regardless, the facts were there and Carrow took great lengths in making sure he wasn't seen as plagiarizing his own work. The fame and attention just wouldn't be worth it in his eyes.
This forced him to grow in a different direction, focusing on more technical and mechanical oriented work. Still detail oriented as that was his roots, but Carrow usually stuck around the fantasy and natural environment for design. In college he worked on the Sci-Fi theme; technology of eras past, space ships, advanced tech and so on. Different from his usual stuff, but similar enough that he still preformed at a level he was satisfied with.
Safe to say, his professor was astounded by the level of Carrow's work and praised him without end. He became the star student of the class and graduated in a short four years.
Graduating soon after, Carrow, now 20 used his saved up credits to purchase top of the line design implants, and with some more cash managed to also get a VR Neural port. These things would likely cost many people their entire life savings, but Carrow had been working high paying jobs since he was fourteen and he had several dozen nest eggs saved up.
With new implants, Carrow tried testing them, and well to say the very least, Carrow's 3D Design skill took a turn from legendary, to actually God-Tier.
Each of his 3D Modeling pieces were seen as the pinnacle of design. Games that had monsters of his work always used them for some of the strongest foes and most interesting quest lines or dungeons. Items and gear of his design were legendary pieces of gear that players would sell their soul for.
'Old World Blues' became a name that most hardcore players knew, as his designs are always some of the best grade of gear. Companies bombarded the mysterious designer with commission requests after he'd made it clear that he wouldn't be taking contracts. This alienated many, but his quality work made them coming back like starving dogs when their competitors shilled out fat stacks for god grade items and raid boss models.
Making designs became Carrow's life for a few years. He followed many VR Games, but none really caught his eye as something that he wanted to devote himself to. The only VR Games that he played were Control Training Sims.
CTS games were very popular in the professional VR gaming scene, as everyone responded to VR differently. Some people had garbage control, stiff, inaccurate, inflexible, slow reflexes, and so on. Games fixed this problem with system assisted abilities and skills, but anyone who was anyone knew that to play at higher levels of skill, getting rid of the predictable and limiting SA was key. Control was a term that simply meant 'how good are you at controlling your character and its skills'. It was a broad term as some people are horrendous at physical control in swinging swords, but were really good at managing spell slots, abilities, and tactical maneuvers.
Carrow in his free time played games that were exalted for their difficulty and versatility in how they trained a player in control. From Kombat Rising, Survivalist, and Abyssal Waves; each of these games Carrow played religiously in attempts toward improving his VR control skill.
Innately, Carrow by and large had exceptional Control. Most guilds would see he Innate Control and likely think him a talent to be cultivated, a possible 'Expert'. The term for hardcore and skilled players.
Kombat Rising was a combat simulation that martial artist found enthralling. Most high level players in this game were people that in the real world trained in martial arts. Everyone was at a base level of Peak Human, something that took time to get used to, and then there were two modes. AI and Matchmaking.
AI was graded in Noob, Novice, Apprentice, Adept, Expert, Master, and Legendary.
Matchmaking was graded in separate terms. Civilian, Thug, Militia, Warrior, Soldier, Martial Artist, and Martial Master. Each rank only fought those of the same rank until a spree could be held. A solid spree was then 'bet' on fighting the rank above and if a victory was held then they'd be promoted.
Carrow was traumatized by his previous life's inability to become Gold Rank in CS:GO, and thus tried out the AI first. He fought a few noobs and killed them easily. Novices fought back and Carrow took some blows, but otherwise was fine. Apprentice, he almost got his ass handed to him, but still won. Adept, he lost, but not without breaking the arm of the one that fought him.
After loosing, Carrow fell in love with the AI, and created a custom bot for him to fight that started at Novice and ranked up the more he fought that specific bot. The first few rounds ended in domination, then an equal battle, before Carrow was the one that was getting adapted to. Unorthodox fighting and bursts of drastic action, mixed with actually feasible martial techniques pulled off on the fly saw Carrow wining a few bouts, only for the next to have adapted to those tricks.
A fun game that he fought a battle in everyday.
Survivalist was a survival game, and was only added to the Control aspect of VR games due to its sheer realistic nature. Eating the seeds from a potato might be fine in the winter and summer months, but during the spring a mold would grow on them and you'd starve to death due to them blocking your ability to produce glucose.
It was a game that attracted wilderness fanatics and naturalists. Carrow liked it due to the sheer depth of the game and had a game saved on Day 756. Time dilation technology allowed him to play entire days at a time in a few hours, a feature only used in single player games as time zones still existed.
Abyssal Waves meanwhile was what most gamers saw as the zenith of CTS games. A rouge-lite VR game where you spawned in a dilapidated city filled to the brim with entire armies of horrific mutant zombies, undead, void horrors, and other horror themed enemies. Armed initially with only a pistol or a single magic spell depending on your starting class, the objective was to survive as long as possible while gaining levels and upgrading your spells, weapons, and survivability.
The longest time survived was one day and three hours. An insane time set by a user-name called: Nox_Nyx_Night.
After a year of practice and grinding, Carrow entered a time at 23 Hours and 43 minutes, yet was still a few hours away from beating that insane time. He was impressed with the one who managed to get such an insane time, theorizing that they were likely born with a natural aptitude toward VR.
Now twenty three years of age, Carrow was an upper-middle class man with a few million credits put away. Wealth that came from his own hard work, and was currently enjoying a glass of naturally made whiskey grown on Mars. An expensive commodity. In his right hand he held a tablet. Scrolling through news tabloids that he followed, before eventually coming across a few articles that peaked his interest.
"Manifest, huh." Carrow mumbled as he took another sip of his weekly alcoholic reward. Enjoying the burn, Carrow started a deep dive on the internet about a game called Manifest. Information burned into his skull as his eyes and expression steadily took on a more excited and maniac demeanor.
"Interesting." Carrow stated as he clicked the tablet off and looked out at the Neo York skyline in his upper end apartment.
--
Manifest. The name started out as a drip into the raging ocean that was VRMMO titles and media. A name there, a whisper there. A few people saw, they scoffed, and looked elsewhere. A few people saw, a few people smiled with anticipation, and waited. Carrow was of the latter.
It was a fantasy RPG. Not exactly original, but it was the other things that made this game so very worth the wait.
Custom classes, a massive 340 x 540 KM world size, races, kingdom building, the list kept expanding and expanding. Many scoffed at the claims, too ambitious they'd claim. Then more leaks, a few hints, a screen shot, a video, a post, and so on. The marketing was drip fed into areas that the Hardcore players were known to thrive. Expertly marketed and placed little Easter eggs that the most die-hard of fans would notice. They'd notice, then point and scream doing all the marketing for False Illusion Games.
Then more information started leaking through. False Illusion was a company that resided inside of the Saturn Moon Belt, there wasn't really a belt of moons, but that's what people called the independent systems that operated around Saturn.
The Saturn Moon Belt had stringent laws and regulation about mining and ice hawking, but VRMMO rules and regulation? Not many.
R18 content was added into the leaks and the media swallowed it like the starving beast it was. Red flags and calls for action against such a game was called, stating a mile long list of 'health' and 'safety' concerns. Some were true, many were bullshit.
False Illusion settled with the United Earth Systems on a separate game copy without the R18 elements. Carrow wasn't happy with that.
In a rash set of actions, Carrow took his large fortune and found a moon base settlement on Titan. He spent a massive amount of money to get a decent sized living space on the moon, before revoking his citizenship on Earth. A month later he was chilling in his deluxe Titan living quarters of 1100 square feet. He got a Quantum Relay set up, then his VR portal and he was back at the 3D Modeling grind while keeping a close eye on further news regarding Manifest.
If it wasn't clear, Carrow was a borderline fanatic about VR Games.
In the following months, Carrow applied several dozen times for early access and beta, yet was sadly refused or ignored. Unlucky, but Carrow kept a close eye on the game and any news related to it.
Leaks from the beta players filled Carrow with an endless amount of hype.
The 'Custom Classes' was further explored by a player going by the name of Winter Strikes. The player stated that at character creation you'd gain 20 Class Perk Slots. The game outright stated that there were no ways to increase the amount of Class Perks one had.
There were likely thousands if not tens of thousands of class perks, and you'd only be able to choose twenty.
Say a person chose 10 class perks that were about wielding a swords and 10 about wind affinity and aeromancy.
The system would then synthesis a 'Class Title', simply called a class that was reflective of your 20 class perks.
For the example above, a player would then get a choice of several possible titles each with their own boons. Wind-blessed Swordsman, Areoblade, Wind Devil, and so on.
A beta player by the name of Chaos Iz Fun chose 20 completely and some even conflicting, gained the singular class choice of 'Failed Prototype'; the worst class in the game that had the greatest amount of weaknesses that would make playing impossible.
Creating a class would require immense amounts of knowledge regarding what perks were what. He theorized that this aspect alone would attract many people who enjoy creating the most 'optimal' of builds. Yet, Carrow could already see that those who had 'optimal' builds would be out-put by those with more specialized builds in their area. It was an interesting effect when so much freedom of choice was implemented.
Information regarding certain Perks and what they created was also going to be a massive secret, as a player could only have a single character. There was no way of knowing if your min-max pyromancer was going to do well in later stages of the game in the creation menu. Powerful classes were going to be guarded well.
This wasn't even to mention the Professions, crafting classes, gear, and skills that a character could learn.
The beta players stated that a mage could learn sword skills, and a swordsman without any magic based perks could learn magic. Yet, if a mage learned fire ball, and a swordsman learned fire ball, the swordsman's fire ball would be a light burn; like touching a stove-top that'd been turned off for a few minutes. While the mages' would be like a 40mm grenade. Perks gave percentage increases, along with the Class Title alone would multiply the power of a skill in that realm by a ludicrous amount.
As a character leveled up, stats boosted their damage and respective abilities. A swordsman with magical capabilities would be left behind by a mage who only needed to put points toward INT and WIS.
But, what about the previous example of Windblessed Swordsman? The class title alone gave that swordsman bonus' in wind magic. There was also an effect that beta players called 'Synergy' in certain perks that blended well together to form more powerful class titles.
Wind could cut, and so did swords. That same Windblessed Swordsman used the 'wind blade' spell on his sword to extreme effect. A normal non-magical swordsman would utterly trash the Windblessed Swordsman in a physical and skill based manner, but the magical swordsman had magical damage to blast through defensive techniques, and support effects that made him superior in evading the other swordsman's advances.
It was a question of versatility, future growth caps, and user control. Building a unique character obviously required a level of skill and adaptability to show such results. The Windblessed Swordsman admitted that he spent a few days working on getting the cast time for Wind Blade on his swords. But, after he managed to get it the first time, the system would categorize it as a base skill, not needing the manual work and concentration that it would otherwise require.
This amount of player freedom sparked a raging forest fire in the VRMMO community, Carrow included. Some people stated that they'd min-max a warrior so powerful, nothing could stop them. Others wanted to become a jack-of-all trades wizard, some wanted to be a full on Necromancer or Geomancer.
Lists of the Perks were leaked to the public, and people started piecing together their own classes. The perks list numbered at exactly 5120 perks. Filters could be used to single out specific perks, like profession perks, combat perks, magic perks, and so on. Yet, for each perk added, you lost more perk slots and the need to create the perfect character blazed even harder.
It was this leak that Carrow's desire to be a quote on quote 'Ranker' spiked. Spread sheets were compiled, classes were theorized about, and his CTS game time spiked.
He was utterly dominating Kombat Rising's Master level AI and was holding his own against the Legendary ones.
He was inching up on Nox_Nyx_Night's score on Abyssal Waves. Coming in at around 25:59:39, just an hour away from their record.
He quit Survivalist to apply more time on Abyssal Waves and Kombat Rising, before finally deciding to take his records public.
The Abyssal Waves community was shaken when the number two spot on the leader boards was taken over by a unknown name. Old_World_Blues. Some felt that name was familiar.
Then Carrow promptly smurfed his way up through Kombat Rising's rankings.
--
Coal-Duster limbered his arms up inside of the dull gray waiting room in Kombat Rising. A timer in white clicked above him and below that time sat his rank. Martial Artist.
Coal was proud of his rank, and didn't really try that hard to reach Martial Master. Those fuckers were on another level.
Still, he enjoyed a decent fight, and he knew most players in his rank.
"CZ-Auto should be on in a few." Coal muttered. CZ was also a Martial Artist like himself, and a good fight if Coal had anything to say about it.
"Match Found." A gravely voice intoned. Coal grinned at the voice, popping up and down on his toes as he got ready for the fight.
His vision blacked out, before his eyes opened to the Black-Sands Arena. Coal grimaced at the arena.
The Black-Sands Arena was a cosmetic arena without any hazards, and was generally the only 'pay to win' in game purchasable item in the game. There were a few other cosmetics, but the Black-Sands Arena was stigmatized due to how bland the place was.
Black sands, black walls, and black skies all lit up by purple brazers. The setting when paired with full body black cosmetics made for a rather annoying fighting location for many lower level players.
Standing opposite from Coal was his foe, and the man was impressed. The game took a real image of the player's body and recreated it in the game. A fat man would have trouble fighting in a peak human body, and the game was criticized for its 'fat shaming methods'. Everyone was at the same physical level as far as strength went, even agile women, but Coal simply thought it was the best way to 'balance' the game. Skill was what mattered, and everyone had advantages.
His foe was of average build. Wide shoulders, that perfect 'V' shaped abdomen and pelvis, with arms that were perfectly proportioned to his body. Coal would think the man a body-builder if it wasn't for how he stood.
His face was covered in a balaclava, the only 'protection' other than leggings and a bra if you were a women the game allowed. Coal himself deigned not to fight in a balaclava, even if there were option to make the article of clothing invisible and merely cosmetic for the opponet. Coal had a rather scary face, and liked to see grown men flinch when he growled and scowled.
"Fight!" As Coal was taking in his foe, the arena had been counting down. Coal widened his stance and prepared for battle, eyes locked onto his enemy, before widening at the man's actions.
He sprinted at him.
Coal was confused. How did an amateur get to Martial Arts rank? That thought stopped when the man promptly landed on his heal and did what was likely the most batshit and anime-esque round house kick Coal had seen in his life. Bracing his arms to the side of his head, Coal took the kick to his forearm and was kicked to the side by the sheer force generate by the blow. Stumbling, Coal was pushed onto full defensive as the man's fists thundered into his guard.
Fingers clawed, fists pounded, and palms slapped into his body, only capped off by elbows, knees, and kicks. The man was a whirlwind of unstoppable motion, and he felt like he was fighting a Legendary AI. There was no pause, no gap or hesitation, just full on violence. Any jab or counter Coal tried, was slapped down and punished, any respite given was taken back twice over.
Coal felt his nose break, his trachea collapse, and his stomach fold.
"Defeat." The arena stated.
Coal found himself back in the lobby, staring blankly at the gray ceiling. "The fuck?" Coal opened his game log and found the name of his dominator.
"Old_World_Blues?" He muttered, before his eyes sparked. Opening the internet inside the game, he maneuvered over to Abyssal Waves leader board.
"Holy shit." Coal muttered.
28:14:19 - First Place - Old_World_Blues
27:29:11 - Second Place - Nox_Nyx_Night
--
Carrow was jonesing. He was walking around his apartment, he was scanning the main website, he was counting the seconds.
Manifest released in 1 Hour.
Carrow had slept well with the aid of a few meds, he'd had a nice breakfast, a filling lunch, and had gotten a massive amount of work done in the past few days in preparation for today.
Today was the day, and Carrow was blitzing through thoughts, revisiting his spreadsheets and finding doubts in his class selection. He didn't have access to the Class Title sheet, as it didn't exist. Only a few class titles had been produced. He had three 20/20 perk combinations and was going to try a few of them for what he hoped to be a powerful class title.
Recently there was a leak that was quickly covered up by a powerful gaming guild known as The Dark Sons. An all male guild of gaming fanatics, also known as The Dark Brotherhood, but that was cliche for several reasons. One of their guild members was a beta player and they'd gotten a class title called 'Curseologist'. The class title was written in red and was classified as a 'Special' class title. Not exactly rare, or unique, but a 'Special' class title obviously had powerful properties.
Not much was known about 'Special' Class titles, but many players all endeavored toward obtaining such a titled class. Others laughed at the player and called him a 'special little boy', obviously calling him a retard.
In his rapid brainstorming and mania, Carrow went stiff as he heard his five minute warning clock go off.
He speed walked over to his VR Portal and started hooking himself in. Getting comfortable, Carrow logged into his Lobby and work studio.
Entering said studio, Carrow then opened the games tab, and located Manifest. The game was locked with a red icon, yet inside that icon were black numbers counting down.
Breathing deeply, Carrow tried to calm himself in futility. A beep sounded and Carrow spammed the play button of Manifest. The familiar dropping sensation began as he felt his mind and data soul be transferred over to Mainfest's servers.
He opened his eyes. He stood inside a cave, water from cracks in the stone dripped into an underground lake that surrounded him as he stood on a flat stone island the size large enough to fit him and one other person.
He was naked, and Carrow covered his genitals as he looked around the cave. Then he heard a notification.
Create Character Y / N
"Y and N, how old fashion." Carrow mumbled. He selected Y.
His vision shifted as he was now looking at himself. Black hair, handsome features, Caucasian skin, and a body that deserved a statue.
He was prompted with several ques. Choose a name, change your features, choose a race, and so on.
Carrow entered his usual name quickly, not wanting it to be stolen: Old_World_Blues. Next he chose human as he'd already seen the other races. Most races had some magical boons and other such bonuses added to them. Small and almost not noticeable, but Carrow didn't really care too much about them as the Human racial bonus was already to his liking. An 8% bonus speed toward skill learning and 3% EXP Bonus. Much to his liking.
Carrow changed his hair style to a more disgruntled look, going for a roguish and handsome look. He added a five-o-clock shadow to his face as Carrow in IRL couldn't grow a beard for the life of him.
Lastly he changed his eye color from sky blue to a toxic green.
Satisfied with his appearance, Carrow moved on.
Now we got down to the real grit and meat of the character selection.
Uhhhh, I'm a lazy fucker? That's a good excuse right?