[Growl]

Bagged lenses stared into the blinding screen from across the glass protectors unmoving, the sound of crunching of countless potato chips symphonising with the audible clicking sounds. The room was dimmed, with only a single source of illumination beside the desktop while the desk was filled to the brim with prepared consumables. She didn’t plan on moving from her spot one bit today after all, the bespectacled woman had eagerly been awaiting the launch of the expansion that she couldn’t get a wink of sleep last night, but that was the same for any other game she could get her hands on this early.

The date it came on was a rather unfortunate one however, as Ryleigh’s thoughts always lingered to the past memories of her pet. A sigh fell from her lips, as gradually went through the slow process of making a character, and seemingly affected by her thoughts as the design of her avatar was almost reminiscent of her pet. “Should I?” She asked herself, her hand hovering the cursor to and fro from the delete button and the button to accept the character that she made. Taking a short breath she clicked, finalizing the last stages for her character as now she was merely met with a loading screen.

A loading screen that seemed to get brighter and brighter, till it was at a point where the whole room was lit up by it’s incandescent brightness…

And then there was nothing but darkness.

She came to, gently opening her eyes and adjusting to the brightness that seemed to occur from the area above. The view of a blurred image which gradually took the form of a pleasantly blue sky with gently moving clouds. Naturally having just been in her room this would lead her to naturally spurt out the question, “How did I get outside?” But once that question was asked only more questioned filled her brain. Her voice, it sounded strange, almost unrecognisable to her own ears. She spoke again, this time just a random pile of gibberish, next cough to see if it’s just a sore throat but no her voice was still completely different from what she was used to. Her hand reached out to grab her neck for her only to realize that it wasn’t also her voice that was different but also her hands.

It took her a good while, touching every contour of her face, finding a long set of ears and also a tail that was unmistakably hers by the way they felt. Heck, even the clothes that she was wearing was far more different that anything that was in her wardrobe. And that’s when the thought lingered into Ryleigh’s brain, ‘Isn’t this just like the character I created?’ A question that she couldn’t answer, more like she felt as if she shouldn’t answer it. Something like your body changing to be someone else was completely unheard of, not to mention turning to a person that had a rabbit ears and tail. The only thing that she could do was chalk it down to this simply being a dream as her mind couldn’t comprehend it being something much more than that.

Resigning herself to that idea she now took the time to actually observe the surrounds and gauge what kind of place her mind has dreamt of. Judging by the buildings around she could chalk it to being the setting of the Gaia Reborn world that was based on Rome as it resembled the leaks that where shown before the expansion released. There were also people too, a variety of sorts having strange body parts such as wings or animal ears. ‘So, this dream is just like the game huh, except it’s not on a screen.’ She didn’t know how to feel about this, knowing that her brain was capable of making such a realistic and detailed dream or the fact that she was missing the launch due to falling asleep before even starting. ‘Urgh, I’m going to be so behind everyone in the game, but it doesn’t look like I’m going to wake up any soon.’

So the rabbit-eared girl merely stood in place, attempting to gauge her current predicament and think of a way to tackle it.

Words - 716 | Talius

[Talius]

Unkempt strands of brown hair hung down into his eyes, the young Brit searching around the environment for something to set it apart. Between week old socks laying about the otherwise clean floor on the back end of his parent's house the only other thing that really stood out against the drab background was the bright blue shirt he was required to wear at work. The young man walked across the room, glancing off for a moment before taking a seat into the cushioned desk chair that had been more than contoured to his shape after years of wear and tear.

He took a moment to process the reality of it all, he had been waiting on this release for a long time and it just happened that all his friends had been telling him to try it out. So with the play button right in front of him it all felt so semi-realistic. Like a part of him was wavering between two realities that he couldn't quite place. He quickly went through the process of developing out a character, selecting the race Alv and making a short gladiator with an almost unnatural level of being handsome. It was something more akin to what he wanted to look like, being rather bland in terms of appearance himself.

He wasn't the type to really stand out in a crowd, his appearance being rather lacking in anything of note. Unkempt brown hair, pale skin and a fashion sense that came right out of the mind of a hungover college student who couldn't tell you the difference between strawberry red and brick red added up to a person that seemingly lacked in anything worth a second glance. So his character for this game was given all the most handsome traits to the point that it was almost a flaw - something he'd never be able to recognize - he was so noticeably attractive that it seemed unnatural.

A few clicks later and the world suddenly shifted. It was like everything had changed and the young man was no longer sitting in his rather worn down desk chair but standing outside. Not that he could tell that he wasn't any longer standing because the ground hadn't changed much for him. Now at a whopping 5'4", compared to his real world 6'6", he basically couldn't tell that he had shifted positions. That was until he realized the chair wasn't underneath him anymore and tried to step to find his legs didn't work quite the way he remembered them working.

He looked about the area for a moment before deciding that it was in his best interest to find someone else and try to get a grasp of the situation. If it wasn't for the fact that he was already pale before he would've noticed that when looking down at his hands too when trying to see why the ground seemed strangely closer than before but when he turned to find a girl with rather large rabbit-like ears he recognized her as one of the Faunri from the character creation screen.

"Ello," He said, a quite noticeable Northern London British accent slipping from his lips - while clearly a different voice than what he remembered. His normal voice was usually a bit higher pitched but he could definitely tell it was him talking as whilst the tone had changed the cadence remained mostly the same as before. Perhaps that was what set him off truly to the fact that he wasn't in his original body and he definitely wasn't at home. "Perhaps you could 'elp me figure this out or summat," He looked around sheepishly.

"Where n' what am I?"

WC:  611
TWC: 611
Notes: Sorry for the delay, real life came for me harsh! But your reply is done!