The login screen dissolved into white.
I felt the weight first. Not heavy—just present. Arms, legs, torso. The sensation of standing. The VR rig had done its job. This body wasn't mine, but it responded when I shifted my weight forward, then back.
The character creation interface appeared as a floating panel of light.
AVATAR CUSTOMIZATION
I dismissed most of it immediately.
Height: default.
Build: default.
The face I left plain. Dark eyes. Long black hair, because short hair in a game like this always looked wrong. The algorithm offered me accessories—jewelry, tattoos, scars, facial markings. I scrolled past them.
Then I saw the ears.
Kitsune. Fox ears, black-furred, sitting naturally where human ears would be. I selected them without thinking too hard about why. They didn't glow. They didn't have particle effects. They just were.
The system asked for a name.
I typed one in. It didn't matter.
STARTING EQUIPMENT
The game offered me a selection of beginner's gear. Leather armor with stat bonuses. Cloth robes that boosted magic regeneration. Heavy plate that reduced incoming damage.
I picked the plainest tunic and pants available. No bonuses. No flavor text. Just something that wouldn't get in the way.
WEAPON SELECTION
This part mattered.
The interface displayed dozens of options. Swords, spears, axes, bows, staves. Each one came with a description of recommended builds, optimal stat distributions, skill synergies.
I scrolled until I found it.
[Wooden Katana]
A training blade. Low durability. No special effects.
It wasn't even a real weapon. It was the kind of thing the game expected you to replace within an hour.
I selected it.
The system hesitated, as if waiting for me to reconsider. Then it accepted the choice.
WELCOME TO KING OF THE BEGINNING
---
The starting area was chaos.
I materialized in a town square packed with players. Hundreds of them, maybe thousands, all moving at once. The air was filled with shouts, laughter, the constant chime of quest notifications. Overhead, the sky was a perfect blue that didn't exist in the real world.
A glowing exclamation mark hovered above an NPC's head ten meters away. A quest giver. Already a crowd had formed around him, players mashing the interact button, rushing through dialogue boxes without reading them.
"Did you see the bonus for first clear?"
"I'm going straight for the wolf den. Easy experience."
"Anyone want to party up? I'm a tank build."
I stepped aside as a group sprinted past me, weapons already drawn. One of them—a guy in full plate armor that gleamed like a mirror—nearly knocked me over. He didn't notice.
I watched them go.
The tutorial prompt appeared in my vision.
[TUTORIAL QUEST: SPEAK WITH THE TOWN ELDER]
I dismissed it.
Another prompt.
[TUTORIAL QUEST: DEFEAT 5 SLIMES]
Dismissed.
[TUTORIAL QUEST: REACH LEVEL 2]
Dismissed.
The system stopped offering after that.
---
I walked.
The town was designed to funnel players outward—toward the gates, toward the fields, toward monsters and experience and loot. But I turned the other way, down a narrow street that led away from the main plaza.
The noise faded.
I passed a few NPCs standing idle, their routines not yet triggered. A blacksmith. A merchant. A child holding a wooden sword, frozen mid-swing. The game's world was detailed, but it didn't try to hide what it was. This was a place built for players to move through, not to live in.
I found what I was looking for at the edge of town.
A small courtyard, empty. Stone walls on three sides. Flat ground. No NPCs. No quest markers. Just space.
I drew the wooden katana.
It felt wrong.
Too light. The balance was off. The grip was too smooth, like it had never been held. But it was straight, and it was long enough, and when I held it in front of me, the blade didn't waver.
I took a breath.
Stepped forward.
Swung.
The blade cut through the air with a soft whisper. My arms completed the motion, bringing the katana down in a clean vertical line. My back foot pivoted. My hips turned. My shoulders followed.
It was a basic strike. Men. Straight down. The kind of cut I'd done ten thousand times in the dojo.
Here, it felt hollow.
I reset my stance.
Swung again.
The same motion. The same result. The blade traveled the same path, but something was missing. The feedback. The resistance. The way a real blade hums when it's cutting correctly.
This one just moved.
I tried a third time, focusing on my grip. Tighter. Looser. Adjusting the angle of my wrists. The katana came down, and I felt the difference—barely—but it was there.
Not right. But closer.
I stepped back. Lowered the blade. Breathed.
In the distance, I could still hear the other players. Shouts of victory. The sound of combat. The chime of level-up notifications echoing across the town.
I raised the katana again.
This time, I focused on my feet. Weight distribution. The way my front knee bent. The way my back heel lifted just slightly at the moment of impact.
Swing.
Still wrong.
I didn't stop.
---
The sun in the game didn't move the way a real sun did. It hung in the sky, fixed, as if time here was optional. I didn't know how long I'd been swinging. Long enough that my arms—this body's arms—had started to remember the motion.
Not muscle memory. Not yet.
But repetition.
I lowered the blade and looked at it.
The wooden katana hadn't changed. It was still too light. Still too smooth. Still wrong.
But I was starting to understand it.
I sheathed the blade and stood in the empty courtyard, listening to the distant noise of the game continuing without me.
This wasn't about levels.
It wasn't about quests, or loot, or clearing content.
I was here to swing a blade until it stopped lying to me.
That was all.
I drew the katana again.
Stepped forward.
And swung.