The Man Who Taught The Machine - A Rebirth LitRPG

Chapter 2: Respawning

Shane stared dumbly for several seconds before twisting to get out of bed and away from the screen. Without pause, the screen instantly followed him and positioned itself in front of his vision as he did. A high-pitched cry escaped his throat in shock as he tripped over his feet and landed hard on the bed. His cheeks were red from embarrassment as he sat up again and looked at the screen.

Some time was spent reading that glowing text over and over. As Shane read and re-read, realization struck him like a lightning bolt from the sky above. He HAD died, and now he was inside his own game. Tears began to well, falling from his eyes in big salty droplets. An ear-to-ear grin took possession of his mouth; there was a level of joy in him that he didn't think was possible. He had considered being a part of a talented team and working on something extraordinary would have been his prime lifetime goal achievement. This, however, was next-level hope and excitement.

Jumping from the bed in a single bound, Shane pressed the Enter button with gusto. The single blue screen split into three more screens of equal size, neatly packed next to one another. He saw a colored map with a reverse tear-drop icon on the left-most screen that showed his location was a small cabin surrounded by forest. North of his position showed a clearing about two hundred meters away. At the top of the screen, Shane saw two tabs.

Map/Quests

He poked the Quests tab and saw there was a quest already available. He read it, delighted.

Tutorial: Welcome to Endless Veil

Look at your character screen - Pending...
Pick your class - Done!
Equip class starter gear - Pending...
Leave tutorial cabin - Pending...

None of this surprised him, as he had done it many times during the creation and testing of Endless Veil. One thing was off; you would usually pick your class at this point. Shane eyed his character stats directly in the middle of his vision.

Name: Shane Carther
Race: Human
Class: Sage
Level: 1
Titl—

Sage? That wasn't one of the classes available in the game. He likely would have known of any significant changes like that before launch, too. His task was to train the artificial intelligence director to accommodate every class and what they could do after all. Shane clicked on his class name, bringing up a new smaller window over his class sheet.

Class: Sage

Sage specializes in questing and reward choice as its primary avenues of growth. There are no limits to Sage's creativity and potential.

Sage Features:

Quests have expanded rewards to choose from
+5 to all Attributes at level 1

Anxiety began to flare as Shane realized he was holding his breath while reading. Taking a few deep breaths to calm down, he thought deeply for a moment. Before his "passing," there wasn't anything called a "Sage" in Endless Veil. There were only supposed to be five classes: Warrior, Knight, Caster, Rogue, and Disciple. It wasn't charming to see the class description written so robotically. He knew the folks on the team in charge of providing text with some personality were far more creative than that. Usually, writing the class description as if it were being told to you by some old wizard or scholar.

He sighed his excitement and stress away. Nothing can be changed, especially now with him actually here. Shane closed the Sage class window and continued reading the rest of his character stats.

Title: None Available
Experience: 0/100
HP: 125/125
Mana: 75/75
Fatigue: 0/110

Attributes:
Strength: 15
Agility: 15
Vitality: 15
Endurance: 15
Intelligence: 15
Wisdom: 15
Luck: 15
Physical Attack: 0
Magical Attack: 0
Physical Defense: 0
Physical Mitigation: 0%
Magical Defense: 0
Magical Mitigation: 0%

Of all the characters he made while testing Endless Veil, HE certainly seemed to be one of the weaker ones, he thought with dissatisfaction. The soul points and morphing of spells and feats could be awesome when explored, but for now, remained decidedly mysterious in their usefulness.

"Maybe I've got some good starting equipment," he mumbled dispassionately as he poked the "Inventory" tab next to the "Character" tab. Whatever excitement he could have felt fell away upon seeing his inventory only had starter clothes. Looking down at his skinny body, Shane realized he was as naked as the day he was born—this entire time. He begrudgingly tapped the starter pants and was surprised to see and feel the pants materialize on his body.

Unfortunately, the pants were nothing more than a pair of brown loosely fitted cloth held up by a thin string sown into the waist. The starter shirt and loafers were equipped shortly after the pants. Between the three pieces of clothing, Shane only gained 15 points of physical and magical defense. Annoyed but accepting, he stood up from the bed with an indignant huff.

He looked down at himself and saw his usual scrawny body. His clothes sagged slightly despite not being much bigger than a "large" in the human world. The inventory screen showed what he had equipped and a three-dimensional representation of himself. One that captured everything about him that he innately found unattractive. From his medium-length wavy dark brown hair to his overly angular facial features, it was the version of him he'd seen in the mirror since high school. One slight difference stood out to him; while still scrawny, his muscles were more defined than what he'd see daily in real life.

He dismissed it as a hallucinatory side effect of dying and being reborn. Surely coming back to life would have you seeing yourself in a different life.

As Shane was looking himself over, the menus in front of him faded away. Replaced with a compass at the top of his vision and showing a cabin icon in the middle. Looking to the left and right showed the cabin icon between "W" and "E." Something colorful caught his eye just then; three bars were inlaid within his wrists: a red bar, a blue bar, and a green bar. He brought one of his wrists closer to his face, watching with fascination as text began to appear.

HP: 125/125
Mana: 75/75
Fatigue: 0/110

"Interesting! Our game always had a heads-up display on the screen at all times. If I ever get out of this, I have to give my kudos to the designer who thought this one up!" But he wasn't sure if he wanted to leave, as this WAS one of his fantasies. Especially after seeing so many anime portray this scenario positively and with excitement. His previous life was full of accomplishments but did lack in both family and intimate relationships—especially the latter.

Shane felt excitement and shame as he pondered whether it would be possible to have such relationships in Endless Veil. The AI Director he worked on used machine learning to augment NPC dialogue so that NPCs could approximate a conversation with the player and react accordingly to actions. To his knowledge, it was the first time something like that had been done in such a high-budget game. His cheeks turned shades of rosy red as he imagined what could be done with his flesh body in this world.

"You're getting ahead of yourself. Focus on the here and now." He shook his head to clear his mind of lustful thoughts. According to the tutorial quest, all that was left was to leave this dusty cabin and start exploring the most exciting thing he had ever been a part of. An infinite world with infinite possibilities lay before him.

Shane walked over to the unassuming door and swung it open. It flew open faster than he thought it would as if it were lighter than it should have been. The handle collided with the wall, making a heavy "WHUMP" sound. Shane tensed, feeling uncomfortable from the thought that somehow other people nearby heard him make too much noise. A few seconds passed before he reminded himself that no one was around and that being reborn was his chance at reinventing the person he had gotten used to living as.