The protagonist is Semo, or Sem Firebrand. He's this kind of anti-hero fire mage with a traumatic past who gets forced into playing a hyper-realistic VRMMO called 'Eternity' to basically run a psychological therapy program. The whole 'Phoenix' angle is his in-game class and persona. The cast around him is pretty tight-knit. There's Nix, his AI companion/mentor within the game who guides him, and Fajo, his best friend and tech genius who got him into the whole mess in the first place.
Then you have the other 'influenced' players he connects with, like Jun Li and Wyck, who become part of his crew. A lot of the early dynamics are about Semo learning to trust and lead these people, even though he'd rather be a lone wolf. The antagonists shift a bit—some are other players with their own issues, some are corporate suits behind the scenes of 'Eternity,' and some are the literal manifestations of trauma within the game's systems. The most consistent personal conflict might be with another influenced player named Kaito, who represents a darker path Semo could have taken.