I awoke that morning to the loud sound of some jet I never bothered to learn the name of. Rolling over and stretching out, I failed to get that pop I was looking for. Need to look into getting myself one of those school chairs. You know the ones, with the attached table in front, perfect for some chiropractic "adjustment." Finally getting dressed and to the only other room in my shitty little home, turning on my computer and searching my empty fridge for something to take the edge off. No luck there. Hard to buy food when you don't have a job. I'd been interested in all sorts of things, but nothing ever really clicked, ya know. So I spend most my time reading and video games. At least those are interesting and somewhat engaging.
Logging into the latest game to level up someone else's character to pay the bills, I started seeing everything start to pixelate. And no I don't mean the game
I mean my entire damn house. I reached up and poked what should have been my mouse and my hand just went right through it. "Soooo.... that just happened." Looking
around, waiting to wake up to reality, everything goes dark and the pain begins.
You know that feeling when you stub your toe really, really hard. Yeah, just like that, except you know a bazillion time's worse. I felt my kidneys going
through a blender that sucked them through my intestines, with a lovely side of bone's being ground and crunched by a wood chipper. Yeah it was awesome, not.
Once the pain was gone and I stopped crying and gibbering like a big tough man, according to my ego. I was able to crack my eye's open to what looked like a glass
case covering me inside some sort of Sci Fi meets Mad Scientist scene.
There were cables and blinking equipment everywhere, lining the walls, the floors, and well as I said, every-freaking-where. As I finally started feeling my
body wake up from the worst case of "arm fell asleep." A voice started talking in my head. Not in my ear, not in the room, not on a freaking screen, in my damn head.
Now I'm pretty good with a crisis or strange situation, but a voice in my head, that is not my own, tends to set of panic switches for me. Am I going crazy, maybe
I've always been crazy, are there other voices, do I want other voices. Finally the droning voice pulled me out of my stupor.
."..RELAXANT APPLIED. CANDIDATE DIAGNOSTICS RUNNING. MENTAL AND HEART RATE FLUCTUATIONS DECREASING. CANDIDATE DEEMED OPERABLE. INITIATING TASK ASSIGNMENT."
"Greeting Candidate classified Indentured Slave, class E, series 1000, block 23, year birthed 2897. I am your assigned task management AI, I will assist in your
reintegration from Earth Sim 001 to current earth. As we are currently in and emergency state, this will have to be brief. First, this is indeed reality, what you
have been experiencing is a simulation to keep your minds from deteriorating. As you were a low class slave your simulation was set to lowest standards required to
maintain efficiency. You have missed five centuries of history that leads to our current situation. I will explain at a later date. Currently you are required to
make repairs to the thermal energy line connected to this Corporate Resurrection bunker. You have 3 hours before the systems turns offline, killing the remaining humans left in the Earth Sim, also canceling the deactivate signal currently being transmitted to the self destruct system that will quite possible level this entire
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continent. So any questions?"
"Ummm...got any pants?" I manage to get out, through shivering teeth. Taking stock of everything, and with my vast knowledge of LitRPG, xianxia, and other
currently related stories. I quickly settle my mind, continent destroying crisis first, mental breakdown and padded room later. A bright light flashes, and look at that i now have pants, that is actually kinda cool. Wonder what else that works with. Could try for a steak and a supermodel...Focus, big boom now, fantasies later.
"So, how am I suppose to fix this thermal energy thingamajig, not exactly in my wheelhouse, also no idea where it is, where I am, how to get there, etc etc.
You know the basic problems with this ENTIRE DAMN SITUATION..." That felt better, not quite maintaining my cool and collected OP guy mindset at the moment. Thankfully,
in some sort of RPG style setup, a screen popped up into my vision. A rotating and zoomable map, an experience bar, equipment tab, and other HUD style doohickeys.
The AI, I'm gonna call him Al, original I know, started talking again. "Based on an extensive search, this display was deemed acceptable for you. The map will have a marker for the tools and repair locations. The red bar is set as your health, it will update as the situation requires. The white bar, you refer to it as an experience bar, is the level of energy your nanite package currently stores." I tried to interrupt him, but was cut off. Snarky little SOB. "To save much needed time, I will not be going into detail about anything now. Your HUD will be updated as required and your grade out screens will be available when needed." Taking a moment to give the evil eye to a part of the wall I now designate as "SOB AL", I patiently waited for him to continue.
"Pulling up your character screen, we can use your energy levels to update your stats and update a simple maintenance and repair skill package to quickly give you the required skills to complete this emergency repair." A screen popped up with me in the vitruvian man pose, slowly rotating. My short dark brown hair, kept in a semi military style, just without the boot high and tight fade. Along with my dark blue eyes, square chin and average nose, where all there. But the massive six pack,
and the damn near popeye arms left my eyes almost popping out of my head. Don't get me wrong, I've always been in decent shape, broad shouldered and decent pecs, starting to go soft around the middle maybe. But I've never been that in shape before.
Once I stopped my Narcissus moment looking at my now Adonis body, I looked over at my new stat screen.
Name ISE1000232897 Strength 2 Physique 1 Dexterity 1 Endurance 1 Intelligence 1 Charisma 2
“Your stats are based on an average humans. Strength for example, whereas an average human can lift 150 lbs, you can lift 300 lbs. Each stat is a basic grouping of your current physical self. You will learn as you go.” Al droned on, as i was busy counting my abs, I could do my laundry on these things.
“Your current energy will allow you to spend 2 points. Each point you bring you to the peak of that stat. As your do not met the requirements for the repair skill you need, the points will be automatically used for the time being.” Following that I doubled over and cried and screamed in a very manly way as my brain tried to split itself in half, and the muscle’s on my body convulsed and spasmed.
After a bit of time I managed to prop myself up against a wall, and stare hard at “SOB AL” wall. Obviously ignoring me, he continued. “Now that the easy part of upgrading your stats to appropriate levels, I will begin downloading the basic maintenance repair skill.”
And I woke up twitching on the ground again. I swear I will find a body to stuff this AI in, then enjoy myself as I watch him pass through a wood chipper, melt him down, and turn him into a lovely commode.
Seeing my Dexterity and Intelligence double helped explain the first bout of wracking pain. Followed by new knowledge floating around in my brain about electrical engineering and other stuff I could care a wet fart about. I stood up, flipped of “SOB AL” wall, and started walking towards the repair tools.