Altogether, I had spent less than two real-time hours in the game. I talked with Chester for a bit, explaining what had happened and asked for advice. Chester seemed like the kind of guy to tell me to suck it up, but he was surprisingly gentle with his advice.

“You don't want to burn out. Running like that, pushing past human limits, isn't psychologically healthy. Especially the way you did it, over and over. I like the idea of pushing one stat up and using it to bootstrap Transcend. Next time you come in, we'll train strength. I think you'll find it less miserable than running. Can you transfer the stamina potions out of the game to here?

I opened my inventory and saw the potions, but no matter what I tried I couldn't get the potions to come out. It's like they were too insubstantial to grab.

Insufficient data to materialize item 'Potion' in this universe.

Possible solution: Create potions with more data in Ellesmere and try again.

Thanks Sarah. I would have to try my hand at alchemy. A basic stamina potion shouldn't be too hard to achieve.

“I can't, but I might be able to in the future.”

“Alright, try to do that sooner rather than later. We don't have the proper facilities in Ellesmere to train all of your stats. You're done for the day.”

“Thanks Chester. You've been a bigger help than I thought a trainer would be.”

“Aww, you are going to melt my heart. Don't worry, I won't ease up on you.”

“Want a fresh meat bun?”

I bribed him with baked goods and put it down to an investment in the future. Couldn't hurt to get in good with the boss.

I headed to Jessie's lab, and found her elbows deep in some weird contraption that was spitting sparks. “Bad time?”

“Yes. Go sit down and I'll be with you in a moment.”

I didn't sit down, but watched her from the corner. She seemed to be using a mix of magic and elbow grease to fix whatever was wrong. It looked to be far more complicated than the computer that I had put together for myself once upon a time. I think alchemy would be an easier subject to learn than magitech. I would probably have to learn magic, then learn tech, then apprentice.

She finally pulled something out of the guts of the machine, replaced it with an identical looking part, and the sparking stopped. She closed it up, and turned to me. “Time for another scan.”

She administered the scan herself this time. More poking and prodding. She pulled up images of the game HUD (Heads-Up Display). It didn't match what I had at all. I didn't have much of a HUD at all. I had my notifications, my stats and skill screens, and my quest list. The HUD had all sorts of configurable features, like NPC names, levels, and health bars above their heads. There was a clock like I had suspected, with an alarm function. There was a different skill list, an actual stamina bar, and costs for various moves. The stereotypical inventory was present, as well as health and mental energy indicators.

Advanced players got more features. Certain classes let you see details of players, monsters, or both. A sort of more highly leveled observe skill that was always on. Party widgets were there. They displayed a player's portrait along with the three main status bars for each. There was more, but those were the big features.

For things that didn't rely on the interface, there were cooldowns on skills. You could only use skills (system assisted movements or supernatural abilities) so often. Thankfully for the players, it was possible to learn them and use them without the system, thusly avoiding the cooldowns. I felt like I already had a system assist in the way my skills nudged me into the correct forms and actions, and I was very glad I didn't have cooldowns.

Jack, I can emulate most of these features if I level up some more.

Right, Sarah had even known there was a skill waiting if I managed a sneak attack on a bunny. She seemed to know at least some of the skills available and what leveling them would give.

I do. And the more I level the more I will know. I am very restricted right now.

Sounds like a worthwhile investment. I should put that at the top of the very long list.

Quest Alert!

Acheive Level 10 in AI Helper

Time Limit: N/A

Difficulty: Low

You have expressed a desire to blend more thoroughly with Ellesmere.  Level your AI Helper skill so that you can do so.

Reward: 500 EXP, $100

Timely. How do I level you?

Conversation with notifications at this point is the only way to level my skill. We could just chat.

That sounded like a good idea, but I would have to finish up with Jessie before I started training again. I explained how Sarah thought she could emulate most of the GUI (Graphical User Interface) for the game.

“That doesn't solve the underlying problem. You are acting like a person transported into a game, instead of just interacting through the game device. We need to know if that's the case, because if it is, there could be significant danger to you in there.”

Do you know Sarah?

Danger seems unlikely. In the game world, the game's rules are supreme. Unless you use your Gaming The System, at a higher level than it is currently, along with your Data Entitiy Conversion, you should be protected from effects carrying over into your Earth body. If you aren't deliberitely foolish, you should be safe.

Digtal Entity Conversion. I have been doing a lot of that sort of thing lately moving data to and from the game world. Show me the skill?

Data Entity Conversion Level 20 (10%)

This skill notes the conversion into a full data entity. Higher conversion levels will have different effects. Current effects include protection from negative mental status effects, item conversion, data assimilation, and error correction.

What the hell was error correction?

Negative effects to your body will be neutralized at a speed compared to the severity of the error. You will be able to drink potions more often, and any harmful foreign bodies inside you will be converted to the proper biological tissue. There is a minimum threshold. I can hear you thinking. You can still drink alcohol, assuming you consume it fast enough.

Sarah, telling me you can hear me thinking is creepy. Just FYI.

“Sarah says there shouldn't be any risk to my safety unless I am deliberately stupid.”

“That is not reassuring.”

“Well, can you think of more tests?”

“Who do you think you are talking to?”

What followed was brutal. No more being stabbed with forks, this time it was straight up scalpels. We brought my HP down to zero, and carved me up a bit more. She assured me she could fully heal it after the testing was complete.

I told her where I was in the game, and we both logged in. A doorway opened in front of the Bard's Guild and she stepped out. My HP moved back to full the moment I entered the game, so of course it was time for more cutting. This time we dropped my HP below zero, and then waited for the game's natural regeneration to kick in. The wounds closed, followed by my HP starting to rise again.

Then we did it again, and logged out before my wounds could start to close. No wounds from the game appeared, but the wounds from before I logged in were still present, along with my zero HP. She healed the wounds she inflicted earlier using life energy, and my HP did rise as I had thought it would.

She still wasn't satisfied. Her work on merging powers with the game wasn't working, so I was stuck there while she did some programming. Eventually she thought she had a solution, and I logged back in.

A HUD just like in the pictures she showed me appeared, before flickering out of existence just like Terra the god had done before. As soon as it completely disappeared I got a notification that Data Entity Conversion and AI Helper both leveled up. I was turning into a data/human hybrid and code had no power over me. I let off a brief cackle, before deciding that was just silly, and logged off again.

Jessie seemed to take it as a personal affront that her code didn't work, but decided if my power wanted to do her job for her, she might as well let it. She systematically went through every element of the HUD, the GUI, and every other in game system that users had access to. Sarah was sure that even if she couldn't replicate them with my own powers, we could eventually hook into the game system and simulate an interface. That would be a while off though, as she was still restricted to notifications. She was sure the skill would raise swiftly once the HUD was enabled and I was seeing information everywhere through her skill all the time.

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As for Data Entity Conversion, I wasn't sure how to raise that besides playing the game. Maybe using more of those unlocked features would level it faster. I wasn't going to try to inflict mental status effects on myself, but I could stay awake at night. Some trading between the game and the real world might help. A trip to some book resellers, in game, would let me absorb data. More things for the to-do list.

I made a note to ask Chester to shoot a note off to HR to explain my purchases and how they related to my getting stronger. If I was using that money to do trading, I should probably try to make some things to bring back and give them to the company. A few buckets worth of stamina potions would likely do it.

I would also want to be a little covert about it if I didn't want to piss off the administrators. It would be one thing for coffee to be available in the city, and another thing if Maxwell House brand coffee containers were found laying around.

It was still the middle of the day. I had gotten to work at 9, trained for about 3 real hours, and spent another hour in Jessie's lab, but my workday was done.

Time to see if I could finagle a couple more game devices for my parents. I asked Jessie who to ask, and it turned out Matt, my apartment's handyman, ran the beta groups, both for the public and the Hidden World. I suppose when you throw enough magic at an apartment, it doesn't have much use for a handyman, so he had time to spare. I hoped he was quick to get back to the apartments if there was a problem.

I took the elevator to the lower, more public floors, and went looking for Matt. He had an office next to a meeting room, where he was collating beta tester reports or something. There were huge piles of paper on his desk, and it didn't look like they were in the out-box. I was so glad I didn't have to deal with that.

It turns out getting beta game sets was easy for people who were already in the know. I signed a waiver assigning me responsibility for any users of the devices I was checking out, and walked away with two more retail-ready boxes. There were separate meetings for unpowereds in the know, so it we wouldn't be going as a family. Maybe they could network a little and make contacts in the Hidden World that weren't based around me or Jessie.

I gave Matt a meat bun. He runs the beta tester groups and was also my maintenance guy. It pays to be in the good graces of people like that.

I didn't want to bother Jessie with more questions in the middle of her work day, so I decided to go to the mall. I wanted to find an alchemist and pump them for information.

* * *

I found the door to the mall eventually by sweeping the area with mana. It was an application of a defensive spell I had picked up. I made my way to the directory. There were two alchemists and an apothecary. I wasn't sure what the point of an apothecary shop was in the modern age, so I decided to ignore that for now. The closest alchemist was called Boil Boil, which amused me.

The store was unlike either of the alchemist stores I had visited in the game. First, it was massive, like most of the stores here. Second, they seemed to have everything. Glassware like you wouldn't believe, ingredients in a candy-store like setup, where you scoop your own, and, of course, potions.

Tiny potions, huge potions, even some fancy sports bottles that seemed to have hidden switches to dispense potions or water, at the user's choice. People cheat with magic? Tell me it isn't so. I am so shocked. It is unbearable. I giggle a little.

There is a small section with instructional books, and I start making my way there when I'm intercepted by a sales associate. “Anything I can help you with today?”

This was both slightly annoying because I had been planning to scan those books and not pay for them, but it might be faster to just ask about a few subjects I was interested in.

“Are you familiar with the new game by LucidTech?”

“Yes, I'm a beta tester, are you?”

“I actually work for LucidTech, and beta test on the side.”

“If you have your employee ID on you, you qualify for a discount. What brings you here today?”

“I was wondering on the differences between modern and less modern alchemy. What's easier today with modern technology, and what was easier back then for whatever reason?”

“We have several books on the history and progression of Alchemy throughout the ages, but as to your specific questions, things were mostly easier back then. The most potent ingredients are either infused with magic, or come from magical type creatures. As a rule of thumb, the more magic, the more potent and expensive the item. Anything infused with magic can be broken down to enchant with, so alchemists are always in competition with enchanters for raw materials.”

This is bad for me, as I need the item to be information dense in order to pull it from my inventory. It seems anything from Earth, with it's atomic structures and molecular bonds, was sufficiently information dense. The code behind the game's potions wasn't up to snuff.

I had a few ideas about deriving or injecting data into digital assets, but it would take testing.

“Do you know anything about the alchemy that happens in the game?”

“Not much, I try to avoid it mostly, but I wasn't satisfied with the products for sale, so I did do a bit of alchemy on my own.”

“If I wanted to create a basic stamina potion from ingredients readily available in the game, what would I use?”

I think he could sense a sale, because he seemed much happier. I was happy that he was happy, but also slightly disturbed. These retail creatures could smell money. We walked around putting items into a basket. Supposedly there was little or no difference between Esmerelda's and Thorn's stamina potions, just how much preparation and infusion they took to make.

The ingredients were about 30 dollars per pound, and a pound would make two to five doses depending on how far I refined it. No monster parts here, just plants. I bought three pounds total for experiments and put it on my business account. I decided it would be tacky to read through the books while the sales attendant was watching, so I took my purchases and left.

Hmm...what else to get while I was here. I looked through my shopping list and decided it wouldn't take long to get the stuff on it. Really I had weeks of food after the cooking marathon, but I was a little short on sweets. I could easily imagine Havlar with a Snicker's bar in hand, fighting off an orc with another. I decided right then to get a Snicker's bar and make that image happen.

I bought a coffee maker that wasn't anything special, but wasn't the cheapest on the shelf either. I picked up the french press, and enough coffee to fill a large barrel.

The candy store was magical. Both literally and figuratively. There were actual chocolate frogs that did the hopping around thing, presumably inspired by Rowling. I picked up a full sampler kit just for people like me. I'd share it with my parents when I gave them their game systems. Then I picked up enough chocolate to feed Jessie, her guild, and then some. If baked goods don't work, chocolate will. I even picked up hot chocolate mix for people who don't enjoy coffee.

Finally I tracked down a store that sold staple foods. It was a cross between a grocery store and an apocalypse prepper's dream. Given what I knew about the not too distant future, I should probably be shopping here. Maybe when I get my first paycheck. It would be hard to justify camping gear on my business credit card. I loaded hundreds of pounds of flour, sugar, baking soda, and miscellaneous other goods into my inventory. I really did not want to be coming back for staples. They didn't carry meat, and I was a little wary of buying meat in a magical mall anyway.

One trip out of the mall to the butcher's later, I was done shopping for the day. I wonder how much a personal shopper costs...and now I feel lazy.

It was still a little early to go to my parents, so I headed home. I needed to get in game and scan some alchemy books if I was going to try this.

* * *

There was an entire floor dedicated to alchemy. I wasn't terribly surprised. It did make my hunt for beginner books a hassle. I started looking for similar looking spines, hoping to find a series that went from beginner to master. I did find a few series, but they were more field guides on ingredient sources than learning material. I picked out a couple, but then started to just look for something big, hoping I would find a treatise on alchemy as a whole. More field guides. These people are really fond of their field guides. Maybe I should have annoyed that guy in the store and read those books.

I started picking books at random, and found a few that were instructional. I did find two that had specific instructions on making basic potions. It used ingredients I wasn't familiar with though, coming from a different climate. This library had too many books. If time weren't slowed down here, I would be annoyed at wasting so much of it.

I gave up on finding what I wanted myself, finished scanning through what I had, and went to go get the librarian. They should know where to find what I needed.

The librarian was the teenager again. “Hi. I've been looking for some beginner's guides to alchemy and have had no luck. I just want to know how to mix a standard stamina potion.”

“I know just what you need. Let me get someone to cover the desk and I'll meet you on the 7th floor.”

I was surprised after I had trudged up all those stairs and saw the librarian fly up through the central viewing area. People could fly? Wasn't that the dream of every human? Damn. Another task. I felt like every time I turned around I found something else I wanted to do.

I got around to learning his name, Julian, and he showed me two books right away. A comprehensive guide to stamina potions, and a beginner's guide that might as well have been an idiots guide. Everything you needed to know to start brewing your potions. As long as he was shoveling gold my way, I asked if there was a series that led all the way up to master level.

There was, but it wasn't for this region. Certain regions have certain plants, not just because no one thought to take some cuttings with them, but because they wouldn't grow anywhere else. That was not the case now. Carefully cultivated greenhouses can support any kind of plant life.

With Julian's help, I found enough material that I could just absorb it all and it would be enough to carry me to a master's level if I was determined enough. More likely, I would just pay an alchemist for tips every once in a while. When Julian was finally flying off, I sat down and started scanning and using my partitions to read. I figured it would take a couple hours, but that was only half an hour outside, and I could use a little downtime anyway.

* * *

My kitchen was a mess. The coffee maker decided not to cooperate and it had overflowed despite clearly not being full. No I didn't read the directions, but that shouldn't matter. It's just a coffee maker.

In the meantime, I had a batch of room temperature coffee from earlier, perfect for storing in plastic gallon jugs and transporting to Ellesmere.

The coffee was subjectively cold, and in order to be served properly, it needed to be reheated. A microwave was ideal, but there were no microwaves in the game. If I could sell this in game, players would pay nearly any price. It would be more effective than perfectly cooked food or chocolates.

Only one problem. I wanted to sell...that is, serve it myself. I would have to use magic to reheat the coffee to serving temperature. I poured the coffee from the plastic container back into the coffee pot and placed it back in the machine. I wouldn't be able to just blast it with flames, I would need to use something like my healing spell to evenly spread the heat out.

I packaged up all my knowledge of heat, layered it with images of very hot but not boiling coffee, wrapped it in what I judged to be just enough mana, and gently pushed it in through the open top of the coffee pot, and told the spell to replicate in the coffee until it ran out of mana.

The coffee started steaming which was perfect. There weren't even any bubbles on the bottom indicating it might be too hot. Just like the images I put in there. Then the glass coffee pot started to glow.

I took a moment and scanned the coffee pot for mana. I couldn't really tell if magic was causing the glow, because the glass was thin, and the magic in the coffee was distorting my mana sense. In the end I decided it wasn't a magical glow because the pot, very evenly, started turning orange. Also it was hot. I wasn't an idiot, I didn't touch the pot to see if it was hot. It was just hot in the whole damn kitchen now.

There must have been a small stress point on the bottom of the coffee pot, because that's where it melted open first. The coffee maker immediately went fully ablaze. The coffee was leaking everywhere. I saw it in slow motion, like every person experiences near death. First it poured over the plastic of the coffee maker, and then started pouring both left and right along the counters, with some heading for the floor. The counters themselves didn't seem affected by the lava-like coffee, but anything on the counter that I had put there was on fire. Smoke started billowing everywhere.

Skill 'Slow Perception' Unlocked!

I should be feeling panic right now. Except panic is a classic status effect. I don't panic. The answer to fire is obviously more fire. I fill my hands with fire natured mana and grab the coffee maker, yank the plug out of the wall socket, and drop it in my inventory, still on fire. I do the same with the rest of the knick knacks that are on fire. I am splashed by droplets a couple times, and my HP dips, but not enough to make me retreat. It did set my clothes on fire though.

Soon the coffee is spread over the counters and floor, covering the kitchen. I am the only thing left that's on fire. My HP is still dropping, but I've got a third left and my hands haven't been burnt at all. I spread fire mana throughout my whole body, spending a small but significant portion of mana, and quickly take off my clothes including my burning sneakers, and do my best to smother them. I'm not doing a great job. I open a window and go wet down a towel to smother the clothes properly.

Like a cherry on a sundae, this is when the door opens and Jessie, followed closely by Matt, rush in.

Jack Ambrose Webb's Statistics

Strength

37

Wisdom

25 (+1)

Agility

50

Charisma

35 (+2)

Dexterity

48

Luck

8

Vitality

42

Transcend

8

Intelligence

63 (+3)

Unallocated

5