Like a mirage turned real, Joe appeared before himself. As the digital contract dissipated in front of him, an avatar of himself faded into existence, though the version wasn’t quite true to life. He appeared as a sort of avatar, smooth as a doll though much more detailed. Apart from some conspicuously missing features, considering the game had no content restrictions, his body was in perfect proportion. An equal scale model of his physique.
For a moment, Joe studied himself. He had the muscular, but wiry frame of a boy entering manhood. Not overly tall at 5ft10 178cm, but being 17 years old he figured he still had time to grow. No six-pack for him, but he figured he made up for it with his obviously muscled biceps, quadriceps, and firm but undefined abdominals and pectorals.
In fairness to his lack of bulk, he was a growing boy, and most of his calories were burned thinking, not exercising, or working an active trade, though he certainly wasn't a slacker. Brown skin, black hair, and clear Hazel eyes that he'd inherited from his mother lent to a handsome, if still slightly child-like face.
Emily had once described him as ‘unapproachable, but attractive’ with a shrug and a sympathetic arm pat, and that was good enough for him. He knew she was the pretty one in their little duo.
It was when he reached out to touch his own frame, and saw what he had believed to be an inert scale model of himself reach right back like a bad mirror that he realized that this wasn't a model of him. This was him. His mind was in that body, but his perspective seemed to have shifted outside. He was looking at himself, really looking at himself from outside of himself. Emotion registered on his previously blank face for the first time, and feeling it while seeing it play out threw him.
That cognitive dissonance caused him to be nauseous for a fraction of a moment before he realigned his thoughts, and snapped his frame of mind back into a place where he could reasonably parse out what was happening, thinking through the implications of what he was experiencing at a truly inhuman pace.
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It was then that the voice of the AI resounded from all around him and inside his own mind. The feeling was uncomfortable, like an itch inside of his skull that he truly couldn't scratch. It was like whatever the AI was doing was replicating sound waves in his head that his mind interpreted as a voice speaking? Once again Joe forced his thoughts back into line, reorganizing his understanding of sound as best as he could by reframing what it meant to hear.
Fear and panic while rational responses to new and incomprehensible experiences, were not particularly helpful. He processed his feelings in a moment, speeding up his reasoning to allow his prefrontal cortex to take control in a fraction of time as the itching sensation of the AI communicating faded into more of a tingling awareness.
“Welcome visitor, to Beyond the Veil,” it said.
He knew when the voice was speaking and that the voice was speaking, but it no longer felt like the voice was speaking. In fact, he spun up his active cognition in an attempt to focus on the exact place in his mind where he could literally feel the intention to communicate. It felt like… huh.
The voice wasn't actually using sound waves, but was using some other method to speak. Instantly, Joe's thoughts spiraled out. How was it doing this? What would this look like on a scan if he were to put a neural tracker on himself right now? Didn’t his mother have him monitoring his brain waves, maybe he should log out really quickly and- No, no focus, he told himself.
“Truly interesting,” the voice said, and with an awareness that bordered on precognition, Joe just knew it was about to say something again. Felt it, literally in the back of his mind.
“I am Guide, your guide. Call upon me when you wish to know. Simply think ‘Guide’ with the intention of calling upon me. Do so now." Joe watched from outside of his body as his eyes blinked. It was unsettling. He focused on his instructions instead and focused with intention at the place where his awareness of the voice came from. He heard his own voice in the same way he’d just heard Guide and instantly, what appeared to be a stat sheet appeared above Joe's avatar.
Joseph Kobi (Change Name) - Tier 1
Body 16/10 | Spirit 56/10 | Mind -/10
Race: Human
Traits: -
Boons: -
Skills: -
Joe stared at the floating chard for a while before he had an idea… He did some mental calculus, realized he had no relevant data points, or frame of reference at all, and decided to go for it anyway.