Frustration

J breathed deep, ignoring the notifications prodigy at her mind, and allowing herself a moment of calm as she slowly let the memories fade into the background as important to her but not important right now. It had taken a lot of practice to be able to do that. recovery was a slow process. Months of therapy, special BDs and special dissociation drugs. She had followed the same routine ever since Haru had paid for her flight back home.

Slowly she felt she was healing. A fact her interface seemed to agree with as a new notification swam to the top of the newly archived ones she had received after the procedure.

+100 Ego experience gained for following a regiment of good mental health

Ego has level has increased

Ego +1

Experience until next level 100.

Current Ego -1

300 to go to -2 and 200 EXP to go to -1 and 100 to go to 0. I bet each increase or decrease requirements are just numbers actual values multiplied by 100 for negative values and the value of the next level of the stat multiplied by 100 for positive value. That would imply it is very hard to recover from higher negative values, which is worrying. Assuming high negative values don’t just kill you or make you brain dead to begin with.

J felt a rush of self-actualization? At Least that’s what she thought it felt like. She just felt more like a person.

Ah, so that’s what it feels like, the releaf from the migraine last time overshadowed it too much last time for me to telll. Momentarily just relaxing a fraction as a small amount of tension faded from her. Before her mind focused back on the crushing reality that her basically broken system provided her.

After fiddling with it for more than a few hours, she had come to a few realizations since she got her interface. One, the system was locked until she was out of stat debt in Ego. Second Ego, unlike any other stat did not have to do with any specific skill or exercise to get experience, it was literally her mental state, and like all things to deal with psychology it would develop very slowly and possibly irregularly. Finally, third, as attested by her notifications while she was sleeping. Ego was directly linked to her ability to accept cyberization.

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-1 temporary Ego penalty for cyberization

As this is your first cyberization penalty is reduced to by one. Revised Ego penalty zero due to limited Augmentation/ cyberization applied

Cyberdeck installation with optical tap [ adaptation (0/0)]

Functions, effects and details limited to standard till Ego has reached a positive value

Sure you're recovering from a lot of internal emotional trauma, and dealing with regaining memories from your last life. Go get some chrome installed, what could go wrong? Who would have guessed that voluntary elective enhancement and cosmetic surgery would have Ego point penalties? J directed her prodigious sarcasm inwardly as she considered the implications.

I wonder if I am seeing one of the effects of low Ego. I have been really impulsive and flighty recently, well flightier,

Well at least I didn’t get any more ego damage. J felt somewhat relieved by that to see that no further debts were incurred but it also showed her what would probably happen if she got any more chrome until she was out of debt. Bet that’s a straight ticket to Cyberpsychosis.

But she did notice that the damage appeared temporary as far as the installation process was involved, and there were also what appeared to be adaptation values. Which probably meant she would have handy, built in values, on how far she adapted to chrome if she was understanding it properly.

It was something, but J was getting progressively more frustrated with the interface. All the functions were locked down by the Ego debt, it was worse than if she didn’t have one at all at this point as the Ego damage was also crippling her from really doing a lot of things she was able to do before. She was more clumsy, she had migraines and muscle tension screwing up her ability to function and the curiosity to explore its capabilities were driving her up the wall with being essentially locked out of their use or experimenting, but she would put that all aside for now. She wasn’t going to let it stop her from living her life, but it did leave her quite annoyed.

Ok, so let’s make today somewhat productive. I’ve got to get back to Vik’s next week to restart my apprenticeship, and I’m limited to how active I can be today. Shifting herself to reduce the pressure caused by her recent surgery, So I guess I gotta practice using my new internal deck at home today. Truly a sacrifice I am loath to do. J mused with a small amount of excitement as she carefully set her old agent on her desk so she could practice with her new chrome. I wonder how much cyberpunk 2020 or red cannon is actually overlapping into 2077?