"But... there is a hidden benefit to all this."
"I have a body again!"
Visdre felt quite excited as he felt he had another chance at life thanks to the risk he had taken.
He grabbed his phone, but was unable to unlock it.
"Annoying..."
He had to factory reset his phone to be able to use it. But it had lost all his contacts, including his manager's number.
He wondered if he had the same job in this universe. It was the early morning. He would likely need to go to work in a few hours. So he got dressed and left.
When he arrived, his boss was confused as he was off this day.
"I actually have come here for a reason..."
"I quit!"
Visdre left his boss speechless as he walked back to his home.
"I am locked out of all my accounts... I am unable to access my savings even if I want to. If I report this problem, I'll probably lose my autonomy. They will think I have memory problems..."
"It is extremely important to read the next steps of the technique!"
Visdre knew that if he died in a universe with the hidden rule of 'Null Spirituality'. He would be fucked.
"I need to construct a global existence..."
Visdre reread through the webnovel.
"There is some opportunity in this universe. Since I lack the white room that I always experienced before. Perhaps I can finally dream?"
Step 11: Sleep
Visdre followed this step and skipped a night of sleep. He spent 24 hours reading news and gathering information on this universe. The next day, he set an alarm for ten minutes on his phone.
He then went to sleep and shut down ECHO.
[ECHO]: Shutting down...
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!
He woke up.
[ECHO]: Initializing...
"I definitely didn't enter REM sleep there, no dreams..."
Visdre decided to put on some music at low volume so he could differentiate the moment he entered the space of 'nothingness'.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
He repeated this series of actions for 12 hours. In a constant loop of sleeping and waking up every 10 minutes. A constant loop of shutting down and restarting ECHO.
He then continued the technique.
He found that he was entering REM sleep in almost an instant.
"I can dream!"
He stopped this cycle of sleep deprivation and went to sleep. This time, he left ECHO running.
He found himself in a dreamless state surrounded by 'darkness'.
"It works! I am aware in nonexistence!"
He knew it worked because he couldn't hear the music he had left playing nor feel his body. But he saw his operating system working.
ECHO was running!
His consciousness shifted and he found himself in a dream.
But he was completely lucid.
Visdre checked his progress on the visualization technique.
[ECHO]: Stage 2 - 90%
"I am also able to access ECHO while dreaming..."
Visdre waved his hands and the dream started to distort.
"As expected. The skills I built up in my last life are useful here."
Visdre held out his fingers and the dream compressed. He snapped his fingers and the dream itself vanished.
He found his spiritual body in an empty space.
He felt as if he was about to get erased. So he rotated his 'key' and the technique manifested around his spiritual body, creating a space that protected him.
"I can finally construct a source castle."
Visdre took his cane and hit the 'ground'. The nothingness radiated around him in a circular motion.
The darkness started to become white.
His white room was reconstructed. But it was far more grand. It was less like a room and more like a heavenly palace.
There was a big table and multiple chairs.
But there was an issue.
The castle didn't look new at all. It looked as if it was falling apart.
"I see... I stretched the resources too thin. It requires a level of accumulation to make such a construct. I am moving too fast."
Visdre could feel the black book as a part of him.
Step 13: Hidden Existence
Preparation:
1.) Manifest your consciousness.
2.) Entangle your brain with your soul.
3.) Temper your will.
Visdre manifested his consciousness and visualized his spiritual body. It was just himself in a suit with a cane. His face however was a fog.
"Entangling the brain with soul? Perhaps that is the proper way to avoid being contaminated by the limitations of the brain you possess."
"I suppose I can..."
Visdre looked around his source castle and pulled his special book out of his spirit body. He put it in the middle of the table and it started float and flip through the pages.
Fog was coming out of the book. Visdre was manipulating this fog, creating a spiritual brain. He felt information he had never learned flow through his mind.
Visdre was using the same mechanism for his revival to construct this.
Cerebral Cortex - Memory, language, thought, reasoning, and personality.
Frontal Lobe - Capacity to plan and organize ones self.
Parietal Lobe - Processor of sensory information and mental map.
Temporal Lobe - Determines reaction to the world.
Occipital Lobe - Object and facial recognition, distance and depth perception, and memory creation.
Amygdala - This controls the fear response, and emotional memory.
Hippocampas - Helps support memory, and emotion.
Pineal Gland - Controls instructions on sleep time.
Pituitary Gland - Controls metabolism.
Thalamus - Processes most information and sends it to other parts of the brain to interpret reality.
Hypothalamus - Body coordination, and production.
Cerebellum - Movement and language.
Brainstem - Visualization technique.
Visdre successfully created a spiritual brain that matched his brain in reality. He looked at the independent parts and put them together.
He then entangled this spiritual brain over his soul. Since the body he took over was also 'Visdre'. He didn't experience the common resistance that he did when he took over other peoples bodies.
He observed his spiritual body from the perspective of an outsider. His skull opened up revealing nothing. He placed his new brain within the empty skull...
His thinking became far more clear.
He felt far more real, even when in his source castle!
"Let's wake up."