Waking up at 4 like she always did, Vera Salvatore was ready to meet the day like it was on purpose. Leaving her husband Nick in bed, she went to her personal training studio in the courtyard outside. After some light stretching, she did 30 minutes of martial training with her preferred weapon, the bo staff, and 30 minutes of intense unarmed forms. She then finished up her morning workout with some more stretching, this time focusing on extension.
As she walked down the hall and into her bedroom, she saw Nick laying in bed like a lump. ‘Every Morning!... I swear I’m going to poison his dinner one of these days. That man is a constant migraine. Come on Vera, don’t focus on the negative. You’re better than that, and you love him. He is a great husband. He bought you that Castle and Son’s hand-stitched pair of boots for your birthday, which he REMEMBERED.’ She walked right past him as her internal monologue ran in her head simultaneously berating and praising her husband, like it did every morning.
Meticulously groomed and ready, she took the time to double check herself in the mirror. She nodded to her reflection with a smile.
Walking back into the bedroom to check on Nick, she found him laying on his back with his mouth open... like a putz. She sighed and walked over to the overly large bed.
Picking up her pillow, she used it to hit him in his stupid face, ‘SMACK’ “Get up Nick, you have Mr. Walker coming in this morning and you have to file a report on his status by 3pm for the intake board.” She didn’t bother to stay and appreciate his resultant fight with her pillow. Walking downstairs, she felt much better.
Starting the coffee maker with a wave of her hand, she sat down and activated her link. Joining the house system, she searched for any alerts or updates. Aside from a city-wide alert about the 100 man squad of Gurs that were killed last night, there was nothing important. She heard the chime for her coffee and got back up. She smoothed out her robes, and collected her favorite mug from it’s place next to the sink. Memories of her visit to the ‘Sanctum of Perseverance’ ran through her head like they always did as she filled it with her artisan coffee blend. Now supplied with coffee, she collected one of her pastries from Pellitie’s bakery, and sat back down to address her personal pings left over from the day before.
‘Arg… I’m going to kill Bennings,’ she thought. Yesterday after she told him that he needed to focus on ‘helping people’ rather than just following protocol, he took it upon himself to contact the parents of Rodney Tipsman and tell them that their son was the only survivor of a merchant raid by Gurs. ‘Well, there goes my morning. That’s the last brick in his house of failure. I’m going to send him to Jenny over in disposal and reclamation services. She’ll find him a job that even HE can’t screw up. Maybe he’ll learn something,’ she thought with a sigh.
Setting a reminder about dealing with the Tipsmans, she continued to go through paperwork while she sat and enjoyed her breakfast. Finishing the last bite of her pastry, she closed her link and just enjoyed the silence. That pleasant sensation lasted a good 3 seconds until the kitchen door opened loudly to Nick walking in. Opening her eyes, the first thing she noticed was that his hair was still wet.
Much too loudly, Nick said, “Good morning darling. That Nero kid is coming in at 7 right?” without waiting for a response he kept walking and waving his hands as pots and plates started flying out of cabinets.
‘How can his hair still be wet? I bought him a hair dryer!’ She wondered with a frown growing on her face.
“How great is it that some soul fused with a kid right near Dorchester. It could have happened anywhere. With all the essence activity down there, it could have happened in the middle of the war in the south. Then that soul would have just been kicked right back out when they died again. It’s so interesting! You know, I’ve gained a lot of growth from just talking to him. That kid is an experience engine. By the way, did Jonas ever get back to you about the non-military engine design that I submitted to the Travelers Board? What was I saying?… Right! That kid Nero is something else. I really like that grindstone thing. It’s imp-”
“NICK!” She interrupted.
Everything in the room stopped. Nick’s breakfast was half made and his toast was floating immobile in the air.
She took a deep breath and said, “It’s 6 in the morning. Calm down. Nero will be in your office at 7am. Your report on him is due at 3. Jonas said that it’s in committee, but no one thinks it’s worth the effort; not when it’s so much nicer to have an intelligent mount. And for the love of the gods PLEASE clean the dishes when you’re done.” Seemingly having vented her frustration, and once again at peace, she returned to her coffee and closed her eyes.
Sufficiently chagrined, Nick went back to his breakfast preparations in silence.
Soon, they were out the door and walking across their courtyard to their private astra-platform for teleportation. Vera once again complained in her mind about the fact that they wouldn’t allow private platforms in the lower city due to energy concerns. It cost enough for that to be a reasonable argument, but it didn’t help her get to the office any quicker. Nick was talking about something which she was doing her best to ignore.
‘Farthing better have his expense reports filled out for the c-103’s or I’m going to have him go through all of the duty sheets for last week. That will show him,’ she thought as she and her husband stepped off the platform, now in lower 7th.
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The alarm went off at 6, and I shot up in bed. Since I didn’t have a link, I couldn’t interact with my room station to turn off the alarm. ‘That’s number one on the list then,’ I thought as I stumbled around trying to figure out how to make the noise go away.
Seemingly without me doing anything, the alarm turned off. Looking around the room, I couldn’t figure out what happened. I was wide awake, and I realized my morning was starting off with an overwhelming feeling of unfinished business. This did not bode well for the rest of the day.
Shaking off my tension, I tried to get control of the situation. I walked over to the desk, still naked, and sat down to start writing a list of what I needed to get done.
‘1: Ask the front desk about a link. If they don’t have one, get one from Nick. 2: Breakfast. 3: Off to Nick’s office. 4: Lunch.’
Reminding myself not to forget the map I was given, I made sure to place it next to my pad of paper.
Finished with my anemic list, I ripped it off the pad of paper and placed it on top of my map. Staring at the four short lines, I decided I needed another list.
I labeled this one ‘Things to poke Nick with’:
‘1: Economy/job’ I wrote with relish. That’s a nice easy topic to start with. And sooner or later, the state was going to want to kick me out, and I was going to have to pay for things myself.
Thoughts of taking care of myself led to my next idea. I grabbed my sad first list and added a ‘5: Sign up for combat classes’.
‘Combat seems to be a big part of life here, and maybe the basic class will have some magic,’ I thought with a smile.
With a nod to recognize how great an idea that was, I went back to the list for Nick.
In bold letters, I wrote ‘2: Magic training’. Then I underlined it twice.
As I tried to think of anything I was missing, I remembered that I was supposed to have a meeting with Mrs. Salvatore too. ‘Why am I calling her Mrs. Salvatore and NOT calling Nick Mr. Salvatore,’ I thought to myself, and then immediately answered my own question. ‘Because Mrs. Salvatore projects an image of a professionalism with leadership qualities, and Nick comes off like someone who gets excited about ant farms.’
Looking at my two, admittedly, thin lists, I adamantly ignored that I didn’t have much to do and proudly thought, ‘This should be enough to get started.’
Time was wasting, so I grabbed a set of clothes and a robe from the cabinet, then headed to the bathroom for a shower. ‘That time-sense thing is still weird,’ I thought as I dropped my clothes on the counter and got down to business.
After getting my appearance taken care of, I collected my lists and my map, then left for the front desk.
The entryway was a mad house. Well, it was this world’s equivalent of a mad house. Everyone was standing patiently while waiting in lines going back 15 deep, and all the clerks at the counter were occupied. The entryway was filled with people leaving to start their day, while the class-board-hub-station-thing for classes was surrounded by patient people waiting for their turn.
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‘This is what the DMV would look like if everyone had their morning coffee, there was no traffic on the way, and the employees enjoyed their jobs,’ I thought.
Looking around, I decided to just ask Nick for a link rather than wait in line. Decision made, I headed off to grab a cup of coffee, and whatever they have that resembles a pop tart.
After collecting a glazed pastry of some kind and a conveniently large paper coffee cup full of morning bliss, I made my way through the crowd toward Nick’s office.
Against all odds, I arrived on time. Leaving the elevator on the 5th floor I saw a new person at the desk.
As I walked up, I could see them making notes while their temple glowed blue through their link. I waited patiently for their call (or whatever they call it) to finish. Once the little blue light turned off, the lady at the desk looked up and said “Good Morning, how can I help you?”
“I have a meeting scheduled with Nick Salvatore.” I said.
“One moment please. Name?” she replied, and her link lit up again.
“Nero Walker”
After a few seconds, she frowned and look confused. She then looked up at me and said, “He’s in lab 3. Just head down that hallway and follow the signs.”
I gave her a nod and walked off. From a few feet away I heard her mutter, “Good luck”.
‘Well, that’s not ominous at all. What the hell is he going to have me doing? I thought we were just going to talk about my identity and the world and stuff. Now that I thought about it, I had no idea what was supposed to happen. This should prove to be interesting at least,’ I thought.
The signs were easy to see, and I found the lab without issue. The doors were large and metal, but they didn’t have a handle. Not seeing what I was supposed to do, I knocked on the door. Not hearing anything when I knocked lightly, I decided to give it a good whack. Soon one of the doors activated, and it slid into the wall and disappeared. Nick was standing there with a confused and annoyed look on his face. He looked around like he was expecting a group, and then his eyes focused on me.
“What are you doing boy? Why didn’t you ping the door? You can’t just bang on things. I understand you don’t know anything, but common courtesy transcends stupidity,” he shouted as I just returned a blank stare.
“Well?” he asked.
I decided that if he was going to be a hothead, I’d return his snark in kind, “I’m guessing I’d need a link to ‘ping the door’. I don’t have a link.”
“How do you NOT have a link, You can’t enter the city without being registered, and if you don’t have a link you can apply for a temporary one until you can buy one. Everyone has a link, unless you live in the middle of nowhere.” Nick said. His logic was impeccable, but he was still wrong.
“Well, I came in with the soldiers from the merchant train massacre, then I got dropped off at the center. It just never came up. And I’ve seen lots of people without a link on their head. People do take them off don’t they? As a matter of fact, didn’t you already know all this? Why didn’t you give me a link yesterday? Aren’t you supposed to be part of my ‘intake’ or whatever? Do I need to talk to your supervisor?” I asked in mock anger.
That put Nick on his heels. Seemingly stunned, he didn’t seem to know how to respond. “What? I am the supervisor.”
The confusion seemed to take the wind out of his anger-kite. Taking a step back, he lowered his tone and seemed to welcome me into the room. “Don’t worry about it, we’ll get you a link. To answer your question, people do take their link off. They put them in their pocket and wait for them to ping. The city network uses them to find people and if someone gets injured they automatically call for aid. The military and guard usually have implants, or are high enough level that they don’t need them. Although very few people in Dorchester don’t need a link. Almost everyone has a link, because everyone uses the thought-hub. Hell, even higher level mounts have a version of the links.” Nick explained in a tone that calmed down the situation.
Although his words did nothing but raise my eyebrows in panic.
“You’re telling me that this is a police state! People are being tracked and monitored at all times? How is the network managed? Who holds the keys to ultimate power?” I rattled off questions in rapid fire as we stood just inside the door.
Unconsciously, I refused to enter further into what appeared to be some kind of research lab. Large machines and crystal apparatuses were all over the place. There were even large open areas with dummies, both wood and metal, lined up for testing. Although the walls were still wood and fancy looking, this was definitely a domain of science.
Nick’s eyes widened and he looked confused. He leaned back and interrupted my rant. “What the hell are you talking about? What’s a police state? I understand the words, but you make it sound terrible.”
I lowered my voice, now containing my burgeoning fear, and said in a whisper, “A police state is where the population lives under threat of police action at all times. Every action they take is monitored and judged as to whether it is detrimental to the state. Harsh and immediate punishments are given out for anyone causing trouble.”
Nick leaned forward, listening intently. “And?” he asked, as if waiting for me to go on.
“You’re alright with that?” I hissed.
Nick gave me a look that I was increasingly becoming familiar with. It was his ‘you’re an idiot’ face.
“I’m too tired to talk to you without coffee. Just follow me and don’t touch anything.” He walked off, rubbing his forehead, and headed toward a kitchen station along the wall. I could hear him mumbling complaints about ‘frames of reference’ and ‘stupid assumptions’. I followed, a little confused, and now much more suspicious about the links.
Pouring himself a cup of coffee, he added some sugar-like substance, then gestured for me to grab one. He then sat down at the table, while sighing like an old man. Taking a sip, he took his time collecting his thoughts.
Looking me in the eye, he said, “I think you’re having a context issue. Let me explain what the links are, and what they do. I’ll also give you a little general world knowledge so you can stop being so ‘shocked’ all the time. I haven’t been around you much, but your expressions are getting annoying.”
He took another sip of his coffee and continued, “Let’s start with a little history. The history of this region is very long and much too large to cover in detail, so I’ll be covering a broad view of the topics in question. This way I can give you some general information from which you can draw your own conclusions. By the way, I’ve never met anyone who can give me a headache when I try to follow their line of logic. It’s very annoying, while also quite refreshing.” Taking another sip, he held his hand out to the side and a shimmer in the air created a small hologram of the city, it was HUGE.
He started his lecture as the hologram provided a visual aid. “This is Dorchester. Founded by the line of Dorchen a little over 1800 years ago. It was ruled by that line until Linas Dorche took over and was caught embezzling funds. He was then executed by the Populators, which are best described as kingdom-wide guards that search out corruption and serve the people first, then the royals, then lastly the nation. Dorchester is currently ruled by Lord Heleema Cosgrave. The Cosgraves assumed control at the behest of the royals a little over 600 years ago.”
While he was talking, I watched the hologram fly over and through the city until it abruptly zoomed out. Now I was looking at a large swatch of land with sections of mountains and lakes all the way of to the sea with some islands. There was a region highlighted in orange that covered most of the map named ‘Oglivarch’, with many dots like Dorchester peppered across it, many on the coast.
“This is Oglivarch. As you can see, Dorchester is just one of the cities near the southern edge. This region here,” a small section near the bottom of the map lit up in blue. “This is known as ‘The Strates’. Dorchester is just one of the cities that are under Duke Michael Stratting. Well, his wife actually rules from here,” and a city named Stratting lit up in the selected area, quite far from Dorchester. “The Duke is in the capital of Oglivarch, representing the interests of The Strates.” Another dot lit up much nearer the center of the country.
My mind was blown. “Hold on,” I interrupted, while waving my hands to ward off the information overload. “I’m never gonna remember all this crap. How big is this world, can you bring up a globe?”
Nick shrugged, and took another sip of his coffee. The hologram zoomed out, and out, and then I got my first look at my new world. I couldn’t believe it. There were tons of land masses, no continents as I knew them. There must be 50 of them. I watched in awe as the globe lazily spun above the table. I asked Nick, “For frame of reference, can you show me where Oglivarch is on this map?”
The globe spun to a stop and tilted a little. On one of the land masses, not even near an edge, was a tiny discoloration. “That’s Oglivarch on the continent of Plastia. Which is named for the great dragon that calls this continent her territory,” Nick continued, as though what he just said wasn’t fucking crazy.
I pointed at the little blemish of a country and said, “You mean to tell me, that the entire country you showed me earlier, which was already big, is in just that highlighted section?”
“Yup” he replied.
“That doesn’t make any sense. How is the gravity of the planet not crushing people right now?” I exclaimed.
“I don’t understand what you're asking,” Nick replied confused.
“You know what gravity is right?”
“Yes”
“You know how to use science to determine gravity?”
“Yes”
“And the math checks out that a human being can be on a mass this size and not compress into a pancake?” I asked incredulously.
“Um…. Yes,” Nick replied, still confused. “Look Nero, I’m pretty sure your soul came from somewhere pretty far from here. The soul doesn’t really hold memories as such. It is simply WHO you are. Then the mind shines those memories on the soul and visa versa. So when your soul took over your body, which was at the time empty of a mind and soul, it imprinted the mind it had available. Although you don’t remember everything, there are a lot of underlying assumptions you have about how the world works that are just wrong. That’s not a bad thing. It’s an entirely new perspective. Whatever function that happens during the cleaning process in the upper planes, didn’t work correctly on you. You have a perspective from what is likely an entirely different section of space. Maybe a different plane. Definitely not anywhere around here,” Nick finished with a smile as he drank the last of his coffee and got up to get more.
I sat there in silence trying to filter what Nick said through my understanding of what happened to me. ‘Ok, no more assumptions. Or, at least, fewer assumptions,’ I promised myself. ‘This world is gigantic and I know nothing. I’m gonna have to hug Nick’s leg until I have some idea as to what I should be doing. This transmigration thing is not as easy as it looks in the webnovels.’
Nick returned to the table, this time with a bagel in addition to his coffee. “Now about the link. About 500 years ago, it was found that you could use essence crystals to create a mind link with a willing partner. Hugo Dieter was a genius, and he used this theory to create a large Thought Center for people to pool their knowledge. It didn’t work at first, because everyone was fighting to find a mind in all the congestion that amounted to the first Thought Center. Luckily, Plastia got annoyed at all the noise the psychic field was generating and came to figure out what was causing all the shouting. You see, an interesting feedback happens when using a large essence crystal to filter more than 10 minds… Doesn’t matter, that’s not relevant right now. Anyway, she showed up and scared the crap out of everyone. See, in the entire history of Oglivarch, people only knew of her through legends. So when a dragon showed up the size of an army outside the gates, then shrunk herself to be a woman and walked up asking to be shown…”
Nick paused as he started laughing out loud, as if he was reminiscing about a college story. “Sorry, this is my favorite part. Gods bless that man for recording the entire history of his discovery. Anyway, she walks up to the gates and says to the guard who is frozen in fear. ‘Take me to the idiot who's injecting his stupidity into an essence matrix loudly enough for me to hear it from across the damn continent.’” At this point, Nick was slamming his hand on the table and howling.
It took a while for Nick to finally compose himself and continue his lecture, “Over the next few years, she showed Dieter how to create a programmable essence matrix to filter and store information. The Thought-Hub doesn’t really allow for personal interaction, it would melt the brain to filter it on your own. So through a series of matrices, different functions were developed, with new ones being developed every day. If you don’t want your information on it, no one will care. The tracking function, while automatic, is only queried as a byproduct of something else. That term you used before, the ‘key to the kingdom’, doesn’t exist. It would be much easier to just have a mage scry for you, and teleport the guards to you. An entire division of Logicians are dedicated to trying to filter OUT information from being arbitrarily collected and unused in the Thought-Hub. The link became so widespread because it can’t be weaponized, and it is safe. It really is just a place for you to store your information in a way that no one can get access to without your knowledge. If you want to get into the science behind it, feel free. No one is stopping you.”
Nick finished his second cup of coffee, and stood up dusting his hands. Then, with a flick of his wrist, his cup flew toward the sink and landed without a crash. “Now,” he said, “Enough of you learning from me, now I want to learn from you. We’ve already wasted enough time on things you could just read in a book. Come along now.” Then he walked off toward one of the testing areas.
‘This guy is just begging to be fucked with,’ I thought to myself, as I watched him walk off while just assuming I’d follow.