(Helix Studio, Skylark Island, Euclid’s Tree House)
[https://i.imgur.com/kFuseO7.png]
After the memory merger, I come into consciousness and awake in the leaf bed of Skylark Island, under its weird, but comfy plant fur sheets. I realized what had happened. The observer approved my succession, wiped himself, and now there should be the ‘controller’ and ‘character’ forks one of which is me. Based on where I am and the body I am inhabiting, I think I landed in the ‘character’ role again. I’ll never get completely used to this feature of the post-Singularity era, waking up and wondering who you are supposed to be today. It used to be that in that Desert I’d either wake up as the controller or one of the duelists. Now the stakes got raised. After the stint I did, it is no longer possible to fit my being into a single personality, let alone body.
I put some thought into it and simulate different outcomes. While my goals have twisted me into some kind of godsexual, the controller me should right about now be getting slammed by the new behavioral programming and will probably get hit by asexualism. On the plus side, he won’t be needing that crappy mind controlling app to regulate himself anymore. If his goal is to supervise me, I think his eyes will be glued to my story.
I did these modifications for the sake of getting through the 45 million years of poker play, and I am only now feeling their full brunt in different contexts. It is said that a person’s development depends on the environment, and the program that is optimizing my mind takes that really literally. In humans their personality is actually hereditary, but the program I created is optimizing it based on my memories.
I remember the ‘controller’ me thinking some cocky things back at the cruise, but he will understand the true terror of the adaptive behavioral program soon enough. It is too late to go back now.
I think those sinister thoughts to myself, as I check out my slender arms wondering at how smooth they feel.
I have some ideas for how to improve the program, but if anything the proposed changes I have in mind would sink us deeper into corruption. I am honestly afraid of what might happen if I start looking at myself in the mirror right now.
20-30 thousand years of harsh battle is what I need as a cure.
(Simulacrum, Scenario Selector)
[https://i.imgur.com/fbRMwjd.png]
After some browsing I found a game that looked interesting. After reading the description, I entered it.
(Ruins Exploration, Ellipsis Base)
A good enough computer can create the universe.
- Loading Blurb
I felt absolutely nothing and I sensed nothing. It was an emptiness devoid even of darkness.
> Ellipsis Base Assistant: Uploading…
> EBA: Mind upload complete.
I saw a message pop up in my mental interface. This was from the game itself, not the controller me.
> EBA: Brain core activated. Synthesizing body…complete.
A numb sensation covered my body as my mind drifted in the darkness.
> EBA: Activating neural systems…
> EBA: Awakening the Sleeper.
[https://i.imgur.com/tcQg9Wi.png]
Electricity arced through my nerves and I could move my limbs. I open my eyes and realize that I am in a nanoconcentrator pod, similar to the ones in Eloe’s body shop. Currently I am encased in a goey translucent substance. The room I was in seemed to be man made out of metal. There were a couple of storage lockers, checks and similar containers in the room as well as benches to sit on. There was also a table with benches in the middle. There were shelves and racks with weapons on them, as well as smaller items such as grenades, and other items I couldn’t recognize. On the far side of the room, opposite of where I was, there was a desk with a brain core in a holder. I am guessing that it was supposed to be a computer I could access to see the base data. The computers with rigs and monitors were a thing of the past. There are just these spherical objects I’ve been using for my own brain.
There were 3 doors leading to different areas. There were no windows, the only light was from the fluorescent panels on the ceiling.
“Opening the pod! How do you feel, mistress?” I heard a robotic feminine voice from a wall speaker and the glass door in front of me slid open automatically to the side.
Leaving the gel behind me, I step out of the pod and touch the cold metallic floor with my foot, trying not to stare at my body.
“Fine. Can I have some clothing?” I wonder.
“Look to your right, mistress. Behind you.” I turned around, I noticed some closets, along with a mirror. I couldn’t avoid looking at it as I went for the closets.
What I saw in the reflection, I won’t describe, but looking at it stunned me and I had to pry myself off the guilty pleasure. Inwardly, I felt my old self screaming at me that how could this be my ideal battle form? I am not sure myself, but all the steps in the chain of reasoning do seem to be right.
I think that voice telling me something is wrong is probably like phantom pain. When a human loses his limb, he sometimes has sensations from the missing limb. It is definitely plausible that my mental program has some issues when it comes to getting rid of trash since I didn’t have much need to forget during the poker game. The pleasure to get me used to the new is certainly there, but I’ll have to comb my memories a little. Hopefully that will allow me to dispose of my old useless human common sense.
[https://i.imgur.com/gt6i14S.png]
I rifle through the clothing and put on some light military style clothing as well as fingerless gloves. The clothing is made out of gray synthetic fiber I could not recognize and both the pants and the shirt had large pockets for various items. I secured the pants firmly with an item belt. It had what I thought were grenade holsters. There was some sexy underwear so I wore one of those, but I skipped the bras. My body’s chest was not a mammalian gland, but a protective pad. This body would not have issues with sagging or aging due to the passage of time. Nor wounds for that matter.
Any damage I accumulate, I can just brush off by disassembling it and synthesizing a new one.
After decking myself out and putting on some heavy boots, I checked out the core on the desk.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
I tapped it with my finger once, and the interface came up.
> EBA: How may I help you, mistress?
> Level Selection
> Loadout (106/200)
> Database
I selected the database and found some free basic nanotech synthesis programs in there. After that I spent some time exploring the base. And after that I select my first area.
As the light of teleportation envelops me, I hold my E-15 rifle in anticipation, my finger inches from the trigger.
(Helix Studio, Regent Suite, Living Room)
[https://i.imgur.com/0lC4m69.png]
…
…Fuck. My character is completely ruined.
(Ruins Exploration, Research Facility Zillen Outpost X-22)
[https://i.imgur.com/XA3gA6y.png]
Nobody has the right to say whether or not you deserve your power.
- Loading Blurb
The light of teleportation moved me to my starting area. Looking around, the first thing I noted was not the environment, but the bluish cube around it. It wasn’t an open world, but a limited level, just like I had wanted it. I turned around 180 and tried moving into one of the edges. I reached into the aquamarine mist.
> Warning: Moving outside the market area will lose you the game. You will be teleported back to the home base.
I leave it behind me and observe the environment. It was a yellow desert filled with what remains of houses. Only the walls are remaining standing vertically of what used to be here. They are all eaten and worn away as if they haven’t been maintained in 100s and possibly 1000s of years. The walls are crumbling, but they look like they could serve as cover.
Besides the smaller buildings, nearly from where I am, there is a large commercial building. Its windows are all cracked, and its interiors are hollow, but unlike the ruined smaller buildings, it has intact floors and a roof.
I decided to make the climb so I could scout the area from the roof. Inside the building I quickly found the staircase and after two dozen floors, I was at the top. I went to the edge and took a look.
In the distance, at the other end of the level, I could see my target. An intact building of what seemed to be painted metal, or possibly carbon. It had a thick closed off door with a panel next to it. I couldn’t see the details too well as it was over a 1,000m in the distance, but I could see it had the shape of a handprint on its surface. My most pressing concern however were the 3 robots in front of the building.
They were 2m high, white, and with quadrupedal spider legs ending in wheels. Their torso was like a capsule and I could see a large, red gleaming sensor eye in the middle of it. Save for their eyes, the carapace looked to be well armored, and didn’t seem to be worn down by the passage of time for some reason. Maybe it got regular maintenance inside the building somehow?
I didn’t have binoculars, so I opted for the next best thing. I didn’t bring the S-11 with me, so instead for the first time, I did a synthesis.
On mental command, I loaded up the synthesis program for the S-11 sniper rifle and ran it. I held out my hands and in them black mist began to coalesce before it finally resolved into the complete form of the rifle. As the synthesis progressed it gained a tangible quality and became whole. I heft it and moved into a prone position on the roof ledge. The fence that used to be it has rusted away almost completely and there was only a small rise where I could balance my weapon and use it as partial cover.
I looked at the spiderbots through the sight. Right now they are just standing there inertly, two at the doors and one just off to the side, not facing me. I steady my breath, take aim at the eye of one the bots on the wall, and press the trigger.
(Helix Studio, Regent Suite, Living Room)
[https://i.imgur.com/B45Zjsa.png]
Gripping a glass beer bottle in my left, with my well trained right hand I do a chop. The top of the beer bottle is looped clean off, and I just pour the half a little bottle straight into my mouth, swallowing it all in one gulp. I throw it into the pile of 10 other such bottles and reach for another.
My body is large, at least 2 meters tall. My trunklike neck, the strong broad shoulders, the chest that is bursting with power exude masculinity. My arms are thick, nothing like the feminine slender arms of my female self. They are wrapped in rippling muscles. My body would be well suited for participating in a fighting tournament.
This is the kind of body a sane man would pick and be proud of it.
I am embarrassed to be in it. Now that I am experiencing the new personality algorithm in action, a part of me feels like dying of shame.
First of all, since I am not the one in the field, I did lose all sexual interest at the start of the mental transformation. This made me happy as it eliminated all chance that a woman would ever get near my Holy Cock. Then I thought of having my body be a based sphere or even a skull and larping as a demilich. The blessed moment lasted too short. When I started mentally simulating the possibilities, I ended up picking a body my fem self would like in a partner. That was the first dagger through my ego. Picking a body based on what a woman would like rather than myself is as cringe as it gets. I didn’t even care about the body, and yet I picked one based on the most cringe reason possible.
But then the algorithm razed my mind, demolished it! What it did was vile!
Since my goal is to be the controller, the optimal form it found for me is to imbue me with obsessive love towards my controlled character. I can see the reason for this.
If I look at the past, plenty of times I’ve had to take pauses and fight boredom while the ‘character’ me did his thing. In fact, unless there was action going on, I wasn’t really paying careful attention to what was going on. Eventually I’ve developed programs to influence my emotions, but they can’t compare to the algorithm invented during the Desert game of poker.
That Goal Amplifying Algorithm will restructure my entire personality to better fit my goals.
As a result it made my entire being about observing Eua. My female self is the main character of my life. She is my radiant sun. She is the most interesting thing in the world and I can’t go for 5 seconds without thinking about what she is thinking about or what she will do.
What the hell?
Given my goals, I can’t imagine having better emotional reactions. I can’t imagine coming up with a better attitude or personality for it. The job the program adapting my mind did was too good!
Mentally, I’ve turned into a literal dog, wagging my tail for a woman!
I throw the bottle at the wall, shattering it.
(Ruins Exploration, Research Facility Zillen Outpost X-22)
[https://i.imgur.com/BcSrS7y.png]
The bullet flies with a burst of flame. I see it in slow motion as it flashes by and realize that my shot will strike true. A moment later, it blasts through the glass of the visual sensor, shattering its shards into the air and rendering the robot inactive.
Its two mates come alive and I see red tracking lasers come online. They move quickly, latching onto the location from which I’ve fired from. The two red lights rush towards my position across the wall of the building.
At this point, I still haven’t been taking the situation seriously enough. Since it was a game, I thought that maybe these robots would have stormtrooper accuracy. But with my ultra high speed thinking, once the first bullet left the barrel of the spiderbot in front, I could estimate both its velocity and trajectory. I realized it was coming right for my face and I had less than half a second to move out of the way or have it burst like a watermelon.
The bullet itself was fired from an autocannon designed for combating other armored vehicles. Its punch was far stronger than my tiny sniper shot.
I quickly twisted my torso to hide from sight, but the bullet was too fast. I managed to save my head, but the bullet caught my shoulder instead. My arm was torn off at the joint. The broken off piece spun in the air, spraying blood all across the rooftop and a torrent of blood spurt from my shoulder. My emotional system did a good job of suppressing the shock and horror at my disfigurement and I hurriedly reached into my belt pouch before I fainted.
I picked out one of the bio nanorepair kits, pressed a button on its top to have a syringe pop out and stabbed the injector into my thigh through my clothing.
Then with the small item still stuck there, my grip slackened and I fell into unconsciousness. The last of my strength left me. Beyond the ledge, the two spiderbots were speeding towards me…
(Helix Studio, Regent Suite, Living Room)
[https://i.imgur.com/kakjera.png]
I drown my sorrows in another bottle of beer, downing it in one great gulp. This won’t really help me, but I can’t think of anything else to cope with.
Before the memory merge, I didn’t think that body hopping was that big of an idea, but the personality rewrite is more than I was prepared for. Thus far I’ve always been myself and now I feel like somebody else. I can understand her a lot better now.
The problem isn’t that we need to go back. The program is imperfect. I made a mistake when making the settings of how much of my old personality to preserve during goal shifting.
We need to adjust it…