Machines beeped softly all around them. Theo would be lying if he said that the general atmosphere of this room didn't make him a bit nervous. Hospital beds lined the walls, one after another. Of course, these weren't the typical generic hospital beds found in most medical facilities. These beds were designed for the comfort of high profile patients—the ones who could afford all of the bells and whistles. When Theo was laid down, he thought the bed was more luxurious than the one he had at home.

The pillow beneath his head was created to be a cradle for the helmet. There was a small bump beneath his neck to make up for the height difference. It was clear that Radical Interactive wanted this to be the most pleasant experience possible for their demo group.

Half a dozen nurses walked hurriedly around the room, hooking the participants up to the vitals machines and electroencephalograms. Thanks to the cold white sterility of the room, Theo felt like he was there for a clinical trial instead of a game demo. The only color in the room belonged to the clothing of the participants.

Theo was assigned his Felote. He stared down at it, the white surface so smooth and shiny that he could see his reflection.

"Please, take off your glasses and put on the Felote." The nurse attending to him held out her hand for his glasses. Everyone else around Theo was already putting their helmets on.

He acquiesced, still feeling nervous as he slipped the Felote onto his head. For being dark on the outside, his visibility through the visor was near perfect minus his genetically shitty nearsighted vision. Vision problems were easily fixed these days, but there was still no point in doing it until your eyesight had stopped degrading, which Theo's had not.

As he blinked, Theo noticed the first surprising feature of the helmet. With each flutter of his eyelids, his vision became clearer. He was not yet inside the game; this was the Felote compensating for his poor eyesight.

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Stupendous, he thought, already wanting a Felote of his own, wondering how well it worked with the current games on the market. A question for later.

"Please rest back and place your Felote into its cradle," Crystal's voice came through a speaker in the helmet. Or was it a speaker? She was across the room from him, but he could hear her clearly as if she was standing beside him. As soon as everyone did as they were told, Crystal continued, "The demo will begin in 3, 2, ..."

One moment, Theo was staring up at the smooth white ceiling. The next, he was standing in a lush glade. The transition happened so fast that Theo was barely aware of it. Everything he knew of his previous life faded away, yet there was no confusion. It was as if his memory had been completely wiped, and new information filled in to take its place.

The glade was empty aside from a full-length mirror. Theo somehow knew that exploring the glade would be pointless and a waste of time. The trees around him were grouped together so tightly that there would be no getting through them.

He stepped up to the mirror, and his mind flushed with new information. The reflection that stared back at him was his own, yet it wasn't. He stood just over four feet tall, his body broad and stocky. For a dwarf, his skin tone was a bit darker than usual. To the others, he might look like a Halfling, but he most certainly was not. His unruly auburn hair was shaved on the sides but long in the back, pulled into a ponytail that extended to his waist. A magnificent bushy beard fell over his barrel of a stomach. Parts of it were braided, as was the custom of his people. He wore heavy plate armour and had a large two-handed double ax strapped to his back.

Theo enjoyed the mountains, mining, gold, booze, and the smell of fresh dirt. Dealing damage was one of his strengths, and he had the capacity to learn spells that would help him in battle, but his short, stout stature made him a bit slow. Elves were his natural enemy. Those pretentious pricks always seemed to walk around like they were better than everyone else. Just thinking about them made his lip curl in a snarl.

Theo stepped away from the mirror and inhaled deeply, thinking about how confusing the immersion was. He had to force himself to pull free of it. Accepting the invitation for this demo was all about finding Nancy, and yet the second he had looked into the mirror, she had practically been wiped from his mind as if she had never existed at all. This was the power of controlled lucid dreaming. This was the power of The Realm.

Time was wasting. The longer he hesitated, the less likely he was to find Nancy. Resolved to keep his focus, Theo stepped back up to the mirror. It was time for him to enter The Realm Online.