[Update Completed. VISS Driver EX is now available.]

“What was that?” Was that the VISS Driver? Why did I get one of its messages just now? I thought it wasn’t working.

The knowledge of how to interact with the VISS Driver was imparted to me when I first picked it up. The message was so unexpected that I immediately tried to pull up some menus to see if it was actually working.

[Iroha Shinohara: Lv.2]

[HP: 188/188]

[MP: 94/94]

[Strength: 13; Defense: 10]

[Magic: 4; Agility: 38]

[Skill Points: 0]

[Skills: Momentum – Agility Burst Lv.1; Mind – Psychological Attack Resistance Lv.1]

It’s working. Looks like it really is working! Was that because of the update? That makes sense. I brought it into another world after all. Of course it needed an update to be used on this world. Why didn’t I think of that? Nifty little thing that VISS Driver, it even comes with auto-update.

What am I talking about? Nothing about this makes any sense. Whatever I may come up with is just speculation. There’s no point in trying to make sense of the ridiculous.

I’m just gonna be happy with the fact that it’s working again. I don’t get why it decided to start working now and not yesterday. I guess the update just took a while… Again, there’s no point in trying to make sense of it. I was expecting it to not work at all, so just knowing that it is working is good enough for me.

Now only one final question still remains. The most important thing of all… Does my skill work?

I was in auto-pilot ever since I entered the room, and I found myself sitting in my usual chair with my computer and consoles already on. I didn’t want to damage anything, so I got up and moved to a less cluttered part of my apartment.

“Alright. Agility Burst!” There wasn’t a lot of space in the room for me to try it out, but in a single second, I was able to jump from one side of the room to the other. I think my jump could have matched that of a professional long jump athlete, if not for the fact that there wasn’t any more space in my room.

“This is good.” My skill actually works. And it’s as awesome as ever! Agility Burst seems like a really powerful skill! I want to see what else I can do with it. Other skills too, I wonder what other skills I can get. There are so many possibilities. I hope I can try a lot of cool things. Perhaps it really was worth it to risk my life to get the VISS Driver.

There are still a few things on my mind left to answer. When I opened up my status earlier, I saw a few strange things.

[Iroha Shinohara: Lv.2]

[Skill Points: 0]

[Mind – Psychological Attack Resistance Lv.1]

What exactly is this? I’m level 2 now, I got a skill I don’t remember getting, and I remain skill point broke. What happened? I think I got an idea as to why I’m level 2. I think this game liked to give the player experience for things other than combat. Combat was still the main source of experience, but it was possible to get some levels from crafting, gathering, and all sorts of random things.

Maybe running from the guards gave me some experience? But I think I was still level 1 when I got to the portal. So does that means I did something in the real world that gave me experience? That’s cool, but wasn’t the VISS Driver offline until just now? Was it keeping track even when it wasn’t working? That’s really impressive.

I think I can also take a guess as to what happened to my new skill points. I should have gotten some after leveling up, but they somehow got used to buy the new skill. Makes sense, but how did I even buy the new skill!? Psychological Attack Resistance? I don’t even want that! Why was it bought without my permission? Not to mention it locked in one of my six trees! Did I subconsciously buy it somehow? Maybe it’s like how the characters in the game already started with some skills and trees locked in. I didn’t think that it would cost me, though.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

There are too many things I don’t get, but now that I’m back in this world, I should be able to get all of my answers. That’s right, it’s time to pull out my secret technique. I’m gonna cheat! Why do I need to try to figure all these things out when I can just play the damn game and get all of the answers?

Uhmm… what it called again? Weird… I don’t remember what the game is called. I started looking through some of my game libraries, but I didn’t find it anywhere. I have too many games, I can’t look through all these… If only I could remember the name, I should have it somewhere. I remember I bought it on a sale… together with like ten other games.

Well, it’s impossible. I can’t remember its name right now… I’ll have to put it off for now. I’m sure I’ll remember it soon. Next time, for sure, everything will come together when I finally remember the name.

I’m finally home, so I don’t want to think about any unpleasant stuff for a while. All I want is to have fun and relax. I should play something for now.

I started my usual checks before playing. Blanket, bathroom, food, drinks. I have to change out of my uniform too. Only after getting all of these things out of the way can I finally have fun. I know it’s not a big deal, but it still feels like a big chore when I’m so tired.

I’m gonna play for now, but later down the road I should try to do something with the VISS Driver. Using skills is very fun, and it’d be a waste not to use them more. I wanna get more new skills, but that would require me to level up and to have them available for purchase. I hope playing games gives me experience. My level’s gonna skyrocket.

Nah, I don’t think so… Unless it’s different from what I remember, it would take years for me to level just by playing games. I can’t imagine the experience gaming gives would amount to anything when compared to combat experience.

Though, even if I did level up, the only thing I would be able to buy would be upgrades to the skills I already have. The skills the VISS Driver lets me buy are based on what I do and what it deems suitable, so I would get a few gaming-related skills at best.

Hmmm… that doesn’t sound too bad… What benefits could game related skills even give me? Perfect aim? Better reaction time? Reaction time would be good for actual combat, too.

In any case, I wanna get fun skills, and I know getting those is not gonna be easy. I think the best way would be to get a big list of potential skills and then pick the ones that seem cool, but for that, I would have to try lots of different things, so the VISS Driver would present me the skills.

Never experiment, never try new things, never take any risks. If that is supposed to be bad advice, then maybe I’m on the right track, but how can I try lots of different things? I bet most cool skills are combat-related. Will I only get those if I experience different combat situations? How am I even going to experience combat situations?

Accepting the invitation Shinji gave me would probably get me those experiences, but that would mean joining their strange House. I’m pretty sure the training plus some occasional combat would get me something nice, but that means putting myself in danger again… I’m not sure I can handle that. Might be my only option if I don’t want to give up on the VISS Driver. If I’m really placed under surveillance, I don’t think I’ll get to use skills very often.

Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Katja was pretty cool, and Narumi seemed nice. I got the impression that there were other members, but I haven’t met them, so I don’t really know what to expect from them.

If I join, I might be able to become close with Katja and Narumi, and I wouldn’t mind that. I’d have to fight against enemies from the other world, and that’s a little scary. But I have the VISS Driver. It was literally made to allow for combat with those enemies.

I looked at myself in the mirror for the first time since getting back. I’m still me, going into the game world and getting the VISS Driver didn’t change anything. My hair is as golden as before and my pastel red eyes didn’t suddenly get any weird pupils. It’s nice that I managed to become friend with Miyuki, but I don’t think she’ll ever be interested in someone like me romantically.

Her kiss gave me some hope, but at the same time, it crushed all of the hope I had. If she really liked me, it wouldn’t have been so easy for her to do it. I don’t know… Maybe it only crushed some of my hope, ‘cause I hope I’m wrong about this.

What I do know is that I can’t force her to like me, and if she doesn’t like me, I need to have other options. Therefore, I should try to get close with Katja, and Narumi, and any other girls that I can. If it turns out I’m wrong and Miyuki does like me, maybe I can get her to let me have another girlfriend. At least I would make some friends.

Not like any of this would ever happen. It’s gonna take a miracle for even one girl to like me, much less multiple ones. I can’t let the idea of getting with Katja or Narumi influence my decision to accept their invitation. But it’s not like I’m gonna accept it regardless! It’s too dangerous! What am I even thinking? It might be fun to get some new skills, but I’m not convinced… Katja and Narumi too… I don’t know.

Now’s not the time for this. I wanna play something now! It’s time to have fun, not to worry about unnecessary things. After this, I’m gonna watch some anime, and then I’ll go to bed when it gets late.

There’s one cool thing that’s been on my mind since earlier that I want to try. I got a skill that protects against psychological attacks, right? What’s gonna happen if I play a horror game? It counts as a psychological attack, doesn’t it? And so, I put a horror game downloading earlier to try it out. Time to see how it works.

…

After playing for half an hour, I can now present to you the results of my experiment. It fucking sucks! The skill worked, a little too well, even. I’m a bit of a scaredy cat, but not a single jump scare made me flinch, nor did I feel any of the tension from the atmosphere. I didn’t feel a single thing, and that sucks! What’s the point of playing a horror game if it’s not going to affect me? Turns out horror games end up being pretty boring if you remove their most important trait, not that I blame them for being unable to get though my skill.

I was worried that this new skill was going to ruin a bunch of games that try to mess with player for me since it was a passive skill, but I ended up learning that I can turn it off. I was able to get startled again after turning it off, and I was so relieved. Note to self: no games, no anime, no nothing without first turning that skill off.

Whew, that was a close one. It ended up being a pretty fun experience. But enough with experiments for now, it’s time to actually play something. What would be a good pick?