*A few minutes after Simon left the Hospital*
Helen was sitting on her bed, using her laptop to check for information about the ‘special program’ Simon had mentioned earlier. Once she heard about it, Helen simply couldn’t stop thinking about it, and she endlessly searched the web until she found the information she was looking for. Indeed there was a rumor floating around describing a special program to let people with disabilities to play the game and enjoy the use of their disabled limbs again.
Once she had found this information, she hungrily continued to search the internet, exhausting every single forum and web page with any details at all about this program. While she was in the middle of searching, she heard a knock on her door. “Helen, it’s me, Marissa. Mind if I come in?”
“Yeah, go ahead.”
The door opened and in came a young woman wearing a nurse uniform. Her medium-length blond hair was tied up into a bun and her blue eyes seemed to give off a bit of a shine. When Marissa looked at Helen, she noticed that she was slightly agitated. “What’s wrong Helen?” She asked, “Did your brother tease you too much again?”
“Ah, no.” Helen replied with a slight blush. “Though he did tease me… Wait, that’s not important. This! Look at this!” Helen said as she urged Marissa to look at the page she currently had open on her laptop. A quick look at the words written at the top of the page instantly caused Marissa to let out a VERY wide smile. “Marissa? Why are you smiling?” Helen asked while tilting her head.
“No… it’s just… *pffft*” At this point Marissa was trying to suppress her laughter. “It’s just that the page is… hehe.”
“So what if I want to play the game!?” Helen felt a little offended by Marissa’s laughter. “I can hope can’t I?”
“Hehehe… Okay, okay… I’m done. Sorry.” Marissa wiped away the tears that were starting to form on her eyes. “Helen, want to make a guess as to why I’m here?”
“Uhh… my checkup?”
“No silly. I’ll give you a hint. It has something to do with that page you have open.” Marissa said, giving a sly smile.
Helen’s eyes went wide as she stopped processing everything for a moment. Her heart began beating rapidly as she digested the information just given to her. She began to speak slowly, as if in disbelief. “This… you mean, It’s real? I can… I can play? I can walk?”
Marissa continued smiling as she switched to a more formal tone. “Helen Aden, you have been chosen to be one of the first participants in the special program: New Game Plus. The details of this pro-”
“YES! I SAY YES! I can play!!! EEEEEEEEEEEEKK!!!” Helen couldn’t contain her excitement and let out an ear-piercing shriek. Marissa let out a laugh, already knowing what Helen’s answer would be. She still had to go through protocol though, so she handed over the clipboard she had been carrying with her. “Since you have agreed, please read the fine-print carefully and sign at the bottom of the page.”
Helen took the clipboard with trembling hands, almost dropping it in the process. She quickly skimmed through the details and fine-print, barely registering any of the information other than the most important part: She could play True World Online!. After reading the information at lightning speed she hastily scribbled her signature and thrust it back to Marissa. “When can I play? Tell me, tell me now!”
“Whoa, calm down a little Helen.” Marissa chuckled. “If you’d have deigned to read the fine-print properly you’d know that you can be playing within 2-3 days. Oh, but here’s some bad news.” Hearing that, Helen instantly deflated and got a little nervous. “W-what kind of bad news?”
“Just that you’d only be able to play for a certain amount of time each day. It’d be bad for your health otherwise.”
Helen let out a sigh of relief. “Phew! I thought it was worse, like I had to pay for it or something.”
“Actually, about that Helen,” Marissa began. “You would have had to pay, but someone else has already paid for the entire thing. In fact, it was this same person who recommended you for the program.”
“Really? Who was it?” Helen asked with a tone of surprise as she began to think. Hmm… Whoever had to recommend me for this program has to have some sort of relation with the Dimen company, otherwise they wouldn’t even know about this program yet… They should also be rich and personally know me as well… Then that leaves only one person! Once Helen finished her train of thought, her eyes widened as she realized who it was. Marissa noticed this and said, “That’s right. It was Sophie who paid for it.”
“Sophie…” Helen murmured. Simply uttering her name brought forth a well of emotions that surged up. A mix of happiness, sadness, and anger appeared in her eyes, but they were all quickly dispelled. “Well… I have to thank her. Did she show up here?” She asked.
Marissa nodded. “Yes. She personally came to the hospital to deliver the news to your doctor. Hehe, she even asked us not to tell you it was her, but I know that you would want to know who it was at all costs.”
“Damn right!” Helen exclaimed. “I swear… it’s been so long and she still hasn’t forgiven herself… When is she going to grow a pair and talk to us directly!?” She angrily shouted. Marissa could only sigh helplessly at Helen’s outburst. This girl is just a large bundle of emotions... She thought to herself. Whenever she was this agitated, usually only Simon would be able to calm her down. In an attempt to change the subject, Marissa re-directed Helen’s attention to the game. “Well then, I’ll be leaving now to let the doctor know of your choice. We’ll both be seeing you tomorrow for your checkup and updates on the game.”
Helen quickly switched gears as she excitedly said, “Okay!”
“Hehe, try to get some sleep tonight Helen.”
“I make no promises!”
Marissa exited the room, leaving the excited Helen to sit there with her thoughts. Many sleepless nights were spent as she waited impatiently for her gamepod to arrive, and in this manner a few days passed…
*Some room inside the hospital*
“Well Helen, this is your new room. How do you like it?” Marissa asked as she helped Helen into the room. Helen took a quick look around the place. It wasn’t very different from her previous room with the walls being pure white, but it was visibly larger in order to accommodate… “The gamepod…” Helen whispered. Staring at it, she felt another rush of adrenaline surge through her veins as she could barely contain her excitement.
“Help me in! I can’t wait!” Helen was just about ready to jump out of her wheelchair and crawl to the machine if she had to.
“Okay hold on a second. Jeez Helen.” Marissa laughed and picked up Helen. “...Have you lost some weight?” she asked, feeling that Helen was a bit lighter than usual. Helen looked away with a blush on her face. “I… couldn’t sleep for the past few days. Just the thought that I could walk again would keep me up for hours.”
“I see. Well, you’ll be able to soon.” Marissa smiled and slowly lowered Helen into the gamepod. “Now remember Helen, the doctor says you can only play for up to 6 hours at a time, and then you have to take a break. Got it? You’ll be automatically kicked out from the game if you don’t log out in ti-”
“Yes yes, I understand! Could you close the pod please?”
“Hehe, have fun Helen. Oh right, are you sure you want to keep this a secret from Simon? You know he’s going to visit tomorrow right?”
“Yes. I want to keep it a surprise from him. Now close the pod!”
“Impatient aren’t we? Well, here we go then.” Marissa closed the pod and heard a muffled scream of delight from inside. Smiling wryly she walked away and left Helen to play.
*Inside the gamepod*
This is happening. Oh my god this is happening! OH MY GOD!!! Helen was screaming both inside her mind and with her own mouth as she waited for the pod to start up. Suddenly she felt a fuzzy feeling in the back of her head and slipped away from consciousness…
When her eyes opened she found herself in a pure white room, sitting on a chair. She was hit with a strangely familiar feeling, and one she realized what it was she froze for a second. She tried moving her toes, and to her amazement, she saw them moving! A smile slowly crept onto her face as she began to move the rest of her legs, moving to her foot, ankle, knees, and thighs. Tears were beginning to form at the corners of her eyes, but she quickly wiped them away. No! You don’t get to cry yet! She scolded herself in her mind. Not until you can stand with your own two feet!
It was at this moment that a window appeared in front of her, but she ignored it completely as she began to put force into her legs. Slowly, ever so slowly, she rose up off the chair. At first she was using her arms to push herself up, but eventually her weight was transferred onto her legs. Then, she stood there. For what felt like hours, she simply immersed herself in the feeling of standing with her own two legs. Tears rolled down her cheeks as a wave of emotions ran through her.
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After wiping away her tears she focused her eyes and tensed her body. This is it. She thought. This is… my first step… And she lifted her right leg and took a step forward. Suddenly, she lost her balance and fell over onto her side. She felt a bit of pain in her leg, but that only made her grin like a madman as she picked herself up and tried to walk again. She fell over a few more times, but each time she would be more encouraged, more willing to take that one step, and gradually, she was able to walk forward. “Haha… hahaha… HAHAHAHA!” Helen laughed loudly while she also cried. Strangely enough, this didn’t feel strange to her, rather, it felt natural. She stayed like that for several minutes, letting out all the emotions she had pent up for seven years inside of her at this one moment.
Eventually, she was aware of another presence in the room with her. She turned around to find a beautiful woman with jet black hair and pure white wings who stood silently, staring at her. “Ah! Um… H-hello, nice to m-meet you.*sniff* My name is Helen.” She said in a trembling voice as she wiped away her tears. “Hello Helen. Welcome to the world of Felnia. My name is Cim, and I will be your guide in creating your avatar.”
“Hello Cim. Wait… you’re Cim? The Central Intelligence Manager C.I.M?”
“Correct.”
“Wow… you sure have come a long way.” Helen said while Cim looked at her with a blank stare. “Uh, anyway, we’re making my character right?” Cim nodded and a mirror appeared in front of Helen.
Seeing her reflection, Helen felt like crying all over again. It just didn’t seem real, being able to see herself standing on her own two legs. She held back her tears though as she focused on the task at hand. Cim spoke up as Helen stared at herself. “Here, we will be creating your character. First of all, please select your race.” Once she finished talking a window appeared in front of Helen with a list of the races, but Helen disregarded it as she asked, “Which race has the strongest legs?”
“Those would be either the Beastkin, Dwarves or Draconian races. They generally have more physical strength than other races. ”
As soon as she heard Draconian, Helen immediately felt attracted to it. Dragons were always her favorite mythical creature, and to play as a dragon (or at least as close to one as possible) was like her personal romance. Hmm… the beast-kin sounds like something Simon would choose. She thought to herself as she asked, “Can I get detail on the Draconian races?”
“The Draconians are a proud race whose lineage traces to the ancient dragons of old. They are few in number, but are very powerful. Much of their might comes from their strong bodies, while their innate skill [Dragon Breath] allows them to breathe out an element depending on what they are attuned to. Their tough scales allow them to disperse some damage from physical and magical attacks, but they are not very skilled in using magic.”
“Sounds good! I choose the Draconian race.” A window appeared in front of Helen asking her to choose an elemental attunement. Her choices were between Fire, Water, Wind, Earth, Light, Dark, and Void. She stared at them for a moment before asking, “Which elemental attunement gives the best physical boosts?” Once she stood up, she realized that she didn’t want to ever feel powerless again. The pain of not being able to move her legs was eating at her for years, and so she decided to have a strong body, so she wouldn’t feel helpless, at least in the game.
“The Earth element provides more boosts towards the body.”
“Okay, Earth it is then.” Helen said as she pressed it on the window in front of her. The Helen in the mirror began to change shape to become more muscular, and she also started sprouting dark-brown scales. Her facial features become far rougher and her eyes changed to resemble that of a lizard. She also sprouted curved horns from the corners of her forehead that went around her head.
“Wow… it’s kind of weird seeing my own body so muscular. It’d probably look better if I was a guy… wait. Hey Cim, can I be a guy?”
*Inside a T.W.O. monitoring room*
A man was sitting in front of multiple computer screens, relaxing and eating breakfast, when suddenly a notice was flashing on one of the screens, indicating that Cim was requesting assistance. Clicking on the notice the screen changed to an image of Cim’s face. “What’s wrong Cim? I just barely started working and you have a problem already?” He said with a slightly exasperated tone. He got a sudden call from his boss telling him that he was needed to work to monitor the new players from the New Game Plus program. “And it was supposed to be my vacation day too…” he muttered.
“This is to inform you that a player has requested to switch genders.” Cim said coolly.
“Again!? Haven’t I told you already that if a player requests to switch genders that they can? Geez. This is like, what? The 1000th person to do so?”
“I have remembered the orders from before sir, but since this player is part of the New Game Plus program they have special treatment and I have not been ordered to treat them the same as regular players.”
“Ooh, that explains it.” The man nodded in understanding. “Well… permission is granted. Also, if the NG+ players ask for similar things, you can let them change genders or whatever.”
(A/N: I’m lazy. NG+ is fine.)
“Understood sir. I will now be closing the line.” The Cim on the screen disappeared and the man was left by himself again. “Heh, even disabled people want to change their genders? Guess people just aren’t happy being themselves… Anyway, what was I going to do again? Oh, right. My interesting list. Let’s see what you players have been up to…”
Opening up a few files, he began to read the log which recorded the exploits that the players had performed. He began sipping his drink as he randomly clicked on a player, and read what they had done. *Pbbbbbbbttt* The man did an amazing spit take as he screamed out loud, “SHE SOLOED A BOSS 15 LEVELS ABOVE HER!?!”
*Back in the character creation room*
After learning that she was cleared to change her gender, Helen immediately did so and the figure in the mirror changed again. This time the figure changed into a relatively tall man with a brawny build and dark colored scales. The hair disappeared and his face elongated to look like a snout, while his eyes became far more fierce and cruel. The horns also became a lot larger and looked far heavier than they were before.
“Grrr.” Helen bared her teeth and the draconian in the mirror also snarled back at her, showing his sharp jagged teeth. “Whoa, that’s intimidating.” She commented as she began to modify her new character. She made the scales turn into a very dark brown, and changed the shape of the horns so that they curved about halfway around the head and then jutted outwards. She also added a bit of muscle to the rest of the body, just because she felt like it. Finally, she modified the eyes so that the irises were red, and made the teeth just a bit sharper than before.
“Haha, Finished!” She said as she looked upon her creation with pride. In the end she had created a 6 foot tall, incredibly intimidating draconian. “All right, now for the most important part… the name! Let me think…” After a bit of contemplation, with random names like Mepleza or Lectus coming up in her head, she eventually settled on the name she normally used for playing male characters.
“My name will be… Zeilan!”
“Are you sure you want that to be your name?”
“Yes!”
“Would you like to go through the tutorial, or jump straight into the game?”
“Tutorial please. I need to get used to my new body first.”
“Is that your final decision?”
“Yup.”
“Very well. You will now be transported to the tutorial level. Have a wonderful stay in the world of Felnia.” Cim said with a smile.
The room began to fade and Helen lost consciousness as well. By the time she woke up, she was in the game...
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A/N: Why hello there. Didn't think I'd actually get around to finishing this chapter today, but I got really hyped from posting my story here and just rolled with it. So... about these "Helen" side stories, they're going to be a regular thing from now on. Well, once every few chapters or so. Her part of the story will move a bit faster than Simon's with time skips and other stuff. I hope you guys enjoy Helen's character as much as I do. I honestly had no idea how to go about making her character when I first started, but all of a sudden this Helen came out. Funny how that works huh?
Fun-fact: My and my friend (who sort of acts like my editor) went back and forth with each other trying to come up with a name for Helen's character for like an hour. Eventually we I settled on Zeilan by force.
P.S: I know quite a lot of things in this chapter is similar to Simon's character creation, but Cim IS an A.I after all. It's not like she'll change her way of talking or thought process in a snap. Also, what can I say? The siblings think on a similar wavelength.