I don’t know how long I just lay there, unable to comprehend what was happening. Eventually, however, the pain coming from my side demanded my attention.

When I deflected the gun earlier, I had taken a graze along my side as it went off, and it had been bleeding lightly ever since. With a grunt, I pulled my shirt off and began trying to staunch the bleeding.

It was surprisingly easy, and I wondered if my Psionics were the only thing that had bled across from the game. I had survived a nasty cut during my last mugging, one that had healed up nicely on its own.

Was that natural, or was it indicative of a tougher-than-normal body in the real world? I had also just run for several minutes and then won a fight. Was that normal? Or was it a sign of increased endurance?

It was a rabbit hole that could draw me in forever if I wasn’t careful, so I forced the intrusive thoughts aside for the moment and began making my way back home.

Luckily, I could use the maps app on my phone to navigate, as I still had little idea of where I had ended up during my frantic run. It took me about ten minutes to return, during which I had to ignore the curious looks from people I passed.

I had to look bad with no shirt and a crude, red-stained bandage on my side. Still, it went to show how bad things had gotten around here that no one even paused at the sight.

Once inside, I began cleaning and bandaging the wound. I could only hope that it would heal just as well as my arm had. While I could afford a visit to the hospital now, I wanted to avoid that, if at all possible.

Who knows what they might notice about me if, as I was suspecting, my body had changed from a normal human baseline? While I was curious to know, I had no desire to become a spectacle, or worse, a subject of experimentation.

Just how deep does this go? I thought as I finished and flopped down on my bed. That mugger sounded like he’d seen Psionics before, so it can’t just be me. Just how many people are being affected like this?

A couple of options sprang to mind, though all of them sounded crazy. The first was that I was naturally Psionic and playing the game had just taught me how to use it. That didn’t feel right to me, however, as it would suggest there had been other psions around for at least some time.

I didn’t think that kind of hidden world could actually exist outside of fiction, at least not for any length of time. That suggested it was something new, something tied to VSO.

The game had been out for a couple of months now and I was sure there were people out there who had leveled a lot faster than I had. If the real-world effects were tied to progression in the game, then it made sense that some people would be ahead of me.

It was a worry that those people had been obvious enough that some random mugger had known about them, though I had heard nothing about it on the Internet or on the news. That led me to suspect that it was a criminal thing, perhaps some kind of Psionic super criminals.

Just great, I thought with a sigh. That’s just what this city needs, literal supervillains. Psionics seemed to have massive potential with dozens, if not hundreds, of abilities, and I could only shudder in thought about what might be possible.

Thankfully, I, at least, was much weaker in the real world than I was in the game. My head was still aching from just using my power once and it was bad enough that I hadn’t even tried again.

Hopefully, that meant that anyone else was similarly weaker. If there were full-powered psions walking around, then everyone was in trouble.

Though, I mused as a thought hit me. Is it just Psions or are there super-powered soldiers out there or genius engineers making super tech? There were dozens of classes in the game and potentially all of them might be changing people.

It really depended on what was actually happening, and what the actual cause was. The obvious culprit was my VR pod, the one that I had been using every day for months.

The pod had been super cheap, suspiciously so, looking back. I had assumed it was to lure people into the game where they really started squeezing you for money, however, there might be another reason.

Could they know? Are they selling all these cheap pods to deliberately cause this? Or is it a side effect that no one knows about? While it seemed like VSO would have to know about it, if that was true then why spread them around everywhere?

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Was it some kind of test? Using all the players as test subjects to see what happened? Or could they be unaware of what was happening, having accidentally created technology capable of causing this?

It was even possible that they had grabbed the technology from somewhere else and didn’t know what it did. While I wasn’t one to cry aliens at the first sign of something odd, it was an explanation.

I hadn’t been able to believe how realistic VSO was compared to the other VR games I had looked into. Perhaps that was the answer. If they somehow found alien technology and incorporated it into their pods and infrastructure, then all sorts of odd things could happen.

I simply lacked the information required to solve the puzzle now, and thinking about it more would just be a waste of time.

Instead, I took a deep sigh and stood up. Whatever was really going on, I wasn’t about to stop now that I had finally started making money. Even if the pod was changing me in ways I couldn’t understand, even if there was some kind of shady plot going on, I was going to keep going forward.

Besides, this is basically like a progression story, right? And the answer in every progression story is the same, just get stronger. I didn’t know what was going to happen in the future, though I couldn’t believe that it was going to be good, so the only thing I could do now was to prepare as much as possible.

That meant returning to the game and continuing to level up and increase my Psionic powers. It was something I was going to do anyway, I just had even more incentive now.

With that in mind, I returned to the pod, only hesitating for a moment before shrugging and getting inside.

----------------------------------------

Once I was back in the game, I returned to exploring despite the thoughts still churning in my mind. Thankfully, exploring solo was a demanding job that required my full attention to avoid being ambushed.

This allowed me to sink into my work, pushing aside the thoughts as I did so and giving me some relief for that day and the ones following it. In fact, I threw myself into the work even more than normal, making excellent progress as I did so.

In my time out of the game, I tested my psionics as best as I could with the fractional amount of energy I seemed to have in the real world. Much as I had thought, they were present, but at a much weaker level than in the game.

I was even weaker than when I had first gained the Item Attunement ability, being only able to use it once before having to wait for my energy to recharge. Given my playtime, this meant I could only use it two or three times per day depending on when I took my lunch break.

Given my most recent trouble, I decided to just stay in and exercise as much as I could in my apartment. I would move to the new VR facility in a couple of weeks, so waiting that long wouldn’t be too much of an issue.

Even if the mugger had promised to leave me alone, I wasn’t going to take that at face value. Part of me wished that I’d just shot him, however, the rest of me was glad that I hadn’t. Fighting in the game was one thing, killing someone in real life was something else entirely.

Though, I thought with a shudder. Who knows what’s going to happen in the future? Or how bad things are going to get here in real life.

In VSO, I continued to progress well, making my usual average income and pushing toward level nine. This was actually a little concerning for me as I would soon have to select a new class skill.

While this was a good thing normally, I didn’t have another Psionic Ability to link it to. While there were some general ones I could take, I felt like it was a bit of a waste.

I read on the forums a while ago that the skill system changed after level ten. Where it had originally been just one post, there were now hundreds of people confirming it, though details were scarce.

While I couldn’t find the details, it sounded like the rate at which I gained skills would be decreased. Given that I wanted to make sure that the last class skill I might gain for a while was tied to an actual ability.

I considered looking around for any hints of people experiencing strange events in real life, however, I eventually decided not to. I had already seen the level of information control that VSO had over its forums, and I didn’t want to even suggest that I might know something.

Instead, I returned to the game and continued farming while trying to force my Psi sense to the max. Ideally, I would get another ability before, or soon after, gaining enough XP to reach level nine, and a wild rift seemed to be my only option.

While it strained my concentration to use Psi sense while looking out for danger, I soon saw results. After a day of using it constantly, the skill reached level four, and two days after that, I finally sensed something.

It was weak, however, it felt just like the rift down in the cave had. While it took me away from my planned route, I felt it was worth it and changed direction. Several miles later, I was looking at a thick copse of trees atop a hill.

That’s it, I thought with a laugh. I would have loved this before overcoming my claustrophobia, it’s a rift just sitting out in the open after all.

Shaking my head to clear it, I began approaching slowly. While I couldn’t be sure that the rift was guarded, I felt like it was the more likely outcome. Psi energy made Beasts, after all, it only made sense that they would congregate on a powerful source of it.

That meant either a single powerful enemy, like the Grand Cave Worm or a group of weaker enemies. Since I was alone this time, I had to be cautious on approach, as it wouldn’t take too much for me to become overwhelmed.

I considered calling for backup but decided to at least scout it out first. If I could handle it myself, that would be best, if not, I would retreat and try to get at least one more person along to help.

The hill was quiet as I strode up the exposed section, extremely quiet, in fact. I couldn’t hear any small animals or reptiles moving around in the scrubby bushland, nor were any bird calls sounding from the trees ahead.

That can’t be a good sign, I mused as I drew my pistol. Something living in those woods has killed or driven everything off.

With that in mind, I approached slowly, monitoring my watch for danger.