Level Up - Part One

A loud and pained groan escapes my lips as I writhe on my couch, the harsh morning sun burning at my face as I strive to block it out with my hands. The previous night is a bit of a blur, bits and pieces of my friends birthday party rattling around in my heavily dehydrated skull.

"How much..." I whine, slowly inching back on the couch as I press myself against the armrest. Slowly but surely I begin to slide into a seated position, my whole body sagging as I feel my stomach churn and ache from the abuse I had put it through.

The train ride in had been fine, the plan had been so simple. Bringing a bottle of wine I had hoped for the night to be a relatively causal time amongst friends, one that would have left me feeling fine the next morning to start my usual job search.

What I didn't plan for was the host to have brought out the Everclear, making a fruity punch that turned the slow and relaxing night on it's head. By the time people started trying to fumble their way home most had passed out around the house, taking up the sofa and spare rooms before I even had a chance to stake a claim.

Feeling relatively fine I just decided to catch a cab home, not wanting to sleep on the cold floor boards despite the sickening nausea beginning to grip me.

 

As my eyes flutter open I find them oddly shaded, a pair of rose gold sunglasses with pink lens resting on my face. I cock an eyebrow, confused at the unfamiliar accessory though certainly not disliking the added protection my achy eyes have from the disgustingly bright morning sunlight.

"Where did these..." I croak, rolling from my seat as I begin to stagger my way towards the kitchen in search of some sweet sweet water.

As I reach the tap I quickly shove my head under he faucet, pouring cold water into my mouth and down my chin as I let out a soft sigh of relief. Guzzling down the water I feel the sun glasses begin to slide out from behind my ears, the thought of hem falling causing me to reach up to hold them steady.

"Syncing..." comes a soothing female voice, the digitized tone buzzing in my skull through some sort of bone induction speaker.

I lurch back up in surprise, blinking rapidly as I hear the soothing tone repeats itself. "Syncing..." it chimes, a faint three tone beeping soon following as it plays some simplistic music.

I struggle to remember how I even found these things, my stomach sinking as I wonder where I could have gotten a pair of smart or Bluetooth glasses like this. Finally it hits me, the memory of the cab ride suddenly gurgling forth much like the punch the night before.

I had asked the driver to pull over on the way home, stopping in a taxi rank along a row of clubs and bars in the center of the city. The scent in the gutter was foul, the sight of vomit slowly running into the sewer doing little to ease my stomach. Thankfully I had managed to hold my liquor, the cool light air helping to calm me down.

It was there that I had seen the glasses, the pink set sitting just barely beneath the taxi and in serious danger of being run over. In a drunken haze I had snatched them up, throwing the rose gold frames on as a bit of a laugh without even thinking about their owner.

"Shit..." I mutter, rubbing at my temples as I try to kill my headache. "Should I have..."

"Syncing complete" chirps the digital assistant, her cheery voice filling my head. "User profile corrupted, Invalid class found: Jobless Joe. Nearest equivalent: Jobless Janet..." it coos, the lens suddenly coming to life as a series of little windows begin to open around my vision.

I snatch the glasses from my face, the audio and the windows in the lens shrink away. I stare down at them with wide eyes, the thought of how much these glasses could be worth causing my blood to run cold.

"What the hell are these..." I groan, slowly pulling them back up to my face. As the arms of the glasses touch my skull I begin to hear the assistant again, the soft cooing having continued while away from my face.

"...mer class ineligible under current conditions. Generating new options..." it states calmly, the pause allowing my eyes to shift over the windows.

I spot the front window immediately, a central semi-translucent pane reading;

 

Name: Jordan Hughes

Age: 28

Class: Jobless Joe - 2/Nerd - 4

  

My heart skips a beat as I read it, the thought that the device somehow knew my name causing me to break out in a cold sweat. What if the owner had this information? What if they thought I stole these damn things.

Suddenly I'm snapped back to reality as the digital assistant speaks up, happily chirping in a seemingly prerecorded voice.

"Options to restore character generated, please let me know if you'd like to hear more..."

If feasible via technology, so long as a civilization gets sufficiently advanced and have the requisite drive then the creation of virtual worlds is inevitable. So long as they have the capability to create more than one of these world then the odds of being a part of this virtual environment only grows with each hypothetical instance.

This is the world in which I lived, one small time dilated instance of the 21-st century running on some deep dark server in a university basement. In theory, it was simply designed to assist in trying to understand sociopolitical factors leading up to the 2050's and the climate implications both before and after.

While each instance ran for centuries and centuries, starting in the industrial revolution and continuing indefinitely, most 'users' chose the 21st century to join the game. After decades of running the students and staff monitoring the simulations had always been observers, mostly joining in to watch from the inside on a few rare occasions, though it didn't stop those on the project for the long term from making their own little game in the ongoing system.

Individual parameters were isolated and codified, creating distinct and separate classes. Before long entire trees were designed, allowing visitors to level up and develop their own character in the simulation.

To assist in playing this 'game' users would be given a pair of glasses to help them interface with the internal system that had been created. From altering the code to even migrating servers, these glasses allowed for those limited few on the project to intuitively interface with a program that had largely grown beyond their comprehension.

Over far too much tinkering with the system it had become more of a game than an interface, altering the code inside the simulation based on actions that glasses comically referred to as quests while doling out boons and bonuses for their completion in the hopes of leading people to enjoy certain types of lives.

Still, given the free and wild life many of these staff and students lived the glasses didn't remain entirely secure in any of the simulations. Before long, across multiple servers there were loose sets of these interface devices in the hands of simulation natives. Without a real way to track these down, and certainly not wanting to invalidate the experiment or lose funding in admitting their mistake, those involved simply ignored the issue.

What trouble could a few simulations get up to anyway?

Pausing for a second I squeak out a response, my voice faltering as I struggle to muster my words in any confident manner.

"Um... I'd like to hear the... uh..." I mutter, swallowing hard. "I'd like to hear the options" I finally manage to croak out, a small chime ringing inside my skull.

"New voice recognized, user confirmed as: Jordan Hughes" the digital assistant chirps, saying my name in an oddly natural manner. A pleasant chime plays in my head, the ascending and cheery tones sounding like a start up sequence.

I watch as the windows in the lens suddenly close, the sight suddenly being replaced with three new windows with various blocks of text.

Restore:

Return to Previous Class Profile

Restart:

Begin From Tutorial With Tool Tips

Recreate:

Begin From Select Beginner Class

 

I pause as I see the option, the cooing woman's voice soon repeating the options listed on the lens in front of my eyes. For a second I pause, unsure how to select anything on the glasses.

"Do I just..." I mutter, reaching out in the open air. My heart seizes up as my fingers seem to catch one of the windows in mid-air before dragging it around in the 2D space of the glasses.

"Manual input is not require" coos the voice in my head, seemingly understanding what I was trying to do. "Just state your choice and I'll do my best to assist."

With a wave of my hand I manage to get the window unstuck, watching as the 'Recreate' window seems to shrink into the distance. I pause as I look over the options one more time, my pounding headache making the act of simply reading them all the more difficult.

Unsure of what any of this even meant, I simply decide to pick...