Vivid Stars Online

The next few days passed in a frantic rush as I attempted to keep up my exploring while also managing everything needed for my move. Despite my best efforts, I had to take more breaks than I wanted to in order to sell the stuff I wasn’t taking with me.

While this affected my in-game earnings somewhat, the money I was making by selling my furniture, kitchenware, and so on offset it. The only things I was taking were clothes and my VR pod.

Even the pod I could have done without as the VR facility provided them for a fee, however given the oddities I had been experiencing, I didn’t want to change anything right now.

There was a chance, though I felt it was small, that everything was tied to my pod specifically. And while I was still worried about what it might be doing to me, I couldn’t bring myself to risk it stopping.

Despite my fears, I loved the fact that I was gaining powers in the real world and that I was becoming something special here, too. If keeping my pod guaranteed that it would keep happening, I would put up with the nuisance of getting it over to the facility.

In VSO, things progressed well, even with my reduced playing time. I was making good time toward the base of the next mountain and should make it on schedule as long as nothing else happened.

While I had built some contingency into the plan, most of that had already been eaten up by the extra time I was spending in the real world. Luckily, I was nearly there by this point and I only foresaw one more day of delays.

On the morning of the move, I didn’t log in to the game for the first time in months. It felt odd to break the routine, almost like I was shirking an important duty. It wasn’t a feeling that I liked and I also didn’t entirely enjoy how dependent on the game it made me feel.

After a few moments, I dragged myself from my thoughts and start the final preparations for the move. I had a couple of bags packed and sitting next to the VR pod which had been disconnected from the apartment’s power and water.

The company I had hired to move the pod would be here any second, so I gave the apartment a final once over before leaving the key on the small kitchen counter.

Getting the pod out of the room and down the many flights of stairs in my building was an awkward affair, which I was glad to leave to the two men I had hired. While it cost a little, I felt the time-saving was worth it.

When I first received the pod, it had taken me most of a day to get it up to my apartment, and that was when it had been in pieces. Given that each hour I spent out of the game meant lost money, I felt it was worth it to have the process expedited.

While they manhandled the pod down the stairs, I brought my bags down one by one. Soon enough, they were finished as well, and we loaded everything into the van. After that, I jumped in a taxi and we left for the facility.

My new home was located on the other side of the city in a much nicer neighborhood. From what I understood, they had taken over an old apartment block, gutted it, and then refitted the entire place to their needs.

I had received instructions on what to do, so upon arrival, I directed the van around the back before taking in the sight of my new home. It was a large building made mostly from dull concrete, which had been the style a few decades ago.

While it was unimpressive to look at, I knew from the pictures I’d seen that the inside was a lot nicer. Eager to see it in person, I moved into the building.

The inside held a small but nicely appointed foyer with a reception desk. After walking in and introducing myself, I spent several minutes checking in and receiving my access before one of the building managers came to give me a tour.

The first few floors of the building were communal spaces for the residents, including several kitchens, eating areas, recreation rooms, and a gym. After that were the apartments, including the one I would stay in.

To save on costs, the one I selected was just a single bedroom. I would have to share a bathroom and if I wanted to cook, I would need to head down to the first or second floor to use one of the kitchens there.

While both of those were inconveniences, I didn’t want to push my expenses too far up in a single go. Perhaps over time, I would opt for one of the full apartment options with a bathroom and kitchen, however for now I would make do.

After touring the living areas, we moved down into the basement. While the renovations they’d made further up were impressive, what they had done down here blew me away.

There were now half a dozen full floors below the building, all of them dedicated to supporting full-time VR. Even I knew that this was a complicated process requiring them to manage food, water, waste, and muscle stimulation for everyone in the pods.

Beyond this, they needed several doctors on standby in case of emergencies and a complicated monitoring system to ensure the health of anyone inside. While that was the limit of my knowledge, I suspected that it only scratched the surface of what went on down here.

What was ideal for me was how the facility provided both living accommodations and full-time VR. Since I didn’t want to completely leave my real life behind, this would allow me to keep the schedule I’d had so far during solo exploration while going with full-time immersion for a couple of weeks during my big expeditions.

With the tour complete, I moved up to my bedroom to unpack everything while they loaded my VR pod into one of the underground rooms. That took a few hours as they had to hook it all up and run diagnostics before they were happy, so I had plenty of time to organize everything before it was ready.

I also spent some time wandering around the common areas to see how other people were living here. I even spent nearly half an hour chatting with one of my neighbors who clued me in on the details.

There were usually a couple of hundred people using the living accommodation at any one time, which was only about half of the population. The rest would be down in full-time immersion.

From what I was told, many people were doing something similar to me with a couple of weeks in full-time immersion followed by time out of it. That was nice to hear, as it helped to confirm that I had made the right decision.

All in all, I was extremely happy with my new home. While in some ways I had less personal space for more room, having the full-time VR setup would make it worth it. More importantly than that, this place was safe.

Not only was the area it was in a lot safer already, but there were also security guards on shift to respond to any incidents. Even if that mugger decided he wanted to track me down for revenge again, he wouldn’t be able to make it up to where I lived.

This was in stark contrast to my last place, where he could have probably walked up to my door and bashed it in with no one caring. It was an amazing feeling to be safe again and that alone would have justified the increase in my expenses.

Soon after finishing my conversation, I got a call to say my pod was ready. Eager to use the last few hours of the day productively, I took the elevator down to basement floor three.

Since I would not be doing full-time immersion this session, I could just walk down to my allocated room and use my access to get in. If I wanted to go full-time, I would have to check in with the medical staff first so they could prepare everything and lift the logout restrictions.

It’s a damn good thing I’m doing better with my claustrophobia, I thought with a grin as I moved down the narrow halls. Whereas the upper floors had been designed for comfort, they had designed the underground to pack as many pods in as possible.

After navigating the hallways, I opened my designated door to find a tiny room with just enough space for the pod and a small walkway to access it. With a grin, I closed the door and moved in.

Before I entered the pod, I reached out with my mind and was attuned to it. I let my senses flow over it for several moments before relaxing with a sigh of relief. I had first started attuning to the pod to see if I could detect anything odd and while that had revealed nothing, my familiarity with it now allowed me to confirm that this was the same pod I had been using.

For all I knew, it wouldn’t matter and any pod would have the same effects, however, I didn’t want to leave anything up to chance. While I hadn’t done a lot to investigate how powers were coming into the world, I knew that I couldn’t afford to be left behind.

With that worry sorted, I slipped into the pod and logged into the game.

I had no difficulties making my way the rest of the distance to the mountain, where I located a small dell by a stream just over ten miles from where it started in earnest. I spent a pleasant day there scanning the area for Brian, who still demanded a day’s worth of data showing no major Beasts were in the area.

Then I got a lift back to the city to finish my final preparations. I sold the latest set of cores, loaded myself up with even more supplies than usual, and sent off a final confirmation message to Elana.

I would have done the same for Linnea if I wasn’t scheduled to meet up with her for a second date already that day. With that in mind, I got myself cleaned up again before meeting her.

Our second date was less awkward than the first as we began to get used to seeing each other outside of our professional roles. While Linnea still held most of her past back, she did hint at a childhood spent mostly inside, perhaps suggesting that she had been sickly.

This time the date ended with a heavy make-out session that left no doubt about our attraction being physical as well as mental. I almost invited her back with me, however, my small room at the guild only had a single bed and wasn’t particularly nice.

Instead, I walked her to the monorail station, and we parted with a last kiss while I resolved to book a nice hotel room next time. Then I returned to my room to make sure I had everything prepared.

The next morning, we met up again at Brian’s landing pad along with Elana. From the way she was smirking at us, I got the feeling that Linnea’s sister had demanded all the details from her the night before.

She seemed approving, at least, which was something of a relief, as I knew they were extremely close. It would have been quite a problem if Elana was against me.

After a quick round of greetings, we packed everything and began the flight. For most of the flight, Brian and Elana were chatting away about spaceships in the front seat while Linnea and I whispered in the back.

Then shortly before we arrived, Brian spoke up. “Are you expecting company, Jared? We’ve got another VTOL that’s still following us. I thought it was headed to that new fishing village, however, we passed that a few minutes ago, and it’s still on our tail.”

“No, I’m not expecting anyone,” I said with a shake of my head. I wasn’t sure why anyone would follow us all the way out here, however, I doubted it meant anything good.