Valkyrie: Virtual Me

By Michael Ocheskey

Lisa Hampton's life is full of monotony.  With no family or close friends, her life has been a daily routine that includes work and little else.  She has always dreamt  of being spirited away from her existence and thanks to SimTech's new Simulated   Reality Universe her wish can finally come true.The Simulated Reality Universe is a system similar to virtual reality, but features complete immersion.  The mind is drawn into the system and all of the senses are active, making it almost indistinguishable from reality.Join Lisa and her avatar, Valkyrie, as she delves into the world of Evanasia and all the wonders and dangers it has to offer.  Experience the grand adventure that will turn her world upside down, challenging her perspective on friendship, love, and loyalty.  Struggle alongside Lisa as she encounters dragons, goblins, other fantastic and mythical creatures, along with her most dangerous adversaries of all, other players.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Siren Song Publishing
• Release date: Feb 16, 2021
• ISBN: 9781950005055

Michael Ocheskey

Michael Ocheskey was born and raised in Cheyenne, Wyoming and has a love for creativity, especially animation, music, movies, books, and tv. He loves digging into human creativity and is currently working toward starting multiple businesses that allow him to utilize that creativity. He is an author of primarily fantasy, but some sci-fi elements as well, and owns Siren Song Publishing, a newly created micropublisher for up-and-coming fantasy, sci-fi, and horror authors. His education was vast and varied. While he did not receive a Bachelor's degree in college due to multiple major changes, he is proud of the education he received. He was able to learn many topics that enhanced his writing and artistry including psychology, philosophy, foreign history and literature, music, anthropology, education courses, and many more. Ultimately, he ran out of funds and was forced to drop out of college before obtaining his Bachelor's degree. He currently works as an independent contractor, delivering for apps such as DoorDash and Instacart  to pay the bills, but is simultaneously working toward his goals and dreams of supporting himself solely through his creative endeavors as an author and entrepreneur. He is working toward establishing multiple businesses including a company that designs card and board games, an animation production studio, and Siren Song Publishing, which is currently a vanity press, meaning he is the only author it publishes, but he is hoping to expand it into a small publishing house with around a dozen authors in time.

Book preview

Prologue

For me, it was the opportunity of a lifetime. I had never been much for the gaming world. In fact, I considered most games to be pathetic wastes of a person’s time and intellect, but something about this game drew me to it.

My employment at New Tech, New You magazine required my attendance at the SimTech designers’ panel, but even if I hadn’t been a columnist I would have been among the crowd. Today’s announcement was going to change the future of the gaming industry. At least, that’s what the press release said.

As I stood amidst the front of the gathered crowd, pen and pad in hand, preparing for the upcoming panel, I found myself becoming giddy with excitement, which was a relatively strange feeling for me. Nothing had excited me this much since I’d received my first book as a child, The Complete Works of William Shakespeare.

Most children would have been more excited to receive a toy or a pet. I wasn’t most children. That was a fact my parents quickly picked up on and continually pestered me about.

While other children were out playing, I was studying. It didn’t matter what. Knowledge was my life and I lived it well. I read everything I could get my hands on. Books, magazines, newspapers; these were my toys. As I grew older, I realized my mind didn’t work the same way other people’s did. The way I viewed the world around me, my social interactions, even the way I learned were atypical. Knowledge seemed to imprint itself on my mind and I rarely forgot anything that I’d learned.

My parents claimed I grew up friendless, but that wasn’t true. I had many friends. My friends all existed on the written page. I loved immersing myself in the vast fictional worlds I encountered whenever I opened a book and preferred those worlds to my own. I longed to be a part of those worlds, to be spirited away. Perhaps that was why I didn’t like video games. Video games weren’t realistic enough for me. I never really felt a part of those worlds. It was always: push a button, watch computer graphics, repeat; like the instructions on a bottle of shampoo.

By the time I was an adult, I had already accumulated enough knowledge to have any career I strove for. I chose to work as a journalist so that I could continue to expand my knowledge through researching the articles I wrote. Besides, my language skills were my greatest asset, spoken and written alike. I was multilingual, and my language skills also included the realm of computer programming. A career where I was able to use those skills was my greatest desire.

Today, I stood among the masses gathered to report on the unveiling of what SimTech was billing as the ‘be all, end all of the gaming industry’ and ‘the last game you’ll ever buy.’

The crowd was getting restless as we waited. The press conference was scheduled to start five minutes ago and SimTech was notorious for never being late with panels, interviews, or press conferences. The noise began to rise as the crowd murmured amongst themselves. When the noise was almost deafening, the spotlights from the edge of the stage flared, lighting the center of the stage.

I heard a metallic clicking noise and the humming of an elevator in motion. A middle-aged man rose from the center of the platform, his arms outstretched theatrically, a broad smile rested on his face. A small podium blocked from his waist down. It was covered with a black cloth.

A hush fell over the crowd. The anticipation in the air was almost palpable. Roland Evermoss greeted the crowd with a silent wave like he was humanity’s savior and spoke into his wireless headset.

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Roland Evermoss, founder and CEO of SimTech. All of us at SimTech welcome you to the greatest day in our company’s history.

Oh, hell. This was going to be long-winded. Just as in previous announcements, Roland Evermoss turned the event into a spectacle. First, he would recap the company’s achievements and ramble for a few minutes to build up suspense as we all awaited his company’s latest achievement. I wouldn’t need to take any notes for a while.

As if to not disappoint my expectations, Roland cleared his throat dramatically, scanned the crowd with a false smile of remembrance, and continued, When I first had the dream for Simulated Technologies, or SimTech, as we’ve come to be called, it was a dream of bringing the distant future into the present. Yes, with the brightest minds in the world...

I snickered and shrank into non-existence as a few heads turned.

Roland continued as if he had heard nothing, which was likely. He was lost in his speech. I was sure a meteor could have struck him and he would still be speaking.

...we have given you the very things many said were nothing but science fiction. We have brought you hover-cars running solely on hydro-electric power, androids and gynoids to assist in your daily lives and make them easier, bio-mechanical prostheses which look and operate like real limbs and organs, the best in recycling technologies, and now we bring you the greatest experience of your lives.

Roland ripped the black cloth off the podium in front of him to reveal his latest device. I had to squint to see it, even from the third row. It appeared to be sunglasses. They had pitch black lenses that I was sure no one could see through and were visor shaped. Apart from their shape, they looked unassuming.

It was rather disappointing considering the large screen behind the panel. All the excitement building up in me withered. I could feel it deflating and not at a gradual pace.

I know they don’t look like much now, Roland addressed his depressed congregation, but there is more to these beauties than meets the eye. Let me demonstrate.

The screen behind Roland switched on and a split-screen view from the cameramen in front and behind showed every angle of his head. He slid the glasses on and pressed an unseen button in the corner of the lens. The temple bands that rested on Roland’s ears began to expand and wrapped around his head until the two bands clasped together.

Metal bands sprouted from all around the now-solid temple band, some reaching over and the rest under the band. They encased the entirety of Roland’s head. Some of the metal bands connected to each other while some connected to the visor-like lenses hiding Roland’s eyes. The whole process took only a few seconds and by the end Roland appeared to be wearing a robot head.

A security guard from SimTech walked onto the stage with a chair in his hands. He placed it directly behind Roland and helped sit Roland down. It appeared that with the visor on Roland wasn’t capable of moving his own body. The security guard pulled a USB cord out of his pocket and placed one end into a jack on the back of the helmet. The other end he attached to the side of the television.

The television screen shifted and instead of Roland's encased head, a man who looked much like Roland, only wearing armor and carrying a sword, was standing in the middle of a dark and eerie forest.

Hello, Roland spoke in a voice that sounded like his, but as a much younger man. He continued his explanation from inside this new world. "Unfortunately, this screen doesn’t do this world justice, but let me explain it to you as best I can.

"These are the fruits of seven years labor at SimTech; the very first simulated reality game in existence. Of course, this isn’t just a game. This is an entire universe with complete immersion. In this universe users are only able to create one account and only one account is allowed per visor. Once a visor has been worn for the first time it memorizes the wearer’s mental frequencies and will only operate when the one with those frequencies wears it. This is meant as a security measure much like fingerprints or retina scans.

That person is then brought to the registration process where they create their account and character. In order to preserve the realism of this simulated universe, only one character is allowed per user account. The character you create can be anything you want. The system uses a unique programming language we call mental programming. It combines computer script and a system which can interpret the electrical signals in our brains, recreate those signals, and relay them to our brains. This is how we create the complete immersion atmosphere with all the body’s natural senses. The only sense which is dulled is the body’s ability to feel pain. A player can choose to play without pain or with varying degrees of pain from one to fifty percent.

Roland continued talking to us as he moved through the world around him, coming upon a few hobgoblins. He engaged the hobgoblins in a fight and the crowd gasped. These non-player characters were intelligent. Unlike the games I’d tried to play and tired of quickly, these monsters didn’t simply charge at you from the front and keep swinging. They dodged attacks, tried to get behind Roland, counterattacked in unpredictable ways, tried to throw Roland off balance, and improvised in their attacks. They even went so far as to pick up rocks and sticks to throw at Roland and toss dirt at his eyes in a failed attempt to blind him.

They engaged Roland in fierce battle for a few minutes and then retreated. I’d only ever seen NPCs retreat in a few games and that didn’t usually happen until they were on the verge of death and weren’t able to move at more than a crippled pace.

This was different though. These monsters weren’t near death and moving slowly. They were running at full speed as if they had made the decision that they shouldn't fight anymore. It almost seemed like they weren't following an algorithm at all. These creatures seemed to possess real intelligence, and as impossible at it may seem, actually possessed free will. Most of them were uninjured or had only a few scratches. They probably could have won the fight if they’d continued. It was as if they realized the fight was taking longer than it should and decided to abandon Roland for easier prey.

When it was safe to talk, Roland addressed us again. Only now he was huffing with exertion. "The NPCs in this game have all been programmed with the greatest of artificial intelligence technology SimTech has to offer, making them every bit as independent as we are. They don’t simply follow a set of preprogrammed functions. They live in their world just as we live in ours.

"What’s more, this isn’t just a game. This is a complete universe designed to function in a multitude of ways. There are countless worlds and galaxies in this universe. Even we don’t know how many because the system AI who controls every aspect of the simulation is constantly creating new features for it. New planets, new NPCs, new plant life, and many other features are always being added. Just as the universe is constantly changing in our reality, the universe in this simulated reality does too.

"There are worlds in this game that were created to direct specifications such as the fantasy world I’m in, but there are other worlds that were created without any specifications by the system AI. These worlds were created for the purpose of exploration. No one, not even SimTech personnel, know what these worlds hold which makes the exploration a fun new feature for players.

"The worlds span genres, with some worlds designed for fantasy gamers, sci-fi, sports, war, historical, and even real-life worlds to name a few. If it can be imagined by the users, it can be done in the simulated reality. There are even more serious features for non-gaming use.

"Earth 2.0 is a world where serious matters are taken care of. People can attend school without leaving home, do virtual shopping inside an actual store where the items you buy are then sent to your home via mail or store personnel delivery, or even attend business meetings. Now people can gather from all over the world for a business meeting in the same virtual room. No more telephone or video conferences that get cut off from poor reception or spending money on plane fare just to spend a few hours in an office halfway around the world.

Also, since we are a multilingual planet, the NPC's that you will meet inside the game are programmed to be multilingual. They take their cues from you. Whatever language you speak to them in is the language they answer you in. If you are multilingual, I suggest giving it a try. Speak to them in one language and switch to another halfway through the conversation. They will switch with you seamlessly.

My excitement was quickly rekindling. If what Roland said was true, then I would finally get my wish. At last I could be spirited away to a world where I could be anything I wanted and do anything I wanted.

That was the start of my greatest adventure.

Valkyrie’s Birth

Ikept close tabs on SimTech in the following days, looking for any news of their new simulated reality universe. The company gave no memorable name to the system, claiming that no name would do justice to such an integrated system. They ended up simply calling it what it was, the Simulated Reality Universe. In order to access the SRU, people had to purchase one SRU-visor for every player in their family that would participate, with each visor costing eight hundred dollars, plus tax.

I wasn’t complaining. It may have seemed expensive, but it was a one-time payment without having to pay for any membership fees or market items afterward. It was relatively cheap comparing it to the virtual reality hardware and software currently on the market which didn't provide nearly the same level of immersion since the experience was purely visual and no other senses were engaged, unless you spent even more money on accessories like haptic suits, haptic gloves, scent towers that mimicked smells, omnidirectional treadmills, and such.

SimTech gave away five thousand SRU-visors to those who signed up as beta-testers. I was lucky enough to be included in the beta-testing. I signed up for being a beta-tester as soon as I returned home from the press conference.

SimTech wanted to have at least twenty-five of the beta-testers be journalists who would write reviews. As New Tech, New You was one of the premiere technology magazines of the decade, I was selected as one of the reviewers. The remainder of the five thousand beta-testing positions were given at random to the over one hundred thousand people who signed up. The beta-testers would be testing the SRU for three months prior to its opening to the general public.

My SRU-visor had arrived in the mail two days ago and the game server was going online in five minutes. I sat on my bed, visor in hands, waiting as I counted down the seconds until I could finally escape into the world of my dreams. I had spent the last two days committing the manual to memory and I now understood exactly how the game worked. More than that, I was also starting to figure out how the game was programmed.

SimTech had created their own unique mind-scanning programming language and kept it secret in the hopes of keeping hackers out of the game, but it wasn’t going to last forever. The programming language was incredibly difficult, and the SimTech programmers had every right to be confident against hackers due to the complexity. I was certain that hackers would be able to crack the programming language, but I was equally certain that it would take them at least a year.

Me on the other hand....

Although I had no desire to hack the game, I found the challenge of deciphering this mysterious language intoxicating and I knew I wouldn’t be able to stop my curiosity until I fully understood it.

Those fools at SimTech believed they had the brightest minds in the world on their team, but there was one girl sitting right here who could outthink them all. With my brain, I was certain that this world would be my playground in only a few short weeks.

My mind was the only thing I had which I took pride in. I was arrogant about my intelligence from time to time, but I tried not to be. I reminded myself of my many flaws to keep myself from letting the arrogance take over.

I wasn’t a very fit person. Scrawny and weak, even for a woman. That’s what my dad had told me all my life, but in this game, it wasn’t the body but the mind that dominated. I was prepared for anything this world could throw at me. While I hadn’t been a very fit person, I had still read every book on martial arts that I could find. I had spent years when I was young trying to prove my dad wrong, but all I accomplished was making a fool out of myself. Reading martial arts books wasn’t going to make me a martial artist, but maybe, just maybe, in this world I could apply that knowledge with grace.

Ten, nine, eight...three, two, one. I slid the visor on and listened to the clicking noises as the metal bands enveloped me. I laid my body flat on the bed and waited with bated breath.

There was a small flash of red light and everything went black.

I was in a void of darkness. I tried to move, but nothing happened. I attempted to look down and realized I had no body. There was no feeling in this darkness and my senses were useless. I had become a consciousness void of the physical.

Then, from the darkness, emanated a voice. Welcome to a world where anything is possible. It was a disembodied female voice. Before you enter Simulated Reality Universe for the first time, you will have to set up a user account and create a character. Please answer these simple questions.

From within the darkness a small light flickered on. It was the light of a desk lamp. Where nothing had existed previously, a cluttered desk appeared with a gorgeous being behind it.

Her body seemed almost transparent, as if she were made of crystal, and her skin gave off a rainbow glow. The colors of light that wrapped around her seemed as natural on her as skin did on me. It enshrouded her in a celestial presence. Her eyes were deep purple, and her hair was pure flame, dancing up into the air above her in red, orange, blue, and white waves.

She was the closest thing to an angel I had ever seen.

She gestured in front of the desk and a plain chair appeared from nowhere.

Please, sit. Her voice was otherworldly, like a chorus of voices speaking in unison, but it didn’t give off an eerie feeling. It was actually quite lovely, like it carried the essence of all life.

I tried one more time to move, drifting on the air like a spirit. As I approached the desk my body gradually appeared. At first, I was nothing but a faded apparition. With each step I took toward the desk my body became firmer and more distinct, until I was myself again. I set myself gingerly in the chair, testing to make sure I wouldn’t fall through it. Sitting in the chair felt like sitting on solid air, firm yet fluffy.

My name is Aurora Eventide, the guardian of this reality. I am the physical incarnation of the system’s AI. First, we need to register your account. What is your name?

Lisa Hampton. I slipped into autopilot.

What is your country of origin?

United States of America.

Your identification code?

A879EG1290.

Thank you for creating your user account. Now please follow me.

I opened my mouth, prepared to answer the next question and shut in quickly. That was a quicker registration than I expected. I wondered for a second why there hadn’t been more questions. Then I realized that the system AI was the most advanced computer in existence and with only my identification code it would know everything about me.

Then I remembered from the manual that the system AI was given access to all government files pertaining to individual citizens in exchange for keeping tabs on their actions in the SRU.

Although this world was not reality, it felt real enough that laws had been implemented in the game. Some laws were only punishable in game and only if you were caught by one of the server’s police force, but other crimes were punishable in the real world. For example, attempted rape.

If a person attempted to rape another person in the game, they were forcibly ejected from the game before they could commit the crime. Then the system AI would send word to local law enforcement of the crime as well as details such as all the criminal’s personal records and a video log of the crime in progress. Attempted rape in the game was punished in the real world, not as an attempt, but as a successful completion of the deed.

There were other crimes in the game that were punishable in reality as well, so it made sense why governments allowed the system AI access to their systems.

As I followed Aurora away from the desk it vanished in a swirl of darkness. She stopped as soon as the desk disappeared, as if the direction of her retreat were unimportant, just the act of doing so.

A large room full of computer equipment materialized around us. We were in the center of the room, directly in front of a clear glass tube chamber. The tube was empty and in front of it was a golden globe on a platform.

Welcome to the character creation chamber, Aurora chimed in her choral voice. Here you can create any type of character you desire.

I smiled wryly. I had decided on my character weeks ago. Can you make me an elf?

Negative, Aurora replied while a buzzer sounded, and a red X appeared in front of her like we were on a game show. A player cannot be one of the legendary races.

I was dejected. But you said, ‘any type of character you desire.’

"True. You can make yourself appear similar to the elven race in physical appearance, but you cannot be an elf. The reason is because the legendary races each have their own skills and attributes that players aren’t allowed to possess inherently. I can make you look similar to an elf if you like, but it will not be an elf in the same sense as the elves you meet inside the fantasy worlds of the SRU.

It is the same for all the legendary races. They are NPCs which were given special skills and abilities above and beyond the normal distributed among NPCs. The legendary races are elves, dwarves, fairies, nymphs, merpeople, sirens, dragons, unicorns, griffins, centaurs, vampyr, werewolves and satyrs. They are the most powerful races in the fantasy worlds, and it is for that reason that a player isn’t allowed to create a character that is one of these races.

In that case, how do I create a character?

Aurora pointed to the tube in the room. Place your hands on the golden globe in front of the tube and imagine your character. The character you imagine will appear in the tube.

I approached the tube when a thought occurred to me. What if I don’t like the character I originally create? Can I make changes?

You can make as many changes as you wish to your character as long as the character is in the tube. After the character has been completed and its body has merged with your consciousness, you cannot alter it again.

Knowing this gave me more confidence. At least I wasn’t stuck with my first option if I didn’t like it. I knew I had only one shot at this. Whatever I merged with would be me for the rest of my SRU life.

I knew I was probably putting way too much thought into this, but I also knew something most people probably overlooked because of how thoroughly I’d read the manual. This was different from other games in the sense that there were no player attributes or skill points that you distributed. The body you created gave you your abilities.

If you created a large, muscular body it would have incredible strength, but its speed and flexibility would be weak. Conversely, a skinny and weak looking body would be just that. These bodies worked like our bodies in reality and were limited to the physical attributes you gave them at their creation.

A character with wings could fly, but the wings had to be the right proportion and in the right position for it to work properly. A character with fangs could bite, but if the fangs were to thin, they would break and too long, they would pierce your own lip.

Every detail had to be perfect and I would settle for no less. Thus, my idea. Start from a model that I create and then change one small feature at a time until I was perfectly satisfied. Still, that begged another question.

Do I have to keep my hands on the golden globe, or can I take them off to walk around the tube and check my work? I wasn’t about to make the mistake of removing my hands prematurely and ending up with a faulty body due to a misunderstanding.

Aurora seemed a little exhausted by my questions, but smiled slightly, as if she knew my every thought...and she probably did. You are a careful one, aren’t you? Why, out of the five thousand players who’ve logged in already, you are the only one who hasn’t finished making your character. But I like that about you. You interest me. You don’t have to keep your hands on the globe. Take your time and make the ‘you’ you’ve always wanted.

I placed my hands on the globe and instantly I was staring at another me. Well, I guessed I’d do as a model, but ugh! Was my hair really that bad? I instantly fell into criticizing everything about myself. My hair was too frizzy, my eyes too dull, my lips too pale, my face too round, my washboard chest (Were they really that puny?) and my too wide hips. As I stared at myself, I could feel my self-esteem plummeting into a never-ending abyss.

I started with the basics. I was a little too short. As I stared at myself, my hands still on the golden globe, the ‘me’ in the tube grew six inches. Perfect. Next, the hair. It straightened out and flowed down to my hips, looking elegant for the first time in my life. The color changed from red to pearl white, even my eyebrows, and looked so exquisite.

I knew I was going to be here for a while, so I glanced at Aurora apologetically. She just smiled back as if accepting the inevitable, her face a hue of sunshine.

Piece by piece, I corrected my body, and four hours later I had the finished product. She was the second closest thing to perfection I’d ever seen, the first being Aurora. Her ears, my new ears, were about six inches long, elongating into a point at a forty-five-degree angle to the floor, parting through my elegant hair. The eyes were now lustrous silver, glinting as if they were two small diamonds. My face was more beautiful than any human I’d ever seen. Beautiful, yet fierce, with sharp, defined features feline in nature. My lips were a vivacious red, the very incarnation of lust.

I felt like Michelangelo carving David. I had turned my body into the perfect weapon. It wasn’t a weapon of strength, but a weapon of speed. The long, lightweight, slender build of the body made it perfect for speed and agility. Although the body was deceptively feminine, there was a tightness about it that hinted at strong and well-toned muscles. The hips were designed for maximum pivot similar to a cheetah’s. This gave me a great boost in speed and flexibility.

The only thing I splurged on, not caring if it served a function or not, was my breast size. True, too large would hinder me in a fight, but I was tired of always being mistaken for a man at a distance. I hated the fact that even as a grown woman I still wore a training bra, so I made my breasts voluptuous and firm without being too large. They, like my lips, were mere