In a relatively southern country of the Northeastern continent was an underground palace.
Actually, a majority of Northeastern infrastructure was underground due to the exceedingly cold temperatures of the winter.
But in this palace... was a new room that was built not long ago. Its addition to the palace was only due to the rapid rise of virtual reality technology.
This country prided itself in its militaristic capabilities. Even in the warmongering Northeastern continent, this country was seen as a battle maniac.
They believed that virtual reality could lead to the next technological breakthroughs in warfare.
While the backwards society of the rest of the Northeast believed that VR was only another set of "children's games", the Alacai Covenant ignored this philosophy and tried to improve their military by any means necessary.
And one of those means lay within this room.
It was a room that only the top of the top brass of the Alacai Covenant had access to.
This room was quite technologically advanced.
It was spherical with a diameter of 100 metron. Since it was underground, it could maintain its shape with ease.
The climate was controlled to a precise degree.
The walls could display any images necessary with an ultra-high resolution.
Holograms could be displayed anywhere in the room to simulate an augmented reality, or AR, experience.
And in the very center was where the testing happened.
Since this room existed to test a wide variety of things related to VR and AR, the central piece was interchangeable with multiple parts to suit an experiment's needs.
Currently the center held a sensory deprivation tank. And in that tank was a young man about 17 or 18 years old.
The young man woke up inside the tank and felt as if he were well rested.
*... This is surprising.*
He was not expected to feel this way. After all, he'd just spent the night playing the newest VR game on the market.
It was called Synergy, and it was unprecedentedly realistic.
*Who could have developed this?*
This young man deemed the developer a threat to Alacai. Not because they had any nefarious intentions, but because their technological capabilities seemed far beyond Alacai's.
If they were capable of producing a product like this, what else could they possibly have that threatened Alacai's security?
Even before the game released, any attempts to look into who the developer was resulted in failure. Were they a cybersecurity genius? Could Alacai's intranet be hacked at a moment's notice?
Without any information on this potential threat, Alacai was unable to make precise countermeasures. The only thing they could do was buff their current security measures and work hard at improving their military in any way possible.
"... First Son."
The young man realized that he'd been lost in thought.
The sensory deprivation tank had speakers and microphones on the inside for monitoring and emergency communication purposes. And through this speaker, a man on the outside voiced his concern for the wellbeing of this "First Son".
First Son replied as soon as he snapped back to reality.
"Yes, Brother Commander?"
"... You sound fine. That is good. Your brain activity showed that you had risen from slumber, and when you did not make any report, there was cause for concern."
"... Yes, I am fine. Unusually fine. I feel very well-rested."
"Interesting. We will now conduct a debriefing for this mission."
With these words, the sensory deprivation tank began to open. When it was completely open, First Son unequipped his VR helmet, the Alacai Mk II.
Yes, Alacai even had their own specialized VR equipment.
After cleaning up a bit and putting on some "regular" clothes, First Son and Commander left the spherical room.
In another room directly outside, another man began setting up a slideshow presentation. This presentation was displayed on a fairly large wall that measured over 20 square metron.
"Younger Brother Commander," said Commander, "What data have you compiled here?"
On the first slide was a collection of various graphs.
With a laser pointer, the presenter, known as Second Commander, pointed at the first graph he wished to discuss.
"First Son, your brain activity shows you've been through an ordinary sleep cycle," Second Commander said.
This was interesting information indeed. How was it possible for First Son's body to enter an ordinary sleep cycle if his mind was supposedly intensely focused on a game?
"Perhaps the technology relies on rapid eye movement stages of sleep in order to induce something similar to a lucid dream," Commander, also known as First Commander, suggested.
"This is indeed what we suspected," replied Second Commander. "However, lucid dreams only occur during REM sleep. First Son, did you notice any interruptions in the gameplay... such as memory loss or brain fog?"
"I experienced nothing of the sort. The entire experience was smooth."
"Interesting... So we can rule out what is known about lucid dreaming."
A sleep cycle was often comprised of sections of NREM (non-rapid eye movement) and REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. In NREM, dreams were rare if not nonexistent. And since NREM was a restorative period of deep sleep, memories would be altered or consolidated in the brain. It was unlikely for one to be conscious at this time.
Since First Son claimed to observe smooth gameplay throughout the entirety of the night, he maintained clear consciousness even through NREM sleep.
"So... either what we know about the human sleep cycle is incorrect... Or this technology is able to somehow allow us to stay conscious while our body rests properly," First Commander mused.
To most people, this may not seem like that big of a deal. However, this fact, as well as the fact that more time passed in the game than in reality, was effectively a boost to lifespan. With extra time added to one's day, they could train for much longer than their peers and effectively "get ahead".
And this was only one implication of this technology...
After several more minutes of debriefing, the meeting concluded.
First Son, First Commander, and Second Commander parted ways. After all, during the day, their duties differed.
As First Son was not quite an adult yet, he was preparing once again to return to the Northeastern Royal Academy next week. This, along with military training, would take up most of his day.
First Son took an elevator up to his room, as the Sphere Room was far underground. He washed up and put on another set of clothes. Its design indicated he was of Alacai royalty. An insignia of a snow owl with its wings spread... it represented the resilience and vigilance of their people.
To finish up, he put on a set of contact lenses and a watch with a thin but large touchscreen.
First Son's natural vision was 20/25. This was better than "perfect", so why would he need contacts?
*>"Crude Oil Prices Reach an All-Time High"*
*>"The Dangers of Outsourcing Oil Production"*
*>"The Tchan Family Continues to Export Oil at an Astounding Rate"*
When he put on these contact, various news articles entered his vision.
Yes, these were AR contacts. As they were wirelessly connected to the watch he'd put on, a combination of the two provided a smooth user experience of having a personal computer on hand at all times. And exactly how old computers used to connect to Etherless, this contact computer could do the same.
First Son sat on his bed and browsed headlines of news articles from around the world. He was gathering as much intel as possible so Alacai could efficiently complete their next mission.
After compiling some information to report on later, he opened the messaging application Concord to see what his "friends"... or surveillance targets, were up to.
*>Brent: Why did the servers shut down so early?*
*>Kenshi: Dunno, maybe they found a bug or something.*
*>Ryozaki: ...*
*>Molotov: Hey Liu, any success on applying spin to projectiles?*
*>Liuzhi: No.*
*>Adverse: Maybe their servers exploded.*
*>Molotov: Yup, I did that to 'em!*
...
It was all nonsense.
They were all complacent.
How could they possibly respond if they were to get attacked the next day? It was unthinkable how they could remain so lax.
*>Kenshi: Hey, Luca's on. Did you happen to find any other dungeons?*
*...*
Why was he obligated to share any information with them?
*>Allux: No.*
*>Kenshi: Damn, no luck, huh? Well, we can continue... tomorrow? When do the servers open up again?*
First Son closed the messaging application. He couldn't take them seriously. But he only had to keep an eye on them for a little longer.
There was only a week before they all had to return to the academy.
As soon as the young men of the royal families returned to finish their final year, Alacai could strike.
(a/n: v2 is a continuation of ending "a")
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