Prisoners of VR

Hearing the commotion, Ashok entered the room, startled to see an unconscious Rahu, "Sir!"

Mud had spilled all over the room, faintly charged as they caused burn damage to the objects they splashed onto. Ashok hurriedly lifted Rahu, terrified to notice that Rahu had lost a lot of weight. Moreover, he was bloody.

"Just what happened here in such short time?" He looked around, noticing blades of grass strewn about on the desk and floor. They were wilting at a rapid pace, turning dry in a matter of seconds.

Ashok was unsure of the cause behind this, but he had his priorities straight, shouting as he activated his Augmented Reality, "Summon the doctors!"

The security team rushed Rahu to the nearest hospital. Upon observing his condition, the doctors promptly admitted him to the intensive care unit.

Hearing the news, Deepika rushed to the hospital, asking in a hurry once she spotted the designated doctor, "How's Sir's condition?"

"There's no threat to his life, but he has lost a lot of blood and body mass. He also seems to have suffered a panic attack, so we're treating him accordingly." The doctor said and entered a ward.

"A panic attack..." Deepika muttered with part confusion and part frustration, "Again?"

"Just what the heck is he up to?"

She then noticed Ashok and glared at him, "What were you doing? Wasn't it your job to protect him from harm?"

"Sir told me to step out of his office for a couple of minutes." Ashok stated in worry, "This happened right after that."

"What was I supposed to do when he told me to leave him alone?"

"You should have still monitored him through a drone or camera." Deepika said, "Weren't we given plenty of equipment just for that reason?"

"I did that," Ashok retorted and pulled up a screen that he displayed to her through Augmented Reality. It showed a scene of Rahu motioning towards the camera to stop watching him when his uVR Earth shone black. All visuals were severed right after.

"See?" Ashok said, "Sir severed all monitoring devices of his own volition."

"Man, I'll grow old quickly at this rate." Deepika kicked a nearby table before deciding to slump on a chair and massage her aching head, "I barely returned home before I had to rush back here. My children can't even recognise me as their mother anymore."

"Please return home. I'll take care of the situation here..." Ashok intended to console but was interrupted.

Deepika snapped, "And do what? Will the superiors leave me be if I dared to return home in a situation where a DOVA Agent's life was at risk? I might lose my job."

"As the Head of Security, I don't have the leeway to think of my home." Her voice trembled.

"I'm sorry," Ashok bowed in response, "I wasn't thinking things through."

"It's not your fault," Deepika sighed, "This is part of our work, nothing more, nothing less."

"To survive in this field long enough, I need to adapt."

7th July 2048-Tuesday!

11:40 AM!

Two days after the Synchronised Reality incident, Rahu regained consciousness. His head hurt and his vision faintly spun when he tried to concentrate. It was the side effect of unleashing Synchronised Reality. 'My mind isn't ready to unleash such a reality-changing effect.'

But still, the fact that he managed to unleash it meant his worst fears came true. It implied that the ultimate secret wasn't a theoretical legend. It was merely theoretical in the past, but that all changed once Worldcraft came into play.

Worldcraft was the final part of the puzzle necessary to unleash Synchronised Reality. Therefore, Manav's earlier threat became all the more menacing.

If he manages to gather all seven Synchro Codes, he'll be able to unleash Synchronised Reality on a large scale, 'And possibly even make Worldcraft descend upon reality.'

Even though it was only for an instant, with the result incomplete, Rahu was still able to bring Worldcraft's Grass Stick to the real world.

How was this possible, one might ask? Earth functioned based on a set of rules. There existed fusion reactions within the sun that generated sunlight. Earth absorbed this energy to maintain its geothermal activity.

The climate, ocean currents, lava activity in the mantle, etc. all functioned on a set of laws. The creators of Worldcraft intensely investigated all the natural laws that governed Earth and allowed life to blossom.

Using these laws, they laid the foundation of Worldcraft. Only then would it be real. But if it was just another Earth, things wouldn't be fascinating, right?

So at this point, they approached Megasphere to obtain a variable that would spice things up. The power system established in Worldcraft was exactly that. The concept behind the power system was the ultimate secret Megasphere had derived based on all the data humanity had collected since its inception.

Human bodies had mass, and generated heat, light, and sound. Their hair was radioactive while electricity flowed through the Central Nervous System. As a result, Humans, like most highly evolved living beings, were miniature celestial objects capable of sustaining life.

After all, the number of individual lifeforms living in a human body numbered in the trillions. From bacteria to viruses, they lived in the human body, having varying effects on the body similar to how the various living beings affected Earth.

When a person ran, their body emitted heat. On a microscopic level, their centre of gravity constantly shifted. As a result, the gravitational force they unleashed on their surroundings varied. This was a minuscule sum, but at an atomic level, it was still potent, enough to affect the layer of air closest to the body.

Thereby, humans were able to affect their environment through their bodies alone, just like a celestial object such as the sun or the moon on a macroscopic scale.

A wind flow is generated when there's a pressure difference between points. This pressure difference is created with different temperatures. Heat causes air to expand, as a result raising its pressure.

Due to the distribution of muscles and organs, even when a human was in a state of rest, his body emitted different levels of heat from different parts of the body. This heat affected the temperature of the air localised to the body part.

And due to the difference, wind is generated between these places. Of course, this wind is minuscule to the extent a human being's senses won't be able to pick it up.

Similarly, grass naturally leans towards the direction of sunlight, as that's necessary for it to perform photosynthesis. This too was a natural law.

The human body was capable of emitting the necessary sunlight too. Everything is at an insignificant scale, but what Synchronised Reality did was amplify the human body's effect on the surroundings at a controlled scale to initiate a chain reaction in nature.

When Rahu attempted it, his body mass was consumed to generate energy, primarily in the form of electricity that was then converted by his uVR Earth into all forms of energy and forces-electrostatic and electromagnetic forces.

These forces influenced the grass to behave in a certain manner and eventually coil to become a grass stick. There still existed multiple pieces of the puzzle that Rahu had yet to understand.

This was the extent to which he could make sense of regarding Synchronised Reality. There was still a vast sea of information that he had yet to comprehend. But, all of the necessary information existed in the silicon brain in his Virtual Space-his Synchro Code.

'The reason I only succeed partially was due to two reasons. First, I had lacking brainpower. Second, the amount of grass was lacking.' This conclusion terrified him. After all, it meant that if he had enough brainpower, he would be able to manifest the Skills of Worldcraft in reality.

Moreover, Worldcraft had been created with the intent to serve as a training ground to increase one's Brainpower, Willpower, and Empower stats.

'If the stats of the people continue to increase as they play in Worldcraft, there would come a day where they would reach a DOVA Agent's level or even beyond.' He shuddered at the thought, 'If Manav gets his hand on a Synchro Code and publicises it, things might become chaotic.'

After all, if there comes a day when people could use the Skills of Worldcraft in reality, public order would collapse.

If even grass could be used as a weapon, how can one live in peace in such a society?

'I need to inform the rest that Synchronised Reality is possible.' Rahu was just about to contact the other possessors of Synchro Codes when he stopped, wondering if that was the right thing to do.

A DOVA Agent's God Complex was already a serious issue. And the ones possessing Synchro Codes were elites even among DOVA Agents. To date, the only thing they couldn't do was affect nature itself in its primal state.

But Synchronised Reality would make it possible, thereby elevating their God Complex to a whole other dimension. After all, if someone can manifest their mind into reality, what are they if not a God?

'I can't stop them from figuring this out on their own. But let's not reveal it to them in advance.' Sighing, Rahu dropped that train of thought. He then called Neeraj Vora, stating once the call went through, "Inform all the DOVA Agents to be active in Worldcraft."

[Did you figure out something?]

"One can increase their Brainpower, Willpower, and Empower through Worldcraft. As a result, the average level of people's minds would elevate in the future. If we remain complacent, we DOVA Agents wouldn't be able to do our jobs as easily anymore."

[I understand, that's worrying indeed. I'll pass down an order for the agents. Anything else?]

"That's it, for now. Please keep training your abilities."

[Something's keeping you worried, huh? What is it?]

"I can't say anything for now."

[Alright, be safe. Don't do anything reckless.]

The call ended as Rahu muttered, "He usually would have cursed me a couple of times by now. Even he's concerned about me, huh?"

Sighing, Rahu got up, intending to stretch his sore muscles when he noticed the figure of Deepika calmly eating a jackfruit beside his berth. He was so caught up in his situation that he hadn't even noticed her presence all along, even when she hadn't done anything to mask herself.

Her chewing sounds were loud as Deepika ignored him and continued to eat her fruit, halfway through finishing it. An entire jackfruit, alone.