Allisium

Chapter 1

Tutorial

«Allsium is a massive virtual social network whose learning can be assimilated by our brain in reality. By being able to incorporate this knowledge into the real world, the human being will reach a new level of evolution.

Patrick Cork, scientist who created Allsium in the year of its creation.

“What a pain in the ass with Allsium! Allsium here, Allsium there..." said my mother, "If you stay connected to that nonsense for so long, you will forget how to live.

I didn't even look at the holographic screen that announced the virtual reality system as the greatest technological and social revolution in history. My mother was a bit old”fashioned, one of those who still liked to go shopping for bread instead of using the virtual bakery. Allsium not only made it possible to live in an alternative world, but it was also capable of instantly materializing anything purchased on its system with a simple blink of an eye. Gone were the two”day delivery online stores or virtual reality video games, which made it seem as if you were living adventures in the first person. But that was water under the bridge, what was in vogue was Allsium, a virtual revolution from which you could buy bread and it would immediately appear in your breadbox. A system in which you did not manage a video game avatar, but you yourself were the protagonist.

In Allsium you could experience pleasure and pain in the same way as in real life. However, virtuality was dangerous, especially if you went out to explore other planets far from the virtual Earth, the only world controlled by the system where it was impossible to die.

Allsium could be accessed just by thinking. You were walking down the street, you had a craving for ice cream and immediately your mind would buy it in the Allsium store, with lemon flavor and the size you wanted; two seconds later, you could go down the street eating a medium”sized lemon ice cream. On winter days it was very curious to see how hats and scarves would appear on people's heads or necks out of nowhere.

You blinked and missed it.

The downside of Allsium was that you couldn't buy a sword and carry it into the real world when four three”bit punks cornered you in a corner and made your medium”sized lemon ice cream attend, thawing on the floor, one of the many beatings you used to get during the week.

I decided a long time ago that the real world, with a sword or a fire spell in time, could be a much, much better place to live.

Allsium was already real life for millions of people. There were vast worlds to visit, enemies to defeat and objects to find while acquiring skills and going on adventures that led to unlocking new worlds. That only happened if you wanted the experience in Allsium to be complete, otherwise you could always stay in the virtual Earth of Allsium, a virtual planet that looked like the real one where you could travel to London for a cup of tea or to China to walk along its wall in a matter of seconds. All for a fee, of course, but still cheaper than taking a plane and less tiring than flying on it for twenty hours.

People worked in real life, or at least those who could, although most spent their time earning extra money in Allsium. There were normal jobs, such as security and control agent, and more complex and dangerous jobs such as bounty hunter. There were those who used it as a mere complement, but those who were hooked on virtuality ventured to planets of maximum difficulty and risked their virtual lives to get a good loot and enjoy Allsium to the limit.

Allsium was a continuity, a place where it was not even necessary to sleep. The eight hours of sleep in real life were used to connect to Allsium and continue living adventures from there. What was the point of existence if we spent half our lives sleeping without doing anything productive?

In Allsium there were no laws, but skill paths that were unlocked through the famous trails. That is why in real life the gyms had already disappeared many years ago. In Allsium you could earn extras in physical improvements such as agility, perception or strength, so the physical capacity of a person in reality was much lower than in the virtual world, where anyone could exceed human limits. And that's not to mention path abilities, which could make one capable of conjuring fireballs with a simple snap of the fingers.

But, unfortunately, all that could not be transferred to reality.

In any case, if the skinny kid with acne all over his face saw progress in Allsium, it goes without saying that he rarely returned to real life to get beaten up by bullies on a daily basis. He would just go back to feed his body and then immediately return to the virtual world.

That was the law of life.

People also preferred to get married in Allsium, because being able to travel from Barcelona to Japan in the blink of an eye made multicultural relations much easier. In real life it was not possible to travel so quickly, nor was it possible to cross certain borders with the crisis that humanity was going through. For this reason, and as a measure for the preservation of the human species, it was legal to practice polygamy in reality. In Allsium, however, you could not have children, but you could have real sex with other people, and it was said to be just as pleasurable and satisfying as in reality.

It was always said that Allsium tried to protect the user, and this was for something very simple: if you died in Allsium you died forever, so if that happened you were forced to return to real life.

Twenty”four hours of insufferable suffering and decadence.

Therefore, in Allsium you only had one chance, but the adventurers made sure to make the most of it.

“Remember that from today on, I won't be coming around as much," I told my mother.

“Oh, yes," he said, waving his hand dismissively, "your plans for world domination.

“Will you come up from time to time to check that everything is going well?

“If you're old enough to get in there all day, you're old enough to take care of yourself here," he said.

I frowned and went upstairs to my room. It didn't cost her anything to make sure from time to time that her own son's body was in condition, but my mother wasn't into that nonsense. Not that she had much to do.

I lay in bed, injected myself with the serum that fed my body during my long sessions at Allsium and thought about the virtual world.