Prologue

Prologue

Work is home, work is home. This is how many people live in my city, including me... By my almost thirty years, I managed to earn money for a one-room apartment on the outskirts of the city. 

After five years of work, I finally managed to take a vacation, and just for three months. There was such an abyss of free time that I did not know what to do with myself. 

I didn’t have any relatives or friends, so I didn’t want to go anywhere at all, and I’m too lazy, to be honest. However, summer has just begun. 

On the first day, I did the most important thing in a long time - sleep. But then my life began to change, for better or for worse, you can’t immediately determine.

Searches in the global network gave me one idea - to try to play an online game with full immersion. After reading a whole bunch of forums, I found a lot of interesting information. 

Most wrote that the game, called Reinea, is absolutely indistinguishable from the real world, and also surpasses it in many ways. I just chuckled at these statements, but still went to the game's website in order to make sure I was right. And something of my skepticism diminished when I looked at just a couple of landscapes that were made by the players. 

No matter how biased I was about games with full immersion, but still this one hooked me. I decided to remember my old days when I played the best games of the beginning of the century. That was when it was fun, and then there were friends ... eh-h ...

***

The capsule was brought the very next day and installed in the shortest possible time. It cost me half of all the savings, in general, as a good car. 

I don’t know why, but I decided not to be stingy and purchase an option from the middle price range; in any case, I wouldn’t have enough money for luxury devices. However, even this capsule was just a marvel of engineering. In vain I never paid attention to the development of virtual reality.

After escorting the workers, I securely locked the door and lay down in the capsule. The capsule automatically adjusted to the parameters of the body, and it became quite comfortable to lie down, although why am I being modest, but now I will sleep here! 

As I found out from the instructions and from the words of the technical staff, this capsule provides full support for body functions, that is, electrical impulses do not allow muscles to atrophy, a bed made of a special material will ensure the absence of bedsores during prolonged immersion. 

Also in the capsule are installed systems that supply the body with nutrients. However, things were also fine with the toilet, so you don’t need to go there. 

This capsule is an amazing thing: a kind of container for keeping your own body in excellent condition. But before I started playing the most popular game on the planet, I remembered a number of strange messages that periodically flashed on various forums. 

And these messages said that some players could not return to the real world, still remaining in the game. I remember that somehow this topic was touched upon in the news, but then everything quickly subsided, so I did not attach any importance to this information. However, unfortunately, I thought about it now. 

Aaah, I don't care, I still have nothing to lose. Yes, and such messages did not appear so often, so the probability of staying in the game is small, most likely. 

Although this state is even somehow scientifically called. Syndrome… no… hmm… exactly, a phenomenon! The Phenomenon of the Transfer of Consciousness, or FPS for short. It is on it that the theory of virtual worlds is based, if I do not confuse anything. 

In general, it doesn’t matter, now I want to relax and look at the new world, and not think about some kind of scientific theory. With a voice command, I activated the capsule, and with a few smooth movements, the lid sealed me off from this world, which made my heart beat faster. No big deal, I'll get used to it. I closed my eyes, but instead of darkness, everything was filled with a pleasant white light.