After the meeting with Chris, I considered his suggestion on my way home. If I wanted to follow the life-path that society generally deemed to be appropriate, accepting his offer and trying to make my way within an ordinary company would be the way to go. But was such a path really the path I wanted to pursue, either now or at all? Would I find happiness, or at least comfort and contendness, if I walked down that path? Or was my Road the one to Purgatory, living in a world that most people wouldn’t see as anything more than a game?

But at what point did a world become real? Everything around us was perceived through the lense of our senses, converted into electrical impulses and interpreted by our brains in an effort to form predictive models about our environment. While I didn’t know how the capsule worked, how they interacted with our brain's perception of reality, the world Pantheon Entertainment had created felt, in many ways, just as real as the world in which I was walking away from a coffee-shop. The snow on Mundus was just as cold as the snow melting in a few secluded spots around me, if I were to pick up a snowflake, I might be able to see similar, yet unique, complex patterns, no matter if I picked the snowflake up here or on Mundus. So, what was the difference?

Did my stay on Earth, my life, create any tangible, impactful difference for those after me? I had no plans on having children, the whole idea of having a baby grow within my stomach was utterly unsettling to me, let alone the idea of marriage and romance. Until I had met Sigmir, I had never thought that such concepts would ever apply to me, making me consider it a miracle. Inexplicable, and quite possibly unique, something that I could hope for but not expect.

The more I thought about it, the more my conviction was reinforced. I would have to do everything I could to stay with Sigmir. What did it matter to me, what some person on the street might think about me and how I lived my life? While we might share some of our mental and physical characteristics, at the end of the day, the only one who needed to be comfortable with my life was myself. Well, at least as long as I managed to keep food on the table and the utilities running.

It was a little eerie, when I returned to my appartement and realised that I didn’t quite know what to do with myself, now that I couldn’t log into Road to Purgatory. Normally, I made careful plans to accommodate the necessary chores outside the Capsule, so that I could spend as much time as possible logged in, but now, with my character dead and thus unavailable, I was at a loss.

Finally, after a few moments of consideration, I decided to push myself physically, hoping that exhaustion would help me to sleep away the remaining time. On a whim, I took up my practise blades after stretching, purchased on Mr. Wu’s recommandation a few years back. Closing my eyes, I slowly started to move, following elaborate sequences that would only work piece-meal in an actual fight but the smooth, flowing movement helped me to relax my mind. I had done these sequences dozens, maybe hundreds of times, often enough that I could start to improvise, departing from the actual sequence and simply let my body flow from one stance and movement into another. Especially since I had started to actually use the style I had learned, and was teaching it to Rai, my familiarity had greatly increased.

I didn’t realise the passage of time, but when my arms faltered and I barely managed to keep my balance and not land in a graceless heap, I noticed that I was covered in sweat, my breathing barely keeping up with my body’s need for oxygen. It took me a moment to place my blades back on their stand, my hands not immediately responding to my brain’s commands, even as my body started to shake a little. I had quite obviously overdone things. Still, I forced myself to keep moving, to go through a series of gentle, cool-down stretches, knowing that I would be in serious pain if I didn’t.

After some food and a quick shower, I fell into my bed, my body still a little achy from overdoing things earlier, but I would likely be fine by the time Mrs. Wu would get to train me some more. Keeping up my training certainly was worth it, it might even be worth it to push things a few levels higher in the coming month, all for those precious stat-points I might be able to gain during the character-creation. Even just a few points in my physical stats would pay dividends down the line, maybe I’d even be able to get an additional trait, though hopefully nothing negative like the Ruthless-Trait I had acquired during the beta.

As I floated in darkness, I could hear the wind whistle around me. Strangely, I knew it was freezing cold around me, but I didn’t feel it. I was comfortable, despite the darkness and cold around me, despite the sharp gusts of wind. Maybe it was because I had no body that could be cold, no eyes that needed the light.

There was a pattern in the whistles, ebbing, flowing, a melody and rhythm, taunting me with my inability to understand, to see the meaning in the sounds. I growled, annoyed at my failure, my growls echoing the bits and pieces of the pattern I could hear. As I was getting more and more worked up over my inability, I was startled out of my concentration, the scant progress I had made, lost. But even as a part of my mind bristled with annoyance, another, primal, part of me drowned it out, my whole being focusing on a single point of recognition. Two gigantic, golden eyes, floating in the formless, featureless darkness that I had been residing in, their attention threatening to devour my mind.

With a yelp of fear, I shot up, darkness surrounding me. My eyes strained, trying to pierce through the darkness, but despite my affinity, I failed. I tried to call upon my magic, trying to conjure Ice to shield me, Mist to Hide me, I even tried to meld into the shadows as my arms and legs were constricted. Nothing worked, even as I frantically tried to escape the bindings that held me. I called out, trying to get Lenore to help me, even tried to blindly shift into my Hallow, but there was nothing, no reaction. As if she wasn’t there.

Suddenly, I was slipping away and after a brief moment of falling, a painful impact shook me awake. Confused, I noticed a dimly shining display, telling me that it was 4:23am. Latching onto the object, something that wasn’t a featureless void or giant, glowing eyes my mind started to boot. After that, it took only a few moments to recognise the bindings around my limbs as the bedsheet I had managed to completely entangle myself in and to realise that there was no magic to call on. Now more cognisant, I looked around and quickly realised that the darkness was only so deep because it was night and my curtains drawn.

Sitting there, on my slightly aching butt, I focused on my breathing, simply letting the air flow in and out of my lungs, the consciously measured breaths helping to calm my racing mind. It had just been a nightmare, obviously conjured up by my latest escapade in Road to Purgatory. Nothing more, nothing less, there was no giant monster with piercing, golden eyes waiting outside my window, ready to devour me. There couldn’t be, if for no other reason than the fact that I was some thirty meters above ground. Though, when I thought back to the eyes, their size, and considered the size of a certain Titan and the giant eagle eating it, were thirty meters really enough?

Shaking my head, I focused on the more pertinent truth, namely that those creatures, their size and everything to do with them was a part of Road to Purgatory. I didn’t need to consider moving to a higher building, or trying to find an apartment on the top floor, there was no need for it. As if to convince myself, I entangled myself from my bedding and padded over to the window, opening the curtains to look out. Just to make sure there were no eyes, waiting to stare in.

As expected, there was nothing outside, only the various lights of a sleeping city, the street-lights shedding light for those unfortunate people that had to work already, the warning-lights of the snow-plows that made sure what snow had fallen during the night was dealt with.

No gigantic monsters threatening to devour me and the world around me in sight.

Shaking my head once more, I decided that there was little point in trying to go back to sleep, not with the nightmare so fresh in my mind, and went to take a shower. The cold sweat covering my body certainly made one necessary.