I stepped into the office, away from the chopped up boss monster. I hadn’t gotten a chance to check out the office in any detail yesterday, but today it had a bookshelf and an obviously glowing briefcase in addition to the finely made desk. While Lindsey examined the briefcase, I scanned the bookshelf for anything clearly magical. Finding nothing, I dropped the entire thing into my inventory, somewhere in the designated office area near where yesterday’s boss now lived. I could feel the tension in its mind ease slightly. A quick look through the desk revealed nothing magical, so it too contributed to my new minion’s comfort.

“Looks like it’s bigger on the inside,” Lindsey declared, having apparently completed her examination.

“Anything good inside?” I asked. She shook her head, pointing to a four foot tall stack of papers she had apparently deposited on the other side of the office.

“Many papers,” she said, “but nothing that stands out.”

I swept up the entire stack and put it next to the desk.

“The pigeon likes office stuff,” I said, “I think I can get it to work for me if I give it stuff.”

She gave me a look, and like most of her looks I wasn’t entirely sure what it meant. Probably scepticism, but I had always been terrible at reading women.

Joe met us at the entrance to the executive office, a comically small duffle bag dangling from his arm. Probably a normal duffle bag for someone human-sized. He was grinning again, so I knew he’d found something good.

From the bag, he pulled two gleaming boxes like the one I’d found yesterday. Next he pulled out a radiantly glowing glass bottle with a long thin neck, sealed at the top with black wax. As soon as I saw it, I knew what it was.

[BOTTLED ETERNAL SUNSHINE]

I could tell that the idea was still unfolding, and I knew that if I focused on it I would be able to learn more. I tore my eyes away from the sloshing yellow liquid and looked at Joe.

“This one was in a different kind of box, shiny glass, with a weird cloud of color floating in the middle. I couldn’t tell you what color, but that’s far from the strangest thing we’ve seen. As soon as I picked the box up, the colored cloud resolved into this bottle and the box around it dissolved.” Joe reported.

“How about you open one of those, and give Lindsey the other.” I suggested, pointing at the sparkly gold boxes in his other hand.

“Why?” he asked.

“I have a hunch that those boxes generate things to suit you, beyond just clothes that fit, and I want to see what comes out for the two of you.” I said.

He nodded and tossed one of the boxes in Lindsey’s direction. She caught it and examined the latch for a moment, before she flipped it open. The box disintegrated like mine had, and she was left holding a sleek silver garment. She held it up, revealing it to be a form fitting dress. It was lit faintly from within, showing it to be at least mildly magical. I glanced down at my jeans, but the magical light was so faint in them that I couldn’t even be certain that it was there at all. Whatever, at least they fit well, and were markedly softer and less stiff than when I had initially put them on. Lindsey hung her head and exhaled sharply, recapturing my attention. She dropped the dress into her new magical briefcase and slammed it shut.

“A nightmare, I suppose, is still a type of dream. I find that there are many things in this game that I do not like. At least I will have something to wear in case what I am wearing now is destroyed.” she said.

“I guess that’s a point against my hypothesis...” I said.

Joe shrugged, set down the bottle, and opened his box, revealing a black faceted object. It was roughly a (human) hand’s length, glossy like obsidian, and pointed at both ends. Each face was identical, all shaped like trapezoids. It was hanging from a black leather cord, along with several smaller and less impressive shards of the black glassy material, all attached seemingly through brute-force ontology. The magical glow from inside it felt sinister and distinctly unpleasant. Joe turned it over in his hand, counting off the faces.

“Thirteen?” he seemed confused, and started counting again. I followed along this time, and sure enough, there were thirteen faces.

“Well that’s messed up,” I said. “It’s pretty rare to see stuff that obviously breaks geometry executed so well.”

I could already feel a headache coming on, so I did my best not to focus too much on the eldritch shape. It was the most obviously alien thing we had seen so far, but unfortunately it was a very human conception of something alien. Though I couldn’t recall the exact sources, I was certain that something like this object had shown up in human fiction at some point. Joe looked away from it as he looped the cord around his massive wrist. He immediately perked up, eyes gazing at what only he could see.

“I have an equipment list now. Showed up when I put on the ‘Cursed Trapezohedron’, which apparently lets me put curses into my power manifestations roughly once a day.”

Joe bent down to pick up the glowing bottle from where he had set it down, and handed it to me.

“The wording isn’t clear, but I think this might help someone to gain sunlight powers. This sort of thing,” he said, holding up his ominous new bracelet, “is more my style though, so I figured maybe some sun lasers or whatever would be a good addition to your power set.”

I looked at the bottle in my hands, and let the game’s label for it unfold completely.

BOTTLED ETERNAL SUNSHINE

This bottle contains a liquid capable of dissolving and preserving aspected essence. Suspended within is the precise amount of Solar aspected essence required to create a self-sustaining reaction.

“Yeah, that isn’t very clear at all. This didn’t trigger your equipment interface?” I asked.

“Nope.”

“Then I kind of doubt that you just drink it and get powers. It is probably some kind of crafting material,” I surmised.

Suddenly remembering that I had a manual for this, I focused on the folder in my inventory. I pushed past the resistance I felt when trying to read while it was still in my inventory, reveling in the feeling that I was rapidly learning to associate with growth in my capabilities.

The second set of papers, labeled ‘basic power boosting items,’ had only two sections. The first was irrelevant to my senses, so probably dealt with whatever system Joe had access to. The second section was sparse: ‘Apply your lessons in perception and precision to objects which hold hidden depths. You will know them when you see them. Be warned that the vast majority of such objects will be much more fragile and less resilient than your soul, and will have no capacity for growth. Objects which The Dream can recognize should be handled with care, as they will inevitably contain great power, hold uncommon renown, or represent a unique existence.’

“According to that manual I found,” I said, “this is very powerful or unique. You sure you want to give this up?”

“Yeah, I’m not really a paladin kind of guy. Light powers are boring.” Joe said. “And mixing light and darkness is too edgelord for me. Even if it’s a super rare drop, I’d probably just sell it once we find a marketplace or something. Better to put it to use and see what it does.”

“I’ll see if I can figure out a way to use it while we wait on the boss’s XP.” I said, storing the bottle.

Not two seconds later, I noticed the trickle of experience shards drifting through the air towards Joe. I guess I didn’t have long. I dove into my void space, and saw the bottle shining brightly, illuminating everything else I had stashed away with it’s warm glow. I guess if nothing else, I could use it as mood lighting for my inventory. I could perceive everything inside regardless of the light level, but that didn’t mean that my pigeon minion should spend the rest of his life in darkness. I relocated the bottle to high above everything else. It seemed more like a particularly bright star than a proper sun, which wasn’t really what I was going for. I took a closer look at the energy inside the bottle, and I got the sense that the liquid and bottle were restraining the reaction somehow. Thinking back on how I had captured nonphysical entities like the handful of experience shards now drifting about in the void, I wondered if I could somehow separate the bottle and fluid from the energy. I summoned the bottle and tried to store only the energy within, but it didn’t seem to take. There wasn’t any resistance, just a sense that nothing was happening. I stored the bottle again and considered alternatives. I could just break the seal and pour out the liquid. I was confident that I could pull in just the energy if I could touch it, but then I might not be able to recover the fluid, which was apparently capable of storing and preserving energy. For all I knew, the energy stored inside wasn’t actually the valuable or unique aspect of this item, and I didn’t want to take the risk.

I looked up at my companions. Lindsey was doing something with a piece of wood in her hand, Joe was examining his horrible new accessory, and the boss’s remains looked about halfway gone. My eyes rested for a moment on Lindsey, who I now saw was whittling one of the remaining desk chunks into some sort of shape using her power. Practicing precision, no doubt. I hadn’t actually considered the problem of precision with my power, as I had just been storing things whole, but what if that wasn’t actually the limit to what I could do? I summoned a sheet of paper, sent it away again, then called forth half of the sheet. There was slight resistance and a tearing sensation, and I was holding half a piece of paper. From the half page remaining inside my inventory, I summoned a star shape. It came out mostly how I had envisioned it, only slightly lopsided. Next I tried a snowflake, but only managed to pull out a mangled ball of shredded paper. I located a bottle of ink, extended my hand palm down, and tried to pull out a single drop of ink. The first two tries failed, my control too shaky to get a hold of the liquid. On the third I overdid it and accidentally emptied all of the ink in that bottle onto the carpet. The bottle itself, however, did remain sealed and inside my inventory. This would take some practice, but I was confident now that I could eventually pull the bottle and liquid out while leaving the magical sunlight energy behind. That would leave them intact for me to store again for later use. I shook myself from my introspection and experimentation, to find that the boss body still hadn’t finished despawning.

“Joe, we should get moving. Waiting on XP is ridiculous and if we really need to level you up, we can always scour one of the other floors prior to looting it. Between you and Lindsey, killing stuff is pretty quick.” I said.

Joe looked conflicted. It looked really strange on his giant lizard face.

“The bosses are really worth a lot. Are you already done reading all the documents you found, and examining and experimenting with this stuff here?” he asked.

“I’ve got one more to read,” I said, “but then we should move on.”

“Sure, I guess I’m the only one who gets to enjoy seeing my numbers go up.” Joe said, guiltily.

“I admit a certain satisfaction in practice and rapid improvement,” Lindsey interjected, holding out the wooden object she had been working on. It wasn’t amazing, but it was recognizably a representation of Joe in all his reptilian majesty.

“But yes,” she continued, “I would like to see more of the tower.”

I crouched down and looked over the final magical document I had: ‘The Dream.’ It had only one section.

‘The Dream is the mediator of this refuge, a place of relative safety for you to learn and grow. It controls and solidifies this space between layers, with greater control near its anchors. It taps into the local branch of the Akashic Record, drawing inspiration for its domain and armaments from local history. It also uses that connection to disseminate information to those who shelter within. It may also disseminate rewards from a pool of provided artifacts, though it can only replenish this pool on its own if errant artifacts drift unattended into its sphere of influence. It can be modified from its core.’

“Well, that’s interesting. They are going for total immersion, explaining the game systems as if they are actually something in the game world, and giving an explanation for why there is all this human stuff here.” I said. I repeated to the others what I had read.

“Also, I think this whole place is just the tutorial area. Probably all tutorial up until we get to the first town, whatever form that will take. Or maybe up until we get to the ‘core’ that it mentions.” I speculated.

I dropped my thus far useless golf club into my inventory and looked around to see if we had any other loose ends to sort out. Nothing stood out to me, so I stood up. The popping of my joints spoke to the eerie realism at work once more. Now that I had named it, I couldn’t help but spot it everywhere.

“That body is nearly gone, we should head out.” I said.

Finding no complaints from the others, we set off through the smoldering ruins, back towards the door to this floor. Joe and Lindsey chatted about his family’s farm as we walked. Her family apparently owned farmland as well, though she didn’t personally know any details about how a farm operates. We made our way to the stairwell, and descended the various landings. On the fifth floor, we heard the sound of combat.

I opened the door to take a quick look, and saw a group of three engaging a swarming mass of squirrels in an office with far fewer desks and more open floor space than on the first level. One of the people sat at the center of a maelstrom of colored shapes, their features obscured, holding the focus of the swarm which seemed to be enraged by the glossy objects. The other two were a cat man who had an actual modern-looking gun, and a tiny humanoid with paper-white skin and hair whose hands were glowing white. I only watched for a second or two before letting the door close and resuming the trek down. Those two seconds of footage would hopefully help my coworkers in the office keep track of the other players not working for DA.

No obstacle presented itself as we made our way down to the 10th floor barrier. I wondered at the design considerations that may have gone into this whole area. I couldn’t imagine what the combination of leaving players to just wander randomly, letting them get killed by birds and rats, or having them run into an impassable barrier with no guidance was meant to accomplish. The thing that made the most sense was that this was just a tutorial for a high difficulty sandbox game, and that if the players couldn’t figure out how to get out, then they certainly wouldn’t have a good time in the zones outside.

The barrier itself came into view, and I could instantly see why it halted all attempts to cross it. It seemed to exist as an unbroken plane of tesselated magical patterns, stretching across the landing leaving no gaps of any sort. The black bars which physically obstructed the way seemed to precipitate out of the magic, in much the opposite way as all the magic items I had seen so far. The physical matter of the barrier was a consequence of, not an anchor for, the magical part. It was an intuitive leap, so I took a moment to try to put my finger on why, exactly, I jumped to the conclusion that I did.

“See?” Joe interrupted my silent inspection, “Totally indestructible with no obvious way through, but the black makes me think that the solution is related to the Hollow Men.”

“Not indestructible.” I said, “It’s just that the magic is constantly recreating them.”

“Wait, can you see how it works?” Joe asked, astonished.

“No,” I said, “but I can get an intuitive sense of some of what’s going on. It’s all geometry and intent, and this is definitely the most complicated bit of magic so far, but there is definitely something code-like about it.”

I turned to Lindsey and asked, “What do you see?”

She scrutinized the barrier, approaching but not closely enough to touch.

“It is made of tiles. I think they strengthen those nearby.” She said, after a short while.

Now that she had pointed it out, I could sort of see what she meant. The tiles seemed to flow into one another in an almost hypnotic endless loop. If the tiles could be treated like discrete objects, and I already knew that my power could interact with purely magical constructs… hmm…

“Going to try something. Be ready to pull me away if anything crazy happens.”

I reached toward the bottom left-most tile, and when my hand made contact, a loud chime sounded. I felt myself jerked backwards as Joe hooked one of his digits under my arm and pulled me away. Hovering in the air in front of the barrier was a woman. She was short to the point of being child-like and had snow white skin and hair, but for the most part looked human. This was clearly the same race as the player I saw earlier, but this image was dressed in flowing white robes, not starter greys, and her eyes had dark markings around them. The eyes themselves were pure black. And it was just an image, just bits of light floating in space like a volumetric display. Then she spoke, and the game interface translated:

[If you are here to receive this message, then my little rebellion was not in vain, and I have managed to pull a few of you out of your prison.]

I could feel a potent mix of bitterness and weariness in her words.

[The Dream will be your cradle. Use your time here to grow into the powers available to you. The vault will provide you with what armaments and armors I was able to bring, spirited away from deeper realms. The Dream itself can produce lesser wonders from the collective imaginings of your kind.]

A hint of pride had crept into her voice. It lasted only a moment, replaced with worry. Her face became more serious. A chill went down my spine.

[Whatever you do, avoid the gaze of the Great Spirits. Though you are their children as much as I, they will not be happy to find you here and free. Hide from their sight as you work to establish yourself. They are loath to expend their energy on anything beyond their games, so if you are able to build your presence here into something that cannot be trivially removed, they may leave you be even should you be discovered.]

Her demeanor softens once more.

[This barrier will be a test for you, before you can step into places where the environment is less controlled. Prove that you can handle a place such as this. Use any means available to you to breach it. Break it, leap past it, or find the keystone, I care not how you do it.]

And with that, she was gone.