“A side benefit this project will offer to the players, and one that we hope will drive sales and insure a high degree of participation from the people of Earth, is how the game should affect them physically. Your average Earth human is one third to half as physically fit as the average human in the Imperium. They suffer from a host of virtually unknown ailments and many are even obese…” James paused at the blank looks and frowns of his little audience. “Let me explain, obese is the term they use to describe people so over weight with fat that it is a medical problem… I know it’s hard to imagine, it’s just a sign of how primitive they are…”

“Getting back to my point, those people with obesity will find their fat melting away as they play the game, thanks to the nanites. The players will get stronger and have a lot fewer medical problems. I have run some A.I. driven projections, and provided the people of the wealthier nations can afford the game pods, over 63% of the people will buy them. They may not use all them to play Omni, some may buy them and use them for time compression feature. It’s estimated that 10% of those people will just buy them for the sleep compression and physical training they will offer.”

“Imagine a whole world of people that spend a third of their very short lives just sleeping.” James wanted to shudder at the thought of all the time wasted.

***

Kevin had the next five days until the start of the alpha testing, he calculated that with time compression, that would give him nearly two virtual weeks to get in shape and train, even while still going to work.

Kevin’s training really took off on the day after his new pod was delivered. This first day, Samantha set up a training course for him.

The first thing to surprise him was that Samantha wanted him to wear a back pack and gun on a belt while exercising. In the back pack there were packs of water with electrolytes, and it weighed about 10 pounds.

“Why do you want me to carry a gun and back pack while training?” asked Kevin.

“This training is not just about you getting more fit. You also need to learn other skills; one of those skills is how to carry a gun while having to move. You should learn to run, dive, roll, and manage any other physical challenge while carrying a weapon.” said

Samantha.

Kevin thought, ‘Glad it isn’t a sword, it would probably make me trip.’

“The back pack serves to get you used to carrying one when you need to, and the weight will help you build strength.”

His training course started out with him stretching his muscles, and then he would take off running. The amount of time he would run was calculated by Samantha to provide the best growth to his strength, agility and constitution. After running, Samantha would have him switch to another exercises, practice martial arts, or practice shooting targets. When Samantha felt he was recovered enough, she had him back to running.

His training was broken up with meals, and after the meal he would find the terrain had changed. He would be on a road, in a forest, on a mountain or desert. The swamp really sucked… no really, each step the mud would suck at his feet, and then there would be a slurping sound when his foot came free.

For the first three days this was how he trained. Each day, more stuff was put in the back pack, like extra ammo, rations, and more water.

On the fourth day, Samantha added the obstacles. He had walls to climb, tunnels to crawl through, a field of tires to step through, and bars to dive and roll over. The course started easy, short walls, big tunnels and tires, a pad to dive and roll on. Over time the difficulty increased.

On the sixth day, targets were added to the obstacle course. Climb over a wall, a man shaped target would pop up. His task was to pull his gun and put two rounds in its chest. The same with the other obstacles, targets would appear from all sides, they would get two rounds each.

On the seventh day, he was expected to make the shots while on the run.

On the eighth day, the targets disappeared, instead someone would appear and aim a gun at him, and he would have two seconds to respond.

It was on the eighth day that he was shot for the first time.

He just crawled out of a tunnel, and had his head down, so he didn’t see the man appear.

He was just pulling his gun out when he felt a great pain in his chest, as he was knocked back a few paces.

The obstacle course disappeared.

He fell to his knees.

‘I’ve been shot… Is this what it feels like to be shot? Will I die… what happens if…’ thoughts were racing through his head.

“Sam”, he called.

Samantha stepped up to him and waved a hand over his chest, and the bullet wound

disappeared.

“What… Why did that hurt so much?” asked Kevin. He had noticed the feel of the aches and bruises from his training but they were the regular pains, and he didn’t think about them, but getting shot HURT.

This is when he learned that pain in the game was real. Samantha said the pain level was set at 45%, but could be adjusted up to 60% or down to 30%. When he asked about the adjustment, Samantha paused and asked if I could wait a minute until she could seek permission from Intelecom to give me more information, since this dealt with game mechanics. After getting permission, she informed him that the company felt that the pain level was part of the realism, and there were hidden benefits for players who chose a higher level of pain, and hidden penalties for players using lower levels. As a result of this information, Kevin decided to increase the pain level to 60%, if he couldn’t take the pain, he would change it later… But the game seem to take the term ‘if there’s no pain, there’s no gain’ to another level.

On the day he found out about the option to increase the games realism, Samantha reconfigured his virtual house by adding a hallway and shifting the training room door and his bedroom to open off the new hall. She also added two other doors, a Bathroom and the door which would eventually open into Omnia Online. It turns out the increased realism included costs other than just pain… having to use the toilet. There was an upside though, a jacuzzi tub and showers with someone to wash your back… hidden benefits… And the after exercise massages… If everyone had a trainer like Samantha, we would all be as fit as Olympic level athletes.

Kevin got shot a few more times in the following days, but he soon learned to pay better attention to his surroundings. The pain helped his focus. He still didn’t think having people pop up behind him was fair though.

The ninth day Samantha added buildings for him to clear.

On the tenth day there was a town to run through. People would appear out of doorways, windows, or from around corners. Kevin found that being shot at from someone behind a dumpster was more than a little irritating, and he was pissed off when the bastard shot him. It’s not easy to target someone who is behind cover and shooting at you.

Lesson learned, use cover.

Kevin noticed a remarkable increase in his in-game/pod skills and strength. What he didn’t seem to notice was that his physical condition in the real world was also improving… This was probably because he spent all his non-work time in the pod.

***

On Kevin’s last day of work, before the alpha test would start, he found himself reaching for a non-existent gun and spinning around when someone dropped a box of cups in the back of the restaurant.

***

The day finally arrived to start playing Omnia Online, as an alpha tester. When he asked Samantha about providing feedback as a tester, she informed him, that she would be sending in regular reports, so that he could focus on playing the game. It worried him at first that she might be sending in personal data that he might find embarrassing. But Samantha reassured him, that the data sent in to Intelecom, would be limited to how he responded to the game.

As for his personal fitness, he was doing three times the push-ups, pull-ups and set-ups as when he started his training…

Kevin had managed to swap days off at work, to get the next two days to play. But he now owed Sarah, a co-worker, an unspecified favor.

So, at last, it was time to open the door and find out what this game was all about.