From crying hysterically to laughing in less than 60 minutes. Whilst they were trying to digest my story about angels, I started to dress, whilst White Flower was making me a proposal.

“There is one way how we could fight the evolved wolshi!”

I turned and looked at her. She was no longer looking exactly like Terri but was a little different. An improved Terri with slender legs. The green in her eyes has also paled. Two small silver horns had appeared on her head. She did not seem to like being the same all the time? I could not abstain from asking:

“You don't like being Terri anymore?”

She made a gesture with her hand a little aghast by my observation, or perhaps by my lack of concentration.

“Oh, my error. It is the high magic concentration in the environment that causes the slow decay of the magic mirrors I used. I should have refreshed it.”

She drew a hand in front of herself and her appearance changed becoming again a perfect Terri without horns.

“See? All done. Now to my proposal! You could also lose your shadow weakness and you could look as fresh as new.”

“Now you got my attention! Speak!”

“As I do transform myself in Terri, I could easily transform yourself in an immaculate Cala without scars, however...”

Listening to her, I felt a little dizzy. I opened again my eyes and looked at her...

And I had a revelation. I suddenly knew what had happened to me and to Spartacius. It was not some hidden secret or some deep mystery. It was so fuking simple and stupid that I started to laugh. It was something that I just learned.

She was a bit taken aback by my sudden outburst.

“I am not sure I know what is so funny in what I said?”

Alice was also shocked:

“Cala, are you OK?”

I could not answer right away.

Alice was looking worried at me whilst White Flower pouted. Even Spartacius risked an eye to look at me, but my guardian, Tina, shot straight:

“Sparty, keep looking away!”

As he was not allowed to look he asked.

“Is there something?”

“Well, there is. I know. I have the explanation! I know what happened!”

He turned and looked at me then turned back.

“Ow, sorry! What do you mean?”

“You are a spawn Sparty. We are spawns too!”

“Cala, It seems that you lost an essential part of your brain to that wolshi!”

“Sparty!”

A small fireball was gathering in Tina's hand. She shoots it at him. The fireball splashed over his back.

“Ow, that did hurt!”

“Tina!”

“He should not speak like that!”

“Tina, let her explain!”

White Flower was looking askew at me.

“Well, I have just logged in. I have just joined the game!”

“It cannot be you were... “

He stopped. He realized what I said.

“Exactly. My character remained in this world. We knew this! We knew we could leave our characters to play in the field or we could move into an inn and wait?”

"Was it not possible to log out your character?"

"It is no longer an option in this version"

“But I don't remember...”

“Yes, you do not remember when you logged out, not even that you logged out, because you did not log out. It was the real Spartacius who did this. I mean, I do not even know your name...”

“Michael. Michael is my name! How can I know my name if I am not on?”

“Oh. Glad to meet you, Michael! I am Dolores. Well, actually you are not Michael. You are Spartacius! I also knew I am Dolores. I mean my owner? No! My other name? No! ... oh this is getting complicated. It doesn't matter, I am the real one, the real Dolores!”

“What do you mean?”

“You cannot log out. I can! You are only the backup spawn!”

“But... but... But why did they do this? Why should they do such a thing?”

“Remember the theory about enjoying 24 x7 hours of gaming? However, there were problems. If you left your character to play, then it took decisions that you wouldn't take. People were not happy with that. I guess they solved that by making a backup of ourselves inside the character. The backup is so good that you think you did it. And when you log in it just implants the memory. It does not yet run perfectly, I was a bit dizzy but it worked. The last two days, it was not really us, it was our backup that was struggling here. Cala and you Spartacius, we are spawns.”

“Ow fuck! I still cannot believe it! Why would they do this for a game?”

“Where else can they test this fucking functions? In a game! However, this explains why it did hurt me so bad! Now I am not so shocked or scared, you understand? But then, I know it was really bad. Because I, when I am only Cala, I do not have that pain reduction. That comes for Dolores when she plays, not for Cala. I mean for me, not for Cala. Gosh, this is getting confusing. I feel probably one percent of what she feels, or I do not know how does this scale. Maybe I feel it differently. They cannot allow those feelings for real, even if I had them for real. Maybe this can also be controlled somehow. Oh well.”

“But why did we remember that we needed to log out?”

“That was probably a bug. Why did nobody else but us care? Yes, that ghost too! It may be that we two talked or did something that put that memory inside our backups. Ivar the ghost was probably another such case. We cannot be the only ones bugged.”

“So you mean I just need to play until Michael logs in?”

“Exactly. You know perfectly well everything that he wants, so you can do it. See, I do have now the memory that I played two days, but I also have the memory that I was in school and just logged in five minutes ago!”

“Weird!”

“Right?”

The others were quietly listening to our exchange, without daring to interrupt.

“This is probably a test. A test for something bigger. Somebody is experimenting with consciousness transfer?”

“I bet they are. Why would all those huge conglomerates sponsor these games?”

The Lynx tried to protest:

“Hey! What are you two talking about? We here, we lost you!”

I put a hand on the furry leg.

“Don't be angry with us my friend. We'll explain everything. We are now talking about our ghouls in our world!”

Tina found the similarities:

“You also have ghouls there? We are not so different!”

“Tina, our ghouls are not real, it is only a way of speaking. People who love only money and power and seem to have no heart!”

“Yeah, those are ghouls!”

“Hey, finish dressing up! I am tired of talking and looking the other way!”

We all laughed at Spartacius.