Whoever turned up the world needed to go and fucking die. The littlest noise was akin to being stabbed in my brain with a needle. There also seemed to be a dog or something in the bed with me for some reason and its soft fur kept tickling my legs. Then again, I preferred animal fur to the scratchy synthetic blankets I usually used. Plus the fur was much warmer.

  I was one of those people that ran cold whenever I slept, no matter how many blankets I piled over myself. Now though, I was practically burning up. It was a comfortable heat though and I was reluctant to push the creature away.

  Of course, my bladder took that moment to remind me it existed. It was insistent that it was full and had to be relieved now. It didn’t care if I was still here or made it to the toilet. My eyelids, coated in gunk as they were, refused to move. The moment I managed to get them open, the curtain that blocked the sunlight fluttered enough to allow a stream to hit my face. It sent a lance of pain searing its way through my brain.

  “Woah,” came a voice I did not expect to hear. In a confused rush, I carefully opened one of my eyes enough to double-check that the speaker was who I thought it was. I caught Xander as he scrambled out of a chair and reached for me. “Your body is still weak from all of those debuffs.”

  “What debuffs?” I rasped as I worked to lift the blanket off. Whatever it was made from weighed a ton. “Where am I?”

  He didn’t answer my questions and instead asked one of his own. “What do you remember?” Given that I was going to have to find the answer myself soon enough, I humored him.

  Do you know how hard it is to look back at a series of memories and try and work out what was real and what was a nightmare? To then sort through those memories as you tried to put them in order. If you haven’t, be happy. It is nerve-wracking and mentally tiring. Before I finished, my bladder decided to send me a subtle reminder in the form of a twinge. “I need to use the bathroom.”

  The emotions that flashed across his face confused me. I could swear that I saw sadness, happiness, fear, and even anger. Yet he didn’t say a word. Instead, he lifted a hand to point at a door set into a wall. It was on the other side of the spacious room with only a table between here and there.

  Undaunted, I scrambled across the bed. As I went to get off the bed my legs wobbled. Xander’s arms caught me just in time as my legs suddenly gave out. Without any effort, the guy carried me like a princess as he strode to the bathroom.

  The bathroom was different than the room. Where the room was made of dark wood, this one was covered in various stone materials. Stone tiles covered most of the exposed surfaces, save for the mirror and the counter. Jet black marble, cut with silver and gold striations, covered the counter.

  When he finally set me on my feet in front of the toilet I caught his conflicted look. I scoffed at him. “I think I can handle going to the bathroom on my own.”

  “That’s not,” he started as he spun around. If I didn’t know better, I would have sworn I saw his cheeks turn crimson. “Call if you need help. And please, don’t freak out, or if you do, don’t kill me. I can't help you if you kill me. Well, I can but…we will figure something out.” He almost sounded panicked as he blurted everything out before he practically sprinted out of the room and shut the door.

  While I was a bit confused and concerned for him, I found myself alone. I could have yelled through the door but another twinge sent me scrambling for the toilet. A short lift of a long t-shirt later, I finally got some blessed relief.

  As the sudden relief and relaxation dissipated, I found that something was different. The stream felt, off. Like it wasn’t coming from the right place. Not only that, but fur now tickled my back. I had a sinking suspicion that some of my memories that I had thought were figments of nightmares had actually happened.

  Eyes closed, I prayed I wouldn’t find anything as I felt along my chest. A wave of tingles trailed after my fingers as I skimmed my skin. They changed from tingles to full-blown fireworks the moment I reached my pecks.

  While I didn’t want to, I had to confirm what my body was telling me. Head tilted down, I slowly opened my eyes.

  As if I had naturally grown them, two orbs of fat sat on my chest. They were not all that large. If anything, they looked just large enough for me to get a good handful and nothing more. That wouldn’t be so bad if they were the only changes I recalled, but they were not.

  My hand continued up. Past my neck, then my face before it stopped at my hairline. “Alex?” Xander’s worried voice carried through the door. While I didn’t answer him, his voice did give me the push I needed to continue.

  Hair turned to soft fur as my fingers brushed against something on top of my head. Oddly enough, the parts I touched were not connected to my scalp. At least not at the spot my fingers brushed. Though, it didn’t help that I felt pleasure radiating from the fleshy masses as my hand rubbed against the cartilage tip.

  “Alex,” the tip twitched upward as Xander’s soft, worried voice called out. “Please answer me.”

  It took me a moment but when I did, my voice caught in the middle as I answered him. “What happened to me?”

  “I wasn’t there but,” he hesitated a moment. “But I have an idea. First, though, tell me, did you use the SoulStone?”

  Memories of my fight with the city captain came to me in a rush. They were enough to cause tears to explode from me. “It was the only way!” I wailed out as everything clicked into place. I didn’t hear the door open or his footsteps. Between one moment and the next I went from alone to wrapped in his arms. I buried my head into his chest as I cried harder than ever. It was like a damn had burst. I hadn’t even cried this hard when both of my parents were killed in a car crash.

  I don’t know how long we sat there. Nor did I need to. It was embarrassing enough to find that I had soaked my friend’s shirt with tears and snot. “Are you feeling better?” He murmured into my hair. His voice caused his chest to vibrate which was oddly soothing. Unable to speak through the knot in my throat, I nodded. “I know it is a sensitive subject, but we have to talk.”

  Just the thought of talking caused fear to fill my mind. I rapidly shook my head back and forth. Determined to try and forget everything that had happened in the hopes that I would wake up and find that this was all a bad dream.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  Thankfully, he let the topic drop. A squeak escaped me as he stood up with me still in his arms. As before, he didn’t show a sign of strain as he carried me. One of his arms held me against him while the other supported my ass. I had no clue how I felt about the position.

  On one hand, it felt nice to be held by someone. Yes, it wasn’t a chick carrying me, but something about how he held me was comforting. I felt safe in his arms. Of course, there was the other side of me that felt like I was losing myself. That the changes would take away what it meant to be me until I no longer existed. To say I was mentally thrown by the situation would have been an understatement.

  Before I could figure out what to feel and how to react, he set me down on the edge of the bed. He took a seat in the chair and looked at me for a second before speaking. “So, you remember using the SoulStone. Do you remember fighting a demon?”

  My eyes dropped to the ground in shame as I recalled the fight with the demon and how I lost. As my mind went over the entire fight, I realized that he had just been playing with me. In fact, I was fairly sure he had done something to win. “Wait,” I started to say, only to have to stop for a second as I fought to keep from bursting into tears again. “Did the demon get you too?”

  A hand came into view as he reached for my chin. It was soft but insistent as he tipped my head back while his thumb gently caressed my cheek. “No,” his voice was soft, calming, as he spoke. “I killed it right after you passed out.”

  I snorted at that. Grateful for the joke and distraction from the situation. “You, the guy that hates online games because people might track you, took down a demon. Right.”

  “Just because I hate playing online does not mean I have not done so before.” He spoke as if he was afraid I would bolt if he said the wrong thing. “How else do you think I knew about this game?”

  “The internet?”

  His lifted eyebrow told me what he thought of my answer. “One of my buddies told me about the game. He even helped me out in the beginning.”

  “And now?” I tried to keep him talking about something, anything, just as long as it was not related to demons.

  “He is still around, we even get together now and then to hang out still, but enough about that.” Damn it, he always seemed to know when I was trying to distract him. “Your body has changed. I don’t mean one part or even your race, I mean everything.”

  I sighed, “I know.” Xander breathed a sigh of relief. “But it's not permanent. I mean, no game can force you to play something you’re not. Ok, so it can make you play as another race, but gender? It would cause too many mental issues when the person goes back to the real world.” His grimace told me that there was something I was missing. “What?” I demanded.

  “Have you been keeping up with the forum posts about people’s experiences with their SoulStones?”

  With a shake of my head, I said, “No, I have been too busy training.” His obvious hesitation coupled with his twiddling thumbs nearly caused a growl to spill out of my throat. Which was odd as I didn’t growl. “Spit it out.”

  Xander’s eyes shot up to meet mine in surprise. He must have seen my resolve because he sighed before speaking. “SoulStones don’t just affect your character. They also affect your real body.”

  I fell backward as I burst out laughing. “Good one.”

  His tone wasn’t that of someone telling a joke. “The description warned everyone about what it would do. It is our fault for ignoring the damned thing.”

  “You mean that whole thing about combining the soul and the body? There is no way that was real. It was like flavor text in other games.”

  Xander shook his head. “You have changed as much there as you have here. Just ask your AI.”

  With a roll of my eyes, I humored his new brand of crazy. “AI, can you tell me my body's current status?”

  “Your body is currently not in the pod.” The AI’s voice echoed in my ears.

  “What do you mean it is not in the pod.” Great, now the sensors on the damned AI were going out. Yet another thing to spend money on. Then again, was there a point in doing so? My chances of finding a way to make money was likely non-existant no matter where I was. “When did it disappear from your sensors?”

  “Sensor records indicate that the user's body vanished around twenty real-world hours ago.” What was that, two and a half in-game days?

  “What was I doing at the time?”

  “You used an object before fighting the demon, Kaelis Morrowgrave.” The AI reported. “Sensors recorded a bright burst of light and radiation at the same moment your body vanished.”

  My mind rebelled against the AI’s report coupled with Xander’s words. He waited a moment before reaching out to gently squeeze my leg. “As I said earlier, I will help you figure this out.” Suddenly, I needed out. I knew it was stupid but I had to get away from this game. He must have known what I was about to do because, as I went to demand the system log me out, he held something up and said “Stop!”

  My eyes locked onto the small round ball in his hand as every muscle in my body froze. The sight of it brought back memories of the demon and his promises. Promises that sent waves of fear and dread racing down my spine. I was sure that my tail was standing to attention as I waited in fear over what his next order might be.

  With the orb in his hand, he could get me to do anything with a simple word and there would be nothing I could do. To my surprise, he held it out to me. “Keep this safe. Maybe put it somewhere no one else can find, or maybe buy a subspace item to store it if you can.” As I grabbed the object, I pulled up its information.

  I groaned in both exasperation and relief as I asked him a question. “Did you read the description?”

  “Yes, how else would I have known to give it back to you?”

  “Did you notice where it says that it cannot go into spatial inventories?”

  “Ah,” he perked up as he spoke. It was almost as if he had found a safe topic that he knew enough about to keep a conversation going. “Spatial inventories and subspace items are different.”

  “How so?” I knew I was about to get a lecture, but I figured I would give him this before vanishing.

  “Inventories and most storage items are considered spatial inventories. From what I understand, they use compression and other tricks to store more items in a smaller area. Subspace items, on the other hand, are items that connect the item to a small pocket dimension. As you can guess, the latter are way more expensive, but they tend to be worth it.” He lowered his voice a little as if to tell me a secret. “There are even rumors of some bags having the ability to follow their user when they log in and out.”

  With a roll of my eyes, I thanked him before logging out of the game. Every fiber of my being joined me in wishing, praying, hoping, that he was wrong about the effect the game had on reality. After all, I had grown attached to that body.