Wednesday, August 27th, 2042, Newport, Bellevue, Washington.

  Finally in his office, Jason booted up the FullDive rig. The device hummed to life, familiar lights blinking on the neural headset.

  As he connected the port at the base of his neck, the tension melted away. His rig scanned his biometric data, preparing for tonight’s dive.

  His personal VR hub opened, and real life’s drabness dissolved into something vibrant, alive.

  The icon for A Realm Reforged Again hovered in the corner of his vision. He smiled, selecting it with a flick of his hand.

  The game booted up, the familiar logo materialising before his eyes.

  The lone character creation option appeared, the game waiting patiently for his selection.

  Jason texted M-E to say he was ready to play, and the reply came back almost instantly.

  They exchanged a few messages in rapid succession, and Jason smiled. M-E knew that healing always stressed him out, but he also knew he liked support roles.

  The idea of playing a wizard who could help outside of combat pleased him, and the irony of them being bookish did not escape his notice.

  But he wants me to recruit a healer? I guess I could try, but would it not be simpler to just roll a priest?

  He figured as long as he picked either mage or priest, it should work out, as they started in the same city.

  He did not linger on the point, and simply thumbed up the request. He turned back his attention on the opening screen, finally selecting the lone option available to him.

  A voice and new prompt welcomed him to the first step of character creation: “Choose your creator.”

  Sixteen icons materialised and floated before him.

  Jason frowned. He was familiar with a talk from Sid Meier.

  “A game is a series of interesting decisions.”

  The legendary designer had cautioned those in the audience about what made up interesting decisions.

  Starting the game with a choice of sixteen gods, without information on the impact, why the choice matters, what was the trade-off between those?

  It was an affront to almost every instruction from that talk.

  Did the developers not pay attention?

  Jason’s attention returned to the floating icons.

  He tried figuring out where to start, which to pick first.

  Then he noticed one of them shone radiantly next to the others. It was the second pearl-white icon, but this one surrounded by a warm golden-yellow light.

  It called to him, like an overly eager student raising his or her arm, standing up, and shouting “Me, me, me!”

  Jason selected the icon, chuckling at the thought of an overly eager creator-god.

  “Sure, sure. Since you insist!”

  A short woman appeared, floating just a foot off the floor.

  She could not be taller than four and a half feet, though her soft, rhythmic hovering made it hard to gauge her exact height.

  She had silver hair and wore a white, flowing, shoulderless robe.

  From where he stood, he could see golden, reflective scales peppered across her body, clustered mostly around her joints—elbows, cheeks, shoulders and along the neck. A long, shimmering reptilian tail extended behind her, glowing with the same radiant gold.

  Two delicate fins sprouted where her ears would have been, arching back. Their bony spines fanned outward, with translucent membranes catching the light.

  She had this regal presence, a creature ruling both seas and skies.

  The woman smiled at him; her glowing amethyst eyes locked onto his.

  The game’s interface introduced her. “Luxoria, the lady of compassion, goddess of radiance. Alignment: Light.”

  There was lore about the goddess and her clergy on floating windows, but Jason confirmed his selection after quickly skimming them.

  He shrugged. “I’ve got no idea how this choice is going to affect anything. Compassion sounds choice for me!”

  The goddess faded away, but not before her smile stretched wider, almost smug now. She practically glowed with self-satisfaction, as if she had known all along this moment would come. Her amethyst eyes shimmered, radiating approval—and ownership.

  A wave of sickening vertigo crashed into Jason.

  His body swayed, the world warping as if gravity had shifted. His balance shattered, and his legs buckled.

  He dropped to one knee, struggling for breath. Every inhale felt muted, distant, as if filtered through layers of fabric.

  A strange pressure pulsed at the sides of his head. He tried to focus, but every movement felt alien, like his body no longer belonged to him.

  His chest tightened with panic, but before he could fully process what was happening, he caught something off the corner of his vision.

  Shapes and lights flickered—game windows and menus opening and closing in rapid succession. A strange orchestra of prompts and beeps accompanied the flashing lights: non-diegetic button presses, sliders adjusting and menus closing.

  Suddenly, a pop-up window superposed itself, front and centre, and followed his gaze.

  With no other choice but to wait, he watched as a progress bar slowly filled up.

  “Normal delta exceeded. Body calibration in progress, vestibular correction necessary.”

  Behind the pop-up, he could still catch glimpses of movement in obscured floating windows.

  But he paid little attention to the screens, his mind overwhelmed as it tried to grasp what was happening to his body.

  Slowly, the world steadied, the overwhelming wrongness retreating just enough for him to push himself back onto both feet.

  “Calibration complete. We apologise for the temporary discomfort.”

  The dizziness ebbed, but his new form still felt strange, too light, and entirely alien.

  He blinked, trying to focus as the menus faded away and control returned to his limbs, but the feeling of being in someone else’s skin lingered, an eerie reminder of the power he had just accepted.

  Jason took a deep breath, and everything felt natural again. Not “normal”.

  He was certain something had happened to him.

  But he no longer felt nauseous, he no longer struggled to breathe, and he was standing on his two feet.

  And that was a net improvement over his situation a few seconds ago.

  “What—” he tried speaking, but froze at the sound of his voice: young, feminine. It sounded just like one of his students.

  “Okay, what just happened…?” he asked out loud, the weird mismatch of his internal voice making it hard to complete a full sentence.

  That feeling was like the horrible echo you get when your voice got picked up by two microphones at once.

  “Choose your starting class.”

  A window appeared and suggested his next course of action.

  Jason scowled at the window.

  That’s not very helpful.

  But he supposed it would have to do in lieu of an actual answer.

  Jason shook his head.

  Her head?

  Her head felt strange. The extra weight of her fins and long silver hair were totally foreign.

  That must be the work of the calibration system.

  That revolutionary system created by the game’s developers had taken away his discomfort at inhabiting a non-human body, but only subconsciously.

  If Jason intentionally took the time to think about it? He could feel all of it: every odd sensation or how foreign her very limbs felt.

  Jason stopped thinking about it, the feeling of disorientation lessening as he focused his mind elsewhere.

  Looks like the calibration system has its limits.

  He had to admit it still impressed him. The system had to deal with way more than having changed him into a non-human body.

  It was also a much smaller body.

  And a woman’s one at that.

  It was not until she noticed the golden scales covering her arms that the reason for the change hit her.

  Jason had chosen a creator.

  And now she now embodied that creator. Luxoria.

  She twisted her torso and glanced behind her, catching sight of her own tail.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  There it was, the golden dracan tail adjusting itself to counter-balance the sudden movement.

  “Yep, that’s her, alright. I’m her.”

  That mystery solved, Jason familiarised himself with the goddess’ form.

  She twisted herself, getting a feel of her body, stretching her limbs. She moved about, a spring in her step.

  After a few minutes, she returned to the menu and tackled the next step of the character creation.

  Eight choices representing the starting classes waited patiently in front of her.

  Picking a class comes second?

  Jason understood the colour-code immediately: blue for tanks, green for healers and red for damage dealers.

  He focused on the red icons.

  A flame, a book and a bow & arrow.

  “The book must be for mage,” she said.

  She considered finding which of the two healers was the priest.

  But she selected the mage class, just like M-E had suggested.

  Her friend knew the way those games worked, the social dynamics and responsibilities of party members.

  There was probably a good reason to pick mage over priest.

  Jason determined he would just work harder and find a healer before the two of them met up.

  It was likely M-E would head over to the starting city of mages and priests.

  What was the name of the place, again? Luminara, I think?

  She confirmed her selection, but part of the message that appeared next took her by surprise.

  “On Umber’s First Darksday of Harvestfall, 1442, Vaelith Dawnscale was born. May the Sixteen watch over her as she blooms into her true self.”

  Jason tilted his head in confusion. But panic quickly took over as the character creation space dissolved.

  That was the last step?

  “Back! Back! Cancel!”

  But her voice commands went unheeded. Darkness swallowed her.

  I didn’t even get to choose my character’s appearance! And what’s up with that name?

  Surrounded by darkness, a new message appeared, glowing softly.

  “It’ll be alright, my precious hatchling. Now it’s time for Vaelith to wake up.”

  Vaelith drifted in darkness.

  The moment seemed to stretch out for an eternity.

  When it finally cleared, she blinked, disoriented.

  Wherever she was now, it was not the game.

  She did not know how she could tell, she instinctively knew it.

  Everything about the world felt familiar, but somehow wrong, like the afterimage of a dream clinging to her mind. The air was heavy and had a foggy quality to it; the light shimmering unnaturally, as though seen through a veil of steam.

  Is this a memory? But no, it’s more than that…

  The courtyard—stone walls draped in ivy, the faint scent of earth—was unmistakable.

  One of the mage’s guildhall courtyards from Vaelith’s childhood apprenticeship. Memories from her character’s past.

  But something was off about the edges of things, a faint flickering at the corners of her vision, as though the scene were struggling to hold itself together, slipping between clarity and dissolution.

  Is this real?

  She was not sure. The paradox gripped her: she knew these were past events, yet she felt tethered to the present, able to act. Not just a passive observer of memories, but something more—a player on the stage.

  She could move, change things, alter the past.

  The confusion gnawed at her. This was not just recollection; it was a place in-between, somewhere she had not been before, a blurred boundary between memory and the now.

  She frowned, her tail twitching reflexively behind her, pulling her spine along with its foreign, yet paradoxically familiar, movements.

  How I am feeling the pull of my own muscles inside a memory?

  Vaelith’s head twitched involuntarily, the fins on the sides of her head vibrating slightly as they caught the distant voices of students that filled the halls.

  She frowned.

  The words sounded clear enough, but they did not travel like they used to. There was something strange in the way sounds carried now, something layered beneath the vibrations.

  It reminded her of Jason’s anhedonia—that muted, distant feeling that had once dulled every emotion. Joy, sorrow, fear, even pain—detectable, but muffled. Life had been there, but never sharp enough, never close enough to touch.

  But now… now, the world felt sharp. Alive! Every sound, every vibration, seemed to cut through her, clearer than before, almost too clear.

  There was an extra layer to how she perceived sounds now—like she was not simply hearing the sound, but feeling the vibrations ripple through her bones.

  She rubbed the side of her head, her fingers brushing the ridged fin beneath her hair, trying to dull the constant hum of sound waves catching on her scales.

  A shock of surprise coursed through her body the moment she touched her fins. The voices of students warped, growing sharp, piercing.

  She winced, jerking her hand away. Her fingers tingled as though the bones themselves had picked up some strange current.

  That had been unexpectedly intense.

  Just how sensitive are those things?

  She gingerly brought both hands to her fins. Delicately, she made contact and slowly covered them with her fingers.

  The world around her shifted.

  Voices twisted, became deeper, and felt more distant. The chirping birds faded into a dull hum. It felt like listening underwater; the sounds muted and vibrating faintly around her.

  Vaelith’s heart skipped a beat.

  This was not human hearing.

  It was not even close to how Jason’s eardrums processed sounds.

  For Vaelith, every sound was much clearer. She could somehow judge their distance and provenance far better. They each had a texture and richness to it that no human ears could ever register.

  It would take time getting used to all the nuances.

  But somehow, all of it filled her heart with a sense of hope.

  Is this a dracan thing? Or is that what “normal” hearing feels like?

  She recalled how long young Jason had lived with poor eyesight.

  To have to squint and to struggle to read anything beyond a few metres.

  It took years before some optician diagnosed him with myopia. Until then, seeing everything this way had been his normal.

  The first day he had put glasses on, and later, the day after the laser eye surgery? Jason could not believe how he had never noticed how blurry his life had been until that day.

  Was this the same?

  Were Jason’s ears somehow defective, and he had never known?

  Maybe dracan’s hearing is simply superior.

  She let go of her fins and took stock of her surroundings again, this time more alert and attentive.

  There was a hum of magical energy that buzzed softly through the air, vibrating like the quiet thrum of a tuning fork.

  Students hurried to their classes, chatting loudly as they passed, some glancing at her. But most simply ignored her.

  The courtyard was alive with motion, but Vaelith felt disconnected—like she was not fully present.

  She looked down at her herself.

  She wore a humble hempen robe, a rope belt tied at the waist. It was a poor fit. The garment was excessively large, its loose form hanging several inches past her ankles.

  The rolled-up sleeves reminded her how her hands would otherwise vanish under the excess cloth.

  Next to her, there was a stack of well-worn textbooks.

  Her precious books.

  Memories involving them immediately filled her mind.

  Without even looking, she knew they were full of lessons, notes, diagrams, rituals and incantations, penned by her own hand at first.

  She recalled fondly the lessons when she learned to control her quill with her magic.

  She shook her head at the alien memory, and stood up, trying to shake off the overwhelming sense that something was deeply, deeply wrong.

  She took a hesitant step forward, feeling the subtle shift in her centre of gravity.

  Her body moved differently—fluid, balanced, as though every muscle had already learned to work with her tail. Each step felt instinctual, her tail counterbalancing every motion with a grace Jason’s body had never known.

  The ease of it unnerved her, the effortless way this body knew itself even as her mind rebelled.

  Jason’s old body had always felt clumsy, too heavy in all the wrong places.

  But Vaelith’s?

  Vaelith’s body was weightless, each step precise, instinctive, as if she were finally moving in sync with herself.

  She took a few steps toward a nearby fountain.

  On the way there, Vaelith focused to still her tail.

  As long as she focused, she could keep its movement to a minimum, but as soon as she stopped concentrating, it moved again—subtly, naturally—adjusting her balance as she walked.

  She scowled again, fear crawling up her spine.

  Part of her body moved on its own, and she disliked how naturally it came to her.

  Once she reached the fountain, she looked down at her reflection.

  It shimmered faintly in the water, the violet, luminous eyes staring back.

  Something inside her recoiled.

  This was not Jason’s face.

  What she saw was the reflection of a younger Luxoria—the creator she had chosen earlier.

  Why do I… Is that how Vaelith is supposed to look like?

  Deep down, she could feel something.

  How her heart yearned to be like that.

  Not knowing what to do with this feeling, she urged that part of her to silence.

  “This isn’t me,” Vaelith said with a trembling whisper in her new soft voice.

  Her fingers brushed the hollow of her throat, and she froze again.

  Of course, there was no sign of Adam’s apple, but something else surprised her.

  It was not just the texture—smoother, thinner—it was the way the touch felt.

  Foreign.

  Her mind scrambled, desperately trying to hold on to the memory of Jason’s old body—broad, human, familiar. But that memory was slipping like sand through her fingers.

  She shook her head, trying to force the memory back, trying to feel like him again.

  But she could not.

  No matter how hard she tried to summon the weight and solidity of Jason’s form, it was dissolving.

  Fading.

  She looked down at her hands again—slender, beautiful. But a stranger’s hands.

  The golden scales on her wrists reminded her how she was not quite human.

  Her dracan tail swayed naturally with each breath, each heartbeat, as though it had always been there, always been a part of her.

  This body isn’t mine. I’m just borrowing it.

  But beneath the fear, beneath the confusion, something darker—something she did not want to acknowledge—stirred.

  This felt... right.

  Horrifyingly, deeply right.

  And that realisation made her breath catch in her throat.

  “Look, it’s the goddess’ shadow,” a boy said with a snicker, interrupting her moment of introspection.

  She looked up, noticing a group of homini children who had stopped nearby, looking and pointing at her.

  Beside the boy, a girl frowned.

  “More like an imitation,” she said, her tone biting.

  “She thinks she’s so much better than all of us,” another girl said with a sneer.

  Vaelith felt a flicker of vulnerability.

  She was almost a full head shorter than any of them.

  Their words stung like sharp thorns.

  She had not chosen this body!

  And neither have I!

  She hated how bullies always targeted people for things beyond their control.

  The memories of moments like these flooded back, old wounds—teasing, rejection, pain.

  The echoes of that past life seemed to claw at her insides, as if those same jabs had hurt Jason long before Vaelith had ever existed.

  Most of those memories ended in tears, and too frequently in bruises as well.

  Her heart raced. She could feel they sensed her fear, how they fed on it. She saw the way their eyes lingered on her with quiet cruelty.

  Mercifully, they seemed satisfied with that much for today; after a few more stabbing remarks, the group turned away, laughing and muttering as they walked off.

  Even as their backs disappeared into the crowd, their words echoed in her head, cutting deeper than she expected.

  Whenever people looked at her, they saw the goddess’ reflection, not Jason. Not the man who taught middle school, who drove an electric SUV, who had a life outside this fantasy world.

  But as their whispers dug into her, she could not shake the quiet, unsettling truth crawling up her spine: this body, this face—it did not feel as wrong as it should.

  A voice, gentle and comforting, resonated within her, as if rising from deep inside.

  “Embrace who you are, my little hatchling. Be without fear.”

  Her breath caught.

  The words wrapped around her like a warm blanket, but her mind was a chaotic tangle of thoughts.

  Why does this body feel so right?

  It had to be wrong. She clung desperately to that belief.

  But beneath the denial, that whisper—that quiet, almost inaudible truth—kept nagging at her, pulling at her insides.

  Once more, she took stock of herself, looking down at the golden scales tracing delicate patterns across her wrists and forearms. Her tail moved slowly behind her, coiling in frustration.

  But instead of revulsion, a strange comfort settled into her muscles.

  She tried to shake the thought, to shove it back down.

  “It’s the dragon parts,” she said in a mutter, folding her arms across her chest and rubbing at the smooth scales on her forearms.

  “It’s not me. The fins, the tail, the scales. That’s what feels weird.”

  Her tail swayed, curling and coiling as though it had a mind of its own.

  “No human would feel okay with this.”

  She tried to convince herself, but one question kept haunting her.

  Am I even still human?

  As she repeated the question, her mind drifted back to the way her body felt while walking through the academy halls, her steps light and precise, her body in perfect alignment.

  She did not want to admit it, but there was something deeply, unsettlingly right about this.

  And that terrified her.

  She really wanted to believe it. But the more she sank into the sensation, the more the world around her felt... right. Alive!

  All her senses felt so much sharper. She was not just hearing sounds. She was feeling them. The vibrations themselves were threading through her bones, giving her a new sense of presence she had never experienced before.

  Her tail curled behind her, the fins on her head fluttered in the breeze, and for a brief, terrifying moment, Vaelith let out a small breath of relief.

  This body felt more real than Jason’s ever had.

  And she hated how much she liked it.

  “This is wrong,” Vaelith said, whispering.

  But the words held no conviction. There was no fight at all behind them.

  Her voice was small, trembling with confusion.

  Jason had spent years perfecting the art of being satisfied with nothing. Or rather, the art of appearing satisfied.

  He had learned to live in a shell of quiet resignation, where joy was something distant and unreachable, something only others could taste.

  And now? For the first time, as things felt... truly right, truly alive—he could feel the creeping urge to shut it down. As if allowing himself this moment of alignment, this rare sense of belonging in his own skin, was selfish.

  As if he did not deserve to feel good, to feel whole.

  She clenched her fists, feeling the weight of the truth creep in around the edges of her mind.

  It was not the tail, the scales, or even the fins that felt wrong.

  It was Jason’s body—the heavy, stiff memory of it, distant and dull—that no longer belonged.

  Her vision shifted, the memory dissolving.

  As it faded, Vaelith felt a part of herself—no, a part of Jason’s past—fade along with it.