Loris had barely confirmed the purchase that multiple holographic windows popped up like computer viruses. Scarcely any good news.

Sigh. Only now did the brand bother to clarify all terms of use. Of course, it comprised all the previously hidden downsides.

The most irritating one concerned the monitoring nano-robots caps. They won’t be delivered immediately. The company had to collect more data about him in order to produce the first customised and organically compatible samples. In short, Loris wouldn’t train with an acute monitoring system tonight.

Taking a step back, it wasn’t such bad news. Training once without was acceptable. That way, he could judge their alleged usefulness and avoid any bottomless money pit. Not that he’d ever been tricked. Ok, maybe once,... or twice.

Even in Merigen, scams kept their name. While selling defective goods - above ground - was impossible, deceptive services and misleading products proliferated everywhere. Both particularly affected the less intelligent part of the population—basically most Merigenian without genetically altered intelligence, vitality or perception. Such people suffered from intellectual laziness and were, therefore, easily fooled by logical biases and ambiguities.

Reading another holographic window, Loris saw some introduction to his recently bought formation.

[Intermediate module: Night steps to conquer yourself.]

Concerning the classification, Loris didn’t bother to make much sense of it. He still blindly trusted this formation’s potential. Fabrice recommended it, after all. Rubbish-tier, or legendary module, it must be useful. Still, he remembered that most of those displayed on the general browser fell below the novice categorisation. Enough to assume that higher grade modules must be exclusive to higher class citizens. The privilege of the meritorious.

It remained disgraceful to read that his pricy module only included the first six steps. Half of these being unusable because of his citizen categorisation. Between that and the delayed capsules, he felt more than rounded up. Although he bore some responsibility for glimpsing the contract, no one in their right mind would waste their time reading a two-thousand-page mess for every purchase. Even for his peers following the intelligence pathway, it would take one to two hours. Still, Loris couldn’t refute he relied too much on Aina to identify such technical scams. Was it illegal? Yes. Did anyone care about his F-rank rights? Hell, no.

Thankfully, not a big deal. As Fabrice had recommended him to reach the second step, anything beyond was of less importance. This reassured him, protecting what little pride he had left. With that in mind, Loris continued reading.

The module divided the six steps into two categories—the first three focused on controlling the body and the other on the mind, each certifying a mastery over a fundamental aspect.

Specific training and preparation phases would be necessary before the ultimate test: to take the step. Still, it remained unclear given the lack of any milestone. According to the notice, it depended on personal capacities and limitations. Great, but he won’t get far with that.

Despite being left in an informational haze, Loris was eager to start right now. Sadly, he had to meet physical and mental fitness requirements first. In the name of which variables? Puny artificial intelligence. Through the meagre information transmitted from his personal object, the Noflo algorithm already looked down on him.

“Aina, do I look like a loser?” Loris asked hesitantly.

“According to which criteria?”

Loris sighed. “Nevermind.” Maybe an instinct of self-preservation, but he felt pushing this matter further would bring no good.

Reading the end of the module’s introductions, loris gladly learned it included a sub-step that would help him meet the prerequisites.

[Step 0: All you need for a good start.]

A meagre consolation. Except for this one, none of the steps matched what he was looking for. Still, his friend went to the length of giving or maybe lending him thirty thousand merits. Therefore, reaching the second step must be beneficial.

BIP BIP

This shrill signal would break the concentration of any being. A very familiar sound as it rang every day in the living room.

Unlike him, Anastasia wasn’t shy about spending money. Quite the opposite, in fact. This irritating noise pounded his eardrums whenever a package landed on the roof delivery platforms. Too many times a day to count.

Looking on the bright side, his order finally arrived. It almost kept him waiting.

“Aina, get the package down.”

“Understood.”

Loris leapt off his flashy green seat, passing through the corridor whose blank walls conditioned a mental reset. With three available doors on each side, he took the first left.

As he approached, it opened by itself, leading him into a narrow spherical room, enough to make a claustrophobic uncomfortable. Nevertheless, the ceiling nearly reached the peak of the dome-shaped house.

A small package stood in the centre, hovering at Loris’ height.

He grabbed it and went back, taking the opposite door. It looked like the previous tube-shaped area, only the entrance closed on his steps.

Without warning, something propelled him into the air at a dizzying speed. Heading straight for the ceiling, his skull wouldn’t end up in a much better state than a chicken egg: both would crush.

About to crash, his body sharply braked, not allowing his brain to test the rigidity of the walls. Instead, he fell back to the floor, which had previously repulsed him with as much violence as any person he had ever tried to befriend.

Mid-air, a hatch opened, making a second floor appear under his feet. It stopped his fall.

Loris smugly smiled at the great satisfaction of elegantly jumping into his bedroom.

Now upstairs, he stood in a private chamber where a sense of emptiness prevailed. The soulless walls only reinforced this feeling.

Devoid of decoration and furniture - except for a sizeable tube-shaped machine and a bed in the corners - this hollow piece would freeze a dead. It lacked history and inspiration. It lacked life. The only device resembled the famous jars where mad scientists put their living experiments. As for the hovering cradle-shaped bed, the sole inspiring furniture in the room, a glass cockpit covered its upper part. Twinkling from hundreds of lights, it formed a stain in this gloomy room.

A snap of the fingers would make this depressing atmosphere cheerful. Still, he wanted to remain authentic, at least in his room—the places that represented him the most. Indulging in false happiness meant forever losing himself for Loris. Equivalent to locking up in a self that clearly wasn’t him. Only by coming closer to his dreams of greatness he would allow himself, once again, to feel and display dignity and well-being worthy of him. Meditating on his own thoughts, Loris pledged aloud. “My world is the world; my power is my will.” Under these words, his room turned into a night sky full of stars and other galactic components. Way too much details for his eyes to discern. From an object of his lamentation, the design of his room turned into his long forsaken, boundless aspiration.

No one else had the power to transform reality into his dreams. That’s why he would make it true. At the very least, that was what he wished to wish.

Sitting in the middle of the piece, of which a cosmic table and chair had emerged for his accommodation, Loris opened the package he had just collected.

There was a pair of lenses, translucent earplugs, and a nose-shaped slimy device. It was the virtual reality kit. Beside it lay a tiny, grey capsule. It contained perishable nano-robots that would collect data from his body to produce custom-made monitoring nano-robots.

He swallowed the pill and equipped the mixed reality kit. As if two slimy slugs rubbed against his face, the substance liquified and flowed into his ears and nose. Much more troubling, the lenses went deep within his eyelids, circling his eyes.

All perfectly took the shape of his sensory organs, now recovered with a transparent material light enough to be considered a solid gas. Weird, but at least comfortable.

Like in games, information appeared before his eyes; it looked genuine, unlike the light effects generated by his smartwatch. Also, he could move around without impacting the visual quality.

[Do you want to use your p-watch as a monitoring device?]

[Yes/No]

Loris winked his left eye to confirm.

In terms of ergonomics, he could use his eyes, fingers, or even various sounds. Over time, the algorithm would deduce his decisions through his subconscious micro-movements and expressions.

Although this was a widget function of his wristband, it could collect essential information about him, such as his heart rate his blood oxygen level. For example, an integrated small pike periodically took blood samples in order to detect most bacteriological hazards; it could also estimate his blood sugar level. It was nowhere near the deep, in-house analysis that monitoring nanobots offer, but it would do for tonight.

[Do you want to train?]

Yes.

[Module list: Nine steps to conquer yourself.]

Come on, it’s not like he had the choice. It was as if this shameless brand purposefully displayed it provided no free modules. Or maybe it was an incentive to buy more. Business is business, as they say.

Thankfully, it immediately confirmed his non-choice and skipped the next, the step 0th being the only available.

[Setup the instructions parameters and say start when you’re ready]

Loris had a lot of freedom with the parameters. The lenses could fill his vision with figures that repeated the perfect movements for each exercise. He could also receive verbal instructions and even get real-time feedback with zooms and explanations, correcting him on his mistakes and inaccuracies.

Loris didn’t bother with all these modalities and just set the fully immersive mode, letting the app control all sports equipment he had access to.

The thin walls of his empty room left enough space between each piece for a logistical complex. It housed all sorts of equipment and not-so-large furniture, allowing Loris to use his friends’ stuff.

He gave free rights to the Noflo algorithm to summon and place the sportive equipment in his chamber. At any time, Aina, his domestic Ai, could interrupt this process as the intermediary between the algorithm and the logistics complex.

With everything sorted out, it was finally time to train.

“Start,” Loris said, understanding this Pavlov effect’s long-term utility.

His vision filled with darkness. Three-dimensional turquoise markers appeared. It allowed him to visualise the ground and distances. It kinda looked like a game. Even more, after three replicas of him appeared.

One turned toward him while the other two showed their respective sides. Simultaneously, he received auditory instructions. “Do the same moves.”

For thirty minutes, Loris mimicked the replicas’ movements. The intensity was low to moderate, and he only did basic exercises such as pushups, squats, and crunches. It should be a child’s play in theory. Even more for his genetically enhanced body.

Yet having to constantly rectify the form of his movements proved extremely exhausting. New close-ups of what he was doing wrong popped every few seconds, rectifying him with live zooms and briefing. The algorithm overflowed with tips and tricks any seasoned coach would kill to get. Every time Loris corrected himself, it caught him with details more superfluous than the others.

Concentration was the keyword of this training or rather warm-up. As he adjusted, each muscle became more engaged. Loris was mobilising muscle fibres that had previously been inactive.

Usually, he liked to train in automatic mode during his daily routine, with his mind wandering to entertain himself. But the algorithm wouldn’t let him do that. It bombarded him with annoying signals at the slightest slackening.

As his body was boiling and sweating, it stopped. Finally, a break!

Only it proved short-lived. His heart was still beating fast, and his breath was erratic when the floor under his feet rose. It inclined enough to form a slope between twenty and thirty-five degrees as if the floor had a built-in conveyor belt.

Suddenly it went from zero to ten kilometres per hour. Loris has barely adapted to this pace that speeded up to twenty at once. Unprepared, he stumbled, losing his balance and almost crashing. Fortunately, he regained his balance in less than five steps. He may not have had any specialities, but he challenged anyone to find him a weakness.

If the previous phase was a warm-up that required a constant focus, this phase was keener to torture than training. While he received no guidance or correction, the treadmill abruptly tilted, accelerated and decelerated.

After only half an hour in this rolling hell, his thighs burned, and his ankles were about to give out. By his half-hearted stride, his hips looked full of rust. The uncertainty of the remaining training time proved even worse than the physical pain.

In this pitch-black world with no landmarks other than turquoise lines, Loris was alone in his agony.

He faced an avalanche of negative feelings consisting of a mixture of demotivation in the face of pain and insecurity. Loris hated this sensation. Was it even worth it? He could train another day, after all.

While all kinds of disruptive thoughts emerged and the intensifying pain pushed him to abandon and take a rest, a much deeper fear drove him to continue.

It was so potent that it made everything else seem insignificant, including his suffering. Despite feeling it, it was as if it didn’t exist anymore. His pain had no longer any significance.

It lasted a moment, but it completely changed the direction of his training.

Past the breaking point, he found some sense of pleasure or perhaps satisfaction in the muscle pain that raged through his legs and body after each step. Maybe it was the pride of having held on or some kind of masochism; he didn’t know.

It didn’t matter.

While he was experiencing some sort of sensorial epiphany or trance, the quality of his movements rose.

As if more energy imbued each of his steps.

Yet it was still mediocre.

A few minutes later, the state of his muscles brought him back to reality. After each additional step, his knees rose slightly lower; his stride was shorter and slower.

When his top speed approached his usual walking pace, the treadmill stopped.

The training session was over.