Once again alone, Jason sighs. ‘That wasn’t really in my plan and cut into cultivation time, but what can you do? Plus, it reminded me I need to keep up my real life, no matter how much that and NeoRealm might overlap.’ Jason shakes his head and settles in to cultivate.

Outside of the apartment, his mom is riding away in the taxi. Her phone rings and she goes to answer it. Or tries to, at least. Instead of answering, it releases a series of beeps that causes her to sigh and rub the bridge of her nose. She pulls up the cab’s special options menu and scrolls all the way to the bottom of the list and selects the most expensive option. This option is listed only as “true privacy” but costs a hundred gold coins a minute.

The cab’s windows go black as she stands up in the moving vehicle. Around her, the side walls of the car opens up as special plates are swung out on mechanical arms. By the time she can sit back down, the entire inside of her cab is completely covered in thin metal plates. Still, the process isn’t done as a loud whine comes from the bottom of the cab and she can feel the little cabin she is in bob upward.

Once the metal cabin has become suspended at the center of the cab, a much louder noise overpowers the magnets being spun under the car. It’s the sound of a high power vacuum system coming into play. While the vehicle isn’t capable of a true vacuum, it can get pretty darn close. Of course it takes a minute or so for it to get there, but once it does the vacuum cuts off.

And with that a tastefully hidden and fully gear driven timepiece starts ticking to represent how much time has passed. With a roll of her eyes, Jason’s mom runs the phone over all the surfaces, taking up a good couple minutes before finally her phone gives the option to pick up which she does.

From the phone comes a jovial sounding voice, “Hey! Jenny! How you doing?”

Jenny rolls her eyes again, “Company paying for the privacy Conner?”

Conner makes a fake pained noise and Jenny can just tell he is covering his heart on the other end of the line. “Jenny! Can our relationship really be reduced to money? A number?”

Jenny sighs, “Of course it can’t. If it was just money, I could pay you to go away. Now the next words out of your mouth better be a yes or a no on whether this is being paid for or I’m hanging up.”

Conner hesitates for a moment but in a defeated voice says, “Yes. Yes, the company is paying for it.”

Jenny leans back and taps the phone screen a few times. “You really need to stop betting with the others on me forgetting to transfer all these fees back onto the company. Speaking of which, I sent the transfer for the payment your way. Better answer it quickly or I might go through a tunnel and lose the call.”

Conner laughs, “As if there are any tunnels on the route you’re taking. Now just let me answer it and we should be good. Did you get the confirmation on your end?”

Jenny glances at her phone. “Yeah, the running cost has been transferred over. So let me ask, what’s the call for? Why couldn’t it wait until I got to the office?”

Conner tuts, “And what? I might be calling to ask about the anomaly at your house? That is important in and of itself. Others must have noticed and the sooner we confirm something, the sooner we can get to work on securing the apartments around your place.”

Jenny rolls her eyes, “You might have been calling to ask about that, but you aren’t. And don’t try to trick me. I know very well the company already has control of all adjacent apartments to my house.”

“Though since you asked, I can truthfully say I have no clue what is up with that. The extra-dimensional pollution just avoids the place. What takes stacks and stacks of cash to create in a small, barely room sized containment area seems to be a naturally occurring event. I’ve even checked the house’s feed. Nothing really has happened of note except for my son’s advancement. Though for all we know that might be part and parcel with whatever is going on.”

“Like seriously! All he does is practice a little bit and meditate like he always has done. It is no way fair that he can be as strong as I was at 25 when he is only 18. I was supposed to be the genius martial artist, but he seems to know how to fight like a fish knows how to swim. The brat with a punch alone can deform that punching bag, I got him as a joke. His kicks? They can knock it around, not by much, but still. Worse yet is his damn ability to stomp the bag. Took him hardly anytime at all to kick it a couple paces.”

Conner whistles, “He really has you beat there Jenny my girl! If that is what humans can do with clean living.”

Jenny scoffs, “As if. Humans lived without all the extra-dimensional goop for thousands of years. While there are some myths of people who had above human strength, and even if those cases were real, it would have been more widespread. My son has something going on and I have no clue what.”

Conner rolls his eyes on the other side of the phone. “If he has something special going on, then how can you be sure he isn’t the cause of the exclusion zone?”

Jenny sighs, “It can’t be ruled out, but do you really want to admit that a child was able to do something all of our labs couldn’t? What would you say to those scientists you’ve kept working on the problem for the last decade?”

Conner goes silent for a few moments, “I must admit that would be painful. On the other hand, it would be good science if we discount something just because it would be personally humiliating. Anyway, we really should get on to the main topic.”