“Correct. Well, mostly. There are instances where the Apocosmos and the Cosmos overlap, but let’s not get into that just yet. For now, it’s enough to know that this world neighbors thousands of others that all have a different set of rules. Rules that, at least for you and me, manifest as numbers.”
“Okay. Then since we’re seeing numbers, does it mean that this Dark Energy is manipulated artificially? And if so, who controls it?”
“Wow, man. Dark Energy theoretics is way above my head. To be honest, I only know the basics. It’s not like the information is channeled to you in numbers and English. It’s more like the information interacts with you and you decrypt it in the form you find easiest to understand. I know of civilizations who only see pictures, since that’s their only way of communicating. As for who controls it or how Dark Energy was created, again, there are many theories. Some believe in an Overseer god. Others say it’s an ancient pact between the highest of gods. Nobody knows for sure.”
“You keep saying things like that. The highest of gods? Gods?”
“Brother, there are so many things you need to learn. But first, let’s get you home. I’ll let my family know you’ve crossed over so that the police will stay out of it.”
He took his phone out and started typing something. I had so many questions but tried to contain myself and ask only the ones with immediate relevance to my situation.
“Okay, are the police on this too? And I don’t think the doctors will just let me go even if I can walk out.”
“The police don’t know anything, but they know enough to leave a poor assaulted man in peace when my family tells them to,” he said as he typed the last of his message and stood up. “And you don’t need to ask the doctor’s permission to leave if you feel fine.”
He moved one step back and stretched his hands upward, a brief yellow light escaping his core, moving up to the ceiling, and onto me. As soon as the light touched me, I felt a warmth spread over my body.
“There, you feel better now?” he asked.
I brought my hands to my face and realized all my wounds had closed, my face was no longer swollen, and my eyesight had returned to its full capacity in both eyes. What’s more, the stitches on the side of my head were gone and a renewed energy flowed through me. There was no pain anymore.
“I’m sorry I can’t do anything about the mess in your hair,” Leo added.
“It’s fine,” I said, more questions immediately popping into my head. “Are you a healer? Your class says ‘Mystic’. And what’s up with your level? Why can’t I see it?”
“Relax. Take Louie and let’s talk on our way out.”
I did as he suggested, putting Louie on his leash and picking up his pillow. My clothes were dirty, bloody, and torn in places, but they would serve me until I reached my apartment.
“I’m not a healer exactly,” Leo explained as we walked toward the staircase that led to the ground floor of the hospital. “Mystic is one of several starting classes for spellcasters. We get a wide array of spells until we have our class change. After that, we get more focused on our repertoire.”
“Kinda like college?”
“Yes, kind of. Everyone can take on personal quests to upgrade their class when they’re level 20, level 40, and somewhere in the high seventies. And the reason you can’t see my level is because I’m more than ten levels above you and I’m hiding it.”
“I see. That’s why I could see my aggressor’s level was 11, but I can’t see yours. What is your level then?”
“Wow. That’s a very personal question, man…” he said as he opened the hospital’s main door for me to exit. “Just kidding. I’m level 19.”
“That sounds high. Is it high?”
“It should be much higher,” he said and turned his eyes to the floor. “But, you know, I don’t really feel like XPing much lately. Wanna walk home? I’m sure you have more questions.”
I nodded and moved over to a tree on the side of the street so that Louie could do his thing. There were so many questions I wanted to ask, and I tried to put the chaos in my head in order.
“You mentioned texting your family,” I said. “Are they all part of this world too?”
“Oh, sure! Sure, sure, sure. For generations. We’re one of the biggest guilds in New York.”
“There are guilds too? I thought that was just how Italian families are.”
“Well, yes. We are tight because we are Italian. But we’re also tight because of our guild benefits, regular XP, and raiding parties.”
Not wanting to show how awestruck I was, I held back my fascination with raiding and experience-gathering parties.
Why am I so excited about this? I shouldn’t be happy about it.
“So, what’s your next question?” Leo asked expectedly as we started walking the streets of Brooklyn toward my apartment.
“What would you have me learn first?”
“Now we’re talking! Pass Louie to me and focus on the things you can see in your periphery.”
I did as he told me and started to see the health and mana bars again. A second later, more little text tabs floated into my view. There was everything you would expect to see in an MMORPG: Equipment, Inventory, Stats, Logs, and Quests.
“When I came into the hospital room earlier, I saw you moving your hands around. I used to do that too when I was a kid but you can just move them around with your thoughts, enabling them or disabling them according to what you want to see.”
I started trying to move them around just by thinking, but was soon interrupted by Leo.
“Hey, hey! You’ll have time to practice
