As dawn's light seeped through the cracks of his worn curtains, Alex continued to stare at his unfamiliar reflection, his mind trapped in a whirlpool of denial and fear.
"This isn't real," he muttered, turning away from the mirror. But as the words left his lips, he heard, or more accurately, felt a strange whisper that sent tingles throughout his body, shaking him to his very core.
He thought he heard something say, "Oh, but it is real, my child."
Alex's heart pounded in his chest, and he quickly looked around his surroundings, scanning every corner of the room, but he saw nothing.
The voice had been so close, yet there was no one there. Dread gripped him as the realization set in that this inexplicable transformation might indeed be more than just a product of his imagination.
'I'm losing it. But I can't stay like this without understanding what is going on. If this really happened, then there must be a way to fix this… I don't think I'm sick; I'm not feeling any different than usual, and I have never heard of a virus that would cause this. I need to figure this out as soon as possible,' Alex thought, trying to maintain a sense of logic amidst the chaos.
What he did not know was that whatever was happening to him was also affecting his brain. Alex was now processing information four times faster than he normally would. During the night of his transformation, his brain had forged new connections between neurons, vastly increasing his capacity for memory, deduction, and quick thinking.
He needed to understand what was happening to him, but where to start? The possibilities and questions raced through his mind at an unprecedented pace, challenging him to navigate this baffling predicament with newfound intelligence and insight.
The first step was to hide. He couldn't let anyone see him like this. He rummaged through his sparse closet, finding an old hoodie and baggy pants that might conceal his altered form. Cloaked in these garments, he felt a semblance of normalcy, though the weight of his new reality pressed heavily on him.
Alex began to think of what he needed to do.
'First step is to cover myself. Obviously, walking around in the summer dressed fully in old baggy clothes and a hoodie will turn a lot of faces towards me, but that's something I'm already used to. What next?' Alex pondered, his heightened intellect working rapidly to devise a plan to unravel the mystery of his transformation.
'Who cares if me, Alex the loser, does something like this; they will just think I'm trying to get their attention. The second thing is to understand what changes are happening inside my body.'
A sudden thought crossed Alex's mind. 'It couldn't be… there's no way,' he murmured as he recalled what his character from I.Zombie had looked like when he was first created.
"There's no f'ing way…" Alex exclaimed aloud, his heart pounding with both disbelief and a growing sense of realization. He rushed towards the console and powered it on.
One thing that Alex didn't notice was that he had never put his glasses back on. His vision was now better than ever, a fact that eluded him in the midst of the unfolding chaos.
While his level 26 character in the game looked impressive—long hair, a macho build, the typical 'Chad' except for the brain-eating part—Alex went to the title screen, then selected 'New Character'... and, to his not-so-surprise, he felt like he was looking at himself.
'Okay, I'm really losing it… This is just too unbelievable. I, Alex, suddenly went to sleep and woke up looking like a level one character in a game that I've been playing non-stop for days on end? Okay, at least now I know this is just a dream,' Alex chuckled, his smile finally breaking through the layers of anxiety.
But as he smiled, he caught sight of his teeth for the first time through the TV's reflection. "Holy sh*t, I am hideous!," Alex laughed, his voice sounding extremely hoarse.
His laughter held a mixture of hysteria and disbelief, a coping mechanism to deal with the incomprehensible situation he found himself in.
'I'm just going to sleep for the day and wake up and forget about this crazy nightmare.'
Alex jumped into his bed, which creaked more than it normally would, a testament to his oddly unbalanced weight. He now bore a disproportionate physique, heavier from the top and lighter on the bottom.
Alex went through his usual routine, hugging the box containing his parents' possessions. His thoughts inevitably turned to the mysterious ring—the heirloom that seemed to be at the center of this surreal ordeal.
'Come on, Alex, it's just a dream, you bimbo,' he reassured himself as he drifted off to sleep, desperately seeking refuge in the realm of dreams.