1 01

Life, to some people, is a sort of game. Life has infinite possibilities, and there are more paths than you could count that you can take in life. Not all of those paths are available to everybody, though. People born healthy, good looking, and of high social status almost always have life much easier than those who weren't so fortunate with their genetics and their parents. Most people live their lives as a balancing act between living to make money, and living to do the things they enjoy.

But it's not always smooth sailing, and it's in times like those where the fortunate people in life begin to excel. Someone who's not the most attractive person might get bullied in school, and someone who is rather good looking likely won't experience that, or might even become the bully. Later in life, when a job is necessary to keep living comfortably, someone could face discrimination during work, or get paid less if they're born a certain gender or ethnicity.

There's countless traits that can and will put someone at a disadvantage in life, and if you have some of them, then things aren't going to be as easy as you'd want them to be.

Life also has rules, as well as people who obey and break those rules. Some of the people who break the rules get caught, and some don't. It's frustrating to watch someone 'unfairly' move ahead in life without getting their just desserts. It can also hurt to watch someone who's having a much better time of life and is much happier than you are, even if they've done nothing wrong.

Everyone has been there and felt that. Life has ups and downs, and how many of those you face and how often you face them depends on how lucky you were when you were born. Effort and hard work can help significantly if someone is unlucky, but more often than not that effort and hard work is never compensated in the way it should be. Both people who work hard and people who don't will all suffer eventually.

Everyone in life, at some time, at some point, in some situation, will find themselves on the losing team. And it'll happen more than once.

That's the general consensus on life, from what I've gathered. Everyone struggles. That's it.

All of life, all of the good parts and bad parts, every single person, place, thing, system, design, concept, idea- everything in life, down the the most minute details, was designed to cause some sort of suffering to every person. But even so, people still revel in the good times, and they can still appreciate life for the parts they enjoy. People who can find things they like about life do exist.

But what's the point of any of that if the live you're living is fake?

I, ̴̡͕͎̑ ̴͙̓ ̵̯̒̔̉̀̉ ̸̡̹̣̫̭̾̕̚̕͝ ̵̙̥̥̗̤̾ ̶̞̳̥̊̋̓̆̕ ̵̨̻̗̟͐̽͆ , lived a fake life. My life, my parents, my sister, my friends, my home, my town. The world I lived in. The planet I lived on. The entire universe I existed within. All of it was fake, in the most literal sense. Simply put, I had lived my entire life in a simulation. A fake version of reality.

I first discovered this when I was eleven years old. I was attending to trash duty after school on a random afternoon, when I noticed the garbage can I went to collect the bag from was rumbling strangely. It's not very normal for a trash can to shake, but I wasn't unnerved by it yet. Once I got closer, the trash can seemed to rapidly flicker back and forth, taking a different level of visibility each time. It was fully visible, then it became partially transparent, until it just up and vanished. When I stepped even closer yet again to investigate the now invisible garbage can, I jumped back as the can blinked back into full visibility. Being the idiot I was, I didn't take that as a warning sign, and I reached my arm out to collect the bag before it stopped existing again. As my hand made contact with the bag, I felt a chill creep down my spine. I looked around, and everything was the same. But everything felt different. Then I noticed my hand. I couldn't grab the trash bag out of the can. My hand went straight through both the bag and the trash can every time I waved it around to grasp the bag. Eventually, I pulled my arm fully out and away from the trash can. I tried again a few seconds later, and found success. After struggling, I was able to collect the trash bag, and avoid a scolding from the teacher.

That was the first error I found.

After much self-turmoil, I had fully accepted that my life and everything in it was fake. I also confirmed that without a doubt, I was within a simulation, or at least some fake environment created by an outside entity. I went through periods of existential crisis, because learning that everything you know isn't real and that you yourself may not even be real aren't exactly the easiest things to come to terms with. During that time, I isolated myself from the family I had, since they weren't real, but eventually I started to tolerate their artificial concern for me. After I did learn to embrace my false reality, I began to wonder. Who or what created this, and why? Am I the only person in here who's not fake, or are there others? After many months of pondering, I never found an answer. I knew full well that I wasn't going to. Some time after the trash can incident, I began experimenting with the limitations of my environment. It was then that I thought of a few questions I could find the answer to:

「How bad can I break this?」

「How much do I have to break to get whatever's running this world to intervene?」

「Can I take advantage of the errors I find to gain the upper hand over everyone else?」

Using methods that shouldn't exist in order to live an easy life might be considered underhanded or shameful by some, but I had developed apathy towards the fake world after living in it for so long. I didn't care what happened to anyone or anything else, not even my 'family'. I believed using glitches and errors was perfectly fine, since everything is simulated.

「Nothing's real. Who could get hurt?」

Despite not caring about what happens to anything or anyone, I never let go of my morals, or at least, my morals never stooped down into depravity. Someone who truly doesn't care about others in the slightest could become an extremely violent, sociopathic, and manipulative person who abuses and uses others to get their way. I truly didn't care about others, but I never brought any form of hostility onto others for no reason. My lack of concern, however, did show. After discovering that the world is a lie when I was younger, I socially isolated myself. Other than my 'parents', and my 'sister', who I frequently talked to despite not caring about them since they're fake, I stopped all contact with the 'friends' I had other than the required minimum interaction at school. I kept socially interacting with my parents and my sister only because I figured I needed someone to talk to in order to stay sane. No one else mattered.

「Don't bother becoming invested in other people, they don't exist.」

And so, years flew by as I exploited every glitch I could find.

̴̡͕͎̑ ̴͙̓ ̵̯̒̔̉̀̉ ̸̡̹̣̫̭̾̕̚̕͝ ̵̙̥̥̗̤̾ ̶̞̳̥̊̋̓̆̕ ̵̨̻̗̟͐̽͆ , seventeen years old. Third year at the high school Akane Academy, located in S-prefecture, Japan. I have an older sister named Miyuki, who is in university, and also very overbearing yet fond of me. It's sometimes annoying how much she involves herself with me. My dad's name is Daichi, and my mom's name is Kotone.

That was "me". But like everything else, I wondered if it was real. Do I really look like this? Is this what I'm really like? Is this how I talk? Is this my real personality? Are these my real memories? If I left the simulation, would I still be the same person? Such thoughts led me to one clear question.

「What's it like outside of this simulated world?」

I figured that no matter how hard I tried, and no matter how many errors I exploited, I'd never find a way to slip out. I never felt overwhelmingly imprisoned being isolated from the real world, but freedom was something I'd need a miracle to get.

But. One such day.

I was due for a reality check.

During lunch break, I left school property to walk around town a bit, and maybe do a little shopping. I had a little spending money, as my bank account balance sat at a humble three hundred billion yen. I found an issue with ATMs where my paper bills would appear back in my wallet after depositing them into my account. After a few hours, the ten thousand yen I had on me became billions.

I made my way into a clothing store, quickly grabbed a few shirts and some pants, and rushed into a fitting room. I wanted to do some experimenting, and the clothing store dressing rooms was the only place nearby that had large enough mirrors. In the dressing room, there was a white mirror, fixed upon the wall. My goal was to test if there was a way to travel into mirrors, or travel from place to place via mirrors. As I hadn't found any glitches that allowed for teleportation, I wanted to come across something at least similar to it. The tests began.

Attempt to reach into the mirror: Fail.

Attempt to walk into the mirror: Fail.

Attempt to run in the mirror: Fail.

Attempt to jump in the mirror: Fail.

Attempt to alter the location in the reflection: Fail.

Everything else I thought of: Fail.

I faced the mirror, staring at my disappointed self. I turned around but as I was exiting the dressing room, I heard an eerie buzzing, that definitely wasn't coming from a nearby faulty light. I turned back to face the mirror again, and when I did, the buzzing immediately stopped. Shrugging it off as just a weird occurrence is normal. But I knew that I was onto something. I faced away from the mirror again, and the buzzing started again. That's when I had a thought.

There's something I hadn't tried.

Looking away from the mirror, I could clearly hear the buzzing. Slowly, while facing the dressing room exit, I walked backwards toward the mirror, until I bumped into it.

But I didn't bump into the mirror. I never felt a solid surface touch my back, because I passed right through the mirror, and the wall- I hadn't phased through the building. I phased through the world. I discovered a glitch, where walking backwards into that type of mirror causes the person to go straight through the mirror, as well as any other surface directly connected to it. Such an exploit allowed me to go somewhere no one was meant to go; out of bounds. This was a wonderful step towards getting the hell out of this fake reality, but I was now in a place where whoever made it clearly never expected anyone to get there, since it was an empty white void. The only thing in sight was the dressing room, of which the wall I phased through was now missing. After walking around, I noticed that the dressing room is only visible from the side of the no longer existent wall. The dressing room was invisible from all other directions and angles, but not just that. Walking into the dressing room from any direction other than the one of the "invisi-wall" didn't lead into the dressing room. It was just like walking around in the blank white void. It's not that the room wasn't visible from any other direction. It's that the room didn't exist in any other direction.

Except for the dressing room, there was nowhere to go, and nothing else to see, until I spotted a barely visible speck off in the distance. Given that everywhere was the same bright white, sense of direction and distance was nearly impossible, but the speck looked impossibly far away. To my surprise, or maybe not, this void defied all logic. Though it looked days away, four steps was all it took to be right in front of it.

Before me was a door. No frame, no hinges, and nothing fancy. Just a door with a knob. Where this led, I didn't know. I thought that it would take me somewhere random in the simulation, or if I was really lucky, it just might be a way out.

Fortunately for me, it was the latter.

From the void I left, and to wherever the door took me I went.

I found my way into a laboratory. It seemed to be part of a military facility based on the sheer size and amount of equipment. There were chairs, desks, computers, wires, and even various containers of chemicals placed around the room. Panel lights decorated the ceiling. I looked behind me, and there was no door.

There was a lady standing across the room, holding a clipboard and a pen. She hadn't noticed my sudden appearance, because her attention was focused on a large monitor. From my perspective it was hard to make out what was on the screen, but I found out on a closer look that the dressing room I was in was being displayed. The lady spoke to someone through an earpiece.

『...Yes. He's gone. He didn't leave the dressing room. He just went in, and... disappeared.』

「I see. I've really done it, haven't I?」

I let my guard down because I was overjoyed, and I chuckled softly to myself. She heard, and looked to me. A surprised expression adorned her face.

『Come here now! He got out!』

Calmly, I spoke to her.

『Relax. I'm not a threat, I just want to confirm something. Is this the real world?』

『...Yes.』

She relaxed her shoulders, and began flipping through the papers on her clipboard, as if she was looking for something. Then she turned to me and read the 'script' she was told to have on hand at all times in case 'this' happened.

『Ahem. Hello. My name is Roza, and I will explain t-to you the things that are most likely on your mind right now.』

She continued to read in a very emotionless voice.

『First, I can confirm that you are real. I am also real. This place is also real. The place you came from is not real, and this place is real. You are in the real world.』

「You don't need to explain all this like I'm a little kid. Just give it to me straight」, I said. She was startled at my remark, but obliged.

『This is a facility for the research of simulated environments and the socialization between real and artificial lifeforms. You likely already figured it out since you found a way out, but in case you didn't, the family and friends you had, your teachers, distant relatives, and any other person you met before you met me, the person reading this to you, are all not real, and do not exist. You will not find them here, because they are not real. If this information is too much for you to take at once, our staff will accommodate you with rest and medication, if necessary.』

As she was about to continue on, she was cut off as loud footsteps echoed nearby as another woman walked in the room. The second woman was tall with long, silky red hair that looked slightly mangled but still well kept. She was draped in a white lab coat with a plain black t-shirt. She seemed to be no older than twenty five, maybe younger. When she came in the room, she looked straight into my eyes, and began to tear up. I heard her speak for the first time, and I picked up her voice. That's when I noticed.

『You really found a way out, huh?』She said while smiling and stifling tears.

She looked exactly like my 'sister' Miyuki.