Ten was back in the familiar lands of Elysion, preparing for another adventurous day with Kal and Zena. He had just woken up from a long nightmare where he found himself in a scary dimension filled with buzzing machines and evil espers.

“Finally awake?” Zena asked, staring up at the early morning sky.

He heard the pleasant noise of the magical beasts that roamed the land. The smell and taste of Zena’s breakfast meals. The soft cool breeze that would gently caress his skin. He was back home, where he belonged.

As he began eating, a single tear streamed down his cheek.

“Huh? Are you crying? Was my cooking really that good?!” Zena chimed.

“As if… he’s probably crying from how bad it tastes,” Kal laughed. He had just woken up.

Ten turned around. “Kal…”

***

Ten suddenly found himself back in a mundane room with Q. His eyes had become drooped and he felt completely exhausted.

“Looks like you’re sober now.”

Ten began to slur his words. “W-where am I? What happened?”

“You took a sip of the NGF about three hours ago. It seems the effects have finally worn off and you're back to normal.”

“Oh… really…” Ten responded with a slight disappointment in his voice. The moment he had spent in Eysion just now was way too short-lived. But it had felt so real, he really believed he had returned to his home world. This was the power of sensory stimulating drugs.

“Are we not going to continue?”

“That’s it for today. These drugs are known to be pretty addictive if used recklessly. So we need to establish a strict regimen to make sure we fully utilize its effectiveness while preventing any unwanted side effects. Whatever you do, only take NGF when I say to do so, if not, there will be catastrophic consequences.”

“I see…”

“Let's end the session off with some sensory deprivation.”

“I thought we were done with that phase of the training.”

“Not exactly, the third phase consists of multiple cycles between stimulated and deprived states. You take NGF, overload your sensory circuits, and then afterwards, you recover the exhausted mind with sensory deprivation. Rinse and repeat this on a daily basis, and you will shock your brain into rewiring itself through neural plasticity.”

“Neural plasticity…” Ten repeated the strange phrase with a dead look in his eyes.

“The ability for the brain to change and adapt over time. Studies show that the younger you begin this process, the more control you can have on your neural potential. It’s why the minds of children can easily be influenced versus that of an adult.”

Q began walking out the room. “You won’t need to meditate this time, there’s a device I want to show you.”

Ten reluctantly got up and followed Q to another room in the hideout. In the center was what looked like a large iron coffin.

“This is a Holotropic Breathing Chamber, also known as an HBC. A device used to completely eradicate all of the five senses by suspending you in darkness while you float on a pool of sensory deprivation liquids.”

Ten slowly got inside of the chamber without much of a hassle. His mind was still foggy from earlier. As Q closed the lid on the machine, Ten found himself adrift in a setting similar to that of the enigmatic black plane he would sometimes find himself in. 

But things were different. This time there was nobody there with him. It was just himself, all alone in this infinite void of nothingness.

As he lost track of time, he began seeing visions of Elysion again. He had been eating breakfast while Zena and Kal were bickering over a nasty comment he made earlier about her cooking.

But it just didn’t feel the same as before. The food tasted bland, their argument sounded like distorted echoes and the cool morning breeze was nowhere to be felt. This wasn't even close to the Elysion he had experienced from the NGF.

He looked up at the mundane sun, which had just been peeking over the mountains. Its glow continued to get brighter and brighter until the false world dissolved. He was back in the HBC and Q had just opened up the lid, letting in a waterfall of light.

“It’s been another three hours. You can come out now.”

Ten had regained some of the energy he had lost after sobering up from the NGF. He got out of the HBC and started drying himself off with a towel.

“So how was it?”

“I started seeing things that weren’t really there… Eventually, I found myself back in Elysion… but… it didn’t feel anything like the Elysion I had experienced during the NGF…”

“That sounds about right. Neural potential in its crude form is the power of manifestation. As your neural potential rises through training, those manifestations become more vivid and powerful. The end goal is to reach a point where the visions from the HBC are indiscernible from the NGF.”

“So are we done for today?”

“Yeah, we’ll continue tomorrow with a slightly higher dose. For now let's have dinner with Mag.”

Ten ate his meal in silence, unable to clearly focus on what Mag and Q were talking about over the table. His mind was still stuck on the realistic rendition of Elysion he had just experienced through NGF. Unable to shake the yearning feeling of returning back to his homeland.

“So how’s the first day of phase three going Ten?” asked Mag.

“Wha.. oh… um, it’s going fine…”

“Are you ok? Did I startle you?.”

“It’s a common behaviour for phase three trainees. Blasting your brain with sensory stimuli takes quite a toll.”

“Yeah, I’m just exhausted that’s all.” Ten reassured them, but deep down, things still felt off.

He felt a tug on his shirt as he looks down to find Naomi’s wide and innocent eyes staring up at him.

“You look tired, who are you?”

In hopes of taking his mind off of things, he began to play along with Naomi’s antics.

“I’m an evil Demon Lord who’s come to capture you!” He roared in a playful manner.

Naomi screamed and ran around the room as Ten tried to chase her. Mag began to laugh and cheer Naomi on.

“I was worried... But looks like he’s ok…” Q murmured under his breath.

***

As days passed and the dosage of sensory stimulants increased, Ten’s tolerance to the NGF grew. Increasing the time he spent adventuring in the hallucinatory world of Elysion. Yesterday, he was with Kal and Zena, and had managed to save a merchant from a group of roaming bandits. Today, they were preparing for an important dungeon raid to secure powerful magical relics. Tomorrow was hiding another adventure that Ten was eagerly looking forward to. Neither Ten or Q had realized it, but slowly, he was forming a powerful dependance on NGF. While making very little progress in the HBC.

In the next session, Ten found himself in the final boss room of the dungeon he and his party had been preparing for all week. They had been locked in an intense back and forth battle with a terrifying thunder dragon. Two of the five members of their party had fallen, with Kal eventually taking a fatal hit from the dragon’s powerful attack.

“KAL!” Zena screamed, as she attempted to use her vines to carry Kal to safety. But the dragon was smart enough to sever the vines, giving it time to charge up a powerful lightning attack to finish Kal off once and for all.

“ZENA, EMPOWER ME!” Ten shouted as he blinked in front of Kal to intercept a lethal beam of electricity.

His flaming sword spit out a blazing carousel of fire that began to push the dragon’s attack away. To counter, the dragon widened its mouth, expanding the power of the beam. The two attacks were locked in a tug of war of pure attrition, as it shifted back and forth. Ten’s eyes widened as he let out a powerful scream. Pouring his entire focus into deflecting the attack and protecting his best friend.

“Looks like you’re back.” Q commented.

Ten was staring blankly at him. What a horrible time for the NGF to wear off. He really wanted to find out what happened next, but he knew if Q had caught on to his desperation, he might put a pause on the Sensory Overload training for fear of addiction.

Holding back his irritation, Ten played along with the rest of the training for that day. When asked about his progress with the HBC, Ten would simply lie about it. 

Later that night, Ten decided he would sneak into the NGF room. Over the last couple of days he had been carefully observing how the NGF was being made, in hopes of learning how to make it himself. He would make a small amount, nothing too crazy. Just enough so he could get an answer to the cliffhanger of an ending he had experienced earlier in the day. 

But when he tried to open the door, it wouldn’t budge.

“Of course it’s locked…” Ten cursed to himself.

There was a small screen next to the door requesting a code along with a display of numbers to choose from. It reminded Ten of the dungeon puzzles that needed to be solved to move onto the next room. The door was always unlocked by the time his Sensory Overload training began, meaning that Q would input the secret code before Ten arrived.

“I could try to catch Q typing the code in…”

Ten began to scheme.

“Should I wake up earlier then? But I don’t even know when Q wakes up… I’d have to hide nearby until tomorrow… But that’s way too risky…”

Then an idea popped into his head.

***

The next day at breakfast, Ten would stare intensely at Q whenever he wasn’t looking. Now that his neural potential had improved, he was hoping he could maybe control his Syncing Inscription, to peek into Q’s memories as he did with Ikara. But no matter how hard he tried to zone in, nothing happened.

Q turned around. “Oh, is something wrong Ten? You look a little constipated.”

Both him and Mag burst out into a hearty laugh as Ten looked away embarrassed.

“I just had a hard time sleeping last night… that’s all.”

It was the truth, he had been up all night conceiving a plan to get access to the NGF room without Q’s knowledge.

“A common side effect for beginners who start increasing their neural potential are really vivid dreams.” Mag commented.

“Depending on the person, some enjoy the enhanced realism… while others don’t… But both have negative consequences… oversleeping has its own set of issues in conjuction with undersleeping…” Q added.

“That’s why it’s crucial for new recruits to take sleeping pills before they go to bed. It helps you get the proper amount of sleep. You haven’t given him any yet Q?” Mag asked.

“I uh… I’m trying to restrict just how many drugs enter into Ten’s system on a daily basis… I’m not really a big fan of drugs, I’m sure you know that…” Q chuckled.

“Hmm… oh that’s right… I remember reading something on the web about recent studies regarding the use of sleeping aids in neural potential development. Long story short, it's better to get rid of the sleeping pills because they can lead to a dependency, which is not worth the trade off.”

“Now that you mention it, I recall reading something recently that was similar.”

Ten had been zoning in and out of their conversation, irritated that his special inscription wasn’t listening to him. However, one thing Mag said managed to catch his attention for a brief second.

“You read it on the web? What’s that… like a spider’s web?” Ten asked curiously.

Both Q and Mag burst out laughing again.

“The web… also known as the internet… is a very powerful and addictive drug…” Q said.

“I guess you could say that.” Mag added.

The word drug got Ten invested.

“What does it do? Is it more powerful than NGF?”

Q and Mag continued to laugh. Just how powerful was this drug? That the mere mentioning of it, elicited such a strange response from these two hyenas.

“So powerful it literally connects you with almost every person on this planet…”

“Where everyone’s thoughts and ideas can be shared…”

Q and Mag couldn’t stop giggling.

“What’s so funny?! I wanna laugh too… hahaha!”

Even Naomi had joined them.

***

Ten walked silently behind Q to the NGF room, wondering what exactly was ‘the web.’ He felt like NGF was already insanely powerful and addictive. To think that there were other substances out there that were much more potent.

Then Ten remembered. He still needed to get the code on the NGF door. At this rate, he may have to go with the riskier plan after all. But another idea suddenly popped into his head. He recalled being able to activate the elusive black plane whenever he was in an intense situation. Q had mentioned that heightened emotions can lead to temporary bursts in neural potential. It was a crazy idea but he was dead set on getting the code.

Ten began to fall forward, face first towards the cement floor; completely prepared to injure his face. He closed his eyes bracing for impact, but Q was swift enough to catch him just inches away from a painful collision.

“Are you ok Ten?!” Q asked in a panic.

Ten opened his eyes and looked up at Q.

The hallway of the hideout had been replaced with an infinite black plane. And conveniently behind Q, were the floating memories of exactly what he was looking for.

The code was 0513.