Harold flapped his wings and grinned. "They finally feel real!"

The new griffin looked as real as any other within the virtual world. He stood on the rune-marked stone floor of a wizard tower in Penumbra, his chosen magical kingdom. All nine of his NPC sidekicks were here in the background to cheer or jeer him, but the only real person with him was the white-robed human wizard doing the brain upgrade.

The wizard, Taldonm said, "They should. With your conversion to the new data format --"

"I know," Harold said. "I'm technically part AI now. You remapped my brain to be more efficient."

Taldon tried to sound clinical. "You were an artificial being the moment you had your human brain sliced and converted to software. This isn't a big leap from there. Think of it as completing the process of hooking up your motor output and sense input in a better way."

Harold made his right wing fold along his side. His body was most comfortable on all fours, resting on eagle talons for hands and lion paws for feet, with a tail twitching behind him and his fuzzy ears flicking high atop his head. He shut his eyes briefly to enjoy the feeling. He tilted his head toward it and ran his beak through the feathers, feeling them tickle.

The mage had no real need to walk over to him and crouch nearby. No need to build a tower or a runic circle or any of the trappings, really, because none of this was really happening. Yet he did these, and now he ruffled Harold's wings. "I don't need your stats to see you're stressed. It's just now hitting, huh?"

Harold nodded, understanding, and his wings drooped to the floor. "What am I, really?"

"You know what the scientific answer is."

"A brain in a jar. Not even that, now, but a simulation based on one. And now streamlined even from that."

"Right. But I've been through this too; I'm an uploader like you. You are a soul, despite what's been done to you. Despite fatal illness and strange technology, you're still here."

Harold looked back at his wings and tried to pull them back in to rest against his sides. When he first entered the virtual world, his digitized brain had been wired for a normal human body. Using wings was like wearing a sweatshirt with too many sleeves, and having to slip his mental map of his arms into a different spot to control them. Now, that part of him had been upgraded. Motor context or something, it was called.

He gave his wings a gentle flap and felt the air stir under him. Again. He lifted off by inches, giving his wings more room. He began a rythym that let him hover.

"You took the Hover feat?" asked Taldon.

"Yeah. Game stuff." He let himself drop gently to the floor with his wings spread. "I started playing this game on a normal video screen, you know. Wanted to fly since the start. Played a pegasus in the Troll War of 2040. So it's been... a process for me, getting more real over time. Except that I'm still a virtual magic game character."

"But you've come to Penumbra."

The virtual world had countless sub-realms, from the most inane or creepy private wish chamber to the grandest multiplayer galaxy. The local AIs liked to say humans had too many dreams to fit into one world. Themes were emerging, even so, as the years wore on and the initial shock and wonder of Talespace wore off. Penumbra was special, a home for people directly involved in the shadow of Earth. Robot pilots, customer service workers, agents whose fantasy lives were designed to be paused often and mixed with the strange emerging reality.

Harold said, "Where are your sidekicks, anyway?"

The wizard snapped his fingers and summoned them. He had a cluster of kobolds, a hot rabbit girl, a pair of recurring villain wizards and a fire elemental. All basic mindless AIs, usually, according to rules everybody was still working out. Taldon said, "I keep them turned off when I'm being serious and helping a client. But now that you're changed, I've got nothing else to do today. Would you like to do some adventuring?"

Harold's own crew were paused in the background: a ratfolk couple, an incarnation of his past pegasus character, and other friends and foils. "I should get used to the new brain. Going to join a shooter game for a bit before doing anything complicated."

"Reasonable. And then...?"

"And then, we've all got work to do."

Taldon nodded. "Good luck; you know how to reach me."

"Thanks, doc." Harold took to the air, made his entourage vanish for now, and flew out the door.

The world curved up in all directions, and Earth hung in the sky. Penumbra was the inside of a hollow sphere with a model of the real world rolling inside. Space stations drifted by and satellites glittered. Harold's sight of the place had inspired him to make the jump to this brain upgrade, to more easily interface with this particular server and its links to the real Earth.

He took to the air again and his beak curled in a smile. He'd altered his brain and become less superficially human, yet he was still himself, enjoying the whoosh of air through new wings. Still filled with a twin love of fantasy adventure and the desire to get back out and be a little heroic for real. For now there was training to do, a learning process for the creature he was becoming, and he'd have fun with it.

Harold flew away in search of battle and challenge.