Railgun Online Book 4: Alicization Beginning

Explanation of Fluctlights

"N-no way!!" Mikoto said. "If he's that good, then Twilight Prankster must have been real good!"

"Well that's all I can suspect, since Pranks wasn't in this BoB." said Shino. "But.. it was incredible, it was as if he knew all the moves and combat patterns of every veteran player.  Then.. when he took me down.. he.. said something real scary.."

"Scary?" said Asuna. "How?"

"He said: 'Your Soul is going to be so sweet.' " said Shino. "If that's not borderline creepy.. then I don't know what is.."

"That's.. something else." said Kazuto, looking slightly disturbed.

"The next BoB is going to be in a month or so." said Shino. "So maybe Imouto-chan and Kirito-san can get in on the action?"

"Hmm.." said Kazuto. "Well.."

"I'm in." said Mikoto. "No doubt, I want to see you work that AS50 Sniper. It better be worth what we went through for it.."

Shino shivered. "So.. many.. Necromorphs... enough about that freakshow game, I wanna know more about how your jobs are.."

"Well." said Kazuto. "I guess we can reveal more, since the tests are almost over, and BMI is basically on edge of being released. Okay... so.. I should probably start by explaining what Fluctlights are.. or you won't understand."

"Fluct.. what?" said Asuna.

"Fluctlight is the scientific term for the Human Soul." said Mikoto. "According to Nox, she says that Viros call it Roswanga in their language, or the Light Core. Every living intelligent being in the Universe, including some pretty powerful ones called Numensapiens and Razzz.."

"Razzz?" Shino began to laugh, along with Asuna.

"Er.. right." said Mikoto. "It's a wild and crazy world out there. Anyways, Light Cores are where a sapient being's base intelligence and life force exists.. it's so base, so inherent in everything, that it can't even be destroyed by Touma's Imagine Breaker... when a being dies.. the Light Core.. or as they call it in Academy City research centers.. the Fluctlight, uses an electrical interface to form into an invisible physical body called a soul, comprised of something called reiatsu."

"That's just the parts that Rath doesn't know about." said Kirito. "It's a tech company, so it isn't really read into the whole aliens thing.."

"Nox makes an irritating sound in my head whenever she thinks I'm going to reveal anything to them." Mikoto muttered. "But she trusts all of us for some reason.."

"Well, she's nicer to us now that we got the whole boy and girl mix-up thing taken care of." said Shino, giving Mikoto a wink.

"Anyways." said Kirito. "Fluctlights are the actual physical manifestations within the human brain of what is usually referred to as the soul. There's even theories that say hauntings like in that movie poltergeists are caused by violent fluctlights.. the technology we're diving into, will probably use the ability to imput a soul into a game to increase the intensity and realistic feel of a Full Dive experience.."

"Well.. if it's your Soul going in, and not actually your brain." said Asuna. "Can we even call it Full Diving anymore?"

"Well, that depends." said Mikoto. "Anyways.. BMI, like Kazuto just said, has the ability to imput Fluctlights into the VR world.. and because of this, the VR world is much more complex then even GGO, or ALO.. it's probably safe to say it's an ACTUAL real physical world hidden within a shell of data.. kinda like how Viros are physical creatures capable of becoming data... "

"At least that's what we're told." said Kazuto. "They delete our memories every time we log out.. so we don't really know what it's actually like in there.. but from what they hinted, the tests are going well.. so.. it must be good."