"Illusion" by Sergei Tarmashev, summary Automatic translate

This science fiction novel was written in 2017. This book is a fast-paced story about a teenage girl who suddenly gains a perfect body and psychic abilities after learning of secret alien control over Earth. The book opens the author’s eponymous "Illusion" series. This cycle also includes a direct sequel, "Illusion 2."

Ordinary life and an incident at the festival

Sixteen-year-old Olya lives in Moscow. She suffers from excess weight, problem skin, and constant ridicule from her peers. Her only joy is the virtual world of a popular online game, where she controls the beautiful heroine, Iolanta. Olya’s mother works as a scientist in a lab, developing alternative energy sources. Her father, who attacked his wife with a shard of a mirror many years ago, was declared insane and is now being held in a specialized clinic.

Olya goes to a computer game convention with her wealthy virtual friend, Sandra. At the event, she accidentally spots a red-haired cosplayer and a sinister blonde. The blonde is wearing the same white dress with dragonfly wings as the virtual Iolanta. Olya senses a mortal threat emanating from the blonde. She follows the girls into the service corridors and foils an assassination attempt by pressing the fire alarm. However, the red-haired woman, having been rescued, uses a paralyzing weapon on Olya.

Assassination and rescue

Olya regains consciousness in a hospital ward. Doctors diagnose severe fatigue. That night, she has a dream that brings back blocked memories of the festival. Returning to her apartment, she encounters an inexplicable explosion on her computer monitor. Soon, two men appear on the doorstep, along with the redhead from the exhibition, known by the pseudonym Sarah Connor. The criminals are using high-tech alien equipment. They hang depressing drawings around the room, post farewell messages on Olya’s social media, and simulate a gas explosion. Sarah Connor uses a device that suppresses Olya’s will and forces her to jump out of a fourteenth-story window. Two men with supernatural powers, Agny and Igor, intercept her mid-air.

Olya awakens in an operating room at the saviors’ forest base. She discovers striking changes. The excess weight has disappeared, her figure has acquired ideal proportions, her skin has cleared, and her vision has improved. New acquaintances explain the situation. Olya is a descendant of the Ancient Cosmic Race. The illusory, higher beings of this race have corrected the girl’s damaged genetic code and initiated the process of Awakening.

The Truth About the Structure of the World

A blonde named Varvara reveals a harsh truth to Olya. Earth is neutral territory. Ancient Races protect the Solar System from open invasion. However, the planet is being secretly plundered by two warring alien civilizations — reptilians and hermaphrodites. The aliens operate through greedy humans they control, called "The Chosen Ones." The Chosen Ones have seized power, global corporations, and resources, deliberately slowing human development.

The Awakened oppose the alien invaders. They are united in Circles. The Eastern Circle consists of Agnya, Igor, Varvara, Lis, Malysh, Lenya, Nastya, Slavitsa, Chikita, and Rafaella. Nastya gives Olya personal equipment: a snow-white dress controlled by the power of the Mind and a silver communication bracelet. Varvara delivers terrible news. Olya’s mother allegedly died in the explosion of an experimental engine at the Baikonur Cosmodrome. Olya decides to join the Awakened to avenge her mother’s death. The Illusory Ones have bestowed upon Olya the rare gift of Contact. She is able to read information from the Unified Information Field of the Universe — a vast database that stores the memory of every event. She can accurately identify the Chosen Ones and hidden aliens.

Training and initial investigations

At the base, rigorous training begins. Olya completes a ten-kilometer obstacle course every day. She trudges through a swamp with medicinal leeches, jumps on stone pillars in a pit, crawls through narrow caves, and negotiates a combat quagmire. Rafaella teaches her to swim in a deep lake with contrasting temperatures. Varvara trains her ability to concentrate her Mind. The Contactee’s main weakness is any strong emotion. Fear, panic, or grief instantly sever the mental connection with the Information Field.

The Awakened travel to the abandoned facilities of the Baikonur Cosmodrome to investigate the accident. Olya inspects the workshop destroyed by the explosion and reads the residual energies. It turns out that the Chosen Ones of the androgynous race deliberately set off two simultaneous explosions to destroy the research team and halt the development of an innovative engine. However, there is no trace of Olya’s mother among the charred remains. The contactee realizes that her mother is alive and secretly abducted by the hermaphrodites.

Later, Olya explores a secret room in the State Duma building, where her predecessor, Svetlana, died four years ago and took the name Aelita. The girl sees scenes from the past. Aelita kept her communication bracelet in a bag of fresh blood to conceal her absences from her comrades. She was betrayed by a Commoner with whom she was in a romantic relationship. For the sake of career advancement, he lured the Contactee into a trap. Aelita was killed by a disguised Nephilim alien and an agent of the androgynous.

Exit to Normal

Agn orders Olya to return to school to establish a secure cover. The girl returns to the Moscow hospital and lies down on a bed, feigning awakening from a long coma. The doctors are amazed at her perfect condition. They attribute her sudden beauty to significant weight loss, successful plastic surgery after the fire, and hormonal changes.

Rafaella picks Olya up from the clinic. It turns out that Olya’s father committed suicide in the hospital several years ago. Immediately after being discharged, Olya meets Sandra. During the meeting, the Contactee suddenly recognizes her friend as the same Nephilim who killed Aelita. Sandra realizes she’s been exposed and quickly leaves by car. Olya goes to the psychiatric hospital where her father was held. After scanning his old ward, she discovers that her father wasn’t insane. His mind was deliberately damaged by radiation from hermaphrodite aliens, forcing him to attack his wife.

Large-scale operations of the Circle

The Eastern Circle is sent to aid the Southern Circle in Afghanistan. The Chosen have amassed thousands of armed fighters in the mountainous Helmand province and installed a teleporter to send stolen resources to their masters. Olya scans the area and exposes the enemy’s diversionary tactic. It turns out the teleporter in the mountains is a decoy bomb. The real alien cargo ship is secretly landing at an American military base in Nevada right now.

The soldiers storm the mountain fortifications, destroy the booby-trapped teleporter, and travel to America through their own portals. Unfortunately, the Awakened are seconds too late. The alien ship departs, taking 200 tons of gold. Only one Chosen One, wearing the uniform of an American colonel, remains. Realizing he has fallen into the hands of the Awakened, he activates the self-destruct chip implanted in his brain. The Chosen One detonates a powerful explosion, killing the American soldiers nearby.

After returning to the forest base, Olya continues to diligently train her Mind. The contactee learns to maintain composure in order to find her abducted mother. The book ends with Igor delivering Olya to a Moscow metro station. She obediently goes to school, ready to use ordinary people to train her abilities and track down hidden alien invaders.