For those just catching up: the first esper was a woman named Celeste, who, while receiving transcranial magnetic stimulation to treat a major depressive disorder, spontaneously broke through to a higher toposophic level: the state of mind that is to human-like sapience what sapience is to animal sentience. This third degree of mentality conferred an enlightened understanding of reality, as well as a supernatural ability to manipulate it in line with traditional accounts of psychic powers.

The development of psychic abilities almost immediately leapt to the forefront of all scientific study and technological innovation. The conditions necessary to elevate to toposophic level 3 were isolated enough to replicate them, leading to a number of people reaching it through intensive effort. Over time, that number increased as the techniques for reaching it refined.

Aptitude

Precisely what traits make someone predisposed to reach TL3 remain a murky matter of constant debate, but certain broad patterns hold true. Anyone interested in developing psychic abilities may take one of several tests devised to measure their overall aptitude for enlightenment: this is referred to as their ψ factor, or psi factor.

The single most ψ-loaded (positively correlated with ψ factor) trait is intelligence, both linguistic and mathematical. Aptitude tests virtually always include several textual interpretation, logical deduction, and shape rotation questions to gauge a potential esper’s intelligence, as pure neural processing power matters greatly to performing the mental computations necessary for toposophic breakthrough. Besides traditionally academic forms of knowledge, cognitive empathy (the ability to accurately assess emotional states) also plays a significant role, as does capacity for generating vivid mental imagery and other mind’s eye sensations.

Personality traits also contribute to ψ, but somewhat inconsistently: early tests suggested that low neuroticism aided breakthrough, but this contradicts the very first esper’s case. The only universally agreed-upon personality trait to increase chance of toposophic elevation is openness to experience, which seems to make it easier for a person’s mind to accept the metamorphosis it necessarily undergoes. In addition, a high percentage of espers are diagnosably autistic to some extent, but this remains only dimly understood.

Training

Typically, only those subjects with ψ ratings above a certain cutoff value advance to the stage of serious mental training, although other (often less scrupulous and more financially predatory) organizations exist to cater to those who failed to qualify for the more prestigious programs. Autodidactic development outside of a university, governmental, or corporate environment is possible, but more dangerous and less likely to result in level increase due to poor access to equipment and materials.

The precise methods used during training vary greatly between practitioners, but all of them focus on a combination of subjecting the student’s mind to intense altered states of consciousness while also building their ability to understand and control their thoughts and perception in order to integrate these experiences constructively. The precise combination of experiences required to bootstrap a mind into enlightenment vary from person to person, so standard procedure is essentially to try as many as possible and hope one works. Certain programs will surreptitiously place a psychic limiter inside of subjects to avoid volatile noospheric outbursts later on, although this is frowned upon.

Techniques for producing altered states include the transcranial magnetic stimulation that first produced psychic activity by accident, but also transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation, hallucinogenic/dissociative drug administration (often in tandem with various nootropic and stimulant chemicals for maximum effect), and hypnosis achieved through a combination of binaural audio and animated fractal imagery. Simultaneously, mental strength is built through biofeedback training (usually by electroencephalogram, letting the subject see their own brainwaves), intensive meditation (both samatha and vipassana), lucid dreaming techniques, and exposure to a variety of traditional occult and religious practices.

Teaching

Esper training programs are typically overseen by teams of researchers, including neurologists, psychologists, computer scientists, and philosophers. Physicians stay on hand to dispense medications and deal with medical emergencies – the latter is a not-uncommon occurrence, as training pushes human nervous systems to their limits and further. Half of all students wash out within the first six months, and those that remain increasingly risk psychological trauma and even brain damage from the experimental protocols tested on them. Even so, people continue signing liability waivers, chasing the dream of joining the extrasensory elite.

Curricula universally emphasize mastery of one’s brain wave patterns: by modulating their frequency and amplitude, one can fine-tune one’s own neural functions. One of the key elements of level 3 enlightenment is conscious access to everything normally considered “unconscious”, so many lessons are given to bridge that gap early on. In a similar vein, students are given extensive psychological counseling and meditative instruction to fully understand their emotions and internal drives.

There are fewer than 50 espers in the entire world, so they generally don’t get directly involved in training unless a given student shows special promise. In the exceedingly rare cases that one does break through into level 3, a senior esper will virtually always take that student under their wing, teaching them directly how to come to grips with their new mode of thought and feeling. This also serves to introduce them to the unique social stratum of the esper community.

One thing that cannot be taught is the use of esper abilities. While personally accrued wisdom may be imparted, no established body of procedures exists for how to interact with psychic powers: they are simply too new, and available for study by too few. Even were they not, such abilities are less like magic spells and more like ways of seeing and interacting with the world that come naturally once you look at it with TL3 eyes. It is much like becoming a child again, learning to grasp and crawl and cry.