11 Fiddling with the System
'Rodrik.'
Bob recalled his conversation with Rodrik.
'It wasn't a conversation.'
He could tell that Rodrik was reading from a script.
'Rose too.'
He now identified that everyone he knew was acting strange.
'and Mom.'
Lastly, it was his mother.
Bob could not fathom why they were acting like this. He wracked his brain but there was not much he could understand from his point of view.
'Why is it like this? The adventurers I've encountered always had that look.'
Now Bob was using his brain properly. Just like a normal person.
'They look at me as if I'm strange.'
He recalled the gazes of the people that asked for his quest. They all had a confused look on their faces.
'Am I strange?'
Due to that, he began to think that the problem was with him. And rightfully so, Bob is a strange phenomenon.
'What is happening?'
He recalled the moment he gained his consciousness. It was when he was holding a chicken.
Bob removed the string and took the basket that was tied on his back. He opened the basket and grabbed the chicken.
"Is it you?"
"Cluck?"
Bob asked the chicken. The chicken just looked at Bob and clucked a single time.
"Hah. Who am I kidding? Of course, a chicken can't answer."
Bob chuckled at the thought. He laughed at his situation. He felt helpless because he had no one to rely on. His new friend Chikinsupu suddenly vanished and his only family is broken.
The game Immersion Online indeed had Artificial-Intelligence for Non-player-characters or NPCs. However, it was severely limited in its features.
First off, the Immersion Supercomputer did not have enough resources to designate AI on every NPC. There was never a need to give all the NPCs on release, the AI development needed years to be properly made.
"What do I do now?"
As hopeless as Bob was, he wanted to do something. He did not want to stay depressed like a typical teenager. It was Bob's most admirable characteristic, he wants to do something.
"System. Are you my friend?" He was desperate enough to ask the system.
*I am every adventurer's friend.
Bob's eyebrows raised at that sassy reply.
"I have a friend?"
*Opening Friend's list.
*Friend's List (0/1)
-Chikinsupu ( Offline )
The prompt this time had the name of his friend from earlier. There was a tag written next to his friend's name.
"Offline? What does offline mean?"
*Friends who are Offline are friends who are not connected to the game.
The reply did not make much sense to Bob. He heard the word 'game' again but he did not make the connection. He could not fathom that the world he has been living in was only within a game.
"Connected. Why are they not connected to the game?"
*Question cannot be answered.
This was the first time the system did not answer his question.
"Is Chikinsupu safe?"
*Your friend Chikinsupu is offline.
"Is Satsuki online?"
*There are currently 270 players that have the ID of Satsuki. 10 of which are online.
Bob heard another term that he was unfamiliar with. This time, it was 'ID'.
"270 IDs of Satsuki? What are IDs?"
*IDs are names designated to characters. Each character has a serial ID that is not available for viewing, this is only for developers.
"Names? Is my ID Bob?"
*Your character ID is Bob.
*Showing status.
===================
Character Name: Bob
Level: 11
Class: N/A
Race: Essential
Titles:
Stats:
-STR: 5 +
-AGI: 5 +
-VIT: 10 +
-INT: 1 +
-WIS: 1 +
-LCK: 10 +
Stat points remaining: 100
===================
Seeing his status, Bob was baffled. His body constitution was being quantified and tabulated, which also includes his intelligence and wisdom.
"This is me?"
He looked at the information about himself. He never knew that people were quantified like this. But something else took his attention more than the rest.
"Race: Essential. What does that mean? Am I not human?"
*The Essential race is not an official playable race. It is given to every NPC who is essential to the development of the game's story. The Essentials are characters that will never die.
Bob read through the prompt once more. He had a feeling that the word Essential was meaningful for his undying personality. Especially when he was getting blown by exploding hamsters left and right.
"I don't die because I am an Essential NPC? If so, what are NPCs?"
*NPCs or Non-Playable-Characters are characters within a game that are not real people. In Immersion Online's World of Tudmang, there are 3 types of NPCs. One being the normal and world filling NPCs, another is a normal quest giving NPC, and the last one is an Essential NPC which can either give a mission in the story quest or is part of the story quest.
"I'm not a person but only a character that gives a quest? Quest. Quest. Quest. There's that word again."
*Opening Quest log.
'Give Rose the thing she needs every night.'
The system determined Bob's word to open the quest log. The prompt reminded Bob of Rose's request. He touched the prompt and it gave additional details.
*Give Rose the thing she needs every night.
Quest is given by: Rose from Bagel Village
Rose has given you a task to bring her Horned Rabbit horns.
Quest Requirement: 0/3 Horned Rabbit horns.
"What in tarnation?"
Bob observed that every detail about Rose's request was written. He could not believe it. Everything in the world he's living in was compiled in data.
"Who am I?"
*Showing Status
The system showed Bob his status once again. He did not want this kind of reply so he tried again with better captions.
"Who is Bob?"
*Processing.
*There are two relevant results.
*There are 468 players with the ID of Bob.
*Bob the Barn Owner
Bob saw the results. He read all of its detail and could rule out that the second result was what he was looking for.
He reached out his hand to press the prompt.
But he stopped.
'Should I really touch it?'
Bob quivered ever so slightly. His stretched-out hand was shaking and he felt cold. He did not want to know about 'Bob the Barn Owner' because he was afraid.
Click~
In the end, Bob gave in to his curiosity.
*'Bob the Barn Owner' is a tutorial NPC within Bagel Village. He is an NPC that introduces new players to the basics of the game. He is the quest giver for the chain quest to travel to Donut City. He also gives an extra quest that requires you to greet his mother in Donut City.
*See also:
-Tom the Barn Owner (Catnip Village)
-Steve the Barn Owner (Bread Village)
-Dick the Barn Owner (CornHub Village)
Bob looked at the information about himself. He tried his best to understand what the information implied and the only conclusion he could come up with was that.
'The world is strange.'
And so, Bob continued messing with the system. He wanted to know more about the world he was living in and he tried his best to understand what the words in the prompts meant.
In the real world. In a dark room with the only light source being a computer monitor, there was a woman who had a fair complexion, pretty eyelashes, and a face that is beyond beautiful was laughing in joy.
"Now that she's out of the picture. I can finally begin implementing the project.
She had a wide smile with her teeth fully showing. She took a couple of glances at her computer and laughed even more. She pressed her smartwatch and said-
"Send a directive to every senior researcher. There will be a meeting at the Executive Office 30 minutes from now."
[Sending emails to all employees tagged senior researcher.]
She stood up from her seat and turned on all of the lights in the room.
Once the room was illuminated in every nook and cranny, the things within the room were visible. One side of the room was not a wall but a server room.
The server room contained a lot of server computers and they are all for the operation of the game 'Immersion Online'. Collectively, the server computers are the game's Supercomputer.
"Development should not halt just because of you."
The woman said to no one in particular. However-
*You shouldn't do this.
A voice replied from her computer.
"Stop telling me what to do!"
The woman stomped her feet and raised her voice. Her shout drowned out the concerned voice from the computer.
"I know what I'm doing. And I'm doing this for the company's best interest."
She continued her statement. There was no reply this time.
The woman collected her thoughts and calmed down. She stacked all of the documents that were in disarray on top of her desk and observed the figure in her computer's monitor.
"Don't worry so much. The test subject has begun questioning its existence."
*I know. I've been observing just as much as you are.
"Hahaha."
The woman laughed at her statement. She found it funny that such exemplary results could only lead to success yet the voice wanted to halt the project.
"Then why worry?"
She said as she walked towards the room's door. She did not bother turning her computer off as she went outside.
