4 Making myself at home

"Well… it could be worse."

I looked at the rundown room in the motel I was now residing in. Place was broken down, cockroaches everywhere and dust on everything. Plus tons of stains that I don't even know the name of. So… It's not bad.

"Relax. I like it."

"I'm - Huh? You like it?"

"Heh, when I was younger I cleaned up this massive house that was disgusting beyond belief. It was 10 times worse than this. No worries, it just takes a bit of cleaning and then boom, I can make it good as new."

"Well… as long as you're happy. Do you need anything else?"

"No. I think I got it from here. By the way, how many mechanical bugs should I expect in this room?"

"Huh?"

"I mean those spy bugs that listen to everything you say in those spy movies. I just wanted to know if you'd care to tell me so I don't do anything embarrassing."

"I don't actually know, there might be some? Possibly?"

"K then, check the apartment for mechanical bugs. If I find any, where do I turn them in?"

"I'll take them if you find any."

"No problem. Those things must be expensive."

He gave a sheepish shrug, "Why are you so concerned anyways. Not like you have anything to hide."

"And? I like my privacy just like anyone else. Even if I'm doing nothing but reading I'd like to not have someone listening in on me."

"Up to you. Here. This is so we can contact you."

He gives me a cheap flip phone. "Well. Ok." There was only one number on it. Cheap and disposable I see, probably not many minutes on it either, heh, weird I'm thinking about minutes now, I'm used to unlimited talk and text. Oh well. You can only do what you can. I bid farewell to Agent Smith and went to work on cleaning up. Lots of cleaning. First I looked in the small bathroom that was way too small for my size and grabbed the old cleaning supplies. Then I got to work. I started to dust off everything. Every nook and cranny. And… I didn't find any bugs. Probably in the walls with how thin they are…

I sat down on the mattress frame. It was on the corner of the wall. Infested with bedbugs and such. I'd have to burn the mattress. I checked everything. Then I purchased some cleaning supplies with my FV. Namely, Bug Poison and Rat Poison. Highly effective in fact. This was Space Age tech in a spray. Only cost 120 Fan Value. More expensive than an uncut diamond. In fact I am starting to have a theory. The cost of items is represented by how much of an appreciation value they have. No one is truly satisfied with uncut diamonds. While they are amazing to get and can sell for a few thousand dollars. It isn't appreciated, only valued. That is why cut diamonds cost so much in comparison. It is also the explanation why power costs vary. For example, I could technically become the Hulk with 1500 FV. But the value of that ability is so low cause the owner hates it so much, while normal super strength is around 30,000 fan value. Meaning it is extremely easy for me to get powerful abilities but the higher value the more the owners appreciate them. Course there has to be more factors than that. My guess is a mix of control, power, and time. Physical value doesn't seem to attribute much to the value. Then again, it could just be that non-magical or non-futuristic items are cheap.

Regardless. It's time to enter the system space. I have a website to create. I was originally thinking of recreating Steam… but it already exists. It died out pretty quickly in this world instead of lasting. Didn't have enough tract cause they never got a hold of Portal or Half Life. Thus instead I've decided to take a new route and call the website BeyondOpportunity. Eventually, I'm going to start massively influencing the world when the more esoteric nature of my games begin to reveal themselves. Regardless, it's time to work on the next step. First I created a similar overlay to Steam in my previous life, but I put the bar on the left of the screen instead of the top. Then colored it green. Next I purchased a protection program specified to protect against Hackers and such. I had to spend around 3,000 dollars for that. The other task of the program would be to assist in protecting the website and assisting users. Course as the site grew I'd have to get more dumb A.I.'s I'd also have to monitor the code the A.I.'s memory won't overload. Eventually I'll make my own downloaded platform. But that will come later.

It would be a rough start, but it needed more support inorder to truly grow. As such, I began to message other indie game creators and began to gather support for my upcoming platform. Which was ready to release, but couldn't be released immediately or it would become a dead site. This was a pretty small start up, but with it being an unreleased site that was fine cause I could gather a ton of backing before I started the actual game. I needed more buy value to grab the more advanced site features. But that was fine, I could work into a full release quickly. I couldn't make money yet regardless. I had no way of receiving money online without an ID or something. I got pretty lucky in who I talked to when I first appeared, but even then paper work is still stupidly slow. Doesn't help that they are all backlogged thanks to the bank robbery.

Hah… What to do. I can purchase some uncut diamonds and sell them for a lot of money. Which is the first thing that comes to my mind. Problem is, where did those diamonds come from, the government would want to know. Unless I found a shady dealer I would be screwed. The shady dealer might screw me as well. Well, if I'm temporarily stuck, what abilities can I buy? Let's see.

Huh, I can buy a F Level body tier strengthening agent from a futuristic human civilization. "What is my body tier? System?"

[Hosts body strength is D Level.]

So this is for people who are extremely weak, got it. Since according to the description it slowly increases the strength of those at F tier all the way to E tier. Meaning it's useful to those above F. The D Tier Agent costs a lot more than I can actually currently afford.

[+10,000 GV]

Huh, it finally happened? Well it should stop at this point. Or at least rise slower. Without a way to get a ton of people to know where to get it the game won't be very popular. Still a lot more than expected.

Well, I got nothing but time right now… so let's make the next game.

I stepped into my space. Looking at the clean looking room and the clean bed and computer filled me with extreme happiness. I slid into my chair and started to program, my hands seemingly flying as they started working on the next game. I decided to remaster a game very near and dear to my heart. Halo: Combat Evolved.

I practically scrapped the entire game. I didn't want nostalgia value, it wouldn't work as this was a new world. Instead I made an entirely new game with Halo as the setting. Halo: First Contact. In this game you played as one of the Marines on Harvest. You lead a desperate fight moving with your squad in a hopeless battle. Eventually as the world begins to fall your job changes from trying to win the battles to taking down as many enemies as you can. Until the glassing begins and ends the game. It was a six hour long game as you lead a desperate fight as a weaker player character than the A.I. But your one marine would still kill hundreds of Covenant forces. In the end cutscene you are just watching the glassing wave reach the building your performing your last stand on.

In just a few hours I was done with the mapping and design. I then proceeded to add sound and try my best with the Sound Designer so it wouldn't sound like it was roboty. It was a consistent effort that I had to keep on improving on. Eventually though the exhaustion hit me. I looked at my programming timer, [28 Hours.] I was getting faster. A game like this would normally take a person tons of months to do. But I finished it in only a day. I was dead tired, but I decided to publish it regardless.

[Halo: First Contact]

[CaptainForever: I came as soon as I got the alert, a new game?!]

[IndieBelief: Don't tire yourself out @Guardian'sLureStudio]

*Snore*

[DawnofMan: Another Sci-Fi? Dev a Sci-Fi Fan huh.]

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