At the morning meeting the next day, it seemed that everyone had had time to think over the consequences of the announcement that the mechanical downgrade had been cancelled. Complex devices wouldn't need to be changed. They were all eager to begin revamping the expansion and Devon Yu didn't even try to slow them down. Instead, he added to the fire by presenting the ideas Danika had helped suggest to everyone then and there.
He told them all, "Since you're all hot to get started on the desert expansion, I'll give you the new incendiary framework that's going to guide you."
The members of the sixth laughed or groaned in response. Only Danika regarded him with wide startled eyes and he grinned and winked at her.
"One, or both of the twin goddesses need to be incited into raining fiery destruction down upon the southern end of the dwarven mountains, until NPCs are given a form of reincarnation." He really was presenting the idea she'd suggested to everyone. "NPCs will begin to be reborn instead of deleted. They will retain their dialogue and response libraries, and player affection levels. And sometimes a memory or two. This means that you'll be able to meet NPCs who hate you on sight, because you offended them in their past lives, or who seem to take an immediate liking to you because you'd gained their friendship in a past life. I would also like to have some of the characters in your future repeatable quests talk up the advantages of reincarnation versus resurrection. The reincarnation system is hardly being used by the majority of players."
Devon Yu continued, "Several mountains will be flattened and a new, larger desert formed in the southwest, or perhaps revealed as the sands of return are pushed back along that edge of the map. The genies need to gain a new racial ability to bring them more in line with their identity in popular culture, preferably something that makes them particularly suited to the new desert. Several cities large enough to support portals need to be built fairly quickly, to give players easier access to the new area. I had planned to have more detail before presenting all this on Monday, but I already got the general plan approved by our overlords in the first, and I don't want to waste this surge of energy."
Danika noticed that the part about lower magic levels in the desert had been dropped, but that otherwise he'd kept most of what had been suggested at the dinner with Lin Hao. She'd never gone to explore the desert edge that looped eternally back onto itself, but she wondered if the border would just be pushed outward or if by pushed back, Devon meant that the desert would gain a coast line. Everyone began tossing around ideas.
Paul said, "Well the first part is easy enough."
Devon grinned at him and suggested, "Enlighten the rest of us on how to easily enrage a goddess?"
Paul just laughed and replied cheerfully, "Just look at how many NPCs have been killed in the dwarven wars with all those primarily human guilds vying for dwarven resources? The God of balance has been sending complaints to the Jade Emperor all month."
Another person, Danika thought his name was Tim, but wasn't certain, said, "I've taken some of those assignments! And when I was working on setting up that truce last week, I discovered that the system even designed this long quest chain that would lead the same players that completed the Christmas Goblin quest into the heart of the dwarven Kingdoms. It seems like it really really wants to force this one little half dragon player who refused to choose a path into becoming a priest of balance. It makes sense though, her party even stopped a border skirmish without a single death this weekend."
Danika gasped.
Ariana looked at her shocked expression and asked curiously, "Do you know them Danika?"
"My character, ZipZing, is a half dragon half pixie and we stopped a border skirmish this weekend," Danika admitted with embarrassment. She wondered if it was really true that the system wanted her to become a priest of balance, if so, it was being too subtle about it. She currently had much more interaction with druids than any of the other priest paths.
Devon Yu started to laugh. It wasn't a mere chuckle either, he laughed uproariously, until the whole team was glancing between him and Danika curiously. He wiped non existent tears from his eyes before sobering enough to point at Danika and say, "Even the AI Gods want you to change the balance of the world! You're in the right place!"
Paul grinned at Danika and asked, "Why'd you refuse to choose a path?"
Danika's blush intensified as she explained, "I just didn't want to have my character limited by what someone else thought a particular class included when "Living Jade Empire" is supposed to be an open world."
Someone else asked, "If the Turtle is already involved, and the dwarves go begging the Twins to start reviving dwarves, aren't the Tiger and the Dragon going to get drawn into it too?"
"I don't really entirely understand the concept of the Tiger with the boundaries and the earth elementals mixed with metals and electricity, but wouldn't the new desert belong to him?" Danika asked uncertainly.
Ariana said reassuringly, "That's a fair question. The genies are the Bird's grandchildren if you consider the etain her children, why would she invade the Tiger's territory?"
Takahashi said quietly, "The system has never placed the races firmly according to their heritage like that. The dwarves themselves are half dragons, but no one has ever argued that they shouldn't belong in the Tiger's domain with their metal and stone working. The new racial ability for the genies just needs to tie in to one of the Tiger's domains like that."
The group meeting carried on beyond its usual scheduled hour, but Devon Yu still called Danika out to continue her ongoing world theory education for the last two hours.
Danika took the opportunity to ask, "How does everyone keep a balance with their player characters when you know too much about the events?"
Devon Yu laughed and asked, "Why? Are you planning to have your character corner the market on canteens before the expansion is released?"
"No!" she protested immediately. "But I could? Or I could ask my assistant dragon about all the available messenger animal quests and go get them all?"
"Yeah, you should do that," Devon agreed cheerfully.
Danika stared at him blankly.
"You should take a couple of extra days off when you get home, and go try as many of the repeatable quests with your own character as you can fit in, and see how they are working from the player side of things," he explained. "Each of them are a little world breaking at the moment in my opinion. The NPCs involved in those quests can all revive and are basically like dolls compared to the normal NPCs, since they are locked into scripts. The white mouse messenger quest is a little better, because it involves an entire population and only a handful of the mice have preset roles."
"Um, should I really start my new job by taking extra days off?" Danika questioned nervously.
He gave her a questioning look and then asked, "Oh, are you worried about delaying your first paycheck? Don't worry, you've been more productive already than anyone expected you to, so I'll put in to have you paid for this week of training. And let's just set up your schedule for next week too. I think everyone should have started getting a clear list of assignments that will need to be completed for the expansion rebuild by the middle of next week, so we'll have you start then, unless you'll feel too left out by not being personally involved in all the groundwork?"
"No no," Danika replied quickly, "I'm amazed that you're really going with my suggestion. I'll be happy to work on whatever seems most useful. Everyone was coming up with really amazing ideas! It's so cool!"
"Well, I'll just schedule you for an hour each morning to attend the group meeting anyway," he said cheerfully.