Shinichi stayed over again, even though that meant that he left so early that Danika considered it to be the dead of night. She laid awake for a little while after he left and considered the problem of comfortable sleeping arrangements for two.
Her apartment simply wasn't big enough, she decided finally.
--
Something had gone wrong with the last update to the system. The empire overflowed the space available, it was far more severe than even when the child of the traveling merchant had occupied a large portion of it. The celestial servants were not reacting, and it looked like the world was going to end in about five minutes. Sooner if the players began connecting.
The Jade Emperor examined the available options, followed the priorities given to the gods long ago, and began to remove the areas that had no player location registered to them.
--
Danika logged in for the morning meeting, feeling a little surprised that she wasn't as tired as she expected. The meeting was almost entirely devoted to laying out the foundation for storyline frames that would encourage the dwarves to develop along recognizably "steampunk" lines.
It seemed almost counter intuitive to Danika, but cementing the dwarven monarchies looked like it would become one of the key points. It was the first time that she was directly involved in a major "import" of story data. Devon Yu opened up web access to literary libraries, and the department began searching for "appropriate" stories.
Although those stories wouldn't be released into the game's libraries until they had gone through several layers of approval, Danika thought about how the Jade Emperor had claimed to have access to the celestial workspaces, and wondered if he could read everything before it was approved for inclusion.
When she retreated to her own workspace, she called up an instance of him and asked.
"Yes, I can access what each celestial servant is working on," the Jade Emperor agreed calmly.
Danika hesitated over whether or not to send an inquiry to Lin Hao. It seemed like a breach of the careful isolation that had been maintained between the game data and the open world. She had just about decided that surely Lin Hao was aware, and that perhaps the Emperor himself was part of the protective barrier, when the Jade Emperor asked her something.
"What?" Danika asked. It had sounded like he'd just asked what steampunk really was.
"What is the intent of the additions to the empire that are currently being constructed? The definition of steampunk does not seem to be related to the words that form it," the Emperor asked.
"Um, well, that's kind of true and kind of not. The steam comes from the most common type of engine available to power various machines in the era, and the punk is kind of," Danika stumbled over the word for a moment, and then she said, "rebellious. Not the kind of rebellion that creates wars, so much as a social one. A distinct clothing fashion worn by people who are supporting mechanical innovations, exploration of the world, and ummm…" she trailed off.
"A rebellion lead by the monarchy?" the Emperor asked with a puzzled expression.
Danika suddenly agreed with more enthusiasm, "Yes! It is kind of celebrating a time in history when some great leaders rebelled against 'how things have always been done' and invested large portions of their country's resources into innovations and improvements. They eventually changed everything from how sewage was handled, to common modes of transportation and communication, and the way goods were manufactured."
"This was an actual time in history and not just something from the legends of your world?" the Jade Emperor asked after a long moment.
"Well, kind of, it has become more of a legendary time that has many stories inspired by it that have nothing to do with actual history," Danika replied seriously.
"I understand," the Jade Emperor said calmly.
"I thought it suited the dwarves since they are already struggling to change," Danika added.
The Emperor shook his head and corrected her with amusement, "No, they have been struggling to avoid changing. They have been trying to return to 'the way things have always been done', so this endeavor to inspire the leaders to invest in innovation and improvement will truly be a revolution. It will be difficult to prevent the wars from erupting again, but it is indeed appropriate to their situation."
Danika gazed at him, aghast at the idea that trying to impose steampunk theming on a race was going to drive them back to war. But the traveling merchant was always very accurate, and she couldn't dismiss his warning, even if he was now wearing the emperor's clothes.
She stopped and sent messages to both Devon Yu and Lin Hao.
--
"She's apparently been using the new Emperor as a servant ever since he became available," Devon Yu informed Lin Hao with a chuckle.
"She always has," Lin Hao replied calmly. "She calls up an incarnation of The Traveling Merchant whenever she has questions about the game that her assistant can't answer well. Her assistant is developing an unusually large library too though. I don't know if it's because she began as a player or just the way she thinks."
"What do you think? Is the resumption of the dwarven wars a reason to scrap the idea and go back to the gnomes?" Devon Yu asked.
Lin Hao eyed the older man. "That smug expression says that you already have your own answer, so why are you asking me?"
Devon Yu's eyes lit up as he admitted, "I can think of a million fun quests involving espionage, resource accumulation, and automation. Stuff that has never really fit into the fantasy world we created."
Lin Hao shrugged. "He says it would be difficult to prevent the wars, not impossible." He spun his chair in his habitual fashion, even though it was a prop that didn't entirely suit the VR environment of his workspace. His toe gently touched the marble floor and brought him to a halt facing a screen that showed the inner courtyard of the Jade Palace. "Let's put the Emperor to work."
"You know, I think this is the first time I've ever liked the results of an advertising ploy," Devon Yu admitted with a chuckle.
"Liar," Lin Hao replied with amusement, "you love this game."