I was on my way back to the shopping strip area when I noticed the night sky. The star map we had created was somewhat made up by us since the novel didn't go into too much detail about it's stars. In the novel the Cursí star and the Phoenix star were mentioned often as they were used for travel by sailors in the story. The Phoenix star was the brightest in the sky and was of red color. The Cursí star was the second brightest and it's color would change through out the night. Then there was the hidden star. A star that normally hid behind the moon and would only show up once a month in the sky. In the novel it was said that on the nights the hidden star appeared people would likely confess their feelings of love as it was considered a romantic gesture. In the novel the ML confesses to the MC during a ball when the hidden star appeared. It was an exciting moment in the novel since the ML was denying his feelings for her the whole time.
"I wish this glitch would have turned me into the MC instead I would love to play as the MC." I said out loud while I made my way down the Coble Stone steps I noticed an influx of NPC'S walking around. It must be around 6 P.M that's when most of the working NPC'S go home and others go to work in the tavern and pub. In the crowd I noticed Leo making his way home after closing up the bakery. I Decided to try again and see if he had evolved a bit since our last meeting.
"Hello Leo!" I said as I stood in front of him. He stopped abruptly and stared at me for a moment. His system was obviously trying to recall my character and his previous interaction with me. These long pauses always took the realism out of the NPC'S characters.
" Ah! You're the young lady from this afternoon." He finally said. I smiled brightly at him.
"That's right! I'm so glad you remembered me. " I said cheerfully.
"Miss I don't remember ever exchanging names with you how is it that you know my name?" Leo's A.I system was rationalizing after recalling it's interaction with me from earlier. I was amazed but also a bit taken aback since I had not thought of this before.
"That's because I heard about you from a person who was praising your bakery earlier that day." I wasn't lying. We had created a few NPC'S that would gossip and chat about certain areas in the city as a way to get players to visit those areas.
His eyes widened at the information he just received. He was learning.
"So, that's a way to learn new information." He said in a cheerful manner. I couldn't help but feel like I was definitely interacting with a robot. " Well since you know my name I would definitely like to know yours." His way of speaking was a bit off but I was happy to introduce myself.
"My name is Stacia." I beamed.
"it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance ms. Stacia." He bowed his head slightly to me.
"The pleasure is all mine handsome!" I wanted to see his reaction to my compliment.
Leo stood in place for a moment looking down at me with a fixed smile on his face.
"Well then Ms. Stacia I'll be on my way home then. " He waved goodbye at me and walked around me to continue his original path. I stood there in place for a moment feeling cheated by the A.I system.
'REALLY!? NOT EVEN A BLUSH!? REALISTIC A.I MY ASS THAT WAS NOTHING MORE THAN A ROBOT TALKING!!'
I whirled around to see Leo making his way through the crowd. I was determined to make the A.I system evolve. To do that I would have to interact more with the NPC'S. Now filled with new determination I rushed over to the avatars residence. The sooner I went to sleep in game the sooner I'd be able to start the next day.
------------Back in reality. ----------
Stacia had slept a good six hours before waking up. She took her VRN headset off and looked around the room. Eric was snoring loudly in the chair next to her. Malick was in his chair also sleeping and Ax seemed to have woken up not so long ago.
"you're up I see. Johnny and Arian went out to get food for us." Ax informed her.
"That's awesome." Stacia said as she stretched her arms and yawned. She felt as though she had a dream about the simulation game but couldn't quite recall it.
" wait. Didn't I plug into the game to test it?" Stacia suddenly remembered.
"pfft! You actually plugged into the A.I Engine and not the VR console. The cord sparked and all that. We thought you died until we heard you snoring. " Ax laughed lowly as to not wake the others. Stacia flushed pink with embarrassment.
"I was sleep depraved ok." Stacia said indignantly. Ax snickered.
"We know that's why we left you like that. By the way it looks like you forgot to upload a personality to a character your screen was saying ready to upload so I hit enter for you."
Stacia turned to look at the character the upload was made to. It was one of Malick's designs. She was surprised to see the characters name was the same as hers when she remembered naming it Dorothy. Maybe she was so tired she accidentally wrote her own name. She thought to herself. She continued to look at her screen and realized her VRN was still plugged into the A.I Engine.
"You guys didn't unplug it?" Stacia asked Ax who was texting on his phone while standing behind her.
"Aw. Guess not. Wait what's that?" Ax noticed something on the A.I screen. Stacia looked over.
"That looks like a new script application." Stacia took a closer look. "It's super advanced." She stated.
"Did you write it?" Ax asked curiously.
" Nope this kind of script is way beyond my capabilities." Stacia read through the script and noticed where it came from. "This is my VRN headset script!" Stacia exclaimed startling Eric and Malick awake.
"Does that mean the VRN application was downloaded into the A.I Engine?" Ax quickly reasoned.
"Do you know what that could mean? We might just have created the perfect A.I by accident!" Stacia's brain was working on over drive.
"Hold up. Hold up." Eric said shaking off his sleepiness as he adjusted his chair to sit up.
"What just happened with the A.I Engine?" He asked groggy still.
" Looks like the VRN script somehow got copied over to the A.I Engine and it looks like we might be able to apply it." Ax explained while lost in thought.
"Holy shit guys that means the A.I system could in theory experience touch taste and emotions." Malick chimed in obviously fully awake now.
"The A.I wouldn't just be realistic by imitating behavior and giving clever responses anymore. They would become sentient at this point." Eric had reached to the same conclusion everyone had reached.
The team had somehow accidentally created a soul for their A.I. All they had to do now was apply it to all the NPC'S.
The door to office opened and Arian and Johnny stepped in with bags of food.
"We got brunch for everyone!" Arian announced only to notice the rooms tense mood. "Did something happen?."
Stacia explained the whole situation to Arian and Johnny. As soon as they were done eating the team got back to work.
Johnny was put in charge of creating a ghost brain for the NPC'S so they could feel things in their proper order for sensations. Malick and Stacia were working to remove the VRN script from the NPC'S personality folder which for some reason was 2000 folders long.
none of it made sense either so they just deleted it in rows.
"All this was put into one NPC? I wonder what it's personality is like." Malick mused.
"She's probably chaotic or doesn't work at all." Stacia guessed. Whatever she's like she deserves to stay that way since she's basically our eve." She smiled to herself.
Malick laughed.
"What if she's an absolute terror?" Malick said jokingly.
" Then a terror she shall be!" Stacia exclaimed proudly.
"Looks like the city guards are going to have their hands full?" Arian bemused.
" We just won't use Stacia 2.0's script in the final version." Eric laughed. The team was beyond excited. They may have just come up with the world's first sentient A.I.
"I just finished all 12 ghost brains for each race." Johnny announced.
"And we just finished separating the personality file from the VRN script." Malick informed.
" Alright everyone let's get to work!" Stacia exclaimed rolling up her sleeves. They would burn the midnight oil yet again that night before doing their new massive upload and turning on the server to see what would happen.
----------Stacia 2.0's POV--------------
As soon as I opened my eyes I could tell something was different. My avatars sensitivity had been heightened from before. I hadn't even noticed because I was so focused on checking the A.I system in play. I took the covers off and stepped out of bed. I felt gravity alot better than before. It seems as the though the system had reset itself while I slept. Or maybe someone made adjustments while I was still in game. I'd have to ask the others once I get out of the game. I walked over to the door where I had left my shoes at and put them on I was ready to go out and work with the A.I system while I could. every second count! As I rushed out excitedly I noticed the NPC'S acting strange. Some NPC'S were touching things and other were smelling flowers and perfumes others were even crying for no reason!
"wh-whats going on?" I stammered out loud. The NPC'S seemed to be in complete awe of everything.
"Ms. Stacia!" I heard Leo's voice call out to me. When I looked over at him I was shocked to see his face full of something akin to worry.
" Leo is everything alright?" I asked fully concerned now.
"Can't you feel it?" Leo asked me eyes full of concern.
"Feel what Leo?" I asked truly bewildered by his words.
"That's exactly what I mean! I can 'feel' things now." His words shocked me. There was no way that could be true.
"I used to say things like 'Smell the sweetness of our baked goods ' or ' feel how fluffy our baked bread is. ' I never actually knew what it meant to FEEL these things but today for some reason I know. " Leo stammered over his words while the information he just gave him glued me in place with realization kicking in.
"Leo..." I started to say but then grabbed both of his shoulders with my hands. " What do you feel?"
"Your hands feel warm on my shoulders." He replied Wonder evident in his eyes.
I dropped my arms to my side Leo and all the rest of the NPC'S had somehow become sentient.
The kingdom bells began to ring through out the city. It was a sign that there would soon be an announcement at the palace and we should all be there.
"We should start heading over to the palace." Leo said putting a hand on my shoulder. I nodded without saying anything. we followed the crowd in silence side by side.
Leo and I stood with the crowd of commoners in front of the palace gates. There; a few Magicians appeared with announcement orbs. I could see the members of aristocracy inside the palace gates. The crowds were full of voices asking and wondering. It felt realistic for once and I wasn't sure how to feel about it.
"Ms. Stacia..." Leo's low voice pulled me out of my thoughts. " What do you think has happened to us? Do you think the king will have the answers?" Leo's questions were the same as everyone else's which made sense. What else could you ask when these things were obviously all anyone could think about.
"Don't worry too much Leo. Everyone and everything will be fine. you'll just be able to experience more." I tried to console him. He was obviously the type to fear new things. Since that was his character trait. One I had written myself. He seemed to feel more at ease.
"Attention please! His majesty King Joel will now speak to everyone. " A senior man announced to the crowd. I knew him to be Reol Sabbath. He is currently working as an administrator for the 3rd prince. The Magicians levitated their orbs and a large screen appeared in the sky. On the screen appeared the king of Olivia. gray hair and bread with fierce golden eyes.
"People of Olivia. Most of us woke up this morning with new senses and feelings. Something we had always talked about but never actually understood. I was told today by the church that this was a gift from our Gods."
He paused briefly. "Do not fear it. It is a wonderful gift but do not abuse it! For once we spoke about pain but never actually knew what it was! This gift should be cherished. Thank you and that is all." The screen quickly disappeared.
"In addition the king would like for everyone in the kingdom to take a day of rest. this is so everyone can acclimate to their new senses." made one final announcement before rushing off himself. The once silent crowd erupted with chatter both excited and confused.
"It seems you were right Ms. Stacia!" Leo said returning back to his cheery personality.
" I suppose so." I answered simply. What the heck was going on outside of the game? Who discovered how to make the NPC'S sentient nut most importantly did the whole system get this upgrade or just the humans? I had to do some investigating.
"What should we do?" Leo asked.
"Sorry Leo I had other plans for today." I quickly tried to strut off but Leo followed close behind. I abruptly stopped and turned to him. " Hey Leo. Did you know your SURPER HANDSOME?" I was determined to see his reaction.
He flinched and his face turned slightly pink. His eyes darted to the floor and he looked abashed.
'Oh, my!' This was the reaction I wanted from him.
" Tell me Leo how do you feel?" My words unintentionally purred out. Causing him to flinch again.
"Face feels warm and I can't bring myself to look at you for some reason." He seemed confused but still every bit embarrassed.
" That's called being embarrassed." I explained. His head shot up in sudden realization of it. I giggled and turned on my heels to continue my way to Burke Park.
"can I accompany you?" He asked sounding a bit desperately.
"Sure." I smiled sweetly at him. I don't know why Leo suddenly seemed so attached to me but I guess it wouldn't hurt to have him around although I already know Viers will throw a tantrum over it.
------------- -------End of chapter 2