The Transience of Her

Downtime Filler, Part 2

Oh, now I'm awake.

It's still daytime.

So that means...

…either I slept for a long time, right into the night...

...or I slept for a few hours.

Again, there's no way of knowing the time by myself.

To get over that hurdle, I ask a passing-by adventurer once I get up and stretch my body from my sleep.

“Hey, Mr. Adventurer!”

Even though I know his name just by looking. His name is Raul Rocket, by the way.

“Good morning.”

“May I know what's the time now?”

“Oh, I saw you sleeping soundly all day yesterday while I was out grinding. Good thing the monsters didn't ambush you, 'cause that would really suck.”

So that answers one question.

“And if you wanna know what's the time now, it's 7:17 ante meridiem. I just got out from Tulyasi, so that's based on the time I saw on the clock tower minutes ago. Hope that helps.”

“Thank you.”

“You're welcome.”

As he leaves towards his own destination...

I ponder on something.

I know I can still sleep.

I know I still can eat.

Eat virtual food that is generated by electronic processes, that is.

And how do those millions of electronic processes get fueled by?

Power sources. Electricity, batteries, and what not.

That leaves one other major possibility: Can I ever get sick?

That pondering continues as I start to walk through the fields and then encounter a bunch of adventurers who are hit with poison.

Antidotes are very easy to come by, and they save more lives and prevent them from being poisoned heaps.

I wonder if there's a semantic difference between being afflicted with a disease and being afflicted with a plain old status ailment, in terms of gameplay.

I want to know the answer...

...and the answer lies in a town I've never stepped in before, despite my long time playing Skypaths Online.

The library town of Vida'a.

It can be easily accessible via Tulyasi's cross-continental teleportation system.

I go back to Tulyasi, head towards the cross-continental teleportation station located in the west of town, and I'm off.

One teleportation later...

I see a huge, multi-storey baroque-style building in the background, with its length encompassing the entire town and its spires located at its sides majestically complementing the clear blue sky I am seeing right now.

In front of the huge building are smaller houses that employ the same baroque style.

So, this is what they call “the central hub of knowledge”.

The Royal Scholastic Town of Vida'a, as it's formally called, was established by librarians and workers who were building the Great Library of Vida'a, which now serves as the town's main attraction and heritage site. Also, as a result of the library's presence, the town's residents boast the highest literacy rate in all of Eleftheria. Some adventurers even gave up the adventuring life to become full-fledged scholars.

Maybe in this town... I can find a definite answer to my pressing question.

With easy-to-follow directions, I am inside the Great Library in no time.

Standing before me are stacks and stacks of bookshelves, complemented by stairs, tables, and chairs, all designed for ease of access for people who just want to pick a book and read it at their own leisure. Or to learn more. Or even both.

The subjects that can be found in this library, which are practically everything under the sun, are all here.

Arts, humanities, sciences, magic...

No facet of knowledge escapes this library.

Since I'm inquiring about the difference between diseases and status effects, I head for the sciences section.

In that particular section,I see someone who has just put pack a book into its proper place.

I take a look at the shelf that the book is in.

Hmmm... The Concept of Diseases?

This may be the thing I'm looking for.

I open the book, at the point where there's a bookmark chucked in it.

The paragraphs I immediately peer at seem to have something.

“Adventurers are always at risk from status effects that are thoroughly documented over time. Poison, confusion, petrification, and the simple knock-out... those are the risks they encounter when battling monsters or activating booby traps. Fortunately, all of those status effects have their own established cures. But as for diseases, these are the things adventurers can also be susceptible to, though they are not caused by typical adventurer risk factors. The concept of diseases is still a vast, untapped facet of biological science. Researchers are still exploring the many ways one can get sick, not necessarily from adventuring.

“One way a person can get sick is fatigue. It has been established that running out of stamina causes fatigue, and it can be easily taken care of by a combination of rest and adequate nutrition. If stamina levels can get into the negative territory, there is a huge chance of developing a disease, something that will make an adventurer quit... forever.

“There is also the question of whether roaming souls of the dead who are not yet ready to go to the realm beyond can contract a disease. Because both the disease and the status effect affect the mortal body, it cannot affect the soul that is housed within the mortal body. Also, there are no documented isolated cases of souls being afflicted with both diseases and status effects. Therefore, souls should be essentially immune to both diseases and status effects.”

Well, I think I found my answer.

I can feel hungry, but that doesn't affect my stats altogether as far as gameplay is concerned.

Can I suffer from fatigue?

Yes, if I don't keep an eye on my stamina.

And drawing from those conclusions, the answer to the question “Aside from status effects, can I really get sick?“, considering my peculiar case...

...is and should be a hard NO.

From a gameplay and story integration perspective, an avatar suffering from a disease, or even a human soul-possessed avatar suffering from a disease, should be impossible.

That would introduce bugs to the game, and that would arouse suspicion of a spirit possessing a player character, and that would then complicate matters.

I just want a good adventuring life...

...and I want those issues resolved before I continue.

Fortuitously, one issue is checked off my list.

Wednesday.

The same routine: Waking up, attending to morning rituals, eating breakfast, going to school, learning some more about computer repair, and going home from school.

Now's the continuation of the appropriation and appreciation of the things she had left behind, namely the games themselves.

Where to start, then?

To find out the answer, I take the little box of memory cards.

Hmm... many of those memory cards are for the DreamStation, due to their familiar shape.

Alright then, time to turn on the TV, and then the DreamStation that Levin sent me, by the way.

Since there no disc inserted, I am led into the main menu.

There's an option called “Memory Card Utility”. I select it.

I then insert two memory cards, and no sooner do the icons show up on the screen.

The first memory card is practically empty. Shame.

The second memory card is quite bare. Just two save files of two popular RPGs – and it seems the previous owner (not her) clocked in less than an hour each. Probably RPGs aren't their type.

I remove the two memory cards and replace them with the next two.

Ooh, now that's interesting.

The third memory card contains nothing but save files of classic visual novels. Gotta love the 90s anime aesthetic.

It seems she was able to play a bit of them, judging from the date of creation or modification.

As for the fourth one...

Hmm... it seems she didn't touch the save files in this memory card, since those files are from ten years ago. And judging from the files themselves, it seems the previous owner was a fan of so-called “dudebro” games. FPSes, sports games, and that's pretty much it. Guess she preserved the card for history's sake. And I'll do the same.

Time for another memory card swap.

Memory card number five.

The save files are pretty insignificant, except for one.

A save file for Real Robot Diplomacy, modified roughly a month ago.

Better save this one for later.

Now for the sixth one.

Blah. It's empty. Next.

It's another memory card swap I am doing.

The seventh memory card contains only one save file, and it's a save file for the RPG Successors of Doom.

OK, I think I have my own copy. Better get it from my room.

One quick trip to my room later, and I'm back with my copy of Successors of Doom.

And I'll of course save the card for later.

For the eighth memory card...

Nothing but save files for several light gun games, including those of In the Nick of Time.

These save files contain light gun calibration data as well as leaderboards for the best players in terms of time spent and accuracy rate.

This card will remain untouched for the meantime, but I'll take a peek at the save file of In the Nick of Time regardless.

This should be the final memory card swap, as there are ten DreamStation memory cards that she kept.

The ninth memory card is full of FPS-related save files. All of them are unmodified for the past five years... except for one, which was modified two months ago.

That save file is the one for Shooter Girls' Duty. Total playtime: Almost 16 hours.

As for the tenth and final memory card... hoo boy, what else do I expect? It's empty.

Now that I'm done taking a peek at the save files in the many memory cards she owned, it's time for the next logical step.

I'll play a little of the games with the save files that caught my eye to see how she has progressed.

First up, Successors of Doom. It's a port of a classic RPG chronicling several generations of warriors, a long-protracted war that is tearing the world apart, and an insidious conspiracy behind the war.

The save file she made is at the point where the game is at the second generation, where there's a larger world to explore, plus the matter of resolving the second local conflict. A witch has run amok and attacks villages one by one, and it's up to this generation of heroes to stop her.

Next on the chopping block is Real Robot Diplomacy.

She's at the point where the protagonist must make a morally-ambiguous choice: Letting the rebels free, without thinking that they will strike fear some time later; or killing them all like the dogs that they are, and become the punching bag of human rights violations later.

When I first played the game, I chose to let the rebels free, and indeed I expected them to strike later in the story, although for an unexpected reason.

I assume she's stopped playing at that point due to both choices having unsavory consequences, without regards to the changes in stage layouts and enemy compositions for the succeeding battles depending on the choice.

Oh well. I respect your decision, Lianna.

Up next is Shooter Girls' Duty.

She's near the point where the MCs face the final boss, a tyrannical overlord with lots of weapons at his disposal. The final boss is a multi-stage battle, with multiple targets to take out.

I remember how I handled the final battle when I finished it five years ago.

Each phase of the final battle is attuned to a particular weapon weakness, except for the first and final forms. Weapon swapping is easy; maintaining the girls' squad's health while delivering consistent amount of damage isn't.

Despite some hiccups here and here, I still managed to beat the game.

And I'm doing it again right now, for her sake.

Whew. That was a close one.

I watch the ending cutscene and the credits, then it's on to the next game.

The last game I'll tackle is In the Nick of Time.

I decide to play with the flat screen-supported light gun peripheral that comes with the DreamStation package she had.

…

…

...

Dang, that final boss is a toughie.

A million bullets to his body and that mad dog still keeps on fighting?

That guy's got some implacable endurance.

And when he's finally defeated, he detonates himself.

But as fans of the game will know, he'll be back in the sequel.

I then take a peek at her records.

Not bad. No continues. But a relatively ho-hum 75% accuracy rate.

I deduce that she's a good shooter, but not good enough to be actually admitted into the police or military in real life.

Well, what do I say? Lianna's a pretty capable gamer, almost on my level.

This is one of the many reasons why she and I are the best of friends.