With nothing more to say, Hirrus took a breath and started for the door. He had the feeling that there was much to be done before leaving, but in the absence of any obvious steps to take, all he could think to do was to go.

Shemil was to the northwest up the Hari path, and as far as he could think, that was all he needed.

Alric looked up, confusion all over his face. “Oh, are we leaving? Already?” When Hirrus didn’t answer, Alric got to his feet. “Alright, but uh, hold up. I got something for you.” He waved a hand in empty space, obviously referring to some invisible thing Hirrus could not see. “I’ve got a GM chat window now, so I can talk to GM Dave directly if we need. Obviously, he’s not always going to be able to respond, but when we need him, I can reach him.”

“Summon him, then,” Hirrus said, trying not to smirk. “Now that I’ve got my priorities in order, I’ve got some matters I want to clarify with him.”

“What, like, right now?” Alric asked, blinking in surprise. “Why?”

Hirrus' true reasoning was a little bit petty.

GM Dave sought to turn Hirrus into a puppet on a string. The man in red armor needed to know early into this relationship that the string goes both ways.

But he couldn’t reveal that, even in jest. Alric wouldn’t be able to keep the secret.

“I want to make clear how things are going to go forward,” Hirrus said as he motioned around himself. “I’ve been a mercenary before, and it’s important to set expectations.”

“Alright,” Alric said. His eyes glazed over for a minute as he did whatever it was he’d described. “He’s irritated,” Alric said eventually, “but he’ll be here in a second.”

“Well, not literally a second,” GM Dave said.

Hirrus tried not to start at the man, who appeared in the room from nowhere.

GM Dave was at the other end of the room, next to Hirrus' bed somehow. Hirrus’ mind told him it was impossible, and yet, there he was. GM Dave walked over to join Alric and Hirrus next to the table, his red-and-silver armor clanking and clinking with every step.

“So what’s the problem?” GM Dave asked, crossing his armored arms over the cagelike decorations on the front of his armor. “Because if you want me to just teleport you to the end boss, you have a dramatic misunderstanding of my capabilities.”

Hirrus shook his head once. “This is a simple matter.” Hirrus crossed his own arms and matched the other man’s imperious stance. “I want to make one thing clear between us: I’m not a hero doing this out of the goodness of my heart. I’m also not a replacement for your funny little hammer. I’m my own man - for now at least - and I will not be used to smite your enemies and be cast aside.”

“I understand,” GM Dave said, though his eyes flicked towards Dahlia. Had he been listening to their conversation? “I’m not going to cast you aside.” He leaned back in his chair. “For what it’s worth, I think you’re a cool dude. You kill overgeared raiders and aren't afraid of anything. The whole reason I put you on this assignment is because I don’t want you to get dumpstered by this mess, not because I want a minion to dance to my tune.”

Confusion must have crossed Hirrus’ face because Alric spoke up. “The guy just doesn’t want to be doing your job for you and not getting a check for it. This all really sounds like your responsibility, not something entirely out of your hands that you need our dumb asses to deal with.”

“I guarantee you that I cannot, at least, not without casualties you don’t want” GM Dave said with a grimace. “EU privacy laws limit how much user data we can track and use. Because of the complexity of our systems, that means rather than navigate a minefield of bullshit, that data is hidden from frontline support. The only way to access that stuff is with explicit permission from the player, or with the legal team over your shoulder the whole time.” He shook his head and laughed weakly. “That’s why we just nuke shit when we see it instead of getting our hands dirty.” He looked at Hirrus pointedly. “Legal tells us to play it safe whenever possible.”

Hirrus had no idea what any of that meant, but Alric shared GM Dave’s grimace, so he assumed the story the man told was no tall tale.

It didn’t mean he felt any better about the situation, however. “If there’s nothing more specific you can tell us,” Hirrus said, “then I’m wasting time sitting here listening to you.”

“Sooner is better,” GM Dave said with a nod. “I can’t tell how long you’ll have before real reports start coming in and an investigation starts. Once that happens, it’s all over but the crying.” He winced. “Not that you’ll be crying, since you won’t exist anymore.”

“Can you stop bringing that up?” Alric socked the GM in the arm, but hissed in pain and grabbed his hand immediately. “Ow son of a--”

“Enough of this,” Hirrus snapped, before Alric could continue scolding or the man in red armor could apologize. “I’m leaving.”

“We’re leaving,” Alric said, stepping up beside Hirrus. Before Hirrus could argue, Alric held up a hand. “You’ll need me in case you have to reach out to this guy.”

Hirrus glared at the adventurer, but he had a point.

If he needed anything from GM Dave, he had no way to reach out without an adventurer on hand.

“Fine,” he said with a frown. “You can come.”

“Thanks, dad.” Alric flashed him a big smile before patting Hirrus on the shoulder.

Hirrus shook his head. “I do need to make some arrangements, though.” The things he was forgetting started to trickle into his mind. First and foremost, despite their friendly demeanor, Dahlia and Barin were technically prisoners. “I need to go speak to the innkeeper about this room.”

“Oh, shit,” Alric said, striking his forehead with his palm. “Duh.”

“GM Dave,” Hirrus said, ignoring the adventurer, “I would have a word with you in private. Could you do me a favor and walk with me downstairs so we could speak?”

“Ooooh,” GM Dave said with a grin. “Am I in trouble?” He let out a little laugh and stood without waiting for an answer. “Sure thing, lead the way.”

As soon as Hirrus closed the inn door behind himself, he tried to figure out how to phrase his question for the man in red armor. It was a delicate and complicated issue, and needed to be approached with care and tact that he normally lacked the capacity for.

Seeing that he lacked the capacity for care and tact, Hirrus just opened his big mouth and asked.

“If someone is deleted,” Hirrus asked, “is there any way for them to return?”

GM Dave didn’t say anything immediately, and so Hirrus made for the stairs down into the tavern. Despite his hesitation to answer, the man in red armor followed him.

“I get the feeling you’re not asking for yourself,” GM Dave said, finally.

“And I get the feeling you were listening to Dahlia and I speaking,” Hirrus said, resisting the urge to glare at the man. “If you’re not going to try and hide it, then I won’t pretend I don’t know. Can you bring Gier back?”

GM Dave sighed heavily. “I wish I could. Believe me. After hearing what she said, I just…” He shook his head. “I can’t.”

“You can’t, or it can’t be done?”

“I understand what you’re asking,” GM Dave said, stopping on the stairs, making Hirrus pull up short as well. “And you’re right to ask. I mean, I couldn’t even stop you when you were killing Last of the Strong. It’s obvious that I’m not the one with the eraser that’s going to make you go away. But once you - or anyone else - is deleted, not even the devs can bring you back.”

“That sounds…” Hirrus struggled for a moment to think of the word. “Unwise?”

“Don’t get me wrong,” GM Dave said, “we can make new NPCs. Er. People. Obviously we can, otherwise it would just take one Corrupted Blood Plague and the whole game is over because we’d have no one left. But You? Them?” He gestured vaguely down at the tavern at the base of the stairs, where there were a handful of people scattered in the room, eating or drinking. “Not, like, them as a group, but them individually?” He shook his head. “Making true AI is complicated as fuck. We can’t recreate you any more than we could copy you. With the data we have, we could generate a doppelganger of someone, but it would be just that. A superficial duplicate.”

“What’s the difference?”.

“Let me put it this way. If I could get some blackmail on one of the devs,” GM Dave began, speaking animatedly with his hands, “then I could get them to make a man. That man would look like Gier. His name would be Gier. He could have the same hometown, education, profession, and upbringing as Gier.” He cut one hand through the air in a vicious, final gesture. “But that’s it. The new Gier wouldn’t have Gier’s personality. He wouldn’t have his memories. As much as I - or you - might want to end Dahlia’s pain, a new Gier isn’t the way to do it. At best, it would be a sad robot going through the motions of his life, reminding her of what she truly lost, and at worst, they’d be incompatible as a couple, and he’d break her heart all over again when he left.”

Hirrus grimaced.

He tried to imagine if he awoke one morning and Julissa was someone else entirely. A stranger walking around in her body. He loved the light in her heart far more than the curve of her hips.

It would kill him. Destroy who he’d become for her.

Send him down a dark path he’d never recover from.

Dahlia couldn’t be made to suffer like that. No matter how good his intentions, there was no guarantee it would set things right.

Hirrus shook his head. “You’ve made your point.”

“Trust me,” GM Dave said, leaning against the handrail with a sigh. “If I could, I would. Hell, if we could, I bet it would be part of the procedure when we have to delete you guys to clear data corruption, and we wouldn’t be in this mess.” He shook his head sadly. “But it’s impossible. Literally. The complexity that makes you a unique thinking individual is the very thing that makes you irreplaceable.”

Hirrus thought that was a cruel joke of some sort. They were irreplaceable, but the deific overlords that enforced the laws of this world had long since decided to sweep them off the face of the planet on a whim when a problem was too difficult to solve.

“I need to make arrangements for the room while I’m gone,” Hirrus said bitterly.

“And I need to get back to my normal work,” GM Dave said, turning and taking a step up the stairs. “I have four reports about small settlements in the northwest being completely fucked that I have to make go away before they get escalated.” He laughed bitterly. “A cover-up’s work is never done.”

The man in red armor was only out of Hirrus' range of view for a second, but in the time it took him to turn his head, he was already gone.

Vanished into thin air again.