My name is Daniel Lopez. 33 years of age. Single. And I’ve been working in the Player Relations department of Aurum Productions for the last year. As such, I’ve met many, many unique characters in my time there. Truth be told, I don’t think I’ll ever truly understand the mindset of most gamers. The amount of work they put into their hobbies is… certainly an extraordinary feat.

In general though, most of the individuals playing our game that I interact with are pretty self sufficient; I simply need to come in, give a warning, and go on to the next task. But this last case ended up being a headache of insurmountable proportions.

“… I’m off.”

The player I was sent to evict, D0n, says his goodbyes and walks to the exit portal. At the edge of the hole he suddenly squats and flies up into the air, spinning several times before falling through and leaving the island.

Ugh, that's another thing I need to tell the developers to look into. I have no idea how he does that. I flick my hand and bring out another note file. A simple purple screen that I can write in — the common holograms we in the management department use — appears. But after all of the insanity that happened during the impromptu tournament he instigated, there's so many of these windows floating in front of me that seeing another one makes me want to scream. It takes all that I have to not swipe them furiously out of my way.

Deep breath’s, Daniel. There's no sense getting upset now. Sadly the work’s only just begun.

I turn to the crowd that had gathered to say goodbye. “Again, I apologize for the inconvenience this has imposed upon you. I do hope we can rely on your patience a few minutes more. Developers will begin resetting the state of this island immediately. When you see a silver flash of light pass through the clouds, you will know that the island is no longer locked; you'll be free to explore any of the instructors buildings once more.”

I turn towards the exit portal, a dozen other tasks I need to oversee passing through my mind, but then freeze. There’s one task that I know takes priority right now. If left alone there’s no telling how the repercussions might spiral out of control.

None of us can afford another headache like this.

I have to move at least a dozen windows out of my way before I can find the holographic button I'm looking for. Upon pressing it dozens of strings of purple light gather together and form a black oval in front of me.

Before leaving I turn to the paladin. “Thank you again for your continued assistance with management, Mr. Morrowolf. I do hope that this incident did not sour our working relations.”

“It was not a problem. In fact, I would say it was my pleasure. I'll check in on the player side, and make sure everything's okay on this end.” He gives me a knowing smirk. “I’m sure you still have plenty of work to do.”

I frown slightly but straighten up and proceed through the black oval.

Walking through it, I leave the Tutorial Village in island instance 113. Currently, I am floating in a black void. It saves on processing time while moving between instances in the game. If anything I prefer it here, since it finally gives me enough space to move these windows out of my face. I take a brief moment to organize the more important ones.

Tch. All of this mess could have been avoided if the two beta-testers had simply seen to it properly.

Zhaz Morrowolf. Vandar Forgemaster.

They were both beta-testers during the game’s development, and amongst the player base, they are regarded as some of the most experienced. There's no reason why either of them should have forfeited victory to a new player. In fact their presence should have been the best security against this precise end result happening. But of course, as they've been around since the beginning they are aware that the rumors were more than just talk. And of course they wouldn't appreciate how much of a headache all the paperwork will be. Again, I can't stand gamers.

Sigh. There's no sense in putting this off. The quicker I take care of it, the quicker I can make it someone else's problem.

Pulling up a code window, I type in the location I need to go to next. The same strands of purple light, invisible to all but the games management, gather around me, forming a shell.

When the shell unravels, I am standing in a transition space. It's a small circle of grass, covered in flowers, in the middle of a white void. Generally these spaces are used when a member of management needs to speak with a player privately. As such, a few feet ahead of me I see the player, D0n, standing. He is looking around the field, clearly confused, but straightens when he notices me.

He gives a short bow with his head. “Mr. Lopez? What's going on?”

Just put on your business smile, Daniel. Let's get this over with. “Hello again, Mr. D0n. I am sorry for bringing you here but there is a bit more unfinished business we need to take care of. Due to the nature of this discussion, it needed to be a bit more private. I do hope you'll forgive the delay. I’m sure you're impatient to begin the game.”

“Well, more like confused. But hey, what's one more delay. What do you need?”

“Yes, I'm sure. Well, Mr. D0n, as I told you previously, we at Aurum Productions value the hard work of our players more than anything else. We strive to protect their work, and we believe that good work should be rewarded appropriately. The feat you performed back there was frankly astounding. Unprecedented. But not unthought of. You see a few of our senior developers have a sense of humor to them, and they always like to find creative ways to thank our players for performing something new. As such it had been decided — during the very early stages of the game — that should a new player ever, on their very first account, defeat all class instructors in a trial of their choice, then they would win a unique reward.”

“Whoa. What kind reward?”

“In honor of your achievement you are allowed to have a passive ability, of your choice, to begin the game with.”

“I can pick anything?”

“Well not quite anything. We can't be giving you too large of an advantage over the other players. But if it can work as a passive ability, even one that will be unique to you, then we can work something out. As I've said previously, this case has never really occurred before. So we don't have preselected options for you. But I can pull up a menu of available skills within the game, and if any of them catch your eye we can have them hardcoded into the data of your character. Do you have any ideas to start with or do you need me to begin reading?”

“Hmm. I mean I've read a lot of different skills that players could get, but there's nothing that comes to mind right off the bat.” D0n holds his chin in his hand, with his eyes closed, thinking. I can feel the beginnings of another headache coming along as I realize I may have to be here for a while longer.

“Oh, I know! Is there anything I could use to let me see mana?”

“See mana? How so?”

“Well I can clearly feel mana as it moves through my body. And I can clearly tell what type of mana it is by the sensation. So is there anything there that would let me be able to actually see it both inside my body and outside my body?”

…

I begin to scroll through a list of the skills available but don't see anything. I quickly type in the words mana, but there are no skills that fit that description… there is however an enchantment called mana sight. It's something usually applied to mirrors or glass. Seems to have been designed as a way for enchanters and craftsman to check if they imbued mana in an object correctly.

… Yes, yes, if I tweak it like this… it might work.

“Come here, Mr. D0n.” I hold my hand in front of the player and bring up his character screen. This one is far more detailed than the one he normally has access to.

I navigate through to find the selection detailing his physical features. Over the section for eye color I include the enchantment “Mana Sight.” Now add a slider for visibility — to make it adjustable. Add a line of code so that it can be adjusted in-game by the player. And I'll give it a unique name, that can link his thoughts with the program… let's call it “Mana Vision.” Yes that'll do nicely. And save changes!

“Well then, D0n, as requested, you have been given the unique passive ability, Mana Vision. Originally it would require you to burn mana as a way of using this enchantment, but since this will be treated as a passive ability you don't have to worry about that. All you have to do is think about it to turn it on. I even programmed the ability for you to control just how strong the Mana Vision is at any time. You can even turn it off if you like, should you find it gets in the way.”

“Wow…” The player D0n starts looking around with wide eyes. Oops, that's an unexpected side effect; I assume he has his Mana Vision turned on, as there's now a cloudy blue color over his pupils. Oh well, if anyone asks him about it he can just say it's a unique physical trait.

That reminds me.

“D0n. I assume this does not need saying, but I hope you don't go spreading around this information everywhere. Just consider how much effort it took for your case to be resolved. We’ve been trying to bury this information since day one, to avoid the risk of overcrowding the Tutorial Villages. How about we just let this remain a nice little easter egg. To reward those who are as, curious, as you.”

“Sure, that makes sense. I’m sure dealing with a bunch of me’s would get really annoying real fast.”

“Quite. I do hope that your Mana Vision pleases you, and we trust you’ll keep this our little secret.”

The player gives me a firm nod.

“Then once again, I wish the best of luck as you go forward in the game. May this skill serve you faithfully. I'll send you back to your starting kingdom now. Ah, one last thing. Please turn around for a moment.”

He does so. Looking over his shoulder at me, he asks, “What's up?”

“It’s nothing, I just need to add a marker into your code. That way if any other member of management happens to be looking at you, they can understand that we gave you this passive ability. The last thing we need is someone to come down hard on you and think of you as a cheater just because of some internal miscommunication.”

“That makes sense. Thanks.”

I lift up my hand and hold it over his right shoulder blade. A large beta symbol appears in front of my hand and sinks into the players shoulder blade, embedding itself into his code.

“And that's the last of it.” Pressing another holographic button I can see strings of purple light gather around the player. “Happy adventures, Mr. D0n.”

He waves at me as the strings of purple light finish the cocoon and disappears, sending him back into the actual game.

I let out a sigh and sit down on the grass. I decide that since I had to open this instance anyway, I might as well use it to relax and finish up the rest of the work.

Now how am I supposed to document this…

Opening up a new screen, it connects to our internal email systems. I begin to draft an email towards the chief monitor for the North American servers.

Greetings, this is player relations agent, Daniel Lopez. I'm emailing to give an advanced warning that you have a noteworthy player starting in the Milford Kingdom. He has been observed and marked accordingly. You can see the attached files for all relevant details. We trust you will follow the necessary protocols regarding the monitoring of a new “Bug Tester.”