Author’s note:

I haven’t been playing Overwatch and neglecting to write this! I swear!

I was only watching other people play on twitch for a little too long. There was this one channel where they were giving free watches.

You can say I needed to be watched over for over watching Overwatch over a watch.

*Dodges rotten tomato*

Chapter 62- Strings

***Shadowmaple***

***Aewyn***

After I sent Ajax to the Dwarven Capital and left him at an inn, I logged off immediately. I took off the gaming helmet. Holding my custom pink helmet on my lap, I sat on the edge of the black reclining chair without moving a single muscle. There were just too much for me to consider.

*knock knock*

“Wyn, you ready to go?”

Fin interrupted my deep thought with a knock on the door. She leaned on the door to my office, waiting for me to go.

“You don’t look so well. Are you fine?”

“Yes, I’m good. I am just thinking about the dungeon a bit too much.”

“I have never seen you become so serious.”

“You just haven’t seen me this tired.”

“Alright, if you say so. Anyway, I know I didn’t win the bet because I didn’t find Ajax. Did you manage to find him?”

I had hesitated for a bit before I decided to lie to Fin. I don’t want to let her know the truth about Ajax yet. Not until I have made up my mind about how to handle the situation. If I let her know now, I might be able to get a say in the matter.

“No, I didn’t as well. As soon as you messaged me, I used my GM power to teleport Ajax to the Dwarven Capital since you are so hungry.”

“So it’s a draw? Since I still owe you a dinner, I guess I am buying, you are driving?”

“Sure that works. Is there something specific you want to eat?”

“I feel like eating something spicy. You up for some curry?”

I gagged a little since I am reminded of what happened during my fight with Ajax.

“Rejected. Anything but curry.”

“Fine. You have any suggestion?”

“Hmm, how about that nice noodle shop next to the office? That way, we can just walk there and don’t have to worry about parking.”

“You want to skimp out of driving too? That’s not fair.”

“Nothing’s fair in this world.”

“Fine, you win this round. I am too hungry to argue with you. Let’s go.”

We headed downstairs using the elevator and casually talked about her experience as a player in my dungeon while we were walking towards the noodle shop. The restaurant’s name is “Strings”. Strings is small little just around the corner of where we worked. The store is housed in an incredibly old fashioned wooden two story house. The owner lives on the second floor while the first floor was used to serve customers.

From what I have heard, the noodle store was thousands of years old, owned by the same lady. It is a heritage class building. When the developers bought out the surrounding area, the owner refused to budge no matter what price they threw her. In the end, she won out, and the store stayed where it was. She did, however, allowed the developers build above her house. The whole restaurant looks a teleport malfunction happened, swapping a cabin in the woods with a section of the high rise.

“Welcome to Strings! A table for two?”

“Yes please.”

“Please sit anywhere you like. Just so you know, I am closing in about an hour so the last order will be announced soon.”

A lady with long blue hair greeted us from behind the counter in the open kitchen. Since I don’t see any other people here, I assume that she is the owner. If she is the owner, her age would be older than Fin and I combined. There is no way to tell, though, as all elves are immortal and have perpetual youth.

The restaurant was tiny, giving it an extremely pleasant and cozy feeling. I would say the maximum capacity would be 10 people. We sat down in the wooden seat. It seems like the whole house, including the furniture, was constructed with the same piece of wood. All the grains line up perfectly, from wall to wall.

“No problem. We are ready to order now. I am starving.”

We both ordered our noodles and started slurping on them as soon as it reached out table. Fin decided to continue our talk about my dungeon while eating.

“So is there any additional thoughts that about Mechanna?”

Thinking about my fight with Ajax, a light bulb lit up in my mind.

“I was thinking, we actually missed one of the most important aspects of the dungeon.”

“Which is?”

“I have an idea to make use not only inside of the cube but also outside of the cube. I was thinking that we can place a secret optional boss using the top of the cube as the arena.”

“That’s interesting…”

“And for its last phase, just before it dies, It will start shifting the cube. Players would have to move around to stay on top so that they wouldn’t fall off. Even if they do fall off, they can grab onto one of the hatches and hope to climb back up.”

“That is a great, make a draft of that and pass it out to everyone in the meeting on Thursday.”

Being reminded of the situation with Ajax once again, I twirled around the noodle with my fork. I finally couldn’t handle the pressure and gave in.

“Say Fin, I was wondering…”

“Yes?”

“I just had a weird idea.”

“Not your weird ideas again. If you are asking me to code something to test your weird idea out, I am not covering for you a second time.”

“No, no, no… nothing like that. This is purely hypothetical since it was proven that it was impossible. Let’s say if you discovered an NPC that gains self-awareness out of pure chance. What would you do?”

“I would isolate its codes from the game and figure out what make it tick.”

Without missing a beat, Fin answered the question. Looks like it was the right choice to not tell her about Ajax for now.

“Isn’t that a bit too mean to turn it into a lab rat and rob it of its freedom?”

“It’s not real. It doesn’t have rights... Why the sudden question?”

“Oh, it’s nothing. It just… Ajax is so cute that I just wished he was real.”

“I don’t get why you are fawning over him. It’s just a bunch of codes.”

“You are the one to speak. I remember someone falling in love with an NPC.”

*Cough* *Cough*

Fin started choking on her noodles when I mention that black history of hers.

“That was a one-time thing. He caught me at my moment of weakness. I got out of it soon enough! I thought we agreed never to mention that again!”

*Cough* *Cough*

“Are you alright? I saw you choking. I hope it’s not the food.”

The blue haired shopkeeper came over with a glass of water and make sure everything was okay.

“She’s fine. We were just in a bit of a discussion and I surprised her.”

Suddenly, I had an urge to ask a third party. I was unable to resist, I popped the question to the storekeeper.

“Say, storekeeper… Um… what’s your name? I don’t want to keep calling you shopkeeper. ”

“My name is Adea, owner of Strings.”

“Adea, nice to meet you. My name is Aewyn. We work at a gaming company nearby. I want to ask you for your opinion.”

“Yes?”

“What would you do if you find an NPC that is self-aware, what would you do?”

“Well, I don’t know much about these ethical debates, but I just have one policy myself. Do unto others what you want them to do to you. Just put yourself in the shoe of other side and think what would you want to happen.”

I grew silent at that comment. I think I have made up my mind on what to do. At this point, Fin finally stopped coughing.

“Thanks for the water Adea. The noodles were delicious. I will definitely come back here again. Can we get the bill please so that we can get out of your hair?”

“Fin, I am going to go back to the office and write down the things we discussed. Do you mind if you take the transit back home tonight?”

“I can’t say no to a hard working employee. I have never seen you so eager to work hard before.”

“Well, this is the first dungeon that I could call mine. I designed everything from head to bottom. I want everything to be perfect.”

“If I know you would work this hard, I would let you head more projects. Alright Wyn, go break a leg.”

I left Fin at Strings and headed back to my office. Once I was there, I turned on my computer and accessed the folder for the video of my gaming session that I have recorded. I opened the file and listened to the whole conversation between Ajax and I. After the video was finished, I hesitated a bit, hovering the mouse over the file.

“I hope you will have a happy life.”

Finally, I right click and deleted the video.