Chapter 0.5 - Good Owner, Bad Owner

With only a month until the game's release, it came as no surprise when Leah found herself with nothing to do. Especially when Eve left to go off to her class at 1.

So she looked up more and more things to do with Freestyle. Stopping only when she found out about a phone app released by the same company.

In fact it was an app related to Freestyle as well.

By playing the user could raise a pixie that could help them later on in the game by locating items or cast support spells during combat. For the lonelier folk, it could even be one of their only friends.

Just as she was about to start to download the game though, thick arms grabbed her and threw her onto the shoulder of their owner.

"I don't know what you thought you were doing, but it wasn't work. Your employees have been waiting for you for over an hour. It's already 4:30. As their boss don't you have any dignity?"

"Dignity what's that? Can you eat it? Plus what you're doing to me right now isn't adding any dignity stat points."

The man puts her down at that, but doesn't leave her side as if afraid she'll bolt if left unattended for even a moment.

"You really need to stop doing this Leah. I know that you think because you're their boss you can push all your responsibilities onto your employees, but you can't. It also makes it harder for me as Co-owner because then they all come running to me when you wander off."

A pout comes to Leah's face at this. "But you're the more responsible one, I'm supposed to be the crazy fun one. You know good owner, bad owner. The more I look bad, the better you look."

She pokes his side to emphasize her next point. "I know how much you care about what they think." Arms spread out, "And you know how much I don't."

He just sighs causing the rest of the short walk to their shared business to pass by in silence.

They found themselves in front of a two story building with a pavilion on the roof for outdoor events when they had decent weather. Stairs led to both the roof as well as the second floor with an indoor and outdoor cafe. A sign saying, "Nerdvana" hung from the outside cafe section above the door to the first floor bookstore.

Leah gives a wave as she walks to the doors on the bottom floor. "Bye Alex."

Alex, the man, stops her just short of opening the door. Pressing her against it, so she can't even think of slipping through.

"This conversation isn't over. If this is going to work then both of us need to be pulling our weights. Please, Leah." His carmel eyes stared deep, pleading, the serene forest of Leah's eyes.

"I'll try. That's the best answer I can give." She places a hand on his arm and squeezes lightly.

Alex sighs and pulls away. Leah then slips into the room while his eyes linger on her disappearing figure. Once more sighing as he proceeds to the second floor.

The floor Leah was in charge of was a bookstore. Extensive collections of manga, wuxia, light novels, young adult novels, as well as science fiction and fantasy books.

In other words, it was full of her favorite genres.

Leah has read almost every single book donning the shelves and could give pages of recommendations to anyone about which books they might like to read.

In another corner were merchandise from various series, a few blue police boxes showing from the spot she was standing. Anime, TV series, and music to be bought by the customers could also be found near this section.

When Leah first walked in, she went straight to work. Putting up the stock, reorganizing the back, planning the next display, and assigning tasks to the few employees on her floor.

It didn't take long for her to get bored though, and she soon found herself wandering to her personal corner in the break room. A small hammock filled with pillows covered in anime characters and dolls. A single fluffy blanket hidden between the various objects.

Shifting stuff around, she made a hole to crawl into with the blanket on top of her.

"Ahhhhhhh. Now I'm comfortable. Now, where was I?"

Leah then pulls out her phone and begins to download the phone app from earlier.

A minute later and Leah was given the choice between a pixie of any of the elements. Each one had different abilities like how the metal pixie helped in gathering gold or using the blacksmithing skill.

"Wood easy. Tailoring bonus."

The game was simple, help a tree sapling grow stronger by providing water and fertilizer. And by exploring the forest you could find items to speed up its growth or help fight the monsters wandering the forest.

Gear could even be found to equip to the pixie so that its energy, health, and magic could come back faster or have a higher base number.

As the monsters got stronger, Leah started to get drawn into the game even more than before. So much so, she didn't notice she wasn't alone in the room until she got yanked out of her hammock.

"What was that about trying earlier?"

"I did try. That is until it got boring. Just ask Kyle, he even helped me as I reorganized the back room."

"I did and he told me you came up with an entirely different organizing system from the last one, making it so no one knows where anything is anymore."

"Hey, at least I did something."

"Yes, now please go and explain how the organizing works or just reorganize it all again so that it follows the last categorizing system."

"Fine, slave driver. But I want some cake as a reward. The one with lots of strawberries and raspberry sauce. You know the one. Whatever we decided to call it."

"Red Explosion? You were the one who came up with the name. How'd you forget it already, it was only last week. Sigh. Whatever. If you do it properly, then I'll even throw in a cup of Chocolate Lava."

Excitement flashes on her face. Her arms snake around his waist as she pulls him in close for a hug. "Oh I knew, I liked you for a reason! Mhm, I'll do a good job! I swear on my love of books. Cross my heart and eat a thousand ham sandwiches. Bleck. That's gross."

His voice rumbled from above her, "I'll never get used to that phrase of yours."

"Hey! It's not my fault I hate ham sandwiches. They hated me first. So really it's all its fault we're sick in this hate-hate relationship. Plus if you don't get used to my weirdness how will our partnership work?"

"Its been working pretty well for us these past few years. Now go, teach Kyle how to use your new system please."

She breaks the hug and runs off to instruct Kyle on how to understand her newly formed organization system.

Alex stands there in the room for a few seconds, a sprinkle of pink hidden behind thick rimmed glasses.

"Hmph. Like she says. Sigh. Teaching Kyle to organize the backroom, I give it fifteen minutes and she's done."

To Leah's credit, it took twenty minutes and by the time she gave up, he already understood most of it. Making learning the rest of the process easy, even if he didn't have Leah to teach it to him.

Earning her only a piece of cake and a frozen cup of Molten Lava. Which wasn't bad and could be drunk even if the cup should have been piping hot, like the name suggests.

Instead of finishing her teaching, Leah decided it would be a better use of her time to come up with advertisements for Freestyle. To increase the amount of people she can both talk about the game with as well as exchange knowledge with. Leah also played with her pixie here or there in the side.

It's level rose steadily over the one month waiting period. Maxing out at 10 due to pixies being unable to raise 10 levels higher than their user's own level. Because players start at level 0, level 10 was the max pixie level until the game came out.

"Grrrrrrrrrrr. Why can't it already be out yet."

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Hello again. I have kept my promise and uploaded a chapter. As the actual game hasn't come out yet be prepared for another chapter(actually a lore) in a couple of minutes. After that starting tomorrow, the real show begins. I shall only post one chapter a day, alternating between lore and an actual chapter. By the way if you don't like to read lores, I will not be offended if you skip them. I write them to not wear myself out writing 10 page chapters everyday. And as the writer it helps me develop the background of the world. So if you as the reader don't want to read it, just don't. It's boring stuff anyway. Just tell yourself that k?

Also if you haven't been cued in, the main character is a little bonkers in the head. How she even got the job is beyond me. Okay not really I know but still this type of boss wouldn't last long in the real world. Probably. Who knows. There are some crazy people in the world.

One more important thing, if you find any errors in spelling or I just plain messed up, tell me. I would like to fix them.

Anyways goodbye and I'll see you again in a few minutes.