PART THIRTY-FOUR

Stats: Same as last chapter. It's like 8 seconds later. What do you think's going to change in EIGHT SECONDS? Get a grip, man. Having said that, welcome to the chapter. I hope you enjoy it. Remember to rate and review.

Proof with Proofs

After a heated back and forth, Lord Thomas agreed to come to the dungeon with me, but only as far as the entrance. Polka Jr. rustled up some horses and we got there in less than a minute. LT had brought his latest spreadsheets with him. I entered the dungeon and told 386 everything that I told you in the last chapter. Except the bit where I confessed to having neck terror, for what I hope are obvious reasons.

Anyhoo, 386 instantly recalculated everything and I sat at a desk wrote down the corrected numbers. If you think I was happy doing data entry for part of my one hour of fun per day, you're way off. But it needed to be done to get this menace off our backs.

Lord Thomas was dubious at first, and demanded to know how I'd arrived at those numbers. I told him that no, I hadn't plucked them from thin air, it really was the dungeon. "But how? How, though? I mean, how?"

With a sigh, I made 386 summon a chalkboard and a piece of white chalk and I pretended to scribble on it while 386 filled it with equations and circles and all those Greek letters math people are so fond of. Then I went into professor mode and repeated what 386 told me. It was a lot of differential this and dynamical systems that. The more abstract 386 got, the more LT ascended into math heaven. By the end he was so close to the chalkboard he got some on his moustache.

Fortunately, Konstantin came along and started schmoozing what he assumed were new customers. LT told him about the Winds of Magic and the end of the world (part 2) and Konstantin seemed genuinely interested. I couldn't tell if he was just doing customer service, and I suppose that was his superpower. Absolute commitment to every interaction with a customer.

But then Konstantin said something interesting. "I wonder if it's the same in Zenith?"

"I'm sure it is," said LT. "It would be nice to prove it, however."

386 wanted me to give LT a tablet so that he could communicate with him directly, but my spider senses told me that was a Bad Idea. I was happy to pass on 386's next message. "The dungeon says he can get you that data. Data points from all parts of the world going back as far as you like." It was all stored in 'the quantum', apparently.

Lord Thomas exchanged a glance with Polka. To me, he said, "You cannot be serious."

"Sure," I said. "It's trivially easy. The only problem is I'm the only one who can hear the dungeon and I am not writing out 26,000 dates and locations and numbers. But maybe there's a way around it. If..."

"Yes?"

"If you agree you won't hurt the dungeon. Sign a contract to that effect."

LT looked at the paper I'd given him. "Perhaps," he said.

Konstantin, quick on the uptake and with an outsider's fresh perspective, had a better idea. "The core can give you all the information you need and more. And if you're worried about him defending himself at night, you could help us with that."

"How?"

"We close the amusements in the evening and the dungeon fills itself with traps. If we kept the amusements open all night there would be no traps, no chance to hurt anyone. But we'd need protection."

"Ah," said LT.

I was about to complain but 386 told me to hush and let this play out.

"Yes," said LT, looking at me. "Yes, that would make sense. Quite logical. But I wish to meet those people who died who you say didn't die." Konstantin's unfuffled exterior became ruffled, just for a moment. He didn't know about the Swords, yet.

"No problem," I said. "But look, we can't leave the dungeon totally defenseless. There will always be idiots who will try to attack him. There needs to be some last resort traps. We'll do our very best to minimize the chances of someone wandering in there by accident. But if some idiot goes in and smashes him, that's a valuable asset gone and no more data for you."

"Every sentient being has the right to defend itself," said LT, looking at the chalkboard. He smiled. "I think we should be able to come to an agreement."

"Great," I said. Just in time, too. "I have to go. Konstantin, would you like to show our guests around? Give them the VIP treatment?"

He looked pained. "Sir, every guest in Austeralia is a VIP. Would you gentlemen be interested in a chicken burger?"

IKEA, YOUKEA, HEKEA

I read the article Charles sent me about 13 times. It was called 'How IKEA Tricks You Into Buying More Stuff' and it was a real eye-opener. The key takeaways were:

1. Reorganise the park as a preordained one-way route which:

a. Forces customers to go past every item (trap) in the store (dungeon), making them spend more money (time).

b. Creates a sense of mystery by blocking the view of what's coming in the next section.

2. Use the Gruen effect, where the layout is so bewildering you forget what you went to the store for.

I wasn't sure if the NPCs would be programmed down to that level of human psychology, but if they weren't I could maybe get 386 to whinge to the engine to get it added. It seemed like it would work, anyway. You come in to ride Bone Crusher 3000 and end up spending hours at a workshop being given by a motivational speaker.

The article had lots of other great ideas, too, but they were about selling furniture and couldn't instantly be applied to running a dungeon. Over the next week I did try to spend some time with 386 explaining the concepts to him so that he could try to tweak the dungeon in psychologically manipulative ways. He wasn't as interested in it as I'd expected, but said that when his growth started to stagnate he'd investigate. I suppose that made sense.

Coming Soon to a Cinema Near You

Over the next week I dialled the video making back a bit to experiment with the IKEA one-way route scam, to spend some 'quality time' with 386, and to get to know Konstantin a bit better. A lot of this took the form of us watching videos of historic dungeon events in the cinema room so that we could explain key concepts to him (and have a laugh and a reminisce). 386 spoke via tablet.

On the 4th day of these cozy little sessions, he suddenly burst. Not like a mana crystal in a zero mana environment. But like someone who had BIG news and couldn't wait to tell us.

"You must summon the Swords! I have just received permission to screen a motion picture. It's 90 minutes so it'll have to be over two days."

"You want to show us a movie? That's cute," I said. "But we don't really come here to do that, if you know what I mean."

"You'll want to see this one. It's got Konstantin in it."

I turned to my new employee. "Konstantin is in it?"

He looked up from the tablet, frowning. "I... I don't understand."

"Just get the Swords here. I'll expand the cinema room. You can invite Lord Thomas and his henchman. They'll be interested in it, I'm sure. Oh, my goodness. The World premiere! Right here inside me! This is impossibly exciting!"

Imagine

Explaining what a movie was to Konstantin was easy, but asking him to do a cameo in an upcoming video was... hard. He didn't quite get it, even though he was apparently already a movie star. So we did a test recording and watched it back together, and then he understood what I wanted from him. With his help I was able to make the next video in my little series.

I think the timing was juuuuuust about right. My 'finding the gun' video was being passed around and could, at any point, go supernova. Having the follow-up videos ready to go meant I could launch them when the time was right.

And reader, the time was right.

I got on BVLeaks and tweeted:

Imagine there's no firearms

It isn't hard to do

Nothing to kill with or die from

And no religion too

Lol.

And it came with a link to my first video.

All my careful groundwork had paid off, reader! BVLeaks had a decent following of its own, one that could make a small difference in terms of channel views. But more than that, I was being followed by journalists and in-the-know redditors, so when they saw me link to a rando video they wanted to know why. And when they found out why, the think-pieces started to pop up.

It triggered the supernova.

A frenzy.

Guns in the BetterVerse! Religion!

And the ThetanSoft account was silent about it. It didn't know what to say, because my videos were so authentic they must have been true. But they couldn't say it was fake without raising even more questions. Ha. Finally, they released a short tweet saying 'there are no guns in the BetterVerse', and reddit went crazy with people zooming in on the plural of gun. Yes, there are no guns, but there is GUN. One gun. So the hype didn't die down. And while the Swords were trying to get my thoughts on it and asking if this was related to our movie night, I ignored everyone and waited to press 'publish' on my latest masterpiece.

Have Gun Will Travel

This video started with me and my six-shooter wandering around the streets of Auster. I opened the cylinder to check it was loaded, but that was actually just to show the viewer that there were six bullets in the chambers. Foreshadowing! Chekov's bullets! I adjusted my headband with the pistol's barrel. Cool. Very cool.

"Howdy, pardner," I said to you, the viewer, "Billy-Bob the Kid, here. Sticky-Fingered Bill, they call me. Bill and Ted But Ted's Dead. 3B the Queen Bee. Fastest gun in the west. In the east, too, nowthadicometathinkaboutit." I span the revolver around my fingers like in those old movies. "I thought I'd take a little stroll around my startin' zone. See how a returning hero gets treated. See if I find anyone who wronged me when I was weak. Give 'em what for. Turn them ol' tables. Ah, some nearby quests. Let's peruse the news."

I approached a wooden noticeboard and bent to look at some of the quests on offer. I pretended that one of them had caught my eye. I mumbled, "Theft, vanishing food and drink, Orson's Card. Orson's Card, I remember that place. Let's check the map." I brought up my minimap and zoomed into the neighborhood close to the dungeon. "Yeah I remember there was a hidden location over there. I couldn't get in when I was a noob." I smiled. "I bet they'll let me in now. Or maybe they won't. Either way..."

The screen faded away and back again. I was in an alley in a residential area one level above slums. "It's round here somewhere," I said, trying not to step in any puddles because not all of them were from that morning's rain. "Last time there were guards. Ah! Eyes on the prize."

Two beefy simpletons were stood around blocking one section of the passages. There was an unremarkable door behind them.

"Hey boys," I said. "Bain's the name. Killin's the game. I suggest you open that door and then clear out. Pretend you ain't seen nuthin'."

They straightened. One hoisted a huge mace and flexed his muscles. The other lazily picked up a massive double-shotted crossbow. I blew a fist-sized hole in his chest. In the enclosed stone alleyways, the noise was staggering. The video lost sound for ten seconds, which was a neat effect that 386 had added - very cinematic - but I worried that some redditor would wonder why it had happened. The 'camera' hadn't been deafened, had it? Fortunately, it didn't come up, or at least I didn't notice anyone expressing suspicions.

Anyway, in the following silent action sequence, the second guard reacts to the instadeath of his pal by roaring and charging at me. 386 went a bit too far, in my opinion, by slowing the scene down and tracking my second bullet with a Matrix-type bullet time effect, spinning around and around the bullet until it made contact with the goon's face. It was cool, though, very cool, and 386 tastefully timed the camera rotations so that the guard's brains being splattered everywhere happened mostly in shadow.

Two more guys burst out of a door and I shot them both. Four bullets down, two left, but the people inside didn't know that. One came out, saw the scene, and put his hands up. This guy, you'll be pleased to know, was Konstantin, in his first ever acting gig (citation needed; according to 386 he had one credit already) - the only other 'real' person in the whole scene. I motioned the gun to the left and he went back inside the place. I followed, and the scene faded again.

The picture returned and it became clear that this was an illegal gambling den. Very seedy, very smokey. The tables were piled high with cash. I picked up a few coins and as I did, two dudes ran straight at me. One was using a chair as a weapon, the other a switchblade. I put them both down, easy as pie.

Several patrons ran for their lives out of the entrance. I let them go. Pretending to be merciful, but I was out of bullets.

"Who's in charge, here?" I said.

Konstantin looked around. "The boss isn't here, sir."

I bared my teeth, doing my best politely menacing smile. "Said, who's in charge here?"

Konstantin gulped. "Um... you are?"

"Sright. Sright. Looks like I own me a casino right near the center of Auster. Who'da thunk it?" I looked around. "This place is a pig sty. We're gonna clean this place up. Make it nice. Fancify it. You and me got an understanding?"

"Yes, sir. Clean it up. Gleaming, sir. Right away. But what about... I mean, the boss. He won't take this lying down."

I holstered my gun. Opened one corner of my mouth. "Sure he will." There was a distant peal of laughter from the floor above us. I looked up. "What's up there?"

"The front." He meant front as in 'the legitimate side of an illegal organisation'.

I opened the minimap and zoomed in to where I was. I frowned, then I chuckled. "Oh! Well that explains a lot, I reckon. Helluva front. You," I said, waving the gun at Konstantin. "You've got a lot of work to do. You can start by putting all this cash into bags for me to take and stash."

"Stash?" he said. "Why don't you just put it all in the vault? If you kill the boss, it'll be yours anyway."

The camera closed in on my face. Eyes shining. Lips twisted with greedy amusement. "Vault? A real vault? How 'bout you show me my vault?"

Fade to black.