Looking all around him all Wei could see was the endless prairie that on one side ended in a desert. There was no one in sight.

“Where are you? Who are you?”, he yelled at his surroundings.

“I am in yourself. I am your artificial intelligence helper.” the voice responded.

“Help me log out.” Wei replied.

“I don’t have enough authorization to do that. You should have upgraded your helper.”

“What do you mean?”

“Did you not read the manual?”

“No. The ON button was obvious.”

“So that is why you chose a huge planet with cultivation, magic and technology on maximum difficulty?” the voice asked with wonder.

“Yes.”

“Ahhh I thought you were committing suicide by proxy, but I guess you are just one of those who does not read the manuals.” the voice replied, reeking of sarcasm.

“Do you have a problem with me?” Wei replied in anger as he was getting pissed off by the tone.

“Yes. You are my problem, but hopefully looking at your surroundings for just a few days and then I can wait for idiot number three.”, the voice replied.

“What do you mean number three and why a few days?”

“I mean you are my second client. My first one was so bad he died on an easy difficulty on a small planet with all the perks in 2 hours. He was a rich second generation who used his wealth for charity to promote himself to society. He had plenty of karma but had shit for brains. The dumbass actually started to flirt with the queen of that planet in front of the king as soon as he got there. Let’s just say he lost his head because he was thinking with his other one and I got a bad score and an F rating. To make matters worse the video of himself being double decapitated is still in the top 100 but that didn’t help my score. His lower head got decapitated first of course. Now all I will be getting is similar idiots like him forever.`

Wei pondered about the new info while looking around.

“This sounds like a shitty game. Log me out. I will report you to the FCC if you don’t let me go this instant.”, he yelled.

“As I already said I don’t have enough authorization to do that. You should have upgraded your helper and this is not a game.”

“What do you mean with ‘this is not a game’ bullshit?”

“This is your life or should I say soon to be death.”, the voice responded.

“So what is your function exactly?” Wei asked in exasperation after getting nowhere..

“At F level authorization. I can help you identify, translate stuff and somewhat help you learn. That is basically it.”

"I don't understand how exactly you even got a chance to participate. I checked your background and you should have nowhere near enough karma points to be even considered for it." the voice replied.

"Well, I am here and you are a helper, so help."

Wei replied agitated.

"Those stupid tentacles must be in mating season again..." the voice mumbled...

"Do you have a map of this world?" Wei asked.

"Yes and no."

"What do you mean? Show it to me!"

A mini map materialized inside his mind like a heads up display showing just a tiny dot in the infinite darkness. As he willed it it zoomed in and showed only the area as far as he could see.

"So you can only show me what I can see?" Wei asked.

"And also what you have seen or gathered from other sources." The voice replied.

"Do you have a name?"

"No. I am an Artificial intelligence helper number 236745225367 or AIH 236745225367. You can give me a name if you want to. "

"You seem more like an AIJ to me..." Wei replied.

"AIJ???"

"Artificial intelligence jinx. In fact that's your new name Jinx." Wei replied feeling satisfied.

“So Jinx, do you have any suggestions?” he asked after some time.

“Your immediate needs are food and water since you haven’t brought any over. I suggest you pick a direction and start walking. Maybe you find a road or even a settlement,” Jinx replied.

Wei frowned and turned around looking in all directions and tried to pick a direction. He could see a dust cloud in the distance in one direction where the desert was and it was to the south according to the map projected in his mind so he chose north.

What followed was walking. Some more walking, followed by more walking.

He got so bored with the never changing scenery he started to sing in his head an old song he heard on the radio. Soon even that got tiring.

In the gloomy silence he felt like he was all alone in this world so he started chatting up Jinx.

“Can you put a measure on the map? A scale like one kilometer is this much?”

“Done” Jinx immediately adjusted the map.

“How long have I been walking?”

“You have been walking for 4 hours 37 minutes Earth time,” Jinx replied.

“What’s the distance?”

“32.5 kilometers,” answered Jinx.

By now he was getting light headed by the sun in the sky and his legs started to hurt.

“I need some water soon... “

Looking around the ground all he saw was different kinds of grasses and some other plants in between. The ground was sandy which made his walking even more laboured as his feet would sink in a centimeter or two if he didn’t step on the grass.

As he stepped on a particular plant he could feel it had a bulb underneath so he stopped. Looking at it closely it was a bit different than the others. He used his hands to remove some dirt and he could see it had a big thick root. Using his hands he removed some more dirt around it until he could pull it out.

It was around 30 centimeters long and 5 centimeters in diameter. Scrapping the dirt off the root he brought it to his mouth.

“What are you doing?” Jinx yelled in his head.

“Getting some moisture and sustenance. If I am going to die at least it won’t be from hunger and dehydration,” Wei replied.

“OK. Makes sense. Try chewing it first without swallowing and I will tell you if it’s safe,” Jinx replied.

Wei took a bite of the sandy root. It had a sweet complemented with a bitter taste. If the sand of an unwashed vegetable would not make crunching sounds in his mouth it would not be that bad.

“I can detect carbohydrates, water, minerals and a mild hallucinogen substance. No permanently harmful toxins so far. If you swallow it you might get some hallucinations but you will live, ” Jinx exclaimed.

“Beats starwing or dying of thirst,” Wei exclaimed as he swallowed before taking another bite.

As he walked and chewed on the root he found some more of them so just walking was replaced with walking, digging up the root and chewing. Before long he was as high as a kite.

After an unknown number of hours to him since he didn’t bother to ask Jinx about it he could see movement in the distance. As he got closer he spotted a group of what seemed to be a herd of wild cows.What he found odd about them was that they were green.

“Am I stoned or are those actually green cows?” He asked Jinx.

“They are green and you are stoned,” Jinx replied.