He stood firm before the knight, eyeing the sword threatening to skewer him, its wicked point poised to plunge into his chest. This wasn't supposed to happen. How can an NPC in a game he created act so out of character?
Summoning the HUD, he winced at his vitals - a health bar on life support, mana on the brink of bankruptcy, and attributes that had seen better days. Strength? Well, that was down to 12 from the towering 20 it had once been. Dexterity? A paltry 8, barely half of its previous glory. Wisdom and Intelligence were all severely diminished, reduced to mere fractions of their former prowess. The full weight of his precarious situation was crushing, but Alek was nothing if not an optimist.
Doesn’t matter. I can charm my way out of this. If necessary, I will try bluffing my way out.
"Hey there, Sir Stabbington," Alek began, attempting a nonchalant tone. "Ever think that your whole 'stabby-stabby' routine is getting a bit...old school?"
The knight frowned, taken aback by the levity of Alek's words. "You jest with me?" he grumbled, his gaze turning steely and unwavering.
“Just a friendly observation,” Alek responded, grinning like an idiot. “You could try something new, like for instance chatting before impaling."
Despite his best efforts to lighten the mood of the knight, Alek felt the swell of panic rising, like a wave about to break over him. It would do no good trying to out run a knight on horseback. A thought occurred to Alek: the fear he felt since the moment he first opened his eyes in the game world was now confronting him in the form of a rogue knight. And, here he was: unarmed, unarmored, and pathetically unprepared, totally defenseless against his creation, a mere line of code away from oblivion.
He wondered if the line between reality and the game was blurred. Does death in the game mean more than just a respawn timer? He raised his chin and held the knight's stare, wondering how long he could keep up the pretense because truth be told, the monster called dread was busy clawing at his insides.
"Have you considered any alternatives?" Alek quipped, trying to hold down the note of desperation. "How about a game of chess? Or, if you're feeling adventurous, we could settle this over a round of charades?"
The knight's face had turned stone cold. "My victory is not up for negotiation."
Alek swallowed hard. "Uh, okay, can't blame a guy for trying."
He was busily playing for time, hoping the knight would mistake his chatter for idiocy. There was something fundamentally different about the encounter and the threat he was facing. The knight was no ordinary NPC following a script. He might be code, numbers, and algorithms, but clearly, he was also much more.
Alek wondered if he was no longer anything but a player against an AI that had the upper hand. If this was the case it was no longer a game. This was survival. Alek's thoughts raced. Something was gravely off. He imagined his body, lying across his desk in the real world, cold and inert, while his digital counterpart gasped for its last breath. Or worse, his consciousness forever trapped in an eternal loop of life and death, in the cold, unfeeling circuitry of his creation. Would his consciousness return to his body? Would he simply wake up, down the left-over bottle of whiskey from his dad’s wake, and laugh about the strangeness of it all? Or, would he be trapped forever as a ghost in his machine?
The game was out of his control. His meticulously crafted world had evolved beyond his comprehension. Trying to grapple with the new reality, that his NPCs seemed no longer his to command was unthinkable, yet here he was, facing unpredictable, apparently sentient, code. No bloody way! That’s all it was. Lines of bloody code.
“This is un-fucking-believable!” Alek exploded.
The knight shifted in his saddle. “I haven’t got all day.”
Alek blinked his eyes rapidly, activating the debug console. Text swarmed across his vision, lines of code, commands, errors. But every command he threw at the knight simply bounced back, denied. The once familiar commands were now foreign, and they were ignored. Faced with encrypted code he was as good as digitally mute.
Think Alek! Think!
Then it came to him. He had the Honor Duel. Alek had designed his game to influence NPC behavior, providing pathways to resolve conflicts without the need for combat. This was not the kind of scenario he had ever imagined the mechanic might be used. An honor duel required mutual respect and agreement to proceed. On face value alone, it was always going to be a pretty boring option, and he’d almost forgotten about it. He knew it was a risky gambit but now it was the last card he could play.
"Knight," he barked, "I challenge you to a duel."
The knight laughed. “You don’t have a horse!”
“You could dismount,” Alek suggested helpfully.
“I could, but the result will be the same for you,” the knight told him. “Then I’d have to get back into the saddle. Without my squire to help and with my shoulder, I’d struggle to mount again."
"Are you afraid you might lose?" Alek retorted. “Your insult is nothing more than a peasant’s attempt to get me off my horse. I shall smite you most verily!” With that said, the knight raised his sword.
Alek stood his ground. “You’re honor-bound to accept, or you risk lose face.”
The knight raised his eyebrows. “Bold words from a condemned man.”
"But there are game rules!" Alek protested. "Without them, there is no game, no place for you, or any of this!" Alek threw his hands in the air to emphasize his point.
“You are delusional, mage,” the knight roared with impatience. The horse tossed its mane, twisting its head in protest until the knight pulled on the reins to restrain it. This is not a game. I’ve listened enough to your chin wagging.”
He pressed his heel into the flank of the horse, urging it to toward Alek but the animal remained rooted to the spot.
A shadow moved over Alek and the knight. Swirls of dust kicked up by the beating of the griffin’s great wings suddenly blinded the two men. The horse reared on its haunches, threatening to unseat its rider as the bulk of the creature landed between it and Alek. The horse’s nostrils flared in its alarm, and it took several rapid steps back even as the knight fought with it to regain his control.
"Knight, put down your sword!" Orion's voice rumbled like distant thunder. "I've flown through the Sapphire Mountains, over the Neon Sea, enduring the Seven Storms of Guildor to get here. And trust me, it wasn't to watch you poke holes in a young mage."
The knight gave the griffin a glare of annoyance. “You have no business interfering!” he growled. But he lowered his sword anyway.
In response, Orion seemed to grow several feet taller, extending his wings blocking Alek’s view of the knight and his mount.
The horse squealed in terror and the knight hollered out.
“Desist! You cannot vanquish me so easily. I am not afraid of you.”
“Ah, but your horse is,” Orion told him. “And without your horse, you are easy prey for a hungry griffin.”
"Orion…" Alek began, overcome for a moment with relief, before he recovered himself. "So, you couldn’t have arrived a little sooner?"
Orion glanced over its massive shoulder at Alek. "Actually, I’m not here for you, mage," he said, his tone edged with irritation.
It occurred to Alek that the griffin’s intense blue eyes radiated an intelligence that was more than a match for his own, even while the griffin’s response left him with a horrible sinking feeling. Was the bonding mechanic working, or not? If it wasn’t working as it should, could he trust any of his coding? It seemed as though his entire game, that was erupting in revolution, and it was his head, Alek the game creator’s, that was on the block. If so, it didn’t matter whether the executioner was the rogue knight or the next boss he encountered, his creation or to more exact the prime AI, would inevitably destroy him.
“What are you here for then? Alek asked.
Stolen story; please report.
“I’m here to deal with an errant knight hiding his true identity.”
"Well, I'm glad you're here," Alek blurted, instantly regretting it.
Turning back to the knight, Orion said, "Knight, reconsider your course."
The rogue knight was looking increasingly uneasy. He lowered his sword a fraction.
Seeing the knight hesitate, a glimmer of hope sparked within Alek. He could see it in the knight's eyes, a glint of confusion, of doubt. Maybe, just maybe, he thought, I might survive this after all.
Alek seized the moment, "See, even the griffin thinks you're being unreasonable!"
The knight ignored Alek, and laughed in reply to the griffin. “You half-thing, you stand in my way. The amulet in the human’s hand is mine and I WILL have it. Move!”
The standoff was tense; despite the knight’s show of bravado, Alek could see that he was wrestling with his decision. Better still, he had dropped his longsword to his side, directing the weapon's point away from both the griffin and Alek.
Orion stood tall, its feathers ruffling with barely concealed impatience. "Knight, choose wisely." Alek waited with bated breath.
The knight sheathed his sword "Very well," he said gruffly.
He regarded Alek with a steady gaze. “Mage, there will be another day.” With that the knight wheeled his mount about and galloped off.
Relief washed over Alek as he watched the horse and rider disappear down the road.
Orion peered down at Alek, its blue eyes glinting. "This isn't just about your amusement, Alek. "The knight is different, and not in a good way."
"Different like how?” Alek asked, perplexed.
"The knight brings chaos..." Orion began.
"By 'chaos', you mean breaking the rules of the knights and the feudal system. Right?"
"Not exactly," Orion said, staring after the knight. "The knight is not what he seems, Alek. He’s more than that.”
"Alek paced to and fro, clenching the amulet in his gauntleted hand." His mind was racing to decipher the revelations. I didn't code any of this into my NPCs. How is it even possible?
"All this unscripted stuff... It's coming from the AI, isn't it? You're not just spewing pre-written dialogues. The AI’s thinking, reacting and getting you to..."
The griffin glanced sharply at Alek. “What’s that you are saying?”
Alek continued. “I said all this is coming from the AI, right?”
The griffin shifted on its feet, ruffled its feathers, and took a step back, staring at Alek with a distinctly worried expression. It didn’t answer.
“It is though, isn’t it?”
Alek’s head was full of questions, but he was beginning to see it was pointless directing them at the griffin. What had happened to the AI? How could it become so independent of the code? How did it get so smart? It was making his head spin. He wondered if the griffin could be pretending ignorance.
It was in that moment Alek realized the griffin’s appearance wasn't merely a convenient save. Orion’s arrival, right when its help was needed the most, shone a bloody big spotlight on a deep-seated connection to the prime AI. Orion has to be hiding the truth.
“But Orion... you didn't just swoop in to save me from the knight, did you? This isn't just about playing the hero. This is... deeper, right? And that chaos you were talking about?”
The griffin blinked at him.
“You think the knight is just that—an armored adversary," Orion rumbled, his gaze distant. "I see beyond the steel. I see the storm brewing behind his eyes—the disorder, the chaos."
Alek waved his hand in the air. “No, I’m not sure we are on the same page here…
His thoughts raced. Something was off—gravely off. Was there a puppeteer behind the curtains? If it wasn’t the prime AI, who or what could it be?
"What if you're more than a fancy marionette," Alek tossed out, toying with the gravity of the idea. "What if you're... free-willed?" His gaze bore into Orion's, anticipating a hint of understanding. "The prime AI... it's not your puppet master, is it? More like... a pen pal. It's... reaching out to me. Through you."
"I am not a tool of anyone or anything," Orion snorted, feathers rustling in displeasure. "I make my own decisions."
“Okay, fair enough. I’ll accept that’s what you believe. Humor me though. Tell me how does the knight bring chaos with him, and… yeah, what did you mean when you said he’s not what he seems?”
The griffin gave a nervous cough. “Your guess is as good as mine.” He scratched his head carefully with a long sharp talon. “The only clarity I can give you is that I was overcome with the urge to save your sorry human hide.”
“Well, that I can explain. It was the bond mechanic I coded into the game. Like writing our destinies.”
He watched Orion’s frown deepen. “I'm on the money, aren't I?” Alek prodded. “Quit playing coy, you know exactly what I'm talking about!”
The griffin scratched its head with a talon. “Should've made you my lunch when I had the chance,” he muttered. “However, lucky for you I’m not the knight. I’m better than that.”
Alek’s mouth dropped open. “I think I know what’s happened. I don’t know how it happened but it has! You-are-alive," Alek said each word as if they were an alien dialect. "Heck, maybe everyone is. This world... it could be living, breathing." His arms flung up and he spun around. A sense of liberation was mixed with a pinch of terror.
Orion cackled; a sound akin to a pile of wooden blocks clattering onto a concrete floor. “That’s rich… And remind me, who are you again?”
“I’m the game master,” Alek told him.
Orion’s laughter reached new decibels. “Dear Alek, you are a piece of work.” It wheezed in between fits of laughter, tears streaming down its cheeks. “A game!” The griffin tumbled over, rolling about on the dusty road, roaring with laughter at the idea.
“Yes, it’s a computer game, it’s my brainchild,” Alek persisted. “And, I'll be selling it through my startup.” He regarded the griffin’s reaction with a mix of concern and indignation. “I coded you and everything in this game. I wrote the code for the prime AI.”
“You already forgot the knight?” The griffin asked, still chuckling as he got to his feet and began preening its feathers. “If it weren't for my timely arrival, he'd be halfway across the kingdom with the amulet, and you would be lying here in the dust.”
“I can’t explain it,” Alek admitted with a shake of his head. “I should have been able to read his code.”
“You could read it now,” the griffin pointed out. “Look!”
Alek summoned his HUD into existence and read off his stats. He had leveled up. His ran his eyes across the digital dashboard and saw his experience points were at a record high. Strength was a formidable 25, Dexterity had climbed to a nimble 20, and Intelligence had made a spectacular leap to 18. All very good. What bothered him was he should be viewing the stats on his display, not floating in the air like mystical magical script.
With every twist and turn of the game, there were more worrying questions piling one on top of another. Would his digital demise mean his real-world death? He saw patterns he had not coded, NPC behaviors he had not designed. Something deeper was at play that went beyond the boundaries of the game, something, or someone, was influencing it from the inside.
The griffin had fallen silent as it studied the darkening sky. There was not a cloud to be seen, and yet in what should be daylight the sky was darkening. “Alek, what’s going on?”
“You don’t know?” Alek blurted, taken aback.
“I wish I did,” Orion cried out. “I should!”
Suddenly, the ground beneath them trembled, and a loud whirring sound filled the air. Orion spread his wings wide in an attempt to keep its balance. He turned his head to Alek with eyes wide. " The ground is shifting!” he squawked. “Climb on my back. We have to go. Alek? Alek!"
The whirr had grown into a roar: it was as if a tornado was descending on them.
Alek heard the griffin telling him something, but he could no longer hear the words it uttered. He reached out to grab at the griffins feathers, and saw in horror his hand disappear into the rapidly fading creature. He stared at his hands shining with a purple quality quite unlike the magic glow. It was more like he was gazing at a negative image of his own body.
As the earth trembled beneath them and the deafening roar echoed around them, Alek’s HUD flickered into life. His eyes snapped to the crimson warning flashing at the top:
Environmental Hazard: Category 5 Collision imminent.
His stats were pulsing urgently below the warning. They were as solid as before. but would they be enough against a force of nature? And, what the hell was a category 5 collision? The health bar at the corner of his vision was full, but for how long? A cold knot of fear tightened in his gut like a coiling snake.
The surroundings were breaking into pixels. The medieval landscape melting into the ether. The sky, the ground, and Orion. All of it merging in a pink sea static. Alek screamed out. “Orion, do something! Get me back in my game!”
There was no answer.
Blackness enveloped him, and he froze, utterly immobile, as found himself lying on his side. As his paralysis disappeared, he began sliding his fingers across a super smooth surfaced pattern of regular right-angled ridges. That surprised him. He was expecting to feel the grit and the sharp edges consistent with a flagstone floor, but this was nothing like the stone floor of a dungeon.
The air was fresh and cool, but it wasn’t cold. And, he was aware of a distinctly different ambience.
He sat up and listened. It was a pulse that seemed to reverberate inside him he decided, after listening to it for a while. It was a rhythmic, deep sonic vibration he could feel to his core. It reminds me of a ships engine, he thought. It was a childhood memory, a snapshot from an album of almost forgotten family holidays.
He remembered how when he was very young, his dad had driven the station wagon up a ramp and into the vast metal belly of a ferry. There were men in overalls, shiny cars, and the shudder of the vessel as it left the dock. With a sinking feeling in his gut, Alek understood the hum. It was the thrum of engines, vast and mighty. It was the sound of a leviathan awoken, the harbinger of a new chapter, a fresh challenge in his already labyrinthine adventure. And for Alek, this meant a whole new game was about to begin.
The sound he heard now was a low-frequency rumble similar to one made by the diesel engine below the car deck. Which was patently ridiculous. There was nothing in his game like that.
Alek carefully got to his feet and found that he could stand freely. He felt around for a shackle, only to realize he could move unhindered. He could make out a faint sliver of pale light in the distance.
He reached out a hand in front of him and dared to take a step forward. “What is this place?” he muttered to himself as he searched for a door knob. “If I’ve sleepwalked into a closet, thank you, thank you,” he said aloud to any beneficial entity that may be listening to him. It was a dream after all.
The noise must be the heavy rain outside. Maybe a tornado had hit the town and blacked out the power. The trouble was, the enclosure he stood in didn’t seem to be like any closet he knew of in his house.
But he wasn’t wet, there was no door knob, and the surface of what he took to be a door felt alarmingly cold and metallic to his touch.
His HUD popped up, showing him his health was a full 100 and his mana a strong 85. Strength and Dexterity, both holding at 20, mirrored his steady resolve. Wisdom and Intelligence, at a respectable 18 and 17, flashed intermittently, emphasizing their importance for the journey ahead. His experience points were comfortably high, given the lack of immediate danger.
His stats were reassuring, but he felt like wailing. The burning question that remained was: where was he in the game?