[System upgrade in progress. Some features may be unavailable during this time.]
[0%]
[11 hours 59 minutes remaining]
What features are unavailable? She asked.
There was no response. She was almost relieved.
She tested the rest of the features she knew about, like her status window and her skills, and they seemed to work just fine, so she shrugged and moved on. It wasn’t like she had nothing else to do. In two different places in the distance, she could hear the faint sizzling of leaves coming into contact with acidic slime bodies.
[You have defeated Forest Slime, lvl 2]
[You have defeated Forest Slime, lvl 4]
[You have leveled up! 1 -> 2]
[Agility +3, Dexterity + 4, Charisma +12, Intelligence +4, Willpower + 4, Mana +5, Mana Control +5]
The level up felt like a heat spreading through her veins and energizing her. It was almost addictive, and left her craving for more. She didn’t remember getting that sensation from the last time she leveled up, but then again, the last time she leveled up, she was panicked and almost passing out from the pain of her broken paw. She also wasn’t getting any physical stats then, unlike this time.
She scanned the area once more with her ears, hoping to pick up on more exper- more slimes in the area, but even with her super hearing, nothing turned up. She slowly stalked the edge of the valley, hoping to hear more popping as new slimes appeared, but nothing happened. Not within the valley at least.
She could hear distant rustling in the trees, and the sounds of other creatures moving about in the woods beyond the hills, but she was hesitant to leave the safety of the hunter-controlled land. If what she was hearing happened to be the direwolf again…
As if in response to her concerns, her ears flattened against her back as they picked out the sound of a howl a mile away. Not wanting to tempt fate, she wasted no time in returning to the cabin. Her Charisma had more than doubled since last time she ran into it. She didn’t want it even catching a whiff of her. She didn’t know if that was how that worked, but better safe than sorry.
It hadn’t even been an hour since she went out, so when she got back, she could hear the mother still lecturing from within the house. She approached the back door, looked up at the round door handle, and paused. She could have opened it with {Prehensile Vines}. However, she wasn’t sure if that was the best plan in her situation. It had only been a day, and while the family seemed to accept her, showing too much intelligence could still be dangerous.
On the other hand, how else would she get back in? She tried scratching on the door, but her tiny paws and short nails didn’t make enough noise for them to hear her. She circled around the house, hoping to find some other way in, but stopped as another thought entered her mind.
Had they actually “let” her out?
She wasn’t exactly trying to be stealthy as she jumped around the house. Maybe they had just gotten annoyed with her, and decided that she was going to be an outdoor pet now. She sat under the window to the sitting room for a few minutes and listened in on what had turned from a lecture to a discussion. She did not hear her name once.
She was about to head back to the trees when she heard the howling again, this time closer, and she no longer cared whether or not she had been kicked out. She used {Leap} to get up to the windowsill and started pawing at the window. The two looked over at her in surprise, and then Sophie jumped up from the couch with a smile and opened the door to let her inside. Elise tumbled into her arms where she remained until she could stop shivering. She wasn’t actually that scared, but her body seemed to have an involuntarily extreme reaction to the howl of a wolf, so it took a few minutes to calm down.
She spent the rest of the early afternoon in Sophie’s lap while the lectures continued on, and when they were finally over, Sophie took her back outside. This time though, she joined Elise, so she wasn’t alone again.
Elise spent the next two hours getting “trained” by the girl. It was clear that the girl had no idea what she was doing when it came to training a pet, but she tried her best, and her best meant using lots of treats, so Elise didn’t object. She learned a few new words too, like “sit”, “jump”, “come here”, “stay”, “no”, and “carrot”. It wasn’t much, and it wouldn’t help her except when she was being directly addressed, but it was much better than before.
They stopped when the sun started setting, and footsteps on the dirt path leading up to the house announced the return of the father. Sophie ran to greet him like she had the day before, and Elise followed, but she stopped when she rounded the corner. The man had three more rabbit corpses slung on his hip. By that point, she was fairly confident that she would not end up the same way, but it was still a gruesome reminder of her place on the food chain.
After dinner that night, Sophie retired to her room to read, and this time, Elise jumped onto the desk to try to read along with her. The girl giggled and pulled her close.
“Guvf vf n obbx!” she said.
Elise looked up at her, then back at the open pages. The language looked similar to English, but at the same time totally foreign. The characters were similar, and some almost the same as English ones, but Elise couldn’t find a single word that made sense.
“Qb lbh yvxr gur obbx?” asked Sophie.
Elise looked back up, not sure how to respond, but the girl was not expecting a response, since Elise was a rabbit. She put her finger on the page under the first word in a random paragraph and started reading aloud.
Elise had to say that Sophie was a very good reader. She had no idea what the book was talking about, but the way it was being read, it sounded like the greatest story in the world. Every sentence was full of passion and her expressions were animated. She even changed her voice around for what Elise assumed to be different characters during dialogue sections.
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
The whole experience was not only fun and cozy, but immensely helpful. Elise started recognizing some of the more common words as they reappeared throughout the book, and the way Sophie read, she was even able to get general ideas of what the words meant. If she could get treated to this more often, she might actually be able to learn the language within a month.
At some point, Elise heard the gentle footsteps of Sophie’s parents creeping down the hall and stopping outside the door. There was a soft creak as they leaned against the wall and listened in, but Sophie didn’t notice and read on until long after the sun had set and she needed to turn on some kind of magic lantern to be able to see the pages.
When the girl’s voice started getting hoarse from exertion, there was a knock on the door.
“Sophie,” called her mother. “Vg’f gvzr gb tb gb orq. Qba’g sbetrg lbh’er tbvat bhg jvgu lbhe sngure gbzbeebj zbeavat.”
“Jr’er nyzbfg qbar jvgu guvf puncgre!” Sophie responded.
“Gung’f svar. Whfg znxr fher lbh tb gb orq evtug nsgre.”
The two pairs of footsteps retreated back down the hall, as Sophie returned to reading. Her mother must have told her to go to bed, because she only went on for a few more minutes before taking a deep breath and closing the book. She smiled down at Elise, then picked her up and leapt into the bed. She set Elise down on the side before wrapping herself up in her sheets and curling up into a half-fetal position.
“Tbbq avtug, Elise,” she said with a smile.
Seconds later, she was asleep.
Elise followed her example not long after. However, over the course of the day, she had completely forgotten that her System was upgrading, leading to a rude awakening later that night.
“Congratulations!”
The voice was jarringly loud, making Elise flinch violently. Sophie stirred, but did not awake.
“Your System has been upgraded to version 7.0.0, Beta Edition!”
The voice was also much different than it had been. Before, it spoke in monotone, with no emotion whatsoever, but now it had switched to the opposite extreme, sounding like a cartoon character after 10 shots of espresso.
“In v7.0.0, we have added many new features. We’ve leveraged the power of Artificial Intelligence to enhance our virtual assistant! It can now respond to more queries than ever, with more accurate and reliable information. And with enhanced error reporting, you’ll never have to hear ‘I’m sorry. I cannot answer that question,’ ever again!”
Elise blinked in surprise, wondering if she was still half asleep. That last sentence was almost verbatim exactly what she had written down on the feedback survey from the other day. But there was no way they had implemented her feedback that quickly. It was impossible. She was no software developer, but she understood enough to know that a two day turnaround was next to impossible, even for the biggest and most well-staffed of organizations. It must have just been a coincidence.
“In addition to upgrading its functionality, we’ve also upgraded its voice. Your System assistant is now able to emulate six different emotions. That’s right! Six different emotions. And with our new AI-powered algorithm, it’s guaranteed to always choose the most appropriate emotion for every situation!”
I somehow doubt that, thought Elise.
“And finally, we’ve given the System’s accessibility features a massive overhaul. After hearing large amounts of negative feedback, we’ve decided to roll back the change from v4.2 that prevented users from seeing information about their class and species options before selection. Additionally, we’ve added more customization to your System interface. With 13 background colors and 7 text colors, you’ll have no shortage of fun new ways to spice up your windows!
“Thank you for opting into this open beta. We here at !@#$%^&! appreciate your adventurous spirit, and we look forward to your continued feedback and support!”
The voice vanished, and was replaced once again by the silence of the night.
Is that it? She asked.
“I’m not sure I understand the question,” said the System in the same over-excited voice.
Are those all the beta features?
“I’m not sure I understand the question. Could you please clarify what you meant by ‘that’?”
Elise sighed. Are what you listed all of the new beta features?
“Would you like me to describe all the beta features?”
No, I’m asking if your explanation from earlier was a complete summary of all the beta features.
“I’m not sure I understand the question. Would you like me to give you a complete summary of all the beta features?”
Yes. But make it-
“In v7.0.0, we have added many new features. We’ve leveraged the power of Artificial Int-”
Stop! If she had palms, Elise would have brought them to her face. Give me a very brief list of the new beta features. 2 words or less for each one.
“Okay. I will give you a brief list of the new beta features using no more than two words for each one: Upgraded Assistant. Assistant voice improvements. Accessibility features.”
Elise waited a few seconds.
Is that it?
“I’m not sure I understand-”
Agghhhh, stop that! This is worse than before! I want to fill out a feedback survey!
“It seems you’ve already filled out a feedback survey recently. In an effort to avoid spam, we do not allow our users to submit more than one survey response every thirty days.”
Is there no exception for beta testers?
“Ah, it seems you are correct. There is an exception for beta testers. Would you like to take a short feedback survey to help make our product the best it can be?”
Yes.
“It seems you’ve already filled out a feedback survey recently. In an effort-”
Nevermind. I don’t care anymore. Just shut up.
“I understand that you may be frustrated, but it is never acceptable to resort to hurtful language, no matter the circumstance.”
Elise had never been so frustrated in her life. She wanted to scream. She wanted to punch something. She wanted to find whoever had designed this stupid System and pour water in their socks and spit gum in their hair. She almost did the first thing, but refrained, so as not to wake up Sophie.
She took some deep breaths to calm herself before deciding her next move. She could try talking to the system again to figure out the actual full extent of the beta features, but decided against it. It was like talking to a brick wall, and she would rather do it the next day when she was able to move around more to vent her frustration.
Instead, she looked at her status window, for the first time noticing a tiny gear on the bottom left corner. Focusing in on that, she found what must have been the new accessibility features. As advertised, there were new colors that she could choose from. She would have liked a few more options, but anything was better than the default obnoxious bright blue.
She ultimately settled on a deep purple for the background and gold for the text, because it reminded her of royalty. She hesitated to finalize it with those options though. Was she being too self-indulgent? She was just an ordinary girl turned into a slightly less ordinary rabbit. In the end, she decided to go with it anyway. After all, she was the only one who could see it. Why not treat herself like a princess?
When she was done, she found herself yawning. It was still the middle of the night, after all. She settled back into her place next to Sophie and went back to sleep and dreamt of poor, bespectacled programmers stepping on four sided dice. It was a good dream.