After a few curses and kicking over the trash can in the bathroom, she walked back into her Office Pool. Her teammates didn’t make eye contact with her. Even Daisuke, who could use the opportunity to gloat, didn’t say anything as she slumped in her chair. She was deeper in debt from not only the Janitorial fee for trashing the restroom, but also the dragon retrieval fee that the Paranormal Investigator Branch charged to her personal account.
Luckily, there was a ceiling to the amount of debt a player could collect from another player based on level to prevent higher level players creating indentured servants. It also wouldn’t count towards her Company performance right away, other than the fact that a portion of all her quest rewards would go to the Paranormal Investigator Branch, which would harm her metrics as she would earn less than an employee without player debt.
She could also pay it off more quickly by completing optional quests assigned to her by the Paranormal Investigator Branch Debt Manager, but from what she read in some of the player forums, they were low XP, low reward quests that were wastes of time for the members of the Branch. Generally, most people seemed to agree that sharing a portion of your own quests was the way to go, which she would be doing for a long while, even with the ceiling.
With negative credits and debt to a Branch of the Company, she didn’t really see any other options besides Generalist. She had the stats for the Accountant class, but she wasn’t a numbers gal, and as much as the Accountant Branch tried to make number-crunching quests sound exciting, she knew that would be her own private version of hell, working on spreadsheets for the rest of her days.
The only classes left were Generalist and various others that really did seem like desk jobs, as none of the combat skills were in their skill parameters. Considering she had entered a dragon’s lair and lived, she couldn’t conceive of working a desk job her whole life, whereas the Generalist would at least offer her the chance to pursue another class’s skills, even if she didn’t have access to their questlines or items in the marketplace.
Since she already had the points in Luck to take the Generalist class, she decided to wait to spend them. Instead of a “Request Trial” button like most of the classes, it said, “Click to Join”, just like the Worker Class. She pressed the button and a message came up, “Office Maxi is now a Generalist. All class traits now apply. Access to the entire skill tree has been granted. Generalist items are now usable and purchasable in all marketplaces. Generalist Quests have been added.”
She checked the skills page and saw that she had been granted the ability to buy any skill with a discount based on Luck. She also noticed that she would be granted class traits at regular intervals. It seemed every hundred levels she could use and purchase another class’s items, which meant she could be a Paranormal Investigator in all but name. She’d miss out on the PI quests that were no doubt fine-tuned to their abilities, but now that she was a Generalist, she could theoretically make her own class.
The only catch was that in order to be granted the trait each hundred levels, she’d need a heavy amount put into Luck, as the first trait was granted when she had both an unmodified Luck score of 90 and reached level 100. Which, if she was thinking strictly in terms of skill points per level, wouldn’t give her the stats to use most PI items. She would have to rely on growing her stats naturally if she wanted to have the Luck score and the minimum score to use the items, like the Sword of Mind Rending, whatever that was.
After looking at some cool PI equipment a level 100 character might use, she searched for anything labeled Generalist. She saw that Sticky Notes of Wonderment was the only item in the Free Market. She was beginning to think being a Generalist was some sort of sick joke when a notification appeared in her Company email with a meeting invite from her mentor, Ted. Since he said he was free anytime, she decided that she wanted some answers.
She got up from her desk and told the magic elevator that she wanted to go to “Ted, the Generalist’s office.” A notification appeared, warning her that private offices needed invites, before it whisked her away. It took a little longer than usual for the light to indicate that she had been transported. The door opened to a private office.
It looked like it had been occupied for quite some time, with a hodgepodge of decorations, papers, office supplies, and general clutter. There was a bookshelf with schlocky titles promising to sharpen the reader’s business acumen. There were knickknacks that must have been accumulated from holiday parties, birthdays, and other corporate events.
Judging from things like the half-empty hand sanitizer and the three-year-old thank you note pinned to a cork board, Ted had been working there a while. However, Ted himself didn’t look particularly old. If she were to hazard a guess, it would be late forties, early fifties. He wore a blue polo shirt and dress slacks. His body wasn’t in peak physical condition, but he wasn’t large either.
He looked like a dad who probably went to his kid’s soccer games, and maybe would have one too many at the holiday barbeque. He was incredibly average, and was managing his fantasy football league when she came into the room. He minimized his window as if he was protecting trade secrets and said, “I didn’t expect you so soon.”
“I’m not exactly the wait-around-for-things-to-happen type,” Maxi responded, and sat in the chair across from his desk.
“So, I hear.”
She wasn’t surprised that word of her had been getting around. There were already rumors spreading on the Company forums about a dragon escape, but considering the Paranormal Investigators probably didn’t want the secret getting out about their trial, most of it was wild conjecture.
She wasn’t surprised that he already knew about her exploits, considering that the monthly cost of a private office was well out of her price range, even if she hadn’t been beaten down with debt. While Ted wasn’t a Power Twelve or anything, she imagined he was relatively high up in the Company, and obviously high enough to be a mentor for the Generalist Branch.
What surprised her was that there wasn’t more. The Paranormal Investigators seemed to have a whole floor, as she had been greeted by a receptionist, they had a conference room to themselves, even a freaking dragon pit. The fact that the Generalist Branch didn’t even rate a receptionist didn’t bode well. Either way, Ted was her mentor, so it was time to start getting answers.
“Right,” Maxi said. “Let’s start with the basics. Are we in a simulation?”
Ted laughed. “That’s what I thought, too, when I first started. I mean, the things I saw, they don’t exist in the real world. But no, this is not a simulation.”
“How do you know?”
“Because nightmares and dreams are real, and the Company keeps our world safe from all the crap that would overrun the entirety of existence.”
“Could you possibly be a little more vague. Who started it? When was the Company founded? Why doesn’t anyone remember a murdering printer?”
“The Middle Ages… the Roman empire… Babylon... No one really knows. There was a time when humans walked side-by-side with monsters. People just took it for granted when their spouse was torn limb from limb during a hunting and gathering trip. But then humans invented agriculture, and could congregate, form defensive guilds. Those guilds grew into secret societies, and then into the Company.”
“So, what, like the Freemasons, Illuminati, Knights Templar or something?”
“Sure, all the above, none of the above, maybe something else. No one really knows. The point is we got so good at fighting monsters that people forgot monsters were even a part of this world. Sure, people remember in myths, legends, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer reruns.”
“Wait. Buffy the Vampire Slayer was real?”
“It’s based on a true story, but you know Hollywood, they embellish the facts. The real Buffy was a hardworking PI from our California extension who saved Joss Whedon when he was in college.”
“Wait, Joss Whedon works for the Company?”
“No, I can’t really comment on him. But think about it. You are assaulted in a dark alley by a creature. Is it easier to believe you’ve been attacked by a demonic entity or some asshole?”
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“Sure, one person. But an entire office?”
“Mass hysteria. For good or bad, people want to explain what they can’t explain. A group sees a strange object in the sky and one person yells “UFO!”, then the whole crowd thinks they are seeing aliens. Your brain wants to latch onto the easy explanation. Add trauma to the equation, and you amp that urge exponentially. Is it easier to think an office was cleared out by a fire, a mass shooter, or a murder printer?”
“Wait, are you saying mass shooters are monster attacks?”
“Not all of them. Some are the worst of humanity. The point is the Company keeps humanity safe, so they can forget, and think monsters are only a thing on TV and video games. People live in delusional worlds all the time. They stay with a lover who’s downright abusive and chalk it up to love. People erase childhood trauma, and only get the memories back during serious hypnotherapy. Just google people’s memories of any traumatic event in history and people will have all sorts of wild “memories” of what happened. It’s no wonder eyewitness testimony is one of the weakest forms of evidence. A police officer can literally implant memories that never happened just by how they interrogate the witness. You wouldn’t believe the amount of people who’ve been exonerated by DNA evidence because a cop didn’t realize they were leading the witness. Sure, there are Company first responders who arrive on the scene and say, ‘Looks like you got scratched up in that fire,’ and then torch the place for some authenticity, but we rely on the imperfection of memory for the rest.”
“So, there is a cover up!”
“Only enough to let the Buffy the Vampire Slayer Effect take care of the rest. People would rather live in a world where they feel safe, and for all the people so doggedly determined to find the truth, we offer them jobs.”
“It’s just so hard to believe with all the phones. Anything bad happens these days, the first thing people do is pull out their phones to record it.”
“Yeah, the Hacker Branch has their work cut out for them, but a real good one can doctor a video before it reaches social media and replace it on the person’s device. Sure, we don’t get them all, but a few here and there are easy to dismiss as a filmmaker prank. We can thank The Blair Witch Project for that.”
“But don’t people deserve the truth?”
“People don’t want the truth. They want safety. Any cable news channel is all the proof you need of that.”
“Who’s in charge here?”
“Upper Management.”
“Is that the Power Twelve?”
“No, those are just the top tier players. They answer to Upper Management like everyone else does.”
“So, who’s Upper Management?”
“I don’t know. I've never met them,” Ted replied, uncomfortably. “Aren’t you going to ask me any class questions?”
“We can learn every skill,” Maxi said. “What more is there to ask?”
“Some skills synergize better with others. Look, I know you didn’t want to become a Worker, so you dumped all your points in Luck and ended up here. If you think that you can just become a quasi-Paranormal Investigator don’t. Even with the discount, you’ll always be behind. All the other classes get skills granted at certain levels, which means they can dump all their points into improving the skills. You have to buy everything.”
“Unless you learn them during a quest.”
“Yeah, but that rarely happens.”
“I have nine skills.”
“Nine?” Ted said, incredulously. “Are they all at zero?”
“I’ve been leveling them. Been lucky, I guess.”
“What? Did you put all your stat points into Luck?” Ted said, then gave her the lecture that everyone had given her about Luck, that it was a waste of points, her luck could run out at any time, and that a solid stat was worth more than the occasional good roll. He had a fair point. Increased damage on every attack from a high Ambition score would probably do more damage over time than the increased criticals from an equivalent Luck score.
However, there was also the fact that it kept working for her, and until the rolls stopped landing in her favor, it was hard for her to just simply ditch what felt like a winning strategy. So, she cut him off mid-sentence, “It’s been working so far.”
“I don’t know. Your debt says otherwise.”
“How do you know about my debt?”
“I know the debt and income of all members of the Generalist Branch. We have to know what we need to pay off and or what we would inherit when you die.”
“I thought my Office Pool gets that,” Maxi said.
“Should you die and the others survive. If you all die, then your financial burdens go to the Branch that manages your class.”
“Thus, why most of them have tryouts.”
“You’re catching on.”
“Okay, so can’t I give my family money when I die?”
“Sure, there are life insurance policies you can buy to make sure your loved ones in the real world will not experience financial hardship when you die, but there’s a monthly service fee that reflects your risk.” Ted swiveled his monitor to show her a rate chart based on her tier and level.
“Why does it go up at higher levels?”
“Because there is more of a risk that you die permanently the higher level you attain. Remember, these chairs can’t heal everything,” he said, patting his chair that looked very similar to the one in her office.
“What’s to stop me from Venmoing my credits to my mom after each quest?”
“Nothing, but then you won’t have access to better equipment. And on that topic...you really are going to need a better weapon, unless you want to get stuck defeating every monster 1 damage at a time.”
“Yeah,” Maxi said. “I have a plan for that.”
Which she did. Now that she was a Generalist, she could purchase the Mind Shard skill off the Paranormal Investigator tree. It was a basic psychic attack that each PI got for free, but it seemed like a good purchase, considering that she couldn’t afford a weapon upgrade.
“If you are thinking about Mind Shard, don’t,” Ted said. “It’s useless at higher levels and will take a week of training. A week you don’t have if you want to live.”
“Don’t I just get it? For selecting the skill?”
“You have to learn the basics of Psychics first. Some skills require training classes. Psychic abilities take a five-day intensive seminar. That’s five days you don’t have. Same with unarmed fighting for the Mind Body Coach class, and all the other low level attack skills.”
“So how am I supposed to up my combat?”
“You don’t.”
“Then what was all the nonsense about getting a better weapon?”
“That’s for the boss raid. That’s the only time anyone must fight. If you up your combat enough to survive a couple rounds with the lower-level minions, you give the higher tier players a shot at beating the boss. That’s all the combat you’ll ever need. You can do the rest with noncombat-related jobs.”
“You mean the menial labor?”
Ted scoffed, “That’s for the Worker class. Generalists are one step above the Workers. We usually go to manage an office cluster of workers or do various jobs for the Company. Trust me when I say the path that will keep you well-compensated and alive is noncombat.”
“What if I want to become a Power Twelve?” Maxi said.
Ted laughed, and then realized that she was serious. He didn’t meet her eyes when he said, “Generalists don’t become Power Twelve. We are the backbone of the Company. The Workers are the ones that are one step away from indentured servitude. We are middle management. We get to go home on nights and weekends, take vacations, and plan for our retirement.”
“What if I don’t want to become a middle manager?”
“Then you shouldn’t have picked Generalist. Look, I’ll send you a presentation of all the recommended Generalist builds. It sounds boring, but most Generalists are never at risk for termination unless you screw up bad. Sure, we aren’t the highest-ranking players, but we are survivors. We found a way to make this place work for us. Once your Pool is tier 9, you can trade members. I have a few noncombat Pools, even a couple Generalist Pools you can join.”
“Sure,” Maxi said. She was pretty sure they both knew she was going to ignore anything he sent her but had to go through the motions anyway. But before she could take her leave, she asked, “One more thing. Have you ever talked to upper management? You know, about Branch business.”
“There are all hands Branch Managers meetings with an Upper Management Liaison present, but that’s about as close as I get to them.”
“You’re the Branch Manager, too?”
“And the Mentor, Record Keeper, Quest Acquisitions, etc. We are not like some Branches that take up a whole floor. This office is it.”
“What’s Quest Acquisitions?”
“It’s how we supply our Generalists with their class quests. Think of each quest as a unique job or a task. I bid ones that will get us the most rewards and XP for the class, and the Branch gets a cut of the rewards. Most Branches don’t bid on the boilerplate fetch quests. It’s not worth the rewards, but if you want to see more than those, check out the class quests.”
“But what about the printer quest?”
Ted blinked.
“You know, the one with the murderous printers?”
“Look, talking about your quests, unless it’s from the one who gave it to you, which would be me for Branch quests, is against Company policy. Unless, of course, you are inviting me as an ally. Are you inviting me as an ally?”
“No, sorry, I just thought everyone has the same quests in the beginning,” Maxi said.
“Oh, no, they are all different. I mean, sometimes it's fixing a spreadsheet for accounting, then fixing another one for marketing, but every quest is unique to each employee. The Branches get to bid on them before they go 'all access'.”
“All access?”
“Yeah, each quest not picked up by a Branch will get randomly assigned to an employee. They have anywhere from a few minutes to an hour to accept it before it will be assigned to another player.”
“So how would one get an epic ongoing quest from this feed?”
“Luck. I mean, not like the skill, but just chance. It’s random.”
Maxi was beginning to think that it went beyond luck, and that somebody was messing with her. A legendary item, a quest that probably shouldn’t have gotten to her inbox in the first place. If what Ted said was true, then for her to get the Printer of Never Jamming, not only would the Branches have had to not be interested, but it would have had to be in her quest options just when she happened to be looking.
She realized that her luck so far had to have been too good to be true. Nothing could explain it, other than that someone had taken an interest in her. She intended to find out who. It didn’t take her too much thought to figure out where she might find them.
“How do I talk to Upper Management?” Maxi asked.
“You don’t.”
“If I did. What would I do?”
“If you become a Branch Manager, you’ll be lucky if the liaison has time for you. I guess the Power Twelve get to go to the top floor holiday party every year.”
“Top floor?”
“It’s pretty much where Upper Management resides, but I have never been there. The only players who have ever been there are the Power Twelve. Now, if you’ll excuse me, your mentoring time is up, but I have a consulting fee if you want–”
“Nope.” Maxi stood and turned to leave.
With shit options, Maxi really had only one choice. She intended to become one of the Power Twelve.