With a resounding clap, the woman before me nods slightly before speaking once more.

“Well, how about I start us off by simply listing every ‘bug’ that’s come your way so far then! Let’s start at the beginning, shall we? To begin with, Jasper was it? The Wild Hunt of your server is a bit of a relic. The issues with that questline were something caught fairly quickly by the wide sweeps, and patched a few days past release! But… you were even faster.”

“Soooo are you gonna tell me what that is or-”

“In due time, come now, everything must have some flair to it, no?”

“...You know, you’re not wrong…”

“Right? So as I was saying! Completing the first stage of her related quest, counted as completing a questline of… let’s just say, higher rarity.”

“...Whaddya mean?”

“Well, something along the lines of completing the final stage of her entire questline? Your character was marked as having completed that! Which… opened up something, shall we say, unique?”

“Literally how does that even happen?”

“You’d be surprised.”

“Clearly, so, what’s gonna happen then?”

“Unfortunately, this is a non-negotiable issue that needs to be addressed. Your character information will be adjusted, and we can’t give you too much in return given it was the only genuine bug to find its way into your playthrough so far.”

“But like… why though?”

“Well, there’s at least three other things that we need to go over still, and you’re not technically losing anything from this… you’re just having a few progression notches ticked off, you’ll be fine. But, given it was an issue that we missed which is now leading to this, I suppose it couldn’t hurt to give you at least something in return. You’ll be given one level in recompense, is that fine?”

…Hollup, whole level? For the thing that supposedly is going to be the least lucrative out of what I’m about to be offered? That’s pretty nice… I’d ask for more, but I’m not sure I want to push my luck here. At first I thought this was going to be pretty one-sided so I was just kind of going along with the motions to get back to the game itself, banter a bit and say “thanks” then dip… However! That has now changed, I smell the dosh.

“Could you give that level to one of my summons instead of me? Or more accurately, give straight up experience instead?”

What looks like a snort almost rips through her composure, but with a slight nod of her head she amends the breach a moment later.

“I suppose so. What exactly is it that you’d want that experience to go towards?”

“Depends, how much experience would you be giving me if it was in place of a level up?”

“Depends, what would you be giving a level to?”

I respond to that one instantly, it’s a simple matter of who the highest level is. If she’s level twelve, logically giving her a full level's worth of experience would be the most efficient use, given she’s, you know, higher level and thus takes more to level?

“Screech.”

“Of course, of course. 2238 exp then. And what will you be giving that experience to?” She asks with a knowing smile.

For the second time, hollup. I thought I was gonna have to talk my way into letting that one happen, but she just gave it to me outright? Is she…? Eh, whatever, questions that can be answered within a short timeframe, for now, go with the moment.

“To Jasper.”

She’s basically my frontliner. She’s far more capable of keeping up with enemies than I am with her heavily boosted stats, and whilst I am able to be somewhat on par with her speed wise under the proper condition, I’m definitely not on par strength skill or skill wise. The first ‘skill’ being my perception speed and the second ‘skill’ literally being our skills.

She just has way more than I do. She’s much more versatile in a straight fight, while I can provide options from incredibly far away. Logically, there’s no reason for me to expedite my own growth when I don’t stand to provide anything from gaining that growth. For the same reason that I took Jasper as opposed to any other monster despite concerns raised about her, it’s more efficient to give her the juice.

“Then, the matter of the first issue is decided. Your character information will be corrected, and your tamed monster Jasper will gain 2238 exp. Then, let us move on shall we?”

I simply nod in response, though I also take care to adjust my posture just the slightest bit. We are, what would colloquially be known as, locked in.

“Your monster, Screech?”

“Yes?”

“There are two issues pertaining to it, both of which are negatives for you. First of all, its AI is… not quite non-functional, but it’s not functioning how it’s supposed to either.”

“...Whaddya mean?”

“Well, without spoiling too much about the game itself, it acquired a class that it reasonably shouldn’t have, or more specifically, an item. You see, all monsters are generated using rather basic rng. Most of them have no unique qualities, but about every… one in a hundred or so will have a unique trait. Some are more or less rare, and Screech… its trait is among the rarest. It has a one out of thirty five million Omnidirectional Mana Perception at high grade, pushing that probability up to one out of two billion.”

“Ehi-whau-gha-what.”

“Yes, quite. You’re a very lucky man Koth. Now, in basic monsters, this trait manifests in them being drawn to any source of mana potent enough to leave any traces. Additionally, an item, of which I might add only three of which have spawned so far, happened to spawn within the range of its perception. This was so, unfathomably unlikely, that it somehow never came up in testing! Because you see, the baseline programming of the game is that any NPC which happens to have a class above rare will end up possessing a higher level of intelligence, not the stat, literal intelligence.

“Hold on, hold on, you’re losing me a bit here. What never came up in testing?”

“Patience, patience, you acknowledged it yourself, yes? Everything must have some sort of flair with it. Please, allow me to continue. Screech’s original class and race would be that of a Great Crossing’s Eagle, which would normally only have the minimum amount of intelligence provided to every monster. But, because of those aforementioned incredibly unlikely circumstances, it ended up getting an epic class.

Now, outside of specific scenarios, NPCs aren’t supposed to change classes, but, this one did. It was an item meant to be used by players, but NPCs technically don’t have any restrictions preventing them from using items. Drawn to it, this particular one used it, and thus, an anomaly was born.

An NPC without any proper intelligence, gained it of its own volition. However, this was done without the assistance of the usual turn of events. And consequently, its more default intelligence and advanced intelligence that it should possess from its newly acquired class have overlapped, causing a few issues, but other than that… It’s a true one of a kind so far in this game's history, nothing else quite like it exists. You’re very, very lucky to possess it.”

…I, wha, what do I even say to that? Oh boy oh gee I sure am a lucky duck, like, what?

“And that’s all without it even having found you, the probabilities get even more absurd when you factor in your involvement. You managed to generate a rare quest with a luck stat of something along the lines of six by simply walking down a path! This could’ve been any number of quests, dozens could’ve appeared right there, but out of those sixty something possible rare quests, one of the only three with a high mana density item were rolled! Within the detection range of that thing’s Omnidirectional Mana Perception! It’s absurd!”

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

“Alright… I get it! The chances were like, one out of, trillion in a bajillion or something, I’m very lucky.”

“Closer to one in a bajillion, but indeed you are, but because of this frankly insane turn of events, an issue arose with your class.”

…I wait. Surely I don’t interrupt for the third time in a row, that would just be poor manners at that point. I kinda vibe with the whole story telling she’s doing right now.

“Surely you noticed when you saw Jasper’s proper class, that a hidden condition was partially fulfilled?”

“Something along those lines, yeah?”

“Well… hmmm, how much to say… that’s the pre-condition to a… certain series of quests, shall we say? And it’s supposed to be partially filled in for every monster with a class of epic or above within your possession! I’ll spare you even more of the nitty gritty, but the game tracks the classes of NPCs with a certain system. Currently, it views Screech’s as common, despite it in actuality, being an epic class.”

“So… in other words, I’m missing one of those conditions because of a bug?”

“Not technically a bug, she is still that common race… it’s just overlapping with its class! Which, happens to negatively impact you! Just like its personality.”

…Pardon?

“So, now that we’ve addressed these two issues, allow me to tell you what will happen. First, obviously, its registration will be corrected to epic and properly apply to your class condition. And secondly, a developer will personally go through and correct its intelligence to properly work. I’m well aware you’ve suffered some issues with it, which is to be expected given the base instincts of a common monster have overlapped with the higher intelligence of a magic based epic class. I did watch some of your gameplay before speaking to you.”

…What?

“What?”

“What do you mean, what? Has it not repeatedly failed to work with your orders, I’m well aware its speaking patterns have caused you some issues understanding it. So we’ll go ahead and fix that for you momentarily.”

So like… literally overwrite her personality with a new one?

“Uh, no? I’m not really having that much trouble with it. I’d prefer if you didn’t do that actually? Could you give me, like, literally anything else in exchange? I mean, still change how her class registers or whatever, but definitely don’t do that second one?”

“...I suppose so? I won’t claim to understand why you wouldn’t fix that, but if you’d rather something else that could be arranged. This is a rather large issue you’re simply overlooking, so… I suppose you could be granted a proper request, what would you like?”

I look at her funny for a moment, the complete nonchalance of what had just been proposed before, rubbing me just a little bit the wrong way. I don’t wanna jump to conclusions or anything, but to me that sounds like personality death. Some would consider that to be a fate worse than death, and even if Screech is just an NPC… What the hell man, don’t do that.

“Well… what’s on the table?”

“Hmmm… how about a weapon of some sort?”

“You can do that?”

Now it’s her turn to look at me funny!

“...We just gave you two thousand experience and you doubt that?”

“Fair enough. But I don’t really need a weapon? I’m not the one who’s going to be fighting up close and personal for at least a while.”

“That’s fair enough. A skill hand might be a bit much so I won’t offer that for this alone, but…”

I butt in before she can continue, clearing my throat before speaking.

“What about information?”

“...What about it?” She asks, tilting her head at me.

“Let’s just say you can answer a few questions I’m curious about? Refuse to tell me if it’s too much, yeah?”

“Hmm, that can be done. Go ahead, ask a few questions then.”

Right! I didn’t really have anything specific in mind, just… it’d be nice to clear some things up!

“Do Jerry and Jasper have any traits?”

“Jerry? No, Jasper? Er… uhm…”

She clicks her tongue as I wait patiently, smiling at her all the while.

“...Yes, is it one I can tell you about? Ah-hah-hah-haaaabsolutely not! You’ll have to figure that one out on your own time.”

“Okay… what about karma? How exactly does karma work when it comes to NPCs with positive karma, and vice versa?”

Was it really, THAT bad for me to have ten? Did I have to get stabbed for it?

“Ah! That’s a fairly simple one. Negative karma in society is heavily, heavily frowned upon. Having even one is enough to get you ostracized, given it’s usually increased from despicable actions or crimes, pagan Gods the like… but, having ten? Well, you did get one karma for a kill, yes?”

“...Uh huh?”

“If you got only one karma, for one kill, what does ten negative karma say about a person?”

“...Ooooooooooooooooh. Okay that makes sense. Well-”

“Actually, no questions for this one, I’ll give you one helpful nugget of information, and then we can move on to the last issue!”

“...And that is?”

“I’d stick around in your current area for a little longer than you’re probably intending to. You’ll find there’s probably a bit more to it than you’d expect?”

What the heck is that supposed to mean?

Oh, she probably figured out just about now that, well, that might’ve been a little bit vague given the ninety degree tilt I’m giving her.

“There’s a fair amount of things that would particularly pertain to you in your locale. You have much more to gain by staying than you do leaving, trust me.”

The heck do I have to gain by staying around Pierre’s Karst? I mean, there’s a bunch of monsters and strong ones, sure… but… ah, whatever, if that’s what I’m being told I probably shouldn’t take it lightly. I’ll stick around for a few extra days or something like that.

“Now! As for the last issue, you recall what I said at the very beginning of this meeting, yes?”

“...Something about doing compensation.”

“Shortly after that.”

“B-oh, unique passive… what about it?”

“You can’t keep that as it is.”

“Dammit.”