With my new found knowledge of AI and the enthusiasm gifted to me by Mr. Derrigar I once again poured myself into Dunn. I motored through the completion of the side quests and tackled most of the major bugs I encountered. By the time Marcus returned from summer camp I had completed two additional major quest lines that comprised the overarching story and some of the underhalls of Castle Stanton. I was glad for him to return when he did however because the Castle was really my white whale.

The positive aspects of Dunn  flowed naturally and healthily from my mind. I could envision the town squares, the farmlands, the rivers, streams, bridges and valleys easily but  the darker parts of the game were tougher. I think because so much of the world was a response to my real life frustrations. It was a place to step away from the real world; from being bullied and ignored and I didn’t want Dunn to be a place where more of that existed. However, I knew it was necessary for the game. A game without difficulty is not a game.

I knew where the challenge would lay. Within Dunn the antagonist to the story, to most of what the PC is working against, resides within Castle Stanton; a deadly, dark and seemingly uninhabited castle with a rich history and a labyrinthine underbelly. The traps, puzzles and obstacles we’re all in place but without the actual antagonist I couldn’t complete the inside of the Castle. I couldn’t complete a lot of the game, the narrative; the story threads and the end result of it all were without a foe.

When school started back up it was my second to last year in High School and really no different than the last. I was more mature (if only by a little bit) but my social anxiety and general aloofness was stronger than ever before. I wanted more and more to spend time at home working on Dunn and while my grades didn’t suffer I found myself having to spend more time with my high school bully: Principal Miller.

Okay, I know what you’re thinking, I’m sure you said the same earlier when I mentioned that he was my bully. I don’t think I can accurately explain how much this man has ruined my chance at a halfway decent high school experience. First off, Principal Miller wasn’t always Principal Miller, when I entered High School he was Mr. Miller, my Phys Ed teacher. What a fancy way to say a whistle blowing lug-head who enjoys mocking kids who can’t climb a rope. If everything I’ve explained about myself so far hasn’t given you the absolute clearest picture of me, let me try one last time; I am not a physical person. I may be different looking now, a lot different, but believe me when I say that Gym class was the bane of my existence.

Gym class is a lot of kid’s least favourite subject but apparently not in my school or at least my grade. There is something to be said about being on the bottom but being alone at the bottom? When everyone else is not just above you but miles above you? When you’re not just a few feet behind the last person running the track but everyone else has finished before you have even started your final lap? That’s not the bottom. That’s a different world of hurt.

Mr. Miller wasn’t cruel. Not outwardly. He didn’t tease me openly or cause any public concern. It’s why I couldn’t explain to my parents when I didn’t want to go to school, I couldn’t just say Mr. Miller makes me feel like garbage because nothing appeared that way. Mr. Miller’s requests, the subtle way he’d force my hand to embarrass myself, to expose my socially outcast underbelly was his true gift to the world.

I remember in swim class, back before the end of my second year when I was much heavier, I wrote him a note. I really didn’t have the ability to talk to him face to face but I needed him to know that… well… I didn’t want to take my shirt off in front of the class. The reasons shouldn’t need to be expanded upon but the end gist of it was that my letter was openly read in front of the class and I was publicly told to remove my shirt for any and all swimming lessons. The kids were ruthless; “man-tits” was my name for the remainder of the year until I lost the weight. Mr. Miller told me that if I was to become liked that I needed to grow thicker skin. Deal with them head on.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

In my second year, when he was promoted to Principal, I felt a weight lifted but my interactions with him only got worse. I think because I’m black as well he felt I was a special case, that under his guidance I could be normal and like him. That I had untapped potential. The meetings in his office became monthly and they were the lowest points of my months. He would make suggestions on what I was up to, ideas about how to fit in better. He would offer thoughts on my “reports” (this is what he called my run down of my interactions and friendships) and ways to improve. It was insulting.

When I returned to school I was told that my meetings with Miller would double; “twice a month come rain or shine,” he’d say with a big toothy smile. That first day back was worse than normal for that reason alone and coming home to Dunn was like stepping back into reality, stepping back into something that was good.

Marcus picked up on it right away, my newly discovered and impending torment.

“School is a bad place this year.” He said as he entered my room. My back was to him and I was working on the paved roads that lead to the Dungeon beneath the Castle.

“Principal Miller wants me to spend more time with him this year,” I said with a shrug not wanting to scare Marcus away from school too much. “It’s not ideal but I’ll manage.”

“Is Principal Miller your Sauron?” he asked innocently. I almost laughed but then I stopped and wheeled around to face him.

“Not in this world no,” I said with a smile.

The evil wizard-king known as Millicent became the antagonist. From there the Castle spun out quicker than I thought possible. Marcus helped more with the Castle than I was willing to admit at the time.

With the castle and the antagonist completed I tackled more over the next 9 months than I thought possible. Just before my 18th birthday, I had 80-90% of the game completed. It was impressive and felt polished and all that was left was the implantation of the AI code I had been working on with Kappa.

This was what I would later refer to as, 'The straw that broke the camel’s back.'   

I’m sure at this point I’ve lost you a little bit. That’s okay, like I said I don’t expect you to pick up every little thing I’m putting down. My motivations are really what I want to get across and there is no sense in pulling any punches with you. I’ve admitted my creepy thoughts about Jessica and my dislike for Principal Miller. I’ve admitted to being a computer geek without any real thoughts on how the rest of my life would be affected by all of this time wasted inside. Stick with me though, will you? Because this next part… this is where things got tricky.

The implementation of the AI was by far the trickiest thing I had tackled. There were days it started to work, days it didn’t. By this time Marcus had gone back to summer camp again and I was in the last warm weather before my final year of High School. Kappa, who I had worked on since the year prior, was now a familiar and comfortable friend. His responses were still mostly canned but pieces of the AI code were within him. Thousands upon thousands of lines were dumped in. He became my guinea pig of sorts, trying different alterations of the same lines of code, swapping out pieces for another, line by line, space by space.

It was trial and error by fire and for every step forward it felt like I was taking three back. Kappa was there, he was on the cusp of true independent thought. We were at the point where I had implemented the speech recognition software (this was to test the AI, not necessarily for in-game implementation) and Kappa became almost like a friend. He could recite poems that I had uploaded, in game facts and could have a coherent, albeit brief, conversation... but he wasn’t all the way there. He wasn’t where I wanted him to be and eventually I realized that he never would be.

What I wanted didn’t exist. It wasn’t something that could be created, especially not by me. It wasn’t something that had a presence in my life, it was an idea, a dream, an irrational desire. It was something that I could never have…  

…until I found the Code.