Day 0, iteration 12

Your rage increased by 1.

Flor woke up on a rough wooden plank. She had kicked off a rough woolen blanket and the tiny cylindrical pillow she had paid for.

“It worked!” she whispered to herself. “Yes! We’ve advanced the day!”

They had not advanced the day, as she would soon find out.

She rolled off the plank, muscles aching. Now, where was Alastair? Wait! I’m upset with him. He’s in time-out.

Flor considered her situation, remembering what had occurred yesterday. {Today, rather. It’s always the same day.} She had led Alastair into the City Mayor’s house and Al had interacted with a city display that allowed him to remove something like corruption from the city via, of all things, a sliding puzzle. And then, while he was getting his accolades, she had left him. It was a temporary leaving. She knew it was probably related to the rage notifications she had been getting almost daily for the last however long. And Alastair’s rage, also. He had become a massive jerk since they had been stuck in this simulation, reliving the same day repeatedly.

So, she made a smart decision and left him.

While he had been glad-handing the Mayor and city Lords, she had slipped out of the Manor, walked to the Brawler’s Rest, and registered for a room. Doing so had officially set her class to Brawler, level 1, and Flor considered this the best use of money so far. She had the idea from one of their conversations with Mida.

A level 3 scribe at the W. Shilgrave University, Olamida should have been a persistent non-playing character, but due to some glitch in the code could not store persistent memories. She recalled her progress to scribe level 4 via intricate notes and a memory device reminiscent of a Rubix cube. Mida was instrumental in assisting Flor and Alastair figure out how to progress enough to beat ‘the City.’

By officially registering for her starting class, Flor bypassed the introduction she had sat through however many times. No longer would she wake up shackled while sitting on a bench in a boat. The hard bed plank was a welcome relief.

She was still disappointed that solving the city hadn’t let them Log out of the game. It had been the last thing she had done after laying down - open the interface, check logout, then yes, then darkness. Then she woke on her wooden plank. But that wooden plank was still something like progress.

Unfortunately, the game didn’t provide a progress bar, so Flor had no idea when she could escape this prison. She summoned her interface and summoned her daemon, Kek. {Kek does not like to be called Kek. He prefers his full name, Kester Elliott Callach, but will settle for Kester. Flor still calls him Kek in her head, though.}

“Hey, Kester,” she said as the chipmunk appeared from *somewhere*. He wore a waistcoat and a tophat and seemed to have found a brass crow-topped cane somewhere. If I didn’t know better, he’d come up in the world. Flor shelved the topic for discussion later, expecting she’d have lots of time to ask innocuous questions of the daemon soon. “I woke up somewhere new!”

“Yes, very impressive. I’ve woken up in lots of new places.”

Flor sighed. “How many days did I wake up on the damned boat?”

“At least ten. You know I cannot account for the days before I joined your service.”

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“The point being, we’ve progressed the day!”

Kester looked at her, then sighed. “I’m sorry to tell you - it’s a new place but the same old day. Maybe a bit earlier than you normally wake up, but still.”

“How much so?”

“You realize you have a clock on your interface. It’s five. You typically wake on the boat at five. But you still have the boat trip to the pier and then the intro puzzle. So, you’ve reclaimed about an hour and fifteen minutes of your day.”

“Does that mean it’s too early to get brekkie?”

“Honestly, I don’t know the arrangements you made with this establishment.”

Flor said, “What good are you, then?!”

Kester looked affronted.

“I’d be happy to leave your service, but cannot do so without your explicit command. Is that what you wish? I’ll remind you that you cannot obtain another daemon after you’ve released one.”

Flor sighed, “You’re too serious. That’s not what I meant. You’re a solid benefit and wonderful travel companion. I doubt I can escape this place without you. That leads to my next question; Do you have recommendations on getting out of here?”

“Typically through the door. I’ll point it out to you if you need my assistance?”

Flor started. “Was that sass? Kester, I didn’t know you had it in you!”

“Yes, fine. I understand you mean how you escape from this island dungeon which you repeat the same day. Sadly, I still don’t know.” The daemon had the decency to look disappointed. “Perhaps you could go pet some more cats. That always seems to cheer you up, and occasionally provides a new interface.”

“The last thing I need to do is fall off a roof and restart the next same day on a boat.”

“Agreed. Otherwise, you could venture beyond the city, or maybe try to solo that carillion to gain some experience, or keep doing the same thing you’ve been doing ad infinitum.”

“You know, I had already forgotten about the carillon. It’s odd what a day does. Maybe it’s worthwhile going back. Oh! How’s my inventory? Did I lose my inventory?”

“What do you remember of yesterday-today?”

“Yesterday-today as in the day we completed the city?”

“Yes, that yesterday-today.”

Flor thought for a moment. “We need a better way of tracking repetitive days…do you think a memory cube would work?”

“If you could find, decrypt, study, then encrypt one…no, I don’t think it would. It would likely return to innate state each day.”

“Why don’t you return to the innate state each day?” Flor said.

Kester blustered. “I’m a persistent memory. Heck, I’m YOUR persistent memory. You didn’t remember anything before I came along.”

“Fine, fine. I’m not happy about that, though. I should be able to remember for myself.”

“Well, you do. Now. Because of me.”

Flor said, “Well the past several days of activity had been a blur, consolidating into a single shambled history. Only some specific events were unique.”

“What stands out to you?”

“Beating the city. That’s fresh. Officially becoming a brawler. What else…falling off the roof to pet a cat and meeting Alastair the following day. I think that we assaulted the Mayor, but it’s fuzzy, almost like it happened more than once.”

“It did. Anything else?”

“No, the rest is a jumbled mess.”

“So, you desire to distinguish the days. Let’s call yesterday C-day zero, for ‘beating the city’ day. Today will be C+1. And we’ll go from there.”

“Do you not remember everything I did since I met you?”

“I…” Kester looked deep in thought, “I should. But I admit that memory is fallible. Do you want to hear a funny theory?”

“Sure. It can’t be worse than ‘trapped in a sudoku-based isekai?’”

“I think I’ve exceeded my memory allotment. As in, I was called to record your journey, but that journey was expected to be over by now. So whoever programmed me expected you to be done already, and therefore I wouldn’t need to know as much as I do.”

“Oh, dang. Can we extend that?! With some in-game power-up?”

“I don’t think so. I think my memory horizon is about nine days, give or take. So, I’m afraid that limits your memory horizon, also.”

Flor contemplated Kester’s words for a moment. Despite its well-dressed nature, the chipmunk pulled its tail into its front paws and began to groom it. After several thorough licks, it looked at Flor and said, “Do you want to know what I recommend?”

“No,” Flor said. This dapper little rodent had been a friend, but she needed some time to consider the nature of the problem. “No, I don’t want to know what you recommend.”

“Well, tough, I’m going to tell you anyway. At some point in the past nine days, you thought about living a cozy little life here with Alais…”

Flor dismissed the chipmunk, who looked affronted and animatedly disappointed with her before poofing in a cloud of smoke.

Okay. To-Do list. First, check inventory. Second, beat up a couple of levels of the carillion. Third, head outside the city. I can do this. She gave herself a note to thank Kester when she called him back.