Considering the Devion family wealth, the family mansion should be a towering building. But the Devion family is instead multiple buildings spanning a large territory that can compare to a small village of a couple thousand people. The most plain buildings are considered to be small mansions.

These small mansions are servant housing, often servants have families living there but many are individuals from all walks of life, as majority of menial tasks can be handled by few people. Many of the servants can also be considered talented individuals hired for their abilities.

Most of these talented individuals are artists but there are also engineers and even martial artists. In short the Devion family estate can indeed be considered a small village. When entering the estate, first the more luxurious buildings are presented.

These buildings have entertainment facilities inside, everything from olympic sized swimming pools, bowling halls, tennis courts to smoke lounges, numerous dining halls and even computer game centres. All these places also have their own dedicated staff who usually live a life of luxury when none of the Devions are visiting the buildings.

“I'm back.”

After passing the various facilities the main family mansions are built in a large circle, a total of twelve buildings, of which three are entirely vacant and only maintained for future guests or other Devion family members, if they wish to return home.

Rak’s little mansion cannot compare to these buildings and can only be considered better than the servant mansions.

There is a road to the each mansion, just wide enough that two small cars can drive side by side. At the end is a small circle with a fountain in the middle, and a large garage door leading into an underground garage. In each garage of every build there are at least ten vehicles, most of which do no have automated driving systems and are considered ‘classics’.

“We’re here mister Rak.”

“Good. So my old house is still vacant?”

“Yes I’ve already coordinated with the head land keeper and Mister Devion’s secretaries. Mister Devion will be meeting you in twenty three minutes and thirty seconds in the head mansion on the fifth floor.”

One of the reason why the Devion patriarch and matriarch are so revered by their children is in part due to their disposition and their diligence. It can be said that Rak inherited his parents diligence in some way, only Rak has almost no responsibility. No responsibilities means anything Rak does is of his own volition while most of his siblings work is ‘required of them.’

“Let’s review the information again.”

“Shall we use the general office?”

“No, we’ll go into the kitchen, I need a light snack.”

“I could hav-.”

“I said we are going into the kitchen.”

Rak’s stone went from indifferent to a slight annoyance in a breath.”

“Of course, sir.”

Henri couldn’t help but feel like a stone dropped into her stomach. She really can’t be faulted for her attempt to give Rak options, but contradicting her boss can be considered outside of her responsibilities. Of course very few people would agree with Rak’s actions and side with the pitiable assistant.

“I wonder if mother will be there.”

It is difficult to empathize with a person like Rak, having not only wealth and power, but good looks and an enormous family as his backer. All these things aside, Rak´s personality is also not likeable. Some might call him arrogant but demanding would be more descriptive.

“Any news of mother?”

“No, sir.”

After setting up in the kitchen a holographic image of a map appears and on the side a document holding majority of relevant experiences Rak has had in the past two weeks. The first week being omitted as it can be considered trivial.

Rak waves his finger down and the document responds appropriately and scrolls down. There isn’t too much information, some of which are filler due to Rak feeling it was all bit straightforward and took an executive decision to flower things up.

“It looks good.”

Rak can’t help but let out a sigh, seeing the past two weeks boiled down into a few paragraphs he feels he didn’t accomplish much and is feeling a bit embarrassed about presenting it to his father. There are many people with ‘better’ experiences in Chaos theory and some of who could perhaps fill a book and a half, but Rak’s experiences are almost all like a filler episode from a long running television show.

Henri stands by Rak’s side and promptly nods. She herself, like every other person in this world, has been experiencing Chaos theory. Much like Rak, her Chaos theory alter ego is surprisingly different from her real life one. In Chaos theory she is carefree and has begun taking the steps towards becoming a herbalist.

Few hours ago Henri helped Rak put together his notes and even listened to Rak narrate things, where she noted things of importance that Rak might have missed. At that time she was in complete disbelief and still can’t imagine Rak doing menial tasks like helping a kid look for a lost toy or rid a garden of weeds.

Even after learning how much Rak gained after selling the products of his brewery she still found the matter of Rak doing miscellaneous tasks the most unreasonable. Not only does Rak carry the haughtiness of a scion his reputation as a boss is volatile.

“We should move now, it´ll take a few minutes to walk over to the main mansion.”

“Alright.”

Rak waves his hand and the map and documents vanish.

“Any updates?”

“Not at this point.”

“Keep checking, mother likes to act at the last moment.”

Nodding in acknowledgement, Henri opened the door and let Rak walked out first, this isn’t a part of her job but she is feeling anxious due to Rak’s previous outburst. Her current state of mind is like a person promised a great reward and then presented with the looming threat of that reward being taken away and instead given a punishment.

It takes them twelve minutes to slowly make their way to the other mansion and another two to reach the fifth floor. Inside, Abalon Devion is staring at holographic screen. In the recent years he has been letting go of control of more and more companies under the Devion corporation, and yet he still feels as busy as ever.

“Your meeting with Rak is in one minute.”

“Send him in now.”

Outside the office Henri receives a notification.

“We can go in now.”

“You stay here.”

“Of course.”

Standing up Rak quickly makes his way towards the double doors. Inside Rak’s father waves his hand and his screen vanishes and he stares down the young man walking towards his desk. Rak is wearing a oddly indifferent expression and Abalon Devion is frowning as if in deep thought.

“Sit.”

“Father!”

The frown vanishes and a brilliant smile emerges from the older man. It is rare for him to have one on one meeting with his children, usually these things are done through assistants, secretaries or simple messages. Other meetings are usually coordinated events with many of the family in attendance.

“You look strong. I’ve been told you have something to show me?”

Rak is already smiling and he can’t help but smile brighter hearing his father.

“I recently got a map from a traveling vagrant in Chaos theory. I’ve had it made into a digital map.”

“Oh?”

“And I’ve also written up my experiences.”

“Let me see.”

After transferring the information over, Abalon waves his hand about navigating to the received documents before making the display leap into the air. Rak moves his head to the left where the map has been revealed with the notes on the right hand side.

“...”

“...”

The room seethes with silence, Rak glances back and forth from the map and to his father, who has resumed his previous frown.

Rak is the youngest in the Devion family and in Abalon’s opinion, the child that most resembles himself in his youth. The reason Rak isn’t involved with the Devion corporation is exactly because Rak has inherited his father’s pioneering spirit. It can be considered being spoiled that Rak isn’t a part of the family business in a way, to allow him to seek his own path.

“A travelling vagrant?”

“Yes.”

“And who drew this map?”

“Two artists Henri found.”

Once again the room fell into silence.

“This.”

Abalon points toward the notes on the right side, these are Rak’s accumulated experiences, gains and losses over the past two weeks.

“All of this is true?”

At this point Abalon finally turns his gaze away from the holographic screen and to Rak, peering into his eyes as if looking for something.

“All of it!”

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After a short pause Abalon bursts into laughter.

“Really like your old man.”

After skimming through the notes again and taking some time to review the map, Abalon and Rak chat back and forth about Chaos theory, especially things pertaining to job advancements. In the field of job advancements, Abalon is a whole lot more knowledgeable.

While very few have achieved similar things as Rak, quite a few have already gotten a job, Abalon himself has already received a ‘survivalist’ job quest in Chaos theory which he is thinking about pursuing.

“Alright, this is about as much time I can give you today. Have Henri send the information on those cartographers.”

“Okay.”

Pondering for a moment Abalon continues.

“If you can, finding more of these maps would be helpful.”

“I’ll keep a lookout.”

“Good.”

In Chaos theory, Abalon has been having a great time exploring the wilderness, even having encounters with wild beasts. Most of which he ran away from but one he managed to miraculously kill. Being an adventures spirit he gathered some herbs casually and cooked his prey with, this action eventually lead to his survivalist job advancement quest.

After Rak left, he and Henri immediately went back into the car and left the Devion family estate. Abalon hinted that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to stay on the estate for a while but Rak has no intentions to return home. Abalon Devion issued some commands, of which Rak was informed about the time they were at the estate’s gate.

Abalon informed not only the family members but all employees to visit taverns and look for travelling vagrants. It was clear that Abalon was now more interested in gathering a more complete understanding of Chaos theory.

However, Abalon underestimates the difficulty in getting a map like Rak got, as not many people will have tier one beer and stumble into alcohol loving vagrants. Nonetheless, the message was clear, the Devion family is building a map of Chaos theory.

On the way back home, Rak can’t wipe a smile off his face, Rak wasn’t too confident about his visit as he didn’t know how much his father values Chaos theory. This is in part because currently the only way generate wealth from Chaos theory in the real world, is through selling information.

If Devion manages to create a map, they will be able to gather their forces and dominate a region. Being able to meet a person in Chaos theory means it will be possible to pay them to work for them in Chaos theory.

It is already possible to hire employees in Chaos theory, like Rak has, but he has to pay them with copper, silver and gold. Devion can pay people in real life with both their immense wealth and influence rather than the far more limiting Chaos theory currency. In this way they could amass an army or set up multiple interconnected businesses.

Just a Henri works for Rak to take advantage of the Devion family influence, so would she work for him in Chaos theory once she can meet up with him. Her pay as an employee will of course be increased depending on her value. It might be curious to see the two worlds collide and see how Rak’s personality adjusts to regaining some of his real life power.

After returning home, Rak immediately eats food prepared for him before returning to Chaos theory, and he does so with the most enthusiasm he has ever had. He is still not to sure of the value or purpose of Chaos theory, but in it, he seems to have found a greater meaning.

It is already early evening when Rak wakes up in his bed in Alp town. Outside, the two horses stamp their hooves and occasionally nibble at their food. The heat outside has subsided and a few small white clouds have begun popping up.

“It’s all real.”

Clenching his fist Rak slowly gets out of the bed, for the first time in a long while he ignores his status window and directly exits the house after putting on appropriate clothing.

“What should I do now?”

After his chat with Abalon Devion, his father, Rak feels that he should find a job. Alley already made it clear that a job can be life altering but she never really explained much aside from things pertaining to training to become a hunter. Alley did remember to put a clause in the initial contract that allows her an out even if Rak doesn’t become a hunter.

Alley the Advanced hunter

I, Abstinence agree to Alley’s training even if it leads to my death.

Contract completes when Rak becomes a novice hunter or Alley decides Abstinence awful personality traits have been whittled down and reforged.

Initial cost: 2g

Maintenance cost: Up to 3g

Final cost upon reaching the rank of hunter: 3g

The contract was whipped out half heartedly and the vagueness allows Alley a lot of leeway, especially considering that “awful personality traits” are not properly defined and therefore all up to Alley herself to deem if they are “whittled down and reforged”. Only Alley will not receive the final three gold if Rak doesn’t become a hunter.

When talking about jobs with Abalon Devion, Rak understands there are two types of jobs, one is a support job and a main job. Due to limited knowledge Abalon did not know that people can get two main jobs, but he does know that people will usually have two jobs.

Henri, Rak’s personal assistant is becoming a herbalist if everything proceeds as expected, but being a herbalist is a support job. It is possible to focus on herbalist related support job and make it into something similar to a main job but this can be a difficult thing to achieve in comparison to main jobs.

A Rune mage is a main job that often supplements with herbalism, concoction, woodworking, leatherworking or enchantment support jobs, there are not exactly limits to the quantity of a support job. Gaining strength comparable to a Rune mage through woodworking is not impossible but the difficulty can’t be compared.

One of the difficulties when talking about jobs is the vast quantity of them. That is to say, if there are thousand different archetype jobs, there are ten thousand variations within each archetype. In addition to this, new archetypes and new variation with an archetype can be created at any moment.

A job is also not a fixed thing. A Rune mage can transition into a Rune enchanter. And a an enchanter can transition into a Wind enchanter. A main job can become the support job and a support job can become the main job. The main difference lies in the function of the job. A main job almost always focuses on combat.

It is entirely possible to advance a job without entering into combat, but that doesn't change the job’s function, if it is a main job it will enhance combat capabilities directly. The job holder will just lack combat experience and if fighting against a peer, they will likely lose.

After Rak spoke to his father about various things, he understood that he could indeed become a hunter without much worry, or he could choose an entirely different route. In this case, Rak was attracted to the prospect of wielding magic in some form.

While it can be said that all jobs are wielding ‘magic’ in some way or form, Rak’s thinking is that he wants to conjure flames or ice and throw them at his target. Rak is conveniently ignorant of things that can be described as elemental warriors, who summon weaponry of various elements and enter into melee combat with them. An elemental warrior is not a job but a descriptor of a type of person and their abilities.

All these sorts of thoughts are running rampant in Rak’s mind as he heads towards Alp’s Town hall. Rak is planning on asking about magic related jobs and where he could possibly find something related to it. According to Alley he already has the potential prerequisite for a job advancement quest, only he has yet to stumble onto one. This prerequisite being his clarity attribute, which is the main limiter of jobs at the earliest stages.

Rak is also reluctantly easing up to the idea of getting a ‘support’ job as a merchant. His only requirement is that is first to get a ‘main’ job. From what Rak’s father, Abalon, told him, finding job advancement quest is the hardest part, the rest should be easy.

There are a few ways job advancement quests work. One is to meet specific requirements and in some cases, a person can have already met the requirements and can directly receive the respective job. In other cases the quest gives simple instructions and a person can choose to fulfill it and once they have they can directly acquire the job in question.

The third type of quest will give very specific goal to do. Something like going into a specific area, like a cave, and in that cave kill a specific thing or collect a thing. This can even chain into another objective before finally the person earns the right to become something like a Hunter or a Rune mage.

The reason these quests are as easy and lax is because any real power comes from subsequent advancements and these quests are usually greater in difficulty. Of course there may be cases where a person accidentally over performs and achieves qualification for advancement, in such cases the quest is often just a formality.

In the end Chaos theory, the general artificial intelligence, is attempting to do something and it has no reason to stubbornly hold people back for arbitrary reasons, this can be seen in cases where people stumble into a job and can instantly acquire it.

Rak’s arrival with two horses sparks some glances but horses are not too rare in Alp town, even if less than ten percent of the population own one. What is rare is that Rak is riding one horse, while the other is following without a leash. In a word, people think it's irresponsible.

“Alright be good, I have to go in for a few minutes.”

The two horses neigh and look at Rak with disdain, be good? If they could speak they would tell Rak that they are the best of boys, absolute saints.

“Good.”

Rak took their responses as acknowledgements and quickly turns around and makes his way inside.

“Should I ask to see the Town planner Ung? I don’t have plans related to the town.”

Rak has already entered Town hall and is now standing still in quiet contemplation. There aren’t too many people about this late in the day, but there are enough that Rak’s arrival is ignored.

“Can Ung be considered my friend? I should just offer to take him out for dinner?”

Feeling his idea was great, Rak immediately asked for Ung. Unsurprisingly Ung is a bit busy and Rak ends up having to wait. The wait lasts over twenty minutes before Rak is called over to meet with Town planner Ung.

“Seems a Town planners day is long.”

“Abstinence! You came to see me.”

Nodding Rak impolitely sat across from Ung.

“I have some business with Town hall so of course I came to visit you, my good friend. When you have time, I’ll treat you to dinner and a few drinks.”

“Oh? I won’t say no. In about an hours time I’ll be heading out, but I can cut that short, why don’t I meet you when I’m finished?”

“Great, should we go to the Laughter’s medicine then?”

“I’ll meet you there.”

Standing up Rak nodded and left the room casually.

“Indeed, it seems we can be considered friends, though just barely.”

A peculiar feeling wells up in Rak’s heart, having someone he can call a friend can be considered rare for Rak. The generational gap between his siblings, the obvious distance and competitiveness from his peers, all of this leads to Rak having a lot acquaintances but very few, if any, friends.

Outside the Town hall, Rak’s two stallions have managed to untie themselves and are neighing at four tethered horses. They stamp their front legs before suddenly freezing.

“What are you doing? Who untied you?”

Not knowing what to do, the two horses neigh and put on what they consider an innocent expression. Rak, however, is just happy they didn’t run off once untied.

“Alright, forget it. We’re going to the Laughter’s Medicine, we’ll be there a while so I can ask them to bring you something tasty.”

Like hungry cats the two horses rush up to Rak and rub their heads and neck against Rak. This in turn makes Rak swing back and forth uncontrollably.

“Okay, okay! Stop it, let’s get going.”

Originally Rak was just messing about when talking to his horses but seeing them respond to everything, he is becoming suspicious. Just now he said they should get going and immediately one of the two horses moves his body in position, turns around and looks expectantly at Rak.

Not willing to give this too much thought Rak heaves himself on top of the horse. Due to his fleeting thoughts she has forgotten to grab the other horse’s leash again. Only after arriving at the Laughter’s medicine does Rak notice the other horses casually strolled along without being led.

“I guess horses just chase after their horse friends.”

Rak has little to no knowledge of horses and that is in spite of his family owning an entire stable, a horse track and full time horse tamers that take care of over dozen of their horses.

“You guys wait a moment, I’ll get them to make something for you.”

After entering the tavern Rak quickly turns around to make sure he properly tied the horses this time.

“What are you doing?”

Frozen like a pair of caught thieves the two horses look down in an effort to feign innocence, but Rak clearly saw them nimbly undo Rak’s knot. They had worked so fast that one of the horses was already free.

“They can untie my knots?”

At this point one has to know that Rak’s ‘knots’ are not something to be held in great esteem. But even considering the poor quality knots, horses should not be capable of randomly undoing them.

Unwilling or perhaps woefully unprepared for this scenario and the line of thought that followed, Rak let out a sigh and turned back around.

“Be good, at least.”

Rak was stepping side once again when he heard the two horses neigh in response. At some point Rak cast away his traditional understanding of the world, and while Chaos theory has been rather mundane for the most part, there are great oddities like Alley, the vagrant Hormby, that tall woman Delil and a few other strange things he has encountered.

When Rak came out of his thoughts a pretty girl was standing and smiling towards him, Arlina’s daughter, Savan.

“Good evening, Abstinence.”

“Ah, pretty little Savan. Nice to see you again.”

With a flush face Rak was escorted to a table where he made the odd request to cook something up for the two horses. Savan has heard stranger requests and immediately gave Rak a few options to choose. In the end he choose ten bowls of a fruit salad and with a serving of ‘medicine’ grass. A fancy term for something used to supplement some medicine, medicinal paste being the most common.

“Is it busy today?”

“Not at all, you are just ahead of the evening rush.”

“Ah I see. Is your mother around?”

Hearing Rak mention her mother she couldn’t help but remember those noises from a few days ago, immediately her face went red but she had the presence of mind to shake her head.

“Too bad. How's your little brother doing? Still planning on becoming an alchemist?”

Savan nods her head, grabs one of the chairs and holds a menu up to her chest with the other.

“He heard someone say that there was no way he could become an alchemist so now he’s obsessed with it and won’t stop stealing materials to ‘conjure potions.’ It’s a whole ordeal, mom has taken him to see an actual alchemist in Trove.”

“She’s gone all the way to the city Trove? That’s up north isn’t it?”

“Yes, up north. So I’m managing the place until then. It’s good I got a few helpers. She said she’d be at least a week maybe two.”

Traveling to Trove and back can indeed take five to seven days.

“This will be good experience for you then, running the place all by yourself.”

At this point Savan smiles brightly, it is apparent she is very excited about the prospect. Soon more people began to arrive and Savan excuses herself. Rak goes back to waiting for Town planner, Ung.

“Maybe I should check on those horses.”

Mulling things over, Rak was beginning to think that horses were special animals in Chaos theory, or that maybe all animals were special. The truth of the matter is that these horses in particular are third generation horses trained by Url.

With each generation, the generation before it hands down its wisdom and strength. While this knowledge and strength isn’t much, it does make them above their peers, namely other untiered stallions. It is still possible for them to reach tier one with some work and at that point their wisdom should increase once again.

As of the intelligence of animals, it is difficult to say, but they certainly aren’t dumb, they are only not used to accumulate knowledge like humans do. There is not necessarily anything preventing Chaos theory creatures from taking up a book and slowly learn to read.

“Maybe I should set out and travel a bit. If I move along the Endless mountain range, maybe I can set up a supply line alongside it.”

One of the things that has caught Rak’s interest is Endless mountain range, or to be more specific, the people that seem attracted to it. Unlike normal food and drinks, traveling into the mountain range requires a bit of supplies.

“If I set up a company that specializes in traveling between places I can also create the facilities that people need. I can slowly create smithies, medicinal and other survival item facilities.”

The more Rak thought about it the safer it all sounded. With tens of ideas swirling about in his head, this idea was most prevalent. After his experience with the cartographers he can now imagine a crude map where his trade routes would be marked in.

“I should ask Ung about starting up a few facilities. Maybe I can get him to recommend someone to manage my places and negotiate new deals and renewing old ones.”

Having some experience in creating businesses in real life, Rak has some ideas of what the long term ramification of creating many business can be. There are numerous ups and downs but there will always be a need to renegotiate and manage things on a personal level. Only Rak has little interest in doing such things in the long term. At the start it is fine, after things begin rolling Rak usually backs out and takes the position of a discrete owner.

Outside the Laughter’s medicine are two horses eating a lavish meal and occasional making noises and stamping their two front feet. This stamping and rowdy behaviour is to remind the other nearby horses, who are still tied to the large wooden stands outside the tavern, that these two grand horses are eating a meal fit for kings.

The servant girl Savan sent to deliver the food has yet to return inside and is enjoying the sight of these two young bucks making noise and acting uppity. Only thing is, she is beginning to feel bad for the other horses who don’t get any fruit salad and medicine grass.

Just as she is about to steel her heart and go back inside a plump man with a wide grin makes his way towards the tavern. This is Town planner Ung. After the thoughts of a meal entered his mind he hurried along and finished all things that took any sort of priority before handing the rest to this secretaries or other people he can delegate work to.

“Ah, did Arlina send you out to welcome me?”

Seeing the regular esteemed Town planner, the little servant girl was about to say something but Ung continued.

“Good! Good! I’ll eat plenty to day, is my good friend, Abstinence inside already?”

Having heard Savan and Arlina talk about the man she was also curious and took a few peaks earlier. She nodded and waited for the Town planner to enter before following inside. Ung glanced at the two horses eating what seemed like a fruit salad but he brushed it all off due to this rumbling stomach.

“Abstinence!”

Roused from his thoughts Rak looked towards the call.

“Your early! Should we get something to drink or are we eating first?”

“Both!”

Savan was prepared for Ung’s arrival after talking to Rak earlier and without having to order a pair of glasses were delivered and they were informed that in just a few minutes some small snacks would be brought over while they waited.