The Mayor's proposal sat on Chris's monitor. He had the evidence, an annotated PDF that laid bare the entire scam, a document glowing with the red aura of corruption. But he had no way to use it.
He couldn't just release the document. It had been acquired through a combination of cosmic power and a secret informant. Releasing it would expose Jessica's friend's mother on the town council and would bring scrutiny down on himself. He needed a different approach. He needed to create his own weapon, a tool of legally admissible truth.
He stared at his [Reality Architect] skill tree, the glowing star chart of his potential. He saw the path forward, a skill that promised the power he needed: [Ability: Independent Scripting (Basic)]. It was the key to writing his own custom functions, to moving beyond the pre-written spells in the System's library and creating his own. But the skill was locked, gated behind one final, daunting tutorial quest.
As if sensing his intent, the final quest in the [RML for Retards] chain appeared, its title glowing with a quiet, final-exam-like ominousness.
[Quest: RML for Retards - Final Exam]
[Objective: Create a new function with a temporary conceptual effect. Write an original RML script that temporarily imbues a mundane object with an abstract concept (e.g., "Heat," "Stickiness," "Honesty").]
[Reward: 500 XP, Ability Unlocked: [Independent Scripting (Basic)]]
The task was a huge leap in complexity. He wasn't just modifying a pre-existing property anymore. He had to temporarily add a new, abstract concept to an object that wasn't designed to have it. This was the final test. This was the challenge that would unlock the power he needed to fight the mayor.
He opened the [Command Console], the familiar, black, translucent window appearing in his vision. He began to work. His goal was simple, yet audacious. He would create a pen that forced anyone holding it to tell the truth. A Pen of Truthfulness. It was the perfect tool for a corrupt politician.
He took a simple, logical approach, his confidence buoyed by his recent successes. He picked up a cheap ballpoint pen from his desk and used [INSPECT] to get its ID. Then, he began to type.
var pen = get_object_by_id("pen_bic_blue_01")
pen.add_concept("Truthfulness")
He hit [EXECUTE]. The console returned an instant red error message.
[ERROR: Concept "Truthfulness" has no defined physical properties. Please specify manifestation parameters.]
Chris groaned. Manifestation parameters? What did that even mean? How was he supposed to define the physical properties of an abstract concept? Was truthfulness a solid, a liquid, or a gas?
He spent the next two hours fighting a losing battle with the Reality Markup Language. The process was a frustrating back-and-forth of trial and error, a live debug session with the universe's most unhelpful compiler.
He tried a different approach.
var pen = get_object_by_id("pen_bic_blue_01")
pen.set_property("Honesty", 100)
[ERROR: Property "Honesty" not found on object of type 'Writing_Implement'. Did you mean "Ink Flow Rate"?]
"No, I did not mean 'Ink Flow Rate'!" he muttered at the screen, his frustration mounting.
He tried to be more direct.
var pen = get_object_by_id("pen_bic_blue_01")
pen.force_truth(true)
[ERROR: Function 'force_truth()' not found. Please consult the RML documentation.]
"What documentation?" he yelled at the empty room. "You haven't given me any documentation!"
The System's error messages were a form of psychological torture. He felt like he was trying to learn a new language by having a dictionary thrown at his head.
Stuck, frustrated, and on the verge of giving up, he reached out to his support network.
He got on a Discord call with Richard, the familiar boop-boop of the voice channel a comforting sound.
"Day! What's up, my dude?" Richard's cheerful voice crackled through his headphones. "Don't tell me your weird ARG broke again."
"Worse," Chris said, his voice a low with defeat. "I'm stuck on a crafting quest. I'm trying to craft a 'Rod of Truth,' you know, the kind that makes an NPC tell the truth when they're holding it. But the crafting system won't accept 'Truth' as a valid material. It keeps giving me these garbage error messages."
Richard laughed. "Dude, you're thinking about the problem wrong. You're trying to craft a concept. That's not how it works. You don't need to create truth. You just need to create an item that gives a 'Cannot Lie' debuff. It's a status effect. See the difference?"
Simultaneously, he was texted Jessica, framing the problem in a different, more technical way.
[Chris Day]: Hey, weird logic puzzle with coding. If you had an object, like a pen, how would you write a program to make it so that anyone holding it could only tell the truth?
Jessica's reply came a few minutes later.
[Jessica Lange]: Ooh, that's a fun one. You couldn't just apply a "truth" method to it. The pen object wouldn't have that method. You'd probably have to create a new class, like a "TruthPen," that inherits the properties of the original pen but adds a new boolean property, like "isHonest," and then set that to true. You have to define the object's properties before you can apply a method to it.
Combining Richard's gamer logic with Jessica's coding logic, Chris had some ideas.
Maybe he couldn't just add honesty. Maybe he had to apply a debuff. And to do that, he had to first define the property on the object. He wasn't enchanting the pen. He was temporarily rewriting its nature, giving it a new, metaphysical stat that he could then manipulate.
He began to sketch out the new, more complex script in his mind, the pieces falling into place... hopefully. He would have to define a new, temporary property on the pen object, a social interaction modifier. Then, he would have to write script for that, when activated, would set the [Truthfulness] parameter of that property to its maximum value.
He was in the middle of this intense, focused contemplation, his mind a whirlwind of variables and functions, when his phone pinged with a new, real-world notification. It was an email. He glanced at the subject line, and his blood ran cold.
"Invitation to Interview - Entry-Level IT Support Technician"
The [Quest: Gainful Employment] flashed in his HUD, a bright, cheerful, and terrifying reminder of his other life. He stared at the email, terror washing over him. He had been so focused on his grand, cosmic battle against a corrupt mayor that he had completely forgotten about his quest to become a functioning member of society.
And now, he had to face an even scarier boss: a job interview.