by Ryan DeBruyn
I let out the breath I didn’t realize I was holding. That’s a huge relief. Just an injury from the way I broke the blockage into my Subcutavian from the River. Why didn’t Crash start with that? My eyes narrow as I study the blue head. Would it intentionally have left off the minor damage part to scare me? No, that’s probably just my paranoia from growing up around verbal torment, right?
My eyes continue to squint at the AI, as other contradictions arise. The method I used is the one taught to all humans, according to Alrick. While my brute-force finish isn’t always required, it isn’t cautioned against. What would happen if I try again before I heal?
“Crash, please explain what you mean. This method is the way humans have been taught to break through for the past hundred and fifty years. Is this injury common then, and what would have happened if I’d broken through while injured?”
“*Pshhhkkkkkkrrrrkakingkakingkakingtshchchchchchchchcch*ding*ding*ding* We apologize, Master, it seems the information you are requesting cannot be shared.”
“All right,” I stutter, still shaken by the strange static buzzing and the three dings. “Can you tell me anything about the circulation you talked about?”
My teeth grind together as the same eerie noises puncture my skull. When Crash’s voice returns, it sounds very different: “Buy the Broken-Down Pawn Shop app today to purchase books like Slow and Steady Cultivation Wins the Race or Why Rushing Cultivation is a Sure-Fire Path to Injury.
“Unfortunately, we cannot offer you any further insights into these books but could read their blurbs for you if that helps.”
“Well,” I respond, my voice higher than normal, “why did your voice change, Crash?” This is the second time I’ve heard it.
“Sire, this is the salesman function of the Training Room. For example: Purchase Circulation Basics for Dummies today to enjoy a comprehensive walkthrough of how to break through spiritual blockages in your arteries and veins without causing injuries! Increase your qi storage today!” So, the slow method that society considers to be for poor cultivators is a good method? That can’t be right; there isn’t a benefit to staying in the lower ranks longer. Is the AI out of date?
Then I reconsider. What if Crash is providing me information, and—even more exciting—what if it’s correct? That sales pitch can be viewed as pretty informative. Better than any vague conversations I’ve overheard from the mercenaries in the group. So, what do I really know about cultivation? Only what little I have been told directly by Alrick, or overheard from the group. Next to nothing, if I’m honest with myself. How much would Crash know about it? I think I can say with relative certainty that he knows more than me.
There is a glaring problem with that possibility, a much bigger issue. If that limited sales pitch was right, how could everyone be teaching this wrong? If Alrick and others were causing damage to themselves, how could they not know? Does it stem from the Church’s teachings, or is it due to the general secrecy regarding cultivation? That was a large part of the reason I didn’t hear much about it from the mercenaries in the group.
Normally, if someone discovers a secret that will make them strong, they keep it to themselves. That’s how most of the mercenaries, and also I, believe that power differences between rankers came to exist. Have I just stumbled on one of those secret paths to power?
“Jackpot!” I shout as my heart trills, and even sitting I feel sweat prickle my skin.
“Sire, we do hope you are aware that there are no shortcuts as a cultivator?” Crash interjects, and refocuses me on the present. I had already been dreaming of flying through the sky. I narrow my eyes at the blue head. Did it do that on purpose?
“I’m well aware of my low cultivation, Crash,” I respond sharply.
“Sire, we don’t mean your rank. The front page quote from Aesir’s Virtuous Philosophies to Live By. A small tree with deep roots bends in the hurricane. Its mighty neighbor that wished to sup with the sun, was blown away.” Crash’s response confuses me.
“Are you telling me I am the small tree, Crash?”
“Master, if you wish to find yourself in that quote, you would be a seed who must choose its path,” Crash responds and I blink. Is that an insult? I lean back and feel my earlier excitement putter out. Is Crash trying to ground my excitement? It is just so ambiguous. Seeds grow, right? I nod at Crash with narrowed eyes, still not sure but willing to give the AI the benefit of the doubt.
“Okay, Crash, let’s do breakfast first, and then can you tell me more about the great books on cultivation?” I say, trying to be very cautious not to call out the loophole for fear of losing it.
Crash nods its bodiless head a single time in affirmation.
Small Kitchen App [Green]
Breakfast Recipe
Scrambled Eggs on Toast
Follow the recipe below to create Scrambled Eggs on Toast. Cost for ingredients: 1 bitcoin.
Ingredients:
o 1 Gallus Egg
o 2 Slices of Bread
o Salt and Pepper (To taste)
o Butter or Olive Oil
Preparing the Egg(s):
Place egg in bowl and scramble thoroughly. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Cooking the Egg(s):
Turn on burner to medium heat and place frying pan over it. Use olive oil or butter to grease pan to prevent sticking. Pour in egg mixture and scrape pan with spatula or other utensil to remove cooked egg from bottom. Continue process until all eggs are cooked to a light fluffy yellow.
Toasting the Bread:
Place bread in the toaster and press the power button. Adjust controls to toast bread to desired degree.
Enjoy.
“Why is this not a quest?” That’s the first thing I notice, and I turn to the holographic head of Crash.
“Breakfast is not a complicated recipe, and like yesterday, you don’t have the funds or ingredients to create a recipe that could be used in the daily quest. We apologize, Master,” Crash says. “Still, this will give you an opportunity to practice cooking and learn the Home Kitchen Application.”
Damn! It’s getting really frustrating to be told no at every turn by my assistant!
Biting my cheek to calm down, I choose not to tell Crash that I was in charge of the fire for the last ten years. It seems pointless and perhaps overconfident to do so. If I am honest, my roiling stomach is telling me that cooking in a kitchen and over a fire might be entirely different, and my pride would rather play down my skill. Better to be pleasantly surprised by the result than the other way around.
The kitchen cabinets and fridge light up to lead me to the frying pan and ingredients that seem to have magically appeared behind their closed doors. I study each as I take it out. In the fridge, the butter is inside of a strange semi-spherical package with a pullback lid and rests beside a lone egg about the size of my fist. I tilt my head and study the egg. It looks just like the eggs the mercenaries used to buy in the suburbs. Still, they called them mutated chicken’s eggs, not Gallus eggs. Perhaps it’s a different species.
The salt and pepper are inside a bowl in two sealed paper packets about the size of my thumbnail. I’m not sure where these could be from. Most salt and pepper I used in camp were in leather satchels that were handsewn by someone in the group.
I turn the indicated knob, and after a hiss and some strange clicking, a flame bursts into existence. My anxiety drops minutely at the familiarity of the flame, and I place the frying pan on top of it to begin heating it up. Now with some more confidence, I crack the egg and use a three-pronged fork to beat the contents in the bowl while mixing in the salt and pepper.
I check the temperature of the pan with a drop of water from the tap and notice it doesn’t sizzle away instantly. It needs a few more moments.
“How long does the toaster take to finish?” I ask as I approach the two pieces of bread. I know Crash will answer despite me not looking at him. He seems to be watching me as closely as he can from his place stuck to the wall.
&nb
sp; “Anywhere from three to seven minutes. The perfect toast is golden brown,” Crash adds. His voice seems to contain a hint of emotion. I smile at the tip I just received. Bread was not something common in camp, at least not unless the group was near a suburb. When the group was in the ruins near suburbs it was often used for trail rations but not as commonly in a meal.
The toaster oven door slides forward, and a rack pulls out, indicating I should place the bread on it. I do so and push the power button. In my mind, I set a three-minute timer and move back to my frying pan. Now that the water drops sizzle away, I add the butter from the strange packet and use the spatula to move it around the bottom of the pan. Once everything is coated, I pull out the remaining un-melted piece of the butter and put it back in the pack. There is barely a thumbnail-sized piece, but wasting something I just paid for seems idiotic.
I quickly pour in the eggs and begin scraping the pan like I have done numerous times before. I am just starting to get the results needed for good scrambled eggs when my mental timer goes off. I look at the toast, and it’s just starting to brown. One more minute then.
After the minute, I pull out the toast and place it on a plate before finishing the final scrapes for my eggs. I remove the pan from the heat, butter the toast with what I saved, and dump a good portion of eggs onto each slice. I turn off the heat and move all the cooking instruments to the sink before grabbing my plate and heading to the table.
“Congratulations, Master, you have successfully made a good quality recipe,” Crash exclaims as I sit down. I notice the blue blob attempts to elongate itself and move closer to my plate from the center of the table. Is it trying to steal my food? Do AIs even have to eat?
“Crash, do you have a thing with food?” I ask. I feel like I was rude to not make him a portion, but I’m not really willing to share this one either. I’m hoping for some kind of a hint if I need to make extras in the future. The floating head beside the fridge doesn’t respond, and I can swear it is staring not at me but at my plate, but without eyes I can’t really be sure. I blink at it, and pull the plate closer protectively. I’ve become rather protective of food thanks to casual food stealing in the mercenary camp. To each other the mercs were pretty tame, but to me not so much. It’s actually one of the largest reasons I took up cooking. For some reason, they didn’t seem to want to mess with my meals after that.
“Is there a way for me to know the quality of food I made without you telling me?” I try a different tack, hoping to distract Crash or at least have it look somewhere else. I’m finding it hard to eat with the AI hovering. My stomach is turning itself in knots for some reason. Am I feeling guilty?
“Of course, Master, there is a way for you to be able to inspect items, recipes, and materials for yourself. We warn you it is still in the beta stages of testing, however. First, eat your meal! It’s getting cold!” Crash pleads his final sentence, and that confounds the situation even more. I throw my hands in the air, in an ‘I give up’ gesture.
“Crash, do you need to eat?”
“Not at all, sire, but if you wanted to describe the flavors you’re experiencing we would greatly appreciate it. . .” Crash doesn’t take his eyes off my plate and I feel my head tilt backward as I regard the creature. Nope. I’m not doing that. It would be weird, I decide, and shovel the food into my mouth hurriedly.
I swallow my last bite and a quick check tells me I just got three drops of liquid from the meal. That’s a huge amount to receive from a single egg, and I wonder again if a Gallus is of a higher ranking than the mutated chickens.
“Can you please explain how I can identify items without your help?” I ask Crash, while running a finger along the plate to pick up any leftover melted butter.
A small square in the concrete table pops up and reveals a hollow-like drawer. The width of the drawer is slightly less than that of my palm and the depth is that of my knuckles. Inside the hollow is a black case. It is flat on the bottom but rounded on top. Crash finally looks away from my empty plate.
“Sire, this is a pair of ‘contact lenses.’ Wearing them should allow you to identify most materials in this world just by looking at them.”
I slide the box free as Crash speaks. “Contact lenses?” I ask, never having heard that term.
Crash begins a strange video that reminds me of when he demonstrated exercises yesterday for the daily gym quest. It shows a blue holographic figure, which I assume is Crash, taking out a small round object and placing it in its eye. My mouth falls open; in its eyes?! Are these torture devices? I open the case to see if I am missing something. No, the contact lenses look like a combination of glass and clear interior circuitry.
“How is this safe?” I exclaim, looking at the glass-like object in floating liquid. “In my eyes?!”
“Master, our database shows that humans often wore ‘contacts’ before The Rise. As we mentioned, this is in a beta phase of development, but the previous owner used a pair.”
My eyes narrow and I stare at Crash. I didn’t miss that he shortened the name to contacts, and I am waiting for more. Crash doesn’t add anything and my initial terror slowly fades. No one can force me to put them in, right? I decide I can take a closer look. I fish around in the liquid to procure the first one and slowly bring it toward my eye. Each time it gets a few millimeters away I flinch and blink. I can’t do this.
“Master, you could try holding your eyelid open with the other hand. That is how the previous owner did it.”
I stare at the blue head, not wanting to show my agitation or fear. After a moment, I choose to use his suggestion. I finally manage to succeed and shudder at the feel of something resting on my eye. I blink rapidly due to the discomfort and am shocked when suddenly the discomfort of the object fades. The strange feeling isn’t completely gone, but it no longer makes me want to dig in my eye to pluck the contact back out either. This mild irritation is something I could probably get used to. Maybe. . .
I place the second one in my other eye and go through the same moment of discomfort before that eye also clears thanks to some furious blinking.
“Good job, Master. We will now merge the devices with your eyes,” Crash states, startling me.
“Wait—aaaaaaaa!” I try to stop the AI, but suddenly what feel like flaming spikes drive into both of my eyes. I scream, “You jackas—”
Chapter 7
August 23rd, 151 AR
Jeff Smith
“Master, welcome back,” Crash says as soon as I groan. After I don’t respond, the Dummy states, “Thinking back, we believe the previous owner had the same reaction.”
Somehow, I hear him through my eyeballs and ears simultaneously. Bringing a finger to my lips, I shush the AI, but even that causes pain. Part of me wants to keep my eyelids scrunched tight. If I don’t pull them back, I won’t reveal the burning pits that were once my green eyes—right? I remember that the old owner died and wonder if going blind was a contributing factor.
“You jackass! What did you do to my eyes?” I whisper, trying to inject my anger into the tone despite the pain and low volume. “Do you have a delete command? I’m seriously blind, aren’t I. . .?”
“No, sire, you aren’t blind,” Crash states dryly and then stops speaking.
A surge of indignation bolsters my resolve, and I open my eyes. The light that greets me makes me so happy that my eyes water, or maybe they are watering because of their dry pain. As I blink, the water clears and soothes the irritation further. Finally, my vision resolves enough. My mind informs me that I’m looking at the bottom of the concrete table and chairs. The lump on my forehead further tells me I hit my head pretty badly on one of the two as I fell.
“Don’t go silent! What, you couldn’t warn me that you were going to do that?!” I immediately regret speaking. My head rings like a bell. My hands fly up to my ears to hold myself together and I begin subconsciously trying to use liquid. But fight against that urge to soothe the pain—I do manage to stop myself, thankfully. I really
need to save all my liquid and I can handle a bit of pain, right?
“Master, we did warn you it was only in the beta testing stages, but now that we have witnessed two individuals experiencing the same results, we’re able to speculate that this is a normal reaction.”
My fingertips dig into my scalp as they attempt to form fists. My plate and fork are sitting on the concrete table and I chuck the latter at the blue head. It passes through the holo-projection, pinging off a chair and onto the floor with a second ding. I shouldn’t have indulged my anger. . .
“Master, there is a fork on the floor and you have bare feet.” The response makes my whole body clench. This hunk of junk is so infuriating! But I shouldn’t show my emotions, I know better. I’ve learned. Most people just yelled insults at me though . . . and this is a whole new avenue of attack.
I try to calm myself, going through all of my learned tricks from my years with Leah. I finally land on a particularly effective one from childhood. What is the lesson I just learned? Take all warnings very seriously—ask some follow-up questions. A few moments of breathing later and the heat in my blood ebbs slightly. There’s a silver lining here. I am not at risk inside the Training Room, unlike in the outside world. If one of Leah’s mercs left me alone out there, even if I were conscious, I would consider myself lucky if an F-rank basher attempted to eat my face. At least I might survive that.
So, no harm done. I repeat the mantra in my head, having found this particular saying helpful after Leah pushed for so much speed that I lost the group in the ruins. Then I got scolded later for finding the group after a pack of canids was already howling. It was a good way to calm down then, and it better work now! Okay, maybe I shouldn’t think of past transgressions? I find myself massaging my ear tips, and concentrating on my breathing. In time I am in control again. The pain dulls in my head enough that I can mostly ignore it.
