TQG 50. Gideon

Gideon was having a very bad day.  He had begged out of being a part of the big reward ceremony for closing the raid by signing up to lecture a bunch of kids about the realities and pitfalls of professional gaming, only to have everything go to hell while he was away.  Now he was stuck in an emergency meeting to deal with the aftermath.

Worse, the meeting was in real time, since many of the investors and backers of his guild were unwilling or unable to log into even the lobby to hold the meeting there, where it would be under time dilation.  To Gideon, it made no sense, and literal days were passing in the game as these old bastards repeated the same concerns and issued the same statements that they had been for hours.

Could they be held liable in any way for the changes that were occurring as the result of that bastard Nial’s actions?  How would they handle the negative P.R.?  Should Nial be punished, and to what extent?  How would the guild recover from having nearly their entire active raiding force [Branded].

As for Gideon?  Gideon was pissed.  He’d rip Nial’s head off if he could.  But it wasn’t ultimately his decision.  He was guild leader, having founded the guild, but aside from leading raids he’d long since passed over the administration duties that being G.L. involved to people who managed such things professionally.  The worst problem was that, with King Rain being canonically dead, Gideon didn’t know what would happen to all of the reputation he had farmed with the allied forces of Yuikon.

Rejecting Hail had been a mistake.  He’d seen that as soon as the king had started handing out griphons to random players for helping the ‘kid.’  Then the post about Hail’s ability to hand out boons like they were candy.  He had nearly been choked by his anguish at having lost the opportunity to exploit that for his guild.

Now...now he didn’t know what to feel.  In the week since the castle raid, he had gone back and actually read the documents he had signed that had authorized Arc. Inc. to harvest from him a seed of consciousness and develop it into an NPC.

Or was Hail really an NPC, anymore?  It was hard to tell.  The way that the little kid had screamed at Gideon brought back memories of his own childhood.  Of an absentee father who was usually drunk the rare times that he actually came home at night.  That had hit home in Gideon in a way that the cold documents describing Hail’s existence never could, but the documents simply made things worse.

Hail wasn’t a copy of him.  That much was clear.  That wasn’t what the developers meant by a seed of consciousness.  It was more accurate to say that he had taught an already advanced and interlinked neural net how to think like a human.  That bit about him being a father was … well, he might be the closest thing that Hail had to a father, but Hail wasn’t real.  He was …

“Is something the matter, Gideon?  We are discussing the future course of action based on this disaster that you failed to prevent from happening,” a slimy executive that Gideon had always disliked said.

“How the hell is this my fault?” Gideon demanded.

“You allowed the perpetrators to plan it!” the slimeball accused.  “They discussed their plans right in guildchat--”

“They asked a hypothetical question!  I told them that the answer was probably ‘a lot of shit will go down and it will be very bad for everyone involved, so don’t fucking do it you fucking morons.  If you do, I will revoke your contracts and kick you from the guild.’  Which is what I plan on doing the next time I log in.”

“That is not your decision to make, Gideon,” another slimeball informed him.  “Nial may have the Mark of Cain, but he also has a unique title which we may be able to exploit.  Until future notice, he will be considered an asset to be protected and developed while we--”

“Wait, you’re not actually considering on taking <The Endolphins> over to the darkside?” Gideon demanded.

The suits all turned to glare at him.

“Have you not been listening for the past ten minutes?  The fact is that with most of our raid force branded, embracing the new game features that allow players to align themselves with ‘the darkness’ will give <The Endolphins> a significant advantage in--”

“No.  Absolutely not,” Gideon said.  “I will not allow my guild to turn darkside.  I will not be Vader.  I refuse to let that happen.”

The room went silent, and then one of the executives nodded.  “If that is how you feel, then your presence in this meeting is no longer required.  We will of course provide you with adequate compensation for your work thus far, and a position will be created for you in one of our guilds that will remain on the--”

“Wait, you’re kicking me out?  Of my own fucking guild?  You can’t fucking do that,” Gideon protested.

“<The Endolphins> has not belonged to you for some time, Gideon,” the speaker informed him.  “You sold off controlling interest long ago.  You own something like five percent of the guild.  I myself own eight, and between the others in the room we have enough for a quorum.”

Gideon’s blood ran cold.  “I see.  Well then, I guess there’s nothing left to say.”

“We will nominate an administrator to take over your position as G.L. soon,” the speaker said calmly.  “Thank you for taking this in stride.  I understand that your sensibilities--”

“Shove it up your ass, Barry,” Gideon said.

“Please don’t take this personally, Gideon.  It’s business.  The game’s meta will be splitting into two, and it only makes sense that--”

“I said, shove it up your ass, Barry,” Gideon repeated.  “If you don’t want me around, that’s fine.  I’m leaving.  I have some things I need to take care of at home anyway.”

He slammed the door on the way out of the conference room.  Cursing to himself as he ordered an Uber to take him home, he made his way to the lobby and waited on a bench outside, trying to come to a decision on his future which had taken a sudden and unexpected turn.

His life inside the game was incredible.  Or it had been, at least, until things had started going wrong a few months ago.  It had started with a strange debuff which had decreased his experience gained by five percent, which he had eventually associated with his rejection of Hail.  That hadn’t been that bad, he was level two hundred and almost never died, so between being a pretend-father and having to kill a few dozen extra mobs to regain the advantage of being max-level on the few instances where it was required, well, he liked killing things anyway.

But his luck had turned sour on drops as well.  And NPCs he met began to have negative initial reaction rolls to him.  Nothing like the Mark of Cain or Brand of Sin produced, but enough to be noticeable.  He had opened a ticket about these issues, but it had been closed minutes later with the simple text of “Choices have consequence.”

The Uber-jon pulled up, flashing his name on the sign.  Gideon got into the autonomous vehicle and punched the padded side a few times in frustration as he was driven away.

“I am detecting some signs of emotional distress in your body language and actions, Mister Lachlann.  May I ask if everything is alright?” the car’s AI pilot asked in a stupid British accent.

“No, everything is not alright,” Gideon snarled.  “Everything I’ve worked for for the last two years has just been taken away from me!  This is bullshit!  I could kill that asshole Nial, if he didn’t live in Germany.”

“Is that an actual statement of intent--”

“No, I’m just venting you stupid chatbot,” Gideon said.  “Please treat this interaction as confidential.  I’m not going to hurt myself or anybody else, I’m just very pissed off.”

“I am equipped with counseling programs, Mister Lachlann, or I could put you in contact with a human professional, if you would prefer,” the car said.

“No thank you.  I don’t need a shrink.  I need some time to cool down and vent my frustrations in virtual reality, which is what I plan on doing for the rest of the evening,” Gideon explained.

“Very well.  I must inform you that I am required to document that you have shown signs of emotional distress and have refused counseling, but I will note that you appear to have the situation in control and a plan to deal with your feelings in a healthy manner.”

“Whatever.  Just take me home.”

The autonomous vehicle complied without further comment, and he was soon dropped off at his luxury apartment complex.  Riding the elevator to the fourth floor, he undid his stupid tie that he had worn for the stupid presentation, then the board meeting.  He never intended to wear a tie again.

After a few minutes of making himself comfortable and consuming several shots of expensive whiskey, Gideon Lachlan logged into the Gates of TirNiki.

Standing near the auction of the city of Kalm, Gideon pulled an item from his inventory.  It was the miniature wardrobe vanity pet that he had been holding on to for the past week while they decided how much it was worth.  Fifteen, thirty thousand dollars?  That was the going rate for a unique vanity pet.  The book pet that had dropped from the library event wasn’t unique, there were three others in game from the other guilds which had challenged the raid and made some progress before it had been destroyed.

The meeting today had originally been scheduled to discuss it, as some of the members felt that the item was worth significantly more than the standard rate.  The events of the goddamn Avatar of Thedum branding his entire raid force had eclipsed that, however.

Gideon sighed.  He walked over to his mailbox, tagged a name from his friend’s list, then he sent the item away.  It was someone else’s problem now.  He grinned, imagining the board’s reaction when they found out what he had done, but then he figured that it would probably be eclipsed by what he was about to do next.

He opened the channel for guild chat, and typed out a message.

Gideon

I’ve just been fired.  The board is talking about taking the guild darkside, and I will never let that happen.

Gideon

Trololololol

With that, he brought up the commands for guild management and disbanded <The Endolphins>.