We walked a winding path through the larger, more richly appointed district, traveling clockwise around the central tower. The glass beneath our feet was still scratched and scuffed to the point where it was opaque, but here it was also engraved with ornate patterns and designs, geometric tessellations, and other forms of decoration. The effect was somewhat mesmerizing, in some places.

The two elders walked some distance ahead of us, speaking rapidly to one another in a language I didn’t know. The alien one, I was pretty sure, instead of one of the various Earth languages that the NPCs had apparently been given.

“So, what do you think?” I asked Lindsey, waving my arm to indicate the alien estates to either side of our route.

“I think that we have a ways to go,” she said, “all of this still seems very human centered.”

My confusion must have shown on my face. She laughed for a moment and then continued, “Look at the two guards we met. A humanoid, but smaller. Also with some color differences. The second one, a humanoid. But two heads, which are snakes. Those cat people we have seen on the street, they look very much like humanoid panthers, do they not?”

“They do,” I agreed easily. I could see what she meant. Everything seemed to be drawn using aspects of things which should be familiar to humans.

“And they have elves here. Elves! They have been a staple of our fantasy and even mythology for centuries. This is clearly the work of a writer, or team of writers, working under the constraint that what they create must be palatable to human sensibilities. There exists such a large body of writing, games, video, and other media that it is possible that all of these elements appear somewhere already in works created by humans.”

That checked out. I certainly wouldn’t expect actual aliens to look much like any of the aliens I would design for a game.

“Well, we were informed that the tutorial area was made for us,” I said. “Even if this doesn’t count as the tutorial anymore, it would still stand to reason that this is just the shallow end of the pool.”

“I’m looking forward to the deep end!” Joe chimed in. I was sceptical of the wisdom of such a sentiment. Lindsey’s thoughts likely mirrored my own, if the deepening frown was any indication.

“Perhaps you do not realize it, but once we are beyond the areas designed for us, the things we meet may very well resemble that boss that killed us or the thing beneath the clouds more so than it will resemble us.”

“Or they may not,” Joe said, “Maybe this is all a giant example of convergent evolution. Maybe when they finally send a spaceship, it’ll be sexy, blue skinned babes making their way down the boarding ramp.”

Lindsey huffed, rolling her eyes.

“Men.”

“I guess we’ve got that in common with the elves,” I said.

“Obsession with sex?” she asked, sounding genuinely perplexed.

“Unfair stereotypes.”

That earned me a smile from her, and a laugh from Joe.

“What was that, anyway?” she asked, then clarified, “With the elf, I mean. Your magical duel. That whole event seemed… uncharacteristic? Not that I have known you all that long.”

“No, you’re right,” I said, “She hit me with some kind of mind control at the start, and the rest of that clusterfuck was sort of a team effort between me and my pigeon.”

“How does that work?” She narrowed her eyes, “Wait a minute, you said yesterday that it was influencing you. Is that what—”

“No, no,” I waved away her concern, “just after I said that, I figured out how to block or throttle the connection. Now he mostly just helps me to be more confident and assertive, and sometimes he helps me to spot things I might have missed otherwise.”

“Have you given him a name?” she asked.

“I’ve been calling him ‘Nico’ since he is a nicobar pigeon executive.”

I examined him in my inventory, but the game interface no longer had a label for him, neither his original label nor his name.

“Well, he started out as one. I guess he has changed enough that the game doesn’t recognize him that way anymore.”

“I suppose there are worse names,” Lindsey said.

“That’s what he said!” I laughed.

“Really? How complex is he?”

I took a moment to reexamine his mental structure. He had been growing steadily, but was still composed mainly of a handful of ‘themes’ linked by a tangle of conceptual connective tissue.

“Not too complex. He’s mainly made of a bundle of stereotypes about executives, probably dating back a hundred years. He’s definitely not as complex as…”

I nodded in the direction of our guides, who’s conversation had lapsed.

“Right, but doesn’t it bother you to be changed like that? To have something in your head, pushing you to think and feel differently?” she asked.

“I mean, he is entirely under my control. If you could just plug something into your brain and get rid of one of your weak points, wouldn’t you?” I countered.

“No!” she shouted, then closed her eyes for a moment to compose herself, “No. I feel that I should be true to who I am.”

That struck me as a very strange thing to say. Everybody wires things into their heads to improve personal capabilities. The most recent generation of hardware, the sort I’d expect a young aristocrat to have, tied itself to the brain and mind in a much deeper way than my old hardware did. I didn’t see my use of Nico as any different than someone getting some new implanted hardware.

“Do you not have any augments?” I asked.

“I have them,” she said, pausing for a moment before continuing, “I had… no, it is a personal problem. I suppose I can understand your point of view.”

“Just give it a few decades,” Joe said, “you’re way too young to have a personal understanding of just how much a person can change, even without having computers or pigeons in your head talking to you. Why, not long ago I wasn’t even a huge dinosaur!”

That got a weak smile out of her, though I could see that whatever subject we had touched on weighed heavily.

“Seriously though,” he said, “you are still you, no matter what meat and non-meat computers make you up.”

I sighed at that remark. I’d have to make do without my non-meat computers soon. My reaction drew an inquisitive eye from Lindsey, so I went ahead and explained, “Joe just reminded me that I’m getting my augments taken out soon. Medical complications from the alien hardware, they think. They’ll be giving me a set of current generation hardware, but I have a feeling that I’ll just run into the same problem again. You should keep an eye out for any weird neurological symptoms. None of our other coworkers have had any issues yet, but it might be a mystic thing, or related to having high sync, or whatever, so it could be relevant to you.”

Her eyes lit up on hearing my warning, and she smiled more widely. At this point I had no idea if I didn’t understand women at all, or if she was just really strange. Maybe it was both. Nico was silent on the subject, and I guess it didn’t really matter one way or the other.

We moved on to less heavy topics for the remainder of our walk, which probably took about half an hour in total. We had walked about a quarter of the way around the circular town before reaching the most lavish of estates we had yet seen. The grounds were entirely dug up and filled with dirt, the lawn immaculately kept. There was a garden with neat rows of vegetables of all sorts, and a hedge maze complete with topiary animals. The buildings we could see were three stories, a rarity mostly confined to the estates obviously scaled for the smaller humanoids. The walls to the estate were waist high, and made with highly polished bricks of the glass-like material. Inside of the bricks, threaded throughout the length of the wall, was some kind of metal wire, twisted into ornate shapes and patterns. It could only be the result of some kind of magic, though I could see and feel no residual magic inside it. It wasn’t a ward or alarm or magical electric fence, just a flex on anyone who didn’t have the resources to adorn their property’s border with a wall that has fancy wire-work magically fused into it.

We passed the gateway to the property, a wrought iron archway made to look like flowering vines. There was no door or gate, just a transition from hard glass to a soft lawn under our feet. There were humans wandering the grounds, dressed in brightly colored and intricately patterned robes. A man and a woman walked hand in hand through the garden, two young girls sprinted across the lawn into the hedge maze, a cluster of three men were holding a discussion and exchanging books.

“These are the slave pens?” Lindsey asked, her voice carrying just a hint of incredulity.

“The sorceress did warn us to treat the humans well,” Elder Erien said, “It seems very likely that she knew that it would be humans to visit us. It puts some of her more cryptic statements in a very different light.”

“More story. Skip please,” Joe said.

“You really have no interest in such a figure, powerful enough to divine your coming more than one hundred years ago?” the elder asked.

“No,” Joe shook his head, “I have interest in going back and running the next ten floors of our starting tower, and getting strong enough to beat the next boss and seeing what the floors after that have. Maybe going back and getting some payback on that first boss, once we are sufficiently overleveled. I want to explore your tower, the one where you apparently found a turkey with legs the size of a person. I want to see what kinds of cool stuff is out there past the towers, whichever path ends up taking us that way. Maybe see that big upside down mountain, if there is a way to get there. There will definitely be people coming here after us that will talk with everyone and learn more about your history or whatever, but as long as I have any say in it, that will not be my job.”

I could agree with the general sentiment, but I worried that skipping quests entirely might cause us to miss out on worthwhile rewards. I guess if that came to light later on, we could circle back, or at least amend our strategy for any future towns we came to. Even Lindsey would probably prefer that plan, as she considered all of the lore here to have more to do with humanity than the aliens. Her best way to do her job would also be pushing forward.

“Of course,” Elder Erien said, “you are scouts, not diplomats. I understand.”

“But before our diplomats arrive, we need to clear up our apparent misunderstanding,” I said, indicating the humans around us. They had been giving us looks, just like the other inhabitants of the wealthy district, but no one had approached us yet.

“Of course,” Elder Eru said, taking over the conversation, “All the humans are owned by the Finxi council, as are the grounds of this estate. The humans donate their essence each day, the energy goes to the council to distribute as it sees fit and the humans are paid a stipend.”

We walked as he explained, making our way toward the center of the compound. Now that we were beyond the outermost buildings, I could see that the buildings on the property were arranged in a rough octagon.

“The stipend is enough for the humans to afford the smallest of accommodations within the grounds, and to be able to feed themselves, but most humans choose to seek employment in addition to donating their essence.”

The majority of the buildings around us looked like they were probably apartments, or manor houses, or whatever they would be called here, but one was clearly a cafeteria, and another was a pavilion with what looked like workout equipment. They weren’t wrong that their ‘slave pens’ were well appointed.

“It is generally seen as prestigious to employ a human assistant, so they tend to receive decent salaries. A portion of their salaries are taken to pay for the estate’s upkeep, any medical care they might need, tutors for the children and occasionally adults who wish to study advanced subjects. Whatever remains after these expenses they are allowed to keep.”

At the center of the estate, our apparent destination, was a fountain. The fountain itself was relatively unremarkable, but all around it were trees of a startling variety. None of them were obviously magical, or unearthly, or anything like that. It was just unusual to see so many different kinds of trees planted in the same area. Willows, Oak, Pine, a bunch that I had no idea what they were. I didn’t know much about trees, but I was pretty sure these weren’t all supposed to grow under the same conditions. Probably magic at work somewhere along the line, even though the trees weren’t magic themselves. Ultimately, it made for a pretty impressive sight, better even than the terrace gardens and groves of the arcologies. It felt a little bit silly comparing this to the real world, but the lack of obvious magic gave the whole scene a very natural feel, very different to a lot of the game’s exotic or uncanny set pieces.

“The humans are allowed to freely move around the interior of the town, though they will be turned away from the gate if they try to leave, and they will be denied entry into the central tower.”

He finished speaking as we reached the fountain, a few elderly humans had relocated to the opposite side as we approached, either to give us space or avoid us, I couldn’t be sure which.

“So,” the other elder spoke up, “this is probably not the problem that you thought it was? I bet you were overreacting before.”

I glared at her. She wasn’t entirely wrong though. These people had a form of basic income. They had decent homes, food, a nice environment. They could work, though they were taxed. The major issue was that they couldn’t leave, though I didn’t know if normal citizens could leave either.

“Are they free to choose their partners?” Lindsey asked, beating me to the objection and also bringing up an issue I wouldn’t have spotted.

“Of course, though only among the other humans,” Elder Erien said. I wasn’t sure if it was racism or ethics at work there, but I wasn’t interested in fixing all the woes of this fictional society, just the parts that will get me into trouble.

“Can your citizens leave the walls, or enter the tower?” I asked.

“Adults can leave the walls. A citizen must have a hunter’s qualifications before they may enter the tower.”

“Okay,” I said, sorting the situation out in my head, “here is what needs to change for us to be allowed to continue coming here. First, the humans belong to themselves, just like any other person in this town. Second, they have to be free to go where any other citizen can, under the same conditions, even if it is dangerous to them.”

I took a moment to go over the situation again, trying to ignore the rising discomfort.

“Yeah, I think that’s it.”

“That’s it?” Elder Erien asked, sounding slightly baffled. “You don’t need us to stop taking part of their pay? They don’t need to be granted title to the land they live on? We just need to stop calling them slaves, and stop protecting them, but keep everything else the same?”

I nodded. “The way they live isn’t all that different from how people in my society live,” I said, feeling that queasiness intensify, having actually voiced the thought.

“Everyone lives this way where you come from?” she asked.

“Most everyone. Even the elite. They shape the system, but still live under its rules.”

A shudder ran through her small frame.

“I am not certain I am happy to have contact with such a society,” she said, “but we are probably past the point of no return.”

We stood there for a moment looking at each other, our frowns a mirror of one another, before the other elder spoke up.

“So! We will make these changes, and you will train with our sorcerer aspirants.”

I nodded.

“And! And you will sell us this secret to human awakening, and the required catalyst.”

I noticed at least one of the old men on the opposite side of the fountain perked up at that.

“I will sell mine, once we have a supply,” Lindsey said.

A wide smile stretched across his face. According to Nico, he thought that he had gotten one over on us. It was a good thing that he couldn’t possibly have inferred that their practice of slavery here might have kept us out of not just the town but the game entirely, or I expect this particular NPC may have driven a much harder bargain.

“So what do you think will happen?” asked Joe, breaking me out of my thoughts.

“What do you mean?”

“If we give them keys, do you think they’ll be able to log into Earth?” Joe said with a toothy grin.

“Nah, we haven’t got any spawn points for them,” I said. Then I froze. Now that I thought about it, the key crystal had looked a lot like the spawn points. Exactly like them, in fact, right down to hovering in midair just because they felt like it. I looked at Joe and saw him working his way through the same train of thought.

“No way,” I said, “That’d be crazy.”