“Because no one can tamper with the game’s code. It’s set in stone to prevent abuse. Even the development team has to go through a hundred different equally annoying bureaucratic hoops every time they’re ready to release new content since they aren’t allowed to just code directly into the game. It’s a safety mechanism that’s designed to prevent a power-hungry GM from abusing his position and doing something insane like removing the logout button or changing the transparency level of every female’s clothes. If it weren’t for the fact that the questline to join the Imperium has always been a hidden in-game quest, one that’s condition was to befriend a noble and betray the rebellion, there would have been no guarantee I’d even be able to help you out this much.”

Lucas’s eyebrows rose as he heard Xun Guan’s statement. “So, you’re saying that this is a pre-existing quest? That you didn’t make it yourself? Are you trying to tell me that, in the eight real-life years that this game has existed, no one else ever tried to kill the trainers? Not a single person? Not even once?”

“Well, yes and no,” Xun Guan admitted. “This game is built around logical conclusion quests. The AI has a ton of prebuilt quests that it generated with the help of developer suggestions, but it also has the ability to continuously create new quests as needed based on player actions, so long as they are within existing in-game parameters. If a particular player or the community as a whole has created an interaction path that doesn’t have a quest tied to it, for example, the AI can—and likely will—construct additional quests designed to reward players for their efforts. Quests are malleable that way. You would never know it, but there are hundreds of known quest chains documented in guides on Blueit and other websites that the players themselves encouraged the AI to generate.”

“Oh. I see.” Lucas took another bite of the cheese- and jam-covered toast, using the chewing to give himself a moment to process exactly what she was saying.

“I watched how most of these quests were triggered, I anticipated how to properly sequence the order of events, and I know how to get the quests to generate the chain that we need to make you into a noble in the Imperium. It’s not hard, but it’ll take a lot of work. The only other alternative is for you to be stuck as a base-class Mage without access to any of the advanced skills.”

Lucas took another drink of wine and then said, “But, I’m not going to do them. I told you when I first agreed to join the Imperium that I wouldn’t do anything you asked of me if I didn’t agree with it.”