Switch to Optimized Regular Labor? (ORL)
Switch to ORL / Stay at GBL.
“What did you say?”
“I wanted to ask you. Since we decided to form a party...”
“We’ll do that today,” I promised. “But let’s deal with our workloads first. Should we risk shedding our goblin skin to try being orcs? Again.”
“Let’s do it! Sol! Sol! Sol!”
“I like your battle cry, Yorka the goblin.” I stretched my lips in a knowing grin. “I really like it. Let’s switch to ORL.”
The interface reacted to my selection... with nothing. The prompt just disappeared.
Indignant, I navigated to the menu and checked my status.
Number: Eleven.
Rank: Nullform (volitional).
Current status: ORL. (three standard meals per day and standard water ration).
Fantastic. I raised an eyebrow at Yorka, who nodded and gave me a thumbs-up. We were orcs again. I theatrically ran a hand along my lower jaw, touching my teeth. Yorka broke down and laughed, realizing I was checking to see if my jaw was bigger and I had grown tusks. I had no idea what her memory conjured up, but the word ‘orc’ made me imagine hulking, muscular brutes with green skin, long black hair, and shiny white fangs. I wasn’t even close to that.
It hadn’t appeared yet. It would be assigned to me during the night.
“We’ll do our jobs together in the morning,” I said. “We’ll see what we get and then figure out which one to do first.”
I didn’t ask, I commanded. And Yorka nodded silently once again, acknowledging my leadership.
“There’s one other thing I wanted to ask,” I added, suddenly remembering. “It’s obvious that the system can punish us. Otherwise people wouldn’t look so scared when they look at the domes. As far as I can tell, they’re pretty severe punishments.”
“More than severe!” My new teammate shivered. “You can’t begin to imagine!”
“Why not? I have a wild imagination. I can imagine things that are scary even for me sometimes. But I’d like to know the details. What are the punishments?”
“Well... If you steal something and the system notices, you’ll have to return it, and you’ll be fined whatever sol you have.”
“Harsh. But what if I’m a worm? Let’s say I crawled up to somebody, real sneaky, and ate a nutrition briquette they left lying on a bench,” I improvised. “And I have nothing at all. What will they take from me? It’s not like they could take the food back out of my stomach...”
Details were important. I had to get every single detail about the system’s punishments.
“They won’t do anything to a worm,” Yorka shrugged. “Or to a zombie.”
“So, if I stole something, but I have nothing, the system would let me go.”
“As far as I know, yeah. But you have to understand that whoever you stole from will corner you down some dark path one day and... Offenses like that are not forgiven!”
“So, did you catch whoever offended you?”
Yorka scowled and turned away resentfully.
“That’s it,” I said. “There are plenty of punching bags. Some take stuff brazenly. Some prefer to steal. Everything makes sense. What about getting beat?”
“It’s pretty simple. If you beat someone up, they get sent to the medblock for examination. This is important.”
“Why?”
“If you damaged their arms or legs badly... Whether you broke a bone or cut them...”
“Then I didn’t hurt the goblin I beat up, but the system itself.” I understood, and looked down at my old arms. “The limbs don’t belong to us. We rent them from the system.”
“Exactly. The system will assess the damage and fine you for it. Anywhere from five sol to fifty. That’s if they end up having to amputate an arm or something.”
“And then they’ll give the victim a new arm?”
“Of course not. You paid your debt to the system.”
“That’s really bad...” I leaned back on the bench in surprise. “That’s some fucked-up shit... Do you realize what kind of power that gives brigades? They have money, so they’d have no problem sending a soldier with an axe to punish somebody. That’s a huge-ass loophole in the law! Imagine a bloodthirsty amputator coming at you with an axe and...”
“A what?”
“An amputator! Bloodthirsty! Never mind. Anyway, imagine him coming at you. He has two hundred sol to his name. He cuts off your arms and legs like they’re twigs. Right in front of the system’s eyes. Then pays two hundred sol and leaves. Is that how it works? The rich rule the world? Although I guess that’s true everywhere...”
“Are you crazy? You’ll die if your limbs get cut off! Even if you just lose one arm, it’d be a miracle if they manage to save you!” Yorka glanced at the stump of her right arm.
She had no right arm. I had no left arm. We completed one another... It was both funny and sad.
“Let’s imagine,” I nodded, slightly taking in the sails of my imagination. “One arm! He cuts off one arm, remembering to apply a tourniquet so you don’t bleed out. That seems pretty realistic.”
