JoshuaCole374
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Chapter 29: Demonstration
🕑 Added 2023-10-02 13:53:42 +0000 UTC“As you wish.” I bowed to Lena, my arms out to my sides. I swept my free hand around and almost into a fist, keeping the Wood “selected” by Third Eye.
I wanted this to create a little cyclone, spin the Wood around me, but it didn’t quite nail the effect. It swept to my left, spinning hard, but stayed over there instead of whipping around to my other side. When I straightened up, I had to cup and curl my hand to pull the Wood back into the camera frame.
Lena clapped for me. I figured it was sarcastic, but I didn’t think that would be obvious to a viewer.
I flattened my palm. The Wood responded by doing its best impression of a tabletop. “As you can see, once you’ve manifested an object, it’s controlled by gestures. Now, it may not be obvious yet, but what you’re really controlling with Air is the flow of wind around an object. It will float in place on its own unless disturbed, but it doesn’t follow your motions instantly or exactly; it’s like physical force is being exerted on it.”
“Which makes it super cool to watch,” Lena said.
“But super hard to control precisely,” I said.
“So you better pay attention, dear viewer!” She wagged her finger. “This is the latest tech we’re sharing.”
I shot her a look. It didn’t do us any good to let people catch on to the sarcasm. She just kept smiling. Maybe trying to guess when she was mocking me would drive engagement?
Spoiler alert, hypothetical people: always.
I swallowed a sigh and pushed on with the demonstration. We had one more big PSA to hit, then we’d finish with Glass and Plastic for the wow factor. “One thing I’ve learned,” I said. “You can manifest as many objects as you have Materials – and MP –, and when you use Air, it exerts force on all of them. However, only the most recent gets passively suspended in midair.”
That had come as a surprise to me, since I’d thought I was using both my Plastic and Wood to fend off Matt. From what the wiki team said, my Wood must have been holding my Plastic up.
“That may be an inherent limit of the system,” Lena said, “or it might be ‘cause OldCampaigner only has one unit of Air to work with.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Oh, like you’ve got so much more, Ashbird?”
“You got me.” Lena shrugged. It looked a lot cooler on her avatar, since her wings followed the motion. “Most of us are lucky to get our first Reactant. We’re pretty sure it’s just going to get better as we find more. Anyway, next!”
Back to Third Eye. I chose Stone for the followup. Just going down the list.
The manifested form of Stone looked the least interesting of any of my Materials. Just a thin slab of something generic and gray, granite or even concrete. I didn’t think anyone would use it as a building material if they had another choice.
I tilted my palm and the Wood slid off the top of the tipping Stone. No longer suspended by Air, it crashed onto the sidewalk.
When I snapped my hand up, the Stone, which got to ignore gravity as long as I kept it selected, flew skyward. The Wood shifted as well, but only until the wind stopped moving.
I brought the Stone down and leveled it off.
“It’s hard to tell when they’re selected,” I said, “but your objects do have weight or mass or something. I need more dramatic motions to move Stone than I did Wood. Once I manifest something new, this Stone will hardly budge.”
Lena said, “Plastic, on the other hand –”
I pushed the Stone upright and interposed it between us. “No spoilers.”
“Well hurry it up, then. We’re losing engagement!” Lena grabbed an edge of the Stone and shoved. She tensed what passed for her muscles – even on her avatar, those didn’t amount to much –, puffed her cheeks out, and pushed harder. “Yeesh. That’s weirdly difficult.”
“Which is the next thing you need to know,” I said. “It’s hard for you to touch an object you manifest with Air, because it will get pushed away as you move, but if you trap it against a wall or something, you’ll be able to. Real world objects and other people can impart physical force to it just like your wind does.”
“And once you’re not controlling an object directly, you or another player can pick it up and tote it.” Lena stepped around the Stone and bent to pick up the discarded Wood. “God. The only reason I know this isn’t real is because I couldn’t one-hand a big wooden sheet IRL. Speaking of...”
She panned her phone to show the sidewalk where we’d practiced. I’d stacked up two units of Wood and one of Stone against another bench. If they’d really existed, no one could have sat down.
“Those won’t go away,” Lena said. “If you make a bunch of objects, your Third Eye vision is gonna get hella cluttered.”
“We’re hoping to find a way to recycle them into Materials,” I said. In truth, I hadn’t given up on my dreams of an infinite XP glitch. Not that XP had done anything yet. Even the wiki team had yet to find a use for it. “For now, though, make sure you find someplace to store them where they’re not an eyesore to other players.”
“Especially Stone,” Lena said.
“It’s a pain to move once you’re not controlling it.” I wiggled my finger to flip the selected Stone around behind Lena and over to the pile. “Don’t ask me how they manage it without haptic feedback, but Third Eye will convince you that you have to work to heft a slab of Stone. If we don’t unlock further uses for this stuff, we’re going to get accused of littering.”
Once I had the Stone in place, I lowered my hand and Lena pushed it down and braced it. I manifested Iron and the Stone fell. It chipped when it crashed, but the pavement didn’t – the surest proof Third Eye couldn’t damage something in the real world.
“Next up,” I said, “we’ve got Iron.”
“Although if you ask me,” Lena said, “it should’ve been called Metal. Iron seems way too specific.”
“Agreed. Maybe they’ll change it before full release.” Because the Iron, like the other objects, was a sheet with a minimum of defining characteristics. The few it had weren’t necessarily what I associated with iron, either in the real world or in games.
It reflected light with almost a mirror sheen, and I made sure to offer up a bunch of angles where Lena’s camera would capture the way it showed off the sun and her flames.
It was tough, but flexible. None of the wiki team had managed to damage it by running it into either real objects or other Third Eye ones. Unlike Wood and Stone, however, it bent a little when subjected to dramatic gestures.
It was also the second thinnest object I could manifest, somewhere between heavy duty aluminum foil and sheet metal.
“Careful with this one,” Lena said. While I held it in place, she approached and pressed her hands along the edge. It heated under her touch, but she didn’t seem to be able to melt it.
From what Erin had posted, this was the dividing line between the cosmetic flames of Lena’s avatar and an actual Fire Reactant. If Lena used one of those, she could turn the Iron molten, melt Glass, burn Wood and Plastic, and make Stone into a hot range.
Instead, she touched her finger to the corner of the Iron and hissed. “Pricked my finger. And yeah, I did lose one HP for it.”
“Which makes this a good time to let you know,” I said. “You can hurt avatars with this stuff. Your own, or someone else’s. This seems to be how Third Eye PVP is going to work.”
“Which means,” Lena said, shoving the Iron away so she could strike another pose, “I’ll have the game’s permission to kick all your asses!”
“Not that you’d kick the asses of our lovely viewers,” I said. “Since we agreed they won’t use this knowledge for evil. Right?”
She crossed her arms. Her wings beat in irritation. Scripted irritation. Right? “Yeah.”
“Ashbird...”
“I won’t attack anybody!” She sighed. “Not until we know what the consequences of PVP are, anyway.”
“That’s right,” I said. “I’m sure you saw the announcement that ‘the bottom 1%’ of Third Eye players will lose access to the beta each day. Right now, we don’t know what measure we’re being judged on. We’ve guessed XP, and running out of HP does make you lose XP. We’ve considered Materials collected, too.”
“But,” Lena said, “it could be PVP wins and losses.”
“So if you decide to manifest some Iron and pick a fight,” I said, “you could be cutting somebody out of Third Eye entirely.”
“If you try it and lose,” Lena said, “the somebody could be yourself.”
“Until we know more, we’re personally not going to engage in arranged PVP. Some people want to. If you decide to take that risk, go for it. Just know what you could be wagering.”
“Invasions, though.” Lena got a wistful look in her eye.
“Invasions are an absolute no-go,” I said. “Anything that isn’t arranged, we are completely against, and it’s not just us. We’ve talked to a lot of the top players about this. If you start attacking random people in Third Eye, we’re going to get the playerbase together and stop you.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Lena spread her palms. “It would be way too cruel if it really did kick people out of the game.”
“That,” I said, “and it’s also legit dangerous.”
“Yep. OldCampaigner, give me a smack with this Iron.”
This was the part of our plan for the video I liked the least. At least it seemed more fantastical than what had happened with the Plastic. I pulled the Iron back, flipped it so the edge faced Lena, then thrust it forward.
Flames exploded into the air where the metal clipped her wing, but she spun almost out of the way so I only landed a glancing blow. “Nice try!” she shouted.
Then she punched me in the face.
