After a dreamless night, Flora woke up in a good mood.

The sun was shining on her bed, the air smelled of grass and needles, and the sounds of servo motors filled the clearing. Perfect!

She opened her stats and did a quick scan. The attributes rose slowly but steady, except the perceptions. They both made a big jump.

Magical Push came along nicely because of the coffin training, and Refresh had broken through the level 100 milestone.

Mechanics, Electronics, and Hacking won in the category abilities.

In the inventory tab, she could look at her balance. The 500 000 VirDias from CentralTank had arrived. 

Flora guessed that they came together with the workshop improvements, but she had missed it due to her excitement.

"It's time to move into a nicer lair, dears." Flora opened the real estate market. "I want an industrial area, with smoking chimneys, factories, or maybe a powerplant in the vicinity. Do I have to consider infrastructure, Aidan? Probably not, with the inventory, magical mailboxes, and teleportation circles."

"Transportation per air is common for parts bigger than 3x3x3m, Milady. These dimensions limit not only inventory space but also the mailbox. Furthermore, you can only beam with connected pets or what you carry. The aircraft, mostly megacopters, need no infrastructure."

Flora shrugged and selected the Rhine River Plain as the preferred region. They had the best weather in Germany.

Unexpectantly, Flora had difficulties in finding an industrialized area. Most towns in the real world had an industrial park, but in the Metaworld, they were missing. 

Flora tried Mannheim and Ludwigshafen, where the BASF, Rosch, ABB, and Mercedes Benz had local branches, but she only found vanity buildings and no factories.

Finally, she discovered a big building with some chimneys on an elevated plateau with a view on the Rhine. She zoomed in and read 'Bakery Gottfriedl'. 

"This is fate! Hello to my new neighbors! I hope you produce good bread!" 

Like she had planned before, she designed a two-story building with a flat roof for a garden. The ground floor had the dimensions 25x50x5m and was for crafting. She partitioned the first floor into the living quarters and 1/4 into a room for the shop and 1/8 for the teleportation circle. 

Then she beamed to the area, using the circle of the bakery as an anchor point. 

When she arrived, a young woman came her way.

"Hello, dear. Are you working in the bakery?"

"Hi. Yes, actually, I own the bakery. Do you want to buy something? I was just on my way, but I have a few minutes."

"Not yet. I'm Flowing Flowers, your new neighbor. You can call me Auntie Flow. I plan to buy this part of the land." Flora pointed to her favorite spot. "Is this alright with you? If you have planned any expansion in this direction, I can go a bit further away."

"No, no, feel free. Welcome to the neighborhood. I'm Momo."

They shook hands and chatted a bit about the weather and floods, but didn't hit on essential subjects like toast. Flora wanted to have a taste first before she decided to do further business with Momo.  

After they parted, Flora surveyed the area. She was a strong believer of eyeballing things before purchase. Pictures on the internet couldn't convey some aspects of reality.

By and large, Flora was delighted with her choice and leased the land. Immediately, she started the automated construction of her building. Maybe it would be cheaper to hire people, but Flora didn't have the patience. The system would complete the building in 12 hours.

When she came home, a letter awaited her.

Dear Flowing Flowers,

[polite blabla]

Due to unforeseen circumstances, we had to lower the rating of the AI E21 from A to C.

We thank you for your cooperation.

[polite blabla]

Regards,

Idillicheskaya Besedka

Flora had seen enough bullshit in her life to recognize it. This letter stank of politics.

"Aitoshuri, I advise you to stay with me. Whatever happened at Idilly's side doesn't look good. I don't want you to bear the brunt of it."

After connecting Aitoshuri to the Hungry Chest, Flora asked her again if she wanted to stay with her, but Aitoshuri still needed more time.

Aidan informed her about the capabilities of a C-rated AI. They could control two devices, and when you bought it in the shop, you could select one character trait. Also, he explained that the growth of their abilities depended on their rating.

"You have to train harder, sweety. It's double hard for an ex-genius to accept that, but believe me, it is worth it. Take me, for example, I outworked a lot of geniuses, and now that I'm old and slower, I have to work even harder. But I learned how to work hard, and I learned to use whatever meager processing power my brain provides me to the max."

"Yes, Milady!" Aidan exclaimed, but Aitoshuri signaled that she needed more processing time again.

"That's the spirit, Aitoshuri! Take the time to think it over. I've known people that can do calculations in their heads in seconds for which I need 5 minutes, a pencil, and probably my fingers. But we will take those five minutes! And the pencil! And the fingers! Or, in your case, grapplers! And the next time, we might only need 4:30 minutes!" 

Aitoshiro rotated her arms.

"Of course, it is complicated! Break it down in simpler parts and quantify them.

For example, 1 Point if it is a bit relevant, 2 points if it's important, and 3 if it is essential.

I tell you my calculation for wanting you to stay.

Pro:

• An intuition that Aitoshuri is relevant: 3 Points
• Idilly owns me a favor: 2 Points
• Hidden capabilities of a possibly S or higher ranked AI: 3 Points
• Interesting personality: 1 Point
• Study example for odd AI's: 2 Points

Contra:

• Limited communication: - 3 Points, but with potential to be resolved, so I count only - 1,5 points
• Lower controlled devices per AI nock rate: - 1 Point
• Higher maintenance because of potential psychological issues: - 2 Points
• Lower growth: - 3 Points

=> 11 Pro-Points - 7,5 Contra-Points = 3,5 Points

You have to contrast it with the pro and contra of going back. I don't have to compare it with buying another AI because I have special jacks. That will be only relevant if I had five AI's, and you or a normal AI would be the 6th.  

Do you have any questions you need for your list regarding our future collaboration?"

Airoshuri signaled 'Yes'.

"Alright, try to convey the question!"

Immediately, the grapplers of the hungry chest drew an arc in the air reaching from Flora's right to her left. The beginning and end were on the floor.

"Rainbow! You are gay and want to know if I'm okay with it!"

No!

"Oh, I love Charades! Aidan, you guess as well, and the one who wins gets ..., hmm, do you want anything, Aidan?"

"No, Milady! But I can't invest enough processing power in the research tasks at night, because I'm used to capacity with managing your HUD, your options, and the devices. Maybe you could delegate some of my tasks to Aitoshuri?"

"Oh, dear! You have to tell me such things! The question wouldn't occur to me, because I do not know you even had limits besides the device amount!

Let's count:

• Manabattery
• Trainingscoffin
• Potion Guzzler
• Hacking
• Driving Robot Training
• Managing friendly fire / Balancing my pool-stats
• Researching...? What? Yes, the classes!

Only five of them are devices."

"Yes, Milady. That is the only reason you haven't gotten error messages. But I'm designed to manage seven tasks simultaneously. The seventh is communicating with the owner. For extra jobs, I have to order more processing power from the System. Its patience is wearing thin, and it admonished me to allocate my resources better. 

Furthermore, such complicated devices as the training coffin and hacking would count double as combat devices. You found another exploit by designing and buying gizmos explicitly for training and non-combat use. 

Another exploit is the use of the simulation ground. I shared the connections with all three Floras but had only my standard processing power. The slaying of the armadillos was definitely combatting, but the Mirror-Flora only had two devices for me to control, the mana battery and the Blade-Roller-Extreme. Therefore no error message appeared. Nonetheless, I had to overclock."  

"Oh, poor dear! I'm sorry! What device do you suggest to give Aitoshuri?"

"The mana-battery, Milady."

"I thought the same. It is nearly always in use and gets always doubled when I enter the simulation. Is this okay with you as well, Aitoshuri?"

She nodded slowly.

"But back to our game. Do you have any other wishes, Aidan? And I mean a prize and not something that goes without saying!"

"No, Milady."

"Okay, whoever wins can choose items from the marketplace or AH in the value of 100 VirDos. Aitoshuri wins when one of us guesses right in the next 15 minutes. It's your turn to guess, Aidan."

"Bridge?"

No.

"An architectural element like a window or door arc?"

No.

"A bow?"

No.

"We have to narrow it down! Is it something you want to do while being with me?"

Strong Yes.

"Something that can be done now in this room?"

Weak Yes.

"Something that you can do while I'm asleep?"

Yes.

"Do you want to use a device?"

Yes.

"Oh, we are close! Is it a device in my possession?"

Strong Yes.

"I know it! But it's your turn, Aidan."

"Was it on the list above?"

No.

"You didn't throw the towel to please me, right, Aidan?"

Aidan coughed.

"I decided that you have to guess again, Aidan!"

"It's the pageturner."

Strong Yes.

Flora clapped, but added another question: "Do you want to read a specific book?"

No.

"You just like reading?"

Strong Yes.

"No problem. I can't promise you every night, because I need the mana, but half of the time would be okay. Oh, if I sleep in the simulation, I've got mana to spare! We'll work something out."

Aitoshiru waved her arms in an A-shape with both grapplers starting from the tip.

Flora noticed that an A is a reverse V, and the opposite from 'I don't know' is ...

"You decided whether you want to stay with me?"

Yes!

"Do you want to?"

Yes!

Flora clapped her hands in delight. 

"Excellent! Both of you sent me the links to the prizes you want. And I have an octopus to design!"

Before Flora even finished the sentence, books appeared on her hud. Flora was appalled, not only from the sheer amount of books but also from the titles: "Stormy Passion", "Conquering his dead heart with Gentleness", "Spacepirate Sandy's Sasquatch", "Reaching for the Stars below the Belt" ...

The list didn't seem to end.

"Wow, you really know how to stretch 100 VirDos, sweety. Order them."

"Milady, Aitoshuri will select my prize as well."

"Um, if you're sure." After seeing her list, Flora wouldn't delegate the task to Aitoshuri. 

But she reversed this judgment when she saw the books for Aidan. Aitoshuri did an excellent job emulating his taste and giving him the knowledge to serve her better: 

'Time management 101' - for managing his processing time? Or her schedule? 

'How to Destroy to Create' - a book on testing! Great choice.

'Product Lifecycle Management' - The versioning in the Cetviwos crafting system was nonexisting. Books about PLM usually had a chapter on this and testing. Alone for helping her with establishing a versioning-system, it would be worthy of reading.

'Virtual Threads - the Guide to Multitasking' - Flora wanted to read it as well!

'Spread the Jamming on Marmalades - Bible of Parfaits' - Toast!

'Communication in Diverse Teams' - Flora laughed.

Although Aidan's list only contained six books because they were more expensive than trashy romance and sci-fi novels, they sounded expedient beyond their price.

When Flora emptied her mailbox of all the books, she needed three 80 liter sacks and all her strength to carry them. Fortunately, the inventory existed. Hers was still overcrowded from the last scenario, so she emptied a few slots by tetrising the contents into the already full Hungry Chest.

Before logging back into the workshop, she changed the auto-mode spell training to Force-Field. She liked the utility of the skill. Yesterday, she had tried to coat her plasma sword with it like Mnoder did, but failed. Aidan thought that she needed to get the spell to level 100 before she could cast it on other persons or objects.

"Milady, the shield works against radiation. So I'll need the poisons of the Potions-Guzzler to lower your health."

Flora rolled her eyes. The affinities weren't scientific. She had problems with distinguishing Light Affinity/ Radiation Resistance, Fire Affinity/ Heat and Burn Resistance and Lightning Affinity / Shock Resistance.

Light was a heatwave, while radiation was a particle-wave. Therefore heat resistance would be a much better fit for the light affinity! And you could burn someone to crisps with lightning and plasma swords. 

A plasma sword was technically burning gas but still counted towards lightning and not fire!

Flora shrugged. She couldn't change it and had to work with it.