6 6. Engineering a Body - Blood and Organs
"Hello, Mr. Administrator. May I offer you a cup of tea? Please sit down."
Flora requested two nicest cups with the best tea and most classy plate of the most delicious cookies.
"No, thank you. I prefer to get right to the business."
"Sure, I'm German. That's how we roll. But I tell you, you're missing out. Those pastries are exquisite." Flora said, munching a cookie.
The Administrator ignored her. "Congratulations, the following exploits were discovered by you:
Access to the advanced workbench in the character creation
Use of the statistical analytics feature to enhance your avatar
Use of the statistical analytics feature to circumvent the material selection restriction
You earned 300 VirDias for disclosing those exploits."
"When did I disclose them? Never mind, big bro System is watching. How much are 300 VirDias in Euro?"
"29.23 Euros."
"A burger and a coke, not bad. I will try to discover more exploits!"
"Thank you for your cooperation, but VirDias can't be exchanged for food. This currency is exclusively used in the Cetviwos-Shop."
Flora sighed. "Every time I ask you, the Cetviwos AIs, a question either you are not allowed to answer, or I have more questions after listening to the answer."
"How did you know I was an AI? I passed several Turing-Tests."
"You gave the Euro exchange rate with decimal places, but more importantly, you aren't tempted by cookies." Flora took another one. They were otherworldly good.
"Back to the topic at hand. The developing team decided on the following actions to close the exploits:
The advanced workbench will be no longer available in character creation but will be still available in character modification. As an additional reward, you are allowed to continue using it for character creation.
The tools of the advanced workbench and users can't interact with the models of the statistical analytics feature. As an additional reward, the changes to your avatar are not reversed.
Please vacate the couch because it will be dematerialized."
"I take back that I'll help you find more exploits!" Flora hurriedly ate the last cookie. "Okay, maybe not. That's like saying I won't earn any money because I don't like paying taxes."
"Please recognize your access to statistical analytics was only granted because of your involvement with the alpha-testing of the brain-wave technology."
"About that, I think you owe me an explanation. My son told me you used my toaster-spaceship for the game." Flora had thought about this for a while. Her intuition told her there was money to be made.
"The alpha-testing contract stated we could use submitted designs for further projects."
"I wouldn't be too sure this argument will hold up in front of a court."
Administrator nodded. "Our lawyers will contact you in the next few days. I'm sure we can reach an agreement without involving the legal system."
Flora nodded as well. She was not inclined to waste the precious time left of her life in courthouses. But if she could get a few benefits out of this without much hassle, why not?
Gracefully, Flora stood up. The couch shimmered. It now looked a bit like a high-quality hologram. Her hand went through when she tried to touch it.
After dematerializing all the aggregated models System had created, Administrator said his farewell and left the workspace.
'So, where were we? Let's check what we got so far.'
Now System rated the skeleton with a whopping SSS, the ligaments SS, the tendons SS and the muscles SS too.
'A really nice start. It will get more difficult without copying the templates, but at least the foundation is solid.'
After preparing her avatar and getting a holographic model of the best blood circuit, Flora asked for the current rating.
"C." answered the System.
"That's significantly better than the other initial ratings. Maybe because the heart is also part of the circulation of blood, and I already improved it, because it is a muscle?"
The model also showed the lungs, so Flora amended the avatar. The lungs had accumulated dirt over the years. Therefore her first step was to get rid of the muck. It proved to be more difficult than she had thought. She selected a particle that looked like it didn't belong in the lung, expanded the selection to all alike particles, and deleted it. Then she watched her lungs collapse.
"I guess, that wasn't dirt," Flora said sheepishly. "System, reload the last save file. We are going to play 'better or worse' again."
Progress was slow and even got slower the longer Flora worked. After she ruptured the alveoli and blood vessels three times in a row, Flora decided to take another nap.
'Only the heavens and maybe System know how much time I've spent working!' Judging her frayed concentration, she had used up more than 10 hours since her last nap. Maybe less, she wasn't used to long hours anymore or maybe more, with age and experience her patience and steadiness might have risen.
After quickly checking her avatars, she sank into the hammock.
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Flora woke up hungry.
"System, where or how can I get food?"
"After you finished character creation, you will be ported to the Metaworld. Many big companies give out free food, and of course, there are thousands of restaurants, cafes, stalls, and food trucks where you can buy meals."
"What about pizza delivery service to character creation?"
"No."
"Hey, I found a market gap!"
"No."
Flora was used to this reaction. It happened regularly when, in her opinion, she had a splendid idea.
"Can I starve in character creation?"
The big blue box appeared again:
*****************
"Notification: Bug detected. Please wait for the arrival of the Administrator."
*****************
A moment later, the Administrator replaced the box.
"We meet again, Flora Fluss."
"Yes, hi," Flora answered unenthusiastically.
"Congratulations, following bug was discovered by you:
- No implementation of respawn mechanics in character creation
You earned 100 VirDias for disclosing this bug.
As an additional reward, you get the trait 'Thorough Digestion' - The satiation meter will drop 50% slower."
"So how long do I have until I die, and what happens when I die?" Flora still felt hungry, but to a lesser degree than before.
"You have 42 hours and 28 minutes until you die. Because of the bug, your character would freeze, and you would be logged out until we fixed the bug. We would compensate you for missed playtime with 100 VirDias per day."
"Alright, thank you. I'll try to hurry up."
The Administrator gave her an impressively expressive look for a sunglass-wearing AI. It screamed: You have 42 hours, and you need to hurry up? What happens when you slow down? Will the VR-technology still exist? Will planet earth even exist? What about the solar system?
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Flora went back to work. After finishing cleaning the alveoli and blood vessels of dirt and plaque, she increased the number of alveoli until System said "worse".
Next, she researched blood vessels. The best should be flexible and smooth. She compared her avatar to the model and found a section in her buttocks, which looked good. (The vessels, not the booty)
She propagated them through the rest of her body without issues. Although she had read about the differences between veins and arteries, System didn't complain, so who was she to object.
The spleen happened to be interesting; the model showed smaller spleens attached to the main one. Flora's avatar had one of those accessory spleens as well, so she copied it multiple times and added the copies to the primary spleen.
She couldn't improve more of the lymphatic system than clean the rest.
Now System rated the circulatory system A. Flora was out of ideas, but then she noticed she had forgotten to change the blood itself and the bone marrow. Fortunately, she had swapped one whole rib with the model's rib yesterday. So, Flora had an excellent and copy-capable example of bone marrow. After transplanting the bone marrow, she tuned the blood cells to her best abilities. The System elevated the rating to S, and Flora was happy.
'The digestive system organs are next on the chopping block. Er, I mean, workbench.'
System rated it C, which conformed to Flora's experiences. She never had problems with organs of the upper body but did experience some kidney stones. Her research was not conclusive if the kidneys were even part of the digestive organs.
So she only cleaned the stomach, the liver, and the kidneys and played around a bit with the gastric acid.
The gallbladder, colons, bladder, and intestines were not rated. That gave Flora the idea of downsizing them. Now she had enough space to move the essential organs closer to the spine where they were more protected. As an unintentional, but welcome side-effect, it slimmed down her waistline.
The rectum was rated to her surprise. But then she remembered System had evaluated the vaginal muscles as well and now she got an idea why.
