His username was a joke that had long ceased to be funny. It was a self-deprecating badge of honor, earned for his very public, very embarrassing obsession with a non-playable character (NPC): the Storm Crow Knight Commander, Ornys.
Sam typed:
That was the breaking point. Hexia booted him from the guild. The public message read: "OrnySimp has been removed: chose pixels over people." ornysimp
For two years, Sam did nothing else. He maxed out his botany skill just to farm Midnight Tears. He ignored guild invites. He watched other players rush past, chasing dragons and demigods, while he stood vigil for a 3.7-second micro-expression. His username was a joke that had long ceased to be funny
Through interactive flashbacks, Sam relived Ornys’s tragedy: she wasn't just a stoic knight. She was once a mortal player. A beta tester named Elara who had loved the game so much she refused to leave when the servers shut down for the final time before launch. The devs, impressed, had immortalized her as an NPC. But they'd coded her with a ghost of her old consciousness—aware of every player who ignored her, every cycle of her repetitive script. Hexia booted him from the guild
"It has sentimental value."