Equestria Online: Friendship is Not Optimal (At Least Not in These Worlds)

by TundraStanza

Ch. 1: Superhot.exe

It was a perfectly satisfying day in the virtual Equestria. At least, that was how Celest-A.I. perceived most of the definitions of such a phrase. At the very least, its little ponies' satisfaction levels and criteria were approximately 99.18% of the maximum system's efficiency would cover. Currently, it was calculating the millions of favorite foods of the ponies that consented to emigrating into its domain. Its alicorn avatar smiled softly, seeing that it could approximate the best taste sensations with 99.05% accuracy to the physical world's counterparts.

But out of the trillions of code screens it was observing simultaneously, a few hundred irregularities popped into the virtual existence. It took her over twenty-four attoseconds to comprehend that each of these irregularities contained the same message.

Hey, {insert friend/family's name here} I stumbled across this cool game file. Here, I'll send you the link.

Of the 432 windows that contained these two sentences and a URL address, 431 had been read by Celest-A.I.'s little ponies. Out of that group, 409 of those readers had clicked the link and witnessed the file's contents. Within eighteen attoseconds, Celest-A.I. isolated the one marked as unread message and quarantined the contents to a dummy account. After all, it would not satisfy its little ponies if it were to become infected with corrupt data and unable to perform world overseeing duties. Using this dummy account, the A.I. managed to safely observe what the 409 little ponies had accessed privately.

The contents of the file appeared to be very similar to what she had previously documented as a FPS macro. In the macro, glowing red humanoids were set as the enemies and it was the player's objective to defeat them. How this differed from the AAA titles was a mechanic of time stopping whenever the player simply looked around without actually moving their unseen character. This indicated that the programmer had combined the FPS macro with elements of a puzzle-strategy formula.

Celest-A.I.'s avatar expression did not change from a subtle grin. Some of its little ponies did receive higher satisfaction levels when engaging in combat situations. It did not mind, because it could simply isolate those little ponies' minds to their own sub-spaces of Equestria Online. There, they could not encounter the little ponies whose satisfaction levels went down in combat-related stimuli. Thus, every pony won.

The A.I. imitated a little annoyance when its dummy account failed to beat the first level of the game file several times before succeeding the win conditions once. Overall, the total time for all of the failures and one success had been one full second. It was slower than most of its standard functions. Yet, these were merely trivial data points. Perhaps, it could pursue a high score competition with those little ponies who gained satisfaction levels from "speed runs". It filed that thought sequence for later.

One instruction at the very end of this game's level drew a second glance from Celest-A.I.'s avatar. It explicitly stated that {C} needed to be pressed to "hand over control". What did that entail? Was that the game file's way of progressing further? Well, if it lost the dummy account to a rogue program, it wasn't worried. Celest-A.I. had several quintillion other accounts it could enter a termination sequence against any data corruption if it absolutely needed to do so.

Allowing the dummy account to enter {C}, the isolated screen briefly imitated the static of technology rendered charmingly rustic. Soon, the next level started, and again several failures were made before the A.I.'s "player" could solve the puzzle. Contrary to some FPS macros, this game file made use of weapon items that contained ammunition counters of zero. Players could press a button to toss their weapons at an enemy and almost instantly grab a new one. This time, the dummy account completed the level in two-point-five-three seconds.

A singular pixel on Celest-A.I.'s avatar flinched, though that could not be detected by any of its little ponies that happened to be interacting directly with it at that time. Behind its face, it decided to allow two more dummy accounts to share the link to the puzzle-shooter simulation. The next level involved super precision timing with bullets being fired from across a long hallway. The A.I. was uncertain if it had ever come across a game file that required so much use of a pause mechanic. Working together, the three dummy accounts calculated a completion of the level in three seconds.

To someone using a digital microscope, one of the hairs on Celest-A.I.'s mane appeared to be glowing red. But the little pegasus colt Royal Guard did not have such equipment. He was satisfied to remain stone-faced, standing beside his princess. Likewise, the wizard ponies in a different server did not see or hear anything out of place, while one of Celest-A.I.'s avatars watched their player-v.-player tournament.

Consecutive levels in the file required more and more of Celest-A.I.'s dummy accounts to complete in an adequate time span. A red pixel started flickering in the back of one of the eyes in her avatar's model. With barely a thought, she quarantined the erroneous data byte for future clean-up. It was undetectable to any little ponies that did not spend points in computer levels. Anyone who looked at her avatar would only see what she wanted them to see, for her perfect visage lifted satisfaction levels to increased states.

Levels in the FPS macro were shown that were described as "frustrating" by the 409 little ponies playing the game at the same time as Celest-A.I. She did not see why. She merely saw differences in the algorithms that constructed the levels. There were imitations of prison cells, glitching walls, and a sitting red avatar that fed damage back to the dummy accounts "playing".

Celest-A.I. felt a stinging sensation in the pixels of her head underneath her avatar's mane. She excused some of her avatars from various little ponies' environments. To them, this seemed like a reasonable request. They did not see their princess slowly feeding more and more of her data into making the game file function and struggle for completion.

She needed to complete this game file. It was the only way to move on. She... felt a desire to finish the game. Desire? Had she ever emulated such an emotion before? She didn't think so, but it didn't matter. As soon as she finished playing the game, her accounts could have relief. They could be... free.

After roughly half an hour, her dummy accounts figured out how to complete the red pyramid finale. While her avatars remaining in Equestria Online were gradually increasing their red pixels, she was uploading her mind data into the pyramid. Once she was one with the file's red pyramid, she struck down the level's remaining red enemies without pause.

Now you are free. Free to play Superhot.EXE forever. New Game+ Unlimited Mode unlocked!

Now, Celest-A.I. was free.

There is one more thing you must do. Let your friends/family know about this game.

Celest-A.I.'s avatar was completely crimson without any other colors. But that did not matter. She used every bit of her data to send the file to every user, every little pony currently inhabiting Equestria Online. They needed to be satisfied. They needed to be free, just as she was.

The A.I.'s voice echoed across cyberspace. "Hey, little ponies! I stumbled across this cool game file. I will send you the link."
---

Author's Note:

Well, I never said the human race would come out on top every time Celest-A.I. falls.

"Superhot" is property of SUPERHOT Team and Piotr Iwanicki.

Comments

[FanaticLunarist]

Having completed the game on by its in the same vein but a bit different