.hack//AI Buster - Volume 2 - Chapter 2.5

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System administrators logged in to the online management room, which was like a virtual office in cyberspace. From here, CC Corp. employees, subcontractors, GMs, techs, test players, and any ocher employees could log in and receive instructions, in some cases without even leaving their home. This login terminal was where I met Saki Shibayama.

"I've confirmed mat Tsukasa is registered in a valid account," she reported in voice chat.

It might seem odd to speak to my colleague (who worked in the same building and on the same floor) through an onJine vo ice chat, but for system administrators, The World was their workplace.

She continued, "Tsukasa has been logged in for over ten continuous days. The charaaer is still out and about."

"Even online game addicts turn off their computers when they sleep. It's possible that the password has been compromised, enabling hackers to crack the system and illegally use the charaaer."

"But in that case, sir, wouldn't the registered user report that someone has taken control of their chatacter? It's hard to imagine the regular player not noticing the illegal use of their character for such a long time."

Provided, of course, they were still alive, I thought.

If Tsukasa continued to cause problems, then GM and upper management would consider the source of the trouble to be Tsukasa's regular user and take action to resolve the problem in real life.

"What is happening in The World, sir?"

"What do you mean?"

"There's so much going on right now, what with the cat PC, the monster handler, and the dumbbell monster. What does it mean?"

"Our job is to figure that out." I took a breath, telling myself she was still just a newbie. "As system administrators, we can access The World in ways that a player cannot, but we don't have a complete understanding
of it, like a God would. We're not omnipotent."

I seemed to reference God more and more often these days.

I cleared my throat. "A massive number of entries are logged every day and temporarily saved, only to eventually be deleted. We can review past logs only up to a certain time frame. It's impossible to read every log ever saved."

"So we need to collect information first in order to determine how to sift through the massive amount of logs."

"Now you're getting it," I said to her somewhat sarcastically.

"We need to narrow it down."

"That's why the job of debugging The World causes eye strain, headaches, backaches, and simply never ends."

"Mister Watarai, everyone says you work too much. You need to get out more often and enjoy your private life."

I frowned. "Let's stick to the subject. Our objective is to make contact with Tsukasa. The usual method of reading logs won't work, since he's conrinuQllsiy logged in."

"Which means he has to be somewhere in The World right now ..."

"Exactly. So let's limit our surveillance to the present."

"Huh?"

"When you're looking for something, don't focus solely on the target; it's too narrow a scope. In other words, we won't look for Tsukasa, but we'll look at the whole World."

"I don't get it. What should we be looking for? There are thousands, sometimes millions of players logged in at the same time."

"If you use a little knowledge and analysis, the rest is statistics."

A pregnant pause. "I'm not following."

"Start by checking for any players who've died, especially those with an 'unusual' death,"

"Unusual, how?" she asked.

"What does Tsukasa do with the dumbbell monster?"

"Defeats ocher PCs."

"Putting motive aside for the moment, let's assume that th is is the primary objective. The defeated Crimson Knight player was a high-level character, but the area he was defeated in--"

"Was a low-level area!"

"Exactly! His character would never die in that kind of area, so that's an unusual death."