Weiss nearly collapsed into her office chair. Her arms and legs were sore, her Aura spent. As their departure from home neared, Winter had decided to intensify their training together. Weiss appreciated it, truly. She just wished Winter would at least leave her enough Aura to not feel like her limbs were made of gelatin.

Weiss turned on her laptop, idly brushing some of her hair out of the way as she reached for her headset. Whitley had sunk his fangs into her with his hobby. Ever since she played that racing game with him all those months ago, she had become somewhat obsessed with trying new video games. Some games she enjoyed, others she did not.

'Pumpkin Pete's Party Extravaganza!' was by far the worst game she had played. She had Jaune to thank for that experience. Although, without their little game night she would have not been introduced to another potential friend to play games with. She sent a quick message to Penny and Yang to ask if they were available to play something.

She wanted to make her last few free nights count. She didn't know how much work Beacon would demand of her outside of the classroom. Worst case scenario, she would have very little time to invest into her new hobby when she started to attend the academy. At least the cross platform nature of most tiles meant she could try to squeeze in occasional games on her portable computer if she did find herself with a clear schedule.

Two notifications appeared on her screen, splitting her attention. The first was a message from Penny.

"Salutations! Thank you for your offer. I will be available in just a moment. As a token of my gratitude, I have sent you one of my favorite video game titles!"

Weiss's gaze drifted to the other notification. True to Penny's message, the second notification notified Weiss that her account had been gifted a new video game.

Weiss mumbled the title of the gifted game as she checked her library of game titles, "Order of Succession."

A few more clicks and she was checking the store link to the page. At a glance, the title was some sort of strategy game based inside a fantasy world. The player's goal was to ensure the success of their dynasty over the course of generations. Screenshots, found on the store page, showed a top-down map view of several divided continents.

Weiss clicked through a few screenshots before she received another notification. She clicked on the message to see it was sent by Yang.

"Hey, Weiss. I'm ready to game when you are. Did Penny send you 'Order of Succession' too? I don't mind skipping out on some 'Distorted Treeline' tonight. Especially since we won't have to wait around for your fifteen-minute queue ban."

Weiss tapped the keys of her laptop as she responded back, "I doubt the game Penny sent us can be as bad as Pumpkin Pete's Party was. We can at least give it a fair try with her. Yang, you know as well as I do that my queue ban is ill deserved. Our teammate was a fool and deserved every word of criticism I sent their way."

Weiss heard the telltale sound of a party call ring through her headset as Yang invited her to chat. She took a deep breath before joining the chat with her.

Yang's tone sounded amused as she spoke, "Weiss. It's a fifteen-minute queue ban. You know, the type of ban you get after the one, three, five, and ten-minute queue bans? I know that dude on our team threw last game but come on. Worst queue ban I've had was five minutes and I have horrible self-control."

Weiss started to install the new game she was gifted as she spoke, "I'm aware I might be a little too competitive at times. It's something I still need to correct. Perhaps, it's a good thing we will be taking a break from 'Distorted Treeline' tonight?"

"Yeah, maybe. I'm always up for trying something new. Should be here pretty much all night to give this a shot. My sister is still sleeping over at her friend's house, so I might have to step away to give her a call later."

Weiss watched the percentage of her install increase, "Your sister is staying over another night? I assume she must be having fun. I'm not even entirely sure what a sleepover must be like. Have you had a sleepover before?"

Yang did an exaggerated sigh, "My little sister is so sick of me that she ran off to stay at our neighbor's house. Nah, I'm sure the two are having fun in between training sessions. Three of us grew up together, so it's not like I'm worried about Ruby being over at a stranger's house or something. I think Ruby even sees her as another older sister to flash her puppy dog eyes at."

Yang paused for a moment, "Only reason I didn't stay over these last few days was because someone had to be on dog duty. My dad is a teacher and is getting ready for the new term, so he's been going back and forth between campus to do stuff. I'm the only one left to keep an eye on our little crazy ball of energy. Last time I stayed over at my neighbor's house, we mostly watched movies or trained together. Those two are likely doing the same."

Weiss fidgeted with her headset wire as she slowly spoke, "Yang, I'm aware you don't enjoy talking about real life subjects. Don't feel pressured into answering me further if you don't wish to. You keep mentioning training. Are you and your sister training to become Huntsman?"

There was a moment of silence before Yang spoke, "You're not pressuring me. You're right that I don't really like talking about my life online because of creeps, but I don't mind sharing some stuff if it's just us two in a chat. You already know my name and we've played together for a while now. Me and Ruby are training for Beacon. Why do you ask anyways?"

Weiss's eyes widened as a slight smile grew on her face, "You know how I have had to cancel some of our play sessions for the sake of my practice? I wasn't practicing an instrument; I was practicing my martial prowess. I'm actually leaving for Beacon fairly soon. I suppose I might see you and your sister there."

Yang sounded surprised, "Wow, didn't expect that. Was worried we might fall out of contact. Don't know how much work Beacon might toss our way. Thought we would have less opportunities to just sit down and play some stuff together. Dang, this is almost as surprising to me as Ruby getting in early."

Weiss launched her new game as it finished installing, "Your sister got into Beacon early? I assume she must be talented. A Huntsman Academy would not let just anyone join their ranks."

Yang's voice was filled with pride, "Yep! Ruby can kick some serious ass when she puts her mind to it. Hey, I'll give you my scroll number. Huntsman teams are four people from what my dad told me. Between Ruby, me, my neighbor, and you we might make for a decent team. We can meetup on the airship to Beacon or just before if you want. Between the two of us, I would like it if you tried to make friends with my sister. She's kind of a social recluse."

"Sounds like a plan, Yang. I'm happy to know at least one other person I know will be attending alongside me," as Weiss finished speaking, she heard the sound notification for a third person joining the call.

The joyous voice of Penny filled her headset, "Salutation friends! Did you two receive 'Order of Succession' without issue? I have prepared a fresh lobby to host our simulation!"

Yang spoke up first, "Yep, got it installed. Thanks for the game, Penny. You didn't have to do that. Next game is on me, that's for sure."

Weiss was on the title screen for the game as she answered, "I'm on the title screen. You can send me an invite to your lobby when you're ready. I appreciate the chance to try a new game genre, Penny. I was unaware this game existed. Thank you for the gift."

Weiss saw an invite message pop up on her screen as Penny spoke, "No problem, friends! I shall do my best to explain the rules of this simulation. Upon accepting my invitation, you must select a county, duchy, or kingdom to rule. Upon your selection, you will have a family you must guide through multiple generations. The controls are simple…"

Weiss carefully listened as Penny endlessly droned on about a multitude of keyboard shortcuts and various tips on how to get started. When Penny's lecture finished, Weiss finally had an opportunity to select her starting location. She looked around the map of the fantasy world before deciding to choose a lone countess in the snowy far northern mountains of the central continent. Yang selected some one-eyed barbaric count living on an island as her chosen character. Penny selected an elderly duke right in the center of the central continent.

"What's up with the old guy, Penny?" Yang questioned as they waited for the game to load.

"Foreknowledge! Duke Reed starts with five male heirs from the multiple marriages he has had over the course of his life. Duke Reed was programmed to have a high chance of firing a special event related to his five heirs upon his death. There is a guaranteed chance of producing a dynastic bloodline if the Blood Court event fires. A bloodline will influence my decision making over the course of the rest of our playthrough."

The game finished loading, allowing Weiss to view the stats of her countess as she spoke to Penny, "Blood Court? Do the heirs fight for territorial rights upon the death of their father?"

"Affirmative. Duke Reed has five counties within his domain. Should the event fire, the individual heirs will fight to claim all five counties for themselves. The winning child will receive a bloodline based on their preferred attribute."

Weiss looked at the stat sheet for her lone countess, "My preferred attribute appears to be related to wealth as Countess Henrietta. Do you have any tips?"

Yang hummed in the mic, "My tough guy seems to like fighting. It says he's a veteran at raiding. Do I just spam raids to keep my dude happy?"

Penny patiently explained more about the game and how they should guide their two particular characters. Around two hours passed before the three of them could start playing the game at maximum speed. Weiss was starting to grow more comfortable with the game, as was Yang, considering they only had to occasionally pause the game now to catch up.

A lot occurred in the life of her countess over the course of the two hours she learned the game. Countess Henrietta matrilineally married the second son of a neighboring count in the mountains. The two had three children together as Henrietta spent most of her ruling life building mines in the mountains to produce income. Both the father and older brother of Countess Henrietta's husband passed away from illness, leaving Henrietta's oldest male heir in a comfortable position of inheriting two mountainous counties.

Yang took a much more active role than Weiss did. With her one-eyed barbarian, Yang burned coastal town after coastal town with a seamlessly endless fleet. She kept tossing all her income at more and more ships as she took small island after small island. Weiss watched Yang's force of ten thousand pillagers burn down another coastal town before scrolling over to check on Penny's progress.

Upon clicking on the duchy under Penny's control, Weiss immediately had questions as she looked through Penny's court.

"Penny, why is your character not wearing any pants? More importantly, why is your priest a dog in robes?"

Yang's voice filled the mic, "Wait really? I have to see this!"

Penny spoke with some hesitation, "Things… did not go according to my calculations. The Blood Court event did fire, however the outcome of the inheritance was unexpected. The least likely of the heirs won the conflict. There is a less than 1% chance for Lars to win with his attribute focus on knowledge. Not only did he win, a knowledge event with less than 0.5% chance of occurring turned him into a lunatic. His first act as duke was to ban pants within his territory. His second act was to replace the priest of the duchy with a stray dog he found outside of his castle."

Yang laughed, "Oh man, that sounds amazing! I should get my dog, Zwei, a little robe and hat like your dog priest has. He would look adorable in it."

The three invested another hour into their play session. Weiss's original countess had passed away, leaving her son to inherit the original territory the countess had alongside the additional county he inherited through his grandfather on his father's side. Weiss had a comfortable amount of gold stores away as she continued to upgrade her territory. A small scheme worked its way through her mind as she watched Penny slowly stabilize her duchy.

Penny's voice was filled with optimism, "Hurray! Lars finally passed away! I no longer have to guide a lunatic. His son Marc is now the duke and has the optimal stats for a diplomatic character. I was able to marry Marc to the third princess of the kingdom!"

Weiss happily clicked on a single button on the character page of the third princess as she turned her attention to Yang's side of the map. She had some time to kill before the event she needed to fire would occur, anyway.

Yang's barbaric fleet was now fifteen thousand strong as she formed some type of barbaric sea kingdom. Her entire economy seemed to rely on constant raiding. Weiss clicked on Yang's character to see she was playing one of the sons of her original one-eyed barbarian. Her new character seemed to be missing an arm.

"Yang, what happened to the arm of your character? Isn't there a combat penalty for missing an arm?"

Yang sounded irritated over the mic, "Bullshit is what happened. My guy is eighteen over here. Second son of the big scary pirate king that has been plaguing the coasts for decades. Guess what? He lost a duel to an old dude! My guy had five times his combat stats! I got robbed! Now I'm stuck with this penalty until my next heir."

Weiss quietly laughed, "How unfortunate. It could be much worse, however."

Yang sounded curious, "Oh? Yeah, I guess he could have died. His younger brother is only ten right now. Pillaging would have slowed down."

"At least you have an heir. How is your progress on your heir coming along, Penny?" Weiss was smiling.

Penny happily answered, "I just got the event stating Marc's wife is with child. My heir should be born before long. I wish Marc's brother didn't die early. There are numerous complications that could lead to an unfortunate end for my run before the child is born."

A few more minutes passed as they played at maximum speed. They did not speak much as they focused on their different territories. After a while longer, the silence was suddenly interrupted by an annoyed Penny.

"Weiss! Stop having sexual intercourse with my wife! I know it was you! Your character has purple hair just like the baby! You just delayed Marc having an heir!"

Weiss grinned, "Sorry, Penny! I saw an option to seduce your wife with my count and I had to see what would happen. I can reveal the child as his, for a small fee."

Penny grumbled as she transferred over two hundred gold, "I hope your mines collapse."

Weiss took the reputation hit for her character as she happily used the extra gold to upgrade her territory. She really was getting the hang of this simulation game.

Weiss happily spoke, "Thank you for your business, Penny. Do you happen to know any similar games like this? I'm enjoying the generational aspect of this game."

Penny briefly answered, "You may enjoy 'Project Life Simulation 3' for its generational structure. It's more modern themed with a focus on earning enough wealth to create a family. There is no end goal. I played it once to an endpoint I was satisfied with before returning to 'Order of Succession' as it has the goal of claiming the map."

Yang added her own input, "Hey, I've played that. Ruby has a small obsession over it. Think she's put something like 500 Lien into the game and only owns half the content released for it. It's pretty expensive, but addicting."

Weiss temporarily switched away from her current game to go look for 'Project Life Simulation 3 in the digital store. The entire collection for the game was around 1200 Lien, barely scratching the surface of her monthly allowance. She bought the collection, setting it to install in the background.

"I just purchased it. I will simply refund my purchase if I don't enjoy the game when I get an opportunity to see if it's something I enjoy."

"Well, it's worth a shot at least. If you do get into it, Ruby will probably talk your head off when we meet up. She's got the game tweaked with a whole bunch of modifications she's picked up over time. Wish she put as much effort into her studying as she did setting her worlds up in game."

Penny spoke, "Who is this, Ruby? Is she a member of your family, friend Yang?"

"Ah, yeah. She's my sister. Turns out Weiss is going to the same academy we are. Going to meet each other in person when we get a chance."

Penny sounded excited, "That would be wonderful! Are you two attending Atlas Academy? I would love to meet all of you!"

Weiss broke the news to her, "We will be attending Beacon Academy. I believe Beacon will be hosting the Vytal Festival this academic year. I would love to meet you when Atlas Academy sends students to compete at the Vytal Festival tournament."

Yang agreed, "Yeah, we should be super settled in at that point. We can give you a tour around Beacon and stuff by then. I've been to Vale city a few times too. Can show you two some cool places."

Penny sounded happy, "Thank you, friends. I will do my best to ensure my team is assigned to compete in the Vytal Festival tournament. Until we can meet, I would like to continue playing video games together when we are able."

Yang responded to Penny before Weiss could, "I'm game! If boring paperwork doesn't get in the way, of course. I'm hoping we're not swamped with a bunch of after class assignments."

"Agreed. I will be bringing my laptop with me. Trust me, if I can fit in time to play with you two, I will do so," Weiss promised.

It was nearly ten at night by the time the three stopped playing together. Yang had been the first to excuse herself, with Penny following shortly after. Weiss really should have been preparing for bed, but she was curious about her new purchase. 'Project Life Simulation 3' sounded intriguing to her, especially since Yang's sister seemed to have an obsession over it.

'Yang did say her sister was a bit of a recluse. Perhaps, I'll have something to discuss with Ruby if I spend some time playing the game.'

She waited through a few loading screens before she was tossed into a character creator of sorts. At first, she spent some time messing around with the character creator to get a feel for how much customization it offered. She made an abomination of a man with humongous eyes and a chin that stretched nearly down to the center of his chest. She giggled to herself before wiping the character to make something much more normal.

She planned on creating herself. Time passed as she carefully tweaked each aspect of her avatar. The hair had to be just right, as did the face of her avatar. Anything less than perfect was unacceptable. She looked at the clock as she finally finished her self-insert.

'11:00 pm. I just need to finish the rest of the household and then I'll go to sleep.'

She needed to make Winter next…

'12:00 am. Winter and Whitley are finally done. Should I make Jaune? There was a cleaning and cooking skill on the character origin sheets.'

She spent time perfecting Jaune's avatar before assigning his origin skill points. Satisfied with her household, she set the household relationships. The Schnee avatars were correctly marked as being siblings while she set Jaune's avatar to be a family friend. Apparently, the family friend designation meant he would start with half his friendship meter maxed for all three of the Schnee siblings according to the tooltip. It was fitting enough, in her opinion.

Well, she should at least move the four into a house before going to bed…

'2:00 am. Why did I decide to spend so much time building them a makeshift hope? I should be in bed already. Okay, let me just assign Winter a job first and make sure I enroll myself into an academy.'

Picking a military career for Winter only took a little while of re-rolling jobs at a newspaper. Enrolling her self-insert avatar into an Academy of Higher Education took longer. Her avatar had to fill out an application that directly pulled from her character's personal skills.

Of course, she couldn't let her avatar look like a fool. Weiss dedicated just a little longer grinding out a few extra skills on her avatar to make the cost of her tuition lower.

'Well, should I enroll Jaune too? I don't really want to waste my character's time cooking my own meals when I could have him do it. Besides, the active household is going to switch when my character moves out. The tooltip says not much will happen at the home lot during the academy content. May as well drag him along.'

She grinded his cooking and cleaning skills a little more to reduce the tuition.

Weiss glanced at the clock on her scroll, '3:30 am. I need to make sure the campus apartment is furnished properly before I go to bed. The two-bedroom apartment is expensive. Jaune will need to get a part time job on campus or funds will be a problem.'

She continued to play, settling into a routine. Her avatar happily attended the academy in the evening while Jaune's avatar attended early in the morning. The separation in the hours they attended meant she always had a character to direct. Funds were tight, as she expected. Making Jaune's avatar work a part time job in the late afternoon had been the right call.

'5:30 am. Winter is going to kill me. I've already stayed up all night. May as well keep going.'

An interesting event popped up as the first semester at the academy came to a close. The academy was hosting some type of couple's dance the avatars could attend. She wanted to see it, so she had her avatar ask Jaune to the dance. When the loading screen for the dance finished, her avatar and Jaune's avatar were wearing the formal outfits she assigned for them.

Her avatar wore a white dress while Jaune's avatar wore a black tuxedo. A series of objectives popped up on the top left of the screen. According to the tooltip, completion of the objectives would mean the characters would have a scaling mood bonus for happy memories relating to the dance.

She watched a bunch of the NPC characters dance among each other to the music playing within the large ballroom. Dancing was one of the objectives she had to fulfill. She directed her avatar to dance with Jaune among the rest of the NPC characters.

Weiss leaned back into her chair with a content smile. The two avatars happily danced to the upbeat music. Both of the avatars had little skill in dancing, meaning their animations were goofy and sloppy. When her avatar or Jaune's avatar slipped up, the other character would laugh before continuing the dance. She was enjoying this.

The music slowed, as did the dancing animations for the characters. Weiss laughed as Jaune's avatar stepped on the foot of her own avatar. The response of her avatar had been to lightly stomp on his foot before the two continued their dance. A symbol of a heart briefly appeared near the characters before a light pink bar appeared under their friendship bar.

'What's this?'

She hovered over the bar to see it denoted romantic interest. Weiss leaned forward, her focus completely absorbed by the game. She needed to finish the rest of the interactions needed for a happy memory bonus.

The avatars took a break from dancing to grab cups of punch at her direction. Another objective was checked off the list in the top left. One more remained, to gaze at the stars. She directed both characters to a balcony to watch the stars together.

Both avatars stood next to each other, illuminated by the light of the moon and what little light escaped from the windows of the ballroom. Weiss's avatar autonomously grabbed the hand of Jaune's avatar as the two stared up at a full unbroken moon.

The romantic interest bar for both characters continued to slowly fill as the avatars looked up at the moon together on the balcony. Weiss's avatar smiled at Jaune's avatar before resting her head on his shoulder.

Weiss took a deep breath as the objective on the top left updated.

'First kiss.'

Weiss's face felt warm as she directed her character to attempt a first kiss.

"T-this is for the sake of the mood bonus," she whispered to herself.

An animation began to play. The screen zoomed in on the two avatars as cinematic black bars narrowed the field of view of the screen. Both avatars shifted their bodies to stare at one another with direct eye contact. The camera slowly zoomed out, the two avatars momentarily holding both of each other's hands.

Jaune's avatar stopped holding one of Weiss's hands in order to brush his free hand against her face. The two avatars leaned in closer, their lips moving forward to meet. There was a moment of hesitation for both the avatars. Both shared a small laugh at the momentary pause before leaning in to finally meet each other's lips in their shared first kiss.

Weiss's face was burning as she held her hands in front of her eyes. She watched the scene between the gaps of her fingers. The objective was completed.

Both avatars continued to hold hands under the moon as she saved the game. It was already 6:22 am. There was no way she could keep playing.

Soft knocking on her bedroom door caused her to nearly bolt out of her chair. She tried to reign in her emotions as she called out.

"Y-yes? Who is it?"

A voice she really didn't want to hear at the moment came from behind her door, "Weiss? Are you feeling alright? I saw your lights were still on when I was doing my morning round of cleaning the hallway windows."

"P-perfectly fine, thank you for asking, Jaune!" She nervously laughed as a sense of guilt and embarrassment filled her.

Her voice was giving her away, she knew it. Jaune seemed to linger behind her bedroom door before speaking.

"Alright. Would you like me to get you something to drink? Water, tea, coffee, hot chocolate, or anything else? I would hate to leave you thirsty this early in the morning," he sounded concerned.

"I-I am feeling parched, anything is fine. I would welcome it if you could sate my thirst," she felt dizzy, simultaneously wanting to curse herself for saying those exact words..

'Get your mind out of the gutter! I need to stop reading those hidden novels in Winter's old study.'

Jaune spoke, "It's a little cold today. I'll make you a strong cup of hot chocolate. Be back in around ten minutes or so."

Weiss heard him walk away down the hall. She walked away from her desk and tossed herself face first onto her bed. She buried her face into her pillow, muffling her scream of embarrassment.

She rolled onto her back to look up at her ceiling. Thoughts rapidly filled her head as she waited for the butler to bring her hot chocolate.

'Those two didn't warn me about how dangerous Project Life Simulation 3 is. Yang did say it was addicting, but I didn't expect to stay up all night playing it.'

She whispered to herself, "The point of the game is to create a f-family. It would be o-optimal for me to continue my avatar's newly forged relationship. The mood bonus is just too good…"

Weiss's eyes widened momentarily before she sprung out of her bed to rush back towards her laptop to slam it shut. She REALLY needed to keep her laptop shut. She would rather face a pack of angry Beowolfs than try to explain the in-game family she was playing to someone in her household if they stumbled upon her laptop while the game was open. It would be an absolute mess! No one could ever see her save, no one!

AN: Figure I should mention the games referenced within this bonus chapter. Order of Succession is loosely based around Crusader Kings 2 and 3. Project Life Simulation 3 is loosely based on a mix of the Sims games.

Quite a bit happened in this little bonus chapter. We see Weiss embracing her gaming hobby while getting to know Penny and Yang more. Weiss has made plans to meet with Yang, Ruby, and their neighbor either before boarding the ship to Beacon or on the ship. Weiss also casually drops 1200 Lien on an entire game collection. For reference, I write as if (1 Lien is = $1 USD) otherwise I think I would go insane trying to figure out currency.

Weiss learns the perils of making real people in a life simulation game. I'm sure if any of you played Sims when you were younger, you likely made a crush of yours at least once. I can't think of anything more mortifying than the possibility of having said crush stumble upon your save with your self-insert character married to or dating a created version of your crush.

Worst part is I recall discussing Sims 2 with a friend of mine back in late elementary school. I think we even talked about making our crushes in our saves. You go from running a Sims 2 business in a ninja or hotdog suit to making real life crushes into characters alongside your self-insert the next moment. Children truly have no shame. I'm beyond happy those saves are long lost to time.