I mean, the example they give is pickpocketing the blacksmith and the blacksmith just doesn’t care. So, never let anything affect you is kind of exactly what the author is proposing.

They try to reign it back in at the end with “goal is to do your own thing” but the examples given, and really NPCs in general, are the antithesis to that.

Ironically, the NPCs are designed to do exactly what they are supposed to with no free will at all. I have programmed you to do this, and thus you shall.

I think the author lost the plot.

>I think the author lost the plot.

they stretched an imperfect metaphor. i think that's forgivable. the piece, as a whole, is (as they say) a retelling of stoicism.