Peter nods. “I’ll be sure to mention these special circumstances to the hacker, and hopefully convince him of our sincerity in acquiring his services.”
“Keep me posted. If we can’t get the Digital Bandit onboard, we’ll need to find someone else quickly,” the CEO says.
The security officer nods again.
Chapter 52 – Legal Agreement
Winston Turner takes a seat at the conference table next to his client, and puts the draft contract on the table. No one else is in the room at the law office of Turner & Turner, LLC. “Sir, this is the latest draft of the legal contract between your company, Eternia Development & Entertainment, Inc., and Virtuous Gaming Co., to begin the process to merge into a single entity upon completion of the Hundred Man Tournament. As specified in Paragraph Five of the merger agreement, stock owned by both you and Charles Winter will be passed on to the chief executive officer of the winning company. The CEO of the losing side will forfeit his ownership interest with zero compensation,” he highlights the paragraph with a yellow colored marker. The bespectacled man takes off his glasses and looks at Richard T. Gibson. “Sir, I must point out that this is a highly unusual transaction, almost akin to gambling with millions of dollars at stake,” he says in a disapproving tone of voice.
The client grins. “Have you lost faith in me already, old friend?”
The senior attorney sighs. “I have been providing legal services to you ever since you came into my office looking for legal assistance to form your own startup company many years ago. We have navigated through numerous tricky obstacles together, and I have watched with great pride as your company grew and you began to employ more people. And now, there is a great possibility that you will throw away your career and everything you worked for—for what purpose? Resolution to a long standing, personal grudge against an old roommate?” He sighs again.
“For the record, I didn’t choose this fight,” Richard defends himself. “Charles decided to throw down a public gauntlet, a foolish challenge that I thought I could win easily. So I accepted.”
“Nevertheless, I wouldn’t be acting ethically as your attorney without pointing out the foolishness of this action. But I realize that you already made up your mind, and won’t back out of this tournament no matter I what I say to you. So, what do you think is the odds of you emerging as the winner after this event?” the skeptical adviser asks.
“Oh I would say maybe eighty percent?” the CEO replies brashly.
The lawyer stares at his client for a moment. “I know that virtual reality games are really beyond my field of expertise, but I highly doubt the other guy will play fair. I won’t press for details, but I don’t think you anticipated all the possibilities,” Winston continues to offer his skepticism. “That being said, the legal contract should cover all the possible outcomes of the tournament—either you or Charles will take control of both entities. Or if there is no winner in the tournament then both of you will retain your shares and your respective companies will split the cost of running the event equally. These scenarios are clearly spelled out in the agreement, in Paragraph Eight. However, let’s say does something substantial comes up during the event, and you need a neutral party to mediate your dispute afterwards. Do you have any idea who the two of you would respect and accept a decision from? If not, I could offer a list of possible mediators for the two of you to choose from,” the lawyer offers.
“That’s a good idea,” Richard accepts the recommendation. “You could add the mediation clause to the draft and see how the other side reacts,” the client replies.
“Okay, I’ll send off the revised draft to my legal counterpart and confirm if they will agree to it,” the attorney says.
“Please do,” Richard nods.
Chapter 53 – Final Arrangements
Wesley waits patiently for his guest to arrive. Finally he hears the door open, and someone enters The Strangers’ headquarters in Starter Town.
Mark takes a seat directly across from Wesley. He notes that all four members of The Strangers are present.
“Thank you for taking the time to meet with us, Mark,” Wesley says.
“On behalf of Eternia Development & Entertainment, inc., I thank you for your diligence in preparing for the Hundred Man Tournament,” the company official replies politely.
“Considering that each of us has a small slice of the company, you shouldn’t be surprised by our efforts to keep your boss in place,” Conrad replies.
“Exactly,” Lucious adds. “There’s no guaranteed that the CEO for the other company will honor our consultancy contract with EDE.”
“The project manager is taking time away from his busy work to sit down with us and to answer our final questions for the tournament. If you don’t have anything to ask, he can leave right now,” Wesley admonishes the group.
“I want to confirm that we will have access to divine magic during the event,” Diana says quickly.
“Pope Lemoine of the Church of Eternia will be provided with the Divine Lodestone artifact. It’s up to him to make sure the holy relic will be brought to the site of the tournament,” Mark replies.
“I’m working with the player leaders of each guild, including the Pope. He will make sure representatives from the Church will bring the artifact to the event,” Wesley confirms.
“How long will the event last?” Lucious asks.
“The duration of the tournament will be four hours. In fact, we will insert a digital countdown on the upper left corner of the live broadcast. Your mission is to prevent a single representative of Virtuous Gaming from passing through the portal and entering Starter Town for the duration of the tournament,” the official answers.
“Isn’t four hours a bit too long?” Conrad frowns.
“Considering that our anniversary event to lift the Curse from Eternia Castle took us a good ten hours to complete, four hours is a breeze,” Lucious remarks nonchalantly.
“Why did you settle on four hours, rather than one or two hour duration?” Diana asks out of curiosity.
“The duration of this tournament is essentially a question of fairness, to some extent,” Mark begins. “Since this is a modified tower defense event, we need to give time for the VG representatives to break through your defenses. And one or two hours would not be sufficient for that to happen, if at all. But since the tournament is streamed live, we need to shorten the duration before our audience decides to tune out the broadcast. In the end, both companies concluded that four hours is a fair compromise.”
“Four hours isn’t that bad, compared to some of the missions in the game,” Wesley adds.
“I want to confirm that the setting or location would take place at the portal that we crossed over last month as ambassadors for the Kingdom?” Lucious asks.
“That is correct,” Mark nods.
“The leadership council had been discussing placement of our defenses based on the presumption that the portal inside a mountain will be the location for this event,” the cavalier adds. “I will provide you guys with further instructions later on.”
“Will resurrection be permitted?” Diane asks.
“No,” Mark shakes his head. “Players killed during the event will stay dead for the remaining duration. Otherwise, death has no meaning during the match.”
“What do you know about the players representing Virtuous Gaming?” Conrad asks.
“I don’t think a project manager for World of Eternia would know anything about that,” Lucious interjects.
Mark smiles at the comment. “Yes and no. Since the 2.0 version of the virtual reality equipment has not been released publicly yet, we needed to send out fifty sets of this gear to the champions from Virtuous Gaming,” he explains. “As part of the process, EDE has to add a special code to these players’ WoE in order for the 2.0 equipment to be accepted by our servers, or else these players will be automatically locked out of the game as cheaters. In other words, we actually have a list of the champions of VG for the
tournament. Of course, we did a little background search on these individuals. Ten of them were members of The Golden Boys, which was a competitive and highly respected WoE alliance. Another dozen or so players had quit World of Eternia for one reason or another. Thus, that leaves about half the recruits coming from a non-WoE background, with many VG employees among this group.”
“Okay, if half the players from VG are not experienced in WoE, wouldn’t that make it easier for us experienced players in general?” Conrad speculates.
“Not necessarily,” Wesley replies. “These players may have extensive experience in other online games, with skills, organization, communication, and teamwork that would translate well into the World of Eternia setting. I fully expect Virtuous Gaming to bring in a competitive team to face us.”
“That is our expectation as well,” Mark nods in agreement. “Before I forget, EDE is inviting all our champions to log into the event directly from our facilities. Since our servers are located on site, the latency would be minimal. Please pass the offer to the other players joining the tournament,” he requests.
Wesley nods. “I think it would be wise to accept your offer, since latency would affect our in-game actions. A shorter latency will allow us move a little bit faster and this will give us a competitive advantage especially in a moba setting. However, many of the participants, including myself, are located in other states. If we decide to fly over to your premises in Washington for this event, would your company be willing to reimburse us for the cost of airplane tickets at least?”
“I will need to check with Richard on this, but my guess would be yes. Please give me an estimate of the cost so that I could confirm with my boss on the reimbursement,” Mark replies.
“Will do,” Wesley agrees.
“I want to confirm that the biofeedback loop function will be turned off for the event?” Lucious asks.
The project manager can only nod. It took a full day of arguments to convince the boss to relent on this issue. “I should also note that the use of potions and scrolls are also disabled for this event. So that means no healing or mana potions,” he says.
“Why?” Diana and Lucious asks together. It is bad enough that resurrection will be prohibited. This new condition is a game-changer!
“Virtuous Gaming insisted on this condition,” Mark replies sheepishly. “I think the reason is obvious. They know that our players have a strong advantage in terms of magic, and they want to limit the amount of spells you guys will sling around the battlefield. So basically, spell casters will need to conserve their mana pool for the most strategic opportunities.”
Lucious shakes his head. “I was hoping to toss earth shattering spells left and right,” he sighs.
“You could use the Church members as batteries, if you need,” Diana reminds him.
“But it’s not the same thing though,” the mage complains.
“Our defense will lean more heavily on fighters anyway, with a thirty-twenty split over spell casters,” Conrad points out. “The restriction won’t change our plans all that much.”
“I’m sure this competition will suit you crazy barbarians better than us spell casters,” Lucious retorts.
Conrad grins.
“Does anyone else have any more questions for Mark?” the leader interjects. Seeing no one speaking up Wesley says, “Thank you for meeting with us, Mark. I will send you an email with the airfare estimate.”
Mark gets up from his seat. “Please contact me if you have any more questions.”
Once the EDE official leaves the players’ headquarters, Wesley turns to face Conrad. “I need to speak with you privately.” The leader looks at Diana and Lucious.
“Come on, Lucious. You need to start packing for a stay over at my place,” Diana teases her boyfriend as she pulls him up from his seat. The two quickly leaves the player housing.
“What’s up?” Conrad asks once he is alone with the ex-Marine. The barbarian puts his feet up on the table to relax.
“I’ve been looking for expert snipers, and I heard a funny story about a sniper tearing it up in our battle arena,” Wesley says with amusement.
Conrad jerks his body in shock, and nearly falls off his chair. He puts his hands on the table to steady himself. “What did you hear exactly?” he asks gingerly.
“I thought you were busy rehabbing, not fooling around as a sniper in the arena,” Wesley smiles at the thought of the muscular man sneaking around in camouflage holding a bow and arrow.
Conrad winces at being outed.
“I want you to use your alternate class in the tournament,” the leader requests.
Conrad’s jaws drop. “Um, but my archer class isn’t maxed out yet. Wouldn’t you find a max level barbarian more useful for the event?”
“Oh, we have plenty of barbarians to choose from the Fighters Guild,” the leader waves his hand in the air. “However archers are another story, particularly archers with actual combat experience in the battle arena. You’re at least a level fifty archer, correct? That makes you a master archer,” Wesley replies. “No need to be so modest.”
The larger man folds his massive arms across his chest. “So let me get this straight. You want me to stand around on some hill top during this competition, and shoot at the players from the other side like fish in a barrel?” he moans.
“Exactly,” Wesley pounds his fist on the table for emphasis. “I also want you to bring your arena partner along.”
“You want to bring a necromancer into the tournament?” Conrad groans aloud. “Wouldn’t the Church of Eternia have a problem with that?”
“My primary mission is to ensure that we win the Hundred Man Tournament. Church sensibilities are secondary to this objective. Mark just confirmed that resurrection will not be allowed for this event. Therefore, a necromancer will be able to raise minions from the dead, and these minions will serve as our reinforcements rather than resurrected players. Depending on the flow of the battle and as the body count piles up, your friend may turn out to be the key to keeping VG representatives out of the portal. I need you to convince your friend to show up for this event. Promise me you will, okay?” Wesley asks.
Conrad sighs. “I promise.”
“But yes, you are correct in noting that the Church will raise a fuzz about this,” Wesley admits. “So we’ll do a little bit of sidestepping around the issue, by not letting the others members see the finalized list of participants. Your partner will only be identified as a battle arena recruit, and we’ll let them draw their own conclusions on her player class without confirming anything. You and your partner will log in and enter the arena right before the tournament starts, so that the Church can’t do anything about it,” he instructs.
Conrad raps his knuckles on the table. “Hey, if you’re willing to draw the heat from the Church, I’m cool with it,” he grins.
“Whatever it takes to win, man,” the veteran replies solemnly.
* * *
Laura Deathmaiden folds her arms across her chest with an amused smile on her face. “Let me get this straight. Your glorious leader wants to add a necromancer into the mix for this so-called ‘Hundred Man Tournament.’ And he wants me to keep out of sight of the Church representatives until I’ve entered the combat arena, so that the goody two shoes won’t be throwing a hissy fit over me. Does that sound right?” she asks. The necromancer leans back on her chair and offers her arena partner a blank stare.
Conrad throws his hands up in the air. “I just keep my head down and do as I’m told,” he replies sheepishly. The warrior folds his hands together and leans his elbows on the table, as if to beg her to accept Wesley’s request. The two are discussing this request at The Strangers’ headquarters in the player housing zone.
Laura starts to draw imaginary circles on the table, using her right index finger. “Well, I do have something planned already for that weekend,” she says. “If you want me in the tournament it’s going to cost you,” she grins and bares her sharp teeth.
/> Conrad winces. Since the request is unrelated to the battle arena, Laura is within her right to demand compensation for her services. “What do you want?” he growls.
“I really like this place you Strangers have here,” the necromancer smiles.
Uh-oh, the warrior worries.
“Silly, I’m not asking for your house in payment,” Laura laughs at his reaction. “I may be greedy, but I’m not THAT greedy.” She pauses for a moment and gets an inspiration. “I want in,” she says suddenly.
“In what?” he asks gingerly.
“I want to join your merry little band, silly. I am still guild-less. And I want to be in your group. So let me in,” she explains.
“Well, I don’t know about that,” Conrad hesitates. “I’m not the leader.”
“Well, there you have it. In exchange for my participation in the Hundred Man Tournament, I want to officially join The Strangers. That way, I get to hang out with you. Plus, I get a room in this house, no? It works out great for me personally,” she smiles. “I can finally have a little room of my own in the player housing zone, a little corner of Eternia to decorate however I want.” Laura claps her hands together. “Oh I can’t wait to get started!”
“I will have to check with Wesley and get back to you,” Conrad says quietly.
“Okay, do that. But the sooner he answers back the better. I need to cancel my previous engagement and reschedule it. Once I get an agreement from Wesley, I will go ahead and reschedule. It’s a fair deal. With me on board, your chance of winning this tournament is guaranteed!” Laura flashes a victory sign with her fingers.
Conrad can only rub his temples. This is going to be a disaster.
Chapter 54 – Start
World of Eternia: The Complete Collection Page 35
