Legacy of the Fallen (Ascend Online Book 2)

by Luke Chmilenko

  “Hi, there! Welcome to Ætherworld Productions! How can I help you today?”

  “Uh, Ætherworld Productions?” I asked, the company name not matching up to the one that I had originally been expecting. “I’m not sure if we’re in the right place…”

  “You wouldn’t happen to be Marcus and Peter by chance?” the woman asked.

  “That’s us,” Peter replied. “I thought this was—”

  “Oh good, you’re here! Sorry for the confusion!” The woman came around the desk, rushing to greet us with a large smile plastered across her face. “We’ve actually just changed our company name to help with branding, and it has been hectic getting everything changed over to the new name. My name is Jen by the way.”

  “Nice to meet you, Jen,” I replied graciously, happy that we were in the right place.

  “Paul asked me to send you two back to him as soon as you got here, so please follow me.” Jen began leading us through the office, almost all of which seemed to be under some sort of renovation. “Sorry about all the construction, we’ve been long overdue for a facelift here and decided to get it all done in one shot.”

  “No worries,” Peter said. “We understand.”

  Smoothly gliding around all the construction, Jen led us towards an already finished meeting room at the back of the office, where two men were waiting for us. The moment we stepped into the room, both men leaped to their feet and came around the massive table to shake our hands.

  “Marcus! Peter! I’m happy you could both make it today!” Paul greeted us enthusiastically, before motioning towards the other man in the room. “This is our attorney, Andrew. I’ve asked him to sit in on our meeting today. I think he’ll have some interesting advice for you both after we get our update out of the way.”

  “Pleasure to meet you both,” Andrew said softly as he shook our hands.

  “Can I interest you two in some coffee or tea?” Jen asked, indicating a pair of carafes on a nearby table.

  “Yes, coffee please!” I nodded excitedly, Peter echoing my response.

  Moving efficiently, the dark-haired secretary poured a pair of cups for both Peter and me before excusing herself from the meeting room. “Let me know if you need anything else.”

  “Thanks, Jen!” I called to the secretary’s retreating form as the door closed, and I breathed the sweet and tantalizing aroma of the coffee before me, my first cup in well over a week.

  “So, we’re really excited to hear what’s happened over the last couple of weeks,” Peter began excitedly. “Just on our way here we saw an ad for our stream on GameTV. I had no idea we were that popular!”

  “Yes!” Paul exclaimed cheerfully as he sat back down at the table across from us. “Ascend Online has just been dominating the entertainment market. You wouldn’t believe what the demand for quality and entertaining streams are like, which I’m happy to say that your guild ranks among the highest for.”

  “That’s great!” I replied with a smile. “I mean, we’ve been having a ton of fun playing the game, but I’m happy it’s working out in the Real World too!”

  “Of course,” Paul agreed wholeheartedly as he began pulling a handful of papers out of a folder on the table and handing them over to us. “I’m sure you’re both eager to know just how much you’ve made with your streams so far, so here’s a general breakdown.”

  Setting my coffee cup aside, I grabbed the sheet with nervous hands, scanning through the document. My eyes widened as I looked at the final figure, causing me to look back up at the two men with a stupefied expression on my face. “We’ve made a little over four hundred thousand dollars in not even three weeks of airtime?”

  “Well, you’ve actually made a great deal more than that,” Paul added. “Unfortunately, taxes and CTI’s five percent cut take a rather substantial portion of your earnings…”

  “You’re not kidding!” Peter snorted as he pointed out the line where Ætherworld’s production fee, taxes and CTI’s portion of the revenue were calculated on my sheet of paper. “I’d completely forgotten that CTI had their hands in the revenue stream, but still…four hundred thousand dollars is not that shabby…”

  “That’s incredible!” I exclaimed waving my hand in the air, narrowly missing knocking my coffee mug over. “I was worried that there would be far too much competition from literally every other player that wanted to stream their play time.”

  “That definitely has an impact on the market,” Paul acknowledged. “However, there are very few players that have combined multiple feeds into a single episodic show like you all have.”

  “Because we’ve been able to consolidate so many feeds from multiple perspectives and expand the narrative into an actual storyline, such as Freya and her party’s journey with Graves, we’ve managed to maintain steady pacing episode to episode and have retained a high viewership throughout the entire series.”

  “Given that we now have a timeslot on GameTV, I’m tentatively expecting that your earnings should at least double over the course of the next two or three months with just what you have released so far,” Paul said optimistically. Then he held up a hand in warning, “But, making any more than that largely depends on what sort of content you have coming down the pipe for us. Entertainment isn’t what it used to be, like back in the 2010 era, where you could afford to be off the air for six months of the year, viewers are demanding new shows and content on an almost daily basis, and if you can’t keep up…”

  “You get left behind,” Peter finished with an understanding nod, then looked over to me. “We’ve been fairly busy the last few weeks, but nothing on the same level of excitement when compared to that run-in with Graves.”

  “Yeah, it’s been mostly quiet since people stopped arriving from Eberia. We’ve managed to get the core group of Virtus up to level thirteen and have spent most of our time building and developing Aldford.” I said slowly, watching Paul nod as he followed along with me. “Well, at least until this morning…”

  “Ooh,” Paul made an excited noise, pulling a pen out of a shirt pocket. “What happened this morning?”

  “Well, we found out that the reason why we haven’t had anyone new coming to Aldford was that we had a group of Bandits camped out intercepting all the traffic,” Peter answered before going on to give a high-level summary of everything that had happened earlier in the day. “I know it’ll be quite some time before that part of the feed becomes available…”

  “No, this is great!” Paul replied eagerly as he made a handful of notes. “This is exactly what we need, a huge battle with the bandits to kick things off… more people coming to the area… we can definitely make this work!”

  Paul paused for a moment while looking down at his notes. “You said there were quite a few new Adventurers that arrived too, right? Any chance of them maybe applying to Virtus, and us getting their feed?”

  “That was still being sorted out when we left.” I looked towards Peter, who simply shrugged at me. “We’ll probably get applicants over the next few days. If any make the cut, we’ll definitely send over their feeds; it’s part of our guild membership requirements anyway.”

  “Perfect!” Paul exclaimed. “We’ll sort through those feeds once we get them, and maybe do a feature on some of the new members since some of those feeds may already be available for use, or will be sooner than today’s bandit battle.”

  “We have a couple other places that we’re looking into exploring near Aldford when things settle down,” I told the producer. “Though the majority of our focus for the next couple days is going to be getting all the new people settled.”

  “That’s more than understandable, and I have no place to tell you how to run your town. Definitely do what you think is best,” Paul replied as he put his pen down and looked intently at Peter and me. “I know I asked this before, but are you sure I can’t convince you all to go public with your names and avatars? It would really help with creating a tangible presence for viewers to identify with. Especially
if we can line up a few interviews or appearances at events.”

  “Right now, we’d rather keep our Real World identities private,” I said after seeing Peter look towards me again for an answer to the producer’s question. “Maybe one day when we can generate the biggest impact with it we can go public, but right now… we’d rather not.”

  “That’s definitely understandable.” Paul looked a little disappointed at my reply, but clearly understood our reasoning behind it. “I won’t lie, it might slow things down with how quickly you climb the rankings, and your viewership, but then again… if you can make it high enough up the rankings without anyone knowing who you are, then that mystery will only make your group even more interesting.”

  “Hang on.” Peter cocked his head in confusion. “There are rankings?”

  “Huh?” Paul gave us a blank look, before slapping himself on the forehead. “Geez, I’m sorry about that! I completely forgot that you two have literally spent the last few weeks in another world and wouldn’t have had a chance to see them yet.”

  “Rankings, or more specifically Player Rankings is something that CTI introduced shortly after the first feeds were released,” Paul excitedly began to explain. “The ranking doesn’t actually have anything to do with your in-game characters, but instead is a reflection of your Real World popularity for that current month. The more popular you are, the higher your ranking increases the following month. It also aggregates ranking in cases where multiple players submit their feeds into a single feed, giving them all the same ranking based on the overall popularity.”

  “So, how are we doing right now then?” I asked hesitantly, looking back down at the sheet to see if it was on there.

  “Right now, Virtus is currently ranked eight hundred and ninety-ninth out of, well… several million players for the month of February,” Paul answered with a smile. “So, I’d say you are doing very well overall!”

  “We’re in the top thousand?” Peter exclaimed slapping a hand on the table, then shifting to high five me. “Damn, that’s awesome!”

  “No kidding!” I replied, feeling a little overwhelmed at how high we had climbed already. “That’s insane!”

  “Has there been any feedback from the viewers?” Peter asked curiously. “I’d be interested to know what they’re saying about us.”

  “It’s largely positive actually, especially from the greater gaming community,” the producer replied. “To be honest, all feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. Practically everyone wants to see more of you all. We’ve only had a handful of negative complaints, and that’s just been due to bad language, and we’ve pretty much ignored those.”

  “People still get worked up over salty language?” Peter asked with surprise. “That’s pretty fucking ridiculous.”

  “Yeah…” I shook my head slowly in disbelief. “They’re okay with watching us fight and kill things, but their ears are suddenly too sensitive?”

  “You’ll hear all sorts of it in this business,” Paul replied with a shrug. “What’s important to focus on though, is that you guys are trending upwards. This new bandit stuff that happened today should keep you guys in the top thousand for the month of March, but if you’re looking to climb… we’re going to need more exciting things to sell to the viewers until you can build a dedicated following.”

  “We’ll do our best,” I told Paul, trying to project some optimism into my voice.

  “No doubt!” Paul said enthusiastically before indicating Andrew, who had been patiently listening to the conversation all this time. “Now, the last bit of our update has a few legal components, so I’m going to turn this over to Andrew because he can explain it much better than I can. Then he has a few options to explain to you all.”

  Still riding high on our excitement, Peter and I shifted our glance towards Andrew, who smiled and leaned forward. “So, to follow up on Paul’s excellent segue, have you two ever considered the benefits of turning Virtus into a company?”

  Chapter 5

  “Peter?” My voice was completely flat as I leaned my head against the side of the elevator wall.

  “Yeah, Marc?” I heard his defeated voice reply to me.

  “My head hurts.”

  “Mine too, Marc.”

  “What happened back there?” I asked, still struggling to understand what had happened in the second half of the meeting.

  “We laid the groundwork to form our guild as a corporate entity to make sure all of our guild members get a fair cut of our earnings while employing a more efficient tax structure,” Peter explained tonelessly. “It will also allow us to have our members expense their subscription costs of playing Ascend Online to the company, which we can then claim for tax credit. In addition, we can also hire employees to help manage Real World or even Game World duties while working directly for us.”

  I blinked twice before turning to look at my friend. “Why didn’t he just explain it that way? That makes perfect sense.”

  “He did explain it that way, just with a bunch of more words in between it all,” Peter replied with a sigh. “I just happen to have much more experience dealing with lawyers at work.”

  “I might sound like a terrible friend for asking this, but…you dealt with lawyers at work? I thought you traded digital currency?”

  “Yeah, I did,” Peter confirmed with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Usually the lawyers came to me representing clients that need money moved in some way, or were looking at exchanging their crypto-currencies for real currency or vice versa. It was all stupidly boring shit, and you know just how much I hated talking about my job…or doing it.”

  “Wait, hated?” I finally caught on to Peter’s choice of words. “You quit?”

  “Hah, yeah!” Peter barked a tired laugh. “Same day that I called you about Ascend Online actually. I just had enough and walked out.”

  “That’s crazy! What were you going to do if the game didn’t pan out?” I shook my head, not believing that Peter hadn’t told any of us that he had quit his job for well over a month.

  “Hell, if I know.” Peter shrugged. “Go back to school for something design or art related? That’s pretty much the only field there’s any real demand for.”

  “That’s a far leap from the economics degree you have now,” I replied slowly, still getting over my surprise.

  “What else is there to do, Marc? Between you, and the others, you’re all in design one way or the other,” Peter exclaimed waving his hands in the air. “Food and retail stores are all run by robots, vehicles are almost all automated now, and thanks to the ‘Nano-Industrial Revolution’ we don’t even need skilled workers for our manufacturing industry anymore, let alone unskilled ones. If it wasn’t for the Basic Living Income giving people money to spend… the world economy would have collapsed ages ago.

  “I don’t disagree with you there,” I replied with a sigh, having heard a similar version of Peter’s rant before.

  The Basic Living Income was a measure enacted by almost all of the world governments in response to nanotechnology and robotics rendering the majority of the global workforce obsolete over the last decade. Almost all labor or service based industries had been fully automated, only needing a handful of individuals to manage and direct their robotic workforce, leaving billions out of work as their professions simply ceased to exist. Mines were now run by fully automated robots, vehicles drove themselves, and once sprawling farms had been converted with massive, completely automated, multi-story complexes.

  To keep society from falling into chaos when bank accounts dried up and the threat of hunger drove people to riot, the government was forced to essentially give people free money, with the goal of providing a basic level of income to keep them from destabilizing the world economy. The money ensured that goods were still purchased, services were still used, houses were built, and the fabric of society kept itself together.

  Once the threat of global destabilization was averted, the government turned their efforts to reeducat
ing their obsolete workforce by subsidizing almost all levels of education and encouraging their citizens to study science, engineering or entertainment.

  However, that ran into its own problems, with only a fraction of the displaced workforce choosing to re-educate themselves, leading to a growing class of people who simply did nothing but stayed at home and consumed entertainment, content to live a life of minimalism within the means provided to them by the Basic Living Income. Only those who wanted larger homes, luxuries, nanite treatments, and meaning beyond simple consumption worked to re-educate themselves.

  But if that wasn’t enough, the Millennials who already have all the engineering and science jobs aren’t retiring, I thought while rubbing my face, feeling the familiar frustration my generation had grown up with surge through me. Leaving us clutching at straws with nothing productive to channel our energy into.

  “I guess that’s why Ascend Online worked out to be so popular,” I said with a weary shrug.

  “It’s given everyone a better escape than sitting at home and consuming all the crap they put on the TV,” Peter agreed, pushing himself off the wall as the elevator doors slid open to our floor.

  “Hang on. Aren’t we on TV now?” I asked, following Peter out of the elevator.

  “Damn, I’d already forgotten about that,” Peter whispered softly before barking a short laugh. “We should watch ourselves! That’ll be hilarious!”

  “Ha! I wonder if everyone’s logged out yet,” I asked with a chuckle as we walked down the hall towards our suite, my stomach rumbling loudly as the smell of food filled the air. “That smells great; I can’t even remember the last time I ate.”

  “That makes two of us.” Peter snorted, waving his metal bracelet in front of our door’s sensor, then pushed it open.

  “Hey, they’re back!” Zach’s voice greeted us the second that we stepped into the suite, followed by a powerful aroma of food. “About time! We thought you guys forgot about us!”

  “Well… if we’d known there was food waiting for us, we’d have come back sooner,” I replied, my eyes growing wide as I saw the massive amount of food that had been ordered. “Did you guys get—”