World of Eternia: The Complete Collection (47 page)

We will participate as
the champions of VG under the following conditions. First, all ten of
us get to join the event together as one unit, or else we are out.
Second, we need the new 2.0 version of the virtual reality equipment,
because the reaction time is supposedly faster than the previous
generation. For a MOBA gaming product, a faster reaction time
translates into a decisive edge. Third, as experienced VRMMORPG
players in the same class as The Strangers, all ten of us demand
compensation for our services. We want the same prize that The
Strangers received last year, namely a consultancy contract for a
small share in your company. Finally, since not all members of the
former Golden Boys alliance will be returning, the ten of us wish to
form a new alliance named ‘The Returned.’

We sincerely hope that
you will agree to these reasonable but non-negotiable terms for
participation as your champions in the Hundred Man Tournament. The
event will require tremendous planning and practice in advance, and
therefore the tournament will require a substantial time commitment
from each participant in the near future. Thus, it is only proper
that we receive fair compensation comparable to what The Strangers
received last year.

We eagerly await your
reply to our offer.

Best regards,

Marcus Stansberry,
leader of The Returned”

After minor corrections
for spelling and grammatical issues, the writer sends off the email
to Virtuous Gaming.

* * *

Charles Winter, the CEO
of Virtuous Gaming, reads the email forwarded from Priscilla
Lombardi, his secretary and the coordinator for player participation
in the Hundred Man Tournament. After finishing reading the rather
audacious email, the man gets up from his chair and slowly paces
around his office.

“I have to give this
Marcus fellow credit for having the guts to demand compensation, and
company stock at that,” he says aloud. “I suppose I could humor
him, and attach conditions in the consultancy contract that he could
easily violate and then lose the company stocks.” Charles chuckles
at the anger Marcus would feel for losing the contract. “Yes, that
would be amusing indeed.”

Grinning to himself,
Charles returns to his seat behind his work desk. He fires off a
reply to Priscilla with just one word, “Approved.”

“Thank you for
coming,” Charles Winter says as he looks around the meeting room.
In attendance are Priscilla, Lisa, Victoria, Martin, and Peter.
Conspicuously absent is the Chairman of the Board, Lewis Richard
Whitney. The CEO hasn’t had contact with the chairman for the past
two weeks. Mr. Whitney refused to return Charles’ phone calls; nor
has the director stepped foot inside Virtuous Gaming’s office.
No
matter
, Charles thinks.
The
Chairman will still get updates from his lackey, old Martin here.

“Since the Hundred
Man Tournament will be taking place in a week and a half, I want to
get an update on the preparations from our end. Let’s start with
you, Lisa,” he suggests.

“My R&D
department has been busy integrating our graphical content into the
Oriental Expansion, since it will serve as the basis and setting for
the tournament,” Lisa explains. “We added outside contractors to
assist us and speed up the process, while doing quality assurance to
stomp out the bugs. We should be done by the end of the week.”

“We have also been
secretly making changes to various scripts and introducing objects
that are not available to the champions representing EDE,” Victoria
adds.

“What sort of
contents are we talking about here?” Charles asks, clearly
intrigued by what the duo have come up with.

“Currently, in the
World of Eternia certain things like gun powder are absent. Since gun
powder WAS used by the Chinese for fireworks, explosives, and
whatnot, we could credibly introduce gun powder into the game and
make ancillary devices like guns and bombs available to our players,”
Victoria explains.

“If the tournament
comes down to players swinging swords at each other, we are going to
lose due to the simple fact that EDE’s champions will have
extensive experience in using the virtual reality equipment in
hand-to-hand combat encounters. To neutralize this advantage, our
champions need something that is simple to use; we believe that guns
and bombs are the most elegant and simplistic means to fight back,”
she continues.

“In other words, our
players will take pot shots at the other side while avoiding melee
counters. I like it,” the CEO nods in approval. “What about
magic? What kind of spells have you come up with?” he asks.

“This is where it
gets tricky,” Lisa begins. “Eternian magic is divided into two
spheres: the divine and the elemental. Supposedly there are no Gods
in the We Tang Kingdom, where the tournament will take place. So
there is a good chance that Eternians won’t be able to cast divine
spells during the tournament.”

“I highly doubt
that,” Charles interrupts with a wave of his hand. “I don’t
think Richard will allow his players to be restricted in this way,
especially with his ownership interest in his company at stake here.
Let us proceed with the assumption that EDE will get around the
restriction somehow, and their champions will obtain unfettered
access to divine spells. What else,” he presses the duo to
continue.

“The Asian culture
believes in spirits, ghosts, possession, and fortune telling. We plan
to introduce Asian-type of magic based on these ideas,” Lisa
replies.

“What does that mean
exactly?” the CEO presses further.

“What it means is
that we can have spirit whisperers summoning up minions to attack on
our behalf and add to our numbers. Also, imagine if Eternians lose
control of their avatars while in the middle of a sword fight, and
fail to block lethal blows. What it means is unpredictable ways to
turn the tide of war in our favor if we start losing badly,”
Victoria answers.

“I like that
approach,” Charles replies with a smile of relief.
Depending
on the execution of the players, we can actually win this thing.
“Priscilla, do we have our fifty men yet?” he asks.

“Yes we do. In
addition to the ten players from The Returned guild, we have an
additional fifteen players who were banned from World of Eternia, and
would like to pay them back. The remaining twenty-five will be paid
mercenaries as well as employees from our company including myself,”
the secretary answers.

“Are you certain
these mercs will stay loyal to us during the event? They won’t turn
their loyalty over to the other side?” the CEO looks at Priscilla
with skepticism. “I wouldn’t put it past Richard to plant players
pretending to play on our side, and then turn coat during the
tournament.”

“I will personally
keep an eye on them; that is part of the reason why I will
participate in this tournament and taking some VG employees along.
Moreover, these mercenaries only interested in monetary
compensation,” the coordinator reassures him. “If I can get your
permission to offer them generous bonuses for winning the event, we
will be assured of their complete loyalties to us,” Priscilla
continues.

Charles scowls at the
thought of spending even more money to buy off these players. “Fine,”
he sighs aloud.
What are another
few thousand bucks when my ownership in VG is at stake?

The platinum blonde
woman smiles at her boyfriend to cheer him up. “Continuing on, we
will need to overnight the new virtual reality equipment to our
representatives though, since none of them have it,” Priscilla
notes.

“Considering that the
2.0 gear is supposed to be released in conjunction with the Oriental
Expansion, only company insiders like The Strangers would have access
to it,” Charles notes. “But do make sure we get our stuff from
EDE, and if you have to badger their project manager then do it. His
name is Mark, right?” he asks.

“Mark Whitney,”
Lisa answers.

“His surname is
Whitney?” the CEO repeats in surprise.
I
wonder if this guy is related to our Chairman,
he ponders
worriedly. Pushing the thought aside, Charles looks over at Peter.
“Any luck reaching the Digital Bandit and getting him to offer us
his services?”

“Yes and no,” the
security officer replies. “We have managed to reach an intermediary
of this hacker, but it appears he remains non-committal to assisting
us.”

Charles chuckles at the
hacker’s reluctance. “I suppose the Digital Bandit thinks this is
a trap to catch him, considering all the times he had shut down our
servers and made us lose a ton of revenue as a result,” he
surmises. “Well, explain to our friend that we are willing to
overlook his past mischief if he is willing to come to bat for us in
this upcoming tournament. Also, make sure to point out that this
event will be streamed live to a worldwide audience,” he points
out.

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.

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.

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.