Immortal Ascension Pavillion
What used to be one of the top three merchant group and also a cultivation sect in the immortal realm is now on the verge of demise. Due to the betrayal one of the sect leader's main disciple, the conspiracy cooked up by their rivals have led to the death of the Immortal Ascension Pavillion sect leader and it's two grand elders.
While the last grand elder managed to escape back to the sect, he knew well enough that he will never be able to recover to his peak due to overdrawing his foundation with a forbidden technique while escaping back to the sect.
In the world of cultivation, wealth is a sin when there is insufficient strength to protect it. Given the vast amount of wealth accumulated by Immortal Ascension Pavillion over the generations, the surviving grand elder knew that the worse to beset the sect has yet to arrive. He immediately issue an emergency order for the return of all disciples and closure of all branches that are spread across the cultivation worlds. To protect those returning disciples, the grand elder has even issued the extreme order of gifting off the wealth accumulated at each branch to the local hegemon less they get targeted for the wealth they may carry. The sect could no longer protect them from the greed of any cultivators with evil intention. Hopefully, the wealth at the branch is sufficient bribe to allow its disciples a safe passage back to the sect.
With Immortal Ascension Pavillion rivals spreading the news of the deaths of it's sect leader and grand elders leading to the sect's day being limited and will soon face destruction, only a minority of disciples that remained loyal have managed to return. The majority of the disciples that failed to return have either betrayed Immortal Ascension Pavillion when it became apparent that the sect is now a sinking ship or killed by old time rivals to cut off the root of the sect.
After the Immortal Ascension Pavillion announced that they will be closing their door, almost everyone in the immortal world thought that the sect's destruction would soon follow as rivals and even Immortal Ascension Pavillion past allies set aside their past differences to swallow up the wealth accumulated by the sect. Rumours has it the sect wealth could rival the combined wealth of any five of the most powerful sects in the cultivation world. However, Immortal Ascension Pavillion survived the combined assault.
When the sect was first established, one of the founding ancestor's secret directives to the succeeding sect leaders to follow is to continuously strengthen the sect protecting array. With generations of sect leaders piling up resources reinforcing the array, it has now become such an impregnable fortress that none of Immortal Ascension Pavillion enemies are willing to pay the butcher's bill to break the sect array.
Ultimately, the alliance against Immortal Ascension Pavillion is one of convenience and every participant knew that they will become next Immortal Ascension Pavillion facing demise if they ever ended up hurting their foundation. With no feasible way to break the Immortal Ascension Pavillion sect protecting array, the alliance decides to go for the long haul. Since Immortal Ascension Pavillion has closed itself off and turtle up, the alliance will just have to starve it to death by denying them the possibility of ever replenishing their talent pool. It will be a prolong siege warfare until the very last of Immortal Ascension Pavillion disciples die of old age. Though labelled immortals, even cultivators can't live forever albeit having a significantly longer lifespan than mortals.
*****
Alexander Smith
A close beta invitation?
In a city in the west coast of the American continent, a software engineer is checking his e-mail before leaving for work. Such invitation usually goes to those who actively applied for the role or ended up sent to popular professional gamers or online reviewers. It is rare for such invitation going to a normal gamer such as himself.
Given the out of norm invitation, the game is most likely by a small no name studio. Alex interest was piqued as he read through the e-mail invitation. It was a VR MMORPG game combining both eastern and western fantasy elements. Any MMORPG worth their name are usually the production of huge game studio and the chances of one produced by a small studio ever exploding in popularity and gain success is quite slim. The game studio, Immortal Ascension Studio claims the game will be testing ground breaking technologies and an innovative new game engine that only appears in popular LitRPG novels genre. Given the interesting introduction, Alex decided to sign up and left the computer running to download and install the game as he leaves for work. The game was surprisingly massive given that it was supposedly the work of a no name small studio.
When Alex log into the game at the end of the of his work day, he came to the all too familiar hall found in most online RPG games.
"Welcome to Immortals Online. Before embarking on your path towards immortality, please review the terms and conditions of becoming a disciple of Immortal Ascension Pavillion. If you consent to the terms and condition of the contract, place your hand print at the end of the scroll."
Without wasting time to read through the fine print, Alex went straight to the end of the scroll and signed his acknowledgement. The moment he did that, there was immediately a shift in perception as he found himself in what appears to be a medical capsule like those in science fiction movie.
The first thought that crossed Alex mind was holy sh*t! Is this the legendary full immersion technology found only in science fiction? How the hell did the game studio manage to pull this off in the first place? Some form of optical hypnotism? The surroundings and sensation are so realistic that he could claimed that he had been teleported to a different world instead. Sh*t, I wouldn't get stuck in-game like those popular novel and anime storyline right?
When the thought of logging off cross his mind, a red warning screen popup with the following notice, "Please be warned that this is a highly realistic game. Ensure your character is in a safe environment before logging off. If your character's body ended up dead while you are logged off, your character will be revived back in the base medical capsule."
This game is definitely not the work of some small studio. The technology to achieve full immersion alone is ground breaking. Regardless of who is behind the game, the game is most definitely a multibillion-dollar investment or would soon be one. As a closed beta user, will he end up making a fortune playing online games like those protagonists in LitRPG novels?
Alex was still in half disbelief as he got off from the medical capsule and took in his surroundings. The hallway was filled up with a long line of medical capsules similar to the one he just got out from. The details are so realistic that there is no way to tell that he is actually within a game. The sensation from the air he breath in and stretching his muscle seems no different than in real life. Even the sense of pain seems to be fully emulated when he gave himself a light slap on the face.
While he is still adjusting to his new reality, a second screen popup instructing him to exit the hall. As Alex walked past the other medical capsules, he discovered that some of the capsules have a body within while others are empty.
Exiting the hall, Alex find himself in another great hall larger than the previous one he just came out from. While taking in the details, he hear someone on his left greeting him.
"Welcome new disciple to Immortal Ascension Pavillion. I am Hall Master Derrick and you will be under my supervision until you gain the qualification to become an outer sect disciple."
Alex can't help speaking out loud, "An NPC?"
Hall Master Derrick expression changes immediately as he severely reprimand Alex, "Please treat this game no different than real life. Your action and words will have consequences. Consider yourself fairly warned and suffer the consequences if you commit the same mistake again."
Alex is dumbfounded by the reprimand. A fully interactive AI? Does this mean all the NPCs in this game are fully sentient and will take offence if he spout nonsense?
"Now go to booth six for your new disciple's tutorial. Pay attention as you will not be able to repeat your tutorial a second time."
Surveying his surrounding again, Alex found booth six shortly and immediately head towards it. At the booth, Alex is met by a male disciple who greets him the moment he approaches the booth.
"Welcome junior. I am inner Disciple Yuri, your guide during this tutorial session. Please bear in mind that this is the one and only session where you will be able to use terms like NPC, the real world, virtual world, online games in front of other non-players without be penalized. To allow for absolute freedom in your gaming experience, Immortals Online uses an experimental next generation game engine. It will fully replicate all the law of physics and nature of the real world. Off course, since this a world where cultivation is possible, you will have to research and comprehend the additional law brought about due to the existence of mana, qi or spirit energy in your gaming term. If you get your basics right, you can even invent new spells, magic potion or create new magic tools that is not in our sect library."
"For starter, make sure you do not die. Although death is not permanent to players like you, it will still be a major inconvenience. You will lose all your cultivation level upon being revived and has to start anew. All items on you will also be lost when you die unless you are able to retrieve it. On this topic, it is highly recommended that you only log off in the base. If you absolutely need to log off elsewhere, make sure to find somewhere absolutely safe. Think of it as your character in a comatose state while you are log off and will be defenseless against any threat."
Since there will be no repeat, Alex ended up spending more than two hours to understand the game's rule and dynamics.