Arcadian Live

Laughter echoes throughout the stadium as many of the viewers within the audience watch Wolf continuously fail to correctly answer question after question after question before finally shouting, “How the hell am I supposed to the know the damn answers to these questions!”

Mikaela chuckles at this whilst attempting to cover his mouth as he says, “Don’t know what to tell ya there. Just keep on guessin!”

Several of the other commentators begin chuckling at his statement before once again focusing on their own screens. However, just seconds later, everyone’s attention is drawn towards the middle of the stadium below the forerunner screen as a new screen appears. The screen has a unique frame that is a mixture of golds and blues, with the corners of the screen looking like real waves that would be found in an ocean.

As soon as the commentators see the man staring directly into the screen, they all begin to kneel in midair with their heads bowed before shouting, “Chairman!”

After that, silence fills the stadium as all of the conversations throughout it begin to dribble down to nothing. Meanwhile, almost every head within the stadium turns to look at the man on the screen. The man has blue skin, with gills visible on his neck, underneath the robe he has on. Occasionally, when he turns enough, one can even see a large, shark-like fin on his back.

“I am Arianais Keiran, the current ruling Chairman of the Arcadian Magic Association, and the owner of this viewing room,” the man says, his voice sounding slightly ruggish from speaking outside of water. “I am here to make an announcement.”

All of the commentators – including Mikaela – keep their head bowed as they intently listen to the water harbinger.

“As of three hours ago, the Council of the Arcadian Magic Association has come to an agreement,” Arianais continues without expressing much emotion on his face, “and we are declaring The Winter Wolf’s family as under our protection from any System faction originating outside of the new planet, Aegis.”

At this point, Arianais finally begins to express some emotion as a cold look crosses his face, “And attacking them will be the same as attacking us.”

Then, just as quickly as the look had appeared, Arianais’s face returns to his previous emotionless look before he nods his head towards the screen and the screen vanishes completely, leaving the stadium in complete silence.

No one says anything for several seconds before the stadium erupts into chaos, with millions of people all trying to talk over each other at once. Meanwhile, the commentators all finally begin to leave their kneeling positions whilst giving each other complicated looks.

The only person amongst the commentators not showing any surprise at the announcement is Mikaela as he looks around the stadium with a frown.

‘I wish he didn’t have to use the show to make that announcement,’ he thinks before turning his head to look at the forerunner screen right as Wolf manages to guess an answer correctly, causing all of the lights within the room he is in to turn green for a second before returning to their previous color, ‘although, it’s not like I can stop him from doing anything. And especially not since the rest of the council would probably agree that using the show is the best way to get the announcement out there…’

Mikaela shakes his head to get his thoughts back on track before the chaos within the stadium grows any further.

Executive Stream

“I guess that finally answers our question,” Diane mutters as she reads through a thread post on the System Forums about Arianais’s recent announcement. “At least we won’t have to worry about his family as much now.”

Leo nods his head without taking his eyes off of Ruth’s screen before saying, “Now we just have to worry about the Abyssal Ruler – who shouldn’t be much of a problem for a little while – and those damned fanatics.”

A frown crosses Diane’s face at the thought of the Reaper cults. “They better stay away from his family if they know what’s good for them.”

“I don’t know,” Leo says, finally taking his eyes off of Ruth’s screen as she finishes a mini boss fight on the thirty-sixth floor, “from what I’ve heard, some of them are already beginning to suspect Wolf of being a reaper.”

The frown on Diane’s face turns into an exasperated look as she puts her face into her hands and groans. “There better not be ice reaper cults on Aegis when Wolf finally leaves the dungeon and heads there…”

Leo doesn’t say anything as he turns to look at Ruth’s screen again whilst thinking, ‘Yeah, that’s probably going to happen.’

When Diane looks up again, her frown returns to her face and she mutters, “Why is Wolf’s screen black? I thought he was in the middle of that qui… Oh.”

The draugr turns to look at Wolf’s screen as well before he calmly states, “The quiz is probably asking a censored question right now.”

“Yeah,” Diane says, leaning back against the backrest of the sofa, “makes me wonder which subject it’s about…”

Wolf

“Why does the Administrator Dungeon exist? Select the answer choice that matches the correct answer.”

This last question makes me raise my brows out of curiosity.

Interesting…

I couldn’t find anything about why the Administrator Dungeon exists on the System Forums, so I’m kind of surprised it’s willing to ask the question whilst livestreaming.

When I look at the answer choices, I pause slightly in surprise.

There’s only two?

Huh?

The left answer choice, colored in green, is, “The Administrator Dungeon exists to give the newly initiated galaxies powerful representatives in the System without any bias, while also introducing them to the inhabitants of the System.”

Uh, that answer… I mean, it doesn’t feel wrong per se, but there are still a lot of… issues… with it…

Right as I’m about to read the other answer choice, I pause.

Why isn’t the robotic voice saying anything about a time limit this time?

I look around the room in confusion before focusing on the other answer choice again with a frown. This one is a little...

“The Administrator Dungeon exists to ruin the lives of one thousand random individuals of the Initializations before killing them all off.”

Yeah, while it does do that, I certainly hope that isn’t the point of the dungeon… Otherwise, why am I even here? To be killed off?

No thank you.

I select the first answer choice, to which makes the anchor’s screen turn green, signifying my answer as correct.

So that’s the purpose of the Administrator Dungeons… to give us a representative in the System. And the livestream is to introduce the representatives to the System inhabitants.

Although, the System certainly goes about it in a very rough way… considering the abysmal survival rate of Administrator Dungeon Competitors…

Then again, most of the Administrators are rulers of their own factions, so I guess it does deserve some credit…

Let’s see, there’s Diane and Leo, of course, who are both Administrators and leaders of their own factions. There’s also the Ruler, Arianais, and even most of the Ascendants from The Ascendancy.

My thoughts are interrupted as my platform finally moves the last of the way towards the other side of the room and stops once it touches the edge of the pit.

I look around for a few seconds before dissipating the wall of ice that – despite the major beating it’s been taking – is still in perfect condition and moving on through towards the anchor. The creature – if I can really call it that – just continues to sit completely still doing absolutely nothing.

The thought of the constant laser beams it fired at me throughout the quiz makes my eye twitch as I reach out to touch it. Surprisingly, even after being touched, the thing still doesn’t do anything.

So, I manipulate my ice element to freeze the entire thing solid before slowly forcing my ice to squeeze it until loud noises akin to bending metal begin to sound out from it. After several seconds of this, a chime echoes in my head, signaling the thing’s death.

I simple nod my head towards the remains of the anchor before walking around it towards the large door, which opens once I touch the mini boss chest and grab the crappy item that comes out to reveal the floor’s exit behind it.