AN: I've looked over my notes. Since I made a decision to add a lot of things to this story that enhance the world and game mechanics, and did so earlier than I might have needed to when certain parts of the story are considered, I have decided to stretch the first season out to at least 12 story arcs instead of only 10.

This chapter starts arc 9. Of course not all 'arcs' are coherent beginning-to-end things. They are pretty much lots of 5 chapters that mostly interact with each other and carry the story further. So, instead of stopping somewhere around 45-50, we'll have closer to 55-60 chapters. This gives the story a little more breathing room. If I get to that point and I need another story arc or two to finish things, well it will just go longer won't it? :)

This will keep the ending from being more like a sudden train wreck instead of something that is led up to over time. Basically, this just means that I won't be ending the first season this year. So, expect a few more months of steady-ish updates before this story goes on its lengthy hiatus for the heavy rewrites that it needs.

Chapter 41.1: You're Welcome, Humanity

The merry sounds of a foursome at dinner filled the room. Scott and his comrades were in the midst of a meal as they discussed the business of the day. The faction had started to take shape and would soon be in a position to run without their constant oversight. Without the need to micromanage, they would be free to hunt and train as they desired.

However, not everything was a simple. Scott spoke up and brought something to the attention to the girls that had nagged at him since he had awoken.

"What?" asked Shara. She stopped trying to eat pudding with her chopsticks and asked looked to Scott for answers.

Scott shook his head and made a dismissive gesture. "I had not thought anything about it before I fell into my dragon sleep, but I had skill points. I had a lot of them."

"Well, you did gain a few levels didn't you?" asked Ashton.

"That's it. When we died we lost all of those points, right?" asked Scott rhetorically. He already knew the answer.

"Right." said Shara. "I haven't checked mine in a while since I feel like I might scream a little if I look at my status screen."

"I should have had around twenty-to-thirty skill points after gaining those levels and increasing my skill levels a bit. I had nearly ninety." he said.

"Was it because you grew?" asked Sonja curiously. She had not died during the home invasion, so she had no real reference for the issue that they were discussing. Normally, back in the dream world people died and stayed that way unless someone resurrected them or some automatic resurrection action happened. That was considered penalty enough.

Scott frowned slightly then shook his head. "I might have thought that myself, but I checked my status before I fell asleep. I had a bunch of skill points. Even then the number felt wrong. I was too sleepy to care, though."

"Wrong how?" asked Shara. "Be specific."

"Well, now that I think about it, I had sixty-two skill points when I should have had half that many at most. I've thought about it, and that's about as many skill points as I lost when I lost my life." said Scott.

"Wait. Are you implying that you got your lost skill points back?" Shara saw Scott's expression after she asked her question then immediately opened her status menu. She read over the invisible information for a moment then nodded.

"I see! This is disturbing."

"It is even stranger. When I woke up I had about twenty-five more skill points, I think. That would be about what I would have earned plus my lost skill points from my death."

"Hold on! Let me go ask about this. It seems like you went to sleep during a major update, and just saw visual proof of a major system change." said Shara. She muttered heavily under her breath for a moment then placed her head down on the table atop her crossed arms. Soon she began to snore softly. She had performed a partial log-out to seek answers.

Ashton made a thoughtful noise. "I don't pay that much attention to my skill points unless I need a new skill. They almost seem superfluous."

"Yeah, the system isn't the best. Though, those points do become harder to come by at some point." said Scott.

"You'll stop receiving them from increasing your level altogether at level forty. They decrease at level twenty and thirty." said Sonja before she lifted her cup of hot chocolate to her lips.

"That's right. You told me something like that before." said Scott. He looked to Sonja. "You did say that we would keep gaining skill points by leveling out skills though, right?"

Sonja shrugged. "Who knows? That's how things have always been as far as I know, but a lot of things are changing."

It did not take long for Shara to return. Her head popped up and she bore an annoyed expression. "Those jerks! They did not even send me so much as a courtesy message to tell me they changed the death penalty system again!" She growled loudly then slammed her fists down on the table. "It's like they are deliberately leaving me out of the loop."

"They changed it again?" asked Scott. "Are you serious?"

"Yeah." said Shara before she shook her head. "They changed their mind about the penalty. When you die, things are different now."

"How so?" asked Ashton.

"The idiots in charge of the project decided that there were too many tokens in the world. They decided that the best way to reduce their number was to make the people who died spend multiple tokens to reduce their death penalties."

"That's... That is asinine bullshit!" exclaimed Ashton. "Tokens aren't that easy to get in the first place. Only a few people even have more than a handful."

"What's the new penalty?" asked Scott. He fought off the annoyed sigh that threatened to escape his lips. It was always something with those bastards. He'd love to punch them in the mouth someday.

"Hold on. I convinced them to share the new system via a system message. It will come through soon." said Shara. She then pursed her lips then muttered, "They should have done that anyway."

Scott started to ask her for further information, but a crystalline blue-screen popped up in front of him. He looked at it and saw that it contained the information that Shara had wanted to impart to them.

[System Update Message]

Greetings mortals. We have determined that there are too many tokens in the world. Such a thing makes death seem trivial. We had originally intended the token generation system to be used as a stop gap measure so that you had a better chance to survive until the final update and the system was set. However, we overdid it. Sorry.

As such, we have determined that death should have more meaning. We know this will seem arbitrary and a little cruel. However, it is for the best. Death is not something that should be trivialized since we know that you do think it to be a terrible thing. We have changed the death penalties to reflect this truth. You are welcome, humanity. There is no thanks needed.

From now on there will be several heavy penalties for death. The number of tokens that you spend before resurrection will determine how many of those penalties apply.

Here is a list of the new death penalties that will apply to everyone.

- You will resurrect at a random location somewhere on the planet, or in the dream world. This depends on where you die. The random location will be a holy site.

- You will lose a level, and temporarily lose [10%] of all attributes. This loss of attributes will end after twenty-four hours unless you die for a second time. If a second death occurs, you will permanently lose those attribute points.

- You will be completely unable to increase your character or skill levels for one Earth week.

- You will leave a corpse behind. All of your worn or carried items will be left behind with the corpse. There is no system protection. Anyone can take your items or corpse for their own purposes.

- You will lose [4] attribute points per character level. The total loss of points will be spread randomly among your attributes. A single attribute can lose multiple points. These points will not be restored after twenty-four hours.

- You will lose all skill points that have not been spent.

- You will lose ten skill levels per character level. Each skill that loses a level will be randomly selected. A single skill may lose multiple levels upon death. There is no limit. It is entirely possible to have a skill reset completely to level one. However, you will not lose knowledge of the skill itself.

- You will suffer resurrection amnesia. For a period of one Earth week you will remember only function skills and your own name. You will not remember much of anything else.

[Token Purchase]

[1] Token = resurrection with all death penalties.

[2] Tokens = Pick a death penalty that you wish to avoid.

[3] Tokens = Pick [4] death penalties that you wish to avoid.

[4] Tokens = Resurrect without any death penalties.

Note: If you spend [4] tokens to resurrect, you will be resurrected at the site of your death or a nearby holy site if you wish, and in your original body. This will happen after twenty-four hours, and no one will be able to steal your items or your corpse. If you are part of a faction, you may resurrect at your faction resurrection point.

[--]

Scott started to say something once more, but another screen popped up. He blinked when he read it.

[System Message Addendum]

In the spirit of general fairness, we have opted to take away all of the current tokens and redistribute them evenly across the planet. Every currently living mortal tied to Earth in some way will receive [4] tokens in place of whatever number of tokens that they currently possess. This effectively grants each of you a single free resurrection.

Once again, there is no need to thank us for our generosity. You're welcome, humanity.

[--]

"Wow, they are serious about this..." said Shara.

Sonja tilted her head to the side then nodded. "I see. That included me."

"You received tokens?" asked Scott hopefully.

Sonja nodded. "Yes. I have four of them now."

"We are going to need to earn a lot more of them before they cut off access in a few months." said Shara.

"You said that they were going to let things continued for a year or so?" asked Scott.

"Three months. When I asked about the skill point issue, I was told that they opted to push everything forward and set a definite date. In three Earth months, well slightly less, the dream world will be cut off. Everyone on Earth will have to stay on Earth. Those in the dream world will remain there."

"Damn, that's..." said Scott, his voice trailing off. "We need to let everyone know. They have to make decisions about where they want to live."

"A lot of decisions need to be made." said Ashton. She looked to Shara. "What about the castle on the dream world?"

"Cut off means cut off." said Shara.

Scott frowned then released an annoyed snort. "It would be pointless to do more than the minimum to get the castle into good repair then... The people there deserve to have a decent place to live. I promised them that much."

"True. I had thought that they would have at least allowed for node transfers, but it seems as though they do not wish to allow any access to the dream." said Shara.

A nod of his head was Scott's first response. The girls discussed the situation between themselves for a moment while he collected his thoughts. When he spoke, it was to say, "In three months, will this be over?"

"Over?" asked Shara.

"The changes to the system, the bullshit. Will everything be set?" asked Scott.

"Yeah, there might be a few minor tweaks here and there but the system itself should be permanently in place." said Shara. "At the very least, if they go live they will have to report it to the city. Any serious changes to the system have to be authorized by an arbiter after that."

Shara gazed intently into Scott's eyes. "Arbiter's don't allow worlds to be screwed over if they have any authority in the situation. None of them would allow this sort of thing to continue if the system is reported to be live."

"What sort of things would they allow?" asked Sonja.

The ninja goddess turned to her blond friend. "Minor things. Tweaks to the system like where you can save your status, or how economic things like the value of money. Major system changes have to go through several committee reviews."

Shara took a breath then slowly released it before continuing. "Most aren't allowed. Something like a massive sweeping change to the death and reincarnation system would never fly as a single action if this world were considered to be live."

Scott nodded once more then drummed his fingers on the table. "We can't trust the game system. We'll have to do our best to develop our own system of doing things."

"Such as?" asked Ashton.

"I had thought to share tokens through the faction item sharing system. Especially, pooling them to allow Shara to do things for us that only she can do." said Scott. He looked Ashton in the eyes. "We can't even trust that. If we had done that earlier, all of the gathered tokens would have been stolen and redistributed to the masses."

Ashton frowned darkly. "As a capitalist, that offended me to the core."

Scott snorted then allowed her a brief smile. Leave it to her to think of it from a monetary perspective. Forced wealth redistribution was something she was staunchly against, as a burgeoning merchant. "Me too, but what I am getting at is the fact that we'll need to hold onto our own tokens until the exact moment we intend to pool them together to get something to happen."

"Good idea." said Shara. "Keeping a bank of tokens as part of the faction is something we are supposed to be able to do, but I don't trust the committee heads. They hide things from me, and change things too often."

"Right, exactly." said Scott.

A short moment of silence passed after that. The foursome considered the situation quietly. Eventually, Scott looked to Sonja. "In three months you won't have the ability to return home."

She smiled at him then reached over and placed her hand atop his. "I'm already there."

"That's so sweet." said Shara, her eyes shining softly as she witnessed the tender moment.

Ashton smiled slightly, but she was a little annoyed by the public display of affection. It was not her hand after all.

"One of our priorities will be to get you to your homeland." said Scott to Sonja.

"Thank you. I will see if my family wishes to immigrate to this world." she said with a warm smile. "We do need to increase your ability first, though."

"Yeah, I'm a weak little guy. I mean, I'm only the size of a freaking bus..." said Scott with a short barking laugh. Currently he was the size of an ordinary man, but everyone knew his meaning. His laugh was joined by the laughter of the others. The world had just become a lot more dangerous, but in that little common room near the top of an apartment building, there was still joy to be had.

**