Polaris Dark - Arc I Epilogue

Eight Days Later...

Real Emotion Inc. Main Building - Developer's Lounge

"You know, developing the professions system in Ascendancy was one of the more difficult projects we had to implement."

A young, blonde haired woman uses her hand to brush a few stray strands of hair from her face. Her sparkling emerald green eyes continue to scan over in flux of data coming from the servers on her computer monitor.

She is currently taking a look at the number of professions acquired and the hidden ones that have been uncovered. Her four colleagues were working on debugging minor NPC algorithms that have cropped up for a while. Right now, they are resting while the simulations deal with the newly fixed codes.

Tapping her finger against the table, the blonde haired woman enlarges and changes the screen into a holographic display so that she does not have to focus on a small screen. Her co-workers turn to towards her when she spoke out, listening and watching the holographic display.

"Japan's continent is the most developed out of the twenty two continents in the world because of the head-start. So far, we have over thirty million players and most of them have basic professions like [Warrior], [Priest], and [Archer]. This is around twenty-two million of the players plus or minus a few hundred thousand..."

The woman does not finish her thoughts and brings up another holographic display instead. She then closes the other display before typing something on the holographic keyboard. This display shows the percentage of players in which Profession Rank niche. In this game, professions are separated into Basic, Prestige, Variant, Hybrid, Unique and Legacy.

The basic rank is like what the woman listed; basic professions that one can easily find. This also includes crafting professions that are common to both NPCs and Players.

The woman adjusts her statement to percent as well.

"It's 63.135% of the players that have the basic professions, with just less than a third of this population holding crafting professions are their main job in this game. The prestige professions like [Guard Captain], [Foreign Infantry] and [Demicus] are taken by 8.363% of the remaining players while 28.301% of them hold a variant or hybrid profession."

The prestige rank is basically awarded professions from nobility and royalty. These ranks bring with them prestige, fame and infamy to one's name, giving them more influence just by holding the profession.

Variant professions are typically basic rank professions with suffixes or prefixes attached to them. These include [Dark Knight], [Arch Druid] and [Mage Killer]. Some of them may not have one but are still considered to be variant rank professions like [Arbalester], [Hermit] and [Enchantress].

Hybrid professions are combination classes such as the [Paladin], [Spellsword] and [War Priest]. Where Paladin is cross-class [Knight] and [Priest] type professions, the [Spellsword] is technically a hybrid of [Mage] and [Swordsman] type professions. The difference between [Paladin] and [War Priest] is the latter is more advanced in healing and support abilities while the former is of a tank archetype for mainstream RPGs but have a few differences.

"The second last 0.197%, about sixty-eight thousand players, have unique professions. These are special professions that have powerful abilities and are the rarest among the profession ranks. Only the last 0.004%, 1397 players, have the Legacy ranking professions that are not only obscure to the point where even one of them being found can cause a stir in the gaming populations though over half of Legacy-holder players have not revealed themselves to the public."

Unique rank professions are given this rank due to their powerful abilities and rarity. These professions include the aforementioned [Eluvia] and [Gracewind] from Miyuki's reward when she completed the rather unique memory quest. [Velcanto], [Mastermind] and [Death's Watch] are also some of the unique professions available.

Legacy professions, on the other hand, are heroic title professions and may be famous unique professions that have a prestigious name attached to them from historical records. [Crimson Rose], [Dreadnought], [Emissary of Dawn] and [Sky Raider] are a few of the Legacy rank professions that are known.

"Rosalina-san," a short brown haired male co-worker says, "we know how important the distribution of professions in this game is. Why are you reiterating this in such a tone though? It's as if there is something troubling you."

"Arata-san," the blonde haired woman named Rosalina, "I am troubled by something..."

Rosalina types in something in the holographic keyboard and then brings up a single line on the screen before pointing to it.

Custom Profession: 1

At this, the room goes silent, staring at that single line that marks the beginning of a new and uncertain future...

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Hanakanmuri Girl's Academy - Female Dormitories: C-Wing

"Kyaaaaaaaaaa!"

A rather lovely, soft but panicked voice cries out.

*Crash!*

*Bam!*

A feminine voice with a higher-pitch sighs and calls out to the first one.

"Mou... Shizu-chan, why do you always trip over the carpet exactly?"

The higher-pitch, sing-song like feminine voice belongs to Nonomiya Kaori a student at Hanakanmuri Girl's Academy, otherwise known as Flower Crown Girl's Academy. Kaori is one of the top eight beauties in this school, voted by both Hanakanmuri Girl's Academy and its twin, Asagao (Morning Glory) Boy's Institute that is separated by the two walls surrounding both campuses.

"Ara... I'm sorry Kaori-chan.... You know that I am rather clumsy when I'm relaxed..."

The gentle, feminine tone that responds to Kaori belongs to Yamato Shizuka, Shizuka is also one of the top eight beauties of the two private schools. Where Kaori is more of the happy-go-lucky cute girl with her mid-length black hair tied into a side ponytail, Shizuka is the big-sister type with her gentle voice and features; her long black hair tied in a long pony. Both of them have dark brown eyes of the Japanese though Kaori's eyes are rounder and bigger. Shizuka's eyes are more natural and prominent, giving her a refined look to her face.

The two girls have just returned to their shared room in the female dormitories of the academy after half a day of swimming, sunbathing and relaxing at the swimming pool common to both academies. The two of them really turned heads at the pool by being there; both girls and boys looked at them with a variety of emotions. Some felt sensually allured by the two while others were envious because of their rare beauty and well-maintained bodies.

*Crack!*

*Pop!*

*Sizzzz*

"Ahhh... A soda after a nice swim is especially good!"

Kaori sighs in content after drinking from a Ramune soda bottle. After strenuously swimming laps with small relaxing breaks in between, soft drinks are soul-soothing and a nice cooling treat. Shizuka opens a bottle of Ramune as well and takes a small sip.

"Kaori-chan," Shizuka speaks out, "let's login to Ascendency after we finish the soda. It's been a while since we played this game due to the final exams."

"Right," Kaori answers, "we also have to check in with the guild as well."

Shizuka brushes her hair away from her face with her left hand before taking another sip of Ramune soda. She then walks to the room where the Full-Dive capsules are placed and hooked up. Setting up her personalized capsule, Shizuka checks over the machine as it starts booting up.

Shizuka's Full-Dive Capsule is like many others, but the outer skin design has her in game character , a beautiful Lana Elf with pale golden blonde hair and sparkling electric blue eyes. At 172.72cm (5'8"), the Lana Elf is the same height as Shizuka and is very voluptuous, drawing attention to others easily.

Next to this one is Kaori's personalized capsule. Kaori's capsule has her character imprinted on the machine skin design. is also a Lana Elf but has mid-length rose gold blonde hair and greyish-blue eyes. is 165.09cm (5'5") tall, the same as Kaori, and is very pretty in her own way.

After booting up her machine, Shizuka wanders over to the other capsule and does the same. She then strolls to where Kaori is and finishes her bottle of soda. Kaori is already done with her drink and is currently changing her clothes in the bedroom section of the dorm.

"Kaori-chan," Shizuka asks, "are you ready?"

"Yep! I'm also done changing. Put your soda away for later Shizu-chan and let's play!"

As always, Shizuka did not finish her soda, taking only a few sips from it. She nods and goes to the private kitchen, using a stopper to plug the opening to prevent the carbonation from escaping before placing it in the refrigerator. Shizuka then walks back to the Full-Dive Capsule room and finds Kaori already in the capsule.

"Mou... Kaori-chan, you didn't wait for me!"

Pouting, Shizuka carefully steps into her own capsules and lays down, getting herself comfortable before entering the system and opening the game.

"System, Login."

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Hanakanmuri Girl's Academy - Kyudo Range A

A gentle breeze blows across the almost vacant Kyudo Range. On the far side, there is a row of standard Kyudo targets as well as a separate section for other forms of archery. The targets are mostly new and clean, with only a single kyudo target being used. There are several arrows embedded in this particular target; all of the arrows are in the center, with none of them touching each other.

A lone figure with long, silky black hair can be seen at the starting position, facing the opposite end of the field. Holding an asymmetrical bow (Kyudo Yumi), the figure slowly moves her slender arms to the standard shooting position and aims at a target at the ninety-meter mark. A few seconds pass without any sound nor motion. Another few seconds pass before a clear "thunk" sound is heard. signalling the release of the arrow from the bow.

Moments later, the arrow strikes the center of the target without touching the outer edge of the central circle nor any of the other arrows already in the target. A while later, two more arrows follow, striking the central circle without touching each other.

The girl slowly returns to a standby position before relaxing. She walks off the starting point with the bow in hand before replacing it on the practice rack with several other bows. The girl brushes off the kyudo uniform she is wearing before heading to the change room and showers. Approximately forty minutes later, the girl walks out of the room wearing a rather elegant but comfortable school uniform.

The uniform itself is fairly standard and is in some ways similar to the high-school seifuku for girls. However, this one is customized and designed exclusively for Hanakanmuri Girl's Academy. The female uniform consists of a dress shirt, sleeveless vest, uniform jacket, skirt, socks and shoes.

The dress shirt is a pure, clean white with silver and gold threads on the edges. The dress shirt the girl is wearing is designed for females and so it has a larger chest-to-waist ratio and a larger waist-to-hip ratio. The vest is a deep, red sangria with golden embroidered edges and buttons. The outer uniform jacket's main color is a cherry red with garnet patches and the same golden embroidered edges as the vest. The buttons on the jacket is black with gold-plated sides.

The base color of the pleated, slightly above knee-length skirt is the same as the jacket. Instead of the garnet patches on the jacket, the skirt has a lighter ruby red color scheme. The ruby colored patches are bordered by the same golden embroidery, creating an elegant, rich feel to the skirt.

The socks that come with the uniform set is fairly standard but reaches just above the mid-line of the calves. With its pure white color and golden threads, the socks provide a nice touch to the lower body, complementing the soft brown Mary Jane-esque dress shoes.

The girl closes her eyes and then yawns quietly, covering her mouth with a small hand. Openning her cornflower blue eyes, she walks out of the kyudo range. Before walking away, the girl puts up a sign that says "Requires Cleaning Up" on the door to the range. There is a team of cleaners employed by the academy that does rounds at certain times; they will come over and clean-up the used field when they see the sign. Otherwise, the cleaners will just move on without entering the range.

The black-haired beauty stops walking for a moment to ponder a bit.

I wonder what I should today after going back to my room... My friends are busy right now and I have no other obligation to fulfill... ...ah, I think I'll go play Ascendency for a while. I can finally leave the starting city so there will be more quests available. I think I'll go exploring the world now that I am able to leave.

Deciding to go with this plan, the girl walks back to her dorm and closes down door behind her.

{{Non-Proof Read Version}}