Week 2:

Pete and Jack sighed expressively. Since learning about the gift of Accessors they were about to receive, the two had been trying to find tidbits of information about what was coming. But as usual the Koreans knew how to keep a tight lip. Eventually Jack had given up and resigned himself to study for finals.

Now the two boys were in Jack’s room, Jack at his desk studying and Pete reclining in his beanbag and still trying to dig up more information. Pete continued to scroll through forums until he suddenly stiffened.

“Jack!”

“……….”

“jaaaacckkk”

“……….”

“JACK!”

“Dude what the hell do you want! I’m trying to study!”

“Look at this!”

Jack whirled around in his office chair and grabbed Pete’s laptop. The page on the screen was from a business website. The header read: RUMOR CONFIRMED! HAPTIX AND UNICORN MERGER CONFIRMED. Jack was silent for a moment.

“What the fuck!”

“I know right?”

“I thought Unicorn was just expanding the range of platforms. But this… it’s almost like they’re trying to become the Google of games!”

“That’s kind of scary when you think about it.”

“Yeah…”

“Doesn’t Uncle Albert own shares in both?”

“I know what you’re thinking, but we can’t. He probably isn’t allowed to reveal whatever he knows.”

“Fine.”

Pete looked a little disgruntled but left it at that. Jack tried to go back to studying, but he was all amped up now because of the news.

“Finals start for you next week, don’t they.”

“Yeah….”

“Good luck.”

Pete had a little mischievous smile on his face as he left Jack’s room. Jack pounded his head into the desk; there was no way he could concentrate.

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It was Wednesday now. The three siblings were sitting around the TV again. They were refreshing the page for Amazon’s online store from the TV. On Monday an E-book of the new Royal Road had been released. By nighttime, the Amazon site had crashed due to the high volume of customers. Similar events occurred to similar sites as well. It was announced that on Wednesday the site would be back online. That was how the three of them were spending their springtime afternoon, refreshing one page so they could buy and download the guide.

They would’ve stayed like that if their father hadn’t come up stairs to threaten them with cleaning the entire house if they didn’t go out and do something. While their parents gave them a lot of leeway, they were pretty adamant about their kids getting plenty of sunshine.

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It wasn’t until Friday that they were finally able to download the book. They were just about to begin devouring its contents when Jack’s phone started ringing. The caller was his friend.

“What’s up Matt?”

“Dude! They’re announcing the contribution awards today for the Final Adventure!”

“Seriously!?”

“Yeah! The break down is on Unicorn’s website!”

“Alright I’ll check.”

Jack grabbed the TV controller from the couch and switched the page from the newly downloaded E-book to Unicorn’s main page.

There on the front, was the break down.

No Participation – 2% EXP boost

Participated/ died – 5%-20% EXP boost

Participated/disconnected – 8%-25% EXP boost

Top 100 – 40% EXP boost + owned item

Final 5 – 50% EXP boost + owned item + special ability

All boosts last 1 month

There was a link for more information but Jack understood the gist of it. People that were forced to log off got a higher boost because it was assumed they would’ve lasted longer. A prized item from their former character would be advantageous for game start and seemed fitting. But what he didn’t get was the special ability, he had already assumed Weed was exempted from this list. It would likely be something that could change the battlefield, it almost seemed a little unfair but then again the final 5 had done something amazing to get there. He tossed the controller on the couch and left for his room.

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