The Alterra Project

The truth of the Alterra Project was only shared to the Diamond-Tier players at this point so they were constantly monitoring all of those players. In order to prevent the spread of information in case one of the Diamond-Tier players leaked it, each Diamond-Tier player would have very restricted access to return to the Virtual World they were raised in. To explain their long absences, Alterra Corporation used the excuse of hiring those for a secret project that required them to be disconnected from friends and family.

Gray was not very worried about being unable to see his friends as all of them were gamers so they would definitely be joining the other players of Alterra Online. As for everyone's family, this was a bit of a tricky situation since everybody's parents from the virtual world were not the same as their biological parents.

Major Valen summed the family situation up pretty well by saying "Just think of it as everyone is adopted and only you lot know that." Everyone had to go along with this as they really couldn't think of a better way to put it.

Major Valen finally said "Okay, listen up soldiers! You will be the guides for the new players, to make your lives easier, you will be given the ability to create faction based missions based upon your rank. No, you can't do it for free, it will cost you merits to create a mission. If the player or group of players complete the mission, you will be refunded the merits and earn half as much more. The players taking your mission will split the merits you used to create the mission."

"What if they fail the mission?" Geoff asked

"Then you've wasted merits! However, if the system deems the mission impossible to finish for a reason outside of the player's control, the merits will be refunded."

"What's to stop us from giving each other quests? And what if we create a quest for killing someone?" asked Gray.

"First, you can give each other quests. Second, remember that the system is still monitored so it can reject your quest if it doesn't deem it valuable. We're not going to reward a player for stepping on a bug for example!"

"So… killing someone IS okay then?" asked Stacia hesitantly.

"Of course, this is a war, but remember your quest can and will be rejected if it doesn't benefit the Alterran Alliance." said Major Valen.

"What system will be judging our missions as valuable or not?" asked Caleb

"Several elder statesmen will devote their lives 24 hours a day to reviewing every single quest one at a time!" said Major Valen

"That… that seems wasteful… and slow…" said Geoff

"Of course it is! This is the 22nd century! We use AI to monitor the quests not some old fogeys in front of a bunch of computer screens!" said Major Valen while grinning at Geoff.

Gray opened up his HUD again and went to the 'Missions' section again. A new button appeared on Gray's HUD as "Create Mission" and decided to press it. A request form of sorts popped up, it allowed Gray to delegate a player to receive his mission or post it publically, set a mission description, designate mission category, and even try some extra options.

Gray inspected the extra options and thought to himself "Require Briefing, Time Limited, and Efficiency Bonus… Those sound fairly self-explanatory."

Gray figured the 'Require Briefing' meant that the mission giver had to give a direct briefing to the mission takers, 'Time Limited' meant that you had to complete it within a set time limit, and 'Efficiency Bonus' meant that if you completed the mission much faster than expected you could get a bonus.

"Ok, not to ask the dumb question but…" Gray hesitated for a moment remembering that Major Valen didn't hesitate to break a clipboard over his head last time he asked a dumb question but he felt it was worth risking "… why should we give missions to other players?"

Gray immediately ducked behind Geoff thinking he was about to get hit with something, surprisingly Major Valen answered normally. "Everyone in the Alliance is on the same side, thus it is more beneficial for everyone to get stronger together instead of just a small group of people. Also, for missions the military creates everyone will be assigned a mech unless they are given permission from a Lieutenant Colonel or above to use their own so even if players slack off they will not be left without one."

"Nice, so I want everyone in this room to help me and give me fast easy missions so I can collect as many mechs as possible!" said Geoff with a grin.

Major Valen walked over to Geoff and smashed a clipboard over his head causing Geoff to wince with pain and rub his head, nobody seemed to really notice as they were kind of hoping that would happen.

"Players are only able to purchase two separate mechs for themselves. Once they purchase that third mech, they will have to trade in one of their other ones. We only have so many resources and with 24,326 players joining the military, we would run out of resources if so many players tried to horde dozens of mechs!"

This seemed like a valid point as it seemed difficult enough to just maintain a few mechs, Gray could hardly imagine fielding and servicing them by the thousands.

"Lastly, the Eurasian Treaty expires September 1st, for those of you that don't know, today is July 25th 2121, exactly as it was in the virtual world. With 70 years of peace, we can expect the Hegemony to be ready to go September 1st so we need to make sure the players are ready by then!" said Major Valen

"Why didn't we start training everyone earlier? It makes more sense to train soldiers for longer, right?" asked Gray.

"We did at first, but pilotable mechs were not developed until 2160, we had remote ones but it was too difficult to not only maintain the signal in combat, but the pilots lost around half of their effectiveness due to signal lag and lack of reflexes." Major Valen glanced at the time and then finished by saying "Alright, the players will be joining us in 30 minutes, follow me."

Major Valen left the classroom with the other Diamond-tier 'players' behind him. He took them to a previously cordoned off building and said "This will be your private rec room. You are only allowed 3 guests each at once and you will be charged 5 merits to bring guests in."

"That seems expensive… why are you charging us for a simple rec room?" asked Gray.

"Take a look for yourself…" said Major Valen with a big grin on his face.

Gray and the other Diamond-Tier players walked into the rec room while Major Valen was motioning for them to enter. Immediately everyone's mouth opened in surprise as they gazed around.

"Calling this a mere rec room…" said Caleb while shaking his head.

What had originally appeared to be a small single-story office building was actually a high-end recreation facility. From the entrance one would actually go down a wide flight of stairs into a much more expansive area than what one expected. On one side there was a reception desk and a few shelves with towels on them.

"This is a sauna obviously, now only 2 rooms exist, one for men, and one for women." Said Major Valen

"What if I identify as an attack helicopter?" Geoff said with a grin

Geoff was once again greeted by a clipboard being broken over the back of his head. Nobody seemed to care, but Gray was curious as to where Major Valen kept that clipboard since he wasn't carrying it before.

"This is the modern age, we don't raise entitled wimps and prissy babies that get to be offended and have their way! You are either packing heat or packing meat!" barked Major Valen

Everyone looked at each other and then Geoff whispered to Gray "Does he know none of us understand what he just said?"

"I don't think it matters because nobody is dumb enough to question him about it." Gray whispered back.

On the opposite side of the sauna was a few vintage arcade booths and a lounge area. It was fairly sparse Gray thought as it only had 4 games, but at least the lounge area had plenty of comfy furniture.

"Why does it seem like the arcade is kind of sparse?" asked Gray

"You are grown a.s.s a.d.u.l.ts, you can request more and purchase them on your own with merits. The military is not going to supply you with everything unless it is related to serving the Alterran Alliance!" said Major Valen.

Thinking about it that way, it sort of did make sense, even setting up this rec room… no, setting up this entertainment facility was above and beyond what any soldiers or pilots would be given.

Finally against the back wall they had a traditional bar with several stools lined up neatly next to the bar. A large projector was placed to give everyone at the bar a view of whatever was being displayed, currently it was playing some random sports channel playing a ball game with a gun that had a curved scoop on the other end nobody recognized.

"That looks kinda interesting, I'll ask about it later." Gray thought to himself as him and most of the other guys were watching it with keen interest.

The 3 girls giggled amongst themselves and Yurika added "Sports at a bar and they're like moths to a flame…"

Major Valen clapped his hands loudly and yelled "Alright boys and girls! Let's get to the medical lab and get ready to welcome the new players! Only a few minutes left!"