Chapter 28: Royal Bastard

Finally, it was time for Apophis's party to disperse.

They exchanged contact information, both in and out of game, so they could contact each other in real life, then went their separate ways.

There were only a few hours left for Apophis to finish his "Save the Princess" quest, but first he had to improve his character—including choosing his second evolution.

Because he had reached lvl 10, this evolution would be a real power-up. The first evolution mainly existed so players could unlock classes. The second evolution was intended to allow players to ascend to a power level that would let them fight on other planets, including ones much more hostile than Gaia.

He equipped himself with the two items he had won in the dungeon. What most players wouldn't know yet was that unique items could influence the evolution options available to them, and the tier of evolution would become extremely powerful as the global power level of "Horus's" threats increased!

The second evolution was different from the first, which was a simple process of less than ten minutes. The second tier took a good hour to complete and involved a lot of AI calculation, so he took refuge in a safe, high tree and selected "Evolution Level 2."

*Calculating your evolutionary potential...*

*Please select from the available evolutionary paths.*

-Spacian Human (common) [Tier 2]: "As humans naturally evolved, their biology grew accustomed to the hungry void of outer space."

-Corrupted Human (rare) [Tier 2]: "The God Tzeentch offers paths to power which some consider to be unnatural."

-Zetark-Human Hybrid (epic) [Tier 2]: "A fusion of Zetark and Human DNA; an organism which comes closer to achieving perfection than any other creature with human ancestry."

"Excellent!" said Apophis.The Zetark-Human hybridization would be perfect. The Zetark were a superior species in every way to humans, after all.

Apophis had no interest in the other two choices. Spacian Humans were the dominant and most widespread species in the United Federation of Planets, and certainly better in every way to the primitive humans, but a far cry from the other options available to Apophis.

The Corrupted Humans weren't bad, and in fact had a good natural affinity for agility and cosmic energy. The main downside, of course, was that the majority of other species rejected Corrupted Humans. Their appearance revealed their loyalty to an evil god.

Only the Zetark-Human hybrid was a pure power increase without any negative consequences.

So, Apophis selected "Zetark-Human Hybrid."

*Evolution will complete in 1 hour, 8 minutes, and 38 seconds.*

That gave him some time to take a break and see if his family was still alive.

He took advantage of the break to sell 100,000 GC. The ratio of GC to credits had quite improved since his first sale.

Originally, 1 GC had been worth 3 credits. Now, the ratio had improved to 1 GC per 4.6 credits. Alexander put up 120,000 GC, which sold quickly for 560,000 credits.

Alexander also took the opportunity to check the game's forum.

Everything was about to explode! The game was gaining a staggering 1,000,000 new players per hour and was very close to reaching 40 million total players.

People were excitedly discussing many topics, such as the first team to have cleared the dungeon in Nightmare mode.

But above all, the most frenzied discussion surrounded the siege of Tyo, which was looking to be one of the largest community events in the history of video games.

10 million players were already on site, 15 million other players had announced their intention to participate, and the assault was planned in two days...

***

After his break was over, Alexander got back into bed with the VRI helmet on his head.

His second evolution was about to complete.

It was time to get serious.