Ethan and Sivan had only been the firsts of many to take risks and pick up a fortune in return. And while Rune knew that for every winner there were thousands of dead avatars, jealousy and envy was a sapient’s motivation and source of desire to progress.
What every successful avatar had was physical stats, and what the majority of those who failed had were also physical stats, only luck decided their fates.
Rune also discovered multiple dangerous grounds over his farming travels, they were a lot less rare than he had expected. Still though, the idea of approaching them never even came to him.
His mind had been done long ago, or a few days ago to be more exact, it was long ago at the scale the new era was working on. He would stick to his slow and steady farming way.
The birth of those lucky ones, heroes in the eyes of others, inspired and publicized even more to others the fact that there now existed a way to exchange risk for massive gains of EP and stat points.
And who, aparts from stubborn farmers, would deny the new trend that appeared to be a completely worthy exchange for every hopeful explorer of the Void Dimension?
Even if Rune didn’t know it, he was one of the reasons motivating those foolish people to take risks.
The image reflected by those like him, having dedicated their entire time to farming in the Void Dimension, was one of perfectly oiled machines, running at every moment at 200% of their capabilities, racking hundreds of thousands of EP per month by virtue of their excellent planning and superior stats.
‘It’s only been slightly more than a month… Why are they all like that?’
Incomprehension written all over his face, Rune only ever saw the situation from the point of view of an arduous farmer, a steady one, a rational one who measured everything and felt he deserved what he now possessed.
‘If they want to be part of the new era, they should just be steady. Once they reach the ideal gathering speed they will then be able to take however many risks they want…’
The spreadsheets used by the Tireless forum, now sitting at a comfortable 542 actives, had long been released as they weren’t complicated to make and only served as indicators.
And they hadn’t been the only ones to have this sort of idea, just like they were not the only forum gathering slow and steady farmers. It could even be said that they had plagiarized others to come up with their own version.
‘I already told them that I only have 266 total stats and I’ve been surpassed by nearly everyone who used a special resource or has found opportunities like an asteroid belt or an asteroid field…’
Rune told the truth, the Tireless forum’s members also told the truth, other private farming-focused forums also told the truth, but at some point, they all realized that some people just didn’t want to hear that truth.
Still, they continued to deny having secret farming knowledge or anything of the sort, being identified as an elitist group that withheld knowledge wasn’t something good for social connections.
And there was nothing to do except socializing on the information board.
[Rune: Did you all think about your specialization? I’m really hesitating, I think I’m just going to continue with a perception-momentum mix and attain the supreme 60 resources per hour.]
[Utopia: Same! I’ll even find a way to break the one-minute limit!]
[Gar: The more time passes, the more everything becomes a mess, doesn’t it?]
The current subject discussed by their group was a theory that was taking lots of momentum as of late.
As the Ether Law statement-verifying capability scaled with the ether density, the higher the density, the more it became able to confirm information he refused to acknowledge before.
And a very surprising thing happened when something that the Ether Law previously refused to put on the wiki was authorized.
Something about tier. Ether soul tier.
There was no careful and detailed explanation put up with the few sentences that had been accepted, but tiers in general now seemed to be a lot more important than expected.
[Tier corresponds to the tier of your ether soul.
Only by fusing your avatar with your original body, becoming an independent entity, and having all physical, energy, and spiritual fundamentals at tier 2 will you reach the next tier.
Each tier corresponds to a maximum value per individual stat.]
In the same manner that Utopia’s dream of 3 000 000 EP per day was destroyed by etherly constraints, every hard farmer’s dream of relying on just gathering ether resources to become the strongest was broken.
The guy who submitted this exact information now repertoried on the wiki was a genius conspirationist, he was part of the gamers union, and he himself thought he was just trolling when he submitted those random thoughts of his.
That’s what his intent said.
As for what was the situation on the board after this information became available? It wasn’t a buzz, it was a division by zero.
Every news forum sent a notification to their adherents, the government relayed the information on their personal forum, and even the special resources heroes were overshadowed, now only figurants against this realm-reversing intel.
When Rune found those 3 statements inscribed on the wiki, only one of them didn’t impact him.
‘Fusing your avatar with your original body, becoming an independent entity.’
The meaning behind that was clear, and while some had of course forgotten about this fact, Rune had not.
The avatar add-on that was given to them due to their dimension’s status of “critically defective” was incompatible not only with gaining independence, whatever that meant, but also with reaching tier 2.
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It was a simple but hard truth.
‘Having all physical, energy, and spiritual fundamentals at tier 2.’
Such a statement had first been so foreign and unknown that no one reacted much to it, Rune included.
Once it had been analyzed and contextualized however, it was just the confirmation from the Ether Law itself that you couldn’t only focus on one group of stats, you had to dabble in everything, and train in everything. Whatever those “fundamentals” even meant.
The main impact of this statement on the IGS nevertheless, was that martial arts were coming back by destroying the ancient connotations attributed to them.
What had been considered a minor sport was now being resurrected, concepts long lost to hundreds of thousands of years of lost history were being unearthed, and online courses to learn about them were exploding.
‘Each Tier corresponds to a maximum value per individual stat...’
This last statement was the dream crusher sentence of the hard farmers' community. There was nothing else to add, everyone had to say goodbye to infinitely growing stats. It was definitive.
[Arik: Rune, are you still there?]
Coming back from another one of his over-imaginative brain trips as he thought of both the martial arts community and the stat limits, he continued his ongoing conversation.
[Rune: Yeah.]
[Arik: I strongly advise you to start branching.]
[Rune: I’m not above peer pressure, convince me.]
[Arik: You’ll not be able to learn by just forcing it. And doing it that way is not optimized at all. What will you do when you’re blocked and can’t progress anymore? Charge head first against the unknown, or transition to another fundamental?]
[Rune: Well, for my defense, I didn’t really think about it and said some nonsense to act like I was smart. As for what you just said, it seems really, like, really intelligent.]
[Gar: Of course my brother is intelligent, did you ever see a message from him that could express stupidity? Me neither.]
[Adreana: The joke about the human, the kajo, and the rululu?]
[Arik: Stfu.]
[Nelo: Your intent is so strong, as vast as a mountain and as deep as the sea.]
[Astryde: And yours is so weak it’s the same as that of a fly.]
[Nelo: Yours I can’t comprehend as I don’t understand monkey intent!]
It was a pleasure to see the two siblings argue for nothing, Rune always had a smirk when he saw their complicity and the jabs that could make anyone else become angered to death.
[Rune: So… Energy or physical?]
[Utopia: Physical.]
[Arik: Energy.]
[Utopia: Physical, because you will be able to farm more. I heard the ether resources in dangerous grounds are richer, learning martial arts can wait, farm before everything.]
[Arik: Good for you. Everyone here except you will branch into energy, it’s the only field where there’s a lot to train in. Your physical argument is so lame that I’m growing pity for your perfect blue brain.]
[Nelo: Energy is freaking magic too. And the affinity stat will help you find special resources faster.]
[Utopia: I don’t follow the masses, I’m no sheep! And he’ll need physical stats to survive the place where those special resources are!]
[Arik: It’s not the masses, it’s only us, I don’t know for the others out of this group. The board seems very divided on this subject.]
As he looked over the flow of the conversation, Rune thought It looked strangely similar to a political debate, but while he enjoyed their arguments, his mind was made after thinking a little.
Energy training was a long-term training, the government and the wiki hinted to that.
In terms of energy techniques developments, the IGS, and probably every other dimensional sector if taken at a grander scale, were at the same era, that of primitive manipulation.
Comparing the totally new pioneer field of energy manipulation to the martial arts field, backed by a concrete minor culture, a history, and a foundation that only had to be redeveloped to adapt to humanoid bodies capable of crushing reinforced concrete… It was easy to make a choice.
Of course, he didn’t intend to start training in martial arts now. The martial arts redevelopment was best left in the hands of the talented ones.
As for his group of friends and himself, they were only determined and ambitious average citizens of the IGS, so their job was to optimize their training path.
‘Spiritual is first in any case… And while putting martial arts first is good and all, there’s not really any place to practice it efficiently, so I’ll have to go for energy until I find such a place.’
[Rune: Anyway… Did any of you mentally prepare yourselves for the incoming violence and fighting?]
[Adreana: I was expecting it from the start. The rise of individual power will lead to an inflated egos, leading to animal instinct, leading to whatever you want to think about. Including bad things.]
[Gar: From what I can observe from the board, everyone seems thirsty for blood. The lack of permanent death is only contributing and amplifying that part.]
[Nelo: A little scared, not gonna lie. But I didn’t put aside my life to stop at the first sign of violence. I’ll just slowly start with safe energy fighting, and then follow up with martial arts or whatever the industry and government find to train the physical fundamentals.]
[Rune: Seems like we aren’t like-minded for nothing.]
[Utopia: In my case, I need to be a man and fight for the future, becoming the hero in the heart of the hopeless!]
[Rune: Why did you stop trying to hide your gender? It was funny.]
[Utopia: Did I do something like that? I can’t remember.]
[Arik: Behavioral analysis still tells us he is a rululu boy, a pretty young one at that.]
[Rune: What does mine say?]
[Arik: Puny human.]
[Nelo: And mine?]
[Arik: Don’t know, it was a joke.]
[Astryde: I would say weak and small little brother for you.]
[Utopia: Male or female, my gender will not define my achievements! I’ll pulverize every record in my way!]
The friendly atmosphere of their little group was perfect in Rune’s opinion.
‘If only farming was the only thing we needed to do.’
Only entertaining this thought for a second before trashing it, he pulled himself together and thought of the new imminent development with a new light.
‘Am I going to become a mage? Or will it be called an energy manipulator? Hehe… And a psychic? That’s definitely the right term to use.’
Smirking at the familiar words he employed, he started to link the changes that were happening to a video game major update.
‘Let’s see when those so-called mage geniuses will launch the first-ever energy beam and get us all out from the primitive era made only of “boring” energy orb and energy revitalization. At least physical stats users have a base to build on… Not that they have life easier for that reason.’
For Rune, the way with the least amount of risks and that seemed the most optimized was the right way, but if there were enough arguments, he was totally ready to change his plan anytime.
But for now, mastering the spiritual fundamentals that not only helped him in farming but also only depended on 2 stats seemed better than focusing on the energy or the physical fundamentals that each had 4 stats linked to them.
Though, it was debatable as to whether the physical side needed anything other than the strength stat, or even needed the strength stat to begin with.
‘The argument Arik used in any case, locking myself in only one fundamentals is wrong. I can plan on theory as much as I want, but after theory, there’s practice.’
Polishing his plan step by step until he considered it complete, Rune ultimately went back to farming at peace with his decision.
With his current 68 momentum stat and 100 perception, at the average ether resources density of 75 per cubic kilometer, he could gain 15 905 EP according to the Divine Spreadsheet Of The Tireless.
In 2 days, he would be able to gain 3 stat points.
‘Maybe that’s the addicting feeling Utopia had in mind, except he was hoping for it to only grow and never stop…’
Gaining 3 stat points every 2 days was completely different from gaining 1 stat point every 2 days.
‘Maybe the current situation impacted the dreams of many, but for me, it only refined my plan.’
And so, Rune still considered himself to belong to the top 10%.