“How much did they pay?” Cassius said, sitting in the corner of the pub next to me.

“Three hundred and Forty-seven thousand along with the stipulation that any new information we plan to publicly release for the next week goes through them first.”

“Thank you for joining us at the Daily ARchive, I’m Cassey and next to me we have the talented and ever so lovely Melina,” Cassey said in her guild’s head office with a holographic depiction of Melina sitting next to her. “Melina, we have heard from many of the larger guilds that you and many of the top tier guilds have been missing from the raids for about a month now. There has been some speculation going around about what’s going on, but I want to hear from the source itself.”

“Well Cassey,” Melina started, waving her long hair across the screen. “We have been on somewhat of an adventure. It’s been a hard month of fighting and looting, but today we feel that this is something we should share with the community.”

“Before you tell us,” Cassey interrupted. “Let’s hear a word from our sponsors.” The floating cameras blinked out as they rearrange themselves around the office. Cassey got up and headed towards a small booth. With a flick of her fingers, her red burgundy blazer transformed into a stylish neon blue robe with black trim tracking across the edge of the robe. Several people walked about the room as they moved different sets of props turning the sensible white spaced room into a luxurious mansion background. Cassey sat down on a white leather chair that replaced the swivel chair she has previously occupied.

“Looks expensive,” Melina commented, noticing the chair was crafted out of dragonhide.

“Our channel goes big,” she said, while her eyes scanned a series of notes in front of her. Before we go live again, anything you want to feed me in on? Any info I get ahead of time would make this interview go a lot smoother.”

“Trust me, any info I give you will only make you feel stressed out. Let me take the flow and your boss over there,” pointing towards a man with a well-tailored dark suit, “should be very happy with the influx of viewers you're going to get.”

“How do you know he’s the boss.”

“Oh please, I’m not the head of my guild just for my looks. That suit cost more than a house and anyone who can stand in one place and point at people give themselves away immediately as someone important.”

“Live in three,” a man said his hands waving back and forth putting the cameras back into position.

“Welcome back viewers and thank for joining us here at the Daily ARchive. Melina, you were telling us that you found something amazing, what details can you give regarding that info.”

“Well... ” Melina began before being nudged in the back.

“What is that?” Cassey shouted pointing to the large fishing hovering behind Melina.

Getting up Melina motion one of her transmission cameras switching it from static to auto-follow mode. Walking behind the Luminaria, she placed her hands over the head of the fish like it was a dog. Giving it a quick rub, she gently pushed it off sending it swimming back towards the dark void in the middle of the tree. “I’m so sorry about that,” Melina started. “That was just Celestine’s familiar coming to say hi.”

“What’s that tree?” Cassey asked, trying to force Melina’s camera to tilt up a few more degrees.

“This thing?” Melina said, obliging the camera to move up. “This is a shrine to Celestine. Don’t worry about it, just pretend its a background prop.”

“A background prop? Melina, you want me along with our several,” aching her head towards the side to look at a small box, “two million viewers to pretend a shrine to Celestine is a background prop. Do you know how many paladins would kill to be favored by Celestine.”

“I’m sure quite a few,” Melina answered.

“More than quite a few,” Cassey replied. A lough coughing sound could be heard coming from the back of the room. A man with a large UI screen that read “Break in 3.” Shaking herself out of her stupor, Cassey look Melina in the eyes.

“I have had a few reports come in telling me that you guys have found a new dungeon. Is that true?”

“Yes, that’s partially true. I’m not sure how to elegantly say this, so I’m just going to say it. We found the lost sixth region.” The room was silent, as every person stared at Melina with wide eyes and even wider mouths. A small beep could be heard coming from the counter every time an additional ten thousand people join the stream. Beep, beep, beep, the sound became more rapid as the counter jumped from two million up to six million viewers within a span of thirty seconds.

“Now a word from our sponsor,” Cassey said, her words cutting through the silence like a paladin's astral ray through a miasmic fog. “This is nuts,” Cassey exclaimed watching the counter as it passed the seven million mark.

“Already another commercial break,” Melina said. “It’s only been like two minutes.”

“The producer wants to run as many as possible to make back the money we lost, and besides, this gives me a bit of breathing room.” A man who was previously pointed out by Melina walked up to the two, his stride calming yet powerful as he stood next to Cassey.

“Melina, this is J.J. Aaron the founder and CEO of the Daily ARchive.”

“Nice to meet you,” J.J. said, holding out his hands. Catching his mistake he withdrew watching as Melina incorporeal form fuzzed. “Sorry, force of habit. I just got a message from Cassius regarding a website server expansion.”

"Yes, we will be hosting a file on your site, and will need a private host for it as well as a transaction server."

"You plan to sell something?"

"In a way, yes."

Waving his hands, J.J. brought up a UI panel. Scrolling down a list he pressed a name.

"You have Davis," the man said, his hand clicking on the keyboard.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

"Davis, I need you to set up a private host server for our friends here."

"Sure thing, what kinda web service do you need and how much bandwidth should I allocate to it."

"Set it up as a default store along with a secure fund transfer. Also, make sure you put plenty of adds on the page."

"That's easy enough, what about bandwidth?"

“All of it, also purchase ten… no make than twenty times more bandwidth for the site.”

“Sure thing boss, let me contact our host. How long do you want it for?”

“Let's make it a week, that should be enough for the initial wave.”

“Ooo,” Davis said sipping air through his teeth. “They are quoting me roughly two million.”

“That’s fine,” J.J. said sending Davis a small cube of data. “Go ahead and charge it to my direct account.”

With a few more clicks, Davis completed the transaction sending J.J. as well as Melina the key for editing the website. “Anything else boss?”

“Not right now, but keep an eye out on the site and let me know if anything needs to be done once we get more players.”

“Sure, I’ll keep an analytics tab open for it,” Davis said his screen closing.

“Here you go,” Melina said waving at a person off-screen. Walking up next to her, Cassius grabbed the key and made his way off camera. “Should be done in a minute,” he said in almost a whisper.

“Back on the air in ten.”

Sitting back down in her seat Cassey added a few last-minute questions down on her notes. “Air in three, two...”

“Welcome back everyone, I see we have gotten quite a few more people watching today. Melina, you have just announced to us that you have found the lost region. Do you plan to publicly release the location of the area and how to get there?”

“Nice segway,” Melina said with a smirk. Opening her UI Melina brought up a map of Amrah. With a flick of her fingers, a small dot appeared on the map marking the entrance of the gate. “No need for screenshots, this will all be public knowledge soon enough. We have compiled all the information you will ever need for this area. This information as been composed by Cassius and his guild, Ledger.”

“Wait,” Cassey started. “I know very well how good ledger is at compiling information, but the information they compile comes at a very steep cost. Is this information going to be somewhat limited to only players that are near the top one percent?”

“Good thing you asked,” Malina replied. “What would you value this information to be worth?”

“I’m honestly not too sure, but I’ll just ballpark and say somewhere in the range of a hundred thousand.”

“No quiet, we are looking in the range of several million, but don't be discouraged. Where not here to money gouge the player, we want everyone to be able to access the new content, or old, however, you look at it. We're not charging you a hundred thousand, or even a thousand, we are going to be selling this information for just a hundred credit, and yes you heard me right a hundred credits,” Maline said with a flourish, sending out a link bubble that floated above her.”

The man who was operating the camera held out another note on his UI screen. Taking a glance, Cassey made a nodding gesture and pushed open a UI screen. “Melina, we have a bunch of people calling in wanting to ask questions, would it be alright if I put a few of them though?”

“Sure.”

With a press of a few buttons, Cassey UI lit up with a list of several players, their names continuously scrolling down in a blur as the amount of caller grew larger and larger. Reaching out her fingers she pressed on one of the names. The button grew a bright green as a muffled sound echoes across the room. “You're with the Daily ARchive, can you introduce yourself and state your question?”

“Oh… am I on?” a man stated on the other line.

“Yes,” Cassey replied.

“Um… yeah, my screen name is Sevenlinkservos with the guild Larkandark, and my question is, even though the information your selling is downright free, why do we even need to buy it if the gate location is going to be publicly available?”

“That’s a good question Seven,” Melina said. “Even though the gate location is going to be public knowledge getting to it is not going to be a cakewalk. Let me give you some of the video sources we have included in the data package.” Melina brought up her UI screen, it's dark blurry background giving way that the screen was not playing. A muffled noise came from what seemed to be behind the screen yelling “your six.” The screen quickly turned around as several large sharp teeth came charging at the camera like a stray locomotive. The large serpentine beast let loose a torrent of water sending camera floating backward. The camera shook and sputtered before it made several quick turns showing the monster as well as a large waterfall. The screen stuttered and dissipated as the orb made its way closer and closer to the waterfall.

“What was that?” Cassey said with her mouth wide open.

“That was the gate guardian Grand Leviathan. We have estimated the monsters level to be above five hundred. It’s one hell of a deterrent to anyone wanting to get to the gate, but we have added a few tricks to make it a bit easier to get across.”

More names scrolled across Cassey’s call list as she attempted to press on one of the tabs. “Your one with the Daily Archive.”

“Oh sweet, I got though, shout out to my guild Rose4Gold. My name is DarentheSlayer and my question is, what is stopping you from killing the leviathan?”

“The Leviathan is on a scale that we have yet to amass enough resources to defeat. We, of course, put the challenge out to any guild that wants to take it on for yourself. For everyone else, we have made a somewhat comprehensible way to get pass the Leviathan. We don't guarantee that it’s a full proof so make sure to keep any unbound items in the bank.”

“We have just enough time for one more question,” Cassey said pressing another name at random.

“Hi my name is 4Runner and my question is, has anyone in your party or the party of the other guilds your currently with realigned a paladin over to the goddess Celestine. If yes, what new ability does she give you?” A woman asked.

“That information is currently private and as I’m not the owner of the bind point I am unable to discuss the matter.”

A new slurry of names stormed Cassey UI as she closed it out. Taking a deep breath Cassey stared into one of the cameras. “That is all the time we have for today folks, please join us back tomorrow where we will reveal any new information about the current situation. This is Cassey singing out from the Daily Archive,” she finished with a rehearsed voice.

“Great job,” J.J. said, coming over and giving Cassey a firm handshake. Keeping a firm hold onto his hand Cassey wretched him forward giving him a hug, “You have to let me go.”

“What?” J.J said in confusion.

“You have to let me go to the new area, how else am I going to get all the new up-to-date information?”

“Who’s going to do all the reporting in the newsroom?”

“Greg,” Cassey said pointing to the man working the cameras.

“What, me?” Greg said in a confused tone. “I have no idea how to report, I just do cameras.”

“It’s easy Greg, you just read off the UI prompt. Now that we have that settled, can I go?” Cassey said turning back to J.J.

J.J. scratched his head and walked over to Melina. “I know this was not part of our contract, but if I send her over would you look after her for me? She’s an NBC and I would feel kinda bad putting her in such a high-level area.”

Pacing over to Melina's projector-camera I hunched down so that J.J. could see me. “Hi, I’m Sid, while I can’t personally agree to Cassey’s safety I can guarantee her a safe place to live while she is here, I just have a small request.”

“What is it?” J.J. said.

“I just need a few small items, none of them expensive maybe a hundred or two hundred credit max,” I said, sending him a list of items.

“Done,” he replied, not even opening the list.

“You can go,” J.J. said. “Just don’t go with the first wave of people, they are bound to make a bunch of mistakes that the second or third wave of people will pick up on.”

“Got it,” she said with a grin stretching across her face.

A low grumble sounded across J.J. face as a call screen popped up. Pressing the accept button, Davis popped up on the screen. “Sir, we already made twenty thousand off the ad revenues...”

“I thought it would be more,” J.J. interrupted.

“We made twenty thousand in the first five minutes before the site crashed. I'm working to get it back up, but we don't have enough resources to keep it sustained.”

“How much more bandwidth do we need?”

“It’s not a bandwidth problem we are being attacked.”

“A DDOS?” J.J. said.

“Yeah, the page is being denied, I’ve traced it back to the source and its coming from a bunch of corps.”