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The Face of The Cards

The Face of The Cards, this is the first time a massive hybrid game that could connect to any kind of device to be played be it a cellphone or the virtual reality capsule that the company who created the game invented and has a world one hundred (100) times the size of Earth, named Veritas, but that could go beyond that if the right circumstances were met according with the company who created the game.

It is a game that is extremely hyped since the moment of it announcement but also criticized since instead of a more popular game genre like action, or adventure they were launching a card game but when the trailers appeared everyone went into a mixed uproar since they innovated the genre mixing Real-Time RPG and Card Game making that for some people it seemed a strange combination but to some it seemed like a good idea and today was the launch day, Day 0, and everyone who could buy bought the game but our protagonist Jack wasn't one of those lucky ones since he came from a poor household, but filled with love nonetheless so he never regretted being born in his family but today, in his 18th(eighteenth), he had a surprise when someone rang the bell of his home and when he opened the door there was a group of man in front of a truck that was being unloaded, and it's cargo is a virtual reality, but a different kind, that is used to play The Face of The Cards and without asking anything the men invaded Jack's house, found his room and installed the capsule so quickly that he almost couldn't say anything because of the surprise but he managed to shout:

- What is happening???? - Then the most petite of the men came to him and gave him a decorated paper that has the following message:

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|Congratulations!!!!!!!!|

Jack White, you have been chosen to receive a special capsule through a prize draw

The company will afford all costs related to the game but only you will be able to use the capsule and only this capsule

With pleasure

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Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

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Then the men finished installing the and left as quickly as they came leaving Jack confused, excited that he gained a capsule, even if it was a different model from the common model, but at the same time he was feeling worried about what he should tell to his mother.

The first thing he did was to find what the logo means by searching it in his old computer. He searched and searched and searched but couldn’t find anything but when he was finally losing hope he discovered that this was the symbol of the mysterious CEO and owner of the company that created the game “The Face of The Cards” , he is also the main person that created the game and no one that dared to use his symbol was ever found, they wouldn’t even leave the place they were at the moment they just disappeared and came back some time later in a terrible condition but couldn’t remember a single thing.

Then he tried to contact this mysterious CEO but he couldn’t find any single way of contact and in some interviews the members of the company said that even then didn’t know how to find him. After searching for some method but couldn’t find any he started to enter a state of panicky his computer screen became black and a message in white letter appeared:

It's all right

Then his computer became normal again but Jack was sweating cold because he understood that the one who send this message was the CEO so he was scared that he could vanish from his house, but then he remembered the message: “It’s all right”, this meant that the CEO knew Jack’s fears and explained to him that he shouldn’t be afraid, this made Jack start to relax but he is still tense since he was being monitored when he did his searches.

But Jack then understood, he couldn’t stop this CEO even if he wanted so he went decided to do the other important thing: to write a note to his mother before he entered the capsule. He wrote a note explaining the situation and even his brief “talk” with this CEO so he put the note in the entrance to his room, locked the door and turned on the capsule after reading the manual but when he entered the capsule, he felt something biting his back where there are the biggest number of neural connections, his brain couldn’t even compute the pain before his mind was taken to the login screen:

|Connecting to the player’s brain…|

|Connection succeeded|

|Connecting to the servers…|

|Connection succeeded|

|Connecting with the capsule…|

|Attention the player has the special capsule TITAN|

|Capsule Code: X-ALFA--1-OMEGA-N|

|Capsule Nickname: Exarion|

|The player’s status has been improved to that of a Titan|

|Connection with the capsule succeeded|

|Have a good game|

All of this happened in the blink of an eye so Jack couldn’t read most of what it was said but what he could read was that his capsule is special and that its nickname is Exarion then in the next instant his mind was taken to a place filled with cards floating in a white void and appeared the following message:

Oh, great Titan who is being born in this world you are in the Hall of Cards

Here you can select your first cards to begin your journey

Since you are a Titan, you can choose one hundred (100) single cards, ten (10) groups of cards or one (1) Titan Card Group

Single cards are cards that have no group or are the ones with some kind of demerit or have less power in a group

Groups of cards can contain more than ten (10) cards or can contain less, it all depends on how useful, how dangerous or with what they deal with. Some cards only appear in groups

A Titan Card Group contain cards that are exclusive to that Titan, if another Titan gain control of one card or of the full group of some other Titan the card can change effects, have more or less power or even destroy itself

Choose wisely

After Jack finished reading the message it vanished leaving Jack without knowing what to do, he even doesn’t know what is a Titan making him uncertain if he should go directly to that section or wander through so he decided to first look at the single cards they are numerous and there some that are different versions of the same type of card. There are item cards that can transform into things like swords or potions, spell cards that can do actions like heal someone or summon a ball of fire, summoning cards that can summon monster to help you or even players that agree to a quick question of yes or no, passive cards that give the player some advantages while the player has the card like elemental resistance or an easier time doing something and even action cards that can help do things that normally can’t be done or do it in an instant.

Then he went to the group cards and he became awestruck from the numerous groups and what they do. There are class groups that have cards which can be described organized in groups like warrior, mage, healer, priest, summoner besides other “classes”, elemental groups that had cards related to any kind of element like fire, sound and even death, race groups that transformed the user’s race and gave abilities related to the race and even authority groups that could do actions with almost certainty like killing something in different ways like making the target go through spontaneous combustion or freezing him to death there are groups that can even do miracles like fully and truly revive something or “heal” age,

Then he decided to go to the Titans section and then he became astonished with the cards there, but then he remembered the message explanation and started looking around and after sometime he DID find something, his capsule nickname, Exarion.

The Titans group has one thing that is different, they had a description of each Titan and in Exarion’s part it said:

The Titan who is always after knowledge

Jack thought that it was a simple, but full of meaning, description and when he looked, he understood that this group is perfect for him since it has cards like:

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Knowledge of Babel’s Library

All the knowledge contained in the Tower of Babel’s library

You will be able to understand every type of knowledge that you find in your journeys

Passive Card

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Elemental Mastery

The ability to change the elements as you want

Anything you do that is associated with one element will gain the characteristics of the best element for the situation

Passive Card

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Weapon Mastery

The ability to change the attributes of weapons as you want

Anything you do that is associated with a weapon will gain the characteristics and form of the best weapon for the situation

Passive Card

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Martial Mastery

The ability to change the martial arts as you want

Anything you do that is associated with martial arts will gain the characteristics and shape of the best martial art for the situation

Passive Card

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Group Mastery

The ability to have mastery over any card group even Titan ones

While you have this card you can use any card group to its utmost potential drawing all the power that the card can muster

Passive Card

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Race Mastery

The ability to “change” to any race of Veritas

While you have this card you can count as any race of Veritas depending on the situation

Passive Card

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Eye of The Sage

The ability to see all the information about one target

When activated will show the information about a target

Action Card

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Fusion of Cards

The ability to fuse cards

When activated will fuse the cards that the player wants into other cards

Action Card

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Dismantle Card

The ability to dismantle cards

When activated will dismantle the cards the player wants into other cards

Action Card

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Create Card

The ability to create cards

When activated depending on the situation will create the cards to the Titan

Action Card

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Free Card

The ability to make a card free of its user or to free it from its card state

When activated can free the card from its user or to free it from its card state

Action Card

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Kingdom of Chaos

The kingdom where all logic is inexistent

When cast will create an area where logic is inexistent, for good or bad

Spell Card

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Bag of The Infinity

The bag that can hold anything

The only item that can hold an unlimited number of items and any item without restriction

Item Card

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Master of Knowledge

The Authority of Exarion the Titan of Knowledge

You can dominate all types of knowledge

This in pair with the Knowledge of Babel’s Library are the main characteristics of Exarion

Each knowledge that you dominate be it a new knowledge that you yourself created or that another being created will be added to Babel’s Library

The act of dominate a knowledge is to master it entirely

Authority Card

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This group is perfect for Jack who likes to gather knowledge from a lot of things even if he won’t use it so he chose this group and all the other cards and groups disappeared while in his arm appeared a bracelet with lots of beads with different symbols and while all the card entered it the knowledge of the functions of each bead but he also knew it won’t work yet.

Then a screen appeared to select a race but it was canceled and the following message appeared:

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Exarion is a Titan who can “change” into any race from Veritas to help in his quest to search for knowledge but his original appearance is similar to that of a human so your race will change to Pseudo-Human

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Then appeared the screen to select the place where he will be “born” in Veritas but it also vanished and the following message appeared:

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Exarion is a Titan who wants to accumulate new knowledges so he is always after an adventure because of this you will be born in a random location

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After this Jack started to feel everything around him changing and he also could fell an excruciating nausea and when everything went back to normal and he finally managed to open his eyes he discovered that he is in a thick forest that didn’t seem like any kind of forest that he knew but it had the characteristics of the Amazonia mixed with a Chinese forest, in other words, a tropical forest filled with moisture and lot of life, step mountains and a mixture of tropical climate and four other climates, since one of the climates of a Chinese forest is already tropical. In top of all this the flora and fauna of this forest is extremely “powerful” in its own way; its characteristics are extremely more accentuated than any forest that Jack knows.

The first thing he did was to crouch down and look at his surroundings. The first thing he did find is a pineapple looking fruit and when he took it out a screen appeared in his eye sight:

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Pineapple-Ginseng which has grown for a thousand years

Can purify the body of the being who eat it and heal a lot of health problems

Can be combined with other ingredients to have better effects

Consumable Item

|Can be transformed in a single use card|

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After reading this Gabriel remembered that both of these plants were used to help people with problems like depression and anxiety for the pineapple and diabetes for ginseng so he decided to transform this into a card and all the items here which have similar into cards and then fuse then and what resulted was this:

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Elixir-Fruit of the Ancient Forest of Shikukihaku

An Elixir-Fruit is a fruit that has been mixed with other fruits in the correct way so all the characteristics of the fruits can strengthen each other

This Elixir-Fruit is made from the Forest of Shikukihaku’s fruits, the Forest of Shikukihaku is an ancient forest that is located in the eastern part of the East Continent

It can purify, strengthen and heal the body and mind of the person who consumes it

One time use Item Card

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Now Jack finally knows where he is but he still doesn’t know anything about how to get out of here so he first tried to do thing like summon an inventory, which didn’t work, summon a community chat, which did work but he is the only one online, then he tried to summon a stats screen:

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Stats: Jack Exarion

Strength: 20                               Stamina: 25

Agility: 30                                Dexterity: 35

Will: 50                                 Sensibility: 50

Perception: 50                               Senses: 50

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- OK my name in the game is my first name and the nickname of my capsule, everything minimally normal here, so now let’s gather a good amount of this Elixir-Fruit before logging out – Jack thought this and started the process of doing lot Elixir-Fruits before logging out. While he does this one being is looked-out at him and when he logged out the being shouted exhilarated:

- Exarion is back!!!! He is back!!!!!!!!!!!!! – And then the being also disappeared.

In the real-world Jack left his room and found his mother worried about him and the situation the he found himself:

- My son please don’t use that capsule, after reading your note I tried searching for information about the CEO of the company and I am worried that he will do something to you – His mother said almost crying.

- Mom I am worried to but he gave his word and in all interviews the people of the company always said that for him his word is something that he always follows as if it is a pact bound in blood – he said the last part half serious half joking since even if they said this it is still strange for him to imagine someone taking its words so serious.

- Just be careful when dealing with that thing okay? – His mother pleaded to him since she is worried for his well-being.

- OK, mom – He said and then kissed her cheek and went back to his room and there he looked at the capsule and said more to himself than to the capsule – I hope you don’t end making me regret this decision – Then he remembered the “bite” he received and looked and his wrist and he was surprised by what he found there, it was the symbols of the bracelet’s beads but only in his right hand and he wondered why it was only there and a screen appeared in his eyesight:

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It was decided that it was best for the Titan if the functions symbols only appeared at only one point of your skin

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- What the… Am I crazy? – Jack said to himself.

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The system has detected none discrepancy in the Titan’s brain

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- So, what are you? – He asked the so-called system.

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The system is a group of nano machines injected in the Titan’s blood stream to help the you handle the transition between the worlds and to help improve the Titan’s body

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- Wait, when you were injected in my blood stream? – He asked looking at his wrist and at the veins that he could see through his skin.

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When the Titan first used the capsule to travel through worlds the system was injected

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- So, this is what that bite was… - Jack said but his thoughts quickly deviated to another thing – What do you mean by travel through worlds?

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This is something the Titan must discover on his own

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- Ok so let’s invoke some of the function of the symbols – He said and the first thing he tried is one meant to be an inventory – Wait these are the Elixir-Fruit!!!! – Jack said as a screen appeared with the items that he had is his bag – So this is why it wouldn’t work in Veritas! – Jack concluded – So now let’s try and use the items Jack said and immediately used ten (10) Elixir-Fruit and then he fainted since he started to go into uncharted waters that even the people from the company that created the game didn’t knew.