Infinite Realm

"Fuuu...haaa." 

Silver Wolf puffed a cigar as he stared at the cavern in front of him. 

Behind him was a team of 10 players, all suited up for battle. Just the aura from the group made them seem like an insurmountable troop; a spear that is used to forge a path in the enemy's formation. They were the best of the best from the Battle Wolves guild and were selected and trained specifically to conquer this dungeon.

"Is everything ready?" Silver Wolf asked as he held the cigar with his fingers.

In Infinite Realm, everything one could do in the real world applied here. Therefore, the fact that cigarettes existed wasn't a surprise. On the contrary, it very much appealed to cigarette fans and chainsmokers since they could experience that calm feeling from smoking without having to be worried about any side effects or damage to their health.

"Yes captain." Iron Bear replied.

"All the equipment and items have been prepared for the raid and we're ready to go. It's just too bad that Lord Han won't be able to follow us." 

"It's not his fault." Silver Wolf sighed as he took another puff from the cigar.

"He has to lay low until the duration of the agreement is over. Otherwise, he will get hunted by the others."

In VR gaming, there were rules know as the 'Unspoken' that were used to govern the habits and actions of players that were too strong for the average man, or to be specific, players that were above the Pinnacle Expert rank/ 'King' rank. Above that level, a player would become a walking bomb as they could simply wreak havoc anywhere on their own, making the game impossible to enjoy for others. 

Attacking random players when they felt like it or simply giving their guild an advantage in the early period of a game were examples of actions done by players at a such high rank which could ruin the joy of a VR game for some. In summary, It would be bad and a bit unfair for others if these players were allowed to roam free without being checked, at least in the early stages of a game. Hence the deployment of the 'Unspoken' rules.

One of the rules prevented these players from attacking the weaker ones and looting them while the other one prevents these extremely strong players in from assisting their guilds in raids and battle until a moment when it seems like the life and death of the guild was impending. While these rules seemed like they were cutting off the arms of a guild, it was advantageous to many.

Take for instance with Battle Wolves. By following the Unspoken rule, they would be unable to request Han for his help in dungeon raids and team fights unless the guild was in danger of destruction. While it seemed like they had lost an important character for battles, the rule had helped level the playing field for them. Guilds like super guilds, who had a couple of players at Han's level were also unable to use those players. If they could, then Battle Wolves would be destroyed by Emperor's Might branch guild led by Azure Dragon, before they could even grow. But with the aid of the Unspoken rule, they had enough time to grow and make preparations against such players.

"In summary, it's quite advantageous to us at least for now." Silver Wolf explained.

Iron Bear scratched his head before nodding, seemingly understand a bit but still confused.

"Alright. Let's move." Silver Wolf scrunched the cigar with his fingers before tossing it away.

. . .

. . .

. . .

"Aldeus has finally given us the values." A mage reported to Daichi, the guild leader of the East Crow guild.

"Finally. What does it say?" Daichi asked.

"The dungeon at the mountain ranges, which Battle Wolves is reported to have gone for, would be a good place for mages. The montsers should be just like Black Grill's Cave, highly resistant to physical attacks but weak against magical attacks. We tagged this dungeon the 'Earth dungeon'. As for the dungeon by the forest path, it should be a field type of dungeon with monsters of different strengths. Due to the varying nature of the monsters, success rate there would be quite low but when considering a situation where we take on the Earth dungeon prepared. However, by the risk mechanism and calculations, it's better we go for it than the Earth dungeon. 

According to Aldeus, the Earth dungeon night be filled with surprises to help prevent mages from turning the area into a farming spor. In other words, it could be a honey trap for players."

"I see." Daichi clasped his hands together as he supported his chin.

Aldeus was an AI that was used to predict certain scenarios in VR games. The VR game industry was a large one and with various technological advancements as well as profits to be made from it, many different industries began diving into the sector. This included the AI industry.

Originally, AIs were only used to control and manage the VR world however, a few idealists and scientists decided to use it in a different way. Just like betting simulators and predicting machines, the AIs they developed was meant to predict the scenario and events in a VR game by analysing a few constructs and data fed into the system. Aldeus was one such AI.

Aldeus was used to predict the internal environment and mechanism of a dungeon by analysing the extteenla environment, pattern of the game, story progress and more to determine both the difficulty and the type of montseds to expect in the dungeon. This would help guilds prepare better for the dungeon and avoid surprises that could cause a team wipe. 

However, since it worked by simply reading the inputted data and predicting the situation within a dungeon, and also since various possibilities could exist within a VR world, Aldeus didn't have a 100% accuracy in predicting the internal environment and constructs of a dungeon but a 30-40% accuracy, usually dependent on the amount and accuracy of the data provided. Players and guilds who made use of the software had to take the risk that the scenario predicted by the AI would be the direct opposite of the actual scenario within the dungeon. Taking such a risk meant that they could be shooting themselves in the foot without knowing it so not a lot of guilds did so but simply relied on their experience and tactical decisions. 

East Crow, however, combined both methods and were able to rise to the top. There was also the fact that the Aldeus software they utilised was patched by the guild's personal software and AI development team, increasing the accuracy by 3%-5% as well as creating more variables with a 65% chance of one of them being accurate. With such a high possibility, it meant that out of every 5 scenarios suggested by the AI, 3 of those would be accurate.

To better understand this, take for instance the setting where an unknown dungeon arises in a forest. The patched Aldeus would predict 5 possible contexts that could apply to the dungeon such as the monsters being field type monsters, their attack power being higher than defense, drop rate being lower than regular dungeons but with high quality equipment, drop rate being higher than regular dungeons but with average equipment and the BOSS monster being a serious pain in the neck. Of the 5 suggested framework for the dungeon, there was a 65% chance that at least 3 of them were accurate. By taking such a risk, East Crow would be more prepared for variables and would have a higher success rate of completing a dungeon than most 2nd tier guilds.

"If that's the case, prepare the team for a dungeon raid. We're taking the forest dungeon."

In the same way that both Sovereign Battle Wolves and East Crow made their preparations, a majority of the top guilds in IR had begun their preparations to raid different dungeons; some hoping to make a killing while others aimed for the regional first place or global first place achievement.

Seven Star Glory aka Team Sato, were also not left out as after 4 hours of journeying, they had finally made it to the Maldora Canyon.