1 Prologue: The Age of Unity

The year was 2234, a year deemed as the end of an era of humanity, an era known as the Age of Peace. Throughout most of the year, everyone went on with their everyday lives, basking under the happiness given by the era. Unfortunately for everyone, this happiness would be broken on a certain day within that year. It was because, on that certain day, the most popular site for everything, Omni…

Decided to wage war against the multiple countries constituting the planet Earth.

At first, many people thought it was some sort of fake news since it was just an article posted on the news section of their site. It wasn't unusual for a few fake news articles to pass through the site's verification filters. But then, a few days later after that article, a livestream was broadcasted throughout the entire world, with almost every single person around the world tuning in. It was a livestream where the head of Omni, its CEO, announced that the company would be waging war against each and every country on Earth, with the intent of becoming the planet's sole ruler.

This time, after watching the livestream, the people could not brush the matter off. The tone of the CEO on the livestream was that of pure confidence and seriousness, it was as if the CEO's words were set in stone. Of course, all of the countries' governments and militaries took it seriously as well, only for them to change their minds as they thought, 'If they're going to wage war against each and every country in the world, at the very least, they should have a level of military power equal to that of a whole continent's! Only with that much would they have hopes of doing so!'

They all thought that since Omni was inherently a company, there was no way that they would be able to amass that much military power.

Boom!

Fast forward to a week after the livestream, a large beam was seen to be circling around the world before colliding with a building owned by the government of a certain country, turning it into rubble in a matter of an instant. Each and every person in the world knew about this happening due to the fact that another livestream was broadcasted by the company yet again while this matter was happening, focusing on the destruction of certain buildings and monuments by the beam.

Although the buildings in the livestream were turned to rubble, in actuality, any trace of the buildings that collided with the large beam…did not exist at all. There were no traces whatsoever. It was as if those buildings did not exist in the first place.

Alongside the livestream, a message was sent to the multiple governments, linking them to a video of what was actually happening. Most of them looked into the matter, shuddering after finding out that the livestream was a facade to the true power of the beam. At this point, around 40% of the countries in the world had already surrendered, knowing very well that they don't have any power to fight against a beam like that.

As for the remaining 60 percent, although each and every one of them slightly feared the beam, their fear had not reached the point of them surrendering yet. They all thought that they still had their ways to fight against a single beam like that.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

Around a few hours into the livestream, what was being displayed was not buildings anymore, but rather, the whole Earth. Circling around it was still that large beam, which now looked like a string when compared to the large size of the Earth. Nonetheless, each and every person around the world was able to see clearly that the thin beam had split into two, then four, then eight…doubling after every few minutes or so.

Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoosh!

Eventually, that single thin beam had split into multiple thin beams, with each beam stopping over a certain position on the face of the Earth. Due to them stopping, the beams now looked like spheres of energy. In fact, if one looked closely, one could see that the beams formed a few words that could be read. The words formed by the beam were…

Surrender or perish.

It was then that the remaining 60 percent hastily decided to surrender, knowing fully well that they could not fight against that many beams. And so, just like that, without harming any people, the Age of Peace had now drawn to a close, bringing in a new era ruled by the most popular website in the world, Omni.

Of course, every person in the world was anxious as to what Omni was going to do next after becoming the sole ruler of the world. Not only that, they were also furious as to why Omni waged war with the countries.

Fortunately, it only took a day's worth of time to finally see Omni's plans, with another livestream being broadcasted throughout the world.

On the livestream was the CEO of Omni yet again, but this time, standing behind a podium as he was about to announce what the company was going to do after becoming the world's sole ruler.

"Good morning, afternoon, or night to everyone," the CEO said. "I am the CEO of Omni, and I am here to announce to each and everyone of you the plans of the company after becoming its ruler."

"First and foremost, we have no reason to rule in a tyrannical manner since that wouldn't benefit anyone, even the company wouldn't benefit from it. In actuality, the reason why Omni has decided to wage war against every country was to make it easier for the company to introduce everyone to a new age. An age of greater technology."

Clearing his throat, the CEO continued, "With that in mind, the company has decided to abolish any form of physical currency that is currently circulating around the world. In exchange, the company shall be replacing every currency, may it be physical or virtual, into a single type of virtual currency called bits. I'll go over this currency a bit more in-depth later."

Hearing that physical money was going to be abolished, almost every person complained about it, becoming silent after hearing that there was more to the currency than it seems. The only people that continued to complain about it were those that hoarded physical money.

"Second of all, the company has decided to merge each and every country in the world into a single entity. Although that would be confusing for a single country to manage, the company would have no problems doing so. In addition to that, the idea of a government shall be abolished as well. Well…not necessarily the government, but rather, the positions of power. Presidents, politicians, mayors, all of that shall be abolished from this day forward."

With this announcement, almost every person that had work related to the government could not help but curse out, complaining as to why Omni decided to remove that. It was their only way to grab hold of more power, as well as the only way for them to experience the pleasure of bossing around people.

But then, after they heard the last announcement, each and every person that was complaining, whether it be money related or government related, could not help but have their eyes glisten from what the CEO said.

"Now, everyone might be wondering, how do you obtain currency? What replaces the positions of power everyone desires? I'm pretty sure that everyone of us, although not very obvious, has the goal of becoming the best in the world. And well…the company shall give you a way to become the best."

"The internet we know and love has already matured. It's quite fast and stable, reaching speeds of up to 10 terabytes per second without any problems. For most people, that's already enough for them to be happy. For us though, that's not enough. Not even close to the speed we had in mind."

"With that, we decided to create a new version of the internet, a faster version, that is. Fortunately, we were successful in creating it, achieving speeds that were at the exabyte level at the very least. With this kind of speed, we now had no doubts that the vision of connecting people together even if they're far away is very possible. And no, the type of connection we're talking about is not through calls and texts, or through videos even. The type of connection we're talking about is equivalent to meeting each other in real life…but virtually."

After the CEO announced that, he rummaged something out of his pocket, then held it up for the world to see. It was a black bracelet with a neon green line etched along the middle. He wore it around his right arm, then continued speaking, "This bracelet is called the Net Actualizer. Other than being a stylish bracelet, it can also…"

"Enter," the CEO shouted out loud. Soon after, the bracelet glowed a faint silver before sending out a shockwave of the same faint silver light, enveloping the CEO's body as the background behind the CEO gradually changed to that of a city. Not only that, the city was filled to the brim with flora, as well as people. But, what surprised every person the most was the fact that the podium in front of the CEO had disappeared. The landscape behind the CEO did not surprise them, nor did the abundance of plants and people, but the disappearance of the podium did.

"This is the new version of the internet the company has created. We call this version the World Net, owing to the fact that this version has allowed the company to form a virtual world, a second world where people could go to at anytime, as long as they have the Net Actualizer on."

"Now, you might be wondering, what about the currency and power you were talking about a while ago? Well, you could obtain both of them through the World Net."

Not long after saying that, the CEO then started to walk throughout the city, allowing every viewer to see the realistic yet beautiful landscape of the World Net, filling every person with the need to enter at this instant thanks to the beauty of the sight alone.

Soon, the CEO went outside the city, letting every viewer view the vast plains that surrounded the city the CEO was in a while ago. Not only that, every viewer noticed that there were animals of different species and sizes, which slightly surprised them. Then again, the viewers noticed that each and every animal was a shade of black. There was no animal that wasn't a shade of black.

It took a few minutes for the CEO to get closer to one of the animals, deciding to get close to a dark rabbit before saying, "Although the World Net may seem perfect, we couldn't really reach perfection as of yet, knowing very well that there are still multiple bugs that need to be fixed since what I'm showing you is still the first version of the World Net. And so, with the thought of removing bugs from the World Net, we've decided to condense those bugs into entities one could kill."

He then pointed towards the rabbit before continuing, "In other words, these dark animals right here."

Bang!

Without hesitation, the CEO kicked the dark rabbit with full force, sending the rabbit flying for a few meters. Not long after, the dark rabbit let out a shrill cry, before disintegrating into ones and zeroes that gradually dissipated into thin air.

Ding!

'You have obtained 5 EXP.'

'You have obtained 30 Bits.'

A few seconds after killing the rabbit, the CEO obtained a notification, to which he showed to the viewers while explaining, "By killing these dark animals, you would be able to help the company in squashing out more bugs, while at the same time, earn money, as well as experience."

"Now, you might be wondering, I get the money part, but what does experience do?" the CEO said soon after. He took in a few breaths of air before continuing, "For every person out there who is a fan of RPGs, I'm pretty sure you know what experience does. The World Net is based off of RPG mechanics anyway."

"Status screen," the CEO soon commanded.

Ding!

Not long after, a screen filled to the brim with numbers was shown to the masses, letting them see the CEO's stats, all of which was at a number of 10. The CEO then said, "By obtaining experience, you level up and gain status points, which you allocate to the eight stats on the status screen I am showing you."

"Of course, there's a maximum level that one could reach, but that could be broken through by upgrading to a new rank, allowing one to allocate more points to stats."

"But then, you might be wondering, so this experience would only allow us to obtain power in this virtual world?" After asking this question, the CEO smiled. He left the World Net, coming back to the real world behind the podium before throwing out a punch. It was a normal punch, a punch that could be done by any average person as long as they exerted themselves to their limits.

After that, he went back to the World Net and opened up his status screen once more. Then, he allocated all of his unused status points towards the Strength stat, raising it up to a stat of 20. Confirming his decision soon after, he then left the World Net and returned back to the real world. He then sent out a punch once more.

Boom!

This time though, the strength behind the punch was seemingly doubled, with the winds compressing in front of the knuckles before dispersing along the sides as a soft explosion was heard. To the viewers who were adept in fighting, all of them could not help but have their eyes widen as they muttered in disbelief, "It could actually…"

"Yes," the CEO said out of the blue, knowing fully well of the thought that was going through most of the people's minds. "Increasing your stats in the World Net increases your body's abilities in the real world as well. Remember very well that a single point is equivalent to 1% of your body's ability, so having a stat of 100 on Strength means that you have unlocked 100% of your body's full potential in terms of strength, allowing you to punch out with an extremely strong force."

With a grin on his face, the CEO continued, "So, what are you waiting for? For the first batch, Net Actualizers can be obtained through physical currency. After that, all subsequent batches can only be purchased with Bits."

"And with that, I welcome everyone to a new age. A new age where money and power can be obtained with enough hard work. A new age where everyone is united under a single name."

"Welcome to the Age of Unity."