Coming of Age Ceremony

All pure blood male members in the family would live under the care of their parents until they reach adulthood. Where they would be taught family literature and martial arts.

But after the ceremony, they would be granted resources depending on their test results and were expected to do family assignments in the outside world.

The central island of the Von Weise Archipelago, it houses the main seat of the family, the elders’ halls, as well as the treasury and punishment halls. The coming of age ceremony is held in the ancestral hall at the center of the island.

The ceremony will include family members from different classes, Including the direct heirs, talented disciples and servants.

Participation for those of pure blood is mandatory, as for the rest it is optional because their mortality rate is much higher. While they were not expected to achieve great results and most likely would die, if even one percent were able to succeed they would add great power to the family, and they would be like the carp Leaping over the Dragon Gate. In this hall, there were 30 members and disciples sitting around the tables in addition to about 80 servants standing in the back.

To participate in the ceremony there are two conditions:

The candidate must have been an adult for no longer than a year.

The candidate must be a virgin.

## History

“Good. Now, listen well,” Theodore said. It is customary in the family for the father to explain the true family rules and rituals for the candidate on the day of the ceremony.

“All the family rules you learned till now were made for a reason. It is to protect a secret so profound it can shake the foundation of the world,” Theodor said while glaring at Victor’s eyes, who had to fake curious look on his face.

“You would not believe it, but the best way to explain it is like this.” Theodore pause, “Our world has video game rules.” He added while glancing at the doubting shocked look on victor’s face.

He continued “Our ancestor discovered this truth during an expedition to the north 600 years ago. There, he found a cave, and in it, there was an orb. The orb glowed with a faint blue light, and when the ancestor touched it he was amazed at what he saw. A shimmering light veil appeared out of thin air with an alien script. He did not know what the letters were but magically he could understand their meaning.”

“It said PLAYER REGISTERED. In old times I would have had to explain what that meant to you, but now you probably guessed thanks to all the time you spent on your console games.”

“Of course, our ancestor, Sir Nicolas Von Weise, had no idea what that meant, but during his lifetime he was able to figure it out. He brought the orb back to this land and used it as a foundation to build his family. Later he discovered that not only his family had such an item, but there exist others too.”

“The other four oligarchs?” asked Victor.

Theodore nodded his head,

“That’s how we dominate the world. Every Artifact like this has its own rules for granting a player status. Sadly only one of every 10 heirs in our family can succeed in becoming a player, Ours has something to do with many factors like bloodline and martial aptitude. And being a virgin is one factor in the assessment. For that reason all heirs are forbidden from being in a relationship before the ceremony.” He said as he glared at Victor, who shrank his head.

“The player status granted by the orb enabled our family to be one of the strongest families in the world. The secret art that the youth practice is meant to increase the concentration of our bloodline so that we could have a better chance at becoming players. Unfortunately, you could not cultivate it so your chances would not be good. “

Theodore looked at his son’s confused face and continued as if he didn’t care if Victor believed him or not.

“You would only have one chance for awakening using the awakening orb. The younger you are, the better. After touching the orb, it will test your will and bloodline. It will give you Points to allocate depending on the results. You would then have to allocate these points as you do in a video game. You must allocate most of your points to the AUTHORITY field, as it is the most important one. There will be three outcomes. If your points were not enough and your Authority is 0, you simply die. About 50 percent of the candidates suffer instant death.” Theodore said as if it was nothing, watching Victor’s face turn white in shock.

“The second outcome is, if your Authority is 1 you gain half player status or what we call a semi-player, you will have some of the strength and perks of a player but you will not be able to communicate with the world system or level up. The last case is an Authority of 2 or more, and you would be labeled as a player, giving you a class and some skills.” he explained to the ‘shocked’ Victor.

“The higher your Authority, the better. It will affect everything from your arts to how much you can level up and grow in the future. As for the other attributes and your class, if you gained one, you are free to choose your own path. That’s all I can tell you for now, and any further discussion will have to wait till after the ceremony. are we clear?”

## Awakening Orb

“I want to welcome all of you to the family’s awakening ceremony, while some of you have already been informed by your elders, most of you do not have an idea of what to expect so listen carefully, I will make this brief,” he said, then cleared his throat and continued.

“ In a while, you would enter the jade hall, where the ritual will take place. You will sit down in a circle around the awakening orb, the higher your rank the nearer you sit,” he said while turning his head, looking at Victor and Ron.

“In the ritual, you will understand what awakening means. In the beginning, you will be tested by a light passing through your heads. But let me warn you, this test will be painful, it will feel like someone is poking your head with sharp needles at the beginning, so make sure not to resist it, It is the orb’s power, examining your potential. It will take roughly five minutes, then you will be presented with a choice.” he continued “I can only tell you to try to raise your Authority as high as you can.” he said while looking at the unsure gazes of the participants.

“What does he mean?” they thought.

“Don’t panic, you will figure it out easily. After the ritual, you would be required to keep in order and wait for further instructions, and I have been instructed to remind you that any trouble makers will be punished by death,” He said. Victor could feel Lily beside him flinch, so he squeezed her little hand to assure her.

This Mysterious Orb is an A-level rare natural artifact, it has only one use, granting player status to its users. It’s not the only way for someone to be a player, in fact, there are countless methods, but every method or artifact has its rules, and bonuses, While this orb was not the best awakening artifact, it belonged to the top tier. and for the current him it was the only way available.

And after awakening, an artifact like the Orb will have no use for a player.

### Awakening

The most important attribute is Authority as it affects everything from classes and skills availability to level limits. In addition to that, some treasures and skills could only be used if he has sufficient authority.It was not written on the screen, but a player can only level 10 levels per Authority point, and increasing authority would require a huge amount of allocation points.

For example, all the players who have 2 Authority are capped at level 20. And they cannot level up without increasing their Authority.

His father was lucky and got more than 3000 points in his ceremony, so he was able to exchange for a level 3 Authority, which paved his road to become a great elder, then he used all his powers to get treasures and complete dangerous missions, and was able to get to Authority 6 just last year.

The awakening is the only chance a player gets to edit his points directly, after that there are only three methods to increase the attributes.

* First, the attributes points would be increased by random value each time he levels up, but this value usually depends on luck.
* The Second method is by training. Someone who wasted most of his time on the Battlefield will naturally get his STRENGTH increased slowly. And someone who spends his time studying will have his INTELLIGENCE increased. Although this method is not very efficient, as the increase tends to be minimal, many strong PLAYERS rose to power using it, thanks to their perseverance.
* The last method is using Treasures, Forbidden arts, and completing missions which depends on luck and the family's wealth and reach, Like many pay to win games.

As for the ORDER, it will have a very important effect on growth and plays an important role after the reckoning, it is a little troublesome, and he has an easy way to increase it after the ceremony.

Usually, a PLAYER would only get to choose from a set of 10 or 15 skills, and 1 to 3 classes max.

The class and skill slots are limited by level. but the available skills are set according to the Authority.