Update and The Eternal Games - Cover Image, Synopsis, Map, and Chapter 1 - Awakening (Patreon)

Here's the rewrite for The Eternal Games! I hope you enjoy :)

Cover Image:

Synopsis:

The Eternal Games.

Games where competitors compete in life or death competitions all just so that they can level up and grow stronger.

The world of Aeon.

One of utter chaos; where humanity’s only hope also happens to be the main source of their trouble.

The System.

An unknown entity that grants power to those humans who compete and win in the games, and to those wraiths who manage to destroy an arena portal to said games.

One that supports both sides just so that the two sides will continue their fight with no end in sight.

Our story begins with young Leon del Asher – the result of an experiment to create a hybrid between the two sides of the war – as he turns eighteen and becomes eligible to compete in the games.

Both a human, and a wraith, he will try his best to reunite with his mother by doing the one thing few ever manage.

By climbing his way through the Leagues of The Eternal Games and becoming a Gamemaster.

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                                                                                  Year 1049
                                                                                   Month 5
                                                                                  First-day

                                                                                      Leon

I stare unblinkingly at the enormous arena portal in the shape of a forty kilometer wide door as the noises of the crowded streets engulf my ears. Just like the norm at this time of day in the city known as Roark, the people are rushing around like crazy, trying to find a good spot to watch the upcoming game.

An event that makes it very difficult to get home.

Which makes my work hours even worse for that, but it should all change after today.

“Hey, Leon!” I hear someone shout my name before I turn to look for the source of the voice over the heads of the crowd. Fortunately, the man – one of my co-workers – is a rather tall person, so it doesn’t take long to find him waving at me with a broad grin on his face.

“Happy eighteenth birthday, kiddo!” Jake shouts, catching the attention of some of the other people around us who then proceed to give me their own congratulations.

I simply nod my head towards them before beginning to navigate my way through the crowd again towards my home.

Ever since my mother was taken away by her husband, I haven’t exactly been the most open or talkative of sorts. Not that I was all that talkative before she was taken away.

But that man certainly didn’t help in that.

Shaking my head at the thought, I continue to walk through the crowd towards the secluded district that houses the place that I call home. The district itself is a pretty quiet one, with several medium-sized homes scattered throughout it and incredibly few people wandering about. It’s a district meant for those who aren’t the most social of butterflies, so to say. But it’s also the place that I’ve been raised ever since I can remember.

Even after I was almost killed by mother’s husband just for being alive.

Now that I’m eighteen, I can finally begin participating in games… or rather, I will be able to whenever the notification appears.

I just hope it appears before today’s first game. Because that would be annoying if I had to wait till the game ended to compete.

Once I enter the district, I find it a lot easier to navigate and I quickly make it the rest of the way towards my house before going inside and locking the door. I then holster the bag hanging by a strap on my shoulder as I head directly towards my room, through the finely furnished and well-maintained rooms in between it and the entrance.

Considering that I don’t spend much time actually in the house – outside of the training room in the cellar that is – it always surprises me by how clean it actually is. But I never see anyone coming in to clean it, so the only thing I can guess is that mom is sending someone to maintain the house for me. Either that or it’s that asshole’s doing. Which I doubt.

As soon as I enter my small, nearly empty room, I take the bag off of my shoulder before approaching the dresser sitting in between my bed and the large mirror. I then open the top drawer of the dresser and pull out the amulet my mother gave me.

Just a little longer…

It’s annoying, but despite technically being eighteen now, I still have to wait for the exact time that marks me as being eighteen years old before I awaken to the System. Which also means that I can’t wear this System Artifact just yet.

I frown at that thought before raising my head to look at my reflection in the mirror. First at the eerie jade-green color of my eyes, then at the silver, two or three inch long wavy hair on my head. Both being a constant reminder of my situation. Of my heritage. Or in other words, the half of me that isn’t human.

After that I focus on the black and silver armor covering my body as a faint smile replaces the frown that was previously on my face. The armor was made by my mom, so it’s always a nice thing to see. Especially when I’m down in the dumps.

I turn my head to look at the black cloak draped across my bed before freezing up as a loud dinging sound echoes in my head, followed by a wave of words that begin appearing in my vision.

As I read the words, I put my cloak on over my armor, just for the words to fade away again with new ones quickly appearing to replace them.

I skim through the details on this section, seeing as it’s pretty common knowledge, before it fades away and is replaced by another flow of words.

Hmm, that GP will be a great start to my life now that the job that I’ve been working for the past few years is no longer an option. Just that one point alone should sustain me for nearly two months. Even if I wasn’t planning on making more through the games.

When my eyes focus on the last statement, a frown appears on my face. But it doesn’t last long as the words begin to fade away before being replaced once again.

The words suddenly vanish without a trace before they even finish appearing, leaving me frowning at the air in front of me.

I kind of expected the System to bug out, but I’m not really sure what just happened.

After waiting for a few minutes to see if any more messages will appear, I decide to just go ahead and check my status.

‘Status.’

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Name: Leon von Asher

Level: 1

Affinity: Poison

Skills: N/A

Natural Ability/s: Poison Immunity, Poisonous Blood, Partial Incorporealize

League: Red

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Oookaay then… I guess the System just bugged out over that then returned to acting as normal.

Anyways, the status looks just like I expected it to. Although it’s nice to finally have a name for partial incorporialize.

I still think it’s kind of weird how the System doesn’t explain natural abilities, but it’s not like I really need it to. Considering that mom’s already done that for me.

From what she had said, natural abilities are abilities that you get from your parents. So in my case, my poison immunity is from my mom, but my poisonous blood and partial incorporialize abilities… came from whatever wraith laid the egg that was used in the experiment.

At the thought, I raise my arm before turning it incorporeal and passing my other arm straight through both it, and the armor covering it.

It’s certainly a unique ability, if you were to go based off of normal human skills and natural abilities. There are other abilities and skills out there that have similar-ish effects, so it wouldn’t be groundbreaking or anything if it got out that I had an ability like this, but it’s still not something I want to blatantly show off. Hence my cloak.

I turn my head down to look at my cloak. It is a little oversized for me, with an incredibly deep cowl, and a silver trim that matches the silver trim on most of my armor.

Anyways, it isn’t that big of a problem. No one would think there could be a human-wraith hybrid. Not when wraiths have little to no intelligence to speak of. To the point that the only wraiths even capable of speech are the strongest ones in existence. The Wraith Kings.

Pushing the thoughts aside for the moment, I begin focusing on the amulet still in the palm of my hand. It has the same color scheme as my armor and cloak, with it being mostly black with silver trim. But it also has a beautiful, green jewel embedded in the center of it. The design itself should be the family symbol for my mother’s family, the del Rose family, but the jewel was personally embedded with me in mind.

I put the jewel over my head before tucking it into my armor to lay flush against my pale chest while at the same time focusing on it with the intent to identify, as mom had told me how to do.

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Rose Family Amulet

Mid-Tier Artifact

Effects: This artifact may only be held by a member of the del Rose family and identifies them as one of the family members. It will create a protective barrier around the wearer once a year that will defend against any one elemental attack when said attack would otherwise kill the wearer.

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A faint smile flashes across my face as I read through the artifact’s description before it vanishes again a few moments later.

It would be nice if I could change my name with the System to my mother’s family instead of the family she married in to, but there isn’t anything I can do about it.

Still with the smile on my face, I turn and walk towards the window of my room before opening it and focusing on the enormous arena portal standing far taller than any other building in the city. The instant my eyes make contact with it, I get a notification in my vision that has my smile growing wider.

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Red League Game Choices:

Rabbit Hunt
Search through the forest generated by the System and hunt as many rabbits as you can. Proof of kills is counted by the number of rabbit’s foots you have on your person by the end of the game.
Expand
Time: 00:15:42

Obstacle Run
Race your way through the obstacle course. The winner will be decided on whoever makes it past the finish line first.
Expand
Time: 01:45:42

Arctic Maze
Navigate your way through the frozen labyrinth while avoiding the labyrinth guardians who will throw you back to the entrance. The winner will be decided on whoever makes it past the finish line first.
Expand
Time: 04:45:42

See more?

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Hmm, not a bad list of games for my first ones.

If it weren’t an unspoken rule to only compete in a maximum of two games a week, then I’d join more. But for now I think the Rabbit Hunt and Arctic Maze should be fine.

Although, I first select Expand on Rabbit Hunt to see the exact rules of the game.

Generally, killing is allowed in basically every game. And obviously if you die in the game, you’re dead. Very few games give you a revive.

But who knows.

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Rabbit Hunt
Description: Search through the forest generated by the System and hunt as many rabbits as you can. Proof of kills is counted by the number of rabbit’s foots you have on your person by the end of the game.

Rules:

1. Players may kill other players to take their rabbit’s foots, but they are not allowed to use large scale skills to wipe out the other players or rabbits.
2. Outside of skills that break rule 1, any skills are allowed in this game.
3. Players may team up through System confirmed contracts or team up without them during the game. But if you are teaming up without them, be warned that betrayal is allowed between the parties.

Rewards: 10 GP for first place.

Spectating Price: 10 EC

Time: 00:15:33

Will you enter? Y/N

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After reading through all of the rules and finding them rather standard fare for a Red league game, I begin to select the Y to enter, only to pause as I hear the loud music blaring, marking the opening of the spectator stands for the very game I’m about to enter. So I raise my head to find the enormous screen floating above the city showing the game, alternating between the bleachers and the few people who’ve already entered them and the room full of the current participants.

I lower my head again and select the Y, just to get a confirmation message asking me to confirm my choice. And the instant I do, I find myself disappearing from my house and reappearing in the very same place I had just seen on the screen with the other participants.

Time to play my first game.

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For those of you who can't read the images:

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Congratulations on your awakening!

From this day forth, you have gained access to the System, along with the benefits that come with it!

However, before the benefits are shown, a few basic facts must be explained to you to start off your newly awakened life!

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Once a human is victorious within a game, they may level up once. This will increase the physical and magical capabilities of the human by 20% of their previous capabilities. Humans will also gain a new Skill at level 2 and every five levels – levels 5, 10, 15, 20, etc. – after it.

A skill is a power, or an ability that a human has. These skills can include active powers, such as throwing a fireball or temporarily transforming, and passive powers, such as resistance to an element or physical damage.

A human’s affinity is the element that their body is attuned towards, and while people may change their affinity through certain items, it is usually set at birth and will help determine which skills the human will obtain.

Lastly, The Eternal Games are split into eight different leagues. The leagues are as follows:

Red League, Orange League, Yellow League, Green League, Blue League, Indigo League, Violet League, and Black League.

These leagues each have different preferences towards what games they have, different leveled or powered individuals playing in their games, and different rewards for winning a game and for reaching the leagues for the first time.

To raise a league, a human must meet a specific win/loss ratio requirement, while also having played a set minimum number of games. Meanwhile, if the human drops below those minimum requirements, then they will also drop below the league.

This may also happen if the human stops playing games for too long a period of time.

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ERROR-Challenger is part human part wraith-ERROR

ERROR-Challenger is pa-