He was standing in an empty space. A beautiful and pleasing voice sounded in his mind. As he turned to he saw a wavy shadow of a beautiful woman looking at him.
"System check-up..."
"Retina scanned, ear lobe scanned, brainwaves analysed, identified as a new user. Account created for the new somnium technology."
"The identity and bank account information have been bound to your account. You need to have a thought password set to the account to modify any of your personal details. You can do it right now or later at any registration office of the alliance."
"Do you intend to set it now?"
"No", sounded his own voice as he thought about it.
"No issues detected in brainwave activity until now. Running a small test to confirm that there are no issues with brainwave activity."
He felt drowsy and the world around him went in and out of focus. Then, everything went back as it was.
"Test completed. No issues found. You are free to browse the alliance virtual reality network. All kinds of purchases are allowed through the helmet."
He was immediately transferred to a large circular hall. It was quite spacious with a large number of counters. He walked to one of the stalls.
"Hi, this is the somnium technology's introduction hall. Temporarily the game vita-nova can't be accessed. Other V.R. games don't support the features of the somnium technology. All other facilities available. This hall is similar to the alliance virtual reality hub. Any queries or specific location you want to be transported to?" asked a pretty female attendant at the counter.
"I would like to explore the Blyth medical technologies," answered Robert.
The V.R. technologies of the alliance had advanced to a state where every organisation which had a website also had a V.R. site where they could explore the options provided by the organisation and even explore many locations virtually.
A display immediately appeared in front of him with the search results for Blyth medical technologies. As soon as he selected the official V.R site, he was transported to it.
It was different than the traditional V.R. experience of a console where it was really hard to find a good angle of view they wanted or a V.R. suit where one had finer control and feel the world. But this had a much more natural feel to it.
"This is just like I am actually standing in such a place. This is what virtual reality is actually supposed to be," he thought.
As he was exploring V.R. site, he was suddenly informed that he was being logged out of his account externally and then, he got up as his helmet was removed by the attendant.
"So, how was it?" asked the attendant.
"It was very immersive. I thought the V.R. suit wouldn't be much different from this, but this is definitely more natural to feel. I would definitely recommend this to others," said Robert to the attendant. He was really impressed by the technology.
"I am glad to see that you enjoyed the experience. The new somnium technology is not only employed in the V.R. helmets but also in the V.R. cabins going to be released on the 1st of February. The cabins have better sync with the game and as all cabins have, allow you to consume nutrient fluids through them providing you a longer gaming experience," said the attendant.
"I am not really into gaming, but thanks for the offer," said Robert understanding that the attendant was trying to make a sale.
"Oh! Are you interested in the gaming helmet? We are having a special offer today. We provide you warranty for an additional two years on the usual three years. Also, the ones bought here can connect to the internet and access all V.R. sites from today," said the attendant.
Balthazar knew that the somnium technology would become extremely popular. Most online software services, educational and training services, interactive videos would become somnium V.R. technology in the future. Even some freelance operations and software development would use the somnium technology for daily work. He decided to best get a cabin as soon as possible.
"Any offers on the V.R. cabin?" asked Balthazar who was right beside Robert.
"The V.R cabins could be pre-ordered with the same offer. They will be delivered to the address you specified by Metis technologies. It is considered to be excellent for gaming and it also monitors your vitals during use."
"I would like to buy a cabin. Could you please quote the price," said Balthazar to the attendant?
"The original price is 5 million. We are having a discount of 10 percent for the pre-order. So, you can have it 4.5 million credits," replied the attendant.
He quickly conducted the transaction, providing his home address to deliver the cabin. Robert was extremely surprised that Balthazar had bought a V.R. cabin. He knew that Balthazar had dabbled in V.R. games during college but didn't expect it to be to an extent that he would purchase a V.R cabin.
"You bought a cabin? You plan to be an active player in the game, when you are serving in the military?"
"It got three months of recommended leave and I am not planning to be joining till May. When I leave, I can just leave it to the workshop for Rudra and the others to use," explained Balthazar.
"You know what? Seeing you even I am tempted to get one. I am going to buy a helmet myself."
Robert got a headset and they left together with it. They carried on to the combat coliseum like they planned. The combat coliseum didn't always have aliens fighting one another. Its original owner were pet trainers and they were the ones who organized the fights. More than half the time, it was them having their pets perform tricks and feats.
Both Robert and Balthazar weren't that interested in these as much as they were in the fights. On finding out that there would be no more fights for the next two hours, they went to the shuttle. Soon, they were back at the Blyth mansion.
"Entora city wasn't as fun as I expected it to be," confessed Balthazar.
"Maybe we had very high expectations of it since childhood and now that were have grown up, we were kind of set for disappointment."
"So, what now?"
"We have about 2 hours till 5 p.m. meeting with Salazar. We can try out his assignments before the evening runs."
"As good a thing as any. We need to do it sometime."
They headed off to the herbariums and soon found themselves searching uprooting plants and separating the bark, stems, roots and other parts and packed them up. They needed to move them quickly to Salazar's lab and work on removing poison out of them and also refine them.
They managed to quickly put them up in their backpacks and reach Salazar's lab in 15 minutes. Processing these materials to extract the poison could be done with automatons, but Salazar had specifically asked them to do the entire extraction manually so that they would have decent amount of practice and could be able to do it even in isolated and unfriendly environments.
They spent more than an hour repeatedly doing the same. They extracted enough to clear off their assignments for the next couple of days. After they were done, they quickly went back to the mansion and went to the racetrack. They finished their daily exercise and decided to call it a day.
As Balthazar reached his room, he got a message from Salazar informing that he would be having direct combat classes for half an hour daily from tomorrow onward.
"Well that would actually be something useful and might quicken up the pace of the training," thought Balthazar. "It had been awfully boring and monotonous the past few days."
He contacted Robert and came to know that Robert go the same message from Salazar. The sun has set, and he was decided to go check up on the cyber cafe. He soon reached the cyber cafe and was greeted by Slaine at the complex.
"The network technician from the nearby internet service provider had just finished updating the optics and ports of the place to match the internet requirements for the somnium V.R. headsets," informed Slaine.
"We could have had the 3rd and 4th floor also done with, if not for the hassle that man caused," said Lizzie coming from behind Slaine.
"Yeah. But Rudra came, informed the crowd that you owned the place and go talk to you. He managed to quell the crowd," said Slaine.
"Who came here? What did he want?" asked Balthazar.
"It was as you warned me. There were a Jack and Oliver Blyth, who lead the crowd claiming we were using their employees. If I hadn't come over to inform that you have paid the severance and informed them that the civil force would prosecute them, if they didn't stop the ruckus, it could have gone worse. The internet technician was quite flustered when he saw that a Blyth was against us. But we managed to convince him that as a Blyth owns the cyber cafe, it wouldn't be much of an issue," said Rudra coming out of the manager compartment.
"Even Oliver came here? I only expected that Jack would try and make some unnecessary trouble. Don't worry I will handle it," said Balthazar assuaging their worries.
"Not an issue at all. We already expected a bit of trouble from your family when we decided to get out of the cyber cafe. Moreover, it is all good publicity for our cyber cafe," added Rudra.
He spent a few more minutes at the Dreamz Cyber Space and played a few V.R. games. Then, he spent some time with Rudra, Lizzie and Slaine discussing the possible floor plans of the 3rd and 4th floors.
When Rudra and his team were a part of cyber drome, the cyber drome provided most of the equipment from their guild or bought the equipment. But now they had to get them all on their own. This required them to have a proper workshop and gaming studio which they decided to have in the 3rd and 4th floors.
He also told Rudra that he bought a V.R. cabin that is going to be delivered at his home and he plans to check it out. When he returned back to the mansion, he had Jack and Oliver waiting for him on a couch at the main hall.
Jack was staring at him fuming with anger. "Same old Jack!" thought Balthazar.
"Hi Jack," he greeted with a smile.
"You shameless coward. Finally, you come back to the mansion. Where have you been all day long?" said Jack in a loud voice. He successfully managed to gather the attention of the people in the hall. But most of them knew him and just carried on with their work after they saw who it was.
"I am a busy man, Jack. Where I have been is none of your business," replied Balthazar calmly. Balthazar knew Jack from childhood and knew that as long as he replied calmly it would infuriate him and he would loose his calm and it definitely seemed to be working even after 5 years.
"How dare you?" started Jack spewing spittle out of his mouth. "I have been waiting at your complex for a lot of time with Elder Oliver. And all you don't even tell us where you were gallivanting."
"Gallivanting? That's what you do with your fellow boozehounds. Don't confuse yourself with the rest of us," replied Balthazar. "You idiot. You are the last person that gets to criticize others of gallivanting," he thought.
"Do you think the same of me?" said Oliver joining the argument. Oliver was one of the members of the Elder council. Balthazar hardly knew much about him. But he never expected an elder to join Jack's pretentious rants.
"Frankly speaking Elder Oliver, I don't know much about you to make any kind of assertion. But I have to confess that I am a little disappointed. If you wanted to actually contact me, you could have simply sent me a message instead manually searching for me like a cave man from ancient ages. Nevertheless, could you tell me why you wanted to meet?"
Oliver's face hardly changed when Balthazar retorted. "He is definitely more composed than Jack. Well, he is an elder that is minimum requirement," thought Balthazar.
"I had Jack try and contact you. But it looks like you had blocked his id on your device," said Oliver.
"Of course, I make it a point to block booze addled ranting gallivants. You could have surely contacted me directly," replied Balthazar.
"Well, Jack is the co-owner of the cyber drome. So, I wanted him to handle the issue. I am just here for support," said Oliver. He hadn't expected Balthazar to be so calm and undaunted in the presence of an elder. Now, he realized that Jack would probably not be able to force Balthazar to do anything.
"Ok Jack. What issue did you have with the cyber drome? What did you want me for?" asked Balthazar looking at Jack.
"You poached my men. You are openly recruiting from my cyber cafe. And you think that it is fine to do so?"
"One I offered my friend Rudra a job as he was dissatisfied with his current position and salary. I openly offered jobs for my new business. If the applicants were satisfactory, I allowed them to move and work for me. Just like in any other business. If you wan't them back, offer them something better."
"So, you agree that you knowingly caused my employees to work for you, causing me to be unable to run my cyber cafe. It is against the family code to directly fight against one another's business. I will have to challenge you for the right to.."
"Oh! Shut up. Please" said Balthazar cutting him from continuing on with his ridiculous speech. "I never agreed to knowingly cause you to loose employees or fight against the cyber drome. I just setup my own business with Rudra. I never forced anyone to join me. It was all consensual and I can prove it. It is just sad that the cyber drome was maintained so bad, that the minute another business was opened your employees decided to quit it."
"But, but,." tried Jack to defend his position but he couldn't get a proper argument.
"Now that we have established that I haven't broken any family code, let us talk about you. You had a great chance to expand into the V.R. cafe business for the past six years. But all I see is that it had deteriorated to a far worse condition than it was five years ago. Even if I didn't set up a V.R. cafe, anyone who had an idea to set one up would have caused the same. Just be glad that I managed to keep it within the family."
Balthazar clearly specified publicly that he had not forced anyone and also that he had paid the severance fees. So, Oliver as an elder couldn't reprimand him. But his son Jake, is someone who was not satisfied easy. Balthazar knew that Jack wouldn't let it be. If Jack couldn't challenge Balthazar, he would try something or the other to his cyber cafe to force him to challenge.
"I had better nip this issue in the bid to avoid any further troubles in the future," thought Balthazar as he thought out a simple plan. If he challenges Jack now and Jack loses the fight. Then he could directly use the family rules to force Jack to not compete with him again.
Thinking along those lines, he said, "Cousin Jack, if you really want to challenge me for a fight to stop me from starting a cyber cafe. You can do so. Just don't search for random excuses but simply bet me for an amount equivalent to the cyber cafe. I put an amount close to 100 million credits into the venture. You can challenge me with something of equivalent value."
"I will also earn some money in this way," thought Balthazar as he smiled inwardly.