CyberBrokers: Project Paradigm

Recap:

The emergence of the Beta worlds brings a whole new breed of missions, quests, and gaming to the Paradigm. Guilds rise up to scavenge loot, rack up points, and dominate high scores. Only the elite make it into the coveted Winners Circle.

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Background

The Paradigm has been rebooted, updated, improved. It is a new metaverse, with countless unexplored worlds appearing like stars in what had been an infinite black void. Under this new order, three Factions rise to seize control, power, and influence. Will one secure dominance over the others, or will they together bring about the end of The Paradigm?

These are the secrets of Version Beta.

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Recap:

With the initialization of Version Beta and the advent of new Beta worlds, three Factions rise, each with a different vision for organizing this evolving metaverse. The Wayfarer Bureau, born of the government's ambition to explore and expand the Paradigm's prosperity, joins the fray.

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Background

The Paradigm has been rebooted, updated, improved. It is a new metaverse, with countless unexplored worlds appearing like stars in what had been an infinite black void. Under this new order, three Factions rise to seize control, power, and influence. Will one secure dominance over the others, or will they together bring about the end of The Paradigm?

These are the secrets of Version Beta.

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Join Our Community

Background

The Paradigm has been rebooted, updated, improved. It is a new metaverse, with countless unexplored worlds appearing like stars in what had been an infinite black void. Under this new order, three Factions rise to seize control, power, and influence. Will one secure dominance over the others, or will they together bring about the end of The Paradigm?

These are the secrets of Version Beta.

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Join Our Community

Chapter 15.5 Recap:

With the Cornerstone, a device able to rewrite any code in an instant, now in their possession, Spice, Soleia, Zinc and Ken had to decide whether to follow Fact’s plan to infiltrate the Merkle Tree and release the next Version of The Paradigm under their rule - or turn against them to create their own vision of TPL.  Not sure what to do, the team sought answers from Faith, the other Architect of The Paradigm. Faith's messenger, a Holo named Anerd, revealed Faith's own end goal of releasing a completely open source version of The Paradigm, and implored them that if they would not give the Cornerstone to Faith, to make some of their own changes to TPL.

The debate about what to do with this immense power got heated. Though they all agreed to change the rules on d-mezzing, the CyberBrokers mutual stand against lifting the Drifter limit and giving them better positions within the Paradigm hurt Spice, who logged off in anger. After Spice's impassioned speech and in a final decision, Soleia, Zinc and Ken agreed that the new power structure should include a council of both brokers and Drifters. With Spice not jacking back in anytime soon, Soleia, Unironic Ken and Zinc must trudge forward on their own. With Soleia now hopeful there may be a way to save her compromised self at the Merkle Tree, and the trio all on board with a stealth mission, they prepare themselves for the hardest challenge they’ve faced yet. 

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Background

This is the story of The Paradigm Lost. The earth is frozen. Locked in a modern ice age. The world governments had come together with a plan to save humanity by moving everyone into the metaverse. It had been called "The Paradigm Shift." The first ten thousand volunteers, ready to pave the way, were called CyberBrokers. Everything went wrong. Two centuries later, a complacent human race copes with a great awakening.

Chapter 15 Recap

Spice and her companions awaken in a strange, blank realm after being rescued from Cold Storage. They find themselves in the presence of Alcove Magnetic, a Holo representing the Architect known as Fact. Fact reveals that the current metaverse they know as the Paradigm is actually a temporary tutorial environment and that the true Paradigm has yet to be fully initialized. Fact offers them a proposition: if they contribute to the initialization of this next version of the Paradigm, Version Beta, they will be rewarded with privileges within it. Reluctantly, Spice and her friends agree to the task and are given the Cornerstone, a powerful object that can rewrite code. Alcove Magnetic takes Soleia aside for a private conversation, leaving Spice with a foreboding sense of danger and the revelation that destructive forces threaten the existence of all CyberBrokers.

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Background

This is the story of The Paradigm Lost. The earth is frozen. Locked in a modern ice age. The world governments had come together with a plan to save humanity by moving everyone into the metaverse. It had been called "The Paradigm Shift." The first ten thousand volunteers, ready to pave the way, were called CyberBrokers. Everything went wrong. Two centuries later, a complacent human race copes with a great awakening.

Chapter 14 Recap

With a ShaDAO Chemist named Koda Trundle Xander's help, Spice, Zinc and Soleia sneak into the Cold Storage fortress. Using the blueprints secured from Selena Nebulous, they track down where ShaDAO is keeping Unironic Ken. They find him sedated in a pod, hooked up to some sort of machine. The team then begins the careful work of extracting Ken from the machine, by sorting through his memories, knowing that the choices they made during extraction may forever alter his memories and his personality. Though successful in finally getting him unhooked from the memory altering machine, the Ken that emerges from the pod is filled with rage about what ShaDAO has done to him, and his time in the pod in Cold Storage has made him overly aggressive. With little time to explain to Ken what has happened before being ambushed, Soleia quickly jumps them out of Cold Storage. But something is wrong...

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Background

This is the story of The Paradigm Lost. The earth is frozen. Locked in a modern ice age. The world governments had come together with a plan to save humanity by moving everyone into the metaverse. It had been called "The Paradigm Shift." The first ten thousand volunteers, ready to pave the way, were called CyberBrokers. Everything went wrong. Two centuries later, a complacent human race copes with a great awakening.

Chapter 13 Recap

Spice, Zinc, and Soleia use the Hubur Key to jump into Cold Storage and quickly discover that it is a brutally cold and harsh environment–not unlike Spice's reality. After guiding the overwhelmed brokers through a blizzard, Spice sets about executing her plan. Through reconnaissance, they identify Koda Trundle Xander as a suitable candidate. They hijack the newly-employed Chemist and his Snowspeeder of valuable chemicals, using his fear of the Hubur Key to get him to comply.

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Background

This is the story of The Paradigm Lost. The earth is frozen. Locked in a modern ice age. The world governments had come together with a plan to save humanity by moving everyone into the metaverse. It had been called "The Paradigm Shift." The first ten thousand volunteers, ready to pave the way, were called CyberBrokers. Everything went wrong. Two centuries later, a complacent human race copes with a great awakening.

Chapter 12 Recap

After her sudden recollection of Cold Storage, where she lost her memories, Soleia also remembers Mason from Silent, an Enforcer who worked there. The Moderator gives Spice, Zinc, and Soleia black market data on OnlyCam users, which includes Mason. They track down Stockpile Quotidian, a Cammer who interacted often with Mason, and Stockpile agrees to try and extract some information from the Enforcer. She succeeds and gives the crew a node address for Cold Storage. With the help of an Astronomer named Thamas, they learn that ShaDAO occupies a fortress there built by the Puzzlemaster Selena Nebulous. Posing as superfans of her work, they meet her with the goal of getting some information on the fortress. Selena agrees to give them the blueprints, if they can perform the seemingly-impossible task of beating Team FOMO at a Fukutsu-sponsored competition. At the very last moment, they defeat Team FOMO, and with the blueprints in hand, they concoct three strategies for infiltrating the fortress at Cold Storage. Spice’s plan of finding and exploiting one of the fortress’ employees is the winner.

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Background

This is the story of The Paradigm Lost. The earth is frozen. Locked in a modern ice age. The world governments had come together with a plan to save humanity by moving everyone into the metaverse. It had been called "The Paradigm Shift." The first ten thousand volunteers, ready to pave the way, were called CyberBrokers. Everything went wrong. Two centuries later, a complacent human race copes with a great awakening.

Chapter 11 Recap

Chapter 10 Recap

Chapter 9 Recap

Chapter 8 Recap

Chapter 7 Recap

Chapter 6 Recap

The protests erupted into violence at the Merkle Tree when the Samurai held their ground and the protestors fought back. When it became apparent that safe mode has been disabled in Era Novum, the city descended into anarchy. Almost robbed by a wily gambler on her way to find Zinc, Spice managed to outwit him before getting back on the road. Once reconciled, she and Zinc discussed the clash at the Merkle Tree and wondered where Unironic Ken might be. Just as they were about to decide what to do next, Spice was violently torn out of the Paradigm.

Chapter 5 Recap

Spice and Ken reveal the truth of the Paradigm to Zinc. He reacts nonchalantly to the reveal that brokers are AI and not, in fact, humans unable to return to their cryogenically-frozen bodies. To him, it’s irrelevant. As the only ones who seem to know the truth, they argue over what should be done. Zinc prefers diplomacy, Spice wants to broadcast the news direct to everyone, but it is Ken's suggestion which wins out. Covertly, they organize mass protests which culminate in thousands of brokers and drifters marching on the Merkle Tree - the center of power in Era Novum. With protestors growing increasingly passionate, and Politicians deploying fearsome Samurai to protect themselves, a violent clash seems inevitable.

Chapter 4 Recap

After tracking down surveillance data on Zinc's mother in a long-forgotten part of TPL, a pair of Demons attacked Spice for reasons unknown. With the aid of a Nun, she was able to narrowly escape back to the safety of Unironic Ken's apartment. But when she and Ken reviewed the hard-won biometric data that cost Spice her mech, Judgment, they discovered that both Zinc and Ken’s bios indicated the impossible. Both of their mothers were somehow Asherah. This led Spice to a shattering realization. Asherah is the program from which all brokers get their source code making CyberBrokers actually AI. Confused and upset at their discovery, Spice abruptly logged out of TPL, leaving behind an equally distraught Ken in his own existential crisis.

Chapter 3 Recap

While chasing down a group of coin thieves at the top of Moss Falls, Spice decided she'd like to spend a little more leisure time with the Zinc, the Clean-up Crew Broker. Unironic Ken wasn't quite sure what he thought about the whole thing and turned a bit sour on the whole thing. Spice brought Zinc down with her to watch the Mech Pilot Olympics where she made an interesting discovery – Zinc had no real memories of his mother. From there, she started on a simple quest, aided by a group of friends, to dig a little deeper into the reasons why and maybe dig up a memory or two for him.

Chapter 2 Recap

Spice and Unironic Ken had learned about a DAO proposal to shift much of the day-to-day maintenance to be run by AI instead of CyberBrokers. Drifters (the majority population of The Paradigm Lost who log in for a few hours each day, drifting in and out of the Metaverse) would not be much affected, but if an AI ran TPL, it might calculate that the energy preserving the bodies of a mere 10,001 CyberBrokers would be better used in some other way. While CyberBrokers can safely dematerialize in TPL, if the plug gets pulled on their physical bodies, they'll d-mez forever.

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Background

This is the story of The Paradigm Lost. The earth is frozen. Locked in a modern ice age. The world governments had come together with a plan to save humanity by moving everyone into the metaverse. It had been called "The Paradigm Shift." The first ten thousand volunteers, ready to pave the way, were called CyberBrokers. Everything went wrong. Two centuries later, a complacent human race copes with a great awakening.

Chapter 1 Recap

When we last left Spice, she had just finished her grueling work day. Her job was to maintain the solar panels outside of her compound on the frozen tundra that was now Earth. Surrounded by frigid winds and bitter cold, her only solace in this new world was deep in the virtual bowels of her TPL headgear and vest. It's in the electric pink and purple glows of a neon-colored Metaverse where her friend, Ken, had eagerly awaited her return. Where he will always have to eagerly await her return because he's a CyberBroker, one of the inhabitants of the Metaverse, forever locked inside because of an accident in the early days of building TPL. No one knows if or when the CyberBrokers will be freed, but what Spice does know is that the Metaverse never disappoints in delivering adventure.
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Background

This is the story of The Paradigm Lost. The earth is frozen. Locked in a modern ice age. The world governments had come together with a plan to save humanity by moving everyone into the metaverse. It had been called "The Paradigm Shift." The first ten thousand volunteers, ready to pave the way, were called CyberBrokers. Everything went wrong. Two centuries later, a complacent human race copes with a great awakening.

This is the story of The Paradigm Lost. The earth is frozen. Locked in a modern ice age. The world governments had come together with a plan to save humanity by moving everyone into the metaverse. It had been called "The Paradigm Shift." The first ten thousand volunteers, ready to pave the way, were called CyberBrokers. Everything went wrong. Two centuries later, a complacent human race copes with a great awakening.