While Augus slept, the Cultivation community started to get active, some went to battle Siphons, while the majority went to train in the small worlds. Pocket dimensions opened by high ranking cultivators and maintained with a small contribution of all the cultivators who used them. Meaning that if the attendees ever dropped below an unknown threshold, the small worlds would cease to be functional. Because of this the DWM was also in charge of promoting the new releases, between them was the newly released world of Augus, named as “Siphon raid” by the Department after the reviewing (as the creator left the name in blank).

  Today, a usual Saturday for Fran, a Fighter at Qi Condensation 8 who opened the new releases of Worlds. Looking for attractive new ones that wouldn’t just try to teach her the seventh “mountain-splitting sword technique”. She stumbled upon Augus world in her rather short search as it was the newest published, actually being just placed in one of the small worlds. Though she was about to dismiss it, as she had already attempted other such raid type worlds which offered lackluster performances in comparison with the real thing. Not that she had been to many raids herself, but the one she had been left a deep impact in her, enough to consider all the raid type worlds as an inferior experience that only served to dull her sense of danger. As she put in her reviews of said Worlds. What made her consider Augus creation was the unexpected comment of the review team, which she read out loud the second time out of sheer disbelief:

  - “ ‘Lifelike action and reaction of the Siphon monsters. The siphoning effect of the very Siphon being the only lacking aspect of a lifelike raid, though it is understood as being adjusted to the limits in strength of the would be fighters.’ This has to be an error” - She told herself, as those comments were reserved for high level raid simulations.

  They needed large amounts of energy to sustain themselves as realistic Siphon raid simulations, or so said the cultivators strong enough to use them (using them in lower ranking than Golden core was seen as a waste so the recommended cultivation started there).

  No matter if it was an exaggeration on part of the comment or not, the sheer curiosity she felt compelled her to contact her friend, another Qi Condensation cultivator, to try the “Siphon raid” World, by creator Augus.

  ***

  An hour later, Fran and her friend Javier met outside of the small world, at the entrance of the spatial passage that would lead them to “Siphon raid” specifically.

  - “I’m telling you, even if it’s an exaggeration we don’t lose much by just going once, at most a few dirty spiritual crystals that we can make back just by running a few errands.”

  - “I know, I know. It’s just… I don’t like the feeling of being scammed. It already happened the other time. Were the “lifelike” Siphon monsters were little more than clunky robots.”

  - “That’s what I saying, none of them had the seal of approval of the DWM that is a comment by someone on the review team, it’s not like the comments of the creators themselves who boasted to no end about their scams.”

  - “Okay, okay. We will go and try it out. We will even tell the others to come. If it turns out to be legit. But if it doesn’t…”

  - “We tell them shit so they don’t start mocking us again.”

  - “Precisely, precisely.”

  - “So?”

  - “Lady's first”

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  And so they became the first Fighters to enter Augus “Siphon raid” World. They appeared in a neutral zone, even if they could hardly make it out between the trees and the fog. The fog, although not too thick, was thick enough to disorient them.

  - “Restrict your spiritual energy Javier, if they are truly intelligent they could ambush us.”

  - “On it, on it.”

  And so they advanced, close to each other, following the general decrease in ambient spiritual energy to find the Siphon. Through their cautious advance they found themselves face to face against a Siphon bull-like monster who was just as stunned as them when seeing each other. While they readied their weapons expecting an attack, the monster, finding itself outnumbered and caught off guard, retreated slowly and cautiously towards another Siphon bull-like monster. This put the cultivator pair in a tough position, as attacking meant retaliation and possibly attracting more monsters, while passiveness would leave them open to a future ambush. As such, faced with an actually endangering situation, Fran told Javier:

  - “Run to it’s rear to flank it while I distract it.”

  - “Aye, aye.”

  And he did exactly that, using a short movement technique he had been practicing lately to position himself just behind the monster. Meanwhile Fran made a feint against the monster so it focused on her, the monster seemingly caught onto their plan and started retreating to it’s left after the pause the feint caused. More quickly this time, as if sensing the urgency of it’s situation. But despite the monster’s quick thinking, Fran and Javier continued their plan, with Fran making a hard to dodge but quick to block broad sword attack, forcing the monster to either defend or risk serious injuries. Meanwhile Javier readied his spear to impale one of the monsters legs. The plan would have worked if the monster hadn’t then attacked in a mad dash against Fran, risking a minor injure while also retaliating. Though this put the pair in an awkward position, Fran made a quick decision of abandoning her attack and instead defended with the flat of her broad sword. Meanwhile Javier attacked one of the rear legs of the bull-like monster. This bought Fran the window to block the bull monster’s charge and to make a downward slash toward the monster’s head. This accomplished cracking the monster’s skull open though without a gore feast, as the Siphon monsters weren’t usually made of flesh and bone, but rather siphoned spiritual energy given form.

  After a little breather the pair started talking about the encounter:

  - “Damn, they are actually intelligent.”

  - “Yes, yes, they are. Intelligent enough to try and go for backup. I looked around and it was always going in the direction of the Siphon. And to boot, that attack at the end…”

  - “It made the best strategy for it’s situation, if it managed to injure me, it might have gotten away, they at least know how to react to a pincer attack and to look for backup if outmatched, that’s way smarter than others we have tried, I think this is the one.”

  - “Let’s keep going for a bit. Might as well use this try to train.”

  The encounter changed their mindset, now they were more cautious but also more daring. They aimed for a stronger Siphon than at the beginning as the purpose of this “World” was to put them in a false state of danger. If they were actually in danger of dying there was a system in place to pull them out and heal them. So that Fighters could push their limits and test thing without the risk of death. A good World was a place where cultivators could try, fail and not suffer the deadly consequences of their actions, only learn from them. The fee system was both to sustain the small worlds and to deter would be idiots from abusing the heal system, as the fee also scaled with cultivation.

  As time passed by other cultivators repeated the same pattern, they found Augus “Siphon raid”, tested it and proceeded to train or bring their friends to train. With the increasing number of people entering the World, the cultivators started to worry about the system the creator implemented to deal with multiple concurrent fights. As the Siphon monsters scaled according to the cultivators realm if found in the wild and to the Siphon itself if found besides one. Cultivators of different levels or even realms always had to cautiously deal with each other, as encountering a Foundation Establishment fight might lead to an early exit. Augus had of course thought of this and his solution left the cultivators worry free, by default the monsters locked on the group fighting them and ignored other groups.

  In case two or more groups attacked the same Siphon monster, they would also consider them in their fighting strategy and increase their realm (if in the wild) to match the cultivator with the highest cultivation in all the attacking groups. This was still a place to train, after all, and having Fighters ganging up on monsters was contrary to any training.

  Considering all the talk about the Small worlds and the Worlds system, a pretty important question is left, are World Makers getting paid? And the answer is, usually. Unless exceptional occasions were the running of the World was so expensive that the payment was voided as a sanction. Although down to each situation, usually the payment were money or cultivation resources each day, week or month, or a personalized process. Augus chose a personalized payment of daily for the first week then each week, so one can imagine his surprise when, after eating, he found a few hundred Dirty spirit crystals worth of revenue in his account.