’Billionaire.’

The word sounded like something out of a fantasy story, the kind of title people chased their entire lives without ever touching. But in Dominion, it was real.

The secret was scale.

Everything in Dominion came down to player numbers, and the numbers behind the game were terrifying. Current statistics showed that the U.S. server alone was nearing 300 million active players. With a player base that massive, even the smallest profit multiplied into something absurd.

Marcus’s recordings were rare, exciting, and packed with information most players would never get to see themselves. On top of that, each viewing only cost fifty gold, roughly the same price as five Large Health Potions. For most players, that was practically nothing. They got to experience dangerous hidden areas, enjoy scenery they might never reach themselves, and pick up valuable information at the same time. It was no surprise the recordings had exploded in popularity.

Even so, the fact that every recording had surpassed eighty million views still felt unreal to him.

But after thinking it through, it made sense. Dominion’s system protections prevented recordings from being copied or pirated, meaning every single viewer had to pay to watch legitimately. With that many players in the game, eighty million views wasn’t impossible at all.

According to Path to Heaven’s projections, if the screening venues hadn’t been limited by capacity, the recordings could easily have broken one hundred million views already.

Demand was so overwhelming that Blaze had purchased two additional screening venues and was running the recordings twenty-four hours a day without pause. Even then, things were still backed up, which was why they had only managed to process three recordings so far.

What a shame the regional servers still weren’t connected.

If overseas access had already opened, Marcus could’ve sold the recordings internationally too. The foreign servers alone had close to five hundred million players.

Now that was the real gold mine.

"Heh."

Making money from foreign players... that would be true success.

Marcus crushed a Town Portal Scroll in his hand. A flash of light wrapped around him, and the next moment he reappeared inside his mansion at Dragon’s Peak Citadel.

"Lily, I’m back. Where are you guys?"

He immediately sent messages to Lily and the others.

"Babe, you finished your quest already?"

"We’re outside grinding monsters and leveling. We’ll head back now."

Marcus let out a small breath after hearing her voice.

Earlier, before he had the chance to register Lily and Amber’s respawn points inside the mansion, the two of them had entered a closed instance dungeon for Amber’s Level 20 skill quest. By the time they finished, Marcus had already entered the Mystic Turtle’s Tomb. Because of that, neither Lily nor Amber could use Town Portal Scrolls to return directly to the mansion yet. They first had to travel back through the city’s respawn point.

Anya and Chloe, on the other hand, already had their respawn points set here. While Marcus had been trapped inside the tomb, the two of them had been treating his mansion like their personal base whenever they logged in or out.

Marcus opened the Monarch Squad chat interface. Both Anya and Chloe were online.

He was just about to message them when a sudden headache hit him.

This was bad. Very bad.

Anya and Lily were about to meet face to face for the first time.

Marcus stared blankly at the squad interface for several seconds, feeling an absurd amount of pressure settle onto his shoulders. He had fought bosses, survived hidden quests, and faced down entire enemy squads without blinking, but somehow this situation terrified him more than any of that.

Mars was about to collide with Earth. And he would be standing directly at ground zero when it happened.

What exactly was going to happen once Anya and Lily met? Honestly, he didn’t even want to imagine it.

Still, hiding wasn’t an option.

They were going to meet eventually no matter what he did, and if Anya discovered he had returned without telling her, things would become even worse. At least if he faced it head-on, there was still a chance of surviving the fallout.

Today, he was committing completely. He only hoped he wouldn’t regret it.

"Anya, Chloe, I’m back. Where are you two?"

The reply came almost instantly.

"Marcus, you finished your quest?"

"Yeah. I’m at the mansion now. What about you guys?"

"Chloe and I are doing a squad quest for an NPC. Just delivering an item. We’re almost done, so we’ll head back right after."

Even through the text, Marcus could practically hear Anya’s excitement.

"Marcus, we’ll be there in less than five minutes."

"Alright. I’ll wait for you at the mansion."

After ending the chat, Marcus headed toward the courtyard where Alana usually stayed while casually opening his friends list.

FreshwindElara was offline.

’Good. One less disaster waiting to happen.’

As for Talia and Professor Tina, the two of them had only started playing recently and were still stuck in Newbie Village without even reaching Level 10 yet.

"Talia, you there?"

Ding!

[Stonehaven, the player you are trying to contact, PhoenixDance, is offline.]

Both Talia and Professor Tina were offline. Marcus checked the time and realized it was already close to midnight. They were probably asleep by now.

Whatever he needed to discuss with them would have to wait until tomorrow.

Meanwhile, near Dragon’s Peak Citadel’s respawn point, the atmosphere was anything but peaceful.

"Boss, another Shadowfall player just came out!"

"Those Shadowfall bastards ambushed our Savage Tribe with cheap tricks earlier. They deserve it!"

Members of Savage Tribe and Shadowfall stood glaring at each other from opposite sides of the respawn point, shouting insults back and forth every time another Shadowfall player emerged from the resurrection area. If city PvP restrictions didn’t exist, the two sides would’ve already started killing each other again.

"Hey, isn’t that Shadowfall_Three, the sorcerer?" 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

"He got killed by the Yellow-Tusk Boar King too!"

The Savage Tribe players immediately burst into laughter and cheers.

In their eyes, their counterattack against Shadowfall had obviously succeeded. They assumed Shadowfall had failed to kill the Yellow-Tusk Boar King and suffered massive losses in the process.

Even SavageBear and the four subordinates Marcus had saved thought the same thing.

After all, in SavageBear’s opinion, there was no way a single knight could fight twenty Shadowfall players alone and survive. Marcus had probably died somewhere out there already.

SavageBear himself remained near the respawn point because he wanted to thank the Rabbit Knight personally once he revived. Otherwise, he would’ve led his people away long ago.

"Shadowfall trash, where’s your guild token now?"

"What happened? Weren’t you planning to create another guild today?"

As more Shadowfall players appeared one after another, the Savage Tribe side became louder and more excited.

But gradually, SavageBear started noticing something strange. His eyes swept across the resurrected players carefully.

Aside from Shadowfall_Two, the knight, and Shadowfall_Four, the archer, nearly every Shadowfall member who had participated earlier had already appeared at the respawn point.

Yet the Rabbit Knight still hadn’t shown up.

More importantly, every single Shadowfall player looked miserable. Their expressions weren’t angry; they were shaken.

SavageBear’s eyes narrowed slightly.

"...Don’t tell me the Rabbit Knight actually killed all of them?"

The thought sounded ridiculous even inside his own head, but the more he considered it, the more believable it became.

Unfortunately, he didn’t even know the Rabbit Knight’s actual player name. Otherwise, he would’ve already sent him a private message to confirm it.