Intelligence agencies around the world were in an uproar. They all were more or less aware of the paranormal around the world, be it mutants or monsters, but his case could be disastrous.
In November 2006, a new game came out of nowhere. In itself this news barely made it to those agencies desk. Aside from the strange setting of the game, it did not have any red flags.
Yet, after weeks, strange things were observed. Those playing the game were getting healthier, stronger. They, alongside their characters, were improving. Already, Photos were shared on forums about those whose improvement were visible. One of them, Marc smith, a man working for MacDonald in Seattle was "impressive" in his transformation. The CIA verified and validated the information. The man had lost twenty-two pounds by just playing the game for ten days.
Others were less noticeable such as a man that saw his reflexes enhanced, a woman got stronger or a teenager getting faster. All this people only one things in common, they played this game.
The game creator did not hide himself, a simple developer working in Illinois as a developer. Nothing about him was special aside from his competency in scripting and developing. As such, almost all of the agencies saw him as a 'front' for someone or something else.
Even the money generated was strange. The paid content was too low for a game of such quality and no people or business would agree to sell at this price for the work needed behind it. To add more inconsistency, Wagner kept working as a developer.
Still, those improvements would be a problem, if the underworld leaders or country started using these anomalous effect to train their soldiers, war would take a new turn for the worst. Already, militaries in the known were starting programs to test if those effect could be used and replicated.
For all the advantage, they still found some worrying side effects. A minority of the players, those that did not care of the famous penalty and let their characters die, reported hearing strange voices in their sleep. They all reported the same:
"the abyss noticed you"
Nothing else was reported but it did not sound good in long the long term.
Even SHIELD was interested in the game. They had a section entirely dedicated in finding who really was behind this as well as replicating the effect observed in the regular players. Augmented strength and speed at the cost of hearing a voice was an acceptable risk for them. Eric Wagner was classed as non-important and the agents in charge of the surveillance were put on others targets.
XoX
Tony stark loved this game. When not partying or working, so not much time, he would play it. The player base was quite good and more importantly, playing it made him feel, full? Better? He could not point out exactly the feeling but kept playing anyway.
At some point he had Jarvis locate the game's developer or company and was surprised to find only one guy.
He decided to test him, sending him requests, using a fake name, for random things. Time would tell if he was interesting enough to contact him