The game was called Essence Online.
It had been created during the early days of the Alliance, back when humanity was still struggling to understand the true workings of essence.
At the time, a revolutionary form of technology had emerged, one that bridged essence and machinery.
The concept was simple, yet profound.
An essence avatar.
Using specialized systems, a digital avatar was created entirely from a martial artist's essence. Anyone capable of controlling essence could manipulate this avatar freely.
However, the avatar could only exist within a digital environment, making it unsuitable for real combat.
But it had one crucial feature.
Whatever the avatar felt, pain, strain, pressure, was transmitted back as feedback to the martial artist who created it.
This made the avatars invaluable for training.
