It seemed that Jim had just made it back with Elizabeth, and they were in the middle of a heated argument. Nick kept his breathing slow and steady as he listened to the woman make her case.
“I don’t care how efficient your method is. You can’t leave all those people unsupported when they enter the tower. It might improve the odds of more elite teams completing the climb, but it’s going to leave us critically understaffed for whatever comes next. Besides, you’re effectively signing their death warrants. Taltos is bad enough, we don’t need to help the Mad God exterminate our species.”
“Come now, Liz. Don’t be so dramatic. Not all of them will die, and the ones that survive will come out of the ordeal stronger than before. This is our best chance of having our top performers reach the boss on the roof of the tower and you know it. Without their support, we don’t have a shot of winning the challenge. The number of survivors for this stage is meaningless if the whole planet winds up getting recycled as a result.”
“The quest’s description said that we’ll be at a significant disadvantage if too few of us reach the last phase. What if we get up there and the challenge is something that only a large number of people can accomplish? A handful of elites won’t do us any good if we have to deal with a swarm, or some other ordeal where bodies contribute more than raw offensive power.”
“Most of them are going to die anyway,” Nick could hear the sneer in Jim’s voice. “Why waste good weapons and valuable consumables on people who won’t make it in this new reality regardless? If our elites hadn’t won in the arena, we’d still be stuck with basic classes, and winning back the Earth would be impossible.”
After another five minutes spent listening to the back and forth, Nick was able to pick up the gist of their disagreement. Jim wanted to group the most powerful people together and outfit them with the best gear, effectively giving up on everyone else.
He believed that they should adopt a two-tier system going forward, and that nearly all their resources should go toward fostering the elite. That everyone should devote themselves to supporting the top teams, regardless of the cost.
If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
Every time that Elizabeth made a moral objection, Jim scoffed. Whenever she tried reason, he countered with his own cold logic. When she accused him of leaving people to die, he implied that she was weak and naive. That humanity wouldn’t survive if they were held back by compassion and morals from their old way of life.
They weren’t at odds on every point. Elizabeth believed that nurturing the elites was important too. But also, that boosting the average person’s level and the quality of their gear would make team Earth stronger in the long run. That people were still adjusting to life in the multiverse and that the last few weeks hadn’t been long enough for everyone to adapt.
“We can’t afford to lose so many promising individuals by underinvesting in them now. Having a handful of top-tier elites won’t solve every problem we encounter. They are great for dealing with difficult quests or taking out powerful opponents, but they won’t be as valuable as a well-maintained fighting force when engaging in large-scale conflicts, let alone rebuilding civilization once we make it back to our planet.”
Instead of jumping in or ducking out, Nick listened for a long while, trying to decide who had the right of it, despite his instinctual dislike of Jim. Nick had to admit that both positions held merit, even if he hated how cavalier Jim was when weighing the lives of others.
But in the end, he decided that Elizabeth was right. Resources should be distributed evenly amongst the survivors gathered at the base of the tower. Considerable effort should be devoted to fostering the elites, but not until they were back on Earth and rebuilding human civilization, ready to face the dangers that being part of the Labyrinth was certain to bring.
While Nick respected her values, he didn’t agree solely for the reasons she’d mentioned. Having more people in the mid-range was an invaluable opportunity to gather information too.
Each member of team Earth could try out different paths of advancement and report their findings, increasing their understanding of the System’s mechanics over time. Having people follow a wide range of classes and builds would contribute to humanity’s research and development, offering balance and flexibility when dealing with various problems later down the road.
In the end, Nick decided not to intervene here and now. He wouldn’t let Jim get away with what he had planned, but Nick needed to talk to his friends first. To ponder how to deal with the situation before making his move.