CHAPTER TWELVE

Jason had always found the flood of highly experienced mappers attacking him over and over again to be a little surprising.

After all, the Towering Crag was a pretty low-level map. In most games, players usually concentrated their efforts on high-level maps, which offered the best loot.

However, he and his fellow One Star Bosses had almost no downtime during their shifts.

The Overdrive Corporation had created a unique system that promoted re-playability on all maps.

Per Overmaniacs, a website dedicated to buying and selling parts, the Towering Crag offered a unique item known as the Dragonbane Sword, which had a minuscule 0.0015% drop rate.

The rare dragon-slaying blade was worth over five hundred dollars.

According to the guide Jason had just pulled up, fighting through the Towering Crag stage offered the following prizes.

Red Minerva Frame: Guaranteed Drop

Dragonskin Armor (Hemoborn Only Item): 40% Drop

Palm-Generated Beam Blades: 25%

Steel Reinforced Anchor: 10%

Climbing Rope: 10%

Busted Grenades: 10%

Dragon's Fang (Collectable Only Item): 4%

Rare Drops: 1% (Click to Expand)

Players who beat the map were guaranteed to get their own copy of the Red Minerva.

Awarding the boss frame to the players who beat a map was a standard Overdrive practice.

Every single player who beat the Towering Crag map received their own copy of the Red Minerva machine. There must have been thousands, if not tens of thousands, of copies of the machine floating around.

As a result, Jason could continue using the Red Minerva in his own games and nobody would know that he'd once been one of the Overdrive Corporation's bosses. They would just assume that he was one of the countless players who'd conquered the Towering Crag stage.

In fact, Jason had earned his initial copy of the Red Minerva by beating the stage during his first day of work at the Overdrive Corporation.

Conquering the old Towering Crag had been a test to see if he had the skills needed for the job. In hindsight, such a simplistic test actually should have told Jason that the One Star Boss job wasn't actually very strenuous.

However, the Red Minerva was far from the greatest prize on the stage.

After all, it was just a relatively weak One Star Boss level frame.

The items were much more important.

Players could also get some standard items.

However, the Rare Drops section had its own list of items that stretched out for the entire page.

The Dragonbane Sword wasn't the only exclusive item the stage had to offer. There were over a dozen powerful items related to flames, poison, or earth, the main elements used in the Red Minerva's attacks.

Jason saw several top-tier items that were even used in professional play including the Gorgon Head Flail, the Quakemaster Staff, and the Hydrochloric Gauntlets.

About half of the items could only be found on the Red Minerva's stage.

Although the standard drops were actual items used by the Red Minerva, the Rare Drops were powerful items that the Red Minerva never had access to.

Weapons like the Quakemaster Staff would only be used by Five-Star Bosses.

However, players who lacked the skill to challenge those bosses could repeatedly battle the Red Minerva in the hopes of getting lucky and finding a high-tier item of their own.

The rates and the exclusivity of the items incentivized beginners and experts alike to play the stage over and over again.

Jason shook his head, utterly fascinated.

Although Jason had defended this loot for the last two years, he'd never actually bothered checking what sort of prizes the map had to offer.

It just wasn't the sort of thing that concerned him.

Finding out what loot he was guarding wouldn't have affected his gameplay.

It never came into play during Jason's fights due to the difficult hidden location of the Towering Crag's Vault.

Unlike other games, Overdrive had a very peculiar loot system.

On most games, the loot simply spawned after you defeated the boss.

On Overdrive, there were two ways to find a map's prizes.

The first was the randomized spawn that dropped after defeating the boss.

The second was the hidden Vault.

Every single Overdrive map map had a secret area that allowed players to access the loot before fighting the boss. The company wanted to reward players for their creativity and exploration of the map.

Finding the hidden Vault on a map was a huge deal.

It provided instant access to every single item on a machine's loot list, including the Rare items.

On top of that, a Vault could only be found once. The Overdrive Corporation didn't want such a special area to get spoiled by guides.

After a Vault was found, the Corporation would completely redesign the map and hide the items in a new location.

On the surface, this sounded like a lot of work for the map designers. However, the Vaults were hidden so well that only three or four of them were discovered each year.

But as exciting as the Vault was, the bosses weren't allowed to access the items.

As a result, he never bothered researching the items he was guarding.

His mindset had always been to focus exclusively on his own gameplay.

On top of that, the secret item stash on Towering Crag was located at the very base of the mountain, just a few feet above the deadly magma pit.

Jason had caught a glimpse of it during one of his more daring escapades, one where he'd swan dove into the magma to try and push the limits of his machine's flame resistance. Although he'd ultimately lost the battle, he had coincidentially discovered the Vault's location.

On the other hand, not a single one of Jason's opponents - not even the mappers - had ever found the location. It was simply too dangerous to jump right into a magma pit. Only a specialized climbing machine like the Red Minerva could access the pit to begin with.

As a result, it'd never occured to anyone to explore the pit's walls.

Consequentially, Jason had absolutely no incentive to find out what the hidden items were.

He didn't need to learn how to use them and he didn't need to try and counter them.

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In fact, Jason knew he'd never get access to the rare loot, so he didn't want to just window shop and get jealous.

But now, Jason was just an ordinary player.

If he wanted to, he could even challenge the map himself.

Jason knew for a fact that it would not be considered a violation.

Jason was probably the first behind-the-scenes map boss who'd gotten fired for winning too much, but he certainly wasn't the first person to ever leave the Overdrive Corporation.

In fact, there were plenty of players who'd left the Overdrive Corporation before going on to successful careers working for professional teams or broadcasting as an independent streamer.

Plenty of them used their knowledge from their days at the company to gain a personal advantage.

Of course, they were still subject to certain limitations.

For instance, Jason's non-disclosure agreement with the Overdrive Corporation was still in effect.

Considering his secret role, there were certain things Jason could never discuss.

In particular, Jason wasn't allowed to mention that the Overdrive Corporation was using real pilots to stand-in for the AI.

Even though Jason had already left the company, the company would definitely hunt him down for a lawsuit if he revealed their biggest secret.

However, the company wouldn't care if Jason challenged the Towering Crag map as an independent player.

In fact, rare parts stimulated the Overdrive economy and encouraged players to keep playing. Although the items had value, they were free-to-produce for the Overdrive Corporation. It was nothing more than a line of code.

The close attention Jason had paid while on the Towering Crag map gave him a significant advantage. If he had to guess, none of the other One Star Bosses knew where the hidden Vaults were.

Out of all the One-Star Bosses, Jason was the only one who had actually paid attention to what he was doing. The others were totally checked out.

Every so often, Jason had watched match tape of his fellow bosses. Two of them had walked right by their Vaults without any reaction at all.

A plan started to form in Jason's mind.

His strategy definitely wasn't sustainable. However, it would certainly provide an enormous temporary windfall.

In addition, certain items he found would also empower his machine.

Jason wanted to win for a living, not lose for a living. As a result, increasing his current Mech's strength was of paramount importance.

Right now, his Red Minerva was a simple One Star Boss. Now that he could finally upgrade her, Jason was hoping to boost her strength to full power. The combination of his familiarity with the base frame and powerful new items would be a deadly combination.

In total, Jason knew the locations of three separate Vaults.

Just to be safe, Jason scrolled over to the other guides.

The other bosses might be protecting items as valuable as the Red Minerva was.

The girl who'd lived across the hall from him had been in charge of Sunken Graveyard, an underwater stage she defended with a mechanical pirate.

Her Mech was excellent on the offensive end, but it struggled mightily to tank hits. As a result, the machine had the same One Star Rating as the Red Minerva.

Just like with Jason's stage, there was a 1% Rare Drop rate that offered fantastic prizes.

The most prominent award was the Cursed Ark, a unique set of armor that granted any Mech the ability to transform into a well-armored ship.

The total value of the items in the machine's Vault was similar to that of the Red Minerva. Anyone who successfully found the Vault would earn just over three thousand dollars.

Jason then moved to the next map for which he'd identified the Vault location.

In this case, Jason didn't know the pilot personally. Jason had only found the pilot's play video by searching on the internal company database.

Every so often, Jason had a hard time falling asleep. It usually happened after a particularly intense battle.

He would usually kill time by watching other Overdrive employees play.

If Jason had to guess, this other pilot simply lived in a different complex.

Although only a dozen or so people had lived inside Jason's gaming complex, there were over a hundred One Star Bosses, as well as countless other players who'd been hired to control bosses with Two to Five Star ratings.

Jason suspected that at least some of them were run by AI, but many other gaming complexes dotted the globe.

At least a dozen existed down in Los Angeles, the home of the Overdrive Corporation and a city most players considered a capital of American competitive gaming.

This pilot's stage was the Haunted Castle, and the final boss was a vampiric Spell Titan, a magical Mech that summoned a storm of blood to drown its foes.

Unlike the Red Minerva or the Sunken Graveyard's Pirate, the Mech was fairly well-rounded, but its low base stats meant it fell a step behind most well-built machines, even starter Mechs.

Just like on the Towering Crag, the value of the Rare items ranged from just over ten bucks to several hundred dollars.

In the Haunted Castle's case, the greatest reward was an item known as the Curse of Blood, which was worth just under a thousand dollars. The high price of that single item meant this stage's Vault was more valuable than the one on either Towering Crag or Sunken Graveyard.

The Curse of Blood could only be equipped by a Hemoborn or a Spell Titan, and it granted different benefits based on the Mech class that equipped it.

When equipped to a cyborg Hemoborn, the increased vigor from Curse of Blood allowed the Mech to regenerate from their Overdrive bonus instantly.

Normally, healing with the Overdrive bonus was a slow and gradual process. A mostly biological Mech like the Red Minerva would heal faster, but it would still take approximately five minutes.

A machine with the Curse of Blood equipped could return from the brink of death in a single second.

Meanwhile, magic-focused Spell Titans which equipped the Curse of Blood were rewarded with an on-hit hemomancer effect.

Blood magic was added to all of their spells.

The effect led to significantly increased damage. In addition, there was a slight chance for their spells to bypass the machine and attack the pilot avatar. Enough hits would allow the blood magic users to kill the pilot directly.

However, the powerful bonuses also came with a corresponding drawback.

The Curse of Blood wrecked a Mech's defenses, reducing it by two full letter grades.

That meant that a Mech with the Curse of Blood equipped could only top off as a B-tier in defense. Even a machine with incredible armor would be demoted from an S to be a B.

In addition, the Curse of Blood took up a significant portion of a Mech's customization cap.

Nonetheless, there was no question why the item was worth so much money.

It was a staple on pro-level offensive Hemoborn builds.

An instant healing effect was completely overpowered, especially on a squishy Mech like the Red Minerva. Mechs like Jason's often had a hard time taking advantage of the Hemoborn class's regeneration effects because they took damage faster than they could heal it off.

The Curse of Blood solved that problem without any issues.

For damage dealers, who were already focused on attacking instead of defending, losing two letter grades in their worse statistic was a worthy trade-off to gain what was effectively a second life.

That was pretty normal for most gamers.

Every player dreamed of finding high-quality loot, Jason included. They didn't think about the vast time and resources they had to pour in if they wanted to succeed.

Inside that fact was a way for Jason to make money and work independently, but how?

Could he try setting up his own map, complete with challenges?

The thought excited Jason greatly, but it would have to be a longer-term plan.

There were plenty of players who created their own maps in Overdrive, but they were usually independently wealthy pilots.

Players who created their own maps also had to provide their own loot.

They also had to use in-game funds to create obstacles, traps, and Grunt units. As a One Star Boss, Jason didn't have any in-game funds, which would only mean an even larger upfront cash payment.

Overdrive's main in-game form of currency, Credits, could also be purchased directly from the company. However, the transaction rate was extremely steep.

It would be a much better idea to earn Credits over time.

As of now, Jason just didn't have the start-up capital to become an independent map boss. Jason could use all of his savings to splurge on some rare items and build an adequate stage, but even a single defeat would ruin him.

However, there was definitely a valuable kernel in this idea.

Even if he couldn't afford a stage just yet, Jason could perhaps create a temporary challenge system. After he grabbed the items from the Vault, he could simply fight people for money or race them through maps.

Regular one-on-one gambles wouldn't require the intense resources of an entire stage.

Jason continued playing around with the idea. He now had a fairly good idea of what he wanted to do in both the short and medium term.

When he looked up again, it was about time for his parents to get off of work.

Jason sent them a message and about an hour later, right when it seemed like they were about to kick him out of the coffee shop, Jason looked out the window and saw both his parents inside their small Honda.

They smiled brightly as soon as they saw him.

"Hey son, how's it going? Everything alright?"

His mom frowned when she spotted the bags.

"Did something happen?"

Jason shook his head.

"Nah. I'm working from home for a while. They are renovating the apartment."

He rolled his eyes dramatically.

"They told us just this morning too, but that's typical for Wass."

The lie sprung smoothly and automatically to his lips.

Jason knew his parents very well, and he could read and predict them just like he read his opponents on the server. His harmless white lie would give him time to figure out his game plan without stressing his parents out needlessly.

Working from home while the apartments got renovated was the perfect excuse.

His parents had never understood why he couldn't work remotely in the first place. They brought this up all the time - if the job was online, couldn't he just work from their house?

In truth, there was no real reason not to let the One-Star Bosses work from home. Wass was just the sort of supervisor who preferred physical supervision.

Jason got into the car.

He was beyond fortunate he had his parents to help him. Many people didn't have such a lucky blessing.

"What do you want to eat tonight?"

His dad's happy voice suddenly jerked Jason out of his thoughts.

Despite Jason's worries about making a living, his dad's eagerness and happiness warmed his heart.

They hadn't said anything in particular, but their tone made it clear that they were both very glad to have him back home.

Jason smiled and steeled himself.

It'd take some time, but once he figured it all out, he could pay them back tenfold for all their love and support.

But first, he needed a stronger machine.

His first step, as soon as he got home, would be to raid the Vault on the Towering Crag and claim his prize for all the years of diligent service.