“What the hell are you talking about?”

Marcus’ voice slammed into the group like a hammer and they looked at him nervously. They all knew that he’d react this way to their new strategy, but unfortunately, the team captain was the one that made the final call. It was just unfortunate that it wasn’t the call Marcus wanted him to make.

The team captain in question was standing with his arms crossed and looking at Marcus with narrowed eyes. On his back was a blazing sword dedicated to slaying enemies, but it wouldn't surprise the team if he brought it out to slam into Marcus.

[The Crimson Eagle.]

The tall man had revealed no details other than his name to the outside world, but Marcus knew it wasn’t because of strategy or anything noble and intelligent like that. He didn’t want people to think he was mysterious. The Crimson Eagle was just afraid that people would attack him if they saw his level. And it showed in his tactics.

“Just give it five minutes. Draw out his abilities and Merry and I can make a battle plan to defeat him.”

Marcus tried one last time to convince his team leader to fight. The Crimson Eagle was the only one out of all the players gathered here from Game Masters that could make Ji-Woo become serious. If the man could draw out even one of their enemy's major abilities, then they would have an absolute advantage on the battlefield. Marcus would make sure of it.

They might even be able to take on Grand Thunder and win.

“Attacking Ji-Woo would be suicide. An unnecessary loss of experience and gold.” The Crimson Eagle’s tone was final as he spoke.

Marcus clutched his head in his hands as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

The Crimson Eagle didn’t care about the gain they could get from fighting Ji-Woo because he couldn’t see past the fact that he would probably lose. And Marcus knew that if his team leader thought he’d lose, then they’d never agree to the plan.

“You know what?” Marcus stuck out his hand but then thought better of it. “I need to get out of here. Go do the damn dungeon on your own.”

“Hey Marcus!” One of the players called after him but Marcus had already logged off.

[GM Sad.]

“Merry.” The Crimson Eagle’s voice was low as he turned away from where Marcus had logged off. “I hope you’re not going to go after him.”

“Oh shove a sock in it you tottering coward pissant of a man.” Sad flipped The Crimsons Eagle the bird and then logged off.

“Well then.” The last two players eyed each other nervously. “I guess we’re going to try this dungeon with three people.”

[GM BagelKing.]

[GM Power.]

“What?” The Crimson Eagle looked at them with a stormy expression. “We’re not going to go there now.”

“Excuse me?” BagelKing lifted his wand up his and the three players could all see it glowing with power. “A few buffs and we should be able to scrape through. It’s not like its undoable. Come on, they’ll join us after.”

He put on a confident expression to goad his allies into committing to the dungeon. Merry and Marcus had already gone through a multitude of videos and NPC dialogue, practically mapping out the entire dungeon before they’d even set foot in it. It was a surefire win if they didn’t screw it up somehow. They might even be able to tackle the areas that other players hadn’t reached yet.

The Crimson Eagle shook his head and turned away from the dungeon entrance. He wasn’t willing to risk death just because his team was throwing a hissy fit. He pointed at the nearby mobs and gestured for the group to head towards them.

“Gabriel. Louise. Go and farm. If you two want to attempt this on your own, then go for it. I’m not following a fool's errand.”

He eyed the spot where GM Marcus and GM Sad had logged off.

“I’ll deal with them later.”

****

“That poor wimpy excuse of a turd! That cantankerous moron!”

GM Marcus could hear Merry logging off long before he spotted the man. His face cracking a smile as the feelings of anger simmered down. Despite Marcus’ outburst being the loudest, Merry was the most affected by the rejection. After all, it had been Merry’s plan that their leader, Kraugar, had rejected.

“God, who the hell does he think he is?” Merry finally came into view as they both entered the kitchen and grabbed a bite to eat.

After a few seconds of ruffling through dishes and removing a secret panel, they’d snuck out some junk food from the stash of snacks they’d hidden up in the cupboards. Thankfully Roxxy had set up the hidden area up once upon a time and allowed Marcus to inherit it after she’d left.

“The team captain probably.”

Merry snorted with derision at Marcus’ response. They both knew that the only reason Kraugar had wanted to be the team leader was because it came with a nice fat stack of reputation. Management had agreed because the man was the most skilled player out of all of them. They couldn’t deny that if he put his mind to it Kraugar could outshine even the strongest of warriors.

“Your plan is still solid.” Marcus recalled the outline that Merry had brought to all of them earlier. “Maybe if we can get Louise to agree to fight Ji-Woo we’d be able to get something out of the Korean?”

Louise was undoubtedly the second strongest player in the team. It was just a pity that she was a tank and not a warrior.

“Ha.” Merry shook his head. “She won’t get anything out of him. No offense but nobody else on the team is strong enough for my plan. Otherwise I’d just send you.”

Marcus hummed good-naturedly, “That’s true.”

Their team had the odd tactic of running two tanks and one pure damage warrior on the frontline. Kraugar was their frontline, so as the main damage dealer and only close-range fighter worth a damn in a duel he was the only one that could match with Ji-Woo.

“Can we delay it two weeks? Send out the four of us into a team battle without telling Kraugar and then go back after the cooldown ends?” Marcus knew he was just fishing for answers now.

The team captain’s word was final and they both knew it.

“Gah!” Merry had already run out of words to use to insult Kraugar. “I just wish the man would grow a backbone.”

“Yeah, it would help us a lot.”

Marcus had been just as excited to bring to plan to their team as Merry had been. It was actually really simple, and they could execute it with minimal loss and a lot of gain for them overall.

Get Kraugar to fight Ji-Woo, reveal his abilities, and then challenge Grand Thunder to a group duel in the nearby future. The individual duel waiting period and the team challenge waiting period were different, so they wouldn’t have to wait two weeks to issue their challenge after Kraugar inevitably lost.

“If only we could convince him that Roxxy’s words are true.” Merry couldn't help but let doubt tinge his voice for the first time in the conversation. “I mean, I obviously wouldn’t doubt her myself but…”

Marcus sighed. He knew what the man meant. Normally there would be absolutely no reason for them to risk challenging Grand Thunder and losing. But if what Roxxy told them was true, then it was a game-changer and they needed to get a spot before the second class advance.

She had given Marcus a very specific list of things as part of their deal.

One of the major pieces of information was the secret to determining classes. Roxxy's notes said the game didn't determine class allocation just by your skill level, but also by your impact on the game, including quests done for NPCs and the difficulty of those quests. The game measured each player in the same way so to gain an advantage you just had to complete quests far more impactful or difficult than everyone else did.

That meant that in order to improve beyond their peers, they needed to take even bigger risks and potentially more losses than anyone else. Marcus and Merry had based their Grand Thunder plan around this idea. Surely the game would consider holding a team city spot as an accomplishment which would lead to better class advancement rewards, and at the least maybe even defeating Grand Thunder itself as the lead team in the city rankings would lead to a boost in whatever metric was used to calculate classes.

But they had already experienced how this went against their team captain’s life philosophy.

No matter how much they tried to convince management, the staff still sided with Kraugar. Nowhere online stated this information as being true and the creators of the game were staying silent. It was as though the information had come from thin air or had even been fabricated by Roxxy. But Marcus knew that the other teams had already caught wind of similar information, or had even worked it out for themselves. There wouldn’t be so many new teams entering and getting higher end rare classes if that wasn’t the case.

Marcus suspected that the problem was less with the verification of the information so much as who Marcus had gotten it from. Kraugar and Roxxy had a terrible relationship, to say the least.

‘Okay.’ Marcus grinned as the thought crossed his mind. ‘Maybe terrible is understating it a bit.’

He could easily picture Roxxy attempting to stab the man if she saw him again. Not just in the game either.

Kraugar probably thought that Roxxy was trying to sabotage him in some way. Honestly, Marcus couldn’t disprove that at all.

“And your source?” Marcus shifted his attention to Merry. “If we can at least confirm their words, we’d be in a stronger spot here.”

Recently, Merry had heard from a reliable source that Ji-Woo had fought a battle against an unknown warrior and used his abilities when pushed. But they didn't know the abilities or have them recorded because that unknown player hadn’t spread them around, but now that Merry knew that Ji-Woo would give up information on his skills just for a good fight it opened up a realm of possibilities.

After all, they already had all of Jein’s moves recorded thanks to her fight against Claire. Jein and Ji-Woo were the focal points of the entire Korean team. Together those two were unstoppable but as long as Merry and Marcus could learn Ji-Woo’s abilities without giving up their own they were sure they could make a plan to destroy them before they gained their second classes.

They didn’t even need to reveal their own skills so long as they figured out how to destroy the enemy team properly. They could trust the team to be professional and not release their recording of the fight, and they would do the same.

Winning this fight had other benefits as well.

Grand Thunder was already the most influential professional team on the scene after the inter-city competition placement matches. If they could take Grand Thunder’s city spot, then Game Masters would instantly gain the reputation needed to build up a proper guild and support inside Zodiac Online. It was the perfect time to steal Grand Thunder’s reputation right from underneath them. They even had the perfect warrior on their team that they could use to draw all of Ji-Woo’s powers out. There was just one problem.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

Kraugar was a wimp.

“We really should have seen it coming.” Marcus tapped his fingers against the table in agitation. “In hindsight, there’s no way he would have accepted this.”

Marcus knew that Kraugar could beat Ji-Woo if he went all out, and he could definitely draw out the man’s skills. But it didn’t matter what he could do. It all depended on what he wanted to do, and Kraugar considered any fight he couldn’t one hundred percent win too dangerous to even try.

Ever since the man had taken charge he hadn’t allowed a single hit to his reputation. To the outside world, it looked at first like Game Masters had completely launched into a new era, defeating foe after foe and creating a legacy of being undefeated. But as the fans watched more and more battles, they slowly came to realise something crucial.

Game Masters were avoiding difficult opponents.

It wasn’t even a small decrease in the quality of opponents. The Game Masters players were outright avoiding players they risked losing against. Even old teams at the top of the game that they’d had rivalries with began to see less and less of Game Masters. Marcus knew Kraugar wouldn’t even scrim or practice against them if the management hadn’t ordered him to. It was bad enough that he had even considered leaving to join other teams at one point. Only professional pride and friendship had kept him with the Game Masters.

This hadn’t been without backlash. They had slowly lost the trust of their fans over time, but it was still an ongoing process. Kraugar was still new, relative to other team captains. Not something that the management could hold against them just yet. Kraugar's record was still too solid for a minimal loss to damage it. But soon Marcus knew it would cave in. No amount of victories could make fans cheer for a team that was acting like cowards every fight.

All this because the management didn’t want to lose the one player they considered skilled enough to carry Game Masters on his shoulders. Kraugar.

The man claimed that defeat wasn’t in his vocabulary. And the online community loved praising him as the man that nobody could slay, but his team knew him as a selfish coward who ran from all the difficult fights. It wasn’t even just about reputation, not as far as Marcus could see.

Kraugar even refused defeat or its possibility in fights that the public would never know about. Unless his paycheck was on the line, he wouldn’t risk anything to grow stronger or let his team gain just that little extra needed to ensure victory.

Kraugar probably couldn't stand the thought of trying to stand up for himself and failing. Marcus was sure that the man wouldn’t have even become a professional if not for Roxxy’s recommendation bringing him to the limelight.

‘Well, she came to regret that.’ Marcus’s eyes shimmered with anger at the thought but he was quick to bring his attention back to memory.

“Okay.” Merry took a deep breath and paused. “What are we going to do next?”

“Mm.” Marcus tilted his head. “I don’t know. What are we going to do next?”

Merry rolled his eyes and flicked a crumb at Marcus. “It’s not a punchline. I’m genuinely asking what we’re going to do next. We need to do some difficult missions and dungeons to get better classes, right? But we’ve been sticking to medium class dungeons for so long I won’t be surprised if our second class offer is to become a dungeon. Actually, you know what you should do.” Merry’s expression perked up mischievously, “You should message Roxxy. Tell her about the thing we got invited to. Maybe it'll stir Kraugar's fighting spirit. You know, for research purposes.”

“Right.”

Marcus grinned as he thought of what he was going to say to her. He didn't care about what Kraugar felt about it or even rousing his fighting spirit. This was an opportunity Roxxy wasn’t going to want to miss even if she had to drag her half-dead corpse there.

“For research purposes.”

****

“And that’s my dissertation on how Kraugar continues to be a giant asshole.” Marcus typed the messages with gusto as he spammed Roxxy’s inbox with messages.

He was facing off against giant spiders as he typed and was dodging their attacks with ease.

“You know I only added you as a friend for business purposes right?” Roxxy’s reply was instant but he knew she was interested in talking, or else she’d have told him to shove off after the first wall of text. “You already have my mobile number.”

“Can’t have this being traced back to me,” Marcus smashed his shield against a spider and slashed at it with his weapon, a shield covered in knives. “And I will claim forgery if you send him a screenshot.”

“Oh-my-God, this is fifteen pages Marcus!” Roxxy’s text came through quickly. “Do you realise how long I’ll have to spend reading this to see if you left me anything useful.”

He had sent a lot of pages to her wording his complaints thoroughly, but that was also a measure of how much he trusted her. If any of that leaked, it’d be a little more than a slap of a wrist even if he denied it before the contents spread too far online.

“Yeah, I’m a thorough guy.” Marcus grinned as he clove a spider in two and moved on to the next mob.

The forest wasn’t very welcoming this time of year. The walls and walls of cobwebs should have tipped him off, but ever since Roxxy had told him about the conditions to gaining a better class he’d been going all out in his exploration of dangerous areas and finding hidden quests.

He’d stumbled onto this beauty of an area after several teams had gone missing inside it. The whole place was reminiscent of a horror film and even the veteran player could feel a chill running through him as he passed by tree after tree covered in cobwebs.

His team had called him crazy for exploring this place on his own; He was just a tank.

“Do those guys drop anything good?” Roxxy was watching his passage curiously as he posted more and more pictures to her, and then she received a picture of the monsters up close. “Actually who-cares. I’d rather just leave them to you.”

“Haha.” Marcus typed a dry response as he made his way deeper into the forest.

He was killing everything in his path, but he wanted to attract something bigger. He didn’t know what hid inside this place but most of the parties that had tried to navigate its webbed walls had fallen prey to a predator far deadlier than a few giant arachnids.

He was itching to get his hands on this team killing monster.

“Well, our glorious leader completely rejected our plans thanks to his ego,” Marcus dug his shield knives into the web hoping to trigger more mobs into fighting him, only to realise it had stuck on the webbing. “The great Crimson Eagle, destroyer of all that is weaker than him and upholder of his own reputation. Long live the king am I right?”

“The Great Crimson Eagle?” Roxxy’s disbelief was almost tangible even from a text. “Did he really add the words ‘the great’ into his name?”

‘Not the ‘great’ part. I just embellished that. But yeah, he really added the word ‘the’ to his name.”

Marcus closed his eyes and for a second he could see Roxxy holding back as her voice threatened to break into laughter. Once upon a time, it had been a common sight.

He missed those days.

He looked at the next thing he wanted to send to her. It was Kraugar absolutely demolishing the fish that Marcus had cooked. Nobody could resist his cooking when he put his mind to it. He had made sure to grab the most unflattering angle he could.

[Saw a pelican gobbling down a fish today :) :) :).]

He typed the message but then hesitated. He may not like the guy, but this was probably going a little too far. His team wouldn't be able to save him from a physical photo being uploaded online. He quickly backtracked the message but kept the picture for future use.

His constant attacks on the web finally seemed to yield results as well. He plucked his shield out of the webs and the threads reverberated around him. He could feel the trees around him trembling as the silken threads began to cascade down around him, trapping him and surrounding him with a wall of white. An unearthly shriek filled the air and he felt a chill crawl down his spine.

‘Yeah.’ His tongue ran over his lips in anticipation. ‘This is the challenge I wanted.’

He couldn’t stand holding back from danger like his team wanted to.

He shifted the conversation somewhere else as he waited for whatever he’d enraged. “Hey, are you free next week?”

After a few seconds, she sent a short reply. “Yeah, why?”

“Someone sent the team an invite to a party. Kraugars not going but Merry and I are. The organisers only wanted the veterans of Game Masters there. So I figured why not you too? Our organisation convinced them to let us take a plus one. I think they’re hoping I’d invite Kraugar but we all know that’s not happening.

“Oh-my-god.” She typed just like she spoke. “You know I’m not in France anymore, right? I can’t just pop by for a late-night and come back like I used to.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Marcus flippantly waved around his shield in front of him with a smile on his face. “But I get the feeling you’ll be able to go to this one. It’s in the organisers budget to get you there at least. Besides, it's not even in France.”

“Oh?” Roxxy’s reply was instant. Marcus could tell he'd gained her full attention now. “Tell me about it.”

Marcus was typing his reply when he saw the first long, black tentacle-like object fall down from the treeline. Followed slowly by another, and another, until finally, eight furry black legs dropped around him.

Each one was longer than a full-grown person.

Marcus looked up and came face to face with a spider bigger than he’d ever seen before. Green venom dripped from above him and splashed into the ground, dissolving the grass and webs around him. It wasn’t something the game meant a single player to take down. Not without the player dying horribly in the process.

“You know what.” Marcus looked up at the creature’s venom tipped fangs and lifted his middle finger at it. “Let me get back to you on that.”

He whipped his shields out challengingly at the creature and it responded with an earth-shattering roar.

“I’ve got a monster to hunt.”

****

"Quite the outburst you had earlier."

Kraugar walked into the kitchen just as Marcus was getting into his meal.

"Thanks."

Kraugar looked unamused by the response as he pulled out a chair. “You didn’t invite me to the Greiche International gathering.”

Kraugar crossed his arms as he sat down across from Marcus. The kitchen was bare and empty because the others were all inside the game levelling up, something that Marcus had thought Kraugar was doing as well.

“I found someone else. Sue me.” Marcus nibbled on his snack innocently but he could tell that he was just pissing Kraugar off.

They both knew that if Greiche wanted Kraugar, then they would have invited him. It seemed like someone in the company had more than just a street-level of information on their team.

This was foremost a business opportunity after all. It was a great place to socialise and create connections to the wider business and professional gaming community. In other words, it was a once in a lifetime opportunity. The entire team had expected Marcus to pass on his additional person onto Kraguar. Well, everyone on the staff at least. The other players on the team had seen this coming from a mile away.

“It’s her isn’t it?” Kraugar looked like he was swallowing a bad pill. “You’re wasting our time and resources. She is no longer part of this organisation.”

“Because you backstabbed her.” Marcus shot back immediately. “If I remember correctly, you wouldn’t even be part of Game Masters if it wasn’t for her. You’d just be a leech sitting around waiting for glory and fame to come and magically kick him in the ass. At least now you’re just a regular leech.”

Kraugar’s eyes narrowed and his fingers curled into fists. He wasn’t a happy-looking man at the best of times, but he was downright ghastly when angered. But Marcus kept his gaze calm and steady.

“What you say doesn’t matter.” Kraugar tapped his knuckles rhythmically on the table as his anger grew. “She is not part of the team. I am. You should never put strangers before the team, and that is that. The people who don’t put their professional lives before their personal are soon to lose their paycheck.”

“Pardon me if I don’t listen to your bullshit Kraugar,” Marcus could feel his teeth beginning to ache as he clenched them and forced himself not to raise his voice. “But that stranger was your best friend once upon a time.”

“Do you value your friendship or your money?

Marcus’ lips pulled back into a menacing smile and he lifted himself off the chair, pushing his face close the Kraugar. “Tell me one time you’ve ever heard a good guy say that line. Go on. Threaten me. But I've got more pull with this organisation than you'll ever have and you know it.”

“This is not a movie.” Despite his words, Kraugar pulled back and Marcus could see a hint of fear in his eyes. “You have a dut-”

“That’s funny.” Marcus’ voice turned quiet, but he could see Kraugar quieting down and listening despite the interruption. “Because I sure as hell see a lot of acting going on in this room. You act like you're top shit, you act like you’ve never tried to manipulate others for your own gain and you act like you’re actually a human being that deserves even an ounce of my trust and respect. If I considered you my teammate for even a second then I’d have invited you without hesitating.”

Marcus pushed himself up to his full height and looked down at Kraugar with disdain. “You act like you’re the man who can bring this team to the top of the world. But inside we all know you’re just a coward. Never noticed by others because you’re too afraid to stand out on your own. You’re a scumbag player who somehow lucked his way into a paycheck and a stable position on this team by throwing someone everybody loved to the curb. You think you’re going to make it in the professional scene but when push comes to shove, you’ll run away just like you always have. Because you can never do it on your own. You’ll keep being held back by the same fear that’s made you hide behind others all your life and ride on their coattails to glory. For god’s sake, you didn’t even put the Game Masters tag in your name!”

“Enough.” Kraugars fists slammed down on the table as he stood up to face Marcus. “When push comes to shove,” Kraugar growled. “I am still better a better player than you. I’m still your team captain.”

Marcus laughed. He couldn’t help it.

The man was so self-centered that he couldn’t see the reality standing right in front of him.

“There won’t be a team if you continue doing what you’re doing.” Marcus decided it was time to detach himself from the competition and throw himself into Zodiac Online.

He didn’t know what he’d do if he let himself be alone with this guy for another few seconds.

“Let me give you one piece of advice, from a veteran to a rookie,” Marcus glared at Kraugar until the man shifted his eyes away. “You’ll never be my team captain. Not until you decide that you’re going to do what’s best for the team and not for yourself. The reason Game Masters grew to be a global powerhouse is because we went above and beyond to tackle risks and come out on top. You may do things in a way that doesn’t get you fired, but that’s also why we’re going to slowly die out until Game Masters doesn’t exist anymore.”

Marcus watched Kraugar fall into a thoughtful expression and without another word left to log onto Zodiac Online. He didn’t care if the man suddenly changed his mind and fought Ji-Woo.

It would take a lot more to earn their respect back.