That night, after all the fights were completed, Shaun attended the last of the meetings, this one with Octavius from The Pantheon. The moment he sat down with him, Shaun got the feeling that this meeting was not going to go well, Octavius seemed overly pleased with himself, too confident in what was about to occur, which put him on edge from the start.

“This won’t take long Shaun, I only have a few things to tell you before we can call an end to this little chat.” Octavius directed him to sit, smiling at him the whole time. “I am going to tell you why, when you are forced to pick tomorrow, that you will join The Pantheon. I have spoken to leadership over the last week and I have been told that many of the leading clans have found other elites in other tutorials that have already decided to join and plans are already in place for when you go back to your planet to sweep through it and claim it for us. It has already been decided that when you join us, you will take up leadership and become the ruler of your planet. It has also been decided that you will be assigned a mentor, one chosen by Zeus himself, to help cultivate your power, to push you to become the best you can be, make no mistake that this is an honour that very few have ever been provided in the eras. Your planet will be yours to do with as you please, in time, if you become a god, it will be your seat of power and you will be allowed to form your own high tier clan, another honour that is being bestowed upon you, if you make it to godhood. What do you say to that Shaun? I imagine no one has given you such an offer.”

Octavius was right, it was an incredible offer. If he was anyone else he would have jumped at the opportunity, but he had no interest in ruling, not a planet or a clan and especially had no interest in having someone keep tabs on him, reporting to Zeus himself. “It is a generous offer, one I will take into consideration, along with all of the others.”

“You misunderstand Shaun, you will accept the offer. If you decide to make any other choice all those elites will be informed that you are enemy number 1 and the moment you are returned to your planet you will be hunted down and killed. You are strong, but even you will not be able to stand against the elites we have pulled together from your planet, you will die if you reject us. Sure, whichever Major Power you choose will surely do their best to protect you, but I have been assured that no others have the amount of elites secured that we do. A war would break out on your planet, one you will lose. We will claim your planet, whether you fight with us or against us. The only hope you have at surviving is to accept The Pantheon, do you understand?”

The Pantheon was making a play for the planet, they hadn’t just been working to secure Shaun, but had spread out and secured as many of the elites that came from Earth as they could, and he could see why so many would agree to join them. The Pantheon was probably one of the most well known factions from Earth, so many of our ancient religions and gods could be tied back to their factions, the Greeks, the Romans, the Egyptians, the Nordic, all of these well known gods were all apart of The Pantheon and if our own histories taught us anything, these gods were powerful, who wouldn’t want to join them. There would be others, those that wished to join The Holy Light, seeing their own religion in their faction as well as those that liked the idea of demons and wealth, but Shaun could see how The Pantheon took the majority of the powerful people from Earth.

Shaun had to give it to them, they had done well in trying to back him into a corner, he either accepted and they worked together to unite Earth under The Pantheon or he rejected them and caused a war, one where he was to be killed at any costs. It was manipulative, cruel, but he couldn’t deny that it was effective.

“I understand.” He didn’t know what else to really say. Fuck you came to mind but he held his tongue, it wouldn’t get him anywhere and he got the feeling that Octavius would enjoy the outburst.

“Good, then I look forward to a prosperous relationship. You can go now.”

Shaun couldn’t even express how pissed he was when leaving the meeting, he wanted to rage at Octavius, but he supressed it as much as he could, it wouldn’t get him anywhere even if he did let out all of his anger. He had hoped that when he got back to Earth that he could pretty much fly under the radar for the most part, maybe push events in a certain direction if he was given the opportunity, but now he had been told that he would either need to give into The Pantheon or fight against them and everyone that they had already recruited. He needed a way to get word back to the others, but he couldn’t do it directly. He needed to fin a way that it would spread through the tutorial without it seeming like he was trying to help anyone or build a resistance to The Pantheon.

As he was walking back to his room he decided to stop in the bar, he hadn’t been there in a long time and figured that he could use the drink, or several. The moment he entered he was somewhat shocked at how busy it was, there wasn’t any free tables that he would be able to sit by himself but there was a few that had some spare seats. When he entered people took notice, instead of addressing anything he just walked up to the bar with the hopes of getting something to drink.

“Hello sir, is there anything I can get you? We have much we can offer.” The woman behind the bar served him the moment he walked up, even though there were others waiting.

“A drink would be good please, something strong.” He wasn’t a big drinker but he wasn’t in the mood to sit around a sip on a weak drink, this wasn’t a social visit.

“I have just the thing, a mana infused draft that will do wonders for a mid E grade like yourself.” She immediately started pouring his drink and handed it across, at the same time she gestured for him to pay. Shaun drank down half the drink in one go, it tasted delicious and he could feel how much mana was imbued into it and it wouldn’t be enough for him to get drunk, not even a buzz.

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“You have anything stronger? Maybe for someone at peak E grade?” His stats were too high for the average mid E grade so if he continued drinking this draft he would need so many of them to feel a buzz that it would be inconvenient.

“Of course, sir, but I wouldn’t advise it. It is much more potent than hat I just served you.” Shaun just motioned for her to get it anyway and he paid for it. He took a smaller sip this time and could immediately tell the difference, it would do the job, if barely.

Now that he had a decent drink he looked around for somewhere to sit, in a corner he recognised a group of people that he hadn’t seen in a while, ones he wasn’t on the best of terms with, which would be perfect for his plan. He walked over to the table and immediately sat down, none of them greeted him, although one of them did have an amused look on her face.

“Jessica, a pleasure to see you again after our fight.” She was the one that was looking at him like she found the entire situation to be funny, the others were looking a little fearful.

“Shaun, thanks for not killing me, its always appreciated.” Jessica replied back, as if it was some kind of inside joke that they shared.

The others at the table consisted of Michael, who was looking very uncomfortable at this point. Alan, the leader of Ruin, or ex leader, who had tried to have him killed, who looked like he wanted to run away as fast as he could from the table. And lastly Phil, the one who had led him to the Alpha back in stage 1, all for the purpose of killing him.

“Isn’t it crazy, how we find ourselves all here tonight. Most of you at one point or another have wanted me dead, some of you even attempted it. Yet here we all sit.” He took a big sip of his drink, savouring the taste. The one drink wouldn’t be enough to get him truly drunk, but no one else knew that. “Any of you still in the running to win this thing? Or have you all been knocked out already?”

“Knocked out I’m afraid, sorry to have robbed you of the chance of revenge. I apologise for my previous action, please forgive me.” Alan replied, attempting to use that weird willpower skill to force forgiveness, which was nowhere near strong enough to have any impact on him.

“Shame that you have been knocked out, would have been fun to see you against me in the arena. No matter, there is plenty of time to address that on Earth, especially depending on which side of the war you end up on.” Shaun had dropped a hint as to what would occur back on Earth, hoping they picked up on it. To make the show believable he downed the rest of his drink and motioned for the bartender to bring him another.

“Did you say war?” Michael had picked up on it and pushed for details. Thank you Michael.

“Yes, I did say that didn’t I” At that moment his next drink was delivered and he proceeded to down half of it in one go. He was starting to feel buzzed, the drink taking effect rather quickly, but he was not drunk. “You didn’t know?”

“I’m afraid we haven’t heard anything about a war, I thought everyone was in a tutorial, how is there a war going on?” Enough people in the bar were listening in to what they were talking about that he felt confident that word would spread around the tutorial, ensuring everyone would hear what he said next. They would assume he had too much to drink, his drinks meant for people above his level and thus making him drunk almost instantly.

“Oh, maybe it’s a secret. Can you all keep a secret?” They all nodded along, now looking at him with amusement, assuming him to be wasted. “You see, the major factions have plans, so many plans. But The Pantheon, they have already started creating their soldiers. They want Earth, all of it under their control. The have recruited elites across all of the tutorials, people just like me, to take over Earth and kill anyone who gets in their way. I doubt the other players in the game will like that so they will move their own people to fight against them, and so the fight for Earth will start, war will spread out, everyone vying for land, for dungeons. I can imagine that the fight for ruling the planet will be short but bloody, a ruler needs to be chosen in the year and The Pantheon wants control.” Shaun downed the rest of his drink, now actually feeling the effects of the drinks. “Its going to be WW3 as soon as the tutorial is over.”

“How do you know this? Any of this?” Alan pressed him this time, looking terrified as he processed everything he had just told them.

“Octavius told me. We just had our meeting. But shhhh, I don’t think I was supposed to say anything.” He chuckled at the end of his statement, just to push home the fact that he was drunk.

“Shaun, I am going to take you back to your room, your drunk and I don’t think you want to say anything that you will regret tomorrow. Come on.” Michael stood up and helped him out of his own chair, Jessica doing the same and each of them took him by one side and led him out of the bar, walking straight to his room.

The whole walk back they drew looks, everyone staring as a drunk Shaun was led through the colosseum and back to his room. The moment they got him to his door he opened it and they led him to his bed.

“You know what it means, right? This war? You know what has to be done?” Shaun asked them.

“Just go to sleep Shaun. I think you have done more than enough tonight, I hope you don’t regret it in the morning. Everyone will know what you said in the bar, its going to cause chaos. But knowing what we will be going home to? What The Pantheon is planning. Its information that everyone will be able to use, for good or bad. I hope your ready for the fallout.”

Both Michael and Jess left him on his bed as they left his apartment. As soon as they were gone he couldn’t help smiling, he had done what he needed to do, everyone would know what was being planned by The Pantheon soon enough, that information would get to the clans and hopefully the reps quickly. He doubted that they would be happy to find out, if they didn’t already know, what The Pantheon had planned. There wasn’t much more he could do at this point, information was a form of power and he had just given everyone enough information to decide what to do. Hopefully Viv and the others would be able to use this in some way, but if not he knew he had done what he could.

He had now finished all of his meetings and come the next day he would need to fight and then the reps were expecting him to choose. He was going to attempt to delay a choice but he had the feeling that they wouldn’t let that slide. If he had to he would tell them he was going to stay independent, but only if he was pushed to it. If preference was to wait until the very end of the tutorial, especially now that Octavius had shown that they would communicate with other reps from other tutorials and spread word of what they planned to do on Earth.