The Cold Snake's Offer
Gabriel Darius.
The mastermind who had built Linzea Guild into what it was today.
Nobody expected Gabriel Darius to come out of retirement and return as a gamer himself — least of all Ryu Hwi.
And with good reason. Gamer accounts were a limited resource, so when a gamer retired, their account was typically wiped clean and passed down to someone else.
Ryu Hwi had naturally assumed Gabriel Darius had handed his account over to some member of Linzea Guild.
The gamers guarding the dungeon had been tasked with alerting their allies the moment the Master appeared.
Well, of course they had. That much he'd anticipated.
What he hadn't expected was a mobilization on this scale — or that Gabriel Darius himself would show up.
"Isn't your brothers' asses getting a little too light?"
Ryu Hwi called out loudly, loud enough for Gabriel to hear, a mocking grin on his face.
Every Linzea gamer present stared at him as if they were looking at a madman.
"Coming out of retirement and moving personally, all just to catch one guy. And this is all you've got?"
Even surrounded by more than a thousand gamers, he felt no threat whatsoever.
Gabriel Darius took a single step forward.
He wore a sleek black formal suit — utterly out of place in World of Phantasm.
"Being lumped in with that fool doesn't sit well with me. I moved because this was a stage I was always meant to appear on."
Unlike in reality, Gabriel wore no glasses here.
His sanpaku eyes, no longer hidden behind lenses, called Linpel Darius to mind.
But where Linpel's had been merely arrogant, Gabriel's were intellectual and cold.
The Cold Snake.
Once, that gaze alone had been enough to crush him. Now it stirred nothing at all.
"You were worth moving for. I'd like to have a conversation."
"A conversation?"
Ryu Hwi glanced around at the surrounding gamers. This was the kind of turnout you'd only see for a large-scale raid.
"You dragged this many gamers all the way here... to talk?"
"I gathered every available hand to show you just how foolish it is to make an enemy of Linzea Guild..."
Gabriel swept his gaze across the assembled gamers.
"...and yet you don't so much as blink, seeing this many of us. You have the gall to cause this kind of commotion. I'll give you that."
Gabriel took another step forward.
Their commander advancing without a moment's hesitation made countless gamers swallow hard.
But not a single gamer present had the standing to voice an opinion to Gabriel.
"I don't care for beating around the bush, so I'll be direct. Join Linzea Guild. You'll receive the very best treatment."
"......"
"You're an Unknown now, but if you work under Linzea Guild, you'll make Bronze. No — within a year, Gold is entirely within reach. I promise you extraordinary support."
For most people, a lifetime of effort wouldn't be enough to reach Gold.
Gabriel had just made the outrageous offer of raising an Unknown to Gold within a single year.
"You paint me as a terrorist first, and then you make your pitch?"
"Shall I put it another way, then? If you refuse my offer, you'll be buried by society. Completely."
"Ah, so this is just your way of eliminating my choices."
Option 1 — join Linzea and become a winner in life.
Option 2 — defy Linzea and be buried as an enemy of society.
Simple choices, clearly laid out.
This army of gamers was surely also meant to strip him of his will to fight by laying Linzea's full strength bare.
"You're doing something extraordinary, all to reel in one man."
"I judged you worth that much. You must hold a grudge against Linzea, no? Someone like you could climb to a position even higher than mine."
"......"
"Taking a guild you hate and making it dance in the palm of your hand. Doesn't that sound fun?"
Dangerous.
A cold sweat beaded on Ryu Hwi's forehead.
"Linzea is the guild you built."
"And since I built it, how I use it is my business, no?"
More than the thousand gamers at his back, it was Gabriel standing before him that frightened Ryu Hwi.
This man was willing to offer up his own stronghold — Linzea itself — as a sacrifice for his goals.
Even branding him a 'terrorist' with that grandiose label of 'enemy of society' had been nothing more than a means to an end.
Gabriel Darius was the same breed as Ryu Hwi.
"Your answer?"
Doing exactly as Gabriel said might actually be interesting.
Follow his terms, and he'd have a comfortable life in the game labyrinths from here on out. His social standing would be as good as guaranteed.
A genuinely tempting offer, but...
"I refuse."
Ryu Hwi turned him down without a moment's hesitation.
"May I ask why?"
"Doesn't revenge feel more thrilling when you carry it out yourself? Besides..."
Ryu Hwi pointed a finger straight at Gabriel.
"Linpel imitated you and wrecked my life for no reason whatsoever. And every time that idiot screwed up, I'm guessing you were the one cleaning up after him?"
Gabriel didn't deny it.
"In that case, Gabriel Darius — I'll trample you too."
Ryu Hwi and Gabriel locked eyes.
After a long moment, Gabriel let out a laugh.
He laughed as if genuinely delighted — a far cry from the man nicknamed 'The Cold Snake'.
Presently, he sighed lightly and wiped the smile from his face.
"You have spirit. I almost wish my idiot brother had learned from watching you. Then, in celebration of your decision, shall I share something useful with you?"
"Useful? Like how Linzea's going to collapse on its own any day now?"
"You've heard the name Saint Yggdrasil General Hospital, I take it?"
Saint Yggdrasil General Hospital.
Of course he had.
That was the hospital where his mother had been hospitalized.
"Linzea and Latia Soft are conducting some rather unsavory research there. Given your connection, you'd do well to look into it yourself."
"What the— Ugh?!"
In that instant, Gabriel moved.
Intuition fired faster than he did — and that was the only reason Ryu Hwi evaded the 'attack'.
He had absolutely not dodged because he saw Gabriel's strike coming.
Reacting to what he saw would have been too late.
By a hair's breadth, Gabriel's long greatsword grazed past his neck.
Ryu Hwi countered immediately.
With no weapon deployed, he unleashed his fastest attack — an iaigiri-type quick-draw skill.
The Gunsword carved through empty air.
A single strike like a flash of light splitting the darkness — so fast it was nearly invisible to the naked eye.
And yet Gabriel responded to it.
By the slimmest of margins — close enough that it could have gone either way — Ryu Hwi's blade swept past Gabriel's neck.
The two men put distance between each other.
They had exchanged attacks exactly once — and that single exchange was enough to gauge each other's caliber.
"A ambush right out of the gate. Do you Linzea people have some disease where you die if you're not ambushing someone?"
"I expected you to dodge. I just didn't expect a counterattack on top of it."
Gabriel reversed his grip on his sword.
"Your movement falls short of the upper rankers. At this level, Linpel should have been enough to finish you."
The attack Gabriel had just made was one even Linpel Darius could barely have parried.
Ryu Hwi — with no stat compensation whatsoever — had dodged it and struck back.
"It seems you know my attacks are coming before I make them."
Gabriel's gaze swept over Ryu Hwi's entire body. The stare of a serpent stalking its prey.
"As I thought — you have some means of predicting an opponent's attacks. Which would mean assessing you through raw stats would be a fool's errand."
He grinned.
Gabriel smiled so brightly it sent a chill down the spine.
In that instant, Ryu Hwi's Intuition detected an indescribable danger.
Trusting the skill, he immediately threw himself backward.
"Hmm. A danger-sensing type of ability, is it?"
"......!"
From that single movement alone, Gabriel had seen through Intuition!
Ryu Hwi was stunned by the man's perceptiveness. But he wasn't about to be the only one making deductions.
Intuition, now at Lv2, fed him something in return.
"Of course I sense danger. That skill you used right after reversing your grip on your sword — if I hadn't reacted, you were planning to cleave me in two from below, weren't you?"
Intuition at Lv2 had read not only what kind of attack the enemy intended, but how he intended to move.
"......"
Gabriel's expression stiffened slightly.
Ryu Hwi had read his intent with perfect precision.
"I was tempted to just kill a nobody like you on the spot, but..."
Gabriel lowered his sword.
As if his business here was concluded, he turned his back without ceremony.
"Gabriel Darius, of all people, showing an enemy his back?"
"I've confirmed what I came to confirm. Today I came only for a 'greeting' and an 'offer'."
Gabriel snapped his fingers toward the sky, and from the far horizon, a colossal eagle appeared.
A mount obtainable only by completing a specific quest.
"You'll be heading for the Tower regardless, I assume? I'll be waiting for you there."
Gabriel leapt high into the sky in a single bound and gripped the eagle's talons.
"Although — this is assuming you can punch through these gamers first."
Hanging from the eagle's foot, Gabriel looked back over the gamers gathered here.
"Carry a message to the gamers of Linzea. Teach that ignorant terrorist the true power of Linzea. I promise this: whoever fells Ryu7017 will be treated as Linzea's next ace."
At those words, the gamers stirred.
Linzea's next ace.
That meant treatment equal to Linpel Darius himself.
"Show me what you can do."
With those final words, Gabriel rose toward the Tower of the Demon God.
Ryu Hwi watched the scene for a moment — then raised his Gunsword high.
"Hey, Gabriel. My business with you isn't finished yet."
He absolutely despised being dragged around at other people's whim.
Gabriel Darius seemed to believe he held absolute superiority here.
Ryu Hwi had decided it was time to correct that misconception.
"Limit Break. Target: SR — Gunsword(ygg)."
The moment the skill activated, a change swept through the Gunsword in Ryu Hwi's hand.
The weapon dissolved into motes of light and rebuilt itself. What emerged before him was a greatsword.
A snow-white greatsword with a beautiful, streamlined curve — its blade was larger than Ryu Hwi himself, and at its tip sat a muzzle of utterly menacing design.
◈ A gunblade-type weapon forged to hunt giant phantom beasts.
◈ Charges energy to unleash long-range cannon bombardment.
Limit Break temporarily elevated its target by one full grade.
The SR — Gunsword(ygg) had evolved into its direct successor: the SR+ weapon known as Peace Breaker.
And that wasn't the end of it.
SSR — Enchant Lv1.
Enchant Lv1
Target: SR+ — Peace Breaker
Effect: SR — Meteor Strike Lv1
Duration: 10 minutes
The light of a shooting star gathered into Peace Breaker.
Charge time: five seconds.
Ryu Hwi aimed the muzzle at the eagle, rapidly shrinking into the distance.
"A present for you, Gabriel Darius!"