Three Announcements
The Meteor Cartel had pushed through Round 8 with a strategy that, at first glance, seemed utterly irrational: annihilating every player who opposed them.
Only thirty rounds existed in this game. They had already cleared more than a quarter of it. While other players dragged dozens of subordinate gods in their wake, the cartel stood alone. Yet their policy of erasing every opponent produced an unexpected result.
The Meteor Cartel was, quite literally, a meteor of mass extinction that had fallen into the game.
Other players, even if defeated, could usually survive by becoming subordinates of the victor. Surviving until now was proof of competence, so most would accept even former enemies. After all, this was not a game where betrayal was possible.
Against the Meteor Cartel, however, that option was sealed. In short, the risk of defeat had become absurdly high.
Victory offered no benefit either. The four members’ territories relied so heavily on their personal mythic-grade traits that there was simply no way to exploit them—whether by destroying us or accepting our surrender.
The Dessert Legion was a perfect example. I could never surrender in the first place!
Even if I did, the legion would still slaughter the enemy world. How could I surrender when I cannot even control my own creations?
That was why the four of us applied crushing pressure on every player. Anyone who could be challenged by us was forced to hunt for their next opponent as quickly as possible, and the haste inevitably led to inefficient choices.
If they were too slow, we would challenge them. Defeat meant vomiting up vast amounts of points and being forced to accept our consulting services. (If they refused even that, plenty of players would simply say, “Then let’s just fight once.”) Absolute peace negotiations followed.
Through this, the Meteor Cartel extracted maximum profit. We could pressure every other player while enjoying the luxury of choosing our own targets at our own pace.
At that moment, the Angel spoke.
“Biin, there are three announcements.”
“What now.”
Every time the Angel mentioned announcements, I felt both uneasy and strangely expectant… a contradictory feeling.
The first announcement was impossible to classify as good or bad.
“As of just now, the shop phase has ended and every mythic-grade trait in the game has been exhausted.”
“Hmm?”
“There were a total of 4,096 mythic-grade traits in the game. Currently, 1,632 players have obtained two each, while the remaining 834 have been taken one by one by other players. No more mythic-grade traits can be purchased from the shop.”
Wait a second. That meant…
“So from now on, the only way to get a third mythic-grade trait is to kill top-rankers and steal theirs, just like we did?”
“You immediately jump to theft… but yes, that is correct. For reference, there were 8,192 legendary-grade traits, all of which are now gone, and 16,384 epic-grade ‘unique’ traits, also fully depleted. Other epic- and hero-grade traits may be unique to individuals, but they are not ‘unique’ in the absolute sense, so there are no restrictions on them.”
I see.
Many mythic-grade traits had strong individual characteristics, and sometimes combining them created unexpected synergies—or the opposite.
Take Fairy Tale Land, for example. I considered it a trap trait.
It sounded good that every creature would gain intelligence, but the reverse was also true: every creature could now express political will.
Unless your Politics stat was absurdly high, the entire game would be ruined by thousands upon thousands of ethnic conflicts. Fairy Tale Land would simply become chaos.
Of course, if your Politics stat was on Wahando’s level, it would be worth having… but it was an extremely difficult trait to manage.
Resources for the creatures appeared automatically, yet before they could develop faith in their god, their own politics would collapse into anarchy, making it hard to raise Faith. Fairy Tale Land, my ass. It was nothing but a brutal multi-ethnic free-for-all.
Intelligent beings really were trash.
“Why do you always reach that conclusion whenever you think about Fairy Tale Land? The player who possesses it is managing their civilization quite competently.”
Of course they were. It was a mythic-grade civilization, after all. I had no idea who they were, but still.
Anyway, mythic-grade traits always included both excellent ones and those completely unsuited to certain builds. For me, Fairy Tale Land fell into the latter category.
There were certainly mythic-grade traits that were universally good, but it seemed I might have to lower my sights to legendary-grade for the next one.
Still, hearing the numbers was absurd. 1,632 players had already obtained a second mythic-grade trait?
Those were essentially the championship contenders. Considering there had been only 180 players with higher scores than me, this was actually rather encouraging. Being 181st among 1,632 contenders was a solid position.
And the number would only drop below 1,632 after Round 20. In other words, Rounds 8 through 19 would lack much tension. I could just pick off some lower-ranked players, threaten them, and if they refused, steal their points and move on.
Honestly, it sounded boring.
“That is precisely why!”
“Good grief. You startled me. What is it?”
“This is the second announcement. It concerns that very ‘tension.’ The organizers are aware that after Round 8, the top ranks feel no tension at all while even the middle ranks tremble in fear.”
“Hold on. Don’t tell me they’re going to slap penalties on the leaders and give benefits to the chasers—like some kind of equalization patch?”
Anxiety surged. It would be infuriating if I got beaten down just for doing well. No one would bother leading if that happened. Staying comfortably in second or third place would always be more advantageous.
“Oh, no. Since the goal is to determine the final survivor, they will not balance the game that way.”
“That’s a relief.”
As if to deny my thoughts, the Angel continued.
“From now on, the community function will be expanded. Beyond simple one-on-one trades and market stalls, players can now form groups, announce their group’s policies and strategies on the community board, and create gatherings.”
“That’s a pretty minor change for such a grand announcement.”
“Minor changes often bring about major shifts. It should be quite useful. In short, you can create mini bulletin boards within the community. That means you could become the leader of a massive group that commands not just subordinate gods, but entire subordinate worlds.”
This was rather interesting.
Checking the community, I saw that groups could choose to reveal or hide their members, conceal their numbers, or set conditions for recruitment—allowing only lower- or mid-rank players to band together. That sort of structure.
In that case, I might as well create a board for the Meteor Cartel right away.
The moment I thought that, Wahando—the most sociable of our four—sent me a message.
Reject.
Reject.
Accept.
After accepting, only Wahando and I remained. When we called Sesaisa and Mihun, the two finally joined.
“Lament! Has our group’s name truly been decided upon such a vulgar title?”
“This immortal also prefers short, powerful names… but it cannot be helped.”
“No, it should be longer. Why shorten it?”
Who cared? If they hated it, they should have had a higher total score than me. Once the angels confirmed that all four of us had entered, my Angel—the one with the highest authority—spoke as the representative.
“When you create a group room like this, a separate ‘clone’ will always be dispatched to the group.”
“Oh? Like Biin’s clones?”
“Yes. That is correct. From now on, conversations between groups will require no attention from you. The clone cannot perform direct community activities, but it can handle communication between group members.”
In that case, we quickly established the Meteor Cartel’s policies through the clones that had appeared in the group room.
There would be no single leader. The four of us stood at the apex, each providing consulting and exchanges to those we had interacted with, forming non-aggression pacts, and collecting their points.
Because quite a few players had survived until this round thanks to our consulting, a simple message of “Challenge us or crawl under us ><” instantly recruited nearly 350 lower-tier members.
“Now we’ll consult for those guys, receive points in return, and gather funds for the next mythic-grade trait.”
“We could also force-sell our goods to them.”
“Would it not be more fitting to call it a sect once our influence grows a little larger? Biin, since you can use many clones, post on the boards and recruit as many members as possible within the public chat rooms.”
“There is a limit to how many we can personally consult. It would be better to simply form non-aggression pacts and collect tribute that way.”
The lowest-tier members were those who only signed non-aggression pacts. Higher-tier members received direct consulting. The highest-tier members received consulting from all four of us and steadily paid points and resources, while in return we would crush or threaten anyone who attacked them—using whatever means necessary—to force the attacker to withdraw their declaration of war.
Therefore, the conditions were not bad even for our lower-tier members.
The game’s economy consisted of two types of players.
First: those who sold resources or knowledge to buy points and traits.
Second: those who sold points to buy resources or knowledge and increase their scale.
We were all the first type, but the second strategy was also quite viable. Mythic-grade traits tended to make strong players even stronger, while lower-grade traits often provided massive direct bonuses. Even legendary-grade traits allowed for independent builds.
So if your goal was not to win but to survive long and thin before exiting at the right moment, joining an organization like ours in the championship tier and paying points to grow your scale was the better option.
After all, our cartel was not openly robbing anyone. We were a group with excellent consulting capabilities that genuinely raised the level of the worlds themselves.
It felt like we had openly become a criminal organization. The thought made my conscience twinge slightly.
“Biin? What nonsense are you spouting now?”
“Biin’s Angel. Be quiet.”
“We’re all thinking the same thing, though.”
“Just stay quiet and you’ll at least place in the middle. Come on, calm down.”
Enough of the angels’ nonsense. Anyway, the Meteor Cartel had been formed.
Other organizations sprang up like bamboo shoots after rain, dividing players into top, upper, middle, and lower tiers, turning the game into something resembling a team battle. But that was an inevitable change in any game that had a community system.
With that settled, I left the management of the cartel to the clone in my group room. Since it was my own consciousness, it would handle things well.
──And my consciousness shifted to the Angel inside my Dessert Desert.
“Good. I’ve heard the two announcements. What’s the third one?”
“While the previous announcements concerned changes to the game environment, this one is about the current game environment.
It is simple. After the seventh collision, you obtained the Great Nature no-man’s land, and this collision has expanded it. However, the player Ogolraeot also possessed a world that was Great Nature. Therefore, I would like to explain more about the expansion of no-man’s land at this opportunity.”
“Ah, that. Fine. I was curious.”
I decided to listen calmly to the explanation.