Chapter 1406 - Preparing For a Golden Opponent

 Miranda was still working on integrating the new Prima Credits into the current budget, planning what to invest in next. More Teleportation Beacons were definitely a must, and she had also sent some reinforcements the way of their Vassal’s Territory, seeing as the Behemoth had been slain. While she didn’t think it would happen, Miranda did have to consider if some other faction had been waiting to take advantage, and as their Vassal, they should at least defend it.

Just then, as Miranda was thinking about where to place a small outpost, she was notified that an Administrator had returned to the Territory from within the Central Domain. She instantly checked who it was, and as she did, she also realized that more Prima Credits had suddenly been deposited, making her open her eyes wide.

“What in the actual...” she muttered before getting up from her chair and rushing to where those exiting the Central Domain would appear. She quickly made her way overt and found William waiting for her alongside Lillian who'd gotten there first.

The young metal mage didn’t look surprised upon seeing them as he nodded. “I’ve returned, Ms. Wells.”

“I can see that,” Miranda commented, too much in a rush to bother with pleasantries. “What happened within the Central Domain? Tramon and the Behemoth died, you and Jake both got a truckload of Prima Credits, and Holstred reported that many of the Territories seem to lack their crucial elites.”

“Aggressively expanding during the next month would be smart, given the majority of top geniuses part of the event died today,” William nodded. “As for how it happened...”

William proceeded to explain what had gone down within the Central Domain, from the jungle and desert to the Palace of Abundance. From his explanation, she could already tell this was an event with an extreme death rate compared to the usual, and when he got to those antechambers, it was downright ridiculous.

Definitely the kind of scenario that the system would only orchestrate given the simulated nature of this event. One thing did strike Miranda, though. Based on his initial description of people being allowed to leave the antechambers, she’d initially assumed William would have left; however, when he mentioned the throne room, she got confused.

“Wait, you survived and came out on top within one of these ten antechambers?” she questioned as realization dawned. “Wouldn’t that make you one of the ten strongest people in this event?”

Miranda knew William was strong and had some interesting magic, but she’d never considered him truly top-tier. Heck, when she’d planned, she’d put him slightly below the level of Tramon, given he was a naturally evolved True Dragon, and William was just a young metal mage who seemed like he was lost in life much of the time.

“I wouldn’t say that,” William agreed with her conclusion, though. “The circumstances just massively favored me. There were plenty of people in that antechamber I would have no confidence in facing by myself, so I avoided combat and manipulated the situation as much as I could. In the end, the person who believed himself to be the final victor was already lethally damaged by his opponents, and all I had to do was step in and finish the job.”

“You make that sound as if doing that isn’t already astounding,” Miranda muttered. “To manipulate so many geniuses at once... how exactly would one even do that? Mere illusion magic wouldn’t be enough. Karmic magic, I guess?”

William nodded as he sighed, nevertheless explaining without hiding anything. “I had no existing karmic bond with anyone present, so I forged a fake persona of sorts that would serve as a first impression. One that would make me naturally appear as an ally in their eyes. If they had time to scrutinize and question, something like that would never have worked, but given the hectic situation of a life-and-death battle, no one questioned me. Everyone believed I was on their side simultaneously, and given I didn’t display any powerful magic, not a threat even if I weren’t an ally. Only towards the end did I make the final two believe I was already dead as they fought it out. The second the victor, a member of the Altmar Empire, deactivated his boosting skill, I struck. So no, I wouldn’t say I’m on their level, and there were several people in that throne room I would have had no confidence tricking in the first place. Lord Thayne naturally included.”

Miranda nodded along, still finding his accomplishment incredibly impressive. Had he used trickery and manipulation to take advantage of the situation? For sure, but that was also a power.

“What happened in the throne room? Who made it there besides Jake?” Miranda asked, motioning for the young man to continue as Lillian was already busy noting everything down. Miranda and Lillian also shared a quick look, both having similar thoughts on William’s revelation and what it could mean.

They kept their thoughts to themselves for now as William told them what the Abundant Emperor had said, not leaving out a single detail. Knowing who the people were that made it to that final throne room was incredibly valuable information, to the level where Miranda considered having one of their Administrators leave the simulation and the Seat of the Exalted Prima to report back to the Order of the Malefic Viper.

Based on the young mage’s words, this Abundant Emperor was quite a character, which in itself was interesting. NPCs in the simulation hadn’t exactly been expressive so far, after all. Perhaps calling the Abundant Emperor an NPC wouldn’t quite be right, though if he was one, classifying him as a major side character seemed correct. His talk about siblings also had many implications.

It also sounded like the event would be going on for a while, though fortunately, it appeared that there would come a time when one could leave the Seat of the Exalted Prima without being locked out of the World of the Exalted Prima for too long. As things were currently, leaving the Seat and locking oneself out of returning for a year should effectively be considered a self-elimination, as no one knew if the Beacon would even survive a full year, given how quick things had been moving thus far.

Well, at least their Territory wouldn’t need to fear elimination, given the century of immunity... wait... how long would their Territory be immune, given they had two people who’d gained the reward?

Based on her interpretation, it could be either a hundred, two hundred, or a hundred and fifty years. It was said that the bonuses would stack multiplicatively, but that was usually only the case with percentage-based bonuses, and the example given was also in percentages, so it could really go either way.

Checking through her menus, she unfortunately had no way of telling how long this immunity would last, or even if it was active yet.

There were many more things to consider based on what William said, and she had now decided that they would save Prima Credits, given that their value would apparently increase in the next phase. There were still a few planned expenditures and upkeep that had to remain funded, which she would go through with, but the majority would be saved.

At the end of the day, there was too much information to digest and way too many missing details. Plus, before making any too-big decisions, she wanted to consult Jake. Though it was a big question when he would return.

“William,” Miranda said after he was done talking. “Be brutally honest with me... what do you think the chances are of Jake winning among those eight remaining Administrators?”

The metal mage was in thought for a moment before shaking his head. “I truly don’t know. I have zero insight into how powerful each of these eight is, but I will say that the circumstances don’t favor him. Lord Thayne and the Eastbound Monk are both priority targets for everyone else, and there is a good chance they will be teamed up on, and if that happens, things would certainly get messy. You asked me to be brutally honest, so I will... I don’t think his chances are that good. Even if he is the strongest person in the room, if several others close to his level throw their trump cards his way, I don’t think anyone could handle that.”

“I see,” Miranda nodded, knowing that she should be ready in case Jake took an extra month to return. It would be annoying, but not disastrous, and she honestly cared more about whether he would at least earn a lot of Prima Credits when going out. Unless things had changed, he should also still get Prima Credits for killing others, right? In that case, they should be able to see if he at least took others down with him.

Alas, for now, all she could do was move on. Miranda shouldn’t dwell on things she had no control over, and besides, they had other important matters to attend to.

Nodding resolutely, she threw William a smile. “I realized and learned a lot of important things today and have many things I need to reevaluate. Thank you.”

“No problem,” William said, looking a bit confused why she was suddenly thanking him.

“One of those things is that I’ve been severely underutilizing you,” she said, her smile turning a bit devilish. “Who would have thought you were this capable? It certainly would be a crime not to take advantage of that.”

Miranda glanced Lillian’s way, the lucenti mage nodding, as William seemed to realize he would have tough days ahead of him.

--

When William gave his assessment, he naturally couldn’t know that the arena would be changed to something massively favoring Jake. The mage hadn’t been wrong that Jake would find himself in trouble if teamed up on, but in a one-versus-one scenario, especially one where he could get the jump, he wasn’t afraid to fight anyone.

Jake wasn’t quite sure if he could get the jump on his first opponent, though, seeing as they were bee-lining straight for him. He was a little confused, though, as he felt no mark placed upon him of any kind, and while he wouldn’t dare claim that he could detect anything used on him by others at his level, he doubted anyone present had the capability to hide a mark from him.

His Perception was simply too high, and usually those kinds of skills scaled with, or were countered by, Perception. That led him to conclude that whatever was used to track him wasn’t a mark placed upon him but something else. One thing instantly sprang to mind as Jake got a good idea of who was coming.

How bold if it’s him, Jake couldn’t help but smile. One person who could definitely track Jake was the one inherently linked to the mask on his face: the Golden Forest King. Seeing as the mask was effectively a part of the Unique Lifeform, it was only to be expected that the King could feel it when it was anywhere nearby, even if Jake tried to hide.

It was very bold, though. The King didn’t exactly have a good track record against Jake. Then again, perhaps that was an argument for why the Unique Lifeform did want to go for Jake. Revenge wasn’t quite the right word; more that the King wanted to prove to himself and others that he had surpassed what he once was.

These thoughts effectively made Jake conclude that the King was the one coming, so even if he couldn’t confirm it, Jake started his preparations as he also looked around for a good place to fight. The open sky was good, but looking to the nearby mountain range, Jake believed that would be better, so he moved over there while also activating Unseen Hunter.

Within his quiver, a Protean Arrow was quickly being woven together, specifically designed to take down the Unique Lifeform. Jake knew that the King’s soul was incredibly powerful, so even if damaging the soul was effectively the only way to beat him, Jake wanted to avoid using any soul poison.

Instead, he decided to go for a very acidic poison. Jake had made a few different varieties of poison, and while this one wasn’t particularly potent compared to his Necrotic Poison or his other more specialized ones, it should do the job to weaken the tough exterior of the King.

Seeing as the body of the Unique Lifeform was just a vessel “possessed” by the mask, it was incredibly durable but also lacked some innate resistances, and if one got through the magical defenses of the King, the usual passives and whatnot biological lifeforms had wouldn’t be there, making the acidic poison more effective.

However, just as Jake was cooking up his response and looking forward to fighting the Golden Forest King, something felt amiss. After he’d activated Unseen Hunter and moved to the mountains, he noticed that the direction of his incoming opponent hadn’t shifted towards him at all. If it was truly the King tracking him through the mask, wouldn’t the Unique Lifeform still be able to see through his Unseen Hunter? Jake had only used the skill with the vague hope of maybe making the King take some extra time to locate him once he arrived, but it seemed way too effective now.

Doubt started to spread as his opponent drew closer, making Jake fly a bit into the air and squint his eyes in the direction his opponent was coming. He’d already noticed that view distance felt severely limited in this place compared to the real world and the Territories, but when he used Boundless Sight, he could still see far further than usual.

Ignoring the odd lines that appeared for a second when he used the skill, Jake finally saw what was coming towards him. He saw a brief flash of gold at first, making him believe that it was indeed the King who was already billowing with power, but a second look confirmed it wasn’t even a humanoid approaching him. Instead, it was a golden dragon.

Aisha, huh, Jake thought, instantly having to adapt his strategy now that he knew he would be facing a very different foe.

He had no idea how she’d tracked him initially, but it seemed that she couldn’t any longer, based on how she was only flying vaguely towards the location where he had fully activated Unseen Hunter. She was still a good distance away, so Jake began adapting.

The Protean Arrow was unwound as Jake focused on remaking it from the beginning. While he had been unsure about the poison used against the Forest King, the same sure as hell couldn’t be said about the poison he’d use with this one.

Out of all his crafted poisons, Dragonsbane was likely still the single-strongest one he had, and he’d naturally crafted more of it after evolving to B-grade. While Aisha’s Path was surely different from Yrel’s, all True Dragons tended to use a lot of mana, so his variant of Dragonsbane was bound to still prove incredibly effective.

A part of him was still a little disappointed that he wouldn’t get to finally see what the Golden Forest King was now capable of, but hey, fighting a golden True Dragon wasn’t too bad either.