Black Online-Chapter 110: Three Rules of War

15th Floor, Hollyhatch Village, the Grand Meeting Room.

Click! Click! Click!

With dark expressions, members of the Grinding Grief entered the meeting room, shut off the curtains, and locked the windows.

They then brought candles to the round meeting table, placing about eight of them in a circle at the middle of the table.

"Whoo..."

One of them scratched a matchstick across the striking surface of the matchbox and lit each candle.

With that, they left.

A moment later, a group of players entered the room—dark expressions on all their faces—and all of them sat down on the right side of the round table.

Another moment later, another group arrived, and they sat down on the left side of the table.

There happened to be enough seats for everyone, and because of the eight candles, it wasn’t that dark either.

"Thank you for coming."

At that moment, the guild master of the Grinding Grief, Derrick Reece, spoke.

He had spiky hair and looked quite mentally unstable with his crazy-looking eyes, and it didn’t look like he was ever going to blink his eyes.

’He really doesn’t blink...’

A few members of the Monsieur Rascal thought as they looked into Derrick’s eyes, waiting for him to blink, only for it to never happen.

"We agreed to have this meeting in your home as a sign of trust and respect. I hope you also carry the same amount of trust towards us."

Victor Ranrakok, the guild master of the Monsieur Rascals, asked.

"...Of course. I appreciate you deciding to come here. We’ve gathered here to put some rules in place that help us... inch closer to a common goal."

Derrick said.

"..."

Victor nodded.

They weren’t allies.

Far from it.

However, they just wanted to avoid clashing with each other and giving Rose Records an advantage in the war.

It was already really hard to push Rose Records away from the Snowberry Village since it was a Safe Zone and they couldn’t attack them there.

Thus, they decided to come together and make a couple of ground rules that’ll help both of them in the Guild War.

"The first rule I’d like to make—we will not attack each other until we’ve dealt with Rose Records."

Derrick said.

’Hmph, that’ll make it so that neither Grinding Grief nor Monsieur Rascal will take the initiative to attack Rose Records first.

’If one of us gets hurt more than the other, the one that is healthier has a much greater advantage once Rose Records has been dealt with.’

Victor thought.

He thought that this rule suited Grinding Grief much more since they had more members that they could sacrifice in the fight against Rose Records.

Monsieur Rascal couldn’t just wait and let Grinding Grief do all the fighting, as they would probably end the short alliance prematurely if they didn’t do anything.

Thus, if they also fought Rose Records, even if Grinding Grief lost members, Monsieur Rascal would also lose, which would hurt them much more since they had fewer members.

"...You don’t like the rule?"

Derrick asked.

He saw that Victor was thinking with a not-so-happy expression on his face, and it was pretty obvious he didn’t like it.

"I thought of a few problems with that rule. I’d like to change it a little bit."

Victor said.

"...Go ahead."

Derrick leaned back against the chair and let him do the talking for now.

"I’d like to form a siege around Snowberry Village. To stop anyone from entering that village, especially traveling merchants.

"Their food will eventually end, and it’ll force Rose Records to make a move. It’s too big of an area for one guild to siege, but with the two of us, it’ll be possible."

Victor said.

"That food problem will only affect their locals. Will they even care if they start dropping dead like flies?"

Derrick asked.

"Haha... Della loves her little locals. She treats them like they are real... How fucking stupid is that..."

Victor laughed.

"How do you know that?"

Derrick asked.

"I have an inside man in Rose Records who has been feeding me information for months now. That guy has realized that Rose Records will meet its demise and decided to jump ship before it is too late."

Victor said.

Derrick nodded with a scoff and agreed to the first rule.

"The second rule—I want both guilds to send three assassins each to try to kill a couple of important members of Rose Records.

"That one-month ban from Snowberry Village will be worth it if we can kill a few key players in their guild."

Derrick said.

"...Sure, let’s do that."

Victor agreed to it.

"Third rule—once Rose Records has been dealt with, I want Snowberry Village to be left alone while our guilds will have their own fight to decide who gets the ownership of that.

"Of course, I don’t want either of us to get destroyed, so I am suggesting a friendly Guild War under the Mutual Combat Law that’ll ensure that none of our members die."

Derrick said.

’As if that’ll work. Even if we win that ’friendly’ Guild War, you’ll backstab us either way, but that’s fine. We’ll do the exact same thing to y’all.’

Victor smirked, reached his hand across the table, and shook hands with Derrick.

"That’s the deal."

"...Good."

Derrick nodded.

...

Megaworld, 59th Floor, Caretaker Facility, Fang Raon’s room.

"...Here, the laptop you requested."

Chaewon said and placed it on Fang Raon’s lap while she lifted the bed’s adjustable headrest to make sure that he was sitting instead of lying.

"Thanks... Can you also type the streamer website for me?"

Fang Raon asked.

"Sure thing~"

Chaewon typed it down, and when the website appeared on the laptop, she asked, "What stream?" and he only said, "Doesn’t matter, one of the popular ones."

She was about to press on one stream but then noticed it was a female streamer, and she pouted and chose a male one instead.

The male streamer was playing Black Online like every other streamer was, as it was easily the world’s most popular game.

"Why do you want to watch a stream suddenly?"

She asked curiously.

"...I have been thinking about streaming as well, and I am just curious what makes a person a good streamer."

Fang Raon said.

"Really?! You’ll stream... Wait, does that mean I’ll get to watch you play as well? That is very exciting!"

Chaewon beamed with a smile.

She would love to watch Fang Raon play, as she had always been very curious about what he was doing inside the game.