Chapter 175. Trap
***
"What are we going to do?"
Lim Min asked, not even daring to approach and seeing the 80 or so players staring at him with worried eyes. "It's okay. SC anyway...
No. I needed some people. We need to resolve the penalty rule between you and Dump." Lee Min's eyes widened at those words. "Are you accepting?"
"They're offering to join us, there's no need to refuse."
"If they betray us when things get tough, it'll be trouble for us."
"That's why we're accepting. If you and Dump lead them to gather resources at Huryungji Castle, that would be great." Ki-chan snapped his fingers and nodded. "If things get tough, we can abandon the castle and buy time."
"If we engage with them, we can see their moves. We can provoke them first and agitate them. Then, when time is right, we can capture the castle. Until then, we'll use them as laborers, gathering resources and accumulating supplies."
Seo-woon considered 80 players good workers for accumulating supplies. Having finished his words, Seo-woon broke his silence and approached the 80 players.
Lee-min nodded, looking at his approaching back with a wide smile. "We need to adapt now." Ki-chan said these words while patting Lim-in's shoulder and passed him and followed Seo-woon. "He definitely doesn't look like a kid walking the path of righteousness."
Bing-hoo agreed and moved forward. "We are players from the Anech Guild. We've heard of Jin Seo-woon's fame." The knight who stepped forward to speak had a tense expression on his face.
"Nice to meet you. As you know, I'm Jin Seo-woon, and these three are my new teammates for this game. Let's work together and do our best in this big four-player game."
**Ding! Do you approve of the Anech Quartet's participation?**
When the notification popped up, the players' tense expressions relaxed after they pressed the confirmation button. As the tension between them dissipated, another meaningful notification was heard.
**During the game, participating quartet members cannot share information with each other.**
"Phew. Thank you. To be honest, we were worried we'd all be destroyed here…"
"No way. It's not easy to survive without cooperation in a game like this." Hearing these words from Seo-woon, who had killed all the players in the castle he captured, Ki-chan nodded slightly.
"So how did you decide to form such a large team and join my group?" The knight, who seemed momentarily taken aback by Seo-woon's question, finally spoke. "The truth is… In this game, we were a fairly large guild with 239 members. However, we were surrounded by the Senruk Four and Subsidiary Guilds, losing more than half of our members and all of our castles, with only us managing to escape."
"I see, so the two teams occupying the center and the north were strong."
"Yeah. Besides, our position was right in between them.We initially thought we could take over the north and challenge Senrukr, but the Yan Guild is a specialized team for this game. Anyway, we lost all our soldiers and were wandering around without a stronghold to spend the night when we received news from Jinseo and came here."
"I think you know quite a bit about the Central Army and the Yan Guild in the North."
Finishing his thoughts, Seo-woon ushered his new team members forward. "The enemy will be surrounding this place soon, so let's move first. We'll discuss the details after we reach Horyeong Castle." Looking at the cavalry and team members approaching in a cloud of dust from behind, Lim Min spoke in his four-voiced tone. "I sense something's wrong with this."
"What?"
"Even if a guild with over 80 members loses all its soldiers, they're still under our jurisdiction." "They probably thought they could absorb us if things got worse, or they're planning to take over the castle and rebuild on their own." "If you and Dump can't control them…"
"Don't worry about it. I already told them you're just a player I met in this game. Just blend in. There's no need for you to get involved. You'll naturally understand what they're up to if you do. All we need now are workers to gather resources and fill our ranks with soldiers and supplies."
After traveling for a while, Seo-woon returned to Horyeongseong and handed over all the soldiers he'd gathered, including the clay and bronze soldiers, to Lim. "From now on, please take over the management of the two remaining castles around this castle. While it might seem unfamiliar, our Quartet is divided into siege, defense, and resource gathering units. You'll be defending this place, gathering resources to secure the base. I'll focus on capturing the castles with the siege unit."
The knight nodded at her words and adopted a confident expression, as if to suggest concern. "For now, I'll leave 2,000 infantry and 1,000 bronze soldiers. That should be enough troops for this castle."
Limin took out the soldiers he'd recruited earlier and showed them to the knight. Seeing the knight's eyes light up at the sight of 3,000 soldiers, Seo-woon asked quietly. "By the way, how many forces do the Senruk Quartet and the Yan Guild have?"
The knight paused for a moment to consider Seo-woon's question. "The Yan Guild's forces… If you're just counting the players, it might not be many. However, they have the ability to transform dead players into their own soldiers." Seo-woon and his team froze at the knight's last words. "Do they have such an ability?"
"Some of them are magicians who can control the dead." The team nodded at the words of a warrior behind the knight. "I heard there's a guild of unique players like alchemists and Daoist priests."
Seo-woon had encountered them before, so he knew their power. Especially the Daoist priests who create ghouls, if they could capture all the corpses that appear in large numbers in this game, Their strength would continue to build up. "I see."
"I've encountered them before, and they're truly formidable. When the near-divine-level ghouls attacked alongside the steel soldiers, we were completely overwhelmed." The mention of near-divine-level ghouls painted a picture in his mind.
"Moreover, their soldiers are quite different from ordinary soldiers. I don't know what kind of buffs they have, but they're much stronger than ordinary soldiers."
The subordinate guild's ability to increase their base strength and even strengthen their soldiers by converting large numbers of spawned corpses into ghouls through siege warfare seemed quite formidable. "They definitely can't be ignored in this game. If memory serves, they're also skilled in formation tactics. In a game that requires large-scale battles like this, formation tactics will be a powerful weapon…"
Lost in thought for a moment, Seo-woon glanced at the article and asked, "What about the Senruk Four?"
"They've already absorbed about 1,000 players. There was even a siege war with over 500 players. Especially since their right and left hands, the evil twins, are frequently seen on the battlefield. Thanks to them, we lost all our castles."
"I understand. That's good information... Then, please defend this castle well."
With those words, Seo-woon returned to the castle where Juriell was.
- The rumors were so bad that I was worried the plan wouldn't work, but it seems pretty stupid. - We didn't have much of a choice. I'm not entirely sure, but they always said he likes to play with a small number of players. Player count is important in this game.
- We managed to infiltrate his camp, but what do we do now?
- Our lord has prepared something special, so we just need to anticipate his movements. When our lord's forces clash with his, we will quickly capture the castles behind him. He will have nowhere to go. We have to retake the castle he captured first.
My lord said that even he might not be able to take that castle. Our role is to cut off his rear. The knight and his accompanying mage talked in four-way voice for a while, then Limmin interjected. "Let's register as soldiers first."
"Yes, let's do it."
"In about half a day, a knight will come to play with me as a duo."
"That's reassuring. We'll probably get along well as each other's knights." As if trying to read the other's mind, Limmin looked into the knight's eyes for a moment before smiling. "Yeah. He's a good friend, so we'll get along well."
The four-way game began as each of them entertained different thoughts. On the way to Juriell, Seo-woon encountered Dump, who was heading towards Ho-ryeong Castle alone. "It's hard to see you in this game."
"Yeah. Have you heard from Lim-min?"
"I heard something. But what's going on? Up until now, you were killing even the enemies who had surrendered."
"They were our enemies fighting to kill each other. We didn't know when they were going to backstab us, so we had to do it."
"So is there any guarantee these guys won't backstab us?" "No. But we can roughly predict when they might. So keep this safe." Dump looked at the box Seo-woon had pulled from his pocket and tilted his head.
"This… What? Could this… be?" Dump opened the box and froze at the sight of the scrolls filling it.
"Exactly. Keep it with you just in case, and when I give the order, bury it all over Huryungseong."
Dump gulped as he looked at the scrolls filling the large box. It would be easy to destroy a small castle with this many scrolls. "What do you think?"
"I'll use it when we're betrayed by the enemy and there's no way back, or if someone important like Gwanggun captures Huryungseong. There's a crystal at the bottom of the box. If you break it, all the scrolls inside will explode at once. I paid them a lot of money, so keep it safe."
Seo-woon patted his shoulder as he watched him put the box in his lower area. "If you can lure Gwang-gun with a small castle, it's not a loss." Seo-woon parted ways with Dump and returned to the castle where Juriell was waiting. After returning to the castle and reorganizing for three days, they continued to gather resources for a while. Seo-woon steadily expanded his territory, focusing on the castles connected to the center by leading the siege troops.
No enemy had yet launched a siege on the castles Seo-woon had captured. As more time passed, a notification was heard.
**-Ding! Only three quads remained on the battlefield. The game will enter the second phase.**
**-Epic Legion Ma-ryeong-gun has appeared.**
**-Epic Beast Minotaur has appeared.**
**-Circle Teleportation Crystals are being collected. (Two crystals form a set. When placed in the center of the inner castle, a crystal connecting the castle to the outer walls is created. creates a magic circle.)**
**-Curse of Betrayal activated. (If you betray your allies and capture a castle, all stats and troop strength increase by 20%.)**
Seo-woon was lost in thought at the sudden change. Ki-chan and Jin-ryong Bing-hoo, who had joined the siege team with him, had also opened the map and were lost in deep thought, their mouths agape.
Bing-ho was the first to speak. "The location of the epic beasts is a bit worrying. Plus, there's the Ma-ryeong Army. If they can 'gather' like soldiers…" He narrowed his eyes as he looked at the Ma-ryeong Army markers scattered across the map.
"They're probably trying to provoke a fight. Gathering the Ma-ryeong Army will undoubtedly have a significant impact on the game. They want us to compete and fight even more fiercely while gathering such a significant force. That's what it means."
"That's not all. This Teleportation Crystal can incredibly speed up supply speeds by connecting castles and fortresses.Having one or not having one makes an absolute difference."
Everyone nodded in agreement at Ki-chan's words. "But this epic beast. It's in a pretty rough place." Seo-woon frowned at Jin-ryong's words. He'd grown suspicious whenever an epic beast appeared now.
"Are they after me again?"
Even though he wasn't sure, the location where the Epic Beast had appeared was suspicious enough. Goyoj's lair. A small island at the end of a large lake. It was a natural fortress, with no connection to the outside world except for a narrow bridge, and the monster's appearance there unsettled him.
Seo-woon had planned to go there and buy time if necessary, so the monster's presence was even more troubling. He felt as if someone had played their trump card.
"Let's move for now. We need to gather as many Ma-ryeong-gun and Teleportation Crystals as possible."
Seo-woon, who had gone outside the castle to gather resources, paused when he saw a dust cloud rising from beyond the hills.
"Oh my…" Ki-chan said as he looked at the dust cloud. The dust cloud rose and spread violently in all directions, as if a meteor had fallen beyond the hills. As he stared at the sight in astonishment, soon the ground began to rumble slowly. The thud rose from his toes and hit his chest, spreading throughout his entire body, becoming increasingly intense.
"How many are there?"
Jin-ryong said as he looked at the endless line of soldiers. The number of soldiers pouring from the hills seemed endless.
"More than 100,000…" A massive army. Looking at the magnificent sight of a massive army he had only heard of in the incredible history of the past, Seo-woon frowned and opened his mouth. "Let's go. We must abandon logic. We have no choice but to abandon not only this place, but all the castles connected to the center. We must stop them at the three castles in front of Goyozhi and wait for an opportunity…"
Seo-woon's words were cut off by the momentum of the army behind him as he gave orders and tried to organize his thoughts. When he turned his head, he saw a large army rising from behind the castle and pouring towards them. "Brother!"
"Priest!" Ki-chan and Jin-ryong called out to Seo-woon, looking in different directions. Front, back, left, right. Enemies were closing in from all sides.
"If they all come together… there must be at least a million of them."
The blood drained from his teammates' faces at Seo-woon's words. And in the distance, beyond the hill, the face of Senruk, now approaching them, could be seen riding his steel horse as he pursed his lips.