Chapter 72: Bounty Quest 2
This is bad news.
If Daeron's ship takes more than two weeks to reach King's Landing, they will definitely not be able to recover it.
By that time, Wilder and his men will have already submitted complete evidence to the Iron Throne.
King Robert Baratheon, already growing increasingly paranoid with age and feeling extremely insecure following the death of his foster father, Jon Arryn, will undoubtedly take drastic action against the two treasonous houses.
Daeron's White Whale, flying the flaming towers of House Grafton, will likely be unable to enter King's Landing's harbor and will be seized by the royal fleet.
This would be a huge loss for Ian, as Daeron said the White Whale could sail all the way to Volantis, and such a ship is worth at least 1,000 gold dragons.
Of course, there is a silver lining: once Daeron loses all his resources, he will be completely under Ian's control.
Ian immediately arranged for Roll to take him to Duskendale, telling them to wait there until he had finished his business before rejoining them.
Next, as agreed, Ian accepted the allegiance of Dorian, the new Black Falcon, who had already captured Taman Village, seized half of the remaining plunder, and returned to the Black Falcon Company's stronghold.
He also took the time to review his own statistics, adding the three attribute points he had gained from "The Truth Behind the Black Falcon's Death" to his Spirit.
[Ian: Strength 27, Agility 24, Spirit 6.
Skills: Basic Etiquette, Basic Common Tongue Literacy, Advanced Swordsmanship, Advanced Riding, Intermediate Lance.
Attribute Points: 0,
Skill Points: 0,
Points: 25.]
Ian then gathered Dorian and Wilder together and, concealing his identity as Dorian's patron, redistributed the spoils.
In the final distribution, Ian received a total of 400 gold dragons from both parties.
Over the course of a week, the decline in player numbers stalled, and by the sixteenth day, the number of remaining players had finally stabilized at seventy-two. Ian's trap at the crossroads inn yielded no new gains.
While dividing the spoils, Ser Wilder's men had also located numerous caravan victims and prepared the valuable cargo to be surrendered as evidence.
With this, Ser Wilder and his men were ready to march to King's Landing.
Ian did not accompany Wilder and his men, instructing them not to mention his presence, as only if all the recognition was attributed to him would Wilder's chances of securing Darry be high.
This gesture earned Wilder's gratitude once again.
After Wilder departed, Ian had Dorian the Black Falcon personally lead a group of reliable sellswords to follow Wilder and his men, instructing him to kill Ser Simon on his way north to the Wall if the Iron Throne's verdict on this "rebellion" allowed him to take the black.
To be safe, Ian assigned Bronn and Keith to Dorian.
Ian then returned to the crossroads inn and paid two months' advance wages to the sellswords led by Ser Grantham, the "turncoat," and Denzel, the "Dornishman," allowing them to continue hunting there, stating that he would return in two months to inspect the situation.
With all these arrangements complete, Ian set out for Duskendale.
Ian couldn't bring the men he had gathered in Westeros to Pentos, as they were all his men acquired as Ser Lucien Lannister, and he would soon become Ian Rivers.
On the evening of their departure, a system message and the day's settlement report were sent to Ian's notifications.
[The number of remaining players has reached 70, triggering Bounty Mission 2.]
Without giving it much thought, Ian directly entered the mission system to check.
[Bounty Mission 2: Treasure Hunt.
Mission Objective: The organizer has placed a treasure chest in each of the four cities of King's Landing, Oldtown, Volantis, and Yi Ti. Players can choose a city to compete for it.
Mission Reward: A two-handed Valyrian steel greatsword, 4,000 gold dragons (this mission reward is placed in the treasure chest).
Note: Players can purchase clues for this mission from the system store, limited to four.]
"A Valyrian steel sword plus 4,000 gold dragons? Didn't the system only provide players with 'extremely limited' resources?" After reading this mission, Ian suddenly felt uneasy.
"The bounty mission only opens three times: at the start, when there are 70 players remaining, and when there are 20 players remaining. Ultimately, only a handful of players will actually receive resources through the bounty mission," Annie explained. "The vast majority of players are still in a state where they can't obtain any resources from the system. The mission settings are in compliance."
"No, how are those who didn't get anything supposed to continue?"
Annie didn't answer this question, which was clearly beyond her programming. But Ian knew the answer: wait for death.
The reward is there. Who can you blame if you can't claim it?
Ian could even guess why the designers had set the second bounty to trigger when there were 70 players remaining.
By this point, the players who had agreed to form alliances and were willing to meet had essentially already met, either choosing to hunt each other or to form alliances as agreed. Those who didn't want to meet their allies would likely never encounter them.
In short, the first wave that would quickly ignite player conflict had ended, temporarily depriving players of reason to seek each other out.
Without any external interference, there would be no further player conflict for a considerable period, allowing players to develop peacefully.
Therefore, the designers chose to mark four points on the map for the treasure hunt.
This effectively kicked off the final phase early, luring players with massive rewards and artificially creating four killing grounds.
Seeing this quest, Ian felt deeply troubled.
After all, he currently held a huge advantage. Without this bounty quest, he would have an excellent chance of maintaining his top spot on the leaderboard, allowing him to snowball and maintain his advantage over other players.
But with this quest, he would have at least four more formidable competitors by the time the treasure hunt concluded.
The most frustrating part of this "battle royale" game for players is the early stages, as players begin with virtually no resources, making everything they attempt incredibly difficult.
But once players overcome these initial obstacles and secure their first significant gains, they can find countless ways to develop and leverage the game to their full potential.
(End of Chapter)
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