Second World

Easycome left. While waiting, Jack sent messages to John. He informed John that he failed to get an audience with Queen Frorryntiar. This prompted John's mockery.

"I'm expecting you to inform me about some sort of a miracle. You truly have disappointed me, expert. You should go hide somewhere and reflect on this. Shame on you."

Even though Jack had expected it, it didn't make this less annoying.

"Cut the crap. I want you to pull out our troops amassing near Hydrurond's border," Jack said.

"Well, since you've failed, there is no use having the army waiting there. But instead of sending them back to their respective bases, I would like to continue keeping them as one army. We can just pull them back far enough so Hydrurond doesn't feel so nervous.

"Why? Do you think we still have a chance to mobilize this army?" Jack asked.

"That will depend on how long the war in Hydrurond lasts," John answered. "Remember my proposed plan to strike once Hydrurond is defeated?"

"All right. Just don't mobilize before that happens or before I give the order, and don't do any secret maneuver that might enrage Hydrurond. I'm serious. I will be angry if you end up offending them when I'm trying to earn their trust."

"Don't worry," John assured. "How are you trying to earn their trust?"

"There is a situation involving players in this country."

"What kind of situation?" John asked.

Jack told John what he had learned.

After hearing the story, John cursed. "Damn our guild's spymaster who is in charge of Hydrurond. I'm going to have a good talk with him. How can he not report such an important incident?"

"Important?" Jack asked.

"Even though I've said that Hydrurond is most likely Master's main target for expansion, we don't know when he will strike. If I'd learned about this serial killing earlier, I would have been able to predict that they will be attacking soon."

"Do you mean that these serial killings are done by the World Maker?"

"Or someone they hired, but I'm sure they are behind it. You said Easycome is getting the information, isn't he? Check the list of victims, I bet you should find all of them to be members of Hydrurond's kingdom faction."

"What does the World Maker's intention with these serial killings?"

"To destabilize the kingdom, disrupt its economy, and halt its military improvement," John answered. "I bet the victims are not only kingdom faction members, but they should also be Hydrurond's officers. Their absence will cause a reduction in the settlements' stats, which in turn reduced the country's income and their ability to wage war. Hydrurond would be forced to redirect their focus in recovering the settlements' stats rather than on military matters."

"Do World Maker need to go that far?"

"Even though Hydrurond is no longer the leader of the seven countries, they once were. Their military might not be able to easily take out another country in a one-on-one fight, but their military is still the strongest. They have the highest army count. Even if Liguritudum and Aurebor hit them together at the same time, winning is not a certainty. World Maker will need to cover many angles to increase their winning odds."

"If only they didn't divide their troops... This is my fault," Jack said.

"If you've managed to convince Queen Frorryntiar, we might still turn this around. But you didn't, so we can only consider this as bad luck."

"If these serial killings are indeed World Maker's doing, then it is more reasons to stop the killings. Doing this will also allow us to gain queen Frorryntiar's trust."

"You do what you have to do," John said and ended the message.

Jack then started messaging different guild members via the guild function. These guild members were Jeanny's investigator teams. Jeanny had informed Jack of the names of the members she selected for the investigator teams. This way, Jack could contact them directly.

Jeanny had assembled quite many players with investigative skills. Jack told these teams to start crossing the border into Hydrurond and teleported to Messephyria once they did. He would then pass along the data from Easycome.

These teams had just completed the reports on five affairs, helping Jack to get perfect scores from three affairs. Jack received 410,000 merit points and 15 ruling powers from those affairs.

Another four new affairs were available but Jack didn't send the investigators to these new affairs. It was a bad rep to ignore affairs but Jack considered dealing with the serial killings in Hydrurond a higher priority. So, he ignored those four new affairs. He would probably just take a shot at one of the multiple-choice answers from the affairs when the time limit was about to end.

From the merit points received, Jack's sovereign level increased to level 10.

At this level, Jack could add another royal agent. After thinking for a while, he decided to send the invitation to Robinson, who used to share a jail with Laurent when they were in captivity by the Verremor nation.

Robinson was a high-level rare elite. He also looked trustable, and since he was a good friend of Laurent, they should be able to coordinate well together.

Jack received the notification that Robinson had accepted his invitation. Considering Robinson had just joined the military recently, his rank was still low. He had no reservations about letting go of his rank and joining Jack's royal agents.

Jack checked Robinson's data. Robinson was still level 75. But even so, he had the highest level among Jack's royal agents. He was one level higher than Duke Alfredo.

His skill traits were dart, dagger, fist, shield, and move. His affinities were light, earth, and wind elements. He had a talent, Fist Proficiency. This talent boosted fist damage by ten percent. It also improved his chance of learning fist skills, and he could learn fist skills with a level requirement twenty levels above his level.

Jack then used the royal agent function and spent coins to upgrade all of Robinson's equipment to super rare grade.

He installed two skills from the kingdom's skill library onto Robinson's two free skill slots. He chose Ki Shield for defense and Multi-sided Strikes for the offense. Both were skills he had seen in action. Ki Shield was once displayed by Ramaun, the underworld demon who fought the infernal stormbird. The Multi-sided strikes was a skill used by Umeza, the veteran orcish elder.