Chapter 142: A True Alliance

Sung-Woon came to the same conclusion.

‘It’s over.’

Black Scale’s army had captured the highlands. Even if Asbestos’s army finished regrouping and came back, Black Scale’s army would have already set up camp on the highlands, so it wouldn’t be an easy fight for Asbestos.

Sung-Woon’s destroyer, Sratis, had defeated Wisdom’s destroyer, Ostro. The mantis-like destroyer had been critically wounded to achieve its victory, but it was definitely a monster that no normal army could go up against.

Apostle Lakrak had also defeated apostle Redin BR Oser and his knights. Although Redin put up his best fight, Lakrak killed each knight one by one through what he had learned and practiced to this day and eventually reached his goal.

Jang-Wan turned to Wisdom as if she couldn’t understand.

“How…?”

Wisdom didn’t reply for a moment, seemingly bemused. And then he turned to Sung-Woon.

“How did we lose? Honestly, I’d like to know that. How did we get defeated?”

Sung-Woon continued to control a few things on his system window.

He told his priests on the battlefield to not lower their guard and hinted to the revelation priests in Orazen about their victory, which would eventually reach the king of Black Scale, Kyle Lak Orazen. Kyle would then quickly hold a meeting on what they would do after the war with the noblemen and then dominate the continent accordingly.

Then Sung-Woon gave Sratis a few words of encouragement while wondering what kind of message he should give Lakrak.

Sung-Woon replied, “It is easy to explain, but you probably won’t understand it.”

“I don’t care, Nebula.”

There was a hint of resignation in Wisdom’s voice.

“I don’t know if you’ll agree, but I don’t really think there’s a big difference between you and me in terms of knowledge on game strategy and tactics. This game doesn’t even have any particular physical factors, and I played in a way that I could manipulate individuals as I intended. So…”

“So because I didn’t play the same way and hence wasn’t able to control individuals as I wished, you should have won, not me?”

“Yes,” replied Wisdom.

Sung-Woon explained, “First of all, I want to say that there definitely are physical factors at play, but that isn’t the important part right now, so let’s move on from that.”

“...Sure.”

“And second of all, manipulating individuals as you intended is an outdated meta among the top players.”

“Is…it?”

Sung-Woon explained, “From my observations, I noticed that you, Jang-Wan, and Lunda had constructed similar religious systems.”

The Lost World was a game where players assumed the roles of gods, so the religious systems and doctrines established were very important. The religious systems were designed in a way that a player's Afterlife and the Small Areas they had would be intertwined with the elements of nature and landscape of the regions where they were active, thus making everything interconnected. And these religious systems were pretty much the player’s overall strategy.

“Your style was known as Manual Play because it didn’t allow things to progress naturally, but rather you direct the progress as you want. It was also called Initiative because the player could progress the game according to their will. When the strategy first came out, it was a powerful meta, and even after other metas emerged, it still wasn’t considered bad, but neither could it be considered the best.”

Wisdom then said with a voice with no confidence, “In a game where nothing goes as a player wishes…wouldn’t it be better if the game progressed according to our will?”

“It would be better than the game progressing completely automatically, but there’s a fatal weakness to Manual Play.”

“A weakness?”

Sung-Woon answered, “It’s that you can

only

play as you intend.”

“That’s a weakness?”

“Yes. Manual Play is based on the assumption that situations will be better when the player intervenes rather than letting the game progress naturally. But that’s not always the case. There are times where the player would make a wrong choice, while an individual would make the right one.”

For example, overseeing a battlefield and commanding a war was one of the times that could happen. New players would usually look down at the battlefield from above, so they think they had a good understanding of the advantageous positions and command their troops accordingly. However, from the perspective of the soldiers actually fighting in the war, they might notice the numerous obstacles they would have to overcome to reach those positions. Therefore, there was a possibility that it would be better to save energy by avoiding making difficult movements even if that meant being in a less favorable location, as that could lead to a better outcome in future battles.

“And above all, players don’t have the ability to control absolutely everything. If they get into a situation where they have to multitask too much, they won’t be able to make detailed or precise commands, and in those cases, they tend to make poor decisions.”

Sung-Woon judged that Wisdom must have had a lot on his plate. The most urgent task that the alliance had to deal with was Red Fruit’s army. They already had Lakrak surrounded, and Black Scale’s army, who had a smaller army, could be locked in the fortress and slowly killed. Therefore, while dealing with Red Fruit’s 40,000 troops, they paid less attention to Ostro and Redin, and these two made their own judgments to not run away, but instead followed the previous command they got from their god to kill their opponents. If rather than following the command, they had listened to their instincts and run away when they felt like they were in danger, the current situation wouldn’t have been so bad.

“If you believe that your plans are always better and try to control the uncontrollable things, problems will arise.”

Wisdom replied, “Then what should I have done?”

“The latest meta is simple. Instead of trying to control individuals, let them follow the player and leave them be to allow for their potential to unfold on their own. That way, if you happen to shift your focus elsewhere, the individuals that need to be protected won’t die, and you would still be able to make detailed interventions in important situations.

Wisdom nodded in understanding.

Wisdom now understood why Sung-Woon had used the Wizards. Wizards were powerful but dangerous cards for a player to have as they had their own fundamental tendencies, which prevented players from manipulating them as they wished. However, if the Wizards were simply left alone rather than being taken by a player, they would remain as a power that no one could claim, and thus they would be a weight to balance the overall gameplay. And this weight could be used differently later on depending on a player’s choices and influence.

‘Handling a Wizard in a small kingdom versus handling one in a unified empire are two different things. Does he see keeping them as leaving possibilities open rather than having a risky wildcard?’

Wisdom then said, “I’ve learned something new… I surrender, Nebula.”

Sung-Woon lightly nodded.

“Great.”

And then he looked at the other two players.

‘He said ‘I.’ Wisdom has easily accepted everything, but what about those two?’

Crampus then said, “Since Wisdom asked a question, can I ask one too?”

"Sure."

If he could get Crampus to surrender by answering a question, there was no reason to refuse.

“Even a complex question?”

“What is it?”

“If our situations were reversed, would you surrender?”

Sung-Woon crossed his arms and thought about it.

“No.”

“No?”

“I would judge that there’s still a chance.”

“...Explain.”

Sung-Woon said, “First, there’s no telling how Wisdom would move after he surrendered. Redin, who was his apostle as well as a king, has died, which will bring great disorder to the country. And even if Asbestos gets into order again, or Wisdom says he’ll actively support me as an ally, there will be a limit to how much support he could offer. Additionally, the other countries, Golden Eye and Danyum, can’t even be considered your enemies because it’s the Wizards that are leading them, not Black Scale.”

“Is there more?”

Sung-Woon nodded.

“Of course there is. Jang-Wan has suffered little damage from the war, and her troops are just as they were. She’s also very far from Black Scale, so she would be able to buy some time before Black Scale and Red Fruit deploy expeditionary forces to attack. During that time, she could formulate a few more strategies. And so, I would think it’s too early to give up.”

Crampus smiled bitterly and said, “I was planning to ask for reasons to surrender and get persuaded, but what you said puts me in a difficult position.”

“But of course, you and I are different.”

𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝚠𝚎𝚋𝗻𝗼𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝚘𝐦

“How so?”

“I would come up with such a strategy, but you wouldn’t.”

Crampus laughed instead of getting angry.

“Hey, you’re actually…”

“But if I am to persuade you into surrendering, I do have more I can say.”

“What is it?”

Sung-Woon raised three fingers.

“Even if my plan this time is to fail, I still have three more cards that I haven’t played yet. First is the Wizard, Mazdari.”

“The Wizard…”

Crampus nodded as if that was enough of an explanation.

“What about the other two?”

“Isn’t the first one enough? The other two are of course secrets. I’ll tell you later if you surrender.”

Crampus replied, “Alright, I’ll surrender.”

Then everyone looked at Jang-Wan.

Jang-Wan asked, “What?”

Sung-Woon replied, “I don’t think it’s necessary to tell you that you’re the only one left to make the decision.”

“Do you wish for me to get on my knees and beg for forgiveness or something?”

Sung-Woon wanted to tell her to not get ahead of herself, but there was something to point out first.

“I wouldn’t want you to do so with that face.”

Jang-Wan flushed red. She then took out her lion mask from behind her and put it on her head.

“...I didn’t mean it like that. I’ll fix my appearance later.”

Sung-Woon let out a sigh.

“Is there a need to do so? Didn’t you want me to get hurt?”

“Yes.”

“And you can’t claim that the disguise was only a part of your strategy, can you?”

“That’s…also right.”

“Then there’s no need to change your avatar since you would surprise me every time you show up with that face.”

Jang-Wan shook her head.

“I’ve changed my mind.”

“Why?”

Jang-Wan’s voice slightly shook.

“To be honest, I never thought you would notice because I believed you were a terrible brother who didn’t even care about his sister. But it seems that I misjudged you. I don’t know if you’re a good person, but I can say that you’re not as bad as I thought. I…made a mistake. I’m sorry.”

‘I am though,’

Sung-Woon thought to himself. He was a terrible person, and Jang-Wan might not have been completely wrong.

After all, Sung-Woon wasn’t very upset about that kind of strategy. Given the opportunity, he would have done the same thing.

‘Rather, it’s Wisdom’s mistake that he didn’t use this card earlier when he had the chance.’

Sung-Woon thought it was better not to mention that part and instead addressed what had been bothering him.

“If you’re going to apologize, you should apologize to Ji-Woo, not me.”

Jang-Wan raised her lowered head and looked at Sung-Woon with wide eyes.

“No. I know her well. She would forgive me.”

“...What’s with all that confidence?”

“This I won’t concede. Ever.”

“Wait. What? What relationship did you have with Ji-Woo?”

“I’m not telling you.”

Sung-Woon was going to ask again when Crampus suddenly came up to them laughing.

“Okay, so everyone is surrendering, right?”

“No, I haven’t surren…”

Wisdom spoke up too and said, “Good. Then Nebula, it’s time to make a choice. Are you going to destroy us all and turn us into figures? Or are you going to make a true alliance with us rather than a loose one?”

Sung-Woon thought to himself,

‘So that’s what he has been ultimately aiming for.’

From the beginning, Wisdom had kept in mind the scenario in which the alliance lost.

‘It takes a lot of unnecessary time and resources for one country to unify a large continent.’

Of course, there were games where that did happen. It would happen when one country gained supremacy over the other countries on the continent in the beginning of the game.

However, in cases like this, where forces at similar levels were growing on the continent, the option of a true alliance would be taken into consideration. Essentially, it meant an alliance that was supported by the game system itself rather than a loose alliance that was temporarily made. The true alliance could take many forms, and the decision was usually made by the player with the upper hand.

“Alright.”

Sung-Woon had already decided on the form of alliance.

“It’s now time to build a pantheon.”