<strong>"Looks like I need to investigate Maverick''s movements."</strong>


    "...?"


    <ul>


    <li><em>What the heck, hahahaha</em></li>


    <li><em>A merchanting directly to see them, hahahaha</em></li>


    <li><em>That’s an expression of absolute urgency, </em></li>


    <li><em>This person always takes a different path from everyone else, haha</em></li>


    <li><em>Yup, flustered as always, hahahaha</em></li>


    </ul>


    After finishing the meat party with Harmony and Dice, I turned on the stream the next day and entered EU. As soon as I logged in, the manager greeted me. Though it wasn''t exactly a greeting, more like a sudden appearance while I was walking near the gear box.


    But, since it was a game, I didn’t care too much about how they got in here. What mattered was the key phrase—Maverick. In the main storyline, Maverick was just a regr merchant, but in my scenario route, he was different.


    It’s hard to say exactly how, but one thing was clear—he was definitely more of a viin than a hero, and the other seven merchants were keeping a close eye on him.


    Seeing hime directly here meant he was probably reaching a breaking point.


    I sat down across from a rather questionable table.


    The exnation began.


    <strong>"Do you know what my position is?"</strong>


    "I can roughly guess you’re in a position where you sit on a fancy chair and boss people around."


    "Sharp-tongued. Well, that’s about the gist of it. And as you’ve probably guessed, in a position like this, sometimes… you need to prepare for coteral damage. Or prevent such situations from happening in the first ce."


    "Coteral damage."


    The mention of Maverick’s movements and coteral damage. The fact that these things were brought up usually meant one conclusion—one was the cause, and the other was a likely result.


    This wasn’t Cash Mendoza, and the reason Maverick came to me was that the manager was probably in a position where they had to deal with or possibly take responsibility for the second potential oue.


    I had a rough idea about this and added:


    <strong>"I think I have a general idea of the situation. What kind of information did you obtain?"</strong>


    <strong>"Maverick made contact with Artemis."</strong>


    "That’s pretty impressive. Doesn’t feel like a good sign though."


    "Exactly."


    He continued exining.


    He pulled a few sheets of paper out of an A4 envelope and showed them to me. They were photos. Specifically, aerial shots, and from the text in the lower right corner, it seemed they had been taken using some kind of UAV reconnaissance tool.


    The first photo was of a man—someone I had seen before among the merchants. Maverick was leading a group of armed men into a high-value research facility. If he had been massacred inside, he wouldn’t be here talking to me now.


    The next photo was taken about an hourter. One shot was of him entering, and the other was of him leaving.


    I spoke carefully.


    <strong>"What did he discuss with Artemis?"</strong>


    "I can’t quite guess. Maybe, for personal protection and organizational survival, he might have sought Artemis’s help. After being caught in this surveince, it was a done deal for him to reorganize the group."


    "Hmm."


    That was a usible exnation, but I had a strong feeling that situations like these usually led to worse oues than I imagined.


    One possible conclusion was...


    <strong>"It won’t end there."</strong>


    "What do you mean?"@@novelbin@@


    <strong>"If Maverick paid some sort of price, where do you think Artemis’s gun will aim?"</strong>


    It was a ssic trade-off.


    I wasn’t sure exactly what Maverick had promised Artemis, nor could I guarantee that Artemis would definitely raid this ce, but still... people like him usually gave back more than what they had received, even if it meant sacrificing a lot.


    I didn’t really care about these people much. I was just wandering around the map, doing what I was asked. But if this was the scenario I wanted to y out, so be it.


    The manager, understanding everything, frowned but nodded. I casually asked without much thought:


    <strong>"So, what are you asking me to do this time?"</strong>


    "Get into the high-value research facility. Find out what happened there. If you can get your hands on any audio recordings, bring those too. The internal defense force might have a keycard that can ess the deeper sections. You might have to visit several times."


    At the same time, he ced something on the table.


    It was a set of keycards. Required ess for entering the high-value research facility. I recalled that these were being sold at high prices at flea markets, and the number on the table, at a nce, seemed to be over 10.


    Seems like he came really prepared for this.


    <strong>"Let’s bring back some good results."</strong>


    "Just don’t be toote."


    With that, the manager quietly left, and immediately, a mission popped up on my wristwatch.


    Enter the high-value research facility, capture at least 25 defense soldiers or users, obtain a keycard for deeper section ess randomly, get into the control room, and copy the audio recordings from a specific date. Arge military-grade USB is needed for the copy, and it cannot be recovered upon death.


    Seeing that, I muttered under my breath.


    <strong>"Arge military USB, how much was that going for at the flea market again..."</strong>


    <ul>


    <li><em>One USB per round, haha.</em></li>


    <li><em>Each one goes for 150,000 credits, hahahaha.</em></li>


    <li><em>No wonder he’s handing out ten entry cards, the manager’s such a...</em></li>


    <li><em>In the end, it’s all zero-sum, hahahaha.</em></li>


    <li><em>Fact: If you escape without dying, it won’t disappear.</em></li>


    </ul>


    Well, that’s true.


    I was a little surprised this was happening so soon after starting the game, but in the end, it just meant I had to do what I’ve been doing all along—kill everything I see and sweep it all up.


    Despite ying EU for several weeks, I had never entered the high-value research facility. Otherwise known as the <em>Wilderness</em>—a map where you couldn’t retrieve weapons and items through insurance, but where high-value items could be found in abundance. Full of armed AI troops.


    There was no better ce for me to loot a bunch of decent weapons.


    I opened the gear box and entered. There were various guns avable, but as usual, I went for the one closest to me. A massive sniper rifle with a suppressor, at least 49 inches long, a semi-automatic sniper rifle that was over 1.3m.


    Mj?lnir.


    It was time to unleash thunder over the high-value research facility.


    <strong>"I’ve got enough ammo, four mags should be fine. The mapyout needs some checking, so about 10 minutes of prep should do."</strong>


    <ul>


    <li><em>Get out of theb, all of you!!!!</em></li>


    <li><em>This guy’s going to dominate the research facility, hahahaha.</em></li>


    <li><em>Trying to beat him is gonna be tough even with that gun, hahaha.</em></li>


    <li><em>Let’s do this, I’ll hang out in the corner with a grenade.</em></li>


    <li><em>Would waiting in a corner while someone fires grenades at you actually work???</em></li>


    </ul>


    As always, the viewers in the chat were wildly off-topic, but I paid them no mind. I began carefully loading my gun and inserting AP rounds into the magazines. It would have been more fun if I had an M107CQB Barrett, but unfortunately, a 50 caliber rifle hadn’t been released yet—though there was a Russian-made Ash.


    Praying for those high-powered guns to be released soon, I stuffed all the items and special items from the lighthouses into my bag and thigh pouches. I took a deep breath and spread out the map of the research facility. It was ridiculouslyplex, so I figured I’d need to explore a bit on my first run.


    I’ll probably get in quicker than I thought.