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“Why are you staring at me like that? Do I have something on my face?”

After I teleported to Liverpool, I saw Katalina staring at me dumbfoundedly, while I asked her why she did so with fake confusion.

“…They say clothes give you wings, but this is…”

It seemed she finally regained her senses, as she shook her head from side to side before saying, “I guess it looks okay.”

“You really think it just looks ‘okay’ to you?”

Of course it wasn’t. I’d already completely carved how I looked and what kind of mood I gave off from my appearance in my mind through the 3rd person view.

I’m not impudent enough to tell that truth to her though.

“Now now, how I look isn’t the important part, let’s remember what we came here for, hm?”
“You’re right…”

Katalina still had a very obvious expression on her face that looked as if she was saying ‘you’re really good at changing topics aren’t you?’.

With that, Katalina brought me to the meeting room in the castle, which was her main goal. Even though I didn’t need to be guided there since I could easily make use of the navigation feature I had. She was still hellbent on making me go with her.

I admit that as the alliance guild leader, attending the meeting alone may look a little unfitting for my status, but wasn’t I bothering Katalina?

However, she seemed to be enjoying it so I really didn’t have much to say.

She stopped me from walking in for a moment, stepped inside of the meeting room first and then I heard her voice announcing my entry from within.

“The Lord is now entering the meeting.”

I started to move again, entering the room.

“Greetings my lord¹.”

It was truly a sight to behold, not dozens but nearly a hundred people all greeting me with harmonized voices. It felt like they had been practicing for this because it was nearly perfect.

On top of that, there was no one in this room that was low level in any way, so their voices were as loud as a lion’s roar as it reverberated around the room.

If I wasn’t at a level that was overwhelmingly higher than theirs, I would have been unable to withstand the powerful forces that they all directed at me at the same time and I might have ended up vomiting some blood as a result.

“It’s nice to meet you, everyone.”

With a short greeting, I moved to the only seat of honor that existed in the meeting room. As I was moving, the huge amount of people that filled the room made way for me like I was Moses parting the Red Sea.

It definitely felt like I was a monarch in medieval times.

‘There’s a high probability that someone may have directed all of them to be like this. Probably Katalina.’

It was such a perfect synchronization of movements that I doubted that there was no coordination, so I was able to guess with good probability of the ‘perpetrator’ who had set this all up to happen.

Sitting down on the seat of honor, I looked down at them. The closest and first people I saw were Katalina, Esther and the guild leaders that I had met previously.

It seemed like they had all lined up according to their rankings.

“Then from now on, we’ll begin the strategy meeting.”

I announced the beginning of the meeting.

“By the lord’s orders², the very first strategic meeting for Camelot shall begin. First, I’m Merlin who has been given the role of taking care of the process. I shall preside over simple briefings and control the meetings, so I hope you will all follow my words.”

Just as promised, Katalina was the one who took care of the process of the meeting and most of the people who were present nodded their heads in acknowledgement. It seemed like since Katalina was the one who had led the guild for such a long time, it would be beneficial for Katalina to take care of these kinds of things to cause minimum friction in the process.

Though I was the one who gave her the permission to do so, honestly I simply didn’t like bothering myself with this kind of thing so I was actually feeling glad she was taking this role.

I’ve said it repeatedly, having responsibility and leading people doesn’t really go well with my personality.

“This is the map of the current area for England and each guild’s influence over them.”

With Katalina’s words, a 3D model of the map appeared in the middle of the hall. You’d certainly be surprised if you were seeing it for the first time, but this kind of scene was extremely common in Blue Sky so no one was even remotely moved as they all studied the map.

Looking at the map, the area to the southern part of England was mostly controlled by Camelot. The Empire guild possessed one corner of the land as well, and a large number of small to medium sized guilds also possessed quite a sizable portion of the rest of England here and there.

As opposed to Camelot, the Chaos guild had Edenborough of Scotland’s capital as its foothold and possessed half of Scotland, while the Shining guild had its metropolis Glasgow as its foothold and possessed the rest of the other half of Scotland.

Meaning that in a way, this war was basically Scotland versus England. Many Korean people just assumed that when you’re talking about England it was just a single country but to people in Britain saying such things would draw their ire, it would be no different from saying that North and South Korea were like one country. And when you considered that they also called England only one part of the United Kingdom, it indicated that there was a deep rooted history that showed just how separate the two countries were³.

By that point, the one thing that simulated real England in the game of Blue Sky was the rivalry between the two lands. In time, a war was sure to begin one way or another. As the two guilds, Majesty and Tempest, had headquarters located in Wales, it was understandable why they would be more likely to go against Volcano.

As for Korea, the Blue Sky corporation considered North Korea as a puppet state and banned them from logging in to the game⁴, meaning that there was no case for a war to happen between the two lands, but the age old rivalry between areas in Korea that existed was in the game as well.

In particular the original rivalries between Kyung Sang Do and Jun Ra Do was reflected in the game by two giant guilds Phoenix and Reaper holding those areas respectively as fierce battles frequently occurred between the two.

“Currently the number one priority that the enemy has for our territory is Manchester. We assume the majority of the enemy forces would be aiming for here, and that there would be around 10 different siege battles occurring simultaneously once the war begins.”
“I have a question.”

Katalina shot a glare at the person raising their hand and spoke once again.

“There is a meeting currently ongoing. I will answer individual questions in a separate time in which I will take questions after the briefing is over. I’ll look over it this time since it’s your first, but understand that if you are to disturb again there will be serious consequences so please keep that in mind.”

“M… My apologies.”

Though one could say she may have been too strict, it was the correct thing to do. If people kept asking questions during the briefing portion, it was sure to become a mess, as the meeting area had a hundred people in total so it was likely that there would be an endless amount of questions.

It seemed like the person realized this as well as they admitted their fault and quietly lowered their head without any further resistance.

“Therefore we will set up the majority of defensive forces within the Manchester city area and divide our forces into 10 different troops. The areas most susceptible to heavy siege would be at higher priority in terms of placement of forces as well. The military forces that have already been organized would be divided into divisions and given a leadership role for each division commander, so please make sure your emergency communications are always available for contact, division commanders.”
“Roger!”

People that seemed like division commanders answered her.

“Additionally, for at least one week the guild shall not be changing our tactics from being defensive to offensive, and we will not tolerate any guild leaders deviating excessively from our plans. Once the forces that have suffered casualties due to the Ianus incident recover their strength, that is the moment when the true glory of the Camelot will show its might against the enemy forces.”
“Oooh…!”

Everyone’s eyes glimmered with hope hearing Katalina speak with great confidence.

“Then with this the briefing is over, anyone that wishes to raise a question please do so.”

A few trivial questions were asked and Katalina did a fine job in answering them adequately.

“With the joining of the Sapphire guild, our forces may look to be at a clear advantage. I’m sure there are people in here wondering why we do not just go on the offensive instead.”

Before the meeting ended I had something to say, so I spoke as soon as Katalina was about to close up the meeting.

“However, we must realize that the enemies have powerful dormant forces –Majesty and Tempest guild– lying in wait for us to make a mistake. We must make sure to suffer the least amount of damages while gaining as many advantages as we can until we bring the Shining and Chaos guilds on their knees, and then be ready for the next war against the Majesty and Tempest guilds immediately afterwards.”

“We must not forget that in the worst possible scenario, those two guilds may simultaneously decide to join the war with Chaos and Shining. Of course, they would receive criticisms from the public for doing so but if they are willing to secure victory at all cost, it may actually be a reality we must face without a doubt.”

Perhaps it was because I was the Lord which made me want to blurt this out? I felt right away that the bright hopeful expressions that the people were making now turned sullen.

Katalina must have judged that I was lowering the morale of the forces and I saw her try to stop me, but I lightly shook my head and expressed my thoughts directly to them.

In the end, Katalina let out a sigh as if she had given up. I was thankful to Katalina for believing in me enough to let me continue.

“I understand the concerns you all have. Honestly, we have a chance of losing as well. It’s the truth that we cannot avoid.”

No one says that their forces may have a chance to lose right before the beginning of a war. Even in the worst possible war or scenario where loss was inevitable, they relied on the false hope that great leadership could turn the tide of battle and kept scamming the troops by putting additional hopes on them without any solid proof of possible victory.

“Do you know the phrase, ‘No pain, no gain’?”

A phrase that was common enough for anyone to know. A similar saying was also popular in Korea so I was sure that everyone knew of it.

Of course, I didn’t ask this question just to hear them say yes or no. Just as they looked back at me with the expression of ‘why is she saying that?’, I continued my speech.

“That’s right. In order to achieve something, pain is sure to follow suit in the progress. If we were to become successful in this painful endeavour, what would we gain?”

A word that everyone had thought about once or twice in their time in the game. But a word they would never dare to speak out. A word that no server in the whole world had achieved.
“Unification of all forces within the server. I wish to achieve this impossible feat with you all.”

A moment of silence.

“Woooooo!!”

Then a great wave of cheer from everyone rocked the Liverpool city meeting hall.

1. Robinxen: The fact real people are saying this is making me criiinge.
2. Robinxen: Criiiiiiiiinge
3. Robinxen: No matter how many times I reworded this in my head I couldn’t get it to make sense without a total rewrite, so let’s just say it was lost in translation. For those curious the original translation was: “Many Korean people just assumed that when you’re talking about England it was just a single country, but to people in England, saying such things would draw their ire. It would be no different from saying that the countries were like North and South Korea, and when you considered that they also called England a part of the United Kingdom, it indicated that there was a deep rooted history that showed just how separate the two countries were.”
4. Robinxen: Gonna be honest, author is pushing their agenda hard here. I would have found it more realistic if they’d just said North Korea restricted the game from being released there because it required internet access.