The seven S Rankers of the Coalition then quietly entered a roofed building that was standing withing the Apple forest.
Frank punched the wall of the building in anger, completely destroying it in the process. The others watched him do it. They also understood the frustration he was feeling.
This feeling of being used and abused was not a good feeling.
"Fuck, Fuck, Fuck! How dare they! How dare they!!"
"Calm down Frank. Being angry like this won't help anything or anyone," said a brown haired beautiful woman who stood by the side. Her demeanour was regal but she had a devilish nature to her gaze that made her especially difficult to not pay attention to her.
"Calm down? CALM DOWN?!" bellowed Frank in anger with an imposing manner while gazing threateningly at the woman. The woman did not react much and merely brushed her hair aside while shaking her head.
One of the other S Rankers standing on the platform came forward at this moment. He had shoulder long curly blonde hair with a bushy mustache, and the air around him made him feel like nobility. He looked at the people in the room and spoke:
"Who are they?"
"Probably groups backed by the other S Rankers" said an Indian man among the Seven.
The atmosphere immediately became gloomy.
They knew that there were other S Rankers in this place besides them. It was obvious. The problem was that the other S Rankers were doing the same thing they were doing. Forming groups, collecting AC, controlling labour and ruling this place.
They had already found out that there were at least 4 different villages being built in this place, with each having more than one S Ranker in it.
They had previously tried recruiting these S Rankers, but were rejected. They figured that the S Rankers would soon come running back to them after they became hungry. But they had sorely underestimated the capabilities of the other S Rankers while overestimating their own.
"How the fuck could we not find a person that can create meat?"
"We used Mai, remember? But she's a B Rank and her Skill doesn't see too much above her rank. Her Energy tends to run out quickly too, forcing her to take massive breaks in between. It was inevitable for a situation like this to occur," said Gwen from the side with some annoyance.
Mai was one of her people. She had done her best everyday to scout out some talents and bring them to her to be nurtured or used. They better not be thinking of placing the blame for this blunder on Mai.
"I think we need to do some more digging, who knows, that meat might not even be animal meat," said the devilish woman.
"What do you mean? You think it's human meat?" asked another male S Ranker in disbelief.
"Desperate times call for desperate measures… I heard human meat tastes like really chewy and rough pork… I wonder how that meat tastes" said the devilish woman with a bright smile, causing a chill to run down the man's back.
This woman was crazy
"Okay, let's stop panicking about the things we cannot control. We will have to reign them in in the future,"
"How?"
"Through trade agreements and alliances. This is basic politics. They will make contact with us. you'll see," said Gwen.
"How many S Rankers do you people think there are in the Trials in total?" said the man.
"I know of 20 already. There should be more, maybe the total number is somewhere close to 40," said a woman with a shrug.
The room went quiet. So many… They could never form a hegemony at this rate. They needed to move quickly to gain the advantage.
"Again, we will deal with all those when they come. Let us start the Council meeting,"
The blonde man spoke at this time, saying, "Before we formally start, I have to say, you really were incredibly charming miss Gwen, making all those people that emotional in just a few sappy words. Even I was a bit affected."
"Oh Andrew, I don't know why, but I highly doubt that, I mean you are the most cold blooded person I've ever met," said Gwen.
"Ouch, that sounds so harsh, Gwen. I might need you to comfort me after this," said Andrew, feigning a hearth-throbbing pain.
Gwen merely snorted and said, "In your dreams."
Andrew watched Gwen with a dark gaze. When had he ever not gotten what he wanted. He is Andrew Jacobs. He always gets what he wants.
A 2 meter tall man, who had managedto calm himself after the earlier outburst, decided to speak at this time, saying, "Andrew, I know we decided to include you in our plans because you have a lot of AC and are a big buyer, but you need to tone it down with the violence. Why do you think Gwen isn't responding to your advances? It's because she knows that your Gift is Shady and the things you do are even more Shady."
"Frank, It's totally fine. I have faith that I can get her to like me. And you don't have to worry about people finding out about my dealings. Even if they do, they won't ever tell anyone, hehe"
Frank sighed and continued, "if you say so.."
"And anyway, aren't we helping each other? Come on, this is a two way relationship."
"Council Meeting!" said the devilish woman in irritation, which caused everyone to chuckle. Andrew spoke first:
"Oh yeah, I have news on the experiments."
"What experiments?" asked a chubby looking dark brown skinned man from the side. This was another one of the Coalition's S rankers.
"The seeds. To test if they're edible. And to test the changes happening on them," explained Andrew.
"Oh? Do continue," said the final S Ranker wearing beach clothes. This S Ranker was the Indian.
"Well… The seeds are edible. More interestingly, the longer we are here, the more fleshy they become. So they must be growing. We made Chosen eat some seeds and found out that it causes them to get high. Like the greatest high they had ever experienced. And then when they come down from it, they go crazy."
"What?! How is that edible?"
"I'm not done. The more developed fleshy seed is a bit more interesting, as it makes people lose themselves for a few hours. It's not a high. It's like happiness. But there is no side effect."
"So basically, we can't eat the seeds, we have to wait for them to grow into fruit?"
"Yeah, exactly. Which is why I was wondering what we should do about this. As you know, something like this could bring serious rammifications to our business model."
"Hmm… For now, let's take our time with spreading rumours about the seeds. Do you still have those people who have gone crazy?"
"No, I had them killed to silence them."
"Jesus Christ, Andrew."
"It's fine, that's exactly what he should have done. We need to create a false narrative. We will get people to eat the unripe seeds and go crazy in full view of others, thus lowering their expectations of the fruits. Then, when the fruits ripen we can collect them for ourselves."
"Haha!! Frank, I love how you think!"
"How do we control the other groups and get them to cooperate?"
"Through Alliances and Trade Agreements, hehe"
"Not bad Frank."
"What about the issue of the disappearing bodies?"
"Oh yeah… People getting buried under the earth end up disappearing after some hours, leaving nothing behind. It might be the way this earth is designed. You know like the bodies get turned into nutrients for the trees to make fruits."
"We'll keep looking into it."
"So, maybe we should get more nutrients for the fruits to grow up big and strong, no?"
"Don't kill people willy nilly. People are already noticing the deaths of 14 new people in the past 24 hours. And we don't gain anything from their deaths anyway."
"Yeah. I was actually so pissed when I found out that people don't drop their AC when they die. What a waste!!"
"Just lay low for now, keep building our influence and soon enough we will control this place fully."
"Yeah!"
"I guess the Meeting's over. If there are any communications, let's do it through Network until the next time we meet up."
"Okay."
"Got it."
Gwen stepped out of that meeting with a lump in her tummy. She was not the type to treat human life as a joke before she came into these Trials.
What was happening? Why were the S Rankers behaving this way? Why was she behaving this way? They all had family waiting for them. Did they really forget the fact that they were being watched?
Well, unfortunately, it was already too late for Gwen to turn back. She had already thrown her lot in with these beasts. They were strong, and this relationship was a mutually beneficial one.
The moment she did not need them anymore would be the moment she threw them all away. Such cold blooded people should never be trusted.
Gwen busied herself with the proceedings for the next few hours until later on in the day when she could finally take a rest. On her walk back to her Cabin, she saw someone who she never expected to see at that time.
"Midas! Are you also joining the Coalition? Welcome!"
"Coalition? No. I'm here for something else. There's an S Ranker occupying the Southern Clearing that has a Gift that allows him to enslave other people and force them to do bad things for him…" said Midas, but seeing no reaction from Gwen Midas felt a pang in his heart.
"But you knew that already, didn't you?"
"Andrew is one of our Coalition's Seven S Rankers, Midas. If you have a problem with him, I advise you to set up a meeting with him and deal with it yourself,"
"Are you protecting him? Do you know that he has enslaved more than twenty people already? Some of those people are even women… Who knows he might be keeping them as sex slaves for all we know!"
"Midas, I think you have a misunderstanding about Andrew. The Skill is called [Enslave] but actually he cannot do anything if someone does not give his or her permission."
"Is that what he told you? And you believed it? Heh!"
"Midas, I'm being civil with you and yet, here you are insinuating that I'm an idiot. Do you think that's okay? If I knew that unspeakable acts were being committed against women and I could do something about it, then I would do something immediately. And anyway, what were you going to do?"
"Take him down. I was wondering if your group wanted to help me do it."
"Take him down? He's a member of the Coalition, Midas. You better not try anything funny," said Gwen coldly.
"Are you speaking for yourself? Or are you speaking for the whole Coalition?"
"She's speaking for the whole Coalition," said Frank.
Gwen paused as some words were about to come out of her mouth. She looked at Frank who had popped up out of nowhere. This guy was annoying. He somehow thought himself to be the police of the Coalition. Now was he policing her too?
Looking around, she could tell that there was now a spectacle as people were paying attention to what was being said. Frank must have come to drive Midas away. Thinking this far, she decided to extend an olive branch.
"Midas, you should really think about Joining the Coalition. Your Skills could prove crucial to our future development. We will protect you and you will help us as best as you can. A Win win situation. What do you think?"
"What if I say No to that proposal?"
"Well then you can only blame yourself for not being able to shoulder what may be coming… You've offended some really powerful people Midas. Me included. Just think about it," said Frank in a domineering manner. Gwen felt annoyed at the interruption. This was a second time now.
After hearing that Midas knew they were S Rankers before they even announced it, he understood that Midas' skills could see though him. This really annoyed him. If he could, he would destroy Midas right where he stood. But he could not. Not with people watching.
Midas nodded and turned to walk away calmly. Frank watched his calm demeanour and felt his heart shake. He spoke to Midas and said "Don't do anything you might regret. An Attack on one Coalition member is an attack on all Coalition members."
Midas laughed derisively and said "Oh trust me, I'm not going to be the one to regret things."
"What did you just say?!" said Frank. DId he just get disrespected in public? Frank looked left at someone and sent him a signal, causing the man to slip out of the crowd and disappear.
Midas stopped paying attention to anything behind him and entered the forest going towards the East. He then activated [Hidden Divinity] and disappeared from the world.
He had to be quick, he turned and looped around the forest to end up now heading towards the South West. He also took off his outerwear to make himself look like a totally different person and continued walking away after turning off [Hidden Divinity].
He would make sure to loop around on his way to his camp so he does not get followed.
— Back at the Shrine —
Frank was waiting in the Plaza for news when a man approached him with embarrassment coloured on his face. Frank was confused.
"He's gone sir."
"What do you mean?"
"He just disappeared right in front of me. He left no trail that I could follow too. I don't know where he went either."
Frank found this puzzling. He had seen Midas' Skills and Stats, and none of them could allow him to outrun his man. It seems this Midas was hiding some secrets…