When List offered Ryker a share in the game, he deliberately used his Game Master privileges to mute their conversation from the rest of the cell block. The other prisoners could see them talking, but they couldn't hear a single word.
"Oh my god! What's going on? Why is the GM offering his hand to that newbie?!"
"I smell a rat! They're making a backdoor deal!"
"This is rigged! I'm reporting this to the admins!"
"Report it to who, you idiot?! The admins are the ones rigging it! This is a private server! They can do whatever they want!"
The prisoners banged against their invisible walls, howling in protest.
But the disgruntled mercenary had a point. Greed Island was essentially a private MMO server built and maintained by a small group of friends. There was no overarching regulatory body. If the devs wanted to give someone admin access, they could.
Ryker casually glanced at List, taking a moment to genuinely appraise the young Game Master.
[Target: List]
[Traits: {Admin: Module Construction} (Gold), {Master Programmer} (Gold), {Calm} (Gold), {Courage} (Gold), {Culinary Arts} (Purple), {Mysophobia} (Gold), etc.]
Tsk, tsk, tsk.
Even though he wasn't a combat-oriented character, List was practically glowing with Gold-tier traits. Unlike Eta, who functioned as a beautiful receptionist, or Razor, who was the physical enforcer, List was the true backbone of the island. He and Dwun built the actual mechanics of the game.
It was a tempting list of traits, but Ryker decided to hold back.
He intended to stay on Greed Island for a while. Plundering the core programmer would be like buying a brand new game and instantly installing a god-mode hack that unlocked everything on day one. It was fun for about five minutes, but then the game became incredibly boring. Ryker was already capable of steamrolling the combat; he wanted to actually enjoy the exploration and the card system.
Besides, if he beat up the devs too badly and broke the game permanently, it would ruin Gon and Killua's fun.
"I'll pass," Ryker said, leaning back. "I have no interest in game management, and I don't want to join your team. If that's all you have to offer, you can leave."
Joining the development team meant he would be obligated to protect the server and fix bugs. He didn't want to be their free bodyguard. Furthermore, tying himself down to a video game island was beneath him. He was a man destined to conquer the Dark Continent, not babysit a private server.
"Ah... I see. That's a shame," List sighed, his shoulders slumping slightly. He had hoped offering admin privileges would be enough to appease the monster.
"In that case... Mr. Ryker, may I at least add you to my friend list?" List asked respectfully, essentially abandoning his GM authority and speaking as an equal. "If you encounter any issues or bugs during your playthrough, you can contact me directly."
List realized that since Ryker's aura dwarfed Ging's, the standard restrictions of the island simply didn't apply to him. Trying to control Ryker was impossible. The only option left was diplomacy.
"Sure," Ryker agreed, accepting the friend request on his Ring.
My Best Friend is a Game Master. It felt like the title of a trashy light novel.
"Thank you. And apologies again for the earlier misunderstanding. You are free to leave the Confinement Zone. We hope you enjoy the game," List bowed deeply.
A spatial vortex enveloped Ryker, but once again, the teleportation spell struggled against his passive aura density.
List's eye twitched. Ging's legendary, flawless code was completely breaking down around this single player. Whether or not Ryker destroyed the game was entirely dependent on his mood.
"Relax. I'm not going to break the game on purpose," Ryker smiled, suppressing his aura to let the teleportation spell grab him. "After all, this island is the only thing Gon's father left behind for him."
FLASH.
Ryker vanished from the cell, leaving List standing alone in the white void.
So... Mr. Ryker knew the true identities of the developers from the very beginning? List thought, a bitter, exhausted smile crossing his face. Ging... what kind of monster did you attract to our island?
"Hey! Hey! That's not fair! How come he gets let out after five minutes?!"
"BULLSHIT! It's an inside job! I demand to be released!"
"This game is trash! P2W garbage! Wait... why did my confinement timer just go up by two hours?! FUCK! No, I'm sorry, GM! Please!"
List glared coldly at the screaming prisoners. Without a word, he turned around and walked back through his black door, leaving them to their misery.
The Starting Prairie.
"Killua, Brother Ryker said he won't be here until tomorrow. Should we just sleep here? I don't know if you'll get hungry though..." Gon asked, looking up at the virtual sky.
"I brought a bunch of ChocoRobo cookies!" Killua grinned, patting his pockets. "We can save some for Brother Ryker."
"Awesome!"
Just as the boys were about to sit down and relax, their instincts flared.
"Gon... someone is watching us," Killua whispered, his eyes narrowing.
"Yeah. I feel it too," Gon nodded, discreetly gripping his fishing rod.
From behind the massive stone walls of the starting tower, two figures stepped out onto the prairie. They were a pair of older men, one fat and one thin. They weren't part of Battera's mercenary group; they were independent players who had logged in from a different console somewhere else in the world.
"Hehe! Hey there, little buddies! Are you new here too?" the fat man called out, waving his hand with a greasy, fake smile. "We just started playing. This game is super tough for beginners. Why don't we team up?"
"Yeah," the skinny man added, his eyes tracing their pockets. "The veteran players in here are ruthless. If we don't stick together, we'll be easy pickings."
"We already have a team. We're not interested," Gon said bluntly, seeing right through their act.
"Oh? Is that so?" The fat man's smile instantly vanished, replaced by a vicious sneer. "Well, if you won't join us, we'll just have to forcefully evict you from the game. The fewer players there are, the better our chances of winning the 50 Billion bounty."
"Hehehe. Tough luck, kids," the skinny man cracked his knuckles.
Because they were new, they didn't have any Spell Cards yet. In Greed Island, when players didn't have cards, they had to fight using their bare hands and Nen. The two men assumed Gon and Killua were just ordinary kids who had somehow stumbled into a console. Furthermore, they knew that many cards in the game had global drop limits. Killing other players meant less competition for the rare cards.
The two men lunged forward.
BAM! BAM!
Before the men could even fully extend their arms, Gon and Killua moved.
Gon swung his heavy, aura-infused fishing rod like a baseball bat, slamming it directly into the skinny man's temple. The man's skull fractured instantly, and he dropped dead on the grass.
Killua blurred out of existence, using his Rhythm Echo to appear behind the fat man. With a casual, lightning-fast thrust, Killua's sharpened fingernails pierced straight through the man's back, crushing his heart.
The two "veteran PKers" died without even making a sound.
After their brutal training at the Heavens Arena and their experiences surviving Ryker's apocalyptic battles in Yorknew, Gon and Killua were no longer naive children. If someone came at them with killing intent, they didn't hesitate to put them down.
A moment later, a pillar of white light descended from the sky, enveloping the two corpses. The bodies, their rings, and their empty Binders dissolved into digital polygons and vanished, cleaning up the server's memory space.
In the real world, the actual bodies of the two men, sitting in front of a console halfway across the globe, slumped over dead.
Meanwhile. The Real World.
Battera's Castle. The Underground Bunker.
Tsezguerra's team of mercenaries had been logging into the game one by one. Tsezguerra, as the captain, had chosen to log in last to ensure everyone made it safely.
As the final two mercenaries placed their hands on the consoles...
Squelch. Squelch.
It sounded like two watermelons being sliced open. The noise was quiet, but in the sterile, echoing bunker, it was unmistakable.
The two mercenaries didn't even have time to scream. They slumped forward, dead, their heads violently impaled by playing cards.
A heavy, metallic scent of blood began to waft through the room. If one were to look down the long, fortified corridor leading to the bunker, they would see the corpses of Battera's elite security guards littering the floor, all killed by razor-sharp playing cards.
Two figures stepped out of the shadows.
Chrollo Lucilfer and Hisoka.
"My, my~. This is quite a dangerous infiltration," Hisoka purred, licking a stray drop of blood off his Joker card. "But... I do love a good thrill~."
After suffering total defeat in Yorknew City, Chrollo had consulted Neon's stolen prophecy poem. It clearly stated his only hope of survival lay to the "East."
Following the clues, Chrollo and Hisoka had quietly tracked Ryker's group from the auction house to Battera's estate. They remained far enough away to avoid Ryker's monstrous sensory range, but close enough to understand their objective: Greed Island.
Chrollo didn't want to run forever. He wanted to find a way to kill the monster who had butchered the Spider, or at the very least, secure the survival of his remaining crew. He believed the answer lay inside this game.
"Oh? Look at this," Hisoka smiled, gesturing to the three specific consoles at the end of the row. "Ryker, Killua, Gon... it seems all three of them have already logged in."
"Shall we go in after them?" Hisoka asked, his golden eyes narrowing in anticipation.
Chrollo stared at the consoles, his dark eyes cold and calculating.
"No," Chrollo said quietly. "Unplug their consoles. Take the hardware with us. Ours as well."
"Hm?" Hisoka blinked, genuinely surprised.
Chrollo wasn't stupid. He knew perfectly well that even if he and Hisoka teamed up inside the game, they stood absolutely zero chance of beating Ryker in a fair fight. To kill a god, they needed to completely rewrite the rules of engagement.
"If they are inside the game, they have to come out eventually. To come out, they need their physical consoles," Chrollo explained, a dark, pragmatic ruthlessness in his voice. "So, we arrange a surprise for them when they return. And we certainly don't need to log in from the same physical location as them."
Oh... I see, Hisoka thought, a twisted, manic grin spreading across his face. If you can't beat the player... you unplug his router and trap his physical body.
You truly are a devious bastard, Chrollo.
Without hesitation, Hisoka and Chrollo unhooked five JoyStation consoles—Ryker's, Gon's, Killua's, and two for themselves—and vanished into the night.
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