Bai Liu was still inside the game.

Although these people had already signed the contracts, the soul transactions could not actually take place until Bai Liu returned. In other words, Bai Liu had handed over the dismantled Carrion Guild first. Only after these people received those assets would the agreed-upon transaction follow.

Watching the guild members crowd around Mu Ke, eagerly signing contracts one after another, Mu Shicheng stood off to the side with a slight frown.

Something felt wrong.

Very wrong.

And strangely enough, it felt familiar.

It felt like someone was getting swindled.

The problem was that he couldn't quite figure out who.

At first glance, it seemed as though these guild members were the ones benefiting. After all, they hadn't handed over their souls yet, but they had already received management rights to the guild. It looked like a deal that cost nothing and promised pure profit.

And yet...

The idea that anyone could gain an advantage over Bai Liu in advance felt absurd.

Mu Shicheng quietly moved closer to Mu Ke and lowered his voice.

“What exactly are you people plotting? You actually handed the guild over to them first. Bai Liu has never struck me as the kind of conscientious businessman who delivers the goods before collecting payment.”

Based on everything he knew about that black-hearted merchant, Bai Liu's style was always the same:

Money first.

Goods later.

And if the goods weren't what had been advertised?

No refunds.

Mu Ke maintained his usual polite smile. He subtly leaned away from Mu Shicheng's approach, then glanced at him from the corner of his eye.

“What do you think is the most valuable thing in a guild like this?”

The question caught Mu Shicheng off guard.

The most valuable thing?

He thought about it.

High-level items.

Guild savings.

Secret databases.

Dungeon strategies.

Those were the resources ordinary guilds used to attract members.

But none of those things existed in the Carrion Guild.

The few valuable items and points the guild once possessed had belonged to the Miao father and son. Most of those had already ended up in Bai Liu's hands during the previous game.

As for databases and strategy guides, those were useful only for low-level players repeatedly clearing familiar games.

Someone like Bai Liu was different.

Every game he entered was a new one.

Even if every guild in the game pooled their databases together, they might still have nothing useful to offer him.

Then realization struck.

Mu Shicheng slowly turned his head and looked at the ordinary players surrounding the table, each clutching contracts with shining eyes.

The Carrion Guild was already empty.

It had been hollowed out long ago.

The most valuable assets remaining were the players themselves.

Which meant—

Bai Liu had divided an empty shell into thousands of pieces and sold those pieces to the people standing here, convincing them they had become its owners.

Once they believed the guild belonged to them, these bottom-tier players would work harder than anyone else to develop it.

They would pour everything they had into filling that empty shell.

And whether they ultimately handed over their souls or not, Bai Liu would lose absolutely nothing.

Because what he had sold them was essentially a blank frame.

An empty box.

A bomb casing with no explosives inside.

And now these people would desperately fill it themselves before proudly handing it back to him.

The more Mu Shicheng thought about it, the more horrified he became.

This wasn't just exploitation.

This was squeezing every last drop of productivity out of people who had already been driven to the brink.

Is this guy even human?!

Unable to hold it in any longer, Mu Shicheng turned toward Mu Ke.

“Isn't this a little too ruthless?”

As someone who had spent years fighting alone, Mu Shicheng knew hardship better than most.

Because of that, he couldn't help feeling sympathy for these players.

If things had gone differently, he might have become one of them.

Trapped inside a guild.

Worked to exhaustion.

Discarded once all his value had been extracted.

“If we didn't do it this way,” Mu Ke replied calmly, “they'd be dead soon anyway.”

His tone carried the detached certainty of someone accustomed to negotiations and transactions.

Adjusting his glasses, Mu Ke cast Mu Shicheng a cool glance.

“What do you think is really trapping them?”

Mu Shicheng paused.

“My father employs many people just like them,” Mu Ke continued.

“People who spend their entire lives huddled inside factories and refuse to leave, even when staying means suffering.”

“Some genuinely lack the ability to leave.”

“Others are simply afraid.”

“Afraid that if they step away from their positions, they'll lose their means of survival.”

“They'll do everything possible to prevent machines from replacing them.”

“They'll resist modernization.”

“They'll resist change.”

“But whenever industries transform, whenever technology advances, whenever an economic crisis arrives...”

“The people who remain frozen in place are always the first to be eliminated.”

Mu Ke lowered his gaze.

“But if you give every worker a share of the factory...”

“If you make them owners...”

“And then hand them a brand-new factory...”

“What do you think happens?”

Mu Shicheng looked at him.

“What?”

“Every single person inside will fight desperately to make it succeed.”

Mu Ke's voice softened.

“Because their survival becomes tied to everyone else's survival.”

“No matter how harsh the environment becomes, they'll keep moving forward together.”

His eyelashes lowered.

“Until the very end, not a single employee was laid off.”

Mu Shicheng fell silent.

The noisy hall stretched out before him.

Contract after contract flashed across countless floating system panels.

Reflected in those pale screens were faces that only moments ago had seemed lifeless.

Now those same eyes were fixed on two words:

Bai Liu.

One by one, they signed their names beneath his.

The faint blue glow illuminating their faces looked almost sacred.

Like faith rekindled from cold ashes.

***

Little Black Room Area

Two groups stood facing each other in tense silence before Bai Liu's small television.

The perimeter around the screen was packed with elite members of the Kings Guild.

They were tall, broad-shouldered, and intimidating. Most stood a full head taller than the Carrion Guild players opposite them. Their height alone created a sense of dominance, and their expressions only reinforced it.

Arms crossed.

Chins raised.

Eyes full of contempt.

Occasional scoffs and derisive snorts drifted from the crowd.

The pressure was overwhelming.

The Carrion Guild players standing behind Mu Ke and Mu Shicheng instinctively shrank back.

Many of them had never experienced anything like this. 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ𝑤𝑒𝑏𝑛𝘰𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝒸𝑜𝘮

At most, they had once followed Miao Feichi while causing trouble for Bai Liu.

Their greatest ambition had always been joining the Kings Guild.

Yet somehow, within a single day, they had skipped directly to confronting the Kings Guild head-on.

Internally, many of them were already screaming.

Could you people slow down a little?!

We only just became guild managers!

Don't destroy the guild before we've even had time to enjoy it!

A Kings Guild member standing near the edge folded his arms and sneered.

“When Bai Liu dropped into the Grave Dancing Area, nobody came to save him.”

“Not a single person.”

“Now that he's in the Little Black Room, you've finally shown up.”

He let out a mocking laugh.

“What's the point?”

Mu Ke lifted his eyes.

“How is there no point?”

“We couldn't save Bai Liu in the Grave Dancing Area.”

“But we can save him here.”

This had been Mu Ke's plan from the beginning.

After gathering information on promotion rankings throughout the central area, he had processed and cross-referenced enormous amounts of data.

Eventually, he calculated the location where Bai Liu was most likely being held.

The Little Black Room.

It was an obscure subdivision that few players understood.

Most people knew it existed.

Very few knew how players ended up there.

And those who did...

Were usually dead.

Fortunately, Mu Ke possessed an exceptional memory.

When he first entered the game, he had memorized countless routes and regional layouts.

That knowledge now allowed him to identify this hidden area quickly.

The rules of the Grave Dancing Area were brutally simple.

A player had to surpass their previous performance metrics.

Under a coordinated blockade, that was practically impossible.

Especially for Bai Liu.

His previous performance had already reached the lower end of the King's Board.

The volume of likes, bookmarks, and points he had accumulated during that run was staggering.

The Carrion Guild simply didn't possess enough influence to reproduce those numbers.

Mu Ke understood that clearly.

With only the Carrion Guild as leverage, rescuing Bai Liu from the Grave Dancing Area had been nothing more than a fantasy.

The Little Black Room was different.

Before a player completely descended into No-Man's Land, the system implemented a final mechanism designed to squeeze every remaining ounce of value from them.

The mechanism was called:

Ransom.

The system allowed supporters to pay points to rescue a player.

Naturally, this wasn't an act of kindness.

It was simply another way for the system to harvest value.

Because of that, ransom prices were rarely set impossibly high.

The system calculated an amount that supporters could realistically scrape together.

Bai Liu's ransom was exactly one hundred thousand points.

And that number was terrifyingly precise.

It was almost equal to the combined total of:

Mu Ke's points.

Mu Shicheng's points.

The points of every ordinary member of the Carrion Guild.

Added together.

The only problem now was—

Mu Ke raised his eyes toward the Kings Guild members.

The viewing area surrounding Bai Liu's television had been completely sealed off.

The Kings Guild had formed a human wall around it.

Earlier, Mu Shicheng had forced his way through and created a temporary opening.

But that gap had already closed.

Now the blockade was airtight.

The players behind him had no chance of breaking through on their own.

Which meant someone had to create an opening from the inside.

Only then would the frightened Carrion Guild members gather enough courage to follow.

Mu Ke took a slow breath.

Then he pressed his hands together.

His wrists rotated outward.

With a clean flick, two sleek black daggers appeared in his pale hands.

The moment the weapons appeared, several Kings Guild members instinctively stepped back.

Then they remembered where they were.

The Game Lobby.

Weapon damage was disabled here.

The tension immediately dissolved into ridicule.

One member looked down at Mu Ke and laughed.

“Kid, maybe learn the rules before showing off.”

He pointed at the daggers.

“What exactly are you planning to do with those?”

“In the Game Lobby, a dagger can't even—”

His words stopped abruptly.

Mu Ke moved.

No.

He vanished.

His body became a phantom blur that streaked past the speaker before anyone could react.

The Kings Guild member's expression froze.

By the time he realized what had happened, Mu Ke was already standing behind him.

Inside the encirclement.

[System Notification: Player Mu Ke has activated the skill Flash Strike.]

The surrounding players stared in shock.

Mu Ke raised an eyebrow.

Back pressed against the stunned guild member's shoulder, he twisted his body sharply.

His elbow slammed backward.

The impact sent the man stumbling sideways.

An opening appeared.

Mu Ke gritted his teeth and shoved harder.

“Who says daggers can only be used to attack?”

His voice rang out clearly.

“This skill reduces Mental Points.”

“It doesn't deal damage.”

The gap widened.

The Kings Guild's blockade had finally been breached.

***

Author's Note

Six's dream:

To build a company where no employee is ever laid off.

My dream:

To work at that company and spend my days slacking off.