Battle for the North (Rogue Merchant Book #4): LitRPG Series by Roman Prokofiev (best beach reads of all time .txt) 📗

legendary tags. Phantom quickly checked the information. True, the new communities had been registered a few minutes after the dissolution.

Cold fury swept over him, and he barely restrained himself from gritting his teeth. They had taken everything, even the name!

But he didn’t spend too long on introspection. He was Phantom — the leader whose icy charisma had made Pandorum unbeatable, a man who thought several moves ahead, calculating all variants. Just like in real life, someone who could break under pressure would never become a leader of a thousand-man alliance.

He braced up, forcing himself to calm down. A lot was gone, but not everything. Pandorum consisted of twenty clans, five of which made up its core. Panther had disbanded the alliance holding them together and the key clan, Euthanasia. The biggest issue was that Euthanasia had been the owner of almost half of the alliance’s lands. The traitor knew where to strike. Four castles and more than fifty fully developed outposts, plus just as many of a lower rank, became neutral. The enemy was probably already attacking and capturing them — NAVY and their many foes wouldn’t miss out on a revenge opportunity. The worst thing, however, was forfeiting Atrocity, the empty ships inside the fortress, and the treasures accumulated over the years in the warehouses. That was a real setback. In a moment, Pandorum had lost hundreds of millions in gold. Phantom even felt slightly surprised: hadn’t Panther realized that his own life was worth much less when taking such risks?

In any case, the other clans were intact, their holdings suffering only partially — many NPCs with artificially inflated reputation had also rebelled. The Heart fell into the enemy’s hands, its power no longer keeping the enslaved NPCs inside. But that was the lesser evil; it could be dealt with.

Upon making the decision, Phantom gave out clear and concise orders. He contacted team leaders, coordinators, and raid leaders; created new communication channels and added players; cursed, commanded, and begged. His determination inspired the others and chipped away at the panic. Eventually, he managed to stop the pointless wiping at neutral resp points, gather the tagless players in a temporary clan, and create a new alliance with a telling name “Vengeance.” After all, revenge was exactly what the furious Pandas were craving.

Having assembled their fleet and mustered their resolve, the only thing they could do quickly was to deploy a barrier to protect part of their territories from endless attacks. The situation was complicated by the deficit of ellurite and inability to replenish consumables, most of which remained in Atrocity. Meanwhile, all allies, pets, vassals — everybody capable of providing help — were rapidly gathering forces and joining the armada of the former Pandorum.

An urgent meeting took place on several newly created Courier channels.

Phantom: Everyone knows that it’s as bad as it gets. We lost many things we’ve been building up all these years — money, a name, a comfortable existence IRL. Someone will answer for this!

Jerkhan: Wait! We are screwed, that’s true. But how could this crap happen? How did Panther get access to the disband button?

Phantom: Euthanasia was created by Proximo. He’s long since gone offline. When he left, he passed down roles to the Consuls. They had all of the crucial privileges, including clan management. Panther picked a moment when no other Consul was online, invited his alt account, promoted him to Consul, and deposed all others via a vote. Becoming the only Consul, he dissolved the alliance and the clan...

Jerkhan: Why didn’t you reform the clan before? Why didn’t you configure the privileges? Only one person should have such access!

Phantom: We didn’t remake the clan because we would’ve lost a slew of clan achievements and titles, including unique ones. There’s no point in hurling accusations. The dissolution is a done deal, and we need to think about what comes next!

Kronk: What are you suggesting?

Phantom: Go all the way. We have enough ellurite for two jumps. Let’s man up and take back Atrocity! With our castle back, we’ll quickly bounce back — it’s only a question of time.

Gor: The castle’s already captured. Scouts say lots of enemies are there.

Phantom: It doesn’t matter. We can strike via the resp point. Let’s fight tooth and nail, wear trash gear, bind our main sets. When we get to the Astral Plane, we kill each other and get inside the castle. There, dress up, resurrect, and bring down their defenses in one fell swoop! Our main targets are the resp point and the keep! We don’t have much time, but we can salvage what they haven’t destroyed yet. I’ll keep dispatching the assholes from the Watchers until I drop dead from exhaustion! This is our main plan and our main raid in this game. Let’s go, guys. Let’s kick their asses!

 

Arranging a mass raid under severe time and resource constraints required a lot of focus. Phantom issued orders while answering a series of messages and calls. One of them pulled him out of the routine.

“Phantom, someone wants to talk to you. He’s from Military. Do you remember those guys?”

Military was one of Pandorum’s smaller clans: a closed community of deranged former soldiers, veterans who had fought in America and Southeast Asia. They were real nutjobs; for them, PTSD wasn’t mere words. Even in Sphere, they continued fighting, keeping their anger from spilling out into real life.

“All right, let him,” Phantom replied after a small pause. Conversations with Military were always tense; he felt a clear threat emanating from them. A second later, a player nicknamed Sharpshooter joined the channel.

“Are you listening, Boss?” Soldiers were never known for being tactful.

“Talk.”

“I’ll ask questions and make suggestions; you say yes or no. The choice is yours.”

“Hurry up; we’re losing time.”

“Is Panther the traitor?” It was the key question.

“Yes,” Phantom said, hesitating slightly.

“Boss, do you think someone like that should be left off the hook?