New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live

He sat down hurriedly, grabbed a pile from his side of the desk, and started flipping through each sheet with rapt attention.

Astaroth wasn't well-versed in politicking or dealing with others. But he was good at finding the most esoteric solutions to the most straightforward problems.

Was it a quality or a shortcoming? Only time would tell.

However, right now, his strange mind was precisely what Phoenix needed.

She'd been poring over these players for weeks, trying to find a middle ground with them, negotiating with them, hoping to find a peaceful resolution to this issue.

The problem was simple.

Phoenix wanted them gone because they were not a good fit for the guild. But the fear of becoming guildless was greater than their fear of retribution, and they refused to break the contracts.

They preferred paying ninety percent of their Exp to the guild and the same percentage of their earned gold and materials in exchange for not becoming solo players.

The risk factor of being guildless was high these days. Many PKers targeted solo players, trying to level up quickly or make easy money.

That, with the inherent difficulty of farming, ever since guilds had grabbed possession of all the dungeons and good farming spots, made solo players easy prey for others.

She understood all this and offered many solutions, such as letting them get a boost in power to reach the average level of the player base and funds to get some proper gear. This would give them a fighting chance.

But it wasn't enough in their minds. The fear was too deep-rooted.

From the more suitable players, Phoenix had learned the reason for this, as well.

The officers in Aces High made sure the players in the lower ranks were reminded daily that they were one mistake away from being kicked out of the guild. Sometimes, they even picked out players to serve as examples.

They would break the contracts, which, at first, was easy since the players felt exploited.

But what came after made all of them regret their actions.

Since they were still linked to the guild building's graveyard, they would respawn there until they linked to another. And the officers knew this.

Using this information, they would PK the players until the dept in Exp was too great for them, and they lost their accounts.

After a few examples were made, the officer stuck to only giving reminders, the fear deeply rooted in the weak player's minds. It was all it took to force them to work harder and without complaining.

And when the players suddenly refused to log in, having enough of their plight, the contracts gave access to their personal information. With it, the officers sent enforcers to the nobodies and lawyers to the more endowed people.

This was usually enough to force them to return and commit to their promised workload.

Phoenix despised Azamus for allowing this to happen and most likely being the one to think about it in the first place, but she wasn't surprised. This was his kind of scheme.

And the players couldn't even complain about it. The moment they did, their accounts locked up, as they broke the NDAs on the contracts.

Now, Paragon was stuck with all these players who feared being kicked out more than being used as slaves.

Astaroth read all the files and found that all the common points they shared were just that. Fear.

He frowned.

"Tell me, could we send these players to Knights of the Sun? It seems like a simple solution, no?" he asked, looking at Phoenix. Novel Fire - novelfire.net

She sighed, not because she felt it was a dumb question, but because she had already tried that avenue.

"Tried already. Killi refused to take them. He said that as long as they had those contracts over their head, he wouldn't take them. He accused me of not doing my due diligence before accepting to overtake Aces High, and they were my problem now."

Astaroth clicked his tongue.

"So he doesn't want to risk looking like the slaver, leaving us to bear that blame… What an ally he is…" he complained.

Phoenix rubbed her eyes, trying to rub the tiredness away from them.

"I get it. It's a PR nightmare. Even if we can prove that we took the contracts from Aces High as is, we still look like the bad guys for not breaking them. The people won't care if it's the players who refuse because that would mean we aren't offering reasonable compensation.

"Our reputation would tank, and no one would apply to Paragon anymore. And we are far from powerful enough to stop growing at this junction. Knights of the Sun have already passed the two-thousand-player mark, while we lag just over five hundred.

"And that is mostly because we took in Aces High's players. We need to fix this before focusing on expanding the guild and the kingdom. It's our only recourse."

Astaroth scratched his chin, falling deep into thought.

If these players feared being guildless more than whatever he could throw at them, that left them little to no leverage.

'We could just let things run their course, and they'll change their minds when they see their allies getting stronger and not them,' he thought.

But he shook his head.

More of them would have already broken their contracts if that were true.

As things stood, a quarter of the Aces High players had already broken their contract when Paragon promised them to keep their spot in the guild and offered better terms of employment.

With this alone, the more sensible players from the remainder of the 'slaves' would have already understood what they stood to gain by breaking their contracts.

The issue was that they feared being kicked, and Paragon had not promised to keep them.

Phoenix had made sure she or Morticia vetted every one of them to see whether they suited their mentality or not. But the ones that came back positive were already settled in.

The rest had too many issues to fix to make them a good fit. These players would only hold Paragon back, whether by their untrustworthiness, lack of initiative, or any other issue.

Astaroth had another thought, but he doubted Phoenix would like it. But he offered it nonetheless.

"What if I gave them something bigger to fear? Something that would make their current nightmares look like dreams. And ensured they understood that breaking their contracts was the only way to escape it."

Phoenix frowned at him.

"What did you have in mind?"

Astaroth grinned maniacally.

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