Chapter 481 - Privileges
Seeing Benjamin's now golden eyes, Andrew, Nataly and Benji looked at him with utter confusion. Since Haruo, Jasmin and Tony already saw them and were aware of what was going on, they didn't have such a strong reaction.
Those other three, on the other hand, didn't believe what they saw, "How the hell did you do that? Are those, like, AR contacts or something? I heard something about those, but-"
"They're not contacts, Benji." The old man pointed out with a clear tone, and then swiftly stepped into the corner of the room so that he could have everyone in sight at the same time, since he didn't really want to use this all that much.
And then, he activated his Mana-Sight. Immediately the gray environment was then lit up by four different figures filled up with bright energies. Three of them were the regular Mana that Benjamin already knew, and one of the figures was made up of two energies constantly intertwining with each other and splitting up at the same time.
Once he confirmed that this really was the case, Benjamin immediately deactivated them again and then held his hand over his eyes as he pressed them shut. This was a rather uncomfortable feeling, like his eyes were about to burn up, but he didn't use them as long as last time so there probably wouldn't be any lasting damage. Hopefully.
"Alright, managed to confirm it. Jasmin, Haruo, Nataly and Andrew, the five of us have mana, or in Andrew's Case Yin and Yang energy, inside of our bodies. Benji doesn't have a speck of it though, so-" Benjamin explained, and immediately Benji sighed out deeply in response, "Grampa, what are you talking about? Is everything okay?" He asked, thinking that his grandfather was just messing around a bit, although everyone else in the room was aware that this was something vastly different to what Benji himself was thinking.
"So it's true? It's actually real, it's not just a game? And we were trapped over there for dozens of Millenia?" Andrew asked as he stared down onto the floor in shock, and Nataly was too shocked to say anything. And while they were dealing with this on their own for a little bit to get their minds into order, Benjamin turned over toward Benji.
"So, I'm going to just go out and say it without anything around it. The 'Game' isn't actually a game. It's a different world that we were apparently placed into at different times to shape it into what Samuel wanted, I guess. I couldn't really figure that part of it out yet, of what his reasons for it were. Either way, as you heard before, Michael was seemingly influenced in a supernatural manner, and my guess is that it was Samuel." Benjamin started, and before Benji could say anything, the old man continued.
"Around the same time, Greg appeared here all of a sudden carrying a gun. Just a little while later, Xenia was attacked by her stalker. Last night, a group of people broke into Evalia's house, probably with no good intention. The triad attacked Brody and his wife, and Jyuuk's research lab was burnt down. That isn't a coincidence. I think Samuel might be freaking out and trying to get rid of us or something. Maybe he wanted to-"
"Grampa, what the f.u.c.k are you talking about?" Benji asked angrily, heading for the door as he was doing so, "I know I said that I wanted to be part of the conversation, but if you don't want me here, don't come up with such a ridiculous f.u.c.k.i.n.g lie."
"For f.u.c.k's sake, do I have to stab myself again to prove it to you?" Benjamin exclaimed, and Benji turned around confused, "Stabbed? What are you talking about?" Benji asked, and everyone else was seemingly just as confused about it, with the exception of Tony.
"Actually… What did the Doc say about it? Is it a bad cut?" Tony asked his father, but the old man just shook his head and removed his left hand from his eyes, showing Tony his palm, "Bad? I wish." Benjamin said with a wry smile, revealing his hand with not even a single recent blemish on it. Like the cut from before was just a lie.
"It… It's gone..?" Tony asked as he grabbed his father's hand and held it closer to his own face to properly see what was going on, and Haruo swiftly walked over to the old man as well, "What? There definitely was a cut here before…" The young man pointed out, before Benjamin just nodded his head.
"Yes, there was. But when you two saw it, Jyuuk and Xenia, it already healed for the most part. Benji, to prove to your father that this is real, I cut into my hand with a kitchen knife to let some mana out of my body, since skin somehow restricts that, apparently." The old man pointed out, and slowly, seeing how everyone else was seemingly rather serious and even Nataly was rather shaken up over all this, Benji was growing a bit more confused over whether this was actually real.
And then, Benjamin started to explain everything to Benji so that he was caught up on it, although he really couldn't believe what he was hearing right now and slid to the ground along the wall in shock, "You've got to be f.u.c.k.i.n.g with me… That's real? You're all serious?" Benji asked, his breathing slowly speeding up, "That world is f.u.c.k.i.n.g real?!" He yelled, and Benjamin looked at him with a calm expression.
"Yes, it is. Now, please stay quiet if you can, alright I don't want others to find out about it if they shouldn't. But there is something more important. Do any of you know what happens when you reveal to the 'NPCs' that their world is a 'Game' and Artificials are 'Players'?" The old man asked, and it seemed like none of them really ever thought about that, although Benji had an answer to that question.
"Yup… I saw a stream clip about that. A ripple in the air opens and some guy steps out and immediately kills the player and forces a log-out without them being able to log in again." Benji explained quietly, and his grandfather immediately nodded his head.
"Exactly that, yes. But luckily for me, when I did it, that 'guy' recognized me and didn't kill me immediately. So, I managed to convince him to give me immunity to the rule, meaning I can now tell others about the truth, as long as it's within limits." Benjamin told the others, and immediately, the four other Originals looked at him with confusion.
"When you did it? What do you mean, who did you tell?" Jasmin asked immediately, and the old man swiftly explained, "Practically everyone in my group. Sky, Bree, the five Half-Dragon kids, Kirisho… Then there were also Gralmar, Morrom, Jekyll, Denmir and Folmirra. The latter four are Grandmaster Craftsmen, and Gralmar has quite high-tier contacts. I invited those five to Prototype. Oh, and then there were also Garon and Jaz, the people from Melroe's adventurer's Guild. Jaz is the descendant of an old friend of mine- of Eisen, sorry." Benjamin explained, and everyone looked at him in shock.
"Why'd you tell all those people..?" Andrew asked with a wry smile, and the old man looked at his friend with a slight grin, "To bring them over to our side. Because from now on, we'll be messing with the balance of that world." The old man explained, and while the others were trying to understand what he meant, he continued.
"We're collecting every single great expert, master, or prodigy there is and bringing them to the islands. It seems like even Samuel can't directly do anything against us five, so we can just go ahead and do it without worries."
"And why would we exactly be doing that?" Haruo inquired, although he seemingly wasn't exactly against it, just a little confused. So, Benjamin explained.
"Two reasons. One, so that we can get any help we might possibly need to get back to who we were, to get our memories from our time over there back. I don't know about you, but I personally don't want to forever forget 100 Thousand years of my life. And then two… to mess with Samuel." The old man explained, as if it was obvious, and in response, Andrew started to slightly smirk.
"Hmm, is that so?" He asked, "I mean, I like the idea of messing with that son of a bitch, if I'll have to be honest. But that's not all there is to it, right? You must have an even better reason, am I right?" Andrew pointed out, and with a sigh, Benjamin nodded his head.
"Guess I can't hide it from you, huh?" The old man said, and then sighed deeply, "With the help of special people like that, we can properly make sure that our strength as a country increases. If we have anyone that's anything on the islands, players and NPCs alike will be drawn there automatically. Once our size is increased and our rank as a country increases, we get certain privileges that are on a whole other level compared to before. That's the only reason I'm even still trying to found a country, since I usually wouldn't have done so because the one that suggested it was Samuel." Benjamin explained, and rather curiously, Nataly looked at him, "What kind of privileges are you speaking about?" She asked, and Benjamin just slightly grinned in response to that question.
"For one, there is a 'King Council' thing every year, which every Rank 3 country is invited to. There are 5 circles to that council, and with every rank above 3, you can move a circle further and get more privileges amongst that Council. For one, each circle has their own meetings with a different level of information-exchange. And a higher-circle country can access any information of a lesser-circle country, as long as that lesser-circle country has been part of the council for five years. Like that, we will be able to gain all the information that we may ever need on that world." Benjamin explained.
"Since that world is being manipulated to make it more exciting for Players, I want any information I can get to properly protect that world and work against that manipulation. Then of course, being part of the council also allows us to have access to countries we usually wouldn't have yet, since there is a travel-ban between the continents right now. That all is the main reason I want those privileges." The old man explained quite clearly, and hoped that the others agreed with his idea.