Might as Well

Three days.

That was indeed some news. Sam’s inherited memories didn’t contain the exact date as the other Sam was so devastated by the losses he suffered that his life at the time was practically a haze. He only played the game so he could keep up with his debt payments that seemingly increased day by day due to the price of gold falling. Or because he borrowed money from loan sharks who saw a vulnerable person that they could exploit.

Sam made sure to write down any information he could remember, just in case he came across them. He currently didn’t have any plans to meddle with the underbelly of the city, as he knew very well that once he made that move, it was irreversible.

For now, he was just happy to set up contingencies in case he ever had the misfortune to come in contact with them and simply ignore their existence. He was aware that there were many things wrong in the world and he was extremely lucky to live the life he currently lived, reincarnation and time travel notwithstanding, but Sam was also realistic enough to understand that there was very little he could do to change the status quo.

Naturally, he had plans, but those were for far in the future.

Currently, his concern was the press conference announced by Future Unknown. The gold market would rise and the lives of a lot of people would change. This would just add to the general chaos the news would generate when the company behind the current number one game would reveal what they had done.

Sam had no doubts that a lot of people would try to sue the company, but his own lawyers assured him even after a cursory reading of the ToS and other agreements that players had to sign before playing the game, there was little chance of any suit succeeding. After reading them thoroughly and doing some preliminary analysis, they told him that there was a bigger chance of Sam becoming the Grand Sultan of Earth than anybody successfully suing the game company.

After all, it was not the game company’s fault that so many people placed their hope on the game’s economy.

But even so, he had to prepare. Lucy had been spreading the idea of buying up cheap gold to profit later and, based on the few forum posts he had seen, the idea had spread far and wide. Of course, it was mostly armchair economists deriding it as some kind of scam while hopefuls argued for it. How many people actually took the advice? He didn’t know. But from what Lucy told him, a lot of people in the guild – at least those who were actually there for their own interests – followed the recommendation coming from the leaders of the guild.

Sam knew for a fact that some of them would leave as soon as they figured out how much they would gain by selling their once again valuable gold, but Lucy and he hoped that this would once again weed out those who were unloyal and reinforce the loyalty of those who remained with gratitude.

A risky game to play, but one that needed to be played. Tim was slowly but carefully weeding out the spies and saboteurs from the members, but there was always a chance that someone managed to slip by the eagle-eyed assassin. Plus, it wasn’t out of the question that a lot of darker groups, like Tim’s former ‘friends’ now demon worshippers, would use the chaos of the reveal to further their nefarious goals.

The city guards were informed, as were the noble houses – via the Silvercrest family – and the defenses on their own company and guild headquarters were also raised. Similarly, they also made sure that Lara was protected in the fortress. The area was still being excavated, with the mines being inspected, but Sam knew several guilds and groups were watching to see what they were looking for.

No doubt they decided to let them do the lion’s share of the work of finding whatever Lara was looking for, then swoop in at the last minute to take over. Good-ish plan if it wasn't so transparent and basic.

Sam didn’t even have to do anything. Lucy took care of everything. She made sure there were some rumors, then prodded a few people here and there and voilá. Several groups were watching and waiting, all planning to strike at the last minute.

He would enjoy watching the bloodbath from the refurbished walls…

But for now, he had other matters to attend to.

Lucy and Tim, with some help from Adam, had declared there was a rather large chance of an attack on the headquarters of the company after the announcement and he wanted to be present to make sure nothing went wrong.

But that also meant he had to find something to do while waiting.

He turned away from the window from which he was watching the city of Ironwood and took in the materials present on the table in the middle of his room.

There were the usual assortments of metals like low- and high-carbon steel, pig iron, bronze, copper, tin, and everything he – or rather Lucy’s people – could find, with a few alloys from the company crafters that showed great promise. Next to them were rolls of leather from all sorts of animals, scales, and a few magically reactive cloths. Wood from several trees, including ironwood, was included in the collection along with a few bones mixed in from various magical beasts.

Sam eagerly stepped forward, raising a hand and summoning a small knife made of solidified shadow mana. While the skill would be excellent as a holdout weapon, it was also great for carving runes into things.

Picking up a piece of oak, according to the label attached to it, he moved the knife made out of shadow mana and began speaking. Lucky, meanwhile, lay on the floor, energetically gnawing on a giant bone.

“Experiment number one, oak….”

DING

Sam opened the futuristic microwave, which for some reason still had an unnecessary number of buttons of which he only used one or two, and took out the steaming bowl of popcorn. ‘At least the popcorn tech evolved…’ he grumbled to himself as he took the bounty of technology into his hands after dividing into two smaller bowls and headed for his living room. There, dressed in casual clothes – or pajamas if somebody else was asked – was Lucy in all her glory, lying on his couch, sipping her drink with several screens open in front of her.

“Popcorn is ready,” he announced uselessly, as the smell of the snack had already permeated his home.

“The forums are about to melt down…” his friend announced as she took her bowl without taking her eyes off the screens.

He plopped down next to her and took a cursory glance at the rapidly flowing comments.

“What is the most popular theory?” he asked, then threw a few pieces of salty goodness into his mouth.

“Doomsayers allege that they will be announcing the end of the game and everything will be lost,” came the dry reply from Lucy. “Then there are the copium groups that say that the company is about to announce that they will be compensating everybody for the losses.”

Sam had to snort hearing that.

Lucy just grinned. “Exactly my thoughts.” Then she leveled a small glare at Sam. “Still not sharing what you know?”

Sam answered with an innocent look. “I have no idea what you’re talking about…”

Lucy eyed him for a long moment, then huffed and turned away, returning to her screens. “I hate when you do that…” she mumbled.

He couldn’t do much, just shrug his shoulders. They weren’t in the game, but he couldn’t rule out the possibility that somebody had bugged his home. It wasn’t exactly the most defended location. There was a reason all of his important notes were on actual paper and encrypted…

Then he saw the countdown on the big screen opposite them and he pointed at it. “Oh, look! A distraction!”

Lucy let out a chuckle, but she still pushed her numerous screens to the side and settled back into the couch, shoulder to shoulder, with the bowls of popcorn in their laps, eagerly waiting for the countdown to finish and for the press conference to start.

“You know,” she began, munching on the snack. “I always hate how Sarah nags me to leave the house, but this is nice…”

“Does she know where you are?” he asked idly.

“Yeah, it’s not like I hide that I know you…”

There was a moment of silence.

“So she thinks we are doing it?” he asked as they watched one of those nameless PR people walk into the picture.

“Totally,” Lucy replied while rolling her eyes. “She even offered to take me shopping…”

Sam chuckled. “Let it be. She just worries…”

“Still annoying…now hush, it is starting!”

The nameless PR person took a few seconds to arrange a few blank pieces of paper while the media sitting in the room was in a frenzy, taking more photos than was humanly possible.

How did he know that the papers were blank? Because it could be clearly seen that the papers only had one word printed on them.

BLANK

“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to our news conference,” came the very bland greeting from the man. Clearly, he was chosen to be a disposable announcer, and from the look in his eyes, he knew it very well. No real person at Future Unknown would want to do it. “We are here today to discuss the current situation of the Real-Money Trading Market of the game, Magic Unbound.” The man took a look around, took an elegant sip of his water, then continued. “A lot of interested parties have been questioning the company’s motives and lack of communication in relation to this issue. I’m here to explain the actions the company has taken and the actions it will take.”

“He didn’t mention they are going to rectify it…” Lucy murmured indignantly.

“Why would they? It’s a player-controlled market…” Sam replied, then tried to pretend the jab into his ribs didn’t hurt.

“As you may be aware, the company has refused to comment on the issue, but there were actual reasons for this silence. Mainly, the true reason for the dramatic drop in the value of the in-game currency compared to the real-world currencies.” The room fell silent, everybody sitting on the edge of their seat, waiting for the revelation. “I’m here to announce that Future Unknown, as of a few hours ago, working in concert with the authorities has managed to bust a ring of cheaters who used inside knowledge to influence the ma…” The rest of the sentence was drowned out by the outrage in the room and the flashes of cameras.

‘It’s the future, why the hell are they still using flashes?’ Sam mused as he watched Lucy quickly scan through all her feeds.

“Well?”

“People are demanding names, and asking where they could buy pitchforks…” she reported with an amused tone. “So, that’s why…”

“Hmm?”

“Nothing, I’m just trying to comprehend your totally bullshit existence…”

“Look on the bright side. At least you got hella rich…”

“One way to look at it…” she agreed, but before they could continue, the people in the press conference also quieted down and the PR puppet could continue.

“Thank you. As I have been saying, the individuals were carefully identified and their sources were investigated. The company has stayed silent on the issue so as not to give away our internal investigations. Currently, they are under arrest and Future Unknown will do everything in its power to make sure the perpetrators are going to be punished to the full extent of the law. Now, any questions?”

Instantly, the area in front of the podium from where he was speaking was like a forest of hands.

“You, in the first row!”

The man chosen stood up and didn’t even bother to introduce himself. “What assurances does the company have that this incident isn’t going to be repeated?”

The PR representative nodded. “We have investigated the way this leak occurred and made sure nobody else would be able to repeat what happened. As of today, we can happily announce that all vulnerabilities have been eliminated.”

A nothing answer, but nobody expected more.

“Next question! You, over there!”

Another man stood, clad in a suit and having at least three camera-like devices hanging from his neck.

“What about the losses? A lot of people lost a lot of money when the prices fell…”

The room fell silent again, and Sam could see from the corner of his eyes that even the chats and forums had slowed down. Clearly, this was something everyone wanted to know.

The man behind the podium clearly saw the eager looks, but he didn’t falter. He cleared his throat and continued to talk.

“Currently, the company is working on a program to help those who lost a great amount of gold due to this incident. We are going to use the logs from the market, but it is still in the planning stages. We will be able to offer specifics at a later date.”

There were more questions after that but Sam was more interested in other things.

“How are the prices?” he asked trying to act nonchalant.

Lucy seemed equally interested and was already looking at the website.

“Going up… ten percent in the last few seconds…”

“So… profit?”

“Yes…”

“And the people?”

“Angry and rioting…”

“Nothing new then…”