Second World

"There is still another party?" Jack frowned. "Are they your friends?"

"Never met them before," John replied. "Got a recommendation from Tip here."

Tip was bewildered hearing his name mentioned. He hurriedly said, "I just happened to bump into them in one of the taverns in the city. The leader added me as a friend and said to contact him if I ever needed a service or help with quests."

"A mercenary group?" Bowler facepalmed. "Are you kidding me? You already have a group coming to help you, what are you blackmailing us for?

"Friend, please, it's cooperating, not blackmailing. You make it sound so bad," John said. "It's a level 20 Boss inside; you can't be too careful. The more the safer, ain't it?"

"How are you going to pay that mercenary party?"

"Well… I said we are only interested in completing the quest. Anything they find inside they can take," John smiled sheepishly.

"You… scoundrel!" Bowler stood up in anger. "Didn't you say the loot inside would be given to us?"

"Actually, friend, I said nothing of the sort. If you think back, I only said that we are only interested in clearing the quest," John defended. "I never said anything about the loot."

Jack now understood why the two men beside John had looked at him strangely when they talked about the loot.

"Let's just kill this asshole and hope the flower drops," Bowler suggested to Jack.

"Please calm yourself. I'm sure an agreement can be negotiated with the other party once they arrive," John interjected in his most persuasive tone.

"Who is this group that you've invited?" Jack asked.

John gave a nudge to Pointy Tip, who reluctantly spoke, "They call themselves Men of Solidarity."

"Wait, do you mean Warriors of Solidarity?" Bowler said.

"Um, no. Not that famous guild. You might consider them a cheap knock-off of that guild."

"What the… Couldn't you at least find someone more reliable? You had to go and find some famous guild wannabees?"

"Friend, it's not like we had many options," John said with exasperation.

"How good are they?" Jack asked Tip.

"I'm not sure, but they look strong. I mean, by real-world standards they would look strong. They are rough men. Like the Warriors of Solidarity, they only accept men into their gang. And they actually went further by only accepting men who use Fighter class. I'm not sure about the others, but when I met the leader two days ago, he was level 11."

"Not too impressive then," Bowler said.

"Friend, you are level 11 yourself," John commented sarcastically after using Inspect on him.

"I wasn't comparing the guy to myself! I was comparing him to my big bro here!" Bowler explained in annoyance.

John looked at Jack, "What is your level, may I ask? My Inspect skill keeps on failing on you."

"Fourteen," Jack tossed out nonchalantly. He didn't bother to conceal his level.

Tip and Trap opened their mouths wide upon hearing this. John however kept his indifferent face. He merely said, "That's impressive. That should be your bargaining chip when you negotiate with them for the loot then."

"How many of them will there be?" Jack asked.

John shrugged; he looked at Tip, who also shrugged.

"You told them about the level 20 boss?"

Tip scratched his head, looking sheepish and said, "Well… John here said there was no need to mention the level. Just to say we got a very very strong boss monster that we needed help with."

John shrugged, "Didn't want to scare them away before they arrived, right?"

"You are one sly meanie," Bowler quipped, disliking John more with every minute.

With nothing better to do, they decided to spend the night together.

At first, Jack thought about going into the cave for a recon. If it was possible for them to kill the boss without waiting for the other party to arrive, then there would be no need to negotiate about the loot distribution. But Peniel reminded him that even if the boss inside was only an Elite, it would still be difficult for him to win with the current team members.  Unless he exposed all his trump cards, of course, including his dual-class and his sword's Overlimit skill. Jack thought that she had a good point, and, as he really didn't want to reveal everything, he decided to wait.

Jack kept the original night watch schedule, as if their three new friends were non-existent, because he did not trust them yet. John, upon hearing that they were not included in the night watch rotation, was completely fine with it; he went to sleep immediately without any concern. Bowler grumbled seeing his carefree attitude.

During the night, they were attacked two times. Once during Bowler's watch by the Silver Wolves, another during Jack's watch by Goblins. During those two attacks, Tip and Trap woke up to help repel the attacks. John, however, amazingly slept through both ordeals. Bowler had to fight the urge to kick him awake.

In the morning, Jack cooked a lot of meals as preparation for venturing into the cave. He made three servings of Chicken Soup for Bowler, Flame, and himself. The he made eight servings of Egg Fried Rice because the ingredients were cheaper and easier to find.

The Egg Fried Rice was for John and his two comrades and the people from Men of Solidarity. He didn't know how many members of that gang would be coming, so he just used up his spare ingredients and made five for them.

After he finished with the cooking, Jack took Bowler and Flame to go grind monsters for experience while waiting for Men of Solidarity to arrive. Before they left, he added John as his Friend, so he could notify Jack when the Men of Solidarity arrived.

They hunted for two hours before John made contact. During the hunt, they destroyed two packs of Silver Wolves and one pack of Goblins. When they returned to the place where they had camped the night before, they found a crowd waiting for them. There were eleven people in addition to John, Tip, and Trap.

As Tip had described, the Men of Solidarity were a rowdy-looking bunch, and all of them wore Fighter armor. John was speaking with one of them; a tall middle-aged man with a bulky frame. He wore full leather armor including a leather cap, an armor piece that Jack still lacked. When John saw Jack approaching, he smiled and called out.

"My friend, you have returned! Come, let me introduce you to this fine gentleman, this is The Man, leader of Men of Solidarity?"

"Who?" Jack asked, afraid that he had heard wrong.

"The Man, leader of Men of Solidarity," John repeated.

"Which man?"

John clasped the shoulder of the man with full leather armor beside him, "the man, T-H-E, space, M-A-N! His name is The Man."

Jack was dumbfounded; he inspected the man using his God-eye Monocle.

The Man (Fighter, level 12)

HP: 340

'There is, indeed, every kind of person in the world,' Jack thought. He nodded towards The Man.

"Nice to meet you."

"Can't say the same," The Man replied rudely. "I hear you are the fools that plan to steal our loot?"

"What do you mean steal?" Bowler said. "It is cooperation! So it is normal for the loot to be shared."

The Man laughed.  His other members laughed as well, following their leader's example.

The Man looked at Bowler disdainfully, "You think you have the right to discuss cooperation with us? Look at you three. Didn't your school teacher teach you how to count? You think you can compare with eleven of us?"

He then turned to John, "Forget these three clowns! We will finish the quest ourselves. Show us the cave!"

All the other members of Men of Solidarity started to make noise.

"Yeah, what's the need for these three weaklings? We will defeat the Boss monster ourselves!"

"Take us to the cave!"

"Let's kill the Boss!!"

Jack looked at John and asked him, "Did you tell them yet that the Boss is level 20?"

The noise died down when they heard Jack's words.