"WintersEmbrace... MidasTouch..." Exile paused as he glanced from one to the other. "You two will my join my Pantheon. As for the rest of you, there's still a chance. Once I have the full results if you qualify I will come to find you here."

The other three players shot hateful glares at the two he had singled out. Which Exile took note of. Winter and Midas looked up with bright smiles on their faces as they thanked him. However, Exile held up a hand to silence them. 

"Before we wrap things up. Tell me, what are you the Gods of?" Exile cocked an eyebrow out of curiosity. Wondering if it would shed some light on how they won against all of the others.

Midas was the first to step forward, and with a rather embarrassed expression looked Exile in the eyes. "I am the God of Fortune."

Exile let out a soft chuckle as he heard that. It seemed that this player was true to the name he had given himself. 'I see... There should be no shortage of people who would pray for that. Hopefully, he can help us with our money problems. Exile nodded as he turned his attention to WintersEmbrace.

"I am the Goddess of Dreams..." Winter smiled smugly as Exile frowned. "You're probably wondering how that helped me? It's easy to plant my name in the dreams of NPCs and discredit others."

Exile's eyes narrowed as he focused on the pair. 'I see... One took ahold of the greed in the hearts of men while the other wormed her way into their minds.' Exile suppressed a shiver as he realised how dangerous this particular pair was. 'It's a good thing they're on our side now.'

"Ok, since the introductions are out of the way, there's only one thing left for you two to do. You'll have to raise your level and Ascend. Once you're there, we'll go through the process of registering you to Ragnarok." Exile smiled as he explained the situation. 'Plus, that should buy me some time to warn the others. Especially about Winter.'

"Oh, we're ready to go now..." Winter grinned as several orbs appeared in her hands at once. At the same time, Midas made his own collection appear in front of Exile.

Exile swallowed a lump of saliva as a dark thought crossed his mind. 'So it wasn't that the others gave up. These guys... eliminated the competition.'

"As thanks for taking us in, we want to give some of these to you." Midas bowed his head as he held out four orbs.

Exile was taken aback by the gesture, but before he could respond, Winter did the same thing. Offering five orbs on her part. The suddenness of it completely caught him off guard as he wondered if it was right for him to take them. After considering it for several seconds, he decided to take them. 'They shouldn't be worth much in the way of stats, anyway.'

"I'll meet you in Valheim then. Just wait in the area where you arrive." Exile nodded as he stored the orbs and cancelled his Avatar.

"Looks like you were right, Winter. The orbs have probably bought us some goodwill." Midas mused as he smiled.

"Of course I was right. With the nature of this game, how could he refuse? Plus, with the impression we first gave him, we had to do something to fix it." Winter returned the smile. "But he's quite crafty. I never thought that he would give us a challenge to reverse the situation we put him in."

"Does it matter? We managed to join a Pantheon. This is better than what we had planned. We don't have to rely on just a single stronger player now." Midas studied the frown that had appeared on Winter's face. "Now we just have to prove how valuable we are."

"You're right. Shall we then?" Winter smiled as she held up her remaining orbs.

"Sure..." Midas grinned slyly as they activated their orbs.

Exile sighed as he returned to The Raider's Horn yet again. As his vision cleared, Burri was sitting there staring at him.

"Finally! Took you long enough!" Burri groaned as he stretched. "Everyone's already been to the Temple, but it seems like there have been some changes in their own temples. I guess it was the same for you?"

"You could say that..." Exile grinned as they both started to laugh.

"Well, you don't need to worry. The Skardians are on their way home." Burri drummed his fingers on the table. "I just stayed behind to let you know what was going on. Before I go, Clay said to let you know there's a new recruit waiting at the temple."

Exile frowned, but before he could question Burri any further on it, the latter activated their Avatar spell. As Burri's eyes glazed over, Exile shook his head. 'I'll pick up Winter and Midas first. That way I can deal with all three at once.'

It did not take him long to meet up with Winter and Midas, who were being harassed by other players to join their own Pantheons. However, the pair turned down every offer, including one from the recruiter for Kaleidoscope. Naturally the re4cruiter recognised and Exile and swiftly sent word to Aeri as they walked away from him. 

"I take it you don't get along with them?" Midas laughed as the recruiter disappeared from view.

"We. You mean we. We don't get along with them. Make sure to avoid Kaleidoscope if you can. Once we get inside the temple, we're meeting with one more person. Then we'll get you registered and we can talk about what we'll do going forward with the others." Exile sighed as they walked inside the unusually quiet temple. 

It took Exile a few moments to spot the player Burri had mentioned, causing his eyes to go wide. 'Ugh, Clay what have you done?' Exile groaned as he met the young woman's gaze. Beans nervously waved to him when she saw that he did not seem too excited to see her.