"Hmmm, Money-san, how do you think the snakes survived for so long with no food nyaa?"

The question's implications jolted Jinyang's brain into calculating possibilities linking to what he already knew.

If the snakes were naturally occurring, they would have to be living very close to the pit for them to appear so quickly. That meant that they would need a source of sustenance that would sustain for decades or centuries since it was a near certainty that they didn’t get regular meals of adventurers falling into the pit.

However having a magic item create food for snakes would not be efficient or effective as that meant the snakes could be all wiped out by disease or other causes and the pit trap would no longer be usable. It was more likely the snakes were conjured or created from the item that Thorny had detected.

"Ah Girls, get ready to jump in and dig."

"Eh? Money-san why would you think that there's anything in there nyaa?"

Jinyang didn’t want to reveal the information that he had gotten from Thorny but he still needed to say something convincing.

"Normal snakes need to eat to survive so these are either magical snakes or there’s a magic item feeding them or they are summoned when someone falls into the pit."

GimmeGirls was quick to make the same connections that Jinyang did and started over to the spot where Eke had placed the heavy backpacks that he had been carrying, to get the shovels and Jinyang’s mining pick. Jinyang then turned to Eke.

"Ah Eke, we'll need you to stay up top and pull us out later in case we get stuck in a death revive loop."

“Chief, would it not be prudent to pull sir Power out and then kill all the snakes first by throwing flammables into the pit?”

“That would be a safe and secure method but it would also put any magical items at risk of being burnt along with the creatures. And if the item isn’t destroyed, there is a good chance that it will simply re-summon the snakes again and we would be back to square one.”

Eke couldn’t deny that it made sense, as long as you accepted that dying was not as important as getting a magical item that summoned snakes or fed them. Though he could not really see much value in such an item (if it was even really in the pit somewhere), he was getting used to not immediately seeing the benefits of things that seemed more like cursed items, unlike his other three teammates. It did not take long before GimmeGirls returned with the mining equipment and brought along two torches as well.

“Ah Girls, Ah Pow will need your help in bandaging to get him out of the 1 health point crisis. I’ll try to keep the snakes off the both of you and then Ah Pow can take over fending off the snakes while I use the mining pick on the wall and you keep us both out of death’s door.”

“A sound plan, Money-san but it may be better to find something to block the nearest holes? And Eke-san will be lowering us into the pit to avoid the falling damage nyaa?”

“Good idea Ah Girls, I’ll pick up some fragments from the sarcophagus and Eke will be lowering you down. I’ll need to jump in with the torches to secure the landing zone and prevent the snakes from having time to bunch up.”

With everything arranged, Jinyang messaged the details of the plan to GimmePower, whose constant dying and resurrection made verbal communication of the plan too arduous a task. Once done, with a torch in each hand, he leapt off the edge of the pit, landing close to the pit wall. Not surprisingly, the action carried consequences as a system message appeared.

You have taken 387 points of damage from falling

With his large amount of health, the damage was easily manageable. Swinging his torches around to keep the scores of snakes away, he didn’t notice that GimmeGirls had slid down the rope until a tap his shoulder alerted him. Passing one of the torches to GimmeGirls, Jinyang removed the short spear strapped to his back and used it in a sweeping motion to clear out the snakes in the area in front of him. Any which got past the sweep would then be driven back with the flaming torch. With his back covered by GimmeGirls, both made their way to GimmePower which was still reviving then dying, spamming the entire team’s display with system messages.

“Money-san, we really need to find a way to stop the death message spam, nyaa.”

“I know the message overlays are distracting, Ah Girls, but if we switch it off for our team members, we won’t know when they die.”

Though a person with a normal sense of morality would have taken the sentence as not knowing when a party member required rescuing, the message between the lines was quite clear to GimmeGirls, namely that they would not know what areas to keep away from, to avoid being caught in a death/revive loop themselves. Rescuing the party member involved was not really a high priority.

As they had planned, once they reached their target, GimmeGirls started bandaging while Jinyang walked briskly in a circular pattern, keeping the snakes from overrunning them. After GimmePower had recovered some health, the three quickly walked to the edge of the pit.

Once they reached it, Jinyang shoved pieces of the stone sarcophagus into the holes of the wall from which the snakes emerged, blocking the snakes’ exits. This reduced the directions that the snakes could attack the party, allowing GimmePower to concentrate on swinging his spear in the arc away from the wall. As soon as they were relatively secure, Jinyang quickly began hacking away at the wall with the mining pick. Under the cover of the hissing noise of the snakes, shouts and warnings of his compatriots and the noise of the mining pick hitting the wall, Jinyang whispered to Thorny.

“Thorny, can you detect where the aura is?”

“Well Thorny, I’m more of a mutual destruction guy who does things like throwing uncooperative people into snake pits in rooms before bringing down the ceiling. Then we both get buried and it’s not like I get resurrected or something. Oh I forgot… I do get resurrected.”

What Jinyang had not mentioned was that he was unsure of whether the immortality curse would actually keep resurrecting him under the tons of rock he would be buried under. Normal players would get resurrected at the nearest town or other civilization that they had visited but circumstances had made his character’s resurrection less than normal. Still this type of worry was not something you told the person you were trying to strong-arm.

“Thorny, I know being one of the forces of darkness requires you to be dramatic but can we save the theatrics for later? I just need to know where the item is.”

“Thanks Thorny, you’re always so cooperative and helpful. It’s a pleasure working with you.”

With the information, Jinyang signalled the team to move and once in place, redoubled his efforts. GimmeGirls, seeing GimmePower doing well enough holding off the snakes without help, joined in after grabbing a shovel. Between the two of them, they quickly broke through into the small hiding place which held the item. The secret area was only two half a meters on each dimension but the floor was utterly filled with slithering snakes.

After a lot of torch waving and mindless hacking, the two of them managed to clear the area, allowing them to focus on the chest from which the snakes had been crawling out of. The chest was made of a dark red wood, only fifteen centimetres in height and a width and length of thirty centimetres. The lid was open and despite its small size, snakes were still crawling out of it.

Assessing the situation, GimmeGirls moved the quickest, slamming down the lid and inflicting damage on the snakes that were halfway out of the chest. Follow up strikes from Jinyang’s morning star finished off those that survived. Jinyang passed the closed chest to GimmeGirls who, somehow, made it vanish from view. Jinyang motioned to the other two with a nod of his head towards the exit back into the pit. With Jinyang acting as the rearguard, GimmeGirls and GimmePower were motioning to Eke for him to haul them up out of the pit.

Unknown to all four however, as Eke was focused on bracing himself and pulling the three up one by one, he did not notice three figures sneaking in. As the three stood near the doorway, a whispered conversation ensued.

“Boss, shoulds we kills them now?”

“Yeah big… er boss, we could push the guy into the pit too. That would get them all in one swoop.”

“Stop and think you two morons. Those three are still alive! In a pit full of snakes! This must mean that they are either insanely high level or they are immune to poison. That must be the spell they were casting by hanging snakes on their bodies…So they must be priests or wizards of some sort…”

“So’s what do we dos boss?”

“No need to take risks. Dark, go grab that pile of treasure. We’ll take it and run.”

“Me? Again?!? Get Asswhooper to do it!”

“Go! Now!!”

Muttering, Dark moved as quietly and as quickly as he could to the treasure pile. Eke had tied the rope around his waist and was backing up from the pit, an elephant’s image surrounding him. As his back was to Dark, he had not noticed him yet but with the power of the elephant coursing through him, he was dragging GimmeGirls up from the pit rather quickly. Seeing Eke’s speed in pulling, Dark panicked and grabbed the first item on the heap before running back. As he did so, he saw that the other two were already running away, having seen him start fleeing. It was lucky that they did so as Eke had finished pulling GimmeGirls out of the pit just as they had fled out of sight. GimmePower and Jinyang followed quickly.

“Hyung, I’m level 1 again! Eh everything is back to Beginner 1 though.”

“Power-san, since we have a mobile training hall (the troll), it should make the skill loss less of a problem nyaa.“

“Ah Girls is right. Anyway, skills come and go but stats stay forever. Though losing the weapon damage bonus sucks but with sufficient Defence scores, we should get back our weapon mastery skills quickly by fighting tough monsters.”

Since everyone was safely out of the pit, the team decided to split the loot gathered. The snake chest was not added to the pile since none of the three would be willing to give it up. The area holding the pit trap had been the last area of the room that was unexplored, which meant that what treasure they could salvage was now all in the pile in front of them.

“Huh? There should be a map on top of the heap.”

“What do you mean Money-san, nyaa?”

“I found a map and two boxes in that coffin the priest was using and placed it on the heap. The boxes are here but the map is gone…”

“Hyung, maybe the wind blew it away?”

“Can’t be that sir Power, there is no wind here.”

“Maybe it was too old a map nyaa and it disintegrated Money-san?”

“Or it may have been thieves Girls-ssi. We are kind of bad at seeing through the stealth skill…”

“Never mind, forget it. At most it’s a treasure map or quest map. Since the treasure here is so little, they probably don’t have much treasure or good quest loot anyway.”

“Money-san, it’s the principle. If it’s because of some thieves, it might encourage others to think it’s easy to get stuff from us nyaa.”

Eke was rather ashamed that such an incident had happened while he was supposed to be on watch and thus was quick to add his two cents in.

“Sir Girls, do not worry, I will stop any other thieves.”

“Yes Ah Girls, with Eke around, I think thieves would find it hard to take our things if we knock them unconscious and tie them up.”

A quick and meaningful look by Jinyang was received and deciphered by the other two. If other thieves tried to rob them, with Eke around to provide muscle, especially with his class abilities, they could catch the thieves alive and loot them of everything they had. If the thieves were players, they could loot them completely instead of getting some random drop. Plus since they did not kill the player, they would not get a murderer’s mark.

It was a plan with all pro and no cons (as long as your morals were as loose as theirs) and that was definitely something all three were supportive of. Of course none of this was openly articulated with Eke in hearing range.

“Hyung, that’s a good plan and so very nonviolent too. It’s always good to be merciful and spare the lives of foes. Anyway let’s split the loot.”

“Well Power-san, we have 8,394 silver coins and 793 gold coins in four shares, which means we each get 219 gold, 23 silver and 50 copper. Of the sellable items, we have 12 gems. Of the unknown items, we have one robe with skulls and death symbols, one black onyx ring, one skull shaped amulet and two boxes.”

GimmeGirls speed of calculating of each member’s share surprised the other three. They were more comfortable using calculators for doing sums like these. Actually they were more comfortable using calculators to get the result of one plus one.

“Girls-ssi, you are very good at maths?”

“It’s nothing nyaa, just had a lot of practise”

“Well Ah Girls, that makes you our official party treasurer in charge of accounts. Any objections?”

As none objected, the appointment passed without issues and each gathered their share of the loot. As there were no copper coins, the members agreed to GimmeGirls‘ proposal of the creation of a party fund with him being in charge of it. The consolidated remaining 200 copper was passed to him in the form of 2 silver coins.

“Let’s open the boxes first, that way I can try identifying all the items in one shot. Ah Eke, you will want to stand further away since we can’t die but you can.”

Despite the prick he felt towards his honour due to having to risk the low level members rather than himself, Eke could not refute the logic of Jinyang’s words. Nodding, he moved a good twenty meters away from the team.

Rubbing his hands, Jinyang looked over the first box. It was the smaller of the two wooden boxes and had a tiny metal lock. Pulling out his crowbar, Jinyang went to work, shoving the tool into the crack between the lid and the box. However the box held firm. Even after GimmePower joined in, the box remained shut.

“Let me try, Money-san nyaa.”

Producing a piece of wire, GimmeGirls jiggled the lock a few times. Both Jinyang and GimmePower waited expectantly. However the wait turned into ten minutes, then half an hour, then an hour. Eke, being bored of waiting alone in a corner, had returned to join the two.

“Ah Girls you sure you have the skill to open the lock?”

“Yes Money-san. Give me another twenty four hours.”

Jinyang looked to Eke who simply shrugged while GimmePower looked annoyed. It was apparent now to them that GimmeGirls was actually working on gaining skill and through that, increasing his Agility stat. By placing it under the umbrella excuse of “helping the team”, it would be hard to rebuke him for violating their unspoken treaty. Plus they did need a person would could pick locks so none of them could press the issue.

Pulling the larger wooden box from the pile, GimmePower was apparently going to do what GimmeGirls was doing.

“Ah Pow, you should be careful. That’s probably a trap as it was positioned to trick people from looking for the smaller box.”

Since Jinyang had no more open skill slots, he could not gain the Lockpick skill and would not be able to gain any stat gains from spamming it. GimmePower still had open skill slots and thus Jinyang was trying to discourage him from attempting the same trick as GimmeGirls. It was not out of the kindness of his heart though. It was simply logical to have only one rival or competitor that was getting ahead than having two.

“Hyung, do not worry, I have a lot of health!”

GimmePower was, of course, aware of what Jinyang was trying to do and was not so easily dissuaded from his plan. Frowning, Jinyang was not going to let the two get too far ahead of him statwise. He could not do the more obvious ones such as the coin flip or tiptoe training or it would be an obvious breaking of their stat race treaty but rather had to hide it under the guise of “helping the team” or “contributing to the team effort”. Grabbing the tattered robe the priest had been wearing, he laid it across his lap.

“Identify, identify, identify.”

Spoken in a loud voice, it was a subtle warning to both GimmeGirls and GimmePower that he was not about let them run slipshod over him and gain a major headstart. With his large mana pool, he could spam his identification skill without any issues though it would only give increases in Intelligence, it was better than zero gains.

In the meanwhile, GimmePower inserted a splinter of wood into the lock of the larger box and jiggled. To his surprise and dismay, the lock opened immediately. This meant that he could not gain the lockpick skill unless… well unless he tried to lock it instead of unlocking. Once he had thought through the issue, his anxiety evaporated. Smiling he opened the box and was immediately assaulted by a cloud of black vapour. Within the vapour were visible faces contorted in agony. The faces screamed. The sound shocked the other three even as the cloud enveloped GimmePower. In half the time needed for an eye to blink, the dark cloud vanished.

“Ah Pow, you’re ok?”

“Hyung, the box is a trap! I’ve just been cursed!”

“Cursed Power-san? What sort of curse nyaa?”

“Told you Ah Pow! It’ll probably be made to trigger multiple times since there’s no mechanic or repairman to reset...”

“Sir Power, we should get you to a priest quickly. They should be able to remove the curse upon you. I have heard that many curse magics increase in potency the longer you leave it unattended.”

The three however were not listening to Eke. Rather their eyes were moving from glancing at one another to the box as each had worked out the implications. Almost at the same time, all three leapt at the box. GimmePower was fastest as he was closest. Slamming the lid of the box close, he hugged it to his chest before rolling away in a foetal position. Eke just stood there confused at what was happening. As GimmePower finished his roll and before Jinyang and GimmeGirls reached him, he opened the box again. As all three had guessed, again the screaming dark cloud appeared and enveloped him. GimmePower continued to roll on the ground while opening and closing the lid of the box before GimmeGirls finally caught up with him and tried to grab the box away. Unnoticed by Eke, something fell out of the box during the fracas.

“Power-san, stop! You have been cursed with an addiction to curses!”

“No Girls-ssi, I’m just trying to take all the curses in the box so none of you will be harmed!”

Jinyang also joined in, grabbing the lower half of the box.

“Ah Pow, you have been mind controlled by the evil in the box. Let go!”

Eke had finally understood what was going on. Like the other seemingly insane things they did, such as hanging snakes on their bodies, they were trying to get exposed to curses to increase their resistance to black magic. Though they could attack a monster that could use curse magic, the very magic they wanted to be exposed to would weaken them which meant that they would be less able to handle the monster. Even if they could not be kicked out of the server due to dying, it would affect the efficiency of their rate of stat gain as they would only revive with 1 point of health and that meant that it would be likely that they would then be killed again, similar to being in the snake pit with constant deaths and revivals.

The box however, could be used in a non-combat situation which would build up their resistance and when they fell afoul of any monsters that could curse, they would be less affected and thus having a lesser chance of being caught in a death-revive loop. Eke had to marvel at the speed the three had reached the conclusion but also at the remarkable inability to see the obvious result if they continued their fight rather than cooperating. Eke walked up to the three, who were clumped up in poor imitations of wrestling moves you could see on television.

“Chief, sir Girls, sir Power, if the three of you keep pulling the box, it will break and the benefits lost.”

At the mention of the loss of the box, the three froze.

“Ah Eke is right… Ah Pow, Ah Girls we should set the box down. I propose the box be added to the list of team treasures”

Still bunched together with none of them letting go of each other, GimmeGirls was the first to respond.

“Team treasures nyaa, Money-san?

“Yes, Ah Girls. The cart, mule, scarecrow and now the curse box and snake chest. The items will be freely usable by team members. For items that only affect one person, like the box, a limit will be imposed. How does twenty four hours divided by the number of team members sound?”

“Hyung, that sounds fair but the mule and the cart…”

“I’m adding that to the list of team treasures to start things off.”

Of course that was only half the story. If the cart and mule were team assets, everyone (not just Jinyang) would have to buy feed for the mule, purchase repairs, etc. It would also be easier to use it as an excuse to persuade the others to carry the mule and cart up or down ledges or cliffs since they too would be invested in the items. GimmePower and GimmeGirls were aware of the implications but since it was tied to the entire “team treasures” idea and layered with an excuse of apparent generosity, it would be hard to delink the cart and mule from the team treasure idea, even if both GimmePower and GimmeGirls wanted only the scarecrow, chest and box.

Still there was not that much resistance to the idea as Jinyang’s laziness had begun to spread to the other two. Having been exposed to the enjoyment of sitting and relaxing on the cart while doing luck and agility stat exercises, having a share in it didn’t seem like such a bad idea especially since they could store much of the training apparatuses in it. Additionally, as the box could only affect one person at a time, having rules on its usage would be useful in preventing the other two from gaining too big a gap on stat gains. Eke never factored into the calculations done by the three as he was not focused on stat gains.

“Yes Money-san, I think that would be fine nyaa.”

“Yah hyung, that’s very generous of you.”

As the three released their wrestling holds on each other, they discussed item usage before agreeing that GimmePower would have use of the box for the next eight game hours. It would have been six but Eke generously allowed them to be cursed in his place. Seeing Jinyang refocusing on identification and GimmeGirls concentrating on picking the box’s lock, Eke logged out to do other things after the three had told him that they would be staying in place for the next twenty four hours. He could only shake his head at their “treasures”. The mule and cart made sense but a box that was supposed to be a trap, a chest that did nothing but spawn poisonous snakes and a tied up troll would need a special type of person (or three) before they could be labelled treasures.

Released from the gravitic field, Eke sat down in the spacious room. He was as fit as he was in game. Only his facial features were different, mainly for reasons of safety. Eke sat there for an hour pondering a difficult question. One that he had tried to ignore and escape from by spending most of his time playing Royalroad. One that Jinyang had forced him to face in game without knowing that Eke was facing the same question out in the real world.

As the hour passed, Eke rose from his cross legged position and exited the capsule room, a servant approached him.

“Your highness, General Madu has been waiting for you.”

Taking a deep breath, he nodded. This was expected. Madu had been visiting him every day at that time of the day when he would be coming out of the capsule.

“I know. Call him to my study.”

Bowing, the servant left quickly.

As Eke walked towards his study, he stopped at the doorway, hand on the silver plated handle.

“Alas my friend, it would seem I am forced to face the choice out here in the world as well.”

Turning the handle, Eke entered the room and sat at the deeply cushioned armchair behind the polished African blackwood desk. A small flagpole holding the state flag of Nigeria stood stiffly next to the desk.

A plump man entered in a military uniform that practically dripped with medals and ribbons. It seemed that General Madu had been having problems maintaining the fitness that a lowly recruit in the Nigerian army was supposed to have.

“Highness, we need your decision. If we do not start preparations now, we will not be able to put things in place before the next scheduled African Union meeting.”

“I understand Madu. Begin preparations. We will go with your plan.”

Madu raised an eyebrow at his words.

“Highness? You are certain? Once we begin, there will be no turning back. Any hesitation and it would mean permanent consequences…”

Standing from his chair, Eke faced a balcony that overlooked the city of Abuja.

“I know, Madu.”

“Highness, it would be best if you did not deviate from your usual routine of playing the game and your other activities. That would give you plausible deniability”

”Yes I understand, now please, I would like to be alone.”

Bowing, Madu retreated from the room whence he came.

“Duty before all…”

Still staring at the bustling city, a tear drop made its way down his cheek.

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