The Final Boss Has Returned 22

Chapter 22

Urban Warfare.

Drakan had already anticipated the wicked scheme Jacques had devised, knowing that reinforcements in the form of Death’s Cog Riach and the White Shark Assault Force would arrive.

“If the Pirate King isn’t a fool, he’ll have sent reinforcements to Lawless Port by now. And they’ll use those reinforcements to open the city and engage us in urban warfare.”

The barracks built in Argan Village.

In the heart of it, a humble village hall, incongruous with the countless sprawling buildings around it, hosted a strategic meeting. Drakan addressed the officers of JDG and its allied guilds, the Eastern Rankers who had studied the quest, and finally, Shin Ha-yeon.

“That’s a given.”

Ignis nodded in agreement with Drakan’s words.

The Guild Master of JDG!

Over-Ranker, Flame Emperor Ignis!

He hadn’t earned his position through a game of Go-Stop. Ignis, famed for his strategic prowess and exceptional game sense from his days as a professional gamer, had already grasped the enemy’s intentions to some extent.

“Indeed, the only way they can defeat us in a city without walls is through urban warfare. It’s where numerical superiority becomes somewhat meaningless, forces are dispersed, and we’re forced into individual skirmishes and guerrilla warfare.”

Drakan.

No other user in Ard World had experienced more wars than him.

Even the current top-ranked player, Hero Eugene, paled in comparison to Drakan’s wealth of combat experience.

From the moment the Iron Blood Alliance was formed to its eventual downfall, Drakan’s game life was, without exaggeration, a story of war from beginning to end.

Urban warfare, guerrilla warfare, siege warfare, large-scale battles, and all-out war!

Drakan was a veteran who had experienced almost every conceivable form of combat in Ard World. For Jacques to try and outmaneuver him strategically would be a greater disgrace than trying to teach Confucius how to write.

“And that’s the problem. To defeat an opponent engaging in urban warfare, the best strategy is to besiege the city and starve them out. However, with our current strength, it’s impossible to completely surround Lawless Port.”

Urban Warfare!

Drakan knew all too well how much of a quagmire it could be.

Especially in a labyrinthine city like Lawless Port, built haphazardly without any planning, urban warfare would be even more horrific.

Within the city’s narrow and filthy alleyways, the numerical advantage they held would become irrelevant. Faced with enemies who knew the city’s terrain better than they did, coupled with the elite guerrilla forces reinforced by the Pirate King, they were bound to suffer significant casualties.

However, besieging the city to cut off supplies and force a surrender was not feasible either. Lawless Port was a port city, and the Pirate Alliance controlled it.

Lawless Port could receive continuous supplies from the Pirate Alliance via the sea. Trying to extend the siege to the sea and complete the encirclement was impossible.

The Pirate Alliance.

Their notoriety was built upon their dominance at sea. Defeating them on the water with their current strength was a near-impossible task.

“But is there any other option available to us?”

Ignis questioned, looking at Drakan.

Flame Emperor Ignis. He was inherently arrogant.

Until the explosive popularity of Ard Saga Second led to the demise of the Heroes of Legend pro league, Ignis was the top-ranked player and pinnacle of the AOS game Heroes of Legend.

After the pro league was abolished due to declining popularity, he and his fellow pro gamers joined Ard Saga Second.

He was a legendary figure who not only broke through the ranks of veteran players established by previous game users and achieved the rank of Ranker as a new user, but also elevated his guild to 6th place, effectively making it the strongest in the human realm.

He possessed the unique trait ‘Flame Specialization,’ which doubled the effectiveness of fire-based skills.

The hidden class Flame Sorcerer and a contract with the Transcendent Being of the Spirit Realm, the Fire Spirit King!

With these three elements, he was destined to become a Ranker and was the most successful user among those affiliated with Jeil E&M.

Drakan!

That was, until he signed a contract with Jeil E&M.

‘What exactly does the Executive Director see in Drakan to warrant such treatment?’

Ignis still harbored doubts in his mind.

Of course, he knew about Drakan very well.

Ard Saga Second was a game closely linked to its predecessor, Ard Saga, both systematically and in terms of background settings. Therefore, it was impossible to play Ard Saga Second without being familiar with the information from the previous game.

In the process, Ignis naturally acquired information about Drakan.

The top-ranked player of the era before Eugene, Drakan!

He was the Overlord who not only conquered the Warring States period, where countless guilds and Rankers vied for the top spot, but also brought major guilds to their knees through guild wars, subjugated them under the banner of the Guild Alliance, and ultimately seized control of the continent through the War of Unification.

However, beneath that brilliance lay darkness. In the end, he failed to overcome the limitations of the Guild Alliance and his iron-fisted rule, ultimately falling to the rising star, Hero Eugene.

While his achievements were impressive, in the end, he too was a loser who failed to maintain his position at the top, relinquishing it to Eugene. He was nothing more than a forgotten legend, a has-been.

That was how Ignis evaluated Drakan.

Modern times were an era of endless competition.

Those who fell behind in the competition could never survive; it was a ruthless world that did not tolerate failure.

‘No matter how great Drakan was, the previous game and Second are different games.’

With such thoughts in mind, Shin Ha-yeon’s actions were incomprehensible to Ignis.

The always-composed expression and the calculated actions driven by self-interest, befitting the era of endless competition.

That was the true nature of Shin Ha-yeon, as Ignis knew her.

But in front of Drakan, she was different.

Shin Ha-yeon consistently used polite language towards Drakan, which even he had never heard her use before, and treated him favorably.

Unprecedented treatment that neither he nor any other Ranker, named player, or even the top stars affiliated with Jeil E&M, currently at the forefront of the Korean Wave, had ever received.

Drakan was receiving such treatment.

Yet, the reason Ignis remained silent was because of Shin Ha-yeon herself.

Executive Director Shin. She was passionately supporting Drakan, even going so far as to mobilize her own in-game character, which he had never seen before.

Ignis couldn’t dare defy her, the true ruler and absolute authority of JDG. Therefore, he faithfully followed Drakan.

Ignis glanced at Drakan with suspicion.

‘Can you truly present a way to overcome this predicament?’

The current situation, as Ignis assessed it, was a veritable crisis.

The only strategy the enemy could employ was, as Drakan had pointed out, urban warfare.

The problem was, as Drakan himself had mentioned, they had no choice but to play along with that strategy!

They were trapped in a situation where they had to crawl into a trap, knowing full well it was a trap, with no apparent solution in sight.

Of course, there was the option of burning the city to the ground and razing it, but Ignis anticipated that Drakan wouldn’t choose that method.

The reason being the significant losses Drakan would incur if he burned the city.

It might be a different story if it were a Lawless Port subjugation quest, but the quest Drakan had received was a reclamation quest.

This meant that after the war, control of the city would fall into Drakan’s hands. Naturally, rebuilding a completely destroyed city would require enormous reconstruction costs.

In the end, it meant a loss even if they won, and Drakan was renowned for never engaging in ventures that resulted in losses.

Ultimately, if that option was excluded, there were no other viable strategies.

Except for accepting the inevitable casualties.

Ignis’s gaze shifted towards Drakan.

Drakan smiled as he looked at Ignis.

‘I can hear your eyeballs rolling from here.’

Drakan had encountered all sorts of people throughout his gaming experience.

Unlike Eugene, who seemed like the protagonist of a passionate growth story, always encountering trustworthy and reliable companions, laughing and enjoying a heartwarming camaraderie and adventure-filled journey, Drakan was a user who had clawed his way to the top through a thorny path rife with betrayal, intrigue, and underhanded tactics.

Therefore, Drakan didn’t trust anyone easily and often placed more faith in NPCs, whose loyalty and trustworthiness could be gauged through numerical values, rather than fellow users.

‘Although, I think I’ve paid the price for that.’

For Drakan, trustworthy companions like Eugene’s group didn’t exist six years ago.

The relationship between the high-ranking officials of the Iron Blood Alliance and Drakan wasn’t based on mutual trust and camaraderie, but rather a purely business relationship driven by shared interests.

The same applied to the other guilds within the Guild Alliance that had been subjugated through war.

As a result, when Drakan began to suffer consecutive defeats against Eugene and the Revolutionary Army, leading to his downfall, they vanished from his side like ghosts. By the time of the final battle at Voltaha Castle, his last stronghold, only the NPCs loyal to him and a handful of users who hadn’t fully grasped the situation remained by his side.

And Drakan humbly accepted the consequences.

He was a loser!

However, accepting the outcome was separate from acknowledging that his approach to organizing his forces based on shared interests was flawed.

The scars left by the years he had endured were too deep for him to blindly trust in the goodwill of others like Eugene.

‘I can’t act like Eugene now, and pretending to be generous like him would only make me look foolish. Building camaraderie by naively trusting in the goodwill of others is his strength, not mine.’

Drakan knew.

Although Eugene had emerged victorious, his victory was accompanied by incredible luck, and above all, he was not Eugene.

He wasn’t as handsome as Eugene, as pure, or as kind-hearted.

Trying to emulate Eugene’s generosity would only lead him down a path of self-destruction.

While there was much to learn from Eugene, it wasn’t necessary to become a carbon copy of him.

Because Eugene and Drakan were fundamentally different people!

Drakan needed a method that suited him, and he was currently in the process of finding the answer that resonated with him.

‘I have my own way.’

Whether it was a strong camaraderie based on mutual recognition or a business relationship built on shared interests, both had their merits and demerits.

There was no perfect method in the world.

And he thought.

If he couldn’t conceal the weaknesses, he would maximize the strengths to render the weaknesses irrelevant!

That’s why Drakan joined forces with Shin Ha-yeon.

He didn’t trust Shin Ha-yeon.

But he believed that her interests aligned with his.

Shin Ha-yeon desired someone capable of rebellion, and he was the only user in this world who could challenge Eugene.

And both Drakan and Shin Ha-yeon desired hegemony over Ard World.

They both knew.

The rebellion against Eugene’s era and the subsequent dominance over Ard World!

As long as both conditions were maintained, this alliance would be mutually beneficial and perfectly satisfy their respective interests.

Therefore, both Drakan and Shin Ha-yeon knew that this alliance would be near-eternal.

Of course, the possibility of betrayal wasn’t entirely absent, but Drakan wasn’t naive enough to allow her to betray him after he had outlived his usefulness, and Shin Ha-yeon wasn’t foolish enough to needlessly kill the goose that laid the golden eggs.

Drakan and Shin Ha-yeon.

Ironically, the alliance born from their extreme self-interest and shared understanding had become as solid as Eugene’s camaraderie, which was forged through empathy and trust.

Both Drakan and Shin Ha-yeon were seasoned professionals who had weathered countless storms, so they both understood that betraying this alliance would yield no benefits.

And because of that, Drakan had already seen through Ignis’s feelings.

‘He can’t say anything because of Shin Ha-yeon, but deep down, he must be harboring resentment towards me!’

The newcomer displaces the established one.

Just like the proverb, Ignis must be feeling like Drakan, the newcomer, was displacing him, the established one!

This kind of sentiment wouldn’t dissipate overnight, and Drakan knew that being overly friendly towards him might actually backfire.

‘I don’t need to worry about him……’

Drakan didn’t need to concern himself with someone like Ignis.

After all, he had Shin Ha-yeon by his side.

The absolute authority!

In front of Shin Ha-yeon, who wielded unparalleled power, even Ignis was nothing more than a insignificant subordinate.

‘It’s true that engaging in urban warfare is disadvantageous, so it wouldn’t be bad to answer his question.’

Thinking so, Drakan opened his mouth.

“Of course, there is.”

“What method is it?”

Drakan and Ignis’s gazes briefly clashed in mid-air.

Shin Ha-yeon smiled as she observed their interaction.

Ignoring Ignis’s gaze, Drakan looked at Shin Ha-yeon and spoke.