What Ashley didn’t know couldn’t possibly know was that the player she was so eager to cozy up to was the exact same man she’d just hung up on.
She wasn’t the only one chasing that particular ghost.Every gaming org with a scouting budget was burning through every contact they had, trying to run down anything on the mystery player calling himself Unrivaled. Hours of digging.
Nothing to show for it. Whoever this was, they’d built themselves out of thin air overnight no footprint, no history, nothing that connected back to a real name.
Inside Ironclad’s conference room, half the org’s leadership sat crowded around the big table, eyes locked on a video looping on the main screen last night’s clip of the fight against the Voss Cartel at Haven’s Rest Ashwood Outpost.
Cynthia let it play three times through before finally killing the feed, turning to sweep the room with a hard look.
"Talk. What did we actually learn from that?"
A melee specialist near the front pushed his glasses up, expression serious. "Hidden class, Beastlord line, that much is obvious. And whatever talent he awakened, it’s not a normal one. Given the pace he’s leveling at, I’d bet S-grade minimum."
"Also and this matters look at his footwork during the melee exchange." He gestured at the frozen frame. "That’s not a Beastlord dabbling in swordplay. That’s someone who’s spent years on a blade."
Cynthia’s eyes sharpened. "Can we trace him through his movement patterns? Someone with that level of polish shouldn’t be a total unknown."
The analyst grimaced and shook his head. "The Cartel players in that clip were too weak to push him he never had to show anything close to his real ceiling. Not enough data to pin a signature style to it."
A woman near the back tilted her head, studying the frozen frame with a thoughtful frown.
"...His build, though. Height, shoulders, stance. It’s uncomfortably close to Kael’s."
The room went dead silent.
Every set of eyes drifted back to the screen, and this time nobody could quite argue the resemblance away. Someone did the math out loud in their head, and it landed hard.
cut from the roster one night on a manufactured excuse, and that same night, this same build tears through four server-first achievements and makes Ironclad’s golden-boy replacement look irrelevant.
If that was actually him
The implications didn’t need saying out loud. Every gaze in the room slid, almost involuntarily, toward Cynthia.
She felt it land, a dozen pairs of eyes weighing something she didn’t want weighed.
Ryan broke the silence first, voice a shade too fast. "That’s not him. Can’t be."
"Kael’s run Warrior for three years straight. He’d never touch a Beastlord build." He shook his head, sure of himself. "And his PK style is flashy showy combos, crowd-pleaser stuff.
Whoever this is fights clean and minimal. Completely different signature. Not the same person."
A few nods rippled around the table. Kael’s reputation had been built on exactly that flair the reason half the fanbase tuned in.
What none of them knew what none of them had any way of knowing was that two years of real, blood-soaked survival in his last life had stripped every ounce of showmanship out of Kael’s game.
What was left wasn’t built to entertain. It was built to end fights as fast and as cleanly as possible.
There was no way for anyone in this room to recognize a style that had been beaten out of him somewhere they’d never seen.
Cynthia exhaled, some of the tension draining out of her shoulders. "Fine. Intel suggests he’s a solo player no guild affiliation."
A calculating look crossed her face. "Whoever he actually is, that kind of talent doesn’t come around twice. We’re bringing him in."
She turned to a sharply dressed woman seated near the wall. "Rachel. PR’s on you for this. Whatever it takes."
"Offer him whatever gets him through the door. A hundred million a year, if that’s what it takes."
The room went still.
Kael had been the highest-paid player on the roster before all this, and even he’d topped out at fifty million. Doubling that for a total unknown said everything about how badly Cynthia wanted this locked down.
Ryan couldn’t sit on his hands through that.
He’d burned every favor he had getting Kael pushed out, dragging the org’s full support onto himself in the process.
If this new player walked in and absorbed all of it instead every resource, every bit of spotlight Ryan had schemed for "Cynthia"
"It’s Manager Miles, in this room." Her glance cut him off cold. "Everyone who isn’t needed can head out. Ryan, my office."
She swept out without waiting for a response.
Ryan sat frozen for a second, color draining slightly from his face, before pushing back from the table to follow. He already knew exactly what kind of conversation was waiting for him behind that door.
Back home, Kael had already worked through a full breakfast noodles, a couple of tomatoes, and enough eggs to leave him thoroughly satisfied.
He leaned back, patted his stomach, and let himself enjoy the quiet for a minute before hauling himself up to clear the dishes.
His phone buzzed on the table before he made it two steps.
Unknown number.
He considered letting it ring out, then answered anyway, mostly on reflex.
"Is this Kael Mercer?"
The voice on the other end was smooth, composed, carrying just enough polish to sound rehearsed.