Chapter 58: Theodore's Plot

Theodore Walker was not having a pleasant week. Hell he was not even having a pleasant month now that he thought about it. It all started back when the large subjugation was started against the eighty thousand population town. The fact that entire situation had turned into such a nightmare was its own issue. Theodore was lucky that he was in the back lines alongside the other leaders of the operation otherwise he would have likely died under the circumstances. Several people died right in front of his eyes and it only took one stray corrupted creature to leap towards his position for his life to come to an end.

Even if he did end up surviving that encounter there were still a lot of problems that came soon after the debacle. First off was the large hit to the reputation of the World Government Guild. The Civilians that had placed a lot of faith in the government getting things back on track to the point where they could once again live on earth were starting to have second thoughts after seeing how many people died under their orders. On the other hand the alliance was able to clear out a large town on their own without a single death and only a few injuries. It made it seem like they didn't care about throwing away lives which was the easiest way to get the people against them.

Kyle White who was the leader of the expedition was put in a worse situation then everyone since he was the face of the raid. All of the talk he did before the subjugation and the fact he was the one pushing for them to take on an eighty thousand population town instead of the original thirty thousand had put the focus on him in the worse way possible. The only reason Kyle was still the face of the World Government Guild was because of the fact he was able to regroup and take over another town that they had planned to go for in the first place. Theodore knew that the only reason Kyle was getting so many chances was because of his original background before the first phase.

Theodore was annoyed by the fact that Kyle was getting so many chances while he had to continuously clean up after such a foolish leader time and time again. In his mind he would have been able to do so much more for their guild if he didn't have to follow such an idiot's orders, but he never realized the fact that he himself wouldn't have been much better. Now that things were tittering heavily on how they handle things going forward they were going to have to figure out a way to turn things around.

For the moment Kyle had decided that it would be incredibly difficult for them to get some positive exposure in a quick amount of time. They had tried showing their strength at the battle arena, but that didn't go as well as they would have liked with the large guilds challenging them at every opportunity. They weren't able to build up much prestige outside of the fact that they were on par with some of the large guilds. Every guild involved in the alliance came out well ahead of them in the battle arena including the Fenrir Guild which was just an upstart guild in their opinion.

They tried to get more positive press by focusing on establishing new businesses in the hub city that could get work for some civilians or help out explorers that were still deciding on which guild they wanted to join, but the alliance already had such establishments all over the place. They had an entire guild under their banner that was made specifically for support jobs along with a major hospital that had already grown a great reputation with explorers all over the hub city.

In the end the alliance was always a step ahead and it made it hard for the World Government Guild to branch out successfully in their current situation. They could go after something specific like the Hunter's Guild or some of the Information based guilds out there since they were already behind the major players in those fields. They definitely weren't going to suddenly go the ways of mercenaries since that would mean they' d actually have to help out all of the large guilds if they wanted to get anything out of such a situation. The only choice they had at the moment was to slowly rebuild their image by doing what was considered the right thing in the public's eye time and time again. Theodore could clearly see this was the way forward for the Government Guild, and because of their size they would have no trouble gradually fixing their public image as they cleared more towns and territories while preparing the world for when humans could once again live on it.

Sadly Kyle was not of the same mindset at the moment. In fact he was the opposite. Instead of focusing on the World Government Guild Kyle was starting to become obsessed with the guilds involved in the alliance. He had it out for them. Kyle just wanted to take all of his problems and project it on to them instead of fixing them like he should. In the end Kyle decided their next action would be to figure out a way to get back at the alliance. In his eyes the alliance was starting to be put up on a pedestal in the hub city because they had yet to fail at anything they had set out to accomplish. That was the key. That was exactly what Kyle was so hung up on, the simple fact that the alliance had never failed. Kyle's goal was to change that fact.

The higher ups that were letting things play out for the moment were giving Kyle one more chance to prove that he could be the face of the guild and he was planning to waste it by rushing ahead and going after the alliance. Theodore knew that Kyle was destined to fail at any attempts of going after the alliance in some way. The Phoenix Guild and Serpent Guild each on their own were strong enough to defend all of their territories without any issues, but going after both of them would just be foolish beyond words. Luckily Kyle was smart enough to realize this, but he still planned to do something, so his target shifted towards the Fenrir Guild.

The Fenrir Guild's territory war was coming up soon and Kyle wanted to use this as a chance to go after them. The World Government Guild couldn't directly go after a mid-sized guild according to the system's rules so instead Kyle planned on getting one of the mid-sized guilds that were under the banner of the World Government Guild to take on the territory war. At first this seemed like a decent Plan even to Theodore. The two strongest mid-sized guilds that were currently established under the World Government Guild were both at max capacity and had been involved in several territory wars in the past which would usually give them the edge in a confrontation with an upstart guild. That would at least be the case if said upstart guild was normal.

After the first day at the battle arena Theodore could tell that the key members of the Fenrir Guild were all strong enough to be at the heads of large guilds let alone mid-sized ones. Even their new recruits had good showings at the battle arena let alone their guild leader who didn't even break a sweat while fighting through the battle arena except in the last fight where he fought another powerful guild leader.

That day Theodore knew that Kyle's plans would go up in smoke and that he would be sinking with the ship if he let things go the way they were heading. So he had to do something, he had to show the higher ups that even if his superior had failed he was still useful. Hell if he did well enough then he might end up taking Kyle's place if he was lucky, but first he had to make a plan of his own to go along with Kyle's. His plan didn't have to end in success for things to work out, in fact he needed things to fail for Kyle to get shown the door and to pave his way forward.

There were two problems that Theodore faced for his idea to work. First off Kyle had been explicit in telling him to get either the Raider's Guild or the Scavenger's Guild to be the guild involved in the territory war. So it was impossible for Theodore to change this. Of the two Theodore knew that the Raider's Guild would have the greater chance of winning the territory war so they were the first guild he visited. He wasn't surprised when he had gotten declined when asking them. Theodore of course put up an act of anger, but he truly didn't want the Raider's Guild to be the guild involved in the territory war. They might actually go and make the fight close with how powerful their guild leader and top members were. That would get Kyle off the hook.

Instead Theodore eventually talked to Dale Wright, the leader of the Scavenger's Guild. The Scavenger's Guild might have been on par size wise with the Raider's Guild, but they were more focused on dungeon diving than anything else. They had some decent level members with Dale himself being level Seventy-three at this point along with a couple of other level Seventy members, but that wasn't nearly as strong as the Raider's Guild who had Six members of that level or higher at this point. With this Theodore knew the Scavenger's Guild would fail miserably.

The second problem was being able to show how he could turn the tables in such a situation. He needed them to lose the territory war in the end, but he needed it to at least seem a bit closer than what the higher ups will probably be expecting after they find out Kyle's plan. There was only one way for Theodore to be able to do that and it definitely wasn't the idea of him getting involved in the combat himself. He maybe of decent level compared to regular explorers, but he had barely ever fought let alone taken part in a large scale territory war. If anything he just stood in the back giving orders during fights. No Theodore needed to bring in some help during the territory war. He needed someone with the strength to put up a fight and show that Theodore was better at leading the guild than Kyle.

In the end Theodore had decided on what he was going to do. That was why he was currently standing outside of the Mercenary Guild in the Hub City. He was preparing to meet up with the man that had the current twenty-third rank in the power rankings in this hub-city. One of only two Mercenaries that were able to make it into the top fifty of the power rankings which was filled up with mostly large guild members, or more specifically guild leaders. With this extra fire power Theodore was hoping to change the tide in his favor.