Vile Evil Hides Under The Veil

Gondel the geek was an excellent captain and team player.

He had made effective use of the Perks that were given to him by Sansara World, ensuring survivability for himself and his entire team.

Gondel didn't have his usual array scrolls or array disks to count on inside the Sansara World. But he could use the Perks to create various spectral array inscriptions on the fly.

Gondel the geek could use them as array disks for potion traps, landmines, diversions, or spectral weapon launchers. Or he could make full-fledged arrays to serve as domain attacks.

Gondel's knowledge of arrays and inscriptions was in-depth and cutting-edge. He could use array domains to buff his teammates and debuff his opponents at the same time. When his expertise was paired up with the Perks from Sansara World, it allowed him to maximize his potential as an array master.

There was a reason why other rankers saw the students from Sansara Academy as nothing more than a bunch of geeks. Most of them spent their academic years studying the concepts of arrays and runic inscriptions. As a result, they didn't have that battle-oriented presence.

However, being geeks didn't mean these rankers should be seen as toothless tigers.

The Sansara World was created by Sage-ranked array master Lin Lehan anyway. The Sansara Sage had obviously incorporated a lot of the Perks used by the rankers who had the same class as him. This was the reason Gondel and his team could survive inside the Sansara World till this point.

Gondel and his team thanked their lucky stars for having studied the books written by Sansara Sage. Being a bunch of geeks, they didn't perform as well as the participants from other Academies when it came to no-nonsense frontal confrontations.

Nevertheless, they understood how to use array-based Perks better than anyone else. It was only natural that they would thrive inside the Sansara World.

***

Gondel the geek felt like he had struck a goldmine inside the Sansara World.

He found out that he could use the array-based Perks as tools to tweak and unlock other Perks offered by the Sansara World. The array master could modify the existing Perks of the Sansara World and make them more potent to suit a specific need or function.

Of course, the modifications themselves wouldn't be too logic-defying if only one person or even a team used them. However, Gondel had found a way to stack the effects of the modifications to get enhanced output.

Usually, it would be impossible for any team to cast a debuff zone over such a wide zone inside the Sansara World. But with the other 11 teams' help, Gondel and his team managed to stack the effects of the modded Perks 11 times in a row.

They all needed to activate the mod Perks at the same time which were already in sync through the Sansara interface. The teams would stay immune to the debuff effects inside the special zone they would create with their mod Perks. And it would become easier for all of them to not only take care of Eren's team but also extract all their items from them.

Gondel the geek was angry at Eren for giving him death threats inside Sage Loxley's testing grounds. That's why he had come up with a strategy to trap him and his entire team using the modded Perks.

Gondel and his team had already disabled some of the Perks Eren's team had at its disposal using the interface-intrusive Perks, which prevented them from breaking the siege effortlessly. Meaning Eren and his team could see all the Perks they had on their Sansara interface. They just couldn't use them for some reason.

Eren didn't even know about Gondel's existence until this point. He had issued an all-inclusive death threat to all the rankers who were present at the scene before he met with Sage Loxley. He hadn't zeroed in on a particular individual.

However, he also knew that most rankers had a habit of trying to come up with reasons for their selfish actions. The reasons didn't have to make sense to everyone around them. As long as the end result was meant to give them some form of benefit, the rankers were content with whatever reasons justified their actions.

Eren had learned a lot of subtle things about rankers from his clash with Team Claho. It allowed him to understand the consequences of his actions retrospectively.

He didn't know about Gondel and his plan. But he knew something like this was going to happen if and when he started collecting Sage Legacies one after another.

That's why he spent a lot of Karma points to buy map-based Perks. He couldn't mod the Perks given to him as Gondel could. But he could make up for it by spending more Karma points to use Premium Perks.

The map-based Perks gave Eren a strategic advantage other teams didn't care to have. They thought that the trade-off wasn't worth it if one considered the Karma point expenditure.

Eren used his map-based Perks in the right way during the upcoming siege. It allowed him to plan potential routes for each of his teammates. They could use the derived routes to attack the siege at its weakest spot.

***

"Hehehe."

A hyena-like laughter was heard in the silent night. A group of rankers was seen traversing the same forest Eren was in.

"I can't wait to see the look on that pompous dickhead Eren's face when he realizes his entire team has been caught inside a net. A net that I created to teach the bastard a lesson of his lifetime."

Gondel felt exhilaration as he led his team to their destined spot. His team was going to serve as part of the perimeter detail at first. It would then move on to confronting Eren after the modded Perks got activated.

Swoosh. Zoom. Pichuk.

Gondel felt like he had heard some kind of noise behind him. However, he sensed nothing out-of-the-ordinary with his mana sense. Plus, the guy was too busy thinking about targeting Eren to care about a random bump in the night.