This chapter has been proof-read by: AnthonyL

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A few days went by in a flash, during which Kneeko did highly advanced research on Exodus and had finally devised the perfect plan to bring it down. With the players publishing everything they discovered on various forums, it was possible to plan every single one of your 'in game' actions in advance without even playing.

Kneeko already knew which missions gave what rewards, and who to speak to in order to obtain or unlock certain things. By the look of it, the Exodus developers seemed quite lazy but there was a good reason for the lack of new content. The reason for this was that the majority of 'customers' were interested in other things.

The Exodus developers were busy creating new cute pets for the players to buy. New rare collectible items, new attractions, games and restaurants to visit in the safety of their walled cities. The adventure aspect of the game was simply being neglected because only a small percentage of players still enjoyed it.

No matter how much Kneeko thought about it, he always ended up coming up with the same answer. What needed to be sabotaged the most was the customer's trust in the Exodus company. Those who played Exodus did it as if it was a second real world. Meaning that they invested their time to get something belonging only to them in return.

Some bought houses, shops, plots of virgin lands to go camping. The players also tried their hardest to earn a bit of money to hang around with their friends. Students would find menial work in the game world during the week, earn a few gold coins, then spend the weekends with their friends online.

Since time went by 10 time faster in the game, a 2 days weekend would then become 20 days of fun times with friends. The students who were late to study for their mid-term tests would go online and use the time speed variations to their advantage. That way, 1 hour became 10 hours of last chance study time for the students.

The players were coming to this world not to play, but to ride horses, go to the beach, do karaoke, eat at restaurants, play sports, gamble, fly their pet wyverns or others stuff like that. So basically, this adventure game was not used by the players as an adventure game. To the players, this game world was a vacation spot without school or real world pressure to deal with.

Plastering one of Kneeko's bedroom walls, was all the information he had gathered, and the most important points making Exodus a success. These points needed to be the ones attacked first by his strategy. If the players lost what they were going there for, then there was no reason for them to go back ever again.

As Kneeko was finally about to connect to Exodus and finally put his plan into motion, loud voices coming from outside attracted his attention. “Lorenzo-sama!! I understand that you missed your children a lot, but you need to get back to your office. UnivR will be released in less than two weeks, and your employees are nervous wrecks since their CEO hasn't been in his office in a week!” The feminine voice scolding his father was that of Lorenzo's faithful assistant Maeda Sadashi.

“Urggg... B-but it has only been a week you know. I'm sure you can pick up the slack a while longer for me, eh? Sadashiiii” Pleaded the 7000+ years old man who sounded like a child trying to skip school. “Don't call me by that name! What would people think if they heard-” Barely finishing her sentence, a voice then interrupted their lover's quarrel.

“Hey! Won't you two shut up a bit. I can't hear myself think. Why don't you two kiss each other already? Jeez... And you old fart, I'm working my ass off on my side in preparation for the launch, you better not slack off on your side of the deal. Move your old scaly ass out of here and get to work! I'm too busy to spend time with you anyway, and Lucy- I mean Lucia has a decade of manga and anime to catch up on, so I don't think she'll even notice your absence.” Abruptly said Kneeko with a look of annoyance on his face.

Maeda was perplexed, how could a child talk to his father that way? “Okay okay, I understand. Sob* sob*” Answered Lorenzo with a sorrowful voice. Kneeko then went back in his room and slammed the door behind him. 'Tch, Lorenzo lacks the necessary backbone to raise this temperamental teenage boy. Maybe I should try doing something about it.' Thought Maeda to herself while throwing a frown at Kneeko's door.

Noticing her expression, Lorenzo instantly grabbed Maeda's shoulders and turned her back around to face in his direction. Maeda was startled. The sudden seriousness on Lorenzo's face was something she had rarely seen in the past. “Sadashi, you are extremely important to me.” Hearing these words, the woman's usual expressionless face instantly broke into a vibrant shade of red.

“What I'm about to say, I'm saying it because I truly care about you.... Whatever you do, never get on Nico's bad side.” Said Lorenzo while intensely staring in her eyes. Maeda had always wondered why Lorenzo seemed so afraid of his son, but seeing him say these words with such a serious expression sent shivers down her spine. Maeda knew that Lorenzo was not a coward, so his son Nicolas had most likely done something horrible in the past.

'I should have someone look at Nicolas' criminal record. Maybe it would help me understand what happened to him in the past.' She then thought to herself while dragging Lorenzo out of the mansion and into his car.

Back in his room, Kneeko had finally connected back to Exodus. He first logged into his 'fungus' account, and confirmed that nothing had happened. His fungus body was still in the same hole, had remained untouched and as he expected, hadn't grown either.

He then switched to his non-cheated character, which was back in Nakubar, the demon capital. He was in a busy street filled with players who were enjoying the peculiar city's infrastructure and famous restaurants. Unsurprisingly enough, some fast food chains had managed to find a way to sell their products even in an artificial world.

You could buy a BicMag everywhere in the world, and even in a virtual one. Most of the players seemed to be using humanoid races since they were more worried about their appearances rather than their special abilities. After all, many came to this game to find a 'virtual love'.

If you hated the way you looked in the real world, you could go in a VR world, create your avatar based on your ideal body type, and go find love online. This was a big step forward compared to normal dating sim games. 'Guhuhuhu enjoy your beautiful appearances while you still can. Guhuhu' Internally laughed Kneeko.

Ignoring all that, Kneeko went down the road and headed for his first destination, the warrior training ground. Since Kneeko was not a warrior but a summoner which was more closely affiliated to mages, there shouldn't have been anything worth his time over there, but Kneeko had read something interesting online.

From what he had seen on the forums, all the warrior training grounds had some type of obstacle course that if you successfully completed, would give you a reward in return. Since failing the course meant death, very few people had ever attempted it, so the developer began to offer valuable weapons as rewards.

Despite that, the number of players who would try the course remained low, so they also added more and more gold in the reward, until they reached an acceptable level of participation. The developer calculated the amount of gold based on the completion rate and made sure they wouldn't lose money by doing that.

As a level one summoner with no summoning skills unlocked yet, a sword and gold was more than enough to lure him to give it a shot. After all, in this game, your starting physical abilities were similar to those you had in the real world. So his genetically engineered body was more than enough to compensate for his currently low level.

After a few minutes of walking down the cobblestone street of Nakubar, Kneeko finally arrived at a large wooden building with giant colourful shields hung on its walls. On a field next to the building, was a fenced area where a bunch of players but also NPCs were practising swinging a sword at wooden posts.

The inside of the building was dark and smelled like sweat, piss and spilled beer. Two men were sitting in a corner and were arm wrestling, while another one was drunk, sleeping at a table in the back. Other than these 3 men, the place was mostly empty. With his face still showing no emotions, Kneeko walked up to the counter and patiently waited.

Only a few seconds later, a small orange bearded man noticed him and walked back behind the counter. “Hello young man, what can I do for you?” He asked while wiping his dirty orange fingers on his pants. Orange beard, orange fingers, this old man probably loved Cheetos.

“What is the reward for the obstacle course here?” Asked Kneeko. Hearing these words, the old man's face instantly began to shine. “The current reward is a high quality sword worth 130 gold, plus a cash reward of 50 additional gold. Ermm, but I see you are only level 1... And not even a warrior... You probably never intended to try it after all. Hurhurhur... I don't know what I was expecting, no one cares to test their skills anymore. Sigh*” After noticing Kneeko's level, the old man's face began to show sourness.

“I wish to do it.” Simply said Kneeko while throwing the the 2 gold admission fee on the counter. “Eh? Are you serious? This course is very difficult and will most likely result in your death. Last week a level 36 warrior failed at it...” Quickly rebuked the old man, but Kneeko kept staring at him in the eyes without showing any type of emotions.

Incredulous at first, the old man eventually pocketed the gold and asked Kneeko to follow him down to the backyard. In the backyard was a big wooden building with two doors. The old man walked up to the left door, turned around to the young man who he thought would soon be dead and said.

“The test begins on the other side of this door. If you manage to go through the obstacles and come out of the second door, you win. But you most likely will never come out alive. I don't know where your confidence comes from, but skills, magic and items are deactivated when you enter this building. You can only use your physical abilities.” Grumbled the old man.

Before the old man could finish his speech though, Kneeko had already entered the building and closed the door behind him. Inside was a long corridor, a left turn and another long corridor leading to the exit. Along the walls, floor and ceiling were obvious holes and slots which Kneeko recognized as blade, spear and arrow paths.

By the total absence of noise or movement, Kneeko concluded that these traps were triggered and not permanently active. Because of that, he wouldn't be able to memorize their patterns but Kneeko was at a much higher level than that.

Just by looking at the holes and slot emplacements, Kneeko could predict dangerous and safe areas. The rest would all depend on his 'natural' heightened reflexes and sensory abilities. After a few seconds spent analyzing the layout, Kneeko took a deep breath and stepped forward.

Outside the building, the old man was depressed and annoyed. “Doing this course at level one... As I thought, among these 'otherworldlers' only nutcases come to try this challenge.” The old man then spat on the floor, turned around and began to walk back to the guild building when the sound of a door opening behind him made him stop in his track.

'Tch, go figure. He got scared and immediately got back out. Youngsters these days.' Thought the old man to himself as he turned around with a fake smile on his lips. When he finally met eyes with Kneeko, the old man's jaw dropped. Kneeko had nonchalantly walked out from the left door which was supposed to be the finishing line.

[table=#800000]You have completed the “Warrior Skill Test”

(Your class does not allow you to unlock the sword mastery skill)[/table]

[table=#800000]You have gained “5” SP[/table]

“Sigh* Seem like I'm a bit rusty...” Said Kneeko while inspecting a small cut on his tattered beginner's shirt. “W-w-wha- H-h-how-....Eeeeeeeehhhh?” Blabbered the old man who was now wondering how Kneeko had cheated his way through the test. “Alright, gimme my sword and money. I have a busy day ahead of me.” Finally said Kneeko.

After making sure that Kneeko couldn't possibly have cheated, the old man then led him back inside. “Young man, I don't know how you did it but if you had such physical abilities, shouldn't you have chosen a class that is more based on your physical prowess? I mean, summoners are usually for those who are physically weak and need their summoned creatures to fight for them.” Curiously inquired the old man.

“Khukukuku. What would you normally do if you fought a summoner?” Asked Kneeko instead of answering the old man's question. “Ermm... Since the summoned creatures disappear after the summoner's death, I would obviously try to get past the creature and get to its summoner. Since they are usually wea- Wait... You mean..? Hurhurhurhurhur I see what you are doing now. You are quite the brilliant young man you know that? Hurhurhur” Said the man before giving a hearty laugh.

“Having your opponents think that you are weak so they would come at you when in reality, you are by far the most dangerous adversary, brilliant. Hurhurhur” Continued the old man who now seemed filled with energy. “Well there are other strategic reasons as well but that's pretty much the gist of it...” Added Kneeko.

“Hurhurhur, well to think some 'otherworlders' were so interesting... Anyway, congratulations! Here's your sword and gold.” Concluded the old man as he placed a standard looking one handed sword and a sack of gold on his counter. After closer inspection, the sword was nothing exceptional but was everything the forum had said it would be.

By far the best sword a lowly level 1 could hope to get his hands on. It was not because of the damage, or any special enchantments, but mostly due to its very high durability value. Kneeko quickly placed everything in his inventory and exited the building. His next step was an obvious one. In his quest list was the summoners' starting quest which he still had yet to complete. The quest was simple.

[table=#800000]Go to the 'Summoners guild' and undergo the Summoner's affinity test.[/table]

As long as he didn't do this, he would remain a summoner with no summoning skills. For Kneeko, this was of course inconceivable. This test would allow him to unlock his first summoning skill and would select the perfect creature for him based on a quick analysis of his brainwaves.

'I wonder how the Exodus systems will react to my, 'peculiar' brainwaves. Guhuhuhu.' Wondered Kneeko with anticipation. 'Ho well, it's sure to be interesting. Let's go.'