The Quest Is Simply To NTR All The Heroes

"So, what is it that you want from me?" Kaisen asked, strolling to the balcony and leaning down to take in the Golden City in all its glittering glory.

"Straight to the point, huh? What, don't you want to ask me how I've been? Don't you want to know how I built an empire? How I bled Authority's heart?"

Kayden replied, joining him by the railing, looking out over the city like a king surveying his kingdom.

"Well, fine. Say it. The shorter version. I don't have all day, alright."

Kaisen dismissed Kayden with a hand gesture that practically screamed, "Spare me the TED Talk and get to the boring stuff already."

Hearing that, Kayden smiled—a smile that, to anyone else, might have looked genuine, like the kind of smile you see on a doting older brother.

To an outsider, Kaisen might have seemed like the rude, impatient younger sibling, while Kayden played the role of the benevolent older brother, happy to see his little bro. But that was a load of crap, and Kaisen knew it better than anyone.

He'd been watching this guy's act for two decades now.

This was just Kayden doing what he did best—bragging. That's all.

Humble bragging,

if he dared to call it that. Though "humble" was about as fitting for Kayden as a tuxedo on a gorilla.

"Fine. The shorter version it is, then!"

Kayden clapped his hands, and for a moment, Kaisen thought it was just out of excitement. But it wasn't only that. The second his hands came together, a drone swooped in from somewhere like a hawk on a mission.

Kaisen didn't see it coming at all. It wasn't one of those spider drones he'd seen before—this one was something else entirely.

It was a restaurant waiter drone.

Yep, just as the name suggests, these little flying guys were used in high-end restaurants as waiters. The kind of places where the menu has no prices, and you have to remortgage your house just to pay for the appetizers.

Customers would order by clicking on the menu that's on the table, and these dapper little drones—with the upper body of a small robot, two limbs, and a large metal plate for a base—would zip around, delivering the dishes like culinary Cupid.

The robot's hands would daintily serve the food from the plate to the customer's table, probably with a level of care and precision that most human waiters could only dream of.

On this particular waiter bot's plate were two drinks, each with a slice of lemon perched on the rim of the glass. The drinks themselves looked...suspicious, to say the least. Both were light blue in color, fizzing away with bubbles like a science experiment on the verge of going wrong.

They were the kind of drinks that made you wonder if you were about to sip on something refreshing—or something that might just melt your insides.

Kayden took hold of both drinks, thanked the bot with the kind of sincerity you'd reserve for a life-saving surgeon, and then turned to Kaisen with a grin that could out-charm a used car salesman.

"Choose one, brother. I know, I know... that's why I'm letting you pick. Now, at least you have a choice, right?"

Kaisen wasn't the least bit fazed. He knew exactly why Kayden was offering him the choice. Trust? That was a currency neither of them had in their wallets. Their long-running shit show of a relationship was built on plenty of things, but trust wasn't one of them.

Kaisen glanced at both glasses, scoffed, and grabbed one at random, not giving it a second thought. Why should he worry? If Kayden wanted him dead, he wouldn't have gone through the trouble of sending Kara to save him in the first place.

'Whatever he needs, it must have to do with some game or something. I don't have any real value here anyway.'

Kayden raised his eyebrows at Kaisen's blatant audacity. He'd expected Kaisen to at least hesitate, maybe demand some kind of test to verify that the drink wasn't spiked. But no, Kaisen just grabbed it and drank like he was at a frat party, not in the middle of a power play.

It was surprising, sure, but it also confirmed that Kaisen knew he held some value Kayden needed.

"So, what happened here?" Kaisen asked, casually sipping the drink. It was alcohol, but he didn't bother to comment.

"Well, after 800 million people vanished, the world went into chaos. Total chaos. If it was just bottom feeders like you, nothing would've changed. But since the game itself was a bit pricey, the ones who got trapped were the rich and powerful, including Authority officials..." Kayden explained, taking a sip from his own glass as Kaisen listened.

That was something Kaisen had already guessed, and it seemed he was right.

"Everybody was in panic. Even the Authority. These dumb motherfuckers thought just by creating more Murderbots, they could solve all their problems. They didn't stop to consider that without humans, all this tech is just a bunch of expensive junk.

"They figured they could program the robots and then kick back with some leisure time—and oh boy, did they use that leisure time to play some dumb game."

Kaisen didn't react outwardly, though he was genuinely surprised. A slip-up from the Authority was about as rare as a cat agreeing to a bath, and the idea that it could lead to something as wild as an uprising? That was next-level insanity.

"Half of them vanished, and the other motherfuckers went into a frenzy. And that's when I swooped in."

Kayden said, his face twisting into that mad smile Kaisen wore when he was reliving one of his more questionable decisions. It was the kind of smile that said,

Yeah, I did it, and I'd do it again.

"Remember how we both had that crazy dream about looting an Authority station?" Kayden continued, his eyes gleaming with mischief.

"No, you did not!"

Kaisen blurted out, genuinely shocked. Not because the idea of looting an empty station was particularly wild, but because both of them had once fantasized about robbing an Authority station just to stick it to the suits in charge.

And it seemed Kayden had beaten him to it.

"Yes, baby. I did it. Albeit an empty one, but I did it. It wasn't the big one, but the small station in our city. The Murderbots were deactivated since there wasn't anyone to power them on or charge them. And since these dumb bots could only kill and not think, they didn't bother to get charged, making them as useless as a pebble."

'So that's where the Murderbots came from, huh?'

Kaisen mused, thinking about the cold-blooded killers he'd seen on the steps. A shiver ran down his spine just recalling them. Those things didn't know the meaning of hesitation. If this were the game world, Kaisen would've folded those dumb motherfuckers like yesterday's laundry.

But alas, one can only dream.

'Wait a minute... if there are no developers here, then how the hell am I supposed to get back to my world?'

Kaisen's mind raced, his eyes suddenly widening as a new thought hit him like a freight train. He looked at his brother with a mixture of shock and realization.

'Hold up! If this guy saved me, brought me to his secret base, and wants something from me... then he must know a way to send me back!'

It wasn't an absurd thought. In fact, it was the most logical one he'd had all day. Kayden knew something. Kayden knew a way to send him back—that had to be the truth.

The pieces of the puzzle were starting to fall into place, and for the first time in a while, Kaisen felt a flicker of hope. Well, hope mixed with a healthy dose of suspicion. With Kayden, there was always a catch, and Kaisen wasn't about to let his guard down now.