Chapter 277: Imperial Ranking War: Clearing Doubts and Uncertainties

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The announcement had changed the atmosphere inside the Rock.

For the past month, the Heavenly Bronze Team had enjoyed a level of peace that they had almost forgotten was possible. They trained, ate, relaxed, expanded their base, and prepared for whatever might come next. Even after the World System finally revealed the true Imperial Ranking War, that confidence had initially remained.

But now, with only twenty-four hours left before the confrontation began, the reality of what was coming had finally settled in.

The Rock was quiet that night.

Not peaceful.

Quiet.

There was a difference.

People were speaking in lower voices than usual. Small groups gathered in corners, discussing the same thing over and over again. Some were trying to figure out how the other four teams would attack. Others were wondering whether they would cooperate or simply take advantage of one another once the battle began.

There were also those who weren’t talking at all.

They were simply thinking.

Ren could hear all of it.

His sensory network covered the Rock, allowing him to notice the subtle changes in everyone’s behavior. He could hear whispers through walls, conversations happening several rooms away, and the occasional nervous sigh from people pretending that they weren’t nervous.

Nobody wanted to admit it, but the truth was obvious.

They were afraid.

And Ren understood why.

The World System had effectively turned their team into the biggest target in the entire secret realm. Their base had been revealed, their six-month lead had become a reason to attack them, and every member of their team was now worth five times the normal merit points.

Four empires could potentially unite against them.

That was roughly two hundred people against fifty-one.

Even with the difference in individual strength, that was an intimidating number.

Ren didn’t think their fear was unreasonable.

But he also knew that allowing it to continue would become a problem.

So, sometime during the night, he gathered everybody together.

The entire team assembled in one of the larger rooms inside the Rock. People came in quietly, some still whispering among themselves until Ren finally stepped forward.

He looked around at them.

Nobody needed to explain why he had called them here.

"I can hear all of you."

That immediately silenced the room.

A few people looked embarrassed.

Ren didn’t laugh.

"I know everybody is nervous. You should be. If you weren’t even a little nervous after what the system announced, I’d actually be more concerned."

That earned a few awkward smiles.

Ren continued.

"But don’t let being nervous make you forget what we’ve accomplished."

He gestured toward the surrounding walls.

"Look around you."

"This place wasn’t given to us."

"When we first arrived here, we had nothing."

He wasn’t exaggerating.

Everybody remembered.

When they entered the secret realm, their clothes, weapons, personal belongings, and inventories had been sealed and confiscated by the World System. They were left with practically nothing except coarse leather clothing.

Nothing useful.

No weapons.

No armor.

No food.

No proper equipment.

Not even underwear.

Ren had never forgotten that.

"Do you remember what we had during our first few days here?" he asked.

"Nothing."

"We had to build everything."

"We had to hunt for everything."

"We had to make our own clothes, our own equipment, our own shelters, and eventually this entire base."

He looked around again.

"Now look at us."

There was a subtle change in the room.

People began looking around.

The walls.

The formations.

The storage facilities.

The training grounds.

The equipment they were wearing.

The weapons they carried.

It was easy to forget just how much they had accomplished because they had lived with these things for so long.

Ren didn’t let them forget.

"Every single person here has equipment now. You have armor. You have weapons. You have spare clothes. You have food. You have clean water. You have medicine. You have a fortified base that survived Extreme Cold, Extreme Heat, Extreme Pollution, and Nuclear Fallout without ever being breached."

"We’ve built enough storage to last for a long time. We’ve gathered enough materials to repair what we have. We’ve prepared emergency supplies. We’ve trained our squads."

"And all of that came from us."

He paused.

"The other teams started with the same restrictions."

That sentence drew everyone’s attention.

"The same World System took their belongings. The same system stripped them down to almost nothing. They had to survive the same environment we did."

Ren’s voice remained calm.

"But ask yourself this."

"Do you really think they’re living as comfortably as we are?"

Nobody answered.

They didn’t need to.

Of course they weren’t.

The ranking alone was proof that the Heavenly Bronze Empire had accumulated an enormous advantage. Seven and a half million points didn’t simply appear because of luck.

They had resources.

They had equipment.

They had food.

They had infrastructure.

They had formations.

They had a base.

Most importantly, they had people who had spent six months becoming stronger while the other teams were struggling just to survive.

"The difference between us and them isn’t just a number on the ranking."

Ren pointed toward the enormous ranking display still visible through the system interface.

"That seven million isn’t some meaningless number. It represents what we’ve actually accumulated during the past six months."

"Think about what you were wearing when we arrived."

"Then look at yourselves now."

Some members glanced down at their armor.

Ren continued.

"You weren’t given these weapons."

"You earned them."

"You weren’t given this food."

"You gathered it."

"You weren’t given this base."

"You built it."

"And nobody gave us the advantage we’re enjoying right now."

"We created it."

The room became quieter, but this time it wasn’t the uncomfortable silence from earlier.

People were listening.

Ren could feel the change.

Their fear hadn’t disappeared completely.

That wasn’t possible.

But it was becoming something more manageable.

He continued before the old doubts could return.

"And there’s another thing you need to remember."

"You’re not going to be sent outside alone."

Several people looked at him.

"This isn’t going to be fifty-one individual fights."

"We have squads."

"We have formations."

"We have defensive positions."

"We have tactics."

"We have plans."

"Nobody here needs to run outside tomorrow and fight two hundred people by themselves."

That finally earned some genuine laughter.

Ren smiled slightly.

"You’d have to be an idiot to do that."

The tension in the room eased.

"Tomorrow, you’ll fight according to the plans we’ve prepared. You’ll stay with your squads. You’ll listen to your commanders. You don’t chase enemies because you’re excited. You don’t abandon your positions because somebody insults you. You don’t try to become a hero."

His gaze swept across them.

"And most importantly, you don’t panic."

He paused.

"I’ll be here."

That simple statement had more weight than anything else he had said.

"I can see what’s happening around the Rock. My sensory network covers the surrounding area, and I can track movements far beyond what most of you can perceive."

"If something changes, I’ll know."

"If an enemy tries to flank us, I’ll know."

"If another team changes their strategy, I’ll know."

"If there’s an opening, I’ll see it."

Ren’s expression became more confident.

"So stop worrying about whether you know what to do."

"You don’t need to know everything."

"You only need to know your part."

That was the essence of what Ren wanted them to understand.

The confrontation wasn’t going to be some chaotic free-for-all where everyone had to make decisions independently.

They were a team.

They had spent six months becoming one.

The other teams might have more people, but numbers weren’t everything.

Coordination mattered.

Equipment mattered.

Preparation mattered.

And they had all three.

Ren took another look around the room.

"You’ve survived six months in this place."

"Six months of calamities."

"Six months of monsters."

"Six months of starvation, exhaustion, environmental disasters, and uncertainty."

"You survived when you had almost nothing."

"Now you have everything you need."

"So don’t suddenly start acting like you’re helpless just because the World System finally decided to put a target on our backs."

The words struck harder than the previous reassurance.

People began standing straighter.

Some nodded.

Others smiled.

The nervous expressions were still there, but they were different now.

There was anticipation mixed into them.

They were still aware that tomorrow would be dangerous.

But danger no longer felt like certain death.

Ren could see the difference.

The uncertainty was melting away.

The whispers would probably continue later. People would still be nervous when they went to sleep. Some would probably wake up several times during the night thinking about the battle.

That was fine.

Ren didn’t need them to become fearless.

He only needed them to trust themselves and the people standing beside them.

"Tomorrow will be our first real confrontation."

He looked toward the entrance.

"The World System thinks giving our enemies five times the merit points will make us an easy target."

A faint smile appeared on his face.

"Let’s show them what that target looks like."

The room erupted.

The tension that had been hanging over the Rock for hours finally broke apart, replaced by cheers, laughter, and the sound of people talking with renewed confidence.

Ren stepped back and watched them.

It worked.

That was good.

Their morale had stabilized.

But Ren knew this wasn’t the real purpose of his speech.

He hadn’t gathered everyone simply to make them feel better.

That was only the first step.

Tomorrow’s battle would demand much more from them than courage.

It would demand discipline.

Endurance.

Coordination.

And the willingness to follow his orders even when those orders didn’t make sense to them.

His real plan wasn’t going to be comfortable.

It wasn’t going to be simple.

And it certainly wasn’t going to be a normal defensive battle.

Ren had spent the entire peaceful month preparing for this confrontation.

The others thought he had been strengthening the Rock so they could survive an assault.

That was only part of it.

There was a reason he had reorganized the squads.

A reason he had expanded the defensive lines.

A reason he had drilled them repeatedly.

A reason he had prepared so many contingencies.

The Rock wasn’t simply going to withstand the coming storm.

Ren intended to make the storm regret coming.

For now, however, he was satisfied.

The team was no longer drowning in uncertainty.

They were ready.

At least mentally.

Ren looked around at the people laughing and preparing themselves for tomorrow, then quietly turned away.

There was still work to do.

Twenty-four hours wasn’t a lot of time.

And Ren intended to use every remaining second of it.