“Oh . . . recon, murder, intrigue, and theft. This is definitely a job for Bonnie! I’ll show you here, boss: You won’t find a better crew than one with me in it.”

“Murder?” Nick looked at Bonnie quizzically. “Wait . . . Yeah, murder. Can you actually join us to help in the mission, or are we going to have to solo it?”

Lucas looked over at Nick. “What do you mean?’

“Well, aren’t you part of the Imperium now? If you get caught murder-hoboing your way through an Imperium fortress . . . isn’t that going to kill your standing with your own faction?” Nick asked.

Lucas nodded. “I’m not at a high enough rank within the Imperium to just kill my way through without permission, which means we just have to make sure there are no survivors to report the issue.”

Like in most stealth-based games, as long as you eliminated enemies before they could report anything, there was no way for people to know you were guilty of a crime. It was one of the game mechanics that Lucas actually enjoyed, and he felt that it gave most players a lot more freedom than they realized. It was also how Lucas was able to talk with the other races amicably since none of them knew that he had betrayed the rebellion and murdered their four sage teachers while they were locked away in a cage. He knew for certain that, no matter how far the distance was between Xun Guan’s manor and the tavern, Gunter wouldn’t have talked to him at all if an enemy NPC had been alive to report him. The Dwarf might have even spat on him for betraying the non-Humans or, in the best-case scenario, although rare, tried to generate a quest that would have allowed Lucas to redeem himself.

“Should be easier said than done,” Nick said. “This manor isn’t like Xun Guan’s: there isn’t a known secret entrance that will lead us to our destination like—”

“There isn’t?” Lucas looked over at him, an eyebrow raised. “There should be, right? I’m pretty sure that nearly every manor on this island that players have attacked, even Dray von Maidbanger’s, has had an entrance that has let players bypass the front door. We just need to find it.”

“Ugh . . .” Nick groaned. “I mean, I suppose we can check the forums. I’ll log out and see.” His body went stiff, the normal process in the game for when a player logged out. This prevented someone from just leaving the game in order to avoid dying and made their body stay visible and interactable for a few minutes unless they logged out from their binding stone, the magical device they could set to reappear at upon death.