Riveting Night led the group towards the Mayor’s Hall, her steps very reflective of the seriousness of the current situation. None of the players behind her were surprised by this, as it was something they had been wondering all this while.

  Umbra had an excellent recruitment scheme for upper echelons and combat players. Even the various guilds with long legacies outside of Boundless unanimously agreed that Umbra would rise like a rocket.

  Of course, these guilds had confidence in themselves, but that was beside the point.

  However, what had left almost everyone scratching their heads like confused apes was how Umbra planned to handle the other aspects of a guild’s management.

  Managing a guild in Boundless had proven to be far more complex than usual. Even in MMORPG games of old, guilds had always possessed versatile members that covered a great many fields.

  Very few guilds manged to rise to the top through combat players alone, and even those few guilds that achieved this only stayed at that lofty position for a while before reality gave them a nice face slap.

  In other words, Umbra needed a full and proper roster.

  Guild management in Boundless was separated into four large categories in terms of players.

  The first and lowest category were the serf players. It was a harsh and uncomfortable term to use, but that was the blunt description. These included harveeys and general miscellaneous groups who assisted in the bottom floor day to day management of the guild.

  This included cleaners, workers and the harvesters (harveey). Since NPCs could not join guilds, players had to fill these roles. Vita Settlement only had some NPC help because of Draco’s circ.u.mstances with the NPC powers, who wanted to leave a good impression.

  As was explained earlier, normal player guilds struggled to grow settlement population count until the Great R.a.p.e of Update 5.

  (Author’s Note: From now on, the horrendous events that did occur and unfortunately, will occur, during Update 5 will be termed as the Great R.a.p.e.)

  It was ridiculous to expect every player to be a combatant. Right now, there were only a few million players online, but soon 7 billion people would swarm the game.

  Just which monsters did you expect to wash their necks and wait for these lovely Immortal Adventurers to cleave them off?

  Not to mention that this current few million players represented the best of the best. These were the true blue gamers who had a legacy of playing games like this, and instinctively understood various things even though the world was novel.

  Those multitudes who would be coming later included the elderly, the young, the working class and even the dregs of society. This great mishmash of people would create chaos, and evil thrived in chaos.

  These people might have vague impression of gaming, but their knowledge was limited. Not only that, but most were ’normal’ people. They had no idea how to even hold a sword, much less kill a monster, and who did you expect to teach them?

  When players like Draco, Rambunctious Buttlover, Joker and Noble Soul had long reached the higher levels and ranks, how were these ’normies’ supposed to find soil to grow in?

  Hence, the severe caste system amongst players. If you had no combat or Tradeskill talent, you could only fall into the category of a serf player.

  The second category were the Tradeskill players. These players were integral to the continued existence of a guild, especially as newer updates came out and reliance on dropped items became lower and lower.

  Even without the interference of future updates, dropped items would become far less useful. At the higher levels, random items wouldn’t help out much in terms of buffing a combat player’s power.

  They would need custom and tailored weapons that encapsulated their strengths and played down their weaknesses.

  In Draco’s past life, he had created the Mana Sword. Since he hardly used Worldly Energy when fighting, but others did, it brought his skill level down a bit.

  It was the equivalent of a Bugatti and a 1990 Hyundai racing on a straight track,only that the Bugatti had flat tires. It was overall a much better and faster car, but the problem concerning the tires dragged down its performance.

  The Mana Sword was crafted personally by Draco to offset that issue. By removing this weakness, he soared to the tiptop of Boundless, hailed as worldwide number 3 among seven billion people.

  Literally the only reason he wasn’t number one was that he didn’t have a Divine item.

  As such, Tradeskill players were on par with combat players in terms of value to a guild, but just slightly lower in this early part. In the late game and end game era, they would become slightly more important than combat players.

  The third category were the tried and true combat players. Not much needed to be said about this category, and Umbra had already laid down too firm a foundation in acquiring these players.

  The final category were the upper echelon, which was also self-explanatory. Without a head, the body would not function. Umbra had also got this down pretty well, but they would need more members here as the guild’s population grew.

  Umbra currently had means to recruit combat players and upper echelon members, but so far had been mum about Tradeskill player recruitment, as well as serf player recruitment.

  Majority of crafters had been silent, eagerly awaiting Umbra’s announcement for the recruitment of crafters. They were also simultaneously incredibly nervous, as it was clear that Umbra only dealt with talent.

  And even that talent would be filtered out and segregated, creating a severe rift between them.

  If they got into Umbra as a basic Tradeskill member, that was fine. However, some had confidence in their talent and felt they deserved to climb higher.

  However, the horrors that the combat players faced was like a ghost that was whispering malice in their ears, eating at their arrogance. Now, they sat with their legs shut together, sweating as they feared and anticipated the event.

  Now, Riveting Night was clearly ready to make moves to that end. It was either she wanted to recruit Tradeskill players or serf players, or maybe even both.

  This discussion was incredibly imperative to the success of Umbra in the future, so the core members with Riveting Night were incredibly solemn.

  When they reached the Mayor’s Hall, Riveting Night led them into the parlor. Here, it was a large room that was able to seat a large amount of people, especially given the size of the Mayor’s Hall in general.

  There were various couches and love seats set over fancy carpets and on either side of suave coffee tables.

  Then again, ’parlor’ was just a fancy anglo-medieval way of saying ’living room’.

  Riveting Night sat down on one of the couches, her posture lax and lazy like a cat. It caused the others to have a bizarre visual dissonance based on her actions.

  She seemed more like a normal beauty the way she lay down like that, but yet she always covered her face. Her body was also nice and curvy, but her sizes weren’t mind blowing.

  This was the first time - for everyone except Sublime Notion - these core members of Umbra realized their Lady Boss wasn’t an overpowered demon with no humanity.

  The finally realized that she was also a human, and pretty young woman at that. Probably.

  Whether they realized it or not, the menacing aura that oozed from Riveting Night had become less effective on them. The human mind was truly a strange thing.

  The Five Generals sat opposite Riveting Night while Sublime Notion and Warm Spring sat beside her. To their left sat Rambunctious Buttlover, who lounged on another sofa with a bored and unconcerned posture.

  "We are going to discuss our plans for executing an effective recruitment scheme for Tradeskill players. Make your suggestions and I’ll assess their merit."

  Riveting Night opened the discussion with a light tone.

  There was a bit of silence before Kiran, surprisingly, lead the discussion.

  "Talent only. Stringent tests and tight contractual terms."

  "Eh, that’s essentially what we should go for, but its the nitty gritties that we need to brainstorm over." Rina replied with a thoughtful frown.

  "I’d say we should mimic the style of the combat talent recruitment and have four different membership ranks with proportionately difficult tests. It worked once before, it could work again."

  "Aye, I agree with Rina. However, the basic test should involve having the members of various lifestyle classes possesses, at least, an Elite rank in their Tradeskill."

  [Author’s Note: Amateur (1-20), Elite (21-40), Expert (41-60) Master (61-80), Grandmaster(81+)]

  Uno pitched in with a confident smile. His words though, made everyone suck in a deep breath.

  Too stringent! Too ruthless!

  One should note that even a monster like Draco, who jumped levels due to abusing his future knowledge and skills, was only at the middle Elite rank in his three main Tradeskills.

  Of course, he wasn’t like Tradeskill players who dedicated all their time to crafting. Draco had many other obligations to tend to and he was more of a combatant. Tradeskills were just a necessary pastime to him.

  There could be Tradeskill players who fit this criteria, but they would be the extreme elite few. Even the requirement for the basic combat test was just to be level 10.

  A large majority of players satisfied this requirement, so it was the test itself that weeded out the weak from the strong, leaving behind the few elites who could solo a team of players at their level with optimal distribution builds.

  The higher ranks had even higher requirements and even higher difficulties, leaving very few players able to complete it.

  Then there was the loyalty test afterward which further culled the members even further.

  Out of 12,529 applicants in the first batch of recruitment in the first four hours, only 413 passed. That number was further culled to 108 people, not including the Five Generals, Sublime Notion and Riveting Night.

  If they implemented such a requirement on the basic test alone, not even counting the harshness of the test itself, they would be lucky to get even 10,000 applicants over ten days. Even then, the passing rate might be 1% or less.

  Next would be the loyalty test which would have passing rate of barely 10%. At the end of it all, Umbra would be lucky to get 10 Tradeskill members at the basic rank after every ten days.

  Not to mention that the higher ranks would be even more stringent. How were these Tradeskill players supposed to support the equipment and consumable needs of the combat-capable population of Umbra with such low numbers?

  Or were they supposed to work like dogs until they died in real life through the game, if that was even possible?

  "It sounds good to me. What we don’t need is quantity but quality! There are millions of players in Boundless right now. With the inevitable rise of our guild they will all line up to join us sooner or later. Even after that, when more players flood in, we’ll be swarmed to death with applicants as the newbies would be seeking shelter from the strong. It’s better to have the extreme elite few than some chaff mixed in with the salt."

  Cobra spoke callously and without care, twirling a dagger in his palms. His voice was genial and his face was easygoing. You would think he was gossiping about some common matter with his female friends, but no. He was discussing the fate of various players who would be subjected to the horrors of the Great R.a.p.e of Update 5 unless they joined them.

  Of course, no one in the room was aware of the heaven shaking events that would occur at that time except Riveting Night. Even Cobra had a vague understanding due to his dark history, but he simply couldn’t understand how evil humans could be without fear of consequence.

  "I was once a bouncer for a prestigious club and a normal club, with the latter job being my first and the former job being my last. The difference between the two was that the prestigious club imposed rules and had a higher price for entry. There were also a lot of superficial decorations that made it more aesthetically pleasing, but didn’t do anything functionally. It was almost the same as the old club, just that prices were higher."

  "And yet the prestigious club is still thriving and attracting more and more high class people while the standard club had closed down a few months ago!"

  "People do not care about difficulty! When something is harder to acquire and there few who can obtain it, it becomes all the more precious, to the point where people take it as a symbol of superiority! If we make the tests hard, people will complain and whine, but would envy those who passed! Along with the benefits we provide, all Tradeskill players would froth at the mouth at the idea of being accepted by us!"

  Boyd spoke all this with a firm look as his arms were crossed over his chest.

  The faces of everyone in the room forcefully changed. In truth, they had all known this in the back of their minds, but having it said aloud drove home just how bright Umbra’s future was.

  Sublime Notion stirred at this. "A great suggestion there. So for the requirements for the basic test, one must be at least at the early Elite rank in their main Tradeskill in order to qualify. I suggest that the advanced test require one to posses the former criterion as well as another Tradeskill at that is at the early Amateur rank!"

  "For the expert test, the requirement should be that players must have middle Elite rank and a middle Amateur rank in two Tradeskills. For the core test…… one must have two Tradeskills at the early Elite rank at the least!"

  Sublime Notion’s suggestion was even more outrageous and unfair. What kind of requirement was this?!

  This was like a job firm asking for university graduates to have a perfect 100 score in all subjects, a world-shattering thesis and fifteen years of job experience.

  What kind of monsters was Sublime Notion hoping to attract? Although Draco fit such a criteria, he was part of the elite 1% of all crafters worldwide. To find people like him who could also pass the test and possess sufficient loyalty, it was too hard.

  However, no one rushed to argue against her. Whether they liked it or not, the words Boyd had spoken echoed in their minds. This was what made them unable to open their mouths to refute anything.

  Riveting Night watched all of this silently. Only speaking when the pause had stretched for three whole minutes.

  "The requirements have been set. I shall decide on the contents of the test myself, as I have a better grasp on Tradeskills that you all. Before that though, do you have any suggestions, Warm Spring?"

  Warm Spring was startled out of her silence when she noticed the attention was on her, but knowing that Riveting Night was sitting beside her gave her some confidence.

  "Erm…… I think that the current proceedings are fine. However…… I would suggest making the applicants use their own tools for the test, otherwise we would have to shoulder unnecessary costs for each test."

  "Good! I agree, we don’t have money to waste on playing with trash." Rina echoed with a gleam in her eye.

  All the other core members nodded their heads in agreement. It was a sound addition to the process.

  Warm Spring was secretly happy with all of this approval from people she had come to perceive as intelligent and strong. She finally felt comfortable here, with people who liked what she liked and didn’t think she was a problem.

  "And? What about you?" Riveting Night asked as she turned to the silent Rambunctious Buttlover, who looked so bored that he was on the verge of passing away in his seat.

  The amus.e.m.e.nt in her voice wasn’t hidden. It was clear that Riveting Night was only asking out of courtesy, and 100% knew what was going to come from his mouth.

  The others didn’t though, still believing Rambunctious Buttlover to be a serious talent, as he was the only core member of Umbra currently. Certainly, he must have something to pitch in.

  Rambunctious noticed all the eyes on him and simply scoffed.

  "All of the criterion you’ve mentioned should only apply to males. For females, they should be admitted based on the size, shape, elasticity, malleability, scent, form, contour, spiritual and mental impact, bounce, texture and movement of their booty!"

  When he listed out the various criteria, his voice was so forceful and impactful that a sharp wind blew around the room. Rambunctious Buttlover’s belief was so ferocious that even as a normal human, he could create such an effect.

  Riveting Night shook her head like she had long expected this, but everyone else was rendered speechless.

  This fellow…… could it be that ass was all he ever thought about?

  How did he even manage to pass the core member test?!

  "Enough. I shall publish the recruitment scheme and we shall see the results soon enough. For now, it is time for us to go on a little shopping trip."

  Riveting Night spoke this mysteriously, making the players here become curious and excited.

  "Where to, O’ Beautiful Maiden in Tights?" Sublime Notion asked Riveting Night with a teasing smile.

  Riveting Night just harrumphed under her breath but continued.

  "We’re heading to the Neutral Kingdom of Avaricious. There, we will purchase a few things that are necessary to the survival of any top tier guild."

  As she said this, she cast her eyes over the core members of Umbra, making their hearts feel an inexplicable weightiness that made it hard to breathe.

  "At the same time, I might be able to show you the true nature of this game."