Game of Thrones: Battle Royale Game

c8: Gou's Plan

Since they had agreed to form an alliance, they must have decided on a meeting location before entering the game.

For instance, the place Ian had originally agreed upon with his two former allies was the Sept of Baelor often misremembered in common folk's tongues as "St. Belle's Cathedral"—the grand Great Sept that towers over King's Landing. A sacred and politically symbolic location, it was the scene of many canonical events: the trial of Ser Loras Tyrell, Cersei's walk of atonement, and ultimately, its destruction by wildfire.

But Ian's allies had withdrawn from the game prior to launch, and he had changed his start point to the Riverlands, one of the most war-torn and strategically unstable regions in Westeros.

Now that he was playing solo, he assumed others would not be in the same position. Players who still retained their alliances would absolutely proceed to The Inn at the Crossroads a historic meeting place for key characters like Catelyn Stark, Tyrion Lannister, and the Brotherhood Without Banners or Shataya's Silkhouse, the well-known pleasure house in King's Landing where highborn men often mingled freely under the veil of anonymity.

Driven by the lure of the First Blood bounty mission, wouldn't these agreed-upon meeting points now become prime hunting grounds?

Certainly, some players cautious and calculating would choose not to show up once they saw the mission update. But humanity is never short of risk-takers.

As the saying goes: If a venture yields 20% profit, it arouses interest; if it yields 50%, it sparks risk; for 100%, laws are broken; and for 300%, one will face death itself without hesitation.

And what kind of profit does this task offer?

Even ignoring the attribute points and skill points, the monetary reward of 3,000 gold dragons is staggering. That's a sum equal to what the Lannisters might use to hire a full complement of sellswords from the Golden Company, or what Littlefinger might manipulate into political influence across the Vale and the Crownlands. Combined with two S-class NPCs of your choice, a player could easily build a personal army numbering in the hundreds.

In this version of the game, where most players are denied access to system-generated development resources, acquiring this early boost would be like finding dragon eggs in the wastelands of Essos an unmatchable head start.

Whoever claims First Blood might dominate the game for years maybe even break free from the assassination mechanics that target low-ranking players gaining the freedom to grow without fear of early elimination.

There's absolutely no reason why ambitious players wouldn't risk everything for it.

"But the second problem still hasn't been solved!" Ian reined in his racing thoughts. "Even if players are meeting up, how do they see through each other's disguises?"

Let's assume two allied players meet at their prearranged location. With the First Blood mission now active, neither would dare use their agreed-upon passcode or signal openly doing so would be suicide.

Instead, they'd test each other cautiously, subtly each hiding behind their in-world identity.

But how can anyone, especially elite players who've survived the harsh qualifiers, be so easily exposed? Everyone in this game knows how to roleplay, how to hide intent. These are not amateurs.

From a design standpoint, if the developers had gone through the effort of removing system tags, disguising players as native inhabitants of Westeros, and programming organic identities with realistic memories and relationships then they must believe players can still identify one another.

Which means…

"There's something we're overlooking," Ian muttered.

It was too deliberate. Too precise. If the developers were confident that early conflict was inevitable, then they must've embedded tells or loopholes into the system clues that could help players identify each other even without explicit names or tags.

The problem of finding players had been solved through prearranged meetings.

The problem of seeing through disguises still lingered.

But there had to be something. A pattern. A weakness. A line of dialogue too smooth. A memory inconsistency. A name drop that only meta-aware players would risk using.

"There's something we all don't know… or something we've all ignored. A structural flaw in the game. A gap."

A loophole.

Ian suddenly recalled the importance of the background story. According to Anne, the auxiliary AI, the background narrative was designed to help players seamlessly blend into the world of Westeros.

But as Ian reviewed the unfolding situation, it became increasingly obvious: the developers never wanted players to remain perfectly disguised. Quite the opposite—they wanted players to spot each other and initiate conflict as early as possible.

It was a contradiction in design unless, of course, something was wrong with the background story itself.

Ian narrowed his eyes, then quickly shut them. He summoned the auxiliary interface and navigated to the "Background Information" tab, reviewing his assigned lore from the beginning of the simulation.

Within moments, he noticed something peculiar.

He had no last name.

Originally, as a commoner from the Vale, this would've made sense. Smallfolk rarely had surnames. However, the narrative specified that Ian had since been knighted a privilege which not only conferred status and lands in some cases, but also the right to adopt a noble surname.

Yet his file still listed no last name.

That was… odd.

Certainly not an obvious flaw, but one that stood out on second reading. It might only affect players who started as hedge knights, and not all players across the board. But that led to a more important question:

"If this is a deliberate design intended to expose players," Ian thought, "then the flaw can't just exist for one class or a handful of players. It must be systemic. What's the common denominator between all of us?"

What did all players share that was visible, subtle enough to overlook at first, but glaringly obvious upon inspection?

It couldn't be something ridiculous like all of them skipping or dancing. This was Westeros a gritty, war-torn world. Nobody in Flea Bottom would waste energy prancing about like a fool unless they wanted to get stabbed for it.

Ian paced across the room, deep in thought.

Then, his eyes landed on the corner where his equipment set was piled.

A half-hand sword, a nose-guard helmet, a gorget, an old ringmail hauberk, a pair of chain gloves, and steel greaves.

He froze.

In a moment of realization, the final character creation interface flashed in his mind's eye the one he'd seen just before being dropped into the game world.

"Seven hells," Ian muttered. "It's the starting equipment. That's it."

Each player began the game with a standardized loadout based on their chosen profession. And based on pre-game data, over 90% of the player base had likely chosen from the top five recommended classes.

That meant that aside from the face and voice, almost every player had been dropped into the world wearing gear identical to what was shown in the class preview screen.

Among the most obvious? The Traveling Merchant.

They began the game with an absurdly conspicuous entourage: four retainers, four old draft horses, two covered wagons, and seven mules. It was a dead giveaway unless they immediately broke formation, they were practically marked.

The next most obvious were the Mercenary Knights. Though they looked impressive with their near-complete knightly gear, they lacked even a single squire a detail that would appear deeply suspicious in a world where even minor knights typically traveled with one.

Then came the rarer but still trackable professions: the Wrecked Sailor, armed with a throwing axe, and the Brotherhood Hunter, with their distinctive yew longbow. Both carried unique weaponry and attire uncommon enough in Westeros to stand out.

Only one profession offered any real chance of blending in: the Wandering Mercenary.

Taverns from Dorne to the Wall were filled with such men. Their starting gear old leather armor, a short sword, and a dagger was indistinguishable from that of the thousands of real-life sellswords and fighters who roamed Westeros.

But for the rest?

"As soon as they arrive at the meetup point," Ian realized, "others will subconsciously think—have I seen this person before?"

The illusion of uniqueness was shattered.

This was the true purpose of the background story.

The developers had made the character creation system overly elaborate to create the illusion of deep immersion and individuality. They'd even trained the AI to tell players their backstory would protect them convincing them they were safe to act naturally.

But it was a lie.

It was a misdirection, exploiting a basic quirk of human psychology: when we receive an official explanation for something, we're less likely to question it again.

Even Ian had fallen for it. He'd completely ignored the blatant uniformity of the starting equipment.

And since the game's AI and organizers could no longer interfere once the simulation began, the developers had planted this pre-game trap to trigger PvP encounters early making the Hundred Player Game more chaotic, more entertaining.

"Mudd," Ian muttered, invoking the old First Men curse. "The first enemy we're up against in this game... isn't each other."

"It's a trap, a deception laid by the developers from the very start."

---