Chapter 36:

Ace selected Thatcher, he would normally not play operators with more of a support role, but he had been queued with a Thermite for the last 3 Ranked games, so they had ended up figuring out a combo that would allow them to breach through anything. Ace could select normal breach charges as part of his secondary gadget, so there was also no need for Thermite to waste his primary gadgets. They came in through the first floor, where the bomb was located. They had checked their path with their drones before the round started, so it should be clear.

Nevertheless, they were still ensuring to peek every corner properly, and as one enemy, unaware of the two attackers less than two metres away from him, turned the corner, he was quickly shot down by the Thermite. They progressed slowly through the various rooms, and when they arrived at the room adjacent to the bomb, they began to set up. Ace threw a well-placed EMP grenade that cleared the two walls of their respective Bandit Charges. The Thermite then placed one of his charges on a wall, while Ace peeked through the door outside the room, to ensure that no enemies attempted to surprise them.

Then, they began the second phase, Thermite quickly triggered his first charge, and stood in one of the corners of the room, Ace then aimed through the wall while Thermite aimed outside. This meant that all angles were covered, and as one enemy attempted to peek at them, Ace shot him down with a controlled burst to the head. They stood like this for about 7 seconds, before Thermite went forward again and placed his second charge on the last wall. This was the most dangerous part, as Ace had to cover two areas, outside the room they were, and inside the area the enemies had to defend. Luckily, it progressed perfectly and Thermite was able to trigger his second charge without worry.

As it exploded, the whole room was exposed, and Ace could shoot down another enemy. There were two more left, but one had been killed by the rest of the team. However, the other three attackers seemed to have been killed by the remaining defender player, a Bandit. He was a common defender in Ranked since it meant that if the other team did not take Thatcher, they would be in trouble. Nevertheless, Ace still prefered to play Pulse, a defender whose main gadget was a Cardiac Sensor that could detect heartbeats as long as they were in range. If the player had good map awareness, he could sneak behind the whole attacker team and still know where each one of them was.

The player behind the Bandit was extremely good, probably the best player Ace had encountered, the username was: 'OneMorePlz', and she enjoyed using Twitch during attack rounds. She had been able to kill Ace a few times during the game, her aim was not as good as Ace's, but his game sense [A/N: Term used by the gaming community to describe a player's predictive and reasoning capabilities within a game] was extraordinary, he had been clearly playing the Beta, and had spent many more hours than Ace had on the game.

Now, it was only her against Ace and Thermite. They had already planted the diffuser and now just had to win. With a normal player, Ace would most likely try and rush regardless, confident in his ability to kill him, however, Ace was not sure he would not be trapped or outsmarted. Ace had been playing a lot of ranked, and had been ranked as a Platinum player. He had lost about two-fifths of his games, but since he always did the best in the team, he usually did not lose a lot of points. He knew he would probably be stuck in this Elo [A/N: Rank] until he found a good team he could play with. He was now playing against 5 man teams all the time, which meant they had extremely good coordination and no problems in regards to picking operators.

They were each standing in one corner of the room, covering their respective angles when a calculated spray of bullets came through one of the walls, the player had consistently kept the spray at chest height, and as one of the bullets hit Thermite, he was killed. He had been crouching, which meant that even if they were aimed at chest height for standing players, it was head height for crouching players. Therefore, as one bullet hit him, the one-shot headshot mechanic was put to play, and the Thermite was killed.

It was now only Ace remaining, and the time on the diffuser was still ticking. Ace knew he had to playtime, if he did, they would win even if he died as the Bandit would have no time to diffuse. He went prone on a corner, and waited. A few seconds later, he saw a c4 fly and land in one of the corners of the room, as it landed, it was quickly triggered and it exploded. It was most likely thrown at an attempt to flush Ace out, but the Bandit now had a problem and that was that Ace knew where he was due to the travel of the c4. The Bandit had bet on a corner and it turned out wrong.

Now, Ace just had to wait for the Bandit to come in and so he stood in a corner, ready for the last firefight. Soon, he saw a Bandit run into the room, swinging a wide path while running, trying to spot the last player. It spotted Ace and began the motion to aim down his sight, but that was as far as it got: Ace quickly killed the Bandit, and won the round and the game.

********************************

"Ok guys, so, now that we are taking a break, I had a new idea, as I normally take about ten to fifteen-minute breaks, I could show you something cool, that will make it more entertaining for you guys.", and with that, he pulled out a guitar he kept next to his desk. The chat went wild, and Ace shouted: "Song requests!". Multiple people each had their own request, but Ace picked the first one he saw.

"Ok, so as courtesy for BuNnyHoppp1nG, I am going to play Bloody Tears, now bear with me while I ensure everything works.", he strummed the guitar, ensuring all audio was well recorded, and looped a few of the necessary chords. He then began playing.

He played a light-rock version of the original, which was much better suited to guitar, he could also play it on piano, but he had told himself he would alternate between guitar and keyboard. He finished the song and then smiled, happy with the outcome. "Ok, so that was the first one, now, the next one I will play on the piano, so it is up to you.", with that, a new string of requests came up, but this time, he picked the one he saw the most.

"This time, I will play the one I saw the most, I will play Unravel, the Tokyo Ghoul Opening.", this was one he had practised extensively on the piano, the version he played [A/N: He is going to play Animenz's version for reference], had a few tricky parts but sounded great.

As he began playing, Ace noticed people in chat typing the words to the lyrics when they could, and he smiled, his plan had been a total success…

******************************

"How is he doing, how is his streaming going."

"Well, he is quickly gaining popularity, and with his new boost, we can justify putting him in a few well-placed spots that will boost his popularity even more."

"Hmmm, that is good, but ensure that he hears no word of this, how do you think the rest of his 'plan' will go?"

"Well, in fact, if he keeps to the standard - which I have no doubt he will, he will quickly grow in popularity, he will have a sizeable following by the time he shows his face, and when that happens…"

"Yes, I get it, I have seen the predictions, and if this is true, it will be a very dangerous weapon we will be able to make use of."

"Yes, however, I would like to warn you, the boy is nowhere near stupid, if he gets even an inkling of what we plan to do…"

"Yes, I will take care of that, do not worry, just make sure to carry out your job efficiently."

"I will, do not worry."

*****************************

Ace relaxed on a stool, he had chosen to increase his workouts, and he now carried them out but with a weight suit. It had been his first one and even with his regenerative capabilities, he still felt sore. He was now sitting down in front of a bowl of fruit, looking through his phone at the progress he made yesterday. Some viewers had made clips of him playing, and they were now spread around social media. His U-Tube account had hit 30 thousand subscribers, but people were clamouring for videos of him playing music. Ace had already prepared for this, and had recorded himself playing various songs in both guitar and piano, and even had some songs where he played them both.

He had just released his first one, him playing Unravel on the piano, and it had already received a lot of views. He had also followed his viewer's advice and created an account on I-Gram, for now, he just posted a short clip of his new video, but he would also post pictures when the time was right. His stream had also grown quite a bit, with all that was happening, he had hit 500 viewers at some point, and had 400 consistent viewers for a large part of his stream. He had received various donations when playing music, so he would have to put another part of his plan in play. Since he had no need for money, any donations they sent his way would directly go to various charities. It would boost his popularity and would also keep his conscience clean.

He made the appropriate post on his I-Gram account and also changed the settings so that people knew that any donations they made on his stream would go directly to various charities. Nevertheless, he also made it clear that he would still read the donation, so there was no problem for people that simply wanted to send him a message and used a donation to ensure he read it.

After having set up all his accounts, Ace headed to the gym, it had been a while since he had gone, and thought that some fighting would be healthy for both his mind and body.