The AI did a little more investigation and found out that the offending soldier used to have a lot of merit points a few hours ago but had exchanged them for game points and other things from the army before he then sought Kelvin out for a fight.
The AI found the situation to be suspicious, and Kelvin had kicked up a fuss about the small amount of merit points, so the AI notified a human in Command.
The human took some time out of her busy schedule that involved keeping the Yggdrasil army on track to check the merit records and recorded videos of the soldier's actions before the fight took place.
In the videos, the soldier was seen smirking to his two friends and saying, "Let me see how he will get merit points out of me now."
One of the soldier's friends had said, "Don't exchange all your merit points, or you will make things look suspicious. Keep a million or so, so that he will get something."
The soldier had stamped his feet and complained, "But I don't want him to earn anything from me. Not after he stole my kills and part of my merit points."
His friend had shaken his head and said, "Just consider this as throwing him a bone to prevent Command from getting involved. You know that once Command gets involved, this matter will become bigger than it is, and you will get a heavier punishment."
The other friend said, "Think of the 500,000 merit points as hush money to keep the AI's mouth shut about the matter."
This finally convinced the soldier. He chuckled and said, "Giving the AI hush money. How do you come up with such things?"
The three of them laughed as they exchanged their merit points for other benefits. Soon after, the soldier walked up to Kelvin and punched him.
The soldier in command headquarters who saw the video and the series of actions was very pissed.
She chuckled darkly and said, "If these third division fools think they can fool the Yggdrasil army, then they have another thing coming."
She also saw Kelvin's suspicious action during and after the fight but didn't see anything wrong with it.
If anything, what Kelvin did made her chuckle as she made a series of orders that had the three soldiers arrested, the things that they had exchanged for were recovered and confiscated, and then they were jailed.
They were jailed in a mental prison for ten years. In real life, only ten minutes had passed. But to them, they had suffered 10 years for their offense in a prison full of other prisoners and harsh guards.
When they were released from their prison, they were new men, but the world appeared to be the same. It would take a while to adapt to the weird situation, but it didn't take long for Kelvin to earn five million more credits.
He received a message an hour after the settlement. He had been disgruntled with the settlement, and he was even complaining to Wrath about it. But the message he received changed his mind.
"It has been found that Richard had planned to deceive the Yggdrasil civilization army and cheat you out of a fair settlement before he engaged in the minor infraction against you."
"His actions have undermined the discipline and legal system of the Yggdrasil civilization army. They cannot be condoned or encouraged, so he is sentenced to spend 10 years in a dream prison, and his properties will be seized to pay you and the court as atonement for his actions."
- You have received 5,128,296 merit points.
The message and notification perked him up immediately. He said, "You know what? I take back everything I said about using an AI for arbitration. The legal system of the army isn't so bad. It just needs some time to get accustomed to that, that's all."
Wrath didn't buy his explanation. His change in stance on the matter was too abrupt for her to be fooled. So she asked, "Does your change of mind have anything to do with what you just checked on your mark, and if it does, what is that message?"
He showed her the message, which made her laugh.
She said, "Very interesting. He probably got rid of his merit points to cheat you. I like such thinking."
Kelvin sneered and said, "It clearly didn't work. I finally got paid for allowing myself to be punched. It seems that there is justice in the world."
Wrath rolled her eyes, and she said, "Maybe you should be the one to be investigated for trying to cheat the system."
Kelvin shook his head. "That's just slander. I was the one that got hit, not him. The fact that I didn't try to dodge and instead leaned in just a little so that his punch would definitely hit my face is not a criminal offense."
He could have dodged the punch if he wanted to because the man that had punched him was only B-rank, and he had sensed the attack before it happened. But he didn't do that.
He wanted to be a victim again since the first time felt so good, so he leaned into the attack instead. Unfortunately, he didn't earn as many merit points as he thought he would earn.
He felt that he had been cheated for his expert performance in playing the victim, so he screamed bloody murder after he was given just five hundred thousand merit points.
Now that justice has been served on his behalf, he felt as if everything that had gone wrong with the works had become right again.
He smiled and said, "Now that that is over, let's begin our mission."
Wrath clapped in excitement. She said, "I hope we come across a resistance cell and have to fight for our lives until we barely escape with our lives. Then a chase ensues in which the enemy pursues us, and we call repeatedly for reinforcement as our lives depend on it. It is going to be epic."