The Final Boss Has Returned
Episode 10
“Management?”
“Yes. You know what a management company is, right?”
She said this to me with a faint smile.
Of course, I knew about management companies too.
A management company was a concept similar to an entertainment agency, a company that mainly conducted business by signing contracts with Rankers or Named Players and managing them like celebrities.
And successful Rankers or popular users each had a management company behind them.
As an exception, Yujin had created his own management company with his crew and was affiliated with that, but in any case, that was how it was.
“I know.”
As I answered, a bitter smile formed on my face.
In the past, this concept of a management company didn’t exist.
There had simply been no reason for it.
Management was a concept that emerged after Miracle Entertainment, the developer and publisher of Arde Saga, launched Arde Live, an internet broadcasting platform, and began supporting real-time live streaming of Arde Saga—which had been impossible until then—exclusively on Arde Live.
Arde Saga was not just a game.
It was the world’s one and only perfect virtual reality game.
When real-time streaming of such a game was permitted, the internet was truly rocked by a massive upheaval.
Arde Live, which held a monopoly on Arde Saga’s real-time streaming, instantly became a massive site that could rival Mitube, the world’s largest video platform.
And by now, internet game broadcasting had become so mainstream that it was taken for granted for Rankers or Named Players to upload videos or stream broadcasts on Arde Live to earn revenue.
Six years ago.
This was a completely different environment from the days when, at best, one would send linked quest footage to a cable game broadcast to have it aired and receive an appearance fee, or upload videos to the official Arde Saga homepage.
The users’ mindsets, too—if during the days of the first game everyone had admired Dark Gamers who made money by selling items, then in Second, everyone and their mother was uploading videos to Arde Live trying to become streamers who would monopolize both money and popularity through game broadcasts. That said it all.
Indeed, compared to a Dark Gamer who toiled for months to barely scrape up a rare item to sell, it was only natural that being a popular streamer who could simply edit and upload dungeon-clearing footage to have money pour in seemed far more attractive to anyone.
Of course, actually becoming a popular enough streamer to make money just by uploading dungeon-clearing footage was extremely difficult, but people didn’t really pay attention to that.
‘Time really has flown by.’
Feeling anew how much the present had changed from the past, I spoke to the woman before me.
“So, are you saying you want to scout me?”
“Yes. Something like that.”
Management. It wasn’t a bad offer.
The times had already changed, and to complete my revenge against him, I had to adapt to the changed era.
Unlike six years ago, in the era of Second, thanks to Arde Live the market pie itself had grown enormously beyond comparison with the past, and because of that, it was difficult to accomplish things at an individual user level like in the old days.
That was precisely why entities like management companies and agencies had appeared.
In any case, to grow bigger, and thereby ultimately achieve my goal of taking revenge on Yujin, I needed to utilize this system called management.
“What are the conditions?”
But that didn’t mean I would just join any management company without considering the conditions.
So hearing her proposal wasn’t such a bad option from my perspective.
A smile rose to the corners of her mouth upon hearing my words.
“That doesn’t seem like something we should discuss inside the game, does it?”
“Are you saying we should meet in person?”
At my words, she laughed, covering her mouth.
She looked straight at me and spoke in a clear voice.
“Right now, a car I sent should be waiting outside your house.”
My face stiffened slightly at her words.
The fact that a car was waiting meant that this user’s real-world identity was no ordinary person.
Of course, I had definitely been a celebrity in the past and had frequently given interviews with gaming media, and even now, if you searched for my email address on the internet it came up as a Dracan mail address, so quite a bit of my personal information was floating around online.
But using my personal information scattered across the internet to track down the studio apartment I had moved to and even have a car waiting there was a completely different matter.
My thoughts racing that far, I realized one truth.
The user before me wasn’t just someone from a game, but a person who held power in the real world!
“Please get in. Let’s talk when we meet. At a place with a good view. Over steak.”
She said this to me in a gentle voice with a supremely relaxed smile.
I looked at her and smiled.
It was clear that she was a person of power in reality.
But so what?
The fact that she had sent a car to recruit me meant, conversely, that someone like me was necessary to her.
In the end, the one holding the knife handle was me.
So no matter who she was, there was no need for me to feel intimidated.
“I’ll look forward to the steak.”
“Good. Then I’ll see you there.”
At my unchanged expression and tone, she made a slightly surprised face, then soon replied with a smile that said she found it interesting, before logging out and vanishing from that spot.
Looking at the place where she had disappeared without a trace, I spoke quietly.
“Logout!”
* * *
After logging out of Arde Saga Second, I took off the helmet on my head and pressed the open/close button inside the capsule.
Ziiing.
With a low sound, the capsule opened. After stepping outside, I opened the small window in my studio apartment and looked out.
“So what she said was true.”
In the scenery of endlessly lined studio buildings and old multiplex houses between alleys, a black luxury sedan that stood out prominently came into my sight.
A smile formed on my lips at the sight of the sedan.
Having confirmed that her words about having a car waiting were true, it was now time to hear what conditions this great person of power had to offer.
* * *
The place I arrived at after riding in the black luxury sedan was beyond my imagination.
‘The Jeil World Tower, of all places…’
Seoul.
Rising on prime land where property values were astronomical, it was Korea’s tallest skyscraper and a symbol of wealth built by Jeil Group, South Korea’s top media conglomerate—the Jeil World Tower!
Right before my eyes, that famous Jeil World Tower stood firmly in place, boasting a majesty like a spear piercing the sky.
‘Back in the day, it was still under construction.’
Seeing the Jeil World Tower brought back old memories anew.
After losing to Yujin and being saddled with astronomical debt, I had sold all my items to make money, and even that wasn’t enough, so I had taken any work I could find before boarding a deep-sea fishing vessel, and one of those jobs was working on this Jeil World Tower construction site.
It felt like just yesterday I was working on the dusty construction site wearing a hard hat and safety boots, groaning with effort, yet time had flowed to the point where this tower was now completed.
I felt anew how quickly time flew.
“Please come in. The young lady is waiting.”
A polite voice was heard by my ear.
An intellectual-looking handsome man in a suit wearing glasses.
This man, who had asked me to call himself Director Kim, was the one who had come with the luxury sedan to pick me up in front of my studio apartment.
It felt strange to see a “Director” that I’d only seen in dramas in real life.
At the same time, I could somewhat guess the identity of the woman who commanded this man.
Actually, coming all the way to the Jeil World Tower and not knowing would be even more absurd.
‘I’ve hooked a bigger fish than I thought.’
Thinking that, I spoke.
“Sure, why not.”
I nodded and followed Director Kim inside the Jeil World Tower.
Passing through the splendid and massive lobby, I arrived at an elevator whose interior was so luxurious and spacious that I could tell at a glance it was a VIP-only elevator.
Director Kim, who had entered ahead of me, pressed the topmost button in the elevator.
The 124th floor.
It was the top floor of this towering skyscraper.
How much awkward silence drifted between Director Kim and me?
Ding!
Finally, the elevator stopped with a chime, and the doors opened smoothly.
“My guidance ends here.”
Leaving Director Kim’s voice behind me, I got off the elevator.
The 124th floor was a spacious hall where soft classical music and a gorgeous chandelier made an impression.
No, to be exact, it could be called a sky lounge where the splendid nightscape of the metropolis Seoul was visible through the floor-to-ceiling glass installed beyond.
And at a table set up like a lonely island in the center of that spacious hall, she was sitting.
“You arrived right on time.”
She looked exactly the same as she did in the game.
With dark blue-dyed hair cut in a bob, she looked at me and smiled.
Without a word, I went and sat down.
A steak with steam rising as if freshly grilled came into my view.
To think that to meet just one person like me, she had rented out the entire sky lounge of the nation’s tallest skyscraper and served steak.
It was a creative damn splurge of money that I couldn’t even have imagined. Of course, as the guild master of the Iron-Blood Alliance, I had handled quite a lot of money, but since I had sent most of the surplus to my parents after reinvesting in the game, I wasn’t one to indulge in luxuries myself.
Anyway, it seemed that those born with a golden spoon really thought differently.
Marveling at her fresh damn splurge, I picked up my knife, cut the steak, and spoke.
“Who are you, anyway? A third-generation chaebol of Jeil Group?”
Hearing my words, she answered with a smile as if amused.
“You guessed well.”
It was as expected.
Well, she had given hints this blatantly, so it would have been stranger not to guess correctly.
The Jeil Group’s pride, the Jeil World Tower.
And the young lady that Director Kim had mentioned!
All the circumstantial evidence pointed to her identity being a third-generation chaebol of Jeil Group.
I looked at her and smiled.
Now it was time to hear the reason why someone who was practically a chaebol herself had wanted to meet with me, of all people.
To me, who was thinking that, she spoke.