The Final Boss Has Returned
Chapter 42
Those gathered here, especially those who had climbed to executive positions in the Church of Infinite Yujin, were overwhelmingly fanatical devotees of Yujin—one could say so without exaggeration.
The fanatics of the Church of Infinite Yujin!
They were among those who understood Yujin better than anyone else.
The fact that Yujin did not strike at Drakan first!
It was because there was not yet a justifiable reason to attack Drakan.
But that did not mean the Church of Infinite Yujin would stand by and watch this potential threat called Drakan, who had contracted with Jeil E&M.
Yujin and the Church of Infinite Yujin were separate entities. While the church voluntarily supported Yujin, he did not directly control it.
Thus, Rexas knew all too well that even if he helped the merfolk kill Drakan, so long as public opinion was well-manipulated, the ones mainly taking the flak would be the fanatics like themselves, while Yujin would suffer little damage.
After all, this was not Yujin's order, but a 'deviation' by a 'rowdy section of the fandom.'
'That bastard must be eliminated, no matter what!'
Drakan!
If they could get rid of this potential threat to Yujin's hegemony—this bastard who would rise as a true threat once he completed all the Dark Apostle quests—before he could even sprout!
If it could help pave Yujin-nim's future path!
Countless fanatics willing to swallow such insults with a smile were scattered everywhere throughout the Church of Infinite Yujin.
And Rexas was one such fanatic.
Of course, blindly heading down to the sea to make contact with merfolk was a daunting task, but Rexas was himself quite an experienced explorer!
Though finding merfolk in the vast ocean was a long shot, Rexas thought that if he could eliminate Drakan, it would be a lucrative deal.
Of course, Rexas was not without sense, so he intended to take only a small elite force loyal to him and proceed in secret.
"Anyway, both of you had truly excellent ideas."
After praising the executive who proposed the plan and the executive who had contracted with the Goddess of the Sea, the atmosphere of the meeting room became harmonious, and before long, the Church of Infinite Yujin Eastern Branch meeting concluded.
After the meeting ended, one of the executives who had attended, Iaron, logged out immediately.
Beep.
As the capsule door opened, a spacious room was revealed.
'Iaron,' climbing out of the capsule, immediately picked up the smartphone atop the dresser and made a call.
Ring, ring, ring, ring, ring.
The moment the ringtone cut off with a click, 'Iaron' spoke in a polite voice:
"Director Kim, there is a report I must deliver urgently."
* * *
In the grand conference room that had now become familiar, familiar members had gathered for a meeting.
"The point is this Scylla. One of the two great guardian divine beasts of the merfolk. If we reconstruct the information on Scylla based on the cinematic video from Drakan-nim's quest, the testimony of the Merfolk Prince Nereus, and the legends of the Arth World, it is a giant monster specializing in sonic attacks, and the expected patterns are as follows."
Team Leader Lee was conducting a raid briefing based on the Scylla intelligence he had obtained, and beside me, Ignis sat listening to his briefing with rapt attention.
I folded my arms, gazing at the massive form of Scylla displayed on the presentation screen, lost in thought.
Scylla!
The guardian divine beast of the merfolk!
A giant sea serpent with six heads!
That bastard was, in my opinion, the greatest obstacle of this quest.
The majesty I had seen in the cinematic video and the information I had heard from Nereus were truly tremendous.
A monster that might be even more powerful than the raid boss monster, the Thunderbird, that the Simseong Milkyway Guild had recently taken down—simply due to the underwater environment!
That was Scylla.
"If the Scylla raid succeeds, this will become the first successful underwater raid case in Arth Saga Second."
"That's rather enticing."
Ignis replied, licking his lips at Team Leader Lee's words.
I looked at Ignis and smiled.
With my current strength, I couldn't face Scylla yet.
Therefore, I intended to mobilize JDG and Ignis once again to have them face Scylla in my stead.
Boss monster raids could truly be called the flower of Arth World content.
Especially, the stronger the boss monster, the higher the fame of the guild or party that conquered it.
Even six years ago, the money earned from live-broadcasting boss monster raids through game-specialized cable stations had been substantial, and now with the internet broadcasting platform called Arth Live, the situation was said to be no less, if not more, than in the past.
In particular, the real-time streaming of monster raids by super-giant guilds on the scale of the Ten Great Guilds could truly be said to be raking in money with a pitchfork.
'I heard that this time, the Simseong Milkyway side easily made over a hundred million from the Thunderbird raid.'
Hundreds of millions from streaming alone!
It was truly an amount that lost all sense of reality.
So it was only natural that Ignis showed interest in the Scylla raid.
Well, it wasn't a bad thing for me either.
After all, I just had to put on airs about a rice cake I couldn't eat myself while working Ignis to the bone.
Right then, as the meeting continued.
The conference room door opened and someone appeared.
A man neatly dressed in a black suit—none other than Director Kim, her secretary who had taken me to Sin Ha-yeon in the past.
"Managing Director. I apologize. An urgent report has come in, forcing me to intrude upon you in this manner."
"What report?"
Sin Ha-yeon asked back, her face cold—an expression I could never get used to, so different from how she treated me.
"Even if I speak here..."
"It's fine. Everyone here is tight-lipped anyway. If they aren't, well, we can make them tight-lipped."
At Sin Ha-yeon's words, a heavy silence swept through the room.
'If they aren't tight-lipped, make them tight-lipped.'
Truly, her ambitions were befitting of a chaebol.
Having heard her words, Director Kim finally caught his breath and spoke in a composed tone.
"We have received contact from an informant. It appears the Church of Infinite Yujin's Eastern Branch has made contact with the merfolk and formulated a plan to interfere with Drakan-nim's quest."
The explanations Director Kim laid out starting from those words were enough to plunge the conference room into an even heavier silence.
The Church of Infinite Yujin!
The fact that they were mobilizing even the contractor of the Goddess of the Sea to target me left everyone in the conference room speechless.
And I instinctively realized.
That the 'informant' Director Kim spoke of was a spy!
'So they've infiltrated a spy inside the Church of Infinite Yujin.'
If it weren't a spy, they couldn't have learned these internal affairs so immediately.
Moreover, unlike a guild, the Church of Infinite Yujin did not have strict joining requirements.
It was a fandom anyone could join, and leaving was just as free.
It was an organization perfectly optimized for planting spies.
Of course, the reason I could figure it out so quickly was because I myself had planted spies in enemy guilds or removed spies from our own guild back when I waged war against other guilds before rising to become a top ranker.
Furthermore, I had a record of infiltrating spies into the Revolutionary Army, his faction, when I fought that bastard Yujin.
Information was crucial in war, and the spies who brought that information were even more crucial.
Well, I did lose to Yujin even with spies planted, but that wasn't what was important right now.
'Sin Ha-yeon, it seems her grudge against that bastard Yujin runs deeper than I thought.'
I looked at Sin Ha-yeon's profile and thought.
I recalled the look in Sin Ha-yeon's eyes when she mentioned Yujin the first time we met.
Remembering her gaze filled with rage toward Yujin, just like mine, I smiled.
Indeed, I thought I had done well to join hands with her, and I spoke.
"I was wondering why no interference was coming. So it's finally here."
The fact that the Church of Infinite Yujin bastards were trying to interfere with my quest, even mobilizing the contractor of the Goddess of the Sea, was not particularly surprising.
Rather, I was almost wondering what took them so long.
I had received countless obstructions before rising to become a top ranker, and had dished them out as well, so I was very familiar with these dirty backroom schemes.
Well, that bastard Yujin was a sucker, or perhaps that's why he was obsessed with fair head-on fights and never resorted to such backroom schemes, but the Church of Infinite Yujin was different.
Yujin's fanatics, whom I had been sick and tired of dealing with even in the previous game!
Those who would gladly leap into flames with a smile at a single word from Yujin—that was the Church of Infinite Yujin.
Such bastards would never leave me alone—his greatest rival, the great villain of the past, a former top ranker, and according to the Analysis King's analysis, a dangerous individual with a high probability of becoming his future archenemy.
It was obvious they would try to eliminate me by any means necessary.
After all, Arth Saga Second was a hardcore game with only one life!
If they killed me, it would be removing an obstacle blocking Yujin's path—a tremendous achievement from the perspective of Yujin's fanatics.
Well, they might get some flak, but perhaps they calculated that they could get by if they insisted the Church of Infinite Yujin and Yujin were separate entities.
"It seems they've acknowledged me as a big shot over there, so I'm almost a little excited..."
Hearing my words, Sin Ha-yeon burst into a snort of laughter.
Her icy face melted like spring snow, and with a smile, she rolled her wheeled chair close to my side and whispered.
"So, Drakan-nim. What shall we do?"
"We'll use them."
I answered Sin Ha-yeon's question without hesitation.
"To the point where they'll regret daring to scheme against me."
I smiled, adding to my words.
The position of top ranker was not one won by child's play.
Until one reached that seat!
One had to overcome the dirty backroom schemes and obstructions of countless bastards, sometimes toppling opponents through conspiracy, and finally seize it through a bloody struggle where blood was washed away with blood—that was the top ranker seat of the past, the previous game.
To dare scheme against someone like me with backroom tricks!
They were a hundred—no, a thousand—years too early.
'How cute.'
I sneered at the Church of Infinite Yujin scheming against me, and to such me, Sin Ha-yeon spoke again.
"How do you intend to use them?"
"Feed them false information through various channels and make them misjudge my situation."
"If you mean false information, what kind of false information?"
The moment I finished speaking, Ignis threw a question.
I looked back and forth between Ignis and Sin Ha-yeon and continued.
"The details of my quest have already become the talk of the town. There probably isn't a single user playing Arth Saga who doesn't know the contents of my quest. Naturally, the Church of Infinite Yujin bastards know it too."
The revival of the Merfolk Kingdom!
I could confidently say there was almost no user unaware of the quest I was undertaking.
Nereus had appeared at a harbor packed with users and openly explained the quest, and Arth Live streamers including the Analysis King had analyzed the contents of my quest and thrown out all sorts of wild theories about the probability of success, so if someone didn't know the contents of my quest, you could call them a spy.
All too naturally, it was clear that the Church of Infinite Yujin bastards also knew my quest details well.
"And any user with common sense would surely guess that my quest isn't the kind that wraps up quickly."
As I spoke, I recalled the streamers' analyses of the video of my quest.
The recovery of the guardian beast.
And even war with the merfolk!
The majority of streamers speculated that the time required for me to achieve these two goals alone would be at least three months at the earliest, and at longest, six months to over a year.
Of course, separate from their speculation, I was already at the stage where I had revived the Kraken and was on the verge of convening the merfolk tribal council.
And the fact that the Kraken had been resurrected was still unknown to anyone in the Arth World except Nereus and his close associates.
Because when the tribal council was convened, Nereus planned to announce the Kraken's resurrection.
Furthermore, since both Sin Ha-yeon and I were contractors of the Demon Subjugation Coalition, the Transcendents of the Hall of Myriad Gods could not pry into our situation.
"And the fact that I've skipped one quest is still unknown to other users."