◈ Chapter 335. Spend Greatly (2)
A cause is always important.
Moreover, am I not the sort of man who attaches all manner of flowery rhetoric even to the act of tilting a single teabag of green tea? But when it comes to hunting? A cause must be examined all the more strictly. ‘I made the priorities clear, that’s all.’ Yes.
As a result, I, Lee Hoyeol, succeeded in checking Unification Under Heaven by monopolizing potions. Of course, to Grandfel, all that hardship would be nothing more than unnecessary effort.
But never forget, Hoyeol.
Even if everyone in the world is assimilated.
I must not be swept up in Grandfel’s storm and stress as well……! ‘It’s not as easy as it sounds.’ First, Unification Under Heaven is no ordinary guild.
Thanks to being the only one not affiliated with the AAU International Agreement.
It means it would not be wrong to see them as one with their homeland.
The proof can be seen just by watching their activities in the Zero Mountains. ‘It’s like a guild commanding an army.’ To get to the point, the confrontation between me and Unification Under Heaven could spread into a confrontation between South Korea and China, between nations. On top of that, would the clash between me and Liuojunchun be anything ordinary? ‘The fact that Grandfel was certain he was prey means…’ Depending on the situation, a moment might come when both sides would have to stake their lives. Considering that level of intensity…… there was more than enough possibility that it could spread into a war between South Korea and China.
That was why I, Lee Hoyeol, used my head.
The fact that Unification Under Heaven was buying potions in bulk.
It was a rumor widely known among players.
So that Unification Under Heaven could be starved dry.
I drew up a plan to sweep up the potions first from this side.
They probably won’t last long. ‘Black history and karma both have a way of coming back around.’ According to Yong Seongrak, a former member of Unification Under Heaven, Liuojunchun drove any high-level player who could give him a lot of experience points into deadly situations, regardless of their class.
Unification Under Heaven’s ratio of dealers, tanks, and healers must have long since collapsed. With no healers to make up for the shortage of potions, it was only natural that the fallout would show immediately.
The golden round table of the Yusra Kingdom.
The Crusade Alliance meeting began, and the situation in the Zero Mountains was relayed.
Nam Cheolmin, the analyst of the Great Alliance, briefed them on the situation.
“As you can see, what stands out above all else is the weakness of Unification Under Heaven. If they had succeeded in clearing the cave rift, they would have distributed a press release as they always have until now…… but the media is quiet.”
Of course it would be. ‘As someone said, everything has its proper procedure.’ I know very well what happens if you forcibly pour water into a bottomless jar. It wasn’t for nothing that I struggled so diligently to repair the broken bottom of that jar, you know?
At Nam Cheolmin’s words, Nam Taemin scratched his head.
“That’s strange. With their recent momentum, there’s no way they should have failed……”
To be honest, my mouth was itching. ‘In a way, the strategy was a complete success.’ I shall personally make Unification Under Heaven eat dirt!
The very first stage had struck home perfectly.
And yet Grandfel’s pride was no ordinary pride.
Thanks to his stubbornness, which regarded even devising a strategy against prey as an extravagance, I couldn’t even praise myself. To soothe my regret, I would have to at least put forth a cause.
Only after the briefing ended did I open my mouth.
“The time has finally come.”
“……!!!”
All eyes focused on me.
Tension settled over the faces of those gathered.
I continued.
“The time to set foot on the Arcana Continent.”
Yes.
Reality and the Arcana Continent.
Full-scale traffic between them was no longer a dream. ‘I learned that for certain through this entry.’ I had added the magic of twilight to the portal manifestation process. Thanks to that, I confirmed that even passing through the portal together with Freyja did not place a significant burden on my mana consumption. ‘If only I can apply the subtle sensation I came to understand thanks to Grandfel’s talent to the Magic Tower’s portal…… around twenty people should be able to travel to and from the continent at once.’ In the end, it was because my ability to manifest magic had risen compared to before.
But as I say time and again, peerless under heaven.
Would he ever obediently admit his own shortcomings?
I shamelessly continued.
“It is thanks to all of you having seized the qualifications yourselves.”
“……
Is that true, Sir Hoyeol!”
“Finally……!”
“I am glad to have answered the Commander-in-Chief’s expectations.”
I swallowed a sigh as I looked at those who seemed moved with emotion.
You should feel the prick of conscience too, Grandfel……!
Though I felt uneasy, as if I had inadvertently pride-lighted them…… At times like this, the only thing I could do was lift the burden I bore even higher.
“Even so, the Arcana Continent will not be easy. The present Arcana Continent, where everything differs from the past, may be said without exaggeration to have all things, including the timeline, mixed together.”
The Demon World and the Arcana Continent had been connected, causing tectonic upheaval across the continent, and as if that were not enough, the ill omen had spat out beings of the past who had been erased.
Even if the Crusade Alliance had grown, the fact that it was dangerous did not change. It meant thorough preparations were necessary. And that was precisely my justification for buying up potions.
“However, you need not worry about that.”
“……?”
“All preparations regarding that are proceeding according to my procedures.”
“The Commander-in-Chief is correct.”
The one who supported my words was the king of the Yusra Kingdom.
Hakuna.
He rose from his seat and continued.
“An enormous quantity of potions and magic tools for the Crusade Alliance is steadily being accumulated in the supply depot. Enough that even if a full-scale war on a continental scale were to begin at once, there would be no shortage.”
Even if it’s a potion, I absolutely cannot chug it straight from the bottle. ‘But I can’t very well pour a potion into a teacup and drink it in the middle of battle either……’ As for me, who did not even use potions because of etiquette, it was out of the question to carry them piled up in my inventory. So I made a request of Hakuna. I asked to borrow the vast warehouse of the Golden Palace.
A parchment with the related details organized.
Nam Cheolmin, who had been reading through it, pushed up his glasses.
Soon, he muttered with a bewildered expression.
“N-no. How did you already secure this much volume……?”
“Hyung, don’t be surprised by yourself. Explain it to us too.”
“With our Great Alliance’s capital, this is a level of items we couldn’t even dream of! You’d have to be at Shining’s level to even try to match it……. No, I don’t think even they could do it?!”
Of course it should be that way. ‘I paid as much premium as they asked for all of it.’ I, Lee Hoyeol.
I had firmly resolved myself according to the old saying: earn like a dog and spend like a prime minister.
But always beyond imagination.
The spending power of a great family was several cuts above even that of a prime minister!
Was there a difference between incorruptible integrity and being stingy?
When I instantly purchased elixirs.
Elixirs that cost billions……
‘I thought my liver was going to drop.’ However, thanks to spending money in a truly great way.
Unification Under Heaven failed to catch even a hint of it and ended up sucking their fingers without being able to do anything in particular. Perhaps they felt as if they had been slapped across the face with bundles of cash?
I looked at those gathered, whose excitement was clear.
Starting with Harkon, all of them could not help but be filled with fresh emotion.
But what to do about this?
Regrettably.
“However, all things require an appropriate procedure.”
I would have no choice but to pour cold water on it.
“From this moment, I intend to select the advance party that will set foot on the Arcana Continent first. The number of the advance party will be exactly twenty. Its purpose is to pave an active path on the Arcana Continent. Of course, the evaluation standards will depend solely on my judgment.”
“……!!!”
As I said earlier, even if we use the Magic Tower’s portal.
At the current point in time, twenty people is the limit I can handle.
I could have honestly said it was due to my lack of ability.
But an advance party—what a plausible excuse, isn’t it?
Thanks to that, the ones shaken were the innocent people gathered.
Hisagi’s eyes had grown narrow before I knew it.
“In that case…… from now on, everyone here is each other’s competitor.”
At those words, their gazes seemed to blaze even more fiercely.
Amid those stares.
I felt guilty once again.
At this rate, there was no guilty man, no sinner of the highest order quite like me……
*
Orc Auction.
It would not be an exaggeration to say that the underground roads of the orcs spread across the entire Arcana Continent. Kitch walked through the orderly underground city, pointlessly touching the ornaments around her one by one.
Tap.
Each time, she sneered.
“I’m jealous.”
Tap.
“Our hideout is only full of the smell of rotting corpses.”
Tap.
“Is this the kind of world where the guys who only skim off the middle live better and eat better? Just how stuffed are your bellies, huh? How can you pile up this many magic stone magic tools?”
The orc guiding her squeezed his eyes shut. ‘Lord Ulrich, you must absolutely not see this……’ On the Arcana Continent, magic stones that contained mana were traded at high prices. Magic stones had value as materials in and of themselves, but they also served as fuel for certain high-performance magic tools.
Wobble—
Those precious magic tools swayed precariously under Kitch’s rough touch. Considering Ulrich’s prickly temperament, he ought to stop her at once.
Because Ulrich would roar that, no matter who the other party was, it was the responsibility of those who failed to do their jobs.
However.
“Right? Am I wrong?”
“……
You are correct.”
The problem was that the other party was Kitch, leader of the Shadow Mercenary Corps.
A heinous criminal organization with few rivals not only in the underworld.
But even in the light of day. ‘……Better to be scolded than to die.’ At Kitch’s swaggering attitude, the orc hunched his large body as much as he could and hurried his steps. Gooooo— Only after passing through several magic stone portals did they finally see the office of Ulrich, the head of Orc Auction.
Creak—
He opened the office door.
Glasses pulled low.
An antique fountain pen.
Ulrich, who had been writing something, raised his head.
Like the merchant he was, he immediately brought up the matter at hand.
“What is it you’re looking for that you’re causing such a fuss, Kitch?”
Kitch laughed.
“An orc with the blood of an old fox running through him is pretending not to know?”
The orc, intimidated by the force of the two, bowed his head.
“Th-then, please speak comfortably.”
Only after he left the office did Kitch continue.
“Hand over the hair.”
“The hair? Why are you coming to me to look for your cut hair?”
“Oh? You’re joking now?”
“Was it not funny? In any case, short hair suits you too.”
“Cut the crap and bring it.”
A joke thrown out to ease the atmosphere.
However, Kitch’s sharp reaction was enough to make Ulrich’s expression harden as well.
Ulrich answered in a voice that had dropped a level lower.
“The leader of the great Shadow Mercenary Corps came to Orc Auction…… Not to sell something, but to obtain something. From the moment I heard that, I had a guess. If you people came to obtain it, that means it must be an object that is one of a kind in the world and, at the same time, cannot be seized from someone else.”
Ulrich’s pupils flashed.
“Yes, you must have come looking for the hair of Claudi, who no longer exists in this world, correct? So you intend to break the rules of Orc Auction, Kitch? Do you think hair that was sold off long ago has value beyond that?”
“Phew.”
Kitch let out a short sigh.
From where to where should she explain?
Should she start with the fact that if it were only for money, she would not have moved at all?
Or with the fact that she had wandered the continent for several days just to find a few strands of hair?
If not that, should she begin by correcting that green pig’s words, asking why on earth he thought Claudi did not exist in this world?
“Too bad, but I don’t think words will work.”
Kitch’s head throbbed.
As expected, because she was trying to do something that wasn’t in her nature.
Her head itself must have been rejecting it.
So Kitch reached for her waist.
“I’m sorry. It’s an old matter I don’t know about, but in any case, to you, it must have been a transaction that ended successfully. If I undo such a transaction, the Shadow Mercenary Corps won’t be able to continue doing business with Orc Auction from now on.”
Ulrich nodded.
“That is so, Kitch. Even if the Arcana Continent collapses, that will be a story limited to the light of day. You know as well as I do that we of the underworld will survive somehow, do you not?”
He continued as if appealing to Kitch.
“I have no intention of needlessly increasing my enemies, Kitch. Recently, Gamond Phil of the Diamond Merchant Guild, who has been reaching his hand into the shadows, has been troublesome enough by himself.”
“Yeah?”
But Kitch drew her dagger at last.
“But I’m no longer part of the Shadow Mercenary Corps.”
“……
What does that mean?”
“What do you think it means? I quit being both the leader and a mercenary.”
“……
Quit? The Shadow Mercenary Corps, and the position of leader?!”
Ulrich was quick with calculations.
“Hmm.”
What Ullichwi had feared was severing ties with the Shadow Mercenary Corps.
After all, in the shadows, there was no one whose abilities could compare to theirs. That mutual relationship was Orc Auction’s irreplaceable asset.
And yet, Kichi was no longer part of the Shadow Mercenary Corps……
He finished his calculations.
“In that case, killing you would cause no loss to Orc Auction.”
“Right. Even if I kill you, the Shadow Mercenary Corps can continue doing business with Orc Auction.”
“So we were thinking the same thing. Such is the burden of a leader.”
Ullichwi looked at the documents he had been working on.
“A shame. I wanted to take care of this much first.”
“Want me to wait?”
“No need. It isn’t something that can be resolved in a day or two. Even for us, dealing with the Diamond Merchant Company, a great merchant power of the sunlit world, is no easy task.”
He set down his fountain pen.
“Well, perhaps it doesn’t matter.”
Even if he died by Kichi’s hand.
Orc Auction would continue to run just fine.
Just as it always had.
All thanks to its strictly established rules and procedures.
So now.
“Do you truly think you can find it, Kichi?”
“I have to. Even if I have to kill a few obstacles along the way.”
“Is that so? Then I suppose I’ll have to stop you, even if it means dying dozens of times.”
It was time for him to step forward, however belatedly, to prove his loyalty to “that person,” who had allowed such rules and procedures to be established.
Ullichwi removed the clothes he had been wearing.
A thick neck.
Rough skin.
Bones strong by nature.
An orc’s body was truly worthy of being called that of a warrior race.
Ullichwi was about to take a weapon from the drawer when a question suddenly occurred to him.
“By the way, may I ask you just one thing, Kichi?”
“Ask whatever you want.”
“Why are you suddenly looking for that hair? Your sigh proved that it isn’t simply because of money.”
“That’s kind of an annoying question.”
“They say you should grant even a dead person’s wish. Can’t you answer one question from a man who’s about to die? We do have some history between us, after all. I feel it would be unfair to die without even hearing the reason.”
Kichi closed her mouth and thought.……
How was she supposed to explain these complicated feelings?
After pondering for a while, Kichi finally answered.
“……
Pride. I don’t know exactly what it is, but maybe it’s because of that?”
At those words, Ullichwi’s gaze changed.
“……
Did you just say, pride?”
“Why? What? Am I not even allowed to repeat what someone else said?”
“No, it isn’t that…….”
For a fleeting instant, Ullichwi’s hand wavered.
How…….
How could she say the same thing as “that person”?
As he had said.‘……
Could the reason she’s looking for the hair be?’Ullichwi was quick with calculations.
“It seems we may have no reason to fight after all, Kichi.”
“What kind of bullshit are you trying to pull all of a sudden?”
“The reason I purchased that hair…….”
Tap—the thing he placed on the desk was not a weapon, but a jewel box.
When Ullichwi opened the jewel box, silver hair spilled forth light.
“No, the reason I have guarded it, is also because of pride.”
“……!”