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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 38
Chapter Title: The One and Only Reward
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Rimon let out a bloodcurdling shout, and Li Chingwei responded with a strangely bashful air.
"It's not exactly a scam. It was just a slightly sophisticated form of creative economics."
"How the hell is that massive shell game 'creative economics'?!"
Rimon ground his teeth.
Her words were just that ridiculous.
If everyone believed that stones were more precious than gold, you could buy gold with a pebble picked up from the roadside.
Likewise, the Seven Dragon Society had inflated the value of dungeon byproducts by hundreds or thousands of times, triggering controlled inflation to wipe out their debts.
In simple terms?
"They deliberately created a bubble!"
Just like the tulip bubble, where a single tulip bulb once fetched tens of thousands of dollars.
Or the dot-com bubble, when any internet-related company's stock skyrocketed dozens or hundreds of times over.
The Seven Dragon Society had artificially pumped up the value of dungeon byproducts.
What you'd call the dungeon bubble.
'Damn, no wonder single items cost hundreds of billions...'
At first glance, players seemed like the biggest winners. After all, they were the ones farming and selling those dungeon byproducts.
But taking a cold, hard look?
Even high-level players were ultimately primary producers.
In other words, just miners.
And given players' endless pursuit of levels, no matter how much money they made, they blew most of it on even pricier gear.
Often going into massive debt to do it.
Whether miners dug up gold or diamonds, it was the mine owners who got rich.
Likewise, in this Iron Age, the real winners from the dungeon bubble were the Association and the Seven Dragon Group.
They had countless ways to rake in fortunes just by manipulating the bubble.
In that sense, the common saying that the Seven Dragon Group "controlled all the world's wealth" was surprisingly accurate.
Of course, it wasn't exactly legal.
Cooking the books, stock manipulation, hoarding and cornering markets, monopolies—you name it.
It was harder to find what illegal tactic they hadn't used.
But even after confessing to this unprecedented scam, Li Chingwei showed no sign of remorse.
She just calmly made excuses.
"In any case, it prevented the world economy from collapsing."
"Wasn't the collapse in the first place because of your bungled attempt to 'protect world peace'?"
"Yes, but if we hadn't poured every bit of profit from that back into the effort, the world wouldn't be this peaceful now."
"..."
Li Chingwei spoke with a bright smile.
Rimon couldn't bring himself to deny it.
Without the Seven Dragon Society scheming in the shadows, wars would have broken out several times over the past few decades. That much was certain.
And in the worst case, clashes between entrenched powers and players might have sparked a global war.
Frankly, it was impressive.
They'd bought off all of it with money.
The method they'd used to earn that money was just absurd.
Deliberately engineering a bubble wasn't something just anyone could pull off.
Let alone fine-tuning it for decades without wrecking society at large, all while raking in steady profits.
It required immense accumulated capital over long ages.
The organizational might to rule the world in ancient times.
The know-how honed as a criminal syndicate.
Only the Seven Dragon Society, with all that in spades, could have achieved it.
"Even that wasn't enough—we had to weather several crises."
Li Chingwei confessed frankly.
Maintaining the world economy while safeguarding peace was possible for the Society, but it strained even them.
Every time they smothered a major incident, they'd scramble to secure the budget.
They'd lost fortunes failing to adjust the bubble.
They'd nearly missed intel and let wars erupt.
Unexpected rivals had forced sacrifices.
It was a time of unspeakable hardship.
"Most of the clans grew disillusioned, wondering how long we'd have to keep up this madness."
"No surprise there..."
Rimon muttered like he was groaning.
If they'd openly protected world peace, it might have been different.
But using dungeon bubbles, bribes, assassinations, and every dirty trick in the book meant they couldn't boast of their achievements.
They took all the losses without any glory.
No matter how idealistic the Seven Dragon Society, they wouldn't tolerate that forever.
Especially now, having legitimized and corporatized—they were hypersensitive to costs beyond mere faith.
"But our Black Dragon Clan never gave up, right to the end."
The one exception.
The Black Dragon Clan, who had proposed the plan from the start.
"To push forward despite the other clans' opposition, we paid a heavy price."
"Price?"
Rimon wore an expression like he dreaded whatever came next.
Unfortunately, his premonition hit the mark.
Li Chingwei smiled brightly, dropping another bombshell that rang in his skull like a gong.
"We agreed to cover all losses from protecting world peace ourselves."
"That..."
This was what it meant to be speechless.
He gawked like a carp gasping for air.
Finally shaking off the shock, as if bludgeoned in the back of the head, Rimon asked incredulously,
"They accepted that insane condition?"
"We made them accept it."
"How?"
Rimon couldn't fathom it.
The world peace plan had overwhelmed the entire Seven Dragon Society.
Dumping those losses on one clan?
No sane person would agree.
Banks don't lend to those who can't repay—just like the other clans knew the Black Dragon Clan couldn't shoulder it.
Yet somehow, they'd gotten them to swallow it.
Li Chingwei revealed the secret.
"We put up our stake in Hotel Leviathan as collateral."
The seven holding companies representing the Seven Dragon Society.
After putting up their pillar—the Black Dragon Clan's Hotel Leviathan—as collateral,
The other clans, who had vehemently opposed it before, suddenly flipped to fervent supporters of the world peace plan.
Li Chingwei said it like a joke.
She flashed a grin at Rimon, whose jaw had dropped in shock.
"Luckily, every time we offered shares, the other clans competed to lend us money, so we could keep the plan going."
Of course they did.
Hotel Leviathan shares meant control over the Seven Dragon Society.
Even as fellow Society members—no, especially because they were—they couldn't resist.
"We lost so many shares that we forfeited the clan's support."
From prestigious lineages producing Seventy-Two Supreme Arts heirs for centuries, to lowly newcomers barely in the clan.
Many had already turned their backs; some had even defected to other clans.
Li Chingwei said it with a smile.
Rimon listened blankly for a moment.
Then, something occurred to him, and he asked offhandedly,
"You've already lost a lot of shares?"
"Yes."
"...Didn't you say you'd give me 49% of Hotel Leviathan as a dowry?"
"I did."
"So how much is left?"
If loyalists over centuries had abandoned them, it wasn't just 1 or 2%.
Handing over another 49% on top—what remained?
Rimon asked half in disbelief.
The answer was crystal clear.
"1.1%."
"..."
"No need for that face—you heard right."
As if he couldn't trust his own ears,
Rimon blinked in a daze, and Li Chingwei smiled gently.
"The 49% for you, plus my remaining 1.1%—that's 50.1%, the last of our clan's assets."
Nearly half of Hotel Leviathan's shares.
To be precise, it was an enormous fortune.
Enough to dwarf the combined market caps of several major corporations.
But flipped around, it meant the Black Dragon Clan had lost an equally colossal amount already.
"Yes, our clan is already ruined."
Li Chingwei confessed.
It just hadn't shown publicly.
The Black Dragon Clan was as good as half-bankrupt.
"No one believes we can rise again. The elders are just plotting to sell me off to another clan for top dollar."
She said it lightly, like sharing an amusing anecdote.
Revealing her clan's downfall with casual ease.
To the stunned Rimon, she asked calmly,
"You said that if you hadn't met me, you might never have fought the Infinite Monarch?"
"..."
"That's right, but also wrong."
The hypothesis Rimon had voiced before her confession.
Li Chingwei affirmed it.
But denied it too.
"My visit was just the trigger. With our clan's fall, it was bound to happen eventually."
The fact that he hadn't clashed with the Monarch yet.
That was the Seven Dragon Society's achievement, pouring in endless funds and manpower to maintain peace.
Guarding it desperately meant nothing if Rimon blew the Monarch away.
But with nearly half their shares gone, the Black Dragon Clan could no longer sustain the plan.
Hence, the clash with the Monarch.
Not that the Society engineered the friction.
It happened because they failed to prevent it.
Li Chingwei spoke calmly, like presenting research at a conference.
"..."
Rimon fell silent, gazing at her.
Silent, silent, silent again.
Finally, staring into her obsidian eyes gleaming like jewels, he spoke.
"Why?"
He'd pondered it countless times.
Yet still couldn't find the answer.
A doubt rarer even in his long life—he asked again.
"Why go that far?"
They'd twisted their doctrines at will.
Pushed the Society to the brink of bankruptcy.
Overhauled the world's economic structure.
Lost their standing as their clan crumbled.
Any wise person would have claimed credit at the start and quit.
Any average fool would have given up after grasping the ordeals.
Even a total idiot would have backed off when the clan fell.
"Knowing there was nothing to gain?"
Yet they'd defied everyone, tightrope-walking this madness for 32 years to protect world peace.
Why?
Rimon asked in a grave tone.
"There was one thing we gained."
Meeting his deep golden eyes, Li Chingwei smiled softly.
And the reason for all that madness.
For selling off half the clan, losing all support, becoming a laughingstock—yet steadfastly upholding world peace.
The one reward she'd reaped.
She declared it brightly.
"You accepted my proposal."
The world peace they'd barely held for decades with the Society's full might.
The absolute being who upheld it for centuries with a single sword.
If they could gain Rimon, selling the entire Seven Dragon Society—even just the Black Dragon Clan—would be a bargain.
Looking at her beaming face, Rimon could only gape.
"...That's it?"
"It's not 'just' anything."
Li Chingwei shook her head slightly.
She glanced at the sky, where stars had vanished since Rimon's arrival.
Then, for the first time, she confessed the reason she needed humanity's strongest weapon—why she'd proposed marriage, a secret she couldn't share with anyone.
"In this era, after the Sword Tower vanished and the Sword Master lineage ended, you, Sword Duke, are the only one who can stand against the constellations."
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