WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
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Chapter 37: Inflate
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Was it because he had lived through such a vast span of time?
Rimon had experienced all sorts of things.
Many of them were things others could not even imagine, so it had become rare for anything to surprise him.
“...You secretly prevented every war that was supposed to happen over the last thirty-two years and maintained peace?”
Yet at this very moment.
Rimon felt shock so profound that his eyes might as well have popped out and rolled across the floor, for the first time in a very long while.
“The Seven Dragons Society did that?”
As though demanding that they confess at once if it was a joke.
No, as though begging them to call it a lie for the sake of his own sanity even if it was not.
Rimon asked again, his voice trembling.
“Yes.”
But she did not hesitate.
Instead, she shattered Rimon's desperate hopes in one stroke, then dealt another blow to his stunned face.
“Whenever there were signs of war for any reason, we bribed and threatened those in power until they compromised.”
“We created the Player Association and the guild system, so Players would regulate themselves.”
“Whether they were black mages, mad scientists, or Players, we monitored those who intended to cause major turmoil in the world and eliminated them before they could act.”
Rimon felt dizzy.
Li Qing-yu's few words had struck him more severely than the thousands of Skills Lee Cheon-gi had unleashed.
That was how staggering her confession was.
No matter how much time had passed.
No matter that it had gone legitimate and become a major corporation.
The Seven Dragons Society Rimon knew was not an organization that would ever do such things.
No, more precisely, it could not.
“Isn't that against your doctrine?”
The Seven Dragons Society was, at its core, a religion.
An organization that believed a world ruled solely by dragons was the supreme ideal.
That was why it believed the world had to be torn apart to turn back the age, and did not hesitate to act on that belief.
It had led wars and chaos for centuries.
That was why, when the Seven Dragons Society first went legitimate, many people had suspected its intentions.
But what was this?
It prevented war, regulated Players, prevented chaos, and maintained world peace?
Anyone who knew even a little about the old Seven Dragons Society would have been left speechless.
Li Qing-yu's answer was clear.
“No, actually, our founders' teachings never said we had to destroy the world.”
Of course they did not.
When the Seven Dragons were alive, they could not possibly have taught their followers to destroy the world they ruled. And after they died, teaching anything would have been impossible.
The Seven Dragons Society's obsession with revenge had simply become tangled with its doctrine, making it take the overthrow of the world for granted.
In that sense, it was entirely possible for the Seven Dragons Society to contribute to world peace.
After finishing her explanation, Li Qing-yu smiled brightly.
“Our most important goal is to create an ideal world like the one our founders made, not to overthrow the world.”
“...Would that nonsense work on the others too?”
“Oddly enough, it didn't work very well.”
“Of course it wouldn't...”
Li Qing-yu tilted her head as though she did not understand why.
Rimon stared at her in disbelief.
If the Seven Dragons Society were an organization that could be swayed by such moderate persuasion, it would not have spent centuries fighting bloody battles with Rimon.
More than anything, it reversed the goal and the means.
They were supposed to bring Rimon down to create their ideal world. Instead, they were creating an ideal world to bring Rimon down.
What, the result was the same, so it did not matter?
Tell a devout believer that the Pure Land and Heaven were both good places, so they should start following another religion tomorrow.
Or tell them their doctrine was irrational, so they should start eating forbidden foods to their heart's content tomorrow.
You would hear the true curses of the faithful.
The Seven Dragons Society, especially, knew no compromise.
There were enough people whose entire extended families had been slaughtered after they criticized its doctrine that you could count them by the hillful.
And now, one of the Seven Princesses, the Seven Dragons Society's highest leaders and pillars of faith, was saying she did not see what the big deal was.
Rimon's vision swam.
“In truth, there was strong opposition to this plan even within the Seven Dragons Society. At first, it was so severe that it was impossible to proceed at all.”
“So the martial world's code hasn't disappeared yet.”
“Pardon?”
“No, I was just relieved to know the Seven Dragons Society doesn't only have people who think like you.”
To think he would feel relieved that there were still people in the Seven Dragons Society who opposed peace.
Even he found the feeling ironic.
Perhaps because she could not understand his complicated emotions, Li Qing-yu blinked at him and continued.
“Anyway, to persuade those who opposed us, we had to present another plan.”
“What plan now? Did you preserve peace in space this time?”
“No.”
Li Qing-yu lightly shook her head at Rimon's sarcastic remark.
Then she opened her mouth.
And once again, he had no choice but to doubt his ears.
“The plan to bring the Seven Dragons Society into the open.”
“...The what?”
“As a means to gain the funding and outside influence needed for the World Peace Plan, we proposed founding the Seven Dragon Group and bringing the Seven Dragons Society into the light.”
“I didn't ask again because I'm deaf! Why the hell is that coming up now?!”
Rimon shouted without meaning to.
The Seven Dragons Society going legitimate and the emergence of the Seven Dragon Group had been among the greatest events since the start of the Iron Age.
At the time, it had become a social issue that shook the world even more than the emergence of Constellations and Players.
And it had all happened because of him.
That was not something he could simply brush off with an, “Oh, is that so?”
Yet Li Qing-yu answered calmly, as if it were nothing remarkable.
“Because that was the only way to persuade those who opposed us.”
“...You used the Seven Dragons Society going legitimate as a pretext to carry out the World Peace Plan?”
“Yes. Sword Duke, I believe you are misunderstanding something. It was not as though the Seven Dragons Society enjoyed remaining in the shadows.”
No one liked living in hiding.
That was even more true for an organization like the Seven Dragons Society, which possessed wealth and power.
They had not revealed it because they were bound by doctrine and feared provoking opposition, but the leadership of the Seven Dragons Society had longed for the light as well.
In that sense, the World Peace Plan was the perfect pretext.
For one thing, it did not go against their doctrine.
It also gave them a justification for bringing Rimon down.
And if things went wrong, those who had first proposed the plan would take responsibility.
Once those conditions were added, it had been inevitable that not only the princesses but even the elders eagerly accepted the World Peace Plan.
“In fact, the reason we were able to finish going legitimate so quickly was because everyone had been secretly preparing for it beforehand.”
As it turned out, most of the Seven Princesses had been quietly preparing to bring the Seven Dragons Society into the open as well.
The reason the public had accepted it so readily.
The reason the Seven Dragon Group had been able to dominate the global economy less than a year after its founding.
All of it had been possible because of their preparations.
Li Qing-yu spoke with a bright smile.
Rimon looked at her with the hollow expression of a man who had lost his country.
“...To hell with the martial world's code.”
Why did the Seven Dragons Society's betrayal hurt more than Yoo Na-gyeong's or Kang Jeong-su's?
Rimon did not know.
All he had done was reconfirm the timeless truth that there was no one you could trust, and that young people these days were still young people these days.
Li Qing-yu gave a bitter smile as she watched Rimon shudder with betrayal.
“But preserving world peace was truly difficult. Far more difficult than we had expected.”
“You thought it would be easy?”
“No, we knew it would be difficult.”
World peace.
A dream even a child could have.
Yet a goal only a child could hold.
The Seven Dragons Society only learned the difficulty of it after experiencing what it had never known while trying to overturn the world.
“We simply did not expect to spend more funds in thirty-two years than the Seven Dragons Society had spent over the last several centuries.”
“Just how much money did you people spend?!”
“Well, I cannot calculate the exact figure, but a few years after the Seven Dragon Group was founded, it nearly went bankrupt as a whole.”
“Are you trying to wreck the global economy while claiming to protect world peace?!”
Rimon was stunned.
The Seven Dragon Group was the greatest corporation in the world.
What would have happened if the corporation said to possess all the wealth in the world had gone bankrupt?
The Seven Dragons Society would have accomplished its centuries-long goal of overturning the world in a single blow.
Though it would have gone completely broke too.
“Of course, that was not the result we wanted either.”
Li Qing-yu spoke honestly.
The Seven Dragons Society's goal was to create an ideal world. No one wanted everyone to become beggars together.
Especially not those already enjoying immense wealth and prestige after successfully going legitimate.
“So we made the Monarchs into the new absolutes.”
“...???”
Rimon looked dumbfounded at the abrupt change of subject.
“How does that even connect... No, wait.”
What did the Seven Dragons Society nearly going bankrupt have to do with the Monarchs being revered as absolutes?
Rimon had been about to ask, but stopped.
Then he narrowed his eyes at Li Qing-yu.
“You said you created the Player Association and the guild system?”
“Yes.”
“Then don't tell me...”
As a PAB agent, Rimon had a rough understanding of how Players made their money.
And because he knew all too well what kind of organization the Seven Dragons Society was at its core, he could make a guess.
With a stunned look on his face, Rimon shouted the conclusion no one else could have imagined.
“You deliberately inflated it, didn't you?!”
“Exactly.”
Li Qing-yu nodded readily.
Then, with a peaceful expression, she continued.
“We deliberately bought Dungeon byproducts for hundreds or thousands of times their actual value and made high-level Players rich.”
The reason high-level Players were called one-person corporations and treated as the leading class of this era.
It was because the various byproducts they obtained from Dungeons, such as minerals, monster corpses, and items, were rare and expensive.
But who determined the value of Dungeon byproducts?
The Player Association.
In other words, the Player Association could inflate the value of Dungeon byproducts without limit.
And if the Seven Dragon Group treated Dungeon byproducts as precious too, their value would naturally soar to astronomical heights.
Even if they were useless trash.
“Under the regulations, Players and guilds pay part of their income to the Association. And if Dungeon byproducts increase in value...”
“The Association's profits increase too. And simply by adjusting that value as needed and repeatedly buying and selling...”
“The Seven Dragon Group could make enormous profits from price differences. And as a bonus, you could probably bury debts you should have been carrying yourself inside that bubble.”
Li Qing-yu looked impressed.
“Amazing. You figured out that much just from knowing we were behind the Association.”
But even after hearing that, Rimon could not smugly say, “Well, I am something of a genius.”
Instead, a vein bulged in his forehead.
“You bastards, that's fraud!!!”
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