Ex-level Player With the Greatest Civilization of All Time - Chapter 105

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 105

Mizuki returned to Japan.
Whoooosh—
He walked while listening to the roar of the departing aircraft.
And with each step, doubts bloomed.
When he’d first escaped through some one-room apartment in Korea, he’d felt pure elation.
Now he was worrying about the risk of mission failure.
Of course, looking back now, the difficulty had been impossible from the start—brutally so.
But that was his personal problem, and his superiors would never accept it.
Not when he’d boasted so confidently.
Coming back empty-handed was already bad enough…
‘Now I can’t reveal anything.’
A bomb was sleeping in his head.
That’s why leaking Nemesis secrets meant death.
So the worry weighed on him.
What if he invoked his right to silence?
Beyond being suspected of betrayal and cast out, there was the worst-case scenario—personal retaliation.
‘Maybe I should take my wife and kids and disappear overseas….’
In any case, he arrived home wearing a face full of anxiety.
The moment he opened the front door, his wife greeted him.
“Welcome back. You must be exhausted.”
His two sons rushed into his arms.
“Dad!”
“Are you done with work?”
He’d almost left them behind.
Part of him wanted to quit intelligence work now and go back to Tower Climbing like before, but wasn’t that just wishful thinking?
He didn’t know if Nemesis would even allow it.
‘Damn it—what the hell am I supposed to do?’
He ended up spending the night awake, then left the house the next morning.
His destination was the Association.
Come what may,
he had to make a report.
Of course, he’d frame it as an infiltration failure rather than disclose everything.
Zing—
How long had it been since he’d left the house?
His phone buzzed in his pocket.
Naturally, very few people knew his work number.
He hadn’t shared it with his family, so there were few places the call could be coming from…
“Who is it?”
An unknown number.
Mizuki hesitated, then answered—and was startled.
The Prime Minister’s Office secretariat?

—Mizuki, the Prime Minister wishes to see you.

The sudden summons meant Mizuki never made it to the Association that day.
“We’ve been expecting you. This way, please.”
He actually ended up having a private audience with the Prime Minister.
As the secretary opened the door and he stepped inside,
the Prime Minister spoke to him.
“Sit down.”
A political heavyweight already in his third consecutive term.
Not even a Player, yet there was an undeniable pressure radiating from him that couldn’t be defied.
“It’s a tea I favor, but does it suit your palate?”
“Ah, yes….”
The Prime Minister savored the tea once more at leisure, then spoke.
“To get to the point—as of today, you’ll be taking over as head of the Association.”
“What?!”
Mizuki nearly spat out his tea at the sudden remark.
“Masashi died last night. He was a decent fellow — it’s a shame, really.”
Masashi, the Association chairman, was dead.
They planned to announce it through the media soon enough.
It was shocking news, certainly.
But relief came first.
Only Masashi knew that he’d been sent on an intelligence mission.
And for some time now, orders had come down only by word of mouth — no digital trace.
Could this too be Neia’s orchestration?
Mizuki suppressed the chill running down his spine and posed a more fundamental question to the Prime Minister across from him.
“But why me as Association chairman?”
He was young, certainly.
He had no proven track record in political maneuvering or administrative competence.
Such an appointment was shockingly abrupt.
That was why Mizuki couldn’t make sense of this conversation.
Yet the answer that came back was even more absurd.
“Do you really not understand, or are you pretending?”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s her orders.”
Mizuki flinched.
He wasn’t fool enough to miss the implication.
Even a Prime Minister who controlled an entire nation
had leverage held over him by Neia.
“I called you here today to tell you that, Association chairman.”

* * *

Recently, across the globe, the Player communities were abuzz with one burning topic.
A private auction.
The sale of a Legendary-grade weapon was capturing all attention.

[Knights Guild bid on it too, right?]
└ They’re really greedy
└ Wasn’t Knights the hidden winner of that Peronta auction last time?
└ More like they tasted victory through Yggdrasil’s breath and can’t quit now.

[Who do you think will take it?]
└ I’m betting on the Chinese side this time.
└ They accumulated plenty of wealth last time anyway.

[Tempest Guild bidding reveal…]
└ Is this actually real?
└ It’s official?
└ 30 trillion… seriously?

[But couldn’t Tempest be bluffing?]
└ A fake bid to make Arc Guild spend more
└ Hm… that’s not impossible.

And as these various pieces of information kept updating, James watched carefully with keen attention.
He too suspected the lie behind Tempest Guild’s 30 trillion figure was substantial.
But the direction in which he measured that deception was entirely different.
“A ploy to lower our guard.”
There was a specific reason he thought this way.
30 trillion wasn’t loose change for anyone.
For a top-tier guild, an expenditure of that magnitude wouldn’t merely shake the foundations — it would buckle them.
The Sword of the Sword Ghost’s Remnant Shadow.
He knew perfectly well they wouldn’t part with it to his side no matter what.
They call out 30 trillion as if bearing an enormous burden.
It was plain he’d prepared far more money than that.
‘Forty trillion? Or perhaps even fifty?’
Fifty trillion for a single weapon.
But the weapon was by far the slot where stat increase felt most dramatic.
The first Legendary-grade weapon.
In an era where even Ancient-grade arms were scarce, the value of a Legendary-grade weapon with its options fully configured was well worth that price.
Especially given what we had at the Arc Guild….
‘Miller was there.’
Tempest had more than enough reason to secure that weapon, if only to counter him.
“Why not just kill that Frank bastard and be done with it?”
A Legendary-grade weapon certainly was impressive.
Miller, who’d devoted himself entirely to Tower Climbing, being summoned to the real world—that alone said everything.
“Calm down. If it comes to that, we’re talking real war.”
Frank was the Master of the Tempest Guild.
Killing him would be genuine catastrophe.
“I don’t particularly care.”
“Well, I do.”
“That’s going to be a problem…”
Miller gnawed at his fingernails anxiously.
He seemed displeased by the very situation itself—Tempest applying pressure over the Sword of the Sword Ghost’s Remnant Shadow.
James found the display absurd.
‘Anyone watching would think it was his from the start.’
Yet at the same time, he welcomed the current state of affairs.
Miller was a member of the Arc Guild and yet simultaneously a troublemaker who didn’t follow orders well.
This was the perfect opportunity to cement his debt and put him to use.
There was even a place where force was needed soon enough.
“Don’t worry too much. I have ways to collect the funds elsewhere.”
“I’m not reassured. Use my entire savings if you need to—three years’ salary too, whatever it takes. Please, I’m begging you.”
For her presence to shake even Miller’s very soul.
Neia truly was something else.
Every move she made stirred up new developments.
And not long ago, they say she was the first to create the Blessing of Trial?
James was in the middle of speaking with Miller about all this.
Knock-knock-knock.
Someone rapped on the door.
The person who entered at James’s permission was Jake, one of the officers.
He’d grown stronger with the Goddess’s Tears.
“Good work. What’s the situation?”
“We’ve got him. Managed to lock him in the guild’s underground detention.”
It had taken quite some time.
They’d managed to capture an Eclipse executive who’d caused a stir in Peronta some time back and fled.
“I should go see him now.”
“Weren’t you in the middle of something urgent?”
“Staying here won’t change anything anyway.”
Jake glanced at Miller, who remained in the executive office trembling with anxiety, then moved with James.

As James entered the sealed room after arriving at the basement via the VIP elevator, Jake spoke.
“The thing is, though…”
“…There’s something unusual about him?”
“He’s been muttering something I can’t quite make sense of.”
“Muttering, you say… Understood for now.”
James stepped inside after hearing this.
There sat Berdon, the Eclipse executive, bound hand and foot.
“Hehehehe… foolish…”
“Hand over information about the organization. I’ll spare your life.”
“… salvation…”
James understood what Jake had meant.
Conversation seemed impossible.
The man muttered to himself like someone whose spirit had departed.
After several more attempts, they abandoned questioning and withdrew.
Then came Jake’s voice.
“What are we doing with him?”
“He has his uses.”
Money.
Berdon was the means to participate in this auction.
Eclipse was a credential politicians loved to claim.
An international headache.
Having captured a high-ranking Eclipse executive under his command was excellent propaganda material.
“One way or another, we’ll extract value from him.”
Ideally, he would have extracted information through Berdon first, then leveraged that into a better negotiation.
But unfortunately, the auction was only four days away.
“Keep him under strict surveillance.”
“Yes, Guild Master.”
After instructing his subordinates, James returned to his office.
Miller was there.
But he was not as he had been before leaving.
He was watching a tablet intently.
It was Neia’s broadcast.
Four days later, his tower climbing had resumed.

* * *

Climbing beyond the 46th floor.
He had started it relatively soon after that.
With the auction coming in just a few days, he’d soon be busy.
And there was the contract with Kang Se-hyun as well—he wanted to climb quickly and be done with it.
He turned on the broadcast.

– Nehuang is seriously so hardworking.
– Neia only rested for two days? Nobody can stop this.
– Don’t rest, pray instead. Nehuang is one who works without resting, he is light and our salvation.

The chat was unusually active with devoted fans today.
Though he couldn’t really blame them.

[…has donated]
– Streamer, here’s the coaching fee. Please take good care of us going forward haha
[…has donated]
– How high is Myriad Guild going to climb?
[…has donated]
– Nehuang, what is your next endeavor?

There were many who had won money.
Some bought cars, others bought houses.
The donations from those who had duplicated their wealth were endless.
“This is not that kind of stream. Please don’t get false hopes—now leave.”

– Leave? Fall? Fall-flower? Ah, it’s fall-flower!

Oops—he’d let his expression slip.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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