The Return of the Genius Ranker’s Myth Warehouse - Chapter 248
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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 248
Chapter 248
“I should warn you upfront—this was a mistake on your part. Touching Silver Veil means….”
The Kalbera branch director of Silver Veil.
She emerged far more boldly than I’d anticipated.
Realizing I already knew her identity, she immediately invoked Silver Veil’s name, attempting to intimidate me.
Well, Silver Veil certainly had grounds for such confidence.
Silver Veil was unquestionably the Continent’s premier Information Guild, and crossing them meant risking ‘information retaliation’.
In other words, every disadvantageous detail about you and sensitive personal information would spread across the world.
The one who refuted her words, however, wasn’t me.
“Wasn’t the mistake on your side?”
It was Ena, stepping forward from behind me.
She continued speaking.
“One of your informants had infiltrated my lord’s residence. Surely you understand how serious the crime of unlawfully entering a noble’s estate is?”
“That, well. It wasn’t an infiltration, it was….”
“As an Information Guild, you must know my lord enjoys the Emperor’s favor. What do you think the Emperor will do when he learns Silver Veil has been harassing my lord?”
“Harassing?! When did we ever harass anyone!”
Ena, unlike her usual demeanor, began pressuring the branch director by addressing me as “my lord”.
And fortunately, that pressure was proving effective.
“That’s not all. The Baltika Maritime Fortress being constructed on Pirate Island—or rather, the Kalvera Maritime Fortress. You’d planted informants there too?”
“Who, who said that.”
“Don’t you see right here?”
Thud!
“Ugh, uhhh….”
It was no lie.
Based on information from Ena, I’d been the first to locate and abduct this very person.
The informant who’d been embedded in the Kalvera Maritime Fortress.
With the informant captured right before her eyes, the branch director seemed momentarily flustered.
“What are you talking about? An informant? That person was simply hired as a worker.”
“My, do you really think you can evade responsibility that easily? You must understand how serious the crime of stealing Imperial Army intelligence is?”
“As I said, that person was merely hired as a worker. Stealing Imperial Army intelligence? That’s absurd….”
“Silver Veil’s informant was merely hired as a worker and happened to work there. Is that what you’re saying? Why don’t you try telling that to the Imperial Court and the Military Tribunal?”
“Why would I…!”
“Superiors are naturally responsible for their subordinates’ mistakes, aren’t they? Director of the Silver Veil Kalbera branch?”
Listening to Ena speak, even I felt a chill run down my spine.
I was profoundly grateful Ena was on my side.
I made a mental note to increase her salary and treatment to ensure I never made her an enemy.
The Silver Veil branch director, apparently abandoning any further excuses, threatened us with a scowl.
“Regardless of being Imperial nobility, aren’t you underestimating us? If you treat me, the Silver Veil branch director, this way, do you think Silver Veil will simply accept it?”
“Regardless of being a Noble Official of the Empire, isn’t he being far too dismissive of us? If he treats me, the branch director of Silver Veil, in such a manner, do you really think Silver Veil will just sit back and do nothing?”
“My, that’s what we should be saying! If the Emperor learns that we’ve been digging for information about our lord, who enjoys his favor, and even infiltrating the Imperial Army’s new fortress, what do you think will happen?”
“The Emperor would hardly….”
“Considering the Emperor’s recent policy direction, it wouldn’t be strange if he completely wiped out Silver Veil, would it?”
“….”
“Or perhaps Silver Veil might cut off the branch director to cover their tracks. What do you think? Isn’t that more realistic?”
As the conversation reached this point.
The branch director’s mouth finally closed.
Anger rose within him, but finding no words left to counter, he kept his mouth shut while his clenched fists trembled slightly.
Seeing him like this, Ena smiled smugly, as if she’d won the psychological battle.
“Don’t worry too much. We have no intention of going that far. As long as you cooperate with us.”
“…What do you want?”
“Don’t be so guarded. After all, the terms I’m about to propose will benefit you as well.”
Now came the real purpose.
Initially, I’d considered completely consuming Silver Veil, but that was unrealistic.
To consume Silver Veil, I’d need to find the headquarters director, and there was no way I could easily locate the Information Guild’s supreme leader.
So, what we devised instead was to ‘cooperate’ with Silver Veil’s Kalbera branch.
“Getting information in Kalbera Territory has been difficult, hasn’t it? We’ll provide everything.”
“Pardon?”
“We’ll sell information about Kalbera Territory directly. Of course, you’ll need to pay a fair price.”
“That’s possible, but….”
The first condition was this.
Selling information.
I’m currently gathering information through the territory’s residents.
I properly manage the collected information through the Information Department.
If I could sell this to the Information Guild?
Enormous additional revenue would certainly flow in.
“However, the critical information we mention must never leak outside. Especially regarding our lord.”
“Hmm….”
The second condition was information control.
Currently, the Information Guild hasn’t properly established itself, and the territory residents’ loyalty is so high that information about the territory and Mir hasn’t spread widely.
But information spreading is only a matter of time.
Even if I stopped Silver Veil immediately, new information guilds would certainly enter.
Beyond that, information would leak through various other means.
But if I controlled Silver Veil’s Kalbera branch?
I could sell information for money and control secrets that needed protecting.
“Finally, regarding dungeon discoveries, boss monster discoveries, and matters concerning our territory. Anything related to the lord or Kalbera Territory should be reported to us as the highest priority.”
“You’re asking us to give such valuable information for free? Then we….”
“My, free? We’ll pay you fairly in gold. We’re simply asking that you provide the information as the highest priority.”
“You’ll pay in gold…? At fair value?”
“If the information is important, I’m even willing to pay more than fair value. However.”
The branch director of Silver Veil in Kalbera Territory.
She was beginning to sense it too.
That Ena’s proposal wasn’t a bad one.
If she accepted it properly, she could completely overcome the difficulties the Kalbera branch was currently facing.
Though she would have to deceive Silver Veil’s headquarters and come under my command, it was a contract more than worthy of that sacrifice.
“If you break the contract or betray and deceive us… you understand what will happen, don’t you?”
The killing intent seeping through Ena’s smile.
Sensing it, the Kalbera branch director swallowed hard.
And then.
“…I look forward to working with you, Baron Mir.”
The decision didn’t take long.
* * *
After Mir and Ena left.
“Phew….”
Yuris, the branch director of Silver Veil’s Kalbera branch, exhaled deeply.
It felt as though a tempest had just passed through.
“What in the world just happened.”
I was about to abandon the branch and flee, yet I’ve suddenly shaken hands with Baron Mir.
And I’ve even signed a proper contract with him.
Couldn’t I just ignore such a contract since we’re an underground Information Guild anyway?
No.
Even if we’re underground, an Information Guild is still an Information Guild.
Trust is their lifeblood.
If the contract became known, our clients’ confidence would plummet, and the Guild would certainly cast me out.
‘But I couldn’t refuse.’
No matter how I thought about it, it was a profitable proposal.
Above all, the words Ena left behind at the end.
– Who knows? If you work with us, perhaps your organization could break free from Silver Veil and become the continent’s greatest Information Guild.
Hearing those words, ambition stirred within me.
Until now, I’d merely been aiming for the position of branch director in Labelt.
But the moment I heard Ena’s confident demeanor and those final words.
My dreams became far grander.
“That’s right, we only live once—why not aim high?”
Since it’s come to this, I’ll nurture my dreams properly.
Not as some branch director of Silver Veil in Labelt, but as the supreme director of the world’s greatest Information Guild that surpasses Silver Veil itself.
“You’ll all follow me, won’t you?”
“There’s no need to worry.”
“After all, we followed you, not Silver Veil. Or rather, we followed Yuris.”
“It’s actually disappointing that you’d even ask such a thing.”
“Hehe, you lot. I’ll give you some spending money, so go eat something delicious. Order the most expensive items in Kalbera. Now that we don’t have to worry about the lord’s eyes, eat to your heart’s content.”
The informants lying on the ground didn’t matter to me.
They were all people I had taken under my wing when Yuris had no power, people who had climbed to this position alongside her.
They were people I could call my own self.
Now only one problem remained.
Since things had come to this, all I needed to do was properly demonstrate my abilities to Baron Mir.
“This will probably be our last rest. As soon as Baron Mir sends the information, I’ll start the operation.”
“Yes.”
“Since the lord has openly approved it, and the number of adventurers flooding into Kalbera Territory is extraordinary, let’s just start the operation openly.”
“Yes.”
“For that, I’ll need more personnel… but extracting people from headquarters would be difficult if we want to keep this secret. I should speak with the lord about it.”
There was no need to worry about that either.
I had held the position of branch director in countless places, and ultimately rose to the rank of sub-director of Labelt, earning recognition for my abilities to reach this point.
So what mattered more than this now was.
‘The body parts of the Black Dragon. And the locations of the Evil Gods, right?’
Baron Mir, the lord of Kalbera Territory whom Ena served, had made a direct request.
No, he had directly ordered me to handle this matter.
Baron Mir had asked me to find the body parts of the Black Dragon and the locations of the Evil Gods.
I didn’t even know what the body parts of the Black Dragon referred to, and the locations of the Evil Gods were classified information managed at the Empire level.
Both were tasks of extraordinarily high difficulty.
“If information exists in this world, it cannot escape my eyes.”
I was confident about this too.
If Baron Mir hadn’t given me a false commission just to toy with me, there was no reason I couldn’t uncover it.
I was the repository of Silver Veil information that only those of sub-director rank and above in Silver Veil could access.
I drew out the ‘Veil’s Crystal’.
Within this lay recorded all the information that Silver Veil’s informants had gathered from across the Continent, and it continued to be recorded in real-time even at this very moment.
The problem was finding the right information within it.
Silver Veil’s information was so vast that even those who reached branch director rank struggled to find the information they needed within it.
“Should I return to my roots after so long?”
This was my area of expertise.
I activated the crystal using my authority as branch director and began swimming through the ocean of information.
* * *
The contract with Silver Veil.
No, I had successfully made a contract with Yuris, the branch director of the Kalbera branch.
Ena seemed very pleased with the contract with Yuris, but I felt somewhat uncertain.
‘But wouldn’t this make finding information harder than requesting from headquarters?’
In any case, Yuris would now have to be cautious of headquarters.
She couldn’t let them discover that she was in a relationship with me.
But if that were the case, wouldn’t it become difficult to obtain information from headquarters, which has the most information?
As someone who didn’t know how Silver Veil’s operations worked, I couldn’t help but feel anxious.
However, there was nothing I could do about it now, so I was trying to shake off my anxiety and focus more intently on hunting.
‘Her abilities do seem quite impressive.’
Indeed, Yuris’s capabilities were already proving themselves.
Until now, I had been hunting new Dungeons and new monsters based on information gathered from various corners of my Territory.
But truthfully, roughly half of it had been mere rumor.
So I had no choice but to waste precious time.
Thanks to Yuris swiftly verifying the authenticity of these reports and sending them to me, I drastically reduced the number of times I chased wild goose chases based on false rumors.
While I was concentrating on hunting in this manner.
“Baron Mir.”
One of Yuris’s informants came to find me.
Fortunately, she did not disappoint my expectations.
“I found it.”
She brought me the information I had been seeking.
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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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