Chapter 24 : Chapter 24
Chapter 24: Malina
The next day, Lin Qi woke up, performed a brief morning routine, dressed, and headed downstairs.
The dining table was already laden with freshly prepared delicacies. Two maids stood by the table, ready to pour wine and clear the dishes.
Lin Qi took his seat at the head of the table and said, "Everyone, please sit."
Viola was the first to respond, sitting down to his left.
The young girl’s mental state was already unstable due to the influence of the Voice of Nightmares, and she had been further shaken by the news of her family's passing. Under such circumstances, she had been moved by Lin Qi's "sincere" declaration of kinship.
She had accepted Lin Qi's arrangements and remained in the manor, with the two now referring to each other as brother and sister.
"Kaff, Yulian, you two sit as well."
Hearing this, Kaff sat to Lin Qi's right. He knew his master was different from typical nobles; Lin Qi did not adhere to the rigid rules they took such pride in. Instead, he treated the staff more like employees in a standard working relationship rather than the master-servant dynamic favored by other aristocrats.
Seeing Kaff sit, Yulian followed suit.
"You two can go about your business. I am not a child; I do not need people waiting on me while I eat," Lin Qi said to the two maids beside him.
"Yes, My Lord," they replied in unison.
After breakfast, Yulian found Lin Qi in the smoking room.
"My Lord, I found the person you were looking for yesterday," Yulian said as he entered.
Lin Qi pulled the Forbidden Object named [Violet] from his pocket, drew out a cigarette, and offered it to Yulian. "Care for one?"
"No, thank you, My Lord. I do not smoke. Silas is currently the Guard Captain at Brague Manor. People generally describe him as serious, responsible, and loyal."
"He has worked at Brague Manor for seven years now. He is a Tide-Caller of the Ocean Pathway, at Sequence 8. Do you need me to gather any further intelligence?" Yulian waved off the cigarette Lin Qi offered. As a Bard who relied on his voice for a living, he could not afford to smoke.
Lin Qi retracted the cost-free cigarette and said, "You have done well, Yulian. No more information is needed for now. Go and find out if there are any noble gatherings happening recently."
"Understood, My Lord."
Before establishing the agency, Lin Qi needed to break into the capital’s aristocratic circles. At the very least, he needed the local nobility to know who he was.
Transcendents in this world were generally divided into three categories: Nobles, Church personnel, and Wild Transcendents.
The first two were self-explanatory. Wild Transcendents referred to individuals who had stumbled upon Transcendent knowledge and become Transcendents on their own. These people were required to register with the Transcendent Management Bureau.
The Transcendent Management Bureau was the enforcement arm of the Viridian Kingdom, primarily responsible for dealing with rogue Transcendents and recovering Forbidden Objects.
Although the Bureau was an official organization, requesting their assistance with supernatural incidents was expensive—exorbitantly so.
This led to the emergence of agencies. An agency was a for-profit organization founded by Transcendents that could privately accept contracts to handle abnormal phenomena.
However, Lin Qi’s goal in creating an agency was not profit. How much money could one really make from an agency? Most of their clients were commoners. Wealthy nobles trusted the official Bureau more; only commoners who could not afford the Bureau’s fees turned to agencies, which often had varying levels of quality.
Lin Qi’s true purpose for the agency was the upcoming arrival of the players.
The books Alden had left at Roland Manor contained the knowledge for all twelve standard pathways, and Lin Qi had brought them all with him. Once the agency was established and he had his own faction, he could use the promise of rapid Transcendent advancement as a gimmick to make his popularity skyrocket among the players!
He could already imagine how many players would fight tooth and nail just to join his agency.
After all, in the game Epoch of the End, players usually only had two ways to obtain a Transcendent Sequence. First, they could join a Church, where they had to accumulate contribution points through mundane labor before they could exchange them for the Church's Transcendent knowledge. Second, they could join a noble family as a guard, which offered a chance of obtaining knowledge.
Both methods had significant drawbacks.
The cost of joining a Church was too high; one had to grind missions constantly to save up points, and they were limited to the specific pathway held by that Church. Many novice players joined a Church blindly, only to end up with a Sequence they disliked.
Joining a noble family was even more difficult. Setting aside the fact that knowledge was only a "chance" acquisition, not knowing which pathway they would get was agonizing. The knowledge granted by nobles was entirely random, leaving players with no choice in the matter.
Lin Qi was different. He possessed all twelve standard pathways as well as one of the hidden pathways, the Romance Pathway. Moreover, he could let them choose freely. The only requirement would be to accumulate contribution points, just like the Church.
However, Lin Qi also planned a safeguard. He intended to purchase a specific Forbidden Object from the Pactum Mundi Chamber of Commerce.
The Unbreakable Oath.
The ability of this Forbidden Object was to ensure that the signer could never betray the contract. The cost was that the signer had to show respect to the Lord of the Covenant after use.
Lin Qi wanted to buy this item because, in his previous life, an unlucky player had been tricked by an NPC into signing such a contract. They later discovered the contract was account-locked! Even if the player wasted a life to respawn, the contract remained! The only way to break it was to delete the account.
Lin Qi felt the need to protect himself against players precisely because he had once been one of them.
He understood these players all too well. To put it bluntly, everyone knows how people behave in GTA V, right? Now imagine a world like Epoch of the End, which offered Transcendent powers and even higher levels of freedom. If a high-status figure like Lin Qi were to be backstabbed by a player, it would be a disaster.
Losing fans would be one thing, but he was genuinely afraid of actually dying. He wasn't a player; he didn't have the luxury of respawning.
After finishing his cigarette, Lin Qi and Kaff boarded a carriage headed for the Pactum Mundi Chamber of Commerce. They intended to inquire about the price of the [Unbreakable Oath] and hire some renovation workers.
Upon arriving at the entrance, Lin Qi spotted his old acquaintance, Link.
After some pleasantries, Link ushered the two of them into a VIP lounge and went to retrieve the [Unbreakable Oath] and the profiles for the renovation crews.
Lin Qi and Kaff waited for a while, but Link did not return. Just as Kaff was about to go out and check, a knock sounded at the door.
It was Link.
"I apologize, Master Isaris. Our Chamber’s Young Miss happens to be here on inspection today. She heard you were here and wishes to meet you. Would that be convenient?"
Link opened the door, pulling out a handkerchief to wipe away the sweat from his hurried pace.
The Young Miss of the Pactum Mundi Chamber of Commerce.
The protagonist of Version 3.0 in the game.
The final mistress of the Republic of Catricia.
The absolute controller of the Land of Covenants and the City of Golden Power.
On the forums, players would constantly lose their minds over her pictures, spamming comments like "Mommy, step on me" and "Sugar mommy, I'm hungry."
She was a gold-haired, wavy-locked, manipulative woman.
Malina Pactum Mundi.