Chapter 369: Ice & IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT
Battle after battle unfolded upon the arena. The crowds roared and Kraven barked out more largely meaningless slop to keep them excited — all the while interspersing sponsorships in between every few fights.
Time ground on as the tournament continued, and days turned to nights and back to days. The tournament suspended in the late hours, only to kick right back up the following morning.
At this point, Art was fairly convinced that the Secret Eye were geniuses. They were accomplishing every goal that their organization possibly could have had all at the exact same time… and they were getting paid for it.
Their purpose, and it wasn’t even one that they’d tried to hide, was to evaluate the abilities of the adventuring guilds in the Kingdom of Lian. They had to keep their rankings updated to properly reflect the abilities of the guilds so the more difficult tasks and most dangerous threats could be assigned to the appropriate teams.
Art was confident the Secret Eye had enough members with very advanced covert abilities that they could have just spied on the guilds they were interested in. That would have been what most people have gone with.
The Secret Eye had chosen the exact opposite approach. They’d turned what should have been a mildly suspicious act at best and laid their cards out on the table, letting everyone know they were doing it by throwing a massive tournament.
A tournament they’d sold seats to for exorbitant prices. One where the guilds would all demonstrate their best abilities in all forms. From spying on their opponents to their supply lines and equipment… everything was on display.
And to top all of that off, the Secret Eye were doing sponsorships. Sponsorships. Art nearly burst out laughing at his own thoughts. They were definitely going to make a ridiculous amount of money off this whole thing.
Makes me wonder why. Everyone wants money, but an organization like this should be funded by the Adventurer’s Guild itself. Even with what I know about the Guild… I would have thought they’d want the Secret Eye to remain in the shadows.