The Martial Unity



At the same time, in another part of the Shionel Confederation, another man was also engrossed in deep thought.

"Hm…" Guildmaster Bradt went skimmed through the pages of a letter, narrowing his eyes.

It was because he was one of the most well-informed men thanks to being in possession of the most sophisticated intelligence network in the Shionel Confederation, that he knew. He was able to tell with one glance.

"These are all organizations and parties of the Kandrian Empire," The man frowned. "On top of that…"

He knew were a fact that many of these companies were simply shell companies that were simply a mask for the Underworld to operate through. Many of these were avenues for money laundering and served as a legitimate 'face' for black money.

He had minimized his interactions with the Underworld of human civilization, especially when the Shionel Confederation ironically had the least amount of illicit business occurring within its borders.

The reason for this was that the Shionel Confederation had decriminalized all goods and services when Guildmaster Bradt took office, implementing libertarian policies.

He had avoided the Underworld in his nation this way, and that principle followed on to interacting with the mafia of other nations. He avoided them all like the plague, even though his services were highly desired by the Underworld.

However, in order to avoid dealing with them, he needed to know who 'they' were. Thus he had kept tabs on the various faces and masks that the Underworld employed.

That was why he came to the suspicion that it wasn't a coincidence that among the companies he did recognize, all of them were shady companies and individuals with shady ties.

"Could it be…?" Guildmaster Bradt narrowed his eyes.

When he initially read through the contents of the letter, he had been displeased by the decision to exclude a large number of organizations and individuals from the list of clientele that Esosale Suppliers would be interacting with. However, now that he had gotten a clue about the Voider's identity, he wasn't too miffed about this change.

"The Voider is most likely connected to the Kandrian Empire somehow," He murmured.

This was the first concrete piece of information that he had come across regarding the origin of the Voider.

However, there was always the possibility that this was a red herring. It could be that the Voider was just trying to throw him off by tricking him into investing an immense amount of time into looking for his identity in the Kandrian Empire. This was something that he could not deny and needed to take into account.

He knew for a fact that the Voider was quite intelligent and competent. This meant that this was perfectly viable to be a trap.

On the other hand, it didn't click right for him. ('A trap would be much more alluring and inviting. This alone would not guarantee for him that I would fall for it.')

That was why he was a bit hesitant to spend too much on the matter.

"I want the intelligence reports on Martial Commissioner Reze of the Martial Union and Ambassador Garton on their time in the Shionel Confederation," He immediately instructed his secretary.

"Yes sir," She bowed.

Soon enough, he came to be in possession of the files that he requested.

"So Martial Commissioner Reze and the Kandrian Ambassador never left their hotel room even once?" He raised an eyebrow before huffing. Had he known the Kandrian Empire possessed a connection to the Voider he would have placed them under greater surveillance.

He tentatively trusted the report, though he made sure to consider the alternatives. He did not think the timing of the delegates from the Kandrian Empire and the Voider's latest company directive was a coincidence. There was most likely some connection, but he was unable to figure out what it was.

Regardless, he tried approaching it from another angle.

('Why would the Voider make such an initiative when he was happily executing what we agreed upon?') He raised an eyebrow, surprised.

There most likely reason was that he had a deal with interest groups with a severe clash of interests with the Underworld of the Kandrian Empire.

There were only a handful of organizations with such interests that were powerful enough to entertain the consideration of acting against the interests of the black market.

That narrowed things down considerably.

('The Royal Family… and the Martial Union,') He quickly surmised.

Had the Royal Family unveiled some legendary trump card that they were planning to dominate the Shionel Dungeon?

He immediately tossed this possibility out of his mind, it was absurd that an apostle of the Royal Family would have to scramble to make a deal with him in the first place. There was simply no way such a thing could possibly happen. Such a thing would be unnecessary if he was allied with either the Royal Family or the Martial Union in the first place.

('Maybe… they are allied now but weren't from the start,') Guildmaster Bradt postulated. ('In which case, could it be that he was discovered by some Kandrian entity?')

He felt as though he was coming close to the truth. He couldn't imagine that the Voider would approach the Kandrian Empire given how staunchly independent barring his collaboration with Guildmaster Bradt.

Although Guildmaster Bradt was certainly happier about coming closer to his mysterious partner's true identity, he realized he needed to be more careful than before. Based on the fact that the Voider's supply schedule and penchant to create chaos in the dungeon had not changed, Guildmaster Bradt speculated that it was still the Voider handling all the dungeon matters.

This meant that any agreement he had with the Kandrian Empire or Martial Union was most likely limited such that the latter did not infringe on the former's operations. Most likely, the latter wanted a cut, in exchange for some extraneous aid.

Still, this meant that he could not pressure the Voider as much even if he did learn of his ability, not with the Kandrian Empire looking out for its golden boy.