Haa...

Walking through the teleportation passage was an experience in itself.

My body felt like it had dissolved and then reconstructed itself on the other end of the passage.

Well... I wasn’t the only one, as Chroma followed me from behind.

New faces greeted me, as the staff seemed to have changed their shift.

"Sir!"

A soldier saluted me before guiding the way to reach Julien.

The same tunnel greeted me as both of us walked in silence.

"Screech!"

Well... Chroma was as energetic as ever, as the hydra kept screeching from time to time.

No small talk was needed, as the beast filled the void in our conversation.

Within a minute or two, I was in a control room, or in simpler words, a control hall that monitored every D.X. base out there in the world.

As I scanned the hall, I found Julien sitting in one of the corners, with several members of the technical staff around him as they discussed some topic of importance.

As I walked closer to them, Julien’s eyes met mine as he raised them in surprise.

"That was quick. I thought you would be out for a week or two."

"It was enough."

Julien nodded his head while smiling, as he shifted his attention to the staff again.

"Make sure all the changes are followed through, and report to me in due time."

The staff bowed slightly in my direction before leaving the two of us in silence.

"Any issues?"

I asked before sitting next to Julien, as I read the papers that were kept on the table before him.

"Haa... To search for more people to recruit, I had asked them to install recording devices across every public place that was prone to daily criminal activities. But—"

Julien paused, as if trying to increase the suspense behind his statement.

"Recently, the Authorities have been doing detailed checks everywhere, so we had to take extra measures to hide those devices. And that has increased the cost to be expended on the surveillance, along with the time that would now be invested in such a petty task."

Julien sighed as he leaned on the table, with both of his hands spread wide, as he rested his head at the edge of the table.

The position looked a little uncomfortable, but I didn’t comment on it.

"And yes!"

Just as I was about to ask for the reports, Julien exclaimed as if suddenly remembering something.

"No. 8 had organised a meeting for the charity campaign, and all the guilds, banks, and businesses that had aligned with us were invited to it. As we had discussed, I had already begun distributing free potions at the Adventurers’ Guilds and the Mercenary Guilds. There were some who were upset about the increased spending, but we promised them to cover half their expenses."

That was what I wanted to hear at the moment.

The time to enact our first worldwide mission had come closer than ever before.

As for No. 8, I had met that guy before.

He had always been a smooth talker, so making some mere businesses fold under his talks wasn’t a big deal for him.

Before joining D.X., No. 8 had been a wanted criminal across Jutan. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

His crimes included looting the vaults of the richest of the rich, funding terrorist operations among all major powers, and the most known crime being looting the national treasure of one of the werewolf empires.

Looting an empire by playing the role of its minister, No. 8 had planned everything for more than 3 years, and in the end, he had succeeded in something that was impossible to even imagine for many.

Looting a major power right under their noses...

That was none other than—

The Faceless, who now went by the name No. 8.

Each of the single-digit numbers was a force to be reckoned with.

Not everyone was born to be a fighter. There were many who were skilled at tasks that were equally important as killing the enemy with blades.

No. 8 controlled the entire business operations of Syma, along with the other major numbers.

"The cost of the campaign is piling up. If we don’t achieve our objective, the loss suffered would be too big of a burden to handle."

Julien’s voice brought me out of my thoughts.

That was indeed true.

Even if the potions sold for free were the basic ones... the quantity in which they were sold was too high to even count.

The masses had been flooding the guild for more potions, though a definite quota was set for every person. The quota would refresh every week.

That was the only thing that stopped our production lines from going into an overload.

"Are the soldiers ready?"

At my question, Julien paused for a moment before opening his device.

"Keeping the regular operations going while bringing in manpower for the mission is proving to be a little difficult, but the new recruits are being used for the daily operations. In some days, more will be available at your disposal."

I didn’t comment on Julien’s words, as my mind processed the information.

Going step by step would be beneficial in its own way, but—

A decisive strike was needed if we wanted to truly shake the business world.

Haa...

"What about the cults?"

I asked the most important detail in our plan.

"That... No. 5 had been sent along with No. 10 and No. 14. As for the results... more than half of the cults have agreed, as we had our own agents in their top hierarchy. As for the rest, we still haven’t managed to convince their leadership, but there is a good amount of progress on that front."

Sigh.

Even though I didn’t like the lunatics from the cults working for me... it wasn’t like I couldn’t use them as a meat shield.

These lunatics didn’t really care for their lives. They had already sacrificed them in the name of their respective gods.

The only thing the lunatics cared for was fame.

Fame for their god, as they wanted their deity to be respected among the world.

Well... respected in their words, but feared would be the appropriate word for their objective.