Chapter 420: Management Records - Markets and Multiverses
At first glance, the room we had secured entry into seemed disappointing. I had been hoping for a room filled with power-ups. If it had contained a new way to create new physical bodies, that would have been even better. I might have broken out into song if we had been that lucky.
Instead, the first room we had entered looked kind of like an admissions office. There were several containers used to store Achievement in the room - but all of them were empty. Some other group had probably raided this place before and taken all of the Achievement already. I sighed.
In retrospect, this room being an admissions office with minimal value made sense. If this place still contained important and valuable resources, it would have been guarded by something stronger than the statues. Still, I couldn’t help but think that this school’s structure was a bit odd. First, they would walk down a long hallway, before seemingly being teleported into a hall where the portraits of previous headmasters looked at them. Then, they would appreciate some art while walking into the admissions office, where they would pay, fill out their paperwork, and sign up for courses. What was the point of having so many rooms and corridors set up in front of the admissions office? Was it to rub the idea that the school was old and prestigious into the noses of new students? I rubbed my forehead in thought, before I shrugged.
Either way, this room didn’t have what I was hoping for. It was just an ordinary administration office. Still, my friends and I started digging through the paperwork in the area. After all, there might be maps, or other valuable information about the school in this office.
It wasn’t long before Felix interrupted my reading.
“Hey guys, come take a look at this. I found some pretty interesting records. They seem to detail some information about the multiverse as a whole.”
“Oh?” Felix’s words piqued all of our interest. We hadn’t found any new clues about the greater Multiverse or the downfall of the Market in quite a while. It was true that such problems were quite far away from our current power level. Still, even if the direct cause of the downfall of the Market didn’t matter to us now
, it would certainly matter eventually. If those who had destroyed the Market learned that we had risen from its ashes, they might return to finish the job. Knowing what to avoid, and knowing what potential future factions or enemies we might face, was still rather valuable.He handed the first report he had found to me, and I started to read.
Quarter report and analysis - external students.
To Diana, Head of Admissions and External Recruitment,
From the other major multiversal factions, we have seen a notable increase in students to this magic academy over the first quarter of the year, compared to previous years. Personally, I believe that this is likely due to the outbreak of war between the 7th and 213th branches of the universal tree. Due to how dysfunctional and prone to factionalism the universal tree is, they may be the most resource rich multiversal faction, but the strength and heritage of each faction is lower than a proper multiverse-level faction. Due to the consistent trend of unification within the Universal Tree, it seems likely that by the time this war ends, another few branches of the Universal Tree will begin a new war. I do not think it is likely that the wars will stop anytime soon.
As a result, I conclude that the increase in students from the Universal Tree is not temporary. We will likely see a major influx of refugees, young elite, and other members of the Universal Tree moving to the Market and signing up for various academies. Of course, at the end of the day, one can only scoff at these ‘elites.’ No matter how powerful they are, they aren’t immune to death, unlike the members of the Market. We can revive as many times as we want to as long as we have enough Achievement, while they are forced to resort to rare spells or treasures to recover from lethal injuries. Since they must also fear old age, naturally, even the weaker members of the Market, who get stuck at Master grade after a few dozen lives, will still outclass many of the achievements of these ‘elites.’
Still, despite their likely unimpressive futures, these refugees, children, and students from abroad represent something far more important than mere strength.
Money.
Every single student we don’t recruit is Achievement we aren’t earning!
Regardless of the reason, regardless of the future accomplishments they may or may not have… money is money. Whether we earn our money from backwater, unimportant multiversal factions, or from members of the Market, we should strive to earn more Achievement!
I recommend that we start an advertising push, targeting the upper middle class and upper classes of the entire universal tree. No need to wait for the different branches of the universal tree to start waging war - many of the more powerful clans, branches, and families have already sensed that an age of chaos on the Universal Tree is beginning. It would be a waste not to recruit more during that time!
With how many wars are already in progress, or likely to start soon, plenty of people will want to send their children to a safe academy where the children can grow to be strong and have a future. What better place for that than the Market? The universal tree’s billions of integrated worlds means that methods of advertising will need to be tailored to each specific world, but I think there is great promise here.”
- Emma
I glanced at the paper in thought.
The content of the paper may not have had all of the answers I wanted - but it was still rather enlightening.
First of all, it proved that the Market had openly recruited people from other major multiversal factions for places like the academy. That idea was surprising, but did lend some context for how major multiversal factions as a whole worked. The Market, evidently, was well-known to the other major multiversal factions. Not only that, the Market openly advertised its existence. It wasn’t some kind of hidden secret known only to the elite of certain factions. It was a well known public entity, at least in multidimensional empires. It even recruited from, traded with, and interacted with other dimensions regularly.
The Market’s attitude towards other factions seemed quite bad - or at least, that was true for Emma, who had written this letter. She treated members of the ‘Universal Tree’ as if they were ignorant country bumpkins, even though they were ostensibly from a major, multiverse-level faction. I didn’t know if that kind of attitude was typical of people from the Market, but it was good to keep in mind. At the very least, it meant that if we reincarnated inside of a multiversal faction, they might be on the lookout for us - and have very poor impressions of people from the Market.
Also important was the information this paper provided about the Universal Tree. Thus far, our information about other major multiversal factions was very scattered - but the mention of the universal tree gave me a rough idea what that ‘major multiversal faction’ looked like. The mention of ‘roots’ and ‘branches’ made me suspect that the universal tree was not a unified civilization. Instead, it was probably something more like a giant collective of worlds. Each branch of the world tree seemed to house at least one faction on it. In other words, the Universal Tree was not even close to a unified force. It was a geographical location, with lots of smaller factions ruling parts of the universal tree. If we ever ended up in the Universal Tree, that might be useful information.
“It’s not directly useful, but it’s still good to know.” said Felix, after some thought. “I wonder when we’ll encounter another multiverse-level faction. I have no idea how much of the multiverse large factions actually inhabit - but if a large part of the inhabited multiverse is ruled by colossal factions, we’re likely to be reincarnated inside their borders sooner or later. It’s also worth wondering if the universal tree had anything to do with the collapse of the Market.”
“Maybe, but I’m not convinced,” I said. “The way I see it, the people of the Market seem to look down on the other major factions a lot. I have no idea whether this arrogance was justified, but it very well could have been. If we take Emma’s attitude as a good indicator of the strength disparity between the Market and other factions, then the Universal Tree is unlikely to have been able to destroy the Market on its own.”
Sallia shrugged. “The way I see it, I think maybe the Market fell to some kind of powerful monster they had never seen before? That’s what I’ve been imagining, at least. It could’ve also been ganged up on by multiple other factions. Given how the Market works and how people here seem to look down on other factions, I could see a war starting due to the attitude of the Market. It’s also possible that the Market’s own internal conflicts ballooned into a civil war, perhaps combined with external factors…?”
I sighed. “All of those ideas make sense. We just don’t have enough information. Either way, we should keep an eye out for any further mentions of other major multiversal factions. There’s no harm in being prepared for an encounter with them in the future, even if it might never happen.”
The other three nodded. We spent another hour reading through other miscellaneous records in the admissions office, before we ran out of reading material and decided to move on.