"Treat the Sword Lord like a sucker? Good heavens, who would dare do anything so insolent?" Wang Gi-neung answered reflexively. He meant every word. Like the rest of the Black Dragon Clan, he knew how terrifying Limon was—and he had seen Limon finish off Ryu Gang-cheol with his own eyes.

Limon merely snorted. "Oh? Then what's this?"

"What do you mean?"

"This junk you brought me, claiming it's everything the Wang family of Shanghai owns." He flicked the thin documents from the split-open box with his foot.

Wang was about to say there had been a misunderstanding. He would tell Limon that the documents truly did represent everything the family owned and beg him not to be angry. But the moment their eyes met, he swallowed the excuse on the tip of his tongue. He looked from Limon's cold face to the large box beneath his tapping fingers, then let out a heavy sigh.

"... You knew all along?"

"Did you think I wouldn't?"

"I'd heard you weren't especially interested in increasing your wealth, Sword Lord."

"So you did take me for a sucker."

Limon raised an eyebrow and regarded Wang coldly. "Enough of a sucker that you thought you could hide away your most important assets and people, offer me this empty shell, swear false loyalty, and watch me swallow it whole."

"..."

"Idiot."

Perhaps because Limon had hit the mark, Wang fell silent. Limon clicked his tongue, looking too dumbfounded even to be angry.

"If you wanted to make a deal, you should've made a deal. If you wanted to beg, you should've begged. What possessed you to try swindling me while asking for mercy?"

"I weighed the costs and benefits."

Offering everything and swearing loyalty was a dangerous gamble. If the person receiving that loyalty chose to, they could strip him of everything and cast him aside at any time. In that sense, Wang's attempt to keep something in reserve against the worst was understandable.

"Did your calculations leave out what it'd cost you if you got caught?"

"I didn't expect you to catch me."

The only flaw in his reasoning was that exposure would ruin him, just as it had now. Wang gave a hollow laugh, as though he had passed beyond despair into resignation. Looking at the large box on Limon's lap, he continued quietly, "How could I have guessed my household would hand you everything before I, the family head, even made a decision?"

Unlike the empty shell Wang had offered, this box contained literally everything the Wang family of Shanghai owned. Limon tapped it and said coldly, "You should've guessed. This is the result of weighing those costs and benefits you're so fond of."

"You're right."

Wang admitted it readily. He had a fair idea why his household had abandoned its head and sided with Limon.

"One scapegoat is enough to take the blame. There's no reason to drag the whole family down with me, is there?"

"Glad you catch on quickly."

"From my household's point of view, this is the most profitable choice."

If Wang had still been whole, not everyone in the family would have turned against him. A master-level fighter could elevate a family's standing simply by existing. But though he had once been a master of claw techniques, he had lost both arms and become a cripple. Now he was a stain on the family, like an old hunting dog whose only remaining use was to be boiled in a pot.

"Do you resent your household?"

"What right have I to resent them? They suffered for having a fool as their family head."

Wang bore them no grudge. The Wang family of Shanghai had suffered the most casualties in the attack, and it had been driven into a corner. Both were his fault.

"What happens to the Wang family of Shanghai now?"

"Ask your new family head, not me."

Limon turned his head. Wang followed his gaze. When the masked figure who had brought the box removed his mask, Wang smiled bitterly. "Well, I'm surprised. I never thought you'd arrange something like this, Wang Lun."

Wang Lun, the combat chief. Originally from a branch of the family, he had become its strongest fighter after Wang Gi-neung was crippled. He answered stiffly, "I only followed orders."

"... From Her Highness?"

"..."

"Good grief. I didn't even know our own combat chief was a spy. I haven't a word to say in my defense."

Wang Gi-neung gave a rueful laugh. He had prided himself on being as perceptive as anyone, but his embarrassment at failing to read even his own household was only part of it. Wang Lun's appointment as the new family head made the family's future plain. As Li Qingyu's spy, he would serve her with all the devotion he could muster, if only to keep his position.

"The Wang family of Shanghai will be your faithful hound now, Sword Lord."

"Yes. Thanks to that, I can finally staff Guardian properly."

"That's a relief."

Wang's bitter smile deepened. His clan would be responsible for auditing its own members, under Limon of all people. Given how it would be treated from now on, the Wang family would be thoroughly subordinate to him even without Wang Lun. Was it fortunate or unfortunate that this also made the family less likely to be discarded once it had served its purpose? Wang did not try to decide. After all, the family had been allowed to survive, just as he had wanted. Only one thing had not gone as he wished: there was no place left for him. So he spoke calmly.

"Sword Lord, there's one last thing I'd like to ask."

"What is it?"

"Where do you think I first went wrong?"

When he intercepted Ryu Gang-cheol? When he obtained the authority to investigate? Or when he met Limon? At what point had he chosen wrongly and set himself on the path to this end? Wang had pondered it over and over without finding an answer. Limon replied quietly.

"How would I know? But I can tell you one thing."

"What's that?"

"If you'd put your princess before your family's interests, she would've helped you at least once, no matter how badly cornered you were."

Even if loyalty meant nothing to Li Qingyu, Limon meant, she would have looked after the Wang family for the benefits it brought her. If they had become scapegoats anyway, it was because they had failed to prove their worth. Wang gave a faint laugh. "I see. I was looking out for the wrong kind of benefit."

As a member of the Black Dragon Clan, adept at intrigue, and as the head of a family in this ruthless age, he had lived believing that money and power were what mattered to a family, not something as intangible as trust. Yet in the end, he had lost everything because he had failed to earn that trust. Wang sighed and slowly raised his head.

"Wang Lun."

Perhaps he no longer saw any reason to wear a mask. The slyness was gone from his voice, replaced by weariness. His face seemed to have aged ten years in an instant as he said quietly, "Don't end up like me."

Those were the last words he left the new family head as head of the Wang family of Shanghai.

* * *

["So what happens to him now?"]

"You're better off not knowing."

["I hate that I can imagine it just from hearing you say that, Team Leader."]

"The Seven Dragons Society isn't merciful to failures."

After the warriors took Wang away, Limon answered Yu Na-gyeong's quiet question matter-of-factly.

It might wear the guise of a conglomerate now, but the Seven Dragons Society had once been called a demonic cult: the world's largest criminal organization. It was not the sort of place that would let Wang retire peacefully after repeated failures had brought heavy losses upon his clan, especially now that he had lost all his strength and become a cripple. That was doubly true given how many times he had betrayed Limon, who was emerging as a power within the Black Dragon Clan.

["But you kept slacking off, Team Leader, and nothing seemed to happen to you."]

"I had someone powerful backing me."

["Doesn't that mean they'd have done away with you ages ago if the Princess hadn't protected you?"]

"As if."

Limon snorted, then stated bluntly why that could never have happened. "I'd have had the annoying job of doing away with a few dozen assassins they sent after me instead."

Yu Na-gyeong clamped her beak shut. She realized anew that the leisurely life Limon seemed to lead had actually been a stroll between blades.

["... I've been thinking about this for a while. Team Leader, do you really have to marry the Princess? The more I think about it, the less this place seems right for you."]

"I can't abandon my bride just because I don't like her family."

["Is that really what this is about?"]

"Yes. And even aside from the marriage, I have no intention of backing out now."

Limon's answer was firm. His expression turned cold.

"Na-gyeong, you saw the Liberation Brigade's ghosts yourself. You know how strange and dangerous they were."

["That's..."]

Yu Na-gyeong trailed off. They had been repelled, but Bellows, Eugene, and Ryu Gang-cheol had been abnormal in more ways than one. There was 『Constellation Descent』, a skill that went beyond borrowing a constellation's power and housed the constellation itself in their bodies. It had let each of them surpass the limits of their levels and wield enough power to challenge even a Monarch. Then there was their strange armor, and Bellows's horrific rampage at the end after he had lost his divinity.

Set everything else aside. If every one of the Liberation Brigade's ghosts could use 『Constellation Descent』, the organization might rival the ten great guilds... or even surpass them.

"I don't know why they're after the Seven Arcs or what they intend to do with them, but one thing is clear."

Limon thought of the Liberation Brigade's objective Eugene had told him about: the seven arks said to conceal the secrets of the stars. He continued quietly. "Something is happening."

Something ominous was taking place somewhere, like the Demon God War, when the Demon God descended, or the Refinement Upheaval, which had redrawn the map of the American continent. If it was not stopped, the world would be swept into calamity once again. Yu Na-gyeong looked at him with a conflicted expression. Limon had saved the world more than once, and he spoke with certainty.

["Is that why you want to join forces with the Seven Dragons Society? Because you'll need its power to stop this?"]

"No. I don't intend to just join forces with it. I'm going to swallow the Seven Dragons Society whole."

["... What?"]

Perhaps it was because she was hearing his goal for the first time. Yu Na-gyeong gaped like a pigeon hit by a slingshot, and Limon smiled coldly.

"I've saved the world several times by now. Don't you think it's time I took a modest reward?"

["... The Seven Dragons Society is modest? That conglomerate controls all the wealth in the world!"]

"Still cheaper than the whole world."

He was tired of being a sucker who saved the world for free. Whatever the Liberation Brigade was plotting, he intended to get something out of it. As he said all this without a hint of concern, Yu Na-gyeong could only stare at him as though he were a salesman trying to force the world to buy peace.