John Clark’s office was in a town near New York City that was an hour and a half away from Manhattan’s Grand Central Station. Tourists and visitors avoided the place as there were no pretty streets and cute shops like the next nearby town, Cold Spring, had. This was a ghost village, filled with abandoned houses, and the only prostitute was an old lady over the age of fifty who had already passed away.

“We have arrived.”

Mick parked his car at an old maintenance shop, where the windows were blocked by large wood panels. John was waiting for us, and I followed him inside the office while Mick closed the garage door.

The office was small, so the monitors occupying the entire wall stood out. There were phones for each monitor on a desk with numbered stickers.

I looked at monitor number three, and it was surveilling a street across from a small bookstore in New York. Apparently, a disguised car was shooting the footage. The bookstore was the pre-Awakened Tina’s workplace, so I had been there. Monitor number four was showing another pre-Awakened, Widen Runch working at his office. Considering the close-up shot, the camera had been installed in his office, and I turned my head to another monitor.

“He must be there,” I said.

I had been informed that John had narrowed First Evil’s whereabouts to Texas, and I was looking at monitor number nine. The footage quality was so fuzzy that I could barely recognize that it was filming a large cornfield, and some of the other monitors were showing the same scene.

“It’s Roberts County, and we have placed agents on the way to its neighboring counties. We’ve also talked to local sheriffs, so we’ll be able to catch him soon,” John said.

“Is there any chance that he escaped to Mexico?” I asked.

John replied, “They would’ve noticed him already since it’s a tiny countryside.”

“Good. This time, he won’t be able to teleport or control the space,” I responded.

The First Evil had run out of insignias, and I didn’t think he would have had opportunities to earn another one since conquering a dungeon solo was usually impossible. The worst-case scenario would be him receiving a life quest, but even I had never gotten one ever since I skipped the tutorial.

“Kill him as soon as you find him. You won’t have time to wait for me,” I ordered.

“Okay,” John answered.

Mick came in and didn’t take his eyes off the monitors as if it was his first time entering the office. Then, he stood straight, and John looked at him, trying to figure out why he was here.

“I told him to come in. He is the only agent who has had first-hand experience of the dangers of our work. In fact, I was very disappointed with your people this time, John. Pay more attention to their training.” I frowned at the end.

“Was there any problem?” John questioned carefully.

“As I mentioned, they’re not taking the risk seriously. Fire those who consider our work as trivial. My friend Mick at least understands what we could encounter, and your organization needs lots of people like him. Place only those like him in charge. Make him a board member and base him out of Headquarters. He’ll help you with recruitment,” I said.

John looked at me and Mick alternately. He was obviously bewildered, but he had no choice but to accept my suggestion.

“Your name is Mick, right?” John asked.

“Yes, sir.”

John pretended he was fine even though he felt uncomfortable and asked for a handshake first.

“We’ll be real brothers from now on,” John said while holding Mick’s hand.

“Stop standing there awkwardly and come sit here,” I said.

Mick relaxed his posture and followed my gaze to sit at an appropriate spot before I changed the subject.

“How are things with the Reinhart case?”

Reinhart was the Second Virtue’s real name, and he was living on a different continent at the present. As the technology had not fully developed yet, there was no monitor surveilling him in real-time from here.

“I have placed one agent as his resident security guard,” John said.

In addition, he had a team observing the Second Virtue’s company and tailing him.

“The target goes back and forth between his work and mansion while working on his IPO[1], but nothing else.”

John played a recording taken in Germany after his explanation. The video was edited in chronological order, and the Second Virtue was really a workaholic. He was focusing solely on business to live up to the expectations of his family and to ride this golden era. The IT boom that took place from the second half of 1998 to the beginning of 2000 happened all over the world, not just in North America and South Korea. Due to the worldwide craze, the German market was undergoing irrational exuberance and the Second Virtue’s firm had prospered enough to buy a communication firm before the IT bubble broke. I presumed that he would be awakened from that time. Maybe that was also when he started to form Revolucion, which was the strongest armed force in my past life.

***

Although he owned a communication firm, it was clearly unethical to listen to the users’ conversations without their consent. However, the Second Virtue must have built Revolucion using that as there was no other way to explain how he had gathered pre-Awakened for a long time. Even the European Union had bowed to him before I turned back time. Even though the First Virtue and the First Evil were undisputedly the most powerful ones among the Eight Evils and the Eight Virtues, the Second Virtue had been the strongest in terms of guilds. Therefore, Western Europe had been his territory, but that had a positive impact on civilians there as they had much better conditions than other regions because of Revolucion’s presence. That was why I was hesitating to get rid of him and decided to think things over as I constantly watched him.

“Where should I drop you off?” Mick asked.

“Just right over there, Mick,” I replied.

“Okay.”

“The organization will continue to expand, and your role will become more important.”

I patted Mick’s shoulder and transferred to a taxi. The atmosphere on Wall Street was bustling, unlike last year as people were now dreaming of a bright millennium in the dotcom bubble. People were talking to each other with big smiles on their faces, and a group of young people from Silicon Valley were having a party at a restaurant to celebrate the launch of their IPO. One of them would become a millionaire overnight and press the opening bell of the New York Stock Exchange Market tomorrow. Then, that person would grace the cover of Wall Street magazine.

In the current craze, it didn’t matter what business each company was running as long as they placed ‘dotcom’ at the end of their project. Even the business of distributing canned cat food could make the owner a billionaire overnight.

I arrived at the Jonathan Investments building, which had moved its headquarters. So many firms once had their office in this building for the past hundreds of years, and our name was now placed in history. The first-floor lobby was open to private clients as we began to expand our business not only to billionaires but also to the private sector.

“Let me know if you're going to disappear, okay?” Jonathan was annoyed as he continued.

“You haven’t checked my email yet, have you? Also, when did you get to New York? Why the heck are you wearing these vintage gloves in the middle of summer?”

This was an unprecedented boom, so Jonathan was supposed to be smiling all day. However, I had irritated him, and he looked with distaste at my Deva King’s Protective Gloves.

“You must have completed all the important stuff,” I said while sitting on the VIP reception couch. It was obviously more expensive than John’s old sofa. Moreover, the furniture inside the office had changed into luxurious ones, and the overall interior was antique. Instead of dozens of monitors, several modern artworks from popular North American artists were hung on the walls. One of them grabbed my attention as it was so popular, I thought it was only available at the Museum of Modern Art.

“The group’s accountants hung that up due to the fucking tax.”

Jonathan briefly explained with an abrasive note. He acted like he had been psyched out as if something urgent happened while fighting monsters in the dungeon. However, I couldn’t think of anything. The stocks I had listed were increasing every day, so I asked him, “Did you have something urgent?”

“Yes.”

I wondered if the group’s hedge funds caused great damage, but that was impossible in this era. Making a loss was out of the question.

“Last week…”

Jonathan’s voice was low and dark, then he began to smile. I could see excitement all over his face.

“Our property fund’s accumulated profit rate is…Hahahahhaha!”

He had suppressed his joy for a long time and began laughing so hard that he couldn’t even speak properly. Of course, that had to be the case in this crazy market with those insane stocks I had him purchase.

1. Initial Public Offering ☜