Chapter 322: Picking a Fight Will Piss Off Even a Sleeping Bear (3)

I came into the living room, powered on the laptop Franc uses, and made my way to the largest, most famous streaming site in the world. Right — the ID and the password were...

The moment I logged in, hundreds of fresh subscription notices I'd missed rose up to meet me.

"......"

Unbidden, the past flickered through my mind — the flame wars I'd started in comment sections, the keyboard-warrior routine. If I uploaded the footage on this account as it stood...

I wiped the cold sweat sliding down my forehead, dug around online until I found a comment-deletion program, and set it running. I watched tens of thousands of comments vanish in real time, then carefully hunted down whatever the program had missed and erased those too, before closing the account for good.

"Whew. My dark history has been safely purged."

"Maaaster. Franc stole my place, waaah."

She'd come clinging to my back to whine it. I stroked Miho's head and dug a fresh account. The ID would be Grand Blue Master... Huh? What? Someone's already using that? Who the hell is on this ID? Nothing for it. Then I'd just use my name, plain and ordinary...

What? That's taken too?

After that I tried several words tied to myself, and every last one of them was already claimed. Curious who on earth was squatting them, I searched the names — and found that most of the accounts didn't even have a channel created.

"People are vicious about staking a claim."

I clicked my tongue. Miho was sniffling with her head pillowed on my thigh, Darky sat perched on her hips, and across the room Hiarid was helping Suhan and Franc with the cooking. I watched them a moment, then typed in one more ID. Taming Master... this one's taken too?! Then Taming Grandmaster?! Oh. This one worked.

I created the account without a hitch and uploaded the two videos I'd filmed. Then, to make use of the authority granted to me as master of the Grand Blue raid team, I called my sister.

"Yeah. I made a personal channel on YouTube. Uploaded two videos, so tag my address on the official homepage for me."

"I'm only going to upload Phase World material, so you don't have to worry."

Abashed, I'd tacked on the excuse, but my sister said she trusted me and left it at that. Honestly, I'd been sure a lecture was coming.

I passed my channel address to Lydia as well, not without an ulterior motive, then hit refresh.

"......What. Thirty thousand views? It hasn't even been ten minutes?"

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

Finding it strange, I hit refresh again, and the number climbed to fifty thousand.

"Holy shit."

Every time I pressed it, the count jumped — seventy thousand, a hundred and twenty, two hundred, three hundred and forty. It was climbing at a terrifying clip. Subscribers were surging by the hundreds and the thousands at the same time.

"So a view doesn't only count if you watch the whole thing? You just click, and it ticks up by one?"

"Is something the matter?"

Franc, come out from helping Suhan cook, must have caught my muttering. She sat down beside me and peered at the screen.

"You've uploaded a video, I see. Three hundred and forty thousand views? Goodness. You've already passed seventy thousand subscribers!"

Then Franc hit refresh herself, and in that brief interval the view count shot to five million. She flinched and froze, startled, and my own mouth fell open.

"This... don't tell me."

A bad feeling sent me looking up the Grand Blue raid team's official Chirper, and sure enough, the address of the channel I'd just created was posted there. Right on cue, a text arrived from Lydia as well.

The attached photo showed my channel address posted on Lydia's own Chirper and on her Outstagram. And her follower count ran well into the millions.

That's no joke. So that's the power of the most famous princess in Britain...

I watched the views and the subscribers climb in real time, then grew curious about the comments, clicked the video, and scrolled down to the comment section. They were pouring in not only in Korean and English but in every language under the sun.

For the most part they ran from I can't believe it — America actually poked a Highest-Rank Variant to our America would never do such a thing. Others had Trumpet finally losing his mind and picking a fight with the God of Destruction, and a few were already saying that since the God of Destruction looked likely to come attack America, it was time to emigrate. Some posts envied the Phase Stones I'd poured out. I hit refresh again, and a fresh wave rolled up — overwhelmingly people wondering what the black, semi-transparent armor on my body was, and what Miho, the one I'd been riding, could possibly be.

I slipped an arm around Franc's shoulders as she read the comments, and murmured.

"Now we just have to wait for time to do its work. I'm curious just how far this video's shockwave is going to reach."

The shockwave... was beyond imagination.

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Britain moved with startling speed, denouncing America's rashness less than an hour after the upload, and Russia joined in — expressing, in language rarely so blunt on a diplomatic stage, its disappointment in America's reckless attitude.

At the same time, the article carrying the photograph of the Highest-Rank flying-fish Variant I had first received from Lydia was rushed out as breaking news, and riding up alongside it came the story of two 15,000-TEU container ships that had left Japan, been attacked by something two days out of Hawaii, and sunk with twenty dead. The attacker, of course, was the Blade Flyer. Russia claimed that America had provoked the Highest-Rank Variant into beginning to strike ships along the Pacific routes.

As time passed, the situation only worsened. Ships that had been running the Pacific couldn't simply halt operations despite the threat, so they began routing through the Bering Sea, past western Canada, and on to America — and the swelling freight costs and extra days fell squarely on ordinary companies, which started to scream and groan.

Criticism of America multiplied of its own accord. With Russia at the head, the countries bordering the Pacific joined in denouncing the United States, and in Europe Britain led the charge, calling it a disaster brought on by the American president's foolishness, so that anti-American sentiment was heating up across the continent as well.

I was left a little dazed by how easily the mood had turned — then decided Yeongeun, President Puchin, and the Queen of Britain must have been pulling strings behind it, and let the thought go.

What mattered was America's reaction. Even inside the country, families of the soldiers and ability users who had joined the first Blade Flyer raid and died poured into the streets to protest the government's incompetence, and — America being the nation of lawsuits — class actions were being filed against the government, or so the reports went. From that spectacle alone, it was plain the U.S. government had been burying the story of those killed in the first raid.

Once things reached this point, President Donald Trumpet gathered domestic and foreign correspondents at the White House and went so far as to deliver a statement himself, in the name of getting the situation under control.

They fought the thing, and surprise — it wasn't a High-Tier Variant. So they lost. And the announcement was that this time, to make certain the Aberrant was eliminated, they would mobilize G.S., the nation's finest raid team, and the entirety of the 7th Fleet.

But the announcement only ended up pouring oil on the fire.

The last article in particular carried a shot of President Trumpet, mid-conversation with me, looking down his nose and sneering.

He'd given his statement, but thanks to what I'd posted on YouTube, an air of utter disbelief had filled the United States. Opinions were pouring in that if America failed the raid this time as well, the Highest-Rank Variant would evolve into a Transcendental Variant, and if that happened, the port regions of the American West would be scorched to nothing. On top of that, the story spread that I'd put America's odds of success in a second Blade Flyer raid at zero percent — I hadn't actually said zero — and with it the threat that if the Blade Flyer became a Transcendental Variant, I'd catch the thing and hurl it onto the American continent. A few weak-kneed members of Congress began appearing on talk shows and news interviews to say the president ought to be impeached.

Whereupon the press pointed out that before taking office, Trumpet had bankrupted not one but five companies he'd built by gathering investors' money through methods bordering on fraud, all while never touching his own fortune, and began making an issue of his personal morality as well. The line of talk was that he'd spent most of his life as a businessman, and hadn't he approached this incident from a businessman's standpoint too, and brought the whole mess on himself?

Anyway, I don't know why he opens his mouth and volunteers to get himself beaten. If he'd simply said he would mobilize A-Class and B-Class ability users and the 7th Fleet, raid the Aberrant, and root the public's anxiety out, it wouldn't have come to this... No. It would have been fine if he just hadn't slighted Yeongeun. Misjudging a Highest-Rank Variant for a High-Tier one, writing me off as a nobody, and looking down on my family — he'd as good as confessed, with his own actions, the incompetence that produced this mess, hadn't he?

As the situation kept deteriorating, President Trumpet convened an emergency Aberrant-response meeting and set about preparing follow-up measures. Senators and representatives, though, joined forces and went so far as to submit a bill opposing a second raid on the Blade Flyer.

One day after the bill opposing the Blade Flyer raid was submitted, a shocking incident — shocking in an entirely different sense — broke. An I-Class Physical Reinforcement ability user murdered an H Class Elemental ability user who had ignored him and looked down on him.

The moment the murder occurred, the Ability User Alliance's special task force deployed at once, subdued the I-Class Physical Reinforcement user, and bound him. The motive that slipped out mid-interrogation mentioned what I'd uploaded to YouTube, and with the world's eyes already fixed on the Aberrant and on the video I'd posted, the case was covered at length in the news. His bare face, not even mosaicked, went out on the broadcast, and with it came his words.

That ability user was, as a matter of course, thrown into Alcatraz for brutally murdering a man while dead drunk, then dismembering the corpse and hiding it. Even so, the case rose as an issue in the ability-user community, spawning several thousand posts and comments, and very nearly set off a storm of controversy.

If not for the Ability User Alliance's announcement!

Even so, that ability user — an I-Class living assistant — had been unable to absorb any Phase Power beyond his measure, precisely because his aptitude was I-Class. More ability users than one might think were already striking the ceiling of their own aptitude, which rendered any further increase in Phase Power meaningless, and so the matter never spread into a larger incident.

Ability users whose limits of growth still lay open could increase their Phase Power only through raids and subjugation battles. A B-Class might, in theory, murder an equal and absorb Phase Power more easily than by fighting an Aberrant — but fellow B-Class users were few to begin with, and by the time one reached B-Class, either their combat ability was formidable, or, in the case of recovery and rare ability users with no combat skill to speak of, they each kept a means or two of protecting themselves.

"You might have at least consulted me before you ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠opened your mouth."

The day after the news broke and Alliance Headquarters made its announcement, the branch chief came to find me, the skin beneath his eyes black as a dead man's, and poured out his grievances. Even his usually razor-sharp dress was a little rumpled; he had the look of a man who had been buried under an enormous pile of work and only just clawed his way free.

He fumbled a cigarette from inside his coat and moved to light it, so I erased the cigarette alone with Spatial Perception. He flinched, startled, then set down what was left — a cigarette that was now nothing but a filter.

"It isn't that I failed to see something like this coming. I grew complacent. If you want to grow, you fight an Aberrant and grow that way..."

"You hold power on another plane entirely — power that doesn't permit comparison with other ability users — and you haven't much hunger for strength besides. That's why. Let a yearning for great power tangle with an inferiority complex, and all that comes of it is a horrific crime."

The deep sigh he let out looked profoundly tired. Sophia, back from completing a subjugation, melted royal jelly in the kitchen, brought out the sweets she'd made with it and a pot of omija tea — that tart five-flavor berry brew — set them down before me and the branch chief, and withdrew with demure steps.

Watching her go, the branch chief shook his head.

"Why'd you do it?"

"What do you mean?"

"Looking at that personality of yours, the video was obviously cooked up to screw America over. Anyone else might miss it. I can tell."

Was I that obvious? A little wrong-footed, I picked up a piece of the honey-drizzled waffle Sophia had set down and put it in my mouth. A crispy waffle is good. A waffle this moist is good too.

I deliberately ignored the branch chief's sharp look and kept chewing, and he picked up a piece of his own and stuffed it in.

"Hm?"

He chewed, swallowed with a gulp, then reached out again and ate without a pause. Startled by the speed at which the waffles were vanishing, I stopped mid-bite to watch — and the branch chief, having put away seven of the eight pieces in a single breath, muttered with a faintly regretful air.

"This is really delicious. A waffle this warm, and this moist, and this sweet — you don't get to eat one like this very often."

"So I get one piece, and you take seven?"

I asked Sophia to bake a few more, but he waved me off — no need — and opened his mouth again.

"Even without all this, there are signs an ability-user crime cartel is trying to take shape. So don't go spreading what you know about abilities, or about the Phase World, through the media if you can help it. Once talk like that reaches ordinary citizens through the press, it only magnifies their anxiety. And if the wrong sort of bastards get hold of something special, worse things still can come bursting out."

"I will. I'll make a point of running it by the Ability User Alliance when I can."

"Thanks. Last thing — don't concern yourself with the murder that I-Class committed. That moron only used the video you uploaded as an excuse. All your video did was pull the trigger on a criminal mind that was already there."

Was I the only one who felt that last part was what he'd actually come to say? I saw the branch chief off, then stood on the terrace in the cold wind and put my thoughts in order.

Where the world has its bright places, it has its dark, and crime is the shadow that has grown up alongside humankind. No matter how relentlessly the Ability User Alliance cracks down, it cannot tear every crime out by the root.

Going by what the branch chief had let slip, the ability-user criminal groups — said to be growing — were already slipping out of control, and under the influence of the video I'd scattered, they were trying to organize into a so-called cartel. I didn't know how they were handling it, but rather than ripping the thing out by the roots, wouldn't it do to stir up just enough infighting and pull the strings from behind until they splintered every which way? Criminals, by and large, have a powerful habit of chasing nothing but their own profit.

Yeongeun, kept in meetings on countermeasures for the trade restrictions, hadn't been able to come home for days; she'd been eating and sleeping at the Blue House, the presidential residence. Saying she needed to blow off some stress, she carved out a little time, came back to the house, and folded herself into my arms.

I drove into her starved womb and rocked her until she shook. Even as a cold sweat broke over her whole body, she climbed atop me and rode, her hair whipping — and the distinct sense that I was the one about to be devoured was the first I'd felt since that day in April.

I spent three hours letting out the desire that had built up inside her. When it was done she wore a look as if she might melt, and burrowed into my arms, her body gone slick with sweat. Toying with Yeongeun's soft, springy breasts while I listened to what she had to tell me of the situation inside America, I could think nothing but that it was a genuine disaster.

"It's a mess."

"Ufufu. Seoha's the one who made the mess, and now he's talking like that?"

"I didn't stop the raid. I told them to go ahead and do it if they wanted."

"Oh my. If Trumpet heard that, he'd clutch his chest and keel over, wouldn't he?"

"I don't care if that potbellied tub of lard keels over or not. Anyway — what happened with the negotiation team from Russia?"

She seemed to have come back to herself somewhat. I slipped a hand into the secret place between her legs and murmured the question against her ear, and she burrowed harder into my side, a soft hum escaping her nose.

"Hnng~ Aht. We agreed to s-sell Russia three high-grade Phase Stones, each charged with over two million TP... hnng."

"Three of them is only six trillion won, isn't it? Can the country buy the basic industrial materials we'll be needing for a while with that?"

"Oh my. You think we'd sell them straight at the Phase Stone Exchange's posted rate? The premium alone doubles it — and don't you remember what the most expensive one went for at the auction on launch day?"

"Uh, so... twelve billion dollars, was it? Fourteen trillion won."

"That's right. The amounts of TP differed, but if you rough out the average, they sold at five thousand dollars per TP. We moved three of them at that price."

"Oh. Hell of a way to pocket the difference."

"We took the spot portion in basic industrial materials, according to the trade ratio, and the rest in precious metals and goods in kind. Just picture twenty-one trillion won in basic industrial materials. Can you even imagine how much that comes to?"

"I can't picture it, but I can tell you worked hard."

"Ahing... Honestly!"

I straightened my middle finger and teased deep inside her. Yeongeun flushed scarlet and squeezed her thighs together — then, catching fire all over again, she climbed on top of me and took me deep between her lower lips. Like that she began to rock and bounce her hips, her breath coming short and fast.

"Hahk — praise me like that and... I can't hold it! Aaah, I love it when you stir my womb this deep! Aaahng!"

I pulled her body — burning hot all over again — into my arms, listened to her short, fierce breaths, and started round two.

Yeongeun's meat pocket, I swear — feed it all you like, it never gets its fill.