The Great Purge
It feels like I’ve only ever talked about the mainstream leagues, so today let’s do an extra episode and cover the non-mainstream ones. You don’t need to know everything about them—just this one thing.
It’s easy. Very Easy.
……
You don’t need to be obsessed with money like the Americans. You don’t need to keep your eyes peeled so you don’t get scammed like the Japanese. And it doesn’t have that thick, unique cultural flavor like China.
Because it’s non-mainstream, the events and overall competition level are drastically lower than the mainstream leagues. Even casual play is enough to conquer the league with ease. So it’s perfect for light users and beginners.
……
But as you keep playing, you’ll get this strange sense of déjà vu. Those nerds wouldn’t be this nice, right? The GM isn’t this soft, right?
If you just nodded your head, congratulations. You have officially graduated from beginner status.
There is one secret to these non-mainstream leagues. Open the worldwide recruitment window and you’ll see it immediately.
That’s right—the timeline is twisted.
……
Non-mainstream leagues begin at the optimal moment for the player to adapt. Saudi Arabia is the perfect example. The game starts right after the ‘League Closure’ and ‘Great Purge’ have already taken place.
“……Say that again. What exactly are we killing?”
“The league, Your Highness. The Saudi league in your country.”
“Haha, have you lost your mind? I brought you here to save the league, yet you’re telling me to kill it with my own hands? Why on earth would I do that?”
“Because if you don’t, it’ll die on its own anyway.”
“!!”
Lee Shin had called the Saudi league a playground for pet guilds created by nouveau riche.
A league that should revolve around skill had been reduced to one that revolved around money. If they couldn’t break that vicious cycle, there would be no future. He had added that, too.
Yet after looking into it, the root of the problem was those very nouveau riche—the Crown Prince’s worthless cousins.
“Let me ask you directly, Your Highness. Can you cut your cousins off?”
“That……”
“You don’t have to kill them. But can you strip them of everything they have and order them to keep their heads down and stay quiet?”
“Ha… That would be difficult.”
“Exactly. You won’t be able to. Oh, I’m not blaming you. It’s only natural. No matter how delinquent or incompetent they are, they’re still royalty. Even for the Crown Prince, kicking them out without proper justification is impossible.”
There was one fact neither of them voiced.
No matter how wise the Crown Prince was and no matter how much authority he held, in the end…
He was not the king.
That was the fundamental reason, and it was why Lee Shin could speak with such certainty.
Until the man before him had his eyes flipped with rage, Saudi Arabia would continue rotting endlessly—just as Lee Shin remembered.
Whether it was because the future he had tried to ignore had been laid bare, or because he felt utterly powerless, the Crown Prince’s expression grew heavy. He could only let out deep, weary sighs.
“Do you happen to smoke magic herbs?”
“Yes, from time to time. Care for one?”
“……Pleasure to meet you.”
Before the Crown Prince even finished speaking, his secretary Hamid extended a hand between them. Inside an ornate golden case lay neatly arranged magic herbs.
Both men placed one between their lips. Hamid snapped his fingers, and a flame appeared.
“Whew. This might be presumptuous, but may I speak about Your Highness?”
“I already gave you permission.”
“If Your Highness had never met me, you would have spent every single year traveling the globe in search of answers to save the kingdom. And every year, you would have somehow found one.”
If Evelyn Rothschild was Europe’s golden goblin, then Crown Prince Muhammad was the Middle East’s original soup kitchen.
He gave without holding anything back.
Unlike Evelyn, who had her own strict standards, the Crown Prince showered infinite goodwill and affection on anyone who showed even the slightest interest in the Saudi league.
Most players would have been delighted by the barrage of gifts and gone along with it, but Lee Shin had always wondered.
Why does this character act like such a pushover?
So he had dug into the story and discovered the truth.
This man was a genuine monarch. Every seemingly foolish act of generosity was a desperate struggle to lift Saudi Arabia—to lift the Saudi league.
“You’ll spend billions to bring in experts. You’ll scatter Legendary items everywhere while searching for answers. Most will fail, but you won’t give up. And perhaps moved by your effort, a few will produce astonishing results.”
“……And yet it still ends in ruin?”
“Wise as you are, I’m sure you already guessed my answer before I said it.”
“……”
“You’re correct. Those pathetic cousins of yours—your own blood—will ruin everything.”
In the world of GM that Lee Shin knew, the Crown Prince had struggled until it became heartbreaking.
Yet the ending was always the same.
Bad ending.
“Whenever things start to look promising, your blood relatives will cause an incident. Eventually, when those incidents spiral out of control, the Bureau will step in.”
“Ha… They’ve already been sharpening their knives at us.”
“After what happened in South America, they’re moving fast.”
“South America?”
“Just talking to myself. Anyway, once the Bureau gets seriously involved, it’s over.”
Everyone has some dirt on them if you shake hard enough. When a league entangled so many people and so much money, how could it possibly be clean?
Whether mainstream or non-mainstream, every league carried one or two chronic diseases.
The problem with the Saudi league was that it wasn’t merely afflicted by disease—it had been built on top of the disease itself.
So the outcome was obvious.
“The league will be shut down. It will die.”
“!!”
“And the hope of the desert will burn with rage.”
When a fundamentally good man finally snaps, no one can stop him.
I traveled the world in the position of Crown Prince, doing every dirty job imaginable to save this league, and yet you people still killed it?
Fine. If that’s what you wanted so badly, I’ll kill it for you.
That was the true nature of the ‘Great Purge.’
“Once you have proper justification, you can lock away more than half your cousins. Only then does the Saudi Awakener community finally achieve unprecedented stability.”
“After the league is closed, you mean?”
“Yes.”
As a side note, the current image of the Crown Prince—like a kind, rich older brother from the neighborhood—could never be seen when playing with Saudi nationality.
Once everything ended, the Crown Prince’s illustration transformed into something venomous and cruel. Exactly like the typical Middle Eastern dictator everyone knew.
That illustration represented the future of the Saudi league and the cruel fate awaiting Crown Prince Muhammad.
“Haha……”
The Crown Prince laughed bitterly.
It was far too vivid to be called a mere story.
No—could it even be called a story? Wasn’t this closer to prophecy?
When his thoughts reached that point, the Crown Prince asked, half joking and half serious.
“The rumors say you can see the future. Do you truly see the future?”
The tale that Lee Shin was a miracle-type Awakener.
No one knew where it had started, but the controversy had followed him for some time.
Ever since he had taken over a League 4 guild on the verge of collapse, Lee Shin had walked an unbroken path of success.
Recruitment, training, management—and now he had become the master of an empire capable of influencing the entire league.
That wasn’t all. He had exerted powerful influence on every guild connected to him.
In all that time, he had never once failed.
No setbacks. Only a straight road of success and legendary achievements.
Logically speaking, was that something an ordinary human could do?
Wasn’t it more reasonable to assume he could see the future, or that some miracle was helping him?
“Well, it’s not entirely wrong.”
“!!”
“Your Highness. If you run a situation a hundred times, you get an average. Run it a thousand times, and you get percentages. So what happens if you run it ten thousand times?”
Lee Shin tapped his own head and smiled brightly.
“The correct answer appears. That is the future I see.”
To Lee Shin, the future was nothing special.
From the days in that tiny one-room apartment all the way to the time he was tormented by that boss whose name he could barely remember now. The playtime he had repeated thousands, tens of thousands of times.
That was Lee Shin’s ability. That was his miracle.
“……And in all ten thousand of those futures you see, the Saudi league is completely destroyed?”
“Unfortunately, yes.”
“So you’re telling me to destroy it with my own hands instead?”
“It’s already rotten. If left alone, the rot will only spread further.”
“What benefit does the kingdom gain from this? What exactly can we obtain by destroying the league?”
“At the very least, we’ll be able to make a deal with the Bureau.”
“Be more specific.”
“……”
“Representative Lee?”
When the conversation suddenly halted, the Crown Prince looked puzzled.
When he turned his head, he found Lee Shin grinning like a sly raccoon and rubbing his hands together.
“Dear customer, from this point on it’s a paid service.”
The Crown Prince burst into laughter, utterly dumbfounded.
“I forgot what a shrewd businessman you are.”
Sometimes he was like a sage of wisdom, sometimes like a wicked merchant.
Yet more than anyone else, he was a philanthropist who truly loved the league.
That was Lee Shin.
“Hehe.”
The matter progressed at breakneck speed.
It hadn’t been long since he left for Korea, yet the Crown Prince’s private jet had already landed in Saudi Arabia. On the runway, his personal royal guard stood ready.
“Hamid!”
“We will depart immediately.”
“Investigate without restraint. Everything! Leave nothing out! Understood?”
“Everything shall be done according to your will.”
More than ten vehicles scattered in every direction from the runway.
The Crown Prince himself climbed into one. As he did, he recalled Lee Shin, who had been with him only moments ago.
Chapter 1: Exposing Guild Corruption
To make a deal with the Bureau, we need something, don’t we? Organize the wrongdoings committed by your lacking cousins. Two points to note here. First. End it as quickly and decisively as possible. Second. Thoroughly investigate only within the guild’s domain.
He said it must not appear to be an external power struggle within the royal family.
There was no ill intent behind closing the league. He genuinely wished to maintain a close cooperative relationship with the Bureau.
If showing the Bureau his sincerity was the surface reason,
the hidden reason looked much further ahead.
Preparing for the aftermath that will follow once the league is closed…
Lee Shin had told him to kill the league with his own hands, but the risk was enormous. For starters, how would they handle the resentment of the citizens who had enjoyed the league?
Of course the Crown Prince himself had said he could bear even that risk, but Lee Shin wasn’t willing to accept it.
Since he had stepped forward, he refused to let that venomous, cruel face from the illustration become reality.
That was why Lee Shin had suggested gathering as much evidence as possible and handing it to the Bureau—to reduce the risk even slightly.
“Haha, how kind of him.”
Not long after the Crown Prince smiled while thinking of Lee Shin, the vehicle arrived at the palace.
He headed straight for the residence of the greatest elder of the House of Saud—the King of Saudi Arabia.
“Father, I have something to report.”
Chapter 2: Building Justification
Never forget where Your Highness’s power truly comes from. In the end, the supreme ruler of this kingdom is the King. Report the situation to your father clearly and without omission.
Until now, the Crown Prince had handled most affairs alone.
Was it due to excessive lust for power? Not at all. It was to spare his elderly father any burden.
But Lee Shin had said otherwise. When royal family matters were involved, there was no justification more solid than the King himself.
I’ll handle public opinion. Just keep the royal family’s mouth shut.
The Crown Prince had appealed with genuine sincerity and ultimately received the King’s firm assurance that there would be no problems whatsoever.
“It’s this easy! It really is exactly as Representative Lee said!”
Of course, Lee Shin had known the King also found those bastard blood relatives repulsive, but the Crown Prince—who was unaware of this—felt as though he had been placed under a spell.
Now that the board is set, the rest depends on Your Highness’s capabilities.
“To the Bureau. Quickly.”
The vehicle carrying the Crown Prince raced toward the Saudi Bureau.
Along the way, Hamid and the royal guard joined them, forming a massive wave of vehicles.
What does Your Highness desire? From an economy dependent on oil, create an alternative resource called magic stones and raise Awakeners. Plant this healthy cycle into the kingdom. What is the key to making this happen?
Correct. It is the Awakeners. The Hunters.
If skilled Hunters are nurtured, magic stones will follow naturally.
Then what was the problem I mentioned? A pet league for the nouveau riche. A league that runs on money instead of skill. A league of gluttonous pigs. There are many descriptions, but they all lead to one conclusion.
Correct. Once again, it is the Hunters.
The root was Hunters.
The answer had always been in the Hunters.
The Crown Prince boldly threw open the director’s office door and stepped inside, handing over documents containing the organized evidence of corruption.
“Please close the Saudi league.”
Disband all twenty major guilds.
Terminate every related contract and pay all penalties.
We will cooperate fully with the league closure without the slightest disturbance.
In exchange,
“We will create a league for those twenty-five and under.”
Nurture Hunters. That is the foundation of the newly born Saudi league.