Chapter 539 - 336: The City’s Tricks Run Deep

Looking back on his life, the Chairman of the Adventurer Guild didn't consider himself a success.

Although the title of Chairman sounded impressive, he had been passively appointed to the position.

Once, he had been a hopeful Adventurer, a fledgling Warrior, until he took an arrow to the knee. The wound mostly healed, but it left him with a permanent limp.

You couldn't be an Adventurer with a limp, and adventuring was all he'd ever dreamed of since he was a child.

So he chose to become one of the Guild's clerical staff—an accountant, to be precise.

In fact, nearly thirty percent of the Adventurer Guild's members weren't Adventurers at all. They were responsible for organizing quests, providing logistical support, mediating all sorts of disputes, and, of course, balancing the books.

After becoming an accountant, he discovered he had a real talent for it—far more than he'd ever had as a Warrior.

As his years of service grew, his diligence and exceptional talent saw him gradually rise to the position of the Guild's chief financial officer.

But as his position rose, the Guild's fortunes sank.

The number of quests dwindled day by day. It went from Adventurers picking and choosing their quests to several teams competing for a single one.

Worse still, there was a surplus of Adventurers, creating a severe imbalance in supply and demand. The invisible hand of the free market made its adjustments.

Not only were there fewer quests, but the average reward for each one had also dropped.

Meanwhile, the Guild itself had to take a cut from the quests—its main source of income.

Back when times were good for Adventurers, the services provided by the Guild were worth the commission. But now that money was tight, some of the more powerful, well-known teams had started bypassing the Guild to contact employers directly.

It was a vicious cycle.

The previous Chairman, a powerful Adventurer in his own right, voluntarily stepped down because he was too busy taking on private jobs.

After that, the Chairman's seat remained vacant for a long time. No one wanted to take on such a thankless job.

After all, becoming Chairman at a time like this meant facing hundreds of thousands of resentful low- and mid-tier Adventurers.

It was a thankless, high-pressure role.

It was then that the board members had a realization: 'Hey, what about that diligent, uncomplaining financial officer? He'd be perfect to shove into the position.'

'He had an attachment to the Guild, he knew the situation inside and out, he had a strong sense of responsibility... and he was an accountant. Accountants are supposed to shoulder responsibilities they shouldn't have to in a crisis, right?'

And just like that, in a daze, he became the Chairman.

The good news was that he genuinely wanted to help the more mediocre Adventurers in the Guild.

He had once been one of them, after all.

When he received the message from Zog, he saw it as a chance to, at the very least, alleviate their current predicament.

But just a moment ago, that chance had been shattered.

A second after his anxiety caused him to jump up and blurt out, "Wait!", he realized Zog was most likely probing the Adventurer Guild for its bottom line.

And with that single word, he'd given everything away.

The negotiation had only just begun, but in reality, it was already over. All that remained was garbage time, just waiting for Zog to offer an even lower price.

The Chairman swallowed awkwardly and glanced around. The board members had lowered their heads, speechless. He looked back at Zog across from him. He'd never studied Dragon expressions, but he guessed the look on Zog's face was one of smug satisfaction.

'No, I have to try and salvage this.'

Everyone said that while Zog was greedy, he wasn't pure evil. He was especially known for treating his workers quite well.

The Chairman immediately came up with a new tactic.

'Since he already knows how miserable the Guild is, I might as well lean into it. I'll play the pity card and gamble on Zog's conscience.'

The Chairman forced a bitter smile, one that looked worse than a crying face. "Mr. Zog, it's like this... I won't hide it from you, the Adventurer Guild has fallen on hard times. The number of quests can no longer sustain the income of so many Adventurers. In some regions, our branches have even started offering quests for things like testing Alchemy Medicine."

Zog nodded, as if to say he already knew all of this.

In truth, he didn't. He had only surmised that the Adventurer Guild's income wasn't covering its expenses; he never imagined the low-tier Adventurers had been reduced to becoming test subjects for medicine.

You could say the only thing separating them from vagrants was their title.

The Chairman continued his appeal. "Dragon Hunting quests are a major category. So many adventuring parties depend on them for their livelihood. What if... what if we accept your previous conditions, but we negotiate a little? Instead of canceling all Dragon Hunting quests, we could set an age limit. Dragons above a certain age cannot be targeted by quests."

"A fair point."

"I knew you'd agree! Thank you so much—"

"But I refuse."

The Chairman's words of thanks died in his throat.

Zog had a conscience, just not a very big one.

During their brief exchange, he had already adjusted his goals for the negotiation.

His original plan was to eliminate the Dragon Hunting quests and, by spending as little as possible, convince the Guild to let its low-tier Adventurers retrain as couriers.

'But now... it seemed he shouldn't have to spend any money at all.'

'He was providing the Guild with courier quests. He was helping them. Why should he have to pay for the privilege?'

So he decided to execute the first step of his new plan: apply pressure. Refuse everything the Chairman said, no matter what.

"I cannot accept your terms," Zog said, his tone serious. "The primary goal of canceling the Dragon Hunting quests is to protect Juvenile Dragons and sub-adults. Older Dragons, on the other hand, don't need protection. How many of the Adventurer Guild's legacy quests to hunt Ancient Dragons have actually been completed?"

"Er..."

The Chairman had no rebuttal.

Zog had a point. Even when there were quests for sufficiently old Dragons, almost no one took them. Some quests had been posted at the Guild for hundreds of years; the clients who posted them had died and been replaced by their descendants several times over, yet the quests remained incomplete.