Vol. 3 Chap. 88 The Limits of Empathy

Vol. 3 Chap. 88 The Limits of Empathy

Truth was trying to connect some very random dots at speed. The picture he was making didn’t make a whole lot of sense to him. Anak and Sons were some kind of human-ish. Cousins of humanity as he generally understood the term. He was a little hazy on what exactly that meant.

Merkovah had played down their importance, but he could vividly remember Remu Anakson. More than two meters of slab muscle and the furious eyes of an emperor, all supported by Level Five cultivation. Truth would bet at least one of those levels was a body cultivation spell too.

Actually, no need to bet- he knew for a fact that they had body cultivation. One of the spells he recovered from Gullvar’s place was a modified body cultivation spell. The system couldn’t crack the other, but... odds were better than good it was related.

They were remainers. Holdouts. The Anak’s were clearly playing for the world after the collapse. But he couldn’t figure out what their angle was with MegaShroom. Definitionally, these pricks were good for nothing. In fact, they sucked value and goodness out of things. Their phony mushroom nonsense was especially toxic. People bought them instead of real medicine, and paid a fatal price for their faith in marketing.

Collapse... control... not entirely human but close enough... what was he missing? What would humans need post collapse? Organization, first and foremost if you were an empire builder. Then once you had people listening- shelter, water, food... material comforts? It starts getting a bit vague once you are past the whole “How to not die right this minute” stuff. Like... a latrine. Nobody ever thinks “I’m in an emergency situation. Where do I poop that won’t poison the water supply?”

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Truth nodded along with that, then grinned slightly. Some mushrooms are hallucinogenic. What do you want to bet MegaShroom grows them for a certain, very select, clientele?

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“Hey Ricardo, when did you get the Conference Room re-done?”

“About ten years ago.”

“Ah. How do you guys get your mushrooms? Contract farming?”

“Some of it.” Tony rolled his eyes. “I know everyone thinks the marketing is bullshit, and ok, maybe it can’t do everything it says on the label, but in terms of ingredients and quality, we really do put in the work. Most of it is grown in house, and most of it really is assayed by alchemists for purity and potency.”

“Right but... it’s potently doing nothing useful.” Truth looked dubious.

“We dispute that. And not legally relevant.”

“Seems relevant.” Truth fixed Ricardo with a look.

Most people would have considered the fact that they were handcuffed to a chair in front of someone who soloed their entire squad of paid killers almost instantly and completely unharmed, and backed down. Most people are never going to be General Counsel for a MLM.

“Megashroom products are manufactured and distributed under the laws of Jeon as Nutritional Supplements. As nutritional supplements are not regulated as medicine, they are held to the ordinary standard of consumer protection afforded to non-food, non-medicinal goods. Our belief in the efficacy of the product is entirely sufficient to defeat any claim of false advertising. Indeed, even suggesting as much could lead to serious legal consequences, young man, and filing a vexatious lawsuit could even result in jail time.” Ricardo glared at Truth.The debut release of this chapter happened at Ñòv€l-B1n.

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Please never call someone a glorious beast of a man ever again. Please and thank you.

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“Are you entirely clear on your odds of leaving this room alive, Rick?”

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“Decent, I expect. You took me alive for a reason, and I don’t believe it’s to enquire about our contractors.”

“You would be surprised.” Truth growled.

“What do you want, then? Not that I’m ungrateful. However, regardless of my... urgent need to renegotiate certain parts of my compensation package with the Board, I am still Megashroom’s attorney. I have a duty.”

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“You seem like the kind of person who gets holiday cards from the President.”

“Of Jeon? Each of the last four.” Ricardo smiled confidently.

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“Shame. I’m a rebel, here to topple the old order.”

“That’s nice.” Ricardo nodded politely. His eyes didn’t even flicker.

There was a pregnant pause. The argument between Ricardo and Tony was only getting more heated, but Truth and the System were both having a moment.

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Right. Yes. Obviously. Do you really think?

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Yeah.

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Staff is no use- go talk to the supervisor.

“Hey, Ricardo, sorry to cut in, where are those farms of yours?”

“Well, we grow mushrooms, so they are all grown indoors. We have a farm in this building, for example. Most of the building is used for cultivation, in fact.”

“Really?”

“Turned out, we didn’t need that much office space. But our founder got a fifty year lease on this place, so here we are. There are plenty of other farms too, of course.”

“Tony, add that to the data on the crystal.”

“Okay?”

“Great.” Truth dithered for half a second, sighed, and destroyed the attorney’s head with a swift palm strike.

“PRAEGER! Why?!” Tony tried to jump back, the chair slamming into the cheap wooden shelves behind the desk. He didn’t manage to get out of the chair until it bounced off the shelves, books falling down on him.

“Because I can’t think of a single good reason to keep him alive, and a lot of bad consequences from leaving him alive, and there will be no consequences whatsoever from killing him.” Truth said, reasonably. Or he thought it was reasonable. Tony turned paper white. Then turned and vomited.

“Oh God. Oh God. Please. Please don’t kill me. Please don’t kill me. Whatever you want. Just tell me. Whatever you want. Please. Please don’t kill me.”

Truth was stunned for a moment, then buried his face in his hands.

Right. He was the bad guy. Despite everything. Despite all the horrible things MegaShroom had done. Despite all the lives they ruined. The fact was that everyone in this room was recovering from mind control and a lifetime of damage. He was the bad guy. The monster of violence. He might have broken the geas, but he certainly wasn’t helping them.

“Tony?”

“Yes?”

“I am planning on letting you run. Let me be very clear on something. If they catch you, they will kill you in a way that makes being eaten alive look like mercy. They will be as brutal and humiliating as possible. They will involve your family, your pets, anyone and anything you ever cared about. Because they need it to hurt you on every level. You understand me?”

“Yes. God! Yes.”

“And you understand what happens if you go to the cops? Or try to call anyone, warn anyone?”

“Same thing. I get it.”

“Yeah. Do your best to flee the country. There is a lot of that right now. Shouldn’t be too hard. Don’t pack anything, don’t grab anything, just run your ass straight to the airport and book the next flight to anywhere not-here. Figure out the rest when you are in the air.

“I will do that. Exactly that.”

“Good. Because you won’t see me, but I will be following you, to see if you draw any more people hunting you down. And if you try anything, you end up like Tony. No warning. Just instant oblivion, and you find out what really happens next.”

There was a sudden smell of urine, and Tony frantically nodded.

“Good. Plenty of carpets outside. Hail one.” Tony grabbed his wallet and fled.

>

No point. I’d just kill more MegaShroom goons, assuming more got sent. No, time to talk to their real boss. Let’s go see our cousins. Those... strong sons of Amak.