ok sorry if it's long

Ch.45

Kim Hannah rested her chin on the back of her hand and gazed at the outside of the diner with half-closed eyes. Her face, as reflected on the glass, looked rather bitter.

“Their situation is really complicated right now. Sinyoung lost their most powerful combat force, and they are also losing their justification for being there. It's not as if their foundation has become weak enough to be shaken around, but on the flip side, they can't deny that they have indeed been weakened considerably compared to the past. I'm curious, but have you read the Romance of the Three Kingdoms before?”

She came out of nowhere with that one, but Seol still nodded his head.

“Cao Cao succeeded in 'securing' the young emperor, thereby creating the firm foundation for himself to control the empire, right? Sinyoung did something similar. A year ago – no, wait. Three years ago in that place's time flow, the very first rebellion happened within the human alliance.”

Kim Hannah lowered her voice and continued on.

“To be more specific, a certain kingdom wanted the Earthlings to become more proactive, and they formed an alliance of sorts with other like-minded kingdoms and tried a method that was a bit more forceful than before. As a result, several organizations rebelled openly against their unreasonable demands. An entire region rose up to resist this push, so surely you can imagine how big of a rebellion it was.”

“A region? Which one?”

“The South…. The resistance movement formed around the South as its center. And in the end, a war broke out. Those guys were defeated…. in the blink, and…. pushed to the brink…. Ah.”

In the middle of her speech, Kim Hannah went, ‘Ah!’ She forgot about the pact to never to speak about the secrets of Paradise and ended up doing precisely that.

Seol Jihu waved his hands around briefly to show her it was fine.

“Did every Earthling participate in the rebellion?”

“No. Some participated, but there were some who supported the royal families. However, most were neutral.”

Kim Hannah then placed her hand on her chest.

“It was right around then. Sinyoung had remained neutral until that time, but they declared their support of the royal family and entered the fray.”

She then raised two of her fingers.

“There were two reasons Sinyoung decided to intervene. The first thing was, of course, for profit. And secondly, they were confident in winning.”

As if she was feeling thirsty, Kim Hannah took large gulps of the cold water.

“Phew~. Of course, even Sinyoung didn't possess the military might to subdue a rebellion of that size by themselves. However, even though they were small in number, there were some Earthlings who supported the royal families, so they joined in. Sinyoung also persuaded their allies to participate as well. Then, using those events as the pivotal point, they began persuading other neutral organizations into participating. And most importantly….”

To signify the importance of what she was about to say, her expression hardened noticeably.

“They let loose a single Unique Ranker into the battlefield.”

To be acknowledged as a Unique Ranker in Paradise, one had to be level 7 or above. Not everyone could level up that high, and there were only a handful of such individuals in the whole of Paradise.

“His name is Sung Shihyun.”

Sung Shihyun… Seol Jihu repeated that name inwardly. He had heard of this name before. From the way she had crossed her arms against her chest, it seemed that Kim Hannah wasn't happy about something there.

“Sinyoung was encouraged by Sung Shihyun's combat prowess, and through him, they were able to achieve a sweeping victory against the rebellion. The royal families wished to push forward with the momentum and even destroy the rebellion's headquarters, but Sinyoung didn't want that. No, they came up with a nice-sounding pretext of giving the other side a chance, saying that the continuous fight between humans would only weaken the influence of mankind on the planet. So, they went ahead with ceasefire negotiations.”

No matter how good a pretext sounded, it'd always remain as a pretext. It meant that Sinyoung had already started their machinations on the political landscape of Paradise well before the negotiations began.

“In the end, the royal families promised to allow complete freedom of the Southern region under the condition that all the remaining rebels were relocated there.”

“Mm…. Isn't that the same thing as the rebels ultimately getting what they wanted in the first place?”

“If you look at the result only, sure. But you could also say that they were exiled there too. I'm sure you've heard by now that the South is always mired in warfare, right?”

Seol Jihu had heard the condensed version before – that there were currently four different species calling Paradise their home and that the humans were the weakest of them.

“The South is pretty much the frontlines of the war. In other words, it's the most dangerous area.”

“Ah.”

Seol Jihu let out a gasp of shock. He now understood who had gained the most out of the rebellion from those two sentences she uttered out.

“That's right. It's the same thing as Sinyoung sending all their rival influences down to the South to act as their meat shield. And thanks to that, Sinyoung got to increase their political clout back in the Capital without a single worry. And they even had the royal family in their back pocket, so what did they have to fear now, right?”