Return of the Shattered Constellation

Chapter 224: Star, the Fog of War (4)

The shocking news delivered to the Celestials, who shone brilliantly in the sky, put <Heaven> in an uproar.

―Minerva won the war against the ‘Gemini’!

―The ‘Tian Shi Yuan’ and two other <Purple Star Astrology> Celestials plummeted!

―The <Horoscope> and the <Purple Star Astrology> blame each other. They have deployed their armies to their borders!

None of the news could be taken lightly. The news about Minerva and the ‘Gemini’ especially made many Celestials tense up since many of them believed that the ‘Gemini’ would emerge victorious.

Minerva was the great <Olympus> Celestial who was known to live off former glory, representing the has-been <Society>. In contrast, the ‘Gemini’ were one of the leaders of <Horoscope>, which was currently the most influential <Society> within <Heaven>. Hence, many Celestials put their bets on the ‘Gemini,’ but Minerva turned out to be the victor in this fight. Although the war technically ended in a draw, the ‘Gemini’ basically lost since they failed to invade Minerva’s divine ground.

Surprised by the fact that the <Olympus> Celestials were still strong, many Celestials grew vigilant and kept an eye out for Minerva’s next move. They had just confirmed that she was still extremely powerful, so they thought her next move would greatly affect the state of affairs in <Heaven>. However, before Minerva could even do anything, a conflict started between <Horoscope> and <Purple Star Astrology>, catching everyone’s attention.

<Horoscope> pointed fingers at <Purple Star Astrology>, saying that they were the reason the ‘Gemini’ had lost. On the other hand, the <Purple Star Astrology> publicly announced that they were holding the <Horoscope> Celestials accountable for the loss of their key member. The borders of the two <Societies> were swiftly engulfed in mayhem. Many Celestials began to move, their soldiers holding up their weapons high up in the sky. The possibility of another <Myth War> breaking out put <Heaven> in tension.

Considering the first <Myth War> resulted in many casualties and damages, the Celestials couldn’t afford to pay attention to a <Saha World> mortal despite his remarkable achievement of overcoming the World Net. Hence, the Celestials’ interest in Chang-Sun quickly diminished.

Of course, some of the Celestials saw the bigger picture and realized that Chang-Sun was in the center of everything, so they paid all attention to observing his every movement instead.

『Find out how Lee Chang-Sun and Minerva—no, how he and <Olympus> are connected right now!』

Some Celestials even kept trying to find out who was supporting Chang-Sun.

『I thought <Olympus> was going to disappear into history forever, but is it actually trying to rise again? Interesting!』

『If my assumption is correct, <Olympus> probably isn’t the only one that’s making a move. Keep an eye on the old <Asgard> remnants, <Memphis[1]>, or <Deva[2]>.』

Meanwhile, some Celestials believed there had to be more to what was going on.

『Information about Lee Chang-Sun is classified? What the hell are you talking about?! Those <Management Bureau> bastards took that much bribe but dare to work like this?! Contact them again! If they try anything funny, warn them that I’ll go there myself!』

On the other hand, some Celestials tried to get their hands on very basic information about Chang-Sun first to verify the information that they had. Either way, it seemed that the chaos Chang-Sun had started wouldn’t just easily die out.

* * *

Meanwhile in the central headquarters of the <Management Bureau>...

Tap. Tap… Tap…!

Rocinante, a member of the Supreme Management Council and the head of the central headquarters, which was where they oversaw the general affairs of the <Management Bureau>, sat in his office with a very annoyed look. He tapped nonstop on a thick folder of documents, displaying just how furious he was.

“So.” Rocinante’s eyes were fixed on the document folder—the very reason he was getting furious.

Forbidden Data.

A big red seal was stamped on the cover of the document folder. Most documents inside it had also been deducted.

“This is what they gave you after I made my request?” Rocinante asked coldly.

“Th-that is correct.” Miguel, Rocinante’s secretary, reported. Not really sure what else to say, he sweated profusely. Although he didn’t do anything wrong since he only followed Rocinante’s orders, his superior would give him hell if he said that out loud.

“He’s just a Player… He hasn’t achieved <Transcendence>, and he’s not a hero who has been selected to become a <Horoscope> or <Purple Star Astrology> Celestial in the future either. Yet for some reason, the information about him requires Class 0 security clearance. What should I think of this?” Rocinante muttered to himself.

Rocinante was a Supreme Management Council member, which literally meant that he was one of the most supreme managers ruling the <Management Bureau>. However, even he didn’t have a high-enough clearance to read the information about Chang-Sun. This matter could never be taken lightly.

“Even <Olympus> can’t make the information of one Player this confidential unless a Ruling Celestial of the <Olympus> stepped in.”

Rocinante was talking about the three brilliant Celestials that ruled <Olympus>—Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto. Among those Celestials, Neptune was currently the only one who was actively operating, but Rocinante knew he was definitely not behind Chang-Sun.

‘Otherwise, he wouldn’t have asked me himself.’ Rocinante recalled.

Although the <Management Bureau>’s purpose was to be a mediator between <Heaven> and the <Saha World>, and its employees’ biggest virtue was neutrality, they were all living beings. Hence, they were still somewhat affected by their personal relationships, and the same went for Rocinante. Several high-ranking Celestials whom Rocinante was close with had recently made requests, all of which were about getting information about Chang-Sun.

Chang-Sun was someone whom the <Management Bureau> had been keeping their eye on, so up until now, Rocinante had made up excuses to reject the request. However, with the Celestials pressuring him more over time, he now had no choice but to abuse his authority.

At first, Rocinante just ordered one of his lowest-ranking employees to bring him the information, but the employee couldn’t even access it, let alone read it. Realizing something was wrong, his subordinates involved the other department members to gain access to it. However, the only word they ever read was ‘Forbidden.’ Right now, even Rocinante’s request to access the information was turned down, putting everyone in the central headquarters in great shock.

’Someone more powerful is behind Lee Chang-Sun.’

That was the conclusion that was engraved in Rocinante’s mind.

“Who in the world is it? Who the hell is behind him? By the looks of it, This has been planned from the very start.” Rochinante nipped the end of a cigar with scissors and bit on it.

Miguel hurriedly approached him and lit his cigar. The cigar’s smoke and its typical scent spread throughout the office.

“I can’t leave him be. At this rate, we could find ourselves in a really big problem,” Rocinante mumbled, now considering Chang-Sun as a threat, not just someone on a watchlist.

It had only been less than a year since he made his name known, but he had already put <Heaven> in chaos. The universe finally regained peace when the <Myth War> ended, and the people had just gotten used to the peace. Rocinante couldn’t let the universe be devastated again.

“But I can’t start anything with him first… Gosh, This is frustrating!” Rocinante didn’t budge until half of his cigar was burnt away. His furrowed eyebrows showed how much he agonized.

He couldn’t mess with a Player without any good reason. Doing so would violate the law of causality, which would ultimately schedule him a very private meeting with an internal inspection agent in a room deep underground. However, he was worried that leaving this mysterious Player alone could lead to a catastrophe that would cost his head in the process.

“Umm, one more thing…” Miguel said cautiously, tiptoeing around his superior.

“What else do you have to report to me”

“I’m not sure if it has anything to do with the current matter…” Miguel trailed off.

“I want to hear anything that can be a hint, so shoot.”

Miguel was really not sure if he should say this, but Rocinante looked like he would fire a missile at Miguel if he didn’t say anything useful. Shutting his eyes, Miguel said, “I know a friend who is currently working as an undercover agent in the <Underworld>.”

Pzzz!

Not realizing that his cigar had almost burned up, Rocinante fixed his eyes on Miguel.

‘The <Underworld>? Those dark and unreadable people? Why is he mentioning them out of nowhere?’

After wondering for a moment, a hypothesis crossed Rociante’s mind.

‘Why didn’t I think of them?’

Rocinante gestured at Miguel with his chin and said, “Elaborate.”

“This happened quite some time ago already, but one of the death lists got lost on Earth for an unknown reason, turning the Reaper Branch upside down.”

A death list was the record that contained the four destined life phases of humans that were going to be born in the <Saha World>. On the other hand, the Reaper Branch was the executive branch of the <Underworld>. It was similar to the central headquarters of the <Management Bureau>. Following only the King of the Underworld’s orders, the Reaper Branch members oversaw the deceased people and the ten hells.

“As you already know, a death list is essential in samsara since one missing death list can imbalance the law of causality,” Miguel continued.

“Get to the point.”

“The reapers recently received an instruction that they can stop their search for the missing death list.” Miguel clenched his fists.

“Hmm…?”

Maybe Rociante could let this story slide since a death list going missing was an incident that even the higher-ups would be reluctant to deal with it, so it would be reasonable to assume that the <Underworld> members wanted to cover up the incident. However, why now? Something was fishy.

“On top of that, many of the Celestials that were recently sealed in the abyss were summoned to the King of the Underworld’s palace.”

“Ha!” Rociante chuckled in disbelief.

“The official reason for the summon is for their regular trials.”

“Something doesn’t add up,” Rocinante assumed.

“The timing doesn’t… Under normal circumstances, it would mean nothing, but I’m reporting it this time just in case. If I made an unnecessary report—!”

“No, you did good. We might not have concrete evidence, but it’s better to look further into any suspicious.” Rocinante rubbed his cigar on an ashtray to extinguish it. “But it’s not easy to interfere in the affairs of the <Underworld>. Hmm…”

The <Management Bureau> didn’t belong anywhere in ‘Trailokya[3] and Six Paths[4],’ which made up this universe, so they had the power to travel to any place. However, their power wasn’t absolute. Even they were uncomfortable with the thick energy of death in the <Underworld>.

Moreover, everything that took place in the <Underworld> was guileful and secretive. Thanatos himself, the King of the Underworld, was known to be unreadable. Taking that into consideration, there was a chance of things backfiring if Rocinante ran around in the <Underworld> without the King of the Underworld’s permission. The central headquarters of the <Management Bureau>? Rocinante? Their titles didn’t matter in front of the King of the Underworld. He would just scoff at them. However…

‘He likes to keep things under wraps, so there is a high chance of him having nothing to do with this… Still, better safe than sorry.’ Rociante thought.

Rocinante determinedly asked, “Miguel, Herald is in charge of this Lee Chang-Sun, right?”

“Th-that’s correct.”

“Where is he?”

“Umm… He must be really busy by now because of all the queries regarding Lee Chang-Sun,” Miguel answered.

Busy was an understatement. Herald hadn’t been able to go home and rest for over a month now. Miguel recalled how surprised he was when he learned know that a rabbit’s eyes could get redder. Now that he thought about it, Herald also currently had huge bags under his eyes and was filthy since he couldn’t even take a proper shower.

“Then call—no, I’ll visit him myself.” Rocinante picked up his jacket from the nearby hanger and stood up.

1. It’s the capital of ancient Egypt. ☜

2. It means male deities in Sanskrit, especially the male deities in Hinduism. But it’s a place/organization in this novel. ☜

3. The definition is different depending on the religion(Hinduism or Buddhism), but it usually means three realms. ☜

4. The concept is from Buddhism. While existences go through samsara after failing to get enlightened, they’re born into six different worlds depending on their karma. ☜