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"Tell me, Lady Harrington." Kaze smiled, overlooking a group of Immortals in amusement. Twenty stood in a line, and a man and woman walked to each, talking and writing down information in notebooks. "What are you having your greed puppets procure on their first outing?"

"I\'m a lady?" Sage mused, turning to him with a charming smile, "It\'s hard to believe the word [director] after our last night together, let alone a designation that implies dignity."

"So long as one\'s preferences are neither criminal nor taboo, and their acts do not transcend into the real world, their sexual activities cannot blemish their dignity." He smirked, turning to her, "Since you still haven\'t enough power to blend fantasy and reality, you remain a lady yet."

The redhead smiled widely as she comprehended his words, frowned when she understood them, and then giggled at the absurdity. "You\'d call me a lady while asserting I\'ll cease to be one soon?"

"If I subverted women based upon personal speculations, I\'d be as barbaric as the uncouth swine festering the Mortal Plane." Kaze smiled magnetically, "Since I refuse to stoop so low, I shall use your proper title, no matter how short-lived my efforts may prove."

"Well, if that\'s the case, Sir Lexicon, I\'ll answer your question with dignity and grace." Sage said, curtseying in her tight business skirt, "We doth scour the Earth to acquire drugs for our sullen people."

"Hoh?" He smiled in amusement, "Dost thou seeketh opium to cure the masses or drink to uplift them from the throws of despair?"

"Both, you nerd." The redhead scoffed, unconvinced the man was a geek at one point, "We\'re scavenging for narcotics for medical use and alcohol to sell to Club Quinn and Kat\'s Casino.

Since both need alcohol and can\'t obtain it on time, we\'ll provide it—and exploit their fool-hearted ambition mercilessly."

Buying alcohol is a minor factor for a business like a bar or a club. The businesses needed to advertise their services and get glasses, chairs, decorations, and music set up.

However, the businesses [required] alcohol. Since they needed it and couldn\'t get it themselves, they would buy it at exorbitant prices they couldn\'t earn back—or fail outright.

Since Sage had an alcohol monopoly, she planned to sell it at the maximum amount possible.

The redhead\'s tone indicated that she had already written off Club Quinn and Kat\'s Casino as bankrupt. That\'s what she meant by [merciless].

"You mean Rick and Hayley will exploit them mercilessly." Kaze smirked derisively, looking at the two people talking to the twenty Immortals standing in a straight line.

"Correct." Sage smiled, "You wouldn\'t want people thinking their government is bankrupting start-ups and price gouging and profiting off its people, would you?"

Translation: I\'m a government official bankrupting our people. It\'d be bad if people knew, yes?

"That ship has sailed, has it not?" He scoffed in disgust, "You\'re listed as the sole owner of the Scavengers; how I don\'t want to know."

Translation: I\'m not sure how you convinced them to set aside the start-up money from the auction and risk their reputations to work for [your business], but it sounds scandal-worthy.

"Aren\'t you the least bit worried about political corruption?" She questioned seriously.

"Not in the slightest." Kaze replied with a sinister smirk, "You run a critical industry. That means you\'re the person [I\'ll be exploiting] mercilessly."

"Hoh?" Sage asked, raising her eyebrows in amusement, "The libertarian speaks of government intervention fluently before the economy starts?"

"I\'m but a humble businessman, Lady Harrington." Kaze replied hypnotically, straight-faced, "I know you\'ll accept any degree of exploitation lest I nationalize your industry, so I\'m exploiting that. I\'m sure you understand."

Translation: If you try to abuse Immortal Skye, I\'ll seize your company and pay you what I wish. So don\'t fuck with me, or I\'ll do to you what you\'re doing to Rick and Hayley of the Scavengers.

The redhead scoffed and turned away in genuine annoyance. "You\'d threaten economy-wide regulations like a political gangster?"

"Oh, no, no." The emperor chuckled, locking eyes with her, "I guarantee exclusive economic ruin as a benevolent dictator."

"Did you feel the need to say that explicitly?" Sage asked in vexation.

"You pointed out the link between my government and private industry." He smiled with gruesome mockery, "So I just thought I\'d return the favor."

"I see, I see." She conceded in amusement, turning and looking at the Scavengers, "Well, it\'s about time that we talk to our people."

The emperor smiled and walked with her to the redhead\'s business puppets.

"Hello, Emperor!" Rick exclaimed with a million-dollar smile. He was a good-looking man with long-straight hair he tied in a ponytail. "I don\'t believe we\'ve got a chance to speak individually; I\'m Rick Measley."

"Kaze Lexicon." Kaze smiled, shaking the friendly man\'s hand, and turning to the woman. She was a brunette with shoulder-blade-length straight hair and a no-nonsense expression. "And you\'re Hayley Musk."

Hayley\'s eyes widened in surprise for a split second before she remembered he was at the auction and also ran the economy—naturally, he would know her by name. "Hayley Musk."

The emperor smiled, seeing she wasn\'t attempting further discussion like Rick, trying to jump in at the first chance.

Sage smiled, watching the two of them. One was her puppet, and the other was a sacrifice—they just didn\'t know it. "Are you ready for your first run?"

Rick turned to the Immortals, standing in the summer sun with a proud expression. "I don\'t know, are you all ready to make some money!?"

Most of the mercenaries—ex-special forces soldiers—nodded silently, standing straight. However, there was one person ecstatic to get going.

"Let\'s go make us some muuuuuuh~NEIGH!" Larkin yelled, shimmying his shoulders in a light jig, making the non-military Immortals burst into laughter.

Rick chuckled awkwardly, turning to the emperor with a slightly-apologetic expression. "We\'re paying rather generously, you see. So everyone\'s excited."

Kaze smiled and shook his head. "This is fine; Larkin is a valued member of Immortal Skye. So I\'m certain… he\'ll help you if morale is ever lacking."

The Immortals burst into laughter when Larkin fist-pumped both arms twice, then flexed his new-and-improved cultivation-toned biceps with a grin.

Hayley cringed, wishing she could murder the Lockheed student and their pets. She wanted to get moving, but her blonde-haired partner insisted they wait to see if Kaze wanted a word.

His insistence paid off. While the emperor only approached because Sage was near them, he still showed up to meet them face-to-face.

"Well, off you go." Kaze smiled, "I look forward to seeing your progress, as you\'ll be busy running food orders after the Underground Bizarre\'s grand opening."

Rick and Hayley were both ecstatic to hear he would give him considerable business. However, Sage frowned inwardly, knowing he wasn\'t joking when he said he planned to exploit them mercilessly.

It was already summer, and if the starvation destroyed the fall harvest crops beyond Kaze\'s recommendation, they would rely upon stockpiled supplies and scavenged food for well over ten thousand people.

They would run out of stockpiled food by October with the influx of soldiers and families to Immortal Skye and Lainwright military base, now a [state] under their rule.

At present, there wasn\'t enough wild game to feed over ten thousand people, and fishing was far more dangerous than it appeared.

As a result, he would be relying upon the Scavengers heavily. While it wasn\'t [usually] wise to put such a critical industry into a person like Sage\'s hands, he needed someone ruthlessly competent to keep it running.

Despite their name, the Immortals were still mortals and would die from collapsing businesses, Qi-mutated animals, and getting overrun by thousands of cultivation-enhanced zombies.

They would still die on missions, and convincing people to sacrifice their life for their country was difficult. It was much easier to create private mercenaries who died for money, unrelated to the state.

Therefore, Kaze subsidized Immortals wanting to start mercenary scavenging businesses for the Underground Bizarre.

Sage was the first to pick up on the need and subsidization when she heard about the auction and exploited her first mover advantage. Thus, the Scavengers were born.

"Where are you off to, Emperor?" Sage asked as he walked away after seeing off the mercenaries.

"I\'m meeting up with Immortals who know how to work with boats." Kaze turned to her with a strange smile, "We have a date with cultivator-fish-infested waters."

The redhead\'s eyes widened in shock. "Cultivator… fish?"

"Surely you don\'t think that humans are the only people who have been affected by Qi, do you?" He mused, walking away.

The redhead was left baffled and shuddering, listening to the woods around her and realizing there were no birds, something very eerie in retrospect.

"Hunting must have been popular for the last month due to starvation and Qi must have killed the birds." Sage whispered, "But the marine life that survived in the ocean… nope! That is not my problem."