He had no proof, but he couldn't help but wonder if this incident was caused by the one who had been dubbed as the 'Voider', as silly of a name he found it to be, was related to this incident.
There were some commonalities, the fact that both incidents had occurred extremely covertly that not a single soul perceived. Furthermore, the taxes for both events had not been paid, though with the unregistered taxing, he didn't even know if that was true or not.
However, he did not care if the two were the same or now, they could be treated as the same, and he could use the infamy to lure them in with the prospect of glory and prestige for killing such a powerful Martial Squire.
Soon enough, his secretary had set up an appointment between Chairman Deacon and the remaining Martial Squires that had taken interest in his offer. He was quite famous in the Shionel Confederation, and outside of a few powerhouses in the Shionel Merchant Guild, he could easily poach Martial Squires with simply far superior contracts with way better terms and conditions. He had even offered to fully pay their severance pay.
The sum was a little too much for them to break the contract lightly, however, for someone as filthy rich as himself, it was not even with thinking about.
Just merely a few days later, his secretary had brought them along to his guest office. This was where he invited people when he wanted to show off a bit.
There were sixteen Martial Squires In total that he had managed to gather using his offers to them. Sixteen was a decent number by his standards, but it was hardly enough in the long run, each floor was as large as a large town, and the Shionel Dungeon itself had the holding capacity of a small country.
Of course, for now, he would have to make do with this amount. He could not gather a hundred Martial Squires in a single day, that would take time.
He wasn't too good at evaluating the combat capabilities of Martial Artists himself and merely relied on the data he had been provided on them. Only one S-rank thus far, and the rest were all A-ranks, barring one B-rank.
"Welcome, adventurers," He told them. "I am Chairman Deacon, and I appreciate all of you taking the time to come all the way to meet me regarding my offer, and patronage."
His voice was heavy and straightforward. He betrayed neither arrogance nor humility, he was willing to give them the respect that Martial Squires deserved, but they were not worthy of him bowing his head down to.
Soon enough, all of them were seated and poised to begin the discussion.
"As you all know," He began. "Recently, there was an event stirred up in the twelfth dungeon multiple times recurringly. Large swathes of esoteric ore deposits have been disappearing without the inland taipans occupying the territories from which they were extracted from being exterminated."
He paused for a moment. "There's a lot that can be said about it in detail, however, those details will be provided to you separately. What I want to get across here is what I'm hiring you to do. The objective is simple. Find the people responsible for extracting the extremely large quantities of esoteric ore deposits in this fashion, and eliminate them."
The Martial Squires raised an eyebrow at that.
"You will possess the full cooperation of the intelligence division of my company that has already begun gathering all the intelligence surrounding the matter. You can even make requests that will be considered by the division and be processed accordingly," He explained, before continuing. "As promised, the remuneration is of no consequence, I'll even double or triple it as long as you bring me the head."
That earned a reaction out of most of the Martial Squires. The terms and conditions were extremely generous, and that was clearly the point. He wanted to buy them over and get them to go all out with generous rewards that were basically no different from bounties.
"Those are some extremely generous conditions, chairman," One of the Martial Squires noted. "However, how are we supposed to engage in tracking measures inside the dungeon, it is difficult to engage in any kind of intelligence gathering."
"I am aware of that," Chairman Deacon would not have gone out of his way to gather the best of the Martial Squires he could at the moment if this were such a troublesome issue. "Rest assured that you will have full support from my side, and you will be compensated hourly regardless of success or failure."
That relaxed them, they were afraid that their recompense would be withheld if they did fail to track down the one or ones responsible for mysteriously draining a floor of much of its resources. However, if they would get paid even in the event of their failure for their efforts and pains, then there was quite the merit in undertaking this contract.
"Out remuneration will also be relative to our rank, correct?" Squire Fren, the leader of the famous S-rank party Saberstrike asked.
She had been looking to cut her contract with her current patron after she failed to be the one who cleared the second floor, which gave the former even more power to try and exert control over her adventuring abilities.
However, her severance fee was considerable, thus she had been quite interested when she heard of an offer that paid for her severance pay regardless of what it was.
"Of course," Chairman Deacon nodded. "Merit will certainly be the foundation of your remuneration."
"Can we opt for an open-ended contract with an hourly remuneration rate without a bare minimum amount of time spent on fulfilling the objective?" The only B-rank Martial Squire asked.
Chairman Deacon frowned inwardly as he tried recalling the identity of the weakest Martial Squire in the room. "You… what was your name again?"
"Ah. The name's Quarrier. Rui Quarrier,"
