1988 Conversation
That day, every single person is within the hub.
The city emptied out. Even the few people that were staying back came running after they heard of the news about how diverse and unique the Hub is. The students stayed mostly at arcade. Anyone who is interested in battle is there.
They are trying to set highscores and beat each other's records.
Of course, right now not a lot of them are doing good since they are new to this. So, the scores and high scores are constantly fluctuating.
The whole day went on just like that.
Joker announced that the establishment will be closed everyday exactly an hour before midnight and then will be reopened after sunrise. It is to check the machine and equipment and make sure everything is in a perfect condition.
Even though everyone left, they are all thinking about returning back.
The Hub has everything and anything they could possibly need.
Pearl and White are sitting in her courtyard after they returned to the academy grounds.
"What do you think about the hub?"
Pearl asked as she sipped some tea.
White didn't eat anything that was placed in front of him. He just looked at the bird that was on his hands. Today, he also spent a lot of time trying out everything in the Hub.
"It is a great place. I am actually surprised that someone is generous enough to open an establishment like this?"
"Why is that? Isn't it a good business?"
"It is, but an establishment like this can only gain money in my opinion. It would just stay as an extremely good business. In fact, they would gain more money compared to what they would get from selling it to someone or making it exclusive to someone.
But they wouldn't gain any power."
"Wait a minute. How are they going to make more money this way, instead of selling it to some power? Do you know what these academies are willing to sacrifice just to make it exclusive to themselves? Even my uncle would go to lengths to make that happen.
He might even summon Zeus's projection to buy it at an insanely high cost."
"Yeah, but the current method is still more profitable."
"He is just opening each machine for one gold coin. How much can even gain much from this?"
"That is where you are wrong. The arcade is not meant to rip off one person in a short term. If one training session costs too much, there wouldn't be many people who would try it. But now, I am sure every single student in the academy would go there every day. Thousands of students and they would use up more than one coin.
Just imagine, he has a guaranteed revenue of tens of thousands of coins every day. And the arcades are designed in a way that would encourage competition and they also highlight the flaws of the candidates.
They are going to use them more and more.
Then the research library. It is no exaggeration to say, these professional people are richer than average students, I am assuming Joker would make the initial investment with just one month of its opening…"
White went on explaining what he thought of the business model and Pearl was surprised. There are many things that she hasn't seen and understood, but White's explanation made everything clearer. She could see the financial scope of the Hub.
"Thanks for explaining. I am so used to the usual business models of this place and I can only see this from the perspective of the academies, so I haven't thought of it. But now, I understand what you mean by why Joker will lose out in the power he could have gained." Pearl said with a smile. It seems like she indeed learned something new from the conversation.
"Really?"
"Of course, with exclusivity Joker would have gained more in power to compensate what he lost in money. He would have influence over the academy that he is affiliated with and they are going to give him more access to resources, people and anything that he wants.
He would be backed by the power of the academy and with the added factors like his future accomplishments and what he could bring the academy, his importance would keep on raising."
"That's right. That is also the reason why I am surprised, why would a person leave a chance as obvious as it. If he could just meet one of the elders of any academy, his life would change.
He would become a person with influence over realms and armies at his beck and call.
Why do you think he didn't do that?"
White asked as he looked Pearl who went into a deep thought.
"Unless, he doesn't desire it? But what could make someone not desire that much power? Maybe he already has it?"
Pearl muttered in that deep thought.
She shook those thoughts off of her head. She knew what kind of influence an academy has. She couldn't imagine an entity other than academies having that much influence. She changed the topic.
"Anyway, whatever the long term impact this thing might have, I am more interested in what it would do the freshmen of this year."
"Why?"
"Since you just joined, you might not be as informed. Let me tell you, the whole point of academies is to create competition and increase the output of competent individuals.
And that competition begins since the first year.
One month after the admissions, the academy towers will open for the freshmen. That would be the start of the competition. People will enter the tower and try to climb it up, there will be an unofficial ranking among the freshmen, but everyone knows that even the elders and deans accept that ranking.
After that was done, there would be the first tournament within a couple of weeks. This would be conducted by one of academies in the region. That would be start of a string of tournaments by all the academies.
Every week, there will be on tournament. Even though they are announced as the internal tournaments of the academies, they are open tournaments. Anyone can participate. This would be until the inter-academic freshmen competition which will happen among the freshmen of all regions. All the academies in the realm compete for it.
The prizes for the competition are extravagant, but more than that, it is a chance to make your mark within the academic realm. It will be start of the glory.
I will be one of the candidates that would represent the Zeus academy in all of this, but I want you to be a part of that too."
White looked at her without answering.
"There is another candidate within the academy who is a great lightning mage. Apart from us three, I already made the list of all the seeded candidates from the other academies in the region.
I drafted a plan.
Us three versus them is obviously going to be an unfair fight for us, but we are going to use the time before the competition begins to deal with them. We will peg them down and defeat them in every way possible both inside and outside of the battlefields."
"You seem to have a lot riding on this freshman tournament. For you to take this much effort just to plan their sabotage."
"Yes. We will use my plan to estimate their prowess in every form. By the time the Inter-academic freshmen tournament begins, we should have a hold of all their strengths, weaknesses and make them dance in the palm of our hands.
This generation is mine to conquer and I am willing to share the glory of this conquest with only a few people. You are one of them. Of course, I wouldn't say I am impressed with you so much that I am giving this to you out of my generosity. Because that is a lie.
I chose you because, you are the only one who seemed to know what Sam is.
He is a man, that I cannot gauge from the time we met.
I need someone to peg him down and you are the only plausible option until now. So, please make your decision. If you do, come here again tomorrow morning. I will assign a team to you, that will help you in every you want."
"A team?"
"Yeah, Zeus academy is the nest of many great talents. Even if I only seeded us three, there are many talents who could be wild cards and dark horses. I am going to keep them close to us three and let us help us in this goal.
They are going to be our cards in this game. Think about it."
With that Pearl stood up and left.
White didn't speak anything. He just sat there for a while before he slowly walked out of the courtyard with cane in his hands.
And the next morning, he walked just as slowly as he made his way to Pearl's courtyard.
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