NOVEL NEXT Chapter 96: The Meeting
Black Snow City is located in the Black Snow Continent, which, in turn, is part of the Black Snow Corporation.
The term 'black snow' is coined due to the presence of a peculiar phenomenon involving black snowfall.
In this continent, black snow falls every winter. It's not harmful, but it creates a surreal scene when outsiders visit.
Black Snow Continent serves as the main base of the Black Snow Corporation, and though it was once its only base, the corporation is now expansive, with control over many continents.
A Rank 12 Leader leads the Black Snow Corporation.
There are fifty corporations worldwide with leaders of this rank. However, it's worth noting that despite their Rank 12 status, they do not truly own any universal laws; Rachel holds all universal laws.
Nevertheless, their combat power is genuine rank 12.
These fifty corporations are unaware of the true owner and wisely refrain from investigating this mystery. After all, Rachel does not want anyone to know her secrets.
As one of the prominent fifty, Black Snow is a member of the World Corporate Board.
This board possesses the authority to tweak the world's codes to some extent. Meetings are convened in various locations annually, usually in one of the board members' headquarters. In this instance, the conference is taking place on the Black Snow Continent."
Black Snow City is not expansive horizontally; instead, it extends vertically. Nearly all buildings are tens of kilometers long.
Of course, with mortal technology, constructing such a city is challenging, if not impossible. However, the city relies on magic formations to protect all buildings, preventing any earthquake from causing damage; moreover, Black Snow ensures that earthquakes do not occur.
...
Savior sat on a chair in a spacious hall in a towering building exceeding 1,000 kilometers in height.
When he became the CEO of Hype, he uncovered many secrets, including those of the world corporate board. The meeting includes the 50 major corporations, but others are also invited.
The final decisions, however, rest with the big 50.
Savior is taking a significant gamble this time. He is going to throw some harsh words in front of rank 12s.
His ultimate goal is to help people, but despite his best efforts, he can only impact his local area with his power. This world corporate board meeting is crucial to influence the whole world.
After years of contemplation, Savior compiled a list of suggestions, and now, he has finally been invited to present his proposals at the meeting.
These tweaks are aimed at benefiting the people. Savior identifies many flaws in the current system, particularly the weak involvement of ordinary individuals.
Most shares in all corporations are owned by other corporations, creating a cycle that dilutes the votes of ordinary people. Essentially, very few corporations have majority control by the people who reside in those continents, and Savior sees this as a travesty of justice.
Therefore, he aims to completely ban the practice of corporations owning each other's shares.
Another of his recommendations is ensuring minimum ownership by mortals. He advocates for every corporation to have at least 50% ordinary people as board members, who are chosen through direct elections by the people.
He also proposes additional requirements, such as including members of all species, genders, races, etc., on the board.
Achieving this necessitates an increase in the number of board members.
These changes are currently impractical due to the existing laws being highly capitalistic and unrestricted. According to the world's rules, shareholders can choose whoever they want as board members, and nobody can interfere with that.
Savior believes that the current system is a kind of rector. The mines that grow all drive their energy from the realization of energy produced by mortals.
However, the mines only use up part of the energy; most of the energy will be looted by various corporations.
Savior know how cruel reactors are.
Reactors are entire worlds with many mortals in them; the mortals would experience all kinds of emotions just to produce realization energy.
Realization energy is based on the power of the soul, and the souls are based on the creation; therefore, realization points are indirectly derived from the creation.
The original souls that people are born with are based on the creation.
That's why realization energy is so powerful.
But to produce realization energy by torturing people? Savior is disgusted.
Even if one collects the realization energy mortals produce, most of it should be used to benefit mortals.
As it is now, corporations gobble up all of the energy.
However, if Savior manages to convince the world corporate board of his ideas and embed them in the world's laws, then nobody would be able to disobey.
Convincing them might be challenging, but he remains hopeful.
...
Allen Short is a rank 12 Coprelatist.
As the sole shareholder of Black Snow Corporation, he selects every board member and wields absolute power.
He is even stronger than a general rank 12.
Coprelatists are more powerful than most other professions, although, in rank 12, the boost given by the corporation weakens.
Allen is just a bit stronger than a rank 12 mage, and in the end, the result depends on whose universal law is more specific and who can suppress whom.
Coprelatists have more energy, more brain power, faster reactions, etc, but these don't mean much in rank 12.
This year, Allen will take on the role of hosting the World Corporate Board Meeting.
As is customary, they invite 100 promising CEOs from various corporations worldwide to hear suggestions. This often resembles a show, with attendees usually discussing matters that have no real impact on the board's decisions.
With this in mind, Allen yawned and teleported to the conference room, taking his seat.
Other rank 12s arrived shortly thereafter. Below, one hundred people, all rank 10s and 11s, were seated.
Allen announced, "Let's start the board meeting for this year, Mr. Michael."
One of the hundred attendees stood up and replied, "Mr. Short."
He then proceeded to the podium and began his presentation.
Most of what he discussed revolved around profits from the mines and their slow growth rate.
In this world, mines are akin to trees—they grow, but the world corporate board dictates the growth rate.
Allen listened attentively and remained silent.
After half an hour, Mr. Michael finally concluded.
Allen then said, "Mr. Conway."
Another older man stood up and initiated his discussion.
He delved into the loosening of laws regarding the extraction of magic crystals.
Despite the general lack of environmental regulations, there are some laws that protect the environment, especially in sensitive areas such as magic crystal extraction.
The extraction of magic crystals virtually destroys the land around it for tens of thousands of years. Therefore, any magic crystal mine located near populated areas will be sealed and not extracted.
Allen resisted yawning and kept his eyes open.
After nearly two hours, Mr. Conway finally finished.
Allen then said, "Mr. Greenlong."
Savior, dressed in a black robe as is customary, stood up.
"Mr. Short," he began, adhering to custom.
"Let me begin by saying this: we have failed!" Savior declared firmly.
Allen, who was on the verge of falling asleep from the previous speech, suddenly became alert. He had never heard any CEO boldly state such a thing in front of rank 12s.
Intrigued, he checked Savior's luck.
"What? Main protagonist luck?" he exclaimed in astonishment.
The main protagonist's luck is so terrifying that it might even bring misfortune to rank 12s.
"How is it possible? The world's rules disallow the appearance of main protagonists. So, this Greenlong must be from outside this world. But how could I not know of such a person?" he pondered.
Entrances to the world are monitored, so he should have been aware of the entrance of such a person.
"Unless... is it that man?" he felt a wave of terror.
That mysterious man is the only one who can bring people in without him knowing—the man who has a blurred face and a chaotic appearance.
As Allen thought about this, he began to take Savior seriously and listened carefully.
Savior continued, "Our purpose should be helping people, not making a profit."
Allen listened while feeling confused. What does that even mean? Of course, corporations are meant to make profits. They are not charities, after all.
"Helping people? Why? There is no reason to help people because, even at its best, mortal technology can't even rival rank 4 mages, let alone immortals. No matter how much mortals progress, their profits are not much."
Allen activated a spell and accelerated his thinking hundreds of times. He thought of every scenario and looked at every angle but failed to find any benefit to helping the people.
"Does he see something I don't?" he started to doubt.
Savior continued, "I have a few suggestions; first, we should reserve 50% of the board of every corporation for mortals..."
Allen frowned. He activated an even stronger spell and started thinking.
No matter how much he thought, there was no way this would bring more benefits than it cost. Mortals are too unproductive, so no matter how hardworking they are, they never produce much for the corporations.
Mortal robots are useless, so automation is a non-starter. Mortal art is garbage, so this is also a non-starter. Mortal labor is ... let's just say worthless.
Mortals on the board? How can mortals, with their little minds, make wide decisions about big corporations controlling continents? How can they help bring in more profits?
"What does he see that I don't?" Allen started racking his brain. As a main character, Mr. Greenlong should see something he doesn't. He secretly messaged other rank 12s and informed them."
Other rank 12s looks changed when they noticed Greenlong is a main character.
As Savior was talking, the rank 12s were busy debating among themselves.
"This Greenlong was brought in mysteriously; it can only be that man!" someone said.
"Definitely." another affirmed.
So it became the consensus that the faceless man was the one who brought in Greenllong.
"As someone who is personally brought in by such a powerful existence, he must see something we don't,"' said a rank 12 with glasses and long white hair.
Nearly all of them nodded. They are all afraid of that faceless man and don't dare to look down on the man who he brought in.
Savior continued, "We should set quotas for various genders, species, and races on the board."
Every one of the rank 12s took Savior seriously, so they analyzed his every word.
Allen thought, "Again, I don't see any benefit to this! Why am I so blind?" He started blaming himself.
No matter from which perspective, he failed to see even one benefit to this. The best people to be on the board are the smartest individuals who can maximize profits. Their gender or race is irrelevant.
Of course, bringing in people with all kinds of life stories might be useful, but that has nothing to do with species, race, and gender.
"Greenlong mentioned race, gender, and species, so something must be specifically beneficial about those." he thought.
"I can't see it," Allen was astonished.
He, a rank 12, can't see something a rank 11 can see. He began to be afraid of Greenlong's foresight.
After some debate among the other rank 12s, they all decided to do all Greenlong said.
They are all curious about precisely what benefits those bring. They cannot see it, but after they implement it, they might be able to find clues.
Savior finished after half an hour, after which Allen came down personally and shook his hand.
He was astonished, "Maybe because I spoke passionately, they got impressed?" he doubted.
"Maybe it's because of your main protagonist's luck!" Rachel suggested. Savior shook his head and sat down.
The rest also got up one by one and spoke.
...
After a few days, the meeting concluded.
A few weeks later, the new changes to the code were announced.
Savior was absolutely astonished and delighted! Every one of his suggestions was adopted, and they will be added to the code.
It went far better than his wildest imagination. After all, the world corporate board is comprised of ultimate corporatists who only care about profits. Many of his suggestions directly hit their bottom line.
So, he expected them to, at most, accept some of his less intrusive suggestions. But they took it all!
He couldn't be happier.