Money Keeps Piling Up No Matter How Much I Spend

Chapter 168

Translator: Dreamscribe“Mr. President. The opposition party has finally submitted the motion for impeachment.”

“.......”

“But you don’t need to worry too much. There’s no solid justification for the impeachment, and they would need at least 20 more votes to pass it. Even if it were to pass, the court wouldn’t accept it.”

At the Chief Secretary’s report, Aiden merely nodded weakly.

How to put it.

Whether he was impeached or not.

It no longer mattered.

“I know what their real aim is. They’re not actually trying to impeach me. They just want to paralyze the administration.”

What the Republican Party wanted was a completely crippled administration.

They wanted to sever Aiden’s arms and legs so he wouldn’t be able to do anything for the remainder of his term.

“But Mr. President. You must step up and show that you’re still capable! The Republican Party is even spreading malicious rumors that you’re suffering from dementia and can no longer run the country.”

The Republican Party was enthusiastically spreading clips on social media of Aiden displaying strange behavior at official events.

"Well, they're not exactly wrong, are they?"

“M-Mr. President!”

“You may leave now. A close friend of mine is supposed to visit soon.”

“.......”

After the Chief Secretary left, the former Chief Secretary entered the room.

“Mr. President.......”

John couldn’t bring himself to look Aiden in the eye.

“You’ve got some nerve coming here. With that thick face of yours.”

“Wasn’t it you who called for me, Mr. President?”

“You could’ve refused.”

“I was going to. But I felt I had to at least say I’m sorry.”

Aiden had looked too exhausted to even utter a word, but suddenly he stood up, his face flushed with anger.

“I trusted you! Of all people, I believed you would be on my side! And yet, you’ve been deceiving me all this time!?”

“You’ve misunderstood.”

“Misunderstood? Don’t make me laugh. All the information that’s been leaked started from you! And I had no idea......!”

John wanted to explain that it wasn’t true at all, but seeing Aiden so agitated, he gave up. In truth, he could understand Aiden’s position.

As soon as John left the White House, he began acting as Kwangwoon’s henchman, meeting numerous figures in the political world.

Anyone would think John had been Kwangwoon’s man from the beginning.

“But I have no regrets.”

“What, what?”

“Whether I was in the White House or not, I lived in constant fear. I never slept soundly, and even the smallest sound would jolt me awake in terror. I lived every day fearing when Kwangwoon might get rid of me.”

“.......”

“But now, my life has changed. Unlike before, I sleep deeply in peace, and I no longer feel anxious walking the streets. Knowing that Kwangwoon is behind me, I truly have nothing to fear in this world.”

John was now living a second life.

He no longer trembled with anxiety as he once did.

He was living a life completely opposite to before.

“Mr. President. The reason I came here today is to deliver one message.”

“What message?”

“To keep doing nothing, and continue pretending to be a fool.”

“W-what are you saying?”

“The moment I saw you in public pretending to be a senile old man with dementia, I knew right away. I’ve known you for decades, how could I not notice?”

“......!”

So John had known all along.

“Just keep pretending to be a fool, do nothing, and quietly finish your term. Then you’ll be safe.”

“Are you threatening me right now?”

“How could I possibly dare to do that. Please think of it as a sincere piece of advice from someone who truly worries about you.”

“Advice? From someone like you!?”

Aiden let out a hollow laugh in disbelief, but John was serious.

“Mr. President. This time, Kwangwoon has finally taken over Wizney. Do you know why they went after Wizney? It's because they’re preparing to move on to the next stage.”

“The next stage?”

“Yes. They’re now targeting our future generations. Starting from early childhood, they’ll use Wizney to begin indoctrination and brainwashing, so that by the time these children grow up, they’ll be complete slaves to Kwangwoon.”

“!?”

“They genuinely want to place the world under their feet. And their plan is already moving forward without hesitation. Even the President of the United States can’t stop it anymore. Why do you think they turned you into a lame-duck president?”

That was something Aiden had wondered about too.

It was true that the Democratic Party had tried to pressure Kwangwoon using antitrust laws.

But had they really gone this far because of that?

“That’s not the only reason. Their real intent was to completely incapacitate the only country capable of pressuring Kwangwoon, the United States, for at least two years.”

Only then did Aiden start to understand.

As John said, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that the U.S. government had effectively come to a halt for the remainder of Aiden’s two-year term.

In other words, even if someone wanted to keep Kwangwoon in check, it was no longer possible.

“Then what does Kwangwoon plan to do during these two years......?”

“That, I don’t know. I’m just someone who follows orders. But from Bluezone, to FaceWeb, and now Wizney, Kwangwoon is steadily absorbing America’s representative companies, one by one.”

“Which means they’ll target another major conglomerate next?”

“Yes. So that only the name Kwangwoon remains. And Mr. President, you won’t be able to stop it.”

Before leaving the President’s Office, John offered one last piece of advice.

“Continue acting the way you have been. Make sure Kwangwoon doesn’t feel the need to keep you in check any longer. That’s your only way to survive.”

“......!”

Aiden couldn’t say a word as he watched John walk away.

Then suddenly, a thought crossed his mind.

If what John said was true,

What company was Kwangwoon planning to target next?

***

“This time it’s not a bluff, they’ve actually submitted a real impeachment motion.”

“......They won’t really impeach him, right?”

“No. It’s difficult even to get a majority, and even if it passes, there’s insufficient legal basis. The Republican Party is just doing whatever it takes to crush the Democrats right now.”

I clicked my tongue briefly.

“President Aiden’s in a pitiful situation. In his final years, no less.”

“Yes. And he was actually doing his job fairly well. I doubt he ever imagined things would turn out like this.”

It was truly unfortunate.

Who would’ve thought that the United States, the nation holding the reins of the global economy and political order, would fall into such chaos.

“For the next two years, it’ll just be a battle of attrition until the next administration takes over.”

“Two years isn’t a short time. And the U.S. is about to lose all of it.”

“Yes. It’s a great loss. But the Republican Party won’t waste this opportunity, so they’re likely willing to sacrifice two years.”

Unfortunate for the United States, but not necessarily a bad thing for us.

Because while everyone is obsessed with the impeachment turmoil, they’ve completely lost interest in Wizney.

“Thanks to that, things are stabilizing again at Wizney. The board has been reshuffled. The plummeting stock price is starting to rebound as well.”

“That’s good. Then tell them to work closely with Netflix and focus on making great content going forward. We can invest as much as needed.”

“Yes, CEO-nim. Ah, and this is a document sent over by Sentinel.”

“Sentinel?”

Sentinel usually only sends us brief reports.

But this time, the report was a bit thicker than usual.

“They’ve succeeded in establishing a new Sentinel base in Greece, but since Sentinel’s mission is to protect maritime security not just in Europe but around the world, they say a decision needs to be made on where to go next.”

So the meaning was that if I made the final decision, they would handle the rest on their own.

“.......”

I looked over the report sent by Sentinel.

They had laid out detailed explanations about which areas would be most effective for a new base, and what geographical advantages each one had.

“So for now, their recommendation is somewhere in Asia. Apparently, organized crime activity in Asia has increased compared to before, so if we can get cooperation from local governments, maritime defense should go smoothly.”

I nodded as I placed the pen tip on the map they had sent.

I had inputted enough information, so now it was time to ask my intuition.

Based on the report content and the fact that the Department Head also recommended it, it didn’t seem like a bad idea to establish a new base somewhere in Asia...

Scritch-.

But suddenly, my arm moved and drew a line not across Asia, but in an entirely different direction.

“.......”

I turned the pen back to its original position.

But not long after, my arm swung sideways again and marked a different region.

How to put it.

Is this what it would feel like to do a spirit-calling ritual?

***

“Director. This is the official document sent from headquarters.”

“That was fast. It’s about the additional base, right?”

“Yes.”

Anthony Watson quickly checked the document.

Officially, it was a document asking where they should establish a new base for maritime security. But the real intention was something else entirely.

KW Sentinel is mainly known for overseeing maritime route security.

But that’s just a public cover. The real mission lies elsewhere.

Their primary mission is covert operations.

So, wherever they establish a base, it means they’re about to carry out new operations there.

“But... what is this? Is this really the right place?”

Currently, Sentinel had undercover agents disguised as foundation staff deployed in Sichuan Province.

So they thought the next target would naturally be somewhere in Asia.

Preparations had already been underway to set up a base there, but Kwangwoon had pointed to an entirely different location.

“South America?”

“Yes. Specifically, somewhere near the Caribbean Sea.”

“This is... around Venezuela, isn’t it?”

“Yes. It’s a bit hard to make sense of.”

Ignoring Asia, where China is the dominant power, and suddenly turning to South America?

And Venezuela, of all places?

Why here all of a sudden...

“Wait. Wasn’t there some recent issue in Venezuela?”

“Yes. There’s been a noisy territorial dispute.”

“Bring me the data on that.”

“Ah, yes.”

Soon after, Anthony looked through the materials brought by his staff.

The territorial dispute between Venezuela and Guyana.

The region called Essequibo spans 160,000 square kilometers.

That’s larger than Greece, and currently about 200,000 people live there.

But Venezuela is claiming sovereignty over the area.

They’re demanding its return, saying it was taken from them during the Spanish colonial period.

The problem is, for Guyana, with a population of just 800,000, Essequibo accounts for 70% of their entire territory.

Losing this land was unthinkable.

“There’s a reason Venezuela is targeting the area. First, it’s rich in minerals like gold, bauxite, copper, iron ore, and uranium. And offshore from Essequibo, oil reserves have been discovered, which Jackson Mobil is currently developing.”

It was a far more entangled situation than expected.

Especially since Jackson Mobil, considered part of oil tycoon Rockgeller’s legacy, was involved.

It felt like the pieces of a puzzle were slowly falling into place in his mind.

There’s no way Kwangwoon would’ve picked South America without a reason.

Which means.

“Back on that land area, what did you say was found there?”

“Gold, bauxite, copper, iron ore, and uranium.”

“......Is that so?”

A place full of minerals and oil.

Add to that Jackson Mobil’s involvement, and the fact that military tension was rising even now.

Establishing a base in such a place.

Watson smiled subtly.

It looked like it was time to stir up a proper mess again.