Book 1: Records of Magus Killer – Chapter 22 - High Table (2) (Patreon)

"Now that everybody is gathered here, can we start the meeting?" Kiritsugu stood from his seat beside Maya, and he went to the middle of the

"Now that everybody is gathered here, can we start the meeting?"

Kiritsugu stood from his seat beside Maya, and he went to the middle of the podium, where they were all seated.

"As many of you present are aware, World War III has left the underworld destroyed, and a lot of long-time crime organizations have been destroyed, leaving the situation grave with the power vacuum. Especially in South America and territories of former Mexico and Europe. Gentlemen, what I am about to propose to you is establishing order in all of this chaos."

Suddenly, murmurs could be heard as several people glanced at each other with open hostility, especially members of the Cartels, and then Long Shen with Dragon Head of Black Rose Triad.

Many people seated here had enmity with each other, and some were mortal enemies to life and death.

Cartels in Mexico took the hardest hit because when the USNA was established, one of the first orders from the High Command of the United States of North America was total extermination of the Cartels and all criminal organizations in Mexico and the Caribbean.

It was a total bloodbath as several tens of thousands were killed by the USNA Army, which executed anyone who was even connected to the Cartels. Today, nobody survived as the Magicians and Miltiary of USNA took care of that.

Kiritsugu knew the reason... Cartels were not like other crime families in the USNA. They could hardly be negotiated with or so; they would always do what they wished as they been doing for the past decades.

So, it was only logical for the government of the USNA to exterminate them to compete with their roots.

"What I propose is to create some sort of a global governmental institution created by us, the strongest Crime Lords in the world, that would rule the underworld. With this, not only would order be brought back to the underworld, but all those useless fights would stop, which in turn would stop police, army, and other individuals messing with our work."

Kiritsugu presented his basic idea, as many in this room agreed with him.

For the underworld, large-scale wars between criminal organizations were never good because they tended to attract attention from the authorities, which was bad for business and one's freedom as well.

"So, what do you present us, Magus Killer? You wouldn't invite all of us here for nothing."

Don Leonetti asked with a raised brow as he was intrusted by the proposal, which was something that he had wanted to see for his entire life. Even though they were all criminals, it didn't mean that they were not living by any rules. 

However, it is true that this was applied only to the large crime families and organizations that needed some sort of stability to exist. Not to small-time ones or individual criminals of various kinds who were doing what they wanted.

"Indeed. What we need is a form of governance, and for that, I present you The High Table."

Suddenly a screen behind Kiritsugu lit up, just as mini-screens attached to each seat, as they showed basic information about the High Table, its organization, and its structure.

"The High Table will work like a congregation of the strongest Crime Organizations in the underworld. Each of the present will get one seat at the Table, altogether creating 13 Seats."

Afterward, everyone talked about how it would function and its benefits, as these criminals never moved without having something from it.

"Indeed, it is true that the situation in the Underworld is very bad right now; countless new gangs and various criminals are wreaking havoc, which is, in the end, increasing the chances for the governments of our various states to strike against us."

Stated Don Domenico Leonetti, and several people in the meeting room agreed with him.

While formerly criminal organizations wouldn't be so much worried about the governmental strikes because many of them, together with their private armies, could put up a fight to a certain degree, which acted as a deterrent for the governments not to push them too far.

However, this fragile state of balance crumbled apart with the addition of the Magicians to the equation because one Strategic-Class Magician was more than enough to decimate their entire organizations.

And the nations were the ones with control over the powerful Magicians, or the powerful Magicians were high-ranking members of the nations themselves. So this was creating a lot of problems for the criminal organization.

"We would need to quell down various gangs and rogue elements... not talking some Magicians that are playing on Supervillains from comics."

Shen Long voiced one of the most major concerns.

From the present organizations, only Azure Dragon Triad had a Strategic-Class Magician. In contrast, Bratva and Cosa Nostra had incomplete ones, who didn't have complete Strategic-Class Magic but were stronger than average Tactical-Class Magicians.

And, of course, the Yakuza, which on the surface had nothing, but everyone with two brain cells knew that it was controlled by the Yotsuba Clan.

That was also the reason why the Yakuza was the undisputed ruler of the Underworld of Japanese society. Rule number one is that crime needed to avoid ordinary civilians; any crime family needed to ensure that during their business, no innocent civilians would be implicated.

That tended to attract the attention of the authorities, something that nobody wanted. 

But not everyone was the Yotsuba Clan, Bratva, or Azure Dragon Triad that had tremendous political influence in their respective countries. In Japan, the Yotsuba Clan essentially ruled the Hierarchy as they were the strongest faction, and their political influence was especially high.

Supervillains...

Many would laugh at the thought some time ago, but nowadays, it was rather real, but not that much; it was far more common right after the discovery of the Magic. Then they appeared like mushrooms after the rain, and they were more and more common

"They won't represent a problem if we act united as one; in the end, there are not even many of them remaining in the world. We need to cull only the strongest, and the rest would go into hiding like rats, or they would just surrender."

There won't be much threat; World War III has taken a toll on practically everyone in the world, and the criminal underworld suffered probably the most.

The interesting thing that happened was when World War III erupted; various governments took the war as an opportunity to do a hard crime crackdown and purge a lot of criminal organizations.

Most of them got an instant death sentence. 

Though this only happened in the later stages of the war when many of the criminal organizations were already greatly weakened from the war, some were destroyed as collateral damage, and so on.

Many didn't have any power or even resolve to defend or do anything.

"Then we should agree... all of us can benefit from this agreement, and the creation of order within the criminal underworld would be only beneficial to us."

Don Leonetti, as the oldest criminal element, stated with the voice of authority that everyone agreed with the proposal. It was clear that they needed to reform and adapt to the new age, or else they would perish.

It was evident that the old methods wouldn't work altogether anymore in the age where Magicians ruled supreme.

***

The establishment of the High Table went rather smoothly, far more than Kiritsugu had initially anticipated, but that was a good thing. The faster the High Table could operate independently, the better for their future plans.

In the end, when the crime bosses agreed on something, they immediately started implementing the decision, because the time was short. All of the people present in the meeting were aware of the gravity of the situation that they were in.

Due to that, for the first time, they put away their useless squabbles and bickering; some even put aside their generation-long grudges against each other as they started advancing toward the common goal, which was the establishment of the High Table.

The first thing that everyone did was to take complete control of all criminal elements within their territories. In short, a bloody purge followed, and everyone who didn't bow to the supreme authority of the founders was immediately killed.

Some organizations even underwent a rather intense internal purge, but that wasn't unexpected because there were many dissenting voices against the establishment of the High Table.

Even though something like High Talbe would be created, then technically speaking, it would weaken the influence of the individual organizations, even though they obtained a seat behind the table.

At the same time, the authority of the High Table must be supreme, thus they needed to clear out their own house. At the same time, the founding members of the High Table also started cleaning out the underworld a bit.

That was mostly due to the unwritten agreement with the various superpowers, so the criminal organizations took up for themselves to start killing the most deranged of their own, mostly several "supervillains," criminal organizations that were terrorizing the common populace, and so on.

Others were directly given to the local law enforcement or also killed, as the crime organization obviously communicated the establishment of the High Table with their respective governments, as it wasn't something that could be hidden.

It was no surprise that all governments around the world welcomed the change in the underworld because the criminals, with the addition of Magic, were getting more and more problematic to deal with.

Especially the powerful ones; in some regions of the world, there were even occasions during World War III when a powerful crime boss could overthrow the country and declare himself as a supreme ruler of some region.

It wasn't that common, but it wasn't that rare either.

Still, the plan was going very well, as just within one year, the High Table attained supreme authority in 2073; the High Table had complete control over the entire criminal underworld while making certain concessions to the world governments that, with their armies of Magicians and Magic Technology grew powerful enough to wipe out even the strongest of the criminal organizations.

Though if someone was wondering why such a thing never came by, the answer was rather clear.

In the end, crime is impossible to eradicate completely, so the best and most logical choice is to control it. And what was better for the purpose of having a unified government in the underworld?

In this way, the entire criminal underworld was rather controlled and cleared of the most unsavory elements that were either locked up in prison or executed en masse by the High Table as a show of goodwill.

Not to mention there was also unspoken problem of corruption among the politicians and many of them enjoyed good relationships with the members of the crime families and criminal organization, because they were on their payroll...

So... money talks.

This resulted in the world governments and the High Table achieving a weird symbiotic relationship with each other because, in the end, they needed one another. The only region that remained as problematic as ever and wasn't under the control of the High Table was Africa.

However, that was an entirely different type of problem because Africa was, right now, absolutely lawless. 

World War III basically destroyed any semblance of order, and most of the local dictators who were ruling their countries with iron fists and creating order to a certain degree were mostly dead.

After their death and the complete destabilization of the entire continent, countless warlords emerged one after another, together with terrorists who were making their home in Africa as it was basically no man's land. 

Nobody ruled there. 

It was already creating problems for many of the nations around the world. The Indo-Persian Federation was often clashing with the countless warlords that were encroaching on their borders and often raiding their supply lines or weapon stores.

And same could be said for the ships of USNA, South American countries or European ones that were transporting merchandise across the globe and going around Africa. 

Obviously, military interference in Africa was impossible for political reasons; nobody would allow that as it would start a new World War III. 

Thus, it was a unanimous consensus that several solutions would be implemented to counter the menace of African Warlords and terrorist organizations that were calling the wretched place home.