Ch.508Cold, gloomy, and complicated. (1)

While I was still grumbling to myself about how the fleet plans had all fallen apart…

“Commander, I have something to report. May I report it right away?”

“What is it, Jessica?”

“Well, the number of commander bases residing in our territory has just surpassed 7,000.”

“Oh.”

Upon hearing from Jessica that the number of users in our territory had surpassed 7,000, I nodded in understanding, finally realizing why surrounding users and those from other sectors referred to this place as essentially a clan.

‘At that scale, we’re definitely on the threshold between large and super-large clans.’

No joke—in the Central Sector, if we’re just talking about size, where else could be bigger than me?

While thinking about this and watching Ignis’s awesome Bolshoi knife dance as today’s escort, I opened the gallery.

Perhaps because users had nothing to do during this rest period after the event, I could see them spending time randomly analyzing other factions.

——————————————-

Title: Current Central Sector Power Map.txt

Author: Anonymous

Content: [As always, a 3D model of the Central Sector resembling a rotten orange.gif]

It’s time for today’s disgusting explanation of the Central Sector power map!

As you can see, it’s spread everywhere like moldy fungus, to the point where even the Newsboy media can’t keep up.

I’m in the same boat, so if there’s anything wrong, figure it out yourselves.

I’ll just cover the major points.

1. Icarus’s Kingdom

Recently, it’s become quite stable with the Leviathan Squadron, the Pirate Alliance Fleet, and the Space Monster faction all involved.

Plus, with representatives from the 4 major clans there, the situation is extremely stable.

Maybe that’s why the number of users living there keeps growing.

Recently, the population surpassed 7,000.

Some say it’s over 10,000, but it’s definitely not that high.

2. Free Legion Faction

Everyone knows about the Yellow Turban rebels who were causing trouble before.

When those Yellow Turbans split up, they divided into the Free Legion and the Libertarians.

This group was formed by the original executives + users who crashed into Icarus and got thoroughly beaten.

Originally around 3,000 people, they’ve grown to 5,000 by absorbing nearby users and small clans.

I heard there were conflicts with surrounding users during this process, but I don’t know much about that.

I can’t tell if these were pre-existing conflicts or issues caused by the mergers lol.

3. New Central Sector Entry Users’ Clans

[8 clan marks, all with populations of about 2,000 each.jpg]

You might wonder why I separated the above two but grouped these together.

I had to because these clans are all similar in size.

There are roughly 10,000-20,000 new users who entered the Central Sector.

Instead of forming one clan, they’ve mixed around and transformed in bizarre ways.

It’s all quite ambiguous.

There’s talk about forming a clan alliance with these, but nothing’s confirmed yet.

4. Central Base Association

This is the faction that tried to forcibly elect Icarus as the Central leader but was exposed when he refused.

It’s a kind of social faction formed by users who are “mayors” of Level 4 or higher bases in the central region.

Remember, it’s not a clan.

Anyway, they’ve been silent since that incident, so they seem to lack presence.

But this is actually a huge faction. While they might appear to have the smallest numbers among the factions listed here—just counting users docked at each base’s central docking area—

The problem is, as Icarus has occasionally shown, these faction users can suddenly double their forces by deploying “base mercenaries” when needed.

Since they own bases, their forces include both docked users and base defense fleets when attacked lol.

Above all, these folks tend to act in underhanded ways, so if you’re not careful, you might suddenly get beaten to death by their political machinations.

5. The Remaining Majority of Small Clans and Regular Users

These are users who maintain the “Central Hellhole” tendencies we all knew until last year.

You might think, what’s the point since they’re all individuals?

But all the factions mentioned above combined don’t even reach 40,000 users.

To be precise, it could be plus or minus 10,000 from 40,000.

But these users? They number 100,000.

And among them are complexly mixed clans with fewer than 1,000 members.

You might say other sectors are the same, so what’s the problem?

But unlike other sectors, here there aren’t large clans with subordinate clans beneath them—these small clans and users don’t have any superior clans.

That’s why, unlike other sectors, the map looks like a rotten orange.

Comments:

-[Ugh, damn]

-[Wait, so each of those small clans is its own faction?]

-˪[Yes, that’s right~](Author)

-˪[LOL what the hell]

-[You missed something]

-˪[What is it?](Author)

-˪[Some users there are puppets of the 4 major clans from surrounding sectors. They’re not subordinate clans, but cases related to them, maintaining 1,000-2,000 members separately from the clans mentioned in #3]

-˪[And you forgot the mercenary users. They can’t be handled by Icarus’s Tannhäuser alone, so they independently consume bases and live there]

-˪[Weren’t they part of the Base Association?]

-˪[No, they live separately from the Base Association]

——————————————-

——————————————-

Title: Central Sector is a Fucking Complicated Mess

Author: Anonymous

Content: [Rotten orange.jpg]

[<Link to above post>]

The crazy thing is, the more you look into it, these bastards are all organically connected without clear boundaries.

Conversely, there are cases where I don’t understand why they’re treated as different groups rather than the same faction.

For example, Icarus’s Kingdom is connected not only to the surrounding 4 major clans,

But also has a business partner relationship with mercenary users, so they’re grouped as the same faction.

The Free Legion straddles between mercenary users and regular users.

And I thought users who consumed bases would naturally belong to the Base Association,

But they’re not part of the Base Association—they’re bases independently consumed by mercenary users.

Ugh, damn, my head hurts.

Comments:

-[Users come and go from the 4 major sectors whenever they feel like it, so it’s confusing]

-[Oh, and we need to separate out the ones sponsored by the 4 major clans lol]

-˪[Fuck!](Author)

-[Don’t forget the Marauder who manages the settlement clusters that couldn’t jump to Icarus’s Kingdom]

-˪[Why does more stuff keep coming up? Fuck]

-˪[But don’t other places have that too?]

-˪[Other places have fewer because large clans manage them]

-[My head is exploding]

——————————————-

The problem was that these posts consistently referred to me as Icarus’s “Kingdom,” which made me involuntarily burst out with curses as I read them.

“Stop with that damn Icarus Kingdom nonsense!!”

“Eek?!”

“Aaaaargh!”

Of course, there was no way they could hear my outburst.

——————————————-

<Icarus Kingdom Chat Room>

<Notice: This is definitely the most appropriate room name>

-[Ooh, His Majesty the King, ooh]

-[Please stop killing Icarus-nim ㅠㅠ]

-[Since he refuses to be clan leader, they immediately crowned him king]

-[“Responsibility without pleasure”]

-[He was already super stressed about having to be in charge, now even the users here are messing with him lol]

<Napoli has entered the room.>

-[Hello]

-[Is this Icarus Kingdom?]

-[Yes]

-[A peaceful kingdom ruled by Icarus, the legitimate ruler of the Central]

-[How dare you address His Majesty the King so casually]

-[LOLOLOLOL]

——————————————-

‘Kids, please stop.’

As time passed, I could only shed tears watching all kinds of nonsense being posted.